Todah rabah!
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Hamas urges West to drop aid funding threat.Well, of course they do. It’s hard to push the Jews into the sea without cash to buy bullets, explosives, and RPGs from neighboring Arab countries.
Oh, excuse me. I meant, provide social services and health care.
The very idea that the whole world is down on its knees, begging a Koran-centric organization whose goals are achieved by murdering Jews to recognize Israel's right to exist, is insulting. Israel was accepted as a member of the United Nations in 1949, the 51st country out of a total of 190. Israel maintains diplomatic relations with 170 of them. Israel is the only democracy in the world that has been fighting from the day it was born to safeguard its national security. It is infuriating when fanatic, backward countries declare that Israel, one of the most stable, progressive democracies in the world, has no right to exist. We will go on living and flourishing even without the recognition of Hamas.
The winner of the Monitor’s second annual Henry Schwarzschild Award for most offensive comments by a Jew in the public spotlight goes to Abraham Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League.The prize, which last year went to Israeli uber-leftist Uri Avnery, is awarded to the person who, in the Monitor’s considered opinion, by his or her statements displays a contempt for the Jewish people, a disregard for historical truth, a desire to sup at the table of Israel's enemies, or who otherwise plays into the hands of the enemies of Jews and Israel.
The question is not rhetorical. I found this BBC photo when doing a Google image search, but I can't tell what it is or when or where it was taken. Looks like it might illustrate the "victory" in Gaza, but without a caption, I can't say. If anyone can help, please leave a comment or email me.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/spl/hi/pop_ups/05/middle_east_enl_1126524255/html/1.stm
According to the Islamic Republic News Agency in Iran:
Israel has threatened to starve and punish the Palestinian people for electing the Islamic Resistance movement, Hamas, in last week's legislative elections in the occupied Palestinian territories of the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem.
Meanwhile, DEBKAfile's Palestinian sources "reveal that senior PA officials... have begun transferring their West Bank assets overseas."
One source estimates that some $45 million were shifted in one day, Monday, Jan. 30.The worst hit was the Arab Bank. Businessmen, doctors and lawyers, worried by the regime change from Fatah to Hamas, are moving their businesses and assets to Europe and Gulf emirates. This flight of funds is a symptom of how little confidence the business community and elite have in Mahmoud Abbas’ ability to limit the Hamas drive to grab full control of government and its organs. Above all, the moneyed classes fear the property of prominent figures will be impounded to make a show of the corruption and thieving practiced by the defeated Fatah.
Hamas leaders came forward Monday with an assurance that private businesses and investments would be safe under the new administration. This reassurance had the opposite effect; it stepped up the drain of money. The small Nablus Stock Exchange, the Al Quds Index, reacted to the uncertainties by slumping 2% Monday, which would be comparable to a 25% dive for regular-sized bourse.
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Best Israel Advocacy Blog
Now, put this into context. Vancouver Island is located along the southwest coast of Canada, across the Strait of Georgia from from the city of Vancouver. Victoria, the capital of British Columbia, is at the south end of the island.
Now put that into context.
Palestinian Fatah militants hold their weapons during a rally in the West Bank city of Nablus January 31, 2006. REUTERS/Abed Omar Qusini
Now Fatah Demands a State from the Jordan to the Mediterranean
The military wing of the Fatah party, the Al-Aksa Brigades, in a post-election effort to outflank the Hamas, says it will step up its terror offensive against Israel.The group will attempt to drum up public support for more violence against Israel by emphasizing the need to “liberate all of historic Palestine from the [Jordan] river to the [Mediterranean] Sea.”
As political leaders in Israel and around the world lament the fall of the Fatah and the rise of the Hamas to the forefront of the PA leadership, the Fatah, via its armed wing, is hardening its stance towards Israel.
The political goals of the Al-Aksa Brigades leave no room for a Jewish State in the Middle East. In what may be an effort to win back the voting public, the political line of the Brigades is moving closer and closer to that of the Hamas.
In an official announcement released in Gaza on January 30, the Brigades said that the Hamas victory in last week’s election “will not affect the policies of the Al-Aksa Brigades or its resistance to the Zionist occupier.”
“No Palestinian government will prevent the Brigades from continuing in its path of resistance until all Palestinian land is liberated from the defilement of the occupation,” said the Brigades.
Using terminology reminiscent of the Hamas and other radical Islamic terror groups, the announcement continued, “The Al-Aksa Brigades will not be silent and will punish those who try to weaken Palestinian resistance and jihad against the occupier that blocks roads, arrests, and assassinates jihad fighters on the West Bank, and kills innocent children in Gaza.”
Abu Zuheri, a leader of the Brigades, expressed satisfaction with the group’s more militant image. “Palestine from the river to the Mediterranean, coincides with the policy of the Hamas and is a source of pride,” he said.
Israeli settler children walk together in the West Bank city of Hebron January 30, 2006. Jewish settlers said Monday they had struck a deal to evacuate an unauthorised enclave in the West Bank city of Hebron in exchange for Israel's consent to consider expanding the settlement at a later time. The agreement defused weeks of tensions in the biblical town where Israeli troops had faced down settler protesters vowing to resist a threatened eviction of 60 squatters from a former Palestinian market by mid-February. REUTERS/Ronen Zvulun
Washington Post: Jewish Settlers Agree to Leave Hebron
HEBRON, West Bank -- Jewish settlers who took over a marketplace in this Palestinian city four years ago said Monday they would leave voluntarily, averting a potentially violent confrontation with thousands of troops preparing to remove them.This makes no sense at all. Jewish ownership of the market was already confirmed (Jan. 19) by a judge in Bet Shemesh.Israel had agreed to clear the marketplace and the separate community of Amona under a commitment to the United States to dismantle unauthorized settlement outposts in the West Bank. Palestinians and the international community view the outposts as seeds of future settlements.
The Israeli Supreme Court on Sunday rejected a last-ditch appeal from settlers to halt the Hebron evacuations, clearing the way for the removal operation to proceed. But the settlers agreed to leave after winning assurances they could return if a legal review determines the property is Jewish.
See also YNetNews.com: No deal on Hebron
Attorney General Menachem Mazuz issued a statement Monday denying a deal has been reached between the State and setters on a voluntary evacuation of the Hebron market.
Mazuz said the settlers' voluntary departure is not conditioned on a compromise deal or a concession on the part of the State and that no commitment was made to repopulate the market with Jews at a later date."There is no compromise or compromise offer on the part of the State for evacuating structures in the Hebron marketplace," the statement read. "If those residing in the market wish to leave voluntarily, the attorney general lauds this."
Mazuz' comments contradict a pledge made by security officials to Hebron community leaders, with the approval of political officials. According to that compromise, once the market is cleared, legal procedures for renting the homes in question for the benefit of Jewish residents will be pushed forward.
However, Hebron community spokesman Noam Arnon rejected Mazuz' statement and said "we do have an agreement. We intend to follow it and we expect and are certain the other side will also deliver."
Palestinian Authority owes Electric Company NIS 220 million in unpaid bills: Israel's national electricity company demands government actionWill the Israel Electric Corp cut off supplies to the Palestinian Authority? Israel’s leading newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth has learned that the Palestinian Authority’s arrears to the Electric company recently reached unprecedented heights, with a bill totaling NIS 220 million (USD 47 million).
The company turned to the Finance Ministry demanding the government deducts the debt from tax repayment to the Palestinians, as agreed upon in former talks between Israel and the Palestinian Finance Ministry.
Hamas’ legislative victory has cast a shadow over fiscal issues between the two warring neighbors, with politicians from all sides of the political spectrum calling on the government to cut monetary transfers to the Palestinian Authority.
“With any other costumer we would have switched off the switch,” a senior official in the Electric company said.
UPDATE: This is especially amusing if considered in conjunction with Sen. Barak Obama's statement Sunday, regarding the Hamas win at the polls:
"My hope is that as a consequence of now being responsible for electricity and picking up garbage and basic services to the Palestinian people, that they recognize it's time to moderate their stance."
