Article Roundup: Maariv Does a Series on Soldiers, ETC.

Maariv's Online site, Nrg, is doing a series of stories on Soldiers' complaints about how the war was executed. The story is in Hebrew, but I have translated the first part. It's a great story and deserves to be read if you can find a full English translation:

"We Paid the Price for the Lack of Training."
Amir Bochbot (sp?)

The war has ended, and the Reservists, that have kept everything inside, are revealing the dimensions fo the rejection and oversight: Obsolete equipement that wasn't fit for battle, hazy orders, and not enough treaning. *First in a series.

They've returned from battle with a "full stomach": Within the Reservists that have begun to leave Lebanon in the past few days, with the beginning of a period of a cease-fire, hard criticism is heard about the manner in which the Army conducted itself during the battle against Hezbollah, including the sharpness of guilt in the line of topics: like the faulty preparation, shortage of equipment, the confusion in the orders, and the incorrect utilization of the forces
[...]

The Israel Project has collected various statistics of what has happened in Israel one year after the Disengagement:

Disengagement: One Year Later

Aug. 15 marks the one-year anniversary of Israel's disengagement initiative, when Israel voluntarily withdrew all of its civilians and forces from Gaza and turned the entire area and part of the West Bank over to the Palestinian Authority (P.A.). Israel took those steps in hopes of paving the way for peace and a potential independent Palestinian state.

The disengagement plan required Israelis to give up their homes, places of work and worship, their schools and the farms where they grew everything from celery to bell peppers. After making these painful sacrifices for peace, Israelis for the past year have faced serious threats from Palestinian terror groups in Gaza that have fired rockets into Israel almost immediately after the withdrawal was completed.

After the withdrawal:
#1,360 of the evictees - 51 percent of adults - are still unemployed [1]
#1,400 families continue to live in temporary housing [2]
#100 families live in hotels [3]
#It will take at least 1 more year to build permanent housing for those uprooted from their homes [4]
#38 of the 220 farmers living in Gaza were able to resume limited agricultural work but lost their markets [5]
#140 of the evacuees have set up businesses; by contrast, 620 owned businesses before disengagement [6]
#30 percent of schoolchildren who had to leave their communities aren't able to adjust to their new schools [7]
#The cost of disengagement to date - NIS 9 billion ($2 billion) - is expected to increase [8]
#0 Israelis, dead or alive, remain in Gaza [9]

READ THE REST...
Ynet news writes about a producer that organized 50 weddings for couples from the North, who had to cancel their wedding because of the war.

Rabbi Aryeh Spero tells us why Why Liberals Refuse to Admit the Reality of Islamic Fascism.

Janet Albrechtsen, from The Australian explains that The West must change its ways because tolerance could be the death of us.

Julie Burchill, of Haaretz speaks about Bleeding-heart ignoramuses.

Memri publishes an article that you won't see anywhere in the international MSM. The Director General of Al-Arabiya TV defends President Bush's statements last week when, after the British terror plot was foiled, he said that the West was in a war against "Islamic Fascists".

In an August 14, 2006 article titled "They Are Fascists" in the London daily Al-Sharq Al-Awsat, the paper's former editor-in-chief and current director general of Al-Arabiya TV, Abd Al-Rahman Al-Rashed, defended President George W. Bush's description of the individuals who were arrested last week before they could carry out their plan to blow up passenger airplanes.

The following are excerpts from the article, in the original English:

"The Protesting Groups... Would Have Done Better to... Denounce the Deeds of Those Affiliated to Islam Who Harmed All Muslims and Islam"

"Many of us are only concerned with reputation and image, our image in the media, and the reputation of the Muslims in the world, but they do not care about reforming the original source, their children.

"When U.S. President George W. Bush described those who plotted to kill thousands of passengers in ten airliners as Muslim fascists, protests from a number of Islamic societies in the West and the East were voiced against this description.

"What is wrong with using a bad adjective to describe a terrorist as long as he is willing to personally call himself an Islamist; declares his stance, schemes, and aims; while his supporters publicly call for killing of those whom they consider infidels, or disagree with them religiously or politically?

"The strange thing is that the protesting groups, which held a press conference, would have done better to have held it to denounce the deeds of those affiliated to Islam, who harmed all Muslims and Islam."

"Bush Did Not Say That the Muslims Were Fascists; He Said That Muslim Fascists Were the Problem" Read the Rest...