Friday Afternoon Roundup -

Two more terrorist attacks occurred this week in Israel, one by Fatah and one likely by Fatah, while Hamas did its part by staging a phony siege situation and then bursting through into Egypt. The media proved all too willing to play along with Hamas' phony wails about starvation and a lack of power, even overlooking the candlelight meeting held in daylight.

Meanwhile during the second terrorist attack we once again saw the virtue of letting people be armed instead of disarmed;

The terrorists, armed with knives and a pistol snuck into a building used by the high school. They entered a classroom where tutors were holding a meeting, and stabbed two of them. Two of the tutors were armed and managed to overpower and kill the terrorists

Bin Laden's son and his wife are getting an excessive amount of positive coverage, despite the fact that Bin Laden Jr has defended his father and his wife has questioned whether Bin Laden was even responsible for 9/11. The Daily Mail has an interesting snapshot of this woman, who in actuality was Muslim all along and claims Arab parentage.

A few days ago, her neighbours in the tranquil Cheshire village of Moulton knew Jane as just another slightly dotty grandmother who sat on the parish council. She was a bit odd, granted, with a face unnaturally smoothed, it was rumoured, by Botox and the surgeon's scalpel.

She was always off on exotic jaunts to the Middle East, and spoke of her devout Islamic faith - but all in clipped English tones. And, of course, there was the small matter of her five former husbands, as well as her latest, who at 27 is young enough to be her son.

Today, she is taking family loyalty to a somewhat improbable level, insisting again that the Bin Laden patriarch might just be innocent. With a jaw-dropping combination of stupidity and naivety, she says in her best school ma'am voice, when I raise the question of the Twin Towers: "I mean, do you know - beyond all doubt - that he did it? "If so, I'd like you to show me the evidence. I don't think it's nice to make assumptions about someone when you don't know the facts."

She concedes, though, that one day Saudi will be her ideal place to live. "I would like to settle in Saudi with him. Of course, I'd keep my home in Cheshire - I am British, after all - but a woman's place is by her husband's side."

But doesn't he already have a home? And a wife and child?

"Yes, but I'd set up another home nearby, and he would come and go between the two. It is quite normal, really. I don't mind at all - why should I? I'm not jealous of his wife. "I have spoken to her. Lots of married men in this country have girlfriends. At least he is being honest."

Somewhere along the way, she also acquired the name Zaina Mohamad al Sabah - presumably when she converted to Islam as a teenager?

"I never said I converted," she exclaims angrily. She won't elaborate, but has previously claimed Arabic parentage. Her parents are reported as being a George and Beryl Hanson. She refuses to clear up the matter. "My religion is a very private matter. It doesn't matter how I became a Muslim. Only that my Islamic faith is very important to me."

For all the holes in Jane's story - all of which give the impression that even she doesn't know who she is - we do know that she was a Muslim by the time she got married for the first time, at the age of 16.

Meanwhile via Hockey Hound the NGO Monitor has an interesting look at the NGO rhetoric over Hamas' manufactured crisis.

At Jammie Wearing Fool, Bush Deranged Syndrome causes millions to be squandered bashing Bush

Lemon Lime Moon looks at Britain's Three Little Pigs ban

This time it is the 3 Little Pigs, that famous ,valiant trio who fought off the wicked, ugly, satanic wolf of evil who tried with all his might to destroy their home and eat them alive! Sound familiar? Of course it does. Don't we wish that there were manly men in government who didn't fear wolves in sheep's clothing? Yes, of course we do. And, of course, it is axiomatic that anyone who tries to destroy the Three Little Piggies automatically aligns themselves with the Wicked, Evil, Rotten, ravening wolf.

Over at IsraPundit, Time to Say Goodbye to Israeli Arabs?

Those who wish to stay and be part of the Jewish state should know that their loyalty lies only with this country. They cannot protest on behalf of those who wish to destroy it. All the others, such as Ra’ed Salah and Ahmad Tibi, must decide where they want to live. If they think that another “Palestinian state” should be established here, instead of the State of Israel, they should get up and leave. They can fight us – but from the outside. Not from within us, and not at our expense.

Over at Barbara's Tchatchkas' is a Cinnamon Stillwell article, Honor killings: When the ancient and the modern collide

Also at question are the vagaries of the Arab honor/shame culture, in which men's "shame" (or that of the family or tribe) at the prospect of women's sullied "honor" (or chastity) must be avoided at all costs. Honor killings are not, as the apologists would have us believe, simple acts of domestic violence akin to those that take place in all communities. They are specific to Muslim religion and culture and must be addressed as such if ever honest debate about the matter is to ensue.

Regrettably, silence is the more typical reaction to these crimes. Fearful of giving offense or being branded with the ubiquitous "Islamophobia" label, law enforcement, journalists, social workers, government officials and, most of all, Western feminists are allowing a grave threat to women's rights go unaddressed. The misguided purveyors of multiculturalism — an ideology that holds that all cultures or religions are equivalent and none (save for the dominant, or Western, culture) worthy of condemnation — have rendered the West incapable of addressing evils where Third World cultures are to blame. But the truth is Western culture offers the greatest boon to women's rights and must therefore be vigorously defended, even if that means stepping into the realm of the politically incorrect.

Via Something and Half of Something, one of the craziest Ron Paul supporters yet caught on tape.

Finally a plea from the parents of a terror victim to bring Annapolis to an end

B/H

We, the corporate body of the Jewish nation, have been privileged with the divine heritage of the Land of Israel , promised in an eternal covenant to our forefather Abraham on Mount Gerizim and Mount Ebal , overlooking Elon Moreh in Samaria . As the beneficiaries of this priceless treasure, we cannot consider our Holy Land as a commodity on the international exchange. The Almighty’s gift may not be surrendered for a bowl of porridge – a paltry sum of “payment,” resulting from a misguided vision of wished-for tranquility. We, the children of Israel , are the guardians of our Holy Land for all the generations to come until the Final Redemption. This, then, is our sacred mission, never to be forsaken. We must concentrate our efforts and gather our strength in unity, to fulfill the objective of being a light unto the nations.

In the State of Israel, we have created benefits for all humankind through the study and teaching of Torah, which is G-d’s divine message for ethical advancement of all societies. Moreover, we have shared with all nations Israel ’s breakthroughs in state-of-the-art medical care, pharmaceutical research, solar energy development, hydroponic farming and social justice.

Our only son, Hillel Eliyahu Lieberman HY’D, fulfilled the “mitzvah” (religious obligation) of making “aliyah,” thereby trailblazing in the true pioneering spirit, the settlement of the Holy Land of Israel, just as our American forefathers had created the first colonies of this young nation in the Western hemisphere by building settlements (towns and villages). Unfortunately, as a result of the mirage of the Oslo Agreement’s promises of peace that could not become a reality, a violent “intifada” left him a victim of cruel, deceitful Arab terrorism as he walked, wrapped in a prayer shawl on the Sabbath between Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur in the Year 2000, to his institution of higher Torah learning, Yeshivat Od Yosef Chai, located in the Tomb of Joseph in Shechem (a.k.a. Nablus), Samaria. Once again, the conferences subsequently held on the Wye Plantation and more recently in Annapolis have pressured Israel with a false promise of “peace” to result from surrounding, hostile neighbors’ recognition of Israel , to surrender slices of its tiny, vulnerable land, viewable from north to south and east to west in a matter of minutes by aerial flight.

Our seven orphaned grandchildren, who commute to high school and college via Samarian highways, do not enjoy the sweet taste of the oft-promised peace. They have been detained on their daily travel by explosives planted by terrorists alongside the road, by burning tires that turn bus drivers and passengers into “sitting ducks,” by suspicious packages blocking progress until a robot pulverizes the source of danger, and by sirens alerting Elon Moreh residents of a terrorist climbing up the Mountain of Har Kabir with a bomb wrapped inside the carcass of a sheep.

Surely, we Americans of all faiths care about the safety and security of “our children,” locally and globally. Therefore, we are totally committed to fighting terrorism – in this post-9/11 era – with strength, not surrender; with backbone, not bending; with vigor, not veering off the vector of our goal of true peace; instead of with “piece” offerings to those who aim to murder freedom lovers throughout the world.

The Government of Israel must resist any American governmental pressure, because such interference will negate our mutual relationship of respect and honor, and our mutual plan for global peace and prosperity, for free trade zones and for a flourishing economy. Inadvertently encouraging violence violates our shared purpose for the era of peace when “nation shall not lift up sword against nation, and they shall not learn warfare anymore” (Isaiah).

Rabbi Dr. and Mrs. Sidney Z. Lieberman