FresnoZionism.org — ציונות פרסנו

Must-Reads:

Barry Rubin and Jonathan Speyer on The Anglo-American pro-Hamas lobby (yes, there is one. Hizballah, too). Incidentally, Barry Rubin’s new blog is excellent, and should be on everyone’s list to read regularly.

Ralph Peters on 21st Century diplomacy and War, the complete article by Peters with comments by Richard Landes on Landes’ blog. Peters explains how and why the ostensibly greatest military power the world has ever known has apparently forgotten the most basic truths about warfare.

Why-do-they-write-such-dumb-stuff department:

Iran canceled air show when Russia warned Israel planned to destroy all 140 warplanes

DEBKAfile’s Iranian and intelligence sources disclose that Moscow warned Tehran Friday April 17 that Israel was planning to destroy all 140 fighter-bombers concentrated at the Mehr-Abad Air Force base for an air show over Tehran on Iran’s Army Day the following day. The entire fleet was accordingly removed to remote bases and the display canceled.

In the first week of April, Tehran announced it would stage its biggest air show ever to dramatize a ceremonial military parade in the capital on April 18. Iran would show the world that it is capable of fighting off an Israeli attack on its nuclear facilities. Instead only four aircraft flew over the saluting stand. Iranian media explained that the big show was canceled due to “bad weather and poor visibility,” when in fact Tehran basked in warm and sunny weather.

1) The logistics of an air attack on the Iranian nuclear facilities are complex enough that it’s doubtful that any aircraft would be diverted to  a secondary target. The poorly-maintained Iranian air force would not be a threat to the strike force, so why attack it? Syrian and Hezbollah missiles aimed at Israel pose a greater danger.

2) While Israel will likely attack Iran when there is no alternative to prevent Iran from obtaining deliverable nuclear weapons, nobody thinks that this point has been reached yet.

DEBKA’s sensational fantasies do not do anything for their credibility.

Interesting photos department:

The following picture is making the rounds in Israel. It supposedly shows a Palestinian truck modified for use as a mobile Qassam launcher. If anyone knows whether this is for real or a product of Photoshop, please let me know.

The top caption reads “note from where they are launching the Qassams and mortars”. The bottom one translates the Arabic sign on the cab: “if this vehicle violates traffic laws, please contact the Palestinian Authority”. Indeed.

Technorati Tags: Hamas, warfare, Iran, Israel, Palestinians

The Muslim Student Union [MSU] at the University of California, Irvine — one of the most militant anti-Zionist groups on the US campus scene — is staging a massive multi-week anti-Israel event, including appearances by notorious Israel-haters such as George Galloway, Cynthia McKinney, Anna Baltzer, Amir Abdel Malik Ali, and the inimitable Gideon Levy of Ha’aretz.

I could write a book about every one of them, but suffice to say — absolutely without exaggeration — the leadership of Hamas is no more fervently devoted to the destruction of the Jewish state than any of the above. And the same goes for the MSU, which explicitly supports Hamas.

The event is called called “Israel: the Politics of Genocide”, which is actually quite accurate if you think about the goals of the terror organizations supported by the MSU. If you are a member of Facebook, you can see the MSU’s announcement here.

The thing that really drew my attention, though, is the list of useful idiots co-sponsors. Here they are:

Afrikan Student Union
Alpha Epsilon Omega [an Armenian fraternity on campus]
Armenian Student Association
Asian Pacific Student Association
Hindu Student Council
Hip Hop Congress
Pakistani Student Association
Society of Arab Students
Sikh Student Association
The Agora
Radical Student Union
Vietnamese Action Committee
Young Americans for Liberty
Workers Student Alliance

OK, I understand the Society of Arab Students and the Pakistani Student Association, but the Hip Hop Congress? The Hindu Student Council?

I’m particularly unhappy to see the Armenians there. As Christian victims of a Muslim genocide like the one Hamas and the MSU would perpetrate in Israel if they could, they should understand that they are on the wrong side (consider Hamas’ treatment of Christians in Gaza).

Yes, they are understandably annoyed by Israel’s failure to call for Turkey to admit that the events of 1915 were in fact genocide. But it would be better for them to concentrate their efforts on the US — or the EU, which Turkey wants to join — than on a tiny country whose foreign policy is dictated by considerations of survival.

Oh, in case you are interested in what to expect, here’s Amir Abdel Malik Ali speaking at a previous event held at UC Irvine:

Technorati Tags: UC Irvine, Muslim Student Union

Netanyahu:

I am prepared to negotiate with any side that desires to advance peace between Israel and the Palestinians…Contrary to reports, I don’t condition dialogue with the Palestinians on recognition of Israel as a Jewish state. Nevertheless, progress in the peace process does depend on the willingness to recognize Israel as a Jewish state. — Jerusalem Post

It is hard to understand what ‘dialogue’ there could be without such recognition.

When the Arabs refuse to recognize Israel as a Jewish state, they are simply saying “you do not have a right of self-determination here”. They are reaffirming their opinion that Israel does not belong to the Jewish people, it belongs to them. Indeed, they do not think there is a Jewish people, only Jews living in Western Palestine.

This goes far beyond saying that although they rejected the UN partition in 1947 they now agree that the land between the Mediterranean and the Jordan should be partitioned between Jewish and Arab states. It says that there should not be any Jewish state.

One often hears that a Palestinian state is a necessary condition for peace. In any event, as the establishment of Palestinian sovereignty in Gaza has shown, it is certainly not a sufficient condition.

A Palestinian state which does not recognize Israel as a Jewish state will be a state at war with Israel. So doesn’t it make sense to deal with recognition first, before creating the state?

Technorati Tags: Israel, Jewish state, Palestinians, Netanyahu

Yesterday I mentioned the fact that no Palestinian leadership — not Hamas, not Fatah — was prepared to recognize Israel as a Jewish state. I must have been prescient. Today, the following news item appeared:

The Palestinian Authority [PA] and Hamas rejected over the weekend Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s demand that the Palestinians recognize Israel as the state of the Jewish people as a precondition for resuming the stalled peace talks between the two sides…

Chief PA negotiator Saeb Erekat said that the demand to recognize Israel as a Jewish state was “an admission by the Israeli prime minister that he cannot deliver on peace.” Erekat pointed out that the PLO had already recognized Israel’s right to exist when it signed the Oslo Accords, while Netanyahu was refusing to mention a Palestinian state.

Azzam al-Ahmed, a senior Fatah official closely associated with Abbas, said on Saturday that the Palestinians would not return to the negotiating table until Netanyahu publicly accepted the two-state solution.

“We reject Netanyahu’s demand to recognize Israel as a Jewish state,” he said. “This demand illustrates the racist nature of Israel and the extremist policies of its government. It also shows that Israel is not serious about making peace with its neighbors…”

Omar al-Ghul, an adviser to PA Prime Minister Salaam Fayad, said that Netanyahu’s demand was aimed at transferring the Palestinians to another country.

“No Palestinian leader can ever accept this demand even if the whole world recognizes Israel as a Jewish state,” he stressed. “The state of Israel belongs to all its citizens, the Palestinians owners of the land and the Jews living there.” — Jerusalem Post [my emphasis]

There you have it, in words that even an idiot can understand. What Salaam Fayad, the moderate of moderates, beloved by the West for his pragmatism and University of Texas Ph.D,  believes is that ‘two-state solution’ means ‘two Palestinian states’. One of them, Palestine, will  be entirely unpolluted by Jews, while the other — temporarily called ‘Israel’ — will be a ‘democratic state of its citizens’, including of course the almost five million hostile Arab claimants of refugee status.

The Palestinians are quite clear that there is something called a ‘Palestinian people’, although they didn’t talk much about it before 1967,  and they believe that there is an inalienable right of self-determination that entitles them to a state. But for some reason, they are unable to accept that there is a Jewish people with a similar right. We can see this by their insistence that a Jewish state is ‘based on religion’, although more than half of Israel’s Jews are secular.

The Palestinians insist that the idea of a Jewish state is a racist concept, although Arabs can live in today’s Jewish state while Jews will be expelled from ‘Palestine’.

Since the Oslo accords, the PA has equivocated and temporized about recognition of Israel. Netanyahu’s demand is, finally, a sign from an Israeli government that it will no longer be possible for the Palestinians to profit from the Arafatian strategy of talking out of both sides of their mouths.

If even ‘moderate’ Palestinians like Salaam Fayad can’t understand this, then a Palestinian state is not in the cards just yet.

Technorati Tags: Israel, Jewish state, Palestinians