A different Hamas?

In a good analysis in Ha'aretz, Zvi Bar'el observes that Hamas' religious agenda seems to have disappeared, despite the Koranic citations quoted in the Mecca summit between Hamas and Fatah.  Here's the start of  the piece:

At the signing ceremony for the Mecca agreement last week, PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas, Hamas political bureau chief Khaled Meshal and Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh all vied so hard to outdo one another that it almost seemed as if they were competing in a Koran recitation contest.

Abbas, who spoke first, didn't know how far Meshal was about to go with Koranic citations, and so he quickly switched to discussing secular matters. Meshal, however, made a brilliant showing. The lengthy verses he quoted by heart resounded throughout the huge auditorium and, if anybody was looking around, they would have noticed at least three Saudi royals murmuring the verses along with Meshal and nodding their heads approvingly.

Meshal, apparently, cleverly chose the right verses. "You can't come into the home of the Saudi royalty without being able to quote some long verses," an Egyptian journalist once said to me. "In the West, everyone always has a joke or some witty comment ready. In Egypt, you have to come up with an eloquent phrase in praise of the host. In Saudi Arabia, it's just Koranic verses. You'd think everyone there is some kind of religious sage," he explained.

Yet the verses that served as a backdrop for the unity agreement could not obscure one particularly interesting detail: Nowhere in the entire agreement, in all the speeches, and in the entire past year since Hamas came to power, has a single religious statement been heard from it. It seems like even Article 27 of the Hamas charter has been totally forgotten.

This section says that "Despite our esteem for the Palestine Liberation Organization and what it is capable of developing into, and without belittling its role in the Arab-Israeli conflict, we cannot exchange the Islamic nature of Palestine in the present or future for the adoption of secular ideas -- Hence the day on which the Palestine Liberation Organization adopts Islam as its way of life we will be its soldiers and the fuel of its fire which will burn the enemy. However, until then -- the Islamic Resistance Movement will treat the Palestine Liberation Organization as a son treats his father, brother treats brother, relative treats relative."

Just scrapping by...

b RAMALLAH, West Bank - The next time you buy something metal that says, Made in China, remember this family. Abu Nabil and sons Nabil, Hamza and Hazem scour the roads and fields of the West Bank for scrap metal that they sell to dealers who in turn ship it to the Chinese. For a full day's work, the family can make 60 shekels, or about $13 although this particular Saturday was "not a good day,'' Nabil said. Until the start of a new wave of Israeli-Palestinian violence in 2000, Abu Nabil worked as a chef in Israel. Since then, hundreds of thousands of Palestinians have been barred from entering Israel and many are forced to scrounge for a living. Almost 70 percent of Palestinians now live in poverty, the UN estimates.

Condi's in town

JERUSALEM - Had dinner tonight at the King David hotel, then walked down the street to Jerusalem's other 5-star hotel, the David Citadel, whose driveway and lobby were crowded with TV crews and guests hoping to get a glimpse of Condoleezza Rice. I hung around the lobby a bit, only to be told by an Israeli security agent that they "always bring her in the back way."  Rice, who earlier in the day was in Baghdad, is here to meet with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian President Mahmound Abbas in an effort to jump-start the peace talks. On arrival, Rice held a  very brief, no-questions, press conference with Israel's foreign minister, Tzipi Livni. (I absolutely LOVE her name :)

I've been told that the King David - the 75-year-old institution that fancies itself the hotel of "presidents and kings''  - is miffed that Rice always stays at the David Citadel, a much newer place.  "I don't care where she stays - she can stay at my house - as long as she does something,'' my cab driver, Tissir said, echoing a widespread hope that peace talks, which came to a grinding halt when Palestinians elected a Hamas government this time last year, will finally resume.

Market day

JERUSALEM - Saturdays are quiet on the Jewish side of Jerusalem - it's Shabbat - but not so in Arab East Jerusalem, where one of the  simple pleasures of life is perusing the street market just outside the Old City. Vendors sell everything from produce to cosmetics to tea glasses to bras. You can also buy a kaek simsm - sesame-encrusted bread in the shape of a large oval - that comes with a little packet of zatar - a ground oregano-like spice mixed with salt - that you sprinkle on the bread. Cost: about 50 cents.  Add a tangerine and it makes a fine lunch to enjoy while watching the parade of shoppers. (as always, click on the photos to enlarge) 

The Hole-y Land

DEAD SEA, Israel - Click on this photo to enlarge, and you'll see that Florida isn't the only place with a sink hole problem. As the Dead Sea dries up, more and more sink holes are appearing in places that used to be under water. Fortunately, it's a lightly populated area so no houses are at risk. But people who ignore these signs can be sucked into the muck, which has a consistency like quick sand.

Shades of empire lost..

WADI RUM, Jordan - (click to enlarge) This old wooden box car made in Belgium in the early part of the 20th century is all that remains of the Ottoman Empire's Hejaz Railway through Syria, Lebanon and Jordan. The Turks built the railway ostensibly to expedite travel to the Hajj, the pilgrimage to Mecca that all Muslims are required to make if they are able. But the real reason was to consolidate Turkish control of the region. Arabs, working with the British intelligence officer T.E. Lawrence - "Lawrence of Arabia'' - blew up the Hejaz during the Arab revolt, and the Ottoman Empire came to an end in World War 1 . The tracks are now used to carry phosphate - Jordan's largest export - to the port of Aqaba on the Red Sea.

Meet Hazim

NEAR THE IRAQI BORDER - Meet Hazim, my Jordanian driver/interpreter. His father was Jordan's chief judge, and Hazim, like many Jordanians in the '80s, went to college in Iraq where he studied physics at Mosul University - "one of the 17 best in the world'' during Saddam Hussein's regime, he says. Hazim tried teaching, decided he wasn't cut out for indoor work, so he's  now a tour guide. I'm the first journalist he's worked with, but he speaks flawless English and is doing a fine job.

He's often worked with Israeli tourists (Jordan is one of just 2 Arab countries that have peace treaties with Israel) and here's a joke  the Israelis like: "Why did Moses wander around the desert for 40 years? Because he had an Egyptian guide, not a Jordanian.''

Highway to hell

RUWAISHED, Jordan - (click to enlarge photo)  We drove out to the Iraqi border yesterday - it's  roughly a 3 1/2 hour drive each way over a very rough, two-lane highway.  During the years of economic sanctions, this was a heavily traveled road, with hundreds of trucks a day ferrying goods to Iraq and bringing back oil. But since the U.S.-led "liberation,'' it's become the road to nowhere, or more aptly, the highway to hell.  Iraq now imports much of what it needs through Syria, Turkey and Iran, while most Jordanians are too frightened - rightfully so - to make the 400-mile trip from Amman to Baghdad. The last time I took this road was in April 2004, just a few days after four American contractors were murdered in Fallujah and their charred remains strung up on a bridge. The memory of that trip still causes chills.

A cautious optimist

AMMAN , Jordan - As I was in the hotel lobby waiting for my driver, I chatted briefly with Dr. Samir A. Hassan, who was passing through Amman on his way back to Iraq from a conference in the United States. Hassan, a brigadier general and chief surgeon in the Iraqi army, said he thinks the troop surge will work. "Otherwise, this is the last chance for Iraq,'' he said.

According to Hassan and another Iraqi sitting nearby, we in the media exaggerate the violence in Baghdad. But when I pressed Hassan on the dangers, he acknowledged that he lives in the Green Zone - the massively fortified home to U.S. diplomats and contractors - and that he is protected by several bodyguards!

A more popular red, white &blue

AMMAN, Jordan - In this monochromatic city of beige, beige and more beige, the Russian flag provides a welcome bit of color. President Vladimir Putin - who accused the U.S. this weekend of wanting to dominate the world -  is here as part of a three-day swing through the Mideast that includes stops in Qatar and Saudi Arabia. Jordan does not have any substantial oil or gas resources but it hosts many Russian oil companies, which had contracts in Iraq and had to move to neighboring Jordan following the U.S.-led invasion. According to a Russian news service, the two countries are mulling geological exploration in Jordan and joint projects in Iraq, as well as the construction of a new pipeline from Iraq to Jordan.

By the way, many people here agree with Putin's criticism of the U.S. although the Jordan Times said in an editorial today that the Russian president "may have underestimated the strength of HIS country (my emphasis added) and the role it plays when he suggested that Washington alone makes all the calls in the world. Still his remarks are clear reflection of most of the world community's dismay with current international situation.''

A hurried cup of coffee

The atmosphere was electric again this morning near the Old City. As I was walking up Salahadin Street to get cappuccino at my favorite Arab coffee shop,  I went past two Israeli police on horseback. Further up the street I saw smoke coming from an open dumpster and heard lots of shouting.  I ducked in the coffee shop just as the owner, expecting trouble, was pulling down his metal shutters. At that moment, the mounted police galloped by and we heard the sound of glass shattering, followed by the percussive noise of stun grenades. Again, things seemed to die down fairly quickly but it remains a volatile situation. I'm heading on to Amman, Jordan tomorrow, where protests against the ramp construction have also been held. Jordan's King Abdullah has joined the chorus of Muslim leaders demanding the work be stopped, even though Israel claims it won't cause any damage to Muslim holy sites.  Click on the photo to enlarge it - I took that in the Old City yesterday, where a young Palestinian was recording  all the excitement on his cell phone.

Violence in Old City

Israeli police were expecting trouble today, and they got it. Just after noon prayers ended around 12:40 p.m.  young Palestinians outside the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem's Old City  began throwing rocks at  Israeli security forces to protest Israel's construction of a ramp that Muslims say will undermine the mosque's foundation. Police responded with rubber bullets, stun grenades and gas bombs. These are some photos I took of a Palestinian man, who appeared to have trouble breathing after being caught in a skirmish, and an Israeli soldier who had a cut on his leg.

"Six cameras for one wound,'' a German TV camerman commented as photographers elbowed each other to get a better view of the soldier.  In all,15 Israelis and about two dozen Palestinians suffered injuries, most of them minor. It's not clear how the Palestinian boys got into the mosque complex - police supposedly were letting in only men over 45 with Israeli ID cards. But many Arabs actually live in the Old City, and there were reports that boys from the outside took up temporary residence within the past few days as some extremist Muslim leaders called for a new intifada against Israel unless the construction stops. As police and protestors chased each other through the narrow streets near the Temple Mount/Noble Sanctuary area, merchants quickly hauled in their  T-shirts, candy bars and produce. The fighting went on about an hour and probably didn't include more than a few hundred Palestinians. As I was leaving , I noticed that most Arab merchants in other areas of the Old City were still open for business. Israeli soldiers were bringing  bottled water and sandwiches to their comrades.

Although this incident seems to have ended relatively peacefully, there is grave concern that protests could turn far more violent in the future. IN fact, Israel's defense minister recently wrote Prime Minister Ehud Olmert urging him to  stop  the ramp  construction  lest it incite trouble like we saw today.

More from the Old City...

And here's a photo of a protest Thursday afternoon just outside the Old City. In an editorial, the Jerusalem Post charged that Muslims are making an issue of the bridge to divert attention from the infighting between Hamas and Fatah, and "are plainly using this nonevent to reignite memories of Ariel Sharon's visit to the Temple Mount in 2000, which was used to catalyze the second intifada.'' The editorial also quotes a spokesperson for Israel's Antiquities Authority as saying, "We invite everyone to come see - We are working under the open sky and have nothing to hide'' re the bridge.

Of course, Sharon's "visit'' was a bit more than provocative than that - he showed up with scores of riot-equipped police. And "everyone'' isn't going to be able to checkout the construction - Israeli police at times have barred Muslim men under 45 from entering Temple Mount or the Noble Sanctuary as it is known to Muslims.

Bridge to trouble?

This afternoon, I took a walk to Jeruslaem's Old City, where tensions have been high since Israel began construction of a bridge near the Western Wall to replace a stone ramp that was destroyed a few years ago in a storm. Muslims claim the work could damage the Al Aqsa Mosque, and some Islamic leaders have even called for a new intifada unless Israel stops construction. In this photo you can see the golden dome of the Dome of the Rock,  the area from which the Prophet Muhammed is said to have  ascended into heaven. Israel says the work won't cause any damage to sacred sites. (click on photo to enlarge it)

Here's a tip - don't overcharge!

A little story for anyone who's ever felt ripped off by a cab driver:

I hailed a cab outside my Jerusalem hotel this afternoon to take me to Ben Yehuda Street.  I get in, we go a couple of blocks, and the taxi driver stops to pick up another person. I ask him what he's going to charge me - assuming he will cut my fare since he is taking an extra fare in MY cab - and he says, 30 shekels. That's at least 5 shekels more than I've ever been charged for the same cab ride (and I go to Ben Yehuda Street a lot)  and about 10 shekels higher than the normal rate. I tell him, "I don't think that's fair,'' to which he ignores me and proceeds to talk to the new passsenger exclusively in Hebrew. I fish out 25 shekels and when he stops  to let me out, I jump out, hand him the 25 and say, "I'm giving you 25 shekels because you've overcharged me - you're getting more than double the normal fare for this trip.'' So he proceeds to get out of the cab and curse me at the top of his lungs!

A happy ending. On the way back in a different cab, the driver puts the meter on and the fare is only 14 shekels. I tell  him what happened before and he says, "That's not right.'' I tell him, "You're an honest man and here's 20 shekels - keep the change.''
(A shekel is worth about 20 cents, so it was no big deal money-wise either way - just the principle of the thing.)

In for a dime...in for a trillion

Israellis - at least some of them - must be a lot more optimistic about Iraq's future than most Americans are. This currency exchange office on busy Ben Yehuda Street in Jerusalem started selling Iraqi dinars four monts ago, and a clerk says business from investors has been brisk. 777 dinars equal 1 U.S. dollar - and $800 billion dollars is about what the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are now costing. (If you click on the photo, you can actually read what the sign says!)

NYPD Blues?

These jackets are readily available in markets in the Palestinian West Bank, I'm told.  I don't know if this is what a real New York Police Department jacket looks like but you could have fooled me.  I saw this on a nice young man in a friendly Arab village but makes you wonder, uh?

Photo in King David

Here's the photo of Begin and Carter taken in 1979 at the King David Hotel in Jerusalem - talk about body language!  By the way, it's kind of ironic that the King David has Begin's photo displayed so prominently, given that his Hebrew Resistance organization  blew up  up the entire west wing of the hotel in 1946, killing 92 people. That was back while the unpopular  British were still running what would become Israel two years later. As the old saying goes, one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter..

More on Jimmy Carter

If you still don't know what to make of Jimmy Carter's book Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid, probably the best analysis comes from his onetime associate Kenneth Stein. An Emory University professor, Stein was executive director of the Carter Center and collaborated with the ex-president on his first book on the Mideast. Here's a link to a piece Stein did for the Middle East Forum:

http://www.meforum.org/article/1633

As my newspaper column notes, reaction to the book here in Israel has been muted. Not so in the United States, where Shmuel Rosner, chief U.S. corrrespondent for the Israeli daily Ha'aretz has gotten literally hundreds of emails to his blogs on the book. Via email I asked Shmuel why the difference in reactions. Here's what he told me:

The average Israeli doesn't give a damn about the Carter book.He has sided with the Palestinians for too long and was quick to embrace and late to denounce Yassir Arafat, quick to put blame on Israel and late to put any blame to the Palestinians for the ongoing conflict.

Maybe if you talk to some Israeli officials they'll give you the establishment perspective. I got a lot of reaction but most of it was North American - the Carter issue is much more important to the Jewish community here than it is to Israelis. It's important to Americans because they understand better the meaning of such event, and they know that when a former President speaks you can't just dismiss it by saying it is bogus. Israelis concluded long ago that Carter was no longer a friend, and stopped paying attention to him all together. This might be a reason for him to turn on the hit and use ever harsher words as to denounce Israel.

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