FresnoZionism.org — ציונות פרסנו

Sheik Khalid Salim a bin Mahfouz sleeps with goats and chickens. And he looks like a weasel, too. So sue me.

Dr. Rachel Ehrenfeld made some perhaps better-researched statements in her 2003 book Funding Evil: How Terrorism is Financed – and How to Stop It. In particular, she accused Saudi billionaire Sheik Khalid Salim a bin Mahfouz of financing terrorism in a big way:

Her book had reported that bin Mahfouz, the former chairman of Saudi Arabia’s largest bank, National Commercial Bank, had allegedly deposited “tens of millions of dollars in London and New York directly into terrorist accounts—the accounts of the same terrorists who were implicated in the 1998 bombings of the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, in which 224 people were killed, including twelve Americans, and more than four thousand were injured.”

The book implicated bin Mahfouz in transferring from the bank’s Zakat (charity) Committee some $74 million to the International Islamic Relief Organization (IIRO) and to the Muwafaq “blessed relief” Foundation. Muwafaq in turn allegedly deposited funds directly with al Qaeda. Finally, Ehrenfeld also indicated that much of the funding for terrorism emanates from the Saudis, including the bin Mahfouz and al Rahji families, who allegedly funnel the monies through a host of “charitable” institutions. — Alyssa A. Lappen, ‘Libel Wars’, Frontpage Magazine (2005)

Ehrenfeld’s accusations were carefully documented, and under US law are protected as free speech. However, libel laws in the UK are much looser and put the burden of proof on the accused. Although only a handful of books were sold in the UK, Ehrenfeld describes what happened:

Bin Mahfouz sued me in London in January 2004, shortly after the U.S. publication of my book… I refused to acknowledge the jurisdiction of a British court over a book published here; the court then ruled for bin Mahfouz by default, enjoined British publication of Funding Evil, awarded bin Mahfouz $225,900 in damages and expenses and ordered me to publicly apologize and destroy the book. I refuse to acknowledge the British Court or its ruling…

Since British libel law favors suits such as bin Mahfouz’s, and the First Amendment protects U.S. journalists reporting on public issues, I chose to fight his false claims in America. I sued in a New York federal court, for a declaration that bin Mahfouz’ English default judgment is unenforceable in the United States, because it violates my First Amendment rights…

On June 8, the Second Circuit Court of Appeals unanimously declared my case is “ripe” for hearing in a U.S. [state] court, noting that the case has implications for all U.S. authors and publishers, whose First Amendment rights are threatened by foreign libel rulings.

Unfortunately, the New York State Court of Appeals (the state’s highest court) has just ruled that a New York court cannot hear Ehrenfeld’s case on the technical grounds that bin Mahfouz does little business in New York.

Although our sheik can’t collect his judgement in the US without going to court here (where he would probably lose, big time) Ehrenfeld is out a small fortune in legal expenses. And she can’t travel to the UK without risking arrest.

The practice of silencing writers and journalists by taking advantage of UK laws has come to be called “libel tourism” and is a favorite tactic of bin Mahfouz and other rich malefactors:

…bin Mahfouz sued Pluto Press in the U.K. over the suggestion in Michael Griffin’s 2003 Reaping the Whirlwind that he was related by marriage to Osama bin Laden and a supporter of terrorism. Bin Mahfouz “accepted” a substantial settlement and an apology, as he did earlier for a report in the Mail on Sunday. In another case, bin Mahfouz’ litigiousness was reportedly behind the halt in British publication by Secker & Warburg in early 2004 of Craig Unger’s House of Bush; House of Saud. — Lappen

…bin Mahfouz threatened to sue Cambridge University Press (CUP), the publisher of Alms of Jihad: Charity and Terrorism in the Islamic World, but refrained from including the book’s two American writers, J. Millard Burr and Robert O. Collins.

Facing the mere threat of a lawsuit from Saudi billionaire Khalid bin Mahfouz, Cambridge University Press — the world’s oldest publishing house — agreed in Britain’s High Court on July 30, to pulp all the unsold copies. When the American authors rightfully refused to join, CUP issued a public apology, which in fact defamed the authors. CUP also paid substantial undisclosed damages, a huge “contribution” to a charity of bin Mahfouz’ choice, and sent letters to more than 200 libraries worldwide, asking to pull the book off their shelves. CUP’s capitulation handed an important victory to the Saudis’ financial jihad against free speech. — Ehrenfeld

Russian oligarch Boris Berezovsky and Mohammed Jameel — another Saudi billionaire — have also sued foreign publications for libel in the UK and won (although Jameel’s case was later overthrown by the House of Lords).

The problem with all this is that publishers are beginning to get cold feet about printing anything that could make a possible libel tourist unhappy, no matter how untrue — or how important. Truth and justice are all very nice concepts, but when a publisher needs to spend half a million dollars in legal fees to publish a book that may not earn that much, this has what lawyers call a “chilling effect” on free speech:

Ehrenfeld was hardly his only target. Bin Mahfouz and other wealthy Saudis had previously attacked other reporters and news agencies, all of which chose to apologize publicly, or settle the cases—or in the cases of some book publishers, to back off publication all together. USA Today, for one, printed a lengthy retraction concerning a November 2004 article by Marc Umile that had implicated bin Mahfouz.

As a result of bin Mahfouz’ intimidation, Gerald Posner, in Secrets of the Kingdom, makes no reference to bin Mahfouz or Muwafaq. Loretta Napoleoni removed all references to bin Mahfouz from her U.S. paperback book, Terror Incorporated. — Lappen

And since the internet has world-wide reach, even I could be a target of such as bin Mahfouz.

Technorati Tags: libel tourism, bin Mahfouz, Ehrenfeld

Barry Rubin writes,

[The] Hamas takeover of the Gaza Strip… is the most important single Middle East event of 2007 because it is a clear, probably irreversible, shift in the balance of power. Four decades of a movement dominated by nationalists has come to an end. Given Fatah’s continuing weaknesses it is conceivable that Hamas will take over the West Bank within a few years and marginalize its rival. To Islamists, this is a great victory.

In fact, it is a disaster for Palestinians and Arabs. It deepens divisions and destroys any real (as opposed to the silly superficial events that take up governments’ time and media space) diplomatic option for them. A negotiated resolution of the Arab-Israeli or Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and with it prospects for a Palestinian state, has been set back for decades. Much Western sympathy has been lost. [my emphasis]

In years to come, struggles between Arab nationalists and Islamists, as well as between Sunnis and Shias, will dwarf the Arab-Israeli conflict. During 2008 we will have to assess whether the Palestinian Authority still ruling the West Bank can meet the Hamas challenge (we already know it won’t meet the diplomatic challenge but it will take all year for most Western politicians and much of the media to discover that).

I agree that it is a disaster for Palestinians and Arabs. But so many of them, maybe not only the hard-core Islamists, think the opposite!

The fact is (and I’m sure Rubin would agree), that they don’t have the same criteria as the West. Peace and prosperity are not the primary desiderata for them. Recovery of Arab honor and removal of the hated Jew from ‘their’ land are.

The US has finally learned a similar lesson in Iraq. The Shiites, having suffered horribly under the brutal regime of Saddam Hussein, are not looking forward to peace and prosperity alongside Iraq’s Sunnis. Rather, they would like to set up a brutal regime which will give the Sunnis their ‘just’ desserts!

Strategic planners in Israel and the West should be prepared for the ultimate triumph of Hamas. But regardless of who the Palestinian leadership will be, whether it will be of the nationalist or Islamist variety, the one thing that we can be sure of is that it can garner respect and support from the Palestinian public only if it promises to replace Israel by an Arab state. This is the only way that honor can be restored.

Therefore we can expect that there will always be demands for right of return, etc., that Israel cannot meet and still survive as a Jewish state.

It’s a matter of speculation whether this has always been the case or if there was some point — possibly before the return of Arafat and his campaign of incitement that was enabled by the Oslo accord — at which a modus vivendi between Jews and Arabs in the Middle East could have been found. But if there was such a window, it is certainly closed today.

Technorati Tags: Israel, Palestinians, Hamas

Hamas, under pressure from Israeli air attacks, has recently started talking about a cease-fire and even the release of Gilad Schalit, who has been in their captivity now for 18 months.

Of course, they will only release him in return for hundreds of terrorist operatives held in Israeli jails. Apparently they will not be satisfied only with those who are being held for trying to murder Israelis, but want freedom for successful murderers as well.

Israel is considering the criteria to be used in selecting candidates for release. Some officials were adamant about not releasing those with blood on their hands:

[Foreign affairs and defense committee] members stepping out of the meeting quoted [Foreign Minister Tzipi] Livni as saying the government was reevaluating what the classifications for prisoners were and how Israel should negotiate with the Palestinians.

“By being so flexible and pragmatic, the government is helping increase terrorism and foils the international fight against it,” Israel Radio quoted FADC member and Likud MK Yuval Steinitz as saying.

“According to the government’s new formulae, a killer is no longer a killer, and the terrorist Palestinian Authority is a peace partner”…

But others were less harsh:

Meretz MK Avshalom Vilan said that “Israel should stop dealing with definitions and rigid standards.” [like the definition of ‘murder’?]

…Vilan said that “in Israel too there are fighters who killed terrorists and can be considered as those with ‘blood on their hands.’ We call them terrorists but they [the Palestinians] call them freedom fighters.”

One might well ask Vilan, “who cares what they call them?”

The fact that a member of the Knesset could make such a statement speaks to the demoralization that has affected some circles in Israel. But the situation is not so black that the discussion needs to be about how much appeasement can be tolerated before it becomes surrender.

The appeasement strategy cannot work anyway, because Arab demands will always escalate, remaining just out of reach until the red lines are crossed — until what had previously been unthinkable, like releasing murderers, becomes acceptable. And then they press even more.

As a tactic to get Gilad Schalit released, it may succeed. But then they can simply grab another Israeli and start the whole process over again.

We should keep in mind that this entire process has begun because Hamas is hurting. Israel is killing Hamas’ own soldiers and their Islamic Jihad lackeys at an unprecedented rate. They want this to stop, and if Israel is dumb enough to also release prisoners, so much the better.

Rather than trying to negotiate a cease-fire, the approach should be to step up the targeted killings and pinpoint incursions with the goal of creating fear for their lives in the hearts of the Hamas (and other terrorist) leadership. And then explain to them that it will only get worse until the rocketing of Sderot stops and Gilad Schalit goes home.

Israel needs to know that it is stronger than Hamas and to act on this basis, not the reverse.

Technorati Tags: Israel, Hamas

President Bush with Saudi King Abdullah

1. Which country allows its residents religious freedom?

1. Saudi Arabia
2. Israel

2. Which country is explicitly racist in its immigration and employment policies?

1. Israel
2. Saudi Arabia

3. Which country practices a form of religious apartheid in which certain places are off-limits to any but a favored group?

1. Israel
2. Saudi Arabia

4. Which country is a democracy?

1. Saudi Arabia
2. Israel

5. Which country is a monarchy in which a 6000-member royal family holds most of the wealth?

1. Israel
2. Saudi Arabia

6. Which country does not permit women to drive, and sentences rape victims to be whipped for the crime of being alone with an unrelated male?

1. Israel
2. Saudi Arabia

7. What was the destination of nine charter flights which left the US as soon as airspace was reopened after 9/11?

1. Israel
2. Saudi Arabia

8. What country colluded with Egypt and Syria prior to the Yom Kippur war to use oil as a weapon, declared an oil embargo on the US during that war which caused severe shortages of gasoline and heating oil, and led OPEC to raise prices in a maneuver which quadrupled the price of oil in the world within a year?

1. Israel
2. Saudi Arabia

9. What country is the major beneficiary of the present run-up in the price of oil?

1. Israel
2. Saudi Arabia

10. Which country operates a quiet network of agents made up of highly influential former officials — including former Presidents — in the US, paid either directly for services of various kinds or by way of funding for foundations and pet projects?

1. Israel
2. Saudi Arabia

11. To which country do present US officials defer in hopes of obtaining a well-paid post-retirement job?

1. Israel
2. Saudi Arabia

12. Which country’s much-discussed lobby is made up mostly of businessmen who meet at fancy hotels, has less real influence than everybody thinks, and recently had two staffers framed by the FBI for “espionage”?

1. Saudi Arabia
2. Israel

12. Which country distributes petro-funds around the world to institutions teaching an extremist form of Sunni Islam, institutions which teach the necessity of jihad against Shiite Muslims, Christians, Jews, Israel, and the West?

1. Israel
2. Saudi Arabia

13. In what country are huge amounts of money collected, ostensibly for ‘charity’, which go directly to Hamas and other terrorist groups?

1. Israel
2. Saudi Arabia

14. What country held a telethon in 2005 to raise funds for the Palestinian intifada?

1. Israel
2. Saudi Arabia

15. Which country was the first to be allowed to buy the advanced F15E jets?

1. Israel
2. Saudi Arabia

16. After a huge bomb killed 19 US servicemen and injured scores more at the Khobar Towers housing complex in Dharan in 1996, what country was criticized by the US justice department for withholding evidence and hindering the investigation into the bombing?

1. Israel
2. Saudi Arabia

17. When the Saudi network went head-to-head with the pro-Israel lobby in 1981 over the proposed sale of the advanced AWACS system to Saudi Arabia, who won?

1. The pro-Israel lobby
2. The Saudi network

18. To defend Kuwait and what other country did the US go to war in 1991?

1. Israel
2. Saudi Arabia

19. When Saddam Hussein fired scud missiles at both Israel and Saudi Arabia during the Gulf war, which country was forbidden by the US to defend herself to avoid insulting the other?

1. Saudi Arabia
2. Israel

20. During the recent Annapolis conference, which country’s delegates were made to enter through a service entrance in order to avoid insulting those of the other?

1. Saudi Arabia
2. Israel

Hint: all correct answers are even numbers. But you knew that.

Extra credit essay:

Explain US Mideast policy since the 1960’s in terms of the influence of the Saudi network on a series of Presidents and other officials, especially Fred Dutton, James A. Baker, Jimmy Carter, J. W. Fulbright, G. H. W. Bush and G. W. Bush, etc.

Technorati Tags: Saudi Arabia

Nothing recently has come close to irritating me as much as Marcy Winograd, exemplar of the Jewish anti-Zionist Left (see: Marcy Winograd, please convert to Islam).

But I suppose it’s worth trying to educate her. She can’t possibly be as dumb as she seems.

Ami Isseroff is trying:

However, for the real and imagined crimes of the “Zionists” there is only one remedy according to these friends of “peace and justice:” Israel must be dismantled, and the Jewish people must be denied the right to self determination. Germany, which was responsible for two world wars and genocide, is not to be dismantled. The German state is not to be flooded with Poles and Czechs and Frenchman. Japan, which committed committed unspeakable horrors in China, was not dismantled and settled with Chinese, and the Japanese are allowed their own language and customs, like the Germans. America, which committed genocide against the native Americans, and is the home of many of these ostensible lovers of peace and justice, will not pay for its sins. Russia, which terrorized all of Eastern Europe and the Baltic, and continues to deny the rights of the Chechnyans and others, is exempt from criticism.

But the Jews are not to share the same justice as Germany, Japan, USA and Russia. Israel must be turned into a “secular democratic” single state of Jews and Arabs according to the peace lovers. This is precisely the “peace” solution offered by his excellency, Hajj Amin Al Husseini, Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, the escaped Nazi war criminal, in 1948. And so, in the name of “peace and justice,” the opponents of “Zionism,” including Jews like Marcy Winograd, propagate the racist doctrine that only the Jews are not worthy of self-determination, and that alone among the states of the world, the Jewish state has no right to exist, solely because it is Jewish. [my emphasis]

The continuation of this “peace” plan is known. The Mufti told the British that the “solution” he planned for the Palestinians, that is, the Jews of Palestine, was precisely the one adopted for the Jews of Europe by his mentor and friend, Adolf Hitler. The Mufti planned to build an extermination camp near Nablus. But the Jews of Palestine were not “citizens of the world” and did not allow this “peace solution” to be implemented. That was the cause of the “Nakba” of the Arabs of Palestine. And the same obstinate and evil Zionists will not, frustratingly enough for people like Marcy Winograd, allow the final solution to be implemented now.

Read the whole article here. I hope that Marcy does, although I am afraid that she’s beyond help.

Update [1104 PST]: I am informed that she did read Ami Isseroff’s article, and her response indicates that it did not affect her thinking at all. Why am I not surprised?

Technorati Tags: Marcy Winograd