God is Back

Karen Armstrong writes in Foreign Policy that the so-called New Atheists are mistaken in their assumptions.

Israel at the UN

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu gives a logical, accurate, and passionate defense of Israel during a United Nations speech. One of the reasons I voted for him was that he speaks English fluently. This is one of the best speeches I have ever heard. If you are going to comment on this post, I ask that you watch all three clips first (they are short).

Stratfor Updates

For policy wonks and international-relations enthusiasts, Stratfor Global Intelligence is a political dream-come-true. I usually agree with their analyses, but they are still insightful when I do not. (Stratfor is a group of hard-core realists who sometimes discount the role that irrational ideology plays in the international arena.)

Here are the group’s reports from the last several weeks (sometimes these links go to advertisements before the actual content):

• The United States and Ballistic Missile Defense in Eastern Europe
• Misreading the Iranian Situation
• The Western View of Russia
• Libya: A Hero’s Welcome
• Obama’s Foreign Policy: The End of the Beginning
• Confidential Informants: A Double-Edged Sword
• Iraq Endgame

Enjoy!

Rosh Hashanah 2009/5770

RISHON LEZION, Israel — Benji Lovitt of the humorous blog “What War Zone?” takes a trip through the streets of Tel Aviv to interview Israelis on what they think of the Jewish New Year.

But do not be misled by the lightness of Lovitt’s video. As Israelis and Jews move into the year 5770, they are increasingly frustrated and anxious over recent events. Here are some headlines from just this past weekend:

• Iran reportedly has the ability to produce a nuclear bomb and is on the way to making a missile system that could deliver it.
• The Israeli government urgently warned Israelis in India that Islamic extremists are planning additional attacks there soon.
• Britain’s Trade Union Congress is calling for a boycott of Israeli goods.
• Iran is increasing its control over Hizbollah, the Islamist group in southern Lebanon.
• The Jerusalem Post remembers Capt. Assaf Ramon, who died recently in a military plane crash. His father was the first Israeli astronaut, and he died in the Columbia space shuttle explosion.
• IDF Brigadier General Avichai Mandelblit talks to the Post about defending Israel from international, legal criticism of the military’s conduct during the recent war in Gaza. The United States has said that a UN report on the issue was “unbalanced.”
• A United Nations conference condemned Israel’s atomic program.
• Jewish celebrities including Natalie Portman, Sacha Baron Cohen, Lisa Kudrow and Jerry Seinfeld are defending the Toronto Film Festival’s decision to spotlight Tel Aviv.
• There is still rioting in Jerusalem over the opening of a parking lot on the Sabbath.

But not all of the news is bad. (Besides, many Jews at Rosh Hashanah dinners over the holiday likely told the centuries-old joke with a shrug: “They tried to kill us, we won, let’s eat!”) Here is a collection of optimistic, inspiring, or light-hearted tidbits from the weekend papers.

• Israel and the United States are working together to prepare for “every possible scenario.”
• Amotz Asa-El commends Bank of Israeli Governor Stanley Fischer for saving Israeli from the worst of the worldwide recession and making the country one of the first to bounce back.

• The Jerusalem Post profiles twelve young Israelis for their contributions in areas ranging from the arts to sports to government to music.

• Herb Keinon interviews soldiers like Isabella Fhima, a 21-year-old, Moroccan Jew, who came to Israel by herself to join the army because she believes in the country. I know many lone soliders from all over the world, and each one deserves a feature in a national newspaper.

As for me, I’ve been listening to a recent pop song by the Israeli artist Sarit Hadad (in English) to get away from the headlines:

Although I generally hate pop music, I have to admit that this song is infectious and sunny. As non-Hebrew speakers can probably understand the video, the words are about running away from life’s stress for a short while and running to the beach. The summer is on its way out here, so we only have a few weeks left to do that.

Weekend News Roundup

Eli Kavon revisits the assertation that 9/11 occurred, at least in part, as a result of American support for Israel. Reuven Hammer says Judaism must return the musar, ethical movement following the recent misdeeds of so many rabbis and Jews themselves. Caroline Glick highlights the economic contribution that Israeli gives to the Western world — and could give to the Middle East if Arab countries would recognize the Jewish state. Hamas is looking to rebrand itself following its poor performance against Israel in the recent war. Israel and the United States is partnering on anti-missile defense systems. A Jewish man shoots and wounds two Arabs in east Jerusalem. Two rockets were fired from southern Lebanon into northern Israel. The Jewish state might be moving closer to attacking Iran’s nuclear facilities. Israel’s military chief of staff wants mandatory national service instead for citizens who do not enlist in the army after high school. One in three Holocaust survivors reportedly live in poverty.

Weekend News Roundup

The Jerusalem Post has an interesting feature on the effect that ultra-Orthodox Jews have on neighborhoods when they move into them. In an effort to combat assimilation among American Jews, the Israeli government and Jewish Agency are airing television commercials encouraging Israelis to convice friends and family there to take extended trips to Israel. Caroline Glick argues that Iran is months away from having nuclear weapons. Madonna ends her world tour in Tel Aviv, meets Israeli politicians, is nice to a Jerusalem waitress, wraps an Israeli flag around herself on stage, and faces criticism from Palestinians. Bradley Burston hopes that the Jewish New Year will bring an end to extremist, unrealistic idealism on the far left and right. Sarah Honig argues that the main conflict in the peace process is not Israeli settlements but the refusal of Arabs and Palestinians to recognize the right of the Jewish state to exist. Amotz Asa-El wonders whether the United States is truly in decline. The White House criticized Israel for building additional settlements before a negotiated freeze begins.

Israel on Fire

RISHON LEZION, Israel — Noah Efron writes in Foreign Policy that the Jewish state is becoming increasingly polarized as the extreme left and far right both feel embattled and are on the defensive:

Israel’s ultra-Orthodox and secular leaders alike broadcast animal assurance: a full, tempered confidence that their way of seeing the world is singular in its virtue. But behind the bluster, both communities feel themselves as embattled and endangered. Ultra-Orthodox Jews in Israel are collapsing under the weight of their successes. Dismissed by Israel’s founding generations as the last vestiges of a dying way of life, the ultra-Orthodox have grown enormously in numbers and in political power in Israel over the 61 years since the state was established. They have negotiated for themselves broad exemption from army service, mandatory for everyone else, and a series of entitlements that allow most ultra-Orthodox men to receive a small stipend for studying in religious academies for as long as they wish to do so. As a result, Israeli ultra-Orthodox males probably spend more time in formal study than any other class of humans ever has in the history of the planet. But small stipends do not easily support large families, and over time the ultra-Orthodox have become Israel’s economic underclass, as each generation exceeds the poverty of the last…

Secular Israelis, for their part, live in perpetual dismay over the fact that their successes have never led them to where they expected to arrive. Their parents’ generation, and that of their parents, expected to be vindicated, that the value and truth of the ideology they embraced would be confirmed by the society they built. After Zionists produced the Good Society, they reasoned, no one could doubt that Zionism itself is a social good. And for some time, it seemed that this formula had proven itself to be Israel’s self-image, broadly, as the country passed through two phases…

No one holds a heroic view of Israel anymore, not abroad and not here… Israel’s social gap is now considered among the greatest in the developed world. The most recent wave of immigrants, from the former Soviet Union, are largely disgruntled, and surveys suggest that a large percentage of them are not even Jews… And most important of all, Israel’s military excellence has been tested in a 20-year misadventure occupying southern Lebanon, and in laboriously maintaining the peace in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. The disastrous last war in Lebanon, and the wrenching recent war in Gaza, won support by most Israelis, and censure by some, but together they have left little doubt that the country’s army is not heroic in the sense that it once was.

For all these reasons, to be a secular Israeli in 2009 is a demoralizing and demoralized affair. We are tired: tired of the Palestinians, tired of the bombs, tired of U.N. and EU condemnations, tired of having so much of our daily wages taxed to buy guns and missiles, tired of the army reserves, tired of being hated, tired of going to bed and waking up to reports of kids — Jewish kids, Palestinian kids — watching their parents die or dying in their parents’ arms. We are tired of our lives and tired of ourselves.

The longest distance between two points is a straight line from Jerusalem to Tel Aviv.

In the ultra-Orthodox neighborhood of Me’ah Shearim in Jerusalem, men walk around in long, black suits and furry hats, even in the oppressive heat of summer in the desert. Women wear many layers of long, flowing clothing to hide any natural curve on their bodies as much as possible. The men study Torah all day while the women work part-time and take care of their families of as many as ten or more children. They survive on donations and government grants.

On the beaches of the cosmopolitan city of Tel Aviv, bare-chested men wear speedos while tattooed women walk around in the smallest bikinis imaginable. They work in the high-tech industry during the day and watch the Israeli version of “American Idol” or the new comedy show “Fun Night,” which features lewd jokes and dancing girls, at home. For dinner, they will probably eat a salad containing bacon and shrimp.

The true threat to Israel is neither an Iranian nuclear bomb nor rockets from Hamas or Hizbollah; it is Israelis themselves. Even if two Americans are respectively a Blue State-devotee of Barack Obama and a Red Stater who supports Sarah Palin, they still have something in common: The principles enumerated in the U.S. Declaration of Independence and Constitution. All Americans, regardless of their political affiliations, are united by a common vision and a set of ideals that supercede preferences on individual policies.

This is not the case in Israel. Sixty-one years after the re-founding of the Jewish state, Israelis still cannot agree on a common vision of what their country should be. Israel does not have a constitution.

Israelis on the far left do not believe in a Jewish state at all because they think countries based on ethnicity or religion are outdated at best or immoral at worst. They want to see a single, secular country consisting of Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza Strip in which every person, Jew or Arab, would have one vote. They disrespect religion as well as anyone who believes in it.

The ultra-Orthodox on the far right do not believe in Israel as it currently exists because it is a country that is officially secular and founded by men rather than a theocracy founded by God himself. (In official terms, Israel is a Jewish state based on ethnicity rather than religion.) They disrespect the government, the army, Israelis whom they consider to be less religious, and those who are secular. The ultra-Orthodox do not really care what happens between the Israelis and the Palestinians; they just want to be left alone to follow Judaism as they see fit.

The Religious Orthodox on the right believe that the current State of Israel was founded by God through the hands of men and that Israelis have a duty to settle the West Bank and Gaza. The routinely resist the government when it tries to evict their settlers from the Occupied Territories because, to them, the Torah is more important than the secular law.

Those on the left want Israel to withdraw from the Occupied Territories as soon as possible. The political left believes that the Palestinians will stop their terrorist attacks once they have a country of their own. The religious left believes that it is wrong for Israel to, in their view, oppress the Palestinians and treat them wrongly.

Those on the center right believe that Israel should not withdraw from any part of the Occupied Territories until the Palestians, in their view, stop their terrorist attacks and prove that they are able to build and run a state of thier own.

I write this a few hours before the start of the holiday of Tisha b’Av, the date when Jews fast and mourn the destruction of the First and Second Temples as well as other tragedies including the return of the scouts sent by Moses to Ca’anan, the failure of the Bar Kokhba Revolt against ancient Rome, the razing of Jerusalem by the Roman Empire, and the expulsion of the Jews from England. According to the Mishnah, God destroyed the Second Temple and sent the Jewish people into exile as a punishment because the various communities in ancient Judea — such as the Pharisees, Sadducees, Essenes, and Zealots — held a “baseless hatred” for each other.

I cannot help but wonder if ancient history is repeating itself. Ultra-Orthodox Jews are rioting and lighting things on fire in Jerusalem. Religious Zionists are resisting civil law and causing anarchy. Secular Israelis are becoming increasingly angered at these actions and losing all faith as a result. Even the moderates on the right and left cannot agree on what should come first: a ceasing of Palestinian hostilities or the giving of more land to them. (At the same time, Hamas shows no signs of accepting the existence of a Jewish state, Palestinian moderates are increasingly impotent, and Iran is continuing its march towards a nuclear bomb.)

None of these Jewish communities can gain a majority in such a fractured country, so Israel is paralyzed and unable to do anything. This country cannot agree at all on what this country should be. As a result, each of the communities feels threatened and increasingly angry. I just hope the division is not turning into baseless hatred again.

Elsewhere: Danny Ayalon agrees.

Rabbi Eliyahu Kin addresses the issue of “baseless hatred” within the Jewish community as well as within mankind as a whole. His advice? Do not gossip. Be humble. Give people the benefit of the doubt. See that there is something good within everyone since all people are made in the image of God.

Neda’s Murderer

According to Andrew Sullivan, Iranian doctor Arash Hejazi has identified the man pictured as the person who shot Neda Agha-Soltan during a protest in Tehran. I do not speak Farsi, but Sullivan is a reliable journalist.

I do not know how Dr. Hejazi obtained this information, so any Farsi-speakers are free to translate his blog post and place the information in the comments.

Earlier: Rape and Neda Agha-Soltan

Rape

If you have any doubts that the Iranian government is one of the most evil on the planet, read this interview with a member of the Basiji militia:

When he was 16, “my mother took me to a Basiji station and begged them to take me under their wing because I had no one and nothing foreseeable in my future. My father was martyred during the war in Iraq and she did not want me to get hooked on drugs and become a street thug. I had no choice,” he said.

He said he had been a highly regarded member of the force, and had so “impressed my superiors” that, at 18, “I was given the ‘honor’ to temporarily marry young girls before they were sentenced to death.”

In the Islamic Republic it is illegal to execute a young woman, regardless of her crime, if she is a virgin, he explained. Therefore a “wedding” ceremony is conducted the night before the execution: The young girl is forced to have sexual intercourse with a prison guard – essentially raped by her “husband…”

“I could tell that the girls were more afraid of their ‘wedding’ night than of the execution that awaited them in the morning. And they would always fight back, so we would have to put sleeping pills in their food. By morning the girls would have an empty expression; it seemed like they were ready or wanted to die.

“I remember hearing them cry and scream after [the rape] was over,” he said. “I will never forget how this one girl clawed at her own face and neck with her finger nails afterwards. She had deep scratches all over her.”

The rest is here. No commentary is required.

Earlier: Neda Agha-Soltan

Iranian Pot, Meet Kettle

I wonder if the Iranian officials said these statements with a straight face:

Iran summons the Italian Ambassador to Tehran Alberto Bradanini in protest against the violent suppression of anti-G8 protesters.

Bradanini was summoned to the Iranian Foreign Ministry on Friday to hear Tehran’s concerns about the “violent suppression of justice-seeking protesters by the Italian police.”

A Foreign Ministry statement included Iran’s “strong condemnation” of the “suppressive actions…which are clear breaches of civil freedoms and fundamentals of democracy.”

Iran’s police and security militias violently suppressed justice-seeking protesters there. Iran routinely breaches the civil freedoms of its people, and the country is a sham demomocracy.

Where Idealism Dies

Michael J. Totten has a fascinating interview with journalist Jeffrey Goldberg on Israel and the Middle East. The talk sheds light on the cultural differences between here and the Western world and how that makes the ongoing conflicts incredibly difficult to solve.

Twitter Lessons

What can companies who use social-networking tools learn from the role Twitter is playing in Iran? See here.

Neda Agha-Soltan

This video shows the death of an innocent, 26-year-old, Iranian woman who was shot in the heart by a member of the Basij militia during the recent protests in Tehran. If you have already watched the video, see it one more time. If you have never seen the video, watch it now.

It is bloody. It is gruesome. It is nothing like the fake violence that you see in the movies. It is real.

As a former journalist, I have always been a proponent that the news media should never censor itself, even when showing images of people dying. The truth is the truth. And the truth is frequently ugly.

Of course, many respectable journalists would argue the opposite. One, they argue, does not need to see a death to know that it occurred. They are correct, but there is more to my point than believing that people should be aware of a basic fact.

There are two ways to become aware of truth: 1.) logically and mentally; and 2.) emotionally and heart-felt. Simply knowing that a person died satisfies the first condition but not the second. One must experience the second to comprehend fully the meaning of an event. The reader or viewer must know and feel that the death occurred to understand the significance. This video reveals the depth of the depravity of the autocratic regime in Iran, and the only way to understand that fact is to feel it.

Neda Agha-Soltan, 26, studied philosophy and took underground music lessons in a country where women are banned from singing in public. She was engaged. Neda loved to travel and had hoped to study tourism and then lead groups of Iranian tourists abroad. She had two siblings. Profiles on Neda and her life and here and here. If my readers know of more information about her, please post links in the comments.

Meanwhile, the Iranian regime — through a state-run media outlet relying on an “unnamed source” — is insisting that the Basij did not shoot her and that the incident had been planned. I spit in the faces of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Neda’s death is about more than the murder of one person. As Elana Sztokman observes:

It took the tragic killing of Neda Soltan in Iran for the world to realize that the lives – and deaths – of women are at the center of the struggle for human rights against religious extremism.

The astounding protests taking place in Iran over the past week, since the fraudulent victory of Islamic extremist Mahmoud Ahmadinejad over Mir Hossein Mousavi, is really a story about women…

Geraldine Brooks, in her outstanding book Nine Parts of Desire about women and Islam, demonstrates unequivocally that radical Islam’s fight against the world hinges on the role of women. The more their woman are covered, the more religious men claim to be (ahem, sounds familiar). What we are really watching in Iran is women taking to the streets, under the unofficial leadership of a woman, to challenge the dark, barbaric rule of radical Islam…

It is quite telling that the new hero of this movement is a heroine – shot while watching from the side. The video of Neda Soltan horrifically bleeding out and dying is not the only element of the story to get people’s attention. Also “before” and “after” photos of her – that is, before and after she was forced into religious subservience by Islamic law – are quite shocking, a transformation from free woman to imprisoned chattel. These photos tell the real story about what is going on in Iran. I hope the world cares enough to help bring about real change.

No government — autocratic, democratic, or otherwise — can withstand the opposition of women who are collectively united. Women hold the true power because they are the bearers of life and the raisers of children. They are the future. Men are the present.

Imagine that all of humanity has died as a result of some cataclysm. The only survivors are a small group of ten on a remote island. If there is one woman and nine men, then the future does not bode well for the human race. She can only have one child every nine months. But if there are nine women and one man, the group can produce nine children every nine months. Every individual woman is the potential for limitless life. Why do you think that the crew of the Titanic gave spaces on lifeboats to women and children first? Men are more expendable.

Societies have always understood this fact, and this explains why traditional cultures have always assigned more protections to women — modest dress, more-severe punishments for female infidelity, the double standard regarding men and women who have casual sex, and so on. If a woman is “damaged” by contracting a sexually-transmitted disease, being raped, or something similar, then that is much more harmful to the human race than if a man does the same.

What many Westerners do not realize is that these standards in the Middle East and elsewhere are not meant to degrade women — it is to protect them (and many women in these societies, like religious Jews, understand, appreciate, and welcome the differences). Of course, these restrictions can be taken to extremes — and, sadly, they frequently are — but the intention of the restrictions, when taken moderately, is not what people in the United States and Europe believe.

Women are more valuable to society than men. Women have more power. And this is why the Iranian regime fears the current protests — for the first time, there is the active participation of millions of women. But by overreacting and killing Neda (among many other men and women), they will have only inspired millions more to fight against the government. Iranian men will not like seeing the country’s women being treated in this manner.

If the Iranian people are able to overthrow the Islamic theocracy and establish a democratic government — as I hope they will — than the Basij member who killed Neda might have just caused the downfall of the regime all by himself. And then she will not have died in vain.

CNN is Back — Perhaps

RISHON LEZION, Israel — I have never liked television  news. It is superficial, prone to sensationalism, and inherently focused on entertainment rather than information. (The failure of the broadcast networks to cover the turmoil in Iran has only intensified my feelings. See here and here.)

However, I was happy to see today that CNN is back on the Israeli cable provider HOT on channel 74. (I don’t know about YES, the country’s satellite network.) If I want to see an American news network, CNN is less bad than Fox News. Still, although I receive most of my daily news online, I usually watch the BBC or Sky News in English when a major news story breaks.

But I must remain critical of CNN, which was the best news network until it dumbed itself down to compete with Fox News. (This is one example of why the free market, usually the best economic system, is not always the best for society. But I digress.)

As a former journalist, I know that real reporters are self-sacrificing idealists who do not mind — and usually love — going around official authorities, especially when they are dictatorial tyrants. Undercover reporters have recently filed reports on life in North Korea, and CNN itself once had a reporter — Christian Amanpour, I believe — go undercover in Afghanistan to document life under the Taliban there.

Iran has banned foreign reporters from leaving their offices, or the government has kicked them out entirely. CNN’s anchors have been airing amateur reports and videos while essentially surrendering by stating that they cannot provide current coverage themselves. A reporter just said on the air that “we cannot report from the ground.”

Hogwash. A real news organization would do whatever it takes to get to the story. Hire Iranians as freelancers and get them hidden cameras and microphones. Get journalists who speak Farsi and do not look like Westerners inside the protests. There is always a way. Robert Fisk, correspondent for the Independent newspaper in England, is defying the Iranian government by filing reports like this.

Stop being useless if you want to have any semblance of a reputation left after the turmoil in Iran. Stop airing soft-news crap when there is real news occuring in one of the most important parts of the world.

Update: CNN is airing a promotional report on Larry King hosting a behind-the-scenes report on the Jonas Brothers. The freakin’ Jonas Brothers. Meanwhile, Iran is threatening to execute the leaders of the protesters, and the Guardian Council may be meeting to discuss the fate of supreme leader Ayatollah Khameni. A new, massive rally has started in Tehran. But… the Jonas Brothers!

War in Cyberspace

Here is a tweet that appeared today:

@StopAhmadi @IranRiggedElect @Change_For_Iran they are spammers from Israel http://tinyurl.com/mxeq5f pls rt #iranelection

For those who are unfamiliar with strings of text on Twitter, the user is saying that three specific users — who have been some of the main people reporting live from the streets of Tehran — are Israeli agents and that people should spread the word. Arab and Muslim dictatorial regimes have always tried to redirect populist anger against them onto Israel, and this is a perfect example. But it will not work.

Now the media war is unfolding in cyberspace. Agents of the Iranian government are on Twitter and throughout the online world, trying to spread misinformation (“the rally has been canceled!”) and disrupt proxy servers that Westerners have set up to allow Iranians to access the Internet. Where this will go is anyone’s guess.

Twitter Takes Sides?

In two of my recent posts, I discussed the significance of Twitter in light of the ongoing political crisis in Iran. Now, the social-networking tool has announced that scheduled maintenance is being postponed to help the protesters:

A critical network upgrade must be performed to ensure continued operation of Twitter. In coordination with Twitter, our network host had planned this upgrade for tonight. However, our network partners at NTT America recognize the role Twitter is currently playing as an important communication tool in Iran. Tonight’s planned maintenance has been rescheduled to tomorrow between 2-3p PST (1:30a in Iran).

Our partners are taking a huge risk not just for Twitter but also the other services they support worldwide—we commend them for being flexible in what is essentially an inflexible situation. We chose NTT America Enterprise Hosting Services early last year specifically because of their impeccable history of reliability and global perspective. Today’s decision and actions continue to prove why NTT America is such a powerful partner for Twitter.

Some bloggers, like BoingBoing, have been commenting as well on the fact that Twitter rescheduled the time so it will not impede the Iranian protesters who are using the tool to communicate with each other — and the world as well. This is also a significant change in the nature of modern media.

Mainstream, journalistic outlets would never make such a direct announcement over fear that they would become — or be viewed as — biased and no longer neutral. But in today’s world in which the masses can communicate to each other without the need of a middle man (except for the media platform of choice), the medium is becoming the message. It is now impossible for social-media outlets to remain impartial. Facebook must decide whether to ban groups that deny the Holocaust. Twitter must decide whether to postpone maintenance and harm the efforts of Iranian protesters. (Of course, Twitter did not say outright that they want to help them, but the subtext is obvious.) The New York Times does not have to make choices like these.

Traditional media outlets have always been gatekeepers. Well, there is no longer a gate. Social-media platforms are the sum-total of the people who use them, so the masses are now dictating to the gatekeeper.

Update: The U.S. State Department had asked Twitter to delay the work on its website.

Stratfor on Iran

See here for an analysis by Stratfor Global Intelligence. I just hope that the Iranian people are more idealistic and motivated than Stratfor is realistic. I would love to see a Second Iranian Revolution that would finally bring freedom and democracy.

Media Revolution

RISHON LEZION, Israel — Here is the money quote of the day:

“I never thought I’d see a day when news came from regular people and the news organizations were too shallow to care about current events.”

– Fark.com forum user BorgiaGinz on the failure of the mainstream media to cover the ongoing turmoil in Iran over the past two days

All of the news I have heard on Iran has come from individuals reporting on Twitter and the message board on Fark.com. Andrew Sullivan and the Huffington Post are also doing superb jobs.

Here in Israel, I have been watching Fox News, Sky News, and BBC World News. (The country no longer gets CNN.) The British networks are barely mentioning the story, and Fox News is, well, being Fox News. From what I have heard, CNN is also reporting stories that, in the grand scheme of things, are trivial or downright ludicrous.

Here is a sample of stories on U.S. television that I have seen here:

• Michael Phelps loses some swimming meet!
• Former President George H. W. Bush goes skydiving!
• Barack Obama speaks to a group of doctors!
• Some state trooper and a paramedic got into a fight — on VIDEO!

It makes me sick. People are dying right now for a free Iran. The entire world would benefit immensely from the removal of the theocratic regime. But does the mainstream, broadcast media care? I guess not.

When the Gulf War broke out, I watched CNN. When 9/11 happened, I watched CNN. While the Iranian people are on the verge of a Second Iranian Revolution, I am reading Twitter and Fark.com.

Twitter Comes of Age — in Iran

I was going to write a lengthy post on how Twitter can help business (as long as the Web 2.0 technology is used smartly). But then the disputed Iranian election, along with the resulting violence and unrest, occurred. This is much more significant.

The Iranian people and the outside world have little access to each other since their Iranian government is blocking the BBC satellite, attacking an Italian news crew, closing the offices of Al Arabiya, and preventing access to Facebook. So, where have Iranians and their supporters turned? To Twitter and blogs.

Most of the news I have seen online has come from the #iranelection Twitter feed that can also be read here through the Huffington Post. There are hundreds of new tweets every few minutes. People are sharing links to YouTube videos and photo blogs from the the streets of Iran itself. Here are a few, select ones:

Iran 101

Picasa Web Album

A YouTube Channel

Twitterers Inside Iran

The DailyKos purports to have received the actual vote tally from a link inside the Iranian government. I am skeptical of its authenticity, but here it is.

The U.S. Civil War was the first conflict to be covered extensively by newspapers there. Edward R. Murrow bought stories from a beseiged London to Americans through the radio during World War II. The United States saw the Vietnam War through their living rooms on television. The war in Kosovo was the first one to erupt after the Internet became popular, and with it came reporting and photos that spread online quickly. During the war between Israel and Hizbollah in southern Lebanon in 2006, civilians on both sides blogged and used webcams to produce videos on living under constant barrages of rockets and bombs.

Now, in 2009, the Iranian people and those who support democracy are communicating, organizing, and reporting through Twitter. Skeptics and ayatollahs, beware: The power of 140 characters is indeed stronger than you know, and even CNN is feeling the heat:

As the Iranian election aftermath unfolded in Tehran–thousands of demonstrators took to the streets to express their anger at perceived electoral irregularities–an unexpected hashtag began to explode through the Twitterverse: “CNNFail.”

Even as Twitter became the best source for rapid-fire news developments from the front lines of the riots in Tehran, a growing number of users of the microblogging service were incredulous at the near total lack of coverage of the story on CNN, a network that cut its teeth with on-the-spot reporting from the Middle East.

For most of Saturday, CNN.com had no stories about the massive protests on behalf of Mir Hossein Mousavi, who was reported by the Iranian government to have lost to the sitting president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. The widespread street clashes–nearly unheard of in the tightly controlled Iran–reflected popular belief that the election had been rigged, a sentiment that was even echoed, to some extent, by the U.S. government Saturday.

If, God willing, the rioters are able to overthrow the regime and establish a free democracy, Twitter — more than any other media outlet — will be largely responsible. And that means so much more than how the application can help a company’s stock price.

More later.

From Palestine to Iran

Michael J. Totten takes aim at the theory of Middle East linkage:

Dennis Ross, Special Advisor on Iran for the Secretary of State, has a book coming out next month that inconveniently takes issue with the Obama Administration’s thesis of “linkage.” “Of all the policy myths that have kept us from making real progress in the Middle East,” Ross writes in a chapter titled “The Mother of All Myths,” “one stands out for its impact and longevity: the idea that if only the Palestinian conflict were solved, all other Middle East conflicts would melt away.” Meanwhile, the Obama Administration – which Ross currently works for – is pressuring Israel in part because the president hopes progress toward the resolution of the Palestinian conflict will help derail Iran’s drive for the development of nuclear weapons…

Of the Middle East’s five most serious problems aside from the Arab-Israeli conflict, only one – the war in Iraq – was caused in any way by Israel or the United States. And Israel is not involved in the war in Iraq. The other four – radical Islamism, the dearth of democracy outside Lebanon and Iraq, Iran’s push for regional hegemony, and the conflict between Sunnis and Shias – simply can’t be blamed on the United States, Israel, or the Arab-Israeli conflict.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and U.S. President Barack Obama currently have opposite priorities. Netanyahu wants the United States to solve the Iranian problem and leave the Palestinians on the back burner because Iran, in Israel’s view, poses an existential threat (and the Palestinians have been waiting for forty years anyway). The Obama administration, as Totten and Ross note, believes that the solving of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict would take the wind out of the sails of Islamic extremists throughout the world.

I side with Totten and Ross. After all, Iran barely cared about the plight of the Palestinians — the Persian state, after all, is far away — until the 2005 election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who has championed the Palestinian cause in a cynical plot to spread Iran’s influence and embolden extremists throughout the Middle East. Besides, the Iranian regime’s hatred of Israel stems from more than mere anti-Semitism and pro-Palestinian leanings. When the Shah ruled Iran, his government was friendly with the United States and Israel. However, those two countries helped the Shah to repress the opposition — including the Islamic clerics who would later overthrow the government — through the SAVAK organization, which tortured and murdered dissenters:

In March 1955, the Army colonel was “replaced with a more permanent team of five career CIA officers, including specialists in covert operations, in­telligence analysis, and counterintelligence,” who “trained virtually all of the first generation of SAVAK personnel.” In 1956 this agency was reorganized and given the name Sazeman-e Ettela’at va Amniyat-e Keshvar (SAVAK). In 1960/61 the CIA trainers left and were replaced by a team of instructors from the Israeli Mossad. These in turn were replaced by SAVAK’s own instructors in 1965.

SAVAK had the power to censor the media, screen applicants for government jobs, “and according to reliable Western source , use all means necessary, including torture, to hunt down dissidents.”

After 1963, the Shah expanded his security organizations, including SAVAK which grew to over 5300 full-time agents and a large but unknown number of part-time informers.

Iran’s hatred of the United States and Israel is more complicated than people realize, and solving the Palestinian issue will not remove these feelings in an instant. Moreover, the Arab countries themselves, rightly or wrongly, do not truly care about the Palestinians — they have done little to help them and merely champion their cause while blaming Israel to deflect from their own internal problems.

The Middle East is much more complicated than people realize, and solving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict will not magically create peace and stability throughout the region. But, of course, it would be a start. For now, Israel and the international community should focus on Iran.

In March 1955, the Army colonel was “replaced with a more permanent team of five career CIA officers, including specialists in covert operations, in­telligence analysis, and counterintelligence,” who “trained virtually all of the first generation of SAVAK personnel.” In 1956 this agency was reorganized and given the name Sazeman-e Ettela’at va Amniyat-e Keshvar (SAVAK). In 1960/61 the CIA trainers left and were replaced by a team of instructors from the Israeli Mossad

Mossad

The Mossad is the national intelligence agency of Israel. “Mossad” is the Hebrew word for institute or institution. Membership in the Mossad is very prestigious in Israeli society, and the organization is considered to rank among the most effective intelligence agencies in the world….

. These in turn were replaced by SAVAK’s own instructors in 1965.

SAVAK had the power to censor the media, screen applicants for government jobs, “and according to reliable Western source , use all means necessary, including torture, to hunt down dissidents.”

After 1963, the Shah expanded his security organizations, including SAVAK which grew to over 5300 full-time agents and a large but unknown number of part-time informers.

The agency’s first director, General Teymur Bakhtiar

Teymur Bakhtiar

Teymur Bakhtiar was an Iranian general and the founder and head of SAVAK from 1958 to 1961, when he was dismissed by the Mohammad Reza Pahlavi….
, was dismissed in 1961 and later became a political dissident. In 1970 he was assassinated by SAVAK agents, disguised to look like an accident.

Hassan Pakravan

Hassan Pakravan

Hassan Pakravan was a well known diplomat and minister in the Mohammad Reza Pahlavi pre-revolutionary government of Iran. He is not only notable for his political involvement with the Mohammad Reza Shah government and SAVAK, but also his relationship with Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini….
, director of Savak from 1961-1965, had an almost benevolent reputation, for example, dining with the Ayatollah Khomeini while Khomeini was under house arrest on a weekly basis, and later intervened to prevent Khomeini’s execution, on the grounds it would “anger the common people of Iran”. After the Iranian Revolution, however, Pakravan was among the first of the Shah’s officials to be executed.

Pakravan was replaced in 1965 by General Nematollah Nassiri

Nematollah Nassiri

General Nematollah Nassiri , was the director of SAVAK, the Iranian intelligence agency during the rule of Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. A personal friend of the Shah, he had gained fame by personally delivering to Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadegh the warrant for the prime minister’s arrest in 1953….
, a close associate of the Shah, and the service was reorganized and became increasingly active in the face of rising Shia and Communist militancy and political unrest.

Weekend News Review

Daniel Gordis writes a book on how the Jewish people can survive when Israeli will likely face unending conflict in the near future. The Jerusalem Post publishes an in-depth look at the Israeli military’s revamped public-relations department. The Post also profiles an army unit that treats everyone in the West Bank — patients today who could turn into attackers tomorrow. One in four Israelis would consider leaving the country if Iran obtains nuclear weapons. In light of the approaching holiday of Shavuot, during which Jews celebrate the giving of the Torah on Mt. Sinai by eating dairy products, Ha’aretz offers some tips on making homemade cheese. Sayed Kashua, an Israeli Arab, describes his encounter with security at Ben-Gurion Airport. Anand Giridharadas is disappointed that Indian culture — one which, to me, seems very Jewish — is becoming Westernized.

Geography is Destiny

Robert Kaplan, writing in Foreign Policy, writes that geography has always laid the foundations for conflict throughout the world in the past and present. The article is your assigned reading for today.

Obama in Egypt

Sometimes the selection of a speech’s venue is just as important as the speech’s message:

President Obama’s decision to deliver a speech here next month has given significant encouragement to a once powerful ally that has grown increasingly frustrated over its waning regional influence and its inability to explain to its citizens why it remains committed to a Middle East peace process that has failed to produce a better life for Palestinians.

After eight years in which Egypt felt unappreciated and bullied by the Bush administration, Egyptian officials were gleeful about Cairo’s selection last week for the president’s address to the Muslim world. They said that it proved Egypt remained the capital of the Arab world and that it eased concerns that Washington might undermine its Arab allies in exchange for a grand deal with their rivals in Iran.

The Obama administration could have selected any number of Arab countries to make a major speech to the Muslim world — most notably, the moderate states of Egypt, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia. Egypt is at a cold peace with Israel, and the country receives a generous amount of U.S. assistance (possibly in exchange for the peace with the Jewish state).

However, Egyptian is an authoritarian regime that cracks down on dissidents and also keeps Palestinians imprisoned in Gaza. Jordan is friendly with Israel, but it wants nothing to do, justifiably or not, with the Palestinians in the West Bank. Saudi Arabia has had a historic friendship with the United States (mainly because of its vast supply of oil), but the country funds extremist Islam schools throughout the world as a result of a devil’s bargain for relative peace between the government and the radical imans there.

So, why did President Obama choose Egypt? The likely reason is that he wants to support the Arab country that is the strongest bulwark against the increasing influence of Iran. (Do not forget that moderate, Muslim countries despise the theocratic state just as much as Israel and the United States.) Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak has effectively, though undemocratically, kept the Muslim Brotherhood in check. Jordan’s goverment is weaker and facing constant threats since a majority of its population is comprised of Palestinians, many of whom are extremists. Saudi Arabia, even if it wanted, cannot fight strongly against the Islamists in there.

Obama is proving to be more pragmatic and realistic than both his supporters and detractors probably thought. Although the White House is now moving quickly in its efforts — rightly or not — to finalize a two-state solution between Israel and the Palestinians, it knows that its must garner as much support against Iran as possible. Egypt is probably the strongest ally in that capacity.

Israel and America

Is Benjamin Netanyahu heading for a conflict with Barack Obama? Michael Hirsh says yes, and David Horovitz agrees.

False Peace

RISHON LEZION, Israel — Hamas leader Khaled Meshal tells the Western media some interesting and paradoxical things:

The leader of the militant Palestinian group Hamas said Monday that its fighters had stopped firing rockets at Israel for now. He also reached out in a limited way to the Obama administration and others in the West, saying the movement was seeking a state only in the areas Israel won in 1967…

He repeated that he would not recognize Israel, saying to fellow Arab leaders, “There is only one enemy in the region, and that is Israel.”

On the two-state solution sought by the Americans, he said: “We are with a state on the 1967 borders, based on a long-term truce. This includes East Jerusalem, the dismantling of settlements and the right of return of the Palestinian refugees.” Asked what “long-term” meant, he said 10 years.

Here is what Meshal is really saying once one understands the subtleties of his message:

We support a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip  [the so-called pre-1967 borders] that will be at relative peace with Israel for ten years.

Hamas does not want peace with Israel. The terrorist group is advertising that it is employing a tactic that astute observers of the Middle East have observed for years. An extremist group terrorizes Israel while the Jewish state tolerates the attacks as long as possible. When Israel finally responds with the intention of ending the bloodshed, the world cries foul and gets the two sides to agree to a cease-fire. After the terrorists regroup and resupply their weapons, they begin attacking again. And the cycle starts anew. In this interview, Meshal is saying that Hamas will wait ten years to attack Israel again — presumably under the assumption that the Palestinians will have even more support and weapons capabilities from a much-stronger Iran at that time.

Meshal seems to say that Hamas is becoming more moderate — that it sees a two-state solution. But, in reality, nothing has changed.

People in the West, particularly those on the far left, firmly believe that any conflict can end as long as mediation and negotiations are ongoing. This is the sincere, idealistic hope of liberal democracy in a world based on secure nation-states. But the Middle East is a different world that operates under a different set of rules.

The West believes that the best way to end conflict is through compromise and negotiation. But that view is based on the assumption that both parties are rational actors. Hamas is not rational (and, most likely, neither is Iran). There are two realistic ways to end wars: 1.) Mediation and negotiation; and 2.) Win thoroughly. When the enemy is resoundingly defeated, if not eradicated, the war is indeed over. But this is a reality of the Middle East that the West has never been comfortable accepting because they hold to a different set of rules that always prefers the first option.

Unless Meshal and his terrorist ilk have a religious epiphany and disavow extremist Islam, Hamas will never try to make peace. So, the only other option is to eradicate Hamas while helping to build a moderate, Palestinian state with a viable, moderate, functioning society.