Paramedic Is Called to the Scene of His Murdered Wife

One day before the Obama Administration succeeded in resuming peace talks between the Palestinians and the Israelis, Israel was rocked by another terrorist attack.

The West blamed the attack on "militants" who were looking for an opportunity to sabotage the resumption of peace talks. For Israelis, the attack was another indication that peace with the Palestinians is an impossible reality.

In the latest terrorist attack,  a car with four people inside came under fire in the West Bank by Palestinian snipers from Hamas. When it was all over, all four people were massacred with gun shot wounds spearing their internal organs. The four occupants in the vehicle were Yitzhak Ames, 47, and his wife Tali Ames, 45, Kochava Ben- Haim, 37, and Avishai Schindler, 24.  The husband and wife had picked up two hitchhikers. While en route to their destination, the Palestinian terrorists fired on the vehicle from afar and then approached the occupants and fired on them at close range.

When paramedics arrived on the scene, all of the victims bodies were strewn on the street.

In an anguishing turn of  events, completely unaware of what he was about to discover,  Momy Ben-Haim one of the paramedics who was called to the scene of the terrorist attack was shocked to observe  his wife Kochava's body strewn on the ground. Kochava happened to be one of the doomed hitchhikers who was picked up for a ride by Mr. and Mrs. Ames.

When observing his dead wife lying motionless on the ground, Ben-Haim screamed and shouted "That’s my wife! That’s my wife!" He was taken away from the scene immediately to his home. 

Terrorist attacks in Israel are not just attacks on the victims. They are an attack on the entire nation.

If the Palestinians ever have any shot of convincing Israelis that they are committed to peace, they will have to rein in on the terror that killed these four occupants and wrecked the life of an innocent paramedic who had no way of knowing that his life would be changed forever in a matter of minutes as he embarked on the scene of unfortunately a routine terrorist attack.

Paramedic Is Called to the Scene of His Murdered Wife

PLO Gets Upgrade in Washington

The Obama Administration  has upgraded Mahmoud Abbas's diplomatic status in Washington. His offices in DC will now be allowed to fly the PLO flag.  The flag raising privilege is granted to an entity with delegation status or embassy status. The PLO now have delegation status which means that PLO diplomats in Washington will also have diplomatic immunity although the PLO still does not have embassy status.

Unfortunately, the PLO continues to be granted these diplomatic niceties on an almost automatic basis despite the fact that Abbas has showed no commitment to making peace with Israel and has made no effort to cease anti-Israel incitement on PA TV.

On the other hand, Israel has to give away the  highway for Bibi Netanyahu to be permitted to stay at the Blair House for his meeting with President Obama. Go figure.

PLO Gets Upgrade in Washington

Two Meetings a Worlds Apart

President Obama Meets with Palestinian Authority Leader Mahmoud Abbas at the White House on June 9, 2010. The President's Meeting with Abbas is one of the photos of the day on the White House's website.

President Obama meets with the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the White House on March 23, 2010. The following was the March 23rd photo of the day on the White House website following the Obama-Netanyahu meeting.

(This picture appeared originally on foxnews.com)

Two Meetings a Worlds Apart

More Videos of the Mavi Marmara

The following is a video of the IDF asking the Mavi Marmara to dock in Ashdod



Here is a video of IDF soldiers yelling to each other that they are under fire by passengers on board the Mavi Marmara



And finally for anyone who believes that the passengers on board the Mavi Marmara were "peaceful", tell them to watch this video

More Videos of the Mavi Marmara

News Summary

Quick News Roundabout

1. Ahmadenijad in NY:  Sanctions Won't Stop Us
2.  John Bolton: Obama damages Israeli security
3.  Austria Backs Iran
4. Abbas calls the Israeli government 'Extremist'
5. Abbas illegally opens up offices in East Jerusalem

News Summary

News Summary

Your Quick News Roundabout 
1. President Obama considers abandoning Israel at the U.N.
2. Mahmoud Abbas will ask for the Jordan Valley, East Jerusalem in Proximity Talks.
3. President Obama threatens to impose a solution on Israel if proximity talks fail.
4. President Obama and Hosni Mubarak of Egypt work together to call for a Mideast nuclear free zone.
5. Obama Administration has been acting on behalf of the Palestinian Authority in negotiations.

News Summary

Obama Invites Abbas to the White House

Barack Obama has invited the PA leader Mahmoud Abbas to the White House essentially rewarding Abbas's refusal to come to the negotiating table.The date and time of the upcoming meeting is to be determined.

I wonder if the President will close his meeting with Abbas to the press like he did with Netanyahu? Will there be no press conferences or photo ops? Will he leave him stranded in the White House while he goes to dinner with his family?  Will Obama criticize Abbas for naming a square after an avowed terrorist with as much ferociousness as he did when criticizing Israel for building homes in East Jerusalem?

Don't hold your breath. Look for the double standard to continue. President Obama will likely treat Abbas, who is also the leader of  the terrorist Fatah organization, with royalty.

Obama Invites Abbas to the White House

No Criticism of the Palestinians

A day after Israel announced the building of homes in Ramat Shlomo which is a neighborhood in East Jerusalem in the midst of a visit to the region  by Joseph Biden, the chorus of criticism are growing louder by the minute. Morocco has weighed in, England has weighed in, France has weighed in, Germany has weighed in, so has the EU, and of course America has weighed in all criticizing the East Jerusalem Construction Project.

The fact is that Israel has an absolute right to build homes within its legal borders the same way that New Yorkers have a right to build homes in Manhattan or Britons have a right to build homes in London. And, as far as timing is concerned, it would not have mattered whether Israel announced its decision to build homes in East Jerusalem five weeks after Biden's visit, the U.S. would be condemning the decision with as much of an equal furor as they are now in claiming that Israel embarrassed Biden by making this decision to coincide with his visit to the region which the Israelis emphatically deny.

Noticeably absent from Biden's visit was any criticism of the Palestinians. After Biden's botched performance in Israel (See "Biden's Poor Performance in Israel"), Biden went over to Ramallah and hardly made any critical remarks of the Palestinians if he did at all. Instead, he chose to criticize Israel once again for the East Jerusalem Construction Project.

In a joint news conference with Abbas,  Biden said:  "Yesterday the decision by the Israeli government to advance planning for new housing units in east Jerusalem undermines that very trust, the trust that we need right now in order to begin ... profitable negotiations." According to Biden, Israel's decision to build in East Jerusalem was "undermining the Palestinians faith in new negotiations."  In turn,  Abbas urged Israel to commit to peace and claimed that the Palestinians are committed to peace  as a strategic choice.

Biden went on to say that the Palestinians deserve a "viable independent" Palestinian state with contiguous territory whatever that means.

Now, in that press conference, Biden never once criticized the Palestinians for naming a square after a Palestinian terrorist who killed dozens of Israelis. Biden never criticized the PA for using its media and school system to indoctrinate Palestinian children with vicious anti-semitic blood libels. Biden never raised the issue of  a reconciliation with Hamas and the PA. He never discussed the growing influence of Hezbollah in the region or the Iranian threat.

Unfortunately, Biden allowed Abbas to portray Israel as the peace breaker when over the years Israel has gone out on a limb to make peace with the Palestinians only to be rebuffed by two Intifadas, scores of homocide bombings and terrorist attacks, a PLO charter which still rejects Israel's right to exist, a Palestinian media that promotes violence against Israelis, and a Yasser Arafat and now a Mahmoud Abbas who claims to want peace in English but in Arabic who wants the destruction of the State of  Israel.

The fact is that there is no feasible way to have a Palestinian state and a Jewish state living side by side with each other in peace.  The Palestinians will not accept anything less than Jerusalem as the capital of the Palestinian state, which would also include the Dead Sea and parts of the Negev plus the entry millions of "refugees" to flood the Palestinian state. This proposal is nothing short of the end of Israel as the Jewish state which is exactly what the Palestinians want.

For Biden to assert that the Palestinians deserve a viable Palestinian state with contiguous territory that will in all likelihood undermine the character of the State of Israel as a  Jewish State is unacceptable. And for Biden to be complicit in allowing the Palestinians to portray Israel in  a negative light while allowing a terrorist-supporting Palestinian entity to be portrayed as being peaceful and positive is also unacceptable.

Remember when Biden said during the 2008 campaign that the Jewish community has nothing to worry about because he was on the ticket with Obama.

Well, that assurance seems to have gone out the window.

No Criticism of the Palestinians

Biden's Poor Performance in Israel

Vice-President Joseph Biden arrived in Israel on March 8th for talks with Israeli Prime-minister Benjamin Netanyahu. He will be in the region for a total of three days culminating with a visit to Ramallah to meet with  Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority.

Prior to Biden's arrival, George Mitchell, U.S. Envoy to the Middle East Peace Process, announced that Israel and the Palestinian Authority will launch indirect peace talks in a longstanding saga of calls for peace negotiations which usually end in a bridge to nowhere as a result of Palestinian intransigence.

President Obama sent Joe Biden to Israel in an effort to mollify Jewish and Israeli concerns that the Obama Administration has not been supportive of the State of Israel.

However, there was another purpose for Biden's visit. On the agenda of issues that Biden intended to discuss with Netanyahu was of course the conflict with Iran. The U.S. does not want Israel to launch a preemptive strike on Iran and instead is focused on procuring sanctions against the Iranian regime. On the other hand, Israel remains worried and for good reason that the U.S. is not committed to ending the Iranian nuclear threat which threatens both Israel and U.S.'s national security. Senator John Kerry, Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, came to Israel a week earlier than Biden and reportedly delivered the same message to the Israelis that Biden intends to deliver that sanctions are the way to go to stop Iran not a military strike.

However, Iran does not seemed at all deterred by the threat of sanctions if sanctions can be procured at all given Russia and China's opposition. And as Iran predicts that there will be a war in the region this summer, rhetoric without action only brings us closer to a showdown with Iran that could potentially cause a nuclear Holocaust. Unfortunately, the phrase "Never again" which was first coined after six million Jews perished in the Eurpean Holocaust, apparently has lost its significance.

Many, including former U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. John Bolton, believe that sanctions will not be effective and only military action will stop the Iranians. Bolton stated in an interview that "Israel has just two choices: a strike aimed at Iran's nuclear facilities, or a nuclear Iran."

Personally, I do not know what the Obama Administration wants Israel to do. Wait indefinitely for sanctions which may never occur and refrain from a military strike while watching helplessly like "good boys" as Iran develops an atomic bomb that could be leveled on the streets of Jerusalem.

Notwithstanding the dissent among policy leaders regarding the plan to respond to the Iranian nuclear threat, Biden's performance in Israel has done nothing to reassure the Israelis or the rest of the world that the U.S. means business vis a vis Iran. Biden asserted while in Israel  without much passion that the U.S. is "determined to prevent a nuclear Iran." We have heard this line of rhetoric before from the Obama Administration and it has had little effect in stopping the Iranians or convincing the Russians or the Chinese to join the international community in procuring sanctions.  The time for rhetoric has long been over.  It is now time for the Obama Administration to  get off the media circuit and get to the drawing boards by articulating specifically what steps Obama intends to take to stop the Iranians rather than glorified speeches that have very little value.

Further, if President Obama expected that Biden would reassure Israel and the Jewish world that the Obama Administration is squarely on their side, he was wrong. Biden, who stated while visiting Yad Vashem (Israel's Holocaust Memorial) that "Israel is a central bolt in our existence" also took an opportunity to criticize Israel which is almost like a double edged sword negating the original praise.

Biden rather strongly criticized Israel's building policies in East Jerusalem stating "I condemn the decision by the government of Israel to advance planning for new housing units in East Jerusalem.The substance and timing of Israel’s announcement is precisely the kind of step that undermines the trust we need right now and runs counter to the constructive discussions that I’ve had here in Israel.”

Here, Biden believes that Israel is a "central bolt in our existence." Yet, he and the Obama Administration do not believe that Israel has a right, like communities in the U.S., to build apartment complexes in neighborhoods within its capital city.

And now, Biden travels to Ramallah where just a few days earlier the Palestinian Authority named a Square after a  Palestinian  terrorist who killed dozens of Israelis according to the Palestinian Media Watch which was published on Imra.org.il's website.  It will be interesting to see whether Biden, who criticized Israel for building flats that will house innocent civilians, will criticize the PA for naming a square after an avowed terrorist or will Biden lavish praises on the Palestinians for nonexistent strides that they have taken to pursue peace.

As long as the U.S. Government sends a message that it will look the other way when the Palestinians promote a culture of violence and that it will carelessly allow the Iranians to continue their nuclear program without immediate consequences, terrorism will continue to exist in the world particularly in the Middle East.

No talks or sanctions will exterminate terrorism  unless the international community starts to recognize once and for all that the terrorists thrive on pacifism, hesitance, and other kinds of passive responses.

Maybe the world already knows this and that's why they are acting to defeat terrorism with kid gloves because in reality they do not want to defeat terrorism the way it  needs to be defeated. Food for thought.

Biden's Poor Performance in Israel