Frankly, I’m wondering whether anything like this has ever been done before.  Apparently, a CIA drone killed two U.S. citizens in Yemen, one of whom was Anwar Al-Awlaki, a noted American-born Al Qaeda leader.  They killed him without trial despite the fact that the U.S. Constitution specifically prohibits depriving any citizen of life without due process.  Last I checked, a drone missile wasn’t due process.  They also killed him nowhere near any battlefield on which any U.S. citizen was in jeopardy nor during any war declared by this country against Awlaki’s (Yemen).  Samir Khan, another U.S. citizen, was also killed in the attack.  He was not on any wanted list at all.  His killing is even less defensible.  Now, enemies of the U.S. can argue we’ll kill you just for editing a magazine we don’t like.  As a member of the Charlotte Muslim community said:

“This is a very dangerous road when you go and kill someone like this,” said Ayeb Suleiman, 25, a medical resident. “He was just an editor. He was just writing.”

To be clear, I have no problem with apprehending anyone who organizes or is an accessory to any act of terror against U.S. citizens.  That’s the claim against Awlaki, though there have been absolutely no legal proceedings brought against him in any court, including any in the U.S.  I am fully prepared to see anyone, including Americans, who kill my fellow citizens punished to the full extent of the law.  If the U.S. had evidence it should’ve brought it.

Obama is now calling Awlaki the “director of external operations” for Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, a term no U.S. official has used before.  Until now, the only charges against him were that he was a fiery, gifted orator who detested the U.S. and its role in the Muslim world.  Awlaki was known as being an especial thorn in our side because he philosophically inspired a number of would-be terrorists who attacked us on our soil.  Now, after we’ve killed him and refused to provide any evidence of our claims about his guilt, we’re all of a sudden calling him a terror mastermind.  How convenient.

Even here, the NY Times says it outlines Awlaki’s “ties” to terror attacks, when all they can do is say that attackers listened to tapes of his before they went on a terror spree.  While I would’ve been be willing to see charges brought against him for incitement of such attacks…but killing him?  They certainly couldn’t get the death penalty against him in any real court.  Which is why they sentenced him to death by missile.  I only hope that those who passed this sentence don’t ever suffer the punishment themselves.  They at least deserve a trial before someone metes out such “justice” to them.

If you follow this logic to its chilling conclusion, the next time in U.S. history there is a movement like the Black Panthers or the American Indian Movement, which advocates violence against American targets, the U.S. government will be justified in murdering these future Bobby Seales, Huey Newtons, Leonard Pelletiers and Fred Hamptons without trial.  The only difference is that Obama killed Awlaki in Yemen and not in the U.S. itself.

I also opposed the assassination of Osama bin Laden.  Not only did he deserve a trial to determine his guilt, doing so would’ve raised America in the esteem of the world and further highlighted the value of international law.  As it was, we showed ourselves to be only marginally better than pirates plying the world’s oceans for prey.

We must be fully prepared for other guerrilla groups and nations to do precisely the same thing to our citizens–accuse them of being terrorists and claim the right to summarily execute them wherever they may be found without due process.  Let’s say that Yemen were a country that had the capacity to do this, and was inclined to pursue revenge against the U.S.  What would stop them, now that we’ve set such a precedent?  Alternatively, let’s say that Israel or the U.S. attack Iran and kill Iranians in significant numbers.  What’s to prevent the Iranians from pursuing a revenge terror attack against those who prepared similar attacks on their citizens?  The mullahs will rightly say that they learned their lessons well at the knee of their teacher, Barack Obama.  Who’s to say they’d be wrong?

David Cole writes similarly in the NY Review of Books:

In international law, where reciprocity governs, what is lawful for the goose is lawful for the gander. And when the goose is the United States, it sets a precedent that other countries may well feel warranted in following. Indeed, exploiting the international mandate to fight terrorism that has emerged since the September 11 attacks, Russia has already expanded its definition of terrorists…It may seem fanciful that Russia would have the nerve to use such an authority within the United States—though in the case of Alexsander Litvinenko it appears to have had few qualms about taking extreme measures to kill an individual who had taken refuge in the United Kingdom. But it is not at all fanciful that once the US proclaims such tactics legitimate, other nations might seek to use them against their less powerful neighbors.

…If…we continue to justify such practices in only the vaguest of terms [without offering proof of who we've targeted and why], we should expect other countries to take them up—and almost certainly in ways we will not find to our liking.

Martin Luther King said, inspired by Gandhi, that “an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth” makes us all blind and toothless.  I’m ashamed to say that Barack Obama has turned his back on this wisdom from the roots of the non-violence movement.  Our president thinks an eye for an eye is pretty good counter-terror policy.  And remember, this is the guy who won the Nobel Peace Prize, fer chrissakes!  What a schande that award looks like now.  It goes to show you that you must never bestow an award on someone in the hopes that it will spur them to do the right thing.

I have never heard that it is part of the CIA’s mandate to kill U.S. citizens.  Is it now legal to do what never was legal before the era of Dick Cheney?  Are we going to allow Pres. Obama, a leader we expected to be different from Bush and Cheney, to become them in such an ugly way?

Israel routinely assassinates alleged Palestinian militants in similar acts of state-sponsored terrorism.  Those killings often extend to innocent civilians who are collateral damage from such attacks.  Like the U.S., Israel never offers any evidence of the victims’ guilt other than to claim they organized this or that terror attack &/or were a “ticking bomb.”  No one inside Israel, except the usual (and blessed) human rights NGO suspects,  raises a hand against such murder.  It is accepted pro forma as the price to be paid by a national security state.  Do we in the U.S. want to become that?  Do we want to become renegades from international law as the Israelis are?

Israel’s military, intelligence, and Likud government are delighted with this development.  It further confirms their own draconian approach to national security.  If we become as bad as they are, then they’re not so bad after all, right?

Cole further argues that there are examples of countries who’ve responded differently than either the U.S. or Israel:

As many countries, including Great Britain, Germany, Spain, and, Italy have shown, the fact that organized groups seek to engage in politically motivated violence does not necessitate a military response.

This must stop.  Of course, just as in Israel, neither the courts nor the Congress will lift a finger.  But I think it’s now time to bring a case in an international tribunal against the current and past presidents who both sanctioned such killings (of U.S. citizens).  This must be tested in a fair tribunal.  One cannot be found here in the U.S., unfortunately.  But in order to bring a case before the ICC, we must exhaust the system here first.  So I hope the ACLU, which has denounced this latest killing, will do so.  A rejection by the U.S. courts would set the stage for an appeal to an international tribunal.

I wouldn’t mind seeing those responsible for this killing and Salah Shehadeh’s both answering to justice in the Hague.  They’d be entitled to far more justice than they ever gave any of their victims.

Another misguided claim by Obama and those who embrace such acts of state terror: they don’t “break the back” of the enemy.  They don’t “dismantle” Al Qaeda.  There are always those who will arise to take their place.  Sometimes, those who replace their predecessors are even more competent and lethal than those who came before them.

I am at the breaking point regarding Obama.  I don’t see any way I can vote for him the next time around.  This hurts me because in some ways all the Republican candidates would be worse, some far worse.  But they, unlike Obama, haven’t betrayed their promise and their promises–the ones they made to me and voters like me to be different from the tyrants who preceded them.

Brig. Gen. Avi Benayahu used false identity to enter Britain after Mossad promised not to engage in similar behavior

In its assassination conspiracy against Mahmoud al-Mabouh, the Mossad cloned the legitimate passports of numerous Israeli dual-nationality citizens, among them several from Britain.  As a result, Mossad station chiefs were ejected from several major western capitals.  For the second time in the past twenty years or so (yes, it had done this earlier) Mossad promised the Brits that it wouldn’t abuse its sovereignty in the future.

Now Defense News brings word that an Israeli general has done almost precisely that, only a few months after the promise was made to Britain.  The IDF’s chief spokesperson, Brig. Gen. Avi Benayahu traveled to  England a few weeks ago in secret.  He used a false name and (apparently) false papers to do so:

Q. EVEN IN FRIENDLY COUNTRIES LIKE BRITAIN, WHERE SOLDIERS ARE FIGHTING TERROR AT HOME AND ABROAD, YOU AND OTHER IDF OFFICERS ARE THREATENED WITH MASS PROTESTS AND EVEN ARREST WARRANTS. WHY?

A. It’s true. In my last visit to London, I had to assume a false name because well-funded anti-Israel activists are exploiting universal jurisdiction powers to wage lawfare against us.

I’d like some of my British readers to query Whitehall about whether its customary for generals of foreign militaries to use fake IDs to enter their country.  Or did British authorities participate in this fiction?  I know if I were a foreign minister I wouldn’t take too kindly to such shenanigans especially given Israel’s predilection for engaging in such fraud on a regular basis.

Benayahu is trying to wriggle out of his predicament by claiming that his security detail directed him to engage in such fraud.  Further, in defending his behavior he attacked European nations like Britain which allow the issuance of warrants for the arrest of Israeli leaders on charges of war crimes.  He made this espeically inflammatory statement in a Yediot Achronot interview:

It’s absurd.  Britain and other European countries are no less concerned about terror than we.  Their leaders understand that he who feeds the radical Islamist snake will get bitten by it.

I’m wondering what an Islamic snake looks like and what it has to do with anything.  And why is issuing an arrest warrant against an Israeli general or defense minister “feeding the Islamist serpent?”  Israel’s problems are not with radical Islamists, but with Palestinian nationalists.  Despite all its attempts to raise the specter of Al Qaeda in Gaza, Israel would be hard-pressed to argue that it invaded Lebanon or Gaza in order to prevent Al Qaeda from taking over Palestine or Lebanon.  Besides, this is just a rhetorical smokescreen to divert attention from Benayahu’s own act of duplicity.

Frankly, I don’t care what his reason for such behavior is.  Other Israeli leaders have refused to travel to Britain for fear of arrest, why does Benayahu earn a right they don’t, to do so using a fraudulent passport and identity?

The interview also reveals other views toward the social networking revolution that are diametrically opposed to the prevailing wisdom.  Benayahu frets that social media pose threats to “operational security” in urban areas (like Gaza), presumably because Palestinian victims can report on the location of Israeli forces.  Perhaps this is why Gazans using cell phones were murdered during Cast Lead.

If you listen to this passage without know who said it, you might think it was Hosni Mubarahk or Muammar Qaddafi speaking:

Even more disturbing is the fact that anyone with a 3.5-generation camera and Internet access can outreach mainstream media to disseminate lies, distortions and calls for unlawful action. It’s ironic that technology developed in the West can be co-opted to serve the interests of decidedly anti-Western, anti-democratic forces.

What he means to say is that Palestinians (a number of whom were provided video cameras by B’Tselem to record IDF abuse) may use digital media to expose the crimes and injustices of Israel.  Can anyone think of a single instance in which cameras or internet access was used during the Arab democratic revolts of the past month to “serve the interests of anti-western, anti-democratic forces??”

The interview is really a flackery masterpiece of its kind.  The interviewer asks him generally probing questions and he replies without addressing the questions at all.  Instead, he makes whatever point he wishes even if it has little or nothing to do with what he’s been asked.  I recently wrote a post about Benayahu in which I expressed strong negative views about him.  This was before I’d read a full interview with him.  Now I find myself even more disgusted.  One of my Israeli readers who is a retired IDF officer told me he knew Benayahu and that if I did I’d like him.  Not on your life.  In fact, the thought crossed my mind, given Benayahu’s announced plans to employ IDF internet geeks to expound pro-Israel hasbara online, thay my interlocutor might be Benayahu himself.  But I’m afraid that the honorary general (whose rank was as well earned as “Colonel” Sanders), has bigger media fish to fry than me.

Many in the English-speaking world think Mark Regev is the most mendacious, oily IDF press representative.  That’s because they haven’t read enough of Benayahu.  He even has the chutzpah to tell the reporter interviewing him that as long as he’s “wearing the uniform” he’ll never express a political opinion!

Demonstrators raise their shoes in disgust during Mubarak's speech (Dylan Martinez/Reuters)

In the aftermath of Mubarak’s extraplanetary speech in which he seemed to be living in a parallel Egyptian universe to the one inhabited by the hundreds of thousands in Tahrir Square and elsewhere in Egypt, the Father of the People was playing a game of chicken with the nation as the prize.  There are three players: Mubarak, the army, and the people.  The people will clearly not blink first.  They are in it till the end.  But Mubarak appears to be daring the army to intervene and expects that they won’t have the nerve to do so.  If the army does blink first, then what will happen?  Mubarak and Suleiman either unleash their thugs and secret police and thousands die in order to suppress the revolution.  Or perhaps the army joins in and even more die.

Alternatively, suppose the army refuses to blink, calls Mubarak’s bluff and stages a soft coup in order to allow the revolution to move forward toward its democratic destiny.  This is what Mohammed al Baradei has summoned it to do.  But one has to wonder why it hasn’t done so already?  Perhaps division in the ranks between old guard senior officers loyal to their patrons who got them this far, and the younger junior officers who still retain a connection to the street?

You can tell something extraordinary is going on when even I come to admire words from the pen of Tom Friedman.  Even Tom the plutocrat understands the moment we are living and he has returned to his roots as a terrific interpreter of events which he once was so long ago before he was co-opted and bought by the power elites.  Even Tom has this terrific comment about Mubarak’s out of touchness:

This man is staggeringly out of touch with what is happening inside his country. This is Rip Van Winkle meets Facebook.

At any rate, something will have to give.  Tomorrow will clearly dawn on a nation even more firmly resolved to rid itself of this pestilence.  I only hope the protesters will retain their remarkable sense of discipline.  Just watching their resolve, their steadfastness, their restraint in the face of violent provocation–how can anyone speak of a nation that would descend into chaos if Mubarak falls?  For shame on the autocrats of Saudi Arabia, Israel, the Gulf States and elsewhere who raise the specter of Islamist bloodbaths as if Egypt was in the throes of the Al Qaeda.  Anyone spending a few minutes watching Al Jazeera’s live video feed can see that these are a disciplined people, one that has earned its revolution.  There is no looting.  There are no acts of revenge.  There is are no acts of religious intolerance.

If we can, we must not let anyone take it away from them.

Over the past three weeks I’ve often written here in fear that external powers or events might wrest the revolution from the hands of the Egyptian people.  That Obama might stand aside at a critical moment, that Bibi might insert his strident, irrelevant rhetoric and muddy the waters, that the army or Mubarak might steal the show.  But over the past 24 hours I’ve come to realize that no one can take this victory away from the people.  It is their achievement and they will not be denied.  Whatever happens they will have won and they very likely will come out of this with a result something like what they are now demanding.  It is only a question of how and when, but no longer a question of “if.”

Egyptian Muslims and Copts parade through Tahrir Square together (Amel Pain/EPA)

Bibi Netanyahu is shreying about the Muslim Brotherhood in terms redolent of Al Qaeda.  Mubarak uses the Brotherhood and a combination of impending chaos and religious holy war as the reason he can’t relinquish power.  Obama seems to have drunk the Kool Aid as well.  So I want to know: what the hell are they worried about?  Look at this picture and explain to me, what the hell they’re all worried about.

NY Times report says that yesterday while Egyptian Muslims prayed in the Square, Copts stood guard protecting them.  And today it was the Copts turn to hold Mass while Muslims stood guard.

Look people, you can harbor fears of Al Qaeda on the Nile all you want, but don’t pretend it has anything to do with reality.  Of course, in the fervor of the moment many wonderful things happen that can later be undone.  But I think the spirit represented in this image will hold true if Mubarak, Suleiman, Obama, Clinton and Netanyahu just would get out of the way and let this thing happen the way it should.

Egypt is a nation in which religions have co-existed for thousands of years.  Why can’t they coexist with a change of government there?

Interestingly, we Jews were enslaved by a few Egyptian Pharaohs way back.  We won our freedom and went our separate ways.  But the Pharaohs remained and found others to enslave.  Now the Egyptian people themselves are enslaved and seek to break the yoke of a latter-day Pharoah.

Let the Egyptian people decide how to run their country.  No more backroom deals.

The Obama administration seemed determined Wednesday to put as much daylight as possible between Mr. Obama and Mr. Mubarak, once considered an unshakable American supporter in a tumultuous region, with Mr. Gibbs once again raising the specter of a cutoff of American aid to the Mubarak government if the Egyptian president failed to bend.

–N.Y. Times

Pro-Mubarak thugs face off against anti-government protesters (Ben Curtis/AP)

If Hosni Mubarak and his thugs want to terrorize the people of Egypt why should U.S. citizens pay for it? We give over $1-billion every year that goes directly to the Egyptian military. The same military which disappeared from the streets conveniently just before Mubarak’s paid thugs rampaged through Tahrir Square on camels and horses trampling peaceful demonstrators underfoot, not to mention shootings which left at least three dead today and hundreds wounded.

If the Egyptian military and those who command it can’t control their country and do their jobs, what are we paying them for? Just today, Robert Gibbs said that the administration would consider freezing aid as a next step. Well the time has come for next steps. Cut the aid now. There is only one way to get to a dictator or an alcoholic: cut him off.

Until Mubarak goes and a transitional government is appointed leading to free, fair elections for a new president and parliament, Egypt shouldn’t get another dime.  This is a no-brainer.  It should be implemented right now.  There are no down sides that I can see, and it will save Egyptian lives plus win a few points in the Arab world, where we’re sorely in need of them.  If we don’t get on the right side of history here, history will shunt us aside and look for those who were and give them the credit and glory.

The Times story also pointed to another important consideration for U.S. policy:

“There’s part of this that’s dangerous to Al Qaeda,” said Juan Zarate of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, who was a top counterterrorism official during George W. Bush’s administration. “If the street protests lead to a peaceful, pluralistic transition, that does huge damage to the Al Qaeda narrative,” he said.

This goes with what I wrote yesterday, a Turkish-style government in Egypt with a strong Islamist component would run completely counter to the Al Qaeda narrative.  It would show both the Arab and western worlds that it is possible for Muslim nations to have free elections, tolerate diversity including religious diversity (Egypt has an important Coptic community), and still integrate Islam into the political mix.

The Israel lobby is now trying to plant its own message into the mix.  It runs like this: if you desert Mubarak, instead of mullahs in Teheran you’ll get them in Tahrir as well.  Here is Bibi himself on that note:

“Our real fear is of a situation that could develop … and which has already developed in several countries including Iran itself — repressive regimes of radical Islam,” said Netanyahu.

Netanyahu continued, adding that although the protests may not be motivated by religious extremism, “in a situation of chaos, an organized Islamist body can seize control of a country. It happened in Iran. It happened in other instances”.

There is almost nothing in common between Iran in 1979 and Egypt in 2011.  There is no charismatic Islamist leader like Ayatollah Khomeini waiting to take power from the Shah.  In fact, while the Muslim Brotherhood is a formidable force inside Egypt, so far it has remained very much behind the scenes of the current wave of unrest.  It has put forward no leaders who could rally the masses for an Islamic republic like the one that captured Iran.  As I wrote above, the comparison you will never hear from the Lobby is to Turkey, which if there is any comparison to be made appears more reasonable.

Tom Friedman quotes this unintentionally ironic comment from Israeli political analyst Mark Heller:

“Everything that once anchored our world is now unmoored,” remarked Mark Heller, a Tel Aviv University strategist. “And it is happening right at a moment when nuclearization of the region hangs in the air.”

Really.  I thought nuclearization of the region hung in the air around 1967 when Israel first is rumored to have put together a crude doomsday nuclear bomb to use if the Arabs overwhelming Israel’s defenses.  Why when Iran may (or may not) be contemplating a nuclear weapon, is that when the danger of nuclearization suddenly hangs in the air?  Might there be just a whiff of hypocrisy hanging in the air as well?

Tom as usual just plain gets under my skin with his patronizing barely concealed racist ignorance against the Arab world:

What the turmoil in Egypt also demonstrates is how much Israel is surrounded by a huge population of young Arabs and Muslims who have been living outside of history — insulated by oil and autocracy from the great global trends. But that’s over.

…Today, I believe President Obama should put his own peace plan on the table, bridging the Israeli and Palestinian positions, and demand that the two sides negotiate on it without any preconditions. It is vital for Israel’s future — at a time when there is already a global campaign to delegitimize the Jewish state — that it disentangle itself from the Arabs’ story as much as possible. There is a huge storm coming, Israel. Get out of the way.

This is the very Orientalist nonsense Edward Said railed against and rightly so.  Who says Arabs are living outside history?  Where are they living: on Mars?  What are they if not human beings?  Arabs are not insulated from global trends.  In fact, the Middle East is one HUGE global trend.  For Friedman to say this indicates this it is HE who is living outside global trends and history.

Further, his notion that Israel must “disentangle” itself the Arabs’ story is precisely wrong.  Israel, unless it wants to move somewhere north of Midtown (Manhattan that is) will be deeply entangled with the Middle East and those who live there.  To say Israel should separate itself indicates Israel should live as if it’s somewhere else or perhaps even another planet.

Does Tom forget the Zionist mantra that the Jewish nationalist movement arose to return Jews to the world and to history from which they’d been alienated by centuries of impoverishment, dispossession and anti-Semitism?  It seems to me that the N.Y. Times pundit is calling for a return to Jews as mandarins, as Other, as outside of history, or at least Middle Eastern history.  This would not just be foolish and divorced from reality, it would also be disastrous for Israel, a small nation dependent on the kindness of allies for its long-term existence.  Israel needs to make friends, not lose them.  It needs to engage with the Middle East, not disengage.

The more and longer I read Tom Friedman, the more unmoored he appears to be intellectually and politically from anything resembling reasonableness or clarity.

I’ve created a new Facebook group which I hope you’ll join and tell your friends about. 1,000 members might send a message to an overly cautious Barack Obama to act.

For up to the minute blogging of the Egyptian Revolution, you can follow UW Prof. Ellis Goldberg’s NisralNasr, and his daily reports on KUOW every afternoon direct from Cairo, where he’s fortuitously on sabbatical (how many times in an academic’s life does something like this happen to them?).

IDF murdered Army of Islam leader Mohammed al-Nimnim (AP)

The IDF teamed up with the Shin Bet to execute a Gaza militant, Mohammed al-Nimnim (or Nemnem), thought to be a leader of a shadowy group Army of Islam.  The group has engaged in activities like kidnapping which haven’t always sat well with the Hamas rulers of the enclave.  Army of Islam played a role in capturing Gilad Shalit and BBC correspondent Alan Johnston.  Israel erroneously describes the group as the local Gaza affiliate of Al Qaeda.  It’s more likely that it is influenced by the Islamist terror group, but certainly not affiliated with it.  This AP story sums up the divergence:

An [IDF] military statement asserted that the Army of Islam is tied to Al-Qaeda and world jihad, but Palestinians said it does not have a direct, operational connection with Osama Bin Laden’s group.

Nimnim was murdered by an airstrike on his car, though some Palestinian security sources (likely the PA, which would like to make Hamas look bad) claimed it was a car bomb.  This seems highly unlikely as it would mean that Israel would’ve had to smuggle it into Gaza and somehow place it in the target vehicle–almost an impossibility.

What is intriguing is the IDF’s tacit claim that the U.S. government approved this killing because Army of Islam and specifically Nimnim targeted Americans in the Sinai:

Asked whether Israel had coordinated the hit on Mohammed Nimnim, a commander in the Army of Islam group, with its American ally, the spokesman did not respond.

She did, however, refer to the tight relationship between the army and the U.S.

“Without getting specifically into more details, I can tell you there is very good cooperation between us and the Americans,” she said.

“We have an ongoing relationship with the Americans, as well as with other forces, and from time to time we pass on information as with other sources,” she said.

Sounds like a non-denial denial to me.

The reporter’s question to the press flack was motivated by this statement on the IDF website:

Lately, the senior operative [Nimnim] was involved in planning several attacks on Israeli and American targets in Sinai with the cooperation of Hamas elements in Gaza.

Now, ain’t that interesting.  What Israeli targets are there in Sinai?  Maybe tourists, though it’s doubtful.  The only potential American target there I can think of is an international observer group which contains American personnel.  It was targeted for attack once in 2006.

Since Israel has released no further information about Nimnim’s alleged crimes except the impossibly vague claim he was a “ticking bomb,” I find the entire story of U.S. approval far too convenient to be credible.  Of course, Israel wants to appear to be doing the U.S.’ bidding in attacking terror targets that the former wishes to liquidate.  Nothing relieves the pressure of charges of international war crimes than knowing the president of the U.S. has “approved this message” to Palestinian terrorists.  Israel only wishes it could say the same of the al-Mabouh hit, which really would’ve taken the heat off the international outcry that followed that debacle.

Debka goes even farther and delusionally claims the victim was killed by a missile fired from a U.S. warship (sorry I can’t stomach increasing their Google rank with a link)!  How do they know?  Their “exclusive counter terror sources” like the birdie, told ‘em so.  Now, that would be handy for those Shabak and IDF assassins wouldn’t it, to have full U.S. cover for their machinations.  I also especially liked the way Debka knows that Israel didn’t assassinate Nimnim: because “witnesses” (where did Debka find witnesses in Gaza to speak to? you see why I call them delusional?) told them they saw no Israeli aircraft in the skies.

This is also an IDF reminder to the world and U.S. that the Obama administration has its own “hit” parade going in which it has targeted an American citizen for assassination.  The IDF wants everyone to know that it is only doing what the world’s greatest superpower arrogates unto itself the right to do.  It does tend to undercut the argument that targeted killings are a gross violation of international law when the U.S. partakes in the tactic too.  Unless of course, you plan on targeting the U.S. president and defense secretary for war crimes charges.

I for one am thankful that a coalition of U.S. human rights groups have challenged the Obama order approving the killing of the Yemeni-American jihadist, al-Alwaki.  I hope the courts will strike down this monstrous affront on the Constitution and human rights.

I have queried several U.S. reporters asking them to secure a response from either the White House or State Department about the Israeli claim.  Perhaps word from the U.S. government has already trickled back to Israel leading the IDF to issue this outright denial:

An Israel Defense Forces spokeswoman said Thursday that she had been completely misquoted in a reported that hinted the army’s assassination of a Islamist militant leader in Gaza had been cleared in advance with Washington.

“I did not, in any way, say that,” said the spokesman.

Well, you were given a chance to deny it originally and you didn’t.

If you ask me, it’s much more likely that this murder was payback for the capture of Gilad Shalit since Army of Islam played an instrumental role in that action.

Alona Avraham Israeli 9/11 victim

I don’t know why Pammy Geller, Robert Spencer, David Horowitz and Joyce Chernick didn’t dig up the Avraham family earlier.  It would be yet more anti-Muslim racist propaganda in their Jewish jihad against the Park51 Islamic center in downtown Manhattan.  Ynetnews reports that the Israeli family of Alona Avraham, who died on one of the planes that crashed into the Twin Towers, decries the Islamic project:

“We intend to address the US government together about this. My position is clear – there shouldn’t be any mosque there. It cannot happen. I don’t understand this government, they invest millions into catching (Osama) Bin Laden but on the other hand they allow this mosque. It’s like bringing a pig into a holy place.”

She firmly rejects reports that the Islamic community center is intended to bring religions closer. “All that’s just nonsense,” she says.

It’s easy to see the racism, ignorance and fear in such a statement.  But I also have to acknowledge the real pain of this family who lost a loved one in what they have come to see as a holy war between Jew and Muslim.  Not a small amount of this racism derives from Israeli Jewish attitudes toward Palestinians and Arabs in general.  In their minds, there can never be peace.  Arabs are eternal sworn enemies of Israel and the Jewish people, etc., etc.  9/11 only confirmed such preexisting attitudes.

Despite this, we must differentiate between very real suffering and the hateful attitudes that suffering has produced.  We affirm the pain, but reject the hate.  We must see that this hate is a huge obstacle in finding a resolution of the Israeli-Arab conflict.  I don’t know whether most Israelis are capable of seeing this and rejecting the odious statements by this family.  Perhaps some day they will if we put a mirror up to their hate and force them to look at it.

Barack Obama clearly is a born teacher.  In fact, in some ways he may be a far better teacher than president.  The proof is in this civics lesson he taught at today’s press conference, where he answered a question about the wisdom of building a mosque (known as Cordoba House) near Ground Zero, and the wisdom of moving it:

…There’s no doubt that when someone goes out of their way to be provocative in ways that we know can inflame the passions of over a billion Muslims around the world, at a time when we’ve got our troops in a lot of Muslim countries, that’s a problem.  And it has made life a lot more difficult for our men and women in uniform who already have a very difficult job.

With respect to the mosque in New York…this country stands for the proposition that all men and women…have certain inalienable rights — one of those inalienable rights is to practice their religion freely. And what that means is that if you could build a church on a site, you could build a synagogue on a site, if you could build a Hindu temple on a site, then you should be able to build a mosque on the site.

Now, I recognize the extraordinary sensitivities around 9/11.  I’ve met with families of 9/11 victims in the past.  I can only imagine the continuing pain and anguish and sense of loss that they may go through.  And tomorrow we as Americans are going to be joining them in prayer and remembrance.  But I go back to what I said earlier:  We are not at war against Islam.  We are at war against terrorist organizations that have distorted Islam or falsely used the banner of Islam to engage in their destructive acts.

And we’ve got to be clear about that.  We’ve got to be clear about that because if we’re going to…successfully reduce the terrorist threat, then we need all the allies we can get.  The folks who are most interested in a war between the United States or the West and Islam are al Qaeda.  That’s what they’ve been banking on.

And fortunately, the overwhelming majority of Muslims around the world are peace-loving, are interested in the same things that you and I are interested in:  How do I make sure I can get a good job?  How can I make sure that my kids get a decent education?  How can I make sure I’m safe?  How can I improve my lot in life?  And so they have rejected this violent ideology for the most part — overwhelmingly.

And so from a national security interest, we want to be clear about who the enemy is here.  It’s a handful, a tiny minority of people who are engaging in horrific acts, and have killed Muslims more than anybody else.

The other reason it’s important…is because we’ve got millions of Muslim Americans, our fellow citizens, in this country.  They’re going to school with our kids.  They’re our neighbors.  They’re our friends.  They’re our coworkers.  And when we start acting as if their religion is somehow offensive, what are we saying to them?

I’ve got Muslims who are fighting in Afghanistan in the uniform of the United States armed services. They’re out there putting their lives on the line for us.  And we’ve got to make sure that we are crystal-clear for our sakes and their sakes they are Americans and we honor their service.  And part of honoring their service is making sure that they understand that we don’t differentiate between them and us.  It’s just us.

And that is a principle that I think is going to be very important for us to sustain.  And I think tomorrow is an excellent time for us to reflect on that.

If only his policies and administration ran on principles this clear, he’d undoubtedly be another Lincoln.

After a very shaky start in which its news reporting on the Islamic center was quite negative–highlighting, for example, Abe Foxman’s opposition as if it were a decisive blow to the project and polls finding that New Yorkers wanted it moved–today the Times published numerous highly sympathetic stories about the loss of Muslim life on 9/11, and the loony-tunes nature of Pastor Jones and those Islamophobes weighing in against it.  It also published an impassioned op-ed by Imam Rauf himself.  Good to see that it’s coming around slowly.  They even published a story on rabbis who were contemplating whether or not to address the subject in their Rosh Hashana sermons.  It has not, though, yet followed up on Politico’s reporting about the funding behind the attacks on the Park51 project from right-wing American Jews like Joyce Chernick. It should.