... [T]here is a curious lack of mention over the demand, enshrined in the previous "Arab Peace Initiative," about what is called the "right of return." Namely, to satisfy PA demands Israel would have to accept the immigration of hundreds of thousands of passionately anti-Israel Palestinians who had lived in the country 60 years ago (or their descendants) and who have been fighting all that time to wipe Israel off the map.

Is the "right of return" as a condition for making peace still in the small print? I don't see that anyone else has asked that rather important question. Presumably it is still there. Consequently, what is in fact a suicidal offer to Israel is made, by selective reporting, to make it sound like an attractive offer. But if the demand for a massive immigration of hostile Palestinians is indeed dropped that in fact is the real news. Of course, the PA would passionately denounce such a step and since it has said nothing on the point one might assume that this demand still stands.

TIAA-CREF officials are asking the SEC to allow it to take no action on a shareholder proposal by activist group Jewish Voice for Peace that would require it to consider divesting from companies that contribute to violations of human rights, including companies whose business supports Israel's occupation of the West Bank.

Jewish Voice of Peace filed a shareholder proposal with the College Retirement Equities Fund on Feb. 8 that was signed by 200 investors, requesting that shareholders be allowed to vote on the issue at CREF's July annual meeting. The date and location of the meeting have not yet been set.

CREF officials in a March letter to the Securities and Exchange Commission requested that they be allowed to take no action on the proposal, said a company source, who asked for anonymity.

Sydney Levy, a spokesman for Jewish Voice for Peace, said the shareholder proposal was rewritten this year not to require divesture of a specific company.

Attorney Nitsana Darshan-Leitner of the Israel Law Center said in an interview that the Jewish Voice for Peace resolution was "anti-Semitic" and "anti-Israel."

Ms. Darshan-Leitner said her organization would sue TIAA-CREF if the shareholder proposal was enacted to ensure the enforcement of state and federal anti-discrimination and anti-boycott laws and to ensure that Israeli companies and businesses are not harmed.

Some worshipers outside the Dome of the Rock, with its now white-capped golden dome, built a replica of an artillery rocket. At Damsacus Gate, I witnessed a fairly vicious gang of Palestinian youths hurling snowballs at passersby.

They pelted a young ultra-Orthodox boy, maybe 13 years old, with real violence, hitting him so hard he fell and lost his hat. Then they set on him, smashing him with snow, then with their fists. He eventually managed to get away. There were no police or border patrol officers to be seen.

Police arrested nine Arabs from east Jerusalem over the past week in connection with a snowball attack against two haredim during the snowstorm a week and a half ago.

[ ... ]

But the innocent snowball fight got out of hand when two haredim tried to leave Damascus Gate and were accosted by approximately 20 Arabs. The Arabs threw snowballs at them from less than a meter away and tried to steal one of their hats, while shouting obscenities.

A video taken of the incident went viral on Facebook with tens of thousands of people expressing disgust.

On Wednesday, police arrested three suspects and on Sunday night arrested six people from the Old City in connection with the attack. Both minors and adults were taken into custody.

Gaza has basically been under siege by Israel for the past several years. Israel controls the goods that come in to Gaza, come out of Gaza. So, I'm just curious, where does Hamas get most of its weapons?

18 Nov 2012

Israel is making a major effort to maintain the fabric of civilian life in Gaza, despite the situation of current hostilities.

Crossings

1. Israel is making a major effort to maintain the fabric of civilian life
in Gaza, despite the situation of current hostilities. The IDF today (18
Nov) opened the Keren Shalom crossing for movement of food, medicine and
other goods from Israel despite the ongoing rocket attacks on the Israeli
population and previous attacks on the crossing.

2. The Erez crossing was open today, as on every other day of Operation
Pillar of Defense. Seventy foreign journalists entered Gaza today by way of
Erez. Twenty Gazans entered Israel for medical treatment, and twenty-three
foreign nationals, representing NGOs who until now had been prevented by
Hamas from leaving the Gaza Strip, departed.

Food and Housing Security

1. Gaza is not experiencing food scarcity. Israel is not blocking entrance
of goods into Gaza, except for weaponry and dual-use materials. Construction
materials can be imported to Gaza under the supervision of international
organizations.

2. Israel is continuing the yearly supply of five million cubic meters
(1,320,860,250 gallons) of water to Gaza, despite the rocket attacks on
Israeli cities and towns.

3. UNRWA (UN Relief and Works Agency) reports (17 Nov 2012) that despite
some displacement of families due to hostilities, "there hasn't been any
need to provide emergency humanitarian assistance or to open UNRWA
facilities as emergency shelters."


Medical Care

1. Between January-October 2012, approximately 14,500 patients and their
accompanying chaperones entered Israel from Gaza for medical treatment. 99%
of the medical requests by Palestinian residents of Gaza were approved by
Israel.

2. The World Health Organization has reported a ten-day slowdown in referral
process for Gaza patients due to disagreements between the Ramallah and Gaza
Health Ministries.

3. Gaza hospitals are currently operating at 80% capacity (17 Nov), slightly
higher than routine periods.

4. Israel is not blocking entrance of medical supplies into Gaza. Requests
submitted by the international community are answered within 24-72 hours of
submission, almost always positively, and Israel has opened the Kerem Shalom
passage for transit of medical materials and other goods, despite the danger
to personnel at the crossing.

5. At present, there is a shortage of some medical supplies in Gaza due to
disagreements between Hamas and the PA, and budgetary difficulties of the
Palestinian Authority.

6. UNRWA reports that all of its 21 health centers are open and functioning.
Of UNRWA's 12,000 staff members in Gaza, only one person has sustained
injuries in the hostilities, and those are minor.


Electricity

1. Israel is supplying 125 megawatts of electricity to the Gaza Strip from
the power station in Ashkelon despite the rocket attacks on Israel's
population, and on Ashkelon itself.

2. Gaza continues to suffer from power outages due to a deliberate policy of
Hamas, which opposes import of fuel from Israel. As a result, the Gaza power
station is operating at 20% capacity.

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas has reportedly demonstrated a willingness to restart talks with Israel, telling Jewish leaders that his UN speech on Thursday would include a greater display of sensitivity to Jewish claims to Israel.

Meeting Monday evening with about 10 Jewish leaders, Abbas endorsed Alan Dershowitz's formula for returning to talks with Israel, participants said.

The meeting was held under the auspices of the Center for Middle East Peace. Top Jewish organizational leaders declined attendance, reportedly at the request of the office of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has discouraged Jewish meetings with Abbas until the Palestinians leader gives up demanding a settlement freeze as a precondition for returning to talks.

Among those in attendance were Dershowitz, the Harvard legal scholar and a leading defender of Israel; Robert Wexler, the CMEP director and a top Jewish surrogate for President Obama; and Peter Joseph, who heads the Israel Policy Forum.

[t]he formula states that "Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu should now offer a conditional freeze: Israel will stop all settlement building in the West Bank as soon as the Palestinian Authority sits down at the bargaining table, and the freeze will continue as long as the talks continue in good faith."

Mr. Romney's frank remarks, which undercut even Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's public endorsement of "a solution of two states for two peoples: a Palestinian state alongside the Jewish state," seemed to break from decades of official American foreign policy. Since before the Oslo Accords were signed in 1993, Republican and Democratic presidents have thrown their weight behind the effort to secure Israel's future as a democratic state with a Jewish majority by creating a second state for up 2.5 million Palestinians who have lived under Israeli military rule for more than four decades.

We support the creation of a democratic Palestinian state dedicated to living in peace and security side by side with the Jewish State of Israel. The creation of a Palestinian state should resolve the issue of Palestinian refugees by allowing them to settle there, rather than in Israel. Furthermore, all understand that it is unrealistic to expect that the outcome of final status negotiations will be a full and complete return to the armistice lines of 1949. And we understand that all final status negotiations must be mutually agreed.

We believe the establishment of a Palestinian State on the West Bank would be destabilizing and harmful to the peace process.

If Palestinians embrace democracy and the rule of law, confront corruption, and firmly reject terror, they can count on American support for the creation of a Palestinian state.

ROMNEY: I spoke out when the key fact that I referred to was known, which was that the Embassy of the United States issued what appeared to be an apology for American principles. That was a mistake. And I believe that when a mistake is made of that significance, you speak out.

Elsewhere in the region, President Obama is committed to maintaining robust security cooperation with Gulf Cooperation Council states and our other partners aimed at deterring aggression, checking Iran's destabilizing activities, ensuring the free flow of commerce essential to the global economy, and building a regional security architecture to counter terrorism, proliferation, ballistic missiles, piracy, and other common threats. Jerusalem is and will remain the capital of Israel. The parties have agreed that Jerusalem is a matter for final status negotiations. It should remain an undivided city accessible to people of all faiths.

Democratic National Committee chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz on Wednesday denied any "discord" over the Democratic Party's decision to return "God" and "Jerusalem" to the party platform, and said the move "absolutely" received the two-thirds delegate vote required.

"Well, really, it was essentially a technical oversight," Wasserman Schultz, referring to the reversal, said on CNN. "And President Obama, because he personally believes that Jerusalem is and always should remain the capital of Israel, he made sure that we amended the platform to reflect his personal view as well as reflect the language that we had in the platform in 2008."

But after the delegates voted by voice, there was some dispute over whether the amendment passed by two-thirds. Some delegates booed the measure, but Wasserman Schultz denied that there was a rift in the convention hall.

In the 2008 Democratic party platform, there was this language on Jerusalem, Israel:

Jerusalem is and will remain the capital of Israel. The parties have agreed that Jerusalem is a matter for final status negotiations. It should remain an undivided city accessible to people of all faiths.

This year, however, that language has been removed. Indeed, there is no mention of Jerusalem in the 2012 party platform adopted by Democrats.

Since 1968, with the sole exception of the rather odd platform (more like a manifesto) adopted in 1988, every Democratic party platform has included language similar to that quoted above from 2008.  Note that recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, a point to which every Democratic (or Republican) administration has refused to acquiesce once safely in office, was always explicitly acknowledged.  In fact, the Democratic platforms for the years 1972 through 1984 all included this language as well:

As a symbol of this stand, the U.S. Embassy should be moved from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.

And Jimmy Carter's 1980 platform actually contained this statement:

We oppose creation of an independent Palestinian state.

As a very old cigarette ad used to say ... you've come a long way, baby.

And it's not only on the issue of Jerusalem that this plank of the platform has been diluted.  It focuses much more on (you guessed it) Obama and his alleged accomplishments than it does on the relationship between the U.S. and Israel.  In fact, this platform is unique in that it makes no mention of Israel as an "ally" nor of the "special relationship" between our countries.  You have to go back to 1980 to find a platform that doesn't use at least one (usually both) of those terms.

Daniel Pipes has a piece today at NRO entitled "What the 2012 Election Means for Israel" in which he concludes that "[i]f elected, Romney will be staunchly loyal, but Obama's coldness will turn glacial."  I think it's somewhat overwrought in places, but his warnings about the waning support for Israel among Democrats obviously merit consideration.

Numerous books and documentaries have told of how Ms. Corrie, a 23-year-old student, stood in an orange vest with a bullhorn between a bulldozer and the home of a Palestinian family in March 2003 during the height of the second intifada, or uprising.

d.    The mission of the IDF force on the day of the incident was solely to clear the ground.  This clearing and leveling included leveling the ground and clearing it of brush in order to expose hiding places used by terrorists, who would sneak out from these areas and place explosive devices with the intent of harming IDF soldiers.  There was an urgency to carrying out this mission so that IDF look-outs could observe the area and locate terrorists thereby preventing explosive devices from being buried.  The mission did not include, in any way, the demolition of homes.

A lawyer representing the state said after the hearing on Tuesday that the driver of the bulldozer did not see Ms. Corrie and could not have.

But at a news conference after the verdict, the Corrie family's lawyer, Hussein Abu Hussein, showed pictures of Ms. Corrie taken that day in 2003, pointing out her bright garb that he said "anyone could have seen."

Yes, that "orange vest" again.  But Corrie's "bright garb," as the verdict makes clear, was also irrelevant, because the bulldozer operator couldn't have seen it.

g.    Based on the evidence presented to me, including the testimony of the
expert for the prosecution, Mr. Osben, I hereby determine that at
approximately 17:00, the decedent stood roughly 15 to 20 meters from the
relevant bulldozer and knelt down.  The bulldozer to which I refer was a
large, clumsy and shielded vehicle of the DR9 model.  The field of view the
bulldozer's operator had inside the bulldozer was limited.  At a certain
point, the bulldozer turned and moved toward the decedent.  The bulldozer
pushed a tall pile of dirt.  With regard to the field of view that the
bulldozer's operator had, the decedent was in the "blind spot".  The
decedent was behind the bulldozer's blade and behind a pile of dirt and
therefore the bulldozer's operator could not have seen her.

The Times wanders through laments and promises of appeals by the Corrie family and its supporters, including a representative from Human Rights Watch.  And it concludes with a quote from an anti-Israel protester, part of a small crowd demonstrating outside the courtroom.  All of which leaves the reader with almost no information as to what the verdict actually said and what evidence it was based on.  For that, you can read the English translation of the court's ruling here.

Update (Aug 29 at 11:46AM): The New York Times has substantially revised its story on the Corrie verdict, eliminating the comments of HRW rep Bill Van Esveld and protester Uri Gordon and adding comments by Mark Regev and by Victoria Nuland as well as some nonsensical babbling by Hanan Ashrawi.  To their credit, the Times also added this paragraph:

Most of those in a packed City Council chambers stood and applauded following the vote. The council decision followed an hour of impassioned - but mostly civil - testimony from supporters and opponents.

Thus ended the latest attempt by the anti-Israel Boycotts Divestment and Sanctions movement to push its junk into yet another corner of civil society.  Note: the vote against them was unanimous.

Interesting background information on the Sacramento-Ashkelon sister city debate and the BDS attempt to rewrite history here and here.