Israel spurs calls from Arab lands for democracy

Khaled abu Toameh writes in the Jerusalem Post: 'No one is above the law in Israel'

The corruption case against Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has earned Israel tremendous respect throughout the Arab world, where many have called on their leaders to benefit from Israel's democratic system and independent judicial system.

Words of praise for Israel are a rare phenomenon in the Arab media. But judging from the reactions of many Arabs to the corruption case in the past week, the trend appears to have changed. Even some Arabs who describe themselves as "sworn enemies of the Zionist entity" have begun singing praise for Israel. Over the past week, the corruption case against Olmert received wide coverage in the mainstream Arab media, prompting an outcry about the need for transparency and accountability in the Arab world.

Rashid Bohairi writes from Kuwait: "I swear Israel is a state that will succeed. They are prosecuting their prime minister because of tens of thousands of dollars. What about the millions of dollars that Mahmoud Abbas and the Palestinian Authority stole? How come the Palestinian people are still hungry?"

"Show me one Arab or Islamic country where a prime minister or a senior government official was ever questioned for financial corruption or bribery," said a reader who identified himself only as Majed.

Another reader, Sami, commented: "The Israeli regime with all its defects is better than all the Arab 'democracies' and still changes ministers and governments every few years."

A Saudi national named Abdel Karim urged his Arab brethren to stop criticizing Israel and learn something about its democracy. "Before we curse Israel, we must learn from the democratic and judicial system in Israel, where no one is above the law," he wrote.

Khaled, another Saudi national, chimed in: "Although we are talking about Israel, which I have always hated very much, there is still no one above the law there."

Mahmoud al-Bakili of Yemen posted the following response on one of the Web sites: "We want this kind of accountability and transparency in the Arab and Islamic world."

And there was this comment from an Arab who described himself as a Syrian Voice: "Despite my strong hatred for the Zionist regime, I have a lot of admiration and respect for this entity because there is no one above the law. In the Arab world, laws are broken every day and no one seems to care."

Rashid in Saudi Arabia: "Despite all our problems with the Jews, they are much better than us in fighting corruption and revealing the truth.""

Israel Lover in Saudi Arabia: "Israel is a state that deserves to exist. It deserves our profound respect. I wish I were a citizen of this state."

Hani in Ramallah: "This is democracy at its best! Enough of dictatorship in the Arab world! Let's learn from the Israeli example. Let's benefit from Israel's democracy."

French court exonerates Karsenty; sidesteps Pallywood validity

Prof. Richard Landes' The Augean Stables leads the coverage of today's defeat for France2's Charles Enderlin.

The Jerusalem Post has an extensive article putting today's Karsenty/al-Dura victory in perspective:

The French Court of Appeals on Wednesday found in favor of Philippe Karsenty, overturning a lower court decision that he had libeled France 2 and its Middle East correspondent Charles Enderlin when he accused them of knowingly misleading the world public about the death of the Palestinian child Mohammed al-Dura in the Gaza Strip in 2000.

"The verdict means we have the right to say France 2 broadcast a fake news report, that [al-Dura's shooting] was a staged hoax and that they duped everybody - without being sued," Karsenty told The Jerusalem Post shortly after the verdict was issued at 1:30 p.m. Paris time.

A statement forwarded to The Jerusalem Post from Enderlin noted that "the appeals court ruled that Karsenty's words were, in fact, libelous, and that Karsenty failed to prove that the news was staged and/or false." The statement added that the case was nevertheless overturned because "the court believed Karsenty had the right to stridently criticize the [France 2] report, since it dealt with an emotional topic, and that Karsenty's investigation into the matter convinced the court he was bring sincere."

A source close to Enderlin's side of the case explained that "you can get out of a libel suit either by proving you're right, or by showing you were sincere and had some research. The court found the latter to be the case."

The source also said Enderlin and France 2 would appeal the verdict, noting that they had won three out of four instances of judgment in the matter.

But, replied Karsenty, the only appeal left would be to France's Supreme Court.

"If they continue to insist they are correct," added Karsenty, "we will have victims of terror attacks that directly resulted from the [al-Dura] footage sue France 2."

MSM buries France2 v. Karsenty; case reveals MSM's complicity in Pallywood to advocate own agendas; condemns press' credibility

Fabricated Al-Dura campaign unjustifiably defamed image of Israel and Zionism; worse than that, it has eased West's resistance to Islamization, claims defendant in France2's al-Dura libel case, Mr. Philippe Karsenty in DemoCast.TV exclusive interview.

'Pal-e-gandist' stringers have been duping mainstream-media ("MSM") elites (& the public) for years. That is why the mainstream-media have avoided reporting on and showing the evidence my case released. The film exposes and implicates all of them and calls-into-question their ethics, their supposed objectivity, and their own agendas,' alleges defendant in France2's al-Dura libel case, Mr. Philippe Karsenty.

Was Philippe Karsenty calling France2's Enderlin's edit of al-Durah 'a fraud' a libel? Defendant Karsenty speaks with DemoCast days before the court verdict is rendered on the significance of revealing the Palestinian government's manufactured victimhood to damn Israel, and the media's complicity in perpetuating and disseminating these libels globally - which:

- Vilified Israel, Jews, Zionism and Zionists in the mind of the public;
- Created an empathy for Arab-Muslims to welcome their immigration into the West; and
- Generated billions of dollars ino embezzlable foreign-aid for Palestinian politicians.



Mr. Karsenty asserts that the mainstream-media ('MSM') has avoided reporting on France2's al-Dura imbroglio because, regardless of the verdict, the evidence has exposed:

1) That ALL global news services have been relying on Palestinian-Muslim journalists in their employ;

2) That their own Palestinian-Muslim journalists, cameramen, and videographers are revealed to be knowingly complicit in reporting what they know to be fraudulent- the PA's fabricating atrocities against Israel;

3) That the France2 Affair is evidence that respected news services, such as news agencies (AP, Reuters, AFP, UPI,), national broadcasters (e.g., BBC, EuroNews members), channels (like CNN, MSNBC, and Fox News), networks (e.g., NBC, ABC, CBS) might all be guilty of compromising their integrity by augmenting, embellishing, and globally-disseminating knowngly-fabricated libels against the Jewish state - because it is the Jewish state, thus becoming knowing-accessories in these crimes.

In Jerusalem, America re-dedicates alliance, commitment to Israel

Israel demonstrates its appreciation for its alliance with America throughout history, at it hosts President Bush and a delegation of international dignitaries at its 60th Independence Day celebration. President Bush reaffirms America's commitment to Israel, reminding the audience, "America is Israel's best friend in the world."



Greeting to President Bush by Benjamin Netanyahu, Head of the Opposition at The Knesset, May 14th, 2008,

We, the citizens of Israel, stand by you and the United States in this struggle.

Our first task is to prevent Iran, which calls for Israel's annihilation, from arming itself with nuclear weapons. Twelve years ago in my speech as Prime Minister before a joint session of Congress, I said that the greatest danger facing mankind is a nuclear Iran. Time is running out.

Our second task is to deny Iran the ability to establish additional bases around us, like the ones it has established in Lebanon and in Gaza.

Unilateral withdrawals only bolster these bases, push peace away and bring terror closer. This is happening before our eyes every day with the rocketing of Sderot, Ashkelon, and the Western Negev. It must stop. Israel should have long ago adopted a policy of not containing terror but defeating it, as you have Mr. President.

Our third task is to bring peace to our region. Forty years ago, we liberated Jerusalem and reunited it. Our first act was to ensure the freedom of religion which had previously been denied. That religious freedom, which is so cherished by the citizens of the United States and so vital to world peace, will be preserved as long as Jerusalem remains united under Israeli sovereignty.

The rebirth of Israel is one of history's great parables. It is the story not of the Jews alone, but of a human spirit that refuses to succumb to history's horrors. It is the incomparable quest of a people seeking, at the end of an unending march, to be a free people in its own land, the Land of Zion and Jerusalem.



Excerpts of Pres Bush's address to the Israeli Knesset Thursday, 15 May 2008

"This struggle is waged with the technology of the 21st century, but at its core it is an ancient battle between good and evil. The killers claim the mantle of Islam, but they are not religious men. No one who prays to the God of Abraham could strap a suicide vest to an innocent child, or blow up guiltless guests at a Passover Seder, or fly planes into office buildings filled with unsuspecting workers. In truth, the men who carry out these savage acts serve no higher goal than their own desire for power. They accept no God before themselves. And they reserve a special hatred for the most ardent defenders of liberty, including Americans and Israelis.

And that is why the founding charter of Hamas calls for the "elimination" of Israel. And that is why the followers of Hezbollah chant "Death to Israel, Death to America!" That is why Osama bin Laden teaches that "the killing of Jews and Americans is one of the biggest duties." And that is why the president of Iran dreams of returning the Middle East to the Middle Ages and calls for Israel to be wiped off the map.

There are good and decent people who cannot fathom the darkness in these men and try to explain away their words. It's natural, but it is deadly wrong. As witnesses to evil in the past, we carry a solemn responsibility to take these words seriously. Jews and Americans have seen the consequences of disregarding the words of leaders who espouse hatred. And that is a mistake the world must not repeat in the 21st century.

Some seem to believe that we should negotiate with the terrorists and radicals, as if some ingenious argument will persuade them they have been wrong all along. We have heard this foolish delusion before. As Nazi tanks crossed into Poland in 1939, an American senator declared: "Lord, if I could only have talked to Hitler, all this might have been avoided." We have an obligation to call this what it is — the false comfort of appeasement, which has been repeatedly discredited by history.

Some people suggest if the United States would just break ties with Israel, all our problems in the Middle East would go away. This is a tired argument that buys into the propaganda of the enemies of peace, and America utterly rejects it. Israel's population may be just over 7 million. But when you confront terror and evil, you are 307 million strong, because the United States of America stands with you.

America stands with you in breaking up terrorist networks and denying the extremists sanctuary. America stands with you in firmly opposing Iran's nuclear weapons ambitions. Permitting the world's leading sponsor of terror to possess the world's deadliest weapons would be an unforgivable betrayal for future generations. For the sake of peace, the world must not allow Iran to have a nuclear weapon.

You have raised a modern society in the Promised Land, a light unto the nations that preserves the legacy of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob. And you have built a mighty democracy that will endure forever and can always count on the United States of America to be at your side."

Islamists commandeer U Cal Irvine for racist hate crusade against the Jewish state

Israel Independence Week marred by racist Jew-hate fest on University of California Los Angeles-area campus.

The Muslim Students Union again co-opts the University of California-Irvine campus to mimic the Nazi-Party by advancing political Islamism through the guise of publicly debasing Zionism.

The public is encouraged to oppose "The Palestinian Holocaust" public event series being staged there though Thursday evening, 15th May. Israeli history revisionist, UK Exeter Prof. Ilan Pappe, will produce "The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine" Wednesday at 7:30pm.

Reut R. Cohen documents some of the trouble (including video of the Islamist 'Passion-Play,' entitled "Checkpoint" courtesy of the intrepid O.C. Rabbi Yonah Bookstein) at this Islamist beach-head on the idyllic Southern California campus.



The Freedom Center's FrontPageMagazine denounces this week-long Nakba event. David Horowitz will present, "On-campus support for a new Holocaust," Tuesday evening 7:30pm in Room 101 Rowland Hall.

Israel - Birth of a Nation

Host: Sir Martin Gilbert; total running time: 90 min in 10 segments.
(Courtesy: History Channel, Israel)

Israel thrives on 60th Diamond Jubilee anniversary of the re-establishment of Jewish sovereignty in their ancestral homeland

Recommended to read: the comprehensive Israel at 60 feature in Canada's National Post.

Complementary op/ed from Barbara Kay: Why Israel should be the plaintiff in the court of public opinion.

In 1948, Israel, and the Palestinians—
The True Story by Ephraim Karsh in Commentary Magazine

The recent declassification of millions of documents from the period of the British Mandate (1920-1948) and Israel’s early days, documents untapped by earlier generations of writers and ignored or distorted by the “new historians,” paint a much more definitive picture of the historical record. They reveal that the claim of dispossession is not only completely unfounded but the inverse of the truth. What follows is based on fresh research into these documents, which contain many facts and data hitherto unreported. Read original May 2008 story.

Memorial Day Precedes Independence Day

Israelis honored their 22,437 compatriots who died in defense of the Jewish state.

Israel came to a halt Tuesday evening and Wednesday morning as sirens sounded across the nation to mark Memorial Day.

As on every year, entertainment venues shut down and radio and television broadcasters aired solemn programs out of respect for Israel's 22,437 fallen -- a figure that includes those killed while serving in the armed forces and in the pre-state Jewish underground. Another 1,634
Israelis were killed in terrorist attacks.

Caroline Glick condemns the international media's irrational anti-Zionist bias on the occasion of Israel's 60th year of statehood in The Jerusalem Post "Our World: anti-Zionism at 60":

Israel's 60th Independence Day is an excuse for the international media to weigh in on the state of the Jewish state. Given the anti-Israel bias of most of the international media, not surprisingly, most of the reports reveal less about Israel's status at 60 than they reveal about how anti-Zionists perceive Israel at 60.

Two critiques - both cover stories of major magazines - stand out in this regard. In Canada, Maclean's magazine's May 5 cover pictures three Israeli soldiers struggling to raise the national flag. The headline reads, "Why Israel Can't Survive."

In the US, the cover of The Atlantic Magazine's May edition sports a Star of David painted in Palestinian colors of red, black and green ensconced in a PLO flag. The headline asks, rhetorically, "Is Israel finished?"

The authors of the two articles - Michael Petrou in Maclean's and Jeffery Goldberg in The Atlantic come to their subject from different angles. Petrou writes as an emotionally disengaged observer. Goldberg, who made aliya in the 1980s, writes as a disillusioned Zionist who abandoned Israel and moved back to America. Petrou writes of Israel's certain demise with amoral detachment. Goldberg's dispatch is a deeply emotional attempt to justify his decision to abandon Israel. ...

While well written, Petrou's piece is a journalistic embarrassment. For his central contention is a fabrication. ...

In the end, the unifying factor in Petrou's and Goldberg's anti-Zionism is that both ignore Zionists. For Petrou, Zionists are irrelevant because they are doomed to fail whoever they are. For Goldberg, Zionists are no more than symbols. They cannot be moral because they are powerful.

Israel's success is a testament to the enduring ingenuity and strength of the Jewish people as moral actors. The longevity of anti-Zionism is a testament to the fact that no matter what Israel's accomplishments, there will always be those who fail to see them.

Nazi / Islamist Nexus: Muslims partners / heirs to Hitler's legacy, crusade

To commemorate Holocaust Martyrs and Heroes Remembrance Day, DemoCast educated the national, home cable TV audience of i-Life TV's Danny Fontana Show to explain Islamism's influence over Nazi ideology and its continuation of Nazi goals and strategies of stimulating anti-Jewish sentiments, then positioning itself as the solution to attain power.

We addressed how the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Hajj Amin al-Husseini, inspired the Nazis with Islamic justification against the Jews. He organized and led the Nazi Waffen SS divisions in Yugoslavia. We pointed out how al-Husseini brought Johannes von Leers, Goebbel's favorite Nazi propagandist of annihilation, to convert to Islam, move to Egypt, and imbue the Muslim world (until his death in 1965) to continue the Nazis' annihilationist credo and crusade.

The world now confronts the Islamist continuation of the Fascist quest to global cultural domination - unifying their power and mollifying the West (as did the Nazis) by continuing Hitler's concerted campaign of scapegoating to stimulate anti-Jewish resentment, and empathy for the 'redemptive' Fascists.

Muslim anti-Semitism is growing in scope and extremism, to the point that it has become a credible strategic threat for Israel, according to a 180-page report produced for Israeli policymakers by the semi-official Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center (ITIC) and obtained exclusively by The Jerusalem Post.

According to the report, by educating generations of Muslims with a deep animus toward Israel and Jews, this anti-Semitism, actively promulgated by many states in the region, holds back the peace process and normalization efforts between Israel and Muslim countries. It also forms the intellectual justification for an eliminationist political program.

"This isn't ordinary prejudice," explained ITIC director Col. (res.) Dr. Reuven Erlich, formerly of the IDF's Intelligence Directorate, who heads the team of researchers that produced the report. "This prejudice is evil because it isn't theoretical. It is ideological incitement by states and organizations with the practical means of translating it into action."

In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, rising anti-Semitic sentiment in Europe was injected into Muslim lands through commercial and diplomatic ties. Spurred by opposition to Zionism and ideologically strengthened by Nazi rhetoric and support, Muslim anti-Semitism grew in the 20th century into a phenomenon so widespread that blatantly anti-Semitic texts can be purchased on street corners of Arab cities, even in countries where almost no Jews remain.

The Syrian government still publishes [writings claiming] that Jews use Christian blood on Passover. You can't say this is anti-Israeli, or caused by the [Israeli-Palestinian] conflict."

The report makes clear that the phenomenon of Muslim anti-Semitism is now widespread, popular and expanding.

"The anti-Semitism that fed the Holocaust isn't dead," Erlich says. "It is prospering."

Read original in the Jerusalem Post

A Tantalizing Look at Iran’s Nuclear Program

"A Tantalizing Look at Iran's Nuclear (Weapons) Program" in the New York Times

On April 8, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran paid a very public visit to Natanz, a uranium-enrichment facility - for peaceful nuclear power plants, Iran insists.


Elie Wiesel was interviewed by Fox News regarding how the world should regard Iran's proposed genocide against the contemporary Jewish nation, Israel.