Poll: Most Palestinians reject idea of a Jewish state, seek eventual single-state

"According to the poll[conducted in October by Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research and sponsored by The Israel Project], most Palestinians refuse to reconcile with the idea of Israel as a Jewish state. While 23% accept the statement that “Israel has a permanent right to exist as a homeland for the Jewish people,” two-thirds prefer the alternative statement that “over time Palestinians must work to get back all the land for a Palestinian state.”


Moreover, the Palestinians perceive the two-state solution as a precursor to this entirely Palestinian state. When presented with the statement that “the best goal is for a two-state solution that keeps two states living side by side,” 30% agreed, while 60% opted for the alternative statement that “the real goal should be to start with two states but then move it to all being one Palestinian state."

Source:  http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3987277,00.html

TIP: 11 Rockets Launched from Gaza Hit Israel in 24 Hours

11 Rockets Launched from Gaza Hit Israel in 24 Hours     

• Israel Strikes Back at Terror Bases, including Iran-backed Islamic Jihad training base
• 4 Mortars Contained White Phosphorous
• Grad Rocket among others fired; first since July

Israel, Nov. 19 – Southern Israel was hit by 11 rockets and mortars fired from Gaza from Thursday to Friday, including four white phosphorous-filled mortars shot by an Iran-backed terror group. That brings to almost 200 the number of rockets, missiles and mortars fired from Gaza at Israel since the beginning of 2010.

 

Excerpted from www.theisraelproject.org

 

PM Harper: Expose the new anti-Semitism for what it is.

Prime Minister of Canada: Expose the new anti-Semitism for what it is!

 “Harnessing disparate anti-Semitic, anti-American and anti-Western ideologies, hate targets the Jewish people by targeting the Jewish homeland, Israel, as the source of injustice and conflict in the world, and uses, perversely, the language of human rights to do so.” – Stephen Harper


On November 8, 2010, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper made the following remarks at the Ottawa Conference on Combating Anti-Semitism:

“Members of the Steering Committee, fellow parliamentarians, ladies and gentlemen, let me begin by saying how delighted I am to see so many of you from around the world, gathered here in Ottawa for the second annual conference of the Inter-parliamentary Coalition for Combating Antisemitism.

“It is a sign, not only of your commitment to our common cause, but also of the momentum established at the London Conference last year.  It is, therefore, a great sign of hope.

“History teaches us that anti-Semitism is a tenacious and particularly dangerous form of hatred.  And recent events are demonstrating that this hatred is now in resurgence throughout the world.  That is why the work of the Inter-parliamentary Coalition for Combating Antisemitism has never been so important or timely as it is now.

“On behalf of the Government of Canada and all Canadians, I commend you and support you in the great and important work that you are doing.


“Ladies and gentlemen, colleagues, two weeks ago I visited Ukraine for the first time.

“In Kiev I laid a wreath at Babi Yar, the site of one of the numerous atrocities of the Holocaust. I was left there with much the same impression as I had in Auschwitz in 2008 — that such horrors defy all comprehension.

“At the killing grounds of Babyn Yar, I knew I was standing in a place where evil — evil at its most cruel, obscene, and grotesque — had been unleashed.  But while evil of this magnitude may be unfathomable, it is nonetheless a fact.

“It is a fact of history.  And it is a fact of our nature — that humans can choose to be inhuman.  This is the paradox of freedom.  That awesome power, that grave responsibility — to choose between good and evil.

“Let us not forget that even in the darkest hours of the Holocaust, men were free to choose good.  And some did.  That is the eternal witness of the Righteous Among the Nations.  And let us not forget that even now, there are those who would choose evil and would launch another Holocaust, if left unchecked.  That is the challenge before us today.

“The horror of the Holocaust is unique, but it is just one chapter in the long and unbroken history of anti-Semitism.  Yet, in contemporary debates that influence the fate of the Jewish homeland, unfortunately, there are those who reject the language of good and evil.  They say that the situation is not black and white, that we mustn’t choose sides.

“In response to this resurgence of moral ambivalence on these issues, we must speak clearly.  Remembering the Holocaust is not merely an act of historical recognition.

“It must also be an understanding and an undertaking.  An understanding that the same threats exist today.  And an undertaking of a solemn responsibility to fight those threats.

“Jews today in many parts of the world and many different settings are increasingly subjected to vandalism, threats, slurs, and just plain, old-fashioned lies.

“Let me draw your attention to some particularly disturbing trends.  Anti-Semitism has gained a place at our universities, where at times it is not the mob who are removed, but the Jewish students under attack.  And, under the shadow of a hateful ideology with global ambitions, one which targets the Jewish homeland as a scapegoat, Jews are savagely attacked around the world, such as, most appallingly, in Mumbai in 2008.

“One ruthless champion of that ideology brazenly threatens to ‘wipe Israel off the map,’ and time and again flouts the obligations that his country has taken under international treaties.  I could go on, but I know that you will agree on one point: that this is all too familiar.

“We have seen all this before.  And we have no excuse to be complacent.  In fact we have a duty to take action.  And for all of us, that starts at home.

“In Canada, we have taken a number of steps to assess and combat anti-Semitism in our own country.  You will no doubt hear from my Canadian colleagues about the measures we have taken to date.

“I will mention for the time being that, for the first time, we are dealing with Canada’s own record of officially sanctioned anti-Semitism.  We have created a fund for education about our country’s deliberate rejection of Jewish refugees before and during the Second World War.

“But of course we must also combat anti-Semitism beyond our borders, an evolving, global phenomenon.  And we must recognize, that while its substance is as crude as ever, its method is now more sophisticated.

“Harnessing disparate anti-Semitic, anti-American and anti-Western ideologies, it targets the Jewish people by targeting the Jewish homeland, Israel, as the source of injustice and conflict in the world, and uses, perversely, the language of human rights to do so.

“We must be relentless in exposing this new anti-Semitism for what it is.  Of course, like any country, Israel may be subjected to fair criticism.  And like any free country, Israel subjects itself to such criticism — healthy, necessary, democratic debate.  But when Israel, the only country in the world whose very existence is under attack — is consistently and conspicuously singled out for condemnation, I believe we are morally obligated to take a stand.  Demonization, double standards, delegitimization, the three D’s, it is the responsibility of us all to stand up to them.

“And I know, by the way, because I have the bruises to show for it, that whether it is at the United Nations, or any other international forum, the easy thing to do is simply to just get along and go along with this anti-Israeli rhetoric, to pretend it is just being even-handed, and to excuse oneself with the label of ‘honest broker.’  There are, after all, a lot more votes, a lot more, in being anti-Israeli than in taking a stand.  But, as long as I am Prime Minister, whether it is at the UN or the Francophonie or anywhere else, Canada will take that stand, whatever the cost.    And friends, I say this not just because it is the right thing to do, but because history shows us, and the ideology of the anti-Israeli mob tells us all too well if we listen to it, that those who threaten the existence of the Jewish people are a threat to all of us.

“Earlier I noted the paradox of freedom.  It is freedom that makes us human.  Whether it leads to heroism or depravity depends on how we use it.

“As the spectre of anti-Semitism spreads, our responsibility becomes increasingly clear.  We are citizens of free countries.  We have the right, and therefore the obligation, to speak out and to act.  We are free citizens, but also the elected representatives of free peoples.  We have a solemn duty to defend the vulnerable, to challenge the aggressor, to protect and promote human rights, human dignity, at home and abroad.  None of us really knows whether we would choose to do good, in the extreme circumstances of the Righteous.  But we do know there are those today who would choose to do evil, if they are so permitted.  Thus, we must use our freedom now, and confront them and their anti-Semitism at every turn.

“That, Ladies and Gentlemen, is the purpose of our intervention today: our shared determination to confront this terrible hatred.  The work we have undertaken, in our own countries and in cooperation with one another, is a sign of hope.

“Our work together is a sign of hope, just as the existence and persistence of the Jewish homeland is a sign of hope.  And it is here that history serves not to warn but to inspire.

“As I said on the 60th anniversary of the founding of the State of Israel, Israel appeared as a light, in a world emerging from deep darkness.  Against all odds, that light has not been extinguished. It burns bright, upheld by the universal principles of all civilized nations — freedom, democracy and justice.

“By working together more closely in the family of civilized nations, we affirm and strengthen those principles.  And we declare our faith in humanity’s future in the power of good over evil.

Source:  http://pm.gc.ca/

Levy: What about recognition?

Recognition of Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people can't simply be left to the end of negotiations, unless the participants know it will be the deal-breaker. But since it will unlikely be the deal-breaker, it has to be dealt with up front. And the president of the United States should know this -- and advocate for unequivocal Palestinian recognition of Israel.

As put by the author of the op ed, below,  recognition is not a precondition for negotiations but a 'required element' for attaining a win-win end of the conflict.

 -- Mark Finkelstein

 

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3985354,00.html

What about recognition?

Op-ed: Without Palestinian recognition of Jewish state, what’s the point of negotiations?

Benny Levy   11/16/2010  [ excerpt]

The commotion around the extended settlement freeze diverts attention away from the additional price Israel is apparently required to pay for the benefit package promised to Netanyahu: Renouncing the demand that the Palestinians recognize Israel as the Jewish state before entering talks. The prime minister, who presented this demand a few weeks ago, has gone silent as of late; yet without such initial recognition, it’s unclear what will be discussed in the talks.

 

Starting with discussion on borders and security arrangements, as the Palestinians and Americans demand, is akin to conducting negotiations where the sides are discussing the price, number of installments, their date etc., without first agreeing whether they are selling or leasing the asset. If it’s a sale, the seller will no longer have any rights for the asset. In a lease, the lessee is expected to, and entitled to, demand the asset again in the future.

 

This is the point of introductory clauses in contracts. There, the sides present their joint interests, which come before the negotiations. For example, as side A is interested in offering an apartment for rent, and side B is interested in renting an apartment, the sides agree to…(and here come the contract clauses to be decided on during negotiations.)

 

The introduction to the “dream agreement” with the Palestinians should say that as the sides are interested in ending the conflict, and as they view the State of Israel as the Jewish people’s state, and the future state to be established as the Palestinian people’s state, they agree to the following (borders, security, Jerusalem, refugees, etc.) Yet the Palestinians say they will refuse to such introduction. Abbas and Erekat truly disparage such possibility, and Yasser Abed Rabbo, who seemingly presented a different position, has no authority anyway.

 

U.S., Israel may make a deal for a 90-day building moratorium

US asks Israel for 90-day settlement building moratorium By T. LAZAROFF, K. ABU TOAMEH, H.L. KRIEGER   14/11/2010  Jerusalem Post PM discusses possibility of halting building with septet; in exchange, US would support Israel in the UN and give 20 fighter jets.

The US asked Israel to freeze all new settlement construction begun after September 26th for a 90-day period in exchange for support in the United Nations and 20 additional advanced fighter planes worth $3 billion, The Jerusalem Post has learned. The principles of this agreement designed to restart peace talks with the Palestinians, were relayed by Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to his inner cabinet, a forum of seven ministers, on Saturday night and will be explained to the full cabinet on Sunday. The US said that if the deal was accepted it would not request an additional settlement freeze. The request does not include east Jerusalem. The date for the new freeze has not been set, but it would be retroactive to the September 26th date, when the previous 10-month moratorium on such activity expired. The details of the deal were worked out Thursday during a seven-hour meeting in New York between Netanyahu, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and members of their staff. Should Israel accept the offer, the US in turn has pledged in the next year to veto any efforts by the UN Security Council to impose on Israel a non-negotiated solution to the Israeli Palestinian conflict, as the Palestinians have requested. It would further veto any resolutions that deny Israel the right to self-defense or seek to de-legitimize Israel. The US would also oppose such efforts in other UN bodies and forums. The US administration would ask Congress to approve the supply of 20 additional advanced fighter planes to Israel worth $3 billion so that Israel can keep its qualitative edge. This defense assistance will be added into Israel's security agreement with the US, so that Israel's safety can be assured. Talks about these defense understanding will begin in the coming weeks. Netanyahu learned of the details of this deal during his trip to the US.

Rennert: A willful disregard for Jewish ownership of land in Jerusalem

Har Homa was built on Jewish-owned land                                                            

 

[Comments by Israel Matzav on an article by Leo Rennert]

 

Lost in the argument over building in Jerusalem, writes Leo Rennert, is the fact that Har Homa, where most of the new apartments are being built, is built entirely on land that has been owned by Jews for nearly a century.

What is utterly ludicrous about this concocted tempest in a Jerusalem teacup is that the bulk of the new apartment units are to go up in Har Homa, a Jewish neighborhood of some 12,000 residents in southeast Jerusalem. Two thirds of Har Homa is on land purchased by Jews after the First World War. The other third is owned by Arabs. The entire existing Harm Homa neighborhood was built on Jewish-owned land and plans for additional housing units also are confined to this part of Har Homa. None of this appeared in media reports or in the criticism leveled by Obama, the State Department and the European Union.

Nor did they bother to point out that, under any realistic scenario for a two-state solution, even with a division of Jerusalem, Har Homa will remain on the Israeli side.

With typical historical amnesia, these Israel-bashers also failed to point out that, during Israel's War of Independence, Jordanian forces attempting to eliminate the Jewish state used Har Homa as a vantage point from which to fire on the Old City of Jerusalem and other neighborhoods of the city.

In their cramped and selective sense of history, none of this matters. Their historical perspective begins with the last day of the Six-Day War in 1967 when Israel prevailed over Jordanian and other Arab armies intent on destroying it, and in the process reunified Jerusalem.

Thus, Washington Post correspondent Joel Greenberg describes Har Homas as an "area of the West Bank annexed to Jerusalem." New York Times correspondent Isabel Kershner, in similar vein, calls it a "Jewish residential development in southern Jerusalem in territory that Israel captured from Jordan in the 1967 war, and then annexed."

So never mind that Har Homa has been on Jewish owned land from well before Jordan illegally occupied it in 1948, in clear violation of the 1947 UN two-state partition plan.

All that history is brushed aside. ...

 

Source: http://israelmatzav.blogspot.com/    11/11/10

Rubin: Demonization of Israel charading as 'ordinary criticism.'

The Hour of the Hanging Judges: Demonizing Israel and Pretending It Is Ordinary Criticism

By Barry Rubin  http://rubinreports.blogspot.com/2010/11/hour-of-hanging-judges-demonizing.htm  11/10/10

This is getting to be a pretty common kind of story. The mayor of Frankfurt invites a Jewish intellectual whose family left Germany in 1932 to speak on the anniversary of Kristallnacht. The problem is that this man, Alfred Grosser, is a ferocious critic of Israel.

Grosser claims the Gaza Strip is a concentration camp (possibly true, but if so it is a concentration camp owned and run by Hamas); calls for ending Israel as a Jewish state; urges Germany to be more critical of Israel; and blames Israeli policies (rather than the deliberate lies about them) are responsible for increasing antisemitism (isn't that what George Soros said?)

All of this is interpreted by the Christian Science Monitor, and many others, as merely rejecting:

"…the notion that criticism of Israel is synonymous with anti-Semitism. If Germans want to criticize the blockade of Gaza or treatment of Palestinians, they should be able to without guilt, many say."

This is the usual absurd response.

But one can criticize Israel's "blockade" of Gaza (I won't explain here why it is needed and, no doubt, the people who criticize it have never read these reasons) without calling it a "concentration camp," which implies deliberate mass murder.

But it is possible to criticize Israel without calling for its extinction—since that is, in fact, what abolishing the existence of a Jewish state means.

But one can say that Israeli policy is an element in growing antisemitism while also listing other elements, including the lying demonization of Israel so prevalent today. Of course, one would then have to talk about all the concessions and risks Israel has taken on behalf of peace in the last twenty years.

And when someone systematically uses such exaggeration, obsessively promotes such hatred, seeks such extreme solutions, sympathizes with those using violence to murder Jews, and leaves out so many facts…it is possible to speak of antisemitism as an element in that overall approach, isn't it?

At times, I reflect, one hears echoes in such rhetoric and activity of a brave, new slogan: Kill the Jews! They really deserve it this time!

Often, however, this kind of talk is actually a result of naiveté and ignorance. This is equally true for Jews who say such things. Being Jewish doesn't make them experts on Israel. But there is also a strong element of opportunism in taking such highly rewarded positions. No Jew need ever starve since he can always make a career bashing Israel.

Yet there is also a remarkable detachment from the facts on the ground.

In an interview, Grosser explains:

"The Palestinians are despised, are occupied and I think that the majority of Israel's citizens despise Palestinians….The central theme of my book [is] that any human being should be respected….As a Jewish boy in a Frankfurt school, I was despised, and even beaten. I can't understand how Jews can scorn others."

But does this have anything much to do with the way Israelis think and behave? Israelis don't "despise" Palestinians in the way Grosser means. Nor are Palestinian (Israeli Arab) students set on and beaten in school or insulted in the streets. On the contrary, such an idea wouldn't even occur to any Israeli but the tiniest minority of most extreme people, who are themselves pretty despised by other Israelis.

What is happening here is that Grosser (and many others) imagine how Israelis behave, then attribute that behavior to them. Often, this means imagining that Israelis behave like Nazis, even though there is no evidence that this is true.

Obviously, there is a decades-long war between them and most Israelis don't love Palestinians (though a remarkable percentage goes out of their way to seek peace and conciliation). Yet compared to other countries at war with each other, Israelis sentiments are definitely at the lowest part of the spectrum concerning hatred or despising.

Anyone can easily ascertain that there is no despising or hating being taught in Israeli media—TV, radio, newspapers, films—or in schools, or in government statements or in the armed forces. Such statements can be found from individuals or at the political extremes, sometimes by radical rabbis, yet it is far less common than the level of despising in a country like Germany against immigrants there or racism in America, or many other such cases. And when incidents of hatred do appear they are widely and officially denounced.

Of course, people like Grosser never consider the behavior of the other side, the relentless, official hatred and despising of Israel (and often Jews) which appears in almost all the media, all the statements of politicians, all the sermons.

Speaking of Gaza as a "concentration camp" this is an appropriate place to mention how the relentlessly anti-Israel Sydney Morning Herald in Australia pubished an article about how wonderful the Hamas regime is in Gaza and extolling its new luxury prison. But buried in it is the following passage about a prison there that the author just let slide by:

"[Prison director Naser] Suleiman is quick to absolve his own institution of such practices. `'We do not practice any torture here,'' he says. `That takes place at the interrogation centre, before people are convicted.'''

Moreover, the one-sided focus on Israel worsens real oppression, hatred, and bloodshed by giving the terrorists and extremists an excuse. The above-mentioned article's author actually blames any mistreatment in Hamas prisons on Israel:

"Just as Hamas struggles to keep order in this restive strip of land of 1.5 million people, Mr Suleiman is trying to do the same inside Gaza's prisons. And just as Israel's blockade of Gaza stunts economic growth and curtails the ambitions of everyday Gazans, it also impairs Mr Suleiman's ability to operate prisons."

Talking about how the terrible nature of the opposition (in Hamas's case, openly antisemitic and preaching genocide against Jews; practicing terrorism; deliberately targeting civilians, etc.) isn't intended to excuse any shortcomings in Israel, but one has to have some way to measure the potential level of hatred and despising going on.

If your enemy is intent on using civilians as human shields and massacring all of yours, this sometimes requires different measures for self-defense. And if the other side is projecting 90 percent hate and Israel 5 percent—the numbers are somewhat arbitrary but also reasonable—that conveys something important. It's funny that Israel is accused of "excessive force" but not credited for its proportionately low level of hatred.

When, for example, two Israeli reservists lose their way on the West Bank and are torn apart (literally) by a Palestinian mob and there is not a single case of retaliation or incitement to violence among Israelis that tells something. Now multiply that by ten thousand incidents.

Western media, academics, and activists often act as if even a single incident by a single Israelis (even if denounced by other Israelis and punished) somehow "proves" that Israel is demonic and worthy of execution. Even the deity only demanded that ten good people out of many hundreds need be found to spare wicked Sodom and Gomorrah. Israel's critics reverse the equation and think finding ten bad ones condemns seven million others.

Of course this doesn't mean Israel is perfect but that's precisely the point: it is unreasonable to expect perfection and once that standard is jettisoned Israel's record can be seen to be remarkably good given the conditions it has faced or even how other democracies have responded to far lower levels of threat.

Come to think of it, when it comes to being "despised" and "scorned," Israel and Israelis aren't the perpetrators, they are on the receiving end.