Wednesday’s “News in Review” Round-Up

Media-ocrity of the Week: “On Monday and Tuesday, House committees held multiple hearings surrounding the revelations that the hard drive of former IRS executive Lois Lerner had been destroyed containing thousands of emails pertinent to the investigation of their targeting of conservative groups. Despite the new details and the subsequent congressional hearings, the CBS Evening News with Scott Pelley has been the only network evening news program to cover the revelations, with ABC and NBC ignoring the story altogether. On Tuesday, June 24, CBS’s Scott Pelley highlighted: “Today on Capitol Hill, House Republicans held another fiery hearing on Lois Lerner’s missing e-mails. Their third hearing in five days. Lerner is the former IRS executive at the center of an investigation into why some conservative groups, including Tea Party affiliates, received extra scrutiny when they applied for tax-exempt status.” (CyberAlert, June 25, 2014)

WEEKLY QUOTES

“It’s to be expected that there will be some more friction on the ground,” — Israeli military spokesman Lt. Col. Peter Lerner. Israeli troops killed a Palestinian youth before dawn Friday and seriously wounded several adults as their sweeping West Bank arrest campaign following last week’s disappearance of three Israeli teenagers both slowed and encountered more resistance. About 25 Palestinians were rounded up overnight, the Israeli military said in a statement, less than half the typical daily number earlier this week. The arrests bring the total detained since Saturday to 330, 240 of them leaders of the militant Islamic movement Hamas. “The mission is ongoing. It is a substantial mission, the most substantial mission in Judea and Samaria since 2002,” Lerner said. “But it is the most substantial terrorist attack in Judea and Samaria also in recent years. People can’t expect to just hijack little boys on their way home from school and we won’t do anything about it.” The three teenagers — Eyal Yifrach, 19, Gilad Shaar, 16, and Naftali Fraenkel, who is also 16 and is a citizen of both Israel and the United States — were last heard from on June 12 around 10 p.m. as they hitchhiked home from their yeshivas in Judea and Samaria. (New York Times, June 20, 2014)

“We will not interfere in judicial matters because the Egyptian judiciary is an independent and exalted judiciary,” —Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi, in a nationally televised speech, ruling out pardoning three Al-Jazeera journalists, including one Canadian, Mohammed Fahmy, sentenced to seven years in prison.  “If we desire [strong] state institutions we must respect court rulings and not comment on them even if others don’t understand these rulings,” he said. (Globe & Mail, June 24, 2014)

“I don’t think anyone believes he [Mr. Fahmy] is in cahoots with the Muslim Brotherhood,” — Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird, “but obviously the government of Qatar has a close relationship.” Baird said the prosecution was based on the fact that Al Jazeera is funded by the ruling family of Qatar, which has also supported the Muslim Brotherhood. (Globe & Mail, June 24, 2014)

“What you’re seeing in the Middle East today in Iraq and in Syria is the stark hatreds between radical Shi’ites, in this case led by Iran, and radical Sunnis led by al Qaeda and ISIS and others,” —Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” referring to the group Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. “Now, both of these camps are enemies of the United States. And when your enemies are fighting each other, don’t strengthen either one of them. Weaken both,” Netanyahu added. (Honest Reporting, June 23, 2014)

“They do pose a threat,” —U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, referring to the fighters from the ISIS. “They cannot be given safe haven anywhere,” he added. After finishing a day of crisis talks with Iraqi leaders, Kerry said Monday that the Sunni militants seizing territory in Iraq had become such a threat that the U.S. might not wait for Iraqi politicians to form a new government before taking military action. “That’s why, again, I reiterate the President will not be hampered if he deems it necessary if the formation is not complete,” he added, referring to the Iraqi efforts to establish a new multi-sectarian government. Within Iraq, U.S. officials say, ISIS has set its sights on destroying the Shiite shrine in Samarra, which would likely lead to an explosion of sectarian violence in Iraq. “Clearly, everyone understands that Samarra is an important line,” Kerry said. “Historically, an assault on Samarra created enormous problems in Iraq. That is something that we all do not want to see happen again. And so the president and the team, the entire security team, are watching this movement and these events very, very closely.” (Globe & Mail, June 23, 2014)

“We strongly oppose the intervention of the U.S. and others in the domestic affairs of Iraq,” —Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei, opposing intervention by the U.S. in neighboring Iraq, where Islamist terrorists opposed to Iran have seized a number of towns and cities. “The main dispute in Iraq is between those who want Iraq to join the U.S. camp and those who seek an independent Iraq,” said the ayatollah, who has the final say over government policies. “The U.S. aims to bring its own blind followers to power since the U.S. is not happy about the current government in Iraq.” (New York Times, June 22, 2014)

“The time is here for the Kurdistan people to determine their future and the decision of the people is what we are going to uphold,” —Iraqi Kurdish President Massoud Barzani, indicating on Monday that his region would seek formal independence from the rest of Iraq. “Iraq is obviously falling apart,” Barzani added, “and it’s obvious that the federal or central government has lost control over everything. Everything is collapsing – the army, the troops, the police…we did not cause the collapse of Iraq. It is others who did. And we cannot remain hostages for the unknown.” Iraqi Kurdish independence has long been a goal, and the region has had autonomy from Baghdad for more than two decades, but they have never before said they would actually pursue that dream. But the latest crisis, in which Sunni Islamists have captured a large swath of Iraqi territory on the border of Iraqi Kurdistan, seems to have pushed the Kurds over the edge. (CNN, June 23, 2014)

“If the recent events spill over into Jordan and ISIL forms strongholds in the Hashemite kingdom … Jordan is liable to be engulfed in chaos with the survival of the kingdom threatened,” —Kobi Michael and Udi Dekel, Senior Research Fellows at the Institute for National Security Studies. Already it is being threatened by a growing number of jihadist cells “infiltrating the state under the guise of refugees.” Saudi Arabia has announced that if necessary it would dispatch tanks to defend Jordan. But that won’t be enough to stop the advance of an insidious force such as ISIL. Nor can Jordan count on Washington to do the right thing in time, according to the Israeli researchers. “Jordan needs a clear strategic military ally,” Michael and Dekel say, and “although it cannot admit it openly, its only practical strategic military ally is apparently Israel.” Indeed, the last thing Israel wants is a terrorist group, such as ISIL, camped on the border across the Jordan River, and it will do whatever it must to keep Jordan free of these forces. (Globe & Mail, June 24, 2014)

“We have used the word crisis about Iraq before, but this is the real thing,” —a Western diplomat, adding that “there is no doubt about the scale of the threat that it poses to Iraq’s continued existence as a state, and it is also a threat to the wider region too.” Western officials fear Iraq is facing imminent break-up, as the jihadist takeover of the north seeks to carve the country into different religious fiefdoms. Using their strongest language to date, diplomats warned that the “sheer scale” of the crisis could defeat belated efforts by the country’s fractious politicians to resolve it. Separately, the United Nations gave its first estimate of the human cost of the crisis. It said that around 1,075 people – at least three-quarters of them civilians – had died in Iraq since the Isis assault began on Mosul. (Telegraph, June 24, 2014)

“When the Middle East is fragmented in this horrible war, this savage, savage war between militant Shiites and militant Sunnis … the only place where you have freedom, tolerance, protection of minorities, protection of gays, protection of Christians and all other faiths, is Israel,” —Prime Minister Netanyahu, criticizing the decision by the U.S. Presbyterian Church to divest from U.S. companies whose products Israel uses in Judea and Samaria, saying the vote was misguided and unfair. “Let’s arrange a bus tour for [Presbyterians] in the region. Let them go to maybe Syria, Lebanon, Iraq. I would give two pieces of advice, though: one, make sure the bus is an armored bus, and two, don’t say you are Christian,” Netanyahu said. (Israel Hayom, June 23, 2014)

“It is to the Canadian government’s great and eternal shame that more was not done,” —Steve Rambam, the renowned “Nazi hunter,” who was in Toronto on Tuesday. It is estimated that between 2,000 and 5,000 war criminals fled to Canada after the Second World War, but not one Nazi has ever been successfully prosecuted. Activists say it’s not too late for Canada to act. Rambam, the U.S. private investigator who will speak at an event for impoverished Jews in Toronto on Tuesday, believes scores of war criminals are still living in Canada. “Entire units came en masse into Canada through Halifax in the 1940s,” he said. “Canada knew at that time who they were. “If there are a few cases that can still be brought, just for the sake of doing the right thing, then that should happen…none will live long enough to make it to trial, they will hire excellent lawyers. …they’ll delay and throw legal roadblocks in the way until they have died safely in their beds, but it’s the point of doing it.” Rambam interviewed 72 out of a list of 1,000 suspected Nazis living in Canada. His work was sent to the authorities, but he said little was done. “It’s a stain on the history of Canada,” he said. (National Post, June 22, 2014)

“It pained us deeply to read “The Klinghoffer Tragedy” (NYT editorial, June 20), criticizing the Metropolitan Opera’s decision not to simulcast John Adams’s opera “The Death of Klinghoffer,” and defending the opera against its critics by claiming that it “gives voice to all sides in this terrible murder.” The Met should be praised, not faulted, for taking a step that will prevent this biased and flawed opera from appearing in 66 countries, including in some regions where anti-Semitism is disturbingly on the rise. The Met did not “bow” to our wishes in canceling the global simulcast scheduled for this fall, but rather listened to our concerns and acted appropriately. We are strongly opposed to censorship and resent the implication that we would want to censor an artistic event. Our 69-year-old father was singled out and killed by Palestinian terrorists on his wedding anniversary cruise in 1985 solely because he was Jewish. His memory is trivialized in an opera that rationalizes terrorism and tries to find moral equivalence between the murderers and the murdered. Imagine if Mr. Adams had written an opera about the terrorists who carried out the 9/11 attacks, and sought to balance their worldview with that of those who perished in the twin towers. The outcry would be immediate and overwhelming. But “Klinghoffer” is justified as a “work of art” and an opportunity to “debate” the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. This is an outrage. These terrorists hijacked an Italian ship with American tourists and murdered an American Jew. What, precisely, did this have to do with Israel? Absolutely nothing. Our father’s death should serve as a reminder of the lethality of terrorists who kill civilians, including women, children and the elderly, without compunction, and of the imperative to stop others from striking again. Any effort to politicize that message is a distortion of our father’s horrific death. People of all faiths should be concerned and appalled. There is never a justification for terrorism,” —Lisa Klinghoffer & Ilsa Klinghoffer, children of Leon Klinghoffer, in a letter to the editor of the New York Times. (New York Times, June 20, 2014)

SHORT TAKES

ISRAEL AIRSTRIKES HIT 9 TARGETS IN SYRIA (Jerusalem) —Israeli warplanes bombed a series of targets inside Syria early Monday, the Israeli military said, in response to a cross-border attack that killed an Israeli teenager the previous day. In all, Israel said it struck nine military targets inside Syria, and “direct hits were confirmed.” The targets were located near the site of Sunday’s violence in the Golan Heights and included a regional military command centre and unspecified “launching positions.” In Sunday’s attack, an Israeli civilian vehicle was struck by forces in Syria as it drove in the Israeli-controlled Golan Heights. A teenage boy was killed and two other people were wounded. (CBC, June 22, 2014)

STATE SEEKS TO RETURN TO PRISON 54 PALESTINIANS RELEASED IN SCHALIT DEAL (Jerusalem) —Israel is seeking to re-imprison 54 Palestinians who were pardoned and released in the framework of the Gilad Schalit prisoners exchange deal. The 54 were among the over 350 Palestinians arrested recently by the IDF during the ongoing search and rescue operation for three kidnapped boys. In the IDF courts, the prosecutor must either prove that an offense has been committed to get a maximum prison sentence restored, or to at least show that some aspects of the former prisoners’ pardoning conditions were violated in order to obtain a partial restoration of their sentence to prison. (Jerusalem Post, June 24, 2014)

PRESBYTERIANS NARROWLY VOTE TO DIVEST FROM COMPANIES USED BY ISRAEL (New York) — The U.S. Presbyterian Church on Friday became the most prominent religious group in the U.S. to endorse divestment as a protest against Israeli policies toward Palestinians, voting to sell church stock in three companies whose products Israel uses in the occupied territories. The General Assembly voted by a narrow margin — 310-303 — to sell stock in Caterpillar, Hewlett-Packard and Motorola Solutions. The American Jewish Committee, a policy and advocacy group based in New York, said the vote was “driven by hatred of Israel.” Israeli officials, along with many American Jewish groups, have denounced the campaign as an attempt to delegitimize the Jewish state. (Fox News, June 21, 2014)

LEBANON DETAINS 17 SAID TO BE ISLAMIST MILITANTS (Beirut) —Lebanese security forces arrested 17 men in two Beirut hotels on Friday on suspicion that they were plotting to assassinate a prominent Lebanese Shiite leader, a government official said, describing an attack that could inflame sectarian conflict across the Middle East. Investigators are exploring whether the men intended to kill Nabih Berri, the speaker of Parliament, who has been a leading Shiite political figure in Lebanon for decades. Intelligence reports identified the men as members of a newly established terrorist cell in Beirut that was believed to include foreigners, the official said, adding that there were suspicions that they belonged to the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, the Sunni militant group known as ISIS. Spreading ISIS attacks to Lebanon, the region’s most religiously diverse country, could intensify the destabilizing sectarian conflict. (New York Times, June 20, 2014)

BOKO HARAM REPORTEDLY KIDNAPS ANOTHER 91 YOUTHS IN NORTHEAST NIGERIA (Maiduguri) —Terrorists have abducted 60 more girls and women and 31 boys in weekend attacks on villages in northeast Nigeria, witnesses said Tuesday, another sign of the Nigerian military’s failure to curb an Islamic uprising. Some married women were taken along with their children who range in age from three to 15, said witnesses. Nigeria’s government and military have been widely criticized for their slow response to the abductions of more than 200 schoolgirls kidnapped April 15. This year, the Boko Haram terrorists have embarked on a two-pronged strategy — bombing in cities and a scorched-earth policy in rural areas where they are devastating villages. (Ha’aretz, June 25, 2014)

APOSTATE WOMAN, FAMILY RE-ARRESTED (Khartoum) —Meriam Ibrahim, the Sudanese woman released from prison this week after worldwide protests at her death sentence for apostasy, was re-arrested at Khartoum airport Tuesday. Their lawyer, Elshareef Ali Mohammed, said they were given no reason for their arrest. The head of a human rights group that has been working with Ms. Ibrahim’s lawyers said the family had been detained by national security officials, apparently over their travel plans. Ms. Ibrahim was released from Omdurman women’s prison Monday. She had spent six months in a jail cell, sentenced to execution by hanging for abandoning Islam, despite her protestations she was raised a Christian by her Ethiopian Orthodox mother after her Muslim father left. In Sudan, which imposes Shariah law, apostasy is a crime punishable by death. Her sentence, imposed on May 15, included 100 lashes for adultery as a result of her marriage to a Christian. (Telegraph, June 24, 2014)

AFGHAN LEADER BACKS U.N. ELECTION ROLE (Kabul) —Seeking to quell a political crisis surrounding the June 14 election to choose his successor, President Hamid Karzai reversed course on Friday and suggested that the U.N. get involved in helping Afghanistan settle disputes over the voting. Until now, Karzai had dismissed any suggestion that Afghanistan needed help running the election, and said that foreigners should stay out of the country’s politics. The election, whose ballots are still being counted, was a runoff between Abdullah Abdullah, a former foreign minister who won the most votes in the first round in April, and Ashraf Ghani, who placed a distant second in that balloting. Abdullah’s followers said early tallies showed suspicious vote totals in the runoff in areas where Ghani is popular, and raised allegations of widespread fraud. (New York Times, June 20, 2014)

ARREST OF CONCENTRATION CAMP GUARD SHOWS SEA CHANGE IN GERMAN POLICY (Philadelphia) — The arrest of an alleged concentration camp guard in the U.S. marks a change in Germany’s legal approach to the prosecution of members of the dwindling number of war criminals who participated in the Holocaust, the Simon Wiesenthal Center stated on Thursday. Dr. Efraim Zuroff, the center’s chief Nazi hunter, said the arrest of Johann Breyer, a Pennsylvania resident, was significant in that it marked a shift in the burden of proof required for a successful prosecution. The retired tool-and-die maker, born in Czechoslovakia, is accused of joining the Waffen SS at age 17 and later serving as a camp guard. He moved to the United States in 1952. Germany is pressing for his extradition, and has issued a warrant for his arrest. According to Zuroff, Germany would not previously have been interested in going after Breyer, as “evidence of a specific crime against a specific victim” was required. However, after the successful 2011 conviction of Sobibor guard John Demjanjuk, the evidentiary bar was lowered, Zuroff said, explaining that the case paved the way for a more vigorous approach to prosecuting Nazi crimes. (Jerusalem Post, June 20, 2014)

ADL BRIEFS KNESSET DIASPORA COMMITTEE ON ANTISEMITISM POLL (Jerusalem) —The Anti-Defamation League briefed lawmakers on its recent worldwide study of antisemitism in a presentation to the Knesset’s Immigration Absorption and Diaspora Affairs Committee on Sunday. According to the ADL Global 100 Index, which was released to the public in May and summarized polls of residents of over 100 global locations, negative attitudes toward Jews are “persistent and pervasive around the world.” Of the people surveyed, 41 percent said that the assertion that “Jews are more loyal to Israel than to this country/the countries they live in” is probably true, making it the “most widely accepted stereotype in five out of the seven regions surveyed..” In response to the briefing, committee member MK Dov Lipman said that he was “actually happy to learn that an overwhelming majority of people in the world don’t harbor negative feelings toward Jews and that those who do are predominantly in the Muslim world.” The problem, he added, is that “those who are against [us] are very loud.” The one area of concern, Lipman said, was the degree to which people view Jews as more loyal to Israel than their own countries, calling it an issue “which Diaspora Jews need to work out.” When asked what should be done about this problem, Lipman responded with a chuckle, saying that “if they are more loyal to Israel I guess they should just move to Israel. If they are not then they have to find ways to make this clear.” (Jerusalem Post, June 24, 2014)

DERSHOWITZ AMONG LEGAL SCHOLARS URGING OBAMA TO RELEASE POLLARD (Washington) —Ten leading legal scholars, including Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz, urged President Obama to grant clemency to Jonathan Pollard. Others who signed the June 20 letter include Irwin Cotler, the former Canadian justice minister, and Nadine Stroessen, the former ACLU president. The scholars, including six from Harvard Law School, where Obama earned his law degree, outlined nine considerations they say merit the release of Pollard. Among them are what they deem is an excessive sentence for his crime; the fact that an array of former U.S. officials who were in office when Pollard was a spy now advocate his release; and what they describe as the prejudicial interference in his 1987 sentencing by then-Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger. “Mr. President, it is precisely for standing injustices like this – and where the justice system has failed and cannot provide relief – that the U.S. Constitution has vested in the President the power of executive clemency,” according to the letter. Israeli President Shimon Peres said that he would press Pollard’s case this week during his final visit to the United States in an official capacity. (JTA, June 25, 2014)

Contents

On Topic Links

Mother of Kidnapped Israeli Teen Addresses UN Human Rights Council, Appeals for Help (Video): UN Watch, June 24, 2014—Rachel Frankel, the mother of 16-year-old Israeli-American kidnap victim Naftali Frankel, who was one of three yeshiva students abducted by Hamas nearly two weeks ago, addressed the United Nations Human Rights Council, in Geneva, on Tuesday to appeal for international support to return the children.

Kurdistan: A Pipe Dream Come True on the Sidelines of Iraq: Patrick Martin, Globe & Mail, June 19, 2014 —‘Welcome to Kurdistan,” said Massoud Barzani, the diminutive head of the Kurdistan Democratic Party at his mountaintop headquarters northeast of Erbil, capital of today’s Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG).           Kurdish Region Offers Refuge for Christians: Matthew Fisher, National Post, June 22, 2014—Convert to Islam or face the sword.                                                        

A Wicked Act: National Review, June 24, 2014 —The world’s organized hostility to Israel would be kind of funny if it didn’t have such serious consequences, or potential consequences.