The Yale Initiative for the Interdisciplinary Study of Antisemitism
Newsletter
Volume 2 No. 49
18 April 2008
YIISA SEMINAR
Thursday, April 24 @ 4:15 PM
Linsly Chittenden Hall, Room 101 (63 High Street)
Title: The Academic and Public Debate over the Meaning of the ‘New Antisemitism’
Speaker: Professor Roni Stauber
Stephen Roth Institute for the Study of Contemporary Antisemitism and Racism, Tel Aviv University
YIISA CONFERENCE – 2 DAYS!
“UNDERTSTANDING THE CHALLENGE OF IRAN”
Tuesday, April 29 @ 6:45 PM
The Yale Club of New York City (50 Vanderbilt Avenue)
*RSVP by April 22nd with meal choice: chicken, vegetarian or kosher to lauren.clark@yale.edu
Formal Dinner & Lectures
Speakers: David Menashri, Director of Center for Iranian Studies & Professor at the Department of Middle Eastern History at Tel Aviv University; Dean of the University’s Special Programs Division
Mehrangiz Kar, Iranian journalist and one of the most celebrated human rights activists in Iran
Irwin Cotler, Canadian Member of Parliament and former Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada
Wednesday, April 30 @ 9:00 AM – 6:30 PM
Linsly Chittenden Hall, Room 101 (63 High Street)
Conference & Panel Discussions with leading scholars, activists and intellectuals
YIISA CO-SPONSORED EVENT
*Please RSVP by April 30th to brooke.crockett@yale.edu
Tuesday, May 6 @ 11:00am – 2:00pm
Co-Sponsored with the Interdisciplinary Center for Bioethics, Genocide Studies
Institute for Social and Policy Studies, Room A001 (77 Prospect Street)
Rescuers of Genocide Victims: Research Perspectives for the Future
Speakers: Ben Keirnan, History, Genocide Studies Program, Yale University
Mette Bastholm, Sociology, Yale University
John Dovidio, Social Psychology, Yale University
Bruce Wexler, Psychiatry, Yale University
Stephanie J. Bird, Neuroethics, Editor-in-Chief of Science and Engineering Ethics
Moderator: Julius Landwirth, Interdisciplinary Center for Bioethics
LECTURES OF INTEREST
Friday, April 25 @ 3:00PM – 6:00PM
Saturday, April 26 @ 8:30AM – 7:00 PM
Sunday, April 27 @ 9:00AM – 1:30 PM
All events to take place at Luce Hall (34 Hillhouse Avenue)
Facing Others: Iranian Identity Boundaries & Modern Political Cultures
Three day conference featuring interdisciplinary discussions of “The Legacy of Cultural Exclusion,” “The Internal Frontiers,” “Empires and Encounters,” “Identity and Iranian Political Cultures” and “Globalized Anxieties.”
Thurdsay, April 24 @ 5:30 PM
BAC, 1080 Chapel Street
The Andrew Cardnuff Ritchie Lecture
History of Matzah: The Story of the Jews
Speaker: Russell Ferguson, University of California, Los Angeles & adjunct curator, Hammer Museum
For more information: www.yale.edu/macmillon/cmes
ARTICLES OF INTEREST
IRAN
PM: Iran will not be nuclear
(Haaretz) “I want to tell the citizens of Israel: Iran will not have nuclear capability,” said Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in a pre-Passover interview. According to Olmert, the international community is making an enormous effort, in which Israel has a part, to prevent Iran from attaining nonconventional weapons capabilities. “And I believe, and also know, that the bottom line of these efforts is that Iran will not be nuclear,” Olmert said.
The Holocaust Declaration
(Washington Post) Charles Krauthammer writes, “On Tuesday Iran announced it was installing 6,000 more centrifuges — they produce enriched uranium, the key ingredient of a nuclear weapon — in addition to the 3,000 already operating. The world yawned. It is time to admit the truth: The Bush administration’s attempt to halt Iran’s nuclear program has failed. Utterly. The latest round of U.N. Security Council sanctions, which took a year to achieve, is comically weak. It represents the end of the sanctions road.”
Ahmadinejad boasts over Iran’s military power
(AFP) President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Thursday proclaimed Iran as the “most powerful nation” on earth as the country’s air force showed off its prowess at a time of mounting tension with the West. Ahmadinejad told this during a military parade outside Tehran marking the Islamic republic’s annual Army Day, reaffirming one of his favoured slogans.
U.S.: Iranian threats to ‘eliminate’ Israel justify int’l sanctions
(Haaretz) In a new round in the war of words between Jerusalem and Tehran, the Iranian army’s deputy chief threatened Tuesday to respond to any military attack from Israel by ‘eliminating’ it. The U.S. State Department said on Tuesday that the comments showed the international community was right to sanction Iran.
US national security advisor in Israel for talks on Iran: radio
(AFP) Visiting US national security advisor Stephen Hadley was to discuss Iran’s nuclear programme with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert on Tuesday night, public radio said. The announcement came just hours after the deputy commander of Iran’s army Mohammad Reza Ashtiani warned that his country would “eliminate Israel from the global arena” if it were attacked by the Jewish state.
Iran is playing with fire
(Haaretz) “Iran under the Islamic revolutionary government represents a serious security problem for Israel. It trains, funds and carries out terror via Hezbollah in Lebanon, and via Islamic Jihad in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. It, or its emissaries, hid navigator Ron Arad. Under its aegis, Syria continues to choose hostility over seeking peace with Israel. Worst of all, its leaders explicitly declare their desire to destroy “the Zionist entity,” and act to do so by developing ground-to-ground missiles and attempting to obtain nuclear weapons.”
Israel Can Stand Up for Itself
(NY Times) The failure of diplomacy to stop Iran’s nuclear program became obvious this week, when President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad revealed the installation of 6,000 new centrifuges at the country’s main uranium enrichment complex. His announcement was accompanied by the now customary assertion that outsiders can do nothing to stop Iran from fulfilling its nuclear destiny.
Spy photos reveal ‘secret launch site’ for Iran’s long-range missiles
(Times) The secret site where Iran is suspected of developing long-range ballistic missiles capable of reaching targets in Europe has been uncovered by new satellite photographs. The imagery has pinpointed the facility from where the Iranians launched their Kavoshgar 1 “research rocket” on February 4, claiming that it was in connection with their space programme.
Iran Top Threat To Iraq, U.S. Says
(Washington Post) Last week’s violence in Basra and Baghdad has convinced the Bush administration that actions by Iran, and not al-Qaeda, are the primary threat inside Iraq, and has sparked a broad reassessment of policy in the region, according to senior U.S. officials.
Iran‘s Sly Games in Iraq
(U.S. News) Fouad Ajami writes, “We needn’t give credence to the idea of a vast “Shiite crescent” stretching from Iran to Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon to appreciate the challenge posed by the Iranian theocrats to the American project in Iraq and to the order of that Greater Middle East. These are crafty players, the men who rule that radical realm. The networks of terror they have at their disposal have a way of overlooking the fine distinctions of theology and politics. In its struggle for primacy in the habitat around it, Iran is not a Shiite power per se: It aids and abets a Shiite-armed movement in Lebanon and also works with the Sunni die-hards of Hamas and Islamic Jihad in the Palestinian territories.
Iran‘s Busted Iraq Bid
(NY Post) Analysts in Tehran describe events last month in Basra as a gamble that proved too costly. Iran’s state-run media have de facto confirmed that this was no spontaneous “uprising.” Rather, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) tried to seize control of Iraq’s second-largest city using local Shiite militias as a Trojan horse.
Countering Iran
(Washington Post) Threaded through the reports of progress in Iraq by Gen. David H. Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan C. Crocker last week was the story of a larger failure: the inability of the United States and its allies to contain the growing aggressiveness of Iran. Since Gen. Petraeus and Mr. Crocker last reported to Congress seven months ago, Iranian-backed militias and “special groups” in Iraq have evolved from a shadow force into the largest remaining threat to U.S. forces and the Iraqi government.
Iran, persecuting your Arab minority
(Jerusalem Post) Daniel Brett writes, “‘Collective punishment’ is a term used often used to describe Israel’s retaliation against Hamas terrorist attacks. Teheran usually rushes to be the first in line to accuse the Jewish state. Yet the Iranian regime’s claim to represent the interests of Arabs is belied by its brutal persecution of the indigenous Ahwazi Arabs living within its own territory, who have been under direct rule from Persians since the end of self-government in 1925.”
Al Wattan: 20 Hizbullah men die in Iran training
(Jerusalem Post) At least 20 Hizbullah fighters have been killed during military training in Iran, the Kuwaiti newspaper Al-Watan reported Thursday evening, quoting the Director General of the Islamic Union in Lebanon, Muhammad Ali Husseini. The Lebanese official did not say exactly how the fighters were killed, but he made clear that “Hizbullah regards those killed while training in Iran as holy ones who died fulfilling their duties, and this concerns not only Shi’ites, but also Sunnis who are loyal to Hizbullah.”
Column One: Ahmadinejad’s smile
(Jerusalem Post) Caroline Glick writes, “The regime-affiliated Iranian Fars news agency published a sensational story this week. According to the Fars report, Saudi Arabia and Israel collaborated in killing Iranian terror-master Imad Mughniyeh in Damascus in February. The story is important regardless of whether it is true. It is important because it says something important about the nature of Iran’s relationship with Syria. Specifically, it says that Iran views Syria as a vassal state.”
MIDDLE EAST
PLO official: We’ll drive Israel out of Palestine
(Jerusalem Post) “The PLO is the sole legitimate representative [of the Palestinian people], and it has not changed its platform even one iota.” Abbas Zaki, told Lebanon’s NBN TV in an interview that aired last Wednesday and was translated by the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI). He added, “Let me tell you, when the ideology of Israel collapses, and we take, at least, Jerusalem, the Israeli ideology will collapse in its entirety, and we will begin to progress with our own ideology, Allah willing, and drive them out of all of Palestine.”
Click here to watch video clip
Killing in the West Bank Exposes a Furtive War
(Washington Post) When the preacher’s body arrived at the hospital, his back was scarlet where he had been whipped with pipes. His legs were black with bruises. His wrists were sliced open and bloodied. The Palestinian Authority, which had been holding Majd Barghouti in an intelligence-service prison for the previous week, soon declared that the popular Hamas imam, or prayer leader, had died of a heart attack.
2 Palestinians arrested for plot to poison Ramat Gan diners
(Haaretz) Two Palestinians from the West Bank city of Nablus were arrested last month for planning to poison diners at the Ramat Gan restaurant that employed them, according to details revealed Thursday after a gag order was lifted. Under interrogation, the pair admitted planning the attack after being recruited by an Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade cell that received funding and instructions from Hezbollah.
Hamas MP and Cleric Yunis Al-Astal: “We Will Conquer Rome, and from There Continue to Conquer the Two Americas and Eastern Europe”
(MEMRI TV) Excerpts from an address by Hamas MP and cleric Yunis Al-Astal, which aired on Al-Aqsa TV on April 11, 2008.
Report: Hizbullah to Launch Offensive in Occupied Territories in Case Israel Wages War
(Naharnet Newsdesk) A high-ranking Hizbullah official has said the party would launch an offensive on Israel in the Palestinian territories occupied in 1948 in case the Jewish state wages a new war, Iranian News Agency, Fars, reported.
The official, speaking on condition of anonymity, made the statement in an interview with Syrian magazine “al-Hakika,” the news agency said.
Israel says Syria arming Hezbollah despite UN resolution
(AFP) Syria is supplying Lebanon’s Hezbollah militia with rockets in violation of UN Security Council Resolution 1701, Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak charged on Tuesday. “Resolution 1701 is not being applied. The transfer of rockets from Syria to Lebanon is continuing and Hezbollah’s military build-up is continuing,” Barak’s office quoted him as saying during a visit to an air force base.
UN Security Council calls for disarming Hezbollah and solution to Israel-Lebanon conflict
(International Herald Tribune) The U.N. Security Council called for the disarming of Hezbollah and all other militias in Lebanon and greater progress toward a permanent ceasefire and long-term solution to the conflict between Lebanon and Israel.
U.S. Senate to discuss N. Korea-Syria nuclear ties
(Haaretz) The American administration intends to give the Senate Intelligence Committee an account of the nuclear ties between North Korea and Syria for the first time on April 22. Senior IDF officers have warned, however, that the release of any information containing details of the Israeli Air Force strike in Syria last September could increase tension between Israel and Syria.
Were Syrian officers involved in Mugniyah killing?
(YNet) Hizbullah’s top military commander Imad Mugniyah, mysteriously killed in a blast two months ago, has been the subject of lively discussion in the Arab press in recent days. Lebanon’s Al-Shiraa magazine reported Saturday that two weeks ago Syrian intelligence broke into the houses of two Syrian officers in Damascus and executed them with shots to the head, apparently due to their involvement in Mugniyah’s assasination.
Hosting Mughniyah in Tehran
(Haaretz) Yossi Melman writes, “It is difficult to see Brigadier General Qassem Suleimani as a promoter of peace. But that is precisely how he was defined recently by several analysts in important newspapers in the United States, Britain and other Western countries, because of his involvement in the negotiations to broker a cease-fire in the war in Iraq between the Shiite militias and the government.”
Hamas says Carter visit a boost to militants’ legitimacy
(Washington Post) Hamas officials said Wednesday that Jimmy Carter’s meetings with leaders of the Palestinian militant group will boost its legitimacy despite criticism by Israel and the U.S. government of the former president’s personal peace mission.
Legitimizing Hamas
(Weekly Standard) Matthew Levitt writes, “Imagine the Alice in Wonderland scene that will take place later this week, when U.S. Secret Service agents entrusted with protecting former president Jimmy Carter stand guard over a meeting with the head of a designated terrorist group responsible for near daily attacks targeting civilians, including numerous attacks in which American citizens have been injured and killed. The former president may have altruistic motives, but his meeting with Hamas leader Khaled Mishal is both imprudent and dangerous.”
Jimmy’s World
(Wall Street Journal) Former President Jimmy Carter has an interesting way of saying more than he intends. He lusts in his heart. He turns to his 13-year-old daughter for foreign policy wisdom. He titles a book, “Palestine Peace Not Apartheid.” What Mr. Carter means to say is that he is a flesh-and-blood human being, a caring father, a missionary for peace. What he actually communicates is that he is weirdly libidinal, scarily naive and obsessively hostile to Israel.
Cool welcome for Carter in Jerusalem
(Haaretz) President Shimon Peres accused former U.S. president Jimmy Carter of causing significant damage to Israel and the peace process in recent years, during a meeting between the two men yesterday at the President’s Residence, officials at the residence said.
Hebron university shut down after Fatah-Hamas clashes
(Jerusalem Post) The administration of the Islamic University in Hebron decided Saturday to suspend studies until further notice following fierce clashes on campus between students affiliated with Fatah and Hamas. The clashes erupted after students belonging to the Hamas-affiliated Islamic List distributed leaflets accusing Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas’s forces of arresting four of their colleagues. Click here to read
How did we forget that Israel’s story is the story of the West?
(Telegraph) Charles Moore writes about how British media and that “Little prepares the post-Christian European audience to understand Israel. By “understand”, I partly mean sympathise with, and partly, just comprehend.”
State Dept. targets anti-Semitism
(Jewish Telegraphic Agency) A U.S. State Department report on anti-Semitism targets its manifestation as anti-Zionism and excoriates its appearance in the U.N. system.
Anti-semitism clouds 2009 summit on racism
(United Press International) Delegates in Switzerland are planning for a world conference on racism amid criticism of a prior summit’s anti-Semitic tones, diplomats say. Israel and the United States walked out of a 2001 Durban, South Africa, conference against racial intolerance because non-governmental organizations took center stage, equating Zionism with racism and accusing Israel of committing a “holocaust” against Palestinians.
NORTH AMERICA
Yale Moves Away From Plans for Link With Abu Dhabi
(NY Times) After more than a year of talks, Yale University has backed away from its plan for an arts institute in Abu Dhabi, involving Yale’s art, music, architecture and drama schools. The stumbling block, ultimately, was Abu Dhabi’s insistence that Yale offer degree programs at the institute, and Yale’s refusal to grant its degrees in Abu Dhabi.
2007 Audit shows decrease in state’s antisemitic incidents
(Jewish Ledger) The number of antisemitic incidents in Connecticut decreased 37 percent in 2007, according to the Anti-Defamation League’s annual Audit of Anti-Semitic Incidents. A total of 49 incidents were reported across Connecticut in 2007, 26 were cited as incidents of vandalism and 23 as incidents of harassment. Continuing a long time trend, the state ranked seventh in the nation in antisemitic incidents, with New York leading the pack.
Koch on Koch on Antisemitism
(Forward) Ed Koch, the legendary former New York City mayor — who puckishly describes himself as “a liberal with sanity” — has never been shy about standing up for his fellow Jews. That much is clear from “The Koch Papers: My Fight Against Anti-Semitism” (Palgrave Macmillan), a new volume he compiled with Holocaust scholar, activist and frequent Koch collaborator Raphael Medoff. The book collects Koch’s speeches, correspondence and writings on antisemitism and Jewish concerns from his years as mayor — a post he held from 1977 to 1989 — and his past two decades as an outspoken private citizen.
Anti-Semitic incidents continues to climb, says League
(Canadian Jewish News) Incidents of anti-Semitism continued to trend upward in Canada last year, with a record 1,042 occurrences reported by the League for Human Rights of B’nai Brith Canada – nearly one-third of them on the Internet. The new high marked an 11.4 per cent increase over 2006 and nearly doubled the 584 incidents reported in 2003, the League stated in its 2007 Audit of Anti-Semitic Incidents.
Seminary slaughter commemorated
(The Suburban) Last week’s murder of eight yeshiva students in Jerusalem was commemorated here in Montreal. A memorial service was held at Mercaz Harav’s local affiliated seminary Kollel Torah Mitzion.
Santorum calls for war with ‘Islamo-fascists’
(Yale Daily News) As part of a speaking tour throughout various college campuses about the dangers of Islamic extremism, Republican Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum spoke at the Yale Political Union debate on the importance of defining the enemy in the “War on Islamic Extremism” — the subject of the debate — and on the historical roots of the clash between Islamic and Judeo-Christian culture.
EUROPE
German FM blasts ‘new anti-Semitism’ clothed in anti-Israel sentiments
(Jerusalem Post) A new form of anti-Semitism increasingly cloaked by expressions of moral superiority and anti-Israel statements is unacceptable and will not be allowed to permeate German society, Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said at a ceremony at the German Foreign Ministry marking the establishment of the offices of a new Holocaust-awareness organization.
Court Faults Britain for Halting Arms Deal Inquiry
(NY Times) The High Court in Britain on Thursday ruled that officials investigating accusations of corruption in a multibillion-dollar arms deal with Saudi Arabia acted unlawfully when they dropped the inquiry under pressure from the government. The court also criticized the role of Saudi officials in the matter.
Over hundred people protest in Prague against anti-Semitism
(Romea) Over a hundred people took part in a meeting in protest against anti-Semitism, held in Prague today, that included a march through the centre of the city and a rally in the upper house garden named All of us are people. The event, organised by the International Christian Embassy Jerusalem, took place for the fifth time this year.
Protester interrupts Israeli singer’s concert in Spain
(YNet) A Spanish protester carrying a Palestinian flag interrupted a concert of Israeli singer Achinoam Nini in the city of Tulsa in Spain this weekend. The concert resumed after the crowd beseeched the singer to return and Nini stated that the incident made her proud to be an Israeli.
Weekly Quotes – (Canadian Institute for Jewish Research – Montreal)
“Just last week, the PLO ambassador to Lebanon Abbas Zaki restated the PLO’s aim of destroying Israel in an interview with Lebanese television. In Zaki’s words, ‘The PLO… has not changed its platform even one iota.’ That platform, to destroy Israel in stages, remains the objective of the PLO. He continued, ‘In light of the weakness of the Arab nation and the lack of values, and in light of the American control over the world, the PLO proceeds through phases, without changing its strategy. Let me tell you, when the ideology of Israel collapses, and we take, at least, Jerusalem, the Israeli ideology will collapse in its entirety, and we will begin to progress with our own ideology, Allah willing, and drive them out of all of Palestine.’” Caroline Glick, quoting the PLO ambassador to Lebanon, Abbas Zaki, to highlight the misguided Israeli assumption that Fatah would eventually transform the PLO and Palestinian society from a “terror-supporting society to a terror-combating society.” (Jerusalem Post, April 14)
“Jimmy Carter’s flacks aren’t denying reports that the former president and global scold is heading for Syria for a friendly sit-down this week with Hamas terrorist-in-chief Khaled Meshaal. That would make Carter the highest-ranking Western leader to break bread with the top leader of a group that the US government has officially designated a ‘foreign terrorist organization.’… Cartera former US president and winner of the now-thoroughly discredited Nobel Peace Prizewill be putting a stamp of legitimacy on a gang of cutthroats who’ve never hesitated to include Americans in their growing body count.… For the record, Carter reportedly will be traveling in his capacity as head of his Carter Center and not as a former president. That’s a distinction likely to be lost on the families of: the four young Americans killed by a Hamas bomb at Hebrew University in 2002; the New Jersey woman who was among the 15 killed by the Hamas bombing of a Jerusalem pizzeria in 2001; the two US citizens killed, along with 13 others, in the 1997 Hamas bombing of a crowded outdoor market in Jerusalem; [and] the three Americans among the 26 victims of a 1996 Hamas passenger bus bombing in Jerusalem….
To sit down with the leader of a group that has the blood of innocent Americans on its hands is an outrage. If he goes through with it, Jimmy Carter will have disgraced (again) the office he once held.” New York Post Editorial. While in Ramallah, Carter visited the grave of the late PLO terrorist leader Yasser Arafat, where he deposited a wreath. Israel’s leaders are boycotting Carter’s nine-day trip through the Middle East. (New York Post, April 13-14; Ha’aretz, April 15)
“The Iranians won’t rush to attack Israel, because they understand the significance such action would have and are well aware of our strength…. However, Iran continues to aggravate the situation by supplying arms to Syria and Hezbollah, and we must deal with this.” Infrastructure Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer, a former defense minister, speaking during a visit to the Infrastructure Ministry war room during preparations for last week’s civil defense drill. Iran has lodged a complaint with UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon over Ben-Eliezer’s remarks that Israel would destroy Iran if it were attacked first. Meanwhile, Iran announced last Tuesday that it has began installing 6,000 new centrifuges that work five times faster than the current version. (Ha’aretz, April 7, 8; Jer.Post, April 11)
“We are not worried by the recent Israeli manoeuvres, but it Israel wants to take any action against the Islamic republic, we will eliminate Israel from the universe. Our answer to any military attack against Iran will be strong.” Iran’s Deputy Chief of Staff Mohammad Reza Ashtiani, at a press conference to announce “Army Day”, asserting that Teheran is not threatened by Israeli National Infrastructure Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer that “Iran will be wiped off the face of the earth if it dares to fire any missiles at us.” (Ha’aretz, Jer. Post, April 15)
“Iran will be the first nuclear state in history against which deterrence won’t work, even if the deterrent is nuclear.… Nothing will stop the Iraniansnot the use of force and not a fear of being hit in retaliation.… [E]very Israeli withdrawal from territories it controls leaves room for Iranian terror to enter.… In the last 30 years, we have been living in a world where Sunni extremists succeed in attacking targets in the Western world, while on the other hand, Shi’ite Iran is rapidly advancing to the point of no return in its nuclear aspirations.” Likud chairman Benjamin Netanyahu, at the international conference “Russia, the Middle East and the Challenge of Radical Islam” in Jerusalem last week, a joint effort of the Adelson Institute for Strategic Studies and the Institute for Eurasian Studies’ Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya. (Jer. Post, April 9)
“We are residents of Israel. Our religion encourages love and closeness among nations. Jews, Muslims, we are all cousins, right? We decided to paint the mosque’s dome, the most important, dear, and holy site for us, in the national colors. We are all citizens of the state of Israel. As far as we are concerned, there is no difference here between Jews, Muslims, and Christians.” Hisham Zuabi, Mayor of A-Taibeh, an Arab-Israeli town in the Galilee near the Gilboa, commenting on the blue-and-white theme demonstrating solidarity for Israel’s sixtieth anniversary. (Ha’aretz, April 8)
“I never use the term winning because it is too simplistic and does not relate to what we are doing here. The Question really is, ‘Are we making progress: Yes or no?’ The fact is that I think we are making significant progress.” Maj.-Gen. Marc Lessard, who leads the thirteen-thousand Canadian, American, and European troops in NATO’s Regional Command South, insisting that Canada’s troops have achieved progress by working closely with the Afghan National Army and Afghan National Police in Kandahar’s Zhari/Panjwaii districts. (Canwest News Service, April 8)
“I think that there is some sense of an increased level of supply of weapons and support to these groups. I would say one of the salutary effects of what Prime Minister Maliki did in Basra is that I think the Iraqi government now has a clearer view of the malign impact of Iran’s activities inside Iraq.” U.S. Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, suggesting that the Iraqi government is becoming aware of the extent of Iran’s influence on radical Shiite resistance in Iraq. Later, he told Pentagon reporters, “They have had what I would call a growing understanding of that negative Iranian role, but I think what they encountered in Basra was a real eye-opener for them.” Friday, police in Najaf, Iraq’s holiest Shiite city, issued a curfew after a senior aide to Moqtada al-Sadr was assassinated. (New York Times, April 12)
SHORT TAKES
YALE MOVES AWAY FROM PLANS FOR LINK WITH ABU DHABI(New York) After more than a year of talks, Yale University has backed away from its plan for an arts institute in Abu Dhabi, involving Yale’s art, music, architecture and drama schools. The stumbling block, ultimately, was Abu Dhabi’s insistence that Yale offer degree programs at the institute, and Yale’s refusal to grant its degrees in Abu Dhabi. The Abu Dhabi project would have been Yales’s first major venture in the Middle East. (New York Times, April 12)
PROTESTERS STORM ISRAELI AMBASSADOR’S SPEECH (Montreal) In a recent address delivered by Israeli Ambassador to Canada Alan Baker about 25 demonstrators forced their way into a luncheon denouncing Israel “apartheid” and “war crimes” against Palestinians. Baker, who emphasized his hope for stronger ties between Israel and Quebec, was hosted by the Montreal Council of Foreign Relations, a non-profit private group, at the Queen Elizabeth Hotel. The protesters did not identify themselves, but a local Montreal group called Tadamon issued a press release stating that Baker’s address was to be targeted for disruption. Tadamon, who have been lobbying to have the Iranian-backed Hezbollah removed from Canada’s terrorist list, has previously organized pro-Palestinian events at Concordia University. (Canadian Jewish News, April 16)
PAKISTAN MAY EASE RESTRICTIONS ON RENEGADE SCIENTIST (Islamabad) The new government in Pakistan is set to consider significantly easing restrictions on A.Q. Khan, the renegade scientist who has been under house arrest for four years since confessing his nuclear proliferation activities in an address on national television. In a recent telephone interview with journalists, Khan said that “when I confessed [and was pardoned by Pervez Musharraf], I took the whole blame on myself.” Analysts said freeing Khan would be enormously popular in Pakistan, where he is feted as the father of the Islamic bomb. (Globe and Mail, April 11)
IRAN MISSILE SITE UNCOVERED (New York) The secret site where Iran is suspected of developing long-range ballistic missiles capable of reaching targets in Europe was uncovered last week by new satellite photographs. The Digital Globe QuickBird satellite images pinpoint the facility from which the Iranians launched their Kavoshgar 1 “research rocket” on Feb. 4. Geoffrey Forden, a research associate at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, said the site120 feet in lengthwas similar in form and size to the Taepodong long-range missile assembly facility in North Korea. (New York Post, April 11)
HAMAS HAS 20,000 ARMED MEN IN GAZA (Israel) According to a recently released report Hamas’ military build-up is at its peak, despite the international blockade on the Gaza Strip. The Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center, an Israel-based think-tank, estimates that Hamas has organized 20,000 armed forces and acquired long-range rockets from Syria and Iran. The report also suggests Israel’s 2005 pullout from Gaza enabled Hamas to boost its power in the coastal strip, over which it gained control in a violent takeover in June 2006. (Ha’aretz, April 10)
COTLER INTRODUCED SUDAN ACCOUNTABILITY ACT (Ottawa) Former Canadian Minister of Justice and Liberal MP, Irwin Cotler, introduced the Sudan Accountability Act, the first-ever legislation aimed at enhancing the role of Canada and the international community in combating the genocide by attrition in Darfur. The legislation coincides with Ottawa’s Commemoration of the Rwandan genocide. Cotler said: “In Rwanda, nobody can say that we did not know. We knew, but did not act. In Darfur, we know, but have yet to act sufficiently.” (Liberal Party of Canada Press Release, April 11)
B’NAI BRITH: ANTISEMITISM SOARING (Ottawa) Last year marked another record high for the number of antisemitic incidents in Canada, according to an audit by B’nai Brith. There were 1,042 antisemitic incidents reported in 2007, an 11.4 per cent increase over the previous year. It was the highest figure recorded in the 26 years that B’nai Brith has been keeping statistics. (National Post, April 10)
PLOT TO POISON DINERS AVERTED (Jerusalem) Two Palestinians from the West Bank city of Nablus were arrested last month for planning to poison diners at the Ramat Gan restaurant that employed them, according to details revealed Thursday after a gag order was lifted. Ahmed Abu-Riyal and Mustafa Salum, both 21, were arrested by the Shin Bet security service and Tel Aviv District police. A Shin Bet probe ascertained that the men were recruited to a particular terrorist cell of Fatah’s Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, which has links to Hezbollah. (Ha’aretz, April 10)
PERES PRAISES WARSAW GHETTO UPRISING FIGHTERS (Jerusalem) Israeli President Shimon Peres delivered an address at a ceremony marking 65 years since the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, stating that peace is the way in which Israel must avenge the horrors of the Holocaust. “During times of intifadas and [Iranian] uranium enrichment, it is through peace that forces of light can avenge the actions of forces of darkness.” Peres praised the young Warsaw fighters who displayed a heroism that “our children will proudly carry with them in their hearts.” (Ha’aretz, April 14)
TRAIN OF COMMEMORATION (Germany) The ‘Train of Commemoration’ will rest Friday, in the train station in Rathenow, Germany, 80 kilometres west of Berlin. The train is a rolling exhibition displaying biographies of children and youth from all over Europe who were deported by the Nazis. The exhibition will travel 3,000 kilometres through Germany before reaching the Auschwitz Memorial in Poland. The exhibition is run by Diakonie Emergency Aid, a Germany-based Christian agency. (CanWest, April 13)
MUSLIM SOCIAL SITE MEMBERS REVEALS HATE TOWARD JEWS (Jerusalem) A social media Web site for Muslims – Muxlim.com- which was launched in 2006 by two Scandinavian-based entrepreneurs, has attracted more than a million users from 190 countries across the globe. Muxlim.com reportedly reveals user profiles fraught with angry messages and outright vulgarity in reference to Jews, Israel, and other non-Muslims. Creators of the site cite Muxlim.com as a “vibrant and friendly community with a welcoming demeanor and a sense of humor.” (Jer. Post, April 14)