You have reached the Israpundit Archives for the year 2007.

If you are looking for the active site for the current year, you will find it by typing in the following URL in your browser’s address bar:

http://israpundit.com

Note that there is no subdirectory listed after the address. If you just type the root address, WE will add the current year automatically. Your bookmarks or favorites should read exactly the same way.

If you link to us on your website, please make sure that you have only the root domain listed.

by Omri Ceren

Just kidding, obviously. Every country on the planet is allowed to open fire on a mob rushing at its border:

About 60 people were hurt, including one woman who was hit by gunfire, as Egyptian border guards fired in the air and used clubs and water cannons to drive back hundreds of Palestinian women who surged across the border from Gaza Tuesday. The protesting Palestinians were demanding that Egypt back their demands for the border to be opened for shipments of food and essential provisions, in short supply due to Israel’s closure of its borders with the Strip.

Well, every country on the planet except Israel. Just imagine the propaganda that Reuters and AP stringers would produce after Israeli troops dealt similarly with similar mobs of Palestinian women. Actually, you don’t have to imagine.

[Cross-posted to Mere Rhetoric]

by Omri Ceren

Qassams have a 10km range and can pack up to 20kg of explosives and shrapnel. The time between the red alert siren and the rocket’s impact is about 15 seconds. So the Palestinians routinely launch rockets at Sderot at around 7:45am to target kids who are walking to school and are too far from buildings to get to a shelter. Now that power is back on in Gaza, Palestinian soldiers are right back at it:

Two barrages were fired shortly before 8 am, as Sderot’s children were making their way to school. Nine Qassam rockets and 13 mortar shells were fired at the western Negev communities on Monday afternoon. Three of the mortars landed in the Palestinian territories.

Surreal. No country on the planet would tolerate that for a day, let alone for the months upon months of that Israelis have been subjected to.

[Cross-posted to Mere Rhetoric]

by Omri Ceren

Maybe “makes them” is a little strong. But there’s certainly something in the way of an intriguing correlation:

Barak consented to ease the near-complete closure imposed on the Hamas-controlled territory, authorizing the entry of humanitarian aid and a one-time shipment of diesel fuel to power Gaza’s electricity station less than a day after it was shut down. Shortly after Barak’s pronouncements the relative respite in rocket attacks on southern Israel seemed over, with nine Qassam rockets and 13 mortar shells landing in and around communities in the western Negev.

On the day before the lockdown – which involved a less than staggering 30 percent energy cut and no fresh fruits or vegetables – the Palestinians launched forty rockets at Israeli schools and hospitals. Immediately after the lockdown, the number of Qassams dropped to one because Hamas got the message that the Israelis were serious about protecting Sderot. Then Barak lifted the closure ever so slightly, and the Palestinians immediately launched over 20 more Qassams and mortars. This is surreal. These people are lunatics. And the UN is set to condemn Israel. Of course they are.

[Cross-posted to Mere Rhetoric]

Breadth of the Beast is one of my favourite essayists on the web today.

His current essay Live incorrect or die correct

[..] Having our way so habitually has even made us a little shame-faced about it. We try very hard not to rub it in- not to appear to be “running up the score” on the opposition. In fact, we invented multiculturalism so that we could pretend that there really is no competition- that we are all just the same as everyone else and that there is no reason why any other culture should feel anymore threatened by us than we do of them.

The problem is that our perspective has become warped. We are not afraid of them because we have been on such a long winning streak. They hate us for our success and power- and they despise our smarmy, condescending, back-handedly racist multiculturalism.

At the same time, non western challengers are rising up in the Islamic world and Asia who do not share our values and our scruples. We don’t believe it, but they have no interest in becoming like us. We are so busy trying to console them for being so backward that we cannot comprehend that they don’t see it that way.[..]

Political Correctness is Unilateral Cultural Disarmament. As bad as it is here in the U.S. it is even worse in Israel.[..]

Enjoy.

Felix remains a fighter for the Jewish people believing that what is needed is a United Front and new leadership.

His blog is called My Weblog.

Good luck Felix.

By Janet Tassel, contributing editor to Harvard Magazine

Once again, we few subversives burrowing furtively inside the Union for Reform Judaism-we call it the Union for Deformed Judaism– girded ourselves for the Big Cringe: The Biennial. And once again, the leaders of Reform didn’t disappoint.

Some eight-thousand aging hippies and their guitars met and hugged in San Diego in December, re-enacting, where canes and walkers permitted, the glory days of Woodstock. There, amid songs and nostalgic tales of the ’60s, with the strains of “All the World Needs is Love” in the background, they held hands and unfolded their agenda: a scornful look at us miserable capitalist sinners, complemented by their utopian recipes for our redemption.
More »« Less

By Ted Belman

MJ Rosenberg of Israel Policy Forum comments on the events in Gaza and repeats all the Arab propaganda about Israel causing an humanitarian crisis then gives his, not so sage but predictable, advice,

But unilateral withdrawal failed. It failed because unilateralism is no way to solve any international conflict. Had Israel negotiated the Gaza withdrawal with Mahmoud Abbas, as Abbas wanted, there would have been a signed and binding agreement between Israelis and Palestinians governing Gaza’s future. As it was, Israel just picked up and left, handing Hamas the opportunity to increase its support by claiming that it drove Israel out, weakening Abbas and setting the stage for the shelling of Sderot and the ultimate Hamas takeover of Gaza.

Incredible. He believes that an agreement with Abbas would be “binding”. When has Fatah or Abbas ever been bound by an agreement.
More »« Less

By Caroline B. Glick , JPOST

On Tuesday, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak had his first reported telephone conversation with his Iranian counterpart President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Their conversation was a sign of the rising intimacy in Egyptian-Iranian relations in the wake of November’s US National Intelligence Estimate on Iran’s nuclear weapons program. According to media reports, the two men discussed the situation in Gaza.

Their conversation brought immediate results. Wednesday Mubarak allowed Hamas to take control of the international border between Egypt and Gaza. Hundreds of thousands of Gazans streamed across the border. Mubarak maintained his faith with Ahmadinejad even after the US Wednesday afternoon began demanding that he reassert Egyptian control over the border. Wednesday evening Mubarak said that the border will remain open.

Wednesday’s border takeover by Hamas was but the latest escalation of the Palestinian campaign for control over the international border. This campaign has been ongoing since Israel withdrew in 2005 and was sharply escalated after Hamas seized control over Gaza last June.
More »« Less

Muslim opening prayer at Iowa Statehouse raises concerns

The prayer asked of “Victory over those who disbelieve,” and “Protection from the great Satan” among other things.

Pastor Steve Smith of the Evangelical Free Church in Albert City is among those concerned about the Muslim prayer. Rev. Smith admits that he doesn’t know about all the levels of Muslim but knows that the Jihadists believe those in the U.S. are the great Satan.

Rev. Smith also wants to point out the mention of

“victory over those who disbelieve.” He feels “this is a request in the Iowa Legislature for God to grant the Muslims victory over every non-muslim. Not a request for salvation.”

More »« Less