The Clocks Are Ticking Bibi

 

We understand that for a brief period you might slowly back away from your pushing the Two State Solution and replace it with a final ultimatum to Mahmoud Abbas, negotiate in good faith or all agreements are now null and void. Set a deadline like, oh, say the first of July, or perhaps June. Then, when Mahmoud Abbas instead makes demands at the United Nations General Assembly claiming that Israel refuses to negotiate honestly, remind him that technically the Oslo Accords had an end by date which was passed long ago and any allowance Israel has made by not deporting him and his merry band of cutthroats has been good faith times ten. Then remind him of the deadline and that this is as far as Israel is willing to extend the moribund Oslo Accords. Remind him that once the Oslo Accords are made defunct, that he no longer has any authority and his Security Force of enforcer thugs will be disarmed and disbanded as Israel will be reclaiming her weapons and enforcing all Israeli laws about firearm ownership. Further, point out that abiding by International Law that once the Oslo Accords are considered abrogated, that there is no Palestinian Authority and the PLO returns to being a terrorist organization and Fatah has no standing as it only existed to serve as the terrorist party which ran the Palestinian Authority as a dictatorship. Remind Abbas that his term of office ended years ago and that Israel will be holding new election across the areas of Judea and Samaria for local offices in every town and city. These elections will be monitored by Israel and Fatah will not be on any ballots because he and his merry band of thieves are going to be back in Tunis or wherever they can find someplace which will accept them. You might want to mention that Syria is the default location for his banishment so he had best find someplace a little less terrifying unless Syria suits his ideas for the future. That is what should happen and what many Israelis are hoping will happen.

 

President Obama is gone and United Nations Security Council (UNSC) Resolution 2334 is an advisory resolution with no enforcement or even advisory status and the nations who are now committing to boycotts are using UNSC Res 2334 as their cover and would use anything they might ever find, even a call from Mahmoud Abbas or any of his henchmen as reason for boycotting Israel. You will notice their boycotts are selective in that they are only boycotting items which they are able to buy elsewhere and not Israeli technology, medical breakthroughs, agricultural developments, communication devices and all other wonders from Israel and aiming for retail items. Perhaps Israel should start a boycott of the nations who are boycotting Israel by refusing to allow them anything Israeli, except that is not how Israel or the Jewish People work as we try to be a better people by not stooping to the low levels others may take against us. Israel refuses to give up on peace despite everything that has worked to make that overly costly and cheated us of the lands we were promised by the world for over fifty years. We gave peace and the Arab Palestinians every opportunity including the Gaza Strip to show their true colors and their idea of what peace should be. They showed they defined peace as dead Jews, an Israel bombed and rocketed back to the Stone Age and in ruins, a desolate ruin with six-million Jews murdered, preferably in their sleep as that makes them unable to fight back. Whenever they attempted to destroy Israel by force they failed because we fought back, period. Every time Israel made a concession, surrendered control of land to the Arabs or anything else to forge peace we were answered with violence and terrorism. No more as we have had enough and we demand our government give our ultimatum and make peace now or end the farce.

 

When we elected your party we did so because we desired an end to the roundabout of demands followed by terror attacks followed by further demands then terrorism over and over endlessly and we were told that this would end. Then came President Obama and a threat over our heads held by the United States President who had nothing but spite and hate for Israel and religious Jews. He favored Iran controlling the Middle East and Israel a secondary power and soon to be a relic talked of fondly as they always do once the Jews have been defeated. After the Shoah we heard the sorrow and apologies and the claims of “We didn’t know.” The lies and the regrets over the dead Jews when the real sorrow was there were live Jews who were now demanding their nation which had been promised already for twenty years and counting. The British did everything they were able to arm the Arabs who were dedicated to murdering the Jewish State at her birth and who rose up with the Mufti of Jerusalem, the Mufti just returned from spending the war in Berlin and attending the Wannsee Conference where he was considered an advisor and expert on how to address the Jewish Problem. There exist reports which give the Mufti credit with suggesting that the Jews be liquidated completely and requested that when the Nazis conquered the Middle East and allowed him to rule it that they assist him with what would be his Jewish Problem. He definitely organized militias and rear attacks by numerous Arab villages during the war of elimination waged against Israel in 1948. The Mufti of Jerusalem commanded a division called the Arab Brigade which was made up of Arabs who had been living alongside the Jews in the lands of the British Mandate west of the Jordan River. These forces already held most of Jerusalem and much of Judean Hills and Samaria as well as parts of the Galilee and Negev as well as what is today called the Arab Triangle in the southeastern Galilee bordering Judea and were well armed allowing the Arab armies from six nations plus volunteers to gain large swaths of what the world had promised Israel including all of Jerusalem. It took the Israelis most of a year to slowly regain land and open a road to Jerusalem and manage to take the western end of Jerusalem but were unable to take the Old City, Temple Mount and much of the historic Jewish Capital City. When that war was ended we heard again how sorry the world was that they had to allow the Arabs to retain lands which were promised Israel. They then armed the Arabs and by 1967 they were ready to try and extinguish Israel once again. The world was quick to stop that war after one week as it became obvious after Israel surrounded the Egyptian Third Army in the Sinai Peninsula, had taken the Golan Heights and were a threat to Damascus and pushed Jordan from the areas of Judea and Samaria and liberated all of Jerusalem. The world was again sorry that they did not allow Israel to force their enemies to surrender but instead allowed them a noble end to the fighting. Then they regretted but started demanding Israel return land, just land and later the land and now all the land. The world is sorry so they demand to set up a rematch this time with Hamas and Hezballah along with Iran and who knows who else. Bibi, the world is always sorry and we always accept their apology. Let us give them a reason to be sorry again except this time because we asserted to take that which is ours.

 

Mufti of Jerusalem During Nazi World War II
Where He Met the Highest Officers
And Attended the Wannsee Conference

 

There is no more threat coming from out of Washington D.C. and we have a friend in the White House. We need act because any friend in the White House will face pressures from the enemies of Israel and her Jews in the American government. They exist in the State Department through and through and they are at the United Nations and a swarm of hundreds of antagonistic NGO’s plus enemies in the Congress and who knows where else. All of these will begin pestering President Donald Trump making his life difficult and being such a bother that eventually he will simply grant them a morsel just for a moment’s peace. That will be a brief respite before the spite returns and demands another morsel. We must act before he is forced to grant that first morsel because once that has happened, we will have lost our golden opportunity. Opportunities for Israel and for Jews are a rare and seldom held jewel. Often when these rare jewels do arrive we find that many amongst us become timid and worry that perhaps we need consider the ramifications of acting too fast. They demand we stop and debate the best course. They want a plan laid out with every step planned and the i’s dotted and the t’s crossed before even taking that first step. Our enemies do not plan; they simply attack and attack never giving a moments rest to those who try to assist us. They cannot help us more than we help ourselves. When we falter, they falter as they are not going to stand someplace we refuse to stand ourselves. We must stand forth now and make our position known and strongly stated. We must make the alternative to Abbas negotiating honestly and immediately with our relegating the Oslo accords to the trash bin of history where it should have been tossed years ago. Time ran out on Oslo long ago during the last century and Oslo II has also passed its use by date and belongs next to Oslo in that trash bin of history. The lands of Judea and Samaria belong to Israel by International Law and we all know this. Time has come to annex them and unite them with the rest of Israel. The first thing after that will be to extend Israeli law to all of Judea and Samaria and allow for the sale of land by its owner to whomever they please for whatever price they are able to get without any threat of death from their government. We must bring the rule of law equally to the Arabs who have been deprived their true freedom to grow and gain wealth. Within the first six months there should be elections in every town, city, community and hamlet and the disbanding of the Palestinian authority. Mahmoud Abbas and the rest of the officers and Security Forces need be fully vetted and if any link to terrorism is found, then they need to be deported. There is an alternative and that is to hold an open and free election in Judea and Samaria and allow the Arabs to choose leadership. All the candidates must be vetted by Israel and be free from any terrorist ties. Regular Israeli laws must be extended to all of Judea and Samaria should Abbas refuse again to negotiate in good faith. Breaking off negotiations or demanding unacceptable conditions will not be tolerated and there should be a deadline for reaching an agreement or Israel annexes everything. No more the Arabs demand, break negotiations and then pick up demanding additional concessions before breaking off negotiations again and repeating this in efforts to gain everything without giving in on anything. This has to end now.

 

The end must come within this first six months as to expect President Trump to tolerate endless fake negotiations is ridiculous. Making the Israelis put up with terrorists governing Judea and Samaria teaching hatreds raising generation after generation of new terrorists is unacceptable. All of this ridiculous allowing endless terrorism with wave after wave must not be tolerated any further. The time has come and the opportunity with it for Israel to demand an end. We, the Israeli people, your people, we have endured intifadas, rocket attacks in the thousands, terrorists tunneling under our towns and coming up near our schools and kindergartens threatening our children. No more terror and safety for our children and ourselves. We demand life and our government should provide us with everything for the safety of our towns, cities, kibbutzim and every last farmhouse. No more terror, no more rockets, no more intifadas and no more incitement which will grant us life because our enemies are correct, we choose life and we value life. The Arabs likely also would choose life providing their lives were made worth living. Under the terrorist government they suffer, their lives are made worthless and their opportunities are stolen before they can be realized. Israel must change that for them because doing this and giving them freedom and opportunity will change their views and many will choose life for themselves and their children. We must choose life and give the Arabs the opportunity to choose life and make life worth choosing. The real thing that is debated and negotiated is and always has been life, our lives and the chance for the Arabs to live free as well. Now is the time that we can make this be a real opportunity for the Arabs and giving them the opportunity to thrive and be really alive, will make a real difference and that opportunity cannot be squandered. Too many times we have squandered real opportunities and we the Israelis demand this one not be lost. If you are unable to commit to progress and life for all within our lands then please resign and hold an election so we can find somebody willing to act and do that which is required to make good on this opportunity we have been presented. We want to choose life and freedom without the fear of terror which had plagued us since Oslo and shortly before committed to push us to the false Oslo promise which was actually a promise of a slow death. We choose life, end this tracking of death and let us choose life.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

Crushing Truck Terror in Jerusalem

 

Truck ramming terrorism returns to where such first found targets, Israel. On the promenade in the Amon Hanatziv neighborhood in Jerusalem where soldiers were getting off a bus, a truck rammed into the crowd on Sunday killing four and wounded seventeen (disturbing video below). The attack could have been far worse if not for the timely acts of a civilian security guard/guide who shot the terrorist as he was turning the truck for a second ramming. Quoting an interview printed in the Jerusalem Post, they reported,
Security guard and tour guide Eitan Rund told Army Radio that after the truck drove into the crowd, “I saw the truck go in reverse, and then I realized that it wasn’t an accident. I ran toward him [the driver] and emptied my whole clip. He drove backward and onto the wounded again. They were motionless, some wounded and some scared. It wasn’t a good scene. There was hesitation to open fire. I have no doubt that this was a significant factor, because all they tell them recently is to be careful. It could be that a few minutes less of hesitation and the situation would have been better.”

 

 

 

We here at BTC find the fact that soldiers at the scene, many of them armed, were so hesitant to fire at the terrorist that this might have produced the first fatalities due to the recent events and the trial that found Sergeant Elor Azariya guilty of manslaughter. We had predicted just such a scenario where soldiers would die from hesitating to shoot fearing legal repercussions in our recent article, What the Guilty Verdict of Sgt. Elor Azariya Will Mean. From the video it appears that nobody at the scene could have prevented the truck striking the crowd as it came screaming from the street directly into the people departing the bus with less than a second to react. Perhaps, if there was hesitation, it came once it appeared the terrorist was attempting to turn the truck for a second run. The evidence that some hesitated was the fact that the cab of the truck was not riddled with 5.56mm rounds having punched holes in the chassis and smashing through the windshield. Instead, the windshield appears to have approximately a dozen holes signifying bullet strikes with a few appearing to have multiple hits (see image below). The reality is that after twenty seconds of the above video, when the soldiers waiting a short distance from the attack behind a Jersey Wall barrier start to run in a direction away from the terrorist and the truck, a number can be seen to have weapons and are showing absolutely no interest in running towards the truck to engage but are running away. The soldiers with weapons were amongst some of the last to flee, but they appear not to be advancing to shoot and engage the terrorist. This was some of the evidence that perhaps shooting terrorists has become something viewed as a dangerous idea and as long as anybody else is engaging, then best not to shoot and end up tried for needlessly placing too much firepower at the target.

 

Truck From Jerusalem Ramming Terror Strike

 

The IDF officer, Col. Yaniv Aluf, commander of the IDF Officers School, was the officer who carried out a preliminary investigation of the attack. His report conflicts with the version of events reported by the civilian security guard’s interview where he reported that soldiers hesitated. Col. Yaniv Aluf’s investigation suggested that at least two cadets fired toward the terrorist at close range. Major General Moti Almoz agreed with the Colonel claiming that it was wrong to suggest that soldiers were hesitant to shoot or especially that the Azaria conviction had any bearing on the incident. Major General Almoz added that the soldiers likely did not know initially that this was a terrorist attack and were probably thinking it was a car accident. Almoz was quoted stating, “The moment that they realized that it was an attack, two cadets fired toward the truck.” That was two soldiers out of how many who were armed, that would be a point worth knowing. With the numbers of soldiers and the many that had weapons, that truck should have looked more like those in movies where the vehicle falls apart once touched and not simply having a dozen bullet holes in the windshield. We are fairly sure that there will be no responses from any of the soldiers at the scene as they were likely briefed and instructed not to talk to the media.

 

The grim reality comes in the form of the names of the deceased. Three female soldiers – 20-year-old Lt. Yael Yekutiel of Givatayim, 22-year-old Lt. Shir Hajaj of Ma’aleh Adumim, and 20-year-old Sec.-Lt. Shira Tzur of Haifa – and one male soldier, 20-year old Sec.-Lt. Erez Orbach of Alon Shvut, were declared dead at the scene. Additionally, the hospital reported that two cadets were seriously wounded, and fifteen other officers and cadets sustained less severe wounds. Our prayers are that they all make recoveries such that there can be some small miracles from this horrifying event. The terrorist was identified as Fadi al-Qanbar, from the nearby neighborhood of Jebl Mukaber, long a source of incitement and attackers. Some reports claimed that the terrorist’s family was known to have ties to terrorist activity. Before anybody asks why this person was not under surveillance, even if such a tactic was thought to be a deterrent, there are not sufficient security personnel to follow every potential terrorist within the areas under Israeli control. As far as giving the Arabs the lands the world claims would satisfy them and end the terror, one question if you don’t mind, why were the Arabs launching terror attacks before June of 1967 when there was no “occupied territory” and why were there pogrom like riots in Jerusalem and Hevron in the 1920’s and 1930’s before there was even a State of Israel. The terrorism has nothing to do with “occupied territory” unless you claim all of Israel is “occupied territory” and every home and apartment where lives a Jew is “occupied territory,” then you might be closer to correct. Mahmoud Abbas has stated numerous times that he will only end terrorist activities when all of Israel has been defeated and made Judenrein. That is his final compromise, all of Israel destroyed and every Jew dead. How is Israel to negotiate with such?

 

All the conferences like we will speak on tomorrow and all the wondrous exclamations of how peace can be attained by Israel for a small price, all these grand and eloquent statespersons from Europe, the United States State Department and President Obama from the White House all misunderstand Mahmoud Abbas’s claim to his desire for the missing 22% which is rightfully Arab. If we may be permitted a quote from Egyptian Judge, Justice El Araby, from the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and who sat in judgement as part of the panel which heard the case where the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) sought an advisory opinion in 2003 from the ICJ on the legality of the security barrier erected by Israel. The Honorable Justice El Araby warned the UNGA and others that filing further ran some risks, as he stated,

 

“The international legal status of the Palestinian Territory (paras. 70-71 of the Advisory Opinion), in my view, merits more comprehensive treatment. A historical survey is relevant to the question posed by the General Assembly, for it serves as the background to understanding the legal status of the Palestinian Territory on the one hand and underlines the special and continuing responsibility of the General Assembly on the other. This may appear as academic, without relevance to the present events. The present is however determined by the accumulation of past events and no reasonable and fair concern for the future can possibly disregard a firm grasp of past events. In particular, when on more than one occasion, the rule of law was consistently side-stepped. The point of departure, or one can say in legal jargon, the critical date, is the League of Nations Mandate which was entrusted to Great Britain.”

 

This advisory would be well heeded by these coming conferences and potential United Nations Security Council endorsing and attempting to enforce any grand solution on Israel by establishing an Arab State of Palestine with defined borders which Israel had not agreed to grant. The truth is that under real and standing International Law derived from the Balfour Declaration, the San Remo Conference, the Treaty of Sèvres, Treaty of Lausanne, the British Mandate, the Churchill White Papers, Anglo-American Convention, Article 80 of the United Nations Charter et al. For a fairly straight forward coverage of the rights for the establishment of the State of Israel at the very minimum on all lands west of the Jordan River, please refer to Legal Rights and Title of Sovereignty of the Jewish People to the Land of Israel and Palestine under International Law. The reality is that any Arab State can thus far only be established in Gaza as Israel voluntarily, if also foolishly granting too much relying upon trust in promises in a private letter from a President of the United States which apparently can be ignored once they leave office as proven by President Obama claiming the letter has no legal standing and he did not make and thus will not keep the promises within, let that be a cautionary note to all putting faith in promises from American Presidents. Any further release of land by Israel would be excessively foolish but it is also the sole legal manner in which there can be any future state for the Palestinians and as long as their terrorist means and claims to erase all of Israel killing all the Jews found within continue, there will be no such surrender of territories for that purpose or any other. The ongoing threat to take Israel before the ICJ and win the rights to lands, according to Abbas all of the lands, but any lands will find their decision handed down being that all the lands belong rightfully to Israel and that only through an agreement, a treaty, can there be anything resembling an Arab State within the borders of the Jordan River west to the Mediterranean Sea. This is why despite constant threats from Abbas and his merry henchmen and the European Union and numerous European governments to take Israel before the ICJ and force Israel to grant the Palestinians their rightful state has and never will happen is because they all know the legal rights and claim Israel holds to these lands and they are aware that they would not only lose in the ICJ but that all future arguments they wish to present would become worthless. Even should the Arabs conquer the lands, they would still revert to the Jews whenever they decided to sue in the ICJ for their rightful inheritance and the only manner around such would be to get a representative for Israel to sign a surrendering document giving up all claims to these lands. We would advise against holding your breath as that will cause unconsciousness.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

What the Guilty Verdict of Sgt. Elor Azariya Will Mean

 

Military court handed down guilty verdict finding Sergeant Elor Azariya guilty of manslaughter. The verdict was in at his arrest, with only the formalities left to complete, in this most obvious result in the universe. The media tried this case before the first military hearing or first witness was called. There was never the slightest doubt in the media, neither the Israeli nor the world, as the left slant of the media will always side against the military because they use violence instead of talking things out in a reasoned manner like they would as the real adults who keep us safe. The media has some less than reasoned beliefs; especially when it comes to the military, law enforcement or any other use of violence performed protecting the public. It’s that reasoned thing where adults would resolve such serious and difficult problems such as the five day weather forecast, political elections, budget issues and arresting violent, armed and dangerous felons or preventing terrorist attacks; oh, wait; the media run and hide when such problems arise and only come forth to complain about how law enforcement or the media used any amount of violence in resolving such situations. We are not going to debate the verdict or whether Sgt. Elor Azariya was justified or not and will leave that to the media, they will be salivating over this, and the demonstrators who will present the opposite views. Our apologies to the few media such as Arutz Sheva which will give all sides all the print they need to tangle and dice the verdict and evidence into second-by-second slices and view them from top, bottom, right, left, front, back, outside and inside and any other manner conceivably possible.

 

Our concern will take us on a different tack. This verdict will place the fear of imprisonment above and beyond the already burdensome Rules of Engagement (ROE), a military hierarchy which either fears or aligns themselves with the left, political establishment which also fears the media or is elected by them, and a public which is almost as equally divided. The losers from this verdict, other than Sgt. Elor Azariya, will be the soldier in the field who when facing any questionable situation where there might be any doubt or opening for leftist outrage will have an extra question in his decision protocols, will I face charges and is it worth my life to act or simply take cover and be safe from prosecution. Remember that at the other end of the infantryman’s rifle are very often terrorists who will have absolutely no decision protocols, they simply shoot first, second and continue to shoot until stopped, stopped by that soldier working through the ROE and now the political and legal challenges which are distractions far outside the norm for soldiers in what is in all honesty a combat zone. These soldiers are actually volunteers in a manner of speaking as if any Israeli teen upon graduating High School can find a means of avoiding military service by one of three alternatives, civilian service or seek some deferment or a long overseas vacation. The most honorable is civilian service but most Israelis choose the IDF and many religious Jews apply for the elite infantry units knowing they will face the harshest of training rigors and an uphill battle to meet and exceed all qualifications as well as have to compete against one another for the limited slots available. The highly motivated, altruistic, selfless, servants of Israel carry the weight of protecting their nation and its people on their shoulders. Now they also need to gauge the emotional state of the world, the probabilities of some prosecutor deciding to make a name for themselves before leaving the service and entering the work force hoping to polish up the resume and hoping if they do decide to use their weapon, whether the media might find reason to explode an expose doubting the need for discharging their weapon.

 

What seems to get lost in this mix is that these young people are facing terrorists who do not have ROE, do not wear uniforms, hide behind civilians, ambush civilians, hate life and worship death. The situation often is not cut and dry; and doubt, if permitted to permeate any situation, can be fatal as when fighting terrorism, delay results in the soldier’s life. These are the truths and we can rely that as time passes this decision will cause some unfortunate soldier to delay, consider one too many consequences, figure one too many angles, second guess before shooting and never get off that saving shot. It may well cost that soldier their life or worse, watching a civilian they were sworn to protect lose their life which would haunt them for the rest of their life. These are the stakes which these youth face regularly and adding more tension to their young lives is criminal, and we do not need any trial to figure this out. Was there no other means for the IDF handling this difficult situation? Unfortunate truth is, probably not after the media made such a monstrous crime of the century uproar about the shooting of a terrorist, injured and presumably subdued though not yet restrained, who had just stabbed another soldier and attacked others at the scene. Is such a mitigating factor? Apparently not in this or any case as they are enforcing the toughest and most moral code of any military in the world. For potentially making the IDF a target for recrimination by the world, its media and propaganda for the terror masters to radicalize more and more terrorists, Sgt. Elor Azariya may end up spending the next twenty years of his life in a military prison and his life will never be the same nor likely ever recover from this ordeal.

 

 

Knowing some will demand our opinion, I will speak for myself and not the remainder of our small staff, though the staff likely would agree. Was Sgt. Elor Azariya guilty of the manslaughter charge? That I cannot tell as I am not and never was a lawyer, intellectual, judge, politician or part of a paid media. Some of the above mentioned have the legal knowledge and possibly the background to judge fairly while others are simply presumptuous enough to claim that right. I can only speak as one who has carried a rifle and was in a combat unit though I fortunately never had to shoot any enemy targets, and in war that is what all enemy are, targets. The first thing in a case where an enemy has been taken prisoner but is not yet secured as they are seriously injured requiring medical attention, one must know the mind of the enemy. Would they still pose a threat and are they sufficiently guarded to prevent such threat. From what I have read, the terrorist in question was not being actively guarded, though there were sufficient soldiers that should he become a menace by one of their judgements of the terrorist’s acts and movements, then the terrorist would be neutralized, killed. This is what occurred and what was on trial here was the danger level the terrorist posed. Here we need consider the motivation to kill us the terrorists keep within them. We know they viscerally despise and hate us wishing us all dead. They would do anything to hurt and kill us. I guess the best way I could describe the level of animosity held by the terrorists is to point out that they would be willing to die to kill a little girl’s puppy because it would make her cry and place them in paradise as is his sick, perverse and beastly interpretation of his religion, and that level of hatred is only prevented from performing more acts of hostility and illogical violence when they are completely neutralized either through restraints or death. The terrorist was not restrained, you figure it out.

 

Beyond the Cusp