"Israel has the right to defend itself..BUT"

 

 

"Israel has the right to defend itself..BUT"

Ask anyone from the EU or someone like Richard Goldstone whether Israel has the right to defend itself, and you will get the answer of "Yes, but...." Goldstone, for example, said that the UN report he wrote "in no way contradicts the right of Israel to defend itself." He just wrote it in such a way that so severely hampers Israel's ability to defend itself as to make the words meaningless. Amnesty International's Middle East director says that "Israel has a legitimate right to defend itself from rocket attacks but this blockade is not the right policy." Human Rights Watch writes that it "recognizes Israel's right to defend itself against attacks by Palestinian armed groups in Gaza...But lawful means of self-defense do not include harming civilians in Gaza." (Note they do not say "purposeful" harming of civilians, they are implying any harming of civilians, even if Geneva allows it.) The EU Parliament passed a resolution last year that stated, in part, that it "Reaffirms the right of Israel to defend itself, but stresses that this right must be proportional to the threat received and should be exerted in full compliance with the humanitarian law and..... " a full paragraph of what Israel is not allowed to do even as they assert this "right." The upshot seems to be that everyone agrees that Israel is certainly allowed to defend itself in theory, but there is always a "but": Israel has no practical, legal, moral means to do so according to these self-proclaimed arbiters of law and morality. The Mabhouh assassination, presumably done by Israel's Mossad, is a textbook example of this rule at work. Assuming that it was done by Israel, here we see the elimination of a known terrorist and murderer; who was in the process of procuring weapons meant to murder Israeli civilians. No civilians were killed or injured; there was no bloody mess for the chambermaids to clean up; no one else in the hotel were even woken up from their sleep - this was the cleanest, quietest way for Israel to defend itself. And yet, the world is up in arms, mostly because it appears that passports were forged! From Al-Arabiya: European Union foreign ministers condemned on Monday the use of forged European passports by assassins who killed a a top Hamas figure in Dubai, but made no direct reference to Israel. "We strongly condemn the use of fraudulent EU member states' passports and credit cards acquired through the theft of EU citizens' identities," the foreign ministers said in a statement drawn up during a meeting in Brussels The EU also for the first time condemned the act of assassination in Dubai believed to be carried out by Israeli spy agency Mossad. Luxembourg Foreign Minister Jean Asselborn said the culprits must be punished, stressing that such political assassinations "have no place in the 21st century." Even though Goldstone ridiculously asserted that Israel could somehow eliminate the rocket threat through "commando actions" - showing his extreme ignorance of what the threat even was - apparently the clean assassination of a terrorist scumbag in Dubai is not an appropriate way to approach that very same threat. After all, the killing of Mabhouh was much cleaner than any actions Israel could do in Gaza - no damage to anyone's houses, no unwanted injuries, no danger to innocents. And yet it is condemned. (It will be recalled that Mabhouh's often used forged passports as well, and no one seems to be very worked up about that.) Putting it all together, and Israel's critics still cannot come up with a single realistic scenario of how Israel can legally defend itself, even as they insist that Israel has that "right." Having the right without the practical ability means that, according to these people, Israel really doesn't have the right to defend itself. They might as well just admit it.

Hamas: Dubai assassins were likely Arabs, not Israelis

 

 

Slain Hamas official Mahmoud Mabhouh's father holds his photo (Reuters)

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Last update - 14:36 02/02/2010 By Avi Issacharoff Tags: Israel news, Hamas  Inquiry finds murdered Gaza arms smuggler Mahmoud al-Mabhouh had enemies across the Middle East and was wanted by Jordan and Egypt.       A preliminary investigation conducted by Hamas suggests that the assassination of one of its officials in Dubai last month was likely carried out by agents of an Arab government, and not by Israel's Mossad spy agency. When Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, a senior Hamas official reportedly behind the smuggling of Iranian arms to Gaza, was found dead in his hotel room on January 20, the organization was quick to point the finger at Israeli intelligence, vowing revenge attacks. But details of a Hamas inquiry passed to Haaretz reveal that Arab states, not Israel, now top the suspect list. Advertisement Both Hamas and Dubai police say that Mabhouh had enemies across the Middle East, any of whom may have had a motive for his murder. A Hamas source told Haaretz on Monday that Mabhouh was wanted by authorities in both Jordan and Egypt, where he previously spent a year in prison. Hamas also suspects its Palestinian rivals in the West Bank. "It is quite possible that Palestinian Authority security forces were involved," Osama Hamdan, a Hamas leader in Lebanon, told Hezbollah's television station Al-Manar on Monday. "West Bank forces are persecuting our fighters and have killed dozens since 1994," he said. Meanwhile, the Saudi daily Okaz reported on Tuesday that Hamas has decided to halt temporarily negotiations over the release of abducted Israel Defense Forces soldier Gilad Shalit due to Mabhouh's murder. A senior Hamas official told the paper that the prisoner swap talks have reached a critical juncture and reiterated the group's stance that Israel is responsible for the delay in its completion. Details of Mabhouh murder begin to emerge On Sunday, a Dubai police commander updated the Palestinian consul in the United Arab Emirates on progress in the investigation. Mabhouh was killed by a seven-man team, four whom had been identified, the commander said. According to Hamas investigators, Mabhouh arrived in the Syrian capital Damascus at 9:00 A.M. on the morning of January 19, where he boarded flight EK912 for the UAE, landing at Dubai at 2:30 P.M. Local authorities were unaware of the presence of the Hamas leader, who traveled under a false identity. Al-Mabhouh took a taxi to the luxury Al Bustan Rutana Hotel, where he checked into room 130, also under a false name. As always when traveling, al-Mabhouh had taken the precaution of reserving in advance a room with no balcony and sealed windows. On arrival, he deposited a case of documents in the hotel safe before spending around an hour in his room. Between 4:30 P.M. and 5:00 P.M. al-Mabhouh left the hotel for a meeting. Hamas claims to know the identity of his Dubai contact - but has so far kept details under wraps. Hamas assumes that he dined outside the hotel, which has no record of him ordering food or drink, before returning to his room at around 9:00 P.M. Police say it is likely that Mabhouh answered the door to his assailants - but Hamas believes the attackers awaited him on his return and were warned of his approach by accomplices tailing him. At 9:30 P.M. Mabhouh's wife called his cellular telephone. There was no answer. Both Hamas and police believe the victim was by then already dead. His body was discovered the following day. Post mortem examinations revealed signs of electrocution beneath both ears -presumably from a device used to stun Mabhouh, whose nose was bleeding and whose teeth showed signs of abrasion. Pathologists determined the cause of death as asphyxiation, probably with a pillow found near the body and stained with blood. Meanwhile, London's Sunday Times reported on Sunday that Mabhouh had been injected with a drug that simulated the effects of a natural heart attack. Also on Sunday, Israeli Infrastructure Minister Uzi landau denied that Mossad agents had posed as part of his entourage to carry out the hit. Landau, the first Israeli minister to travel officially to the UAE, left the country three days before Mabhouh was killed.

Another Tack: 'Dam butlab dam' ­ only for some

 

 By SARAH HONIG 19/02/2010, jpost.com
 
As in yesteryear, so in the 21st century, it's axiomatic that Arabs have the right to inflict incalculable harm on Jews, but the Jews'
attempts to deflect such blows are evil, outrageous and deserving of merciless punishment.
 
Terrorist arms smuggler Mahmoud al-Mabhouh's son, Abdel-Rauf, stood teary-eyed before TV interviewers and lavished praise on his deceased father. He bragged that the late lamented, who was discovered dead in Dubai, "fought the Jews, hit the Jews, kidnapped and killed Israelis.
He outfitted and dispatched suicide bombers." That evidently made him an object for admiration, a source of honor and a claim to fame.
Killing Jews is a noble objective, one to take pride in, to revere.
 
So when we Israelis point to Mabhouh's gory record, it isn't just our biased say-so. It's hardly an unsubstantiated allegation, a pretext to justify assassination. His own son concedes this, indeed he crows about it as the paramount tribute he can pay his father.
 
And it isn't a mournful son's subjective or self-serving aggrandizement either. Hamas issued an official statement celebrating its latest shahid (martyr). Prominent in the Hamas-compiled catalog of Mabhouh glories are the 1989 abduction-murders of IDF soldiers Avi Sasportas and Ilan Sa'adon.
 
By the boastful admission of both his kin and organization, Mabhouh's hands were bloodstained. Hence, by the Arabs' own rules of engagement, he was liable for reprisal. The principal code governing these rules is dam butlab dam (blood begets blood).
 
Because of this core premise Hamas now vows to wreak the most horrific vengeance on Israel, actual proof of Israeli culpability for Mabhouh's demise being entirely immaterial. All Israelis are therefore fair game. This is the elementary protocol of the blood feud.
 
But here's where we encounter our enemies' cynical lopsided logic. By their own rules ­ assuming for argument's sake that we submit ourselves to them ­ we should be perceived just as entitled as they to hunt down and kill whoever killed our own. Yet our retribution is condemned a priori as illegitimate. The right to avenge Mabhouh's death is unchallenged, whereas the right to avenge Mabhouh's victims is categorically denied. What is valid, in fact a sacred duty for one side, is intolerable and entirely villainous for the other.
 
The underlying assertion is that Mabhouh's acts were virtuous and sanctioned by absolute supernal will. Unlike our own, Arab society is unbothered by the pluralistic niceties of postmodern moral relativism.
Allah is exclusively on their side and they are the only interpreters of his wishes. This isn't only Hamas ideology. The Palestinian Media Watch disseminated the text of the January 29 sermon on PATV, under the auspices of our supposed peace-partner Mahmoud Abbas.
 
It called on all Muslims to remember that "the Jews are the Jews! The Jews are the Jews! Even if donkeys would cease to bray, dogs cease to bark, wolves cease to howl and snakes to bite, the Jews would not cease to harbor hatred towards Muslims. The Prophet said that if two Jews would be alone with a Muslim, they would think only of killing him… The Prophet says: 'You shall fight the Jews and kill them...'"
There is a whole loathsome lot more, but the basis is clear: the murder of Jews is divinely decreed.
 
In other words, Mabhouh acted morally. Those who opposed him are immoral. By this precept Jews must die and have no right to resist.
That is their lot. Not only do they possess no right to avenge, they possess no right to self-defense, to fight at all. Their very existence is a provocation, a casus belli.
 
THIS IS key to understanding today's Mideast. As in yesteryear, so in the 21st century it's axiomatic that Arabs have the right to inflict incalculable harm on Jews ­ and to do so in the most sadistically inventive ways ­ but the Jews' attempts to deflect such blows are evil, outrageous and deserving of merciless punishment.
 
Failure to admit how selective Arab rules of warfare are precludes making sense of anything in our region and dooms to failure any so-called peace drives and mediation initiatives. The tragedy is that not only is the fundamental asymmetry between Jewish and Arab mind-sets not comprehended abroad, but there's no inclination to even consider it.
 
Worse yet ­ the Arabs' skewed standards are commonly accepted overseas. Hence the outcry whenever Israel does anything in aid of its self-preservation. Large-scale campaigns like Defensive Shield, the Lebanon War or Cast Lead are decried for "lack or proportionality."
However, there was censure even for pinpointed targeting such as the recent Nablus killing (in an exchange of fire during an attempted
arrest) of the three ambushers who had earlier slain Meir Avshalom Chai in a drive-by shooting. Abbas described them as "ruthlessly executed martyrs." Even the trials and convictions of murderers like Marwan Barghouti are portrayed as illegitimate. There plainly is just nothing Israel may do to secure itself. Even the most legalistically scrupulous remedies are repudiated.
 
The Goldstone Report is part and parcel of ongoing efforts to paralyze and disallow Israeli self-defense. The mud now slung at Israel is intended to intimidate use of force in future.
 
It's nothing new. This isn't the product of what's castigated as occupation and/or the shortage of suicidal concessions on Israel's part to appease Arab/Muslim appetites. Jewish self-defense, in its most rudimentary and literal sense, was anathema way before the Jewish state's birth and subsequent cheeky survival.
 
In his milestone, still ever-relevant 1943 book The Forgotten Ally, Dutch-Canadian journalist Pierre Van Paassen quotes his own interview with the British Mandate's acting high commissioner Harry Luke during the countrywide Arab rioting of 1929 (most notorious for the Hebron massacre). Van Paassen told Luke: "You arrested first and foremost, in every case I investigated, the Jews who successfully defended themselves. You arrested 50 Jews in Haifa at the moment they defended themselves heroically against the attack of a mob of some 2,000 runners-amok… yesterday I saw a man brought into Jerusalem by the mounted police and recognized in him an older settler from the neighborhood of Lifta, the owner of a small canning factory who had been in this country for more than 50 years ­ a real pioneer. I visited this man in jail. His name is Isaac Brozen… He was arrested after he had barricaded himself in his factory… Arabs from Lifta raped and massacred his old wife and two daughters and set fire to his house across the roadway."
 
Luke, like Goldstone eight decades later, argued that he was only looking out for Jews. Brozen, and the many others Van Paassen listed, were merely "placed in protective custody for their own good." The interviewer countered: "but they were in chains and in solitary confinement… Mr. Brozen was loaded down under chains… chains on his hands and chains on his feet, old Turkish chains at that…"
 
The more things change, the more they stay the same. "Impartial" Brits once sought to foil Jewish defense with chains. Now "impartial"
Goldstone tries to foil Jewish defense with different, no less restrictive shackles.
 
The writer was The Jerusalem Post's long-time political correspondent (as well as for years of the now-defunct Davar). She headed the Post's Tel Aviv bureau, and wrote daily analyses of the political scene as well as in-depth features.

Must Read Caroline Glick Abbas is not moderate

February 21, 110 Sunday 15 AdarI 3870 12:25 IST

Photo by: AP [file] Column One: The Fatah fairy tale BY CAROLINE GLICK 19/02/2010 Israel's is the only government that can force the rest of the world to recognize that Abbas is not an ally.

Fahmi Shabaneh is an odd candidate for dissident status. Shabaneh is a Jerusalemite who joined the Palestinian Authority's General Intelligence Service in 1994. Working for PA head Mahmoud Abbas and GIS commander Tawfik Tirawi, Shabaneh was tasked with investigating Arab Jerusalemites suspected of selling land to Jews. Such sales are a capital offense in the PA. Since 1994 scores of Arabs have been the victims of extrajudicial executions after having been fingered by the likes of Shabaneh. A few years ago, Abbas and Tirawi gave Shabaneh a new assignment. They put him in charge of a unit responsible for investigating corrupt activities carried out by PA officials. They probably assumed a team player like Shabaneh understood what he was supposed to do. Just as Abbas's predecessor, Yasser Arafat, reportedly had full dossiers on all of his underlings and used damning information to keep them loyal to him, so Abbas probably believed that Shabaneh's information was his to use or ignore as he saw fit. For a while, Abbas's faith was well-placed. Shabaneh collected massive amounts of information on senior PA officials detailing their illegal activities. These activities included the theft of hundreds of millions of dollars in international aid; illegal seizure of land and homes; and monetary and sexual extortion of their fellow Palestinians. Over time, Shabaneh became disillusioned with his boss. Abbas appointed him to his job around the time he was elected PA head in 2005. Abbas ran on an anti-corruption platform. Shabaneh's information demonstrated that Abbas presided over a criminal syndicate posing as a government. And yet rather than arrest his corrupt, criminal associates, Abbas promoted them. Abbas continued promoting his corrupt colleagues even after Hamas's 2006 electoral victory. That win owed to a significant degree to the widespread public revulsion with Fatah's rampant corruption. With Israel and the US lining up to support him after the Hamas victory, Abbas sat on his hands. Enjoying his new status as the irreplaceable "moderate," he allowed his advisers and colleagues to continue enriching themselves with the international donor funds that skyrocketed after Hamas's victory. Since 2006, despite the billions of dollars in international aid showered on Fatah, Hamas has consistently led Fatah in opinion polls. Rather than clean up their act, Abbas and his Fatah colleagues have sought to ingratiate themselves with their public by ratcheting up their incitement against Israel. And since Abbas has been deemed irreplaceable, the same West that turns a blind eye to his corruption, refuses to criticize his encouragement of terrorism. And this makes sense. How can the West question the only thing standing in the way of a Hamas takeover of Judea and Samaria? Recently, Shabaneh decided he had had enough. The time had come to expose what he knows. But he ran into an unanticipated difficulty. No one wanted to know. As he put it, Arab and Western journalists wouldn't touch his story for fear of being "punished" by the PA. In his words, Western journalists "don't want to hear negative things about Fatah and Abbas." Lacking other options, Shabaneh brought his information to The Jerusalem Post's Khaled Abu Toameh. On January 29, the Post published Abu Toameh's interview with Shabaneh on our front page. Among other impressive scoops, Shabaneh related that Abbas's associates purloined $3.2 million in cash that the US gave Abbas ahead of the 2006 elections. He told Abu Toameh how PA officials who were almost penniless in 1994 now have tens and even hundreds of millions of dollars in their private accounts. He related how he watched in horror as Abbas promoted the very officials he reported on. And he showed Abu Toameh a video of Abbas's chief of staff Rafik Husseini naked in the bedroom of a Christian woman who sought employment with the PA. If Shabaneh's stories were about Israeli or Western officials, there is no doubt that they would have been picked up by every self-respecting news organization in the world. If he had been talking about Israelis, officials from Washington to Brussels to the UN would be loudly calling for official investigations. But since he was talking about the Palestinians, no one cared. The State Department had nothing to say. The EU had nothing to say. The New York Times acted as if his revelations were about nothing more than a sex scandal. As for Abbas and his cronies, they were quick to blame the Jews. They accused Shabaneh – their trusted henchman when it came to land sales to Jews – of being an Israeli agent. And when Channel 10 announced it was broadcasting Husseini's romp in the sack, Abbas demanded that Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu bar the broadcast, (apparently forgetting that unlike his PA-controlled media, Israel's media organs are free). SHABANEH'S ODYSSEY from PA regime loyalist to dissident is an interesting tale. But what is more noteworthy than his personal journey is the world's indifference to his revelations. Just as the mountains of evidence that Fatah officials – including Shabaneh's boss Tirawi – have been actively involved in terrorist attacks against Israel have been systematically ignored by successive US administrations, Israeli governments and EU foreign policy chiefs, so no one wants to think about the fact that Fatah is a criminal syndicate. The implications are too devastating. Since at least 1994, successive US administrations goaded by the EU have made supporting Fatah and the PA the centerpiece of their Middle East policy. They want to receive proof that Fatah is a terrorist organization that operates like a criminal organization like they want – in the immortal words of former EU Middle East envoy Christopher Patten – "a hole in [their] head." As for the Western media, their lack of interest in Shabaneh's revelation serves as a reminder of just how mendacious much of the reportage about the Palestinians and Israel is. For 16 years, the American and European media have turned blind eyes to Palestinian misbehavior while expansively reporting every allegation against Israel – no matter how flimsy or obviously false. When the history of the media's coverage of the Middle East is written it will constitute one of the darkest chapters in Western media history. But while the American and European allegiance to the fable of Fatah as the anchor of the two-state solution accounts for the indifference of both to Shabaneh's disclosures, what accounts for the Netanyahu government's behavior in this matter? Shortly after the Post first published Shabaneh's story, the PA issued an arrest warrant against him. He was charged among other things with "harming the national interests" of the Palestinians. But Abbas's henchmen couldn't put their hands on him. Israel had already arrested him. Shabaneh was booked for among other things, illegally working for the PA. It is illegal for Israeli residents to work for the PA. But oddly, although Israeli authorities have known whom he worked for since 1994, until his disclosures were made public, they never saw any pressing need to arrest or prosecute him. Official Israel has nothing to say about Shabaneh's information. Instead, in the wake of his disclosures, everyone from Netanyahu to Defense Minister Ehud Barak has continued to daily proclaim their dedication to reaching a peace accord with Abbas. This even as Abbas and his cronies accuse Israel of using the "traitorous" Shabaneh to pressure Abbas into negotiating with Israel. There are two explanations for Israel's behavior. First, there is the fact the presence of Barak and his Labor Party in the government makes it impossible for Netanyahu and his Likud Party to abandon the failed two-state paradigm of dealing the PA. If Netanyahu and his colleagues were to point out that the PA is a kleptocracy and its senior officials enable terror and escalate incitement to deflect their public's attention away from their criminality, (as well as because they want to destroy Israel), then Labor may bolt the coalition. Beyond that, there is no doubt that an Israeli denunciation of Abbas and his mafia would enrage the US and EU. Apparently, Netanyahu – who to please President Barack Obama accepted the two-state paradigm in spite of the fact that he opposes it, and suspended Jewish construction in Judea and Samaria despite the fact that knows doing this is wrong – is loath to pick a fight by pointing out the obvious fact that the PA is a corrupt band of oppressive thieves. Shabaneh argues that due to PA corruption, Hamas remains the preferred alternative for Palestinians in Judea and Samaria. In his view, the only reason Hamas has yet to take over Judea and Samaria is the IDF presence in the areas. The strategic implications of his statement are clear. Far from being a bulwark against Hamas, Abbas empowers the Iranian-backed jihadist force. The only bulwark against Hamas is Israel. WHAT THIS means is that Israel must end its support for Abbas. Every day he remains in power, he perpetuates a myth of Palestinian moderation. As a supposed moderate, he claims that Israel should curtail its counterterror operations and let his own "moderate" forces take over. To strengthen Abbas, the US pressures Israel to curtail its counterterror operations in Judea and Samaria. To please the US, Israel in turn cuts back its operations. Abbas's men fight Hamas, but they also terrorize journalists, merchants and plain civilians who fall in their path, and so strengthen Hamas. To ratchet up public support for Fatah, Abbas escalates PA incitement against Israel. This then encourages his own forces to attack Israelis – as happened last week when one of his security officers murdered IDF St.-Sgt. Maj. Ihab Khatib. And so it goes. It is clear that Barak will threaten to bolt the coalition if Netanyahu decides to cut off Abbas. But if he left, where would he go? Barak has nowhere to go. He will not be reelected to lead his party. And if Labor leaves the coalition, Netanyahu would still be far from losing his majority in Knesset. As for angering the White House, the fact of the matter is that by pointing out that Abbas is not a credible leader, Israel will make it more difficult for Obama and his advisers to coerce Israel into making further concessions that will only further empower Hamas. Shabaneh told the Post that he fully expects the PA to try to kill him. But in a way, the yawns that greeted his story are his best life insurance policy. Until the world stops believing that Fatah is indispensable, no one will listen to the Shabanehs of the world and so the PA has no reason to kill him. Just as the Post was the only media organ that would publish his story, so the Israeli government is the only government that can force the rest of the world to recognize that Abbas is not an ally. But to do that, the government itself must finally break with the fairy tale of Fatah moderation. caroline@carolineglick.com

Hezbollah is not the IRA

Hezbollah is not the IRA

Tony Badran, February 2, 2010

Hezbollah soldiers salute during a parade on Martyrs' Day in Dahieh. (AFP photo/Ramzi Haidar)

Islamist groups have invited a whole set of analogies purportedly aimed at better explaining them and how best to deal with them. One such analogy that has gained currency in recent years is the oft-encountered comparison between Islamist groups and the Irish Republican Army.

The point of the comparison is to show that as the IRA was purportedly co-opted through dialogue, the same method can be applied to other armed organizations as well. Hence, the argument runs, only such a peaceful process, and not military coercion, will lead to any given group's decision to abandon violence, and ultimately to disarm and integrate into democratic politics. Of course, forsaking violence is not a prerequisite for dialogue, and engagement is further facilitated by a nifty conceit distinguishing a group's "military wing" from its ostensibly more moderate or pragmatic "political wing." Indeed, the British are currently pursuing this policy with Hezbollah – and going nowhere.

The argument has just been trotted out again in a rather fantastical and factually handicapped piece  by Steven Simon and Jonathan Stevenson on the Foreign Affairs website.

The two authors get off to a sound start, noting a major difference between the IRA and Hezbollah, namely the organic ties between the Party of God and Iran, which have no parallel in the IRA. However, when they elide that inconvenient fact and nonetheless claim that "the similarities between the two cases are no less striking than the differences," their argument goes off the tracks.

One "similarity," they contend, is that both Hezbollah and the IRA have "political wings." But this is misleading, not least of all because Hezbollah rejects and ridicules the proposition that it has a "political wing" separate from a "military" one.

Even if everyone knew that the IRA and its political wing, Sinn Fein, were separate only in name, Sinn Fein's leaders still tried to deny any organizational links or knowledge of IRA operations. But that's not how Hezbollah works. For instance, in an interview with the Los Angeles Times last spring, Hezbollah's deputy secretary general, Naim Qassem, dismissed the supposed dichotomy outright. "All political, social and jihad work is tied to the decisions of this leadership," he said. "The same leadership that directs the parliamentary and government work also leads jihad actions."

In other words, far from being ready to "shift more decisively to the political realm," as Simon and Stevenson contend, Hezbollah sees involvement in politics as serving its broader, regional, agenda: "resistance."

It's bad enough to misunderstand Hezbollah, but to make the case that engagement in peaceful dialogue is what leads to moderation and disarmament is to distort the historical record regarding the IRA as well. The British did not bring the IRA "in from the cold" through peaceful talks with its "political wing." Rather they forced them to the table after infiltrating their ranks and cultivating informers even in the top echelons of the movement. Information from these informers was secretly passed to Loyalist paramilitary forces who used it to target IRA members extra-judicially.

In the end, the IRA was cornered, unable to force a British withdrawal, and, worse, unable to even protect its community from Loyalist gangs. It was not the Brits but the IRA that initiated talks when its armed struggle had reached a stalemate.

This is hardly where Hezbollah sees itself today, neither ideologically nor operationally. Instead of finding itself cornered by its local rivals, Hezbollah has used its weapons to extract powerful political concessions, neutralize the unfavorable result of democratic elections, and impose its priorities on its adversaries and the Lebanese government.

Why is Simon and Stevenson's article riddled with so many errors and misconceptions? Because they assume an affirmative response to a key question that they never bother tackling: Does Hezbollah want to disarm? Without addressing this question convincingly, further misconceptions are inevitable, like the authors' proposition, unsupported by any evidence, that Hezbollah is trying to distance itself from Iran, whose Ruling Jurist (Wali al-Faqih), as Hezbollah itself declares, has final say over all important decisions. The proper answer of course is that Hezbollah does not want to disarm since it makes no sense for it to do so, neither from a pragmatic perspective nor an ideological one.
 
The issue here is not sloppiness, but a chronic ailment afflicting Western writing on the Middle East, as what appears to be analysis is often something else entirely. Simon (who was recently in Lebanon at the invitation of the New Opinion Group) and Stevenson are not writing about Hezbollah or Lebanon, but Washington.

In 2003 the two co-wrote an essay arguing that the example of Northern Ireland was "a strong argument" against adopting a "lenient" policy with Hamas, so why do they now argue that such treatment will work with Hezbollah? Perhaps it is because there are figures in the Obama administration who are sympathetic to a policy of engagement with Hezbollah, like the NSC staff's counterterrorism czar, John Brennan, who has publically implied an acceptance of the "political vs. military wing" dichotomy in Hezbollah, claiming that the "political wing" allegedly denounces the violence of the "military."
 
Thankfully, when it comes to Hezbollah, as evident from the State Department's quick rejection of Brennan's views, there is more sobriety in Washington than in the poor Foreign Affairs article, or in the British Foreign Office for that matter.

Tony Badran is a research fellow with the Center for Terrorism Research at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.

 

What is a Miss?

by Paula R. Stern
Shevat 22, 5770, 2/6/2010

Palestinians shot a rocket at Israel yesterday. For all intents and purposes, they again missed their target...whatever that might have been this time. Palestinians also launched explosive barrels against Israel's shore lines. For all intents and purposes, they again missed their target...whatever that might have been. The devices - three so far and counting, were all found and neutralized. A miss. Again.

Because this new water warfare is a bit unique, it garners a bit of international attention but for all intents and purposes, the explosives were oh-so-boringly disarmed. No spectacular explosions; no blood; no deaths and so, sadly, no real news as far as much of the world is concerned.

The world is blasé about the rockets that keep raining down on us. Yesterday, another rocket - the 20th rocket in a period of 34 days. The rocket crashed down near a city of 25,000 people. Certainly, Hamas cannot control the rockets - proof in the fact that they keep missing. But...because they cannot be controlled, because they are launched indiscriminately, they bring with them terror.

There is no miss when it comes to terror - and that is the point that must be made.

A miss doesn't make the news but that doesn't mean anything on the scale of what is really important. Twenty times in the last month, close to one million people have been terrorized by rockets.

In the last few days, all of Israel has been warned - avoid the seashore and if you go, beware. If you see a suspicious object...it could be a bomb. Can you relate this idiocy to your life - you who live far from such a concept?

When I was young and wanted a day of freedom, it was to the beach I went. I have always felt so close to the water, so touched by the majesty and power of that place where water meets land. Two years ago, I asked my youngest daughter what she wanted to do on her last day of vacation. Elie was in the army, her older sister in her first year of marriage. My youngest child picked the sea and so we went (A Candle and a Wave). I watched her dance among the waves, enthralled as I have always been. Today, in fear, there are many who are not going to the beaches; the army has told us to stay away while they comb the waters of our shoreline. Boats have been warned as well. This too they would take from us, if we let them.

What amazes me is how the shades of terrorism never seem to include terror. Attacks are measured only in bodies and blood - but what of the terror itself? What of the family who avoids the beach, the mall, the buses today because they are afraid? What of the child who walks and is afraid on his way to school because he knows that a Color Red might sound and he has to run and hide and only has 15 seconds?

What of the mother who plays in the park with two of her children and wonders if she can, within 15 seconds, get to both and safety as well? All these are facets of terrorism too easily ignored.

That the Palestinians missed murdering innocents in Sderot yesterday and the day before and eighteen other times this past month, is a blessing, a miracle, a gift. The fact that alert Israelis are finding these water bombs before innocents find them is a blessing, a miracle, a gift. It is wrong to ignore the horror, the terror, the indignity, the murderous intent...simply because, by the grace of God and our security forces, the Palestinians have, once again, missed their targets.

http://www.ekurd.net/mismas/articles/misc2010/2/syriakurdistan234.htm

Kurdish man died under torture in Syria, two others arrested

February 14, 2010

 

AFRIN, Syrian Kurdistan,— According to Syrian Committee for Human Rights – MAD, Mohammed Musto Rashid from Mabatli, Afrin, died as a result of torture in Aleppo Central prison. He had been in detention for nearly four months, and had been subjected to severe torture, and was taken to hospital in Allepo where he stayed for four days. He was then sent back to prison and his death was announced on 19 January 2010. The reason for his arrest and detention is not known, nor if this was in connection with any political activity.

 

Zahr al-Din Khorshid Ibish and his brother Rashid, from the town of Afrin, were arrested on 1 January 2010 after a raid on their house by security forces.                
Mohammed Musto Rashid, a Syrian Kurd, died under torture in Syria
Zahr al-Din Khorshid Ibish had been detained in Turkey for eight years for allegedly belonging to the PKK. He was handed to the Syrian authorities in 2004,www.ekurd.netand was then imprisoned for three months. He then moved to live in Lebanon with his brother, where he worked for three years. On return to Syria they were arrested again, but the reasons for the arrest are unknown.

 

Syrian Committee for Human Rights – MAD is calling for the responsible authorities to investigate the death of Mohammed Musto Rashid, and bring the perpetrators to justice.