The Swiss Ban on Minarets

For those following European news you have heard that a referendum in Switzerland recently passed which banned Mosques from building minarets. Those unfamiliar with minarets please see this Wikipedia article. Traditionally minarets are used to call the faithful to prayer and broadcast the prayers of the Imam.

I can’t tell you how disgusted I am with this ban. It represents an attack on Islam. The Islamic community in Switzerland is one of the most successfully assimilated in Europe. There are a number of Muslim extremists in France and other European states that fail to successfully assimilate into society and adhere to Gods law rather than man (though a number of religions have their extremist elements) and do represent threat to the democratic nature of the State.

Protest

This is a picture of a protest against the NT intervention outside the PMs office in Sydney

Israel Will Pay The Price

Yes I know I haven’t posted for a while. Some major news though. I will be attending the StandWithUs “Israel in Focus 2009″ conference in Los Angeles. I fly a day after my exams finish so you can understand why I doubt i’ll be posting in November. I am arranging a US SIM card for my iPhone which will allow me to continue to tweet whilst i’m away (my twitter feed is on the right hand side of the screen) and is updated daily, at least, rather than this blog which realistically should be growing cobwebs in the corner of the screen.

A lot has been going on in Israel over the past month most notably the release, and adoption of, Richard Goldstone’s report into the Gaza conflict. I have a lot of respect for Richard Goldstone however it seems in this case that he was more than willing to take information from dubious sources; be they NGOs with little credibility or Palestinian civilians who are being bullied by the Hamas “security forces”. No one denies that mistakes took place in the heat of battle and those that who it found broke the IDF’s Purity of Arms will face criminal charges (there are currently over 100 investigations by the IDF and 23 have been upgraded to criminal investigations).

For now I leave you with this article by Alex Fishman from Ynet. An interesting piece about Mohamed ElBaradei and his collusion with the Iranian regime. It’s obvious that such a partisan character has failed in his duty to uphold the office of the IAEA. There is not a single person I know of (both Arab and Jew) who aren’t ecstatic that his tenure will be over next month. However it appears that he may have done irreversible damage to the international coalition to stop an Iranian nuclear bomb.

Benjamin Netanyahu UN Speech

Please listen to this amazing speech by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Say what you want about the man he’s a damn good speaker.

Augmented Reality

One of the cool features of the new iPhone and of a number of other smartphones coming out is Augmented Reality.

To make up for my lack of posting I give you this very funny YouTube clip about the perils of this new technology.

Arrest the Secretary-General of the UN for Murder!!!

Is that heading a bit extreme? Well….yes. I am not saying that Ban Ki Moon, Kofi Annan or any of the other previous UN Secretary-Generals have literally killed anyone. However it is through their actions, or to be more accurate their lack of action, that millions of people have been killed.

Through its obsessive focus with Israel the United Nations has ignored some of the gravest human rights abuses since the Holocaust. Darfur, Rwanda, Yugoslavia are all human rights abuses that had been ignored by the UN. Not to mention the dozens of conflicts in Africa (including the use of child soldiers) and scores of massacres throughout the world that simply go unreported.

Article 1 of the UN charter declares:

All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.

It appears that the Secretary-General, and the thousands of people that work under him, have forgotten the founding article of the UN. I am not saying that Israel should not be criticised, as no country is above international criticism, however there must be a degree of proportionality when it comes to international condemnation, censure, boycotts and divestments etc. In the last 9 years, since the beginning of the second intifada, 6,348 Palestinians have been killed. This number however does not differentiate between armed combatant and civilians. Furthermore it does not take into account the fact that Hamas terrorists often use civilian buildings as launching pads, ammo caches and sniper nests. This use of civilian infrastructure ensures that the civilian death toll will be much higher and is against international law and the laws of armed conflict. That being said regardless of the ration between civilian/combatant casualties the number is far too high.

Yet let us look at a similar period. Between 2003-2009 more than 450,000 Sudanese in Western Darfur have been killed. In 100 days more than 800,000 (with reports of more than a million) Tutsis were murdered, in the Congo between 1998-2004 almost 4 million innocent people died and I have not even begun to examine the human rights abuses in the Arab world against their own citizens.

This all happened within the last twenty years. The United Nations was created out of the ashes of the Holocaust under the mantra ‘never again’. Lets hope that the UN Secretary-General ends this obsessive focus on Israel and starts to examine the real human rights abuses that are occurring under his watch. If he doesn’t then i’m making a citizens arrest!

Google Opt Out Service

A very funny video from the Onion, a satirical news website, about how Google is controlling us all

Google Opt Out Service

The Religious/Secular Divide in Israel

Tragically two Israeli’s were gunned down in Tel Aviv a few days ago. They were sitting in a basement when a gunman burst in and open fired injuring dozens as well. The basement was a safe haven for homosexuals and this was a hate crime. Whilst homosexuals have found Israel to be a safe haven (it is the gay capital of the Middle East and Tel Aviv is a hotspot for both gays and straights around the world) there is a religious/secular divide within Israel. Only hours after the attack many gays were blaming the religious right (as represented by the ultra-orthodox Shas party) for motivating the attacker*.

The religious secular divide is one that has plagued Israel since her birth more than 60 years ago. Whilst Israel would be a Jewish State it would also have to be a secular state. Therefore how often would Jewish law (Halacha) interfere with the secular rule of law. David Ben Gurion, the first Prime Minister of the State of Israel, tried to strike a balance between the divide and the impact of Judaism on the country is evident to this day. The most striking example is in the country’s marrage laws. Jewish marriages are performed under the auspice of the Chief Rabbinate who only recognises Orthodox marriages and other religions perform their own marriages. However the State of Israel does not recognise civil marriages (marriages performed by the State rather than a religious institution) performed within Israel (it does recognise civil marriages performed abroad). This has caused a great deal of anger within the secular community as it imposes the will of Orthodox Judaism on those who may not believe in the Orthodox (or indeed any stream) of Judaism.

The emergence of the far right nationalist political party Yisrael Beitanu (discussed in a previous blog post) and Avigdor Lieberman’s support for civil marriage has helped to reinvigorate the widening gap between religious and the secular. However marriage is not the only evident gap between the two Israel’s. Simply drive from Jerusalem to Tel Aviv and it is as if you were driving through time. Shabbat (the Jewish day of rest) is observed strictly in Jerusalem whilst in Tel Aviv it is an excuse to party. In Jerusalem the divide between religious and secular has unfortunately become quite violent. The opening of a new car park has led thousands of haredim (ultra-orthodox religious Jews) to protest in the street. These protests have led to a great deal of damage to the holy city and often end with cars in flames. For the last few years the Hardei community have made their opposition to the State well known. They believe that the law is the Torah and do not recognise the laws created by man. One Haredi man ran down a parking attendant with his car because she gave him a parking fine. The man was guilty however he escaped punishment simply because the Jerusalem district judge did not want to harm his chances for joining a rabbinical court.

For the last twenty minutes i’ve been staring at this blank paragraph wondering exactly how to end this blog post. Should it be on a happy note that Israel with her myriad of problems still manages to be a beacon of light to those that suffer in the far corners of the Earth under repressive regimes such as Darfur? Should it end on a sad note that Israel is facing a tough decision whether or not to remain a halachically Jewish state and if man’s law should dominate will Israel lose its unique Jewish characteristics? What will happen to the Zionist dream as both man and God compete for the heart of a nation? After much thought I have decided to end on a ?. Because I, and no one else, knows exactly what is going to happen in the future.

What I do know is that two young teens were gunned down the other night and the gunshots pierced more than just their bodies but rather the soul of a nation.

*I would like to make it clear that this has been written prior to the conclusion of a police investigation. The criminal has not yet been caught (and there appear to be no leads) and the motive has not been determined. The majority of articles coming out of Israel are pointing to a religiously motivated crime. It could however be a crime of passion, a crime of opportunity or simply the work of an insane individual. However it has opened a can of worms within Israel and this is what this article addresses.

IDF probes into Cast Lead complaints

Whilst no military operation is perfect and civilians will undoubtedly be killed in urban terrain it is how an army conducts itself in the aftermath of battle that seperates us from our enemies.
Whilst Hamas terrorists are celebrated in the streets and candy handed out whenever there is a homicide bombing against Jewish civilains the IDF is launching investigations into complaints against their soldiers.

Those that are guilty will be punished!

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1248277926837&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

The army is currently reviewing close to 100 complaints accusing soldiers of criminal conduct during the assault on Hamas in the Gaza Strip earlier this year, The Jerusalem Post has learned.

IDF Judge Advocate General Brig.-Gen. Avichai Mandelblit, it is understood, has ordered the Military Police to launch criminal investigations into 14 of the cases.

A senior IDF source said Wednesday that the investigations were proof of the IDF’s longstanding claim that it was capable of conducting responsible internal investigations into complaints against its soldiers.

“We do not need NGOs and rights groups to tell us to investigate ourselves,” the source said. “We know how to investigate on our own and have been open all along to receiving additional material from these groups.”

The near-100 cases are being reviewed by a variety of IDF units, including the air force, the Southern Command and specific brigades and battalions. Their findings are then being presented to the JAG, who decides whether they warrant the opening of an official criminal investigation.

The allegations were received from a number of sources. Some were initiated internally by soldiers. Some came directly from Palestinians. Others were raised by various nongovernment organizations such as Human Rights Watch, the Red Cross and Breaking the Silence.

A Breaking the Silence report two weeks ago on Operation Cast Lead included testimonies from 26 unnamed soldiers who participated in the campaign and claimed that the IDF used Gazans as human shields, improperly fired incendiary white phosphorous shells over civilian areas and used overwhelming firepower that caused needless deaths and destruction.

Military sources said that the reviews were being conducted into allegations that soldiers looted Palestinian homes, beat Palestinian prisoners and used Palestinians as human shields when sweeping homes for weaponry and terrorists during the operation.

Similar allegations were raised in the Breaking the Silence report.

The IDF traditionally does not formally comment on ongoing investigations.

Two soldiers from the Givati Brigade were recently charged with stealing a Palestinian credit card during the operation and using it to withdraw cash from ATMs in Israel.

That investigation was launched after Ahmed Rafia, a resident of Gaza City, filed a complaint with the IDF’s Gaza Coordination and Liaison Administration regarding the theft. Rafia, whose account is at Bank of Palestine, told officers from the administration that his card was stolen and that NIS 1,600 was withdrawn from ATMs in Israel following the conclusion of the operation in January.

In related news, the army has decided that in the event of a future conflict it will issue more detailed warnings to Palestinians before air strikes in residential areas. During Cast Lead, the IDF dropped millions of flyers in areas before raids and placed close to 250,000 phone calls to homes before they were bombed. The phone calls and distribution of flyers was part of an overall IDF effort to minimize harm to civilians and civilian infrastructure during the three-week-long offensive.

In recent discussions on the results of the operation, senior IDF officers have called to make improvements to procedures and to provide more details in the flyers to ensure that the Palestinians realize that their lives are at risk. Some of the flyers may henceforth include details on routes that the Palestinians can use to flee an area which is scheduled to be invaded.

Dump the CEIRPP

An interesting opinion piece from the Jerusalem Post detailing the bias that Israel suffers at the hands of the United Nations and how this bias contributes to the distrust that Israelis have for both the United Nations and various NGOs.

Over the years, the United Nations has done its fair share to prolong and exacerbate the Arab-Israel conflict. The explanation for this lies not with the world body conceptually, and certainly not with the ethos of its founders. But the UN can’t but reflect the values shared by the bulk of its members, the efforts of an enlightened minority notwithstanding.

With the arguable exception of General Assembly Resolution 181, which in 1947 called for the establishment of independent Jewish and Arab states – and which the Arabs rejected out of hand – just about every subsequent UN/GA stand on the conflict has been to Israel’s detriment. The most recent pertinent GA resolution, for instance, ES-10/18 of January 2009, basically regurgitated the Palestinian position on Operation Cast Lead, codifying it in international law.

There are now 192 member-states in the UN, most of which maintain diplomatic relations with both the Palestine Liberation Organization and Israel. In practice, however, the PLO has a built-in majority for just about any resolution it champions. Start with the 22-member Arab League and add (though allow for some overlap) the 57-member Organization of the Islamic Conference, then throw in “non-aligned” countries such as North Korea, Cuba and Venezuela. The result is that one would be hard pressed to come up with a single instance in which the General Assembly sided with Israel against the Arabs. Not once has the GA unequivocally reprimanded the PLO or Hamas for engaging in airline-hijackings, bus bombings and other forms of anti-civilian warfare. Israel, in contrast, is censured at every opportunity.

THE international body sank to its moral nadir on November 10, 1975, when the General Assembly passed the odious Resolution 3379, by a vote of 72 to 35 with 32 abstentions, labeling the national liberation movement of the Jewish people – Zionism – as a form of “racism.” The fact that the resolution was revoked in 1991 by no means entirely removes the ethical stain with which the world body remains tarnished.

But perhaps the one single most damaging step the organization took to institutionalize its bias against the Jewish state came with the creation in 1975 of the Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People (CEIRPP).

Unlike the Kurds, Roma, Copts, Uyghur, Tibetans, and others peoples’ who plead for international support, only the Palestinian Arabs have a permanent UN-funded body which does nothing but agitate on their behalf.

The committee – which convenes again today and tomorrow in Geneva – is comprised of Afghanistan, Belarus, Cuba, Cyprus, Guinea, Guyana, India, Indonesia, Lao People’s Democratic Republic, Madagascar, Malaysia, Mali, Malta, Namibia, Nigeria, Pakistan, Senegal, Sierra Leone, South Africa, Tunisia, Turkey and Ukraine.As part of a revolving door of injustice, each year the GA meets to “discuss” the “Question of Palestine” and each year it passes the recommendations of the CEIRPP. The biases of the committee have metastasized throughout the UN system owing to its ability to poison attitudes toward Israel from within. It is the CEIRPP which came up with the charade known as the “International Solidarity Day with the Palestinian People,” held annually on November 29, and which sponsors an array of meetings, seminars and conferences targeting Israel.

It will not question the Palestinian decision to reject former prime minister Ehud Olmert’s magnanimous 2008 peace offer. It will not tell the Palestinians that Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s seminal Bar-Ilan speech offers a way forward toward. It will not tell the Palestinians to end their boycott of the peace negotiations. The CEIRPP will never call on Hamas to recognize Israel, end terror and accept previous Palestinian commitments – as demanded by the Quartet.

Of course, the committee will do none of these things – because its raison d’etre is not peace but the vilification of Israel.

That is why this newspaper endorses a campaign initiated by the New York-based the Anti-Defamation League urging UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to dismantle the committee on the grounds that it is the “single most prolific source of material bearing the official imprimatur of the UN which maligns and debases the Jewish state.”

The CEIRPP is also an obstacle to peace – it needs to go.