Friday Afternoon Roundup -

My post on Venezuela and the Arab and Muslim presence in Latin America has been garnering a lot of attention with incoming links from Dissident Frogman and Asian Badger among others. You can't get more international than that. As some have pointed out it's just the tip of the iceberg. There are several degrees of interconnections between old line Marxist and new line Islamists and Muslim and Latin American terrorist groups and by the 2010's, that's a problem that is likely to be a major one on America's radar.

Meanwhile in Israel people are appealing to Yisrael Beiteinu and Shas to leave the coalition. But appealing to their principles is as useful as appealing to a thief's morality.

Yisrael Beiteinu is driven by Avigdor Lieberman's political ambitions and he is no hurry for new elections, especially with Gaydamak and his Putin backed party breathing down his neck. Avigdor Lieberman is now trapped between disclaiming his right wing credentials and endangering his plans to become Prime Minister and the loss of Yisrael Beiteinu's Knesset seats to a Moscow backed juggernaut of Gaydamak's celebrity.

Shas meanwhile only cares about the shekels. If Netanyahu's victory is assured, they'll get on board, but only after they've pumped the loser for everything he's got. Unlike Yisrael Beiteinu, Shas doesn't even worry much about what its voters think, after all they can just hand out some more amulets and warn that anyone who doesn't vote for them will go to hell.

In the US meanwhile, the Presidential race continues to slowly chug along without really going anywhere. Rudy has a Pat Robertson endorsement, which may either show pragmatism or a commitment to the War on Terror on Robertson's part, depending whether you want to judge favorably or not. The Ron Paul hordes have apparently been financing their money bomb using stolen credit cards. Shocking? Not really.


-- In the blogsphere roundup, Daled Amos has a roundup of One Jerusalem Posts on protecting Yerushalayim.


-- Elder of Ziyon has some great flashbacks that show just how little things have changed since 1948 with followups of archived newspaper clippings


-- Meanwhile in contrast to the demographic horror stories which helped push the surrender of Gush Katif and now the proposed surrender at Annapolis, the reality is that Jewish fertility is up and Arab fertility is down

The country's fertility rate continues to rise; the average number of babies born to Muslim women is falling; having babies before the age of 20 is less common, and the average age when women have their first child is up
A total of 148,170 babies came into the world last year: 71 percent of them were born to Jewish mothers and 23% to Muslims; 3% to women of undetermined religion; The average fertility rate among Jewish women rose from 2.7 in 2005 to 2.8 in 2006. Muslim women's fertility has declined to four children, compared to 4.7 in 2000

While these statistics may not seem so impressive, keep in mind that what this really represents is a trend, as the Israeli population becomes dominated by a higher number of religious families while Arab families are increasingly hitting a population peak.


-- At IsraPundit, Ted Belman has 11 questions for the Government of Israel

1. How many Israelis will be displaced as a result of a deal? (Under convergence it was 80,000)
2. What is the estimated cost all in? (Steve Plocker estimated the cost of convergence at $25 billion for 80,000)
10. Does the GoI accept the New Demographic Study which forecasts that Jews will outnumber the Arabs in Israel plus J & S by 2:1 for the foreseeable future?
11. Why doesn’t Israel consider abandoning Oslo and annexing J &S? Many reports have been written that illustrate how this could be done democratically. It would be easier for Israel to deal with the Arabs within Israel than outside Israel. Why isn’t his option given serious consideration?

Lemon Lime Moon has a post on Right

"Right-wing" "Fringe group" "Ultranationalist". These are words used to describe

Rabbis Dov Wolfa, Yekutiel Rap, Gedalia Axelrod , chief rabbi of Kiryat Arba and Hebron, Dov Lior and Yaakov Yosef son of Rabbi Ovadia Yosef by Y.net's Jewish World. The rabbis have come out and openly given a warning to President Bush that the so-called peace conference in Annapolis will end in disaster for America.
It surely will. Condoleeza Rice and George Bush are two who do not learn from lessons of the past and from failure. They are mindless in regard to the middle east and the treachery played out there by mohammedan nations who promise anything but stay on track as far as the total annihilation of Jews is concerned.