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Fifth Column

Freed from ICE custody, Palestinian activist graduates from Columbia to cheers

2025-05-20

[IsraelTimes] Mahdawi Mahdawi joins post-commencement ceremony vigil outside university’s gates, raising photograph of his classmate Mahmoud Khalil, who remains in federal custody

Less than three weeks after his release from an immigration jail, the Paleostinian activist Mohsen Mahdawi strode across the graduation stage at Columbia University on Monday morning, savoring a moment the Trump administration had fought to make impossible.

Draped in a keffiyeh, Mahdawi, 34, paused to listen to the swell of cheers from his fellow graduates. Then he joined a vigil just outside Columbia’s gates, raising a photograph of his classmate Mahmoud Khalil, who remains in federal custody.

"It’s very mixed emotions," Mahdawi told The News Agency that Dare Not be Named. "The Trump administration wanted to rob me of this opportunity. They wanted me to be in a prison, in prison clothes, to not have education and to not have joy or celebration."

You already got the education, idiot, though clearly it didn’t take if you are that confused about the situation. “They” just didn’t see reason to keep you in the country long enough to be formally handed that sheepskin while wearing a pseudo-Medieval costume.

Mahdawi, a 34-year-old legal resident of the US, was detained during an April 14 citizenship interview in Vermont, part of the widening federal crackdown on pro-Paleostinian activists.

He was released two weeks later by a judge, who likened the government’s actions to McCarthyist repression. Federal officials have not accused Mahdawi of committing a crime, but argued that he and other anti-Israel student activists should be deported for beliefs that may undermine US foreign policy.

For Mahdawi, who earned a bachelor’s degree in philosophy from Columbia’s School of General Studies,

…perfectly suited for standing behind a counter in colourful polyester for minimum wage, politely asking, “Would you like fries with that?”

the graduation marked a bittersweet return to a university that he says has betrayed him and other students.

"The senior administration is selling the soul of this university to the Trump administration, participating in the destruction and the degradation of our democracy," Mahdawi said.

He pointed to Columbia’s decision to acquiesce to the Trump administration’s demands — including placing its Middle Eastern studies department under new leadership — as well as its failure to speak out against his and Khalil’s arrest.

He said Columbia’s leadership had denied his pleas for protection prior to his arrest, then ignored his attorney’s request for a letter supporting his release from jail.

A spokesperson for Columbia University did not return an emailed inquiry.

Mahdawi was born in a refugee camp in the West Bank and moved to the United States in 2014. At Columbia, he organized campus protests, led a Buddhist association

…clearly a matter of protective colouration and taqqiya, because while he reportedly meditates beautifully, there is no peace to be found in his heart…

and co-founded the Paleostinian Student Union with Khalil.

The Jordanian-Palestinian graduate philosophy student at Columbia boasted to a Vermont Gun shop owner that he had plenty of experience with guns, having built 9mm submachine guns and used them to kill Jews back home in Palestine — he started his career throwing rocks at IDF soldiers as a child, then led anti-Israel Palestinian student groups since arriving in America a decade ago, true to the traditions in his family where a cousin is an Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade field commander. He is president of the anti-Israel Palestinian Students Union at Columbia, since 10/7 organizing violent anti-Israel protests and taking the opportunity to beat up Jews, for which he was arrested thrice; he was also caught at the Canadian border with drugs, but one imagines the judge did not think that a notable event; Mr. Mahdawi did not think any of this an issue before he was arrested for a revoked green card on his way to his scheduled citizenship exam.

Khalil would have received his diploma from a Columbia master’s program in international studies later this week. He remains incarcerated
Don't shoot, coppers! I'm comin' out!
in Louisiana as he awaits a decision from a federal judge about his possible release.

Mr. Khalil, 30, was a frontman for Columbia University Apartheid Divest, the student coalition that spearheaded violent and vicious anti-Israel protests at the school, hosted at least one specially designated foreign terrorist, and broke into, occupied, and vandalized a university building. All of which led the Trump administration to treat Columbia like a post-Civil War southern state in need of Reconstruction.

As he prepares for a lengthy legal battle, Mahdawi faces his own uncertain future. He was previously admitted to a master’s degree program at Columbia, where he planned to study "peacekeeping and conflict resolution"

…no doubt he planned to apply his steller Jew-beating skills to the problem, or perhaps he still prefers his youthful favourites: rocks and homemade submachine guns..

in the fall. But he is reconsidering his options after learning this month that he would not receive financial aid.

Somebody finally noticed the not-so-minor problems with that...

For now, he said, he would continue to advocate for the Paleostinian cause, buoyed by the support he says he has received from the larger Columbia community.

"When I went on the stage, the message was very clear and loud: They are cheering up for the idea of justice, for the idea of peace, for the idea of equality, for the idea of humanity, and nothing will stop us from continuing to do that. Not the Trump administration nor Columbia University," he said.

How much time and federal money do you suppose that particular bit of stupidity cost the university, dear Reader?

The School of General Studies graduation comes two days before Columbia’s university-wide commencement, as colleges across the country are bracing for possible disruptions.

Last week, New York University announced it would withhold the diploma of a student speaker who criticized Israel’s prosecution of the war in Gazoo
...Hellhole adjunct to Israel and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, inhabited by Gazooks. The place was acquired in the wake of the 1967 War and then presented to Paleostinian control in 2006 by Ariel Sharon, who had entered his dotage. It is currently ruled with a rusty iron fist by Hamas with about the living conditions you'd expect. It periodically attacks the Hated Zionist Entity whenever Iran needs a ruckus created or the hard boyz get bored, getting thumped by the IDF in return. The ruling turbans then wave the bloody shirt and holler loudly about oppression and disproportionate response...
in his graduation speech.

Link

Home Front: Politix

Judge rules Tufts student detained by US immigration authorities must be released

2025-05-10

The process continues.

[IsraelTimes] A federal judge has ordered the Trump administration to release a Tufts University student from Turkey who has been held for over six weeks in a Louisiana immigration detention facility after she co-wrote an opinion piece criticizing her school’s response to Israel’s war in Gaza.

US District Judge William Sessions, during a hearing in Burlington, Vermont, granted bail to Rumeysa Ozturk,

,…age 30, Turkish PhD student and Fulbright Scholar, whose student visa was revoked for having co-authored an opinion piece for the Tufts University student newspaper a year earlier supporting the listed terror organization Hamas and castigating the university for not divesting from Israel-related companies. I’ve not yet seen anything about the other three students involved — perhaps that association is what got her in trouble. No doubt her naturalized, activist Iranian-American immigration lawyer, Mahsa Khanbabai, is also somehow objectionable …

who is at the center of one of the highest-profile cases to emerge from Republican President Donald Trump’s campaign to deport pro-Palestinian activists on American campuses.

The judge ruled shortly after a federal appeals court rejected the Trump administration’s bid to re-detain Columbia University student Mohsen Mahdawi, a Palestinian campus activist who a different judge in Vermont ordered released last week after immigration authorities arrested him as well.

The Jordan-born, Palestinian graduate philosophy student at Columbia boasted to a Vermont Gun shop owner that he had plenty of experience with guns, having used them to kill Jews back home in Palestine — he started his career throwing rocks at IDF soldiers as a child and led anti-Israel Palestinian student groups since arriving in America a decade ago, true to the traditions in his family where a cousin is an Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade field commander. He is president of the anti-Israel Palestinian Students Union at Columbia, since 10/7 organizing violent anti-Israel protests and taking the opportunity to beat up Jews, for which he was arrested thrice; he did not think any of this an issue before he was arrested for a revoked green card on his way to his scheduled citizenship exam.

Ozturk’s arrest on March 25 by masked, plainclothes law enforcement officers on a street in the Boston suburb of Somerville, Massachusetts, near her home, was captured in a viral video and occurred after the US Department of State revoked her student visa.

The sole basis authorities have provided for revoking her visa was an opinion piece she co-authored in Tufts’ student newspaper criticizing the school’s response to calls by students to divest from companies with ties to Israel and to “acknowledge the Palestinian genocide.”

…which does not mean it’s actually the only reason they have, just the only one shared.

Link

Israel-Palestine-Jordan

Israeli forces arrest Fatah-linked terror operative in Jenin refugee camp

2023-09-10

[IsraelTimes] IDF says Tanzim member Muhammad Naghnaghiya aided in carrying out series of West Bank shootings in recent months

Israeli forces raided the Jenin refugee camp in the northern West Bank on Wednesday morning, for the second time in days, arresting a suspected terror operative partially associated with the Paleostinian Authority’s ruling Fatah party.

Muhammad Naghnaghiya, a veteran member of the mostly dormant Tanzim terror group, was detained for allegedly aiding in executing a series of shooting attacks in the West Bank in recent months, according to the military.

Members of the Border Police’s undercover West Bank unit converged on a building in the Jenin refugee camp and nabbed Naghnaghiya, after receiving intelligence on his whereabouts from the Shin Bet security agency.

The Israel Defense Forces said that during the raid, Paleostinian button men shot at the forces, who returned fire.

Naghnaghiya was handed over to the Shin Bet for further questioning.

Tanzim, an armed militia founded in 1995 and loosely affiliated with the PA’s ruling Fatah party, was a key player in violence at the start of the Second Intifada in 2000.

Paleostinian media on Wednesday published a photo from the early 2000s showing Naghnaghiya with notorious terror commander Zakaria Zubeidi in the Jenin refugee camp.

Zubeidi, a senior commander in the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, was released from Israeli prison in a 2007 amnesty deal, but was rearrested a decade later. Exactly two years ago, on September 6, 2021, while still awaiting trial, Zubeidi fled Gilboa Prison — along with five other high-risk Paleostinian security prisoners — in an escape that transfixed Israelis and Paleostinians for weeks. They were all later rearrested.

The raid on Wednesday morning came less than two days after Israeli forces entered the Jenin refugee camp to arrest three members of the Hamas, a contraction of the Arabic words for "frothing at the mouth", terror group.

Violence has surged across the West Bank over the past year and a half, with a rise in Paleostinian shooting attacks against Israeli civilians and troops, near-nightly arrest raids by the military, and an uptick in Dire Revenge attacks by krazed killer Jewish settlers against Paleostinians.

The IDF said Wednesday morning that troops detained nine wanted Paleostinians during overnight raids elsewhere in the West Bank, with festivities in some areas.

Paleostinian attacks in Israel and the West Bank since the beginning of the year have left 27 civilians and three soldiers dead, and several others seriously maimed.

According to a tally by The Times of Israel, 180 West Bank and East Jerusalem Paleostinians have been killed during the same period — the vast majority of them during festivities with security forces or while carrying out attacks, but some were uninvolved civilians and others were killed under unclear circumstances, including by armed Israeli settlers.

Link

Israel-Palestine-Jordan

Israeli father of two killed in northern West Bank terror shooting

2023-05-31

[IsraelTimes] Drive-by attack occurs near settlement of Hermesh, west of Jenin; military launches manhunt; victim named as Meir Tamari, 32

An Israeli man was shot and killed in a shooting attack near the settlement of Hermesh in the northern West Bank on Tuesday, the military and medics said.

According to local authorities, the victim, later named as 32-year-old Meir Tamari, came under fire from a passing vehicle on a road near the settlement of Hermesh, west of Jenin. He continued driving until he reached the community, where he was treated by medics.

The Magen David Adom ambulance service said Tamari, a civilian, was treated at death's door at the entrance to the settlement, after suffering from multiple gunshot wounds to his upper body. A helicopter was dispatched to the scene to take the victim to Hillel Yaffe Hospital in Hadera, where he was later declared dead.

The Israel Defense Forces said troops launched a manhunt for the button men, closing off several roads in the area.

In a statement carried by Paleostinian media, the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades terror group, loosely linked to the Paleostinian Authority’s ruling Fatah party, grabbed credit for the deadly attack.

"We affirm that this operation and others will not be the final response to our deaders," the statement read.

Tamari had moved to Hermesh some four years ago after getting married to Tal, a resident of the West Bank settlement, the Samaria regional council said. He is survived by his wife and two young children, aged one and three.

Link

Israel-Palestine-Jordan

Daoud Zubeidi, brother of jailed terror chief, dies of wounds from battle with IDF

2022-05-16

“Roooosebuuuuud.”
“He’s dead, Jim.”

[IsraelTimes] Zubeidi was taken to an Israeli hospital after his condition deteriorated; terror groups threatened to ’open the gates of hell’ should he come to harm.

Daoud Zubeidi, the brother of notorious terror chief and Gilboa prison escapee Zakaria Zubeidi, has died of wounds he sustained during a shootout with Israeli soldiers, the Paleostinian Authority Health Ministry said Sunday.

Zubeidi, 40, was among 13 Paleostinian button men reportedly injured Friday in fierce exchanges of fire with Israeli troops in and around the city of Jenin in the West Bank, during an arrest operation carried out by police special forces and the Israeli military.

After he was critically maimed in the shootout on Friday, Zubeidi was taken to a local hospital for treatment, but when his condition deteriorated, he was transferred to Rambam Hospital in Haifa.

Paleostinian terror groups in Jenin — including both the loosely Fatah-linked al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades and Islamic Jihad
...created after many members of the Egyptian Moslem Brotherhood decided the organization was becoming too moderate. Operations were conducted out of Egypt until 1981 when the group was exiled after the assassination of President Anwar Sadat. They worked out of Gaza until they were exiled to Lebanon in 1987, where they clove tightly to Hezbollah. In 1989 they moved to Damascus, where they remain a subsidiary of Hezbollah...
’s al-Quds Brigades — threatened to "open the gates of hell" should Zubeidi come to harm while in Israeli custody.

Yeah, yeah. Whatevs.

"Any harm to the life of Daoud al-Zubeidi will open the fire of hell in the face of the occupation," masked button men apparently affiliated with the al-Quds Brigades read out in a statement on Saturday.

Israeli police commando Noam Raz, 47, was killed during the same shootout on Friday. Mourners carried Raz’s coffin to the police cemetery on Mount Zion for burial on Sunday in a private funeral, away from the press.

Zubeidi’s brother Zakaria is notorious for criminal masterminding terror attacks during the Second Intifada. A child actor who turned to violence, Zakaria Zubeidi became a senior commander in the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades. He frequently gave interviews to Israeli media and became a familiar face to the Israeli public.

In 2007, the Shin Bet security service and the Paleostinian Authority reached an amnesty deal for thousands of Paleostinians who had fought against Israel during the wave of violence. Zakaria Zubeidi was one of them, and founded a so-called "Freedom Theater" in Jenin with a director of both Jewish and Arab Israeli heritage, Juliano Mer-Khamis.

Over a decade later, Israeli forces apprehended Zakaria Zubeidi, accusing him of having resumed his terror activities. The Shin Bet security service later said Zubeidi had confessed to two shooting attacks on buses outside the Beit El settlement in the central West Bank in November 2018 and January 2019 that maimed three people.

While still awaiting trial in September 2021, Zubeidi fled Gilboa jail — along with five other high-risk Paleostinian security prisoners — in an escape that transfixed Israelis and Paleostinians for weeks.

The six prisoners — five of them members of the Paleostinian Islamic Jihad, along with Fatah commander Zubeidi — made their way out through their cell’s drainage system and an empty space underneath the prison.

Four of the prisoners, including Zubeidi, were captured in northern Israel within the first week, while the other two made their way into the northern West Bank city of Jenin and hid out there until their arrest on September 19.

Israel has recently stepped up its operations in the West Bank and especially in the Jenin area, from which several Lions of Islam behind recent deadly attacks carried out in Israel hailed. The violence has left 19 dead in central Israeli cities since March 22, in the bloodiest wave of terrorism in years.

Around 30 Paleostinians were killed by Israeli forces in the same period; some perpetrated the attacks, while others died during ~~violent~~ mostly peaceful festivities. Still others were uninvolved civilians, such as al-Jazeera journalist Shirin Abu Akleh, who died under disputed circumstances in Jenin on Wednesday.

Link

Israel-Palestine-Jordan

Hamas claims deadly Ariel terror shooting, vows it ‘won’t be the last’

2022-05-03

[IsraelTimes] The terror group has repeatedly praised, but rarely taken responsibility for, attacks against Israelis in recent years.

In a rare move, Hamas, a contraction of the Arabic words for "frothing at the mouth",’s military wing grabbed credit on Monday for a terror shooting that left an Israeli security guard dead at the entrance to the West Bank settlement of Ariel on Friday night.

"This operation comes within a series of responses to the defiling of our al-Aqsa [Mosque] and aggression against it," the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades said in a statement.

Sixteen Israelis have been killed in a deadly wave of terror attacks since mid-March. Hamas officials have encouraged and praised the bloodshed, but this is the first time that the terror group has taken credit.

The "heroic, quality" attack "will not be the last one, with God’s help," the Qassam Brigades said.

Hamas’s military wing has rarely issued statements taking responsibility for attacks in recent years. Even when avowed Hamas members committed attacks — such as when an East Jerusalem schoolteacher killed an Israeli in the Old City last January — the terror group praised rather than claimed the killings.

A video that circulated after the attack purported to show that the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, a set of gangs loosely affiliated with Fatah, Hamas’s main Paleostinian rivals, had claimed the killing. The claim could not be fully confirmed, however, as the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades have no official channels.

Two Paleostinians — Yusef Assi, 21, and Yahya Marei, 20 — were arrested by Israeli forces in connection with the attack on Saturday from the town of Qarawat Bani Hassan in the northern West Bank. Official Hamas media identified the two as Qassam Brigades members on Monday night.

"[The Qassam Brigades] declare its pride in its fighters, the blessed sons of Qassam in the occupied West Bank, who are still wielding the ’Sword of Jerusalem,'" the terror group said, using Hamas’s name for the May war with Israel.

The victim of Friday’s attack, Israeli security officer Vyacheslav Golev, 23, was laid to rest in Beit Shemesh in central Israel on Sunday. Golev died while shielding his fiancee, Victoria Fligelman, who was on guard duty with him that night.

Tensions between Israel and the Paleostinians have been high for weeks. The deadly wave of terror against Israeli civilians led Israeli security forces to step up their activities in the West Bank to tamp down the violence in early April.

The resulting festivities left several Paleostinians dead. Many were combatants or were claimed by terror groups as members. But some others — such as a visually impaired woman killed in a town near Bethlehem in April — appear to have been unarmed civilians.

Meanwhile,
...back at the buffalo wallow, Standing Buffalo watched the circling Commanches and asked himself What would Geronimo do?...
Paleostinian rioters clashed with Israeli police at Jerusalem’s Temple Mount holy site, which houses the al-Aqsa Mosque. Paleostinians hurled stones at officers, who responded with rubber bullets, sound grenades and tear gas, wounding hundreds.

The ~~violent~~ mostly peaceful scenes at the flashpoint site, Judaism’s holiest and Islam’s third-holiest, sparked fears of renewed war between Israel and the Paleostinians. Despite scattered rocket fire from Gazoo
...Hellhole adjunct to Israel and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, inhabited by Gazooks. The place was acquired in the wake of the 1967 War and then presented to Paleostinian control in 2006 by Ariel Sharon, who had entered his dotage. It is currently ruled with an iron fist by Hamaswith about the living conditions you'd expect. It periodically attacks the Hated Zionist Entity whenever Iran needs a ruckus created or the hard boyz get bored, getting thumped by the IDF in return. The ruling turbans then wave the bloody shirt and holler loudly about oppression and disproportionate response...
in mid-April, however, the situation did not immediately deteriorate further.

On Saturday afternoon, Hamas Gaza chief Yahya Sinwar gave a speech laden with threats against Israel that urged Paleostinians in the West Bank to commit terror attacks.

He said that any further Israeli "violations" of the al-Aqsa Mosque would lead to attacks on Jewish synagogues worldwide.

Link

Israel-Palestine-Jordan

Haifa woman indicted, allegedly trained to build bombs in Gaza

2015-11-06

[Ynet] The mother of seven, who is married to a Gazook, crossed into Israel to visit family but allegedly used her time to spy on strategic installations.

A 40-year-old mother of seven from Haifa was indicted on Thursday, after an investigation raised allegations that she had travelled to Gazoo, and agreed to spy on behalf of the al-Aqsa Martyrs brigade in exchange for a undeclared sum of money.

The indictment stated that Nassrin Hassan, who is married to a Gazook, apparently met with members of the terrorist organization at a military training facility in Gazoo last March. The indictment went on to allege that Hassan was trained to build bombs, and agreed to carry out an attack upon completing an additional training session.

She later took photos of strategic facilities in the Haifa area in preparation for the attack, according to the indictment.

Hassan was brought before a Be'er Sheva district court judge, who ordered that she be remanded to custody pending further proceedings. An additional court session was scheduled for November 10. The indictment sought to charge Hassan with four counts of aiding the enemy during wartime, providing the enemy with information in order to harm state security, conspiracy to aid the enemy during wartime, espionage, contact with a foreign agent, membership and activity in an unlawful organization, and more.

According to the indictment, which was submitted by the Southern District prosecutor Moran Gaz, Hassan had sporadically lived in both Israel and Gazoo in the 15 years since her marriage to a Gazook. Hassan had lived in Gazoo during the last year, and said she entered Israel to visit family in Haifa.

According to the charges against Hassan, she first made contact with members of Katibat al-Mujahideen (a faction of the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade) two years ago, later joining the group in order to conduct operations inside of Israel. Obstensibly, during the last two years she met with members of the group who provided her with spying objectives. Among other tasks, Hassan supposedly took photos of strategic compounds in Israel, specifically governmental institutions.

According to the indictment, Hassan entered Israel through the Erez crossing, and immediately went to work observing and writing down details regarding the security of the Haifa Port, Haifa trains stations, the interior ministry building in the city, as well as several other institutions. Hassan allegedly recorded the number of security guards on duty at each institution in writing, while secretly taking photos of security camera placements during fake phone conversations.

Upon returning to Gazoo, Hassan allegedly handed over her cell phone's memory card, which included the photos and information she had gathered.

She later attended a bomb-making course at a military training facility in the strip, claimed the indictment, where she learned to build the type of bomb she would use in her attack. She was enjugged
Maw! They're comin' to get me, Maw!
at the Erez crossing on October 18 as part of a joint operation between the Shin Bet and Negev police division.

Link

Israel-Palestine-Jordan

Sacha Baron Cohen threatened by Palestinian terrorists over Bruno film

2009-07-27

The Martyrs Brigades, a group of West Bank Palestinian insurgents, said it was "very upset" that it appeared in the film starring Baron Cohen's flamboyant Austrian homosexual character and would "respond in a suitable way", according to a statement published on the Right-wing website called World Net Daily.

In the film, Bruno, a television journalist interviews Ayman Abu Aita, who is claimed in the movie to be the leader of the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades.

Mr Baron Cohen's character implores Mr Abu Aita to capture him, saying, "I want to be famous. I want the best guys in the business to kidnap me. Al-Qaeda is so 2001."

Mr Abu Aita and his associates were angry by his portrayal according to the statement published by the Jerusalem bureau of the World Net Daily.

"We reserve the right to respond in the way we find suitable against this man. The movie was part of a conspiracy against the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades," the statement read.

"According to what we checked there was was no meeting about the real context of the film," the statement added "This was a dirty use of our brother, Ayman, and we don't accept that the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades is part of the film."

A lawyer for Mr Abu Aita said that he was tricked into appearing in the film and was no longer involved with the Martyrs Brigades, it was reported. He added that Mr Abu Aitas planned to file a law suit against the 37-year-old British comedian.

Mr Baron Cohen has reportedly tightened his security following the publication of the statement.

Link

Israel-Palestine-Jordan

Murder Solved: Arab Assaulted Jew with Wrench At Arab Car Garage

2009-06-17

Instant Jihad.
The Israeli Security Agency (Shin Bet), in cooperation with IDF and Border Police units, have arrested four Arabs for the July 27, 2006 murder of Dr. Daniel Yaakobi of Yakir. After Yaakobi brought his car to an Arab car garage for repairs, an Arab on site attacked the Jew with a wrench and a stick until he collapsed.

The ISA and Israel Police carried out intensive intelligence and investigation activities in the three years following the murder which resulted in the arrest of four suspects during April and May 2009. Their identities have now been approved for publication:

Tioun Hadi Khalil Tioun -- resident of Hadja village in the Kalkilya area, 21, a Tanzim militant, student at Abu Dis University.

Ahmed Hadi Khalil Tiyoun - resident of Hadja village in the Kalkilya area, 25, brother of the above, Fatah activist.

Amar Khamed Abdallah Nofel, resident of Hadja village in the Kalkilya area, 19, participated in disturbances in his village.

Nasim Jamal Ahmed Gaviti, resident of Funduk village in the Kalkilya area, 26, Tanzim militant, participated in disturbances in the area.

Tioun Tioun admitted to murdering Yaakobi, allegedly in revenge for the death one day earlier of Khamada Shativi, an Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades terrorist from Kadoum. Shativi was killed by security forces while attempting to evade capture on July 26, 2006. Yaakobi was last seen driving towards Karnei Shomron on the day he was murdered. His body was found inside his burnt car on the same evening.

Tioun said that he murdered Yaakobi after Yaakobi brought his car to his brother Ahmed Tioun's garage for repairs. He assaulted Yaakobi with a wrench and a stick beating him to death.

When his brother and Amar Nofel eventually arrived, Tioun Tioun told them to place the body in the trunk and burn the car. They loaded Yaakobi's body into the trunk, drove the car outside the village and set it alight. They then drove to Shativi's funeral, following which Ahmed Tioun informed Nasim Gaviti of Yaakobi's murder.

They then drove to the garage, where -- joined by Tioun Tioun and Amar Nofel -- they cleaned the garage and burnt Yaakobi's belongings. All four men will be indicted in the coming days.

Rabbi Chaim Kanievsky, considered a top Torah sage of the generation in the hareidi-religious community, issued a Jewish legal decision banning the employment of Arab workers by Jews after an Arab hired as a driver by the Merkaz HaRav Yeshiva in Jerusalem murdered eight students in March, 2008.

"According to Jewish law, it is completely forbidden to hire Arabs, especially in yeshivas," Rabbi Kanievsky said. "There is a concern of endangering lives."

The rabbi explained, "After all, we are at war with them...and are there not Jews that can work and make a living?" Asked later if his words should be publicized, Rabbi Kanievsky said: "Certainly."

Though a web site listing Jewish labor businesses was closed down by the supreme court after a law-suit from an Arab advocacy group funded by the New Israel Fund, a hotline and email account has been set up to provide solutions for those seeking Jewish laborers for work anywhere in Israel, for everything from gardeners, heavy equipment operators, painters, car garages, cement mixers and handymen to catering and restaurants.

Dr. Yaakobi was 59 when he was murdered. He was survived by his wife Chani, four children and 12 grandchildren.

Link

Israel-Palestine-Jordan

WND: Israel pardons Palestinian terrorist chief

2008-08-29

PM grants full amnesty to leader of most active group as 'peace gesture'

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert this week granted complete amnesty to 45 terrorists, including the chief of the most active West Bank Palestinian terrorist organization, whose cell is responsible for scores of deadly attacks, WND has learned.

Ala Senakreh, considered the West Bank chief of the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, was on the amnesty list obtained by WND. He received his full pardon Tuesday. The Brigades is the military wing of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah organization.

Senakreh, based in the northern West Bank city of Nablus the Brigades' main stronghold directed cells that carried out scores of suicide bombings inside Israel, according to security sources and Senakreh's own admission during in-person interviews. Together with the Islamic Jihad terror organization, Senakreh's group took responsibility for every suicide bombing in Israel in 2005, 2006 and 2007, and for scores of deadly shooting attacks.

Last June, Olmert granted temporary amnesty to 178 terrorists on condition they disarm, refrain from attacks and spend three months in PA detention facilities and another three months confined to the West Bank city in which they reside. If the terrorists completed their side of the deal, Olmert's office would grant permanent amnesty, allowing them freedom of movement in the West Bank and taking them off Israel's most wanted list of terrorists to ensure they are not arrested.

In spite of rampant Israeli media reports that many of the 178 pardoned terrorists refused to disarm and continued carrying out attacks, Olmert last October pardoned 48 more Al Aqsa Brigades members and earlier this year pardoned at least 80 more. About 45 percent of the temporarily pardoned terrorists received permanent Israeli amnesty in coordination with Olmert's office and Israel's Shin Bet Security Services. In July, a handful of more terrorists received permanent amnesty, purportedly for abiding by the Israeli conditions for a pardon. On Tuesday, 45 more received their permanent pardons, including Senakreh.

Israel granted the new list amnesty in spite of information dozens of terrorists recently granted full amnesty were later involved in attacks. Just today, Israel arrested Mahmoud Lubada, an Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades member pardoned last month. Lubada was suspected of planning attacks meant for central Israel. Two weeks ago, Israeli forces arrested Maamun Hamdan, an Al Aqsa member given a complete pardon, on information he was planning an imminent attack meant for central Israel. One week prior, Israel arrested Muhammad Qutawi, another Brigades leader given a full pardon. Qutawi is also accused of planning an attack meant for central Israel.

Link

Israel-Palestine-Jordan

Haniyeh: Stop firing at Israel for sake of Palestinians

2008-06-28

Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh on Friday appealed to Palestinian factions in the Gaza Strip to honor the week-long truce with Israel, and stop firing at the Negev, for the good of the Palestinian civilian population.

Two mortar shells from Gaza hit the western Negev on Friday, exploding in open areas, despite the cease fire agreement. No damage or injury were reported. "We expect everyone to respect the agreement so that the Palestinian people achieve what they look for, an end to this suffering and breaking the siege," he told reporters outside a Gaza mosque after Muslim prayers.

The attack on Friday came one day after two Qassam rockets were fired from the Strip into Israel. The militant Fatah offshoot Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade claimed responsibility for the attack and demanded that the cease fire agreement between Israel and Hamas, which currently includes only the Gaza Strip, be extended to include the West Bank as well.

At a high-level security meeting late Thursday, Israel decided to keep the border crossings into the Gaza Strip closed on Friday because of the latest rocket attack defense officials said. They added that a limited amount of fuel would be transferred into the Strip despite the closure.

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Israel-Palestine-Jordan

Rocket hits Israel, second violation of Gaza truce

2008-06-27

Gaza militants fired two rockets into southern Israel on Thursday, further straining a shaky, week-old truce as Israel kept vital Gaza border crossings closed in response. The rocket attack, the second ~~in as many days~~ since the cease-fire took effect, led to a call for retaliation by Israel's Foreign Minister while Palestinians charged that the continued closure of crossings violated terms of the cease-fire.

Despite the breach, Israel dispatched an envoy to Egypt in hopes of negotiating a prisoner swap with Gaza's ruling Islamic Hamas.

The Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, a violent offshoot of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah, claimed responsibility for firing the rockets Thursday. One exploded harmlessly in a field, the military said, refusing to disclose where the other landed. A statement from the militant group demanded that Israel halt its military operations in the West Bank.

The truce, hammered out by Egypt over months of separate talks with Israel and Hamas, does not include the West Bank. On Tuesday, Islamic Jihad fired three rockets at Israel, wounding two people, linking the attack to an Israeli raid in the West Bank.

Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni said it should not matter who was behind the rocket attack. "I am not interested in who fired and who didn't fire at Israel," she told reporters. "It is a violation, and Israel needs to respond immediately, militarily, for every violation."

Previous truces have come apart quickly because Gaza militants claimed the right to retaliate for Israeli raids in the West Bank. Since the cease-fire agreement took effect June 19, Israel has responded to rocket attacks by closing crossings rather than retaliating with airstrikes at Palestinian rocket squads, as it did routinely since Hamas overran Gaza a year ago. Closure of the crossings, where vital supplies are shipped into Gaza, restores a blockade that has caused severe shortages.

That hits at the main interest of Hamas ending the blockade and easing the hardships facing the people under its control. Hamas officials charged that by restoring the blockade, Israel is violating the truce. Underlining the high level of distrust, Palestinians formed a committee to track Israeli violations. Israel was expected to keep the crossings closed Friday because of the latest rocket attack.

At a meeting Wednesday, Israeli defense officials discussed how to proceed once the crossings are reopened. According to officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because the meeting was closed, Israel might reset the truce clock each time it closes the crossings in response to a Palestinian violation.

Israel had significantly increased the amount of supplies flowing into Gaza on Sunday, in accordance with the truce agreement, and was ready for another increase next Sunday. But the rocket attack stopped the process. Now Israel is considering counting three days from each reopening of the crossings before it reinstates the original increase.

During a visit to Prague, Czech Republic, Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad said Israel should reopen the crossings to preserve the truce. "(The reopening is) important because the closure ... of Gaza is actually producing a situation where you have 1.5 million of our people who live there with a sense of not much to lose," Fayyad said. "That is a situation that's got to end."

Hamas charged that the reimposed blockade is a violation, but Hamas official Taher Nunu said the group remains committed to the truce. "The (Hamas) government will not allow anyone to violate this agreement," he said.

The rocket attack Thursday came as Israeli envoy Ofer Dekel headed to Egypt to meet with Egyptian officials on the final stage of the truce a swap of hundreds of Palestinian prisoners for an Israeli soldier Hamas has held for two years. Israel has balked at Hamas' demands, saying its list of prisoners includes militants involved in deadly attacks on Israelis.

Hamas also has demanded that Israel allow reopening of Gaza's only border crossing with Egypt in the final phase of the six-month truce deal. The Rafah crossing has been sealed since the Hamas takeover, confining Gaza's people to the seaside territory. Israel has said it would not allow reopening of Rafah until the soldier is freed.

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