The Pope and Sarkozy dicuss the"injustice done to the Palestinian people"

Context: President Sarkozy and Pope discuss Middle East peace


Le Figaro reports that one of the issues the French President and the Pope discussed during their meeting las week was the "moral imperative" to "repair the injustice done to the Palestinian people".  There is also the somewhat vague call to ensure "the security to the Jewish people" (but not specifically the security of Israel and its people).


(Au Vatican, Sarkozy lève les malentendus avec Benoît XVI)

Mosque shooting game banned in Austria, not Jewish soldier shooting game in Belgium

Anti-mosque web game banned: Austria (and quite rightly so)

"Austrian authorities have banned a far-right online game where players eliminate animated mosques and Muslims, the political party behind the game said on Friday.  The "Bye Bye Mosque" game, which has had over 200,000 visitors since it was launched on Monday, has drawn sharp criticism from Austria's Social Democrats and Green Party, as well as the Islamic and Roman Catholic communities.

Set up by the provincial branch of the far-right Freedom Party ahead of an election in Styria later this month, the game encouraged players to collect points by putting a target over mosques and minarets emerging from the countryside and clicking a "Stop" sign.  They also had the chance to eliminate a bearded muezzin calling Muslims to prayer. [...]"
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In Belgium, children are exhorted to shoot at Israelly soldiers and throw them to the sea.  And the big difference with the Austrian game is that it is not an online game.  The game was staged at a Roman Catholic school ('Throw Israel soldiers to the sea' educational game at Belgian Catholic school), at the Ghent Fair [Belgian NGO incites children to shoot at Israeli soldiers at the Ghent Fair], and now at Charleroi (though adults were not asked to shoot at the soldiers, the exercise seems to be only aimed at children and their parents) :

8 October: a laughing Griet Deknooper, a teacher and the inventor of the "shoot a Jewish/Israelly soldier game", with her fund-raising aquarium at a Charleroi anti-Israel event.

'Throw Israel soldiers to the sea' educational game at Belgian Catholic school

Hardly does a week go by in Belgium without a few NGOs - which receive generous funds from the government - organizing anti-Israel events.

In Flanders alone, during the last weekend of September, several such events took place.  The city of Antwerp [!] - repeat the city of Antwerp [!] - supported, for the second year running, a "Day for Palestine". No wonder that the Antwerp Jewish community is moving out. At Bredene, NGO Belgium to Gaza held an information and sales booth at a fair.  On the 30th, there was a debate in the Herent parish hall on the Israel-Palestine conflict.

But what happened at the Heilig Hart en College (Sacred Heart College) in Halle is so sick that it beggars belief. It is worrying that a reputable Catholic school sees nothing wrong that Catholic adults exhort kids to symbolically but very physically shoot at Israelly/Jewish soldiers and throw them into the sea.  In fact, killing them.

The city, run by a right wing coalition (CD&V, N-VA et VLD), had granted permission for the event "Gaza Terminal" to be held in front of the Halle train station to ensure maximum public exposure.

In the event, because of bad weather conditions, it was transferred to the school gym hall.  The organiser was Griet Deknopper,  a Belgian woman who took part in the flotilla supposed to break the Gaza siege.  She used to be involved in Chiro, the Flemish catholic scouts, and is the niece of a CD&V alderman.   The usual anti-Israel crowd always resorts to the same propaganda methods (flea markets, BBQs, music, anti-Israël propaganda: boycott calls, accusations against Dexia bank, leaflets by the far left-islam party Egalité whose incitement is well documented).

"Throw the soldiers [Israelly Jews] to the sea with your coins!"

Norway cartoon : Netanyahu builds Auschwitch for Palestinians

"Oh they are a brave crowd, the men and women of the Norwegian media corps."

Source: Norway, Israel and the Jew (Adresseavisen burns 90 000 newspapers rather than risk offending Muslims)

Background: Cartoon: Netanyahu builds Auschwitch for Palestinians

On March 18th Adresseavisen published the cartoon above, depicting Abbas on his knees, pleading in front of Netanyahu who is building a concentration camp for Palestinians. The cartoon was made by Adresseavisen’s cartoonist Jan O. Henriksen.

Yesterday, NTB (Norway’s News Agency) reports that Adresseavisen has burned 90 000 copies of the newspaper, as it offered a cartoon by Jan O. Henriksen depicting Danish cartoonist Kurt Westergaard. Adresseavisen feels the cartoon might be offensive to Muslims.

Henriksen understands why 90 000 copies of the newspaper, carrying his cartoon, was thrown to the flames. In the NTB article he states: "I most decidedly feel that this is not censorship. One must take into concern the safety of one’s co-workers. If one is to provoke on purpose, one must agree on it in advance, and discuss what measures to take".

So everyone in Adresseavisen agreed it was a good idea to publish a picture of Netanyahu constructing a concentration camp for Palestinians. But not to publish a cartoon of Kurt Westergaard, who is threatened on his life for drawing a cartoon of Muhamed, as this might offend Muslims.

Oh they are a brave crowd, the men and women of the Norwegian media corps.

U.K., Spain to boycott OECD tourism conference because it’s in Jerusalem

Source: Haaretz, by Irit Rosenblum

Britain and Spain will not send delegates to the OECD’s biannual tourism conference on October 20-22, because it will be held in Jerusalem, Tourism Minister Stas Misezhnikov (Yisrael Beiteinu ) said yesterday.

This is only the second time in its history that the conference, which this year will deal with sustainable tourism, is being held outside Paris.

Journalist and blogger Jorge Marirrodriga (Sobre Israel Opinamos Todos) writes that tourism is the main source of revenue in Spain, a country which is going through serious financial trouble deeply affecting the lives of many people.  But still Zapatero's government seems to put the "Palestinian cause" above the tourist sector interests.

Funding Palestinian Incitement, European taxpayers are made to pay for the propaganda that fuels the Mideast conflict

"Now, as new peace talks proceed, such contraventions and contradictions go on, with PBC broadcasts from March and July this year praising, for instance, 18-year-old female suicide bomber Ayyat al-Akhras, who in 2002 detonated explosives strapped to her body, killing a security guard and a 17-year-old girl in Jerusalem." Rachel Levy (photo) victim of human bomb Ayyat al-Akhras.


Article by Matthew Sinclair et Raheem Kassam in the WSJ

It is easy to understand why many Westerners are bewildered by the conflict in Israel-Palestine. Confrontations like the springtime flotilla crisis make it easy for people to see the situation as too complex, ugly, and hopeless, and they switch off. But we can't ignore what goes on in Israel and the Palestinian territories, if for no reason other than we're affecting it:  Our money is supporting indoctrination in the territories that is sowing the seeds of future conflict for decades to come. We have a responsibility to take that incredibly seriously.

In 2007, the European Union provided €420 million to the Palestinian territories, while member states also provided extensive bilateral aid: Germany provided €55 million, France €67 million, and the United Kingdom put in £63.6 million (about €76 million). Many countries have increased their donations since then, with the EU and U.S. pledging the lion's share of $7.7 billion for the period of 2008-2010, with a focus on reconstruction after last year's Gaza conflict.

Some donor countries have recently taken steps to try to prevent their funds being used to terrorize Israelis. Germany, for instance, has worked to outlaw the Turkish-German NGO, Internationale Humanitaere Hilfs organisation, which has delivered more than $8.3 million in funding to groups linked to Hamas.

But such moves only address part of the larger responsibility that donations create. Millions in Western taxpayers' pounds, euros, and dollars, now fund all the actions of the Palestinian Authority. Much of that money comes through direct budget support, which means unconditional checks to the Authority, or paying off its debts. In that way our governments support everything, good and bad, that the Palestinian Authority does.

Palestinian terrorism: 30th anniversary of Paris synagogue bombing

28 years later:
- Canadian professor (Hassan Diab, 54) held over deadly 1980 synagogue bombing in Paris, Haaretz, 13/08/08
- Friends shocked as Ottawa professor held in Paris bombing: The Ottawa university professor arrested in the 1980 bombing of a Paris synagogue made his first court appearance yesterday as his former academic advisers expressed disbelief over allegations the "lively" scholar was once involved in a terrorist act. Canada.com, 15/11/08
- Justice delayed,  Shimon Samuels, Jerusalem Post, 10/01/10

The facts: Wikipedia

The 1980 Paris synagogue bombing was a terrorist attack on the synagogue of Union Libérale Israélite de France, located on rue Copernic, Paris, on October 3, 1980, the eve of Simchat Torah. About 10 kilograms (22 lb) of explosives hidden in the saddlebags of a motorcycle parked outside the synagogue detonated, killing four people and injuring dozens. [1][2]

The bombing was the first of a string of attacks against Jews in Europe. On August 29, 1981, a synagogue in Vienna, Austria, was attacked by Palestinian gunmen, who killed two people and wounded 30 in the 1981 Vienna synagogue attack. On October 20, 1981, also the eve of Simchat Torah, three people were killed and 94 injured in a truck bomb attack outside a synagogue in the diamond-trading centre of Antwerp, Belgium in the 1981 Antwerp bombing.[3][4]

1. "Canadian held in Paris synagogue bombing". The Toronto Star. November 14, 2008.
2. "File on 1980 Paris bombing revealed". The Globe and Mail. November 20, 2008.
3. "Jewish Targets: Recent Attacks". The New York Times. 1986-09-07.
4. Lewis, Paul (1981-10-21). "2 Killed By Bomb at Antwerp Synagogue". The New York Times.