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Standing in support of Israel, Jews, and believers in all the nations, in the name of Jesus (Yeshua). Sharing biblical truth, encouragement, news and prophecy.
Showing posts with label stabbings. Show all posts
Showing posts with label stabbings. Show all posts
Friday, April 15, 2016
Joel C. Rosenberg's Blog: After six months, some good news: Israel seeing “significant decline” in terror attacks.
Thursday, October 22, 2015
We've Become Like Sodom and Gomorrah, Laments Israeli Judge - Aviel Schneider
We've Become Like Sodom and Gomorrah, Laments Israeli Judge
Thursday, October 22, 2015 | Aviel Schneider ISRAEL TODAY
The daily stabbings in Israel have had a serious impact on the local population. Everywhere, fear is palpable. People are afraid of being stabbed from behind or run over at the bus stop. In Jerusalem, every young Arab or covered Arab woman is seen as a potential threat.
Yes, Israelis are on edge. But that didn’t stop Israelis from doing some shock-induced soul searching after a young man from Eritrea (pictured) was mistakenly identified as a terrorist and lynched by an angry mob.
“This is strictly forbidden,” admonished Rabbi Ratzon Arussi, chief rabbi of the Tel Aviv suburb of Kiryat Ono. “This is not the way of the Torah. Even if our enemy behaves worse than an animal and is himself already dead, we are obligated to honor his body, for he was created in the image of God.”
Israel’s media has been full of heated debate over the Beersheva lynch. “Only because of his skin color,” screamed a front page headline in Yediot Ahronot.
Israeli politicians have been lamenting video footage of the incident.
“It’s just awful what is happening,” said opposition leader Isaac Herzog. “We must be careful not to allow the fear, anger and frustration that these terrorist attacks create to break our soul.”
Ofer Shelah of the centrist Yesh Atid party said he was deeply ashamed by the behavior of those caught on film attacking the innocent African, while Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to bring to justice all those involved.
In a related case, Tel Aviv district judge Shamai Becker ordered the police to hunt down an Israeli caught on video kicking the head of a suspected female Palestinian terrorist who had already been subdued. “We have become just like Sodom and Gomorrah,” said the judge. “Even if it were a terrorist, it is unacceptable for Israelis to kick that person in the head when she is no longer a threat.”
The Palestinian girl in question had indeed assaulted someone, but was later determined to be mentally ill and not an armed terrorist.
On local WhatsApp groups videos have been shared showing enraged Israelis at the scenes of very real attacks either cursing or beating terrorists who had already been neutralized. The videos also show an overwhelmed police force doing its best to keep the angry crowd away from the subdued or dead terrorists.
The panic and anger currently bubbling up in so many Israelis becomes evident in such situations. But such reactions are rejected and condemned by the majority of Israelis, as is evident in local media coverage in the past several days.
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Monday, October 19, 2015
Jerusalem Dateline: Terror Wave Hits Jerusalem, Spreads Through Israel [VIDEO]
Jerusalem Dateline: Terror Wave Hits Jerusalem, Spreads Through Israel [VIDEO]
“Fear of man will prove to be a snare, but whoever trusts in the LORD is kept safe.” (Proverbs 29:25)
An ambulance brings a wounded soldier to the Hadassah Ein Karem hospital in Jerusalem on October 17, 2015. The Israeli soldier was injured in a stabbing attack in Hebron, October 17, 2015. (Photo: Hadas Parush/Flash90)
A wave of terror hits Jerusalem and spreads throughout Israel. From terror attacks on Israeli buses to “random” stabbings by children as young as 13, what is motivation behind the latest Palestinian violence?
Then, Ron Lauder, president of the World Jewish Congress, gives his take on the situation in Israel. What can Israel do to combat the threat?
Plus, Christmas in October? A Christian choir brings some joy and solidarity to the city of Jerusalem in the midst of all the terror.
Chris Mitchell from CBN News takes you inside these stories and more.
Read more at https://www.breakingisraelnews.com/51484/jerusalem-dateline-terror-wave-hits-jerusalem-spreads-through-israel/#EPylurs5pUoZtwmT.99
Thursday, October 15, 2015
The Hand that Rocks the Knife - ISRAEL TODAY
The Hand that Rocks the Knife
Thursday, October 15, 2015 | Tsvi Sadan ISRAEL TODAY
Based on his previous "successes," John Kerry's pending visit to Israel will either end up achieving nothing or actually increasing the violence. Since Kerry has discovered the reason why so many Palestinian hands are rocking so many knives, it is worth looking into it.
In his Harvard lecture this week, Kerry determined that "there’s an increase in the violence because there’s this frustration that’s growing." This frustration, he says, is caused by “a massive increase in settlements over the course of the last years.”
I don't know the source for Kerry's information. A safe guess would be that he was given short headlines from radical left-wing Israeli sources that are manipulating statistics for their own gains.
According to the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics, however, true to 2014, construction of new homes in Judea and Samaria increased by 3.1%, representing a 52.5% decrease from the previous year. Additionally, the 7% increase in the Jewish population in these areas actually supports the settlers' complaint of a de facto building freeze in Judea and Samaria.
Kerry's explanation is found to be baseless, but there are other popular explanations about the Palestinian frustration that causes them to knife Jews, including poor living conditions and unemployment.
But over the course of the past weeks, enough information has surfaced to demonstrate that this, too, is not the source of frustration. Pictures of the dead knife-wielding terrorists are proudly displayed in the spacious houses of their families or next to their expensive cars.
Nor can a lack of education opportunities be blamed, considering one of the would-be stabbers, Israa Abed, is a chemical engineering student at the prestigious Israel Institute of Technology, popularly known as the Technion.
Of course, there is the explanation that Palestinians are extremely frustrated because Israel refuses to give them a state. Even if it is true, and Israel is the one refusing a Palestinian state, statistics show that more than 60% of Palestinians reject the two-state solution and hope to regain control over what they call "historical Palestine," which includes the whole of Israel.
This, I propose, is the real source of Palestinian frustration. For more than a hundred years, they failed to regain control over "Palestine." In fact, they have achieved the opposite.
The pretense for the present "wave of terror," as it is called, is the rumor that Israel intends to harm the Al Aqsa Mosque. This well-crafted strategy to rock the hands that hold the knives has consistently proved to be an effective tool to rally Muslims for yet another attempt to free Palestine.
With all the frustrations Israelis feel about the lukewarm response of their government to the present Palestinian attacks, there should be little doubt that Israel simply can't afford to be defeated.
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Tuesday, October 13, 2015
"To Love the Lord" ✡ A Great Life Lesson from the Dead Sea
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Monday, October 12, 2015
Israel report from within the city of Jerusalem Oct. 12, 2015
Here is a report from Jerusalem:
This morning began with an attempted stabbing of a police officer at the Lion Gate of the Old City in Jerusalem.
http://www.timesofisrael.com/attacker-killed-after-stabbing-attempt-in-jerusalem-old-city/
Next, was a stabbing attack at Ammunition Hill just north of the Old City. The officer stabbed was 20 years old, and the terrorist was an 18 year old female.
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/201763
The third attack was the worst of the day, in Pisgat Ze'ev - where we have had the Aharai race each year that we've written about in the blog. It is in the most northern neighborhood of Jerusalem, and the Light Rail train ends in this town. A 20 (or 25) year old and a 13 year old were critically injured by two terrorists - 13 years old and 15 (or 17) years old. Yes, children terrorists.
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/20176
Most recently, this evening, an attack was thwarted in Tel Aviv by a taxi driver as he saw his female passenger jump out with a knife trying to stab people. Praise God he was able to stop her until police came.
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/201776
If you wish to see the reality of what is occurring, here is a 30 second video of an attack on border police from two days ago.
Sunday, October 11, 2015
Israel and the Palestinians - THE TIMES OF ISRAEL
Israel and the Palestinians slide deeper into conflict
Stabbing attacks are multiplying, PA security forces are shrinking away in the West Bank, the IDF is getting more deeply involved and more Palestinians are joining the clashes.
BY AVI ISSACHAROFF October 9, 2015 THE TIMES OF ISRAEL
WRITERS
Avi Issacharoff, The Times of Israel's Middle East analyst,
fills the same role for Walla, the leading portal in Israel. … [More]
RELATED TOPICS
ISRAELI-PALESTINIAN CONFLICT
WEST BANK
PALESTINIAN TERRORISM
At Jerusalem stabbing site, protest tent marks new status quo
Israel may outlaw far-right Lehava organization
Abbas trying to quell violence — Israeli security officials
PM to Abbas: Stop the incendiary speeches about Temple Mount
Leading rabbi: Jewish visitors to Temple Mount sparked tensions
Jordan slams Israel for Palestinian deaths, urges world intervention
At least 6 Palestinians die in clash with IDF along Gaza border
Israelis buy pepper spray, sign up to self-defense courses as stabbing attacks surge
Attempted Afula stabber identified as Nazareth woman
Settler leader’s family hurt in West Bank crash as car pelted with rocks
The events of the last few days show a deeply alarming trend: Three or more Palestinians, mostly East Jerusalemites, are daily attacking Israelis — knowing that they are likely to die in the attempt. These are a kind of suicide attacks. They are far less devastating than the bus and restaurant and market bombings of the Second Intifada, but they are motivated by the assailants’ desire to become martyrs. The upsurge of these kinds of attacks is all the more disquieting given that the overwhelming majority of them are not organized by a terror group or known orchestrator, but rather are carried out by “lone wolf” terrorists.
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This simply didn’t happen at this kind of rate during the Second Intifada. At its height, in the spring of 2002, that strategic onslaught of terrorism was producing horrific suicide bombings every few days. But today, we have entered an almost surreal reality of attack after attack every day, mostly carried out by young Palestinians (mostly, but not only male) with no known previous involvement in terrorism, willing to kill and to die “for Jerusalem” and “for al-Aqsa.”
Is the day drawing near when one of the terrorist organizations will try to initiate a Second Intifada-style suicide bombing inside Israel? For now, at least, there is no intelligence information indicating this. But that does not mean no such plans exist.
Hamas does not want to declare all-out war against Israel, and to completely destroy its relations with the Palestinian Authority. Therefore, it apparently will not initiate this kind of attack. The same can be said of Fatah’s well-armed Tanzim forces. But it may well be that within Islamic Jihad, with the encouragement of the Iranians, there may be those who will — if only to “steal the show” and show up the “paralysis” of the rival terror groups.
Even without these kinds of bombings, the relentless daily attacks are sowing fear and deep disquiet among Israelis. This is a kind of assault not previously encountered. The closest precedent was a rash of knifings in 1990, on a much smaller scale, also motivated by concern for ostensible threats to the al-Aqsa Mosque.
Part of Israelis’ concerns stem from uncertainty: what exactly are we facing, and how is it going to develop? It’s not (yet) a popular uprising. In the Palestinian twittersphere, some are calling it the “al-Quds Intifada” — the Jerusalem uprising — much like the al-Aqsa Intifada of 15 years ago. But that’s just what would-be opinion-shapers are branding it. Are we truly entering a Third Intifada? It’s still hard to say with any certainty. Something has clearly shifted, however, and things are unlikely to revert to the way they were. The status quo that has prevailed since 2007, rooted in close coordination between the Israeli and PA security hierarchies, is coming to an end.
Uncomfortable meeting
The crack, or possibly the rift, in security ties between Israel and the PA is not official, and may not be irreversible. Nobody on the Palestinian side has formally declared that coordination is over. Quite the opposite. PA President Mahmoud Abbas is ostensibly maintaining it. His security chiefs met with their Israeli counterparts this week, despite all the problematics and sensitivities of such a meeting at a time like this.
Word of the meeting leaked out, and the PA promptly denied that it had taken place, claiming that it had rebuffed an Israeli invitation to meet. In fact, according to an Israeli source, PA officials — including Nidal Abu-Dahan, the head of PA National Security, Intelligence chief Majed Faraj and Preventive Security chief Ziad Habalreeh — discussed ways to calm the situation with their Israeli counterparts. The PA officials emphatically did not announce an end to the coordination, or any plans for such a rupture.
In fact, earlier this week, PA security officials safely extracted Israeli solders who had entered PA territory by mistake, and also carried out a series of more than 20 arrests among Hamas activists.
But the PA security chiefs did, nonetheless, convey a sense of disquiet to the Israelis. What they were wondering was, what happens next? As in, if they help calm the situation, and thwart the upsurge in attacks, what will the Israeli government do for the PA? Faraj, who is regarded as particularly close to Abbas, was one of the officials making this concern clear, the source said.
Israeli suggestions to withdraw forces from certain areas, and allow the PA to deploy there, were met with hesitancy. For instance, there was talk of the PA placing forces at the northern entrance to Ramallah, across from the IDF’s Judea and Samaria HQ. The Israelis pointed out that it was an affront to the PA for Palestinian youths, including Hamas supporters, to be running riot so close to the PA’s own West Bank capital. But the PA officials were disinclined to act decisively to completely douse a fire they feel was started by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his ministers surrounding al-Aqsa.
There was also talk of encouraging a greater Jordanian role regarding the contested holy site, specifically for King Abdullah to reassert a more direct role in the oversight of the Muslim holy places there. Such a move, it was thought, might constitute another de-escalating step, to follow up on Netanyahu’s ban on MKs and ministers, Jewish and Muslim, from visiting the site.
In truth, however, another reason for the PA security chiefs’ hesitation was that most of the demonstrations taking place in West Bank cities in recent days and weeks have been organized by Fatah activists, not senior Fatah officials directed by Abbas, but Fatah and Tanzim figures some of whom are close to the leadership and some of whom directly work in the Fatah bureaucracy. The PA security apparatuses have no interest in entering into confrontations with these people. And the absence of the PA forces was indeed conspicuous this week during clashes in Bethlehem, Tulkarem and Ramallah.
This may also explain the dramatic rise in the numbers participating in these protests and clashes. Now, hundreds are gathering — 10 times as many as was the case a mere two or three weeks ago.
Fatah wants to play a role in the confrontation against Israel, in part so as no to lose more of the Palestinian street to Hamas. All this unsurprisingly hinders Israeli-PA security coordination. And that’s not about to change.
The bottom line: The PA forces no longer can, and no longer want to, do what they were doing a few short weeks ago.
A case in point: Three days ago, gunmen from Ramallah opened fire at an IDF command post in Beit El. These were Fatah-Tanzim gunmen. The PA security forces told them to desist, but it is unlikely that this order will be heeded for long.
Abbas’s thinking
It may be that the current situation has its perceived benefits for Abbas. He’s not ripping up relations with Israel altogether, and he is not directly responsible for the deteriorating situation. But the escalation is producing so much anxiety in Israel that, Abbas may be calculating, Netanyahu may resort to widening his coalition, to bring in the center-left National Union, and perhaps even freezing settlement construction.
In this context, Abbas’s insistent refusal to condemn the terror attacks is telling. In the past, he did condemn all attacks and bloodshed. This time, he has been silent, and his Fatah colleagues have been hailing and praising the attacks.
The breach between Israel and Abbas, as reflected in his speech to the UN General Assembly last week, was followed, predictably, by the planned dispatch by Abbas of a delegation to Gaza to discuss a unity government with Hamas, except that Hamas refused to host Abbas’s emissaries.
Again, it is not impossible that this new wave of terror will be calmed for a while. But the fundamental causes will remain. The coals will keep burning unless or until there is a substantive diplomatic process — even in the highly unlikely event that the specific issue of al-Aqsa is effectively addressed.
For now, the cycle of violence is well and truly in motion: Palestinian attacks, in some cases bringing Jewish “revenge” attacks, and more Palestinian attacks, and wider Palestinian demonstrations, with a rising insistence by Fatah that it play a role. The PA security forces shrink away. The IDF has to intervene more directly — as in this week’s operation by undercover forces near Beit El. And the deterioration accelerates.
Last weekend, after the terror attack near Itamar in which Naama and Eitam Henkin were gunned down in front of their children, some 40 incidents of Jewish attacks on Palestinians were reported. That constitutes a portent of what could unfold during the olive-picking season, which is now getting under way. Each week’s Friday prayers constitute another event that potentially widens Palestinian participation in protest and violence in Jerusalem and the West Bank.
In a classic Catch-22, each new Palestinian terror attack prompts pressure on the government to cancel work permits for tens of thousands of West Bank Palestinians in Israel and for the imposition of a closure on the territories — as Zionist Union’s Isaac Herzog, of all people, urged on Thursday. Such a step would likely be disastrous, and would probably mean that rather than 3,000 Palestinians participating in West Bank protests against the IDF, we would see 30,000 or more.
At which point, any attempt to halt a popular uprising would become almost impossible.
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