November « 2011 « Tikun Olam-תיקון עולם: Make the World a Better Place

Archive for November, 2011

IAEA’s Report on Iranian Nuclear Program

Tuesday, November 8th, 2011

Now the dreaded “smoking gun” is out–the IAEA report proving beyond a shadow of a doubt that it’s possible that Iran is pursuing various research initiatives which a country on the road to a nuclear device might undertake (gotcha Ayatollah!). It’s clear and beyond a shadow of a doubt that Iran plans to incinerate the entire universe and that it must be stopped at all costs. I’d suggest a world alliance of all like-minded, sensible, decent and Christian nations (we’ll let Israel in because it hates Muslims as much as we do) to wage war to the death with the heathen fiends.

This must be a no holds barred affair, a struggle to the death between good and evil. We must win whatever it takes. The stakes are high. For if they win the world as we know it ceases to exist. We’ll all be forced to convert to Islam and marry four wives (at least). And we’ll be speaking that horrid gibberish they speak over there.

Those Israelis know a thing or two about Holocausts and there’s no question in any red blooded white man’s mind that those mullahs are just itchin’ to follow in Adolf’s footsteps. So saddle up those F-16s, we’re goin’ to war baby. Just like Slim Pickens in Dr. Strangelove. Our cause is just. Their’s is barbarism.

This is typical of the Nancy-boy stuff going around the internet from those peacenik types who would sap our precious bodily fluids and prevent us from doing what must be done about Iran. Imagine she even has the chutzpah to say:

…The report…does not contain a “smoking gun.”

Let’s not forget also that impeccable journalism offered by Yossi Melman in Haaretz breathlessly and preposterously claiming:

Iran has miniaturized a nuclear warhead on a Shihab missile and tested it.

NOTE: After I read this passage and quoted it here, Haaretz edited this sentence and added the phrase “experimented with.”

Unspecified “western sources” told him Iran is “months away” from assembling its first nuclear weapon. Muhammad Sahimi tells me that they’ve been making that claim for years.

Melman provides useful background that underscores the slanted nature of the report. He notes that Israeli intelligence agencies figured heavily (though he doesn’t use that term) in the evidence used to produce the report:

One can assume, and read into foreign reports that the Israeli intelligence agencies – the Mossad and the IDF’s Aman (military intelligence) – also contributed their share of the evidence.

Melman also confirms that the IAEA chief, Yukio Amano is a creature of the U.S. and Israel:

Iran is right about one thing: Amano is backed by the West and especially the U.S.

And here, in all seriousness, is Melman’s justification if Israel does decide to go to war:

The fact that up until now Iran has acted rationally doesn’t mean that it won’t change course and press the button for apocalyptic, messianic reasons.

Why, yes actually because Iran has acted rationally (even Melman concedes this because he does possess an element of rationality and pragmatisms as opposed to some of his Israeli intelligence sources) does mean they are likely to act rationally going forward as well. In fact, even Iranians who detest the regime and would celebrate its demise, like Muhammad Sahimi, remind us every chance they get that Iran’s leaders are careful, cautious and pragmatic in weighing their actions. Anyone who paints them as madmen or messianically-inspired is deluding themselves.

In considering Melman’s reporting on this subject, we should remember that he wrote several articles and a glowing profile of his old professor, Raymond Tanter, who now espouses the MEK cause and advocates violent regime change.

What have we learned today from the IAEA? That it appears Iran may be trying to enter that august body of the world’s nuclear powers. A body of which there have been members for the past 65 years. Members who at times seemed on the brink of waging war on each other. Now there are a dozen or so of such members, some of whom are truly nasty specimens. Yet somehow the world hasn’t yet gone up in flames. Somehow we all manage to wake up the next morning and go to work and raise our children. All despite the fact that countries like North Korea and Pakistan possess the wherewithal to blow us to Kingdom Come.

I have news for all of you and horrible news it is. Iran at some point is likely to join the ranks of nuclear nations. And yes, the world will be rendered a slight bit less safe because of this. But will this development add significantly more danger to the world than the accession of Israel, Russia or the U.S. to that club? Not at all.

We don’t have to like Iran’s leaders and many of us don’t. But there are other real reprobates already in this club and we seem to be still muddling along. In short, if the worst happens and Iran goes nuclear, we will survive. This will put a big crimp in Israel’s style, which is why they rail at the prospect. But somehow even they will figure out how to stop worrying and love the bomb. If they don’t go and do something stupid like start WWIII.

Tags: iran-nuclear-program, Islam
Posted in Mideast Peace | 45 Comments »

Ben Gurion University Punishes Professor for Resisting Military Service in Territories, Death Threats Against Peace Now Activist

Tuesday, November 8th, 2011

Graffiti: 'Hagit Ofran RIP'

Ben Gurion University professor Idan Landau, author of the important Israeli blog, Not to Die a Fool, protested a decision by University President Rivka Carmi to punish Landau for refusing to perform his reserve military service in the Occupied Territories. For the week he spent in military prison, the University has docked 50% of his salary.

The professor of foreign languages protested the punitive measure and announced that he no longer found the school to be his “academic home” and would search for an institution that would be more congenial to his values. The faculty association has announced that it will stand behind Landau in protesting his punishment.

This is the same Rivka Carmi who told Neve Gordon that his support for BDS meant he shouldn’t be teaching at Ben Gurion, because it was a fundamentally “Zionist” institution and he had committed “treason.” Naturally Neve remained at the school where he chairs his academic department. Also the same Rivka Carmi who sat by and watched as University trustee, Michael Gross said the world would be better off with Prof. David Newman dead. Newman ran for the position of dean of the humanities and social sciences and won thanks to the bullying and administration’s passivity. Also, the same school which informally offered Assaf Oron a job, only to have Prof. Yisrael David Israel introduce purely political criteria into the hiring process, causing the department to withdraw the offer.

In related news, Peace Now activist, Hagit Ofran suffered the second round of vandalism and death threats at her home from settler brutalists, who scrawled graffiti threatening her life. The faux terrorist buzzed her intercom and told her he’d left a bomb at her doorstep which would explode in 10 minutes. She called the bomb squad and the building was evacuated. A few days earlier, Israeli emergency services were called in a ruse to Peace Now’s Jerusalem office. Naturally, the police seem to have lost the ability to do their jobs and find and arrest suspects. Funny thing how that happens when the victims are Palestinian or Jewish peace activists.

Posted in Mideast Peace | 17 Comments »

Bibitours: Overseas Trips Involved 30 Knesset Ethics Violations

Tuesday, November 8th, 2011

Bibi and Sara Netanyahu a taste for the high-life and traveling first-class

I’ve now watched three of Raviv Drucker’s video reports on the budding Bibitours scandal (this is the entire list of Drucker stories on the affair–Hebrew only) and plan to summarize some of it here. Perhaps the motto of this scandal should be this statement Bibi made on one of his overseas trips: “I never work at the expense ["on the account of" in Hebrew] of the State, I work on behalf of [on account of] the State.” Raviv Drucker’s expose proves otherwise.

In a single two year period (1999-2001), Bibi earned $2-million from speakers fees. This enabled him to move on up to a luxurious Herzliya villa and generally live in the style to which he became accustomed.

Between 1999-2008 Bibi Netanyah and his family took scores of overseas trips which were paid for, at least in part, by private individuals or Jewish advocacy groups. There are explicit ethics rules for ministers and Knesset members to follow in financing these trips. He took scores of such trips and among them Drucker found at least 30 violations of the guidelines.

A member must receive permission to take such trips and report who will be funding them. The trips must be solely for State-related business. He must also report who, if anyone, is joining him and who is funding their trip. In some cases, Bibi got proper permission, in some he didn’t. In some cases, he got permission for himself but not for his wife and family. In such cases, the member is supposed to pay out of his own pocket for unapproved family members. On no account, may private individuals or organizations pay for the expenses of someone who hasn’t been approved. This happened multiple times. Further, the expenses of someone who hasn’t been approved are subject to tax as Bibi received a personal benefit from the individual or group. I strongly doubt he paid any such tax.

In a number of cases, Friends of the IDF was listed as the organization paying for a trip when in fact it only paid for part of the trip (the remainder paid for by private donors): another ethics violation. In one case the same group was listed as his sponsor but he did no events on its behalf. In some instances, Bibi received approval for a trip from the Knesset, but included a family vacation funded by the private individual or group. Another violation. On some trips, Bibi did some State business while also cultivating and soliciting political donors: another violation. Though it would be illegal here, imagine Barack Obama jetting to Paris in Air Force One to solicit campaign donations from a French CEO for his next political campaign.

Sara Netanyahu was noted for conducting her “official State business” on some of these junkets in Brioni boutiques. After the Knesset refused to approve his wife joining him on a trip to London, billionaire Marc Belzberg (a crony of Michael Milken from the days Drexel Burnham who has been in hot water with federal regulators in the past), paid for Mrs. Netanyahu. Friends of the IDF was supposed to be paying Bibi’s way. They only paid a small portion of the expense. Netanyahu needed Knesset approval for Belzberg to pay for the trip, but didn’t bother to get it.

Bibi once informed the Knesset that a visit to Brussels would be paid for by the Harvard Club. It wasn’t (another violation). Instead, his $20,000 fee was paid for by a Jewish high tech entrepreneur, Benjamin Vanoudenhove. Netanyahu stayed at a castle owned by a prince who was Vanoudenhove’s business partner. The partners at the time were seeking Israeli business investments which Bibi no doubt expedited for them.

A number of the donors who paid for Bibi’s trips benefitted in a material way from their relationship with Bibi. In one case, Larry Mizel, a billionaire Colorado home builder asked for a private dinner with the Israeli leader. He was informed that the price for the dinner was paying for Bibi’s trip, which Mizel dutifully did. The quid pro quo? Mizel’s company, MDC received a State license to explore for natural gas near Hadera a few months after the prime minister’s trip. You can imagine what was discussed at dinner that night.

Arnon Milchan, chairman of the New Regency film company paid for one of Bibi’s New York trips. Another veteran of the Milken junk bond mill at Drexel was Sig Zises, who funded another of Bibi’s stays in the Goldeneh (in more ways than one) Medineh.

Corporate donors gave Bibi virtual free rein: corporate jets, stays at luxurious hotels (the Connaught in London and the Mark in Manhattan averaging $2,500 per night), dinners at the finest restaurants, chauffeured cars, shopping at luxury boutiques, etc. In a number of cases, his hosts made complex arrangements for special trips to cater to the Netanyahus whims, which the latter cancelled at the last-minute. There were tickets for top London shows, trips for the Netanyahu children to see the latest Harry Potter movie.

In at least one case, two different U.S. Jewish charities, Friends of the Ashdod Medical Center and the Jewish Heritage Foundation, each paid for the same plane ticket. If this sort of double-dipping sounds familiar it’s because Ehud Olmert did this routinely as part of a scandal that also involved corrupt travel practices abetted by Rishon Tours, his own travel agency.

The following is my own contribution to research on Bibi’s self-interested double-dealing: a reader reports that during the 2000-01 academic year Bibi delivered two Millenium lectures (see pg. 5) at the Columbia University School of Business. My source reports that billionaire Orthodox pro-Israel donor, Ira Rennert paid the fees for Bibi’s lectures which were in the range of $50,000 each. I haven’t been able to determine who paid for Bibi’s airfare and hotel on these trips. I have little doubt it was Rennert, which would put this deeply controversial business figure into the mix. Rennert owns a palatial Versailles-sized mansion on the Long Island shore and his companies are known for polluting pristine Latin American rain forest and causing cancer in Ecuadorean peasant women (among other achievements).

Drucker discovered that a Spencer Partrich (Michigan and Florida resident and noted real estate developer) offered Bibi use of his corporate jet on numerous occasions and that the former employed at least three of Bibi’s aides while they were working for Bibi. In Britain, Chaim “Poju” Zabludowicz, the chair of Bicom, the UK version of Aipac, funded Bibi’s trips as did a Manchester Jew named Joshua Rowe. Zabludowicz, a major Tory Party donor, also funded the similarly high-flying travels of Adam Werrity, the infamous best friend of former UK defense minister Liam Fox. Werrity traveled the world seeking to foster regime change in Iran.

Donors to Bibi’s political campaigns are permitted to give only $8,000 per person. But a number have given two or three times that much. One of these is Moshe Ronen, vice-president of the World Jewish Congress, who gave $24,000 for the last campaign. A donor may do this legally by enlisting family and business colleagues to donate. We call it bundling here. But it is illegal to reimburse the donor for the contribution. Drucker believes this may’ve happened in the case of some of these contributions.

Several donors who gave to support Bibi’s election bids aren’t listed in the State Controller’s public report, which means the campaign didn’t report the gift properly. In at least one case a donor gave six times as much as the donation listed by the Controller.

Way back in 1999, Larry Cohler Esses reported on the ways in which Israeli politicians got around then new Israeli campaign finance law which prohibit foreign citizens from supporting Israeli election campaigns. Israeli politicians seeking to help American Jews skirt the law establish their own charities, which then invite them to address their U.S. affiliates. Donations are supposed to support the charity’s work in Israel. Often they do. Sometimes they disappear somewhere between Brooklyn and Tel Aviv. The Israeli leaders also use these events to cultivate and prospect for new political donors. And the fundraisers for the Israeli charity often double as political fundraisers.

This is precisely the route that “Rabbi” Morris Talansky took as a fundraiser for an Israeli hospital while also being Ehud Olmert’s chief U.S. bag man. Similarly, Netanyahu has his own U.S. political fixer, Zeev Rubinstein. Rubinstein makes all the arrangements for the family’s visits to America and often brokers Bibi’s time for those seeking to see him. At a dinner whose guests included Rubinstein, Sheldon Adelson and Bibi, the fixer arranged for a fundraising job with Taglit/Birthright, Adleson’s vanity charity project.

For his trouble, Bibi is suing Channel 10 for $800,000 for libelling him and seeking to close the station for non-payment of royalties and licensing fees to the State–unless it fires Drucker. All this after Ronald Lauder, a part owner of Channel 10, compelled the station to issue an apology to Sheldon Adelson for a documentary it ran about his questionable business practices. That’s press freedom-Israel style.

Tags: corruption, israeli-politics
Posted in Mideast Peace | 6 Comments »

Bibitours: Netanyahu Took Millions from Pro-Israel Groups and Donors, Violating Knesset Ethics Rules

Monday, November 7th, 2011

Yesterday, I wrote my first post about a brewing Israeli scandal, Bibitours, which is enveloping the Israeli airwaves and political discourse. I’ve just started watching Raviv Drucker’s video reports which broke the story and it’s potentially huge. As I understand it, Bibi, in the period from when he ended his first prime ministership in 1999 until as late as 2005 (and possibly later) accepted millions of dollars worth of speakers fees, hotel, food, and personal jet travel from a network of pro-Israel groups and individual right-wing donors against the ethics rules of the Knesset. Those rules state that an MK may only speak or travel when it is directly related to his government role and that family members must be paid for directly by the member and not by outside parties. MKs must also receive permission from a Knesset committee for such travel. In addition, any benefit accrued on behalf of family members must be declared on personal tax returns.

According to my understanding of Drucker’s report, Bibi did none of these things. To give you a sense of the scope of the charges, between 1999 and 2001 alone Bibi earned $2-million in speaking fees from pro-Israel groups like Israel Bonds, American Enterprise Institute and BICOM. Hundreds of thousands of dollars in stays at luxury hotels in London, New York, Brussels and elsewhere were paid for on his behalf by corporate fatcats with business interests that could directly benefit from helping a future prime minister. Scores of trips using private jets of these same fatcats. Private cars at the beck and call of Sara Netanyahu and her children. All of this again in direct violation of ethics guidelines and Israeli tax law.

In a number of these cases, the groups themselves were reimbursed for the fees and other expenses by private parties whose names are the cream of the crop of French, U.S. and British Jewish corporate power. Among the names of those who offered Bibi financial carte blanche are Arnon Milchan, the Hollywood powerbroker and Poju Zabludowicz, chairman of BICOM, who helped fund Adam Werrity’s first-class world travel conniving for regime change in Iran. Most of those individuals either refused to discuss their actions or offered limited explanations and were reluctant to talk. Some confessed to memory lapses. Some even tried to hide them in ways that are even more suspicious.

That Bibi is a typically corrupt Israeli politician will come as no surprise to any Israeli. Prime ministers going all the way back to Yitzhak Rabin have been accused of, and toppled because of corruption and bribery charges. So this is nothing new. The question becomes whether the story has legs. What brought down Ehud Olmert was a cascading series of charges which reinforced the corruption charges against him. So far, Drucker has opened a huge reservoir of information and charges which the State Controller has begun to investigate. If these charges stick, then the Israeli media will be forced to delve into them in greater detail, which may lead to even more and newer revelations.

That could threaten Bibi’s hold on power, which is why he’s attempted to get Drucker fired and the government’s chief investigator removed from the case. This story is potentially deadly for him, though it’s still too early to tell how it will play out.

It should be noted that even if Bibi falls it likely will not change the complexion of Israeli politics or make it any easier to resolve the thorny issues of the Israeli-Arab conflict. Anyone who takes his place will almost as bad on these issues as Bibi is or was. But if Bibi does fall, it can only be for the good both for the direct reasons related to the corruption charges and because his is a deeply noxious influence on the Israeli political scene.

Tags: bibi netanyahu, bibitours, corruption
Posted in Mideast Peace | 2 Comments »

Iran Assassinates Key U.S., Israeli Atomic Scientists

Sunday, November 6th, 2011

Imagine instead of the body of Massoud Ali Mohammadi, an Iranian nuclear scientist assassinated by the Mossad, this was J. Robert Oppenheimer, murdered by the NKVD (Reuters)

No, that headline isn’t literally true. But I wanted to reverse reality to give you a sense of what this might feel like to Iranians who see their own best and brightest gunned down in broad daylight by the intelligence services of nations like Israel.

Think for a minute if Stalin had sent his NKVD henchmen to assassinate Edward Teller or J. Robert Oppenheimer. It would’ve precipitated at worst a war and at best a major confrontation between us. Why do you think Russia didn’t do this and the U.S. didn’t kill Russian scientists? Because both of us already had nuclear weapons and knew that neither would swallow such a grave violation of sovereignty and international law. There was a sort of grim deterrence on both sides, which tacitly acknowledged limits to such rogue behavior.

Iran, of course, does not have a nuclear weapon. As such, Israel and the U.S. may toy with it practically at will, without fear of reprisal. This is precisely why Iran may want a bomb so badly. That is, contrary to the claims of Barak and Bibi that Iran wants a bomb to impose hegemony on the Middle East, they want a bomb so they cannot be knocked around in the way they currently are by the Mossad and CIA, who’ve not just assassinated leading scientists, but sabotaged Iran’s nuclear facilities with Stuxnet and Duqu.

I make no claim that either Iran or its nuclear scientists are Boy Scouts. But they are serving their country in the same way that Israeli and U.S. nuclear researchers are serving theirs. Until those two nations tell us they don’t mind their own scientists being gunned down outside their labs, then Iran’s scientists don’t deserve to die no matter what field they’re working on.

Given the current bitter hatred between Iran and the west, I predict that Iran will eventually get the bomb if it wants it. That holds even if Israel attacks Iran. I predict neither Israel nor the world will disintegrate. I predict the world will become a slightly more dangerous place. But the amount of danger an Iranian bomb will add to the world will dwarf the danger Israel’s 400 weapons pose, and the U.S. and Russians’ thousands of warheads.

There might have been a way through negotiation and diplomacy to persuade Iran to forego its nuclear arms program (if it has one). But that option appears to have faded and any opportunity of doing so in the past would seem to be long-gone. The west, to paraphrase Abba Eban, has lost yet another opportunity to lose an opportunity. Of course, a Middle East nuclear free zone might persuade them. But you’d have to persuade Israel to give up all of those warheads it produced at Dimona over all these years. A tall order.

Tags: iran-nuclear-program, mossad
Posted in Mideast Peace | 75 Comments »

Tzinor Layla Interview on Jericho III Missile Launch

Sunday, November 6th, 2011

On the day that Israel launched the newest prototype of the launch vehicle for its Jericho III missile, Channel 10′s Tzinor Layla interviewed me. There was a gag on reporting the exact nature of the missile that was launched. But as long as a foreign reporter said it, it was OK for the Israeli censor. We’re sometimes very useful in that way. To this day, the New York Times and its “ground-breaking” Israel bureau still insist on reporting only that a “missile” was launched, despite the fact that both AP and my own Israeli source have reported that it was a Jericho III. Ground-breaking indeed.

Tags: iran, israel, nuclear-weapons
Posted in Mideast Peace | 1 Comment »

Bibitours Scandal: Offer to Save Israel’s Channel 10 if it Fires Political Reporter

Sunday, November 6th, 2011

Mafia don, Bibi Netanyahu, makes Channel 10 offer it cannot refuse to fire Raviv Drucker (Ohad Romano)

Channel 10′s political reporter, Raviv Drucker, has been a major thorn in the side of Bibi Netanyahu, with his reporting that between his prime ministerships he took multiple foreign trips on the dime of major corporate donors in violation of government ethics guidelines. Bibi was so enraged by the reports that he sued the reporter and Channel 10 for libel. So far, all well and good. Drucker and his employer were only doing what good political reporters are supposed to do: afflict the comfortable.

But there’s a major wrinkle, in that Channel 10, which recently offered an abject apology to Sheldon Adelson for a documentary the station aired that recounted all the sleazy ways in which he operates, owes the state $10 million in royalties and fees. That puts Channel 10 between a rock and a hard place. If it can’t repay the debt by December it is in danger of going under.

That’s where Bibi comes in: the station received word that the State would work with the station to ease the repayment schedule and work out the debt if it fired Drucker or put him on unpaid leave. Bibi’s boys also demanded that the State Controller replace the chief investigator (Hebrew) probing this brewing scandal, which has come to be known as “Bibitours” (in an echo of Ehud Olmert’s travel scandal (Hebrew) that was focussed on his travel agency, Rishon Tours). Though he’s a tough guy, Bibi isn’t yet a tyrant with the ability to muscle anyone out of his way.

The prime minister’s urgent need to punish and dismiss anyone involved with uncovering details of this case indicates Bibi thinks it could be damaging to him. This in turn should make it even more attractive a story to any good investigative journalist left in Israel.

In any other democratic nation, such news would result in a major scandal, heads rolled and possibly a prime minister losing his job. After all, this is outright extortion, the way the mafia works rather than a democratic government. But in Israel, I’m afraid, business as usual. Freedom of the press is a principle honored in the breach, if at all.

Last June, Drucker received Israel’s Sokolov Prize for Journalism (awarded by the city of Tel Aviv) for the excellence of his reporting. This is what mafia chieftains like Bibi do to the best and brightest. They cut them down to size when they are a threat. I suppose Drucker is lucky he doesn’t get run over by a car or murdered by a bomb as they do in some countries.

Here is Drucker’s report:

I should point out that I have an interest in seeing Channel 10 survive, since its show Tzinor Layla features my stories irregularly and not many Israeli media outlets are beating down my doors to include my reporting in their coverage.

Tags: press freedom, sheldon-adelson
Posted in Mideast Peace | 10 Comments »

Cyberwarfare: What Goes Around Comes Around

Sunday, November 6th, 2011

Israel, the land of Stuxnet and Duqu and home of a sophisticated cyberwarfare capability pursued both by Mossad operatives and the IDF’s Unit 8200, has received a small comeuppance. While it was busy figuring ways to penetrate Iran’s computer defenses and sabotage its purported nuclear program, Anonymous decided to (Hebrew ) hack into the websites of various official Israeli government agencies and bring them down:

In a video that was uploaded to YouTube, the group [Anonymous] warns that if the siege on Gaza is maintained, it will have no choice but to go on the attack.

On Sunday, the websites of the IDF, Mossad and the Shin Bet security services were down.

The Hebrew version says the Government of Israel website was also brought down. I must say it seems rather odd that the website of Israel’s intelligence and military, among the most technologically sophisticated at cyberwarfare would have the sorts of vulnerabilities that Anonymous could exploit. Though the intelligence agencies emphasized that their internal sites, where most of their dirty work is done, were not affected.

The government released a statement denying that Anonymous had brought down the sites, feebly claiming that an unspecified ”malfunction” had done so. I got news: malfunctions happen to one site, maybe two, but not all of the major external sites of the Israeli government. That’s not a random failure, but something organized and coordinated like what Anonymous is capable of doing. Haaretz, rather humorously, calls the group “an international cabal,” rather like the Elders of Zion I imagine.

I think this shows that even the most secure nations, intelligence services, and websites can be penetrated and havoc wrought. Which is precisely my argument regarding Stuxnet: if we sow the seeds of sabotage inside Iran Israel will eventually reap the whirlwind inside its own borders. Someone somewhere will figure out how to do what Israel what it has done to others. It’s a version of the old adage: