We start our review this week with an article about a former Islamic jihad member from Egypt who is now a strong Muslim supporter of Israel. The article is well worth reading because he gives a lot of insight into the dynamics of radical Islam and how it seduces young people, especially men, into its service. The article is a little on the long side, but it is worth taking the time to read.
Our second article is also about radical Islam in Egypt. This story is a bit sensational, and the practice it is talking about, sex slavery in Egypt, is certainly still controversial even there. However, it does show how far radical Islam can go from anything remotely acceptable in the modern Western world, a fact worth pondering now that the Muslim Brotherhood's candidate will soon be President of Egypt. This article is NOT very long.
The third article is very short and reports about a recent Friday sermon of the Muslim Brotherhood's Supreme Guide in Egypt (remember, they're the ones whose candidate just won the presidential election there). In it, he says that ALL faithful Muslims have an individual duty to do everything they can to "free al-Quds", i.e. to force Israel out of its capital, Jerusalem. If his advice is actually followed, Egypt will have to attack Israel, violating the peace agreement which was paid for many years ago by transferring the entire Sinai peninsula (nearly 3/4 of the area Israel controlled at the end of 1967) to Egyptian sovereignty (the "land for peace" deal). Did I mention that their candidate just won the presidential election there?
Our fourth article outlines the Muslim Brotherhood's ideas of the goals of an election. And what are these goals? Not merely that their people should win, but that Sharia law will be established. As the article states, the directives were: "Cheat, fight, and kill during elections, as long as doing so enables Sharia; vote only for whoever will enable Sharia; avoid hell by enabling Sharia." Will the Muslim Brotherhood candidates, including President Morsi, actually takes steps to implement Sharia law in Egypt? We can hope not, but, remember, it IS what they were ELECTED to do!
We now turn to Israel and the areas under its control. The first article in this category proposes something a bit radical, at least at first blush: applying Israeli law over all of Judea and Samaria (the area, part of the ancient heartland of the Jewish People, that Jordan dubbed "The West Bank" during its years of illegal occupation there, from 1948 to 1967). But if you read further, the author makes a good argument for this. In particular, this would stop the use of the Jordanian land registry as the main the authority on land ownership there. This is important because this registry is mostly fictitious, awarding ownership of land to people who had NO idea that they were its owners and had never made any claims to the land in 40 years. This is the supposedly "private" land that you see headlines about Jewish settlements being built on. It's important to know the truth about this, I think, because the headlines make the "settlers" look like thieves, when they actually are NOT.
Our second article in this category is a light-hearted, heart-warming story about a personal friendship between a "settler" (i.e. a Jewish resident of Samaria) and an Israeli Muslim Arab. If there is EVER to be anything even RESEMBLING peace here, THIS is how it will start.
The next article starts out with some rather strong, critical language, just short of name-calling. However, the author supports his statements well, and I recommend reading his clear-headed analysis, as opposed to the muddy thinking that he is debunking.
The bizarre title of our next article, "Is Israel in danger of becoming a failed state?", is actually what made me read it. As a citizen and resident of Israel, I can assure you with rather high confidence that Israel is not anywhere NEAR becoming ANYTHING like a "failed state" in the near future! Even the parts of Judea and Samaria under the control of the Palestinian Authority are doing better than most of the Arab world right now, and, of course, the parts of Israel under direct Israeli control are booming! The strange thing is that strong proponents of the 2-state solution are trying to use this classification to argue that Israel must relinquish territory in order to avoid being dragged under. But this is insane! First of all, Israel is doing very well, even WITH the support that it gives to the PA areas. Releasing those areas in order to form a Palestine state very likely WOULD lead to such a state becoming a failed state in short order (look at Gaza under Hamas, for example). This would not be a good outcome for Israel OR for the people living in such an ill-conceived state!
Our last article is rather long, but it is excellent. It looks in particular at the controversy over Silwan, a neighborhood in Jerusalem that lies just southeast of the Old City. In fact, there's rather strong archeological evidence that THIS is the REALLY old city of Jerusalem, the city of the Jebusites and of the biblical King David. But, as the article points out, the controversy here follows an increasingly familiar pattern: fabrication of "Palestinian" history. The serious problem with this, though, is that it really would be better labeled "denial of any Jewish connection to ANYTHING at all here in the Land of Israel". Take the time to read this well-documented article to learn MANY more details about this process.
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