Free Republic

"Christians ended slavery." Do you think that’s a conservative simpleton’s mock-worthy bombast, embarrassing the rest of us with his black-and-white, unapologetic caricature of American history? No. It is the considered conclusion of a Nobel laureate, a former communist, a secular Jew, and arguably the foremost scholar on American slavery. Robert Fogel (1922-2013), the son of Russian Jewish immigrants, was president of Cornell University’s American Youth for Democracy, investing eight years promoting communism. Meanwhile, he married Enid Morgan, an African-American woman, consequently suffering the ugliness of American racism personally. Eventually, he rejected communism. Apparently, the data didn’t support it. Fogel was...

TheMilitary Court of Appeals has accepted an appeal against the leniency of the sentence handed to Muhammed Awad by the Samaria Military Court, over his part in the brutal murder of five members of the Fogel family in March 2011. Muhammed Awad was originally found guilty of accessory to voluntary manslaughter (the military court's equivalent to murder), failing to prevent a crime, weapons trafficking and conspiracy to carry out a shooting. The military court acquitted Muhammed of the first, most serious charge, finding him guilty only for failing to prevent a crime, as well as the latter two charges, which...

The NSA slide that tech experts say Glenn Greenwald misinterpreted. (The Guardian/NSA, US Federal Government.) Glenn Greenwald has posted a response to his critics today, including myself, titled “;On PRISM, Partisanship, and Propaganda”: “In a Nation post yesterday,” he writes, “Rick Perlstein falsely accuses me of not having addressed the questions about the PRISM story.” Actually I didn’t accuse him of not having addressed “the questions,” but instead a single question, which he still does not address: whether, in his claim that corporations have allowed the National Security Agency direct access to their servers, he misunderstands the meaning of...

The Military Court in Shomron (Samaria) convicted Yazed Hassan Mohammed Awad on Sunday of assisting the murderers of five members of the Fogel family in Itamar on March 11, 2011. According to the charge sheet against him, Awad gave shelter to some of the people involved in the multiple murders and attempted to obstruct justice by briefing the suspects regarding Shin Bet interrogation techniques. In addition, he held two M-16 weapons that were stolen in the course of the murderous attack. The defendant denied the charges but in view of the evidence, the court decided unanimously to convict him. Knesset...

...... Amjad said that he had initiated the murder in Itamar. "I wanted to carry out a terror attack because I wanted to get rid of this life," he said. "There were problems between me and the family. Two years ago my father used to ask me about the studies, and why I smoked, and he would constantly meddle in my personal matters, so I thought of committing suicide. The way I thought of doing this was to carry out a suicide attack in Itamar." Hakim also took credit for the initiative to murder. "We spoke about another subject, which...

A female police officer interrogating one of the murderers of the Fogel family was so revolted by his “defiant” smile, she slapped him across the face. Just days ago, Amjad Awad, one of the two Palestinian cousins who murdered five members of the young Israeli family last March was sentenced to five life sentences. According to Israel’s Channel 2, which reported the incident exclusively [Hebrew link], killer Amjad Awad’s smile “from ear to ear” made the 52-year-old officer lose control: A senior investigator with the Judea and Samaria police district could not control herself when she was faced with the...

An attempt by a Palestinian Authority Arab to enter the community of Itamar on Thursday disguised as a hareidi Jew was thwarted at the last moment. The incident began in the afternoon hours, when the community’s security personnel someone who looked like a Jew wandering near the olive trees adjacent to the community. Itamar’s security coordinator drove to the area, thinking that it was a Jew trying to steal olives. When he reached the olive grove he realized that the man was a disguised Arab. The suspect fled towards the nearby Arab village of Awarta, and was chased by the...

The prosecution does not plan on asking for a death sentence for Amjad Awad, who pleaded guilty on Tuesday to the horrific murders of five members of the Fogel family in Itamar last March. According to a report on Israel’s Channel 10 News, the military prosecution and the defense have reached an agreement, according to which Awad will be sentenced to five life sentences in prison. The report stated that in order to impose a death penalty, unanimous support of all the judges in the panel is required. The prosecution previously attempted to impose a death sentence on a Palestinian...

Glenn Beck arrived in Israel yesterday and broadcast his daily radio show live from Jerusalem earlier today. Beck, who began the show by saying it has been “an incredible weekend,” is in Israel as part of his much-anticipated “Restoring Courage” event, which is intended to show solidarity with the State of Israel and the Jewish People. During the first hour of his show, Beck spent time discussing his visit to Itamar in Samaria [part of the region, along with Judea, that those with less-than-warm feelings for Israel prefer to refer to as the “West Bank”]. While in Itamar, Beck visited...

An Israeli military court has found an 18-year-old Palestinian man guilty of the murder of a settler family in the West Bank, an army spokesman has said. Hakim Awad had confessed to murdering Udi and Ruthie Fogel, and three of their children, as they slept in their home in the Itamar settlement in March. His brother, 19-year-old Amjad Awad, is also standing trial for the attack. The murders shocked Israelis and were also condemned by Palestinian leaders and the international community.

"I'm proud of what I did, I did it all for Palestine," one of the suspects says during an appearance in court, "I would do it again." [snip] Ehud and Ruth Fogel. The parents fought back, attempting to fend off the attackers. Ehud died of stab wounds and Ruth was shot dead by the attackers with a stolen M- 16 gun. The two then left the house, before hearing cries from three-month-old baby Hadas. Awoken by the attack, the baby lay in its crib in the parents’ bedroom. “They went back into the house and stabbed the baby to death...

The Israeli army on Sunday confirmed the recent arrest of two young Palestinian Arabs for the March 11 slaughter of the Fogel family in the northern Samaria Jewish community of Itamar. An army spokesman told Israel Radio that 18-year-old Hakem Awwad and 19-year-old Amjad Awwad confessed to the murders of Udi and Ruth Fogel and three of their young children, and that they showed absolutely no remorse for their crime. Reenacting the murder, the young suspects told security officials that they infiltrated Itamar at around 9 PM armed with knives. They proceeded to enter a home that was empty and...

Dear Tamar, We have never met, nor are we likely to. I am not a Jew nor an Israeli, though for many years I have defended both Jews and Israelis from the physical and political attacks that are made on them. I live in England, though I'm Irish. The Irish used to be great enemies of the English, who did bad things to us, but who gave us their language, something in which we excel. But many years ago, long before you were born, the enmity between the Irish and the English faded. We are not the same people, but...

When terrorists planted bomb in a bag near a bus station killing a Scottish Bible translator studying ancient Hebrew, and wounding dozens more including six Americans -- Reuters decided it was time to explain to its audience what that peculiar Hebraic term, "Terrorist Attack" meant. "Police described the explosion as a “terrorist attack” — Israel’s term for a Palestinian strike," Reuters elucidated. Reuter's term for a terrorist attack turns out to be "Palestinian strike", which suggests a labor rally by terrorists demanding more virgins in paradise and more euphemistic media coverage. If such were their demands, then they got their...

The world was shocked and repulsed by the brutal terrorist slaying of five members of the Udi Fogel family as they slept in their beds this month. The terrorists broke into the Fogel home, and slit the throats of Udi, the father, and baby Hadas, and stabbed 4- year old Elad in the heart. They then killed Yoav,an eleven year old boy, as he read in bed, and overpowered Ruth, the mother of the family as she emerged from the bathroom. Did I mention that the world was repulsed by this act of wanton barbarity ? I meant to say...

Here's a transcript of an interview with Sgt. Edi Itelman (pictured), who is an IDF medic, who was first on the scene at the home of Udi and Ruti Fogel HY"D (May God avenge their blood) on the night that they and three of their children were massacred in Itamar. The interview took place a few hours ago (I missed it) and the transcript was sent to me by one of the participants.

Friday night 3/11/11 in Itamar, Samaria, parents, Udi, 36, and Ruth Fogel, 35, as well as three of their six children, Yoav, 11, Elad, 4, and the 3-month old infant Hadas, were all brutally stabbed to death. The infant Hadas was in fact decapitated. Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, terrorist wing of the Fatah faction headed by Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas, claimed responsibility for the savage attack, characterizing it as a “heroic operation.” Saturday evening (3/12/11) Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addressed the Itamar massacre. Netanyahu’s eloquent remarks included a demand … that the Palestinian Authority stop the incitement that...

As Meotti tells me, “Those who profess to deplore violence on both sides of the Israeli-Palestinian equation have remained relatively silent on the slaughtering of this Israeli family. No words of condemnation about the killing of these innocents have been heard from the human-rights groups, the same faction that is so quick to vilify Israel for defending itself from terrorist attacks, especially when Palestinian citizens lose their lives during a retaliatory foray by Israel. There is no other conclusion to draw: When the deaths of Jewish innocents go unmourned and unacknowledged, it is because Jewish lives do not count. Where’s...

The mourning members of the Fogel family who escaped the terrorist slaughter of their family release footage of their loved ones in happier times. As all of the Jewish people mourn with the survivors, they also can join the survivors in recalling joy. Rabbi Udi Fogel, his wife Ruth, and three of their six small children – Elad, Yoav and baby Hadas – were butchered by Arab terrorists as they lay in their beds Friday night, the Jewish Sabbath.

In a special interview with Israel National News, the IDF Commander of the Judea and Samaria Division, Brigadier General Nitzan Alon, said progress has been made in the investigation of the horrific attack in Itamar, which left a married couple and three of their children dead. Alon said dozens of suspects had been arrested by the Israel Security Agency to clarify their connection to, or involvement in, the murders of the Fogel family. Alon unequivocally rejected claims that removing checkpoints made the attacks possible and put Jewish residents of Judea and Samaria at greater risk, insisting the current IDF doctrine...