FAKE NEWS “PLO announces it will no longer recognize the State of Israel”: They never did

“PLO announces that it will no longer recognize the State of Israel” now runs as a headline around the world.

This is fake news at its best.

The PLO never recognized the State of Israel in the first place

Most people do not realize that the PLO never ratified y the “Declaration of Principles of the Oslo Peace Accord when the PLO was supposed to have recognized Israel in the first place.
I cite in my book, GENESIS OF THE PALESTINIAN AUTHORITY that few people know or remember that it was Israeli journalist Pinchas Inbari, who broke the story that Arafat announced in Tunis that he could not get a quorum of the executive council of the PLO to ratify the Declaration of Principles of the Oslo Accords.

One of the few Israeli correspondents covering the PLO in Tunis at the time, Inbari for the Israeli left-wing Hebrew newspaper Al HaMishmar, which ran a headline story on October 7, 1993 which confirmed that the PLO did not ratify the peace accord that Arafat and Abbas had signed together with Peres and Rabin only a few weeks before, with US and Russia as co-signers.

Carrying Al HaMishmar in hand, I walked into the office of the Israel Government Press Office Director at the time and showed him the headline of PLO non-ratification of the Oslo accords.

The GPO director, speaking on behalf of Prime Minister Rabin, took the news item very seriously and made it clear that, from the point of view of the Israeli government, this meant that Arafat signed the accord on his own, without the sanction of the PLO. And that never changed.

The rest of the Israeli media, however, did not report that the PLO never ratified the accord
Yet the Israeli government acted as if the PLO had done so.

Inbari was scheduled to appear on a popular morning KOL YISRAEL radio show when he got back from Tunis. However, Kol Yisrael informed Inbari that an Israeli government official asked Kol Yisrael to cancel that appearance.

Instead, the Israeli government dispatched then deputy minister of Foreign Affairs, Yossi Beilin, to fly to Tunis to thank Arafat for facilitating the ratification ofthe Oslo accord, which the PLO never did.

Why is this important? According to Israeli law, since the PLO did not ratify the Oslo accord which renounce terrorism, the PLO and Fatah were not stricken from Israeli law books as “a terrorist entity,” a status that the PLO received on March 1, 1980.

If you check the law books today, you will find that the PLO is still defined in Israeli law as a terror entity, because the PLO never ratified the Oslo accord.

The same goes for American law. In March 2002, US government designated the Al-Aksa Martyrs Brigades of the Fatah as a terror organization.

That PLO terror designation was never changed. Under US law, any government that aids and abets an organization defined as a terror organization must forfeit US foreign aid assistance.

There's no hope for peace

Two days ago, I showed you a video in which 'moderate' 'Palestinian' President Mahmoud Abbas Abu Mazen laid out his vision for peace with Israel. It's not much of a vision. If you haven't seen it, I suggest that you click the previous link and watch the video.

Peter Wehner sums up what that video taught those of us who were willing to watch it and accept it at face value (which likely includes no one in Obama's Washington).

We’re repeatedly told that the issues surrounding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict are enormously complicated, solvable only by diplomats of unusual skill and ability, and that Israel, always Israel, must take a “chance for peace.” But in its most important respects this conflict, at its core, is quite simple: the Palestinians have yet to make their own inner peace with the existence of a Jewish state. Every failed effort at peace, beginning before Oslo and to this very day, can be traced back to this fundamental truth. Because it is an unpleasant one, many people in the West have simply refused to accept it. It is too unsettling to their premises and presuppositions. And so they proceed in self-deception, demanding that Israel make concessions with a “peace partner” that is, in fact, an implacable and lethal enemy.

Tactically “we may win or lose,” Faisal Husseini, a supposedly moderate figure in Yasir Arafat’s Palestinian Authority, said a decade ago. “But our yes will continue to aspire to the strategic goal, namely, to Palestine from the [Jordan] rive to the [Mediterranean] sea.”

“Whatever we get now,” he added, “cannot make us forget this supreme truth.”

That remains, now as ever, the “supreme truth” guiding the Palestinian leadership. As long as it does–as long as the malignant and murderous pathologies that afflict the Palestinian and Arab world remain–it is folly to pretend real peace is possible. Illusions, even soothing illusions, are never a substitute for reality.

It's time to dispel our illusions. There is no peace on the way. Not now, and probably not ever.

The Problem Is Palestinian Rejectionism Why the PA Must Recognize a Jewish State Yosef Kuperwasser and Shalom Lipner

Nearly two decades of peace negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians have failed miserably. The key reason for this failure is the Palestinians’ refusal to recognize Israel as a Jewish state.

The basic paradigm of the Oslo accords, signed in 1993, held that both the Israelis and the Palestinians were, at long last, prepared to recognize the legitimacy of each other’s national rights and aspirations. With that essential threshold crossed, it was thought, all that would remain was to work out a compromise on core issues: where to draw borders, whether and how to divide Jerusalem, and how to resolve the Palestinian demand that refugees from the 1948 war be allowed to return to Israel.

That, at least, was the theory. Yet over the course of the last 18 years, during which negotiations were conducted along these lines, the rhetoric and actions of the Palestinian leadership have proved that paradigm wrong. The Palestinians have not in fact recognized the legitimacy of the national rights of the Jewish people. Consider, for example, the Palestinians’ refusal to negotiate with Israel over the past year, a result, they say, of continued settlement construction in Jerusalem and beyond the 1967 lines. This is a dubious claim given that the Palestinians have never made halting construction a precondition before. And when Israel did freeze settlement building for ten months in 2009–10, the Palestinians still refused to talk, only agreeing to do so at the last moment and even then only to prevent a crisis in their relations with the United States....

Perry: Palestinians Must Recognize Israel as a Jewish State

Texas Governor and GOP presidential hopeful Rick Perry wrote an op-ed taking the Palestinians to the woodshed for their plans to seek UN recognition of a Palestinian state. He also admonished President Obama for distancing himself from Israel while pursuing engagement with Iran and Syria. While the Obama Administration has been notable for exerting pressure on Israel, a Perry Administration would put the pressure where it belongs:

The United States must affirm that the precondition for any properly negotiated settlement between Israel and the Palestinian Authority is the formal recognition of the right of Israel to exist as a Jewish state behind secure borders.

Now I have no illusions that the Palestinian Authority is prepared to do such a thing. They don't want to live side by side in peace with Israel. But if Perry wins the GOP nomination, is elected President and somehow finds a way to get the Palestinians to recognize Israel as a Jewish state, it would be the greatest foreign policy achievement of his presidency. But even if that doesn't come to pass, at the very least a Perry Administration would hold the Palestinians accountable for their actions in a way the Obama Administration simply won't.

Netanyahu: Abbas, Just Say the Six Words

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu called on Palestinian Authority chief Mahmoud Abbas to "just say six words - 'I will accept the Jewish state" - in his address to the Jewish Agency Board of Governors Tuesday,  

"Palestinian society is split now between those who actively are prepared to use force, violence, terror and war to wipe us out and those who refuse stand up to that first half," he said. "That’s basically the division there. This remains the heart of the problem."

 

Nevertheless, he added, "I understand that we will have to have a historic compromise which is very painful, so I stood before my people, the people of Israel, and I said numerous times that I will accept a Palestinian state. Now President Abbas must stand before his people and he has to say these six words, 'I will accept the Jewish State.'" 

"He has to say it.  And I will repeat this over and over and over again because it is the attempt to fudge, it’s the attempt to fudge and evade and obscure this essential component of peace, the removal of this basic obstacle to peace, that is required, and this is what the international community must face up to."  

Regarding the demilitarization of the future "Palestinian state," Netanyahu repeated the formulations he used in his speech to the joint session of Congress.

"We don’t want a repeat of what happened when we withdrew from Gaza or from South Lebanon. I believe that this will require for Israel to maintain a long-term military presence along the Jordan River. There will be arguments about sovereignty, about territory, but I think that... demilitarization and a long-term military presence along the Jordan River are essential to guaranteeing any peace. A peace you cannot defend will not hold.  A peace you can defend will."

Netanyahu said Israel would incorporate within its final borders "what are called the settlement blocs, these large, urban communities that are fairly dense and concentrated alongside Greater Tel Aviv and Greater Jerusalem, and other areas of critical, strategic and national importance..."

"We believe also that Jerusalem must remain united, under Israeli sovereignty. It’s the only time in its millennial history that it has assured the free and unfettered access of all three monotheistic religions to their holy places." 

Israel v. Palestine is not a border dispute, by David Frum

Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu did not like Barack Obama’s big Middle East speech, and for understandable reasons.

For two years, the Palestinian Authority (PA) leadership has refused to meet with Netanyahu. Rather than seek a negotiated outcome, the Palestinian Authority has tried to mobilize outside forces against Israel: first the Obama administration back in 2009; then (when that did not work out), the United Nations.

Now the PA has made a unity deal with Hamas. The new Hamas-tainted PA is now asking the UN General Assembly to vote in September to recognize “Palestine” as an independent state. In a New York Times oped last weekend, Abbas explained that such a vote would permit an intensified Palestinian campaign of lawfare and delegitimation against Israel: “Palestine’s admission to the United Nations would pave the way for the internationalization of the conflict as a legal matter, not only a political one. It would also pave the way for us to pursue claims against Israel at the United Nations, human rights treaty bodies and the International Court of Justice.”

This behaviour merits a slap-down from the United States. Instead, President Obama devoted one-fifth of his speech on Thursday to Palestinian concerns. The president even endorsed the controversial concept that a future Palestinian state be granted control over an area equivalent in size to all the West Bank and Gaza territories occupied by Israel in 1967, albeit with border rectifications.

Netanyahu understandably complains: If that’s the consequence for bad behavior, why should the Palestinian Authority ever change to good behavior?

True enough. But now listen to the tough message the speech administered to the Palestinians. It said:

1. The PA should be talking to Israel, not seeking to bypass Israel at the UN: “For the Palestinians, efforts to delegitimize Israel will end in failure. Symbolic actions to isolate Israel at the United Nations in September won’t create an independent state.”
2. The inclusion of Hamas in the PA government is unacceptable — and the United States will not resolve this problem for the Palestinians. They must resolve it themselves in a way that reassures Israel: “In particular, the recent announcement of an agreement between Fatah and Hamas raises profound and legitimate questions for Israel: How can one negotiate with a party that has shown itself unwilling to recognize your right to exist? And in the weeks and months to come, Palestinian leaders will have to provide a credible answer to that question.”
3. Any deal with Israel must be final. No using “declaration of statehood” as a basis for further demands against Israel. The Palestinians must accede to “a lasting peace that ends the conflict and resolves all claims.”
4. The future Palestinian state will be non-militarized, and Israel’s military supremacy in the region must be accepted: “Israel must be able to defend itself — by itself — against any threat. Provisions must also be robust enough to prevent a resurgence of terrorism, to stop the infiltration of weapons, and to provide effective border security. The full and phased withdrawal of Israeli military forces should be coordinated with the assumption of Palestinian security responsibility in a sovereign, non-militarized state. And the duration of this transition period must be agreed, and the effectiveness of security arrangements must be demonstrated.”
5. Finally, while the President would wish to resolve the border question in the Palestinians’ favor, the security question would be resolved in Israel’s favor: “Palestinians should know the territorial outlines of their state; Israelis should know that their basic security concerns will be met.”

The president sent no message about the utterly unacceptable Palestinian demand for a “right of return”: i.e., a right to immigrate Palestinians into Israel itself, after the creation of a Palestinian state alongside Israel. And he has never reaffirmed his 2008 campaign commitment to an undivided Jerusalem. Too bad in both cases.

But how relevant is either issue? When Bill Clinton in 2000 pressed Yasser Arafat to sign the most generous agreement ever offered to a Palestinian leader — an agreement that included unprecedented Israeli concessions, even over Jerusalem — Arafat answered, “You are asking me to sign my death warrant.”

Again in January 2011, the Guardian newspaper and Al Jazeera published a cache of Palestinian negotiating documents that showed amazing concessions from Ehud Olmert’s Israeli government, including exactly the kind of hectare-for-hectare land swap endorsed by President Obama. Palestinian opinion condemned this deal, too, as a sell-out — and the negotiators themselves disavowed their own proposals.

So Netanyahu can calm himself. The so-called peace process remains very far away from any real-world bargaining over borders. The process continues and will continue stalled in a Palestinian fantasy land where the one and only issue is: Destroy Israel now? Or later?

©David Frum

PMW: PA defines "Palestine": Tel Aviv, Haifa, Galilee, Negev, Rosh Hanikra, Caesarea, Acre, Masada, Beit Shean, and Jerusalem. In front of Abbas: All of Israel depicted as "my [Palestinian] land"

Contrary to the PA leadership's claim that they recognize Israel's existence, their controlled TV and cultural events continue to reinforce the message of non-recognition of Israel, by their ongoing depiction all of Israel as "Palestine."

This week a PA TV program for teenagers included a short video clip which opened with the words "Palestine: We will return one day to our home..." across the screen, and then followed with a series of pictures of cities and regions in Israel, with the names on the screen, including:  Tel Aviv, Haifa, Galilee, Negev, Caesarea, Acre, and Jerusalem. PA TV also showed a picture of Masada but incorrectly labeled it "Jericho mountains."

The picture of the Galilee, though not labeled, was of the ancient Synagogue in Capernaum. The Christian Bible cites the Capernaum Synagogue as a place where Jesus taught on the Sabbath. [Luke 4:31-37]

After showing the Israeli cities and regions, the PA TV host said: 

"This [video] is our gift to Palestine and to all the Palestinians inside and outside, and throughout the world."

[PA TV (Fatah), April 11, 2011]

Click to view

At a recent Fatah event in the presence of Mahmoud Abbas and many other senior PA officials, a Palestinian singer defined Palestinian land that "I am returning to" as spanning from Rosh Hanikra, in Israel's north, to Rafah in the Gaza Strip in the South, and from Haifa, on Israel's Western coast to Beit Shean on Israel's Eastern border.

Click to view

The following are the words of the song at the Fatah event:

"We commit and promise to stand behind you, oh Mahmoud Abbas, until Judgment Day. I am returning to you, the purest land, oh land of the free. No matter how long the nights of exile, I am returning to you, oh land. From Rafah to Rosh Hanikra (northern Israel) our coast, and Beit Shean (Israeli city). Above your soil, oh my land, is a picture of Garden of Eden. From Rafah to Rosh Hanikra our coast, and Beit Shean. Above your soil,oh my land, is a picture of Garden of Eden. From Rafah to Rosh Hanikra, north and south, are the picture's borders. From Haifa (Israeli city) and Tantura to the [Jordan] valley (i.e., all of Israel). I am returning to you, the purest land, oh land of the free."

[PA TV (Fatah), Feb. 27, 2011]

What if Arabs had recognized the State of Israel in 1948? By ABDULATEEF AL-MULHIM

I HAVE been exposed to Palestinians since I was in first grade in Al-Hassa, Saudi Arabia They were my favorite teachers. They were the most dedicated and the most intelligent among all my instructors, from elementary to high school.

When I was attending New York-based SUNY Maritime college (1975-1979), I read a lot of books about Palestinians, Arabs and the Israelis. I have read every article about the many chances the Palestinians had and missed to solve their problem, especially the Camp David agreement between Egypt and Israel.

I have seen and read about the lives of the Palestinians in the US and other places. They are very successful in every field. And at the same time I saw the Arab countries at the bottom of the list in education and development. And I always ask the question: What if the Palestinians and the Arabs accepted the presence of Israel on May 14, 1948 and recognized its right to exist? Would the Arab world have been more stable, more democratic and more advanced?

If Israel was recognized in 1948, then the Palestinians would have been able to free themselves from the hollow promises of some Arab dictators who kept telling them that the refugees would be back in their homes and all Arab lands will be liberated and Israel will be sent to the bottom of the sea. Some Arab leaders used the Palestinians for their own agenda to suppress their own people and to stay in power.

Since 1948, if an Arab politician wanted to be the hero and the leader of the Arab world, then he has a very easy way to do it. He just shouts as loud as he can about the intention to destroy Israel, without mobilizing one soldier (Talk is cheap).

If Israel was recognized in 1948, then there would have been no need for a coup in Egypt against King Farouq in 1952 and there would have been no attack on Egypt in 1956 by The UK, France and Israel. Also there will be no war in June 1967 and the size of Israel will not be increased and we, the Arabs would not have the need for a UN resolution to beg Israel to go back to the pre-1967 borders. And no war of attrition between Egypt and Israel that caused more casualties on the Egyptian side than the Israeli side.

After the 1967 war, Israel became a strategic ally of the US because before this war, the US was not as close to Israel as people in the Arab world think. The Israelis fought in that war using mainly French and British weapons. At that time, the US administrations refused to supply Israel with more modern aircraft and weapon systems such as the F-4 Phantom.

The Palestinian misery was also used to topple another stable monarchy, this time in Iraq and replacing it with a bloody dictatorship in one of the richest countries of the world. Iraq is rich in minerals, water reserves, fertile land and archaeological sites. The military led by Abdul Karim Qassim killed King Faisal II and his family. Bloodshed in Iraq continued and this Arab country has seen more violent revolutions and one of them was carried out in the 1960s by a brigade that was sent to help liberate Palestine. Instead it made a turn and went back and took over Baghdad. Even years later, Saddam Hussien said that he will liberate Jerusalem via Kuwait. He used Palestinians misery as an excuse to invade Kuwait.

If Israel were recognized in 1948, then the 1968 coup would not have taken place in another stable and rich monarchy (Kingdom of Libya). King Idris was toppled and Muammar Qaddafi took over.

There were other military coups in the Arab world such as Syria, Yemen and the Sudan. And each one of them used Palestine as their reason for such acts. The Egyptian regime of Jamal Abdul Nasser used to call the Arab Gulf states backward states and he tried to topple the governments of these Gulf states by using his media and his military forces. He even attacked southern borders of Saudi Arabia using his air force bases in Yemen.

Even a non-Arab country (Iran) used Palestine to divert the minds of their people from internal unrest. I remember Ayatollah Khomeini declaring that he would liberate Jerusalem via Baghdad and President Ahmadinejad making bellicose statements about Israel, though not even a single fire cracker was fired from Iran toward Israel.

Now, the Palestinians are on their own. Each Arab country is busy with its own crisis. From Egypt, Tunisia, Libya, Sudan, Yemen, Syria, Jordan, Somalia, Algeria, Lebanon and the Gulf states. For now, the Arab countries have put the Palestinian-Israeli conflict on hold.

—Abdulateef Al-Mulhim, is Commodore (Retd.), Royal Saudi Navy. He is based in Alkhobar, Saudi Arabia, and can be contacted at: almulhimnavy@hotmail.com

"Palestine is big" -- PA says it includes all of Israel 3 PA TV shows present Israeli places Tiberias, Rosh Hanikra and all of Israel as "Palestine"

Contrary to the repeated statements by Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas to foreign leaders that the PA recognizes Israel, the PA internally in Arabic continues to deny Israel's existence and to present a world without Israel.

The PA transmits the message to its people that it does not recognize Israel's existence, describing all Israeli land, cities and regions as "Palestinian." Palestinian TV is one tool among many used by the PA to disseminate this message.

In three recent programs on PA TV, which is owned by the PA and operated under the auspices of Mahmoud Abbas's office, Palestinians were presented with a world without Israel, which is the most explicit non-recognition:

1. The Israeli city of Tiberias was said to be "in northern Palestine, close to the Palestinian-Jordanian-Syrian border."
- "Palestine" could not share a border with Syria unless Israel did not exist.  Tiberias is in northern Israel and not "northern Palestine."

2. The coast of "Palestine" was said in an educational program to be 224 km. long, reaching Rosh Hanikra in northern Israel.
- The coast of "Palestine" could not be 224 km. long unless there were no Israel, since the coast of the Gaza Strip is only 40 km. long.

3. "Palestine is big - 27,000 sq. km.," said PA TV host.
- The area of "Palestine" could not be 27,000 sq. km. unless Israel were to disappear, since the West Bank and Gaza together are only about 6,000 sq. km. 

The following are the transcripts and context of the statements defining Israel as "Palestine":

1. Host: "In Palestine there are very beautiful historical sites and cultural and natural sites... The city of Tiberias is one such area, where history, nature and water come together."
Reporter: "The city of Tiberias is in northern Palestine, close to the Palestinian-Jordanian-Syrian border."  Click to view

[PA TV (Fatah), Nov. 23, 2010]

2. Question on PA TV quiz showThe Stars for university students:
"The length of Palestine's coast, along the Mediterranean Sea from Rosh Hanikra to Rafah is:
1. 152 km.
2. 224 km.
3. 375 km."
Representative from Bethlehem University answers: "224 km."
[His answer is confirmed correct.]
Note: Rosh Hanikra is Israel's most northern coastal point, and the coast of "Palestine" would be 224 km. long only if Israel did not exist.

[PA TV (Fatah), Nov. 26, 2010]

3. Amal Daraghmeh, chairman of the committee planning the "Palestine Conference for Public Relations, Communications and Media" said on PA TV that he hopes to include as many Palestinians as possible in the conference. The PA TV host responded: "Palestine is big - 27,000 sq. km."

[PA TV (Fatah), Nov. 29, 2010]

Saudi prince rules out engagement with Israel until Arab land is returned

Saudi Arabia will refuse to "directly or indirectly engage Israel" until it leaves all land captured during the 1967 Six-Day War, a leading member of the Saudi royal family said Thursday, dashing any hopes the Obama administration might have had for rapprochement before a final peace deal.

"For us to take any steps toward any form of normalization with the Israeli state before these Arab lands have been returned to their rightful legitimate owners would undermine international law and turn a blind eye to immorality," Prince Turki al-Faisal, the former Saudi ambassador to the United States, said in a speech at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Turki, though out of government, is considered a candidate to succeed his ailing brother, Saud al-Faisal, as foreign minister.

In his speech, which came as the Obama administration is trying to breathe new life into stalled Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, Turki emphasized that since 2002 Saudi Arabia has led an Arab effort to recognize Israel if it reaches agreements on the return of the territories, including East Jerusalem, and arrives at a "just settlement" of claims by Palestinian refugees.

In an unusual detour into U.S. politics, Turki also warned against a return of the "neoconservative philosophy." He said that under the policies of President Obama, many Americans may have believed "that the neocon movement has died, the victim of its own failed, delusional ambitions." But, he said, "this recent election will give more fodder for these warmongers to pursue their favorite exercise, war-making."

As an example of what he labeled neoconservative thinking, Turki dissected in detail a recent article on foreignpolicy.com by Robert Satloff, the executive director of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. Satloff warned Obama about actions that he thought might be counterproductive to reaching a peace deal, including failing to make clear that a military option remains on the table in confronting Iran's nuclear ambitions.

Satloff's advice "threatens to start a new conflict as a pretext for ending another," Turki said.

Satloff, in an interview, said he is "nonpartisan to the bone" and his organization includes thinkers from across the political spectrum. "I will take it as a compliment that I am read in Riyadh," he said.

SCHOLARS FOR PEACE IN THE MIDDLE EAST: THE OPEN RACISM OF THE FUTURE STATE OF PALESTINE

During a meeting with the Egyptian press in Cairo at the beginning of August, Mahmud Abbas, President of the Palestinian Authority, and the man on whom the United States and Europe have placed all of their hopes for peace, revealed what was at the back of his mind with regard to the Jews and the nature of the regime he plans to set up in the future State of Palestine. The official demands of the Palestinians for a settlement are known: Israel’s agreement in advance to withdraw to the borders of 1967, a freeze of construction in the territories including Jerusalem, the division of this city, including the Old City, which must become part of the Palestinian Authority, the solution of the problem of the “refugees” in conformance with Arab demands and Resolution 194 of the General Assembly of the U.N.).

When considering the possibility that a third force, such as NATO, could be given the responsibility of overseeing the implementation of the planned agreement, Mahmud Abbas imposed a condition: that there should not be a single Jewish soldier and any Israeli. “I am ready to accept a third party which supervises the implementation of the agreement, NATO forces for example, but I will not accept the presence of Jews in these forces or a [single] Israeli on the Land of Palestine.”

Hamas to step up executions of collaborators; Hamas authorities in Gaza have begun imposing the death penalty as part of a campaign against Palestinians found guilty of collaborating with Israel.

Two men have been executed in Gaza this year for passing information to Israeli forces. Dozens more are in jail.

The Arabs' "NO" to Israel

Israel and the Palestinians: "No" is the Real Obstacle to Peace from AJC on Vimeo.



More than borders, more than land, more than water, more than settlements, the main hurdle to peace between Israel and the Palestinians is an idea: that Jews have no right to a state on a land where they have lived for centuries.

NYT: Iran Renews Nasser's Three "No's" - In the Mideast, No Politics but God’s

BEIRUT — A line was uttered this month by Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah, that drew little notice in between his stentorian asides but said a great deal about politics today for Israelis, Palestinians and the larger Arab world.

A Jewish Democratic State That Is Here to Stay: Read Rabbi Hier's Washington Post op-ed

The current impasse over inserting pre-conditions between Prime Minister Netanyahu and President Abbas over what it will take to finally jumpstart the Middle East peace process – with Abbas insisting on a freeze in settlements while Netanyahu, holding out for Arab recognition of Israel as a Jewish State – has some biblical precedent.

Sergio Britva in World Masters Weightlifting Poland 2010 Medal Ceremony cat. 105, men's 35-39 (Watch how Iran refuses to congratulate the Israeli winner)

Abbas: We'll never sign deal demanding recognition of Israel as Jewish state 'PA recognized Israel's existence in 1993, and now Israel needs to recognize the Palestinian state in line with the 1967 borders,' Abbas tells left-wing MKs in Ramallah.

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas said Friday that under no circumstances would the PA sign an agreement with Israel which required the recognition of Israel as a Jewish state or a land swap.

CNN: PA Rejects Inferred Recognition of Jewish State

A top Palestinian negotiator distanced the Palestinian Authority government from comments made by a senior Palestinian Liberation Organization official inferring  Palestinians might recognize Israel as a Jewish state in exchange for a future Palestinian state based on 1967 borders that included all of the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

P.A.: We Will Never Recognize Israel as a Jewish State

Here it is, in black and white.
Israel has offered a compromise. It will impose a further building freeze in the West Bank if the Palestinian government acknowledges in return the Jewish character of the State of Israel.

Seraphic Secret: Jews and Arabs Fade to Black

In the Arab Muslim world, Holocaust denial happily coexists with promises of another Holocaust.

Seraphic Secret has long maintained that the Arab Israeli conflict has nothing to do with borders or so-called settlements.

It is an existential conflict.

The Arab Muslim world is a sewer of Jew-hatred that refuses to reconcile itself to a Jewish State.

If the Arabs truly wanted a Palestinian state, they could have one very quickly. All they have to do is renounce violence and recognize the Jewish State. But the Arabs have no interest in building a Palestinian state. Their primary desire is to destroy Israel.

Such depravity is hard for most westerners to comprehend, but it is a fact of life in the Arab Muslim world.

Predictably, President Obama, clueless about foreign affairs and positively stupid when it comes to the middle east, has only made worse an already bad situation. By demanding a freeze on settlements, something the Palestinians never demanded, Obama has, in effect, forced the Palestinians into a position from which there is no retreat. Afterall, they can't allow Obama to be more Palestinian than they.

Personally, I'm relieved.

This farce, this so-called peace process—in fact, a murder process—has gone on long enough.

The Arabs reject the very existence of a Jewish State. And the denial of Jewish history is enshrined in Palestinian culture, an Orwellian construct of lies built upon lies.

Thus Israel should simply inform the Arabs that until they're ready to recognize Israel's 3,000 year old claim to her homeland there is nothing to talk about.

Israel is a vibrant, free market democracy, and the lack of a formal peace with her numerous enemies will make little difference.

Palestinian society is a fragmented theocratic tyranny that thrives on Jew-hatred, and marinates in victimhood.

It's time to FADE TO BLACK on this narrative.

The Jewish people will endure and thrive.

The Arabs will sink deeper into nihilism and civil war.

Here it is, in black and white.

Israel has offered a compromise. It will impose a further building freeze in the West Bank if the Palestinian government acknowledges in return the Jewish character of the State of Israel.

The Palestinians are emphatic in their rejection of such a deal.

"We forcefully reject all these Israeli games," said Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat, according to the Jerusalem Post. "The racist demands of Netanyahu cannot be tied to the request to cease building in the settlements for the purpose of establishing a state."

A spokesman for P.A. President Mahmoud Abbas also rejected Netanyahu's offer. "The topic of the Jewishness of the state is not connected at all to the issue [of the building freeze]," the spokesman said Monday.

So, after 62 years of independence and decades of attempted peace making, Israel can not get its peace partner, the Palestinian Authority, to acknowledge the most fundamental characteristic of the State of Israel: It is a Jewish state, founded by Jews, created for Jews, because the rest of the world showed that it did not want Jews.