DAILY ALERT

In-Depth Issues:

U.S.: Israeli Strike on Iranian Nuclear Facilities Won't Help - Orly Azoulay (Ynet News)
    Israel lacks the military capability to neutralize Iran's nuclear facilities, according to a report on strategies to deal with Iran's nuclear program published Monday by the U.S. army.
    The report compiled by the U.S. Military Academy said the Israel Air Force could not carry out a complicated strike deep in Iranian territory due to the distance separating the two countries, and Israel's lack of access to bases situated closer to Iran.
    "Israel can attack pinpoint targets, yet could not lead a campaign against all Iranian nuclear targets," the report concluded.

Expert: Saudis Have Radicalized 80% of U.S. Mosques - Haviv Rettig (Jerusalem Post)
    Over 80% of mosques in the U.S. "have been radicalized by Saudi money and influence," according to Yehudit Barsky, who heads the Division on Middle East and International Terrorism at the American Jewish Committee and is executive editor of Counterterrorism Watch.
    For each mosque they invested in, the Saudis sent along their own imam (teacher-cleric), meaning that "the people now in control of teaching religion [to American Muslims] are extremists."
    Discussing mainstream Muslim organizations in America, she noted that the Islamic Society of North America "supports the Muslim Brotherhood and the Saudi regime."
    The Islamic Circle of North America "is composed of members of Jamaat e-Islami, a Pakistani Islamic radical organization similar to the Muslim Brotherhood that helped to establish the Taliban."
    The Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) was "founded in the 1980s by pro-Hamas activists."
    "Some of the leaders have even condoned suicide bombings in Israel and against American armed forces."

Dutch Islamist Trial Hears of Gruesome Films - Wendel Broere (Reuters)
    A group of suspected Islamists, including the jailed killer of a Dutch filmmaker, watched films of beheadings, a court heard as they went on trial on Monday in Amsterdam for plotting attacks and belonging to a terrorist group.

Kaare Kristiansen Dies, Resigned from Nobel Prize Committee after Arafat Award - Greer Fay Cashman (Jerusalem Post)
    Kaare Kristiansen, 85, who in 1994 won the hearts of Israelis when he resigned from the Nobel Committee rather than be a party to awarding the Nobel Peace Prize to Yasser Arafat, has died.
    Kristiansen explained that he in good conscience could not bestow a Nobel Prize on someone with a record of terrorism such as Arafat.

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Global Commentary and Think-Tank Analysis (Best of U.S., UK, and Israel):

Observations:

An Absence of Morality - Editorial (Jerusalem Post)

• It is hard to imagine a people for whom blowing oneself up in a crowd of innocents is not considered an act of barbarism. Yet it is hard to escape the impression that the Palestinians, even today, remain such a people. How else is one to interpret the antiseptic Palestinian response to Monday's atrocity in Netanya, in which five were murdered and 55 wounded?
• "I believe that this harms Palestinian interests and is another act to sabotage efforts to revive the peace process and to sabotage the Palestinian elections," said Saeb Erekat. But is it wrong? Is there anything morally wrong with slaughtering innocent Israelis?
• We Israelis can hardly ignore the fact that the most popular Palestinian groups and individuals seem to be those most associated with terror against Israel.
• The notion that Palestinians arrogate to themselves the right to impose and execute a death sentence on every Israeli man, woman, and child says to us that, in Palestinian eyes, we have no right to exist. What the president of Iran and the leaders of Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and Hizballah say openly - that Israel should be "wiped off the map" - the terror attacks clearly attempt to put into practice.