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The Yale Initiative for the Interdisciplinary Study of Antisemitism
Newsletter
Volume 4 No. 10
6 November 2009

YIISA LECTURES
Thursday, November 12, 2009 @ 4:15pm
“Purifying the World:  What the Radical Anti-Empire Ideology Stands For”
Location:        77 Prospect Street, Room A-002
Speaker:         Professor Ernest Sternberg, Professor, Urban and Regional Planning, University of Buffalo, SUNY

CHARLES SMALL, YIISA DIRECTOR, TO PRESENT KEY LECTURE AT SPME CONFERENCE
Sunday, November 8, 2009 – Tuesday, November 10, 2009
“The Islamic Republic of Iran:  Multidisciplinary Analyses of Its Theocracy, Nationalism and Assertion of Power”
Location:        Western Case University, Key Center, Cleveland, Ohio
Sponsor:         Scholars for Peace in the Middle East
Speakers:       Charles Small, YIISA Director; Effie Eitam, MK, Israel; David Menashri, Tel Aviv University; Irwin Cotler, Professor, McGill University, MP Canada, Former Canadian Minister of Justice; Ambassador Jackie Wolcott, Special US Envoy for Nuclear Nonproliferation
More:              www.spme.net

YIISA IN THE NEWS

Canadian Parliamentary Inquiry into Antisemitism
(CBC)  Charles Small testifies at the Canadian Parliamentary Coalition to Combat Antisemitism.
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REPORT

Iranian Missile and Outer Space Programs: Assessing Present and Future Capabilities
(Washington Institute) A Briefing to the Washington Institute of Near East Policy regarding Iran’s armament policy, Iran’s missile and outer space programs in retrospect, achievements, implications and future prospects.
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ARTICLES OF SPECIAL INTEREST

"Mr. Obama What Side Are You On?": Chanted on the streets of Tehran"
(NY Times) Iran’s beleaguered opposition movement struggled to reassert itself on Wednesday, as tens of thousands of protesters braved police beatings and clouds of tear gas on the sidelines of a major, government-sponsored anti-American rally on the 30th anniversary of the takeover of the United States Embassy in Iran.
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Army Doctor Held in Ft. Hood Rampage
(NY Times) Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, 39, an Army psychiatrist killed 13 people and wounded 30 others on Thursday in a shooting rampage with two handguns at the sprawling Fort Hood Army post in central Texas, military officials said.
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Germany: No case against ship's owners
(Jerusalem Post) German authorities do not plan to prosecute the owners of the Francop, the German-owned vessel that shipped the massive cache of Iranian supplied rockets and weapons that was confiscated by Israeli naval commandos.
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IAEA Found Nothing Serious At Iran Site: ElBaradei
(Reuters) U.N. inspectors found "nothing to be worried about" in a first look at a previously secret uranium enrichment site in Iran last month, the International Atomic Energy chief said.
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Iran's nuclear diversion
(Washington Post) Ray Takeyh writes, "As the Obama administration grapples with the conundrum of Iran, it must balance its proliferation concerns with its moral responsibilities."
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Comparing Islamic antisemitism to Nazi Germany at its worst
(Haaretz) Today, shocking to relate, the specter of apocalyptic antisemitism such as “Crystal Night” has returned to haunt Europe and other continents, while often assuming radically new forms.
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IRAN

Iran's Revolution At 30
(Forbes) In previous years, the government was fond of organizing a few thousand people to burn the U.S. flag and chant their death-to-America slogan for the anniversary of the Iranian hostage crisis. But this year, the Iranian government is less than enthusiastic about the ritual.
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Iran's Khamenei rejects U.S. outreach
(Washington Post) Iran's supreme leader, spurning what he described as several personal overtures from President Obama, warned that negotiating with the United States would be "naive and perverted" and that Iranian politicians should not be "deceived" into starting such talks.
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Iran may have tested nuclear warhead design, secret IAEA report says
(Haaretz) The United Nations nuclear watchdog has asked Iran to explain evidence suggesting the Islamic Republic's scientists have experimented with an advanced nuclear warhead design.
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Germany's Merkel Tells Congress Iran Must Not Acquire Nuclear Bomb
(Radio Free Europe) German Chancellor Angela Merkel has told a joint session of the U.S. Congress that her country can never accept a nuclear-armed Iran.
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Israel: Commandos seize huge Iranian arms shipment
(AP) Open crates from a cargo ship seized by Israel revealed dark green missiles inside. Containers from the vessel bore writing in English that said "I.R. Iranian Shipping Lines Group."
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Israel Navy chief: Hezbollah-bound Iran ship carried hundreds of tons of arms
(Haaretz) Israeli commandos seized the ship before dawn on Wednesday and defense officials said it had been carrying missiles and rockets bound for Lebanon's Iranian-backed Hezbollah guerrillas, believed to have come from Iran.
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Israel complains to U.N. over alleged Hezbollah arms
(Reuters) Israel's U.N. ambassador complained to the United Nations on Thursday about what she said was an Iranian attempt to skirt a U.N. arms embargo and supply weapons to the Lebanese guerrilla group Hezbollah.
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IDF: Arms smuggling will continue
(YNet) Military says that while capture of Hezbollah-bound weapons shipment was major blow to Iran, Syria and Shiite group, smuggling attempts are likely to continue using different routes
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International pressure on Tehran is having impact
(Haaretz) The fact that Iran is trying to ship arms under the guise of civilian cargo suggests that the pressure exerted by the international community is having an impact.
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Saudi Daily: Iran is Expanding its Activity in the Red Sea
The Saudi daily Al-Watan published an article about an unprecedented crisis in Yemen-Iran relations and the Yemen government's accusations against Iran for its support for the Houthi rebels in northern Yemen. The article indicates that apprehension is increasing in Saudi Arabia about the ramifications of Iran's activity in Yemen and in the Red Sea.
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Iran Arabic channel taken off air
(BBC) Iran's Arabic language satellite television channel, al-Alam, has been taken off air by two Arab-controlled satellite companies.
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Student stuns Iran by criticizing supreme leader
(AP) An unassuming college math student has become an unlikely hero to many in Iran for daring to criticize the country's most powerful man to his face.
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Israel accuses Chávez of turning Venezuela into an Iranian outpost
(El Universal) "The scope of the Iranian regime does not end in the Middle East. It is global, and also reaches Africa and Latin America," Ayalon said during a press briefing to diplomats and journalists at the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, a Jerusalem-based think tank.
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MIDDLE EAST

Israel: UN 'detached from reality' for adopting Goldstone report
(Haaretz) Israel on Friday rejected a United Nations General Assembly resolution urging an investigation into a report saying war crimes were committed in Gaza, and condemned the world body vote as "completely detached from realities".
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'OIC initiated Goldstone inquiry'
(Al Jazeera) Al Jazeera spoke with Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, the secretary-general of the Organisation of Islamic Conference (OIC), which was established in 1969 to safeguard global Muslim interests and is the second largest inter-governmental body after the UN.
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PATV: Jews have no history in Land of Israel
(Palestinian Media Watch) A Palestinian historian and a senior PLO official have denied that the Jewish nation has any historical connection to the Land of Israel, thus continuing the Palestinian Authority's ongoing historical revision.
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US State Dept. rescues 60 Yemeni Jews
(Jerusalem Post) Amid a rise in antisemitic violence and terrorist activity in the country, the US State Department recently spirited nearly 60 Jews from Yemen and resettled them in the United States.
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U.S. rescues dozens of Yemenite Jews
(Examiner) The U.S. has just rescued a few dozen Yemenite Jews.  Although Israel had airlifted 49,000, early in its statehood, a couple of thousand remained.  For the past few decades, this remainder was stuck there and intimidated from outside contacts.  “For three decades there were no telephone calls, no letters, no traveling overseas.  Few people outside of Israel even knew of their existence.
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EUROPE

Europe's new Antisemitism
(National Post) Dennis MacShane discusses the spike in antisemitic incidents in Europe in which Jewish cemeteries and synagogues are defaced, Jewish students are threatened on their way to school. Rabbis and Chassidic Jews are being attacked physically.
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Swedish 'body parts' reporter defends article
(Jerusalem Post) Swedish journalist Donald Bostrom, who has been severely criticized for an article he wrote in the Swedish daily Aftonbladet alleging that Israeli soldiers had stolen body parts from dead Palestinians during Operation Cast Lead in Gaza, was given a cold greeting in Dimona.
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Students bully Britain envoy
(YNet) Ambassador Prosor requires heavy security in face of rowdy Anti-Israel protestors.
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Turkish students pelt Israeli ambassador with eggs in Trabzon
(Hurriyet Daily News) Turkish police detained around 20 students on Wednesday after they pelted Israel's ambassador with eggs to protest the Jewish state's treatment of Palestinians, forcing him to cancel a university visit.
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Weekly Quotes

(Source - Canadian Institute for Jewish Research)
"UNIFIL doesn't have means to go into the villages. They don't look for arms aggressively. They are a supervising force carrying out passive enforcement. If an incident occurs on the ground and Hizbullah seals off the area for four to five hours, UNIFIL will wait before moving in."-Yoram Schweitzer, Director of Tel Aviv University's National Security Studies Program on Terrorism and Low Intensity Conflict commenting on the UN's peacekeeping effort in southern Lebanon, and criticizing its futile performance in enforcing UN Resolution 1701 banning Hizbullah from maintaining weapons. (Jerusalem Post, Oct. 29)

"We're going to deal with the [Afghan] government that is there and obviously there are issues we need to discuss, such as reducing the high level of corruption there."-Senior Obama Administration advisor David Axelrod, on Face the Nation, claiming that the U.S. strategy in Afghanistan has not been complicated by the withdrawal of Dr. Abdullah Abdullah from the proposed run-off election with incumbent Pres. Hamid Karzai. (Reuters, Nov. 1)

"Let's not let perfection become the enemy of progress. Given Afghanistan's brutal history, two elections in eight years-even with the taint of corruption-is a forward step. And the allies need the U.S. surge to secure the extraordinary effort and underreported success of our military and civilian volunteers so far. All the more troubling then that, at this crucial moment, we have some calling for Canada to cut and run-to retreat.... [R]etreat would mean a much more costly and constantly expanding frontline here at home.

I am not only embarrassed but angry with such ill-considered rhetoric. Soldiers have spilled blood for the cause we said we believed in when we sent them into battle. Let's remember we are in Afghanistan because we chose to be there. We responded to the attacks of 9/11 that killed our citizens, and joined our allies in the American-led Operation Enduring Freedom. And it is simply not good enough to claim that we can somehow 'support our troops,' but not the mission."-Canadian Senator Pamela Wallin, in an opinion for the National Post, affirming Canada's ongoing role in Afghanistan and rebuking dissenters for hurting our troops' progress. (National Post, Nov. 2)

"I suspect the Iranians. I think we have to realize what is going on here. The demand of the U.S. and the European countries, for years, was not just that Iran let in inspectors to their installations, but that Iran immediately stop the uranium enrichment. This agreement, however, permits Iran to continue to enrich uranium on a low level."-former Mossad director Danny Yatom, in a statement on Israel Radio, expressing his concerns about the UN-brokered uranium enrichment deal for Iran. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has, for the meantime, endorsed American diplomatic efforts. (New York Times, Oct. 31)

"On the day after election day, certain people described this great election as 'a lie without proof': is that a minor offense?"-Iranian Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, warning the Iranian Reformist opposition in a public meeting on October 28 with university students and instructors in Tehran. Khamenei added that questioning the June vote is the "biggest crime." It is unknown if this marks the beginning of a harsher policy against the opposition movement in Iran. (Associated Press, Oct. 28)

"This is not a reverse honor-killing-it's martyrdom. It's a ticket for heaven for her, to clear her books. The only exception that's made for a wife or daughter to disobey her husband or father is if he forces her to do something that's un-Islamic. This is a message to other Muslims: 'This man is defying God. What am I supposed to do?'"-Islamic apostate and human rights activist Ayaan Hirsi Ali, commenting on Rabia Sarwar, the-37-year old Pakistani immigrant to the U.S. who allegedly attempted to slit her husband's throat because he encouraged her to drink alcohol, eat pork and wear revealing clothing. Hirsi Ali warns that the threat is greater than most Americans know: "The kind of American Muslim you're seeing now is changing-not because America is changing, but because the world is. Someone from Pakistan is coming here not for freedom, but to escape a horrible situation. [Once here], they are being radicalized." (New York Post, Nov. 1)

"Today, at the United Nations General Assembly, Canada will table the toughest resolution on the human rights situation in Iran. For the first time, under this government, we are calling on the investigators to focus on Iran's appalling human rights record."-Canadian Foreign Affairs minister Lawrence Cannon, announcing in Parliament that Canada deposited a draft resolution at the UN that criticizes UN human rights investigators. The draft resolution calls on investigators of extra-judicial executions, torture, free speech suppression, persecution of human rights activists, arbitrary detention and enforced disappearances to focus on Iran. It notes that Iran has "not fulfilled any requests from [UN human rights investigators] to visit the country in four years." (National Post, Oct. 30)

Short Takes

ISRAELI COMMANDOS SEIZE HEZBOLLAH-BOUND ARMS-(Jerusalem) Israeli naval commandos seized an Iranian vessel carrying arms intended for Hezbollah and Syria in a pre-dawn raid off the coast of Cyprus this morning. Hundreds of tons of weaponry were disguised as humanitarian aid and commercial goods aboard the Francop, which picked up the cargo in Diametta, Egypt. The Francop has been taken to the Israel port of Ashdod for further inspection. Israeli defence officials say that they have uncovered documents pointing to Iran as the source of the shipping containers in which the weapons were found. (Jerusalem Post, Ha'aretz, Wall Street Journal, Nov. 4)

IDF: HAMAS ROCKETS CAN NOW REACH TEL AVIV-(Jerusalem) According to Maj. General Amos Yadlin, head of IDF intelligence, Hamas has successfully test-fired a rocket with a 60 km range, capable of bombarding Tel Aviv. The rocket was fired into the Mediterranean Sea and recovered by the IDF. Hamas has fired 250 missiles and mortars into Israel since the end of Operation Cast Lead earlier this year; Yadlin testified that the terror group had, in order to rebuild its forces and consolidate its control of civil society in Gaza, not seriously escalated tensions with Israel. (Jerusalem Post, Washington Post, Nov. 3)

JEWISH TERRORIST ARRESTED IN ISRAEL-(Jerusalem) Yaakov Teitel, of the West Bank town of Shvut Rachel, was arrested three weeks ago on suspicion of murder and a string of murder plots. A gag order was placed on the media by the Shin Bet immediately following the arrest, and Teitel was not allowed legal council for two weeks. According to police, Teitel has confessed to the murder of two Palestinians, the maiming of a Messianic Jewish child, and the attempted murder of leftist professor Ze'ev Sternhell. Teitel admitted to coming to Israel to carry out attacks against Palestinians as revenge for suicide bombings. (Jerusalem Post, Ha'aretz, Nov. 1)

IRANIAN LAWMAKERS REJECT NUCLEAR DEAL-(Teheran) The UN-brokered plan to ship most of Iran's stockpile of uranium to Russia for enrichment has been rejected by senior Iranian lawmakers of the Iranian National Security Committee. Alaeddin Boroujerdi, head of the Iranian NSC, was quoted on the government INSA news agency, saying that "We are totally opposed to the proposal... We can't trust the West." Iran wants to buy nuclear fuel first before shipping its uranium stocks abroad. (Jerusalem Post, Oct. 30)

PROTESTERS CLASH WITH IRANIAN POLICE-(Teheran) Police clashed with supporters of Reformist leader Mirhossein Mousavi in Teheran on the 30-year anniversary of the storming of the U.S. embassy. The Iranian Revolutionary Guards had warned the Reformists not to try to hijack the annual anti-U.S. rally. Meanwhile, the Revolutionary Guards, already a dominant economic, military and political power, will extend its influence by launching a news agency modeled after the Associated Press and BBC. Analysts say that the Guards aim to counter reports from Reformist and foreign media sources. (Wall Street Journal, Nov. 4)

NORTH KOREA RAISES STAKES IN NUCLEAR THREAT-North Korea announced that it has completed reprocessing thousands of spent nuclear fuel rods to extract plutonium to bolster its atomic stockpile. This comes after North Korea's Foreign Ministry pressured Washington to accept its demand for direct nuclear talks. According to a dispatch from the North's official Korean Central News Agency, the country finished reprocessing 8,000 spent fuel rods, which will yield enough plutonium for at least one atomic bomb. The North is believed to already be in possession of enough plutonium to make at least six nuclear weapons. (Jerusalem Post, Nov. 3)

IDF EXECUTES LARGEST-EVER TERROR ATTACK SIMULATION-(Jerusalem) The Israeli Home Front Command performed a simulation of a multiple casualty terror attack on Tuesday, the largest drill of its kind to ever take place in Israel. The exercise simulated a massive explosion in a mall in Haifa, which would cause around 600 casualties. (Ha'aretz, Nov. 3)

SAUDI POLICE DISCOVER AL-QAEDA WEAPONS CACHE-(Riyadh) Saudi authorities have discovered large quantities of weapons, belonging to the al-Qaeda terror network, in the capital city of Riyadh. Maj. Gen. Mansour al-Turki said the discovery included 281 assault rifles and 51 ammunition boxes, found buried in a vacant house in the capital. He added that police learned about the cache after investigating a group of al-Qaida suspects arrested in August. (Washington Post, Nov. 2)

YORK FACULTY MEMBERS PAY STUDENTS' $1000 FINE-(Toronto) Forty faculty members at York University in Toronto contributed personal funds to defray a $1,000 fine issued to Students Against Israeli Apartheid (SAIA) last month. SAIA was fined for staging an illegal and violent demonstration on campus last February, which led to Jewish students barricading themselves inside Hillel office, because of a mob of anti-Israel students surrounding the premises. The group Concerned Faculty For Palestinian Human Rights decided to pay SAIA's fine because they claim it is "part of a larger pattern of repression of free speech in defence of Palestinian human rights." (Jewish Tribune, Oct. 22)

SYNAGOGUE SHOOTING IN LOS ANGELES-(Los Angeles) A gunman shot and wounded two men in the parking garage of a North Hollywood synagogue early Oct. 29. Police initially listed the shooting as a hate crime, and Jewish schools and temples were put on alert in case it was not an isolated attack. But police are now looking into the possibility that it was related to a business or personal dispute. They said one victim may have been the target and the other was shot because he witnessed the attack. Maor Ben-Nissan, 53, and Allen Lasry were both shot in the legs. They were rushed to a hospital and underwent surgery, and were reported in good condition. (Jerusalem Post, Oct. 29; Los Angeles Times, Oct. 30; JTA, Nov. 1)

WAQF QUIETLY PLEASED AT SALAH`S ARREST-(Jerusalem) Heads of the Waqf, the Muslim religious authorities that supervise the Temple Mount, have quietly expressed their satisfaction with the Israeli authorities' recent measures against Sheikh Raed Salah and Hatem Abdel Qader. Salah, leader of the northern branch of the Islamic Movement in Israel, and Abdel Qader, a top Fatah operative, have each been arrested by the Jerusalem Police for their role in instigating the latest wave of violent protests at the Temple Mount. (Jerusalem Post, Oct. 29)

TRIAL OPENS FOR 88-YEAR OLD FORMER NAZI-(Aachen) Decades after he confessed to shooting three Dutch civilians, a former Nazi death squad member went on trial Oct. 28 for their killings in 1944. Heinrich Boere, 88, was able to evade prosecution for years, first by fleeing the Netherlands and then because German courts ruled he could not be extradited. He was sixth on the Simon Wiesenthal Center's most-wanted list. (New York Times, Oct. 29)

SUICIDE BOMBING KILLS 35 IN PAKISTAN-(Islamabad) A suicide bomber killed at least 35 people and injured dozens of others near a government bank in the garrison city of Rawalpindi on Monday. The attack came as the Pakistani army pressed an offensive against Taliban terrorists in a lawless tribal region bordering Afghanistan. Hours later, another bomb exploded in the eastern city of Lahore as police were inspecting a vehicle at a checkpoint. Two suspected suicide bombers in the vehicle were killed and 15 people were wounded. (Washington Post, Nov. 2)

PAKISTAN FINDS 9/11 DOCUMENTS-(Lahore) Pakistani forces pushing toward a lair of hard-core Taliban fighters found documents last week linked to a member of the Hamburg cell of Al Qaeda that is believed to have planned the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Soldiers found a German passport belonging to Said Bahaji-a German citizen and alleged associate of Mohammed Atta, the leader of the 9/11 hijackers. His presence in Pakistan is a clear indication that al-Qaeda members have taken refuge here, as the United States has maintained. (New York Times, Oct. 30)