U.S. Asst. Sec. of State Deliberately Misleads Congress About Terrorists’ Salaries

The United States Assistant Secretary of State, Amb. Anne W. Patterson, disregarded documented evidence that money goes into Palestinian terrorists’ pockets, and not just to their families as mentioned in her testimony to Congress.

By Itamar Marcus, Nan J Zilberdik

 

In testimony to Congress, US Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs, Ambassador Anne W. Patterson, defended the Palestinian Authority (PA) practice of paying salaries to terrorists in prison saying “they have to provide for the families.”

Assistant secretary for the Near East Anne Patterson

Assistant secretary for the Near East Anne Patterson – Reuters

However, Palestinian Media Watch has documented repeatedly that this is not correct. Continue Reading »

Baltic states up number of Christian ‘Israel ally’ caucuses to 30

 

Israel MK Yuri Shtern established the Knesset Christian Allies Caucus in 2004.

 

 
Latvia and Estonia will become the 29th and 30th countries with Israel Allies Caucuses in their parliaments this week at events attended by MKs in the Knesset’s Christian Allies Caucus.

Christians Love Israel – Photo: .the peoples voice

The MKs will join together with World Jewish Congress and International Christian Embassy Jerusalem representatives to meet with Christian and political leaders in the two Baltic states to mobilize support for Israel.

There will be meetings with senior leaders from a spectrum of Christian denominations, with hopes of garnering further support for Israel, concentrating on shared Judeo-Christian values.

Continue Reading »

IDF: Only rubber bullets were fired in Beitunia – Pallywood clip surfaces

 

Following a Haaretz report detailing the suspension of an Israel Defense Forces soldier in relation to the May 15 clashes in the West Bank town of Beitunia in which two Palestinian youths were killed, IDF officials said on Wednesday that the soldier in question was firing rubber bullets, not live bullets, and was not aiming at rioters, but at a nearby wall.

An image from the video that purportedly shows the shooting deaths of two Palestinians in Beitunia on May 15 – Photo: Defense for Children International Palestine website

No apparent evidence links the suspended soldier, reportedly belonging to a communications unit, to either fatality. Continue Reading »

Hamas operative details terrorist activities on Temple Mount

 

Israel’s Shin Bet security services reveal how Hamas paid young men monthly salaries to prevent a Jewish presence on the Temple Mount.

By i24news

 

The Shin Bet (Israel’s Security Agency) announced Thursday that a senior Hamas operative arrested at the Allenby bridge last month revealed during interrogation that Hamas uses the Islamic Movement in Israel as a front to promote its activities within Israel, according to the Jerusalem Post.

Policemen guard the Esplanade of the Mosques in jerusalem on May 26, 2014 – Photo: Thomas Coex / AFP

The operative, Mahmoud Toama, a member of the main economic council of Hamas as well as Hamas’ General Shura Council, provided the security agency with information on Hamas activities in Jerusalem as well as the organization’s funding sources and international relationships. Continue Reading »

Sudan tells Saudis it declined Iranian air defense offer after alleged Israeli air-strike

 

In fear of bring alienated from Saudi Arabia, Sudan distances itself from Iran while denying any support for the Muslim Brotherhood.

By Reuters

 

Sudan turned down an Iranian offer to set up air defenses on its Red Sea coast after a 2012 air strike Khartoum blamed on Israel, fearing they would upset Iran’s regional rival Saudi Arabia, Sudan’s foreign minister was quoted as saying on Thursday.

The Yarmouk military complex in Khartoum, Sudan seen in a satellite image made on October 12 2012, after the alleged attack. -  Photo: AP/DigitalGlobe via Satellite Sentinel Project

The Yarmouk military complex in Khartoum, Sudan seen in a satellite image made on October 12 2012, after the alleged attack. – Photo: AP/DigitalGlobe via Satellite Sentinel Project

In an interview with the Saudi-owned al-Hayat newspaper that seemed aimed at improving frosty ties with Riyadh, Ali Karti played down Khartoum’s links to Iran and to the Muslim Brotherhood, which is outlawed in Saudi Arabia. Continue Reading »

Archaeologists in Jordan uncover Roman inscription about Bar Kochba Revolt

Roman Fort found in southern Jordan housed garrison to vanquish the Jews during the Bar Kokhba revolt (132–136 CE), in the Judea Province.

 

Four years after starting to dig up an ancient Roman outpost in southern Jordan, a team of archaeologists from Tennessee found a unique, and well-preserved, inscription on a rock – revealing that the site is the previously unknown base of a Roman infantry unit involved in crushing the Bar-Kochba rebellion.

The 'Ayn Gharandal inscription (Robert Darby)

The Ayn Gharandal inscription, above the collapsed gate to the Roman fort. – Photo: Robert Darby

The outpost, ‘Ayn Gharandal, lies beneath the dunes around 70 km north of present-day Aqaba, the Jordanian resort city on the Red Sea, and 40 km southwest of the ancient Nabataean city of Petra.

Continue Reading »

US Security Firm: Iranian Hackers Infect Israel Supporters from Twitter & Facebook

An American internet security firm reported Iranian hackers were actively using social media networks like Facebook & Twitter to spy on Israelis, by pretending to be their online ‘friends’.

By Yaakov Levi

 

Iranian hackers used social media networks to spy on Israelis, and supporters of Israel in the US and Britain, a report by an American security firm said Thursday. The report, by the iSight security group, said that Iranian hackers used profiles on Facebook, Twitter, and other social media vehicles to trick Israelis and supporters of Israel to connect to unsafe links on a phony news web site, where they would be sent a virus that could sweep their computers and gather information about logins and passwords for e-mail accounts and sensitive web sites. Continue Reading »

SEEKING: Ride to the Moon for One Torah

 

The Israel based ‘Torah on the Moon’ project has commissioned the European Space Agency to carry a special capsule designed to protect the Torah for at least 10,000 years.

 

 

The European Space Agency has been commissioned to participate in a project to carry a Torah scroll to the moon, according to New Scientist magazine.

Scribe completes Torah scroll

An ultra-Orthodox scribe completing a Torah scroll. Combining all five books together revolutionized Hebrew printing. – Photo: AP

The commission, which was confirmed by the agency’s engineering arm in Noordwijk, the Netherlands, came from a Tel Aviv-based group called, appropriately, the Torah on the Moon project.

Continue Reading »

Mordechai Kedar: Israel Stands Up to Turkey – Like a Wimp

Op-Ed: Jerusalem must change its tactics vis a vis Turkey. Erdoğan is not Israel’s friend.

Dr. Mordechai Kedar

 

From the first day on which the Islamic Party gained control of the government of Turkey, Israel has attempted to pacify and reassure Erdogan,  despite that leader’s proven antagonism to Jews – in line with his extreme Islamic approach –  that was all too evident by the 1980’s. During that period, he wrote a play called “Mas-kum-ya”, an abbreviation of “The Free builders, Communists and Jews” and recently called an anti-Erdogan demonstrator “Jewish seed”, considered a most denigrating and humiliating insult in Turkey. Continue Reading »

Abbas: I expect Israel to accept upcoming Palestinian election results

 

Abbas’ comment comes as IDF soldiers order Palestinian newspaper to stop printing material by outlawed terrorist organization Hamas.

By Ben Stansall (AFP)

 

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas said Wednesday that peace talks are the only way forward and that he “expects Israelis to respect the decision of Palestinians in the upcoming elections,” Israel’s Channel 2 reported Wednesday.

British Prime Minister David Cameron (L) welcomes Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas in London on May 14, 2014 – Photo: Ben Stansall / AFP

In a meeting with representatives of Israeli peace NGOs in the West Bank City of Ramallah, Abbas discussed the coming elections and how the transfer of power would be carried out. Continue Reading »

Former South African President: ‘Israel Not an Apartheid State’

 

The man who would know, former South African President de Klerk says it’s nonsensical to refer to Israel as an apartheid state.

By Israel Today Staff

 

It is wrong for anyone to refer to Israel as an apartheid state, the man who brought an end to South Africa’s apartheid regime said to Israeli media on Tuesday.

Israel Not an Apartheid State, Says the Man Who Would Know

Former South African President Frederik Willem de Klerk says, “Everyone has closed boarders, also the United States has closed boarders.” – Channel 2 News screenshot.

In an interview with Channel 2 News, former South African President Frederik Willem de Klerk suggested that it is nonsensical to label Israel an apartheid state simply because it has closed off the border that the world insists exists between Israel-proper and the “West Bank.” Continue Reading »

Assassination Plot Revealed After Lebanese Church Patriarch visits Israel

Lebanese daily report security forces arrested a suspect in plot to assassinate Maronite Church Patriarch Beshara Rai, who defied warnings from Hezbollah by accompanying Pope Francis on his visit to Israel.

 

The head of Lebanon’s Maronite Church, Patriarch Beshara Rai, continued his visit in Israel and toured ruins of a Maronite village near the Lebanese border on Wednesday as an assassination plot against him was reported.

Lebanese Maronite Church Patriarch Beshara Rai

Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rai (C) holds a cross during his visit to Birim, a northern Israeli village, May 28, 2013 – Photo: REUTERS

Lebanon’s security forces arrested a suspect who confessed to working with regional intelligence agencies in a plot to assassinate Rai, security sources told The Daily Star on Wednesday. Continue Reading »

Israeli Lawmakers Introduce Legislation to Annex ‘Area C’

 

Legislation set to apply Israeli law to some 90 enclaves, but Netanyahu’s gov’t does not support measure.

Right-wing lobby says step needed after peace-talks collapsed.

By Ynet Staff

 

Right-wing MKs called on the government Wednesday to annex about 90 Jewish settlements built on West Bank land, with one of them saying it was retaliation for the collapse of peace talks with the Palestinians a month ago.

While Israel has built dozens of enclaves since capturing the land in the 1967 Six Days, it has not applied its law to the territory other than near East Jerusalem, which it annexed as part of its capital in a move never recognized internationally. Continue Reading »

Assad forces destroy Syria’s oldest Synagogue

The more than 400 yr-old Eliyahu Hanabi Synagogue was hit by a mortar shell in 2013. After Israel was established, the building was used as a school for Palestinian refugees.

By

 

A historic synagogue on the outskirts of Damascus was destroyed amid fighting in Syria’s civil war over the weekend.

Damascus synagogue destroyed

A sign at the entrance of the Damascus synagogue, taken from a Youtube video.

Opposition leaders said Syrian army forces flattened the more than 400-year-old Eliyahu Hanabi Synagogue in an attack — part of a months-long bombardment of the suburb of Jobar — and also may have destroyed thousands of Jewish artifacts, The Daily Beast reported. Continue Reading »

U.S. Seminary Girl Hit in Face by Arab Stone-Throwers in Jerusalem

In yet another Jerusalem Day Arab attack, residents in Jerusalem’s Muslim Quarter reportedly throw rocks at Jewish youths, hitting a girl in the face.

By Ari Yashar

 

Arutz Sheva has received exclusive reportage on yet another violent Arab attack Tuesday on Jewish youth in the Old City of Jerusalem. Again, Jews celebrating the 47th year since the unification of the 3,000-year-old Jewish capital were targeted.

Ahuva Schwartz, a resident of Jerusalem, reports that a group of 60 Jews, mostly Israeli high school boys along with some families and American seminary student girls, met at the Kotel (Western Wall) on Tuesday night. Continue Reading »