The Philadelphia Bulletin: US Weary over Turkey-Iran Deal

by David Bedein

JERUSALEM - The Middle East Newsline has confirmed that the United States has expressed increasing dissatisfaction with Turkey's alliance with neighboring Iran.

U.S. officials said the Turkish rapprochement with Iran would be a leading item on the agenda of talks during a summit in Washington in December and added that President Barack Obama would raise the Turkish alliance with Iran during his meeting with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Erdogan.

"It's not a good thing to make business, at the moment, with Iran," U.S. Assistant Secretary Philip Gordon said.

Mr. Gordon, responsible for European and Eurasian affairs, met Turkish officials in November to discuss the agenda for Mr. Erdogan's meeting with the Obama administration. During a wide-ranging briefing, the U.S. official stressed that Ankara and Washington would be required to resolve a range of issues.

"There were more points of disagreement than of agreement with Turkey," Mr. Gordon said.

In November, Iran and Turkey signed a multi-billion-dollar energy agreement that elicited strong opposition from Washington.

Officials said the Obama administration warned the Erdogan government that the accord sent the wrong signal to Iran amid the international drive to stop its uranium enrichment program.

"Iran needs to be assured that it has to cooperate with the international community," Mr. Gordon said.

"Otherwise, it will face consequences."

The Obama administration has also been alarmed by Mr. Erdogan's statements that Turkey would not support United Nations Security Council sanctions on Iran. Turkey, a leading member of NATO, has been a non-permanent member of the council.

Other disagreements between Ankara and Washington were said to include Turkey's warm relationship with Sudan. In November, Turkey invited Sudanese President Omar Bashir, accused of war crimes in the Darfur province, to an Islamic summit in Istanbul.

The American government has also been dismayed by Mr. Erdogan's efforts to reduce Turkish defense and strategic relations with Israel. Mr. Erdogan was warned by the U.S. that the prime minister's policy would hurt Turkish interests in the U.S. Congress.

"Americans watch closely Turkey’s relations with its neighbors," Mr. Gordon said.

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Lawrence of Palestine

by Marc Prowisor

It seems that ignorance and arrogance rule when it comes to US policy in the volatile situation in Israel. Since 2005 the US has been leading the effort of the building of a “Palestinian Army”. Partnered with Britain, Canada and a few others, they have been training and building a military force for the “Palestinian Authority”. This force is said to bring law and order back to the “West Bank”, or as said by Lt Gen Keith Dayton in his address to the Soref Symposium in Washington DC, “to create a Palestinian State”, “The three 500-man battalions are intended to grow, to as many as ten battalions. Their mission, he said, is to “create a Palestinian state.” “If you don’t like the idea of a Palestinian state, you won’t like the rest of this talk.”

General Dayton takes his job very seriously, as he has agreed to sign on another two years to complete the goal. The general of course is aware how the situation overturned in Gaza and is doing his best to avoid the same happening on his watch. Yet reality on the ground is different. The simple fact is that this force is charged at keeping Abbas in power. The United States see him as a partner in their plans and demise for Israel, and they will go to all lengths at this point to keep him alive. Despite the fact that they are well aware of his weakness in the field, his ever sliding popularity, the vast corruption that runs through his government, and not to mention the current negotiations with Hamas, training and support continue full speed ahead. General Dayton regards the Jewish residents as obstacles to his goal of a “Palestinian State” in Israel. His concept of “Las Vegas laws” shows his lack of understanding of the situation in Israel and the Middle East.

Indeed I am amused by his observations of Yasser Arafat’s forces, as he describes them as not properly trained and equipped and lacking an effective security mission. I have news for the General, they knew exactly what they were doing, and thank Gd they were not “properly trained and equipped”, otherwise we would have had a lot more dead Jews around Israel. I guess we should be happy he and the US led team will assist in the training and equipping of the troops to achieve their “goals”, by the way, using US tax dollars. What will their response be when this equipment and training also ends up in Hamas hands, or before that, being used to kill Jews throughout Israel. Such a warning was even stated by the General at the symposium. The rhetoric coming out of the Palestinian mouths presented to the symposium could be considered the best stand up comedy for years to come, how many times will you subject us to the continued lies? How much Jewish blood must flow before the US administration and General Dayton is able to admit error in their doings. I would hate to think that this may be part of their motive, as we know war is used by politicians as a tool and blood is just a statistic to them, couldn’t be. If I sound skeptical, forgive me as I have had to clean up the bloody mess of mistakes, time and time again and am irked by the “Consultants” and “Advisors” who just go home and so “oh well”.

It was presented to the unassuming “Think Tank” how the Israeli’s are grateful to the General and agree with his “view”. I guess “Think Tank” has other meanings that I am unaware of.

More and more US money is being poured into the training, equipping and the creation of the Palestinian Army, or lining many pockets in the Abbas infrastructure while Israel cuts it’s security funding to the Jews of Judea and Samaria, at the request of our “friends”. Sounds devious, yet it is true. It’s all part of the big plan, the two State Solution that will bring peace to the world, that eludes us because of a piece of land smaller than some national parks in the US. Please stop insulting us.

So the US has it’s own Lawrence of Arabia (or Palestine), and who knows, maybe Hollywood will make a movie of the heroic dedication the US advisors and their friends are showing in the Israel-Palestinian conflict.

I am sure the strangle hold on Israel being attempted will continue on and the attempted Ghettoisation of Jewish communities will continue in the Jewish heartland. US policy gets worse regarding Israel in its feeble attempt to please world Islam and give Yusuf (Cat Stevens) more song material. The US will go through the pangs of change, and the world will learn that friendship does have a price and the words Honor, Duty and Loyalty translate different in Arabic.

The Philadelphia Bulletin: Peres Warns Brazil About Terror Activity

by David Bedein

JERUSALEM - As an integral part of his visit this week to South America, Israeli President Shimon Peres shared intelligence with Brazilian Defense Minister Nelson Jobim regarding Iran and Hezbollah being active in the three-way border between Brazil, Argentina and Paraguay.


Israel's President Shimon Peres, right, shakes hands with Brazil's Defense Minister Nelson Jobim in Brasilia on Tuesday. (Eraldo Peres/Associated Press)

Hezbollah terrorist cells working there are engaging, among other things, in money laundering, arms trafficking, drug trafficking and diamond smuggling in order to finance terrorist activity, according to the information conveyed by President Peres.

Israel warned Brazil and other Latin American countries of Hezbollah's intentions to perpetrate terror attacks against Jewish and Israeli targets in South America similar to the large-scale, murderous terror attacks that were committed during the 1990s against the Israeli embassy in Buenos Aires and the Jewish community center in that city.

This is the first visit by an Israeli president to Brazil in 40 years.

Upon landing, Mr. Peres received a magnificent reception that included an honor guard, a military parade and a gun salute. Afterwards, Mr. Peres held a long meeting with Defense Minister Jobim, who is considered to be one of the strongest men in the Brazilian government.

Mr. Peres brought three leaders of Israel's defense industry - the director-general of Israel Aerospace Industries, the director-general of Elbit and a representative of Rafael - to the meeting in order to advance defense deals worth hundreds of millions of dollars. The Brazilian army is currently undergoing a modernization, and Israel's defense industries wish to take part in this process.

Mr. Peres was invited to address the Brazilian parliament, where Israel's president made specific reference to the fact that Iran's president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad will be visiting Brazil this week. Mr. Peres remarked that he "finds it amazing to come from a nation where it is common to see people branded with concentration camp numbers to address a nation who will hear from another nation's leader that the mass murder of Jews never occurred."

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The Philadelphia Bulletin: Israel, United States Joint Military Exercise Considered a Success

by David Bedein

JERUSALEM - The U.S. Army and the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) successfully completed the Juniper Cobra 10 exercise this week.

The exercise was geared to improve cooperation between the two armies and to simulate defensive action against missile attacks on Israel by Syria and Iran.

This is the fifth time this exercise has been held. It was held in Israel, over a three-week period and involved 1,400 troops from four different branches of the U.S. Army. The exercise involved field training in which the two sides practiced cooperation between the American and Israeli troops in a variety of scenarios, a training of command posts, which practiced cooperative air defense and the firing of a live Patriot missile, which occurred yesterday.

Commanders from the U.S. Army and the IDF voiced their satisfaction with the results of the joint exercise, and noted the exercise had allowed the participants to learn from the knowledge and experience possessed by each other's army.

Commander of the Anti-Aircraft Forces Brig. Gen. Doron Gavish said, “We used the active defense system in collaboration with American forces and Israeli forces. The exercise manifested challenging scenarios and the conjoining of the most advanced weapons systems in the world in this field. The exercise was completed successfully. The professional level of the troops and the degree of cooperation between the armies manifested itself in the way in which the troops were put to use.”

The commander of the American task force, John Richardson, said, “We trained together in a challenging scenario. We presented new technologies and means of operation, and we scored tremendous results.”

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The Philadelphia Bulletin: US to Review Military Police after Attack

by David Bedein

Jerusalem - The Middle East Newsline has confirmed that the U.S. military plans to begin a review of its increased Muslim presence in the armed forces.

The U.S. Defense Department and Joint Chiefs of Staff plan to discuss an examination of the Muslim presence in the U.S. military and the threat of Al Qaida influence. They said Congress was pressing for such a review in wake of the Nov. 5 killing of 13 U.S. troops by a Muslim officer.

“We have to go back and look at ourselves and ask ourselves the hard questions," U.S. Army Chief of Staff Gen. George Casey said. "Are we doing the right things? We will learn from this."

The review will focus on the exact number of Muslims in the U.S. military, which has encouraged such enrollment.

The U.S. Defense Department reported 3,409 Muslims on active military duty as of April 2008, but officials said the number could be at least three times higher.

"We believe there are many more Muslims who, when recruited, did not list their religion," an official said. "Some of these people simply wanted to avoid harassment; others might have had a sinister agenda."

Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, born in the United States and alleged to have killed 13 soldiers in the army base at Fort Hood, Texas, did not identify himself as a Muslim when he enlisted.

Mr. Hasan was, however, recruited as part of a U.S. military drive to reach out to the Muslim community. Over the last decade, the military has intensified its recruitment of Arabic-, Farsi- and Pashtun-speaking soldiers for the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

The Pentagon has been receiving reports of Muslim soldiers who expressed opposition to the U.S. military campaigns in Afghanistan and Iraq. They said the opposition was encouraged by Islamic clerics as well as Muslim officers such as Mr. Hasan, who warned Muslims against harming co-religionists.

In 2003, U.S. Army Sgt. Hasan Akbar, said to have opposed the U.S. invasion of Iraq, killed two officers and injured 14 others in a grenade attack. Mr. Akbar, a convert to Islam, was sentenced to death.

The U.S. military has sought to shield Muslims from retaliation in Afghanistan and Iraq. In many cases, they said, Muslim soldiers were ordered to use fake family names to prevent reprisals against their families abroad.

Some in Congress have called for clear guidelines on allowing soldiers to express political views in the military. They said Mr. Hasan's pro-jihad views were tolerated by officers concerned over charges of discrimination.

"I want to say very quickly we don't know enough to say now, but there are very, very strong warning signs here that Mr. Hasan had become an Islamist extremist and, therefore, that this was a terrorist act," Sen. Joseph Liberman, a Connecticut independent and chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, said.

Senator Lieberman said his committee would investigate the Hasan shooting, particularly the motive for the attack. He said a focus would be whether the U.S. Army ignored warning signs that Mr. Hasan was heading for an attack.

Mr. Hasan underwent an investigation in April on suspicion that he had adopted Al Qaida doctrine of holy war against the West. They said Mr. Hasan was suspected of trying to contact Al Qaida via the Internet.

"I am intending to begin a congressional investigation of my homeland security committee into what were the motives of Mr. Hasan in carrying out this brutal mass murder and to ask whether the Army missed warning signs that should have led them to essentially discharge him," Mr. Lieberman said. "If Mr. Hasan was showing signs, saying to people that he had become an Islamist extremist, the U.S. Army has to have zero tolerance. He should have been gone."

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The Philadelphia Bulletin: Israel: Hezbollah Acquired Long-Range Missiles

by David Bedein

JERUSALEM - Israel's military has detected Hezbollah acquisition of missiles and rockets with ranges of up to 325 kilometers. They said the weapons could strike targets in most of Israel.

"Some of them have a range of 300 kilometers (180 miles) and some of them have a range of up to 325 kilometers," Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi said.

In a Nov. 10 briefing to the Israel Knesset Parliamentary Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, Mr. Ashkenazi said Hezbollah has already deployed the long-range rockets in Lebanon. He said a rocket attack from the Beirut area could reach the nuclear reactor in the southern Israeli city of Dimona.

"There is a paradox," Mr. Ashkenazi told the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee said. "On one hand, there is calm. But when you peek over the fence you can see armament and empowerment."

The latest acquisition marked the longest-range missiles and rockets in Hezbollah's arsenal. Until this year, they said, Hezbollah wielded weapons with a range of about 120 miles.

Mr. Ashkenazi did not identify the latest Hezbollah missile. The missile approximated the range of the Soviet-origin Scud B.

Hezbollah has amassed an arsenal of 40,000 missiles and rockets, most of them short-range weapons. They said Iran has increased weapons and other military support to its Lebanese proxy.

"We don't delude ourselves," Mr. Ashkenazi said. "The situation is delicate and Hezbollah is growing stronger all the time. The Iranian challenge is to increase control over the Middle East through training, arms and money provided to all terror organizations."

The Hezbollah acquisition of arms from Iran and Syria represents a violation of UN Resolution 1701, which implemented a ceasefire that put an end to the Second Israel-Lebanon War in August 2006.

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The Philadelphia Bulletin: Saudi Arabia:The Source Of Islamization In US Military

by David Bedein

JERUSALEM - Saudi Arabia has been identified as the source of the growing Islamization in the U.S. military.


Army Pfc. Michael Pearson’s mother, Sheryll Pearson, is comforted by her son, Kristopher Craig, who is also Michael’s brother, at their home in Bolingbrook, Il. on Nov. 6. Pfc. Pearson was shot and killed at Fort Hood Army base in Texas on Nov. 5. (Paul Beaty/Associated Press)

A leading analyst asserted that Saudi Arabia spent millions of dollars in its effort to convert U.S. soldiers to Islam. Dr. Gal Luft, co-director of the Institute for the Analysis of Global Security in Washington, said the campaign pioneered by the Saudis began during the 1991 war against Iraq, which involved the deployment of nearly 500,000 U.S. troops in Saudi Arabia.

"Nearly two decades have passed since the Saudi conversion campaign, and most of the converts may no longer be in uniforms," Dr. Luft said.

"But the seeds sown during the Gulf War have germinated, creating scores of radicalized Americans who are a threat to their comrades in uniforms as well as to their civilian communities."

Dr. Luft traced the recent killing of 13 U.S. soldiers by a Muslim officer to a Saudi indoctrination campaign.

Dr. Luft said the Saudi campaign resulted in the spread of Wahabi doctrine, which stresses Islamic war.

"While Muslim soldiers have served in uniforms loyally for decades, it is the rising number of Wahabi-trained and converted Muslims that is a relatively recent phenomenon," Dr. Luft said in a report, "Since Wahabism is one of the most radical and puritan strands of Islam, the penetration of Wahabi thinking into the ranks of the military must be treated with care."

Dr. Luft's report, released on Tuesday, said the spread of Wahabi influence has endangered U.S. soldiers. A recurring prospect has been the turning of Wahabi-indoctrinated soldiers on their colleagues.

Dr. Luft, quoting former U.S. officers, said Saudi military personnel were directed to identify and missionize their American counterparts. He said the Saudi campaign was a "well-orchestrated and generously funded effort sponsored by the Saudi government to convert as many American military members as possible to Islam."

At one point, Saudi commander and now deputy defense minister, Prince Khaled Bin Sultan, bragged that more than 2,000 U.S. troops converted to Islam in 1991. Some of the U.S. officers were said to have been given as much as $30,000 to convert.

"These Muslim troops are now the messengers of Islam in the U.S. forces," Dr. Abu Ameena Bilal Phillips, an Islamic convert who missionizes in the military, was quoted by the report as saying.

The report said the shooting by Maj. Nidal Hasan at Fort Hood, Texas represented an Islamic attack. Dr. Luft quoted Hasan as shouting to fellow

soldiers, "You guys are coming into our countries and you’re going to rape

our women and kill our children."

"It is time to investigate what exactly happened back then in the desert

and assess how serious and deep-rooted the damage is," Dr. Luft's report said.
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The Philadelphia Bulletin: Israeli Bill Includes Rights Of Jewish Refugees From Arab Lands

by David Bedein

Jerusalem - Israel's Knesset Parliament passed a seminal bill last Wednesday that will affect any future Middle East peace negotiations.

According to the bill, it will not be possible for Israel to sign any diplomatic agreement with any state or foreign entity without arranging for the interests and rights of the Jewish refugees from Arab countries.

The refugees are defined, according to the UN's Refugee Convention as, "the Jewish citizens of Israel who immigrated from Arab countries in the wake of the establishment of the State of Israel and forced to leave the property that had been in their ownership in their countries of origin."

The terms received by the Jewish refugees, moreover, must be on par with the terms received by Arab refugees in the final status negotiations. 


In addition, the bill says, "In any discussion on the subject of Palestinian refugees as part of peace negotiations in the Middle East, the Israeli government will raise the subject of awarding compensation for loss of property and the granting of equal status to the Arab refugees, who left their property from the day that the state was established, and Jewish refugees from Arab countries."

The background explanatory statement about the bill notes that a million and a half Jewish refugees either were expelled or fled from Arab countries and were forced to leave their homes and property since the establishment of the state of Israel in 1948.

The U.S. Congress passed a resolution in February 2008 stipulating that these Jews were defined as refugees in keeping with the explicit definition of the UN Refugee Convention. The bill states that the Israeli government already made the decision about registering claims of Jews from Arab countries. Now, this bill will obligate the government not only to "register" these claims, but also to include them in any future peace treaty and also in the negotiations which precede it.

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A DAY OF INFAMY: NOVEMBER 10, 1975

by Alex Grobman

Justice Richard Goldstone’s U.N. report charging Israel of “deliberate attacks” against civilians in last January’s defensive war against Hamas, is just the latest assault to undermine the legitimacy of the Jewish state and her right to defend herself.

That the U.N. continues to play a central in this effort is not surprising. After failing to defeat Israel on the field of battle, the Arabs chose to employ the U.N. to wage a political war against the Jews.

On November 10, 1975, the 37th anniversary of the Kristallnacht (Night of the Broken Glass), the U.N. General Assembly declared that Zionism is Racism and racial discrimination (Z=R) by passing Resolution 3379. The passage was part of an orchestrated worldwide campaign to delegitimize the State of Israel, after her enemies failed to expel her from the U.N.

On the same day the U.N. declared Z=R, the U.N. General Assembly adopted Resolution 3376, establishing an Assembly Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People. Sixteen of the original 20 members on the Assembly committee did not have relations with Israel, and some had never acknowledged Israel’s right to exist.1

The Z=R resolution initiated a new strain of international antisemitism. Although the resolution was abrogated in 1991, depriving it of legal status, the hostility against Israel it generated in most U.N. member nations-and in the U.N.’s own institutions-continues unabated.

Implications of the Resolution

“In the U.N., words take on a life of their own,” noted John R. Bolton, then Assistant U.S. Secretary of State for International Organization Affairs, “To declare as ‘racist’ the historical and cultural underpinnings of a state is tantamount to branding that state an international criminal, for racism is a crime enumerated in the Genocide Convention and numerous other instruments commonly accepted under international law.’’2

Abba Eban, Israel’s first permanent representative to the U.N. was the man who negotiated her entry into the U.N. and was later Israel’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, believed that this was the first time in history that an international body directed its criticism against ideas and articles of faith venerated by one of its member states-and not against its policies. The U.N. had never endorsed or denounced an “-ism” before. Even at the height of the Cold War, the United States never sponsored a resolution condemning communism, socialism, or any other “-ism.” 3

A racist state has “no rights at all, not even the right to defend itself.” observed Jeanne J. Kirkpatrick, U.S. ambassador to the U.N. After 3379 was passed, Israel became “fair game for armed ‘liberation.’” The U.N. General Assembly deliberately branded Israel as illegitimate on the same day it recognized the legitimacy of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO).4

Antisemitic rhetoric in the U.N. was no longer taboo. Diplomatic representatives were free to use antisemitic stereotypes in their speeches, reflecting classical Christian antisemitism in their political attacks against Israel.5

Demonizing Israel has turned it into a physical target for terrorist organizations, and into apolitical target for left wing and reactionary forces. Whether there are fatwa’s (legal rulings by Muslim clerics issued to legitimize suicide terrorism) or there are organizations demanding divestment from Israeli corporations, destruction of Israel-physical, spiritual or economic-is one of the mantras of the day. This is political antisemitism.6

For the majority of the members in the U.N., Israel is a locus of evil deserving of international condemnation-unlike many countries in the U.N. who practice ethnic cleansing, offer no rights to women or the poor, starve their own people for political reasons, and commit genocide.

These same nations, in the halls of an institution that was designed to prevent exactly this from happening, deny Israel her rights even in the courts of international law. Israel is the target of the majority of U.N. sanctions, is vilified by The Hague for defending herself and is singled out by the Geneva Convention as the utmost violator of human rights.7

Political science professor Ehud Sprinzak suggests this deliberate delegitimization leads to gradual erosion of Israel’s stature and ultimately her right to exist. Those targeted are the last to recognize the transformation until the consequences of ostracism become evident. This occurs when remarks by the country’s spokesman are “perceived as irrelevant,” and when the leadership is no longer regarded as worthy of engaging in legitimate discourse with other countries.8

Branding Israel as racist, portrays her as a country that harms civilian populations, oppresses minorities, establishes restrictive immigration laws and religious statutes as part of their ideological raison d’être. Thus, Israel’s wars, its military response to terror and laws passed by the Knesset are racist. A significant danger to Israel is that if this charge becomes a new stereotype through popular culture, the media, literature and daily speech, it will taint the Jewish state and become a part of the legacy of the West.9

No logical argument ever succeeded in disputing the blood libels or any other spurious allegation leveled against the Jews. Limited response to Z=R ensured that anti-Zionist resolutions continued to be passed. To counter the process of delegitimization, the charges have to be seen as a “corruption of language and thought,” a threat to freedom, and a campaign of disinformation orchestrated by the Arabs and their collaboraters.10

Dr. Alex Grobman is a Hebrew University trained historian. His is the author of a number of books, including Nations United: How The U.N. Undermines Israel and The West, Denying History: Who Says The Holocaust Never Happened and Why Do They Say It? and a forthcoming book on Israel's moral and legal right to exist as a Jewish State.

===

1. Jeane J. Kirkpatrick, “The U.N.’s Day of Infamy,” The Washington Post (November 11, 1985): A23; Harris O. Schoenberg, A Mandate For Terror:The United Nations and the PLO (New York: Shapolsky Publishers, Inc., 1989), 108-125.

2. John R. Bolton, “Zionism Is Not Racism,” NYT (December 16, 1991).

3. Abba Eban, “Israel, Anti-Semitism and the United Nations,” The Jerusalem Quarterly (Fall 1976): 110, 118.

4. Kirkpatrick, “The U.N.’s Day of Infamy,” The Washington Post (November 11, 1985), A23; Schoenberg, op. cit., 108-125.

5. Avi Beker, The United Nations and Israel: From Recognition to Reprehension (Lexington, Massachusetts: Lexington Books, 1988), 3, 5, 94.

6. Irwin Cotler. “Why is Israel singled out,” The Jerusalem Post (January 16, 2002); Irwin Cotler, “Human Rights And The New Anti-Jewishness,” The Jerusalem Post, (February 5, 2004); Irwin Cotler.” Durban’s Troubling Legacy One Year Later: Twisting the Cause of International Human Rights Against the Jewish People.” Jerusalem Center For Public Affairs Volume 2, No. 5 (August 20, 2002).

7. Ibid.

8. Ehud Sprinzak, “Anti-Zionism: From Delegitimation to Dehumanization.” Forum-53 (Fall 1984): 3-5.

9. Ibid 7-8.

10. Ibid.9-10

The Philadelphia Bulletin: Israel-U.S. Missile Exercise Confirmed

by David Bedein

JERUSALEM - The Middle East Newsline has confirmed Israel and the United States have been conducting a multi-phased missile defense exercise meant to defend against an Iranian attack.

The two countries have been engaged in Juniper Cobra-2010 in several areas of Israel.

“Juniper Cobra”, organized by the Israel Air Force and U.S. European Command, marked the biggest edition of the biannual exercise and sought to counter Iran’s new Sejil-2 solid-fuel ballistic missile. The exercise began on Oct. 21 and is scheduled to end on Thursday.

“Each exercise varies in focus and scope, and this year we are concentrating on combined air defense,” U.S. Navy 6th Fleet chief of staff Capt. Mike Martin said.

The exercise, the fifth edition since 2001, has been divided into three phases. Officials said the first phase was the deployment of more than 1,000 U.S. military personnel, including 17 naval vessels, around Israel.

The second phase would consist of a simulation of ballistic missile attacks meant to reflect Iran’s capabilities. Officials said this phase would link such missile-defense systems as Israel’s Arrow-2, PAC-2 and the U.S. PAC-3, sea-based Aegis and the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense.

“The simulation would test against a salvo of advanced Iranian missiles,” an official said.

The third phase of Juniper Cobra would feature a live-fire missile defense test. Officials said Israel and the United States would oversee the fire of PAC-3.

“JC-10 is the fifth iteration of this exercise with this year’s focus on testing the active missile-defense capabilities of both U.S. and Israeli armed forces,” the U.S. Navy said Tuesday.

The U.S. Navy has deployed the USS Higgins to transport sailors and soldiers to the Israeli port of Haifa. The exercise was also the first in which the U.S. military’s AN/TPY-2 X-band radar was deployed in Israel.

“We will advance both the art and science of ballistic missile defense between our two forces, and in the end, I am confident we will have a safe and successful Juniper Cobra exercise,” Rear Sixth Fleet deputy chief Adm. John Richardson, also the commander of JC-10’s joint task force, said.

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The Philadelphia Bulletin: Israel Cuts Off Arms Shipment To Hezbollah

by David Bedein

JERUSALEM - Israeli naval forces, led by Israel's elite Naval Commando Unit, stormed the Francop cargo ship before dawn on Wednesday and, after searching its containers, found large quantities of weapons and ammunition on board.

This cargo, earmarked for Hezbollah, originated in Iran. The seized weaponry was hidden inside containers, which supposedly were filled with goods.

A senior Israeli government official said, "Our work now is to show the world what Israel has to deal with. The photographs of arms and ammunition will prove that Israel is defending itself against fierce terrorism, and you don't fight terror with silk gloves. What country would allow terrorist groups to arm themselves in a way that endangers the lives of the citizens in its heartland?"

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu chose to frame the issue somewhat differently and said, "Anyone who still needed proof that Iran continues to send arms to terrorist organizations received it today, clearly and unequivocally. Iran is sending these arms to terrorist groups in order to strike at Israeli cities and kill civilians. The time has come for the international community to apply real pressure to Iran to stop this criminal activity and give support to Israel when it defends itself against terrorists and their patrons."

Meanwhile, a senior Israeli military source predicted Iran would attempt to find other ways to supply Hezbollah with weapons. He said Iran had settled on a maritime strategy after having confronted difficulty when smuggling over land. The source stressed the seizure of the arms ship was proof that Iran was continuing to invest great energy in smuggling munitions despite the restrictions placed on it. He said it was quite possible Iran had in the past made use of civilian commercial vessels as a cover to supply weapons to various destinations.

Israeli Navy Chief of Staff Brig. Gen. Rani Ben Yehuda said yesterday the amount of munitions apprehended on the ship would have allowed Hezbollah to fight Israel for about a month.

Detailing The Capture

Former Israeli Navy Commander Maj. Gen. Yedidia Yaari still remembers how, seven years ago, he planned and commanded the operation to capture the arms vessel Karine A, which was bound for the Palestinians, at sea.

This time, however, Maj. Gen. Eliezer Marom sat in the war room in the north, commanding from afar the capture of the Francop, which carried hundreds of tons of arms for Hezbollah - 10 times the quantity of arms aboard the Karine A.

The waves were high and the winds reached speeds of 50 knots. But the intelligence information in Operation Four Species was accurate. Using aircraft and Navy missile boats, they tracked the German vessel continuously. The Navy commander gave the order to begin the operation, despite the weather conditions, and had to relax the safety instructions for the ships. Once the missile boats spotted the vessel and contacted it, the information was passed to Defense Minister Ehud Barak. Mr. Barak then issued the order to board the ship.

The countries involved - Antigua, under whose flag the vessel sailed, and Cyprus, the country of its operating firm - were informed. Several hours later, the picture became clear: A ship of the Iranian national merchant fleet had left the port of Bandar Abbas carrying hundreds of containers, in which hundreds of tons of arms were concealed.

The ship's Polish and Ukrainian crew steered the vessel through the Strait of Hormuz and the Suez Canal to the Egyptian city of Domiat.

The containers were unloaded from the Iranian vessel in Domiat and loaded onto the German vessel, Francop, which set out for Cyprus on Tuesday.

One hundred miles out, two Saar 5 missile boats surrounded the German vessel and contacted the Polish captain. The Israeli Navy asked him to inspect the vessel's cargo. The captain agreed to do so at around midnight, and allowed the naval commandos and soldiers of the Combat Engineering Corps's Yahalom unit to search the ship. The troops from the Yahalom unit, covered by naval commando troops, opened the containers and discovered the boxes of arms behind containers of pencils, toilets and polyurethane, a material used in the plastics industry.

The captain and crew were informed of the findings, and, after brief coordination with the Cyprus-based firm and Antigua, were brought to the Ashdod Port, where port workers began to unload the cargo.

A high-ranking security official said last night, "The Iranians hid the fact that the containers concealed arms, thus endangering the ship's crew and all the ports at which the vessel had stopped. Containers carrying explosives are treated completely differently from those carrying civilian material."

As one of the crew members watched the port workers unloading the cargo, he remarked, "We look at the containers, see all the ammunition, and don't believe it."

Gift From Heaven

Officials in Jerusalem had not dared even to dream of better timing for the capture of the vessel carrying so much arms and ammunition bound for Hezbollah. For all practical purposes, in light of the discussion of the Goldstone report that began in the United Nations yesterday and the campaign against Iran, the capture of the ship was, for Israel, like a gift from heaven.

In light of the capture of this ship, Israeli government officials expressed hope that "now the international community will understand whom we're dealing with," as a high-ranking minister said.

Israeli Foreign Ministry officials have been preparing for a major public relations battle in the UN's institutions and Security Council.

High-ranking ministry officials said they intended to bring the subject to the attention of the UN's member countries by means of both photographs and written messages. Jerusalem officials claim the fact that the weapons captured on the ship originated from Iran proves what Israel has been saying for a very long time: Iran has been consistently violating the UN Security Council resolutions, including Resolution 1747, which forbids Iran from exporting arms and is a blatant violation of Resolution 1701, which had led to the end of the Second Lebanon War and determined that southern Lebanon, between the Blue Line and the Litani River, would be demilitarized and that Hezbollah would disarm.

"None of the papers that we signed, including the Security Council resolutions, are being upheld. They are not worth the paper that they were written on. We have been saying loudly that Hezbollah and Hamas were being armed by Iran, and now we have clear proof that this is the situation that we're dealing with," a high-ranking diplomatic official said. "Iran continues to send arms to Hamas and Hezbollah, ignoring the UN and the international community."

The Israeli PR campaign made an effort to list the long line of UN Security Council resolutions Iran has been violating by such activities as the one thwarted yesterday.

The important aspect of this success, and this is no small thing, is a certain element of deterrence and encumbrance. The Francop is the visible tip of the iceberg. The smuggling routes are known. It is clear the intelligence was good enough to follow the cargo as it made its way on the Iranian ship, that led it from Bandar Abbas to Egypt, and then to the Francop and then to the point where it was detained. It is far more convenient to stop the vessel in the Mediterranean Sea, where a NATO policing force, which Israel is a part of, patrols the seas, and far from Egypt's coast, near which any operation is extremely sensitive.

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The Francop

The Francop

Name of vessel: Francop

Length: 137 meters

Width: 22 meters

Capacity: 8,622 tons

Year of manufacture: 2003

Ownership: United Feeder, which has a fleet of 41 ships and concentrates on shipping goods in the Mediterranean Sea and the Black Sea.

1. Oct. 26: Dozens of containers filled with arms and ammunition made their way from Iran to Egypt on a ship belonging to Iran's national merchant fleet.

2. In the Egyptian port of Domiat, the containers were unloaded in order to trick anyone who might be trying to track the shipment.

3. The vessel Francop, on which the camouflaged arms were loaded, made its way to Cyprus, from which it was to proceed to its final destination: Syria.

Distance from Israeli coast: 130 miles

View the original article in the Philadelphia Bulletin

The Philadelphia Bulletin: Improvements Made in Turkish-Iranian Relations

Erdogan Terms Iran Visit As ‘Positive’

by David Bedein

Jerusalem - Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan described his visit to Iran and his meetings with Iranian officials as “positive.”

Speaking at a press conference at the Turkish embassy in Tehran on Wednesday, Mr. Erdogan referred to the results of his trip to Iran, and said, “regarding settlement of regional issues, we share common views and on economic issues we can also perform some works jointly.”

“As regards foreign policy, our main goal is attracting friends and having no enemies, and this is our basic (principle of) thinking at national and international levels,” he told reporters.

Mr. Erdogan received a red carpet welcome by Iran’s First Vice President Mohammad Reza Rahimi Tuesday morning.

Earlier in a meeting with Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki on Tuesday, the Turkish prime minister called for further expansion of all-out bilateral ties between the two neighboring states.

Mr. Erdogan once again stated that pursuance of nuclear technology for peaceful purposes is the legitimate right of all world countries, including Iran.

Mr. Erdogan asked for joint efforts by all regional states to provide security in the Middle East.

“Iraq should enjoy stability. All nations should work for stability in the Middle East because other countries are under the effect of terrorism as much as us,” Mr. Erdogan said at a joint meeting between Iranian and Turkish traders and businessmen in Iran’s Chamber of Commerce in Tehran on Thursday.

“There exists no one to provide security in the region, but us. We cannot rely on other parties. We should be brothers and stand firm,” Mr. Erdogan noted.

He described Iran and Turkey as stable islands in the region, adding, “In order to make the whole region stable like our countries, we should initiate joint plans for Syria, Iraq, Palestine, Lebanon, Iran, Turkey, Afghanistan and Pakistan.”

Elsewhere, Mr. Erdogan underlined Iran’s responsibility for peace and security in the Caucuses, “Iran, like Turkey, is responsible for peace and security in the Caucuses. The presence of foreign troops is not a solution to the problems of the region. A decision by the regional states is needed.”

Mr. Erdogan arrived in Tehran Monday night leading a high-ranking delegation, comprising of five cabinet ministers, 30 parliament members, 80 representatives of the private sector and 30 representatives from the media.

Regarding economic relations between Ankara and Tehran, Mr. Erdogan said that Turkey agrees with Iran on increasing the volume of trade exchange to $30 billion.

He noted that the two countries enjoy the necessary capacities to materialize such amount of trade exchanges.

View the original article in the Philadelphia Bulletin