Palestinian Authority chairman Mahmoud Abbas welcomed the “steadfastness” of so-called “Palestinian refugees” in Syria in a televised speech but forget to mention his concern for them did not extend to helping those who are dying of starvation.

“Marking the 49th anniversary of the Palestinian Revolution … Abbas [said], “We negotiate to reach a fair solution to the refugees’ issue based on the UN Resolution 194 as stated in the Arab Peace Initiative,” the official Palestinian Authority WAFA website reported Wednesday.

“Abbas greeted the ‘steadfastness’ of the Palestinian refugees in Syria, Lebanon and the Diaspora,” it continued

The several million “refugees” living outside of Israel serve as the Arab world’s doomsday demographic weapon to destroy Israel as a Jewish state. If their parents, grandparents, great-grandparents and great-great grandparents had come from any other country, the United Nations would not have designated them as refugees, the United Nations would have considered them to be ordinary citizens who have to get on in life. The international body reserves the “refugee” status for first-generation people who flee or are forced out of a country.

It makes an exception for Arabs from Israel. The approximately 700,000 Arabs, who left on their own free will, fled or were forced out in previous wars, have grown to more than 5 million.

They are under the jurisdiction of UNRWA (U.N. Relief and Works Agency) and almost without exception are denied citizenship in their host countries.

However, their ranks have dwindled lately. At least 15 died from starvation in war-torn Syria since September, the Beirut Daily Star reported recently. UNRWA spokesman Chris Guneess told the French news agency AFP that approximately 20,000 of them in the village of Yarmouk are suffering from limited medical and good supplies.”

On Saturday, WAFA reported that Abbas finally ordered the dispatch of immediate food supplies to the Yarmouk camp. Well, he least that is what said.

That was on December 28, 2013.

And what did Abbas do exactly a year ago in January 2013?

He turned down an Israeli offer to allow “refugees” fleeing Yarmouk to enter Judea and Samaria. Why? Because Israel insisted they could enter only if they gave up their “right of return” to whatever would be left of Israel if Abbas gets his Palestinian Authority state on his terms.

The same week, five of the “refugees” were killed in the civil war.

Abbas’ great concern for the refugees is that they serve their true purpose in his life – pawns to be moved into Tel Aviv, Tzfat (Safed), Tiberias and anywhere else where the Palestinian Authority would have no legal sovereignty under its ”two-state” solution, which is his interim phase towards a one-state solution to the Jewish problem.

Lebanese media reported that Israeli warplanes carried out surveillance flights over southern Lebanon in Tuesday, as Lebanese, United Nations and Israeli officials try to keep the lid on tensions following Sunday night’s murder of Israel soldier Sgt. Shlomi Cohen by a Lebanese soldier.

The Air Force frequently sends planes into Lebanese air space to monitor Hezbollah terrorist activities.

Lebanese media also reported that its army will prosecute the soldier who “acted on his own” when he opened fire on Sgt. Cohen and killed him.

Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati described it as “an isolated incident of limited scope,” but a similar “isolated incident” occurred three years ago when Lebanese soldiers shot and killed an Israeli officer and wounded a soldier.

Israel has long been a nation without a home at the United Nations.  The UN member states are divided up into regions, with committee membership and plum assignments being meted out according to those regions.

Israel, located as it is in the Middle East, geographically falls within the Asian group; that is where every one of its neighbors sits.  But the Islamic countries which constitute the majority of the Asian regional group would not abide having Israel as a member of its group.

The UN accepted this refusal.

That is why Israel has sort of been rotating about in a nether universe, not really in one group, and not really in another. In 2000, Israel became a member of the West European and Others Group (WEOG) but only as a limited member – only in New York, but not in Geneva, where much of the UN official work takes place.

But this week it became official. More than 60 years after becoming a member of the United Nations, Israel will officially join a regional group, with all the rights and privileges of such membership.  Israel will be officially in the West European and Others Group (WEOG) – in Geneva as well as in New York – as of January 1, 2014.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry stated in a press release issued on Dec. 2, that Israeli membership in WEOG in Geneva was “long overdue.” His statement continued:

It goes without saying that at a time when the scourge of global anti-semitism is on the rise, it is more important than ever for Israel to have a strong voice that can be heard everywhere. This is a particularly welcome development as we work to end anti-Israel bias in the UN system. We will continue to speak out for our close ally, Israel, and we will continue to support efforts to normalize Israel’s treatment across the UN system as a full and equal member of the community of nations.

No word on why Islamic member nations of the UN have been permitted to bar Israel, a geographic neighbor, from membership in a regional group, or how that comports with the UN Charter.

Israel may join for the first time a regional group within the United Nations Human Rights Council as part of a deal to improve the U.N. body’s relations with the Jewish state.

The council’s Western European and Others Group (WEOG) is expected to announce that its member states have voted in favor of Israel’s admittance, The Times of Israel reported Friday.

The European states had agreed to welcome Israel into their midst in exchange for the Jewish state’s return to the council and its participation in its Universal Periodic Human Rights Review process.

Israel had left the council a year and a half ago to protest its alleged bias against it.

Since 2006, the council has passed 27 resolutions criticizing Israel and has convened 19 special sessions, six of which were about Israel. Regular sessions feature a permanent agenda item 7, “the human rights situation in Palestine and other occupied Arab territories.”

U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and several Western nations have criticized the council for singling Israel out for criticism.

“Though it’s not yet final, we are hopeful that Israel will very soon be admitted into the Human Rights Council’s Western group, putting an end to a longstanding act of discrimination whereby the Jewish state was the only nation to be excluded from a regional group,” said Hillel Neuer, director of UN Watch, an NGO that monitors the United Nations.

Admission to the group would allow Israel to participate with all other U.N. member states in receiving regular briefings, and would enable it to have a say in the selection of council investigators, Neuer said. “More than anything, admission for Israel would be a sign of equal treatment, removing what has been an ugly stain of bigotry upon the reputation of the U.N.”

However, he added, “it will not detract from the Arab states’ continued ability to target Israel in resolutions, urgent sessions and a special agenda item.”

Earlier this month, senior diplomats from the United States, Britain, Australia, Canada, Germany and France sent a letter to the U.N.’s institutions in Geneva and to the ambassador of Spain, who heads the WEOG, telling them to finally admit Israel into their circle.

On Oct. 29, Israel participated in the council’s so-called Universal Periodic Review, during which it was widely criticized for alleged human rights abuses.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Monday there will always be a job waiting in Israel for a United Nations interpreter caught wondering aloud at an excessive number of anti-Israel resolutions while her microphone was still on.

The interpreter’s remarks came during the Nov. 14 meeting of the United Nations General Assembly’s Fourth Assembly, attended by representatives of all 193 United Nations member states. Nine of the 10 resolutions adopted at the meeting condemned Israel.

“I mean I think when you have five statements, not five, but like a total of 10 resolutions on Israel and Palestine, there’s gotta be something, c’est un peu trop, non? [It’s a bit much, no?] I mean I know, yes, yes, but there’s other really bad s— happening, but no one says anything about the other stuff,” the interpreter said in English in remarks heard live by the delegates.

Amid titters of laughter from the delegates, the committee secretary states, “I understand there was a problem with the interpretation.”

Netanyahu splayed a recording of the remarks at the Cabinet meeting Sunday and said, “I would like to tell this interpreter that she has a job waiting for her in the State of Israel. There are moments that tear the hypocrisy off the unending attacks against us and this brave interpreter did so.”

At today’s session of the United Nations General Assembly, the body to which all 193 member nations belong, it was mostly business as usual. Mostly, but not completely.

Nine resolutions were passed denouncing Israel; none were passed denouncing any other nation on earth.

That’s right, no resolutions were passed condemning Syria for mass slaughter of its citizens, no resolutions were passed condemning North Korea which already executed 80 people this November alone, some merely for possessing a Bible or watching a movie from South Korea. And no resolutions were passed condemning the government of Sudan which has killed more than 170 people since protests erupted there on September 23, with scores more injured.

But here’s something very different that happened at the UN.

Other than the hieroglyphics inserted to protect The Jewish Press readers from harsh language, the following was actually said, out loud, into the ears of every delegate present at the U.N. on Thursday:

“Isn’t it a little weird? There are nine or ten resolutions against Israel. And I know there’s a problem with the Palestinians. But there’s other bad s*#@ going on and they’re spending so much time on this.”

Honesty at the UNGA.

But the person who made that statement, like the innocent child in the children’s book The Emperor’s New Clothes, was not an official, not a representative, not an “important” person at all.  It was an interpreter who said it.

The now famous UN interpreter thought she was simply speaking to the person sitting next to her, she did not realize that she was speaking into a “hot mic,” that is, a microphone that was transmitting her words to everyone in the hall who had their headphones on.

Upon hearing the outburst of laughter from delegates who heard her, the interpreter realized what happened and apologized.

Among the nine resolutions condemning Israel, was one which blamed Israel for its mistreatment of Syrian citizens in the “occupied Golan Heights.”

That’s right, it’s Israel who is mistreating Syrians, not Assad.  And the General Assembly even called on Israel to return the Golan Heights to Assad!  The whole world is calling for Assad to resign because he is unfit to rule, but the global assembly of nations tells Israel to hand over more Syrian citizens for Assad to butcher.

The saying, “in vino veritas” means the truth comes out when wine is imbibed.  In the UN, apparently the only time the truth comes out is when an innocent speaks, thinking no one will hear.

Hillel Neuer, executive director of UN Watch, first revealed the lapse in falsehood at Thursday’s UN meeting.

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu has ordered Housing Minster Uri Ariel to cancel plans for 1,200 housing units that could accommodate thousands of people in the “E-1” area of the city of Maaleh Adumim, located 10 minutes east of Jerusalem and overlooking the Dead Sea.

The cancellation was ordered shortly after the Haaretz newspaper reported that the Housing Ministry has hired an architect to plan construction of residential units for a reported 20,000 people in Maaleh Adumim and in smaller communities in Judea and Samaria. The cancellation affects only E-1 and not other areas.

The Office of the Prime Minister was unusually honest, although inaccurate, in explaining the order to Ariel, a leading Jewish Home minister.

“There is no need to pay international prices for a process that does not have great significance,” it told the Yediot Acharonot newspaper.”

Not of “great significance?” Apparently, the Prime Minister’s office was being sarcastic. More probable, it was being cynical.

E-1 has become a flashing red line for the Palestinian Authority. Building Jewish homes in E-1 would guarantee that the Palestinian Authority would not endanger Israeli security with a contiguous land mass from eastern Jerusalem to Judea and Samaria.

Constant reports that E-1 would “cut off” the Palestinian Authority are patent lies because highways connect Arab villages and cities in all directions.

It has been a political ping-pong ball within Israel, with nationalists such as Ariel fighting tooth and nail for Israel to stand up and take a position that the mostly vacant 4.5 square mile area, which is part of the city of Maaleh Adumim, will be a home for Jews, sooner and not later.

Almost everyone except the Obama administration knows that it will happen. Palestinian Authority chairman Mahmoud Abbas once upon a time may have had little hope that he could prevent E-1 from being developed, but the Obama administration has effectively become his spokesman and is dead set against its development.

The Bush administration gets the first “credit” for opposing construction in E-1 after President George W. Bush came out with his “Roadmap Plan,” which eventually fell off a cliff, a better result than the Oslo Accords that literally exploded in Israel’s collective face.

The saga of E-1 is a prime example of why Israel cannot depend on promises from the United States. President Ronald Reagan once wrote Prime Minister Ariel Sharon a letter that promised recognition of Israel’s right to build there. The promise was not a legal document, and its worth was only as long as Reagan was in office. The Obama adminstration has said it is not committed by the letter.

It was none other than Prime Minister Yitzchak Rabin, whose memory has been defaced into an image of Peace Now, who in 1994 provided Maaleh Adumim Mayor Benny Kashriel with documents to make E-1 an official part of the city.

Nearly 30 years later, all that Israel has built on E-1 is a police station. The Arabs have woken up and have sent Bedouin families to dot the area so they can tell foreign and local reporters how they have been living on the land for centuries.

E-1 has been a toy, or pawn, for Prime Minister Netanyahu.

He has defied nationalists and has toed the line in Washington to keep the bulldozers out of the area.

True, after Abbas went to the United Nations last November to upgrade the PA’s status in the General Assembly to that of a non-member state, Netanyahu unleashed the E-1 pawn and announced plans to build 5,000 residential units there.

So much for hot air.

Not a single house has been built there. In fact, Netanyahu inflicted an unannounced building freeze on almost all of Judea and Samaria until last month, one hour after Israel freed the second batch of terrorists in the four-step program to release 104 murderers in return for the privilege of officially arguing with the Palestinian Authority.

Netanyahu’s policy on E-1 sounds like a broken record.

In January 2009, Netanyahu secretly promised President Barack Obama and then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton that Israel would not build in E-1, according to an Al Jazeera report in 2011.

Netanyahu, of course, denied the report, prompting Maaleh Adumim Mayor Kashriel to demand that the Prime Minister “order the defense minister to submit the master plan for the neighborhood immediately and progress with development on site, as former Prime Minister Ariel Sharon did during his tenure.”

The Carmel Caves in northern Israel were recognized by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) as a heritage site in a special ceremony on the Carmel Wednesday.

The caves were recognized for the exceptional per-historic archaeological findings found in the caves which represent at least 500,000 years of human evolution.

The Carmel Caves join the White City of Tel-Aviv, the Biblical Tels [archaeological sites]of Megiddo, Hazor, Beer Sheba, the Incense Route and Desert Cities in the Negev, the Bahá’i Holy Places in Haifa and the Western Galilee, Masada and the Old City of Acre as the seventh site to be recognized as a UNESCO Heritage site in Israel.

The four caves are situated on the western slopes of the Mount Carmel range. Ninety years of archaeological research have revealed a cultural sequence of unparalleled duration, providing an archive of early human life in southwest Asia. Evidence from numerous Natufian burials and early stone architecture represents the transition from a hunter-gathering lifestyle to agriculture and animal husbandry. The caves have become a key site of the chrono-stratigraphic framework for human evolution in general, and the prehistory of the Levant in particular.