"....Instead of cracking down on terrorists, Abu Mazen and his sidekick Mohammed Dahlan have secretly applied to more than 20 world governments with urgent requests for large quantities of heavy weapons. ....According to our sources, the countries solicited for arms are primarily in Europe – Britain, Spain, Italy, France, Germany, Norway, Sweden as well as Russia, Mexico, Brazil, Argentina, China, India and Pakistan. The list of countries not addressed is much shorter: United States and Japan. Palestinian Authority leaders calculated that however many or few respond in the affirmative – which several have – Israel cannot afford to get into a fight with them all.
The list of Palestinian requirements is attached to an innocent-sounding request signed by Mahmoud Abbas for combat equipment to restore and build up Palestinian security forces with all possible speed. He asks the recipients to contribute to the creation of the Palestinian state by allocating outdated items no longer in the use of their armies.
.... It includes all types of armored personnel carriers with fixed mortars, jeeps fitted with 107 mm recoilless guns, telescopic rifles, pistols, ammunition, communications and engineering gear, helmets and medical equipment.
The army Abbas is building is designed to absorb the disassembled Palestinian terrorist organizations. For the first time, they will be equipped with heavy arms.
Asked how the shipments would be delivered over Israel’s objections, Abbas and Dahlan pointed out that once the Israelis had pulled back the Gaza Strip and Egyptian border, there would be no one to stop the hardware being unloaded at the reopened Gaza port or coming through northern Sinai past Egyptian patrols.
Shopping for heavy arms is in total contravention of every international accord the Palestinians, including Abu Mazen in person, have ever signed with Israel and every pledge Abbas has made to the Bush administration and other world leaders. ...."
"....Telltale indicators of Russia's activism are everywhere. In late January, Syrian president Bashar al-Assad embarked upon a diplomatic visit to Moscow designed to upgrade the historic strategic ties between the two countries. Assad's consultations with Putin yielded a mutual commitment to closer cooperation between the Russian government and its "most important partner" in the Middle East. As part of this public reengagement, the Kremlin gave Damascus a much-needed economic shot in the arm, agreeing to write off almost three-quarters of Syria's $13.4 billion Cold War-era debt. The two leaders also began negotiations regarding the sale of an array of advanced missiles to the Baathist state in a deal that officials in Israel have warned could significantly alter the regional military balance in Syria's favor.
Russia is also dipping its toe into post-Arafat politics in the Palestinian Authority. In late January, on the heels of Assad's visit, the Kremlin played host to new Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas. During his two-and-a-half-day visit to Russia, Abbas was warmly received by a slew of government officials, including President Putin, foreign minister Sergei Lavrov, and Boris Gryzlov, the speaker of Russia's lower house of parliament. The new Palestinian leader, for his part, brought with him a consistent message: that Russia should increase its involvement in Palestinian politics, and in the mediation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Most recently, the Kremlin has formulated plans to break into the Saudi arms market. The Russian government is said to be finalizing its first major defense accord with the House of Saud — one that, if implemented, would mark "a landmark event in Russian arms exporting," according to Russian defense industry experts. News of the impending deal comes on the heels of a recent arms agreement between Russia and Morocco, the first between the two nations since the fall of the Soviet Union....."
Upcoming Events, SW Ohio
Sun. 3/6/05 - Day-long conference on Women in Judaism, CJCE - several sessions on Torah and daily living, and Torah and women's activism. Small fee. Call 937-854-4150 x 106 for more information.
Sun. 3/13/05, 10AM - Ryterbrand Brunch at Temple Israel. Dr. Adam Kamesar of HUC, "Jewish Nationalism from the Maccabees to the Destruction of the Temple", $5. Call 937-496-0500 for more information.
Scholar in Residence, Temple Israel, Monday evenings 3/21, 3/28 and 4/4/04, 6:30-8:45PM - a series on the Da Vinci Codes and Jewish Art - $60. Call 937-854-4150 x 300 for more information.
Sun., 4/10/05, 10AM - Ryterbrand Brunch at Temple Israel. Dr. Eric Friedland, WSU, "Maimonides' Views Concerning Islam and Christianity", $5. Call 937-496-0500 for more information.
"....The 14,000 Syrians referred to are the ones in uniform. But there are more than 100,000 OTHER Syrians in Lebanon, contributing to the occupation in ways both legal and illegal.Some are simply working at jobs that don't exist at home. Lebanon has a productive, free-market economy and Syria has a leftover 1960s militaristic socialism that sucks the economy dry – particularly now that the coalition has cut off the illegal oil that was flowing through Syria from Iraq. Syria needs that safety valve of sending workers outside the country to help ensure domestic tranquility. Some of the Syrians are related to the drug and counterfeiting trades in the Bekka Valley that provide hard currency earnings to Damascus. Some are intelligence officers and plainclothes security forces, the undercover eyes and ears of the Syrians and liaison for the Iranians and their Hizballah protégé troops in Lebanon....."
As usual, the headlines in Debka are worth following -
Change in the Wind?
From 2/7/05 www.jcpa.org/daily: “· Abbas Orders Palestinian Television to Clean Up Its Act - Inigo GilmoreOn Palestinian television, eulogies to suicide bombers, or ''martyrs,'' have given way to ''feel-good'' nature programs and romantic films. Instead of referring to ''martyr operations,'' suicide bombings are described more neutrally as ''explosions." Abu Mazen told the directors that "he does not want a screen full of blood,'' said Radwan Abu Ayash, head of the Palestinian Broadcasting Corporation. Now "we have passionate Egyptian love films replacing war films, we have soft geography programs for the kids, films with cute animals roaming in the wild....We are broadcasting more traditional music, rather than martial music." (Telegraph-UK) See also Israel: PA TV Incitement Down, Wider Change Needed - Gideon AlonForeign Minister Silvan Shalom told the Israeli Cabinet Sunday that there has been a substantial change in the content of Palestinian television broadcasts in the past few days. "This is evident in the end of inciting broadcasts," he said. However, "the change must be deeper and include public awareness, starting with the education system, universities and so on, where the change in content is not yet evident." (Ha'aretz)
From www.bicom.org.uk daily brief for 2/8/05: Israel exports to Arab states rose by 48 percent in 2004; Syria to import Golan apples
According to Israel’s Manufacturing Association (IMA), Israeli exports to the Arab world rose by 48 percent in 2004 to a total of $180 million USD, with another $12 million sold indirectly in Arab countries. Closer diplomatic ties with Egypt and Jordan, the lessening of political tension in the region and increased cooperation between Israel and the Palestinian Authority were all seen as factors for the increase in trade and the economy. The total number of exports to Jordan, consisting mostly of textiles, clothing, leather goods, wood products, furniture, paper and printed material, rose by 55 percent in 2004. Meanwhile, exports to Egypt rose 11 percent last year to approximately $29.2 million and included mainly chemical and petroleum goods, textiles and clothing. The Qualified Industrial Zones (QIZ) trilateral trade agreement with Egypt and the United States, which was signed on 14 December 2004 and ratified by the Knesset on Sunday, is also expected to increase significant trade with Egypt. IMA President Shraga Brosh, who acknowledged that great progress had been made between the neighbouring countries, predicted even stronger and better results for 2005. He predicted that the $800 million in foreign investment during 2004 could potentially triple in 2005.
In related developments, Syria has announced that it will buy 10,000 tons of apples from Druze farmers in the Golan Heights in Israel. This will be the first time Syria has traded with the Golan area, which Israel captured during the Six Day War of 1967.
From 2/8/05 www.jcpa.org/daily: Bedouins Lead Egypt's Hunt for Militants - Sarah El Deeb (AP/Washington Post) Bedouins in Sinai are leading the hunt for militants wanted in last year's Egyptian beach resort car bombings, guiding police through mountains and deserts to find the suspected culprits. Bedouin tribes signed a "pledge document" with Egyptian security forces to help them track down wanted militants after the detention of many Bedouins during the post-bombings police crackdown. "We were the most hurt from the attacks. Our camps were destroyed and people lost their jobs," said Sheik Attiyah al-Kebriti, a local Bedouin leader.
· Arabs Finally Face Terror - Amir TaheriThose in the West who see Arabs as exporters of terrorism forget that Arabs are also its biggest victims, including the 11,000-plus lives lost in Iraq over the past 18 months, 150,000 killings over the years in Algeria, and at least 25,000 in Egypt since 1980. At least some Arab states seem prepared to admit that terrorism is threatening their very existence as organized societies. That understanding is the driving force behind the Riyadh conference on counter-terrorism. (New York Post)
In my other weblog, I've noted the shift toward successful free-market or "ownership society" practices in mainland China and Russia - the same has happened in Israel's legendary kibbutz movement. From a 2/04 article in Israel Today:
"....Of the 267 kibbutzim (collective farms) in Israel, 165 already operate according to the new capitalist model. About 120,000 people live in kibbutzim— just 2 percent of the population. When the state was founded in 1948, the kibbutzim made up about half of the settlements in Israel and were home to 8 percent of the Jewish population....
At the kibbutz, the principles of communism were far more successfully implemented than in communist countries. To enable mothers to work, the kibbutz ran children’s houses. The kibbutz took care of all its members’ daily needs, so for example, meals were eaten together in the dining hall. But as Israel advanced economically, the second and third generations of kibbutzniks did not want to live this way ....During the 1980s, many kibbutzim encountered serious financial difficulties and faced debt and bankruptcy. The reasons were runaway inflation, the Israeli bank shares crash of 1983 and poor management of the kibbutzim themselves. The crisis forced the government to bail out the kibbutzim in 1989 and broker a deal for debt restructuring with the banks. This led to a fundamental reorganization of the kibbutzim in which they turned away from agriculture and toward more profitable industry, including high-tech.
Many of my comrades in the army in the 1980s, who were second-generation kibbutzniks, wanted to leave the kibbutz after three years of military service. They wanted to earn their own money like people in the cities and not toil day-in, day-out like their parents, without any assets to show for it. In those days, if one wanted to visit friends for example, one had to order a car two weeks in advance from the kibbutz secretary. Young kibbutzniks were jealous of the freedom of city dwellers who had their own car...."
I believe that if you looked at the history of many utopian groups, you'd find that they disappeared within 2-3 generations, and rarely represented large groups when such alleged utopias were voluntary. Trying to fulfill an absolute ideal that we're all alike, and should all share identically, violates the reality that we're actually different, with different skills, abilities, interests, and that groups value those skills, abilities and interests differently at any moment in time. Currently, the more financially successful kibbutzim in Israel incorporate some wealth accumulation and for-profit businesses, and that trend is likely to continue.
We visited the Library of Congress exhibit about the 350 year history of Jews in America and found it good and scholarly. Though some children were there, taking notes from the exhibit's opening timeline for an obvious class project, the exhibit generally did not cater to children. There's too much to read and look at, and other than some fun TV clips, not much for children to do. I encourage adults to see it, then teach it.
From David Gelernter's related article, "Telling the Story of America's Jews," Commentary magazine, p. 46:
"....the Hebrew Bible furnished a template for democracy. In 1780, for example, while the fighting was still under way, Pastor Simeon Howard of Boston was already pondering the new nation's government. He decided - on the basis of the Hebrew Bible and the ancient Jewish historian Josephus - that it must be a democratic republic. Howard's advice was a radical as it was straightforward, as avant-garde as it was Bible-centered and godly. 'In compliance with the advice of Jethro,' he preached in May 1780, 'Moses chose able men, and made them rulers[ over hte Israelites in the desert]; but it is generally supposed that they were chosen by the people. This is asserted by Josephus, and plainly intimated by Moses in his recapitulary discourse, recorded in the first chapter of Deuteronomy' (emphasis added). William Lecky, the eminent 19th-century Irish historian (and no Judeophile), knew well what today's historians have largelly forgotten: 'Hebraic mortar cemented the foundations of American democracy.' Freedom and democracy are basic to America. The connection between freedom and the Exodus is obvious; to the mind of America, infatuated with the Bible ('the best book in the world,' John Adams called it), democracy, too, was rooted in ancient Israel...."
Yes, I include this snippet in part to express my disdain for any extreme position about the separation of church and state, any position that says that all mention of God in any public venue, including American history classes, is bad. The Bible is fundamental to understanding this country, and that underlying philosophy should and can be discussed in public, in schools, and the Ten Commandments can even be used as the ethical basis for decisions, without turning this country into a theocracy.
Click on the headline for this link to Jihadwatch. The follow-up comments of the readers are as much fun as the article itself.
Happy Hanukkah!
