Mr. Senor’s talk was not about the book. It was about the recent developments in the Middle East – the toppling of the Tunisian and Egyptian governments, the uprisings in Syria, Yemen, Lybia etc.
Ken Herman at Momentum
This guy knows what he’s talking about and it was an extremely interesting and engaging talk. If you attended, feel free to share your thoughts in the comments.
Richard Goldstone wrote an op-ed on the Washington Post called Reconsidering the Goldstone Resport on Israel and War Crimes. On it, there is no news: Israel is investing considerable resources investigating 400 or so allegations of misconduct from the report, while Hamas has done nothing of the sort – unsurprising since it was always clear that Hamas targeted civilians purposefully.
The sad part is that this editorial will not even get a fraction of the press that the original report received., but at least it’s being mentioned, even on Al-Jazeera. A lot of damage was done to Israel’s image because of the conclusions reached in the report and this retraction will not undo that. But you owe it to yourself to read the article on the Washington Post.
The western world debates about Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood: are they ok? are they “moderate”? Are they extremist? This report prepared for the Wiesenthal Center talks about their history and let me tell you, it’s some scary stuff. None of that “Non-Violent, ‘Secular’ Group” nonsense.
It’s long, but worth a read if you want to get some background on what’s going on over there. Click here for the report..
Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast on the ongoing protests in Egypt against Mubarak:
Iran expects Egyptian officials to listen to the voice of their Muslim people, respond to their rightful demands and refrain from exerting violence by security forces and police against an Islamic wave of awareness that has spread through the country in form of a popular movement
I commend the Iranian government on raising the bar in the art of hypocrisy to unimagined levels only a year after the D.O.A. Green Revolution.
The topics were varied. From his time in the Gulag, his early struggles fighting for human rights as a refusenik, the founding and disolution of his Yisrael B’Aliyah political party, the free world’s betrayal of their own principles with their support of a dictatorship within the PA, his criticism of HRW for having become a biased political entity, etc.
If I can find a good article on what was covered I will update this post.
I spent Yom Kippur in Houston. At the synagogue I grabbed their flier to see what they are up to. The small section “Mazal Tov” is where they congratulate members for various things. I found it to be a funny and interesting window into the Jewish psyche. Some examples in no particular order:
The Abramsons won the Torah Bowl. Good for them.
Laura, Ira and Mindy’s girl, got engaged. Mazal Tov!
Olga and Terry had a grandson. May they know nothing but naches.
A lot is being written about the Gaza Aid Flotilla and Israel’s terribly botched attempt at stopping it. There is no excuse: there should not have been any deaths whatsoever in this operation.
However, the true intentions of the organizers of this “humanitarian” fleet were not exactly humanitarian. For example, they declined to carry out a message from the Shalit family. Many of the people on board have known ties with Jihadist groups included Al-Qaeda. And the soldiers boarding the ship were brutally attacked even before they set foot on board.
Israel deserves blame for what happened. They were not ready at all for the kind of violence encountered. Had they been properly prepared and equipped, the soldiers would not have been lowered one by one only to be lynched, and they would not have been put in a situation in which they were forced to protect themselves through force. It was a failure of logistics and of intelligence.
But the organizers of the flotilla deserve equal or greater blame, and this is not what I read in the press. A supposedly peaceful demonstration to bring humanitarian aid should not have members or terrorist organizations nor people who support violence against Israel on board. They should not have brutally attacked anyone. It was clear they were looking for a confrontation when Israel offered to transfer all aid cargo on the ships into Gaza as long as the flotilla agreed to first dock at the Israeli port of Ashdod for a weapons inspection before-hand… but it was not clear they were looking for such level of violent confrontation and blood.
Foreign reports fail to mention knives found on ship (Photo: IDF Spokesperson's Unit). Source: YNet
Israel was clumsy, unprepared, and fell for a clear trap. The loss of life is regretful, and so is the lack of honesty with properly assigning the blame on the events. And remember, it’s not Israel who is impeding the lifting of the blockade in Gaza. It is Hamas who needs to meet the demands of the international community to renounce violence and recognize Israel’s right to exist. Once they do it, the blockade will be open.
But I don’t think anyone in that flotilla has the desire of reminding Hamas of that little fact.
And here I am thinking that the tablets were supposed to be received in Shavuot, not Passover. Still, the image seemed appropriate. The iPad lands today. (image source)
