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The Trouble with the Apartheid Analogy
by Joel Pollak
Last month, former U.S. president Jimmy Carter in a speech at Brandeis University cited a letter to the New York Times by Nelson Mandela laying out the case against Israel. Unfortunately for Israel's critics, the letter was a hoax, the creation of Arjan El Fassed, who runs an anti-Israel website called The Electronic Intifada. El-Fassed has admitted that he made the whole thing up, but the Mandela letter has now entered the anti-Israel canon alongside countless other fictions. (Business Day-South Africa)
Islam of a Different Kind
by Michael Melchior
 The continuation of the present situation will bring upon us nothing but disaster. With the lack of a diplomatic alternative, it is merely a question of time until the Israel Defense Forces returns to Gaza. If we allow despair to overcome us, it will do so quickly and easily. Among us also there is a need to realize that without the peace we yearn for, it is not possible morally to continue ruling over the lives of 3.5 million Arabs who do not want us. This moral position must drive us also to make the effort to try to climb the ladder of opportunity that has been placed at our side. The half-full glass of the Mecca agreement could be the one to show the way. The writer is chairman of the Knesset's Education and Culture Committee. (Ha'aretz)
West Bank, Gaza Drifting Apart
by Joshua Brilliant
Gaza and the West Bank are drifting apart. "We are seeing the beginning of two states. A state of Gaza under Hamas' control and the State of the West Bank governed from Ramallah," says Shalom Harari, a prominent Israeli analyst of Palestinian affairs. The West Bank is slightly smaller than Delaware with 2.5 million Palestinians. The Gaza Strip is double the size of Washington, D.C. and cramped with 1.5 million people. About a million of them are registered refugees. Israel is 22 miles wide between the two territories. Ramallah is more affluent, and Ramallah's residents seem more sophisticated, leading many West Bankers to look down upon the Gazans. In the last Jerusalem Media and Communications Center poll of Palestinian opinion, 43% of the West Bankers supported suicide bombings against Israelis, but in Gaza 56% favored it. (UPI)
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Mecca Agreement Is Not Good Enough
by Barack Obama
 We had to ask the world community, those who might have been critical during that summer, what nation in this world would not respond when another nation crosses their borders, kidnaps their troops, and continues to rain down missiles on them. I don't know of any nation that would. We shouldn't expect Israel to do any less. The support of Syria and Iran in terms of shipments of weapons to Hizbullah and Hamas, which threatens the peace and security in the region, must end, and the U.S. must send a strong signal that it needs to end. Now, these are great challenges that we face, and in moments likes this, true allies do not walk away. The writer is a U.S. Senator and a Democratic Party candidate for President. (Jerusalem Post)
See also Obama Says Iran a Big Threat to U.S. and Israel by John McCormick (Seattle Times)
Brothers in Arms: Fatah and Palestinian Islamic Jihad
by Pinhas Inbari
 Both Islamic Jihad and Hizbullah were established with deep Fatah involvement. Originally, Islamic Jihad was actually a purely Fatah offshoot, part and parcel of the military apparatus of Arafat's deputy, Abu Jihad, who, as his name may convey, was the major promoter of Islamic features in Fatah. During the first Lebanon war, Abu Jihad followers helped Iran establish Hizbullah on the ruins of the Fatah infrastructure that Israel had destroyed in the war. The joint plan of Fatah and Hizbullah was to surround Israel with terror rocket power from all sides. This master plan still exists, but now the main role has been given to Hamas. (ICA/JCPA)
The New Anti-Semitism
by Marvin Hier
 Those who counsel us that there is a need to understand what it is that motivates these fanatics should remember that billions of people live on this planet suffering from intolerable living conditions, illness, hunger and poverty without seeking to avenge their cause by becoming suicide bombers who target innocent civilians. Let us take an example from the survivors of the Nazi Holocaust who lost their entire families, had no homes to return to, found no countries that would harbor them yet, despite this, picked themselves up, married, had children and taught them to love rather than to hate. Those are the people who need our understanding and who merit our admiration. The writer is the dean and founder of the Simon Wiesenthal Center. (Jerusalem Post)
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