UPDATES 9 am Israel time, Sunday, September 14 2014:
**A sad story: Yesterday your humble servant and family went to Sderot. Granted it was Shabbat and Sderot is a religious town, the city was nevertheless deserted. No one walking on the sidewalks, no one to be seen anywhere–it was like a ghost town with pages of newspapers being windily scraped along empty streets. It was a tremendously depressing experience and a sad indication of what has happened to southern Israel.
**Shifting world balance of power? For the first time, a Chinese warship, the guided missile destroyer Changchun 150, has sailed up the Gulf of Eilat and docked in Aqaba, Jordan.
The Changchun 150 in Aqaba yesterday to the accompaniment of Chinese and Jordanian flags.
**Shifting coalitions? For the first time in decades, a Kuwaiti official is visiting Ramallah today (remember that the Palestinians supported Saddam Hussein in his invasion of Kuwait). The Kuwaiti Foreign Minister will be discussing the upcoming talks in Cairo with PLO Chairman Mahmoud Abbas.
TODAY’S BLOG:
This is just one of those days on which everywhere your humble servant looks, he sees idiocy run rampant. Here is a sampling:
Stupid Quote of the Day 1:
Amos Gilad, Head of the Political Military Division of the Israel Ministry of Defense, as spoken on Israel Channel 2 Television:
“For Hamas, rehabilitation is currently important, and you cannot have rehabilitation while you are engaged in terrorism. Therefore, at the present, Hamas is not engaging in tunneling.”
Can you even believe this idiotic thinking? Hamas has done nothing but produce weapons and tunnels for years–all of which took place right under the nose of our clueless Defense Ministry and IDF General Command. And now we are supposed to believe that because Hamas is supposedly interested in rehabilitating Gaza, that they have suddenly stopped?
This thinking, so reflective of so-called “Defense” Minister Boogie Ya’alon and the do-nothing IDF Chief of Staff Benny Gantz, is more than idiotic–it is downright scary.
Stupid Quote of the Day 2:
Shukri Bishara, PLO Finance Minister and former Chief Executive of the Arab Bank, testifying at a trial in New York in which the bank is being sued by 297 terror victims on the basis that it funneled money to Hamas terrorists (particularly Hamas leader Osama Hamdan) between 2000-2004–money that was then used to carry out suicide bombings in Israel that killed and wounded hundreds:
Victim’s Attorney: (referring to a check made out to Hamdan and signed by Bishara):
“You gave this terrorist $8000, the man who moves weapons and explosives. You had no other choice than to give this terrorist $8000?”
Bishara: “My concern was to get rid of the account. [Even though I knew Hamdan was on the U.S. terrorist blacklist], there was simply no way to close the account.”
In the same breath:
Bishara: “We were living in complete fear and panic [in Jerusalem]–even my daughter’s school was hit by a suicide bomber. We finally moved to Amman.”
Can you even believe this? Bishara claims that he and his family were victims because the very terrorists he was funding were blowing Israelis to pieces all over Jerusalem. And he had to pay them because “there was simply no way to close the account.”
Stupid Quote of the Day 3:
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Scott Grogin, Fox Network Group, Senior Vice President, referring to the fact that the wholly owned Qatari company beIN Sports, which administers Fox Sports–Middle East, had completely removed “Israel” from its online, pull-down menu of countries and program schedule times and replaced it with “Palestine”:
“Fox is not a political entity, we provide entertainment and sports programming. In order to ensure that all of our viewers across the region receive accurate information, we will be eliminating the pull-down menu that lists countries and will provide listing in all venues in Greenwich Mean Time.”
Fox is not political? Fox has farmed out its Middle East operation to Qatar–one of the leading state sponsors of terrorism? (See previous israelstreet blogs: The Qatar-Hamas Connection Part 1, Part 2, Part 3).
We could go on and on. How about John Kerry’s spokeswoman Marie Harf talking about her horror at strikes that hit UNRWA facilities in Gaza and saying that “Suspicion that militants are operating nearby does not justify strikes that put at risk the lives of so many innocent civilians. Israeli authorities say they are investigating. We expect these to be investigated thoroughly and promptly.”
Nothing about the photos that show that Hamas stored missiles in the facilities. Nothing about the fact that photos show Hamas fired from the facilities. Nothing about the fact that Hamas used people as human shields. Nothing at all about an investigation of Hamas.
Pardon your humble servant as he loses his breakfast.
A student from Malawi, who had worked with an Israeli health volunteer in his country battling AIDS, came up to us as we walked down the street in the UC-Davis Picnic Day Parade and wanted to carry the Israeli flag.