Hatchet Job On Israel By 60 Minutes

ACTION ALERT

From Stand With Us

On Sunday, April 22, CBS` "60 Minutes" ran a shockingly biased episode, "Christians of the Holy Land" by Bob Simon. Even the always diplomatic Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren called the show a "hatchet job" on Israel.  You can watch the program here.

Ambassador Oren was right. Simon only paid lip service to the violent persecution and flight of ancient Christian communities throughout the region which is the real historical tragedy unfolding in the Middle East. Instead, incomprehensibly, he chose to bash Israel, the only Middle Eastern country that protects Christians. The program scapegoated and demonized Israel, distorting reality to blame Israel`s security measures -- the fence and checkpoints -- for the suffering of Palestinian Christians. Simon interviewed biased and sometimes anti-Semitic sources, treating them as legitimate.  He asked leading questions.  He dismissed the real reasons for the plight and flight of Palestinian Christians: persecution by Palestinian Islamists and the Palestinian Authority. His shoddy, irresponsible research produced propaganda, not journalism. This dangerous misinformation stokes anti-Israel prejudice and bigotry, shifting public attention away from the forces that are imperiling the survival of Christian communities in the Palestinian Authority and throughout the region.

Write to CBS executives.  Demand that CBS offer an apology, and give equal time to correct the misinformation and anti-Semitic innuendos.

WRITE, E-MAIL, OR PHONE THE FOLLOWING PEOPLE AND ORGANIZATIONS, AND BE SURE TO BLIND COPY INFO@STANDWITHUS.COM IN YOUR E-MAILS.

"60 Minutes"
Jeffrey Fager - Chairman of CBS News, Executive Producer of 60 Minutes
524 West 57th Street, 9th Floor
New York, NY 10019-2930

E-mail:60m@cbsnews.com
Phone: 212.975.2006

Bill Owens - Executive Editor of "60 Minutes"
E-mail:bowens@cbsnews.com
Phone: 212.975.7685

CBS News

524 W. 57th Street
New York, New York 10019

Feedback E-mail: weekend@cbsnews.com
Phone: (212) 975-3247 (Leave a message at the tone.)

SAMPLE LETTER:

Dear _______,

We were shocked by the shoddy journalism in your April 22nd "60 Minutes" piece, "Christians of the Holy Land." We urge you to run a corrective piece and publicly apologize for the piece`s irresponsible inaccuracies, misrepresentations, and bias. Bob Simon either unwittingly or intentionally promoted hostility toward Israel and anti-Semitic views. In a pattern that he has repeated in the past, Simon interviewed biased sources and treated them as legitimate. He asked leading questions. More disturbing, he ignored and effectively belittled the real threats to beleaguered Christians, which come from rising Islamist persecution throughout the region and in Gaza and the West Bank. Instead, he focused on the one country in the Middle East that firmly protects the rights of Christians. If allowed to stand uncorrected, this program will have misinformed the public and irreparably damaged the reputation of "60 Minutes," which will no longer be considered a reliable news source.

Sincerely,
Your Name

SELECTED DETAILS ON MISLEADING AND ANTI-SEMITIC INNUENDOS IN "CHRISTIANS OF THE HOLY LAND"

Despite the program`s claims, Israel is the only country in the Middle East where Christians` rights are fully protected and where the Christian population has grown instead of declined in the last 64 years.

• Israel`s Christian population grew from 34,000 in 1948 to 154,000 in 2012.
• Israel has fostered a positive environment for Christians, most evidenced by official recognition of 10 Christian denominations and by Israel`s distribution of free Christmas trees every year at Christmas time.

Christians have been emigrating from the Holy Land in a two-century-long trend, not because of Israel and the security policies -- the barrier and checkpoints -- it was forced to implement in just the last 10 years.

• Major emigration occurred in the 19th and early 20th centuries. In some cases, emigrant Christian Palestinian communities grew larger than their communities of origin in the Holy Land.

• During Jordanian control (1948-1967), Jerusalem`s Christian population dropped from 29,000 in 1944 to 11,000 in 1961. In Bethlehem, 75 percent of the population was Christian in 1947; in 1967, the percentage had dropped to 46 percent.

The program interviewed one businessman only to deny the real problem facing Christians: rising hostility and persecution by the Palestinian Authority (PA) and Palestinian Islamist groups. Why didn`t the program mention any of the following?

• The PA declared Islam its official religion, committed to Sharia law, and does not offer civil protection to other religions.  A few weeks ago, the PA declared that the First Baptist Church of Bethlehem is illegitimate.
• Christians in the West Bank have been victims of repeated persecution, violence, and rape. In 2005, Palestinian Christians, including Fr. Pierbattista Pizzaballa, custodian of the Holy Land, documented 93 incidents of abuse and violence by the "Islamic fundamentalist Mafia" against Christians.
• Christians face intimidation, brutality, theft of their property and boycotts of their businesses.
• The PA Ministry of Information reported in 1997 that "any Muslim who [converts to Christianity] or declares becoming an unbeliever is committing a major sin punishable by capital punishment."
• Christian history is denied by Palestinian Muslims, including Yassir Arafat`s and the recently retired Mufti of Jerusalem who claim that the Jewish Temple never existed in Jerusalem.
• The Christian population in Gaza has plummeted from 2,500 to under 1,000 because of persecution by Hamas.

Simon implied that Israel`s policies and the fence are harming the West Bank`s economy.

• In fact, the terrorist war known as the Second Intifada, not Israel, is what harmed the West Bank`s economy.
• As the PA has tried to control terrorist groups, Israel has been able to relax its counter-terrorism measures, bringing the PA extraordinary economic growth of 8 percent per year in the last three years.

Simon interviewed only biased sources -- and did not bother to investigate whether many Christians were afraid to speak out of fear of endangering themselves and their families.

• Simon did not interview clergy and ordinary Christians who might have had the courage to speak up, such as Rev. Steve Khourani of the First Baptist Church of Bethlehem; Samir Qumsiyeh of Bethlehem, director of the Catholic radio Station; or the Christian leaders who signed the 2005 document detailing the PA`s persecution of Christians.

Simon asked leading questions to provoke answers that fit his political agenda.

• Simon asked the woman who lived near the security barrier, "How can you live like this?" The barrier may be unpleasant, but his very question suggested it is unjustifiable and intolerable, and he got the answer he wanted.
• When the woman said she wouldn`t move but would stay and "fight," he never asked what she meant by "fight" or why she didn`t instead say she wanted to seek peaceful coexistence so the barrier could be removed. Instead, he stoked the sense that the barrier was intolerable and her reaction understandable -- even though her anger betrayed why the barrier is necessary.

Simon interviewed and promoted anti-Semitic sources.

• Mitri Raheb, the main pastor he interviewed, is well known for promoting replacement theology which Vatican II condemned as a prime source of anti-Semitism and the Holocaust.
• Raheb delegitimizes Israel and the right of the Jewish state to exist.
• Simon uncritically promoted the Kairos Document though it has been exposed as using high-minded rhetoric to camouflage the authors` sinister motives -- delegitimization of Israel, opposition to the existence of the Jewish state, and calls for boycott and divestment from Israel.

Simon engaged in anti-Semitic innuendos.

• Simon claimed that Israel treats Christians well and wants to promote good Christian-Jewish relations because of the money it gets from Christian tourism.
• In fact, Israel protects Christians, not for tourism dollars -- an anti-Semitic "Shylock" innuendo -- but because those are Israel`s values.

FACT SHEET -- Read more about the persecution of Christians by the Palestinian Authority here.

This is just one part of a greater whole to demonize Israel and the Jewish people.  Both Jeffrey Fager and Bill Owens should change their names to Joseph Goebbels.  For they are just continuing the work that he started.

Call, Write, Boycott the network.  If this is allowed to continue on, the next step will be worse.

Moses Led Muslims out of Egypt

Is the proclamation of Dr. Omar Ja’ara of Al-Najah University in Nablus.  The Arabs not content with teaching American University students lies about Israel, they are now stealing the Bible and Jewish history.  I can see the so-called Mainstream Churches (Methodist, Episcopalian, Presbyterian, Lutherians, etc...) now teaching this new doctrine as Gospel truth.  Why not?  They already teach the Koran as if it is the next New Testament.

Dr. Omar Ja’ara, lecturer at Al-Najah University in Nablus specializing in Israeli affairs, said on Fatah television on February 15 that Moses led the Muslims out of Egypt and that the Exodus was the first instance of ‘Palestinian’ liberation through armed struggle, reported the Palestinian Media Watch.



“We must make clear to the world that David in the Hebrew Bible is not connected to David in the Quran,” he said. “Solomon in the Hebrew Bible is not connected to the Solomon in the Quran and neither is Saul or Joshua son of Nun.

“We have a great leader, Saul, who defeated the nation of the giants and killed Goliath. This is a Muslim victory.

“The Muslims of the Children on Israel went out of Egypt under the leadership of Moses and unfortunately, many researchers deny the Exodus of these oppressed people who were liberated by a great leader like Moses the Muslim, the believing leader, the great Muslim, who was succeeded by Saul, the leader of these Muslims in liberating Palestine,” Ja’ara claimed.

“This was the first Palestinian liberation through armed struggle to liberate Palestine from the nation of giants led by Goliath,” he added. “This is our logic and this is our culture.“

Source

Muhammad the Pedophile was born in 570 CE and died 632 CE.  The events of the Exodus occurred in 1450 BCE.  Over 2000 years BEFORE Muhammad was born.  In fact everyone has the story wrong.  The true story of the Exodus Out Of Egypt is this:

A young boy returned home from Hebrew school, washed his hands and sat down to dinner.

His father asked him what he learned that day in school.

The boy replied that the Rabbi told his class the most amazing story of how the Jews were rescued from the Land of Egypt and brought to the Land of Israel.

His father smiled and asked his son to relate the story the Rabbi told them.

"Sure Dad," the boy said. "Now this story happened a long time ago, before the time of CNN. Before the time of computers, and cell phones. Before even TV. I think it was in the 1920s or so it happened.

"Egypt was ruled by this guy named Pharaoh. I think it means "Nasty Egyptian". And we Jews were his slaves. We didn't like being slaves and prayed to G-d to set us free. G-d heard our prayers and sent us a miracle.

"G-d sent the IDF back in time to rescue the Children of Israel (I think they rescued the parents too.). The Commandos diverted the Egyptian Army while the Children and their parents fled to the Red Sea (It was red because G-d turned the water to blood like in Zombie Killers 3.). There the IDF built Pontoon bridges across the Red Sea for the people to go across. When the Egypt Army tried to follow, the IDF blew up the bridges.

"Then this guy named Moshe Dayan (He is the head of the IDF, I think. Rabbi said he was G-d's greatest profits.) lead the Children of Israel (and their parents) to Mount Sinai where Moshe lays down the law, destroys the Golden Calf and leads them to Israel.

"But it took them 40 years because nobody had a GPS and Moshe would not ask for directions."

His father had a look upon his face that was a cross between total astonishment and WTF. "Is this what the Rabbi taught you?"

"No Dad," the boy said. "But you wouldn't believe the crazy story he did tell."

Source

The Miracle of the Exodus cannot be denied.  G-d rescued the People of Israel, not the Muslims (who did not exist), not the Canaanites, Moabites, or the Egyptians.  It was to Moses, the leader of the Hebrews, that G-d gave the Ten Commandments and Torah to.  If G-d had given the Torah to Muhammad, where is it?  Why is the Islamic faith so hateful, so violent?

The Passover narrative is a Jewish one.  Moses, with the help of G-d, brought the Children of Israel (and their parents) out of bondage in Egypt and into freedom in the Land of Israel.

How Stupid Are Anti-Semites?

(From Wikipedia)

On December 10, 1868, the first traffic lights were installed outside the British Houses of Parliament in London, by the railway engineer J. P. Knight. They resembled railway signals of the time, with semaphore arms and red and green gas lamps for night use. The gas lantern was turned with a lever at its base so that the appropriate light faced traffic. Unfortunately, it exploded on 2 January 1869, injuring or killing the policeman who was operating it.

The modern electric traffic light is an American invention. As early as 1912 in Salt Lake City, Utah, policeman Lester Wire invented the first red-green electric traffic lights. On 5 August 1914, the American Traffic Signal Company installed a traffic signal system on the corner of East 105th Street and Euclid Avenue in Cleveland, Ohio.  It had two colours, red and green, and a buzzer, based on the design of James Hoge, to provide a warning for colour changes. The design by James Hoge allowed police and fire stations to control the signals in case of emergency. The first four-way, three-color traffic light was created by police officer William Potts in Detroit, Michigan in 1920. In 1922, T.E. Hayes patented his "Combination traffic guide and traffic regulating signal" (Patent # 1447659). Ashville, Ohio claims to be the location of the oldest working traffic light in the United States, used at an intersection of public roads until 1982 when it was moved to a local museum.

The first interconnected traffic signal system was installed in Salt Lake City in 1917, with six connected intersections controlled simultaneously from a manual switch. Automatic control of interconnected traffic lights was introduced March 1922 in Houston, Texas. The first automatic experimental traffic lights in England were deployed in Wolverhampton in 1927.

The color of the traffic lights representing stop and go might be derived from those used to identify port (red) and starboard (green) in maritime rules governing right of way, where the vessel on the left must stop for the one crossing on the right.

Timers on traffic lights originated in Taipei, Taiwan, and brought to the US after an engineer discovered its use. Though uncommon in most American urban areas, timers are still used in some other Western Hemisphere countries. Timers are useful for drivers/pedestrians to plan if there is enough time to attempt to cross the intersection before the light turns red and conversely, the amount of time before the light turns green.

This is all fascinating you are thinking, but what does it mean?  If this report found in the Economist is true, every city, town or village will want it!

The widely-respected British Economist has come up with a new anti-Israel libel: Jerusalem traffic lights are timed to discriminate against Arabs. The pro-Hamas Al Jazeera Arab satellite network picked up the story and showed its readers one of the intersections in question.

The CAMERA (Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America) media watchdog group researched the claim and found it a total fabrication.

At CAMERA’s request, The Economist provided it with a list of the intersections where Arabs allegedly have to wait a longer time than Jews. CAMERA said that its investigation “reveals that The Economist and Al Jazeera claims are absurdly false “and that the discrepancy between the timing is related to street size and traffic flow, as in every other city in the world.

The Economist claimed that cars approaching an intersection from two Arab neighborhoods in northern Jerusalem have only 18 seconds to proceed on a green light while motorists from the nearby Jewish areas of Pisgat Ze’ev and Neve Yaakov have a 90-second light.

However, CAMERA points out that the road from the Jewish neighborhoods is part of the major artery known as Highway 1, where traffic is much heavier than the road from the Arab neighborhoods of Shuafat and Beit Hanina.

In fact, at another nearby intersection of Highway 1, Jewish residents from Ramot Eshkol and Givat HaMivtar have only 16 seconds to proceed on a green light while having to wait one minute and 41 seconds, the time allotted for cars to pass the intersection on the main highway.

If the “discrimination” label is applied equally, the traffic lights also are “biased” against Jews at the Highway 1 intersection with the Ramat Shlomo neighborhood, where the Obama administration has demanded that Israel stop building for Jews. Motorists from the Ramat Shlomo neighborhood have a much shorter green light than those at the Arab populated Shuafat intersection.

“Clearly, then, the discrepancy between red and green light times at the intersection is a function of road size and not ethnicity,” CAMERA concluded.

“Motorists from the Arab neighborhoods are certainly able to use any of the larger roads crossing Route 1. For example, it is a mere half-kilometer detour for Beit Hanina residents to opt to skip the allegedly racist traffic light by using the overpass highway crossing Route 1,” the watchdog group added.

Another allegedly “discriminatory “ intersection involved the Wadi Joz junction with the major highway that serves Maaleh Adumim, with three times the population of Wadi Joz and a much longer green light.

However, the “discrimination” there also works in reverse. Traffic from Wadi Joz to the intersection of the Hebrew University’s Mount Scopus has a green light for two minutes and 12 seconds, while mostly Jewish drivers from the other road have only eight seconds.

The same article also charges that Jerusalem is building a light railway (pictured above) for “settlers” and "robbing” Arabs of two lanes of traffic. The same light railway has taken away lanes from all motorists, Jewish and otherwise, throughout the city. Shopowners in Jerusalem's center have been affected the most, with many shutdowns as a result. Furthermore, the light railway will be available to Arabs as well as Jews.

The Economist has not replied to CAMERA’s documentation.

And you thought your traffic lights were screwed up!

I really shouldn't be angered by this, after all Al Jazeera is an Arab news source, and The Economist is a British news source.  Both by those very definitions explains it all. BLOOD LIBEL by the 2 of the leading groups of anti-Semites in the world.

Middle East Round-Up 3

Just a few of the articles I found on the web in the last 24 hours.

Emmannuel Buso is one lucky man! Trapped in the rubble of a building for 10 days, he was rescued by the IDF in 30 minutes after both American and French doctors were unable to help him.




Great Britain has raised its alert level to severe.  This is important as it signals the Muslim World they will cave into their demands only after the Lame Stream Media demands that they revert back to their Dhimmi status.

United States Envoy George Mitchell is back in the Middle East with a new five-point plan to advance Israel's retreat to the 1949 Armistice Line

Proposed New Borders for Israel 

40 lashes for wearing trousers, 100 lashes for being raped, beheading one's wife is considered self-defense.  Why any respectable woman would agree to live under such a system is amazing!

4 cows will get you a 12-year old girl in Turkey.  This price is down from 6 cows, 8 sheep, 2 donkeys, and a goat last year.  The recession has hit the Muslim World hard.

Obama Administration Lifts US Ban on Muslim Brotherhood Leader. The Barack Obama administration has lifted an entry ban preventing Muslim Brotherhood leader Tariq Ramadan from entering the United States.  Ban on sanity also lifted.  It is official:  The Inmates Are Running The Asylum!

Anti-Semitic Blood Libel Aimed at IDF in Haiti. As the world praises Israel’s massive aid to earthquake victims in Port-au-Prince, a US anti-Semite in Seattle renews the blood libel against Jews. Must be that need for Palestinian organs that are abundant in Haiti.

Just in time for Saint Patty's Day.  Israel is going green! By the end of 2010, Israel will be the first nation on Earth to host a national electric car network - and more ‘green’ solutions are in store.  How come Al Gore and his Moonbat friends aren't shouting this from the rafters.

Rod Stewart will perform at the Ramat Gan Stadium on July 1, the veteran British singer's official website confirmed Friday.

Fellow British singer Elton John and American heavy metal band Metallica are also expected to perform in the same stadium this summer. Canadian musician Leonard Cohen gave a long-anticipated concert to his Israeli fans in the same place last September.

According to Stewart's website, tickets for the concert will go on sale on January 26. The Israeli production has yet to make an official announcement on the matter, but sources in the music industry said several weeks ago that the negotiations with with Stewart were being held by producer Marcel Avraham.

My Football Picks:

Jets vs. Colts:  GO JETS!!!!!!!!!!!!
Vikings vs. Saints:  GO VIKINGS!!!!!!!!!!

Have A Good Weekend!

When Lies Become The Truth....

...the truth suffers.

Earlier this month the Swedish newspaper tabloid rag Aftonbladet published a story with no basis of fact. Nor will the Swedish government condemn this sorry excuse for a newspaper claiming Freedom of the Press. Yet this same abomination of a government pulled and condemned the publication of the Muhammad Cartoons.

Sweden is becoming the most anti-Semitic nation in Europe.

For years the Arabs have told strings of lies by print, and by video hoping that some idiotic media in the West would carry the lie and bring credence to the lie. Time and time again the media obliges them NEVER CHECKING THE FACTS!!!!!!!

Blood Libel In Sweden

Sign the petition and let your voice be added to the choir shouting:

A FREE PRESS IS DEDICATED TO THE TRUTH NOT LIES!

BLOOD LIBEL!!!

In the Middle Ages illiterate and ignorant people would believe any lie told to them by the Church, the Nobility or even their neighbor if it was said often enough. So it is true today.

In the Middle Ages Jews were accuse of poisoning wells, causing the Black Death, ritual murder and killing Christian children so their blood (especially virgin blood) could be used in the making of matzoh for Passover.

Today the blood libel has new twists to it. Matzoh is still being made with the blood of children (only now they are Muslim children), body parts of Muslim children are used in the making of food for Purim (the Saudis are very fond of this one), and now there is this bit of anti-Semitism from Sweden:

The tabloid Aftonbladet, one of Sweden’s most popular newspapers, published a report Tuesday that claimed IDF soldiers execute Arabs in Judea and Samaria, harvest their organs and sell them. The report carried a photograph that purportedly shows the body of a victim of such an execution, with a large scar running from his chin to his abdomen. It notes the IDF’s explanation that the scar is from an autopsy which is routinely performed on people who are killed in fighting – but seems not to give it much credit and prefers a completely unsubstantiated claim by Arabs regarding forced organ harvesting.

The report, which appears under the heading, in quotes, "Our sons plundered for their organs,” begins with snippets from a transcript of an FBI recording of a Jewish man who was arrested in July, in connection with a corruption scandal in New Jersey involving elected officials, rabbis, money laundering and illegal organ trading.

Screenshot from Aftonbladet website: article shows scarred body, Jewish man, leaves readers to make connection.

Immediately after providing a short description of the FBI’s suspicions against that group, reporter Donald Boström takes his readers across the ocean to discuss the organ trade in Israel, without explaining what connection there may be between the two matters. He describes “a strong suspicion” among Palestinians that young men’s organs were harvested by the IDF “as in China and Pakistan.” Boström repeats that this is “a very serious suspicion” and suggests that the International Court of Justice should open an investigation into it.

The paper says that half of the kidneys that are used in transplants in Israel are purchased illegally from Turkey, Eastern Europe or Latin America and that Israeli health authorities have full knowledge of the matter, but do nothing to stop it. It then connects the shortage of body parts in Israel to stories of Palestinian men who, it says, are killed and returned to their villages five days later by the IDF.

17 year old eyewitness account
The reporter then gives what he says is his own eyewitness account from 1992 -- 17 years ago -- of an IDF raid on a village in which a rioter named Bilal Achmed Ghanaian was shot and severely injured. He was taken away by a military helicopter and brought back by the army five days later, dead. As his family members buried him, they saw a large scar running from his stomach to his chin.

The report then quotes Arabs who claim that their sons were used as forced organ donors but provides no support for this claim.

Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor said that the newspaper had “turned the demonization of Israel into a sacred cause.” He called upon Swedish citizens to express their disgust with “the incitement to hate crimes that the report includes.”

Aftonbladet claims to be the leading daily newspaper in Sweden and in Scandinavia, with a readership of more than 1.5 million.

I think I am finally at a loss of words or an action to take over this. Not only is is libelous, but it shows the ignorant mentality of the nation of Sweden.

At first I was going to cancel my organ and bone marrow donation cards, but that wouldn't really solve this problem, only hurt many others in the long run.

I would boycott all Swedish products, but there aren't many of them sold here in the US. So I just blog about this, feeling powerless to do anything, yet knowing the people of Sweden actually believe this, knowing the government of Sweden condones these stories, knowing the idiot Moonbats here in the US will use this to defame Jews world-wide.

There are just times when a person must choose to do nothing, and pray that somehow someway sanity will return to Sweden and just one person in the country will cry out:

THIS IS NOT ACCEPTABLE HERE!