Roberto Abraham Scaruffi

Wednesday 17 March 2010

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Wednesday, Mar 17 '10, Nisan 2, 5770

Today`s Email Stories:
Israel Rebuffs US Pressure
Obama vs. Congress on Jerusalem
PA Temple Mount Libel
Holland's Next PM to be Jewish?
Le Pen Gains Votes in France
TNL#45: Aliya - Jews Come Home
  More Website News:
Avner Netanyahu Wins Bible Quiz
Healing Children With 'Magic'
Jews Fight US Pro-Hamas Rallies
Israel Develops Bionic Retina
Egypt Bans Synagogue Dedication
Jobs Galore in Israel
  MP3 Radio Website News Briefs:
Talk: Redemption Time!
Getting Close to G-d
Music: New Mellow Selection
Shabbat - Quiet


   


1. Netanyahu’s Brother-in-Law: Obama’s an Anti-Semite
by Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu 
Bibi’s In-Law: Obama Anti-Semite


Dr. Hagai Ben-Artzi, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s brother-in-law, labeled U.S. President Barack Obama an anti-Semite in two radio interviews Wednesday. The Prime Minister immediately disassociated himself from his remarks and outright rejected them.

The time has come to tell the truth.” Dr. Ben-Artzi told Arutz-7 radio (Hebrew). “I understand the Prime Minister’s reaction to me, but the truth must be told. Obama is an anti-Semite.” He said that Israel is dealing with “a president who was educated by anti-Semitic preacher Jeremiah Wright.”

He also told IDF Army Radio that Wright (pictured) is "anti-Israeli, anti-Jewish and anti-Semitic." Obama was a devotee of Wright for two decades but distanced himself from the preacher during the presidential campaign two years ago.

Dr. Ben-Artzi told Arutz-7 that the United States is important to Israel from both the economic and security standpoints, but when “the United States makes demands on Jerusalem, the time has come to tell the truth -- we are talking about an anti-Semite."

He said that Prime Minister Netanyahu must follow the course of his predecessors since all of Jerusalem was restored to Israel in 1967. "Once the Americans tried to intervene in anything related to Jerusalem we told them one simple word: No.

"We Jews are a people from nearly 4,000 years ago. In another year, you [Obama] will disappear. Who will remember you?”

Dr. Ben-Artzi said if President Obama is looking for a crisis over Jerusalem, “then a crisis is what he will get.” 

He said that he did not speak personally with his brother-in-law about his comments but discussed with him the achievement of Avner Netanyahu, the Prime Minister's son, who advanced this week in the national Bible Quiz. 

Dr. Ben-Artzi noted that the achievement was symbolic "because the theme for this year is Jerusalem and its connection with the People of Israel. He said he told the Prime Minister, “You, Avner’s father, stand at a test that requires you to prove the strong link with Jerusalem.

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2. Despite US Pressure, Israel Insists: No Preconditions for Talks
by Gil Ronen 
Israel Rebuffs US Pressure


Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu's bureau appeared Tuesday to rebuff United States pressure to make immediate gestures toward the Palestinian Authority, when it issued a statement insisting that all preconditions to talks with the PA be dropped. 

Reports Monday said that US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton spoke to Netanyahu on the phone for nearly 45 minutes at week's end and demanded the cancellation of the construction of 1,600 housing units in the northeastern Jerusalem neighborhood of Ramat Shlomo. Clinton also reportedly demanded additional Israeli 'gestures' such as the release of Arab prisoners. 

The Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) noted that Israel has made efforts in recent months to improve relations with the PA, including the Prime Minister’s speech at Bar Ilan University in which he called for a two-state solution; the removal of hundreds of checkpoints and barriers in Judea and Samaria, and the freeze on construction starts in Judea and Samaria for ten months – a decision that Clinton herself had hailed as unprecedented.

Meanwhile, the PMO stated, “the Palestinians pile on more preconditions for restarting the diplomatic process than they did in the past 16 years.”

Netanyahu's bureau noted further that the PA is “conducting a delegitimization campaign against Israel in international institutions through the Goldstone Report, and continues to incite to hatred and violence, including the decision to dedicate a square in Ramallah to the memory of a terrorist who was responsible for murdering dozens of Israelis.”

"Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu again calls upon the Palestinians to enter the tent of peace without preconditions, because this is the only way to reach an arrangement that guarantees peace, security and prosperity to both nations,” the PMO added.



3. Obama’s Policy Challenges Congressional Law on Jerusalem 
by Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu 
Obama vs. Congress on Jerusalem


U.S. President Barack Obama’s policy against a Jewish presence in parts of Jerusalem flies in the face of the contents of a 1995 Congressional law to relocate the American embassy in a united capital.

Congress passed the law in October 1995 after the House of Representatives approved it in a 374-37 vote and the Senate voted for it by a 93-5 margin. 

Click here to see the entire Jerusalem Embassy Act and here for a current bill to cancel the waiver it contains.

Article 1 of the law states: "Each sovereign nation, under international law and custom, may designate its own capital".

Then it goes on to specifics in Article 5,6,7: ” From 1948-1967, Jerusalem was a divided city and Israeli citizens of all faiths as well as Jewish citizens of all states were denied access to holy sites in the area controlled by Jordan. Since 1967, Jerusalem has been a united city administered by Israel, and persons of all religious faiths have been guaranteed full access to holy sites within the city.”

It also notes that “Jerusalem has been administered as a unified city in which the rights of all faiths have been respected and protected.” 

In Article 9, the law quotes a 1990 Congressional resolution that Congress ‘‘strongly believes that Jerusalem must remain an undivided city in which the rights of every ethnic and religious group are protected’’ and states in article 10 that in 1992, the United States Senate and House of Representatives unanimously adopted Senate Concurrent Resolution 113 of the One Hundred Second Congress to commemorate the 25th anniversary of the reunification of Jerusalem, and reaffirming congressional sentiment that Jerusalem must remain an undivided city. 

Since the act was passed, President Obama was the only candidate for office who did not state during his campaign that he would act to move the embassy back to Jerusalem, which was reunited in the Six-Day War in 1967. The United States and eventually every other country in the world pulled embassies out of Jerusalem following Israel’s declaring sovereignty over the city. Every president, except for President Obama, has exercised the law’s waiver that allows for delay in moving the embassy “to protect the national security interests of the United States.” 

President Obama’s policy since taking office last year has been to divide the city and create a base in Jerusalem as the seat of Palestinian Authority state although the Jerusalem Embassy Act recalls previous Congressional resolutions calling for the city to remain united.

The Obama administration has continued a State Department policy, disregardng the law passed by the Congress, of not recognizing Israeli sovereignty over parts of Jerusalem, including the Old City, that were restored to the Jewish State in the Six-Day War in 1967 after Jordan conquered them in 1948.

Republican Senator Sam Brownback and six other senators last November co-sponsored a bill to require the President to execute the Congressional act by 2012, regardless of the “security” waiver. Co-sponsor Sen. Jim Inhofe flatly stated that security has not been the reason for the embassy remaining in Tel Aviv. “For political reasons, our embassy is currently located in Tel Aviv instead of in the nation's capital city,” he said.

Following this week’s standoff between the Obama and the Netanyahu governments over building for Jews in part of Jerusalem, Sen. Brownback stated, “It's hard to see how spending a weekend condemning Israel for a zoning decision in its capital city amounts to a positive step towards peace.

"Rather than launching verbal attacks on our staunch ally and friend, it would be far more worthwhile for this Administration to expend the effort planning for the transfer of our embassy to Jerusalem and tackling the growing Iranian nuclear threat."

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4. PA Incitement Increases as Riots Subside
by Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu 
PA Temple Mount Libel


The Palestinian Authority, which agreed under the Oslo Accords to halt anti-Israeli incitement, has escalated inciting rhetoric as Arab riots subsided Wednesday morning. In the United States, Jewish groups have complained about the Obama administration’s condemnation of Israel's building for Jews in Jerusalem while the U.S. does not tackle the issue of incitement.

The Israeli Foreign Ministry issued a harsh statement Tuesday condemning “with disgust the recent contemptuous, anti-Semitic remarks of senior Hamas officials, aimed at inflaming emotions in the region.” The statement charged that Hamas, in addition to being a group of terrorists, also is "an active anti-Semitic organization whose foundation documents refer to Jews as animals and advocate the murder of Jews.”

Mahmoud al-Zahar, a senior Hamas leader, accused Israel of making “a deal with the devil” by restoring the Hurva synagogue in the Jewish Quarter of the Old City in Jerusalem, where Jordanian troops destroyed it in after they overcame the Israeli forces there in1948. “You've killed and murdered your prophets and you have always dealt in loan-sharking and destruction," he said at a Gaza conference.

The Palestinian Authority, headed by PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas, used PA television to return to an old blood libel that Israel helped an alleged Jew to try to burn down the Al-Aksa mosque on the Temple Mount in 1969.

The attack was perpetrated by an Australian Christian, Dennis Michael Rohan, who described himself as the "Lord's emissary." However, PA television told viewers, “On Aug. 21, 1969, the Jew Dennis Michael [sic] set fire to the Al-Aqsa Mosque, with the support of the Jewish government, which cut off the water supply from the neighborhoods close to the Al-Aqsa Mosque with a view to delaying the operations to extinguish [the fire]." The statement was translated by Palestinian Media Watch.

Several American Jewish groups have criticized the Obama administration for ignoring the incitement while harshly criticizing Israel for advancing plans to build more apartments in Ramat Shlomo, a totally Jewish neighborhood located across the road from the Har Hotzvim industrial park, home of Teva Pharmaceuticals, Intel and dozens of high-tech firms.     

National Council of Young Israel, the Orthodox Union and the Zionist Organization of America, among other groups, have denounced the PA’s holding a ceremony recently honoring Dalal Mughrabi, the female terrorist who murdered 37 Israelis in the Coastal Road massacre in 1978.

“This monstrous spectacle took place while Vice President Biden was visiting the region,” stated David Harris, executive director of the American Jewish Committee. “Unfortunately, we have not heard a single word of condemnation from the U.S. administration.

Even the left-wing J Street lobby condemned the praise of Mughrabi.

The Jewish groups complained that while ignoring the ceremony, which was toned down because of Biden’s presence in the region, the Obama administration focused solely on attacking Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu for the Ramat Shlomo project. However, the new housing is expected to be delayed for at least two years anyway due to bureaucracy. 

Despite the publicity on Ramat Shlomo (pictured), Israel is in the process of building hundreds of other units in others Jerusalem neighborhoods, such as French Hill and Ramot, which the U.S. State Department also does not recognize as being under Israeli sovereignty and which border Ramat Shlomo..

On the other hand, in the Jerusalem Embassy Relocation Act of 1995 the U.S. Congress specifically referred to a “united Jerusalem” that include all of the areas of the city that were restored to the Jewish State in the 1967 Six-Day War. Ramat Shlomo is one of those areas.



5. Will Holland's Next Prime Minister Be Jewish?
by Hana Levi Julian 
Holland's Next PM to be Jewish?


Holland may elect a Jew to become its next prime minister in its upcoming national elections slated for June, according to a new opinion poll quoted this week in a report published by the European Jewish Press.The newly-resigned Jewish mayor of Amsterdam, 62-year-old Marius Job Cohen led the field, the news service reported. 

Cohen, who was compelled to resign his position as mayor in order to run for office, became the new head of the Dutch Labor party last Friday after Wouter Bos, his predecessor, resigned. The party brought down the government last month when it pulled out of the coalition led by Christian-Democrat Prime Minister Jan-Peter Balkenende in a dispute over Holland’s military presence in Afghanistan.

Some 52 percent of the respondents to the survey said they preferred Cohen over Balkenende and anti-Islam right-wing lawmaker Geert Wilders. Other media reports have also indicated that Cohen is expected to make a strong showing at the polls with the slogan, “Authoritarian but enlightened.”

This is not Cohen’s first run as a candidate for prime minister; he also previously ran as the Dutch Labor Party’s candidate for the post in 2003.

Prior to becoming mayor in January 2001, Cohen served as State Secretary for Justice, Chair of the Parliamentary Party in the Senate, and State Secretary for Education, Culture and Science. 

He has an undergraduate degree in law from the University of Groningen, and a doctorate from Leiden University. He also chaired a commission that established a faculty of law at Maastricht University, and served as a professor, and then a rector at the institution.

Cohen was named 2005 “European Hero” by TIME Magazine for his outreach to the Muslim community after tensions following the November 2004 murder in Amsterdam of filmmaker Theo van Gogh by an Islamic jihadist. His slogan for administration of the city was “keeping things together.”

Cohen was born in the northern Dutch city of Haarlem to Adolf Emile Cohen, a history professor, and Hetty Coster, both members of the local Jewish community. He has one elder brother, and also has two children.



6. Strong Showing by Anti-Semitic Le Pen in French Regional Vote
by Hana Levi Julian 
Le Pen Gains Votes in France


The extreme-right National Front party, led by 81-year-old Jean Marie Le Pen – convicted several times in the past for racism and anti-Semitism – won almost 12 percent of the votes in Sunday’s polls. The victory means that Le Pen’s party has qualified for a second round at the polls on March 21, where National Front will be an option on the ballot in 12 out of 22 regions.

Le Pen’s daughter, 41-year-old Marine, won 18.31 percent of the vote in the Nord-Pas-de-Calais region, home to a low-income population. Pundits speculated that Marine would become her father’s successor as leader of the party.

The extreme-right movement had been in a state of decline for the past several years, winning only 4.29 percent of the vote in the 2007 legislative elections, and 6.8 percent of the vote in the 2009 European polls. However, as the senior Le Pen told TF1 television on Sunday, the party “has shown it is still a force to be reckoned with in France.”

President Nicolas Sarkozy had been attempting to woo Le Pen’s supporters away through public debates on the nature of French identity, but analysts said he may have inadvertently done the opposite instead. Both Sarkozy and Le Pen have been battling the trend towards radical Islamization of the Muslim population in France, currently some six million strong and rising. Sarkozy’s party has been advocating for a French ban on wearing the burka – a full-length, all-encompassing Islamic facial veil.  

Le Pen’s party has battled open immigration and has focused on the “threat of Islam” in French society. A recent National Front poster showed France covered by an Algerian flag and a forest of minarets (towers belonging to mosques), with a slogan that read, “No to Islamism.” The poster resembled one that was produced by an extreme-right party in Switzerland prior to a referendum on whether to allow the construction of mosques in the country last November. Swiss voters approved the ban.

The National Front poster caused a diplomatic brouhaha and prompted the Algerian government to lodge a formal complaint with the French government.

Sarkozy’s center-right UMP party, which won only 26 percent of the vote, was a major victim of voter apathy, according to the polling group CSA. The leftist French Socialist party (PS) was the big winner in Sunday’s polls, with nearly 30 percent of the votes.

Some 53.65 of voters didn’t bother to go to the polls at all.



7. Tuesday Night Live #45: Aliyah - Jews Gather in their Homeland
by Arutz Sheva TV 
TNL#45: Aliya - Jews Come Home


In this week's edition of Tuesday Night Live in Jerusalem, Ari and Jeremy present their exciting and colorful visit to Ben Gurion Airport where TNL joined a welcoming ceremony for a planeload of Olim (new immigrants) who decided to open a new page of their lives in Israel with the help of the Nefesh B'Nefesh organization. 

Watch and see how some of the other participants, who came to Israel just for the year, are mercilessly urged by Ari and Jeremy to stay in Israel and change their trip to a final move.