Vittorio was not a peace activist. He was not a human rights activist.

Vittorio Arrigoni, who was killed yesterday by a Muslim group in Gaza, was not a peace activist. He was not a human rights activist.

And, as Zvi points out in the comments to my last post, he was not even a "pro-Palestinian" activist.

A look at his Facebook page photos show nothing about how much he loves Palestinian Arabs. Barely any pictures of him smiling with his friends the Gazans. Unlike most Facebook pages, stuffed with photos of people smiling with their family and friends, Arrigoni's page is filled with hate.

In fact, one can see how he defined himself: not as pro-anything, but only as anti-Zionist:

He never had anything bad to say about Hamas. He never campaigned for Arab countries to stop their discrimination against Palestinian Arabs. He never spoke a word demanding that "refugee camps" in Gaza be dismantled and real homes built.

Here is how he was described by his Free Gaza friend, Mary Hughes Thompson (via email):

Words can't express the shock and sense of bereavement at the loss of this beautiful man, who considered himself Palestinian.  The videos we saw of him bloodied and blindfolded were chilling, nothing like the Vittorio we knew and loved, always smiling, always wearing a skipper's hat and holding his beloved pipe.  

The anti-Israel left might consider themselves "Palestinian," but clearly some Palestinian Arabs don't.

Imagine if Christian Zionists who visit Israel in solidarity were murdered - by Jews. You can bet that their enthusiasm for Israel would cool quite quickly.

But that is because their support is built on love, not hate.

So-called "Pro-Palestinian activists" are not motivated by love. If they were, they would act completely differently. So the murders of Arrigoni and Juliano Mer-Khamis - done by the people they supposedly love - will not make a dent in far leftist "support" for PalArabs, because they don't support them in any real way.

They only have a shared hate for Israel.

One last cartoon on Arrigoni's Facebook page is stunning in its irony, an irony that his fellow activists will never, ever get:

UPDATE: One more lovely photo that Vittorio thought was wonderful: (h/t Kramerica)

His heart was overflowing with love.

To be clear...he didn't deserve to die. But he doesn't deserve to be remembered as a person who cared one bit about peace or human rights, either.

 He was a hater.

Palestinian girl shot in the head. Call the NGOs! Oh, wait...

From Ma'an:

A Palestinian girl was killed Saturday evening after she was accidentally hit by gunfire during wedding celebrations in Balata refugee camp east of Nablus.

Local sources said that Ilaa al-Araj, 16, was hit in her head by a bullet fired during wedding celebrations, which she had been watching from the roof of her home.

Sources said that the girl was taken to Rafidiya Governmental Hospital in Nablus but she was later pronounced dead.

Sources added that the shooter had turned himself into the Palestinian police, who have opened an investigation to determine the circumstances of the incident.

It is illegal in the occupied Palestinian territories to fire gunshots during celebrations, although it remains a common practice.

In 2006, after three young girls were accidentally killed by gunfire at a wedding in Jenin, the Palestinian Center for Human Rights issued a statement that said they were "extremely concerned over the continued falling of victims, mostly children, by gunshots fired during celebrations and weddings."

In 2010, a Bedouin groom was killed at a bachelor party in the Negev.

In 2011, a girl celebrating her college prep test results in Gaza City was killed by celebratory gunfire shot by her brother.

Six children and three women were injured from celebratory gunfire at Israel releasing terrorists in 2011.

In 2013, at a wedding in Yemen, a happy gunman killed three guests dancing to "Gangham Style" on video.

I have yet to see any European NGOs spend money on educating Arabs that firing weapons at celebrations is dangerous. Shouldn't they throw a few euros into saving Arab lives?

But if you find a way to blame Jews for the killings, then the EU money would flood in.

Study: "10,000 international forces cannot stop PalArab terror" (UPDATED)

One of the assumptions of a final peace agreement that is bandied about is the idea that an international force would be deployed within the PA-controlled areas in order to protect both sides from aggression by the other.

A new study determines that such an approach would fail to stop Palestinian Arab terrorists from their activities.

From IMRA:

Maariv correspondent Eli Brandstein reported in the 21 April 2011 edition that a war simulation organized by the Saban Center with the participation of former senior American officials found that a large international force of 10,000 deployed in a sovereign Palestinian state could not prevent Palestinian terror attacks against Israeli targets despite receiving advance warning from Israel.

The simulation also found that official Palestinian security forces would not act themselves to prevent the attacks, relying instead on the ineffective international forces.

To make matters worse, the simulation found that the presence of the international force in the Palestinian state served to increase friction and tension between Israel and the United States in a way that impaired security cooperation between Israel and the United States.

Under the simulation, a sovereign Palestinian state would be created after a complete Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank with major settlement blocs annexed by Israel and over 82 settlements evacuated.

The 10,000 man international security force that failed in the simulation was composed of European soldiers along with some soldiers from Morocco and Palestinians under American command.

In the simulation the international force enjoyed complete security authority via a UN mandate with its principle mission being to prevent terror attacks against Israel.

Maariv did not indicate if any Palestinian state promoters have revised their position given the results of the simulation given that these result serve to undermine a key working assumption of those who claim that there are viable durable workable security arrangements that could be implemented in the event of the creation of a sovereign Palestinian state.

So much for what "everyone knows."

Yet, as with all other fatal assumptions that have no proof, real evidence will not sway those who are wedded to the idea of the "peace process."

(h/t Zach N)

UPDATE:

In response to a inquiry by IMRA regarding the simulation reported in
Maariv(see below) , Kenneth M. Pollack, Director of the Saban Center for
Middle East Policy responded late Saturday night as follows:

"The Maariv report is entirely INACCURATE. It is factually incorrect. The
simulation demonstrated nothing of the sort. We tried to explain this to the
reporter, but apparently he was not interested.

We will be putting out an accurate account of the simulation and its
findings in the days ahead. You will find it on the Brookings website when
it is out. "

Nice to know. We'll see. (h/t Challah Hu Akbar)

Honor killing in the West Bank: A slight twist and a light sentence

Firas Press reports that a West Bank man who murdered his daughter for "honor" has been sentenced to eight years in prison.

His sentence was reduced from life imprisonment because he is older and the head of a large family, as well as (if I am interpreting it correctly) his "fury" showed that it was a real honor crime, a crime of passion and not just an ordinary murder.

One twist: Not only did he kill his daughter because of his suspicion that she was involved with a man who was not her husband, but he also thought that she was involved in giving intelligence to Israel!

I'm not sure if that was a factor in the light sentence, though.

Last days of Passover open thread

I will not be able to blog for the last two days of the Passover holiday starting tonight. (This is reason #1765 to move to Israel....)

Anyway, here's an open thread to entertain everyone until Tuesday night....

Have a Chag Sameach and happy holidays for the other weekend holiday celebrants (including, of course, Egyptians!)

"Jews destroyed the Arab character of the Jewish Quarter" (NYT, 1971)

From the New York Times, May 29, 1971:

It sounds ridiculous to claim that the Jewish Quarter had an "Arab character" after only 19 years, but isn't it equally ludicrous to characterize all of Jerusalem outside the Green Line as "Arab East Jerusalem"? Yet that is what is routinely written today.

Jews were a majority in Jerusalem since the 1860s. Since 1900, Jerusalem's Old City and its neighborhoods/villages in  the east, north and south have been under 18 years of Ottoman rule, 30 years of British rule, 19 years of Jordanian Arab rule and 47 years under the rule of the Jewish state. For some reason, the 19 years of illegal Jordanian occupation is considered the status quo, the anomalous 19 years that makes the entire area supposedly "Arab."

But it isn't. Jerusalem has never been an important city to Arabs or Muslims except during times that it was controlled by Jews or Christians. Jews didn't only live in the Jewish Quarter, but they lived throughout the city as well as in supposedly "Arab" neighborhoods like Silwan - a Biblical village later settled by Jews who called it Kfar HaShiloach. 

There were even synagogues and yeshivot in the Muslim quarter 150 years ago. 

As absurd as the headline of this story is, only a few decades later the world now believes the lie.

(h/t/ Ahron, YMedad)

BDS Claims Credit For Keeping Mozart From Appearing In Israel (PreOccupied Territory)

Our weekly column from the humor site PreOccupied Territory. 

Check out their Facebook page.

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Vienna, May 13 - Leaders of the Boycott, Divest, Sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel are boasting that their publicity efforts have succeeded in preventing one of the world's most famous composers and performers of classical music from making an appearance in the Jewish State.
Wolfgang Mozart, an Austrian composer of chamber, orchestral, and operatic works, has never performed in Israel, and appears unlikely ever to do so. While no official statement from Mozart addresses the issue specifically, BDS activists assert that their campaign served as the decisive factor.

"The facts are simple: we have been campaigning among artists for quite some time, and since we began more than a decade ago, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart has not once announced plans to travel to Israel," said prominent BDS activist Mustafa Barghouti. "Clearly, this kind of pressure works, and we intend to maintain our course of action until all artists finally come around."

Other figures in the music world who are active in BDS circles applauded the news. "This is a growing movement whose success is magnified through momentum, so we celebrate this coup," said former Pink Floyd member Roger Waters, a high-profile proponent of the cultural isolation of Israel. "At the same time, we must keep up the pressure for genuine success to happen. Real political change - the elimination of the only Jewish state in he world - is not something that will occur all by itself."

Waters added that all indications seem to point to other musical giants joining the boycott: of Johannes Brahms, Felix Mendelssohn, Franz Schubert, the entire Bach family, Josef Haydn, Claude Debussy, Antonio Vivaldi, Georg Frederic Handel, and many other influential composers, not a single one has announced a planned trip to Israel since the current round of BDS activity began to gain momentum in 2002.

Cultural institutions in Israel have yet to respond formally to the BDS announcement, but experts say they are unlikely to dignify it. "Reacting publicly to this would be playing into the hands of the BDS people, whose main weapon is publicity," explained Mozart biographer Maynard Solomon. "I personally find this all an unconvincing publicity stunt, since what they're really after would be an actual statement by, say, Ludwig Beethoven that he refuses to play in Israel because of the way they treat the Palestinians. And they're never going to get that, not from everything we know about Mozart."

Solomon explained that it would be completely unlike Mozart to involve himself in anything political, considering the composer's experience of dependence on political figures. "Alienating an entire society, especially one disproportionately appreciative of and involved in classical music, is not something I can see Mozart ever doing, and that's only one myriad other good reasons not to believe the BDS crowing," he added.

Activists intend to continue focusing on major figures in classical music. "Our next best bet is probably a major composer already predisposed to our point of view," said Barghouti. "Richard Wagner comes to mind."

Best place to go for breaking news from Syria

Now Lebanon is following Syrian tweets, Facebook entries and YouTube channels to bring you the very latest on the protests in Syria.

Here are two videos said to have been taken last night of two separate crowds, in two separate towns, chanting "The people want to bring the regime down.”

To read more: http://www.nowlebanon.com/NewsArticleDetails.aspx?ID=253828#ixzz1K9hkaYLF
Only 25% of a given NOW Lebanon article can be republished. For information on republishing rights from NOW Lebanon: http://www.nowlebanon.com/Sub.aspx?ID=125478

How to manipulate photos to tell an anti-Israel story (update)

From Ma'an:

Amateur photographer Ahmad Nazzal captured Israeli forces spraying 'skunk water' at a Palestinian child during the Kafr Qaddum weekly march in the occupied West Bank on Friday.

Five-year-old Muhammad Riyad appears standing in front of Israeli forces wearing a Palestinian Keffiyeh before the forces begin chasing him with skunk water, the boy eventually falling to the ground.

The foul-smelling liquid has been used by the Israeli military as a form of non-lethal crowd control since at least 2008 and can leave individuals and homes smelling like feces and garbage for weeks.

The poor kid is just standing there, minding his own business!

Too bad the photographer didn't show what else the little boy and his friends were doing for quite a bit of time while the soldiers did nothing. The boy in blue in this first clip looks like he isn't out of diapers yet.

And also that the skunk water was not aimed at the kid, but at the older stone throwers (The kid can be seen running on the left side while the water is clearly aimed at adult stone throwers on the right,  Another video shows where he tripped):

Where are the parents? Obviously letting their little boys go out and throw stones at soldiers.

Don't expect Ma'an to issue a correction, but it might be fun to tell them just to see them remove the comments.


(h/t Bob Knot)

UPDATE: I posted a comment:

The full video of the event shows not only that the child was throwing rocks from close range, but the police did nothing. The video also shows that the skunk water was shot at adult rioters on the right, unseen here. Video at Palmedia YT page.
Ma'an owes its readers a correction and apology.

We'll see if it gets published along with the hate.

05/12 Links Pt1: Kontorovich: A Tale of two blockades; Palestinian Authority's "Crimes of High Treason"

From Ian:

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Eugene Kontorovich: A Tale of two blockades

In Gothenburg, Sweden, a ship has set sail to run Israel’s blockade of Gaza, in a reprise of a now common activist tactic. At the same time, an Iranian ship has set sail from Bander Abbas to relieve the Saudi coalition’s blockade of Yemen, which has half the country on the brink of starvation.
Both blockades arise in what much of the international community regards as “non-international armed conflict” (NIAC). [The reasoning for both characterizations as NIACs is quite strained, in my view.]
In a new post at OpinioJuris, I discuss the legality of the Saudi blockade, showing that much previously neglected state practice supports the use of blockades in NIACs. Indeed, the only time it has been argued that such actions are illegal is in relation to the Gaza blockade. But the international community’s acceptance of the Yemen blockade (though not necessarily the particulars of its administration) shows that any potential anti-blockade norm has failed to materialize.
One wonders whether the new Gaza flotilla will meet a different response from the international community, now that it has remembered that blockade is legal. One also wonders whether the Yemen blockade, which by Oxfam’s description of it has turned it into what one would elsewhere call “the world’s largest open air prison” will manage to get half the international attention as the Gaza one.

Eugene Kontorovich: Libya’s shelling of Cook Islands ship gives New Zealand its own Maersk Tigris moment

The Libyan Navy has attacked a civilian ship off that country’s coast, as it was apparently bringing supplies for an Islamist rival militia, which Turkey has been accused of backing. The Turkish-owned ship was shelled from the shore and then attacked from the air. It caught fire and was towed to port, with at least one crew-member killed.
Some quick observations:
1) The vessel was flagged out of the Cook Islands, a Pacific nation with much the same defense relationship with New Zealand as the Marshall Islands have with the U.S. While under the former relationship, the Cooks must formally ask for assistance, it is unlikely that Wellington would brave the Barbary Coast to release the captured vessel.
It is quite a historical moment when the security benefits of being a New Zealand protectorate are indistinguishable from those of being an American protectorate.
2. It is unclear from news accounts if the ship was in territorial waters, but given the resulting loss of life, this is a matter of international note. One wonders how long it will be before the U.N. creates special commissions to investigate, as has been its past response to the violent loss of life on Turkish vessels.

Khaled Abu Toameh: Palestinian Authority's "Crimes of High Treason"

Hamas is at least being honest about its intentions to destroy Israel and replace it with an Islamist state. But the Palestinian Authority leadership in the West Bank continues to deceive not only its people, but also the international community, with regards to the refugee problem.
By sponsoring, funding and encouraging Palestinians to take to the streets to "mourn" the establishment of Israel and remain committed to the "right of return," Abbas and his officials in Ramallah are not being honest with their people. They are undoubtedly afraid of telling their people that Israel would never allow millions of Palestinians into its borders. They are even more afraid of admitting to the refugees that Arab and Palestinian leaders have been lying to them since 1948 by asking them to stay in their camps because one day they will return to non-existent villages and homes.
If and when the Israeli-Palestinian peace talks ever resume, PA leaders will not be able to make any concessions on the refugee issue. They will not because they know that their people would not accept any kind of concessions on this matter. Once again, the PA leaders will have only themselves to blame for having radicalized their people over the years to a point where Palestinians consider any concessions to Israel as a "crime of high treason." This stance not only applies to the refugee issue, but also to other matters, such as the two-state-solution, the status of Jerusalem and the future borders of a Palestinian state. Neither Abbas nor any future Palestinian leader will be able to reach a compromise with Israel when the Palestinian Authority itself continues to promote such anti-Israel sentiments.

Breaking the Silence bids to place IDF, Hamas on level field

Breaking the Silence, an Israeli nongovernmental organization, used to gather and publish accounts of military service in the West Bank and Gaza as part of an attempt to turn Israeli society against the occupation of those areas. Now it has shifted tack.
The NGO’s most recent report, at its core, seeks to change how Israel wages war.
Breaking the Silence, which on Tuesday is hosting a public launch of the report in Tel Aviv, largely expects Israel to value and seek to preserve the lives of the citizens of Gaza and limit collateral damage just as it would if its own civilians were being held by Hamas — an approach that would mean more Israeli soldiers would pay with their lives, fewer Palestinian lives would be lost, and Israel’s ability to bring its military might to bear against Hamas would be drastically reduced.
War, in that context, would look a lot like a hostage-rescue mission, based almost exclusively on small arms fire. The strongest army in the Middle East and the terror group that controls Gaza would be facing off on a largely level field.

Israelis Help Others; Palestinians Don’t Even Help Themselves

Israeli humanitarian efforts finally got a little attention in the aftermath of the Nepal earthquake. While some acknowledged it, unfortunately, it was glossed over by others, while the hardcore haters said, “Yeah, but…” That “but” was followed by crazy stories of ulterior motives (like the old anti-Semitic canard of organ harvesting, baby trafficking, or that it was purely a publicity stunt?!) or sob stories of how Israelis are helping the earthquake survivors but won’t help those “poor” Gazans.
The truth is, Israelis do help Gazans. During Operation Protective Edge, for example, the IDF set up field hospitals and treated Gazan casualties, and Israeli hospitals treat even the relatives of Hamas leaders who vow to destroy the Jewish State and celebrate the “victory” of any dead Jew, from babies to elderly Holocaust survivors, murdered by Arab ‘martyrs’.
Israel has also decided to double the amount of water delivered to the Palestinian territories, despite only receiving payment from the Palestinian Authority for less than 10 percent of the water usage. Palestinians are also wasting their water; up to 33 percent is wasted due to leakage, and their own policies prevent them from having more water. Still, Israel is providing more water to help them.
Furthermore, the IDF facilitates the transfer of goods into Gaza, like cement which is intended for building new homes.
Here’s the kicker: that cement is not used to build new homes. Building terror tunnels to kill more Jews takes priority over their own well-being. That violence is valued higher than taking care of themselves, despite their cries to the world that their living conditions are poor. If they are in such dire need, why are they not using the cement transferred into Gaza via the efforts of those “evil” Israeli soldiers, to help themselves?

Nepal relives nightmare as new quake rips fresh wounds back open

Aftershocks have been rattling Nepal every day or so since a massive earthquake devastated the country on April 25. But the quake on Tuesday, striking just as the country was beginning to pick up the pieces, felt different from the quick jolts those in Nepal have grown accustomed to, with the shaking lasting longer, witnesses said.
While the 7.3-magnitude quake toppled homes and knocked out infrastructure, it also reopened emotional wounds just beginning to heal from the last earthquake, while catching Israeli aid groups just as they were preparing to shift their focus from rescue to rehabilitation.
“Only the ‘hard-core’ organizations are left,” said Sam Amiel, the senior program director at the Joint Distribution Committee, which has committed more than $250,000 to Nepal.
IsraAID had already sent its rescue team back to Israel, and started concentrating on bringing social workers and therapists.

Israel may send new aid team to Nepal following quake

Israel will likely send a new aid team to Nepal after a fresh earthquake rocked the country Tuesday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said while greeting a returning Israeli delegation from the ravaged country.
Netanyahu was speaking at Ben-Gurion airport as he welcomed home a 260-member army team of medics and search and rescue experts who had spent 14 days in Nepal following an initial quake on April 25.
“I am certain that you are already prepared for the next mission, wherever it may be needed, and it appears, according to the news, that this next mission is already in front of us,” Netanyahu said.
“I told the Nepali ambassador just a few minutes ago that we are prepared to the best of our abilities to help now too. I hope that they will not need you, but if they do, we know – and the world is beginning to know – that we can count on you.”

IsraAid in Nepal: Phones down after new quake, people afraid to be indoors

Following the earthquake Tuesday, Israeli-based humanitarian aid agency IsraAid released a statement in which its head of mission stated that phones were down in Kathmandu and people were outside afraid to come indoors.
"I am worried for vulnerable neighborhoods like Gongabu, where our search and rescue team rescued Krishnadevi last week. The houses there are not sturdy, and many were damaged by the earthquake. We are on the way there now," said Yotam Polizer, IsraAID's head of mission on the ground in Nepal.
IsraAID, an Israeli-based humanitarian aid agency, currently has medical and psychosocial teams on the ground and is distributing goods in in Nepal, in coordination with the Nepalese government, UN agencies, and NGOs.

Diary of an IDF rescuer

In ordinary days, Yoav Sasson is a lieutenant serving in David Company of the Kedem battalion in the IDF Homefront Command. Following the deadly earthquake in Nepal last month, Sasson had departed for the battered country to command one of the Israel Defense Forces' search-and-rescue teams. This week he returned to Israel and is sharing his firsthand account of his time there.
A day late, I celebrated my 21st birthday at the military post I was stationed at the time. My entire family came to visit me there to cheer me up until At 1:30 a.m., I received a sudden phone call: "Yo-Yo [my nickname], I need you in my office as soon as possible." It was Diller, my company commander. "Do you have a passport?" He asked me and I innocently replied that I did, because I was planning to travel abroad on my next vacation.
"Pack your bags and notify your family -- you are joining the IDF search-and-rescue mission in Nepal! When I called home to tell my parents, my mother started crying and my father didn't know what to say. While everybody outside were still in shock, I began packing the equipment. This is the only unit where the transition from routine to emergency is extremely sudden.

Saudis Show Iran Deal Crackup Has Begun

Put another way, because the Obama administration is refusing to do anything to oust Bashar Assad, the Saudis are getting together with the Turks and Qataris to back some of the more fundamentalist Islamist fighters working against the Assad regime—including, it is rumored, the Nusra Front, an Al Qaeda affiliate. This is what happens when the Gulf states lose confidence in America: they start taking matters into their own hands and that means they will increasingly forge a pact with extreme Islamists, possibly even with ISIS, because they see the extremists as the only reliable barrier to the spread of Iranian influence.
This is a catastrophic if wholly predictable development, and it is only the beginning of the fallout from Obama’s decision to align so closely with Tehran. The next step in the Sunni pushback is, as the Saudi leadership has loudly and long signaled, for them to acquire their own nuclear weapons. As the Wall Street Journal reports, Saudi Arabia is conveniently next to Jordan which has vast uranium reserves but no money to exploit them. The Saudis could easily fill that gap and develop their own nuclear capacity within a decade, the timeline of the Iranian nuclear deal. Or the Saudis could get nukes even sooner if their friends in Pakistan agree to provide them.
Nothing that President Obama will do or say at the Camp David summit can remotely offset this parlous trend. What America’s Arab allies are looking for is an American commitment to resist Iranian designs. Instead all they see is America standing aside while Iran threatens to dominate the region.

Irwin Cotler: Defending human rights prisoners of Tehran

Canadian parliamentarians from across the political spectrum joined together to launch the fourth annual Iran Accountability Week in order to sound the alarm on the toxic convergence of threats posed by the Iranian regime: the nuclear threat, terrorism, incitement to hatred, and particularly the widespread and systematic violation of human rights.
Our program this year included hearings of the House of Commons’ Subcommittee on International Human Rights, a public forum on Parliament Hill, press briefings, political prisoner advocacy, and a concluding call to action. Among the participants were Dr. Ahmed Shaheed, the UN Special Rapporteur on the Situation of Human Rights in Iran; Iranian-Canadian journalist, filmmaker and former political prisoner Maziar Bahari; Marina Nemat and Shakib Nasrullah, both former prisoners of conscience at Iran’s notorious Evin Prison; FDD leaders Mark Dubowitz and Ali Alfoneh and Freedom House President Mark Lagon.
This year’s Iran Accountability Week occurred at a most propitious time, as the P5+1 nuclear negotiations with Iran have overshadowed – if not sanitized – the Iranian regime’s massive domestic repression.

US Senate passes resolution for release of Americans in Iran

The US Senate on Monday unanimously passed a resolution calling on Iranian officials to immediately release three Americans held in Iran and help locate a fourth.
The measure, which passed 90-0, calls for Iran to free Saeed Abedini, Amir Hekmati and Jason Rezaian and cooperate with the US government to locate and return Jewish-American former FBI agent Robert Levinson, who went missing eight years ago from the Iranian resort of Kish Island.
Abedini, a Christian pastor from Idaho, has been in Iranian custody since September 2012 and is serving an eight-year sentence for undermining state security. During a trial in January, he was convicted of trying to establish a network of Christian churches in private homes.

US poll: Many approve Iran deal, but most don’t trust Tehran

Many Americans like the idea of the preliminary deal that would limit Iran’s nuclear program but very few people really believe Tehran will follow through with the agreement.
An Associated Press-GfK poll found that just 3% said they were very confident that Iran would allow inspections of its nuclear facilities, remove plutonium from the country and shut down close to half of its uranium-enriching centrifuges as the preliminary deal says would be required. Nearly seven in 10 people said they were not confident, while 25% said they were only moderately confident.
The US, Germany, Britain, France, Russia and China are aiming to finalize a deal with Iran by June 30 that puts limits on Iranian programs that could be used to make nuclear arms. In exchange, economic sanctions on Iran would be lifted over time. Tehran denies any interest in such weapons but is negotiating in hopes of relief from billions of dollars in economic sanctions.
The next round of nuclear talks between Iran and six world powers were to start Tuesday in Vienna.

Zarif: Why Can’t the U.S. be a Dictatorship like Iran?

Speaking in South Africa, where he is cultivating business now that sanctions are collapsing, Iranian Foreign Minster Mohammad Javad Zarif demanded that the Obama administration bypass any Congressional review of the Iran deal. According to the Islamic Republic News Agency, Zarif said:
“We consider the US government responsible for implementing the [final nuclear] agreement. In our opinion, the Congress bill does not take the load of the commitments off the US government’s shoulder, and in fact makes it heavier. The US government should show that it will act upon the possible agreement between Iran and the P5+1… In our opinion, the bill by the US Congress does not have any effects, and if it does, then the US government has to nullify it.”
How inconvenient and incomprehensible it must be for Mr. Zarif, who has such a history of lying that his lies have even merited widespread use of a twitter hashtag (#ZarifLies), to realize that American leaders are accountable to the people’s elected representatives. And how arrogant and disrespectful it is of Mr. Zarif to demand that President Obama simply ignore the law, should Congress eventually pass a more stringent and biting review process than Senator Corker’s slight-of-hand solution. How sad it is, meanwhile, that Congress largely stands aside as a representative of an undemocratic and unrepentant terrorist-sponsoring regime lectures Congress on how it does its job. Then again, that’s not nearly as sad as an arrogant chief executive and a legacy-seeking secretary of state who rather consult with Iranian leaders than with their own congress.

Iran Promises Not to Reverse Engineer Russian S-300 Missile Defense System

Brig. Gen. Farzad Esmayeeli, the Commander of Iran’s Khatamul Anbia Air Defense Base, announced on Monday that his country does not intend to reverse engineer the sophisticated Russian S-300 missile air defense system.
According to Esmayeeli, “S-300 is an operational system and doesn’t need reverse engineering,” and “since the S-300 is a defensive operational system, it will be deployed in specific spots and will not be reverse engineered.”
According to semi-official state news agency Fars, Esmayeeli also emphasized that the Khatamul Anbia Air Defense Base’s experts have undergone the necessary training, and are ready to use the Russian-made missile defense shield.

Defying Sanctions, Iranian Airline with Terror Ties Buys New Planes

An Iranian airline that has been sanctioned due to ties with Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps has purchased nine planes in violation of existing sanctions, the Financial Times reported today. According to the report, the airline, Mahan Air, purchased the planes from European companies using a front company.
The Financial Times reported that though Western diplomats fear that the planes could be used to transport weapons to Yemen, a member of Mahan’s board said that it would use the planes to address a shortage of planes within Iran, rather than transporting weapons internationally. However, a Mahan Air plane was turned away by Saudi jets earlier this year as it headed to Yemen.
While the suspensions of some sanctions have allowed Iran to purchase spare parts for planes, the sale of planes to Iran is still prohibited by American and European sanctions.
The Financial Times called the scheme through which Mahan purchased the planes “most ambitious,” and involved using an Iraqi airline, Al Naser, to purchase the modern Airbus planes, which, in turn, were sold or transferred to Mahan. Al Naser denies that it acted on behalf of Mahan, but the Financial Times reported that a diplomat traced payments from Mahan through Gulf-based companies to purchase the planes.

‘#Iran_Aflame’ Trends as Kurdish Protesters Confront Iranian Police

As Iranian Kurds rioted in the northwestern city of Mahabad in response to the mysterious death of a Kurdish woman, the Twitter hash-tag “#إيران_تشتعل” or “#Iran_Aflame” has been popularly adopted to disseminate the ongoing story.
The hashtag – which reached 230,000 tweets since Saturday – was used to circulate pictures and video clips of the ongoing tensions within Iran, specifically in Mahabad in Iran’s West Azerbaijan Province.
Riots there arose after Farinaz Khosrwni, a 23-year-old Iranian Kurdish woman, committed suicide by throwing herself from the fourth story of the hotel where she worked. Activists claimed Khosrwni took her own life to prevent herself from being raped by an Iranian officer.
Chief of Iranian Police Gen. Hussein Ashtari said a number of police officers and security forces had been killed by those he described as “evil armed gangs which oppose the regime,” according to Al Jazeera.

Middle East nuclear weapons ban proposal stumbles at UN"

A U.N. attempt to work out a ban on nuclear weapons in the Middle East was in jeopardy after Egypt complained on Monday about the lack of progress and demanded the resignation of the Finnish coordinator of the initiative.
Western officials said Arab proposals drafted by Egypt for a major nuclear nonproliferation conference at United Nations headquarters in New York could torpedo the process and push Israel to walk away.
Israel neither confirms nor denies the widespread assumption that it controls the Middle East's only nuclear arsenal. Israel, which has never joined the 1970 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, agreed to take part in NPT meetings Monday as an observer, ending a 20-year absence.
The head of Egypt's delegation, Assistant Foreign Minister Hashim Badr, rejected any suggestion that Cairo was a spoiler and insisted that he wanted to move the process forward, not kill it.

Did Palestinians poison Yasser Arafat?

For many years Palestinian conspiracy theories held that Israeli Jews in some way had killed Arafat. The Palestinian Authority Minister of Religious Affairs, Al-Habbash, on November 8, 2013 drew on history and preached that Arafat was killed in the same way as the Prophet Muhammad.
He "knew" that the Prophet had been given poisoned meat by Jews in the town of Khaibar, and died of it three years later. Similarly, though Habbash did not mention that the mechanism had been meat, he declared that Arafat had been killed by Jews in the same way as the Prophet had been. Arafat had become a martyr.
The drama about Arafat’s death began in July 2012 when al-Jazeera television incorrectly, probably deliberately, reported a version of an article in The Lancet. That article was written by scientists associated with the Institute for Radiation Physics in Lausanne, Switzerland on the general subject of the detection of polonium poisoning.
The Institute happened to include the laboratory that had initially tested some of Arafat’s clothing.
Al-Jazeera then reported that The Lancet article had supported the possibility that Arafat was poisoned with the radioactive element polonium-210. This inaccurate statement was based on the fact that the Swiss scientists had merely examined Arafat’s effects and found “abnormal levels of polonium.”
The Arab League secretary-general, Nabil al-Araby, who had been less interested in probing the assassination of the former Lebanese prime minister Rafiq al-Hariri, raised Arafat’s case in the UN Security Council.

White House hosts US-Palestinian teen beaten by Israeli cops

White House National Security Council staffers recently hosted a US-Palestinian teenager who was beaten by Israeli riot police last year to review “pending issues related to his case,” CNN reported on Monday.
Tariq Abu Khdeir, 16, met with officials at the White House on April 15 to discuss matters related to his family’s planned visit to Jerusalem later this year.
“The US government has remained closely engaged with Tariq and his family since his return from Jerusalem,” a White House official told CNN. “As part of the follow-up on pending issues related to his case, National Security Council staff met with the Abu Khdeirs recently.”
The Tampa teenager — of Palestinian descent — and his family plan to return to Jerusalem in the summer to visit relatives in the Shuafat neighborhood of the capital.

PA Cracks Down on Hamas Supporters on West Bank College Campuses

Palestinian Authority (PA) security forces have rounded up more than two-dozen Hamas supporters on West Bank college campuses for interrogation in recent weeks.
A Hamas-aligned student group won an April 22 student council election at Birzeit University, which is located near the PA’s de facto capital of Ramallah.
“Everyone knew that this was going to happen,” Nagham Yassin, a Palestinian student at Birzeit, told Al Jazeera. “It happened last time the Islamic bloc won in 2007. Everyone assumed it would happen this time. Anyone who goes into student politics—especially Hamas supporters—knows they risk arrest.”
According to another Hamas supporter, Jihad Saleem, PA security forces allegedly blindfolded him, deprived him of sleep, and held him in stress positions during his 24-hour interrogation.
“They wanted to know how the Islamic bloc won the elections. They wanted to know how Hamas’s supporters had funded the election campaign on the campus,” Saleem told Al Jazeera.

IDF sees no alternative to Hamas rule in Gaza

IDF Southern Region Commander Maj. Gen. Shlomo “Sami” Turgeman said on Monday that Hamas remains, effectively, the only option for governance in the Gaza Strip. He further accused Israeli media of handing the terror group propaganda victories during the war there last summer by revealing the number of southerners who left their home during the fighting.
Turgeman met with the heads of local authorities located near the Gaza border, where he reviewed the 50-day war with Hamas, which the IDF dubbed Operation Protective Edge.
He argued against the assertion — espoused by several senior Israeli ministers during the war — that the army should have worked to topple Hamas or take full control of the coastal enclave.
“There is an independent rule in Gaza that behaves like a state,” he said. “Inside that state there is a ruler, Hamas, and at the moment there is no alternative to Hamas. Aside from that, there is no one else who can hold things together. The alternative is the IDF or chaos.”
Turgeman assessed that the residents in Gaza were also not interested in ousting their Hamas rulers.

The Salafist 'nuisance' in Gaza

The first and foremost ideological difference is that Hamas is also a national Palestinian organization. Its goal is to fight solely against Israel inside the borders of the Palestinian homeland. Hamas’ leader, Khaled Mashal, has declared on numerous occasions that Hamas will not operate outside of Palestine. Those declarations earned the group the opportunity to participate in the 2006 election in Gaza and enter into a unity government with Fatah.
This is not the case with the Salafist groups affiliated to IS. Their ideology is anti-national. They have and still are attacking Muslim Brotherhood’s leaders, such as the founder of Hamas, Sheikh Ahmed Ismail Hassan Yassin; the leader of the Global Muslim Brotherhood and the spiritual leader of the movement, Sheikh Yousef Al-Qaradhawi; the leader of Tunisia’s Muslims Rashid al-Ghannushi, and even former Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi - all of whom incorporate a national component in their ideology.
It is no wonder that those zealous, anti-national Muslim groups are flourishing in places where the national Arab leadership has failed. The Arab nationality has enabled the establishment of states within borders set by the Imperialists. Now, when one by one those countries disintegrate, the Islamic state movement, unbound by national borders, rears its head. We see this happening in Iraq and Syria and to some extent in Libya and Yemen, as well. Is this also the fate awaiting the Palestinians, who have not yet succeeded in establishing their own national state? Not likely, but in the meantime the violence is raging.

Report: Iran Funding Shi'ite Religious Centers in Gaza

Shi'ite religious centers have opened for the first time in Gaza, Walla! News reports Tuesday, and are being directly funded by Iran.
The centers, under the name 'Al-Sabrin,' (from the Arabic word for 'patience') are attempting to spread Shi'ite Islam in the Sunni stronghold, according to the news agency, and are doing so on Tehran's orders.
Most Palestinian Arab Muslims are Sunni, and very few people have embraced Shi'ite Islam instead, but this is a completely new phenomenon in Gaza.
Photos of the centers sent to the daily show banners featuring Ayatollah Ruholloh Khamenei, the leader of the 1979 Iranian Revolution, hanging over the entrances. One banner even reads, "good luck to the Iran-Jerusalem axis."

Report: Hezbollah Apparently Already Has Chlorine Gas

Syria is believed to have succeeded in transferring chemical weapons to Hezbollah, Channel 1 television's military affairs correspondent said Monday.
According to the reporter, Amir Bar Shalom, it appears chlorine gas bombs have made their way from Syria to Hezbollah's hands, despite the IDF's efforts to interdict the transfer.
Forces loyal to Syrian strongman Bashar Assad have recently been using chlorine gas against civilians in the ongoing civil war there, despite Syria's having supposedly gotten rid of its chemical weapons stockpiles, in an agreement the Obama administration took pride in.
Bar Shalom noted that the IDF has recently been repeatedly targeting convoys and facilities along the Syria-Lebanon border because of these developments.
He explained that Assad's use of chlorine bombs in recent months obviously indicates has the ability to use such weapons successfully. It would be a relatively easy matter to transfer the weapons a few kilometers across the border into Lebanon and into Hezbollah's hands, he noted. (h/t Alexi)

UN Castigates Saudis for Bombing Houthis and Their Human Shields After 24-Hour Warning

A recent exchange between UN representatives in Yemen and Saudi Arabian officials sounded just like the ones that take place between the UN and Israel over Hamas in Gaza.
On Sunday, UN Humanitarian Coordinator for Yemen Johannes Van Der Klauuw said he was “deeply concerned” by the Saudi-led coalition strikes on northern Yemen. The UN warned that the “indiscriminate bombing of populated areas a violation of international law.”
The UN claims the airstrikes have killed at least 1,400 people and more than half of them were civilians.
Saudi’s military spokesperson, Brigadier General Ahmed Asiri, responded to the UN criticism, saying Iranian-backed Houthi rebels are using hospitals and schools to store weapons, which is why they have been targeted by airstrikes.
On Sunday, the Saudis reportedly also targeted the home of former President Ali Abdullah Saleh in Sanaa, Yemen’s capital. Saleh is unharmed, according to a BBC report.
The Saudis have declared the northern province of Saada, located on the Saudi border, a “military zone”, and on Friday dropped leaflets warning local civilians to get out before the attacks began.

Who needs Bashar Assad?

For as long as the northern border remained quiet, it was in Israel's interests somewhat to see Syrian President Bashar Assad remain in power. A weakened dictator who makes a concerted effort to keep the border quiet is better than the chaotic terror of the Islamic State gangs. Israel is better off with a familiar, albeit crazy, neighbor who plays by the rules along the border than new neighbors who are no less crazy but don't who abide by any rules at all.
This held true for as long as the rules were observed. But now that the Golan Heights border is starting to become a terror border, now that the situation has been reversed and the Lebanon border is relatively quiet while the Syrian border has seen an increase in terrorist activity on the part of Hezbollah, under the cover of the general chaos in Syria, we need to rethink what is good for Israel.
The fall of Assad's regime would bring Islamic State to our borders – and that's a problem. But it would also be a fatal blow for Hezbollah. Without the Assad regime and the Hezbollah-Syria-Iran axis, the threat from Lebanon would fade significantly. It won't happen overnight, but it will happen for sure.

Beware the pan-Arab army

Israel, however, cannot ignore the fact that the unstable reality in the Middle East means that the plan to form a pan-Arab coalition of this nature has negative potential.
Washington has vowed that bolstering the Arab nations' military abilities will not undermine Israel's strategic qualitative edge -- a pledge the U.S. is bound to keep, as per a 2008 Congress resolution -- but history has taught us that this promise is not without its weak spots.
The U.S.'s strategic considerations do not have to account for threats from Canada or Mexico, but Israel does not have the luxury of dismissing Middle East dynamics, even when it concerns countries with which it has peace treaties -- and especially with regards to a pan-Arab army that includes nations with which such treaties do not exist.
An Arab coalition that seeks to stop Iran and its proxies in Syria, Lebanon, Sinai and Yemen from expanding Tehran's regional influence is a welcome development, as long as we remember that even what appears to be steadfast and permanent may prove fleeting.

Syrians cross border into Israel for treatment

CNN's Oren Liebermann reports on a hospital in Israel that is treating Syrians -- included militants -- injured in that country's civil war.