From The...

.."you can't make this shit up" file:

Hamas arrests dolphin accused of being an Israeli spy

Long Overdue

What will it take to fix the UN? Or is it beyond repair? I happen the think it should go the way of the dinosaur.

UN report denies Israel's right of self-defense, advocates arrest of Israelis instead

Related:

Man found decapitated in France terror attack

""The intent was without doubt to cause an explosion. It was a terrorist attack," President Francois Hollande said at a news conference in Belgium.

French Prosecutor Francois Molins said four suspects were in custody, including the suspected attacker, identified as Yassin Salih, 35, his wife, his sister and another person close to him.

"The slain victim's head was found yards away from the body, stuck on a perimeter fence, with Arabic writing on or near it. There were also flags or banners bearing Arabic writing found at the scene."

Hamas And Its Pals

Egyptian Court: We Can't Designate Israel a 'Terrorist State'

Hamas Tortured Rival Palestinians, Blamed Israel

Hamas executed Palestinians during summer war

Amnesty accuses Hamas of war crimes in Gaza

When two Gazans fight, Israel suffers

About Damned Time

Amnesty International says Hamas tortured, killed Palestinians

The militant group Hamas tortured and killed Palestinians during the war against Israel in the Gaza Strip last year, Amnesty International said in a report released Wednesday.

"Hamas, which controls Gaza, arrested and tortured dozens of Palestinians and executed at least 23, the human rights group reported."

 I may have  to change my mind about Amnesty International.

 

Netanyahu Speaks The Truth

Post by The Prime Minister of Israel.

Better Late Than Never, I Guess...

...but still, what took the lamestream media so long: Study: 49% of Gazans Killed in War Were Terrorists

Does Anybody Think It Will Work?

In either case? I have my doubts:

Rival Ukraine forces ready pullback under new peace plan


Israel, Hamas to resume indirect cease-fire talks in Cairo

The Lamestream Media And The Arab-Israeli Conflict

"The volume of press coverage that results, even when little is going on, gives this conflict a prominence compared to which its actual human toll is absurdly small. In all of 2013, for example, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict claimed 42 lives—that is, roughly the monthly homicide rate in the city of Chicago. Jerusalem, internationally renowned as a city of conflict, had slightly fewer violent deaths per capita last year than Portland, Ore., one of America’s safer cities. In contrast, in three years the Syrian conflict has claimed an estimated 190,000 lives, or about 70,000 more than the number of people who have ever died in the Arab-Israeli conflict since it began a century ago.

News organizations have nonetheless decided that this conflict is more important than, for example, the more than 1,600 women murdered in Pakistan last year (271 after being raped and 193 of them burned alive), the ongoing erasure of Tibet by the Chinese Communist Party, the carnage in Congo (more than 5 million dead as of 2012) or the Central African Republic, and the drug wars in Mexico (death toll between 2006 and 2012: 60,000), let alone conflicts no one has ever heard of in obscure corners of India or Thailand. They believe Israel to be the most important story on earth, or very close.

A reporter working in the international press corps here understands quickly that what is important in the Israel-Palestinian story is Israel. If you follow mainstream coverage, you will find nearly no real analysis of Palestinian society or ideologies, profiles of armed Palestinian groups, or investigation of Palestinian government. Palestinians are not taken seriously as agents of their own fate. The West has decided that Palestinians should want a state alongside Israel, so that opinion is attributed to them as fact, though anyone who has spent time with actual Palestinians understands that things are (understandably, in my opinion) more complicated. Who they are and what they want is not important: The story mandates that they exist as passive victims of the party that matters.

Corruption, for example, is a pressing concern for many Palestinians under the rule of the Palestinian Authority, but when I and another reporter once suggested an article on the subject, we were informed by the bureau chief that Palestinian corruption was “not the story.” (Israeli corruption was, and we covered it at length.)"

Bingo!! RTWT

The Enemy Of My Enemy

Saudi foreign minister: we must denounce our hatred toward Israel and begin normalize ties with Jewish nation

"Speaking on the sidelines of the world assembly of Islamic scholars in Jeddh, Saud bin Faisal Al Saud said that the Middle-East needs peace and co-existence more than ever and Saudi Arabia as a leading Islamic country is ready to make sacrifices in peace negations and encourages President Abbas to follow the same policy.

Referring to the ongoing war in Gaza strip, the Saudi foreign Minster stressed that Hamas authority is the sole responsible for Palestinian calamity and they must brought before the law. [Emphasis mine]

The Saudi official further added that Arab World Increasingly Frustrated With Hamas which is seeking more wars."

[---]

"Media in Saudi Arabia and Egypt blame Hamas’ actions for Israeli war and prioritizing conflict over the safety of the Gazan population and criticized the leadership for waging war far from the conflict, a Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI) report shows."

[---]

"“[Meshaal], we are tired of defending the [Palestinian] cause that you have sold for cheap to an MB (Muslim Brotherhood) gang whose way you followed even though they have lost their [own] way,” wrote columnist Abdul-Hamdi Razaq. He also called Meshaal out for living in luxurious Qatari hotels instead of fighting in Gaza.

Hamas is losing its legitimacy because it was sacrificing Palestinians while using financial aid to promote its interests, wrote Al-Watan columnist Abdullah Al-Sayyid."

I've been nursing this theory for some time that the House of Saud is afraid of a Muslim Brotherhood inspired coup. There is obviously no love lost for the MB with the Egyptian regime, either. They are all afraid of Iran and Israel is stronger than all of them combined. We live in interesting times.

(Note: Poor English and grammar exists throughout the text of the article. It looks like it may have been machine translated, or translated by someone whose command of English is very weak.)

Related: Iran to sue Israel over drone issue: spokesperson

"Iran will give a crushing response to any enemy aggression against its soil, Iranian military officials also said on Monday.

"Iran will respond to any aggression, from any aggressor, under any circumstances" and "this is a serious message from Iran," Iran 's Defense Minister Brig. Gen. Hossein Dehqan was quoted as saying by Press TV on Monday.

Meanwhile, Commanders of Iran's Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) also threatened retaliatory steps in the wake of the downing of the drone.

"We will accelerate arming (Palestinians) in the West Bank and we preserve the rights for any response" to Israel in retaliation for its drone penetrating Iran's space, Amir-Ali Hajizadeh, aerospace commander of IRGC, was quoted as saying by semi-official Fars news agency.

Iran's military forces are fully ready to detect and intercept the flying objects of the enemy over the country's air space, Hajizadeh said Monday, adding that "in case these actions are repeated, the aggressors should wait for our crushing response."

The IRGC said Sunday that it had downed an "Israeli spy drone" near Natanz uranium enrichment site in the central province of Isfahan.

After the drone of Israel, which was a stealth and radar- evading kind, was intercepted by IRGC's air defense system, it was targeted by a missile and downed before penetrating the airspace over the Natanz nuclear site, a statement by IRGC said without elaborating on when the drone was shot down.

It said the main parts of the drone were undamaged, according to Press TV.

Iran's state TV on Monday broadcast footage of an allegedly Israeli drone, showing small scraps of the destroyed drone in a dessert-like area.

"The downed spy drone is Hermes and made in Israel," Hajizadeh said, adding that the operational range of Hermes drones is 800 km and the aircraft can fly 1,600 km by refueling once.

The Israeli drone is equipped with two cameras, enabling the espionage aircraft to capture high-quality images, Press TV quoted him as saying.

The country's military experts will analyze the remaining parts of the downed drone to extract any data stored on its system, Dehqan was also quoted as saying.

The Iranian defense minister said Israel and the United States seek to create the impression that they could penetrate the airspace of any country to conduct spying operations.

On Saturday, Iran launched a uranium-conversion plant which would produce enriched uranium dioxide in Isfahan province within the framework of the agreement with the P5+1 group, namely Britain, China, France, Russia, the United States plus Germany.

Under an interim deal reached between Iran and the P5+1 that came into effect on Jan. 20, Iran would suspend some sensitive nuclear activities in exchange for limited sanction relief, and the two sides would negotiate over a comprehensive deal within six months.

After six months of negotiations, Iran and the six world powers agreed on July 19 to extend their talks until Nov. 24, as disagreements remained over Tehran's uranium enrichment capacity, its Arak heavy water reactor and the sanctions.

The two sides are expected to hold meetings in New York in Sept. ."

All bluster and bravado. The downed drone is probably their own.

Yup

"See If I Care"

UN Threatens Israel… Israeli Official Says, “See if I Care!”

"The United Nations Human Rights Council has been making fools of themselves by blatantly supporting terrorist organizations against Israel since its inception in 2006. U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay recently said, for example, that Israel may be guilty of war crimes for not providing its Iron Dome defense technology to the Hamas terrorists to use to protect civilians in Gaza.

The council apparently does not know–or, more likely, does not care–that Hamas began the current conflict with the kidnapping and murder of three Israeli teenagers and has since fired more than 3,000 rockets at Israel while hiding in the Gaza Strip behind human shields.

In a blatantly anti-Semitic move, the council recently voted 29-1 to investigate Israel for possible human rights violations in its conflict with the radical Islamic terrorists in the Gaza Strip. The United States, to her credit, was the one dissenting vote; the European members of the council mostly abstained, no doubt fearing Muslim backlash in their home countries.

According to WZ, Israeli Minister of Justice Tzipi Livni issued a brief response to the vote on Facebook: “I have [four] words to say about the decision of the UN human rights council – see if I care!”"

Up yours, U.N..

Such Nice People

Hamas Executes One of Its Leaders - Then Blames Israel

"Sources in the Gaza Strip said on Thursday that Taha was executed because Hamas feared he might implicate some of its leaders in many corruption scandals. "The man knew too much about the senior leaders of Hamas."

The international media, for its part, will simply endorse the Hamas story because it is more convenient to blame Israel than to get into trouble with a radical Islamist movement that carries out extra-judicial executions.

Militiamen on Thursday dumped the bullet-riddled body of Ayman Taha, a former prominent Hamas figure, outside Gaza City's Shifa Hospital.

The body remained on the ground for nearly an hour before other militiamen came back and took it to an unknown destination.

Palestinians who were at the hospital were too afraid to remove the body.

A few hours later, Taha's body was handed over to Shifa Hospital by a number of Hamas militiamen.

Palestinian journalists said that Taha had been executed for spying on behalf of an Arab intelligence service and involvement in financial corruption."

[---]

"According to the journalists, Taha was executed by a firing squad three days ago. They said that he died instantly of gunshots to the head and chest.

Hamas's armed wing, Izaddin al-Qassam, arrested Taha in 2013 on suspicion that he had served as an informant for the Egyptian General Intelligence Service."

[---]

"Sources in the Gaza Strip said on Thursday that Taha was executed because Hamas feared he might implicate some of its leaders in many corruption scandals. "The man knew too much about the senior leaders of Hamas," said a veteran journalist living in Gaza City who had close ties with Taha. "Hamas leaders used to take him with them on their visits to different countries.""

Is Hamas falling apart? Certainly their Arab neighbours are getting sick and tired of them. Well, Egypt anyway.

"Although Hamas never named the Arab intelligence party to which Taha was allegedly linked, Palestinians familiar with the case have pointed at Egypt's General Intelligence Service as being responsible for the recruitment of the slain Hamas figure.

The Taha affair has seriously embarrassed the Hamas leadership. His arrest last year came as a shock to Hamas leaders and followers, who noted that this was the first case of its kind since the Islamist movement was founded in 1988.

What was even more embarrassing was that the slain man was the son of Mohammed Taha, one of the most prominent leaders of Hamas and former director of the Islamic University in Gaza City."

[---]

"Interestingly, Taha was executed for collaboration with the Egyptians exactly at the same time that senior representatives of Hamas were negotiating in Cairo with the head of Egypt's General Intelligence Service about ways of achieving a permanent cease-fire with Israel.

The execution is apparently aimed at sending a message to the Egyptians that Hamas would not tolerate Cairo's attempt to meddle in the internal affairs of the Islamist movement. A Hamas source said that the arrest of Taha was a "severe blow" to the Egyptians because they had lost one of their most important informants inside the movement.

The execution of Taha is likely to aggravate tensions between Hamas and the Egyptian authorities. Needless to say, the new regime of President Abdel Fattah Sisi already considers Hamas a hostile party and threat to Egypt's national security."

We live in interesting times.

Yet Another Form Of Deception

Assorted leftards in the Western world should be feeling pretty stupid by now:

"Spokesman Capt Eytan Buchman told BBC News that "the UN numbers being reported are, by and by large, based on the Gaza health ministry, a Hamas-run organisation".

He said that part of the reason for the discrepancy between the figures was "when militants are brought to hospitals, they are brought in civilian clothing, obscuring terrorist affiliations"."

“Save the trees, ...

...wipe your ass with an owl.”

An excellent rant by a Metis supporter of Israel.

You Say That...

...as if it's a bad thing:

Canadian govt complicit in Israeli war crimes

"In the midst of international condemnation of Israel’s attacks on civilians in Gaza, Canada’s ambassador to the UN issued a statement last week unequivocally supporting Israel’s “right to defend itself” and maintaining that Hamas was a “terrorist organization,” laying blame for civilian deaths firmly at the Palestinian group’s feet.

On Wednesday this week, Canadian Prime Minister Steven Harper reiterated this stance after the Israeli bombing of a UN school in Gaza that killed at least 17 displaced Palestinians who were sheltering there, saying, “We hold the terrorist organization Hamas responsible for this. They have initiated and continue this conflict and continue to seek the destruction of the state of Israel.""

[---]

"While Harper’s support for right wing Israeli politicians is in step with his support base, a large component of whom are evangelical Christians fundamentally opposed to a two-state solution, it’s becoming an issue in his growing unpopularity with Canadian voters."

The author even manages to get an anti-Christian slur in there, and he manages to put in a plug for all the right (read leftist) people: Judy Rebick, Rabble, KAIROS, the UN Security Council, Margaret Atwood, Tubby-er-Libby Davies. (Heavy sigh.)

Ya Think!!

The empty spaces in Gaza (Emphasis mine throughout.)

"...How many times have you heard on television or read in the media that the Gaza Strip is "the most densely populated area in the world"? Repeating this statement, however, does not make it true. There are dense parts of Gaza, especially Gaza City, Beit Hanoun and Khan Younis, but there are far less dense areas in Gaza between these cities."

[---]

"The fact that these sparsely populated areas exist in the Gaza Strip raise several important moral questions: First, why don't the media show the relatively open areas of the Gaza Strip? Why do they only show the densely populated cities? There are several possible reasons. There is no fighting going on in the sparsely populated areas, so showing them would be boring. But that's precisely the point—to show areas from which Hamas could be firing rockets and building tunnels but has chosen not to. Or perhaps the reason the media doesn't show these areas is that Hamas won't let them. That too would be a story worth reporting.

Second, why doesn't Hamas use sparsely populated areas from which to launch its rockets and build its tunnels? Were it to do so, Palestinian civilian casualties would decrease dramatically, but the casualty rate among Hamas terrorists would increase dramatically.That is precisely why Hamas selects the most densely populated areas from which to fire and dig. The difference between Israel and Hamas is that Israel uses its soldiers to protect its civilians, whereas Hamas uses its civilians to protect its terrorists. That is why most of Israeli casualties have been soldiers and most of Hamas' casualties have been civilians. The other reason is that Israel builds shelters for its civilians, whereas Hamas builds shelters only for its terrorists, intending that most of the casualties be among its civilian shields.

The law is clear: using civilians as human shields—which the Hamas battle manual mandates—is an absolute war crime. There are no exceptions or matters of degree, especially when there are alternatives. On the other hand, shooting at legitimate military targets, such as rockets and terror tunnels is permitted, unless the number of anticipated civilian casualties is disproportionate to the military importance of the target. This is a matter of degree and judgment, often difficult to calculate in the fog of war. The law is also clear that when a criminal takes a hostage and uses that hostage as a shield from behind whom to fire at civilians or police, and if the police fire back and kill the hostage, it is the criminal and not the policeman who is guilty of murder. So too with Hamas: when it uses human shields and the Israeli military fires back and kills some of the shields, it is Hamas who is responsible for their deaths.

The third moral question is why does the United Nations try to shelter Palestinian civilians right in the middle of the areas from which Hamas is firing? Hamas has decided not to use the less densely populated areas for rocket firing and tunnel digging. For that reason, the United Nations should use these sparsely populated areas as places of refuge. Since the Gaza Strip is relatively small, it would not be difficult to move civilians to these safer areas. They should declare these areas battle free and build temporary shelters—tents if necessary—as places of asylum for the residents of the crowded cities. It should prevent any Hamas fighters, any rockets and any tunnel builders from entering into these sanctuaries. In that way, Hamas would be denied the use of human shields and Israel would have no reason to fire its weapons anywhere near these United Nations sanctuaries. The net result would be a considerable saving of lives.

But instead the UN is playing right into the hands of Hamas, by sheltering civilians right next to Hamas fighters, Hamas weapons and Hamas tunnels. Then the United Nations and the international community accuses Israel of doing precisely what Hamas intended Israel to do: namely fire at its terrorists and kill United Nations protected civilians in the process. It's a cynical game being played by Hamas, but it wouldn't succeed without the complicity of UN agencies.

The only way to assure that Hamas' strategy of using human shields to maximize civilian casualties is not repeated over and over again is for the international community, and especially the United Nations, not to encourage and facilitate it, as it currently does. International law must be enforced against Hamas for its double war crime: using civilian human shields to fire at civilian Israeli targets. If this tactic were to be brought to a halt, then Israel would have no need to respond in self-defense."

Caught In The Act

BWHAHAHAHAHAHA!!

Hamas Claims Victory; It Defeated the West, Once Again

Israel Is Just Mopping Up...

...the slop: Commander of Boys' Kidnap & Murder Cell Arrested

Anudder Roundup

Climate Change Unreason

"It is a cruel irony that, while it was science which, more than anything else, was able by its great achievements, to establish the age of reason, it is all too many climate scientists and their hangers-on who have become the high priests of a new age of unreason.

But what moves me most is that the policies invoked in its name are grossly immoral...

[T]he greatest immorality of all concerns the masses in the developing world. It is excellent that, in so many parts of the developing world—the so-called emerging economies—economic growth is now firmly on the march, as they belatedly put in place the sort of economic policy framework that brought prosperity to the Western world. Inevitably, they already account for, and will increasingly account for, the lion's share of global carbon emissions.

But, despite their success, there are still hundreds of millions of people in these countries in dire poverty, suffering all the ills that this brings, in terms of malnutrition, preventable disease, and premature death. Asking these countries to abandon the cheapest available sources of energy is, at the very least, asking them to delay the conquest of malnutrition, to perpetuate the incidence of preventable disease, and to increase the numbers of premature deaths."

[---]

Captured Hamas Combat Manual Explains Benefits of Human Shields

"IDF forces in the Gaza Strip found a Hamas manual on “Urban Warfare,” which belonged to the Shuja’iya Brigade of Hamas’ military wing, the Al-Qassam Brigades. The manual explains how the civilian population can be used against IDF forces and reveals that Hamas knows the IDF is committed to minimizing harm to civilians.

Throughout Operation Protective Edge, Hamas has continuously used the civilian population of Gaza as human shields. The discovery of a Hamas “urban warfare” manual by IDF forces reveals that Hamas’ callous use of the Gazan population was intentional and preplanned.

This Hamas urban warfare manual exposes two truths: (1) The terror group knows full well that the IDF will do what it can to limit civilian casualties. (2) The terror group exploits these efforts by using civilians as human shields against advancing IDF forces."

RTWT