Michael Ross was born in Canada and served as a soldier in a combat unit of the Israel Defence Forces prior to being recruited as a “combatant,” (a term designating a deep-cover operative tasked with working in hostile milieus) in Israel’s legendary secret intelligence service, the Mossad. In his 13 year career with the Mossad, Ross was also a case officer in Africa and South East Asia for three years, and was the Mossad’s counterterrorism liaison officer to the CIA and FBI for two-and-a-half years. Ross is a published writer and commentator on Near Eastern affairs, intelligence and terrorism. He is the author of The Volunteer: The Incredible True Story of an Israeli Spy on the Trail of International Terrorists. You can follow him on Twitter.

John Little: You left the Mossad in October 2001. You have cited the isolation and personal sacrifices made (chiefly the impact on your family) during your intelligence career as motivators. With a decade behind you are you happy with your decision? What’s life like for you now?

Michael Ross: To be honest, there are times when I wish I was back in harness simply because it would have been a most interesting and dynamic period to be a spy but then, it wasn’t exactly dullsville during my tenure either as I was in the field when 9/11 occurred. Having said that, I think I was ready to move on to other things and return to Canada. I realized that my lifestyle in Israel didn’t always include meaningful interaction with others outside the profession – which I believe to be an essential element to maintaining good mental health in this business. It’s also important to add parenthetically that my marriage had faltered and while it would be easy to blame this on my work, there is no doubt that it played a contributing factor. My life now is very good although I wish I could see my sons more often. I certainly feel that I have much to contribute in an advisory, teaching or consultancy role given that I had such a unique and rich insider’s view of a part of the world – that for obvious reasons – has an increasing impact on our lives in the west whether we want it to or not.

John Little: The Israeli position is never a dull one is it? I know you moved on in the aftermath of 9/11 but what is your sense of how the Mossad was impacted by those events? The impact on the US intelligence community was, and continues to be, significant. Do you think the Mossad experienced similar expansion, structural changes, or cultural shifts?

Michael Ross: I was off and on in Mossad headquarters well after 9/11 and after the U.S. invasion of Iraq. There were some fundamental changes primarily in the realm of counterterrorism (CT). The branch dedicated to al Qaida – which we called “Global Jihad” due to the amorphous patchwork confederation of Jihadist entities we were dealing with – increased significantly in manpower, resources, and scope. Traditionally, those of us at the sharp end of CT operations were regarded as the poor cousins of the intelligence world. Nobody considered terrorism to be anything more than a major nuisance and we were always reminded by our peers working counter-proliferation that terrorist entities did not constitute any strategic threat to national security in the manner that non-conventional weapons pose. Of course no clear thinking individual thinks that way anymore. In many ways however, the U.S. has been concentrating so much on al Qaida that it has been overlooking other terrorist threats. The Mossad appears to be the only intelligence service that is devoting any significant resources to Hizballah and their Iranian sponsors. It didn’t seem to alarm the U.S. very much that a senior Hizballah commander, Ali Mousa Daqduq, was caught helping Shi’ite militias target coalition forces in Iraq or that the Taliban are carrying Irainian-manufactured weapons.

John Little: And now Hizballah, along with everyone else in this struggle, is trying to cope with the scope, pace, and chaos of the Arab Spring. Despite the opportunity for positive change the landscape has rarely been this unstable and unpredictable. Do you have a sense for how the Mossad is prioritizing and adjusting? How do you think they and their partners in allied intelligence communities should be positioned in this environment?

Michael Ross: Hizballah has been on the ropes for a while now. While they claim that the 2006 war with Israel was a great victory, in the scheme of things, it had a very detrimental effect on this wholly-owned subsidiary of the Iranian regime. Nasrallah is in perpetual hiding and the arch-terrorist, Imad Mughniyeh, is dead leaving behind a significantly diminished operational capability. Hizballah is also in financial dire straits and has lost billions from its coffers (hence the increased criminal enterprises aimed at making money for the organization popping up around the world) but the greatest set-back has been the international pressure on Iran and the civil war in Syria. This has Hizballah very worried because they are not only losing a chief sponsor and logistical corridor in Syria, the Syrian regime has been shooting at Lebanese citizens across the border. For an organization whose raison d’etre is the ostensible defence of Lebanon from foreign threats, this has placed them in a very awkward position. You only have to imagine a scenario where the IDF shoots a Lebanese journalist across the border to grasp the situation. The Lebanese are very savvy and as the body count rises in Syria and the conflict spills over into Lebanon (and it will) with Hizballah supporting the Assad regime, it’s not going to bode well for Hizballah’s already tattered support in Lebanon.

I don’t envy the analysts in the Mossad or the CIA these days. The ground is shifting so quickly underneath their feet, it must be very hard to come up with a cogent analysis of what the future holds anywhere in the region. The Mossad has a clear advantage from a finger-on-the-pulse perspective as it lives in the neighborhood and there is a sense of urgency simply because what happens in Syria can quickly escalate to something on your immediate doorstep as it has with Turkey and Lebanon. Israel has maintained a very low profile throughout the so-called “Arab Spring” but that doesn’t mean it’s asleep and I think this is a very wise course of action. Now is the time for subtlety in Middle East diplomacy and intelligence services should be active partners in determining the best course of action for policymakers to take. It’s one of many reasons why I advocate a hands-off position vis-a-vis Syria.

John Little: There is obviously something to gain for Israel and its allies if Syria transitions to a more reasonable posture but can you foresee a scenario where regime change occurs without also triggering significant downstream violence and weapons proliferation issues? Israel arguably has the most to lose if Syria slips into chaos and chemical weapons fall into the wrong hands. From Israel’s perspective could the unintended consequences of intervention currently pose a bigger threat than Syria itself?

Michael Ross: Knowing the status of and providing options to secure Assad’s prodigious chemical weapons (and deployment systems) arsenal is a top priority for the Mossad and western intelligence services. I participated in an unsuccessful foiling operation against rogue Russian General Anatoly Kunsevich in the late 1990′s who was assisting Syria obtain nerve agents for their Scud missiles. Syria has been developing a non-conventional weapons capability for some time (and until the 2007 Israeli raid on al-Khibar, a nuclear weapons program).

It’s an axiom of the intelligence world to hope for the best but to prepare for the worst and this absolutely applies to Syria right now. First off, I’m not convinced that Assad won’t prevail and successfully crush the uprising. He may end up significantly weaker than he was, but still retain power over the majority of the country. The Allawite regime still enjoys Russian – and to a lesser degree – Chinese support so this civil war is far from over. In fact, right now I see it as a Middle eastern version of the Third Balkan War circa 1992-1995. It could still go in several directions for a long time.

If Assad loses and a strong faction of anti-western jihadists emerges as the dominant power in Syria, a potential scenario arises where a terrorist entity brandishing non-conventional weapons threatens Israel and the west. We have to monitor this situation very closely and especially the intervening foreign factions that could ultimately radicalize Syria. Syria still is a secular nation and its people not easily given to Islamic extremist urges, but we’ve all seen how quickly Islamism can take root when there is a power vacuum in the region. My hope is that the Syrian resistance relies on that strong secular base of support and a new Syria – divested of both Iran and Hezbollah – emerges with a more reasonable geopolitical posture.

John Little: Mossad officers are probably faced with a wider array of hostile operating environments than any other service. As a result they periodically catch some heat for their false-flag operations and cover methods. Some of that criticism has come from “unnamed sources” within the US intelligence community. In your experience do these types of issues ever impact the level of professional cooperation between the Mossad and the US intelligence community or is this background noise?

Michael Ross: There is no doubt that there is a vocal constituency of U.S. intelligence officials that for whatever reason, don’t like the Mossad. It’s been my experience however, that the loudest critics of the Mossad are the furthest from the bilateral intelligence dialogue and operational relationship. The Mossad is indifferent to these critics and it would be fair to say that some of these negative sentiments are reciprocated but at the working level and especially while in the pursuit of joint operational objectives, there is a warm and intimate relationship that is appreciated by both sides.

The negative grumbling really is nothing more than background noise. Mark Perry wrote a piece in Foreign Policy last January describing Mossad officers posing as CIA while in London as a means to recruit Iranian dissidents. The Mossad never uses U.S. cover because of a bilateral agreements and to be frank, U.S. cover is only marginally better than Israeli and to even consider a scenario where it would be conducted in London under the noses of one of the best security services in the world (MI5) is beyond ludicrous. The Mossad also doesn’t need U.S. cover to recruit and train its own cadre of Iranian dissidents. Suffice it to say, you can pretty much say and/or write whatever you want about the Mossad and it will go unchallenged and to be quite frank, as a service it could care less what a journalist or conveniently unnamed CIA official writes or says.

It’s worth noting that it’s the CIA that employs a press office and small army of communications professionals to keep its image untarnished. Imagine if all that money, time and effort were expended in putting case officers in the field to recruit foreign sources of intelligence? The Mossad is on the ground in places where Angels fear to tread and as a result has operational cover imperatives that other services either refuse to employ or take for granted. I find it somewhat ridiculous that competing intelligence services disingenuously make heavy weather out of the fact that the Mossad uses foreign cover to conduct its operations as if this is supposed to be out of bounds. Of course this never stopped any service from accepting the extremely valuable intelligence (obtained at high risk by Mossad combatants and case officers) and shared via the Mossad’s liaison division.

For an interesting insight into the CIA’s organizational culture, I highly recommend my friend Ishmael Jones’ book, “The Human Factor: Inside the CIA’s Dysfunctional Intelligence Culture.” It’s quite an eye-opener.

John Little: While we’re discussing identity and operations – The reconstruction of the 2010 Mahmoud al-Mabhouh assassination highlights the surveillance capabilities increasingly deployed by private entities and local governments and the challenges those systems pose to covert activities. Are technological advances in surveillance, biometrics, and other forms of identity management outpacing tradecraft or are they creating as many opportunities as they are barriers?

Michael Ross: While I believe that there is more to the al-Mahbouh assassination than meets the public eye, there is no doubt that it was a wake-up call for anyone conducting covert operations in these sensitive milieus. Clearly there was a gross underestimation of the willingness of the authorities in Dubai to pursue this case. The overlooked and unreported irony in the whole story is that al-Mahbouh was traveling on alias identities, was known to the Dubai security services, and was conducting clandestine meetings with Iranian officials concerning advanced weapons systems for HAMAS. These activities apparently failed to arouse the interest of the Dubai authorities which in itself says a lot.

Biometrics and advanced surveillance/security systems pose real challenges for covert operations and will affect intelligence service’s overseas clandestine activity on just about every level. This is especially problematic now that European companies like Germany’s Trovicor and Italy’s SpA have been selling and implementing cutting edge hi-tech intelligence platforms aimed at providing rogue regimes with communications interception and monitoring capabilities. Much of this technology has been used in Syria and Iran against dissidents and it’s entirely possible that this technology was used by the regime in Syria to locate foreign journalists in Syria by locating their satellite phone signals. Once you have this geo-location technology, it’s a simple matter to transfer that information to an artillery battery or when spy-catching, to a team of Mukhbarat thugs.

Having said that, one of the Mossad’s great strengths is its incredible ability to innovate and adapt to new obstacles be they technological or otherwise and even more importantly, to engage in a lessons learned process and improve its capabilities. Dubai notwithstanding, the Mossad is also adept at tackling hurdles in advance of the emerging technology. I saw some inventions in the Mossad’s Science and Technology Division that would make anyone in the private sector go very green with envy.

John Little: There were online communities when you were active but I assume they weren’t pervasive enough to require much thought except in very specific cases. Now virtually everyone in the developed world, and many beyond, has a social presence online. Have you thought much about the impact that social media is having on intelligence? The upside from a mass collection / data mining perspective is pretty obvious but it is also presents intelligence professionals with a unique operating environment in its own right doesn’t it?

Michael Ross: Social media and the possibilities for open source intelligence collection have expanded exponentially with the advent of all the various social media platforms available online. It also opens up a whole world of operational cover and networking possibilities that in the past involved a lot of leg-work when I was in harness.

Social media has both strong offensive and defensive elements in its makeup. For a “poacher” like myself, I can mine a considerable amount of data on a potential target for recruitment (including vulnerabilities or avenues for exploitation) long before I even come into any contact with the target. For my “gamekeeper” colleagues in the counterintelligence realm, it offers a number of possibilities in determining potential for attack and what the “poachers” are targeting.

Social media and the internet are a double-edged sword also because they are open to abuse by outfits like Stratfor that sell jargon, open-source information, and fabrication as a finished intelligence product for corporate and government consumers. The other edge of the sword is that people like myself and others can access social media and set the record straight.

The most interesting aspect for me however, is that I can interface with someone in say, Beirut and find out in real time what’s happening in the southern suburbs of that city while I sit at my table Laphroaig at elbow. Now that’s social media.

John Little: The Mossad brand is a powerful force multiplier. It is a relatively small force but its enemies see it lurking everywhere. It has maintained this fearsome image though its share of embarrassing episodes and high profile failures. The organization seems to shrug off mistakes and boldly plow forward. How does the Mossad deal with failure and how much brand self-awareness is there in the senior leadership’s decision making processes? Is there tension between the need to work covertly while still making their presence felt or reinforcing their public image?

Michael Ross: The Mossad brand is very powerful and I have to admit that I am quite surprised by this simply because to me it’s comprised of a small number of human faces that I worked with. Admittedly these are very talented and dedicated people, but people all the same.

Outsiders tend to disproportionately concentrate on the sensationalized subject of assassinations. This comprises probably 0.01% of the Mossad’s activities as an intelligence service. When you put it into perspective, the majority of the Mossad’s time is spent determining and analyzing the intentions of Israel’s enemies using the full suite of collection platforms available – much in the same way as the CIA or MI6. I think people would be surprised by the similarities between top tier intelligence services at the operational level. Much of the tradecraft is similar among these services and it’s a little-known fact but the Mossad was actually based on post-war MI6. If I was to single out the one aspect of the Mossad that remains misunderstood by the public, the media, and other intelligence services, it’s that the Mossad is operating like the OSS or MI6 during the Second World War. Sometimes my colleagues in Washington DC tend to think of Tehran, Damascus, Amman, Cairo and Beirut as distant exotic locales reached after a long jet-lag inducing flight. For the Mossad, they’re next door neighbors in a very unstable and threatening neighbourhhood.

When you are a very active intelligence service operating 24/7 365 days a year then mistakes are going to happen. Some of them have been significant mistakes but the Mossad is a learning organization with a culture of integrating lessons learned. At the completion of every operation, regardless of size and scope, there are sessions where everyone sits down and asks, “How we could we have done that better?” It’s not a punitive process but rather a necessary element to maintaining the upper hand through continual improvement. The Mossad makes mistakes but you never hear of the incredible successes – and they are legion.

The Mossad does not think about or concern itself with image. It never enters into the equation. We know we have a fierce reputation but nobody really thinks or talks about it. The fearsome reputation has been an unintentional consequence of the Mossad simply getting the job done.

John Little: You titled your book “The Volunteer”. What advice do would you give to other volunteers following in your footsteps at the Mossad or other intelligence services? They’re choosing a difficult path aren’t they?

Michael Ross: I don’t think my particular path of recruitment could easily be re-created or is in anyway typical but then I believe that in the Mossad’s case, no two recruitments are ever alike. I know the CIA likes to troll the Ivy League schools but the Mossad is looking for qualities that don’t exclusively involve academic scholarship. I didn’t get to university until later in my career. If you are smart, can think on your feet, cope with uncertainty, and above all maintain a sense of humor in all situations, then you have the prerequisites.Some of the funniest people I know are spies because like good comedians, they have a nose for the absurd and are very keen observers of human nature. Mossad selection is very rigorous but anyone interested should go to their website. Likewise for the CIA and MI6. My only advice is that being a spy is anything but glamorous. A lot of it involves meetings in dingy hotels in third world hell-holes trying to convince some person – often afflicted with only a passing acquaintance with personal hygiene -that they should sell their country’s secrets. Honestly, does it get any more fun than that?

The pro-Pollard buzz that was building in the Israeli press, blogs, and social media channels throughout last year has culminated in an official plea from Netanyahu:

Dear Mr. President,

On behalf of the people of Israel, I am writing to you to request clemency for Jonathan Pollard.

At the time of his arrest, Jonathan Pollard was acting as an agent of the Israeli government. Even though Israel was in no way directing its intelligence efforts against the United States, its actions were wrong and wholly unacceptable. Both Mr. Pollard and the Government of Israel have repeatedly expressed remorse for these actions, and Israel will continue to abide by its commitment that such wrongful actions will never be repeated.

As you know, Mr. President, I have raised the question of Jonathan Pollard’s release numerous times in discussions with your administration and with previous U.S. administrations. Previous Israeli Prime Ministers and Presidents have also requested clemency for Mr. Pollard from your predecessors.

Since Jonathan Pollard has now spent 25 years in prison, I believe that a new request for clemency is highly appropriate. I know that this view is also shared by former senior American officials with knowledge of the case as well as by numerous Members of Congress.

Jonathan Pollard has reportedly served longer in prison than any person convicted of similar crimes, and longer than the period requested by the prosecutors at the time of his plea bargain agreement. Jonathan has suffered greatly for his actions and his health has deteriorated considerably.

I know that the United States is a country based on fairness, justice and mercy. For all these reasons, I respectfully ask that you favorably consider this request for clemency. The people of Israel will be eternally grateful.

Sincerely yours,

Benjamin Netanyahu

Fairness, justice and mercy. These are precisely the reasons why Jonathan Pollard should not see the light of day.

Fairness

The intelligence community, the one which Jonathan Pollard betrayed, is overwhelmingly composed of patriots. Most of them quietly shoulder the burden of secrecy. They do this, not for personal gain, but because it is a requirement of their service. They tolerate the rules, regulations, and the invasions of privacy. They may struggle with strained relationships, long hours, and sometimes even great personal risk. They do this quietly and at a government pay grade because they are patriots.

Pollard, on the other hand, acted without honor. He is not an American patriot. At the time of his arrest he was, by most accounts, a greedy, cocaine-snorting, narcissist:

For about a year after the time Pollard met Avi Sella, he gathered computer printouts, satellite photographs, and classified documents from his department three times a week and brought them to various Washington apartments. There, they were copied and returned to Pollard, who restored them to the Navy the following day. In exchange for his services Pollard received, in addition to the agreed salary, a lavish collection of gifts for himself and his wife, including a honeymoon in a private compartment aboard the Orient Express.

Pollard did not sacrifice for his country. He traded it for diamond rings, bundles of cash, and expensive vacations. He betrayed every American and every patriot who served with or before him. So yes, fairness is important. How could releasing Pollard to a hero’s welcome in Israel be in any way fair to the countless Americans and patriots he betrayed? Fairness demands some measure of…

Justice

Pollard’s apologists have conjured up so many silly arguments over the past two plus decades that (and this is part of their strategy) casual observers may understimate the impact of his betrayal:

Joseph DiGenova, the former U.S. attorney who prosecuted the case, said Tuesday that Pollard was a spy who was paid and who tried to entice others to join his operation.

Mr. DiGenova said Pollard received about $500,000 a year plus expenses for giving intelligence documents to Israeli agents.

“By the time he was caught, he caused enough damage to U.S. intelligence that, according to the Defense Department, it cost between $3 billion and $5 billion to fix because of what he compromised,” Mr. DiGenova said. “That the country he spied for is seeking clemency is not only unprecedented, it is a joke.”

The bits and pieces of the Pollard damage assessment that have leaked out over the years are shocking. It’s easy to understand why the U.S. intelligence community continues to oppose his release:

THE men and women of the National Security Agency live in a world of chaotic bleeps, buzzes, and whistles, and talk to each other about frequencies, spectrums, modulation, and bandwidth — the stuff of Tom Clancy novels. They often deal with signals intelligence, or SIGINT, and their world is kept in order by an in-house manual known as the RASIN an acronym for radio-signal notations. The manual, which is classified “top-secret Umbra,” fills ten volumes, is constantly updated, and lists the physical parameters of every known signal. Pollard took it all. “It’s the Bible,” one former communications-intelligence officer told me. “It tells how we collect signals anywhere in the world.” The site, frequency, and significant features of Israeli communications — those that were known and targeted by the N.S.A. — were in the RASIN; so were all the known communications links used by the Soviet Union.

The loss of the RASIN was especially embarrassing to the Navy, I was told by the retired admiral, because the copy that Pollard photocopied belonged to the Office of Naval Intelligence. “He went into our library, found we had an out-of-date version, requested a new one, and passed it on,” the officer said. “I was surprised we even had it.”

The RASIN theft was one of the specifics cited in Defense Secretary Weinberger’s still secret declaration to the court before Pollard’s sentencing hearing. In fact, the hearing’s most dramatic moment came when Pollard’s attorney, Richard A. Hibey, readily acknowledged his client’s guilt but argued that the extent of the damage to American national security did not call for the imposition of a maximum sentence. “I would ask you to think about the Secretary of Defense’s affidavit, as it related to only one thing,” Judge Robinson interjected, “with reference to one particular category of publication, and I fail to see how you can make that argument.” He invited Hibey to approach the bench, along with the Justice Department attorneys, and the group spent a few moments reviewing what government officials told me was Weinberger’s account of the importance of the RAISIN. One Justice Department official, recalling those moments with obvious pleasure, said that the RASIN was the ninth item on the Weinberger damage-assessment list.

The compromise of RASIN alone would justify life in prison but the piece goes on to detail the compromise of the Rota reports, DIAL-COINS, and the National SIGINT Requirements List. Pollard compromised not only individual intelligence systems and methods. He compromised the security of every single American citizen. So please Mr. Netanyahu don’t talk to us about justice. Justice was served and it was served with…

Mercy

Jonathan Pollard is alive. He is alive after betraying the patriots at his side. He is alive after betraying the government which trusted him. He is alive after betraying those who fought and died, sometimes quietly and without public acknowledgment, for this country. He is alive after betraying every single American man, woman, and child. Jonathan Pollard is alive and he is treated humanely. He is a living testimony to our mercy.

As I have said before, I support Israel as an ally. I even respect Mr. Netanyahu’s (now) persistent support of the spy Israel once betrayed. However, Jonathan Pollard was never a harmlessly naive ideologue. His betrayal was cold, calculated, and immensely damaging. May he stay in prison indefinitely where he can reflect on America’s fairness, justice, and mercy.

I will leave you with video of Jonathan Pollard in action:

Wikipedia Bio: Mahmoud al-Mabhouh
Mahmoud Abdel Rauf al-Mabhouh (February 14, 1960 – January 19, 2010) was a senior Hamas military commander and one of the founders of the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades. Al-Mabhouh was assassinated in the Al Bustan Rotana Hotel in Dubai on January 19, 2010, having arrived in the country earlier that day from Syria. It is suspected by Dubai police that he was murdered in his own hotel room, with accounts of the cause of death ranging from suffocation to electrocution. A controversy over the murder has arisen over speculation that it was an Israeli government sanctioned assassination

Israeli Envoys Meet British, Irish officials over Dubai Killing
British Foreign Secretary David Miliband said the government was determined to get to the bottom of the passport issue in the international murder mystery, in which the official was killed last month in his Dubai hotel room.

Miliband Denies Going Soft on Israel over ‘Mossad’ Killing
The Foreign Secretary insisted today that Britain was not “going through the motions” over the cloning of six British passports in a suspected Mossad assassination after Israel’s Ambassador denied he was rebuked by the Government.

Miliband: Israel Must ‘Cooperate Fully’ in Fake Passport Probe
Israel’s ambassador to the Republic of Ireland, Zion Evroni, said Wednesday that he too had received a summons from the country’s Department of Foreign Affairs and would be meet Minister Michael Martin on Thursday. In Jerusalem, Foreign Ministry officials declined to comment on the matter, but an Israeli diplomat said on condition of anonymity that the government has decided to withhold a public statement until the British message is received, and would then choose how to respond.

Six More Hunted in Dubai Assassination
The identities of the new six have not yet been made public, but among the group there is thought to be at least one more female in addition to the woman originally identified as “Gail Folliard from Ireland”, until the Irish authorities said that no such person existed. The second, as yet unnamed woman, was caught on CCTV camera following al-Mabhouh to his hotel room and identifying him at close quarters, before other members of the team moved in for the kill. She had arrived at the hotel dressed as a tourist and wearing a large summer hat and was accompanied by a large man in a Panama hat and beard.

France Demands Israel Explain Dubai Passport Affair
“We are asking for explanations from Israel’s embassy in France over the circumstances of the use of a fake French passport in the assassination of a Hamas member in Dubai,” the Foreign Ministry said in an electronic news briefing.

UK, Ireland Envoys: ‘Nothing to Add’
Ambassador Zion Evrony said after the hour-long meeting he had nothing useful to tell Ireland because he knew nothing confidential about the Dubai assassination.

Analysis: Dubai Hit Was Not a Botched Job
Irrespective of who carried out the January 19 assassination of senior Hamas terrorist Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in Dubai, the operation was meticulously planned and successfully executed, and despite a surprisingly impressive investigation by Dubai police, the hit cannot be considered a botched job.

Analysis: Long-Term Fallout with UK from Dubai Hit Unlikely
While the British government (and the governments of France and Ireland, whose passports were also reportedly used in the operation) will be understandably angry, past experience shows that disputes in this area tend to be treated as belonging to the special, sealed-off category of ‘national security.’ Where states have good reasons to maintain healthy ties with one another, such incidents are rarely allowed to muddy the waters for long.

‘Israelis with Names on Assassins’ Passports not Protected’
Israeli law protects citizens from privacy violations, but not necessarily that of the seven Israelis whose names appeared on passports allegedly used by the team that assassinated Mabhouh.

Worth Watching: haaretzonline

The European Union has imposed new sanctions against Iran in protest of its nuclear program, the EU presidency announced Friday.

Current EU president France said EU nations would show restraint in giving public loans that help companies trading with Iran and would carefully watch financial groups doing business with Iranian banks, especially the Saderat bank.

EU countries will also inspect airplanes and ships traveling to and from Iran, notably Iran Air Cargo and the Islamic Republic of Iran Shipping Line, to check that they are not carrying contraband to the country.

The move was in accordance with an agreement reached between European ambassadors last month and marked a strict implementation of the latest UN Security Council resolution.

It sounds weak but AFP knows a bold move when it sees one:

The measures, in line with an agreement by European ambassadors last month, are a robust application of the latest UN Security Council resolution on Iran.

The UN has called for “vigilance” in entering into new commitments for public-provided financial support for trade with Iran, including the granting of export credits.

The EU has gone further by urging member states to exercise “restraint” in its dealings with Iran in those areas.

That’s right, we have a shocking case of cowboy diplomacy on our hands here.

A bulldozer driver went on a rampage in central Jerusalem Tuesday afternoon in an apparent attempt to recreate the terror attack in the capital a few weeks ago.
The aftermath of a previous…

The bulldozer reportedly left a construction site near Yemin Moshe near King David Street, crashed into a city bus and hit two cars, wounding one person seriously and several more lightly.

The wounded were evacuated to Sha’are Tzedek Hospital in the capital.

According to initial reports, the driver was first shot by a civilian, but continued his attack before he was shot dead by border policemen.

This mirrors an attack that occurred at beginning of the month.

Update:
Thankfully the initial low casualty reports are holding:

One person was “moderately to seriously wounded,” and four others sustained minor injuries in Tuesday’s attack, the statement said, citing Jerusalem’s police chief.

Or are they? The AP is reporting 16 injuries. At least there seems to be agreement on the severity of the injuries.

Update II:
The attack occurred near the hotel that will host Obama:

Obama was due to arrive in Israel later in the day and stay at the King David Hotel, a couple of blocks from the scene of the latest attack.

Update:
Police are reportedly searching for additional suspects:

Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said police had sealed off possible escape routes into predominantly Arab east Jerusalem and were searching for two suspects who fled the scene.

Israeli rescue services said they had evacuated one person whose leg was partially severed.

Israel’s Shin Bet counter-intelligence agency said one of the suspects had used his mobile phone to film helicopters at a sports stadium in Jerusalem that was used as a landing site for Bush’s delegation.

The suspect then posted queries on Web sites frequented by al Qaeda operatives, asking for guidance on how to shoot down the helicopters, the agency said in a statement.

Bush visited Israel in January and again in May.

Lawyers for the six suspects could not immediately be reached for comment.

The Shin Bet identified four of the suspects as Palestinian residents of Arab East Jerusalem and two as Israeli Arabs.

The Shin Bet said the men had met several times at Jerusalem’s al-Aqsa mosque, seeking to organize a local al Qaeda network. The agency said computers seized from several of the suspects contained bomb-making manuals.

Plot is perhaps too strong a word but the interest was definitely there:

Israeli authorities have arrested six Arabs suspected of trying to build an al Qaeda-linked cell, including one person said to have asked about targeting President Bush’s helicopter.

These people might not be too swift but getting them behind bars is still critical. Stupid people can, and do, cause harm.

On a somewhat related note Bush is in Houston this afternoon. I happened to be working out in along part of his route (I had no idea he was going to be in the area) and was kind of freaked out by the massive number of cops, helicopters, and secret service who descended on the area. I won’t go into detail but it was impressive.

Assud the bunny: “In the name of Allah, I hope my dad doesn’t see me. God, make him go on sleeping, while I take one or two bills. There’s his stash of money… Man, there is so much money here… No, I must put it back. Stealing is forbidden.”

Satan: “No, no… What are you doing, Assud? No, Assud, I promised you that nobody would see you or know about this. Take one or two bills. Don’t be afraid, Assud.”

Assud: “Okay, I’ll just take one… Actually, I’ll take two.”

Satan: “No, take three.”

[...]

Voice of girl: “Assud, you were wrong to follow Satan, who is the source of all problems. In addition, you caused problems between your parents. You have no right to cause such a great problem. Don’t you know that stealing leads to Hell? The Prophet Muhammad said: ‘If my daughter Fatima had stolen, I would have chopped off her hand.’ If you were in Saudi Arabia now, they would chop off your hand. Allah said in the Koran: ‘As for a thief, male or female, cut off their hands: A punishment by example, for their crime.’”

[...]

Child TV host Saraa: “What do you think about what Assud did?”

Asmaa: “It was wrong, because ‘as for a thief, male or female, cut off their hands.’”

Assud: “Oh my God! You say that my hand should be chopped off, Asmaa?”

Asmaa: “Yes.”

You can see the video here.

Israeli forensic experts have begun trying to identify the remains of what are believed to be two captured Israeli soldiers, the Israel Defense Forces said.

Hezbollah officials handed over two black coffins to Red Cross officials, who will carry them over the border to Israel.

The families had hoped for the best:

A day before the transfer, Goldwasser’s father, Shlomo, held out hope about his son’s fate.

“They were kidnapped alive. [Hezbollah leader] Hassan Nassrallah swears on it the first day that he announced to the world he kidnapped two soldiers alive,” the father said. “If tomorrow he brings them in coffins, it means that he killed them — his words. It means that they killed them, and if he killed them, I am waiting for him to be punished.”

The Israeli’s released a monster in exchange:

Kuntar, who had been a member of the Palestine Liberation Front, led a group of four men who entered Israel from Lebanon by boat in 1979. They killed a police officer who came across them. Then they took a 28-year-old man and his 4-year-old daughter hostage.

Kuntar shot the father dead at close range in front of his daughter and tossed his body in the sea. Then he smashed the girl’s head, killing her.

A 2-year-old girl suffocated as her mother tried to stop her from crying as they hid from Kuntar.

And what do terrorists take away from such an exchange?

Islamic Hamas movement Wednesday said the prisoner swap between Israel and Hezbollah is a victory for the resistance and the Lebanese guerillas.

“This is very big victory for the resistance and for Hezbollah and it is a festival for the prisoners and their families,” said Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri.

“This is also a proof that kidnapping Zionist soldiers is the best way to free the prisoners since the occupation keeps arresting them,” Abu Zuhri added.

You can imagine how Kuntar and friends will be received:

Hezbollah has pitched tents with washing facilities near the border crossing in south Lebanon, where the five men are expected to change into commando attire like that which they wore on the day of their capture.

A red carpet leads from the crossing to a stage where Samir Kantar — a convicted murder serving multiple life sentences — and Khaled Zidan, Maher Kurani, Mohammed Sarur and Hussein Suleiman are set to make an appearence.

Five horses, their riders waving Hezbollah flags, made their way along the carpet in preparation for the moment when they will greet the prisoners in a military style procession.

Two hundred Hezbollah volunteers and supporters, dressed in black and wearing yellow caps reading “Divine Victory”, ushered crowds and ensured that the road was kept clear.

“Today Lebanon witnesses an unprecedented victory over Israel,” proclaimed the Ad-Diyar which backs the Hezbollah-led opposition. “Today the Lebanese prisoners return to their country with their heads held high.”

Hamas and Hezbollah now figure that if the Israelis will release a man like Kuntar anything is fair game. The advantage is clearly theirs:

Hamas said that the release of Kuntar, who was serving multiple life sentences, had broken Israel’s refusal to free prisoners serving long terms for deadly attacks, and that the group would redouble its efforts to release such prisoners in exchange for Shalit.

Tzahi Hanegbi, a member of Olmert’s Kadima party and head of the Israeli parliament’s foreign affairs and defense committee, said that in retrospect, the swap had undermined the rationale for launching the Lebanon war after the two soldiers were seized on July 12, 2006.

“In the end we gave what we could have given on the morning of July 13,” Hanegbi said. “Ultimately we are surrendering.”

It was an understandable moment of weakness but the consequences will be disastrous and far-reaching.

The exchange is scheduled to take place Wednesday morning at 9 A.M. at the Rosh Hanikra border crossing with Lebanon.

The deal will proceed in several stages: first Hezbollah will transfer Regev and Goldwasser – which, according to intelligence estimates, will involve the transfer of their bodies. If this is the case, then the IDF Rabbinate and the police will identify the bodies. After a positive identification, Kuntar and the other four Lebanese will be released, along with 199 Lebanese and Palestinian corpses, which will transferred to Lebanon.

The Goldwasser and Regev families will be given an opportunity to be united with their loved ones at an army base south of Nahariya.

Not much is known about the condition of the two Israelis:

Hizbullah has never allowed the International Red Cross Association or any other agency or private individual to ascertain their condition, nor has the group ever released information as to their status.

I guess all we can do is hope for the best.

Despite the opposition of his own generals and widespread scepticism that America is ready to risk the military, political and economic consequences of an airborne strike on Iran, the president has given an “amber light” to an Israeli plan to attack Iran’s main nuclear sites with long-range bombing sorties, the official told The Sunday Times.

“Amber means get on with your preparations, stand by for immediate attack and tell us when you’re ready,” the official said. But the Israelis have also been told that they can expect no help from American forces and will not be able to use US military bases in Iraq for logistical support.

I can’t imagine that Bush would believe that limiting overt support to Israel would allow us to escape any of the resulting fallout. Israel and America will not be viewed as independent operators regardless of the circumstances. There are still a few other wrinkles in all of the attack plans that have to be addressed anyway:

The one thing that all sides agree on is that any strike by either Iran or Israel would trigger a catastrophic round of retaliation that would rock global oil markets, send the price of petrol soaring and wreck the progress of the US military effort in Iraq.

The upside to all of this chatter is that it likely has moderate (or at least somewhat pragmatic) forces in Iran freaked out. If they have their say, or if the hardliners are smart enough, we’ll see the Iranians ratchet it down a bit – at least until after the election. All bets are off if this continues on it’s current track.

At least three are dead in the attack – more injured:

The rampage in western Jerusalem lasted about five minutes before a police officer climbed up the side of the swerving bulldozer and fatally shot the driver — a Palestinian from an East Jerusalem village with a criminal record, police said.

A bus was pushed onto its side with a gaping hole in its center during the incident on Jaffa Road, a busy thoroughfare. It is not known if the dead were on the bus or not.

Police said the attack was not planned, but they are treating it as a “terrorist incident,” and not an accident. They added they have no motive for the attack.

This video appears to show the end of the attack, and the bulldozer’s driver:

One bystander caught part of the attack with a mobile phone:

The driver of the bulldozer was a Palestinian construction worker:

“The employee of a contractor company working on the street here in Jerusalem directed his bulldozer in the direction of civilian vehicles – a bus and cars that are on the street all the time yelling Allah al-akbar, apparent to us based on things we have experienced in the past,’ said Daniel Seaman, a spokesman for the Israeli government. “This is undeniably a terrorist attack.”

Police say the attacker was a Palestinian who lived in East Jerusalem who held Jerusalem identity papers. Palestinian residents of East Jerusalem have access to Jewish West Jerusalem and carry out nearly all construction work in the city.

In March, another Palestinian from East Jerusalem attacked a Jewish seminary not far from where today’s incident took place, killing eight students.

I guess you have to give them credit. They’re pretty good at finding new and exciting ways to kill for Islam.

An IDF soldier was killed Tuesday in the middle of a farewell ceremony held in honor of French President Nicolas Sarkozy, in attendance of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and other state dignitaries.

The soldier fell from a vantage point he was occupying on a high building and a bullet misfired from his gun.

According to Israel Radio, the incident happened no more than 200 meters from where Olmert was standing.

Separately, two female soldiers fainted.

Initially, the prime minister’s security personnel withdrew their handguns and rushed Olmert and Sarkozy to the French president’s plane, fearing a terror attack.

Zaka is calling it a suicide:

Israel Radio said the soldier who was shot was stationed 100 metres to 200 metres (yards) away from the plane. Two women soldiers who witnessed the shooting fainted and were treated by medics.

Israel’s volunteer medical service Zaka said the soldier apparently committed suicide.

It’s tragic either way but if it is a suicide at least he had enough sense not to try and take anyone else with him.

Update:
The Daily Mail has photos and TimesOnline has video.

The report said that according to assessments in Israel, recent turmoil in Lebanon, where Hizbullah de facto established control of the country, was advancing an American attack.

Bush, the officials said, opined that Hizbullah’s show of strength was evidence of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s crowing influence. They said that according to Bush, “the disease must be treated – not its symptoms.”

These rumors were circulating years ago. If Israeli officials were briefed or otherwise involved in discussions like this the last place you’d hear about it is Galatz. I’d bet that this was intended for Iranian consumption.

Update III:
Jules Crittenden is ready:

“Called for” and gonna do it are two very different things. It’s entirely called for. Strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities and Quds Force training camps and headquarters. Any more crap out of Iran, and follow-on strikes on the oil and transportation infrastructure Iran uses to support and facilitate terrorism in Iraq and elsewhere. It’s long overdue.

Update II:
The White House has a slightly different take:

“An article in today’s Jerusalem Post about the president’s position on Iran that quotes unnamed sources — quoting unnamed sources — is not worth the paper it’s written on,” the White House said in a statement hours after the Israeli newspaper published the report on its Web site.

Update:
Chuck Adkins is surprised that people are falling for it.

Are the political ambitions of the broader jihad totalitarian, genocidal, millenarian – in a word, nuts? Or are they negotiable? President Bush knows where he stands. Just before the words that Barack Obama took umbrage at, he said:

“There are good and decent people who cannot fathom the darkness in these men and try to explain away their words. It’s natural, but it is deadly wrong. As witnesses to evil in the past, we carry a solemn responsibility to take these words seriously.”

Here are some words of Hussein Massawi, the former leader of Hezbollah:

“We are not fighting so that you will offer us something. We are fighting to eliminate you.”

Are his actions consistent with those words? Amazingly so. So, too, are those of Hezbollah’s patrons in Tehran.

President Reagan talked with the Soviets while pushing ahead with the deployment of Cruise and Pershing missiles in Europe. He spoke softly – after getting himself a bigger stick. Sen. Obama is proposing to reward a man who pledges to wipe Israel off the map with a presidential photo-op to which he will bring not even a twig. No wonder he’s so twitchy about it.

Four years of soft talk/no-stick is a pretty terrifying proposition.

Bin Laden said the fight for the Palestinian cause was the most important factor driving al Qaida’s war with the West. “To Western nations … this speech is to understand the core reason of the war between our civilisation and your civilisations. I mean the Palestinian cause,” said bin Laden.

“The Palestinian cause is the major issue for my (Islamic) nation. It was an important element in fuelling me from the beginning and the 19 others with a great motive to fight for those subjected to injustice and the oppressed,” he added.

IntelCenter, a US group that monitors al Qaida message traffic, said the audio message was accompanied by a photo of bin Laden wearing a white robe and turban next to a picture of the Al Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem. It was unclear when the photo of bin Laden was taken.

The al Qaida leader said the Western media managed to brainwash people over the past 60 years by “portraying the Jewish invaders, the occupiers of our land, as the victims while it portrayed us as the terrorists.”

“Sixty years ago, the Israeli state didn’t exist. Instead, it was established on the land of Palestine raped by force,” said bin Laden. “Israelis are occupying invaders whom we should fight.”

I don”t know who’s writing bin Laden’s stuff these days but it’s pretty pathetic. This is the kind of cheap rhetoric you’d expect to hear from a rock-throwing Palestinian or Rosie O’donnell.

“Some seem to believe we should negotiate with terrorists and radicals, as if some ingenious argument will persuade them they have been wrong all along,” Bush said at Israel’s 60th anniversary celebration in Jerusalem.

“We have heard this foolish delusion before,” Bush said in remarks to Israel’s parliament, the Knesset.

“As Nazi tanks crossed into Poland in 1939, an American senator declared: ‘Lord, if only I could have talked to Hitler, all of this might have been avoided.’ We have an obligation to call this what it is — the false comfort of appeasement, which has been repeatedly discredited by history.”

Joe Lieberman quickly offered his support for the President’s remarks:

“President Bush got it exactly right today when he warned about the threat of Iran and its terrorist proxies like Hamas and Hezbollah. It is imperative that we reject the flawed and naïve thinking that denies or dismisses the words of extremists and terrorists when they shout “Death to America” and “Death to Israel,” and that holds that—if only we were to sit down and negotiate with these killers—they would cease to threaten us. It is critical to our national security that our commander-in-chief is able to distinguish between America’s friends and America’s enemies, and not confuse the two.”

Bush didn’t mention Obama directly but guilt apparently drove him to issue an immediate and angry response:

“George Bush knows that I have never supported engagement with terrorists, and the president’s extraordinary politicization of foreign policy and the politics of fear do nothing to secure the American people or our stalwart ally Israel,” Obama said.

“It is sad that President Bush would use a speech to the Knesset on the 60th anniversary of Israel’s independence to launch a false political attack,” he said.

“Instead of tough talk and no action, we need to do what Kennedy, Nixon and Reagan did and use all elements of American power — including tough, principled, and direct diplomacy — to pressure countries like Iran and Syria.”

The AFP piece calls out Obama on his assertion that he would not support engagement with terrorists:

Obama said in a Democratic presidential debate last July that he would be willing to hold talks, without preconditions, with the leaders of top US foes including Iran, Syria, North Korea, Venezuela and Cuba.

In a subsequent debate in April, Obama renewed his offer for direct talks at a leaders’ level with Tehran, saying the Islamic Republic should be pressed with “carrots and sticks” to end its nuclear program.

McCain finds him naive – and I think that’s being generous:

“I think Barack Obama needs to explain why he wants to sit down and talk with a man who is the head of a government that is a state sponsor of terror that is responsible for the killing of brave young Americans and wants to wipe Israel off the map and denies the Holocaust,” McCain said.

“It is a serious error on the part of Senator Obama that shows naiveté and inexperience and lack of judgment to say that he wants to sit down across the table from an individual who leads a country that says and says that Israel is a stinking corpse, that is dedicated to the extinction of the state of Israel.”

It’s going to be tough going for Obama from here on out.

Anyway, there is an official site for those who are interested. Wikipedia has more information including a pretty comprehensive rundown on the participants.

National security advisor Steve Hadley recently laid out some goals, if you can call them that, for the event:

…the focus of these discussions are the Israelis and the Palestinians launching a negotiating process, supporting them in their efforts to implement the road map, which we still think is the critical path for achieving peace, and, in parallel, building Palestinian institutions and making sure there’s international support for that. That’s what really this meeting is all about and that’s what we hope will come out of it.

In other words, they’re not hoping for much. Or as Rick Richman puts it:

So the conference will “launch negotiations” — since the last few months of actual negotiations over a “document” have failed. Since failure is not an option, this will be called a success.

Frank Viviano is bit more optimistic:

The atmosphere is marked by weakness, uncertainty and pessimism. Yet that may prove to be the Annapolis conference’s greatest strength, an unexpected prelude to breakthrough on the 60-year road to an Arab-Israeli-settlement. It is between the lines of bleak editorials, op-ed columns and analyses in the press of the Middle East itself that this hope, however slim, can be read. From Riyadh and Beirut to Cairo and Jerusalem, pre-conference media coverage has been a strange mosaic of dark foreboding and unusual glimmers of light. No less unusual is the fact that Annapolis will bring together all of the governments and mainstream players in this unending conflict for the first time – precisely because because all of them are reeling in crisis. In a sense, there could be no more potent chemistry for success at the negotiating table. The closest equivalent is the “Nixon shock” of 35 years ago, when a fiercely anti-Communist U.S. president, faced with riots in the American streets and a war about to be lost in Southeast Asia, suddenly found common ground with a marxist China gravely enfeebled by cultural revolution.

John Bolton is cranky, pessimistic, and right (as usual):

“If there is a conference and it fails, we are not simply in the status quo that we had before,” Bolton said during a Web-based question-and-answer session. “We are in a worse position, because it will show a decline in American influence, a failure in a very visible way. I wish we weren’t doing this at all.”

And The Washington Post falls somewhere in the middle:

If there are causes for optimism, they lie in the hopeful public rhetoric of Mr. Olmert and Mr. Abbas — and the fears that lie behind it. Mr. Olmert has publicly pledged several times that Israel will negotiate seriously, and he said last week that he believed there was a chance to complete a peace deal by the end of next year. His government, like many in the Middle East, is deeply worried by Iran’s attempt to expand its influence throughout the region and believes a failure of the talks would play into Tehran’s hands. That prospect may be enough to produce some progress at the Annapolis meeting and in the months to come. But the breakthrough that Ms. Rice thought was possible still looks remote.

While, Henry Siegman hits all of the Arab talking points on the way to this ridiculously one-sided conclusion:

If the international community has been largely indifferent to—or impotent to do anything about—what some have tried to portray as a quarrel between Israel and Palestinians over where to draw the border between the two, it is far less likely to remain indifferent to an Israel intent on permanently denying its majority Arab population the rights and privileges it accords to its minority of Jewish citizens. It would be an apartheid regime that, one hopes, a majority of Israelis would themselves not abide.

According to the prosecution, during his IDF reserve duty, the psychiatrist was exposed to classified material including emergency plans of the IDF Medical Corps, detailed plans for the deployment of medical units and control centers, procedures for providing psychiatric services to the home front during a war and tactics for evacuating civilians in the event of rocket attacks, as well as IDF intelligence and operations assessments.

The November 22 indictment served in the Petah Tikva Magistrate’s Court asserts that “in April 2007, Shamir decided to provide information to hostile entities in exchange for money and he contacted the Iranian Foreign Ministry by electronic mail.”

Stupid – but it gets worse:

In addition, it is alleged that in August 2007, Shamir sent faxes from his home to the Iranian consulates in London and Turkey and, about a month ago, after receiving no responses, he faxed them again. Police said that after sending the faxes he destroyed them and saved the fax numbers to his cellular phone memory in order lessen the chances of detection.

If only all spies were this stupid.

In the first reaction from an Israeli official to Wednesday night’s alleged IAF foray over Syria, Science, Culture and Sports Minister Ghaleb Majadle said Friday that IAF planes enter Syrian airspace on a daily basis, adding that he did not believe the latest alleged incident would spark off a war.

Majadle told the Nazareth-based A-Sinara newspaper that while he had no specific information about the latest alleged operation, it was likely that “the planes either entered Syrian airspace to take photographs or in error.”

So they were either spying or there accidentally. I’ll let you decide which.

The private security guards handled themselves bravely in the pursuit and likely prevented a far worse attack:

The video clearly shows Ahmed Mahmoud Khatib, 29, from Kafr Manda in the western Galilee, following the guards, Alex Nepelvich and Mikhail Popov, as they patrolled the narrow cobblestone streets of the Old City. Then, as the guards start to enter a kiosk, Khatib snatches Popov’s gun and runs away.

The guards give chase through the crowded street, and Khatib tries to shoot Popov, but failed since the pistol was locked, the video shows. The two men scuffled and this time Khatib succeeded in shooting Popov, before fleeing.

“My weapon was taken from me by complete surprise, and then he is pointing the weapon at me with his face to me,” Popov, 31, recalled from his bed at Jerusalem’s Shaare Tzedek Medical Center.

“I jumped on him, and he cocked the gun, and at that second I grabbed his hands. At that minute he started shooting.”

Nepelvich is seen on the video standing next to a wall and shooting at the terrorist.

At first, Nepelvich failed to hit Khatib. After a resumed chase, Nepelvich caught up with Khatib and killed him.

There’s nothing to see here. Just move along. It’s just another video from a bearded attention-seeking dumbass who is filled with rage because he didn’t get a pony as a child:

“We shall continue to target you at home and abroad just as you target us at home and abroad … ,” Gadahn — also known as Azzam the American — says in the video provided to CNN by www.LauraMansfield.com, a Web site that analyzes terrorism.

Later in the video, which is about an hour long and takes the form of a documentary, the self-proclaimed American jihadist makes explicit threats against the United States and U.S. interests, singling out embassies and consulates. Video Watch a silent excerpt of the video »

“These spy dens and military command and control centers — from which you plotted your aggression against Afghanistan and Iraq and which still provide vital moral, military, material and logistical support to the crusade — shall continue to be legitimate targets for brave Muslims … until and unless you heed our demands: Stop the crusade and leave the Muslims alone,” he said.

I think he is probably pleading their followers, giving them broad direction, more than anything else. You can download the video, which is provided by Laura Mansfield, here. (Now available above – John)

“The last 16 weeks have been the very worst of my life,” he said at a press conference a few hours after being freed.

“It was like being buried alive, being removed from the world [with] occasionally very terrifying people who were dangerous and unpredictable and frightening.”

“The stresses are absolutely huge,” he said.

“It’s a battle to keep your mind in the right place.”

He said he felt “unimaginable relief” upon his release.

“I’ve dreamt, literally dreamt, many times of being free again and I would always wake up in that room.”

It was hard for him to believe, Johnston said, that he will not wake up back in captivity again.

He said his captors were not violent, although they were often “rude and unfriendly” and sometimes threatened his life.

Hamas wants to take credit for this, claiming that they have lines of communication open with the Army of Islam. Whatever. I’m pleased, but not impressed, when terrorists release their captives.

“The era of justice and Islamic rule have arrived” in Gaza, a spokesman for the Hamas militia was quoted as saying on Thursday.

Press reports said Hamas fighters — Islamic radicals — are winning their battle with the Fatah faction, which is loyal to Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas.

Hamas fighters, who are said to be better armed and trained, want an Islamic Palestinian state in all of Gaza, the West Bank, and Israel. They stormed one of Fatah’s key security installations in the Gaza Strip on Thursday, reportedly dragging Fatah gunmen from the building and executing them one by one in the street.

Broadcasting from inside the P.A.’s Preventive Security Services headquarters in Gaza City, Hamas television displayed weapons it said were smuggled into Gaza by Israel and the U.S. over the last months to aid Fatah.

Fatah forces are paying a heavy price:

Fatah officials said seven of their fighters were shot to death in the street outside Preventive Security. A witness, Jihad Abu Ayad, said the men were being killed in front of their wives and children.

“They are executing them one by one,” Abu Ayad said. “They are carrying one of them on their shoulders, putting him on a sand dune, turning him around and shooting.”

Some of the Hamas fighters kneeled down outside the building, touching their foreheads to the ground in prayer. Others led Fatah fighters out of the building, some of them shirtless or in their underwear, holding their arms in the air. Several of the Fatah men flinched as the crack of gunfire split the air.

Carl in Jerusalem has a plan for a Hamas-controlled Gaza:

What should Israel do? Israel should seal off the crossings from Gaza into Israel completely and let the ‘Palestinians’ rot. Nothing comes in and nothing goes out on our side. Let the Egyptians deal with them. Unless they start shooting Kassams. Then we can let the helicopters deal with them.

Israel will be condemned for that action, of course, but what sane country would expose its population to Hamas controlled border crossings?

How do you send your kids to school when you’re under almost constant rocket attack? The rockets don’t have guidance systems so the schools can’t easily be targeted but the Palestinians would love nothing more than a Qassam rocket landing on a school packed full of children:

The Sderot Municipality has asked the Education Ministry for approval to terminate the current school year immediately, and resume classes in August should the security situation allow it.

Sderot children will return to school Sunday for the first time since the recent fighting broke out, although classes will be held outside the embattled town in areas that are not within the Qassam rocket’s range.

The students will be brought to Kibbutz Ruhama in armored buses, from which they will be bussed to schools in nearby towns.

Another Israeli civilian was killed by the rockets today.

In the continued crackdown on Hamas in the wake of Kassam rocket attacks from Gaza, the IDF conducted a massive arrest sweep of senior Hamas leaders in the West Bank overnight Wednesday, arresting the Palestinian Authority education minister, three parliament members and several mayors.

In total, the IDF said it had arrested 33 Palestinians, the most senior of which was Hamas Education Minister Nasser al-Shaer. Other detainees included three parliament members, the head of the Wakf in Nablus, a top official in the PA Interior Ministry, the mayors of Nablus, Kalkilya, Bidya and El-Bireh, and 21 Hamas operatives and other officials.

The army also shut down 10 Hamas offices in towns throughout the West Bank, includin Jenin, Ramallah, Nablus and Bethlehem.

Earlier Sunday, the security cabinet granted the IDF a green light to strike at terror chiefs, including politicians, involved in the nonstop Kassam rocket fire on Sderot.

Two hours after the cabinet dispersed, IAF aircraft fired a missile at a terrorist cell walking down a street in the Gaza City neighborhood of Sajiya, killing eight and wounding 13.

Palestinians said the missile struck the home of Hamas lawmaker Khalil al-Haya. But the IDF said the strike was on the terror cell and it was possible that Haya’s home was hit by shrapnel. Palestinians said at least six of the dead were Haya’s relatives.

I still don’t see any indication that Israel is ready to deal with the Hamas problem in a decisive manner. This will probably escalate a bit more, tension will be defused with some kind of hollow agreement, things will simmer, and we’ll be back here again in a few months.

Earlier, a high-ranking IDF officer said Friday that the goal of the current operation in Gaza was to “make Hamas pay” for its continued terror attacks against Israel.

Predicting that Kassam rocket fire would continue over the next few days, the officer said that the IDF planned to continue in its current policy of bombing Kassam manufacturing plants, warehouses, Kassam rocket squads and other Hamas infrastructure involved in terror attacks.

He also hinted that the IDF operations could continue even if Hamas stopped firing rockets.

Israel is not “conducting a dialogue” with Hamas, he said, and added that IDF operations were not necessarily dependent on the continuation of rocket attacks.

“We’re not just attacking real estate. We want to make Hamas pay for the terror,” he said.

Unfortunately, it’s all too predictable. The fighting will escalate until the Palestinians give, tension will ease just slightly, and Hamas will get stronger.

With Israel’s blessing, Egypt has delivered a large arms shipment to forces loyal to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, officials said Thursday – the latest Israeli attempt to boost the embattled leader in his bloody conflict with the militant Islamic Hamas.

Though there has been a weeklong hiatus in armed clashes, Palestinians fear the heavily armed security forces of Hamas, which runs the Palestinian government, and Fatah could erupt in violence at any time.

Israel has been trying to reinforce Abbas’ standing among his people. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said Abbas is a partner for negotiations – unlike Hamas, which rejects the existence of Israel and refuses to renounce violence.

This morning, I read a story about this conference from a European newspaper that stated and I quote, that Iran’s President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad called for wiping Israel off the map. This assertion has been made in literally thousands of newspaper articles and radio and TV news reports.

But, all those here know that such a translation of his speech is nothing but a big lie. He never said anything of the kind. Any proper translation of his speech shows that he never called for Israel to be quote, “wiped from the map”! But millions of people in the West and around the world have heard this so many times they believe it. Whatever might be the ultimate truth of the Holocaust, how can we learn it from a press that repeats 5,000 times a lie about your President that anyone with an Iranian-English dictionary can disprove in 5 minutes? In short, their ability to sell this easily disproven lie shows that the media can get away with any lie, even of the largest proportions. The only way to learn the truth about any idea is free speech, free discussion, and free debate.

This isn’t really something new for Duke. Check the MEMRI video of his speech in Syria if you can stand it.

You can read the full transcript of his conference speech but you’ll have to visit DavidDuke.com to do so. I wouldn’t bother. It’s offensive and totally predictable. That’s all the time I’ll devote to this subject. Cue the “Zionist conspirator” and “race traitor” hate mail.