Bashar al-Assad gasses civilians in Syrian civil war, Israeli officials say
(JNS.org) Israeli officials corroborated the Syrian opposition’s claim that President Bashar al-Assad used chemical weapons on civilians in a Wednesday attack in eastern neighborhoods of Damascus that killed more than 1,300 people.
The Assad regime “has already used chemical weapons several times” during the Syrian civil war, said Israel Defense Minister Moshe “Bogie” Ya’alon, Israel Hayom reported.
“The death toll in Syria has now crossed the 100,000 mark. This is a struggle for life and death and there is no end in sight,” Ya’alon said.
Minister of International, Intelligence and Strategic Affairs Yuval Steinitz told Israel Radio Thursday that the international community has “failed to take any significant action to stop Assad from butchering his people.” Member of Knesset Binyamin Ben-Eliezer (Labor) echoed that sentiment on Israel Radio, saying, “Assad is guilty of genocide and the world—which is so quick to denounce us over every little thing—stands idly by, doing nothing.”
The Syrian opposition believes Assad’s regime on Wednesday used sarin gas, which was developed in 1938 in Nazi Germany by two scientists who were searching for an especially potent insecticide, and was classified as a weapon of mass destruction by U.N. Resolution 687 of 1991. The United Nations Chemical Weapons Convention of 1993, which was signed by 162 countries, banned the production and stockpiling of sarin. The use of nerve agents against civilian population is considered a war crime.
*
Future U.S. military aid to Israel discussed while Middle East threats grow
(JNS.org) Israel is seeking an increase in U.S. military to help it deal with the growing Middle East threats that surround it.
Israeli and American defense officials have been meeting to discuss a new 10-year military aid package after the current one expires in 2017. Israel’s main concerns are maintaining its so-called Qualitative Military Edge (QME) over its Arab neighbors and modernizing its military.
“I don’t know how big of a role, if at all, QME played in the previous round of negotiations. But the nexus between QME and FMF (U.S. Foreign Military Financing) has become stronger,” Israeli Ambassador to the U.S. Michael Oren told Defense News.
Israel is also concerned about modernizing its military. According to a report in the Economist, Israeli military planners have begun shifting resources away from large mechanized units and infantry designed to defend against Arab armies, to a focus on air power and cyber warfare to deal with new threats from Iran or terror groups like Hezbollah and Hamas.
“We’re looking at a holistic Mideastern picture, which includes growth of missile arsenals in Lebanon and Gaza; the strategic situation in Sinai; the Syrian situation as it impacts us and other countries, including Jordan… and the fact that all this is going on in an age of sequestration,” Oren told Defense News.
But according to American officials, discussions on future U.S. military aid to Israel are still preliminary.
“At this point, we’re trying to understand and assess the full range of Israel’s security concerns,” a U.S. official told Defense News.
*
Palestinian Fatah party glorifies Saddam Hussein on Facebook
(JNS.org) One of Palestinian Fatah party’s official Facebook pages recently posted a picture of Saddam Hussein with the caption, “How many people love this hero?”
The same Facebook page posted two other pictures of the former Iraqi dictator last year, portraying him as a hero, Palestinian Media Watch reported Aug. 21.
“He smiled to deny the enemy the pleasure of victory. May Allah have mercy on you, Saddam Hussein,” one of photo captions on the Fatah Facebook page stated.
The most recent glorifying picture of Hussein garnered 1,439 Facebook “likes” and 111 comments praising it.
*
EBay to cooperate with Israeli exporters
(JNS.org) EBay plans to cooperate with the Israel Export and International Cooperation Institute (IEICI) for the first time.
For three months, the online retail giant will assist 10 Israeli exporters with small businesses in the field of consumer goods by exporting their products through eBay’s online commerce platform.
This is just the first stage in the planned cooperation. “We see this support as a top value and hope to make it permanent in the future,” said the head of eBay’s business activity in Israel, Elad Goldenberg, according to Yedioth Achronoth.
*
Egyptian Christians cancel church services for first time in more than 1,600 years
(JNS.org) Several of Egypt’s Coptic Christian churches canceled Mass services last Sunday for the first time in more than 1,600 years, amid the unprecedented wave violence against them.
Christian churches in Minya, located in Upper Egypt, canceled their Sunday Mass after an attack by supporters of ousted Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi last week that destroyed their monastery.
“We did not hold prayers in the monastery on Sunday for the first time in 1,600 years,” Priest Selwanes Lotfy of the Virgin Mary and Priest Ibram Monastery in Degla, just south of Minya, told Egypt’sal-Masry al-Youm newspaper.
“One of the extremists wrote on the monastery’s wall, ‘donate [this] to the martyrs’ mosque,’” Lotfy added.
On Wednesday, the Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) called on President Barack Obama to condemn the Muslim Brotherhood’s anti-Christian violence.
“We are observing with horror the way this horrifying and murderous Muslim Brotherhood assault on Egyptian Christians has been proceeding for several days with hardly any international reaction,” ZOA National President Morton A. Klein said in a statement. “The ZOA strongly condemns these attacks on innocent Christians across Egypt by the radical Muslim Brotherhood mobs.”
Pro-Morsi supporters have accused Coptic Christians of playing a disproportionately large role in the ouster of the former president. Coptic Christian Pope Tawadros II was outspoken in his support of protests against Morsi in the days leading up to his ouster. On his Twitter account, he encouraged followers to join the protest movement. Following Morsi’s removal, Pope Tawadros, along with his Muslim counterpart the Grand Imam of al-Azhar University Dr. Ahmed el-Tayyib, appeared together to endorse Egypt’s military roadmap for a new government.
Since Aug. 14, when the Egyptian military cleared two pro-Morsi encampments in Cairo, dozens of Christian churches, schools, businesses, and homes have been targeted by Islamic terrorists. At least two Christians have also been killed in the violence. Pope Tawadros is believed to be in hiding.
Coptic Christians constituted a majority of Egypt’s population until the Middle Ages, when Islam, introduced by the Arab invasions in the 7th century, eclipsed their religion. Today, Coptic Christianity comprises nearly 10 percent of Egypt’s 85 million people, making it the largest single Christian community remaining in the Middle East.
*
Preceding provided by JNS.org