Tel-Chai Nation

Labels: Israel, United States

Labels: islam, londonistan, Moonbattery

(IsraelNN.com) Travelers on Israeli airline El-Al report that its flights now feature a satire about residents of Hevron which many have termed “anti-Semitic.” The producers of the film may face libel suits.

The offending skit was aired earlier in the month on the satirical Eretz Nehederet (A Wonderful Land) show on Channel 2 TV. The popular show has run for six seasons in Israel and is similar to the American program Saturday Night Live. (The Hevron film clip can be viewed here in Hebrew.)

The skit, entitled “Everyone Hates Rabin,” showcased a family in Hevron. The mother is depicted as ironing clothes on the back of an Arab and later hanging the laundry on his arms. The father, named Ketzaleh after the Ichud Leumi (National Union) party head Yaakov "Ketzaleh" Katz, describes how he beat up an Arab flower vendor.

The children in the show scream “Nazi” and “Hitler” every time someone upsets them. The daughter of the family also wants to attend a "Baruch Goldstein" celebration, in reference to the Kiryat Arba pediatrician who killed 29 Arabs in Hevron in 1994. In addition, the family prepares acid to pour on soldiers, while the grandfather shoots two Arabs and a soldier in the course of the skit.

El-Al also claims it is not at fault for airing the show and blamed the HOT company which is responsible for in-air programming. El-Al promised to discuss the issue with HOT.

Labels: anti-semitism, communications, Israel

It is clear that after only nine weeks in power, President Obama is embarked on a dramatic reorientation, or should I say about face, of American foreign policy in the direction of appeasement of our enemies and indifference or worse toward our friends, something we last saw under Jimmy Carter.

Take Obama’s eagerness to talk to those that don’t want to talk to us like the mullahs in Tehran, the decision to steer $900 million to Gaza, which, whatever the spin, means Hamas, and new efforts to appease Putin by reneging on our missile defense commitments to the Eastern Europeans, to name just a few examples.

...What’s most disturbing is that Washington no longer talks about winning in Afghanistan but rather about striking a deal with the Taliban, which essentially means abandoning Afghanistan to the terrorists... A month ago, the government of the Northwest Frontier Province, evidently at the urging of the military, made a deal with the Taliban in Swat to impose Sharia law in this federal Pakistani territory in return for a Taliban promise to cease hostilities... This was nothing short of a complete capitulation of the Pakistani government and its military to the terrorists.

...Washington’s reaction is the most disturbing not to say scandalous aspect of this disaster. It has come in the form of remarks by Defense Secretary Robert Gates to the effect that he considered the Swat agreement an acceptable compromise. If this is a sign of the administration’s thinking about negotiating with the Taliban, and I can’t see how it could be otherwise, we’re facing a national security disaster.

Labels: terrorism, United States, war on terror

Labels: Armenia, islam, racism

(IsraelNN.com) The Anti-Defamation League has protested against a cartoon published Wednesday by syndicated cartoonist Pat Oliphant which shows a Nazi-type storm trooper wheeling a fanged Star of David that appears ready to devour a woman and child labeled “Gaza”, both much smaller than the headless figure and star.

[...]

Oliphant has faced criticism in the past for his virulently anti-Israel drawings.

Labels: anti-semitism

“I don’t believe that soldiers serving in the IDF hurt civilians in cold blood, but we shall wait for the results of the investigation. The IDF is the most humane army in the world and operates according to the Spirit of the IDF and high moral standards of fighting. Isolated cases, if found to have taken place, will be dealt with individually,” Lt. Gen. Ashkenazi said. “As the chief of the general staff, I feel very proud to stand at the head of an army with such commanders and soldiers. Immediately after the operation, and as part of an existing tradition in the IDF, we carried out a thorough, professional process of drawing conclusions and lessons learned. This is important in order for us to operate correctly in the future.”

Lt. Gen. Ashkenazi went on to say Hamas, not the IDF, chose to center the fighting in heavily populated areas where civilians would find themselves in the crossfire during the Gaza operation.

“[They] chose, and not by chance, to fight in heavily populated areas, turned neighborhoods into war zones, schools to terror outposts and public facilities into weapon and munitions storage facilities,” he said. “The IDF’s operation was carried out inside populated areas and its mission was to fight those who fire at Israel, which is why we operated in the structured areas.”

Labels: Israel, jihad, military, msm foulness, terrorism, war on terror

The offer involved a return of 93% of the West Bank, leaving in Israel the large population centers, such as Ariel and Elkanah in the north, Maaleh Adumim in the center, and Jerusalem and Gush Etzion in the south.

Regarding Jerusalem itself, Olmert offered to cede over to the Palestinians the peripheral neighborhoods and the refugee camps surrounding the city, such as Kalandia. The holy sites, whose sovereignty is desired by all faiths, would be determined within an international framework, the prime minister said.

Labels: Israel, political corruption

STOCKHOLM (AP) - The Swedish Arts Council says it has named a Palestinian organization that promotes children's reading as the 2009 winner of the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award for Literature.

The annual award is the world's largest children's book award and includes a cash prize of 5 million kronor ($620,000). It is named after late Swedish writer Astrid Lindgren.

The Palestinian Tamer Institute For Community Education was awarded for its work to promote reading on the West Bank and in Gaza. Tuesday's citation honored its "unusual breadth and versatility."

Each year it organizes a national reading campaign, including discussions about literature, drama and writing activities.

The prize will be handed out by Sweden's Crown Princess Victoria in a ceremony on June 2.

Labels: islam, msm foulness, political corruption, Scandanavia

MADRID, Spain Former prime minister Jose Maria Aznar has criticized Muslim demands for the pope to apologize for his remarks about Islam, suggesting it is unfair when the Islamic world has not asked forgiveness for such grievances as the 800-year Moorish occupation of Spain.

Aznar, speaking Friday night at the Hudson Institute, a thinktank in Washington, D.C., also said a United Nations program to encourage dialogue between Muslim and Western countries made no sense because some Muslim countries like Iran are too radical to deal with.

[...]

Aznar said he found it surprising that Muslims have demanded an apology from Pope Benedict XVI over his Sept. 12 remarks quoting a Byzantine emperor who characterized some of the teachings of the Prophet Muhammad as "evil and inhuman," particularly "his command to spread by the sword the faith."

The pope said Sunday that he was "deeply sorry" about the reactions to his remarks and that they did not reflect his own opinions. But did not issue the direct apology still demanded by some Muslim leaders who were offended by his remarks.

Aznar noted the nearly 800-year Moorish occupation of Spain, which began in the year 711 with an invasion from North Africa. He said in English: "I never (heard) any Muslim apologize (to) me (for) conquer(ing) Spain and to maintain a presence in Spain during eight centuries."

"What is the reason ... we, the West, always should be apologiz(ing) and they never should ... apologize? It's absurd."

He also criticized an initiative launched by his Socialist successor, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, to encourage dialogue between the West and Muslim countries. It is called the Alliance of Civilizations and has been formally adopted by the United Nations.

Aznar said some Muslim countries such as Iran are too radical to engage in dialogue with.

Labels: Europe, islam, jihad, Spain, UN corruption

Labels: Israel, Jerusalem

What it represents, however, is more ominous. This marks the beginning of mass private transport in the world’s second largest population. India’s carbon dioxide emissions per capita — at 1.2 tonnes — are just 12% of the United Kingdom’s.

But that is changing rapidly, as the middle class expands and economic growth continues to barrel along at gobsmacking rates. For years, environmentalists have speculated about what would happen if consumption in the poor world matched consumption in the rich, talking of the number of planets that would be required to sustain us. Now the great experiment has begun.

Labels: Moonbattery

Freida Pinto, the Indian actress who starred in the Oscar-winning movie, "Slumdog Millionaire," arrived in Israel last week ahead of shooting for a new film by critically acclaimed writer-director Julian Schnabel.

Schnabel, whose recent film, "The Diving Bell and the Butterfly" won awards and praise, will begin shooting his next project, "Miral," a joint French-Israeli production in April.

The movie is set in Jerusalem, and it chronicles Hind Husseini's effort to establish an orphanage in the city following the creation of the state in 1948. It is scheduled to be released in 2010.

Although the filming does not start for another month, Pinto arrived early in order to get into character, the production team said.

Labels: anti-semitism, islam, Israel, showbiz

Labels: Israel

My CT researchers and I conducted ‘first-hand’ research at a predominately Somalia based mosque, Al-Farooq Masjid, 1421 4th Ave. S. Nashville, TN. Initially I conducted a pre-assessment of the various Islamic Centers within the area. Although there are other mosques in the area advocating the ideology of Sharia law for the U.S. and advocating the same ideology as Islamic terrorists groups, our research uncovered more frightening and disturbing intelligence. Not only does Al-Farooq provide materials by convicted Islamic terrorists to their worshippers, they practice polygamy (per statements made by Al Farooq worshippers) as allowed under Sharia law, which also advocates children to be taken as ‘child brides’ married to older men. One need only research how often this occurs in Somalia.

In Feb 09, I obtained evidence and there were several indicators the children were being physically and emotionally abused. I immediately provided my analysis and concerns to authorities. Almost immediately First Amendment religious freedom rights came up and their fear of being sued by Islamic organizations. I knew from the beginning when I had to explain the basics of Sharia law and who Islamic scholars such as Ahmad Sakr (U.S. based scholar who lectures to children and informs them to not follow the U.S. Constitution, but instead to follow Sharia law) are, it would be useless to rely on them alone to protect the innocent children of al Farooq, which ultimately means our country is not being protected. The objective of my company is to simultaneously provide the research intelligence to the American public and to Law Enforcement (LE). In our current times it is often necessary for news organizations and the public to become involved before issues are taken seriously.

In Mar 2009, I sent two researchers (male and female) to Al Farooq to obtain further information. On 9 Mar 2009, a female child informed one of our female researchers she and other children are ‘hit’ at the ‘Al Farooq School’ by a teacher and ‘her’ legs hurt. Additional lectures by convicted terrorists and their supporters were provided to my team. Again I notified authorities, but received no encouragement the allegations of child abuse or the evidence pertaining to Al Farooq leadership advocating violence would be responded to.

Authorities wanted ‘hard evidence’ children were being abused and Islamic leaders at Al Farooq were educating the worshippers to commit violence against innocent people, America, and Israel. Respectfully I advised authorities Americans rely on them to take the lead and conduct investigations pertaining to allegations. My organization is limited in manpower and funds. Taxpayers pay our LE and elected officials to protect our country. It is beyond my capability to convince authorities that distributing material by Al Qaeda, Mawdudi (JI), and Ali Al Timimi to children can lead to violence and is dangerous for all concerned. One need only look at the Palestinian schools who are educated by Hamas.

Labels: islam, United States

(IsraelNN.com) Likud members of Knesset Tzipi Hotobeli, Danny Danon, and Yaron Levin, as well as National Union MK Michael Ben-Ari, toured Hevron on Sunday.

Hotobeli called the tour “a corrective measure" (tikkun) to the agreement the Likud made during the Wye Accords.” [...]

MK Levin deplored the government’s actions against the Hevron community, such as in the evacuations of the Peace House and the nearby Federman Farm. “As compared to the strength of the residents here, the government’s weakness is very apparent. Not only has it failed to help the Jewish communities, but it has established harsh decrees against them,” he said. “I will work with the Jewish residents to enlarge and strengthen their communities.”

Labels: Israel, Knesset

TEHRAN, IRAN (AP) - The wife of the late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the father of Iran's 1979 Islamic revolution, has died after a long illness, state media reported Sunday. She was 93.

Khadijeh Saqafi, who was known as the "mother of the Islamic revolution," died Saturday in Tehran, state TV said. Thousands of people, including Iran's president and supreme leader, attended her funeral at Tehran University on Sunday.

Labels: islam

A 25-year-old Jordanian national from the Far North Side was arrested and charged this morning with mailing a threatening letter to a Jewish school in response to the Israeli invasion of the Gaza Strip, according to the FBI.

At a morning federal court appearance, Mohammed Alkaramla was ordered held pending a hearing Tuesday morning.

If convicted, he faces up to 10 years in prison, said Assistant U.S. Atty. Robert Milan. He described Alkaramla as a flight risk, noting his Jordanian citizenship.

Neighbors on Alkaramla's block said that about eight FBI agents came to the house around 6:00 this morning to arrest the man.

Eli Azzo, a neighbor and relative of Alkaramla's landlord, said he was surprised to find hear the man was accused of a hate crime.

"He doesn't talk politics or religion, he's a real quiet guy," Azzo said. "I never gauged him that way as that kind of person."

Labels: anti-semitism, islam, United States

Hundreds of Bikini Models Look to Restore America’s "Fading Patriotism"

Six years after the start of combat operations in Iraq, one volunteer organization is still going strong, and looking to expand.

The Patriot Girls currently operate in 38 states, and hope to spread their unique brand of stars and stripes boosterism to all 50 states by the end of the year, as they train the spotlight on the sacrifices the troops and their families are making.

And how do they attract the spotlight? With their stars-and-stripes bikinis, of course.

Labels: Armenia, Asia, Europe, France, Israel, Italy, United States

Labels: anti-semitism, islam, Israel

“I was shocked to learn of the comment made by President Obama about Special Olympics,” Governor Palin said. “This was a degrading remark about our world’s most precious and unique people, coming from the most powerful position in the world.

“These athletes overcome more challenges, discrimination and adversity than most of us ever will. By the way, these athletes can outperform many of us and we should be proud of them. I hope President Obama’s comments do not reflect how he truly feels about the special needs community.”

Labels: United States

Labels: Egypt, islam, misogyny, racism

Channel 2 TV Army correspondent Roni Daniel stated at 6:30 PM this evening, that he personally tracked down one of the soldiers interviewed for the Ha’aretz article. Apparently the soldier’s testimony to Ha’aretz wasn't based on anything he personally saw or witnessed, rather based on rumors and hearsay he heard (and the soldier wasn’t even in Gaza!)

Labels: anti-semitism, dhimmitude, Israel, jihad, military, msm foulness, terrorism, war on terror

A day after Labor leader Ehud Barak confirmed that he was considering taking the party into a Likud-led government, attorney Dekel David-Ozer submitted a petition to the party's legal institutions on Thursday, calling for Barak's dismissal and a primary to replace him within ninety days.

Meanwhile, Labor Secretary-General Eitan Cabel met Prime Minister-designate Binyamin Netanyahu, but said the Likud head did not manage to convince him to back Labor joining the coalition.

Netanyahu repeated his insistence that the country required a national unity government.

An argument among Labor MKs over whether the party should join a coalition headed by Netanyahu may be decided on a technicality, as the party's bylaws may not permit the Labor Central Committee from convening before the new government is sworn in.

On Thursday morning, Labor's legal adviser, Yoram Avrahami, insisted it would take a minimum of three weeks to call a convention to discuss the possibility of joining the coalition.

"We will not allow anyone to trample the party's constitution and we will maintain [the] set procedure of convening the convention, which takes three weeks," Avrahami said. "Netanyahu's timetable is irrelevant."

Avrahami is a staunch supporter of Cabel, who vehemently opposes joining the new government.

Barak, however, dismissed the legalities, saying that the needs of the state must supersede those of the party.

"The party's institutions will meet very soon," he said during a noon-time interview with Israel Radio. "No legal shenanigans or procedural shtick will prevent Labor members from convening."

"First the state, then Labor and, in the end, us," he said, adding that not joining the coalition would be a disservice to those who voted for the party.

"Between a narrow, right-wing government and one which represents the Left, [it is definitely] more preferable for the public [that Labor join the coalition]," Barak said.

The Labor chairman dismissed accusations that he was fighting for the broad coalition just as a means of remaining defense minister.

"I don't accept the opinion that we are looking for portfolios," he said. "We are all obligated, we are representatives of Labor."

Barak pointed to the economic crisis and the security situation as reasons for the necessity of a broader coalition.

"A party is a means, not a end. It must answer the real issues," he said.

Speaking shortly before Barak on the same radio program, senior Labor MK Shelly Yacimovich expressed her strong opposition to joining the coalition, dismissing the possibility that the party needed to help ease the unemployment crisis from inside the government.

"I think that [Labor] sitting in a government with Netanyahu, Shas and Israel Beiteinu would not influence the current situation," she said. "We can achieve things with Netanyahu without being dragged into his government."

She vigorously rejected the possibility that opting to stay out of the government would be ignoring the will of those who voted for Labor in order to see Barak as defense minister.

"I am very sorry, but Labor is not a school for the appointment of ministers," Yacimovich said, adding that the party had had many historical achievements in its past.

"I truly see this struggle [of whether to join the government or the opposition] as the struggle for Labor," she said.

Labels: Israel

(IsraelNN.com) A decision by the Palestinian Authority Health Minister to cut off medical benefits at Israeli hospitals has cost the life of at least one little girl, and it is not clear how many more will follow.

Following the recent counterterrorist Operation Cast Lead against Gaza terrorists, PA minister Fathi Abu Moughli decided in January to stop covering Israeli hospital expenses of PA residents who cross the security barrier to receive treatment.

As a result, strokes have gone untreated and life-saving chemotherapy, radiotherapy and bone marrow transplants for cancer patients have been put off indefinitely.

Six-year-old Asil Manasra died. The Palestinian Authority child had for eight months been receiving intensive treatment at an Israeli hospital for complications arising from tuberculosis. One week after the PA Health Ministry forced her family to stop the visits, the little girl struggled for breath no more.

Asil first became ill after receiving a TB vaccination as a six-month-old infant. During the following four years, her father, Jamal Manasra told the Associated Press that said she was subsequently misdiagnosed by two PA hospitals. The child became sicker and sicker with severe stiffness, high fever, and then acquiring liver and lung infections. Only as a five-year-old did Asil win a referral to Hadassah, where the race for time began, as the disease had overwhelmed most of her body, necessitating intensive, constant treatments.

The PA Health Ministry decision ended the race in February, cutting off payments for the life-saving treatments. The little girl spent the last week of her life in a hospital in Bethlehem, where medication was administered per the advice of her doctor at Hadassah.

"I blame everyone. Should children die because of political decisions?" Asil's father asked the AP reporter in anguish. "How can you stop treatment? When a child is so sick that she is going to die, is there something more important than that?"

Labels: islam, Israel

The film would have been better without the gratuitous attack directed at America’s armed forces. The U.S. Department of Defense was shown throughout as being composed of a bunch of overbearing heavies. A more direct slam occurs when one of the alien kids says that their planet is dying and that there is a debate on their home world between those who favor a military conquest of Earth and those who want to study the Earth’s environment to learn of a way to repair the damage to their own world. It was as if Al Gore and Dick Cheney were battling off-world by proxy.

Labels: anti-americanism, military, Moonbattery, showbiz

The UN on Tuesday cut out recently added references to Israel, defamation of religion and reparations for slavery from its draft declaration for next month's Conference Against Racism, dubbed Durban II.

The move comes after the United States and Italy announced their intention not to participate and the European Union threatened as a bloc to boycott the event.

The changes are seen as an attempt to entice US and EU to attend the conference scheduled for April 20 to 24 in Geneva.

"We believe this shortened text represents a solid and meaningful basis for negotiations," Doune Porter, spokeswoman for the UN in Geneva, said in a telephone interview. "It's a little too early to see what the reception will be, but this is a significant step forward that has support."

The new draft declaration, released on Tuesday in Geneva by Russian conference coordinator Yuri Boychenko, addressed concerns put forward by the EU and the US. It was shortened to 17 pages from the previous 45.

Talks will continue on the text.

But Israel, which along with Canada, plans to boycott the event, said it did not believe that this was a positive step forward.

Ambassador to the UN in Geneva Roni Leshno-Yaar said that in the last few months Iran had attempted to add in references to Israel.

The new paragraphs, he said, went beyond what had been in the text that was adopted in the 2001 UN World Conference Against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance, which took place in Durban, South Africa.

The draft text for the follow up conference in Geneva states in its first paragraph that it affirms that document, Leshno-Yaar said.

"We have come full loop and we are back to square one, where we reaffirm and single out Israel as a racist state," he said.

"What we have gone through is that the Iranians and their friends have loaded the draft document with all kinds of paragraphs and then removed them, hoping we would forget that ancient thing, which is back in full force in the first paragraph," Leshno-Yaar said.

He added that there was still a month to go until the conference and there was plenty of time for additional anti-Israel language to be added to the draft.

"We should have our eyes wide open and watch further," he said.

He said he was also concerned about attempts to delegitimize Israel by NGOs working on the sidelines of the conference.

"It leaves me with a bad taste and a sense that we are going backwards," Leshno-Yaar said.

Mark Kornblau, spokesman for the US mission to the UN, said that new draft version still affirmed the outcome of the first UN conference on racism, in Durban.

The US and Israel walked out of that meeting to protest the outcome document. Then-US secretary of state Colin Powell denounced the conference text's "hateful language" that "singles out only one country in the world, Israel, for censure and abuse."

Labels: anti-semitism, Israel, UN corruption

We are all too familiar with the persecution of Christians in countries such as Pakistan and Afghanistan. Yet sitting in front of me is a British woman whose life has been threatened in this country solely because she is a Christian. Indeed, so real is the threat that the book she has written about her experiences has had to appear under an assumed name.

The book is called The Imam’s Daughter because “Hannah Shah” is just that: the daughter of an imam in one of the tight-knit Deobandi Muslim Pakistani communities in the north of England. Her father emigrated to this country from rural Pakistan some time in the 1960s and is, apparently, a highly respected local figure.

He is also an incestuous child abuser, repeatedly raping his daughter from the age of five until she was 15, ostensibly as part of her punishment for being “disobedient”. At the age of 16 she fled her family to avoid the forced marriage they had planned for her in Pakistan. A much, much greater affront to “honour” in her family’s eyes, however, was the fact that she then became a Christian – an apostate. The Koran is explicit that apostasy is punishable by death; thus it was that her father the imam led a 40-strong gang – in the middle of a British city – to find and kill her.

Hannah Shah says her story is not unique – that there are many other girls in British Muslim families who are oppressed and married off against their will, or who have secretly become Christians but are too afraid to speak out. She wants their voices to be heard and for Britain, the land of her birth, to realise the hidden misery of these women.

[...]

Hannah’s description in the book of the moment when her “community” discovered the “safe” home where she had fled after becoming an apostate is terrifying. A mob with her father at its head pounded and hammered at the door as she cowered upstairs hoping she could not be seen or heard. She heard her father shout through the letter box: “Filthy traitor! Betrayer of your faith! Cursed traitor! We’re going to rip your throat out! We’ll burn you alive!” Does she still believe they would have killed her? “Yes, without a doubt. They had hammers and knives and axes.”

Why didn’t you call the police after-wards? “First, I didn’t think the police would believe me. That sort of thing just doesn’t happen in this country – or that’s what they’d think. Second, I didn’t believe I would get help or protection from the authorities.”

Hannah had good reason for this doubt. When, at school, she had finally summoned the courage to tell a teacher that her father had been beating her (she couldn’t bring herself to reveal the sexual abuse), the social services sent out a social worker from her own community. He chose not to believe Hannah and, in effect, shopped her to her father, who gave her the most brutal beating of her life. When she later confronted the social worker, he said: “It’s not right to betray your community.”

Hannah blames what is sometimes called political correctness for this debacle: “My teachers had thought they were doing the right thing, they thought it showed ‘cultural sensitivity’ by bringing in someone from my own community to ‘help’, but it was the worst thing they could have done to me. This happens a lot.

“When I’ve been working with girls who were trying to get out of an arranged marriage, or want to convert to Christianity, and they have contacted social services as they need to get out of their homes, the reaction has been ‘we’ll send someone from your community to talk to your parents’. I know why they are doing this, they are trying to be understanding, but it’s the last thing that the authorities should do in such situations.”

This is the sort of cultural sensitivity displayed by Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury, last year when he suggested that problems within the British Muslim community such as financial or marital disputes could be dealt with under sharia, Islamic law, rather than British civil law. What did Hannah, now an Anglican, think on hearing these remarks?

“I was horrified.” If you could speak to him now, what would you say to the archbishop? “I would say: have you actually spoken to any ordinary Muslim women about the situation that they live in, in their communities? By putting in place these Muslim arbitration tribunals, where a woman’s witness is half that of a man, you are silencing women even more.”

She believes the British government is making exactly the same mistake as Rowan Williams: “It says it talks to the Muslim community, but it’s not speaking to the women. I mean, you are always hearing Muslim men speaking out, the representatives of the big federations, but the government is not listening to Muslim women. With the sharia law situation and the Muslim arbitration tribunals, have they thought about what effect these tribunals have on Muslim women? I don’t think so.”

Labels: islam, londonistan, misogyny

SEATTLE - The Seattle Post-Intelligencer, which has chronicled the news of the city since logs slid down its steep streets to the harbor and miners caroused in its bars before heading north to Alaska's gold fields, will print its final edition Tuesday.

Hearst Corp., which owns the 146-year-old P-I, said Monday that it failed to find a buyer for the newspaper, which it put up for a 60-day sale in January after years of losing money. Now the P-I will shift entirely to the Web.

"Tonight will be the final run, so let's do it right," publisher Roger Oglesby told the newsroom.

Hearst's decision to abandon the print product in favor of an Internet-only version is the first for a large American newspaper, raising questions about whether the company can make money in a medium where others have come up short.

David Lonay, 80, a subscriber since 1950, said he'll miss a morning ritual that can't be replaced by a Web-only version.

"The first thing I do every day is get the P-I and read it," Lonay said. "I really feel like an old friend is dying."

Hearst's move to end the print edition leaves the P-I's larger rival, The Seattle Times, as the only mainstream daily in the city. The Times plans to deliver a copy of the newspaper to every P-I subscriber on Wednesday morning, spokeswoman Jill Mackie said.

"It's a really sad day for Seattle," said P-I reporter Angela Galloway. "The P-I has its strengths and weaknesses but it always strove for a noble cause, which was to give voice to those without power and scrutiny of those with power."

Seattle follows Denver in losing a daily newspaper this year. The Rocky Mountain News closed after its owner, E.W. Scripps Co., couldn't find a buyer. In Arizona, Gannett Co.'s Tucson Citizen is set to close Saturday, leaving one newspaper in that city.

And last month Hearst said it would close or sell the San Francisco Chronicle if the newspaper couldn't slash expenses in coming weeks.

The newspaper industry has seen ad revenue fall in recent years as advertisers migrate to the Internet, particularly to sites offering free or low-cost alternatives for classified ads. Starting last summer, the recession intensified the decline in advertising revenue in all categories.

Four newspaper companies, including the owners of the Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune and The Philadelphia Inquirer, have sought Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in recent months.

While the P-I's Web site ensures it a continued presence in the Seattle news market, it will likely be a pared-down version of its former self — with a heavy reliance on blogs and links to other news outlets.

The P-I had 181 employees, but Managing Editor David McCumber said the Web site would employ about 20 in the newsroom operation and another 20 to sell ads. He said he would not be working on the new site.

Steven R. Swartz, president of Hearst Newspapers, said the online P-I would not just be "a newspaper online."

"It's an effort to craft a new type of digital business with a robust, community news and information Web site at its core," Swartz said.

Hearst said the online edition will include some of the newspaper's marquee names, including sports columnist Art Thiel, political columnist Joel Connelly and Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist David Horsey. Horsey also is under contract to continue drawing for Hearst's other newspapers.

In February, the P-I Web site had 1.8 million unique visitors and 50 million page views, according to Nielsen Online. Meanwhile the newspaper's print circulation was down to 117,000, from nearly 200,000 in 1998, according to the Audit Bureau of Circulations.

It's unclear how the online-only venture will affect the Times, which is controlled by the Blethen family and has a circulation of 199,000. The Times has had severe financial troubles of its own and has cut 500 positions in the past year.

The P-I has had a feisty rivalry with the Times that intensified when the Times shifted from afternoon to morning publication in 2000. But since 1983, the P-I and the Times have shared business operations in a joint operating agreement in which the Times handles advertising, printing and other business functions for both newspapers in return for 60 percent of profits — or losses.

The Times, which also has been losing money and cutting jobs, has long sought to end the joint operating agreement, arguing it threatened the survival of both newspapers. However, ending the deal could be problematic because now the Times will shoulder losses alone during a weak economy, Mackie said.

The P-I's roots date to 1863, when Seattle was still a frontier town and James Watson founded its precursor, the Seattle Gazette, as a four-page weekly.

The newspaper changed hands, names and offices several times — including when the 1889 great Seattle fire destroyed its office — before newspaper baron William Randolph Hearst bought the P-I in 1921 through a representative. Hearst later revealed his ownership of the newspaper in an editorial, according to the P-I archives.

"Every idea, every movement, every debate in Seattle's civic life was reflected on the front page of the paper," said Leonard Garfield, executive director of the Museum of History and Industry in Seattle.

Some of the newspaper's more famous employees over the years included novelist Tom Robbins, columnist Emmett Watson and Frank Herbert, author of the science fiction novel "Dune."

Former P-I columnist Susan Paynter, who retired in 2007 after 39 years at the newspaper, said the P-I pushed the envelope on stories, running early pieces on abortion and the Equal Rights Amendment.

"The P-I was really on the forefront of telling the average person's story and why it mattered," Paynter said.

Horsey, the cartoonist who won the newspaper's only two Pulitzer Prizes in 1999 and 2003, said much would be lost when the print product ceases publishing.

"A daily newspaper tells the stories of a community and lets the people of a city know who they are, who their neighbors are, and the life and issues they share," Horsey said. "When you lose any one newspaper, you lose a piece of that."

Labels: United States

The European Union urged Prime Minister-designate Binyamin Netanyahu on Sunday to craft a government that embraces the long-standing goal of an independent Palestinian state living side by side with Israel.

The prospect of a new hawkish government, with Israel Beiteinu chairman Avigdor Lieberman as a possible foreign minister, will be seen in Europe as a setback to the Middle East peace process.

"Let me say very clearly that the way the European Union will relate to an [Israeli] government that is not committed to a two-state solution will be very, very different," said Javier Solana, the EU's foreign and security affairs chief.

US, European and moderate Arab officials have largely remained silent about the possibility of Lieberman becoming Israel's top diplomat. But as Netanyahu is in the final stages of crafting a coalition government based on the Feb. 10 election outcome that prospect could become a reality this week.

Solana and other EU officials met with the foreign ministers of Egypt and the Palestinian authority to discuss the formation of a Palestinian unity government - bringing the rival Hamas and Fatah factions under one roof - and rebuilding the Gaza Strip after Israel's recent offensive.

Labels: anti-semitism, Europe, islam, Israel

Labels: Israel, United States

Two Israelis were killed after sustaining critical wounds Sunday evening in a shooting attack near the community of Massua in the Jordan Valley.

Rescue teams pronounced the two dead after attempting to administer first aid. Police reports said the two were found shot in the vehicle, and were pronounced dead by a doctor.

According to police reports one or more terrorists fired at the Israelis' vehicle from short range as the two were driving along Route 90 in the Jordan Valley at around 8 pm. As a result the driver lost control of the vehicle and it overturned.

Security forces are currently investigating whether the fire came from a passing vehicle or from the side of the road.

One of the two victims died from wounds sustained by the vehicle's overturning, according to reports. The other died while paramedics were attempting resuscitation.

Labels: Israel, jihad, terrorism

The founder of a Muslim-American television station pleaded not guilty Friday to beheading his estranged wife.

Muzzammil "Mo" Hassan, 44, is charged with one count of second-degree murder for the Feb. 12 death of 37-year-old Aasiya Hassan at the offices of Bridges TV in the suburb of Orchard Park.

The Pakistani-born businessman, who has been in custody since reporting his wife's death soon after it happened, remained held without bail.

"The proof of guilt in this case is strong," prosecutor Colleen Curtin Gable told Erie County Judge Thomas Franczyk. She cited alleged admissions, forensic evidence and "strong motive evidence." Aasiya Hassan was stabbed multiple times and decapitated less than a week after having her husband served with divorce papers.

"We believe he would and could flee the jurisdiction if released," Gable said in arguing against bail.

Defense attorney James Harrington did not oppose the position.

Hassan did not speak during his brief arraignment, except to tell the judge he understood the proceedings.

Harrington declined to comment afterward.

The case against Hassan is striking in its irony. Muzzammil and Aasiya Hassan launched the Bridges TV network in 2004, saying they wanted to counter negative stereotypes and media portrayals of Muslims.

Labels: islam, misogyny, United States

Labels: Israel

An aide to President Barack Obama is on leave from his White House job after the FBI raided his old District of Columbia government office Thursday, arresting a city employee and a technology consultant on corruption charges, a White House official said.

The charges were lodged against the two men at a federal court hearing as the FBI finished searching the city’s technology office, which was led until recently by Obama’s new computer chief, Vivek Kundra.

Kundra is on leave from his White House job until further details of the case become known, according to a White House official speaking on condition of anonymity because the official did not want to publicly discuss personnel matters.

Labels: political corruption, United States

Philadelphia Newspapers, LLC, the parent company of the Philadelphia Inquirer and the Daily News, has estimated, in recent bankruptcy court filings, it has a much larger negative weekly cash flow than originally projected.

The change in the cash flow numbers were included in a filing on Monday authorizing Philadelphia Newspapers to access cash collateral and continue operating. The arrangement allows the company to use its collateral from a $350 million loan from Citizen’s Bank to fund its operating costs.

The original cash collateral budget for Feb. 20 through March 6, predicted Philadelphia Newspapers would lose $1,695,402, for an average loss of $847,701 per week. The new budget, which provides for the company’s estimated expenditures from March 9 until March 20, shows a negative cash flow of $4,701,804, an average of $2,350,902 per week.

Labels: communications, msm foulness, United States

(IsraelNN.com) The Palestinian Authority (PA) celebrated the single most murderous attack against Israeli civilians by broadcasting an hour-long special Wednesday on its official television station.

Arabs who penetrated into Israel by rubber dinghies from Lebanon carried out the attack, known in Israel as the Coastal Road Terror Attack, on March 11, 1978. They hijacked a tourist bus and killed 38 civilians, 13 of them children.

PA TV celebrated the attack on the anniversary of the hijacking with an hour-long special. The program included interviews with terrorists who described the planning and implementation of the murder spree.

Labels: anti-semitism, islam, Israel, jihad, terrorism

(IsraelNN.com) British officials granted senior Hizbullah member Ibrahim Moussawi a visa to visit the country on Thursday. The visa will allow Moussawi to lecture at a conference on political Islam. Moussawi plans to speak at the University of London on March 25.

The British government granted Moussawi a permit to visit Britain in 2008 as well. During that visit he appeared at events sponsored by the British group Stop the War.

Moussawi, who has been quoted as calling Jews “a lesion of the forehead of history” and justifying attacks on Israeli civilians, insists that he is not an anti-Semite. “I'm a bridge-builder and I've always been an advocate of dialog and discussion,” he claimed in response to criticism of an earlier visit.

Labels: anti-semitism, islam, jihad, londonistan, terrorism

Labels: anti-semitism, islam, Israel, Scandanavia

...sadder still is the fact that the teaching that Ayers “celebrates” is far from “exceedingly rare” these days. In fact, at Georgia Southern, one finds many professors whose areas of interest include “representations of diversity in children’s and young adult literature,” “gender issues in science, mathematics, and technology,” “cooperative learning,” and “identity development of Caribbean students.” These education professors also specialize in such things as “postcolonial theory,” “black feminist theory,” “poststructuralism,” “peace education,” and “queer theory.”

Labels: Moonbattery, political corruption, terrorism, United States

One in seven people believe it is acceptable in some circumstances for a man to hit his wife or girlfriend if she is dressed in “sexy or revealing clothes in public”, according to the findings of a survey released today.

A similar number believed that it was all right for a man to slap his wife or girlfriend if she is “nagging or constantly moaning at him”.

Labels: londonistan, misogyny

What 9/11 showed is that if we bomb people, they bomb back.

Labels: political corruption, terrorism, United States

KNOXVILLE, Tenn. – Three more federal charges have been filed against a University of Tennessee student charged with hacking into the personal e-mail account of Sarah Palin, the Alaska governor and former Republican vice presidential nominee.

David Kernell, the son of a Democratic Tennessee legislator, pleaded not guilty to all charges Monday, and a magistrate agreed to push back his trial from May to October.

Kernell allegedly gained access to Palin's account in September by correctly answering a series of personal security questions.

The new counts are fraud, unlawful electronic transmission of material outside Tennessee and attempts to conceal records to impede an FBI investigation.

An earlier indictment against Kernell was unsealed in October. He pleaded not guilty and was released on several conditions, including staying away from his computer except for school work.

The October indictment said Kernell tapped into the Alaska governor's widely publicized Yahoo! e-mail account, reset the password and was able to read the contents, make screenshots and post his exploits on the Web using the nickname "rubico." The indictment said at least one other person followed a similar path into Palin's account.

Kernell is the son of longtime state Rep. Mike Kernell of Memphis, chairman of Tennessee's House Government Operations Committee.

Labels: Moonbattery, United States

Does Europe want peace or does it want to be left in peace? I’d like you to think about this. Do you want peace or do you want to be left in peace? It isn’t the same policy, it isn’t the same strategy, and the consequences aren’t the same. If you want peace, you have to give yourselves the means to exist as an economic, financial, political and military power. You want to be left in peace? If so, you have to curl up very small, stay in your corner, cover your eyes, block your ears, and not talk too loudly, and for a time you will be left in peace. Until the moment when it’s discovered that you haven’t got the means to defend yourself. But at that point, it will be too late.

Labels: Europe, islam

There can be only one reason for how this has come about: The town fathers in Malmo, and perhaps the leadership of the Swedish federation itself, desperately wants this tie to be controversial -- wants to see it played behind closed doors, in order to somehow suggest that Israel is a pariah nation -- thereby advancing anti-Israel sentiment.

Dozens of anti-Israel activists clashed with police Saturday as they tried to storm a closed arena where Sweden and Israel were playing a Davis Cup tennis match.

The activists hurled rocks and firecrackers at police vans as they tried to break through the barricades set up to keep protesters from the arena. Hundreds of riot police pushed them back using truncheons. [...]

The clashes erupted after about 7,000 people gathered at a square in downtown Malmo to hear speeches condemning Israel's offensive in Gaza and urging support for Palestinians. [...]

Sweden's Left Party leader Lars Ohly told the crowd that the European Union and the rest of the world should "boycott the racist regime in Israel."

The protesters then marched toward the Baltic Hall arena, where some of them attacked the police line with eggs, rocks and firecrackers.

The doubles match between Sweden and Israel started as planned before about 300 special guests invited by the two countries' tennis federations.

Labels: anti-semitism, islam, Scandanavia

CAIRO, Egypt (AP) — Pulitzer-prize winning author Alice Walker, who wrote "The Color Purple," is traveling to Gaza along with other female activists to highlight the devastation of the Israeli offensive on Gaza's residents.

"I feel that what is happening in the Middle East is very important because the situation is so volatile," said Walker, speaking by telephone Saturday from the Rafah border crossing as her group waited to travel into Gaza. "I love people, and I love children and I feel that the Palestinian child is just as precious as the African-American child, as the Jewish child."

Walker is part of a group of about 60 women going to Gaza to deliver aid and meet with NGOs and residents. The trip, organized by the U.S. anti-war group Code Pink, is intended to push both Israel and Egypt to open the borders into Gaza, said Medea Benjamin, co-founder of Code Pink who helped organize the trip.

Labels: Moonbattery, terrorism

Labels: anti-semitism, londonistan

Labels: anti-americanism, anti-semitism, political corruption, terrorism

Beit-Hanina resident Mar'i al-Rdaidah, the Palestinian driver who rammed a bulldozer into a bus and a police car on a Jerusalem highway Thursday, drove the construction vehicle unhindered through the city to the scene of the attack, Channel 2 reported.

Two police officers were lightly wounded in the attack before Rdaidah was shot dead in the latest in a string of attacks by Palestinian terrorists using heavy machinery against Israeli civilian targets. (Click here for security camera footage of the attack)

Witnesses described a harrowing sight of the towering yellow front loader speeding along the highway, dragging the police car, flipping it into the air and trying to crush it with its front shovel.

According to the television channel, the bulldozer used in the attack was listed under Rdaidah's name.

Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said it wasn't clear whether the man worked on his own or was affiliated with a terror group.

However, the family of 26-year-old Rdaidah, who was married and had a young daughter, said they believed the incident was an accident and not a deliberate act of terror.

"We are waiting for him to return home… He is only interested in religion, he doesn't know what terror attacks are, they don't interest him," his mother told Channel 10.

In the afternoon, policeman Eldad Bin-Nun, who helped neutralize the terrorist, gave Channel 10 his account of the incident. "We were in the area by chance and were waiting at a red light when we noticed the tractor in the opposite lane, to our left, trying to slam the police car into the bus," he said.

"We stopped the police car and I ran toward the tractor, firing several shots at the driver from the vehicle's left side until he slumped to the right. I then ran to the bulldozer's other side and noticed he [the terrorist] was trying to sit up, so I fired at him again. Several moments later another policeman arrived, and he fired three more shots at the driver from an M-16 rifle," Bin-Nun told the television channel.

One witness, a taxi driver identified as "Dor," told Israel Radio that he chased the driver as he witnessed the attack.

"I saw the police car fly into the air. He flipped it over twice, then continued dragging it toward a bus that was stuck in traffic," he said.

He told the station that he had fired four shots at the man, wounding him. "Then a policeman came with his M-16 and finally finished him off," he added.

Police, MDA and ZAKA forces streamed to the scene minutes later, after police received emergency calls telling them that a bulldozer was trying to run over a police vehicle.

An initial police investigation indicated that the bulldozer driver reached the intersection near Teddy Stadium and managed to push a police vehicle for about 30 meters. After that, he tried to push the police vehicle into a bus, but was apparently blocked by an electrical post.

According to ZAKA, the bus was full of girls dressed in Purim costumes en route to Hadassah Ein Kerem Hospital to cheer up patients before the holiday.

A number of bystanders suffering from shock were treated on the scene by MDA teams.

ZAKA operation commander Haim Weinrot said that "the girls were hysterical. They saw the enormous scoop heading toward them and saw death approaching, but they were saved at the last minute by the post. It is a Purim miracle."

[...]

Within half an hour of the attack, Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat was on the scene to personally inspect the situation.

"The attack targeted us for no reason other than the fact that we live in Jerusalem. This was an attack carried out exclusively for the purpose of harming civilians," he said.

Barkat said he expected the government to approve harsher punishment of terrorists.

"The policy toward those who want to hurt us should combine strict punishment to create effective deterrence, quickly neutralizing the attackers, and returning to our routine lives as soon a possible following an attack," the Jerusalem mayor said.

Barkat gave the two policemen and the civilian who helped kill the terrorists the Lion Pin, bearing the city's emblem, and thanked them for their heroic behavior.

He went on to vow that "everyone involved in the attack" would be brought to justice.

The attack is the third of its kind in less than a year. At the beginning of last July, a bulldozer plowed into a number of vehicles on Jaffa Street, near the Mahane Yehuda market in the capital. Four people were killed in that incident, including the terrorist.

Three weeks later, another bulldozer driver went on a rampage in Jerusalem, aiming his vehicle at an Egged bus near the King David hotel. He wounded 15 people before being shot and killed.

Labels: islam, Israel, jihad, terrorism

Europeans were among the loudest cheerleaders for Barack Obama during his presidential campaign. Soon after he won the Democratic candidacy 200,000 people turned out in Berlin to hear him speak. But now that he is settled in the White House, many Europeans feel snubbed.

Just six weeks into his presidency, Europeans are already fretting that Obama has yet to visit Europe. His Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, flew west for her first foreign trip, spending a week in Asia last month, before traveling to the Middle East. Meanwhile, Obama has returned the Winston Churchill bust that sat in the Oval Office for the past eight years to the British. Indeed, some Europeans brood that the new President's only nod toward them came with the family decision to adopt a Portuguese water dog.

Labels: Europe, United States

Labels: CAIR corruption, islam, United States

Senior Islamic Jihad commander Khaled Shalan was killed on Wednesday night in an IAF missile strike on his car in Gaza.

Another member of the terror group was critically hurt in the attack on the vehicle that was traveling from Jabalya to Beit Lahiya, in northern Gaza.

According to the IDF, Shalan was responsible for the recent rocket fire on Ashkelon.

Hamas officials said the two jumped out of the vehicle when they heard the approaching aircraft, but were hit by the incoming missile.

Five others were reportedly wounded in the strike.

Labels: islam, Israel, jihad, terrorism, war on terror

US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton on Wednesday promised vigorous and personal involvement in stalled Mideast peace efforts and criticized Israel's demolition of Palestinian homes in east Jerusalem as "unhelpful."

Clinton also displayed strong public support for Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas.

The PA is the "only legitimate government of the Palestinian people," she told a news conference in Ramallah standing next to Abbas.

In recent days, Israel has issued orders for the demolition of dozens of Palestinian homes in east Jerusalem, saying the homes were built illegally.

Palestinians say they cannot receive proper building permits from Israeli authorities.

"Clearly, this kind of activity is unhelpful," Clinton said, adding that she would raise it with the Israeli government as well as municipal officials in Jerusalem. She said such actions violate the "road map."

Clinton spoke shortly after Israel issued a new order to demolish five residential buildings containing 55 apartments, said Hatem Abdul Qader, a Palestinian official on Jerusalem affairs.

"It's an open demographic war," he said. He said lawyers have challenged the orders, halting the demolitions until March 10.

Stephan Miller, a spokesman for city hall, said the buildings under demolition notice were empty and had been built illegally.

Abbas said Israel cannot be considered a peace partner if it keeps expanding settlements and demolishes homes in east Jerusalem. "The Israeli government has to respect its obligations under the road map and the two-state solution and completely stop all that is related to settlement and demolitions," he said.

Clinton signaled that she'd be heavily involved in the region, and said her special envoy, George Mitchell, would return soon.

"The Obama administration will be vigorously engaged in efforts to forge a lasting peace between Israel, Palestinians and all of the Arab neighbors. I will remain personally engaged," she said. "This is a commitment that I carry in my heart, not just in my portfolio."

Labels: anti-semitism, Israel, State Dept, United States