T. and I had brunch on Friday morning at Cafe Hillel. It was a bit less crowded and somewhat more secured than before it was blown up. The less crowded part made it more pleasant to be there. It doesn't strike me as a big deal to visit a place that was recently Islamikaze-d.

This article by Australian parliamentarian Michael Danby provides good context to Mahathir's OIC speech. Mahathir is strongly and pragmatically anti-Western as well as anti-Jewish, but realizes the counterproductivity of terrorism and seeks (or seeked) to develop Islamic strength through economic and military power.

This might mean that Thomas Friedman's "The Lexus and the Olive Tree" should join Shimon Peres' "The New Middle East" as one of the most quaintly naive books of the 90s.

Like most Israelis I'm appalled by the reports that supposedly 59% of Europeans think that we are the leading threat to world peace.

The actual data of the poll (which also asked about the Iraq situation) are supposed to be released tomorrow. My admittedly conspiratorial idea: the results are deliberately engineered by European Commission bureaucrats to promote the "Geneva initiative". The "initiative" has little support among the Israeli public as I've described previously, but from the EU perspective the poll result could be a way to pressure Israel and indicate that they don't respect or recognize our reasons for skepticism.

I imagine my European readers are likely to jump in here and say that the 59% figure is actually plausible. But I haven't seen a good description of what these polled people are likely to be thinking.

Update: Miranda from Germany responds that I'm way off, and that the EU doesn't support the 'Geneva Initiative'.

A possible reason that the James Reynalds at the BBC and Justin Huggler at the Independent seem to just regurgigate the Palestinian versions of events: they're too busy looking for oddball Israelis to mock.

European parliamentarian Francois Zimeray is leading a group of 150 MEPs on some sort of "interparliamentary forum". Today they met with PM Sharon; their meeting w/ Abu Ala was cancelled but it's not clear why.

Interesting article on the IAF's internal response to the events in Rafah.

There's a politician who wants to rename Jerusalem's Aza (== "gaza") street for some reason.(report). Beats me why that bothers him more than "Derech Beit-lehem" and "Derech Hebron".

Sometimes it strikes me as strange when I see road signs that say "Bethlehem 10 km" etc. (and there are not a small number around).

There was something fishy about Beilin-Abed Rabbo's "solution to the refugees issue" as reported in the initial descriptions of the "plan".

Now it's clearer what's actually going on: At Taba, the Palis strenously attempted to force their interpretation of UN General Assembly resolution 194 as the basis for dealing with the refugees of 1948 and their descendents (despite the non-binding nature of the resolution and other issues). As described in this important article, Beilin essentially consented by presenting some draft language which included the text "The realization of the aspirations of the Palestinian people, as recognized in this agreement, .... the comprehensive and just solution for the Palestinian refugees, based on UN General Assembly Resolution 194, providing for their return". In a laughable attempt at consideration for Israeli interests, Beilin also included language that stated that the "return" will preserve the Jewish identity of Israel and that the influx of refugees would be limited to a specific but unspecified number of returnees. (See here for Beilin's response to Ari Shavit's article)

According to this report, (by Akiva "it's all our fault" Eldar), the still-secret "Geneva documents" address the refugee issue along the same lines, but with some significant differences.

First, since the notion of a Palestinian "right of return" to pre-67 Israel is anathema to the Israeli public (as is the explicit reference to UNGAR 194), the new documents don't mention them, but instead they (or rather their Palestinian interpretation) are incorporated into Article 7:

Second, the stipulations about retaining the Jewish character of Israel and capping the number of "returnees" are still present. Thus far, the contradictions of the Taba proposal are still present. But a single sentence seems to resolve everything in Israel's direction :

.

On the face of it, that means that there is no mandated "return" of refugees whatsoever, while fully erasing Article 7. But if so, why is Article 7 there at all? Clearly Israel is expected to accept some non-trivial number of "refugees".

Note: The above is in the middle of being rewritten.

Backseat Drivers blog wasn't impressed with a play performed in Dublin by Tel Aviv's Cameri Theater ("a cast of fourteen Israeli, Palestinian-Israeli and Ethiopian-Israeli actors")

On Army Radio this AM, Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom was doing his best to dismiss the whole "Geneva discussions" business: it's "entirely virtual", the Israelis involved are not elected representatives etc. He's correct of course, but that won't matter at all to the Europeans, Kofi Annan etc.

Oslo architect Ron Pundak was asked how these "agreements" managed to attain consent from the Palis when the Clinton plan did not. Pundak's answer was that the Clinton plan was 1) too general on issues like Jerusalem 2) had Israel receiving 3% of territory for which it offered nothing in return. Pundak's response is preposterous: if such were really the case, Arafat would have had no reason to walk away from Camp David. Moreover Clinton would never had permitted him to do so. And it's well known that the Pali list of objections to the Clinton plan included foremost what the Palis call the "right of return" for descendents of 1948 refugees.

And Pundak was evasive when interviewer Udi Segal tried to understand the details in the "agreements" regarding the refugee issue. As I wrote yesterday, it sounds like their solution is that Israel should accept an unspeciifed number of descendents of 1948 refugees into its pre-1967 borders, without it being called the "right of return". I'm certain that if Palestinian officials describe these discussions to their own people, they will insist that the "right of return" has been preserved.

When (or if) at sometime in the future there is a "real" attempt at a permanent solution agreement, it will involve a certain amount of ambivalence and risk-taking. The fact that Ron Pundak ecstatically describes the "agreements" as "a classic win/win situation" and seems to harbor no doubts whatsoever about Pali intentions makes the whole thing even more questionable.

More: In the US there is apparently a law called the "Logan Act" which specifically outlaws the type of thing that Beilin and co. have done here.

Ultraleftists Yossi Beilin and co. have been play-negotiating again with a Palestinian team in Amman, and - as they did in real negotiations at Taba - they're "offering" outlandish concessions that would never receive a mandate from the Israeli public (report). These include settling an unspecified number of residents of refugee camps into pre-1967 Israel, and relinquishing border control to an international force, no Jewish prayer on the Temple Mount. For years Beilin has been saying that Israel must accept in principle what the Palestinians call the "right of return" in order to strike an agreement; now he's saying that we should accept it only in practice and not in principle.

The Pali team say they "will pledge to prevent terror and incitement and disarm all militias" ("and we really really mean it this time") and agree that their state will be demilitarized (yeah right). I don't see that the Palis anywhere agree that this package would "end the conflict", rather than (as in the past) merely being the stepping stone to their next set of demands

Beilin and co. have provided a major propaganda coup for the Palis and have complicated any attempts to establish stability or agreements through other mechanisms. Good going Yossi.

More: Ynet adds (Hebrew link) that the 4-day discussions were quite tempestuous and that last-minute Swiss intervention and an Israeli threat to walk out rescued the discussions. Doesn't sound like a considered piece of statecraft if you ask me.

Oh, and the "signing" is going to be on the anniversary of the Rabin assassination in the presence of luminaries including Bill Clinton.

Adrian says he heard an apparent bombing in Haifa.

Shoom is an interesting world-music type group based here in Jerusalem.

Avant-garde saxophonist Daniel Zamir has a new ensemble called "Ad Matai" that will be appearing at a jazz festival in Mizpe Ramon in late October.

The pop group Hamadregot will have a new CD out soon.

The pro-Palestinian International Solidarity Movement pretends to be a "peace group" and often gets away with it. Read the group's Orwellian response to Islamic Jihad's bombing of a Haifa restaurant that killed 19 yesterday. Sort through the various self-serving ISM garbage to get to the punchline paragraph:

ISM is unequivocally opposed to the killing of all innocent civilians, and sees the perpetuation of violence as a direct result of the Israel's military occupation of Palestinian land.....

Note to Independent columnist Johann Hari and others: the second half of that sentence unequivocally renders the first half meaningless. Does the ISM somehow object to the bombing or its perpetrators? "no, the bombing is a direct consequence of Israeli policies" and you can't object to or complain about natural consequences. The ISM has no complaints about Islamic Jihad (and Hamas) or objections to being buddies with them. If anyone has any doubts on the matter, see a previous Huwaida Arraf rant. The ISM continues:

...Earlier this afternoon two Palestinians, one a 9-year-old Mohammed Daraghmeh al-Nouri, were shot and killed by Israeli troops in the West Bank town of Tulkarem.

"two Palestinians" ... hmmm... one of them was Sarhan Sarhan, who shot 5 Israeli civilians dead (including a mother who was reading to her 2 children) at Kibbutz Metzer in November 2002 (report). Strange for the ISM to be mourning someone like him right after they claim that they're unequivocally opposed to the killing of civilians. The death of the 9-yr. old in crossfire, tragic if true, has not been confirmed by non-Palestinian sources.

This very informative article describes the impact of a recently-completed segment of the security fence near Umm al Fahm.

Israel has approved plans to build 530 houses in the ultraorthodox Betar Illit settlement and a 3 dozen more houses in 2 other settlements near the Green Liine.

This is a big deal only because such building had been frozen for the duration of the "performance-based roadmap" and prior to it. Not that you would have known that based on comments from Palestinians and the global media who had made so much noise about the hilltop trailer "outposts".

The imove isn't wise - my guess is that there is high demand in Betar Illit because housing there is so cheap and the ultraorthodox are currently more cashstrapped than ever.

People sometimes write letters and address them to "God" without any additional address. Postal clerks around the world send these to Jerusalem, and the "dead letter office" here inserts them in the cracks of the Western Wall (article).

Walked by Cafe Hillel today. They're well along into the rebuilding, and the place will look pretty much the same as it did before the bombing.

Thanks Stefan! I really would like to be writing more these days....

A comment at LGF notes that two of the MEPs who were present at (and apparently applauding) Tanzim leader Marwan Barghouti's trial appearance were Luisa Morgantini and Grazia Mascia of the Italian Rifondazione Comunista party.