Clipmarks | arifsali's 'israel' clips

Why do non-Jewish Americans support Israel?

Mon, 23 Jun 2008 04:08:36 GMT

clipped by: arifsali

Walter Russell Mead is one of the most revered American foreign policy scholars in the U.S.

Here are a couple of paragraphs from Walter Russell Mead's The New Israel and the Old:

The American public has few foreign policy preferences that are this marked, this deep, this enduring -- and this much at odds with public opinion in other countries. In the United States, a pro-Israel foreign policy does not represent the triumph of a small lobby over the public will. It represents the power of public opinion to shape foreign policy in the face of concerns by foreign policy professionals."

Tags: united states, israel

Tel Aviv - Gay - Pride Parade 2008

Tue, 10 Jun 2008 20:26:45 GMT

clipped by: arifsali
clipper's remarks: Freedom of Speech in Israel? Yes!

Clip Source: www.linkinn.com

Tags: gay, israel

U.S. cancels Fulbright grants to Palestinian scholars

Thu, 29 May 2008 23:05:08 GMT

clipped by: arifsali

Clip Source: www.iht.com

The State Department has withdrawn all Fulbright grants to Palestinian students in Gaza hoping to pursue advanced degrees at American institutions this fall because Israel has not granted permission for the students to leave Gaza.

Israel's restriction is in keeping with its policy of isolating this coastal strip, which is run by the militant group Hamas.

The United States consulate in Jerusalem said the grant money had been "redirected" because of concern that if the students were forced to remain in Gaza the grant money would go to waste

Abdulrahman Abdullah, one of the seven Gazans who received the letter, was in shock.

"If we are talking about peace and mutual understanding, it means investing in people who will later contribute to Palestinian society," he said. "I am against Hamas. Their acts and policies are wrong. Israel talks about a Palestinian state. But who will build that state if we can get no training?"

Tags: israel, united states, scholars

Israeli award goes to Palestinians

Mon, 26 May 2008 19:46:37 GMT

clipped by: arifsali

Clip Source: english.aljazeera.net

A US scientist is reported to have donated his share of an Israeli mathematics award to a Palestinian university and its students.

Professor David Mumford of Brown University in Rhode Island said he was donating part of his $33,333 portion of the Wolf Foundation Prize for Mathematics to Bir Zeit university in the West Bank.

"I decided to donate my share of the Wolf Prize to enable the academic community in occupied Palestine to survive and thrive," Mumford told Haaretz, an Israeli newspaper.

"I am very grateful for the prize, but I believe that Palestinian students should have an opportunity to go elsewhere to acquire an education," he told the newspaper.

"Students in the West Bank and Gaza today do not have an opportunity to do that."

Tags: israel, palestinians

Israelis Claim Secret Agreement With U.S.

Thu, 24 Apr 2008 20:29:53 GMT

clipped by: arifsali

Clip Source: www.washingtonpost.com

A letter that President Bush personally delivered to then-Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon four years ago has emerged as a significant obstacle to the president's efforts to forge a peace deal between the Israelis and Palestinians during his last year in office.

Ehud Olmert, the current Israeli prime minister, said this week that Bush's letter gave the Jewish state permission to expand the West Bank settlements that it hopes to retain in a final peace deal, even though Bush's peace plan officially calls for a freeze of Israeli settlements across Palestinian territories on the West Bank. In an interview this week, Sharon's chief of staff, Dov Weissglas, said Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice reaffirmed this understanding in a secret agreement reached between Israel and the United States in the spring of 2005, just before Israel withdrew from Gaza.

Tags: united states, israel, politics

Israel Pics

Thu, 29 Nov 2007 14:16:28 GMT

clipped by: axelsenzon

Clip Source: www.zuzafun.com

Tags: israel, nature, pictures, interersting

Moshe and Munir

Thu, 04 Oct 2007 15:56:56 GMT

clipped by: arifsali
clipper's remarks: Video at the source, MUST WATCH.

Clip Source: www.cbc.ca

International/U.S.

Moshe and Munir

October 2, 2007 (Runs 19:43)

Adrienne Arsenault presents the story of an unlikely friendship between two men, one Palestinian, the other Israeli

play video

Tags: video, israel, palestinians, cbc

Israel labels Gaza 'enemy entity'

Wed, 19 Sep 2007 19:26:47 GMT

clipped by: arifsali

Clip Source: english.aljazeera.net

Israel's security cabinet has declared the Gaza Strip an "enemy entity", opening the way for cuts in fuel and other vital supplies to the territory.

Hamas issued a statement in response, saying that the security cabinet's announcement on Wednesday amounted to a "declaration of war".

Sand barriers have been built on some Gaza streets
in anticipation of Israeli raids [Reuters]

The office of Ehud Olmert, Israel's prime minister, said his security cabinet approved the "enemy entity" classification and there would be "limitations on imports to the Gaza Strip and a reduction in the supply of fuel and electricity".

Tags: israel, palestine, gaza, war, hamas, politics

Iran's Unlikely TV Hit

Mon, 10 Sep 2007 17:05:59 GMT

clipped by: arifsali

Clip Source: online.wsj.com

Every Monday night at 10 o'clock, Iranians by the millions tune into Channel One to watch the most expensive show ever aired on the Islamic republic's state-owned television. Its elaborate 1940s costumes and European locations are a far cry from the typical Iranian TV fare of scarf-clad women and gray-suited men.

But the most surprising thing about the wildly popular show is that it is a heart-wrenching tale of European Jews during World War II.

The hour-long drama, "Zero Degree Turn," centers on a love story between an Iranian-Palestinian Muslim man and a French Jewish woman.

On the surface, the message of the lavish, state-funded production appears sharply at odds with that sent out by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who has repeatedly called the Holocaust a myth.

Tags: iran, israel, tv, entertainment, jews, europe

Prophet Abraham was from Andhra Pradesh India

Wed, 06 Jun 2007 18:45:39 GMT

clipped by: arifsali
clipper's remarks: Oops, so now what happens to the holy land of Israel?

Clip Source: acorn.nationalinterest.in

The All India Telugu Conference turns up an astonishing piece of research

It was astonishing enough when a remote tribe from North Eastern India was discovered to be one of the lost tribes of Israel. Now one scholar from the Potti Sriramulu Telugu University has produced arguments that contend that the Israelites of the Old Testament might have started their journey from Andhra Pradesh.

Quoting several such examples Ms. Samyuktha said there was sufficient proof to link those Sumerian cultures with the Telugus. Hebrew, Sumerian and Assyrian records abound in such descriptions and suggest that the present Israelis belonged to Andhra Pradesh.
Ms. Samyuktha argues that Kamakur village in Balayapalli mandal of Nellore district still has 21 Jewish families. Only they are not even aware that they are Jews. She is one among them and her first name Kooniah could be found in Hebrew as Koni, she says.[The Hindu]

The findings do look, shall we say, outlandish. But intriguing.

Tags: israel, india, religion

Israelis held (10 days) over 'hate' murder

Wed, 16 May 2007 20:18:18 GMT

clipped by: arifsali
clipper's remarks: I had to read it twice to confirm that they stabbed him to death. Wow, what a punishment for such a crime.

Clip Source: news.bbc.co.uk

Two Israeli brothers have been detained in connection with the stabbing to death of a Palestinian taxi driver in an apparent hate crime, police said.

Julian Soufir, 25, has been ordered to be held for 10 days and his brother, Jonathan, 21, for three days.

One of the suspects had confessed the attack was anti-Arab and nationalist in nature, a police spokesman said.

The 35-year-old father of five was buried on Tuesday in Beit Hanina, in East Jerusalem.

Soufir confessed to the killing and showed no sign of remorse in court

Tags: israel, palestinians, crime

Olmert: I'm ready to negotiate Saudi peace plan

Tue, 15 May 2007 22:52:11 GMT

clipped by: arifsali

Clip Source: www.haaretz.com

While visiting Jordan Tuesday, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert invited 22 leaders of Arab nations to convene and invite Israel to negotiate the Saudi peace plan without preconditions. Olmert added that if they were willing to invite him somewhere for talks, then "I'm ready to come."

The Saudi peace plan calls normalized ties between Israel and the Arab world in return for a full Israeli withdrawal from lands captured in the 1967 Six-Day War.

"We heard about the Arab peace initiative and we say come and present it to us. You want to talk to us about it, we are ready to sit down and talk about it carefully," Olmert told reporters.

Tags: israel, arab, peace, politics

In Ahmadinejad's Iran, Jews still find a space

Fri, 27 Apr 2007 04:48:43 GMT

clipped by: arifsali

Clip Source: www.csmonitor.com

Some 25,000 Jews still live in Iran and many say that President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's fiery anti-Israeli rhetoric is about politics, not religion.

They caution against comparing Iran's official and visceral opposition to the creation of Israel and Zionism with the regime's acceptance of Jews and Judaism itself.

"If you think Judaism and Zionism are one, it is like thinking Islam and the Taliban are the same, and they are not," says Ciamak Moresadegh, chairman of the Tehran Jewish Committee. "We have common problems with Iranian Muslims. If a war were to start, we would also be a target. When a missile lands, it does not ask if you are a Muslim or a Jew. It lands."

The continuous Jewish presence in Iran predates Islam by more than a millennium. One wave came when Jews sought to escape Assyrian king Nebuchadnezzar II around 680 BC; others were freed from slavery by Cyrus the Great with the conquest of Babylon some 140 years later.

Tags: ahmadinejad, iran, jews, israel, religion, politics

Tens of thousands of Holocaust survivors enduring poverty in Israel

Wed, 18 Apr 2007 17:39:18 GMT

clipped by: arifsali

Clip Source: rawstory.com

Tel Aviv- At least a quarter of an approximate 250,000
Holocaust survivors in Israel were living below the poverty level,
the Chairman of the International Association of Holocaust Survivors
Noah Flug said Sunday.
Some estimates put the number at closer to a third of all
survivors. In Israel the poverty line for a single person is

approximately 2,000 shekels (486 dollars)a month.

Flug sad that the Israeli government and Germany were responsible
for the poverty of the survivors. Most of them were borderline cases
in bureaucratic terms which meant that they did not qualify for

compensation or were only entitled to meagre amounts, he said.

Many had arrived in Israel from the former Soviet Union during the

last 20 years.

Tags: israel, holocaust, poor

Revealed: Israel plans nuclear strike on Iran

Thu, 08 Feb 2007 19:06:46 GMT

clipped by: arifsali

Clip Source: www.timesonline.co.uk

Revealed: Israel plans nuclear strike on Iran

ISRAEL has drawn up secret plans to destroy Iran’s uranium enrichment facilities with tactical nuclear weapons.

Two Israeli air force squadrons are training to blow up an Iranian facility using low-yield nuclear “bunker-busters”, according to several Israeli military sources.

The attack would be the first with nuclear weapons since 1945, when the United States dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The Israeli weapons would each have a force equivalent to one-fifteenth of the Hiroshima bomb.

Under the plans, conventional laser-guided bombs would open “tunnels” into the targets. “Mini-nukes” would then immediately be fired into a plant at Natanz, exploding deep underground to reduce the risk of radioactive fallout.

“As soon as the green light is given, it will be one mission, one strike and the Iranian nuclear project will be demolished,” said one of the sources.

Tags: politics, iran, israel, nuclear, nuclear weapons, war