Toronto for Israel Rally

What would I do without Shiloh Musings to inform me as to what is going on in my own backyard?



Bundle up and bring cognac.

Children of Hamas or the Harvest of Bitter Fruit

The Toronto Star hosts a report on the ‘nightmarish’ situation in Gaza Strip hospitals and while I have no doubt medical personnel are operating in their worst case scenario this bit caught my eye.

The Lancet cited the Ministry of Health in Gaza as saying that as of Monday, 292 children and 75 women had been killed in the offensive, with 1,497 children and 626 women wounded.

According to the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights, the death toll is somewhat lower: As of today, it said, 225 children and 70 women had been killed. However, the ministry defines children as 18 and under, the Palestinian Center 17 and under.
Israeli defence officials acknowledge the military has loosened its rules of engagement during the current round of fighting to prevent the killing or capture of soldiers.

But military officials note that Hamas fighters have worn civilian clothing while fighting Israeli troops, using schools, mosques and crowded residential areas for cover, making it hard to keep ordinary residents out of harm's way.Reacting to the Lancet articles, Israeli Cabinet Minister Isaac Herzog said his country has worked hard to allow humanitarian aid into Gaza throughout the fighting, and Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor sharply criticized one of the doctors quoted in the Lancet for "spreading vicious lies."

Paul Garwood, a Geneva-based spokesman for the World Health Organization, said the Gaza Health Ministry's figures had not been independently verified, but they seemed reasonable based on their staff's observations in Gaza. In a statement last week, WHO declared that health services in Gaza were "on the point of collapse." UNICEF called the situation "tragic" and "unacceptable."

The International Committee of the Red Cross said the Israeli army has failed to evacuate the wounded. "The violence launched on Gaza is taking an unjustifiable toll on civilian populations," the Lancet said in an editorial. "These actions contravene the fourth Geneva convention," it said, referring to the international agreement that civilians are to be protected in times of war.

Why? Well, let’s roll with this video aptly titled Children of Hamas.



There are those who suggest the Israeli Operation Cast Lead will only create more enemies and hardened the attitudes of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip/ I would counter that Hamas and Fatah have indoctrinated and incited, so well for so long, unencumbered by an vestige or pretense of humanity, that anything the Israeli state would do or did not do, is absolutely irrelevant in the face of this ideological pathology. There is only one counter - which is to allow those who preach and toil incitement, blood and hatred; to feel the full measure of sowing what they reap, and make no mistake, it is a harvest of the most bitter fruit a human heart can taste.

Meanwhile, as the calls for more worldwide pro-Hamas/Gaza Strip rallies are being staged, and I do mean staged, Ha'aretz reports on the lack of protests in Ramallah.

h/t - Shiloh Musings

Hamas’ white phosphorus rain into Israel

Well, well, not only are Hamas fighters donning IDF uniforms and utilizing civilian human shields, (contrary to umpteen articles of the Geneva Convention) Hamas is now firing white phosphorus mortar shells into civilian centres in Israel reports Ynet News:

One of the mortar shells fired from northern Gaza at the Eshkol Regional Council Tuesday contained white phosphorus. The council's security chief, Nikki Levy, said that "the potential danger of using such a rocket is enormous. It is far more dangerous than other Qassam rockets and mortal shells. This is an escalation in the type of explosives the Palestinians use on civilians."

Of course, Israel has been denounced as using white phosphorus missiles by all the usual suspects despite denials from the IDF Chief of Staff, and contrary to certain pro-Hamas fractions would have you believe - there are legitimate legal military uses for white phosphorus munitions but Hamas’ use of white phosphorus mortars does not even come close to being a considered legit in the broadest interpretation of the word.

I await the Hamas denunciations and charges of war crimes and I wait, and I wait, and I wait….

Katyusha launched over Israeli skies - again

The Jerusalem Post is reporting, once again, rockets have been fired into Israel from Lebanon.

At least three Katyusha rockets fired from Lebanon landed near Kiryat Shmona on Wednesday morning, the second rocket attack from Lebanon in less than a week. While security forces continued to search for the impact sites of the rockets, there were no immediate reports of anyone wounded or damage to property. The army launched a counter strike, firing artillery shells at the assumed location of the Katyusha launchers.

Lebanese officials also confirmed that several rockets were fired, with at least one falling short inside Lebanon. They said that the source of the rockets was likely the village of Kfar Hamam. Israeli helicopter gunships flew reconnaissance missions along the heavily protected border as Lebanese troops and UN peacekeepers sent out patrols, the Lebanese officials said on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the press.

The IDF Northern Command announced it was holding ongoing security assessments in light of the situation. "We view the Lebanese government and military as responsible to prevent such attacks," an army statement said. Following the strike, the Home Front Command ordered all residents of the north to stay close to bomb shelters in case there was a repeat attack. Students in Kiryat Shmona were moved underground into bomb shelters to finish out the rest of their school day.

No doubt there will be denials issued all around from all the usual suspects in Lebanon but Hezbollah is in control of southern Lebanon. So given this is the second attack from Lebanon in less than a week I think its time to replay my favourite Nashrallah song because it’s just so darn catchy.

Canada sole voice of dissent at the UN human rights council

The Toronto Star is reporting this:

OTTAWA–Canada stood alone before a United Nations human rights council yesterday, the only one among 47 nations to oppose a motion condemning the Israeli military offensive in Gaza.

And then the Toronto Star starts the spin:

The vote before the Geneva-based body shows the Stephen Harper government has abandoned a more even-handed approach to the Middle East in favour of unalloyed support of Israel, according to some long-time observers.

No doubt the Jewhaters in Canada will be having a fit and will come out in full force against Stephen Harper's government but I can live with the implications of not standing on the same side of those alleged big promoters of human rights. Of course, both Russia and China vote against humanitarian intervention in places like the Dafur...go figure.

No place like home....

I arrived home after midnight last night. I knew I was back in Toronto after the limo driver took the Jarvis street exit and was stopped at the lights under the underpass when a cracker rushed the limo and started to bang on my window with her begging cup. I turned to my youngest son and said I sure can tell we aren’t in small town Alberta. The Limo driver yells at me to ignore her and not to ‘feed the need’. I think he assumed I was from out of town as he launched into long diatribe about how drug addiction was ruing the downtown core and he peppered his lecture with lots of ‘helpful advice’ on dealing with drug addicts I might encounter in the city.

We came through the door and were presented with a ‘Montana-sized Mess’ which smelt strongly of eau de boy and cat. I tried to ignore it and go straight to bed but the dishes, empty pizza carton, and litter box kept calling my name. I finally gave up the struggle for sleep when I realized my neighbors weren’t going to get any quieter just because I came home after a month away. So I spent the night cleaning and went back to work on the morning. Dinner has been made and the dishes are put away. The washer is busy cleaning 10 days worth of dirty clothes from my oldest son and I am far to tired to blog anything I bookmarked earlier in the day. I have come to the conclusion there is no place like home but unfortunately, I am not home, not any more.

Anyway, the IDF found more of those ‘defensive tunnels’ leading from the Gaza Strip into Israel. Let me channel Jimmy Carter and say, digging tunnels into Israel are a necessary human right for Hamas.

What a news scoop

...for the Toronto Star's Harpoon Siddiqui

Jewish dissenters speak out over Gaza

Siddiqui, not being a member in any kind of standing within the Jewish community so I suspect difference of opinions are newsworthy only for him. Obviously, he never grew up hearing that old joke – two Jews, three opinions.

I am back in Toronto, and while the mother in me is finally at peace knowing all my sons are now sleeping safely under one roof – even if it is in Canada’s premier city of Jew-haters, I can’t help wishing there was a little more Alberta and a lot less Toronto.

the value palestinians place on their children's lives

Those brave 'militants' (or is the correct term 'freedom fighters') in action.
Did anyone else notice the 'ambulance' in the background? Now you know why so many children have been killed but can I get anyone to agree this is not only child abuse but a war crime in action? Of course, I fully expect no international tribunal or body will ever call any Palestinian, anywhere, to ever account.

h/t: Israel Matzav

The Reading List

I intended to catch up on my reading this holiday, but I find my good intentions didn’t keep pace with my reality. I only managed to finish two books so far and I have three days let. The holiday reading list started off with Farley Mowat’s People of the Deer, and Wally Lamb’s The First Hour I Believed, and considering the speed in which I read - it’s a disgrace.

I knocked off the People of the Deer in a day and a half. Say what you will about Farley Mowat’s politics but give the man his due. Not only can he tell a story but he engages the reader in ways few living writers ever manage to accomplish. I would have finished sooner but I found catering to the tribe’s need got in the way of my reading, and then, Wally Lamb’s new book logjamed my reading list like a big fat beached whale.

I really liked his two previous books and I was really looking forward to the time spent sitting by the wood stove reading this book. I should never have bothered, but once in, I was determined to finish it. There was just no way I was going to lug this mammoth book back to Toronto with me. Half-way through though the idea of reading the Red Deer phone book was starting to look as a viable alternative to finishing this book. I finally finished it last night and I am full of nothing but regret. I regret that I bought this book, I regret that I started this book, I regret the giant black hole of time reading this book consumed, but mostly I regret, I didn’t heave this book into the woodstove after the first 100 pages failed to deliver anything of substance or charm.

Anyways, I have been carting around Meir Shalev’s “A Pigeon and a Boy” for sometime. I hadn’t started it - just because I wasn’t in the mood but after Lamb’s book I needed an anecdote, and figured I’d give Shalev a chance. I haven’t finished it but I did manage to wade in roughly 100 pages last night - besides I didn’t get an offer to do anything better then read last night. Meir Shalev is no Wally Lamb, and can I get an Amen for that. So far I am utterly charmed by this book and I will quote you why:

There are a few character traits that set me apart from my parents and brother and wife. Some I have already mentioned and others I will mention now. They – she included – are well acquainted with the skies above their heads and the earth beneath their feet, while I am a kite whose string has severed. They – particularly she – take risks, while I hesitate. They – especially she – decide and do, while I settle for hopes and wishes, in the manner of the devout in prayer: like a hammer that pounds again and again on the same spot. Always the same words, always toward the same east. Sometimes – with my dark, closely spaced eyes, my desire for wandering and fear of travel, my uttering of prayers and my dread that they will be answered – I feel like the only Jew in the family.

And the best thing is - I cannot imagine any of the poetry or emotion this evokes - has been lost in translation.

So why is today any different than any other day in the Palestinian Authority?

Well, the short answer is Palestinian Chairman Mahmoud Abbas mandate to govern has expired. According to Palestinian Constitutional Law (insert appropriate oxymoron joke here), if no election has been held to elect a chairman directly, the role of chairman must now pass to the Speaker of the Palestinian Legislative Council, but this being the Palestinians, nothing is as simple as that for a multitude of reasons - the least - not being this one. Jerusalem Post:

According to the Palestinian constitution, the speaker of the Palestinian Legislative Council is supposed to serve as acting PA president for a period of 60 days, after which presidential elections are to be held.

The current speaker of the Hamas-dominated PLC, Abdel Aziz Dweik, is serving a 36-month sentence in Israel for membership in a terrorist organization. His deputy, Ahmed Bahar, also a senior Hamas official, is based in the Gaza Strip. Some Hamas spokesmen said in recent weeks that one of the two men would become acting PA president on January 9.

Of course, Abbas being the good democrat and moderate man, (insert all shades of Arafat here) we know him to be, has not intention of stepping down – for at least another year….

Abbas's aides said he has no plans to step down in the near future, claiming that the PA's Basic Law allows him to stay in power for another year.

Abbas was elected in January 2005 to a four-year term. Hamas officials said that as of Friday they would not recognize Abbas's status as president of the PA. But they also made it clear that they would not demand his resignation for now "because of the war" in the Gaza Strip.

"This is not the time to talk about such matters," said one Abbas aide. "President Abbas was elected by a majority of the people, and as such he's the legitimate leader. He represents all the Palestinians and not only those living in the West Bank." PA Prime Minister Salaam Fayad told reporters on Thursday that the law calls for holding presidential and legislative elections simultaneously. And since the legislative elections are due to be held in January 2010, Abbas is entitled to stay in office for an additional year, he explained.

Can you imagine the outcry if Bush tried to pull this move?

Dhimmi Carter

This should be a term limit on how long an ex-Presidents of the United States should be allowed to openly pimp for terrorists in the public eye. The Washington Post opinion piece:

And this fragile truce was partially broken on Nov. 4, when Israel launched an attack in Gaza to destroy a defensive tunnel being dug by Hamas inside the wall that encloses Gaza.

A defensive tunnel which just happens to lead into an opening into Israel...and the World Trade Centre towers are for sale. I will say it again - there is no human right to build tunnels into Israel. Carter is not just a major embarrassment to the United States but to human beings everywhere. As much as I dislike Bill Clinton, he does manage to conduct himself without being an absolute and complete tool.

War by proxy

Some ‘unknown group’ from Lebanon has fired rockets into Northern Israel according to the Jerusalem Post:

Two people were lightly wounded when terrorists in Lebanon fired three Katyusha rockets at the area of Nahariya in northern Israel on Thursday morning. The IDF returned fire.

(…)The IDF's Northern Command held consultations following the attack, saying that "Israel holds the government of Lebanon and the Lebanese armed forces responsible for preventing rocket fire into Israel." The army also said that Palestinian elements were interested in "dragging Lebanon into a war."

The army instructed citizens of the North to return to normalcy, saying that the attack was an isolated incident. According to Northern Command assessments, the salvo was probably fired by Palestinian terror groups and not by Hizbullah, but the possibility that Hizbullah instructed another group to fire at Israel could not be ruled out.
"Nothing happens in Lebanon without a green light from Hizbullah," a defense official said. "Even if it was a Palestinian group who fired the rockets, Hizbullah would have to at least have turned a blind eye to allow the rocket fire." Hizbullah denied involvement in the attack.

A Lebanese government official said the country was trying to determine who launched the rockets. The official also said Lebanon is committed to a UN-brokered truce that ended the Second Lebanon War in 2006.

An Al Jazeera reporter with close ties to Hizbullah said there was no chance the rockets were fired by the Shi'ite terror group, because the rockets were of an outdated model that Hizbullah had not used for years. Channel 10 also quoted him as saying that had Hizbullah wisheded to open a second front on Israel's North it would have fired dozens of rockets and not only three.

A few points to emphasize here. It does not matter which official group fired the rockets, it doesn’t matter how old the rockets were because the bottom-line is the government of Lebanon in partnership with UNIFIL is responsible for maintianing UN Resolution 1701 which explicitly states there are to be no rocket attacks emminating from Lebanon against Israeli civilians. Nothing happens in Southern Lebanon without the explicit okay and approval of Hezbollah. Whatever ‘fraction’ fired the rockets had to get the rockets from somebody and the somebody who is in complete charge of weapons smuggling in southern Lebanon is Hezbollah.

No doubt Hezbollah is feeling rather smug today with their plausal denibility but they should remember why the Israelis launched Operation Litani River. What’s the old saying – those who fail to learn the lessons of history are doomed to repeat their mistakes? In any case, I cannot help but wonder if the Syrians are feeling as smug as Hezbollah obviously is today. (h/t Elder of Ziyon for this link)

About that ceasefire

While the international cries for a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip increases proportionately with every image of Palestinian suffering, and that suffering is by no means unrealistic or not immense; what exactly would a temporary ceasefire accomplish other than a time of re-grouping till the next round?

Hamas, if taken at their word, rejects any permanent ceasefire with the Israelis. So even the efforts of France and Egypt are successful in creating a temporary ceasefire between Hamas and Israel; how exactly will it be the world will not one day be watching the IDF in action and scores of Palestinians suffering more than a human heart should know in another six months, a year or 18 months?

International monitors on the borders of Israel, Gaza and Egypt? Actually, this has been tried, and whenever things got hairy in a confrontational way, the EU Observer team routinely fled to Israel for safety. Egyptian forces have been increasingly coming under fire from not just "Hamas" but their own Bedouin tribesmen whenever Egypt has tried to interfere in the lucrative Bedouin weapons trade with Hamas. The current situation would not be possible without the general inadequacy and incompetence of the Egyptian Security Forces, and if nothing else, should prove the Egyptians are in way over their heads. While it is easy to cast motes in Egypt's eye, even first world nations in similar situations, have found it difficult to maintain order with determined gangsterism – just think US/Mexico border for starts.

Retired Canadian General Lewis MacKenzie has an opinion piece in yesterday's Globe and Mail outlining the need for a UN force with a strong Chapter 7 mandate.

On their own, Israel and Hamas are doomed to a perpetual state of war no matter how much international diplomatic horsepower is applied to resolving the conflict. But there is a solution that the world has been adroitly avoiding for 40 years.

Israel deserves security. Its population is prepared to live in peace with its neighbours providing they aren't dedicated to its extermination. If Israel deals with the threat from Hamas on its own, the situation will not improve over the long term - Hamas will simply resuscitate itself and carry on with its terrorist actions against Israel. The Security Council needs to show some rare backbone and authorize a strong UN force under the UN Charter's Chapter 7, which authorizes the use of deadly force as necessary, and deploy it within the Gaza Strip, taking on the responsibility to provide the security to which Israel is entitled.

The force would need to be strong enough to interdict weapons smuggling by sea, land (including by tunnel) and air from outside sources, to eliminate rocket attacks on Israel, to stop suicide bombers through use of border controls and, most important, to be strong enough militarily to take on Hamas if need be. The oft-expressed idea of putting international monitors into the Gaza Strip to control smuggling and the firing of rockets is ludicrous: Hamas would run rings around any unarmed outsiders whose only mandate was to "observe and report." Such monitors wouldn't even qualify as yet another Band-Aid solution.

The idea of an 'observe and report' mission is absolutely asinine. If a rocket falls in Sderot, we all know it. No one needs a UN mission to count rockets and report, and to what purpose would an 'observe and report' mission be - when it happened to stumble upon a rocket launching or an arms cache destined for Hamas? Report it to the UN and ask for direction? Shades of Rwanda and a big hairy so what if it did? It would not change the ultimate or logical outcome.

MacKenzie is right. The only international force worth its salt would need a strong Chapter 7 mandate to militarily engage and actively pursue those 'militant' Palestinian fractions who wish to circumvent or undermine the 'ceasefire' at a time of their choosing.

But even a Chapter 7 mandate security force does not even begin to address the most crucial of Palestinian aspirations, and would ultimately be doomed to failure - if a strong civilian administration authority is not put in charge to oversee matters of daily governance. Turning control back over to Hamas, who is ultimately responsible for bringing the Gaza Strip to this bloody abyss, or even (G-d forbid) to the Palestinian Authority - which has proved itself a thousand times over as utterly incapable of governing the Gaza Strip with any measurable standard of responsible government, is to perpetuate the cycle of violence indefinitely.

Ordinary Palestinians are held in bondage and shackled to high terror thuggery practised by Fatah, Islamic Jihad, Hamas and other sundry 'resistance' based gangsterism. The Palestinian people have shown the world time and time again they are impotent to change the cycle of violence by themselves...which is Arafat's true legacy to the Palestinian people, so if we won't help – who will?

The only other viable alternative is for the Israelis to annex the Gaza Strip and rebuild the settlements, and for a nation accused regularly of being colonizers; there is definite reluctance to do just that.

Remembering the disengagement

Next time one of those pie in the sky two-state solution types starts talking land for peace remember this – Jerusalem Post:

Three-and-a-half years after Israel's unilateral withdrawal from Gaza, two-thirds of the 8,500 evacuees are still living in temporary housing sites, and the move-in date for their permanent housing is still far off, according to a report filed Wednesday by State Comptroller Micha Lindenstrauss.

In response, the Knesset's State Control Committee decided to form an official committee of inquiry to investigate shortcomings and failures in the treatment and resettlement of the evacuees.

Lindenstrauss's report found serious deficiencies and delays in dealing with permanent housing solutions. A total of 95 percent of the Jewish former Gaza residents who had requested to join "communal housing" similar to the makeup of their settlement communities remain without permanent housing, the report found.

In all, two-thirds of the Gaza evacuees have asked to be resettled in such communities."The evicted families paid a heavy price following the disengagement, and continue to pay it even today," the report states. "The process of relocating them could still take years."

The Gaza Strip represented less than 9,000 Israelis and the government of Israeli has yet to fully compensate or arrange permanent housing solutions going on four years later. The Golan Heights is approximately double that number, and the disputed territories represents, at minimum - 25 times the number of Gush Katif refugees. Dismantling the settlements is an unworkable solution.

Freedom Fighters or just plain old Fashion Gangs Bangers

You decide. Ynet News:

As the Israeli operation in Gaza wears on it appears Hamas has relinquished any visage of a socio-political party, abandoning its claim to govern the residents of Gaza in favor of engaging in open war at their expense.

A number of reports from the Strip paint a picture of very difficult humanitarian conditions, not least because of Hamas itself. The suspicion is that the group's operatives have seized control of any supplies passing through the crossings – including those sent by Israel and international organizations.

Reports say Hamas takes a cut out of all aid that arrives, including flour and medicine. Supplies intended to be distributed without gain among the population is seized by the group and sold to the residents, at a profit to the Hamas government.

One such incident was recorded Monday, when a convoy of trucks carrying supplies through the Kerem Shalom crossing was opened fire upon and seized by Hamas gunmen. Similar incidents occurred with trucks carrying fuel.

In other cases, civilians are simply used as cannon fodder or human shields. Reports out of Gaza say residents who attempted to flee their homes in the northern area of the Strip were forced to go back at gunpoint, by Hamas men.

The organization is presumably interested in increasing civilian casualties in order to give rise to international pressure against Israel. Arab media reported that in an IDF strike on a UN school 30 civilians were killed, but there is no legitimate way to prove gunmen were among those killed as Hamas tends to bury these bodies quickly, thus eliminating evidence in Israel's favor.

Other civilian complaints state that Hamas gunmen pull children along with them "by the ears" from place to place, fearing that if they don't have a child with them they will be fair game to the IDF. Others hide in civilian homes and stairwells, UNRWA ambulances, and mosques.

In other reported cases Hamas gunmen hold civilians hostage in alleyways in order to provide themselves with a living barricade to ward off IDF forces. Reports somewhat more difficult to verify say the group's men shot Fatah operatives in the feet to make sure the latter would not attempt a coup.

Is there no end to the legacy of Arafat?

Ontario's answer to Joe McCarthy calls for boycott in support Hamas Terror U

According to the National Post, Ontario’s largest public employee union has called for an academic boycott of all visiting Israeli academics from speaking, teaching or researching at any Ontario universities unless said visiting Israeli academics publicly denounce the Israeli government’s Operation Cast Lead, and explicitly denounce the IDF’s attack of a Hamas run university of ‘higher learning’. No doubt the resolution vote will be held on a Saturday afternoon just like the other CUPE Israeli boycott.


Syd Ryan, leader of Ontario CUPE is quoted as going on record for beyond the pale in this Globe and Mail report:

"Attacking an institution of learning is just beyond the pale,” CUPE Ontario president Sid Ryan said last night. “They deliberately targeted an institution of learning. That's what the Nazis did.”

I really could not care any less what a CUPE union calls to boycotts or not; although I do find something deeply ironic in calls for the collective punishment of Israeli academics as a protest against the any action of the Israeli government. I suppose collective punishment is all in the eyes of the beholder.

Anyway, I love blogging - if only because my archives are a hidden throve of information available at my fingertips. Let us revisit said bombed institute of higher learning – circa February 2007 via the Palestinian Authority. Ynet News report:

Kidnapped solder Cpl. Gilad Shalit spent most of his time in captivity imprisoned on the campus of the Islamic University in Gaza, said senior Palestinian sources on Monday. Shalit was kidnapped on June 25th 2006 and up until three months ago had been held at the university – a prominent Hamas stronghold – but arguments amongst his captors led to his relocation. The Islamic University is under complete Hamas control, with faculty members and students alike all loyal to the organization.

Within its walls there are not only regular academic studies but also military training and religious preaching. Palestinian officials have labeled the university a "sanctuary for wanted men" and they note that Hamas mastermind Yahya Ayyash fled from the West Bank to Gaza in 1995 and hid in the Islamic University for several months during the time he was being pursued by Israeli forces for his role in numerous suicide bombings in the 90's.

Ayyash and other wanted Hamas members took advantage of the fact that none but Hamas loyalists set foot in the university. That changed last Thursday when troops from Fatah's Force 17 raided the university campus, confiscating some 2,000 AK-47 assault rifles, hundreds of RPG launchers and massive amounts of ammunition. Fatah troops also uncovered a tunnel opening leading all the way to the Palestinian Police headquarters in Gaza City. Estimates suggest Hamas had intended to fill the tunnel with explosives and destroy the police building.

Of course, what would a university be without visiting foreign academics? Ynet News:

A Palestinian source has said that the Iranian general nabbed in Gaza by Palestinian security officers supervised the manufacturing weapons and explosives for Hamas.

The source told Ynet on Friday that the expert was in charge of several labs in the university, mainly chemistry labs in which he trained Hamas activists, most of them women, manufacturing the explosives. At least five Iranian citizens were arrested during a raid at the Islamic University, a Hamas stronghold in Gaza City. One of the Iranians committed suicide during the raid. Six to nine Palestinians were killed in the raid, sources said. The raid on the Hamas-linked university in Gaza was carried out by national security forces affiliated with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. Hundreds of weapons and a lathe for the production of Qassam rockets were seized in the raid.

A security official said that during the raid a Hamas commander believed to have orchestrated the kidnapping of an Israeli soldier near the Gaza Strip in June last year suffered serious-to-moderate wounds. Ahmad Jaabri is believed to have planned the cross-border raid carried out by gunmen of Hamas and two other Palestinian groups on June 12 during which Corp. Gilad Shalit was kidnapped. The Palestinian source added that at least 20 women, some of them students, were arrested in the labs supervised by the Iranian expert, who was mainly involved in developing shells and rockets, but also explosives.

The source said that it was so far not clear what would happen to the general, who was still being questioned by Fatah members. Official diplomatic sources in the Palestinian Authority, including aides to Abbas and senior Fatah officials, refused to officially comment on the affair. Hamas officials also continued to strongly deny the report on the Iranians' arrest.

So where was Syd Ryan and CUPE’s voice of outrage back in February 2007? And just why weren’t there calls for an academic boycott of all non-Hamas affiliated Palestinian academics when Palestinian Authority forces raided Hamas U? I suspect - it’s because no Jews were involved - and there does seem to be a kind of pattern for that kind of thing here.

Perhaps, Dr. Dawg can offer up a rationalization as to how a university which stores hundreds of RPGs, thousands of AK-47s, masses amounts of ammunition, in addition to bombing making equipment is nothing more than a hallowed of hall of higher academic learning as he is rather good at that kind of thing, but I know, I cannot.

I will see your Allah and raise you a HaShem

Apparently, the Turkish Prime Minister got his knickers in a knot – and not over the Kurds but the Israelis. He threw down the “Allah” card to be played. Jerusalem Post:

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan's toxic comments Sunday that Israel's actions in the Gaza Strip would lead to punishment from Allah and Israel's "self-destruction" drew a protest from the Foreign Ministry, which told Turkey's ambassador to Israel that these words were "unacceptable" among friendly nations. Erdogan, speaking at a municipal election campaign rally in Anatolia, said Israel was "perpetrating inhuman actions which would bring it to self-destruction. Allah will sooner or later punish those who transgress the rights of innocents."

So be it.

The Intolerance of Kateness

What are the limits of free speech/expression in a civil free society? Some will tell you there can be no limits of free speech or expression. Others will say any speech or expression which is libellous or slanderous, while still others will draw the line at inciting hatred, contempt or the counselling the killing of any who represent the ‘other’.

My country has a rather chequered record on the free speech and while I will not say I am a free speech/expression purist, I am reluctant to silence anyone’s protected rights of speech or expression. I generally think libel and slander laws are necessary restraints to keep free speech/expression as responsible speech/expression, which goes towards keeping the ‘civil’ in society. I have no desire to revisit life in the schoolyard, and speaking of one who was there; there was very little which was civil about the experience. One of the perks of growing up is leaving the schoolyard behind and in keeping with a civil society, should one not have recourse to the courts and legal remedies, if one is unjustly or maliciously libelled and/or slandered by the exercise of someone else’s free speech?

So what brings this up? A post and a quote at Kathy Shaidle’s blog from her co-author (The Tyranny of Nice) Pete Vete:

As a free speecher I don't believe waiving the Hezbollah flag should be illegal, but I'll be spending my big-city tourism dollars in Montreal and Chicago from now on.

Hezbollah is banned as a terrorist organization in Canada. In practical terms, this means any show of support - whether it is - material, financial or moral support of this organization is legally prohibited under law in Canada.

Now, one can argue Hezbollah is not a terrorist organization, and one could even lobby the government to have Hezbollah removed from the banned list of terrorist organizations, but until the day comes when Hezbollah is removed from the banned list of terrorist organizations – distributing, selling, buying or waving the Hezbollah flag in a public rally ,is a proscribed activity under law and all who flaunt this law, should face prosecuting under the law for lending support to a terrorist organization.

And no, I don’t have a problem with prosecution of any individual for waving the Hezbollah flag at a public rally but I do take a dim view of Toronto Police Officers selectively refusing to enforce the law as it now stands because it runs counter to the whole notion of a ‘civil’ society if moral support of a designated terrorist organization is allowed free reign to exercise such support in the public domain.



But by all means, go ahead and support the free speech/expression rights of terrorists, just don’t count on me helping you defend them.

Will we ever hear a 'war crime' charge for this?

Hamas targets a kindergarten in Ashdod Israel. Ha’aretz:

Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip on Monday fired a barrage of 30 Qassam and Katyusha rockets at southern Israel, after a night of relative calm.

One of the rockets, fired mid-afternoon, exploded in a kindergarten in Ashdod. The playground was empty at the time of the attack, and no casualties were reported.

No doubt shelling an Israeli kindergarten is justified because these children could very grow up to join the IDF one day which is in keeping with Hamas PR efforts.

And the only reason no deaths were reported is the strange Israeli habit of not using their children as martyrs for the Elders; consequently, the Israeli government has issued closure notices for all schools within rocket range while Operation Cast Lead continues.

Canadian War Zone Refugees

Ah yes, here we go again. The CBC reports:

At least 36 of 58 Canadians known to be in the Gaza Strip have asked for assistance to leave the territory as Israel escalated its attack on the Hamas militant group with a ground offensive over the weekend, but the earliest they could leave would be Monday, Israeli officials said.

The Canadian government said Sunday that it asked Israeli authorities Friday to issue the necessary travel permits to allow Canadians to leave Gaza as quickly as possible, the CBC's Nahlah Ayed reported.

But Israeli officials said the request only came Saturday evening, the same night that the ground offensive began, killing 64 Palestinians. At least 512 Palestinians and five Israelis have died since Israel launched its campaign in Gaza on Dec. 27.

Among those who want to leave the territory is Marwan Diab of Calgary, who was visiting Gaza City with his wife and four children. "I want to get them out as soon as possible," he told CBC News. "You cannot imagine the amount of violence that is happening, the magnitude of this wave of violence."

Wafa Zakout, who returned to Gaza City to sell her house and move to Toronto, said she hasn't slept properly for almost a week. "I am so nervous … because of the situation," she said.

I would find it hard to sleep too if I was in Zakout's spot, and before anyone gets their knickers into a knot, I fully believe the Canadian government has an obligation towards any citizen who finds themselves in a war zone…such is the burden of conferring citizenship. One could argue that by deliberately visiting a place like the Gaza Strip on was playing Russian roulette with one’s life, but realisticaly, the Israelis have let the Gaza Strip fester for years before taking a pro-active military stand.

There is a much more interesting scenario to this article which is why I posted it. If the Gaza Strip is the largest open-air prison in the world (a la progressive Palestinian apologistas crowd) – just how is it that others are allowed to visit and leave?