A Hamas official captured by the Shabak (Israel’s General Security Service) last month spilled the beans during his interrogation on how Hamas operates and is funded, particularly in Jerusalem.

Mahmoud Toameh was caught trying to sneak into Israel from Jordan, the Shabak announced on Thursday.

One of the more important pieces of information Toameh revealed was how Hamas works with the Israeli-Arab Islamic Movement to keep Jews off the Temple Mount – the Jewish people’s holiest site.

Hamas pays hundreds of men between NIS 4000 to NIS 5000 a month to always be on the Temple Mount and to harass and throw stones at Jews who go up to visit the holy site.

JewishPress.com has published more than once these past few months, photos of Muslims waving Hamas flags on the Temple Mount, after rioting.

Toameh also linked the Islamic Movement’s Northern Division Raed Salah directly to Hamas.

One of the ways Hamas receives money from overseas is through real estate deals originating in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States. Iran was a major funder of Hamas, until it couldn’t afford to anymore. But with international sanctions quickly falling by the wayside thanks to the US, that could quickly change, and we can once again see Tehran funding Hamas.

And of course, one is not surprised to learn that Hamas is also linked to the Muslim Brotherhood.

The Saudi Arabian government has begun to issue a series of laws aimed at outlawing any activity loosely connected to terrorism — or criticism of the government.

According to a report by the “Human Rights Watch” (HRW) organization, the Muslim Brotherhood and two Syrian jihadist groups were outlawed as terrorist organizations. Saudi citizens were ordered to return home from fighting in the Syrian conflict within 15 days or face jail time from three to 20 years. The sentence comes in connection with the new “Royal Decree 44″ issued by Saudi King Abdullah which bans “participating in hostilities outside the kingdom.”

A new set of provisions added in early March further defines terrorism as “calling for atheist thought in any form, or calling into question the fundamentals of the Islamic religion on which this country is based.”

Recently two human rights activists in Saudi Arabia lost appeals in court following convictions for dissent and criticizing the government, HRW noted.

The Saudi Arabia city of Qurayyat, located near the border with Jordan, went on high alert Tuesday after official discovered a local fruit market was selling persimmons that came from Israel.

Anything from Israel is considered evil in the kingdom, home of the holiest city for enlightened Muslims.

The Saudi Gazette reported that a local inspection team, acting on a tip, confiscated approximately 300 pounds of persimmon that had Israel stickers.

“The municipality team conducted a surprise inspection after the closing hours of the fruit market and confiscated the fruit boxes that originated from Israel,” said them municipality environment health department director Abdulaziz Al-Musaed.

The Ministry of Commerce and Industry was alerted at the chutzpa of someone daring to buy and selling fruit from the forbidden country of Israel.

The Saudi Food and Drug Authority also was notified. It seems every official agency was alerted except perhaps for the Air Force. Al-Musaed reminded Saudis that “such fruit is not allowed in the Kingdom, and he warned shopkeepers not to deal with fruit vendors without knowing the true origin of produce.

An investigation is underway to determine how the evil persimmons found their way into the holy Muslim country.

Al Qurayyat is located 19 miles from the border with Jordan.

If authorities catch the poor soul who violated the purity of the country by contaminating it with Israeli fruit, he will be lucky to get away with flogging instead of having his hands chopped off so he never again will be able to touch anything from Israel.

If authorities catch the poor soul who violated the purity of the country by contaminating it with Israeli fruit, he will be lucky to get away with flogging instead of having his hands chopped off so he never again will be able to touch anything from Israel.

In 2005, Saudi Arabia announced the end of its ban on Israeli goods and services, mostly due to its application to the World Trade Organization, where one member country cannot have a total ban on another. However, the boycott in practice still stands.

The truth is that there are many Israeli products in Saudi Arabia, but they have no labels that would divulge that they were sent from the enemy of darkness.

When I worked at a kibbutz plastics factory years ago, we made sure that the product being shipped to Saudi Arabia was sent in a box marked “Made in Jordan.”

Americans’ views of eight important Middle East countries were fairly stable over the past year, after a decade that saw shifts in several of their ratings, a Gallup poll released Tuesday sowed. About seven in 10 Americans view Israel favorably – making Israel the only positively viewed Middle East country of those Gallup tested.

Less than half of the Americans asked view Egypt favorably, and only a third have a favorable view of Saudi Arabia. Less than 20% have a favorable view of the remaining five, including Libya, the Palestinian Authority, Iraq, Syria, and Iran.

These results are based on Gallup’s 2014 World Affairs poll, conducted Feb. 6-9. Gallup’s annual World Affairs poll measures Americans’ views on a variety of foreign policy issues, as well as the favorable and unfavorable images of a number of countries. The poll was initiated in 2001 and is updated each February.

At 13%, Syria’s minimal U.S. favorable rating is similar to what it was a year ago, but down slightly from 2012, continuing a gradual slide in that country’s image since 2005.

However, Iran’s position in American public opinion has been improving, in response to the massive propaganda brainwashing of the media. As the U.S. and other world powers are engaged in high-level talks with Iran over its nuclear program, never mind the results, Gallup finds little change in the overall percentage viewing Iran favorably, remaining near 85%, but there has been a decline in the percentage viewing Iran very unfavorably, now at 42%, down from 52% in 2012.

No doubt about it, fewer Americans fear and hate Iran this year. It makes for a great slogan: Iran – you don’t hate us so much any more.

The poll shows some differences among different age groups’ view of the Middle East, with young adults aged 18 to 34 holding somewhat more positive views of some Arab countries than do adults 55 and older. This applies to Libya, Egypt, Iran, Syria, Iraq, and the Palestinian Authority.

It’s also clear that older Americans have more favorable views of Israel, while there is no difference by age in views of Saudi Arabia.

Libya and Egypt, the two “Arab Spring” countries, receive positive evaluations from the youngest Americans. The older folks – not so much.

Egyptian army chief and probable next president, Field Marshal Abdel-Fattah el-Sisi, landed in Moscow Wednesday and is expected to sign up with Russia for a $2 billion arms deal in another move that could diminish American influence over Cairo as well as the entire Middle East.

After the Obama administration openly warned the Egyptian regime last year,it could face cuts in military aid from Washington because of its undemocratic policies, Saudi Arabia stepped into the break to offer help to Egypt.

The United States pooh-poohed the idea that it was losing its clout in Cairo, but Russia now is set to take advantage of Saudi financial aid to Egypt and boost its defense sales and to further erode the Obama administration’s position.

Al-Sisi’s is on his first foreign visit since he replaced ousted president Mohammed Morsi. Russia’s foreign and defense ministers visit Cairo last November.

Russia has become a major thorn in the side of President Barack Obama over Syria and Iran. At the same time, the Arab world is increasingly fed up with the president’s foreign policy. Obama’s “engagement” with Iran has disappointed Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

The former American administrations’ military actions in Iraq and Afghanistan have left behind anarchy, violence and rabid anti-Americanism.

It is no wonder that U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry is willing to go for broke for a deal between Israel and the Palestinian Authority. That would restore America’s shine to some extent, but if a deal is made, which is unlikely, and if it falls apart in the future, which is more than probably, the United States will be in a weaker position in the Middle East.

President Barack Obama will fly to Saudi Arabia next month in an effort to repair a deteriorating relationship following his failure to significantly improve ties in his 2011 trip to Riyadh and in the wake of differences over relations with Egypt, Iran and Syria.

Obama will visit the Vatican on the same junket, as well as the Netherlands, Belgium and Italy.

The White House did not specifically include the Palestinian Authority as being on the agenda of issues the president will discuss with King Abdullah.

White House press secretary Jay Carney tried to make the scheduled visit seem like a routine trip, a “part of regular consultations.” He added, “The president looks forward to discussing with King Abdullah the enduring and strategic ties between the United States and Saudi Arabia as well as ongoing cooperation to advance a range of common interests related to Gulf and regional security, peace in the Middle East, countering violent extremism, and other issues of prosperity and security.”

“Peace in the Middle East” probably refers to much more violent situations than the Palestinian Authority-Israel argument, The Wall Street Journal reported. For starters, there is the Muslim civil war in Syria, with the Sunni sect, backed by Saudi Arabia, against the Iranian-backed Shi’ites.

There is not lack of work for the Obama administration if it wants to get along better with Saudi Arabia, which was extremely unhappy with President Barack Obama’s backing the ouster of Hosni Mubarak, who was replaced by a violent military regime that was succeeded by a violent Muslim Brotherhood regime, which was in turn succeeded by another violent military regime.

Saudi Arabia was upset at Obama’s appeasement of Iran and his about-face on the idea of using military force to help Syrian rebels.

The Obama administration also has lost some influence in Egypt, where Saudi Arabia has stepped in to help the current military regime deal with the crippled economy.

Obama’s visit to Saudi Arabia in 2011 did little to calm the monarchy anger over the American support to get rid of Mubarak, implicitly backing Arab Spring unrest.

Obama called for changes in attitudes in the Middle East, and that is the last thing Saudi officials want to see in its own country.

The United Nations has bowed to pressure from  the United States and Saudi Arabia and has rescinded its unexpected invitation to Iran to attend  the Geneva II  conference for peace in Syria Wednesday.

U.N. Secretary-general Ban Ki-moon reconsidered the invitation after Iran stated refused to back up a previous promise that it would publicly support the creation of a transitional government for Syria.

“Iran, despite assurances made to the secretary-general, has made a disappointing statement,” U.N. spokesman Martin Nesirky said earlier in the day before the decision to rescind.

“The Islamic Republic doesn’t consider the Geneva II conference legitimate if it hinges on accepting the terms of Geneva I,” said Ali Akbar Velayati, senior foreign-policy adviser to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. “We don’t accept Geneva I under any circumstances.”

The sudden changes in preparations for the conference could scuttle the lakes, which are given zero chance of succeeding anyway.

Iran now has made it is clear how much it can be trusted, but that does not mean that President Barack Obama and other members of the P5+1 will understand that Tiran will not live up to its commitments under the agreement for supervising its nuclear development.