Israel Security

Moshe Freedman, a leader of the Neturei Karta who kissed Ahmadinejad at the Holocaust denial conference in Iran, was beaten up by the chairman of the organization that collects body parts of suicide bombing victims for a respectful burial. Unmentioned in any of the stories about the Neturei Karta is the fact the group was discovered to be on Arafat's payroll.

Yehuda Meshi-Zahav, chairman of ZAKA and former operations officer for the Ultra-Orthodox community, hit the Jewish man who kissed Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, it was reported on Monday.

The violent incident occurred last Friday in Poland during a mass visit of Orthodox Jews to the country in order to honor Hassidic Rabbi Elimelech of Lizhensk.

When the visitors arrived at Lizhensk on Friday morning, they heard that Moshe Arye Freedman, a member of the fanatic anti-Israel group Neturei Karta, was present as well. Freedman recently made headlines when he was photographed kissing Ahmadinejad during the Holocaust denial conference in Teheran three months ago.

Meshi-Zahav, along with another ZAKA member, quickly located Freedman and set upon him, punching the man, kicking him and breaking his glasses.

The Muslim hysteria surrounding an Israeli repair project on a ramp to the Temple Mount is transparent to anyone with a sense for the ubiquity of these Big Lies. For those who care about the specific details of this round, here is a useful summary:

The hysterical Arab reaction to the replacement of a ramp to the Temple Mount must be understood in context. Why are Muslim religious authorities in charge of the Temple Mount anyway - Judaism's holiest site, in the heart of Israel's capital city? And who built the Temple Mount in the first place, and what makes this site holy? Furthermore, the real question is how can the Arab world be cured of its blood-lust against the Jews of Israel?

Muslims revere this site in consequence of the Temple that once stood here. The Temple was as real as the World Trade Center. No sane historian doubts its existence. It is attested in many contemporary sources, Jewish and otherwise. Simon Goldhill, professor of Greek at Cambridge University, called the Temple "the largest and most awe-inspiring religious monument in the world....There is nothing like this anywhere else in the ancient world."

Israelis created (long ago) the platform on the Temple Mount and the Temple itself, and the religious community that gave it all meaning. Thousands of years later, Israel in 1967 turned over the keys to the Waqf in a peace offering, an act of friendship. Today, Arab leaders demand (in violent outrage) that the world protect the Al-Aqsa Mosque - their precious, sacred cultural treasure - by stopping an Israeli construction project that won't go anywhere near it.

Read the whole thing...

The Temple Mount ramp repair project is the latest Arab Big Lie.

Here is a good, short video rebuttal:

Here is must-hear audio, in which I challenged former Prime Minister Netanyahu. How do we know he will not again sell us out by granting territory to our sworn enemies?

Tough questions from the right such as these are a rarity because Israeli reporters are generally left-leaning and any conservative journalist with the temerity to challenge the Prime Minister, as I did, would be quickly blacklisted.

Background to the question:

The polls indicate that Bibi is the clear front-runner in the next election. Israelis are tired of the leftist administration of Kadima and Labor and that neither party would make it higher than third place if elections were held today. Israel's hopes for a national security candidate rest, therefore, on Bibi. However, no policy can be effective if the diagnosis is missed. The Palestinians have repeatedly revealed that their most fervent wish is for Israel to be destroyed. The Palestinian Authority, including the "moderate" Abbas, has been unmasked repeatedly as a terrorist body, even prior to the landslide Hamas victory.

Notice that Bibi's answer does not respond to the issue of whether the Palestinians are an enemy.

What is quite amazing is that Bibi himself predicted the Oslo accords, and that they would be used as part of the PLO's historic plan of phased destruction of Israel. The details are laid out in the chapter "The Trojan Horse" within his terrific book "A Place Among the Nations."

Listen to his answer, in which he makes the following points:

-"We inherited the Oslo Accords and were contractually bound by them."

Unfortunately, Palestinians continually falsely offerred renunciations of terror as their part of the land-for-peace trade, making any "contract" ludicrous. It's like pretending a rental contract exists when the tenants keep presenting bounced checks.

-"I gave away less land than other Prime Ministers and slowed down the process."

Ariel Sharon and Ehud Olmert proved that the only irreversible elements to the land-for-peace process are Israeli concessions. The speed of Israeli withdrawals can be increased at any point.

In fairness, I should point out that while Netanyahu did sell out the nation's security by granting land concessions to the Palestinians after their "peace" deal was revealed to be a Trojan Horse, he has been Israel's most effective international spokesman as well as the best Finance Minister in its history.

The complete audio of Netanyahu's blogger conference call is available here.

Haaretz is the most left-wing of Israel's major newspapers:

No commission of inquiry is needed in order to realize that the fact that the prime and defense ministers are not speaking to each other is a clear and present danger to national security. This grave situation has continued since the war in Lebanon ended, but the public is not fully aware of its gravity. All the conciliatory statements emanating from both ministers' offices are false, as are the smiles they exchange in front of the cameras. The state is not being governed, and there is no coordination between Ehud Olmert and Amir Peretz on the most vital issues.

Just yesterday, a scandalous letter that Peretz sent to Olmert, which demanded that construction work on the Temple Mount be stopped, was publicized. Instead of this sensitive matter being discussed privately and seriously, things are evidently being done without coordination, and the defense minister simply responds to events.

The unacceptable explanation offered for this state of affairs is that Olmert intends to replace the defense minister, but is postponing the move for political reasons. This cowardice attests to Olmert's inability to govern. The prime minister - who complains that criminal investigations are disrupting the government's work and therefore, in order to demonstrate his dissatisfaction, quickly and provocatively appointed a like-minded justice minister - has been incapable for months of choosing a defense minister who will help him ensure the security of Israel's citizens. The question is no longer whether Peretz is suitable for the post, or whether the Labor Party will agree to replace him. The situation in which the two are incapable of working together is frightening in and of itself.

It is hard to put faith in the government's declarations about Israel Defense Forces activity on the Lebanese or Gazan borders, its policy on the settlement outposts and the considerations that have led it to acquire new weapons systems - let alone its handling of the Iranian nuclear issue or its contacts with the Palestinian Authority - when these issues are dealt with mainly via the media, and every statement by one side immediately prompts a dismissive response by the other. The offices of the prime and defense ministers are too reminiscent of those of PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas and PA Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh, and Israel's advantage of proper democratic governance is being eroded by embarrassing ego games.

Deputy Defense Minister Ephraim Sneh says that publication of Peretz's letter about the Temple Mount caused consternation in the Defense Ministry. But the very fact that a letter had to be sent from one ministry to the other on such a sensitive matter, which is liable to result in loss of life, attests to the enormity of the crisis. The work on the Temple Mount, as well as the operations along the Lebanese border, are both matters with the potential to spark a major conflagration, so it would have been reasonable to assume that the decisions were made knowledgeably and judiciously. But the current Israeli government has neither knowledge nor judgment, only politicians hunkering down within their own camps and among their own cronies, and it seems that grudges and vengeance have become substitutes for a national agenda.

If the prime minister wants to leave any positive impression at all before he is replaced, he must at least ensure that the defense establishment is headed by someone who enjoys the confidence of that establishment, and with whom he can work. And if Labor quits the government over the defense minister's replacement, that will be a sign that it, too, is unsuited to lead the country.

Of course, the Israeli official has to speak anonymously to avoid being fired.

Hezbollah is presently receiving a "constant stream of armaments" from Syria, Iran and other foreign sources, senior Israeli officials said Tuesday. "They are getting all kinds of rockets, advanced anti-tank missiles, command-and-control systems, training, finance," an Israeli official said. The official said Hezbollah maintains an "operational" presence along the Lebanese-Israeli border. Enabling Hezbollah's rearmament is the "open border" Lebanon shares with Syria, and the lack of "real teeth for enforcement" in UN Security Council Resolution 1718, which established a ceasefire in the Israeli-Hezbollah war last August.

At the same time, and in a similar way, foreign sources are providing Hamas with anti-tank missiles, high-trajectory rockets, rocket-propelled grenades and their launchers, explosive devices and automatic rifles. The armament of the Hamas commanders is "intensive" and "incessant," and intended for use against both their Fatah rivals and the Israelis. The official said the IDF has had "no operational activity whatsoever" in Gaza for the last three months, but that in the same time Hamas has launched more than 100 Kassam rockets at Israeli civilian targets.

The official was skeptical about Western plans to shore up the Fatah security forces loyal to Mahmoud Abbas. "Every meeting we have on this subject always ends in the conclusion, 'Bolster Abbas,' as if that will solve all the problems. He was in power two years ago [before Hamas came to power], wasn't he? What did he do then?" The official said the Israelis provided Abbas with weapons and some have wound up in the hands of Hamas.

Notice the amazing revelation that every meeting ends with "bolster Abbas," today's "conceptzia":

"Conceptzia" was the term coined by the Agranat Commission to describe the intelligence failure that led to the surprise of the Yom Kippur War. As a friend at Tel Aviv University explained, "It is much more than a mistake." It is a fundamentally flawed understanding of events that prevents one from seeing what is before his eyes.

There is just one flaw in this reasoning hiding in plain sight: Abbas has been a lifelong terrorist who has recently been calling for the shooting of Israelis. Today it was revealed that his Fatah organization is funded by Iran.

While Israel's leadership is daily revealed to be spending its time focused on lining its own pockets, Hezbollah is planting bombs on the Israeli side of the border (under the nose of the UNIFIL 'disarmament force') and Hamas is preparing sophisticated underground assaults from Gaza. Olmert's financial response to Hamas' openly genocidal intentions have been an utter fraud. All of these events have traspired exactly as predicted on IRIS.

Hamas is setting up a new military infrastructure for a serious confrontation with Israel.

It is digging combat tunnels, improving rocket performance and quantity, and collecting weapons, mainly antitank and antiaircraft missiles through smuggling.

The tunnels will allow mobility underground to the expected points of battle with IDF forces entering Gaza.

The fighters will be able to surface quickly, launch missiles or rockets, and disappear, only to surprise IDF forces at another spot.

The tunnels are also meant to hold explosive devices that would be detonated when IDF forces try to enter Gaza.

Tunnels could also be used to infiltrate Israeli territory.

The solution? A leader like Rudy Giuliani who gets two things:

1. The West does not have the option of 'disengaging' from the Global Jihad. They are at war with us and we have only to choose whether to join the battle as passive victims or as active combatants.

2. In this war, we need to be on offense.

Meanwhile, only free-market conservatives are proposing sensible new solutions for advancing Israel's interests.

See here for Daniel Doron's insight that Iran's statist economy is hopelessly overextended and thus quite sensitive to economic pressure.

See here for Caroline Glick's column explaining how a larger understanding of the Global Jihad could be used by jihad victims like Israel and Kenya to influence Bush's "going wobbly" in the war on terror.

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"

Caroline Glick continues to highlight the frightening Leftist strategy of Israel's leaders. Her radical plan? Advance Israel's national interests:

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's visit to Israel this week reinforced this untenable situation. In an interview with The Jerusalem Post, US Ambassador Richard Jones explained that during her visit, Rice "picked up" Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni's plan to hold "discussions" with Fatah terror group commander and PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas about the establishment of a Palestinian state in spite of the fact that the PA is ruled today by the Hamas terror group.

According to Jones, Livni convinced Rice that it is necessary to provide a "political horizon" to convince the Palestinians to replace Hamas with Fatah. After the Palestinians overthrow Hamas, he explained, it will be possible to implement the agreement and handover Judea and Samaria to Fatah (and Hamas).

That is, the Israeli government is pushing a national strategy that is based on a total lie. While Abbas plans his visit this weekend with Hamas terror master Khaled Mashaal in Syria in the hopes of facilitating the formation of an Iranian-Syrian sponsored Fatah-Hamas unity government, the Israeli government wishes to "strengthen" him.

A revitalized IDF will be unable to secure Israel under these conditions. As long as the guiding strategic principle dictating Israel's policies is that Israel must establish a Palestinian state, and to that end, the policy debate revolves around issues such as whether protecting the residents of Sderot from rocket attacks will strengthen or weaken Abbas, the IDF will be incapable of defending Israel regardless of who its leaders are.

SINCE THE inauguration of the 1993 Oslo peace process, Israel's national debate has largely ignored the only question that should be guiding it: How are we to advance Israel's national interests? Rather, since 1993, our national debate has been anchored around the question of how best to establish a Palestinian state. This question, rooted in the false Arab narrative which consciously rejects the morality of the Zionist revolution, has brought us to a position where the IDF is cognitively barred from rationally approaching Israel's security challenges.

Read the whole thing.

Death Toll of Israeli Civilians Killed by Palestinians Hits Six-Year Low

Palestinian militants killed 23 Israelis and foreign visitors in 2006, down from a high of 289 in 2002 and 43 deaths in 2005.

Only two Palestinian suicide bombers managed to sneak into Israel for attacks that killed 11 people and wounded 30 others in 2006.

This is, of course, good news for which we should be thankful. But the implications are not what the Israeli leadership will claim, because their Lestist policy of concessions is not responsible for this improvement in one terror category. The Oslo capitulation is what caused the spike in 2002; conservatism in the form of continuous security vigilance is responsible for the decline since. Also, the Jihad is shifting tactics, such as using missiles, anti-tank weapons and even nuclear weapons. This has definitely been a building year for the Jihad around Israel.

Prior to the Gaza pullout, I predicted that the territory would flourish as a Taliban-style hub of international terror now that Islamists had taken control. The evidence continues to mount:

I am sitting somewhere in Gaza City - I'm not allowed to know where - and opposite me is a huge beaming picture of Osama bin Laden, with the smoke from a burning World Trade Center forming a black halo around his head. He is surrounded by a gaggle of jihadi angels: some Chechen fighters, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, and Britain's own Tube bomber, Mohammed Sidique Khan. "Would you like to see our weapons?" a masked jihadi says cheerfully, before thrusting a grenade into my hand.

"I want to kill and kill and kill again. I want to be a killing machine until, inshallah [God willing], I become a martyr," said Abu Ahmad, 27. He has just described how he slashed the throats of four female Israeli soldiers in 2002. "All the Jews have to be killed," he says. The Holocaust did not happen, he says, "but it should have." "I love Osama bin Laden," he said to me as we parted, slapping me on the back.

Meanwhile, Gaza Weapons Smuggling Flourishes, and they are talking about the anti-tank weapons that humiliated the IDF in Lebanon, not guns. Of course the key line in the story is:

The Palestinians have done nothing, despite a promise by President Mahmoud Abbas to shut down the weapons pipeline as part of a Gaza cease-fire reached last month, said Israeli government spokeswoman Miri Eisin.

The Israeli leaders from Chelm are not powerless, however. They still have the ability to threaten dire consequences:

The smuggling, Eisin added, could easily bring down the truce. "We don't build a cease-fire on luck," she said.

Elder of Ziyon has more on the story.

Israel's leftist leadership has been consistently dissembling about its plans to protect the country because it basically doesn't have any. Therefore I predict that this story will be revealed to be an utter lie:

Israel: No More Gestures to Palestinians Until Kidnapped IDF Soldier Is Returned

Hezbollah used anti-tank missiles extremely effectively in Lebanon. As predicted, Hamas has used Israel's Gaza retreat to build a similar force there:

Israel has determined that the Hamas-led Palestinian Authority has received advanced, Russian-made, AT-14 Kornet anti-tank missiles with a range of 5.5 km. and a high level of accuracy.

Officials said the weapons were capable of changing the strategic balance in the region since they could significantly threaten Israeli military operations in Gaza.

They said the missiles could also target civilian and military sites inside Israel.

"The Palestinians have received dozens of the anti-tank missiles that were used by Hizballah in the Lebanon war," said Shalom Harari, a senior consultant to the Defense Ministry.

"These are weapons that break the strategic balance."

Palestinian government spokesman Dr. Ghazi Hamad wrote in Al-Ayyam on October 17, 2006: "Are we really a violent society?...It has become the master that we obey everywhere - in the home, in the neighborhood, in the family....Our celebrations have no point or meaning, unless during them we fire a volley of bullets that echoes alongside the women's ululations of joy. Under sad circumstances and at funerals, our heroes volunteer to 'puncture' the air with hundreds of shots from their rifles. It is inconceivable for our marches - whatever their goals and political color - not to have dozens of rifles and armed gangs climbing on cars and aiming rifles, and youths leaning out of car windows waving the barrels of the Kalashnikovs and roaring with joy."

"When we are angry at the electric company, we have no solution but to shatter its [equipment] and break its furniture. When we are angry at the municipality or at the governor, we call in a group of masked gunmen - the heroes of our age - to climb on the rooftop and draw their weapons in front of the satellite TV [reporters]."