Quick Takes: <i>News From Israel You May Have Missed</i>

Quick Takes: News From Israel You May Have Missed

By: Aaron Klein

Published: August 12th, 2009

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The website for the U.S. consulate in Jerusalem ignores Jews and the state of Israel while providing news and services geared primarily toward Arabs and Palestinians, a pro-Israel group has charged.

Harvey Schwartz, chairman of American Israeli Action Coalition, stated, “It is as if the United States is totally denying the existence of Israel or Israelis. We do not believe that this is in accordance with the will of the American people.”

The Coalition sent around blast e-mails pointing out the consulate websitemaintains an Arabic section but not a Hebrew one and that almost the entire website is dedicated to helping the Palestinian cause.

A review of the website this week found about a dozen announcements related to U.S. aid to the Palestinians. Not a single announcement was related to Israel except for a two-sentence item on a U.S.-funded initiative to review Israeli and Palestinian textbooks. But even that announcement was geared toward the PA.

The website also announces the availability of educational financial grants to candidates who must be “a Palestinian resident of the West Bank, East Jerusalem or the Gaza Strip.”

Asked about these finds, a spokesperson for the U.S. consulate in Jerusalem told WorldNetDaily the “consulate is an independent mission. We are the U.S. representatives to the Palestinian Authority.”

That statement might be news to Israeli residents of Jerusalem and the West Bank who use the consulate for visa and citizenship matters and to American citizens in Israel who use the consulate for a variety of issues.

The consulate spokesperson added that the U.S. embassy in Tel Aviv is the official American representative to the State of Israel.

Even the embassy website, however, maintains an Arabic section but not a Hebrew one. That website also features far more news items related to the PA and American programs for Palestinians than announcements related to Israel.

U.S. Watching Israeli Construction Like A Hawk

The Obama administration has set up an apparatus to closely monitor Jewish construction in Jerusalem and the strategic West Bank to the point of watching Israeli moves house-to-house in certain key neighborhoods, this column has learned.

For the past few months, Obama’s Middle East envoy, George Mitchell, has protested to the highest levels of the Israeli government about evidence found of any Jewish housing expansion in those areas, informed Israeli officials said.

The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said that last March Mitchell oversaw the establishment of an enhanced apparatus based in the U.S. consulate in Jerusalem that closely monitors the West Bank and eastern Jerusalem neighborhoods, incorporating regular tours of the areas, at times on a daily basis.

Previously, under the Bush administration, the consulate kept a general eye on Jewish Jerusalem and West Bank construction, receiving much of its information from nongovernmental organizations.

Jewish leaders in the West Bank said the consulate takes no pains to hide their activities.

“They come out. They tour our communities. They try to interact with our leadership,” said David Ha’ivri, spokesmen for the Shomron Regional Council in the West Bank.

PA Delegate: Every Israeli Is A Legitimate Target

Every Israeli is a legitimate military target, declared a senior delegate of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah organization.

“I don’t believe there are civilians in Israel. All of Israeli society is a military society and therefore a military target,” Rashideh al-Mughrabi said in an in-person interview with this reporter in Bethlehem last week.

Mughrabi is a senior deputy to the Fatah congress which took place in Bethlehem at which hundreds of voting Fatah members discussed the future of their party and passed official resolutions outlining its major objectives. Mughrabi is one of six voting Fatah delegates from Lebanon.

She is the sister of Dalal al-Mughrabi, one of the most infamous anti-Israel terrorists in history. Dalal led an attack in March 1978 that killed 36 Israelis.

Rashideh said her only regret about her sister’s attack was that she herself could not participate.

“If I feel any sorrow it is because I wasn’t allowed to participate in the operation since Abu Jihad [a Fatah terrorist who planned the attack] decided that two sisters cannot participate in the same attack,” she said.

New Study Highlights Hamas Media Spin

A new study asserts Hamas is engaging in a phony rapprochement with Israel in order to continue engaging with the West, while its leaders explain in Arabic that they are still seeking the Jewish state’s destruction.

“Hamas is conducting a ‘smile spin’ for the West, particularly the United States. Its main objectives are to ease its political isolation, improve its position vis-?-vis the Palestinian Authority and get funds to rebuild the Gaza Strip,” concludes the study by the Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center at Israel’s Center for Special Studies.

The study quotes liberally from multiple recent Hamas interviews to U.S. and British news media outlets and compares those statements to Hamas rhetoric to the Palestinians during the same period. In some cases Hamas leaders outright deny to Palestinian news media statements they provided days earlier to the Western, English-language press.

Aaron Klein is Jerusalem bureau chief for WorldNetDaily.com. He appears throughout the week on leading U.S. radio programs and is the author of the book “The Late Great State of Israel.” Follow Klein on Twitter under the name “AaronKleinWND.”

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About the Author: Aaron Klein is Jerusalem bureau chief and senior reporter for WorldNetDaily.com. He is also host of an investigative radio program on New York's 770-WABC Radio, the largest talk radio station in the U.S., every Sunday between 2-4 p.m (CHANGE TO 7-9 p.m.). His website is KleinOnline.com

Quick Takes: News From Israel You May Have Missed

PA Delegate: Every Israeli Is A Legitimate Target

New Study Highlights Hamas Media Spin

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