Yasmine Perni Cries Out

I’ve just come back from a screening of Yasmine Perni’s film The Stones Cry Out. I didn’t actually see the film on account of the fact that, because of adverse weather conditions, it took me five hours to drive from Nottingham to Tunbridge Wells. The film started at 7.30pm and I arrived an hour late in a very spaced-out condition. But I was in time for the Question and Answer session.

I bought a DVD of the film afterwards and will post a review after I’ve found the time to watch it. But what follows are my comments on the après-film session.

First of all, although the views of Ms Perni on the Israeli-Palestinian problem are poles apart, I was impressed by her evident sincerity and concern for the plight of Palestinian Christians. Most pro-Palestinians I encounter (particularly those of the female persuasion) tend to be loud, aggressive and a little too fond of the F-word for my delicate taste. But not Ms Perni.

She defines herself as a Christian who believes the Bible ‘one hundred percent.’ She is gently spoken, highly articulate and, it seems to me, passionately and genuinely concerned about the Palestinian people, particularly Christians.

The audience, as you would expect in Tunbridge Wells, was predominantly white, middle class, civilized and well educated. And the questions and comments were the kind you would expect from such an audience. Israel’s treatment of Palestinians in the film had reminded one urbane gentleman of the way Nazi Germany treated the Jews and, in his considered opinion, no peace would come in the Middle East until America ‘shed the shackles of the Jewish Lobby.’ To her credit, although Ms Perni thinks Israel is ‘torturing’ Palestinians, what the Palestinians are enduring is not as bad as the suffering of the Jews in the Holocaust.

A lady who, by her own confession, had never been to Israel or ‘Palestine’ was nevertheless of the opinion that Bethlehem was becoming a ghetto and unctiously likened the barbed wire on the Security Wall to the crown of thorns on the head of Christ. Another lady likened Israel’s Security Fence to the Berlin Wall and wondered how long it will take to bring it down. It was also clearly implied that Israel is an apartheid regime. The willingness of otherwise intelligent people to publicly trot out these trite clichés and pious platitudes was frankly depressing.

There can be no doubt that in 1948, for the thousands of Arabs who obeyed their leaders and fled the country, the founding of the Jewish state was a Nakba, a disaster. According to Arab pastor Shmuel Aweida, however, for him and his family, and for all Arabs who remained in the land, the founding of the state of Israel was the best thing that could have happened to them because they found themselves for the first time living in a democracy. They’d never had it so good. Which is why today Israeli Arabs, although they might complain about the government (and who doesn’t?) would rather live in Israel than in Gaza or the Palestinian Authority.

When I pointed out in the question time that Israel is the only place in the Middle East where the church is growing, Ms Perni informed me that in Israel it is illegal to convert to Christianity. It’s amazing how many people believe this enduring urban myth. In Muslim countries, of course, you can be killed for converting but in Israel freedom of religion is written into the constitution.

Yasmine Perni told me after the meeting she believes the Palestinian people want peace. But why would a people that wants peace name their streets after suicide bombers? Why would a people that want peace display pictures of terrorists on the walls of school classrooms in the same way that our school classrooms display pictures of the Periodic Table? Why would a people who want peace publicly welcome hundreds of murderous thugs released from Israeli jails as though they were heroes? Why would people who want peace send their children to summer camps where they can be trained to shoot automatic weapons and to blow themselves to smithereens? Why would a people who want peace teach their children in school and on TV shows that the Jews are apes and pigs?

If the Palestinians want peace, why doesn’t PA President Mahmoud Abbas accept Israel as a Jewish state? And why does he continue to say that a future Palestinian state will be Jew-free while insisting Israel will have to open its gates to hundreds of thousands of Palestinians?

Yasmine Perni also supports the Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC) and the Boycott, Disinvestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement, believing BDS to be a ‘peaceful and non-violent’ to force Israel to less inconsiderate to the Palestinians. I’m sure she genuinely believes that but from my experience of the PSC and BDS movement I’m not so sanguine. I know a Jewish man who had his nose broken by a female BDSer he was shadowing in a supermarket. She and her comrades regularly loaded shopping trolleys with Israeli products before dumping them in the store car park, and he was going to prevent her from doing so. She turned suddenly, uttered some very naughty words and drove her delicate little fist into the centre of his face. I’ve stood with pro-Israel demonstrators singing Am Yisrael Chai and Hava Nagila while just yards away pro-Palestinians demonstrators were angrily chanting anti-Israel slogans.

I was concerned at the Palestinianisation of Christianity. We were informed that Christianity was born in Palestine and that Jesus was born in 'Palestine' and that the first Christians were Palestinians. According to Matthew 2:20-21, Jesus was born in 'the land of Israel,' not the land of Palestine.

I was also bemused at Ms Perni’s objection to Israeli companies operating in the Palestinian Authority, even when they are helping Palestinian farmers and providing gainful employment to other Palestinians. It’s true, for example, that SodaStream is defying international law by setting up shop in the Palestinians Authority to provide well-paid work for over 500 Palestinians. But give me a break! If international law supposes it’s better for Palestinians to be out of work than earning good wages in a Jewish factory built on the West Bank then international law is a ass!

The meeting was not helpful. It reinforced the myth that Israel is the obstacle to peace in the Middle East and it was clear that at least some in the audience see Israel as a Nazi state and an apartheid state that must be brought to its knees if there is to be peace in the Middle East.The most depressing aspect of the evening was that at the screening of a film by a professed Christian film-maker, chaired by an Anglican clergyman, with a panel that included a bishop, no mention was made of the gospel as the solution to the problems of the Middle East.

First we take Syria, then we take 'Palestine'

There's no denying that some Christian Zionists come over as extreme and, not to put too fine a point on it, as nut cases. But to claim as some do that they are to blame for the troubles in the Middle East is crazy.

Watch this clip from Memri of a Saudi Jihadi Leader tearfully but creepily pray  to his god for martyrdom and slaughter. His only reasons for living are to take Syria, shoot Jews in the head and to behead unbelievers.

I've yet to see John Hagee or any Israeli settler preach the beheading of Arabs while waving knives.

Jeff Halper: Settlers in danger from Palestinians. Is he bothered?

In an interview with Russia Today, Santa Claus lookalike Jeff Halper (pictured), says the Israeli Defence Force is preparing settlers for the mass uprising of Palestinians, expected after the UN votes on a Palestinian statehood in September.

The preparations include handing out tear gas and stun grenades to civilians. Military resistance to Palestinians will only bring international sanctions on Israel after Palestine is recognised in September's vote. That's the view of Halper, a political activist and co-founder of the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions.

Halper, an Israeli who is able to place an anti-Israel spin on every news item (in an interview with the Church of Scotland magazine Life and Work he was able to castigate his own people for not disliking him!), says every settlement is a military base.

Notice that Halper expects there to be violence against settlers if the UN recognises a Palestinian state on Friday but he doesn’t believe the settlers to be able to defend themselves.

Halper appears to believe that there are no circumstances under which Israel is ever justified in destroying a Palestinian building. Halper has no apparent objection – or at least none that he has ever expressed – however about Israel demolishing Jewish settlements.

And there are several well-defined reasons why Israel has demolished Palestinian homes. Sometimes it is to deter the families of convicted terrorists from continuing to attack Israel. Sometimes homes are demolished in counter-terrorist operations, such as when houses are used as bomb laboratories, or as terrorist headquarters or offices. There are times when homes are demolished because they are booby-trapped. When houses are used as hide-outs or cover for snipers or for launching missiles, they sometimes have to be destroyed. And if homes are in the way or Israeli tanks or armoured personnel carriers, they are demolished.

There may have been times of course when Palestinian houses have been demolished by mistake or even wrongly but the man who opposes the demolition of any Palestinian home for whatever reason would apparently deny settlers (even if they are, in his opinion illegal) the right to defend themselves against murderous attackers.

1967 and all that

There's a lot of talk about Israel withdrawing to the '1967 Borders'.

Does anybody know what the '1967 Borders' were?

There were no borders in 1967!

Between Israel and Syria, and Israel and Lebanon there were (as now) only Armistce Lines, patrolled by the United Nations. There were no peace agreements between Israel and her northern neighbours.

Today, there are still only two internationally acknowledged borders: the border between between Israel and Egypt and the border between Israel and Jordan. These exist because Israel made peace with those two countries.

The Armistice Lines between Israel and Lebanon, and between Israel and Syria came into existence after Israel’s War of Independence in 1948/9, which was forced on the legally established fledgling Jewish State by the surrounding Arab Islamic nations who remain dedicated to the destruction of Israel.

During the 1948/9 War of Independence, the Gaza Strip was illegally conquered and occupied by Egypt. Judea and Samaria provocatively labelled 'The West Bank' were illegally conquered and occupied by the racist and apartheid Kingdom of Jordan, which has never allowed Jews to live within her borders.

The Kingdom of Jordan also illegally conquered and occupied the Old City of Jerusalem against the stated will of the United Nations, which had said in Resolution 181, that the Old City of Jerusalem would be governed by the UN as an 'International City'

In the infamous Resolution 242 passed by the UN in the wake of the June 1967 'Six Day War', Israel was instructed, among other things, to hand East Jerusalem, including the Old City back to Jordan, which had been ocupying it illegally for the previous 19years, and not to the United Nations, from whom Jordan had taken East Jerusalem! This was hypocrisy on an international scale.

It was not 'Palestinians' who had occupied Gaza, Judea, Samaria and the Old city from 1948 to 1967, but Egypt and Jordan, the supposed allies ofthe 'Palestinian Cause'.

So what now does Mahmoud Abbas want the United Nations to do if/when it votes on Friday?

Abbas wants Israel to return to a time of insecurity, when her ‘borders’ were untenable and she was being attacked constantly.

They want her to return to a time of illegality, when Israel’s 'borders' were illegal according to International Law, even though recognised as legitimate by the UN.

Justice, only justice

Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu is planning to address the UN General Assembly on Friday, shortly after Palestinian Authority President Abbas presents his demand for full membership and recognition as a state. Netanyahu holds no illusions regarding the reception he is likely to receive. ‘The General Assembly is not a place where Israel usually receives a fair hearing,' said Netanyahu, ‘but I still decided to tell the truth before anyone who would like to hear it.’

I believe this week will be the most significant week in Israel’s history since 1948.

The Palestinians remain committed to demanding a state formed from Israeli land, and the bottom line is that while a Security Council veto would deny the Palestinians official member status, the Palestinians appear to be fully committed to that demand. If the vote in the Security Council fails due to a US veto they can seek upgraded observer status at the General Assembly as a non-member state.

Such a move could be interpreted as implicit UN recognition of a Palestinian state. The advantage of this option would be that it would require only a simple majority of the General Assembly. Since around 120 countries already recognise the state of Palestine, it would likely win such a vote overwhelmingly.

If ‘Palestine’ receives recognition as a non-member state, its leaders will be able to sign certain international treaties, such as the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. The result of such an outcome will be thousands of lawsuits against Israel and isolation and demonization of the State of Israel.

We should all pray that justice will prevail at the UN on Friday.

IDF seeking to prevent casualties ahead of UN vote

From the BICOM (Britain Israel Communications and Research Centre) website.
The Israel Defense Forces are currently on a high level of alert, in preparation for all possible scenarios as the date for the Palestinian bid for statehood in the UN draws near. The key aim, according to a statement by IDF Chief of Staff Benny Gantz on Saturday, is to prevent any deaths, Israeli or Palestinian. IDF Central Command, which covers the West Bank, has been reinforced with three additional battalions, according to Israeli media reports. Border Police and IDF reserve forces will also be made available according to need. Both IDF and the Palestinian Authority security forces have been equipped with large amounts of non-lethal crowd control equipment, to best enable the prevention of fatalities. There are particular concerns regarding the possibility of clashes between Jewish settlers and Palestinians. These could take the form of attacks by extremist settlers on Palestinian property, or an attempt by Palestinians to march on one of the settlements adjoining Area A, which is under Palestinian security and political control.

However, not all officials and analysts are predicting Palestinian violence following the statehood bid. Senior PA official Nabil Sha'ath said in an interview with Israel Army Radio over the weekend that he does not foresee an outbreak of violence in the West Bank unless the settlers initiate confrontation. Sources in the West Bank also suggest a lack of enthusiasm among large numbers of the population for the UN bid, indicating that disappointment is unlikely to be intense if it fails to go through. However, protests did take place at the Qalandia Checkpoint near Jerusalem on Saturday, in which rocks were thrown at IDF troops.

Those who do not learn from history...

Last week I sent out an email newsletter in which I explained that although CWI is first and foremost a mission concerned with the spiritual well-being of the Jewish people, we cannot afford to stand by silently when Jewish people and our own friends and colleagues are in danger.

I pointed out that the Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas has called on the United Nations to support the establishment of a Palestinian state when the UN meets on the 20th of this month. In the lead up to the historic vote, attacks on Israel have increased and as we draw closer to the tenth anniversary of the destruction of the World Trade Centre claims that Israel was behind the 9/11 attacks abound on the Internet.

I related how, in May, PM David Cameron had assured Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that 'Britain is a good friend of Israel' while at the same time warning that unless Israel ‘engages seriously in a meaningful peace process’ with the Palestinian Authority, it is more likely that Britain will endorse the “State of Palestine” for which the PA is expected to seek recognition at the UN in September.’

Columnist Melanie Philips asked if Mr Cameron made a habit of threatening his friends. ‘This is not the behaviour of a friend,’ said Miss Phillips, ‘so much as the kind of intimidation that is more reminiscent of a Mafia protection racket.’

I reproduced a letter I had written to Mr Cameron, inviting readers to feel free to adapt it to write their own letter to Mr Cameron, to the Home Secretary and to their local MPs. Here it is:

The Prime Minister
The Right Honourable David Cameron MP
House of Commons
LONDON
SW1A 0AA

Dear Prime Minister,

Although I welcome your assurance to Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that Britain’s friendship with Israel is ‘unshakeable’, I was deeply concerned to read your warning to Mr Netanyahu that unless Israel ‘engages seriously in a meaningful peace process’ with the Palestinian Authority, Britain will support the PA’s call for the recognition of a Palestinian state at the UN this month.

Your threat concerns me for a number of reasons.

First, you are pressurising the victim in the Israel-Palestine conflict rather than the aggressor. Israel has constantly tried to make peace while their enemies have not, and virtually all Israel’s concessions to the Palestinians have been reciprocated with an increase in aggression.

Second, Mr Netanyahu has stated publicly that he will be the first to welcome a Palestinian state if that state is willing to recognise a Jewish state. Although Mr Abbas wishes the world to recognise and support a Palestinian state, he has stated repeatedly that he will never accept Israel as a Jewish state.

Third, a ‘State of Palestine’ will be a racist state, inasmuch as Mr Abbas has declared on several occasions that not a single Jew will be allowed to live there.

Fourth, Mr Abbas’ Fatah party is in an alliance with Hamas, a terror organisation explicitly committed to the genocide of the Jews and the destruction of the state of Israel. If Britain supports the establishment of a Palestinian state, it will be endorsing a regime committed to a programme of genocide.

Such unreasonable pressure on Israel is nothing less than a demand that Mr Netanyahu negotiate the destruction of his own country. Should Britain support a Palestinian state at the UN later this month, I believe future generations will condemn you as the Prime Minister who stood shoulder to shoulder with genocidal terrorists against their victims.

May I be assured that you will be a true friend to Israel by opposing the establishment of a Palestinian state until such a time as the Palestinian leaders unambiguously recognise the right of the Jewish people to a national homeland?

Yours sincerely,

About six people responded to my email by unsubscribing but three people expressed concerns that CWI was deviating from its core concern: Jewish evangelism.

The following is the essence of my response to one of the respondents:

I did say at the start of the letter that ‘CWI is first and foremost a mission concerned with the spiritual well-being of the Jewish people’. The email was therefore a departure from my usual letters.

I am guessing that you did not receive the daily newsletters I emailed when I was reaching out to Hasidic Jews in August. If you did receive them, you will know that I was rising at 5.00am each day to reach out with the gospel to Orthodox Jewish men when they went to ritually immerse themselves in the sea. It should be evident therefore that CWI is not off-track regarding its ‘core commitment’.

I’m glad that your church member supports ‘the right of all people whether Jew or Gentile to be protected from abusive states’. That was the motivation behind my email because Israel is the target of state-sponsored abuse through terror organisations such as Hamas, Hezbollah, Fatah and the Muslim Brotherhood.

Additionally, the Iranian state continues to threaten Israel with annihilation even as it continues to seek nuclear capability. Things will get far worse if a Palestinian state, presided over by a founder member of the PLO, that refuses to accept or acknowledge the existence of a Jewish state. We should never forget that in 1967, following the Six-Day War, that all the Arab nations resolved at the Khartoum conference: No recognition of Israel; no negotiations with Israel; no peace with Israel. They have never rescinded those resolutions.

I agree totally that ‘Israel is not exempt from its responsibilities to treat Palestinians with dignity.’ When Israel was in control of the so-called West Bank, the Palestinian economy thrived and there was freedom of religion. After the establishment of the Palestinian Authority, the economy of the West Bank plummeted.

In 2010 and 2011, the economies of the PA and Gaza rose sharply as a result of aid from Israel. But the PA and Gaza have continued to bite the hand that feeds them.
I’m not sure what the church member means when he says he supports ‘the right of Palestinians to challenge the status imposed on them by the secular state of Israel.’ By choosing to reject Israel’s control and become a separate entity (the Palestinian Authority) the Palestinians chose their own status.

My friends and colleagues in Israel will suffer greatly should a Palestinian state be estate be established, because a state of ‘Palestine’ will be committed to the destruction not only of the Jewish state but also of the Jewish people.

And, of course, every Jew (or Arab) who is killed is one more person who never gets to hear the gospel.

Most Christians, with hindsight, believe that in the 1930s, the churches in Germany should have stood up to Hitler but seem to think we should remain silent in the face of modern-day Nazism in the Middle East. If that appears too strong a statement, it is worth noting that The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, which inspired Hitler and Mein Kampf are best sellers in Arab lands. In ten years, I don’t want to find myself wringing my hands and wishing I had spoken up when the world was making straight the way for another Holocaust.

Since the Jewish people began to return to the land from 1897 onwards, they have been the constant victims of Arab aggression. For example, in 1929, without any provocation, hundreds of Palestinian Jews were slaughtered in riots in Jerusalem, Hebron and other places.

In the 1930s and 1940s, the Arabs collaborated with Nazi Germany and the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem Haj Amin al-Husseini supported Hitler’s ‘Final Solution’, intending to implement a similar programme in Palestine.

In 1947, the Arabs violently opposed the establishment of a Jewish state even though the Jews were willing to share the land.

When the state of Israel was established in May 1948, the Arab states immediately confiscated the possessions of their Jewish citizens and expelled them. Those same Arab states, on the day Israel became a nation, also declared war on Israel and attacked the fledgling state.

In 1967, by a miracle, in six days, Israel defeated Egypt, Jordan and Syria in a defensive war that was intended to wipe Israel off the map.

In October 1973, on Yom Kippur, the holiest day in the Jewish calendar when Jews in Israel were fasting and praying, Egypt and Syria launched a coordinated surprise attack against Israel.

In spite of all the Arab hostility, Israel’s Arab citizens still enjoy all the legal and civil privileges of Israel’s Jewish citizens. Arabs in Israel have a better standard of living and better health than their brothers in Arab countries. Yet Israel’s Arab neighbours still wish to destroy the Jewish state and its citizens.

Never were the words of Edmund Burke more important: 'Those who do learn from history are doomed to repeat it.'

PA is free to break agreements with israel

“Moderate” Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas announced last Sunday that the Palestinian Authority is to break its agreements with Israel at any time.

Addressing the first annual Sir Bani Yas Forum on Peace and Global Security in Abu Dhabi, Abbas declared: “We met our obligations, but [Israel] did not, and so we are free from obligations”.

Israel has complied with many previous agreements. The very fact that that Abbas’ Palestinian Authority today rules the Arab population in Judea and Samaria (the West bank), that the PA has an armed military force and that Israel fully evacuated all Jews from the Gaza Strip proves Israel’s compliance with previous deals.

Abbas’ tactic is to ignore the concessions Israel has made and its compliance with previous deals by focusing solely on his favourite current demand, which at the moment is that Israel cease all construction in Judea, Samaria and Jerusalem. As long as Israel fails to satisfy that demand, Abbas will claim that Israel is non-compliant and always has been.

Meanwhile, the Palestinian Authority has never fulfilled its earliest peace process commitments to disarm and dismantle the Palestinian terrorist infrastructure, end anti-Israel incitement in the Palestinian media and to educate its public for peace and coexistence. If anything, the Palestinians have moved in the opposite direction.

Abbas spoke in Arabic in Abu Dhabi, so his inflammatory rhetoric has gone unreported ignored by the international media, and will not in the least influence US-led international peace brokering in the region.

Meanwhile, more than 10,000 Qassam rockets have been launched from Gaza into Israel over the past ten years. More than 600 Israelis have been injured and 28 lives have been lost as a result of the constant bombardment. The IDF cannot respond effectively to the attacks because almost all the rockets are fired from densely-populated civilian areas in Gaza, often near to schools, hospitals, and mosques. Since the so called “cease-fire” of February 2009, more than 250 Qassam rockets and mortars have been fired from Gaza into Southern Israel.

In spite of all that Hamas is doing to destroy Israel and kill innocent people, some Israeli citizens that are responding in a very different manner. In fulfilment of the prophecy of Isaiah 2:4, that the day will come when men will beat their swords into ploughshares”.

In an interesting spin on Isaiah 2:4, members of Moshav Yated, led by Yaron Bob, are beating Qassam rockets into objects of beauty. The “Peace Rose” (above) was made from the remains of a Qassam missile. You can view and purchase some of the work of the Moshav Yated artists at the Jerusalem Depot.

A Palestinian Zionist Organization?

I have long believed that there is no hope for a political solution to the Israel / Palestine problem. A single state would be the end of Israel and would result in Jews becoming a second-class citizens as they are in most Arab countries. A two-state solution, as we’ve seen with Gaza, would create an independent Palestine that from which state-sponsored terrorists would continue to attack Israel.

Palestinian Arab Elias Issa also believes that. Last week Issa marked Israel's 62nd Independence Day by launching the Palestinian Zionist Organization.

Issa rejects the notion that the Jewish state is a repressive entity that has stolen the lands of another people and established the PZO to show the world “why it must support the Jewish people and to [distance itself] from the terrorist Palestinian government."

Issa insists that an independent Palestinian state would be nothing more than a haven for terrorism, not only against Israel, but against the West in general. He also explains that the world has been duped, either knowingly or unwittingly, into believing that the Palestinians truly want a peaceful two-state solution.

“The Palestinians don't believe in a two-state solution; they only believe in a one-state solution – a land called Palestine [which] does not involve any Jewishness.”
For his own safety, Issa now resides in the United States, where Mosab Hassan Yousef, another former terrorist who now supports Israel, lives. Yousef’s book Son of Hamas, details his years of undercover service for Israel's security agencies, despite being the son of one of Hamas' top leaders. Coming closer to Israel and the Bible eventually resulted in Yousef becoming a Christian.

Israel’s critics frequently cite Jewish and Israeli critics of Israel to bolster their charges against Israel. But Israel’s Jewish critics do not have to live in exile with 24/7 protection. Indeed, Israeli Jeff Halper, who lives unmolested by his neighbours in Jerusalem, uses the very safety he enjoys as a stick to beat Israel. He regards the fact that his neighbours don’t persecute him for his anti-Israel activities as evidence that they don’t care about the plight of the Palestinians.
For more information on the Palestinian Zionist Organization, visit their website.

Is Israel expansionist?

Andrew Sibley has graciously responded to my review of his book Zion's New Name (see Comment on 'Replacement Theology's New Name') and raises a number of issues that deserve a response. Over the next few days I will deal with Andrew's points. Today, I examine his charge, set out in his book, that Israel is an expansionist state. Andrew Sibley is not the first to level this accusation at Israel. This is his comment on my review:

Is Israel expansionist? In making this claim I am simply looking at how the State of Israel has expanded its borders since 1948 with Palestinian areas reducing in size as Jewish settlements are established and expanded. That I think is factually correct.

In response to Andrew, let’s examine the background to the founding of Israel in 1948. The Balfour Declaration and the Palestine Mandate had in mind that what is now Israel and Jordan should be a 'Jewish National Home'. In 1920, the San Remo Conference assigned to Britain a mandate to establish a 'Jewish national home' in what is now Israel, Jordan and the Golan Heights.

Article 6 of the Preamble to the Mandate specified that Britain was 'to facilitate Jewish immigration to Palestine and encourage close settlement of the land, including State lands and waste lands not required for public purposes'.

The Mandate made no mention of Arab national or political rights in the land. It stated only that civil and religious rights of all the inhabitants of Palestine, irrespective of race and religion, must be safeguarded. Arab riots in Palestine resulted in Winston Churchill issuing a White Paper in 1922, which handed almost 80% of the land promised to the Jews to the Hashemi family. What should have been the Jewish homeland east of the Jordan, by a stroke of the pen became the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan.

The UN Partition Resolution of November 29, 1947 (General Assembly Resolution 181 (II)) attempted to diminish still further the Jewish homeland by proposing a partition of Palestine into an Arab state and a Jewish state. The Jews agreed to the proposal but the Arabs rejected it and immediately proceeded to attack Jewish settlements.

When Israel declared its independence in May 1948, the fledgling state was immediately attacked by the surrounding Arab countries with the express intention of driving the Jews into the sea. The Palestinians had rejected the opportunity to have their own homeland and opted instead to destroy the newly-founded Jewish state. It was the Arabs who were expansionist, not the Jews.

Israel 'expanded' its borders in June 1967, by fighting a defensive war against Egypt, Syria, Lebanon and Jordan, armed by Russia and assisted by Saudi Arabia and Iraq. Egyptian President Nasser declared that his objective was the 'destruction of Israel', and other Arab leaders expressed similar sentiments. Israel pleaded with Jordan not to enter the conflict but Jordan ignored Israel’s pleas and entered the conflict along with Syria and Iraq. The war ended with Israel’s victory; the Sinai, the Golan Heights, the Gaza Strip, Judea and Samaria (AKA 'the West Bank'), and the Old City of Jerusalem came under Israeli control.

When Egypt made peace with Israel, Israel handed back the Sinai peninsula. When Jordan made peace with Israel, Israel relinquished control of territories claimed by Jordan. Israel returned to parts of the West Bank in 2001 only in response to Arab terror. Syria has never made peace with Israel, therefore Israel retains the Golan Heights.

In 2000, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak met Yasser Arafat at the Camp David summit. At that summit Barak offered to withdraw from 97 percent of the West Bank and 100 percent of the Gaza Strip. He agreed to dismantle 63 isolated settlements. Barak also agreed that Arab neighbourhoods of East Jerusalem would become the capital of the new Palestinian state and that the Palestinians would maintain control over their holy places and have 'religious sovereignty' over Israel's most holy site, the Temple Mount.

Barak's proposal addressed the refugee issue, guaranteeing them the right of return to the Palestinian state and reparations from a $30 billion international fund. He also agreed to give the Palestinians access to water desalinated in its territory.

Israel offered generous concessions but Arafat rejected them and walked away from the table. Instead of putting forward a counter proposal, he rewarded Israel's generosity with the second Intafada.

Four years ago, Israel pulled all its people out of Gaza and Hamas expressed its gratitude by launching a lethal rain of missiles on southern Israel.

How, in the light of these facts, can anyone accuse Israel of being an expansionist power?

I am old enough to remember that within days of the end of the Six Day War, Israel made overtures to its enemies regarding a negotiated settlement and withdrawal from the captured territories, overtures that were firmly rejected by the Arab nations at the Khartoum Conference of August/September 1967. The Arab slogan coined at that conference was: 'No peace with Israel. No negotiations with Israel. No recognition of Israel'. This is still the position of Syria and various Palestinian terror groups, including Hamas, Hezbollah and Islamic Jihad.

Expansionist? Israel is fighting just to retain the little territory it already possesses!

Israeli soldier rescues Palestinian child

It is increasingly common to hear on the radio, TV and even in respcted newspapers that Israeli soldiers are trained to kill Palestinian children.

This video from Aish tells the remarkable story of an Israeli soldier saving a Palestinian child from stoning by other Palestinians.

Make sure you've got a few tissues handy before you watch this beautiful story!

I know it's true cos I read it in the papers

Media watchdog Honest Reporting has just announced its 'Dishonest Reporter Award 2009', its 'annual recognition of the most skewed and biased coverage of the Mideast conflict'.

Awards this year go to the talented cartoonist Pat Oliphant for the cartoon above; to former London mayor Ken Livingstone for his New Statesman interview with Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal; to Peter Oborne for his Channel 4 documentary on the shadowy UK 'Israel lobby'; to the Guardian's Michael White who managed in a brief interview about the assault on Sylvio Berlusconi to charge Israelis with murdering each other 'a great deal' (see Big White Lies, 15 December).

If you think the great British media is a paragon of unbiassed reportage, think again.

Where’s the beef?

Israel has been harshly criticized by the international community for constructing a security fence to keep out suicide bombers. Since the wall was constructed attacks on Israeli citizens and subsequent deaths have declined. I find it interesting that no one is beefing about the wall the Egyptians are building to keep out their fellow Muslims.

Egypt Building Iron Wall on Gaza Border to Stop Smuggling

Egypt has begun the construction of a massive iron wall along its border with the Gaza Strip, in a bid to shut down smuggling tunnels into the territory. The wall will be nine to 10 kilometers long, and will go 20 to 30 meters into the ground, Egyptian sources said. It will be impossible to cut or melt.

The new plan is the latest move by Egypt to step up its counter-smuggling efforts. Although some progress had been made, the smuggling market in Gaza still flourishes. Egyptian forces demolish tunnels or fill them with gas almost every week, often with people still inside them, and Palestinian casualties in the tunnels have been steadily rising.

Read the full article by Avi Issacharoff.