IRIS Blog

Islamist Kidnap And Beheading Plot Thwarted In UK

Barack Hussein Obama: 'The Arguments of Liberals are More Often Grounded in Reason and Fact'
He received a 100% rating from the liberal ADA lobbying group

New York Times Reports Loss of $648M
Incessant liberal bias has its price

California May Ban Conventional Lightbulbs by 2012
Liberals are the opponents of liberty

As I emphasized prior to the election, the Kadima party is profoundly corrupt. Today's conviction of Haim Ramon for an indecent act is simply the latest revelation of this reality.

What is surprising is that the Israeli justice system is still strong enough to convict the political elite, who are working feverishly to wrest power and subvert justice through the appointment of cronies. Why else appoint a felon as Justice Minister?

Israelis, as a result, are living out the joke about the ethnic definition of hell:

Hell is a place where the motorists are French, the policemen are German, and the cooks are English

Israel's Justice Minister is a felon, the Defense Minister is a semi-literate union extortionist, and the Foreign Minister is a non-English speaker who tirelessly campaigns for a state for Israel's genocidal enemy.

This is why it is inadvisable to elect corrupt leadership.

Consider these facts:

-Abbas publicly called for Palestinian gunmen to shoot Israelis last week.

-al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades, a part of Abbas' Fatah, claimed responsibility for the bombing operation. A Fatah spokesman explained that the attack was aimed at "reminding our brothers in Fatah and Hamas that they must direct their weapons against Israel and not at each other."

-The suicide bomber's family explained that this was an attempt to inspire Palestinian gunmen to stop fighting each other and start attacking Israelis ("I hope that his martyrdom will deliver a message to the Fatah and Hamas fighters to stop the fighting and direct their weapons against the one and only enemy - Israel."). I believe the suicide bomber left behind an explicit explanation to that effect as well.

-Islamic Jihad repeated the sentiment in their admission of their role in the attack.

-Israel and America are funding Abbas as their great white hope of "moderation" for the Palestinians against the "extreme" Hamas.

Here is the AP actively disseminating a ludicrous anti-Semitic libel:

In this photo released by the Hezbollah?s media office, green balloons with Hebrew writings were found in the southern market town of Nabatiyeh, Lebanon Sunday, Jan. 28, 2007. Mysterious balloons drifting in from Israel to Lebanon are unnerving people, with some south Lebanon villagers reportedly feeling ill and authorities warning residents against touching them. Hebrew on the balloons reads ?Ha-Ir? which is the title of a Tel Aviv weekly magazine. (AP Photo/Hezbollah Media Office, HO)

Notice that the AP is now involved in distributing propaganda that they receive from the Hezbollah media office. The balloons are hardly "mysterious." They contain a single Hebrew word, the name of a newspaper that released them as part of a marketing promotion.

Here is the version of the DFP, the largest news wire in Germany:

Israel Planes Dump "Suspicious Green Balloons" On Southern Lebanon

Israeli planes violated Lebanese airspace Saturday and dumped green balloons over the southern port city of Tyre, Lebanese security sources said.

This is pure fiction. A check of any Israeli newspaper could have uncovered the truth, as could a simple phone call to the newspaper Ha-Ir.

Lebanese troops cordoned off the area around the coast of Tyre and prevented people from touching the "suspicious balloons" after reports indicated that some people were poisoned when they did.

The 'reports' were from the same kinds of sources that were exposed innumerable times staging false news during the latest Lebanon War.

According to a hospital source in Nabatiyeh, similar green balloons were dropped over the market-town of Nabatiyeh, 54 kilometres south of Beirut.

Five people suffering from nausea and dizziness were brought into hospital after they touched the "suspicious green balloons," the source said.

Israel violates Lebanese airspace on a daily basis despite the fact that the attacks on Israel from southern Lebanon by the radical Hezbollah movement have stopped after a beefed-up UN force along with the Lebanese Army were deployed to the area in accordance with a UN resolution.

Of course, neither news source reports on the ubiquity of anti-Semitic libels throughout the Muslim World.

Why do they do it?

1. Almost no Muslim source will state the truth about anti-Semitic libels.

2. There has been a successful campaign throughout the Muslim World to demonize Jews in order to justify genocide.

After one anti-Semitic publication by the French news agency AFP, I predicted "This highly dubious charge will likely lead to the murder of Jews." The following day, the news was announced that Ilan Halimi was tortured to death, with the complicity of dozens of Muslim neighbors. There were acid burns on 80% of his body, multiple stab wounds and severed body parts.

3. Israel routinely drops leaflets from airplanes prior to military maneuvers to warn civilians to leave the area. If the population can be spooked into avoiding reading them, perhaps Hezbollah will win the propaganda victory of pinning another 'war crime' on Israel.

Another must-read by Caroline Glick:

In the world of international diplomacy few issues receive more wall-to-wall support than the notion that it is essential to establish a Palestinian state. Leaders worldwide are so busy speaking of how essential it is for a State of Palestine to be founded that none of them seems to have noticed that it already exists.

This state was officially founded in the summer of 2005, when Israel removed its military forces and civilian population from the Gaza Strip and so established the first wholly independent Palestinian state in history. Israel's destruction of four Israeli communities in Northern Samaria and curtailment of its military operations in the area set the conditions for statehood in that area as well.

And so it is that as statesmen and activists worldwide loudly proclaim their commitment to establishing the sovereign State of Palestine, they miss the fact that Palestine exists. And it is a nightmare.

In the State of Palestine 88 percent of the public feels insecure. Perhaps the other 12 percent are members of the multitude of regular and irregular militias. For in the State of Palestine the ratio of police/militiamen/men-under-arms to civilians is higher than in any other country on earth.

In the State of Palestine, two-year-olds are killed and no one cares. Children are woken up in the middle of the night and murdered in front of their parents. Worshipers in mosques are gunned down by terrorists who attend competing mosques. And no one cares. No international human rights groups publish reports calling for an end to the slaughter. No UN body condemns anyone or sends a fact-finding mission to investigate the murders.

In the State of Palestine, women are stripped naked and forced to march in the streets to humiliate their husbands. Ambulances are stopped on the way to hospitals and wounded are shot in cold blood. Terrorists enter operating rooms in hospitals and unplug patients from life-support machines.

In the State of Palestine, people are kidnapped from their homes in broad daylight and in front of the television cameras. This is the case because the kidnappers themselves are cameramen. Indeed, their commanders often run television stations. And because terror commanders run television stations in the State of Palestine, it should not be surprising that they bomb the competition's television stations.

Official: US Missile Defense Operational in Year
Great news, but I'll believe it when I see it working in Israel. Many US systems were first combat-tested in Israel.

Jerusalem Registers its First Gay 'Marriage'
Credit another wildly undemocratic change to the most activist Supreme Court in the world. Here Robert Bork notices the danger Israel's precedent poses to all free nations.

We're Very Proud, Eilat Bomber's Family Declares

Iran Developing Long-Range Missiles with North Korea
Remember the derision of Bush for calling Iraq, Iran and North Korea an "Axis of Evil?"

The southern resort city of Eilat has had its first suicide bombing, thanks to the decision of Ariel Sharon and Ehud Olmert to turn over Gaza to Islamists. Precisely as I predicted the terrorist strategy was two-pronged: arm Gaza and then use that base to move terror into Israel. In this case, the suicide bomber apparently travelled from Gaza across the now open border to Egypt, and then through the desert border into Israel.

Of course, one of the three groups claiming responsibility for the bombing is the al Aksa Martyrs' Brigades, part of Abbas' Fatah. Abbas is the linchpin of American and Israeli hopes for 'moderation.'

Dichter: Eilat Bomber Came in Via Egypt

IDF: Eilat Attack is Tip of the Iceberg

Analysis: Defenseless Against Southern 'Terror Triangle'

Peretz Orders IDF to Launch Operations Inside Gaza, Ending "Restraint"

The mainstream news media increases its bias despite accelerating losses:

U.S. media job cuts surged 88 percent in 2006 from the previous year, a downsizing trend expected to continue this year, a survey said Thursday.

The media industry slashed 17,809 jobs last year, a nearly two-fold increase from the 9,453 cuts in 2005, outplacement consultancy Challenger Gray & Christmas said....

"A sea change in the way people get and read news, not to mention the way they search for jobs, used cars and consumer products, was the primary contributor," the company said.

Nice spin. I wonder how it is that each of the handful of conservative newspapers managed to buck the trend, as well as the rapidly growing Fox News and profitable conservative talk radio?

Media companies, including the New York Times Co. and Time Inc., have already laid off 2,000 employees in 2007, Challenger noted, saying the cuts suggested the downsizing trend would continue.

After many years of the mainstream media's annual story about mean Israelis stealing Bethlehem's Christmas (see here for a comical example), the truth has been revealed. Christians are fleeing every Muslim-majority territory because of the apartheid discrimination encouraged by Muslim sharia law. Land theft works because the testimony of non-Muslims is weighed less in every sharia court in the world.

A number of Christian families have finally decided to break their silence and talk openly about what they describe as Muslim persecution of the Christian minority in this city.

The move comes as a result of increased attacks on Christians by Muslims over the past few months. The families said they wrote letters to Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas, the Vatican, Church leaders and European governments complaining about the attacks, but their appeals have fallen on deaf ears.

According to the families, many Christians have long been afraid to complain in public about the campaign of "intimidation" for fear of retaliation by their Muslim neighbors and being branded "collaborators" with Israel.

This is a death sentence.

But following an increase in attacks on Christian-owned property in the city over the past few months, some Christians are no longer afraid to talk about the ultra-sensitive issue. And they are talking openly about leaving the city.

"The situation is very dangerous," said Samir Qumsiyeh, owner of the Beit Sahur-based private Al-Mahd (Nativity) TV station. "I believe that 15 years from now there will be no Christians left in Bethlehem. Then you will need a torch to find a Christian here. This is a very sad situation."

Qumsiyeh, one of the few Christians willing to speak about the harsh conditions of their community, has been the subject of numerous death threats. His house was recently attacked with fire-bombs, but no one was hurt.

Qumsiyeh said he has documented more than 160 incidents of attacks on Christians in the area in recent years.

He said a monk was recently roughed up for trying to prevent a group of Muslim men from seizing lands owned by Christians in Beit Sahur. Thieves have targeted the homes of many Christian families and a "land mafia" has succeeded in laying its hands on vast areas of land belonging to Christians, he added.

Fuad and Georgette Lama woke up one morning last September to discover that Muslims from a nearby village had fenced off their family's six-dunam plot in the Karkafa suburb south of Bethlehem. "A lawyer and an official with the Palestinian Authority just came and took our land," said 69-year-old Georgette Lama.

The couple was later approached by senior PA security officers who offered to help them kick out the intruders from the land. "We paid them $1,000 so they could help us regain our land," she said, almost in tears. "Instead of giving us back our land, they simply decided to keep it for themselves. They even destroyed all the olive trees and divided the land into small plots, apparently so that they could offer each for sale." When her 72-year-old husband, Fuad, went to the land to ask the intruders to leave, he was severely beaten and threatened with guns.

"My husband is after heart surgery and they still beat him," Georgette Lama said. "These people have no heart. We're afraid to go to our land because they will shoot at us. Ever since the beating, my husband is in a state of trauma and has difficulties talking."

The Lamas have since knocked on the doors of scores of PA officials in Bethlehem seeking their intervention, but to no avail. At one stage, they sent a letter to Abbas, who promised to launch an investigation.

"We heard that President Mahmoud Abbas is taking our case very seriously," said Georgette Lama. "But until now he hasn't done anything to help us get our land back. We are very concerned because we're not the only ones suffering from this phenomenon. Most Christians are afraid to speak, but I don't care because we have nothing more to lose."

A Christian businessman who asked not to be identified said the conditions of Christians in Bethlehem and its surroundings had deteriorated ever since the area was handed over to the PA in 1995.

"Every day we hear of another Christian family that has immigrated to the US, Canada or Latin America," he said.

Monroe Doctrine time?

The Iranian president's recent visits to Venezuela, Ecuador, and Nicaragua all underscore Iran's increasingly close contact with Latin America. Iran's ambitions are, in fact, global, with Ahmadinejad visiting countries where the current leaders were elected on platforms that included heavy doses of anti-Americanism. Ahmadinejad has said, "We should make our presence felt in different parts of the world to promote our values." Exactly which values? Nuclear weapons development? Suppression of human rights? Calls for destruction of another UN-member state? Holocaust denial? Support for terrorism? Iran has gained a foothold in the Western Hemisphere and is seeking to expand its reach. We and our regional friends must seek to ensure that a bad situation does not become worse.

Pilgrims' Road to Temple Unearthed in City of David Dig
"The road is much grander, wider, more central, and is parallel to one discovered at the end of the 19th century by the archaeologists Bliss and Dickey, which was previously thought to be the road to the Temple Mount"

Poll: 74% Agree Olmert Should resign; 84% Sey Peretz Should

U.S. Troops Authorized to Kill Iranian Operatives in Iraq
America is slowly joining the war Iran declared. Previously a ludicrous catch-and-release policy was in effect.

Russian Listening Posts in Syria Track IDF Movements for Hezbollah

Two Hezbollah Bunkers Built in Israeli Territory Discovered, Destroyed
They housed supplies, food, and tools that would enable a long stay underground

Palestinian Rocket Fire at Israel Continues
Israeli leaders from Chelm continue to insist there is a cease-fire and negotiate further truce agreements

That impending Palestinian civil war that was ubiquitously reported certainly seems to have been resolved quite easily in the end. We'll never know for sure, but could it be that it was all a scam as IRIS was alone in predicting?

I wonder if Abbas will return the $100 million to Israel, plus the far greater amount from the US taken on the pretense of fighting Hamas?

National Unity Talks Reach Agreement to Fulfill Five Goals, Including Formation of a United Resistance

Lawmakers Want Polygraph of Berger Over Stolen 9/11 Documents

John Kerry Not Entering Presidential Race

Barack Hussein Obama: Name Not an Advantage
Ya think?

While Ahmadinejad continues to announce an impending nuclear Holocaust for the US and Israel, Jimmy Carter performs the equivalent of June Cleaver in the movie Airplane who declared "I speak Jive:"

The distortion that we are about to be destroyed makes us suspicious of those who don't worship the way we do. And our country has no reason to be afraid.

Well, that's a relief. I guess my distorted understanding is based in my literalist tendencies in interpretation.

Newt Gingrich, along with most Republicans, apparently shares my distorted literalism:

Gingrich: Israel Faces Nuclear Holocaust

Literalism is apparently contagious. It has now spread to the most left-wing of Israelis:

This Holocaust will be Different

Seriously, the above article by Benny Morris is a must-read, despite its enervating impact. Unfortunately, the jihad is not as unserious in its thinking about war as Morris has been. Morris makes two naive assumptions: Iran will leave America intact and take credit for annihilating Israel.

Much more likely is that Iran will catalyze the hyperproliferation of nuclear technology, so that its condemnation of the first nuclear attack will paralyze any Western response. If a "previously unknown terror group" takes responsibility, will the West really strike Iran?

Additionally America may be unable to respond if a large number of simultaneous nuclear explosions occur in multiple US cities. Islamists have had a history of detonating large numbers of bombs at once.

I know that the tradition for State of the Union addresses is to project a rose-colored view of foreign affairs, but aren't these two statements a bit obscene?

we are pursuing diplomacy to help bring peace to the Holy Land, and pursuing the establishment of a democratic Palestinian state living side-by-side with Israel in peace and security.

and

The United Nations has imposed sanctions on Iran, and made it clear that the world will not allow the regime in Tehran to acquire nuclear weapons.