For the first time, the United States defies Israel in obligating her to a UN Security Council resolution. No prior discussions or consultation with Israel on matters directly affecting the well being of the Jewish state. Who are they trying to impress?
Jewish civil-rights group,"The 18," call out the danger of this dynamic and this resolution.
Columnist, Michael Freund, writes "Bush's December Surprise" on Dec 18, 2008 cricticizes the U.S. action more severely:
With just a month left to go before he leaves office, George W. Bush has decided to pull the trigger and drop a bomb on the Middle East. Only instead of targeting Iran's illicit nuclear program, or Syria's nefarious regime, the outgoing US president has inexplicably chosen to detonate a diplomatic device over the heads of all Israelis.
In a move that was said to have been "personally led" by Bush, diplomats from the 15 member nations of the UN Security Council convened for an emergency session on Saturday to discuss the text of a proposed resolution aimed at tying the hands of Israel's next government.
The draft resolution, which was slated to be passed Tuesday, calls on Israel and the Palestinians to continue to negotiate "core issues" such as dividing Jerusalem, even after the present Israeli and Palestinian governments leave office in 2009.
"The initiative," as Haaretz reported on Sunday, "is seen as a bid to cement the Annapolis process with the approval of the highest authority," with Bush hoping that Security Council backing will make it "irreversible." This, he believes, will result in "shielding it from the administration changes in both Israel and the US."
In 2002, when oil prices were hovering around $21 a barrel, nearly two dozen Arab nations joined to pledge yearly contributions of $660 million to support the Palestinian Authority's annual budget.
Now, even with oil prices more than six times higher and the Palestinian Authority bordering on financial ruin, only a handful of Arab countries are sending even a small portion of the money they promised, according to data examined by The Washington Post.
Out of 22 Arab nations that made pledges, only three -- Algeria, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates -- have contributed funds this year, while oil-rich countries such as Libya, Kuwait and Qatar have sent nothing and still owe the Palestinian government more than $700 million in past-due pledges.
Many members of the Arab League that committed to make annual contributions do not have oil riches and have paid on average about 4 percent of what they pledged since 2002, according to U.S. figures. But some of the worst offenders are oil producers. Through the first half of 2008, Bahrain has paid 13 percent of its total pledges, Libya 14 percent, Oman 23 percent, Kuwait 35 percent, Algeria 73 percent and the United Arab Emirates 92 percent. Saudi Arabia has paid just shy of 100 percent, but many experts believe it should be paying four times as much, given the increase in the price of oil since 2002.
One senior U.S. official, speaking on the condition of anonymity because of diplomatic sensitivities, said that Arab nations could be doing much more to support the peace process launched at a conference in Annapolis last year and that "their effort falls short in every category." He said he is puzzled by their failure to meet their pledges in a period of phenomenal oil wealth.
"The one thing I find hard to explain is why they don't contribute more financially," the official said, noting that the Palestinian government is "really operating hand-to-mouth." He added that more than 50 percent of the money goes to the Gaza Strip, which is controlled by Hamas, so even people living under Hamas rule are suffering from the Arab failure to pay pledges.
Arab diplomats, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said there is little trust that the Palestinian Authority will use their contributions wisely, even though Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad is a veteran of the International Monetary Fund and, during his time as finance minister, introduced new standards of accountability and financial management. Arab diplomats said they also resent the tight grip that Israel has maintained on the Palestinian territories during the peace talks.
The International American school in northern Gaza fell victim to a vicious attack on the building over he weekend. Armed Palestinians set fire to school buses, smashed windows, overturned chairs and tables and damaged classrooms and computers.
Hamas officials said the recent attack, the second in the past 48 hours appeared to be in response to how they view US Pres. Bush visiting Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to plan boosting Fatah to regain control of Gaza from Hamas. (Courtesy InfoLive.TV)
$7.4 Billion Pledged to Prepare Global-Jihadist State to Conquer Israel towards recreating Islamic Global Caliphate
'U.S. to Shoulder One-Third of Cost'- Secy of State Condi Rice
InfoliveTV reports: "Ninety delegations from the world's powers attended a one day conference in Paris to agree on an aid package worth billions of dollars to stabilize the Palestinian economy. At the start of the conference, French President Nikolas Sarkozy urged fast international support towards creating a Palestinian state. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas called on Israel to impose a total freeze on settlements. As the money poured in, Hamas officials in Gaza, while denouncing the meeting, admitted they will apply the funds to pay 77,000 workers in Gaza."
The amount the Palestinians needed for 2008 was "around $1.6 to $1.7 billion," said US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, adding the US will shoulder one third of the financial burden, Ynet published.
"This is an historically large figure. I think this is the largest assistance package that we have ever done for the Palestinians," a senior US official said. According to YNet here's what some governments are reported to be donating:
$630 million- The European Union $555 million- United States of America $500 million- Saudi Arabia $300 million- Britain, France, and Germany, each $300 million- Kuwait and United Arab Emirates, each $150 million- Japan $140 million- Norway $60 million- Spain $10 million- Russia
Israel's Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni headed the Israeli delegation to the Conference of Donors. Israel was not named an official member of the conference, but it presence, Ynet was told, helps legitimize the process.
Some 3.4 billion dollars of Monday's pledges was to go to the Palestinians in 2008, the first year of Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad's three-year recovery plan, diplomats said.
Fayyad promised that the donated funds would be transferred to the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. "The money is meant for all Palestinians and will be budgeted according to the Palestinian government under the leadership of elected the elected president, President Abbas," Fayyad emphasized.
He also said that that the Palestinian government would monitor the manner in which the money was used.
Fayyad noted that, since the Oslo accords, the PA had received around $9 billion in aid, but said that there had been poor oversight on how the money was spent. He promised that the funds raised at the conference would be spent in a manner controlled and supervised by the international donors.
Considering that the PA barely has any infrastructure, gets its power from Israel and has lost control and responsibility for the 1.5 million Arabs in Gaza leaving it with only half the population-- what exactly does Abbas need all that money for? ...
$150 million is just being given away as a blank check. Another 130 million is going into "job creation" and like all the billions advanced toward job creation is simply going to go toward Fatah's payments to the huge number of people it keeps on its payroll, including the militias attacking Israel and killing Israeli citizens. Another 40 million is being given away to the ministries directly to "improve their administration". 10 million will cover security for the American experts who will take a tour of the area because Abbas in reality controls nothing, including Fatah militias. ...
The PA "security forces" themselves range in the tens of thousands. The bulk of the PA's employees are really terrorists drawn from the Fatah and even the Hamas ranks. Local militias who enforce PA rule outside its base of power and Fatah loyalists in Gaza still being paid.
The money being sent to the PA really consists of salary checks for an army of murderous thugs responsible for the ongoing reign of terror against both Israelis and Arabs.
Weed out the rhetoric, and the lion's share of the money is going into the same old money pit, the PA Ministries, a nepotistic network of family organizations and militias that do absolutely nothing but employ a staggering number of people. ...
Where the money is really going is anyone's guess, but much of it does indeed go to salaries just not of civil service workers, but of the terrorist and thug militias that make up the real backbone of the PA. Much of that money goes into foreign bank accounts for leading PA figures and funds their lavish mansions and luxury automobiles.
The $5.6 billion covers the massive bribes and the graft that has enriched the PA leadership all throughout the years even as the PA's infrastructure has collapsed.
The one true employer in the West Bank is the Palestinian Authority itself funded by foreign aid, followed closely by international relief organizations such as the UNRWA which alone employs thousands of Palestinian employees and has virtually no actual outside UNRWA employees there anymore. Whatever remains of the Palestinian economy is parasitic on these.
Like the Palestinian state, the Palestinian economy is a corrupt and bloody fiction. Its real economy is underground, it is rooted in drugs and weapons smuggling and theft, particularly car theft from Israel.
While the international community pledges billions to keep on paying the terrorists to stay loyal to Abbas, that same community is insisting that Israel dismantle the checkpoints that keep those same terrorists from murdering Israelis.
Having rearmed Fatah's terrorists with assault rifles and ammunition, poured billions into their war chest, the world is now eagerly demanding that Israel lower the gates so they can put their new toys to use.
Strangely, although Islam and Christianity have been natural enemies through the centuries, they do cooperate in attempting to eliminate Israel and the Jews in it. On this they agree, although presently in Europe it has not reached the level (yet) where they can express their hatred too openly. The Arab Muslim immigrants take care of that as Germany and France tell their Jews not to look Jewish on the streets.
Europe also wishes to sell armaments to the Arabs. They also want the oil. Both of these motives drive their official government attitude toward Israel. However, underlying the urge for profit, there is always the taught, but now endemic, hatred of Jews and the Jewish State.
It’s no longer a question of hatred; it’s just a matter of degree. Right now, as Islam threatens their society, by extension, it increases Jew hatred. The European benefits are both money and satisfaction in their hatred of Jews. They would like to see Israel eliminated. After that it’s highly probable they would go to war with the Arab Muslims, hoping for U.S. participation. Expect some form of the Crusades or, as some refer to it, as a Clash of Civilizations.
One last thought: With the elimination of Israel, they could expunge their ever-present guilt for their active participation in the Genocidal murder of six million Jews. In other words: "Out of Sight - Out of Mind!"
The Bush administration, vying for American financial hegemony over the oil-rich Persian Gulf against Russia or China, is reported to have turned against democratic Israel in the hopes of appeasing Islamist-imperialists, Saudi Arabia and Iran.
DEBKAfile reports that "DEBKA-Net Weekly first revealed on Dec. 7 that a Washington-Tehran understanding is in the making, brokered by Saudi Arabia. According to Washington and intelligence sources, the first steps of the dialogue were made possible by the US National Intelligence Estimate of Dec. 3 affirming that Iran’s nuclear weapons program had been put on hold in 2003. This public statement effectively took the US military option off the table, as stipulated by Riyadh and Tehran (and binding Israel).
Shortly thereafter (our) exclusive disclosure, the well-connected Saudi journalist Jihad El-Khazen gave his version of the course of events in the Arab newspaper Al-Hayat :
"Here is what happened: The rate of violent acts dropped in Iraq; therefore the American intelligence services discovered that Iran had halted its military nuclear program in 2003. This means that the resumption of violence will make American intelligence services find out that there is a secret military program that is different from the peaceful and famous one.
The Saudi reporter went on to ask: "Is there a deal between the Bush administration and Iran? I cannot categorically assert that a deal was concluded between the two parties through direct negotiations; however, there is an understanding resulting in the 2007 national intelligence report.”
Saudi and American sources told DEBKAfile that President George W. Bush used the Annapolis conference as a piece of theater, which presented a sham moderate Arab front against Iran to disguise the intense work underway on a Saudi-mediated accommodation between Washington and Tehran.
The Bush administration appears to be in the midst of developing a new foreign strategy. Admiral Michael Mullen, chairman of the joint US Chiefs of Staff arrived in Israel for a one day visit. Admiral Mullen met with Chief of General Staff Lt.Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi and Defense Minister Ehud Barak. The Israelis announced they would provide the Americans their proof of Iran's nuclear weapons development, in contradiction to the U.S.' National Intelligence Estimate. Israeli leaders are appealing for America to take pre-emptive action against Iran so that Israel won't have to act unilaterally. The Americans may be there to explain that under the new terms of their relationship, Israel will not be tolerated to act unilaterally.
U.S. defense officials said they did not believe the briefings Mullen received would change America's stance on Iran, but they could help him understand the way Israel views the threat.
During their meetings, Mullen and Ashkenazi discussed the Iranian threat. Israel believes Iran is pursuing a nuclear weapon and will be ready to manufacture such a device as early as the end of 2009.
Mullen and Ashkenazi also discussed the Hizbullah and Hamas threats.
Mullen briefed the IDF generals on ongoing American operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. The IDF is concerned of the consequences a premature US withdrawal from Iraq could have on the region. Nehushtan presented Mullen with the IDF's multiyear plan that, for the first time in a decade, includes ways for dealing with a potential threat from Iraq if the US pulls out prematurely.
The radical Washington about-face has in the last ten days touched off a chain of repercussions:
DEBKAfile's sources disclose that Iran’s extremist president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad began purging the Iranian leadership of his opponents, emboldened by what he perceived as the victory of the intransigent nuclear policy he and the Revolutionary Guards had pursued.
Still in crowing mode, Iran’s oil minister Gholam Hossein Nozari announced Saturday, Dec. 8, the cessation of oil transactions in US dollars. He labeled the greenbacks an “unreliable” currency.
Less than 24 hours after the NIE was released, the Kremlin announced resumption of Russian work to finish Iran’s nuclear reactor at Bushehr and the consignment of nuclear fuel.
In Lebanon, the Hizballah opened the door for the election of chief of staff Gen. Michel Suleiman as president. To buy a stable Beirut government, Washington accepted a pro-Syrian Hizballah sympathizer as president.
The prospects of tough UN sanctions against Iran’s continued enrichment of uranium dimmed dramatically. The Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov said there is no point in the light of the US intelligence reassessment. Saturday, the Iranian ambassador in Tokyo invited Japanese investors to put their money in Iranian oil production which he said could be expanded by 30 percent. Tehran has clearly lost its fear of international economic sanctions.
Moscow has dispatched war fleets to the Mediterranean and the northeast Atlantic. A flotilla of six Russian warships including an aircraft carrier will dock at Syria’s Tartous port for the first time.
President Vladimir Putin and defense minister Anatoly Serdyukov decided to send a sortie of six Russian warships, led by the Admiral Kuznetsov aircraft carrier and the Moskva guided missile cruiser, to the Mediterranean. This will be the first prolonged stay of a Russian carrier to the eastern Mediterranean vicinity of Israel’s shores and waters patrolled by the US Sixth Fleet. On its decks are 47 warplanes and 10 helicopters. The Moskva is the Russian Navy’s Black Sea flagship.
According to our Moscow sources, the Kremlin is determined not to be left lagging behind the new Bush administration’s steps towards an accommodation with Iran, which were signaled by the US National Intelligence Estimate absolving Tehran of running a military nuclear program from 2003.
DEBKAfile’s military sources report that the Russian fleet, which has already set out for its new mission from the North and Black Seas, will have the use of naval facilities at Syria’s Tartous port. Its presence for several months will be a complication for the Israel navy’s operations opposite the Lebanese and Syrian coasts, especially if the Russians are joined at Tartous by Iranian submarines or warships.
The Kremlin also decided to send a sortie of ships to the northeastern Atlantic.
Meanwhile, the AP reports that "Iranian and UN nuclear officials began a new round of talks in Teheran on Monday, this time to probe the source of traces of weapons-grade uranium that were found at a university in Teheran, the official IRNA news agency reported.
It was not clear from the report how or when the weapons-grade uranium contamination was discovered at the Technology Faculty of a state university."
This week the Bush Administration legitimized Arab anti-Semitism. In an effort to please the Saudis and their Arab brothers, the Bush administration agreed to physically separate the Jews from the Arabs at the Annapolis conference in a manner that aligns with the apartheid policies of the Arab world which prohibit Israelis from setting foot on Arab soil.
Evident everywhere, the discrimination against Israel received its starkest expression at the main assembly of the Annapolis conference on Tuesday. There, in accordance with Saudi demands, the Americans prohibited Israeli representatives from entering the hall through the same door as the Arabs.
At the meeting of foreign ministers on Wednesday, Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni called her Arab counterparts to task for their discriminatory treatment. "Why doesn't anyone want to shake my hand? Why doesn't anyone want to be seen speaking to me?" she asked pointedly.
Israel's humiliated foreign minister did not receive support from her American counterpart. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who spent her childhood years in the segregated American South, sided with the Arabs. Although polite enough to note that she doesn't support the slaughter of Israelis, she made no bones about the fact that her true sympathies lie with the racist Arabs.
As she put it, "I know what it is like to hear that you cannot go on a road or through a checkpoint because you are a Palestinian. I understand the feeling of humiliation and powerlessness."
Rice's remarks make clear that for the Secretary of State there is no difference between Israelis trying to defend themselves from a jihadist Palestinian society which supports the destruction of the Jewish state and bigoted white Southerners who oppressed African Americans because of the color of their skin. It is true that Israel has security concerns, but as far as Rice is concerned, the Palestinians are the innocent victims. They are the ones who are discriminated against and humiliated, not Livni, who was forced - by Rice - to enter the conference through the service entrance.
OneJerusalem provides this commentary:
The Bush administration's tolerance for discrimination against Israel was not merely ceremonial. Diplomatically, the conference was equally prejudicial. At Annapolis, the US joined the Arabs in placing the lion's share of blame for the absence of peace between Israel and the Palestinians on Israel. But you wouldn't know that from listening to Olmert, who is working steadily to hide what happened there. Olmert obfuscates the truth because his political stability rests in the hands of his hawkish coalition partners Yisrael Beiteinu and Shas. Both warned before the summit that if Olmert made any concessions on either Jerusalem or the so-called outpost communities in Judea and Samaria they would bolt his coalition and so spur new elections.
Shas and Yisrael Beiteinu expressed satisfaction with the outcome of the summit. Both Shas leader Eli Yishai and Yisrael Beiteinu leader Avigdor Lieberman dismissed Annapolis as a pathetic joke and claimed that there is no reason for them to resign from the Olmert government. But these assertions are deliberately misleading.
The fact that the Israeli-PLO joint statement made no specific mention of Jerusalem, and that the government didn't announce a timetable for destroying the so-called outpost communities and expelling the hundreds of Israeli families who live in them, doesn't mean that Israel made no concessions on these issues. In fact, the Olmert government made massive concessions on these issues.
The Israel-PLO joint statement at Annapolis contains a joint pledge "to propagate a culture of peace and nonviolence; to confront terrorism and incitement, whether committed by Palestinians or Israelis."
Although Olmert, Lieberman and Yishai dismiss this Israeli acceptance of moral equivalence with Palestinian jihadists as a meaningless rhetorical concession, the government's move is rife with political and legal implications. US Ambassador Richard Jones's unprecedented meeting this week with Supreme Court President Dorit Beinisch made clear that the US demands that Israeli courts interpret Israeli law in a prejudicial manner in order to demonize Israeli opponents of Palestinian statehood and the ethnic cleansing of the Jews from Judea and Samaria.
Their meeting also signaled that the US expects Israel to treat lawful building activities by Jews in Judea and Samaria and even in sections of Jerusalem as criminal acts. Since the Olmert government accepts that Israel is morally indistinguishable from the Palestinian Authority, it is hard to foresee it preventing the criminalization of its political opponents. From now on, Israelis who oppose the diplomatic moves of the Olmert government can expect to be treated as the moral equivalents of Palestinian terrorists.
Don't try to make Israel your Czechoslovakia, President Bush and Secy Rice.
Holocaust survivor, Mr. Paul Schnek, protests Bush Administration pressure on Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert whose capitulation to reward Jihadist terror with Israeli surrender of land and communities for the establishment of a hostile, Muslim, Palestinian state alongside Israel imperils the West against the Jihad.
Filmed at contra- Annapolis Conference protest outside Israeli Embassy in NYC, organized by Eva Costabel and Buddy Macy.
Mrs. Costabel warns against those, like Arabs and James Baker, who use Jews as scapegoats to manipulate power.
Survivor, Mrs. Costabel, warns Christians not to trust those (like the Nazis and Islamists) that scapegoat the Jewish people (civilization's canary in the coalmine) to implement tyranny. The Nazi's used anti-Judaism to rise to power, which enabled them to kill more than 50 million Christians.
She warns Westerners that Islamists resent Israel as the only modern democracy in the Middle East (which runs against the grain of the Muslim socio-political system of theocracy) which Saudis preach must dominate anywhere Muslims live - including throughout the West.
The mood is dark in the IDF's General Staff ahead of this week's "peace" conference in Annapolis. As one senior officer directly involved in the negotiations with the Palestinians and the Americans said, "As bad as it might look from the outside, the truth is 10 times worse. This is a nightmare. The Americans have never been so hostile." Saudi Foreign Minister Saud al-Faisal confers with Secy Condoleeza Rice
On Thursday a draft of the joint statement that Israeli and Palestinian negotiators are discussing ahead of the conference was leaked to the media. A reading of the document bears out the IDF's concerns.
The draft document shows that the Palestinians and the Israelis differ not only on every issue, but differ on the purpose of the document. It also shows that the US firmly backs the Palestinians against Israel.
As the leaked draft document shows, the Americans have sided with the Palestinians against Israel. Specifically, the Americans have taken for themselves the sole right to judge whether or not the Palestinians and the Israelis are abiding by their commitments and whether and at what pace the negotiations will proceed.
But the Americans have shown themselves to be unworthy of Israel’s trust. By refusing to acknowledge Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah party’s direct involvement in terrorism and indeed the direct involvement of his official Fatah “security forces” in terrorism, the Americans have shown that their benchmarks for Palestinian compliance with their commitments to Israel are not necessarily based on the reality on the ground. Then too, the US demands for wide-ranging Israeli security concessions to the Palestinians even before the “peace” conference at Annapolis have shown that Israel’s security is of little concern to the State Department.
IDF sources blame the shooting murder of Ido Zoldan on Monday night by Fatah terrorists on Israel’s decision to bow to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice’s demand to take down 24 security roadblocks in Judea and Samaria. If it hadn’t been for US pressure, they say, it is quite possible that the 29-year-old father of two small children would be alive today.
As the State Department Secretary, Condoleeza Rice, brings the world to Annapolis to pressure Israel to boost Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah Party's image, the predominant Hamas government shows the nature of the brutality which can be expected under Palestinian statehood. Contributor Boni123 has aggregated and translated this news story from Israeli TV News into English. Watch clip:
