Friday Afternoon Roundup: Peres Declared an Honorary Arab

President Shimon Peres was declared an honorary Druse on Sunday by Sheikh Kamil Tariff. The sheikh, together with another member of a large delegation of the Druse religious, judicial and secular leadership, dressed a beaming Peres in a long, black gold embroidered Druse robe, traditionally worn for festive occasions.

As Peres entered the reception hall where the delegation was waiting, Kamil Mansour, the legendary adviser on Druse and other minority affairs to every president of Israel from president Shazar onwards, announced in Arabic, "All rise for the Rais!"

No this isn't a parody. For the first time ever Peres has actually been declared an honorary Arab. This just makes official what we knew all along. Peres is the leader of Israel's Arabs and not Israel's Jews.


In a briefer than usual news roundup for the week--

When they killed Cousin Ebi with a bullet to the heart, my family finally decided it was time to leave Iran

With Iran's Islamic government stirring up trouble in the Middle East, Berookhim is among the growing number of local Iranian Jews who are finally beginning to speak out about the horrors they faced in Iran, part of an effort to give Americans a better idea of the enormous threat Iran poses to world peace.

"He was shot with one bullet to his heart," said my cousin Abe Berookhim, a Los Angeles Iranian Jewish businessman.

At a Sinai Temple Men's Club meeting earlier this month, Berookhim publicly shared the 30-year-old heart-wrenching story of his 31-year-old uncle's arrest and execution at the hands of Iran's Revolutionary Guard.

Indeed, Ebrahim Berookhim was not the last Jew to be executed by Iran's fundamentalist regime. According to a 2004 report prepared by Frank Nikbakht, an Iranian Jewish activist in Los Angeles, at least 14 Jews were murdered or assassinated by the regime's agents, at least two Jews died in custody and 11 Jews have been officially executed by the regime, all since 1979.


In the roundup of blogs for this week--

Over at Lemon Lime Moon is a post on What It Will Take to Shake Jews Up

"Is there anything that will shake Jews to the core? Anything at all? Some talk now around the blogosphere of how we are better off without the Beit Hamikdash and that life with it was not as good as without it."


Over at IsraPundit, Ted Belman has an exchange with Michael Coren.

"I also said that Islam is bent on world conquest. You thought that I was wrong and only extremists like al Qaeda are intent on it.

Pipes, above quoted, wrote “The purpose of jihad, in other words, is not directly to spread the Islamic faith but to extend sovereign Muslim power..”

Spencer is quoted above “We deceive ourselves if we think [violence] is just something that�s manufactured by the Wahhabis and not present in Islam in general.

So once again I am correct.

I also said that wherever elections in Muslim countries have been held as of late, the Islamists go from strength to strength. This is true in Lebanon, Egypt, Morrocco, Palestinian territories, Turkey and Indonesia to name a few.

With current trends supported by an ascendant Iran, Islamists, if not stopped, will encompass the whole Middle East and also Africa.. Pakistan and Afghanistan are are likely to fall to them. Europe is teetering on the edge."

Daled Amos has a post on Abbas Still Knows How To Talk the Talk

That's quite a deal that Abbas has--all he has to do is talk the talk, while Israel is the one expected to walk the walk.

Before popping open the champagne, let's see: has the Fatah Charter been changed? Remember, the one's with the Charter that still contains the goal for their peace partner:

Article (12) Complete liberation of Palestine, and eradication of Zionist economic, political, military and cultural existence.

Let him change that first. Then we can talk.