11-Sep-15: How devoted to non-violence are the villagers of Nabi Saleh really?

Mr and Mrs Bassem Tamimi's photogenic and very camera-aware
daughter has been throwing fists into restrained but lethally
equipped IDF service personnel faces since she was ten years old. What kind
of parent does that take?

Nariman and Bassem Tamimi are the parents of the child now widely known in the social media as Shirley Temper.

It's a name she earned by emerging as a child prodigy in the thrusting of clenched fists into the faces of impassive, well-disciplined, heavily-armed and incredibly-self-restrained IDF soldiers since she was a very little girl, long before she had the capacity to make any decisions about who, what, why or when to seem to be really, physically angry.

The effect on large swathes of grown-up mainstream reporters, photo editors and commentators has been alarming.

Instead of doing the responsible and obvious (in any other setting, that is) thing - which obviously would mean condemning the parents for their shabby and irresponsible manipulation of a pretty, blonde, very-non-Arab-looking prepubescent girl - they have issued the parents with a free-pass while upgrading the child to a pint-sized, pouty-faced version of historical female warriors like Queen Boadicea, France's Marianne and the Maid of Orleans.

Given how often Palestinian rock-throwing attacks turn into firebomb showers and then shootings, stabbings and bombings, Nariman and Bassem Tamimi - both as parents and as full-time propagandists professing a somewhat confused message of non-violence and female empowerment in time of war - are playing with fire. Literally.

So how devoted are they really to the principles of non-violence? Bassem Tamimi, who has just embarked on a month-long speaking tour of the United States [see "07-Sep-15: Peace, human rights, the sheer joy of killing people"], frequently invokes Mahatma Ghandi, the patron saint of non-violence. But as a glowing 2013 portrait of him in the New York Times notes:

He and everyone else I spoke with in the village insisted they had the right to armed resistance; they just don’t think it works... “We see our stones as our message,” Bassem explained. The message they carried, he said, was “We don’t accept you.” While Bassem spoke admiringly of Mahatma Gandhi, he didn’t worry over whether stone-throwing counted as violence. The question annoyed him: Israel uses far greater and more lethal force on a regular basis, he pointed out, without being asked to clarify its attitude toward violence.["Is this where the Third Intifada will start?" | NY Times, March 15, 2013]

As we have noted in this blog (here, for instance), Nabi Saleh has produced a serious number of murderers. It takes huge pride in that achievement. The culture of the town - a concept we have heard invoked numerous times in interviews with various Tamimis - is heart-and-soul aligned with those killers. The claim that the town is somehow more devoted to pacifism, less violent, worthy of special respect, is a dangerous, misleading, dishonest and knowing fabrication. And that's before we get into the open adoration of Nabi Saleh's population for the most accomplished of those homicidal terrorists - the woman who was convicted of the massacre in Jerusalem that stole our daughter's life in 2001.

But leaving open adoration aside, we think there's a good case for viewing Ahlam Tamimi, the architect of the Sbarro massacre, as the litmus test for what Nabi Saleh and its Tamimis really mean, really believe.The article that now follows may do just that.

Here is our translation of a Hebrew-language interview published a week ago. In it, Nariman Tamimi, Bassem's wife, drops her guard, sharing an attachment to murder and its role (significant) in her town's media-rich 'struggle'. No one has published an English version of this until now. We hope it gets plenty of exposure as Bassem Tamimi ["10-Sep-15: It takes a village: The passion for violence of the peace-loving Tamimis"] sets off to sell his somewhat mislabeled packaged goods to Nabi Saleh's US followers. But we have low expectations.

The weapons of the Palestinians against the security forces: women and children | Assaf Gibor | NRG | September 1, 2015 | Our unofficial translation from Hebrew 

Nariman Tamimi, mother of Muhammad, the youth who hurled rocks at an IDF fighter in the village of Nabi Saleh, has issued a call to Palestinian women to join in the struggle against the “occupation” and for its liberation. “We knew the media were present and that the army would not arrest women and children, and so I avoided arrest.” 

The latest weapon of the Palestinians? Against the background of Palestinian reports about the investigation and rapid release a short time later of the parents of the Tamimi family from Nabi Saleh - the women who clashed with an IDF fighter have issued a call to Palestinian women to join the fight against the “occupation”. Nariman Tamimi, mother of Muhammad, the boy who hurled rocks at the soldier, and the boy’s aunt Nawal Tamimi, claim the Israeli army will not arrest women and children and that they should therefore join the struggle. 

In the discussion the two women had with nrg in the village of Nabi Saleh, they admitted to being satisfied with their release by the security forces since, in their eyes, it signifies victory. According to their approach, images of the IDF soldier struggling with women from Nabi Saleh last weekend and distributed throughout the world amount to a weapon against Israel. "Our hope is that other women in other villages will see our struggle and the victory, and that they too will join in the fight. When all is said and done, we won. We managed by stubbornness to prevent the soldier from taking my son away," says Nariman, the mother. 

The aunt and the mother made clear that in Friday’s incident, men were also present. They however feared being arrested if they would try to prevent the arrest of Mohammad. They therefore permitted the women to be at the center of the fight. "We knew the media were present, and that the army would not arrest women and children, and so I avoided arrest. We decided to try and prevent his arrest, and we did,” she admitted. 

"Women and children have always been a part of the struggle in Nabi Saleh, as opposed to what has happened in Qadoum, Bil'in and Ni'lin. Here, it’s a cultural thing, something traditional and educational, and also the fact that everyone in our village belongs to the one family numbering about 500 people and in reality there’s no alternative. But we hope that women seeing the photos in the media will understand their power and join in the struggle", she emphasized. The two women explained further that ''When the ‘enemy’ wants to shoot at us, he shoots at everyone without distinction: women, children, men. So we all need to be fighting against the occupation." 

An integral part of the struggle 

One of the major Palestinian murderers who emerged from the village is Ahlam Tamimi who transported the perpetrator of the terror at Jerusalem’s Sbarro pizzeria. "What she [Ahlam Tamimi] did was an integral part of the struggle. Everyone fights in the manner in which he believes. There is armed uprising, and there is popular uprising. I support every form of uprising. I personally choose the way of popular uprising," explains mother Nariman.

Ahlam Tamimi, confessed and happy murderer of children
including ours, makes an appearance on Mrs Bassem
Tamimi's Facebook page

And lest anyone suspect that Mrs Bassem Tamimi, Um Shirley Temper, has any actual reservations about the particular form of "uprising" chosen by her cousin, the homicidal sociopath Ahlam Tamimi, a quick glance at the Nariman Facebook page, with images like the one on the right, will soon put that matter to rest.

Like virtually everyone in the hateful village of Nabi Saleh, she holds to the view that the confessed, boastful and unrepentant murderer Ahlam Tamimi is a celebrity, a hero, a figure to emulate in the literal sense.

People who go along to hear Bassem Tamimi in the United States ought to ask him and themselves whether his answer to the following question (we have been circulating it the past week - see "04-Sep-15: Mr. Human Rights Defender, a question if we may") gives them the kind of moral comfort that lets a person of conscience sleep at night. 

Bassem Tamimi, tell us in simple words: are you as delighted by your cousin Ahlam Tamimi's massacre of Jewish children as she is? Have you criticized it ever, anywhere? Will you condemn it here and now?

(The massacre we mention is described here. It's where the life of our precious fifteen year-old daughter Malki ended.)

Bassem Tamimi and the mother of his abused children are the stuff of our nightmares. If people understood them better, they would probably have the same problem we do.

10-Sep-15: It takes a village: The passion for violence of the peace-loving Tamimis

Celebrations in the little village of Nabi Saleh as the release date for several of its murdering sons and daughters

approaches, in October 2011. The woman wearing a white scarf in the framed photo is our daughter's murderer, Ahlam Tamimi, a beloved and widely-admired figure, a town hero, because of the deaths she brought about [Image Source: CNN]

We received a letter this week from a member of the International Division of the Board of Deputies of British Jews:

One of the constitutional obligations of the Board of Deputies is to take such appropriate action as lies within its power to advance Israel’s security, welfare and standing. As you may know, last year Yachad UK narrowly achieved a two thirds majority at the Board of Deputies to be admitted as a member. At the time, I along with the 60 other Deputies that voted against their admission were concerned that this would lend credibility to an organisation that is outside the mainstream of Jewish life in the UK and has a well-known reputation for demonising and delegitimising the Jewish State of Israel.  Indeed I was aware that Yachad funds numerous “educational” trips to Judea and Samaria, known to them as “the West Bank”. 

Their guides include a member of the infamous fringe group “Breaking the Silence”. On such radical groups, the reputation of Yachad hangs.  Even the left-wing Haaretz newspaper described Breaking the Silence as having “a clear political agenda, and can no longer be classed as a ‘human rights organization.’’’  In fact as I am sure you will agree, checkpoints are an essential security requirement for the citizens of Israel. As far as I am aware, there are no such Yachad-funded “educational” visits to Israeli terror victims. Had there been, Yachad might get a different Israeli perspective of the need for security and check posts. 

Their activities in Israel are entirely pro-Palestinian and anti-Israel. However if this was not bad enough it has now been drawn to my attention that Yachad’s tours have, in the past, stopped at the Tamimi house for drinks and a briefing from the family themselves. Having already read the article about the Tamimi family [source], I was absolutely shocked to learn that Yachad had gone beyond giving legitimacy to an Israeli political group with an agenda that undermines Israel’s security but is also giving legitimacy to the family of a well-known Pallywood “star”.  

This led me to do further research on the subject and I came across the blog “This Ongoing War" which was cofounded by you and inspired by the tragic murder of your daughter, Malki, at the age of 15 in a massacre in the centre of Jerusalem carried out by Hamas, the infamous Sbarro massacre. 

In particular I saw this recent article: 07-Sep-15: Peace, human rights, the sheer joy of killing people. There, you state that Ahlam Tamimi - who rode with the suicide bomber, helped him and his explosive-filled guitar pass without interference through the Qalandia security crossing - can be seen on video exulting over the murder of the victims and is in fact a cousin of Bassem Tamami, the father of Shirley Temper.  Clearly this raises the most serious questions about Yachad that I intend to raise at the first possible moment. I would therefore be grateful if you could provide the evidence of the relationship between the Tamimi family of Pallywood fame and Ahlam Tamimi.  

I look forward to hearing from you. Yours sincerely | David Berens | JNF UK

Child abused: The widely-photographed Tamimi child,
better known as Shirley Temper, with the PA Minister of Education 
last week in the Nabi Saleh village schoolyard [Image Source]

Ready, willing and able to oblige, Mr Berens.

Bassem Tamimi operates a publicity business which has staged and videographed Friday clashes in a village in the Binyamin region a few kilometers north of Jerusalem by the name of Nabi Saleh for years. 

This is the Tamimi who, under the title "Palestinian human rights activist", is heading to the US now for a month-long roadshow during September and October about which we commented a few days ago ["07-Sep-15: Peace, human rights, the sheer joy of killing people"]. Amnesty International which took him under its wing some years ago is among the groups paving his way in the US.

Bassem is married to Nariman Tamimi. Their children include A'hed Tamimi, aka Shirley Temper, a front-and-center role that her kept her in the camera's focus for the past five years ["06-Sep-15: The making of a pigtailed provocateur"]. She is now about 15 and adored by Aljazeera [see their recent video promo] and by the PA Minister of Education (he's the moustached one in the photo on the right, taken a week ago). 

A son, Mohammad, now about 11 is the boy who appears with an arm in a cast and head in a headlock courtesy of an IDF soldier in a viral video that emerged two weeks ago.

Tamimis celebrating in Nabi Saleh on the day their favourite
murdering cousin/clan member was freed 

A female in her mid-thirties, Ahlam Tamimi was convicted of engineering the 2001 Sbarro massacre in which 15 people were murdered - among them our teenage daughter Malki - and sentenced to sixteen terms of life imprisonment. The three judges of the judicial panel, plainly shocked by the cold-bloodedness and complete absence of remorse on the part of the convicted killer in front of them, formally recommended that no consideration ever be given to early release via political deals or amnesties. 

But in 2011, along with 1,026 other convicted terrorists, she walked free in the Shalit Deal. She returned to Jordan where she was born and had lived most of her life. Today, she is living the life of a celebrity there, advocating for more terror and attracting a world-wide audience of Arabic speakers via a weekly television program produced in Amman and beamed via satellite to Arabic-speaking homes on every continent.

Ahlam Tamimi, according to reports we have seen, had spent a short time living in Nabi Saleh for a short time before joining Hamas as a field terrorist and carrying out two separate explosive attacks in central Jerusalem during July and August 2001. (One failed. The second, tragically, did not.)

A UPI photo [source] shows Eftikhar Tamimi in her
Nabi Saleh home, holding a poster of her sister Ahlam, the
murderer, on October 17, 2011. The sister was freed
from prison two days later amid unrestrained joy in the
Tamimi village.

Her unwarranted release from prison after serving a mere eight years behind bars was greeted with undisguised and joyous celebration in Nabi Saleh. Images – like those on the right – of Tamimis celebrating are easily found on the Web.

Dusty, undistinguished Nabi Saleh seems an unlikely candidate for the large degree of media attention and myth-spinning its residents have garnered. A New York Times Magazine cover story brought the village into millions of American homes in 2013. That piece, which a commentator recently called “a fawning tribute”, focused on the enthusiasm of the villagers for a “Third Intifada”.

We felt compelled to address the fabricated claims and concealed realities of the town. Mostly because of its connection to the death of our child, we have followed events in Nabi Saleh for years. We are continually astounded by the way Nabi Saleh’s children – clearly below the age at which they should or even can make decisions about their own well-being – take the lead roles in the “non-violent” confrontations with the IDF staged by the Tamimis each Friday. We are only slightly less astounded by the way the flagrant child-abuse on display there is almost never commented upon by the tellers of the Nabi Saleh tales.

Nariman Tamimi, wife of Bassem, recently posted
this tribute to her mass murdering cousin Ahlam 
on her Facebook page [Image Source]

The article we wrote - "17-Mar-13: A little village in the hills, and the monsters it spawns" – in response to that massive New York Times exposure is the most widely-read post this blog has had.

Most of Nabi Saleh’s 500 residents, as a New York Times piece wrote in February 2012, “belong to the same extended family”. A different NYT story published a year later put it more assertively: "All of Nabi Saleh’s 550 residents are related by blood or marriage, and nearly all share the surname Tamimi."

A year after she walked out of her prison cell and returned, free, to Jordan, Ahlam Tamimi married. As happens frequently in Palestinian Arab society, the man she married is her first cousin; their fathers are brothers. And as happens frequently in the life of the Tamimi clan, the husband is also a convicted and unrepentant murderer. He too was released from life imprisonment in the Shalit Deal.

Back to Bassem, whose wife Nariman told Electronic Intifada in July 2011 that Bassem’s sister was "accosted... and hit… on the head" by an Israeli soldier, a female, inside an Israel court in 1993. The sister, not named in that report, died. That sister had a son called Nizar, as a result of which she is referred to as Im Nizar, Arabic for “mother of Nizar” in the article. Now that’s obviously not an actual name but an honorific. Think of it this way: Nizar killed a Zionist and thereby became a celebrity. Thus his mother’s status rises and she gets to be called “Nizar’s Mother”.

Nabi Saleh: Photographers seem to be drawn to images
of young men with slingshots. Photos of bombers and
knife-wielding Tamimi attackers are less photogenic
[Image Source: WFB, "All the intifada that fits to print"]

To summarize: on the basis of the description given by Bassem’s wife, Nizar is Bassem's nephew and Bassem is Nizar's uncle. 

Nizar is also a murderer. He conspired with two other Tamimi clansmen, Ahmad Yusuf Mahmud al-Tamimi and Sa’id Rushdi Mohammad At-Tamimi, to lure, kidnap, and then kill Chaim Mizrachi [background], an Israeli who bought and sold eggs. 

We have come to learn that relationships and facts acquire a certain looseness in the world of Nabi Saleh. Thus, according to a different report, this one from Haaretz, the death of Nizar’s mother happened this way - and she is named: 

Bassam’s sister, Bassama, was killed 10 years ago when she went to the military court in Ramallah, where Bassam was being remanded in custody. An army interpreter allegedly pushed her down a staircase; as a result, she broke her neck and died, leaving five young children behind... [Haaretz, February 17, 2013]

In the Haaretz version, Bassem - and not the murderer Nizar - was on trial. Whether Nizar and Bassem are nephew and uncle, or cousins, their close relationship may explain why, when the convicted murderer Nizar returned to Nabi Saleh after the conclusion of the Shalit Deal, he was embraced not only by the Tamimi clan at large but specifically by Bassem, as this 2011 photo shows:

Close ties: Bassem Tamimi with arm around his nephew/cousin Nizar Tamimi, murderer/terrorist in the service of Fatah. [Image Credit: Anne Paq/Activestills.org]

Not long afterwards, Nizar married. The bride was his cousin Ahlam, the architect of the Sbarro pizzeria massacre and the convicted killer of our daughter Malki, and of fourteen other innocent Jews. We described the event in a post: “22-Jun-12: A wedding and what came before it”

The adoration of terrorists who kill Jews and Israelis is at the heart of the Tamimi experience. But about five years ago, for reasons most of us can probably deduce, the Tamimis adopted a pose of what they and their backers call non-violence. The rocks and petrol bombs continue but because they are classed (by the Tamimis) as tools of resistance, compliant audiences - and there are many - are expected to nod with understanding and allow the non-violence charade to continue.

Two weeks ago, we wrote here about Nabi Saleh's Wikipedia entry. Not the English language version which has always been sanitized and projects a carefully cultivated image of Ghandi-like forebearance but the gritty, candid Arabic version. Soon after we first publicized that Arabic version in 2013, someone emptied it of most of its incriminating contents, leaving almost nothing behind. Every reference to the village people's adoration of jihad, martyrdom and death to the Israelis was erased. 

But then two weeks ago, when we understood what had been done, we went looking and found the original Arabic text as it had appeared on Wikipedia in May 2013. We saved the original Arabic text to here, and a partial English translation to here. They are archived now thanks to the wonders of the Internet, and safe (we sincerely hope) from the destructive attentions of those who feel compelled to re-invent the past.. 

That deleted Wikipedia text is the village of Nabi Saleh paying tribute to its own viciously violent true self: to its warriors, to its killers, to its dead fighters - all named - and above all to its favourite daughter, the one who smiles on-camera when she recalls how many innocent Jewish children she blew to pieces in the Sbarro pizzeria, our daughter Malki among them. 

For additional background, may we recommend two fine analyses by the estimable Petra Marquardt-Bigman -

• Bassem Tamimi and the Use of Children as Political Props (September 3, 2015)
• The Tamimi masterclass on media manipulation (September 7, 2015)

and some past posts of ours -

• 07-Sep-15: Peace, human rights, the sheer joy of killing people
• 06-Sep-15: The making of a pigtailed provocateur
• 04-Sep-15: Mr. Human Rights Defender, a question if we may
• 02-Sep-15: Lights, action, camera, bite: Scenes from a cognitive war
• 01-Sep-15: A tale of two villages: one devoted to non-violence, another that actually exists
• 29-Aug-15: Revisiting a Palestinian Arab village and its monsters
• 17-Mar-13: A little village in the hills, and the monsters it spawns

09-Sep-15: Figuring out what people have figured out about Iran and its nuclear plans

Tehran: Where is this all going? [Image Source]

It's been eight weeks since the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action became a reality. Many news outlets would have written that as "been signed". Wikipedia's entry on the JCPOA, for instance, starts out with this definition:

an international agreement on the nuclear program of Iran signed in Vienna on 14 July 2015 between Iran, the P5+1 (the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council—China, France, Russia, United Kingdom, United States—plus Germany), and the European Union. [Wikipedia]

But as we pointed out ["29-Jul-15: Built not on trust but on... verification"], the JCPOA was not signed in Vienna and will not be signed there or anywhere else. (We explain in that post.) This has been carefully and repeatedly explained to the Iranian people by the people who run the Iranian regime. In fact, ordinary Iranians appear overall to have a better grasp of what the JCPO does and does not mean for them and their interests when compared with citizens of other places.

In the West, where optimism frequently trumps reality, the JCPOA and what it stands for continues to be seriously misunderstood.

How much support does it have in the US? Depends whom you ask.

The issue is with the people's representatives in Washington right now. There, the threshold which the Obama administration had to cross to overcome Congressional rejection seems to have been passed a few days ago ["In Win for Obama, Iran Deal Assured of Passage", Vice of America, September 2, 2015]. Seems to, because so far it's all pledges by politicians which, forgive the cynicism, are not always worth the paper they're not written on. But everyone seems to agree that whatever had to be done in the Senate and the House from an Obama standpoint has been done, and the rest is predictable, more or less.

Scene at a rally in Washington DC happening right
now [click to view] [Image Source: Twitter]

But if you ask the American people, the picture looks entirely different: black-and-white different. The latest numbers from Pew Research Center ["Support for Iran Nuclear Agreement Falls", Pew, yesterday] tell a clear, unambiguous and - if you're a politician with principles - depressing story: US public support for JCPOA, very low on the day it was signed - sorry, agreed, no we mean finalized - has dropped precipitously and steadily since then. The more people know about it, the more they want it stopped.

As of yesterday, it stands at 21% - one American in five is on board the train. A shade under half of all Americans define themselves as opposed: 49% according to Pew. Some 30% say they have no opinion. The poll was conducted between September 3 and 7, and among some 1,004 adults.

In mid-July, a week after President Obama announced the deal, 33% of the public approved of the agreement, while 45% disapproved and 22% had no opinion. Over the past six weeks, the share approving of the agreement has fallen 12 percentage points (from 33% to 21%), while disapproval has held fairly steady (45% then, 49% now). Somewhat more express no opinion than did so in July (22% then, 30% now)...  While the partisan divide over the nuclear agreement remains substantial, support for the deal has slipped across the board since July. Currently, 42% of Democrats approve of the agreement, while 29% disapprove and an identical percentage has no opinion. In July, 50% of Democrats approved, 27% disapproved and 22% had no opinion. Republican support for the agreement, already low, has dropped even further (from 13% to 6%).... When opinion about the Iran nuclear agreement is based only on those who have heard a lot or a little about the agreement, opposition to the agreement exceeds support by more than a two-to-one margin (57% to 27%)... [Pew Research, September 8, 2015]

Here's a comparison. When Britain's prime minister during Hitler's rise to power, Neville Chamberlain, returned home in September 1938, 77 years ago, with the infamous Munich Agreement ("peace in our time") in his hand and appeasement on his mind, he had pretty good public opinion support.

Opinion polls appear to show that the majority of the nation was in support of the stance taken by Chamberlain... [Source]

And in the end, peace was of course not what they got.

President Obama cannot even claim as much backing as the failed British leader Chamberlain did. As a German analysis of the appeasement chapter puts it

Britain and France underestimated just how determined Adolf Hitler was in his lust for conquest. The failure of Neville Chamberlain's policy of appeasement meant war was inevitable... ["The Road to World War II: How Appeasement Failed to Stop Hitler" | Klaus Wiegrefe - Spiegel Online] 

Back to 2015, and is the world closer to war or further away?

The main story on the Iraninan FARS news site at this
moment. In Iran, they take this man very seriously. Good sense
and caution suggest we should too [Image Source]

Sitting where we are, in Jerusalem, the prospect of getting to peace with Iran seems remoter than ever. To show why, here's one of the main news stories in Iran at this moment, Wednesday afternoon, in Tehran:

Supreme Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei described Israel as a "fake" regime, and said there won't be any Israel in 25 years from now. "Some of the Zionists have said that given the results of the nuclear negotiations (between Tehran and the world powers), they have been relieved of concerns about Iran for 25 years, but we tell them that basically, you will not see the next 25 years and with Gd's grace, nothing under the name of the Zionist regime will exist in the region by then," Ayatollah Khamenei said, addressing a large number of Iranians in Tehran on Wednesday. He added that the heroic spirit and morale of Muslim fighters will not let the Zionists feel comfort and tranquility in the next 25 years. ["Supreme Leader: Israel Not Alive in 25 Years" | Iranian FARS News | September 9, 2015]

There we go again, narrowly obsessing over Israel. Or as President Obama put it a month ago ["Obama says Israeli interference in US affairs over Iran deal unprecedented" | Times of Israel | August 8, 2015], the JCPOA is “very good for Israel” and (not in precisely these words, but this is how he was widely understood) "Israeli interference in internal US affairs ahead of a Congressional vote on the Iranian nuclear deal was unprecedented."

But that Khamanei blast yesterday was not directed at the Jews alone:

Elsewhere, Ayatollah Khamenei warned of the US endless enmity towards the Iranian nation, and said even after the nuclear agreement, whose fate is not yet clear in Iran and the US, the Americans have been hatching plots and approving a bill in the congress against Iran. He described national might as the only way to end the US plots, and said a strong economy, growing scientific progress and maintaining and reinvigorating the revolutionary spirit and morale of the people, specially the youth, are among ways to boost national might and power. Ayatollah Khamenei reiterated the need for vigilance against the US plots to influence Iran, and said Tehran had only entered negotiations with Washington just on the nuclear issue "and we will not negotiate with the US in other fields". In relevant remarks in August, Ayatollah Khamenei stressed that regardless of the nuclear agreement with the world powers, Tehran would not allow the US to find a way to influence Iranian economy, politics and culture...  "Washington imagined that it could use this agreement whose fate is not clear yet - as its final approval is not yet a definite fact neither in Iran nor in the US -  to find a way to influence in Iran; and this was their intention." But "we closed this path; and we will definitely keep it closed", he underlined. "We will not allow the US to influence (our) economy, or politics or culture. We will stand against such penetration with all our power - that, thanks God, is at a high level today," Ayatollah Khamenei said. [FARS News | September 9, 2015]

And over at TIME Magazine they have more, also from today, quoting the Supreme Leader's own website and Twitter account, as he reminds the faithful that:

...the U.S. remains the ‘Great Satan’. “Satan only deceives and tempts, but the Americans not only do that but they also murder and place sanctions and act hypocritically. They claim to be the banner holders of human rights in the world, yet every few days an innocent unarmed person in America itself is murdered by their police, and this is only one example of their crimes. They are worse than Satan,” he said. [TIME, today]

In case any of the Supreme Leader's statements lack clarity, we can ask one of his most recent honored guests for help in interpreting them:

Austrian President Heinz Fischer was travelling to Iran on Monday, becoming the first European head of state to visit since 2004, his office said, two months after an international deal was struck over Tehran's contested nuclear programme. During his three-day stay, Fischer is due to meet supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, President Hassan Rouhani and Foreign Minister Mohammad Jawad Zarif, one of the main negotiators of the historic agreement signed (sic) in Vienna on July 14 with six major world powers. [AFP, September 7, 2015]

And in the background, there's plenty of Tehran action involving anxious business-minded visitors:

Germany got in on the action first, with a government jet touching down at Tehran’s Imam Khomeini Airport just five days after the deal was signed. Since then, a representative from every major European power has visited or announced plans to do so, and smaller countries like Poland are scrambling to get a cut. ["These European leaders and businesses are rushing to do deals with Iran" | Washington Post, August 21, 2015]

Just yesterday, three Spanish government ministers (Industry, Energy and Tourism; Development; Foreign Affairs) arrived there for much the same reason.

What can the JCPOA actually deliver, besides rich commercial agreements? Some disturbing things, according to an influential and very well-placed Israeli voice, who argues that the effect of the transaction is going to be very different from the way its marketers have portrayed it (our words, not the writer's). This is also from yesterday:

The claim that Iran’s enrichment routes to a nuclear bomb have been blocked has no basis. In fact, Iran will have four routes to enriching uranium to a military level... The nuclear agreement with the main world powers is set to enable Iran safely, legally, and without economic hardships or changes in its rogue policies, to overcome the main obstacles on its way to possessing a nuclear weapons arsenal and becoming a regional hegemonic power... By endorsing the deal, its supporters actually surrender the most effective tools to convince the Iranians to make concessions and give up their nuclear program, namely the biting sanctions and the credible military threat.  A containment policy by definition makes a military option irrelevant. The claim that after 10-15 years the US will have all options in case Iran resumes its nuclear program is false because the Iranian defense, industrial and nuclear infrastructures in place will make any military reaction futile.
["The Mistaken Rationale behind the Iran Nuclear Deal" | September 9, 2015, authored by Brig.-Gen. (Res.) Yossi Kuperwasser, former head of the IDF Military Intelligence's research division, and until recently, director general of Israel's Ministry of Strategic Affairs]

The way we see it, American public opinion seems to have intuited what one of Israel's sharpest and best-informed strategic minds is saying, chilling as it undoubtedly is. (His view is part of the reason we call the JCPOA the "Iran Nuclear Enablement Deal". And we think we're being factual, not irreverent or cynical.)

As for the way America's politicians are steadfastly articulating why and how they are taking the courageous stands they are taking - against the bulk of their electors' opinions, we think you can't beat the Democratic Senator for Michigan (nothing personal), one of the handful who boldly stepped forward once the Obama threshold had been safely passed, and stated his position this way:

"Despite my serious reservations, I will reluctantly vote against a motion of disapproval because I believe that doing so will protect the credibility of the United States to hold Iran accountable to adhere to every single obligation in the [Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action]..." ["Senate Democrats deliver Obama's Iran nuclear deal support" | CNN, September 8, 2015] 

Hard to argue with a man who, despite serious reservations, evinces such deep faith in the power of "credibility" to stop a renegade state propelled by messianic fervour and with a nuclear arsenal in the making.

07-Sep-15: Putting numbers to the fears: terrorism is absolutely growing

From the September 2015 Terror Threat Snapshot

In June 2015, a freshly launched USA government publication called “Terror Threat Snapshot” caught our eye. It was going to be put out monthly by the US Congress' House Committee on Homeland Security. Now, we're not great believers in the readability of government reports, but this one made some interesting comments right off the bat. So we have stayed tuned, and read it when new issues emerge.

That first issue referred back to newspaper reports (like this one from International Business Times) that appeared in 2014 and indicated that terrorists in the service of ISIS were using sea-going smugglers to create refugee flows into Europe as a kind of "Trojan Horse", generating concerns about how terrorists might potentially exploit these flows.

So here we are in September 2015, thinking disturbing thoughts, particularly after viewing the video clips circulating in the social media the last few days - lots of men, many rough looking but hardly desperate; not so many women and children. (This one from Hungary, devoid of dialogue, captures the mood. And this one. And this.)

The House Homeland Security committee chairman Michael McCaul, a Republican representative from Texas, launched the latest Snapshot on Friday [press release], emphasizing that the threat from jihad in the U.S. was already high and has escalated dramatically during 2015. Here, in our words, are some of the larger talking points:

• More jihadist terror cases have been uncovered in 2015 than in any year since 9/11. 
• ISIS is fueling what the report calls "Islamist terror wildfire across the globe" at a speed that has no precedent. As of the end of August, ISIS had inspired or initiated 57 terror attack plots against Western targets, of which 15 were targeted at the United States. 
• ISIS has affiliates, groups pledging support or a direct presence in 18 countries including Afghanistan, Algeria, Egypt, India, Indonesia, Iraq, Jordan, Libya, Lebanon, Nigeria, the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip. Pakistan, Philippines, the North Caucasus region of Russia, Sudan, Syria, Tunisia, and Yemen. It controls 12 cities and towns in Iraq and 13 more in Syria as of early September 2015.
• Activists working in the name of ISIS have released "hit lists" of American government personnel, including service members. Most Islamist terror plots on U.S. soil have, since the start of 2014, been based on killing police or U.S. service members.
• Cases involving homegrown jihadists/terrorists rose from 38 in July 2010 to 124 today, a rise of 300% in five years.
• On August 13, 2015, the ISIS "hacking division" released information on 1,400 American government personnel  and urged its followers to track them down and do harmful things. The released information included names, e-mail addresses, and phone numbers. 
• How many Westerners have gone to fight in the Syria and Iraq Arab-on-Arab bloodbath? About 4,500 including 550 women, and including more than 250 Americans, including those who attempted to travel and failed. Some 40 American fighters who went to Syria had returned to the United States as of March 2015, and some have since been arrested on terror charges.

We don't have much time for people who say terrorism is a side-show, we're winning, it's drying up. The reality is it's getting worse on a global basis, with clear and identifiable focuses of activity and inspiration, and it's going to get much worse before our side prevails.

07-Sep-15: Peace, human rights, the sheer joy of killing people

Bassem Tamimi with arm around his nephew/cousin Nizar Tamimi, an unrepentant convicted murderer/terrorist in the service of Fatah, soon after Nizar was released from life imprisonment via the Shalit Deal. Nizar was convicted for being one of three Tamimis who killed a Jewish "friend", Chaim Mizrachi [Image Credit: Anne Paq/Activestills.org]. Nizar Tamimi is now married to another convicted, unrepentant Tamimi, a hero of Nabi Saleh, who is also an  unrepentant terrorist/murderer

Speaking tours are generally supposed to be listening tours too.

That's Bassem Tamimi above, the one on the left. Along with his wife and other members of their clan-controlled hamlet a few kilometers from where we live ["17-Mar-13: A little village in the hills, and the monsters it spawns"] he has been sending children, including his own children, out into the dusty streets for five years since before they reached their teens. The goal has been to theatrically challenge Israel Defense Forces personnel in a weekly series of staged clashes while his cameras roll. The results can be seen all over the social media.

Mr Tamimi will be speaking over the coming month in various United States venues. Given what we know from paying close attention to his statements over these years, we hope his audiences listen really hard.

And not only his audiences. The roadshow, in which our daughter's murderer's clansman is described as "Palestinian human rights activist", is sponsored by three aspirational groups: Jewish Voice for Peace, Friends of Sabeel North America and Interfaith Peace-Builders. They, along with Amnesty International, have provided indispensable megaphones for his message for a long time.

We know the work of the first two only too well. Whatever they mean by "human rights" and "peace", the human rights of our family and the peace of our neighbors have no role in it.

The promo for Bassem Tamimi's Ithaca NY whistle-stop says he will be speaking under the faux-noble title "Our Destiny is to Resist". It's a familiar-sounding phrase. The word 'resist' happens to be used over and over again by Ahlam Tamimi, the proud murderer of our daughter Malki, as Ms Tamimi describes the sheer joy of selecting a Jerusalem target that is filled with children - with religious Jewish children - and planting the bomb - a human bomb - so that it would explode at 2 in the afternoon on a summer vacation afternoon to ensure maximum devastation.

'Resist' is also part of the formal name of the death-cult terrorist organization Hamas and appears throughout its self-published apologetics.

We're sincerely hoping Ithacans turn out in large numbers. And when Bassem Tamimi is done with his speech, we hope (as we wrote here on Friday - "04-Sep-15: Mr. Human Rights Defender, a question if we may") someone will have the integrity and courage to ask him this:

Bassem Tamimi, tell us in simple words: are you as delighted by your cousin Ahlam Tamimi's massacre of Jewish children as she is? Have you criticized it ever, anywhere? Will you condemn it here and now?

(The massacre we mention is described here. It's where the life of our precious fifteen year-old daughter Malki ended.)

Why do you think no one has asked the ever-interviewable man (or his wife, or his daughter better known these days as Shirley Temper) this question till now? Arriving at an answer would bring an enquiring person a long way towards comprehending just how poorly terrorism, terrorists and their defenders are understood in most societies.

The 'gentle' folk of Bassem Tamimi's town are on record numerous times celebrating the killing of Jews by various Tamimis, and especially the murders done by Ahlam Tamimi, the town heroine. As we wrote on Friday, this sort of stuff, first-person-statements, photos from the village of Nabi Saleh as it celebrates the killers, is easy to find for anyone who actually looks for it. 

Your chance, Ithaca.

06-Sep-15: The making of a pigtailed provocateur

There's a reason she has such stage presence. 

The Tamimi clan child who featured in the staged clash ["02-Sep-15: Lights, action, camera, bite: Scenes from a cognitive war"] in a town a little north of Jerusalem ten days ago brings years of experience and practice to the role. But her determined parents get a large part of the credit, along with the PA education system via which she is acquiring life skills.

She is a mere ten year old moppet in the pictures below. They come from a YouTube video dated July 2, 2010. It was filmed in Nabi Saleh, the Palestinian Arab town which earned itself a New York Times Magazine cover two and a half years ago. We responded to that cover story here: "17-Mar-13: A little village in the hills, and the monsters it spawns". 

The child now better known as Shirley Temper, as a 10 year old, playing ball
inches away from a cluster of armed soldiers of the IDF. Experience has given the well-prepared 
Nabi Saleh children an uncommon sense of what to fear and what not. Hence their apparent
lack of fear of the Israeli soldiers. [Source: A Nabi Saleh video dated July 2, 2010 (at 7m 01s)

Screaming on demand as the cameras roll to capture the "clash" as the well-armed
IDF servicemen stand by impassively. Syria this certainly isn't, as the children know.
Source: A Nabi Saleh video dated July 2, 2010 (at 2 m 20 s)

Shirley Temper (Ahed Tamimi), ten and as angry as she needs to be,
screaming on demand again. Great YouTube fodder
Source: A Nabi Saleh video dated July 2, 2010 at 2m 40s

Barely ten years old (her right arm is raised) and already "fearless",
and aware of the lengths to which IDF soldiers  will go to avoid falling victim to
the provocations engineered by the Palestinian Arab parents of these children.
Source: A Nabi Saleh video dated July 2, 2010 (at  1m 4 s)

Here she is (below) this past Friday, September 3, 2015, now 15 and in the clutches of an important visitor to Nabi Saleh.

The Syrian-born political figure in the dark suit and with a roughly, more-or-less sort-of-fatherly arm over her shoulders is famous in Palestinian Arab circles because he used to be the Fatah Revolutionary Council's Deputy Secretary General.

The PA being what it is, the distance between revolution and school-children is never very great. So now Dr. Sabri Saidam is making a name as His Excellency Minister of Education and Higher Education in the Abbas regime.

It's not difficult to figure why the person responsible for Palestinian Arab education would want to be at the center of a photo opp in that particular village at this particular time. The sympathetic media coverage in certain quarters must be a huge temptation to someone with his hands-on approach to the emerging generation of activist Palestinian Arab boys and girls.

Shirley Temper and the PA Minister of Education
Source: Facebook image from Nabi Saleh, September 3, 2015 

Below, His Excellency the minister, with the Tamimi girl and her brother (see the boy with the plaster cast), alongside Bassem Tamimi, proud father and performance director:

Tamimis with the Minister | Source: Facebook image from Nabi Saleh, September 3, 2015

Additional background:

• 04-Sep-15: Mr. Human Rights Defender, a question if we may
• 02-Sep-15: Lights, action, camera, bite: Scenes from a cognitive war
• 01-Sep-15: A tale of two villages: one devoted to non-violence, another that actually exists 
• 29-Aug-15: Revisiting a Palestinian Arab village and its monsters 
• 17-Mar-13: A little village in the hills, and the monsters it spawns