Wednesday, February 14, 2007
Letters reveal Anne Frank's father sought U.S. visa in 1941
By Reuters
The father of Anne Frank, the Jewish girl whose diaries of life hiding from the Nazis became world famous, sought money and help obtaining a U.S. visa from a wealthy New York friend in hopes of escaping Europe, according to documents released on Wednesday.
Frank asked for $5,000 from college friend Nathan Strauss Jr., whose father at the time owned Macy's department store, as he tried to escape Holland with his wife, mother-in-law and daughters Margot and Anne, according documents from the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research in New York City.
"This is the first concrete evidence that he did actually pursue the possibility of escape from Holland," said David Engel, a New York University professor.
A YIVO volunteer discovered the correspondence among the millions of documents in its archives in mid-2005, but the institute had to resolve copyright issues before putting them on display.
The letters, telegrams and government documents date from April to December 1941 and show efforts by Otto Frank to get to the United States and Cuba before going into hiding in 1942, a period Anne Frank described in her diary before she eventually
died aged 15 in a German concentration camp in 1945.
"It is for the sake of the children mainly that we have to care for. Our own fate is of less importance," Otto Frank wrote in a letter to Strauss, who was the head of the U.S. Housing Authority. "You are the only person I know that I can ask."
Frank asked for $5,000 to cover a deposit related to getting a U.S. visa, but the money was ultimately not needed because the visa was not granted.
Appeals for help
Strauss, who is now dead, and his wife made several appeals to government contacts, according to the documents. The papers also show the Franks received help from Julius Hollander, Otto Frank's brother-in-law, who was living in Boston.
If her father had sought help sooner, "Anne Frank could be a 77-year-old woman living in Boston today, a writer. That is what the YIVO's documents suggest," said Richard Breitman, a professor at American University.
However, Otto Frank decided to try to escape just as the Nazis were making it more difficult to leave and the United States was making it more difficult to enter, Breitman said.
Cuba issued Otto Frank a visa on Dec. 1, 1941, according to the documents, but it was canceled 10 days later when Germany declared war on the United States.
The following summer, as Jews were being sent from Amsterdam to Nazi camps, the Frank family went into hiding for two years before being discovered and sent to concentration camps. Otto Frank survived the camp but died in 1980.
Engel said one of the most striking findings for historians was the timing of his efforts to escape the Netherlands, which he didn't pursue until a year after the Nazi invasion.
He said there was evidence that Frank may have been blackmailed by a member of the Dutch Nazi Party, who approached Frank with a letter of denunciation in April 1941. Just 12 days later, Frank contacted Strauss seeking help getting to the
United States.
"So circumstantially there is reason to speculate about this as a possible trigger for the events," said Engel.
Soure
The father of Anne Frank, the Jewish girl whose diaries of life hiding from the Nazis became world famous, sought money and help obtaining a U.S. visa from a wealthy New York friend in hopes of escaping Europe, according to documents released on Wednesday.
Frank asked for $5,000 from college friend Nathan Strauss Jr., whose father at the time owned Macy's department store, as he tried to escape Holland with his wife, mother-in-law and daughters Margot and Anne, according documents from the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research in New York City.
"This is the first concrete evidence that he did actually pursue the possibility of escape from Holland," said David Engel, a New York University professor.
A YIVO volunteer discovered the correspondence among the millions of documents in its archives in mid-2005, but the institute had to resolve copyright issues before putting them on display.
The letters, telegrams and government documents date from April to December 1941 and show efforts by Otto Frank to get to the United States and Cuba before going into hiding in 1942, a period Anne Frank described in her diary before she eventually
died aged 15 in a German concentration camp in 1945.
"It is for the sake of the children mainly that we have to care for. Our own fate is of less importance," Otto Frank wrote in a letter to Strauss, who was the head of the U.S. Housing Authority. "You are the only person I know that I can ask."
Frank asked for $5,000 to cover a deposit related to getting a U.S. visa, but the money was ultimately not needed because the visa was not granted.
Appeals for help
Strauss, who is now dead, and his wife made several appeals to government contacts, according to the documents. The papers also show the Franks received help from Julius Hollander, Otto Frank's brother-in-law, who was living in Boston.
If her father had sought help sooner, "Anne Frank could be a 77-year-old woman living in Boston today, a writer. That is what the YIVO's documents suggest," said Richard Breitman, a professor at American University.
However, Otto Frank decided to try to escape just as the Nazis were making it more difficult to leave and the United States was making it more difficult to enter, Breitman said.
Cuba issued Otto Frank a visa on Dec. 1, 1941, according to the documents, but it was canceled 10 days later when Germany declared war on the United States.
The following summer, as Jews were being sent from Amsterdam to Nazi camps, the Frank family went into hiding for two years before being discovered and sent to concentration camps. Otto Frank survived the camp but died in 1980.
Engel said one of the most striking findings for historians was the timing of his efforts to escape the Netherlands, which he didn't pursue until a year after the Nazi invasion.
He said there was evidence that Frank may have been blackmailed by a member of the Dutch Nazi Party, who approached Frank with a letter of denunciation in April 1941. Just 12 days later, Frank contacted Strauss seeking help getting to the
United States.
"So circumstantially there is reason to speculate about this as a possible trigger for the events," said Engel.
Soure
Former Mossad chief: Assassinate Ahmadinejad
Iranian president 'says he wants to die a martyr so he should be sent to heaven,' Meir Amit says
Aaron Klein, WND
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad should "be made to disappear from the arena," Meir Amit, a former director of Israel's Mossad intelligence agency, advocated in an exclusive interview with WND.
Amit, one of the most esteemed figures in the Israeli intelligence establishment, said while he was director of the Mossad from 1963 to 1968 he regularly argued against the assassination of world leaders. But he said the case of Ahmadinejad is different.
"Ahmadinejad is the pusher of all the Muslim world toward fanaticism and extremism. In his case, he should be made to disappear from the arena. He has said he wants to become a shahid, a martyr, so I think he should get his wish and be sent to heaven," Amit said.
Amit, now in his mid-80's, directed some of the most notorious Mossad operations while he was the organization's chief, including the running of Israeli spy Eli Cohen who penetrated top levels of the Syrian government, and the hijacking of an advance fighter plane from Iraq. The subject of multiple books and movies, Amit serves as chairman of Israel's Center for Special Studies.
Amit says he is intimately familiar with the political structure of Iran , having gone on special missions to the country during the 1960's while Israel had a relationship with Iranian leaders.
He told WND he does not advocate an Israeli military attack against Iran's suspected nuclear facilities. Instead he said Israel should adopt a defensive position, deploying a working anti-missile system to intercept possible Iranian missile attacks.
Israel this weekend successfully tested the Arrow missile defense system in its first nighttime exercise against a missile mocking an Iranian Shihab-3.
Amit termed Iran an "international threat." He said Israel and the US should work with the international community to undermine Ahmadinejad's regime and foster a popular uprising.
Ahmadinejad has called for Israel to be wiped off the map
"We know most of the younger generation in Iran is against Ahmadenejad. They should be aided. The US and international community is trying now in a light way by using broadcasting, and putting antennas in several places in Iran and also having one or two stations broadcasting real news and appropriate messages," said Amit.
"More money needs to be budgeted to this cause," Amit said.
'We're on the eve of World War III'
While the former Mossad chief did not call for a military strike against Iran, Amit said he foresees a war in the region in the future.
He said global civilization is on the verge of "World War III," a massive conflict in which the Islamic world is attempting to impose its ideology on Western nations.
"I am worried about a regional war, but also we need to look at the bigger picture and see that Islam is fighting western world and not only Israel. Look at the terror in Spain, France, London, the U.S.," said Amit.
"I call it World War III. You must look at it from this angle and treat it wider, not as a problem of terrorism here and there. The war is not being waged just by Iran and in Iraq, it's being launched by Muslims all over the world," said Amit.
Amit referenced recent terror attacks against Israel, Europe and the United States; Iran's alleged nuclear ambitions; the insurgency in Iraq and Afghanistan; and recent worldwide Muslim riots.
"It looks to me like it is a kind of coordinated or contemplated problem to somehow impose the Islamic idea all over the world," Amit said.
Amit urged Western nations to "unite and work together. Unfortunately, the world is not uniting. Russia is playing its own game, and so is China."
Both China and Russia have been aiding Iran's nuclear program, which Tehran claims is intended for peaceful purposes only. In a bid to soften possible sanctions against Iran, Russia earlier proposed setting up a joint venture to enrich uranium for Iran on Russian soil.
Amit's call for the "disappearing" of Ahmadinejad comes as the Iranian leader yesterday told ABC News in an interview he was "open for talks," on his country's nuclear program. Ahmadinejad denied suggestions he sought conflict with the US, saying Iran was "trying to find ways to love people".
But Ahmadinejad's statements were punctuated by comments also made yesterday by Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Seyed Mohammad Ali Hosseini, who told Iranian state-run television Tehran will "never" agree to suspend its nuclear activities.
"The issue of suspension is not acceptable under any conditions," Hosseini said.
Amit said Iran currently is fostering region-wide instability, funding and aiding the insurgency against US troops in Iraq, directing the Lebanese Hezbollah militia and funding Palestinian terrorism.
"But I think the most serious problem is Iran developing nuclear power," Amit said.
Soure
Aaron Klein, WND
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad should "be made to disappear from the arena," Meir Amit, a former director of Israel's Mossad intelligence agency, advocated in an exclusive interview with WND.
Amit, one of the most esteemed figures in the Israeli intelligence establishment, said while he was director of the Mossad from 1963 to 1968 he regularly argued against the assassination of world leaders. But he said the case of Ahmadinejad is different.
"Ahmadinejad is the pusher of all the Muslim world toward fanaticism and extremism. In his case, he should be made to disappear from the arena. He has said he wants to become a shahid, a martyr, so I think he should get his wish and be sent to heaven," Amit said.
Amit, now in his mid-80's, directed some of the most notorious Mossad operations while he was the organization's chief, including the running of Israeli spy Eli Cohen who penetrated top levels of the Syrian government, and the hijacking of an advance fighter plane from Iraq. The subject of multiple books and movies, Amit serves as chairman of Israel's Center for Special Studies.
Amit says he is intimately familiar with the political structure of Iran , having gone on special missions to the country during the 1960's while Israel had a relationship with Iranian leaders.
He told WND he does not advocate an Israeli military attack against Iran's suspected nuclear facilities. Instead he said Israel should adopt a defensive position, deploying a working anti-missile system to intercept possible Iranian missile attacks.
Israel this weekend successfully tested the Arrow missile defense system in its first nighttime exercise against a missile mocking an Iranian Shihab-3.
Amit termed Iran an "international threat." He said Israel and the US should work with the international community to undermine Ahmadinejad's regime and foster a popular uprising.
Ahmadinejad has called for Israel to be wiped off the map
"We know most of the younger generation in Iran is against Ahmadenejad. They should be aided. The US and international community is trying now in a light way by using broadcasting, and putting antennas in several places in Iran and also having one or two stations broadcasting real news and appropriate messages," said Amit.
"More money needs to be budgeted to this cause," Amit said.
'We're on the eve of World War III'
While the former Mossad chief did not call for a military strike against Iran, Amit said he foresees a war in the region in the future.
He said global civilization is on the verge of "World War III," a massive conflict in which the Islamic world is attempting to impose its ideology on Western nations.
"I am worried about a regional war, but also we need to look at the bigger picture and see that Islam is fighting western world and not only Israel. Look at the terror in Spain, France, London, the U.S.," said Amit.
"I call it World War III. You must look at it from this angle and treat it wider, not as a problem of terrorism here and there. The war is not being waged just by Iran and in Iraq, it's being launched by Muslims all over the world," said Amit.
Amit referenced recent terror attacks against Israel, Europe and the United States; Iran's alleged nuclear ambitions; the insurgency in Iraq and Afghanistan; and recent worldwide Muslim riots.
"It looks to me like it is a kind of coordinated or contemplated problem to somehow impose the Islamic idea all over the world," Amit said.
Amit urged Western nations to "unite and work together. Unfortunately, the world is not uniting. Russia is playing its own game, and so is China."
Both China and Russia have been aiding Iran's nuclear program, which Tehran claims is intended for peaceful purposes only. In a bid to soften possible sanctions against Iran, Russia earlier proposed setting up a joint venture to enrich uranium for Iran on Russian soil.
Amit's call for the "disappearing" of Ahmadinejad comes as the Iranian leader yesterday told ABC News in an interview he was "open for talks," on his country's nuclear program. Ahmadinejad denied suggestions he sought conflict with the US, saying Iran was "trying to find ways to love people".
But Ahmadinejad's statements were punctuated by comments also made yesterday by Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Seyed Mohammad Ali Hosseini, who told Iranian state-run television Tehran will "never" agree to suspend its nuclear activities.
"The issue of suspension is not acceptable under any conditions," Hosseini said.
Amit said Iran currently is fostering region-wide instability, funding and aiding the insurgency against US troops in Iraq, directing the Lebanese Hezbollah militia and funding Palestinian terrorism.
"But I think the most serious problem is Iran developing nuclear power," Amit said.
Soure
First good move by Olmert?
The End Of Judicial Tyranny In Israel?
By: Steven Plaut
Wednesday, February 14, 2007
It pains me to tell you this, but Ehud Olmert has actually done something right. Possibly the very first correct thing he has done since becoming prime minister. And it is spectacularly correct!
Olmert has appointed Professor Daniel Friedmann as the new minister of justice. And Professor Friedmann is determined to blow the whistle on the long reign of judicial tyranny imposed on Israel by its anti-democratic judges and by advocates of judicial activism.
First, let’s back up a bit. Israeli democracy has for many years been under massive assault by anti-democratic elitists promoting judicial tyranny. Under their doctrine of judicial activism, it is the proper role of unelected judges to trample, trump and override the decisions of the elected representatives of the Israeli people.
Advertisement
Led by previous chief justice Aharon Barak and now by current Chief Justice Dorit Beinisch, the advocates of judicial activism believe leftist judges should dictate to Israel’s legislature what laws those lawmakers may or may not make. Accordingly, judges should be empowered simply to make up the law as they go along.
Bear in mind that judges in Israel cannot be removed from the bench through any process of impeachment or ballot referendum. Advocates of non-impeachable activist judges want them to dictate everything in the country, from micro-decisions made by the army to Israel’s foreign policy because “absolutely everything should be subject to judicial review” (a favorite Barak slogan).
These people generally want the courts to impose a leftist political agenda on Israel, and that is what judicial activism judges often do. Barak infamously has stated that judges in Israel impose ideas favored by “enlightened opinion,” which of course always means the secularist Left. The vast majority of Jewish Israelis hold “unenlightened opinions,” according to such snooty elitists.
The Israeli Supreme Court has ordered the government to record homosexual “marriages” that were registered in other countries, and has granted spousal rights and privileges to homosexual couples. The court ruled that there is a constitutional right in Israel to be an importer of non-kosher foods (remarkable, given that Israel has no written constitution at all), but no such right to be an importer of kosher food.
The court has collaborated in the many assaults against free speech and free expression in Israel, assaults invariably directed against the Israeli Right. The court has refused to stop the persecution of anti-Oslo dissidents or to overturn Israel’s ridiculous “anti-racism” law, which declares that expressing Kahanist points of view is a felony but cheering on suicide bombers or calling for Israel to be annihilated is protected speech.
A Supreme Court justice, Ayalla Procaccia, last year tossed female teenage settlers into prison for their criticism of government policy at a protest, declaring that the girls were guilty of expressing an unacceptable political opinion. “The message must be made clear that the law will be enforced, at times of calm or at times of crisis, for minors or adults,” the judge declared.
Just a few weeks back, hopes for reining in judicial tyranny in Israel seemed bleaker than ever. Professor Ruth Gavison had been a contender for appointment to the Israeli Supreme Court. A longtime champion of civil rights, somewhat left of center and secularist, Gavison nevertheless is a ferocious opponent of judicial activism and would have worked against the activist judges on the bench.
That was enough to arouse the Left against her. In a campaign somewhat reminiscent of the malicious jihad in the U.S. against the nomination of Yale Professor Robert Bork to the Supreme Court, the Israeli Left mobilized its shock troops against the Gavison appointment and it was shot down.
Meanwhile, Dorit Beinisch took over as chief justice when her mentor Aharon Barak retired. Beinisch used the occasion of her accession to praise Barak’s judicial activism and promised to conduct more of the same Like Barak, she believes the court is entitled to revoke and cancel laws passed by the Knesset, supposedly as part of “judicial review.” Never mind that there is no constitutional basis in Israel for such judicial review.
The distinguished Robert Bork mentioned above is on record as declaring that Israel’s Supreme Court is the very worst in the democratic world in terms of ignoring checks and balances and in its promotion of judicial activism. He wrote: “Israel must have the most activist, and from my point of view, the worst court in the Western world. They have developed an intrusive, pervasive constitutional law without really having a Constitution. Now that’s hard to do, but they’ve managed it and they have managed to get themselves in a position where they, in effect, control the membership of their own court.”
Tel Aviv law don Daniel Friedmann is both a man of principle and a man of conservative legal principles. Politically he is a centrist. He was one of the people who served on the Beijski Commission in the 1980’s, set up after the bank share scandal of 1983. That commission recommended a program of critical economic reforms that the political hacks largely ignored.
Educated at the Hebrew University and Harvard, Friedmann strongly opposes judicial tyranny and is dead serious about reining it in. He wants to end the system under which the Israeli commission for appointing judges acts as a rubber stamp for candidates supported by the judges already on the Supreme Court. He wants to create a constitutional court that will strip the Supreme Court of its powers of judicial review of laws. He wants to change the system under which the chief justice of the Supreme Court is selected.
In short, he wants to appoint judges who will actually obey the law, an idea quite novel in Israel.
Professor Friedmann was one of those jurists who vehemently opposed the appointment of Beinisch as chief justice, repeatedly declaring his position that she is not competent or qualified to serve on the Supreme Court.
Beinisch had personally led an earlier successful campaign against the appointment of Professor Nili Cohen as a Supreme Court judge. Friedmann was the country’s leading promoter of Cohen for the post and accused Beinisch of blocking the appointment for petty personal reasons. “It appears the justices are not immune to the possibility of misusing power, as the developments in the process of appointing judges has proven,” he wrote.
All judges in Israel are appointed by a Judicial Selection Committee, which is currently made up of three Supreme Court justices, two ministers (including the minister of justice), two Knesset members, and two members of the Israel Bar Association. Once a judge is appointed, it is all but impossible to get him or her dismissed. Dismissals can take place when the chief justice leads the campaign against a judge – and not always then.
In reality, the committee usually rubber stamps what the Supreme Court justices, who dominate it, want. Hence, appointment of judges in Israel effectively consists of unelected judges dictating which other unelected judges will sit on the bench.
Under Friedmann’s proposals, the Judicial Selection Committee will be revamped. Only a single sitting judge will be a member. The others will be representatives of the public and the voters, and they will be in a position to flex their muscles against judicial abuse.
And the Israeli Left is simply hysterical about that. Israel’s leftist Haaretz has been overflowing with outraged articles opposing Friedmann. One Haaretz writer compared the appointment of Friedmann to a hypothetical appointment of convicted traitor Tali Fahima as head of the Shin Bet intelligence service. (The comparison is amusing since Haaretz has long served as cheerleader for Fahima and would probably support her appointment as head of the Shin Bet if it were to take place.)
Meanwhile, the leftist apparatchik and godmother of the Oslo debacle, Yossi Beilin, had a public fit when he heard the news of Friedmann’s appointment. Far-left Meretz Knesset member and Peace Now leader Avshalom Vilan raged in the press at the fact that an academic, not a political hack, was being appointed – someone the Left would have difficult in bullying into political compliance.
A retired Supreme Court Justice and advocate of judicial activism, Mishael Cheshin, openly threatened Professor Friedmann with violence, promising to “cut off the arm of anyone who raises a hand against the court.”
The Israeli law enforcement system has long been little more than the occupied territory of the Israeli Left. The attorney general does little to hide his political agenda when he makes decisions about investigations and indictments.
Friedmann’s appointment upsets this cozy undemocratic arrangement and threatens to strip the Left of its unelected de facto domination by democratizing Israel’s legal system. And that’s the first piece of really good news in Israel in quite a while.
Steven Plaut, a frequent contributor to The Jewish Press, is a professor at Haifa University. His book “The Scout” is available at Amazon.com. He can be contacted at stevenplaut@yahoo.com.
Source
By: Steven Plaut
Wednesday, February 14, 2007
It pains me to tell you this, but Ehud Olmert has actually done something right. Possibly the very first correct thing he has done since becoming prime minister. And it is spectacularly correct!
Olmert has appointed Professor Daniel Friedmann as the new minister of justice. And Professor Friedmann is determined to blow the whistle on the long reign of judicial tyranny imposed on Israel by its anti-democratic judges and by advocates of judicial activism.
First, let’s back up a bit. Israeli democracy has for many years been under massive assault by anti-democratic elitists promoting judicial tyranny. Under their doctrine of judicial activism, it is the proper role of unelected judges to trample, trump and override the decisions of the elected representatives of the Israeli people.
Advertisement
Led by previous chief justice Aharon Barak and now by current Chief Justice Dorit Beinisch, the advocates of judicial activism believe leftist judges should dictate to Israel’s legislature what laws those lawmakers may or may not make. Accordingly, judges should be empowered simply to make up the law as they go along.
Bear in mind that judges in Israel cannot be removed from the bench through any process of impeachment or ballot referendum. Advocates of non-impeachable activist judges want them to dictate everything in the country, from micro-decisions made by the army to Israel’s foreign policy because “absolutely everything should be subject to judicial review” (a favorite Barak slogan).
These people generally want the courts to impose a leftist political agenda on Israel, and that is what judicial activism judges often do. Barak infamously has stated that judges in Israel impose ideas favored by “enlightened opinion,” which of course always means the secularist Left. The vast majority of Jewish Israelis hold “unenlightened opinions,” according to such snooty elitists.
The Israeli Supreme Court has ordered the government to record homosexual “marriages” that were registered in other countries, and has granted spousal rights and privileges to homosexual couples. The court ruled that there is a constitutional right in Israel to be an importer of non-kosher foods (remarkable, given that Israel has no written constitution at all), but no such right to be an importer of kosher food.
The court has collaborated in the many assaults against free speech and free expression in Israel, assaults invariably directed against the Israeli Right. The court has refused to stop the persecution of anti-Oslo dissidents or to overturn Israel’s ridiculous “anti-racism” law, which declares that expressing Kahanist points of view is a felony but cheering on suicide bombers or calling for Israel to be annihilated is protected speech.
A Supreme Court justice, Ayalla Procaccia, last year tossed female teenage settlers into prison for their criticism of government policy at a protest, declaring that the girls were guilty of expressing an unacceptable political opinion. “The message must be made clear that the law will be enforced, at times of calm or at times of crisis, for minors or adults,” the judge declared.
Just a few weeks back, hopes for reining in judicial tyranny in Israel seemed bleaker than ever. Professor Ruth Gavison had been a contender for appointment to the Israeli Supreme Court. A longtime champion of civil rights, somewhat left of center and secularist, Gavison nevertheless is a ferocious opponent of judicial activism and would have worked against the activist judges on the bench.
That was enough to arouse the Left against her. In a campaign somewhat reminiscent of the malicious jihad in the U.S. against the nomination of Yale Professor Robert Bork to the Supreme Court, the Israeli Left mobilized its shock troops against the Gavison appointment and it was shot down.
Meanwhile, Dorit Beinisch took over as chief justice when her mentor Aharon Barak retired. Beinisch used the occasion of her accession to praise Barak’s judicial activism and promised to conduct more of the same Like Barak, she believes the court is entitled to revoke and cancel laws passed by the Knesset, supposedly as part of “judicial review.” Never mind that there is no constitutional basis in Israel for such judicial review.
The distinguished Robert Bork mentioned above is on record as declaring that Israel’s Supreme Court is the very worst in the democratic world in terms of ignoring checks and balances and in its promotion of judicial activism. He wrote: “Israel must have the most activist, and from my point of view, the worst court in the Western world. They have developed an intrusive, pervasive constitutional law without really having a Constitution. Now that’s hard to do, but they’ve managed it and they have managed to get themselves in a position where they, in effect, control the membership of their own court.”
Tel Aviv law don Daniel Friedmann is both a man of principle and a man of conservative legal principles. Politically he is a centrist. He was one of the people who served on the Beijski Commission in the 1980’s, set up after the bank share scandal of 1983. That commission recommended a program of critical economic reforms that the political hacks largely ignored.
Educated at the Hebrew University and Harvard, Friedmann strongly opposes judicial tyranny and is dead serious about reining it in. He wants to end the system under which the Israeli commission for appointing judges acts as a rubber stamp for candidates supported by the judges already on the Supreme Court. He wants to create a constitutional court that will strip the Supreme Court of its powers of judicial review of laws. He wants to change the system under which the chief justice of the Supreme Court is selected.
In short, he wants to appoint judges who will actually obey the law, an idea quite novel in Israel.
Professor Friedmann was one of those jurists who vehemently opposed the appointment of Beinisch as chief justice, repeatedly declaring his position that she is not competent or qualified to serve on the Supreme Court.
Beinisch had personally led an earlier successful campaign against the appointment of Professor Nili Cohen as a Supreme Court judge. Friedmann was the country’s leading promoter of Cohen for the post and accused Beinisch of blocking the appointment for petty personal reasons. “It appears the justices are not immune to the possibility of misusing power, as the developments in the process of appointing judges has proven,” he wrote.
All judges in Israel are appointed by a Judicial Selection Committee, which is currently made up of three Supreme Court justices, two ministers (including the minister of justice), two Knesset members, and two members of the Israel Bar Association. Once a judge is appointed, it is all but impossible to get him or her dismissed. Dismissals can take place when the chief justice leads the campaign against a judge – and not always then.
In reality, the committee usually rubber stamps what the Supreme Court justices, who dominate it, want. Hence, appointment of judges in Israel effectively consists of unelected judges dictating which other unelected judges will sit on the bench.
Under Friedmann’s proposals, the Judicial Selection Committee will be revamped. Only a single sitting judge will be a member. The others will be representatives of the public and the voters, and they will be in a position to flex their muscles against judicial abuse.
And the Israeli Left is simply hysterical about that. Israel’s leftist Haaretz has been overflowing with outraged articles opposing Friedmann. One Haaretz writer compared the appointment of Friedmann to a hypothetical appointment of convicted traitor Tali Fahima as head of the Shin Bet intelligence service. (The comparison is amusing since Haaretz has long served as cheerleader for Fahima and would probably support her appointment as head of the Shin Bet if it were to take place.)
Meanwhile, the leftist apparatchik and godmother of the Oslo debacle, Yossi Beilin, had a public fit when he heard the news of Friedmann’s appointment. Far-left Meretz Knesset member and Peace Now leader Avshalom Vilan raged in the press at the fact that an academic, not a political hack, was being appointed – someone the Left would have difficult in bullying into political compliance.
A retired Supreme Court Justice and advocate of judicial activism, Mishael Cheshin, openly threatened Professor Friedmann with violence, promising to “cut off the arm of anyone who raises a hand against the court.”
The Israeli law enforcement system has long been little more than the occupied territory of the Israeli Left. The attorney general does little to hide his political agenda when he makes decisions about investigations and indictments.
Friedmann’s appointment upsets this cozy undemocratic arrangement and threatens to strip the Left of its unelected de facto domination by democratizing Israel’s legal system. And that’s the first piece of really good news in Israel in quite a while.
Steven Plaut, a frequent contributor to The Jewish Press, is a professor at Haifa University. His book “The Scout” is available at Amazon.com. He can be contacted at stevenplaut@yahoo.com.
Source
Lebanese primeminister calls for sanctions against Syria
Premier Fouad Saniora said the bus blasts that killed three people and wounded 18 on Tuesday "wouldn't terrorize us" and the March 14 majority coalition blamed the crime on the Syrian regime, calling for sanctions on Damascus.
Saniora, in an address to the Lebanese on the eve of the second anniversary of ex-Premier Rafik Hariri's assassination, said the bomb blasts in commuting buses northeast of Beirut were "criminal acts of violence."
"We will not be terrorized and we will not be scared off. We will chase the criminals," he pledged.
Saniora said "we will not give up our commitment to serve justice" in the 2005 Hariri assassination and related crimes.
Addressing families of the three people who were killed in the bus blasts in Ain Alaq earlier in the day, Saniora said: "Their rights will not be lost irrespective of the cost."
"We will not succumb … we are not a sphere of influence for anyone…The Lebanese will not compromise on their freedoms, security and safety… and the nature of their regime," he added.
In a related development, the majority March 14 coalition which backs the Saniora government said in a statement the bus blasts are "a new massacre … targeting innocent civilians."
"We hold the Syrian regime fully responsible for this crime and we charge this regime of attempting to change Lebanon into another Iraq to destroy its security and stability in order to torpedo efforts aimed at setting up an international tribunal" that should try suspects in the Hariri assassination and related crimes.
The alliance, in a statement after an emergency meeting, urged the Arab League, the U.N. Security Council and the international community to "shoulder your responsibilities in lifting the Syrian regime's aggression off Lebanon."
The statement called for imposing sanctions on Syrian President Bashar Assad's regime and for dispatching U.N. peacekeepers to "control the Lebanese-Syrian borders that would halt the flow of weapons to tools of this (Syrian) regime."
It also urged major factions in the opposition, in reference to Hizbullah and Amal, to "shoulder your responsibility in confronting efforts by the Syrian regime to change Lebanon into another Iraq by immediately approving the creation of the international tribunal and returning to the dialogue table."
The alliance also called on its supporters to take part in the popular ceremony scheduled for Wednesday to commemorate the second anniversary of the Hariri assassination in Beirut's Martyrs' Square.
Source
Saniora, in an address to the Lebanese on the eve of the second anniversary of ex-Premier Rafik Hariri's assassination, said the bomb blasts in commuting buses northeast of Beirut were "criminal acts of violence."
"We will not be terrorized and we will not be scared off. We will chase the criminals," he pledged.
Saniora said "we will not give up our commitment to serve justice" in the 2005 Hariri assassination and related crimes.
Addressing families of the three people who were killed in the bus blasts in Ain Alaq earlier in the day, Saniora said: "Their rights will not be lost irrespective of the cost."
"We will not succumb … we are not a sphere of influence for anyone…The Lebanese will not compromise on their freedoms, security and safety… and the nature of their regime," he added.
In a related development, the majority March 14 coalition which backs the Saniora government said in a statement the bus blasts are "a new massacre … targeting innocent civilians."
"We hold the Syrian regime fully responsible for this crime and we charge this regime of attempting to change Lebanon into another Iraq to destroy its security and stability in order to torpedo efforts aimed at setting up an international tribunal" that should try suspects in the Hariri assassination and related crimes.
The alliance, in a statement after an emergency meeting, urged the Arab League, the U.N. Security Council and the international community to "shoulder your responsibilities in lifting the Syrian regime's aggression off Lebanon."
The statement called for imposing sanctions on Syrian President Bashar Assad's regime and for dispatching U.N. peacekeepers to "control the Lebanese-Syrian borders that would halt the flow of weapons to tools of this (Syrian) regime."
It also urged major factions in the opposition, in reference to Hizbullah and Amal, to "shoulder your responsibility in confronting efforts by the Syrian regime to change Lebanon into another Iraq by immediately approving the creation of the international tribunal and returning to the dialogue table."
The alliance also called on its supporters to take part in the popular ceremony scheduled for Wednesday to commemorate the second anniversary of the Hariri assassination in Beirut's Martyrs' Square.
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