Pallywood and the dishonesty of James Zogby

From Wikipedia:

James Joseph Zogby (born 1945) is the founder and president of the Arab American Institute (AAI), a Washington, D.C.–based organization that serves as a political and policy research arm of the Arab-American community. He is Managing Director of Zogby Research Services, LLC, specializing in research and communications and undertaking polling across the Arab world. In September 2013 President Obama appointed Zogby to the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom. Zogby is a lecturer and scholar on Middle East issues and a Visiting Professor of Social Research and Public Policy at New York University Abu Dhabi. From 2001 to 2017 he was a member of the Executive Committee of the Democratic National Committee.

A prominent Arab leader, Democrat and pollster - one would expect a minimum level of honesty from such a person, and a backlash from his own party when he crosses a line, right?

He tweeted:

His photos include the one on the lower left, which is twice Photoshopped - it would be impossible for a soldier to maintain his balance like that.

What about the other photos of soldiers seemingly pointing their guns at innocent Palestinians?

Besides the optical illusion of a two dimensional photo making it impossible to see whether the guns are actually pointed at someone, there is another issue: this is how soldiers carry guns.

See this photo of a US soldier in Afghanistan:

And others from Afghanistan:

Given the right caption, any of these innocent photos can be twisted to look like US troops are terrorizing Afghan civilians, with guns pointed in the direction of children.

Pallywood isn't always the staged and Photoshopped photos Often it is the framing/captionng of an innocent event to make it appear as if it is malicious.

Another example from Twitter yesterday:

Israeli occupation forces humiliated and abused Palestinian civilians as they searched them at the military checkpoints installed around the Ibrahimi Mosque in the West Bank city of #Hebron. pic.twitter.com/JPyTG4VMgc

— Palestine Live (@pallive_en) December 16, 2019

The video shows no such thing, but the people who follow the account are primed to believe the lie because of how it was presented.

It was pointed out to Zogby that at least one of his photos were Photoshopped. He doesn't care; he didn't take down the tweet nor did he acknowledge it. He knows he is being dishonest in both the text and the photos, but he doesn't care - he is not about truth but to push anti-Israel propaganda.

The real question is why the Democratic Party he is so heavily involved with tolerates someone who is so obviously dishonest. 

(h/t @kweansmom)

---

---

We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.

Read More

Why is Bernie Sanders such a magnet for antisemites? (Daled Amos)

By Daled Amos

One thing you can say about Bernie Sanders: He sure does have some unexpected friends and admirers.

Bernie Sanders and Farrakhan

Farrakhan was very clear in 2016 that he was not supporting Bernie Sanders.
You won't find him supporting Sanders for president now either.

And yet in 2016 Farrakhan went out of his way not to attack him as one of those "Satanic Jews".
According to Farrakhan, Bernie Sanders is one of those "decent" Jews:

"I have to say this about Mr. Sanders: he's a Jew, not a so-called Jew. He's trying to be decent..."

Bernie Sanders and Sharpton

'Nuff said.

Bernie Sanders and Ilhan Omar

Earlier this year, Omar attacked AIPAC and accused her Jewish fellow Congressmen of dual loyalty:

Bernie Sanders wasted no time. During a conference call hosted by James Zogby, founder of the Arab American Institute, Sanders confirmed that he had talked to Omar that night to give her his support.

Of course, it did not take long for Omar to again accuse Jews of dual loyalty:

But that did not dissuade Sanders. In June, Teen Vogue had a piece on how Bernie Sanders Teamed Up With Ilhan Omar and Pramila Jayapal on a Plan to Cancel All Student Loan Debt

Bernie Sanders and James Zogby

In Lovable Bernie Whacks Israel, Charles Krauthammer wrote in 2016 that

two of Sanders' appointments to the 15-member platform committee are so stunning. Professor Cornel West not only has called the Israeli prime minister a war criminal, but openly supports the BDS movement (boycott, divestment and sanctions), the most important attempt in the world to ostracize and delegitimize Israel.

West is joined on the committee by the longtime pro-Palestinian activist James Zogby. Together, reported The New York Times, they "vowed to upend what they see as the party's lopsided support of Israel." [emphasis added]

Actually, lopsided would an apt description of Zogby's defense of Hezbollah and Palestinian terrorists.

In 2006, Zogby defended Hezbollah's use of human shield's:

Zogby: I've said from the beginning that [Hezbollah's] behavior was reckless and provocative. But Israel bears the responsibility. It's like saying what Mort is saying and what those who want to make that case is saying, the girl who wore the short skirt deserved to get raped--

James Taranto commented:

Zogby's claim that Hezbollah bears no responsibility for civilian casualties is outrageous, and his likening of Hezbollah to a rape victim is scandalously so.

Elder of Ziyon quotes this example and gives another, one of Zogby defending Yasir Arafat. In an interview with Paula Zahn on CNN:

ZAHN: Mr. Zogby, how much responsibility do you think Yasser Arafat should bear for the ongoing troubles in the Middle East?

ZOGBY: Well, listen, it's -- we live in a kind of an "Alice in Wonderland" world here, where Ariel Sharon is the man of peace and Arafat becomes the obstacle to peace. We've lionized one and demonized the other, and I simply don't think this picture is accurate. The man has flaws...

Imagine a world where Ariel Sharon removes every last Israeli from Gaza and gives it, along with the infrastructure intact, to Hamas while Arafat rejects Clinton's attempt to forge a peace deal -- this is the "Wonderland" Zogby inhabits. Arafat did not have flaws -- he was responsible for the deaths of unarmed civilians because they were Jews.

Bernie Sanders and Cornel West

Krauthammer writes about Cornel West:

West doesn't even pretend, as do some left-wing "peace" groups, to be opposing Israeli policy in order to save it from itself. He makes the simpler case that occupation is unconscionable oppression and that until Israel abandons it, Israel deserves to be treated like apartheid South Africa -- anathematized, cut off, made to bleed morally and economically.

Like Zogby, Cornel West, a BDS proponent, also makes excuses for Palestinian terrorism, writing that  the actions of Hamas “pale in the face of the US-supported Israeli slaughter of innocent civilians.” West once accused President Obama of being “most comfortable with upper middle-class white and Jewish men who consider themselves very smart, very savvy and very effective in getting what they want.”

Of course, Bernie Sanders is different.

Bernie Sanders and Linda Sarsour

Last weekend, Sanders made Sarsour his surrogate, allowing her to campaign on his behalf, creating a unique situation considering, as The Jerusalem Post put it, "that Sanders is Jewish and Sarsour is known as an anti-Israel, antisemitic activist."

Actually, what does he have to lose?
The Democrats have the Jewish vote anyway.

With Sarsour -- as with Simone Zimmerman before her -- Sanders can tap into the energy of progressives with minimal cost to a Jewish base which sided with Hillary anyway during the last election and is unlikely to flock to him this time around either. A poll in May showed Biden getting 47% of the Jewish vote among registered Democratic voters, compared to 11% for Sanders and Pete Buttigieg is doing better than either of them in terms of Jewish contributions.

Now we find out that 2 months ago, Sarsour -- along with Bob Bland and Tamika Mallory -- left the Woman's March.

This has been misinterpreted by some as a setback for Sarsour, and by extension, for Sanders:

If you check the article at The Hill, all it says is:

Women’s March has cut ties with three board members who were accused of anti-Semitism and has created a new, diverse board of 16 members

It does not actually say the reason for cutting ties was because of their antisemtism. The article in the Washington Post that The Hill refers to is more expansive on why Bland, Mallory and Sarsour left:

The Women’s March is replacing three inaugural board members who have been dogged by accusations of anti-Semitism, infighting and financial mismanagement.

That article also ties the issue of antisemitism not to Sarsour but to Mallory, who is a big supporter of Farrakhan.

Seth Mandel, editor of the Washington Examiner, was more on-target -- both Women's March in general and Sarsour in particular win:

Whether Sanders will benefit by this arrangement is an open question.

But Sarsour definitely has.

Bernie Sanders and Zahra Billoo

Among those who will be replacing Sarsour is Zahra Billoo, a civil rights lawyer and the executive director of CAIR-SFBA.

She is also an antisemite.

As indicated by tweet

After tweet:

After tweet:

After tweet:

Check out Petra Marquardt-Bigman and Ryan Saavedra for many more such tweets.

And Billoo's hatred extends beyond just hatred of the state of Israel:

California imam Ahmed Billoo recently called for the mass extermination of Jews. Apparently impatient at the border-security protocols at Ben Gurion Airport in Israel, he posted a prayer to Twitter with the hashtag "Zionists": "Oh God, reduce their numbers, exterminate them, and don't leave a single one alive."

Ahmed Billoo's sister is Zahra Billoo, director of the San Francisco branch of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR). She is also an important figure in the Women's March movement, and has appeared alongside her brother at Women's March events.

...[Zahra Billoo] was curiously unwilling to offer any criticism when it came to her brother advocating mass-murder. On the contrary, Zahra Billoo made a heartfelt post to her brother on Facebook a mere few hours after he prayed for the extermination of Jews, apparently in relation to another public stand he had taken: "My brother makes me proud often, but there's a special kind of appreciation I have when he does this - puts his privilege to good use, asserting his rights, speaking out against border harassment, and thereby making it at least somewhat easier for those who are afraid or unable." [emphasis added]

And sure enough, Billoo is also a big fan of -- Bernie Sanders.

Bernie Sanders is a convenient shield for antisemites.

He is Jewish -- but does not advertise that fact.
Sanders rarely talks about it publicly.

He may support Israel, but he adopts the progressive narrative about the extent of Gazan casualties during war between Israel and Hamas, as well as the narrative that makes armed Gazan rioters trying to break through into Israel as nothing more than peaceful protestors.

Sanders is also on-board when it comes to condemning and leveraging aid in order to push Israel (and only Israel) to "make peace".

He boils the conflict down to the simplest terms:

Israel has a right to exist in security, and at the same time the Palestinians have a state of their own.

Who could argue with that?

To be fair, journalist Ron Kampeas finds Bernie Sanders to be typical of Jewish Americans:

Maybe Kampeas is right, and Sanders it typical.
But Sanders does come across as shy about his being a Jews and more defensive than most when it comes to Israel.

More to the point, I don't know if we can be so sanguine about this "norm" of Jewish American.
What really is so Jewish about being progressive?

Daniel Gordis writes that

most American Jews, having lost a sense of peoplehood and then a commitment to religion or Torah, have recently assumed an identity that is focused on little but politics. Yet as a form of politics, Judaism has, so far, found little to say that is uniquely Jewish.

Gordis concludes the thought rather darkly:

And if we have nothing unique to say, does it really matter if American Jews do not survive?

I would suggest that if we Jews in America cannot identify as Jews and feel unique as Jews, then there are those out there who will be only too happy to define our Jewish identity for their own purposes.

And the names of some of those people are on this page.

---

---

We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.

Read More

Rabbi Shmuely 1, James Zogby 0

Yesterday, Rabbi Shmuely Boteach put a full page ad in the New York Times denouncing and disproving Rashida Tlaib's comments on the history of Jews coming to the Holy Land after the Holocaust.

James Zogby, head of the Arab American Institute, tweeted:

This is a dishonest & dangerous assault on ⁦@RashidaTlaib⁩ by far-right Shmuley Boteach. He funnels dark money into attack ads like this that distort the truth & put people’s lives at risk. It’s not an ad, it’s incitement. Shame on @nytimes for running it. #handsoffRashida.

Since Shmuley runs a number of this [sic] hateful attacks each year - i guess the NYT is more interested in the ad revenues. But shouldn’t there be some fact-check screening of these attacks

I responded, asking exactly what in the ad wasn't factual. Because it is completely accurate, including Tlaib's complete quote.

I'm not expecting a response. Because it is easier for a major Arab American leader to baldly lie than to admit that Boteach is right in this case.

---

---

We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.

Read More

Fisking a single sentence of James Zogby

James Zogby, the founder and president of the Arab American Institute, wrote an essay earlier this month that was translated and reproduced in Arabic news sites.

Called "Normalization Doesn't Advance Israeli/Palestinian Peace," the first sentence is all you need to read: "For as long as I can recall, Israelis have sought recognition and acceptance from the Arab World without reciprocity."

He brings some bizarre "proofs" - mainly that the US promised to pressure Israel about the settlements in 1992 in exchange for Arabs ending the secondary boycott of Israel, and Israel didn't stop building (even though there have been very few new settlements since 1992.) Israel never promised anything, and Zogby knows that.

His ending is as sweeping as his beginning, as he rails against Arab nations softening their stance on Israel:

  Israelis have simply never operated in good faith vis-à-vis their dealings with the Arab World, and most especially with the Palestinians. They take and they do not reciprocate. That is why I say "Don't be fooled. Normalization doesn't advance peace and it most certainly doesn't advance Palestinian rights." 

Well, let's see. Egypt's economy was helped a great deal by peace with Israel, and Israel has helped it against ISIS in the Sinai. Jordan effectively uses Israel to defend itself. They both gained lots from their official but cold peace with Israel, including intelligence cooperation.

But Israel offers much more to the Arab world in exchange for peace. Israel wants to help the Arab world with water management, with setting up economic zones of cooperation, with direct trade (and there is already lots of trade under the table), and not least with defending against Iran.

Moreover, peace with Israel can result in the Arab nations having a means to trade goods with Europe through the Mediterranean, as Israel is proposing with a rail line. That is not a small concession!

Zogby is lying, and he knows it.

As a major contributor to the Democratic Party platform, he has bitterly complained that he is typecast as the "anti-Israel guy." This essay alone proves that he absolutely is.

---

---

We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.

Read More

A short Palestinian lexicon (poster)

One of the dumbest tweets in recent memory came from James Zogby, founder of the Arab American Institute, angry that food celebrity Rachael Ray referred to food as Israeli:

Damn it @rachaelray. This is cultural #genocide. It’s not #Israeli food. It’s #Arab (#Lebanese, #Palestinian, #Syrian, #Jordanian). First the Israelis take the land & ethnically cleanse it of Arabs. Now they take their food & culture & claim it’s theirs too! #Shame. https://t.co/1nDXlcfRHA

— James J. Zogby (@jjz1600) December 26, 2017

Yes, Rachael was guilty of "cultural genocide" by calling some salads that are popular in Israel, "Israeli."

So just to explain how Palestinians use language, here is a very short lexicon of Palestinian expressions. Only two of them, but they are quite representative.

Feel free to retweet the poster.

---

---

We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.

Read More

James Zogby's logical fallacies

James Zogby writes in the Huffington Post:

In 1991, Israel's per capita GDP was $14,000. Three years later, after the ending of the secondary boycott and Madrid and Oslo, Israel's per capita GDP had risen to almost $16,000. Palestinians did not fare as well. In 1991, their per capita GDP was $900. Three years later, new Israeli restrictions on Palestinian labor and continued control over all access to and egress from the territories, resulted in the Palestinian per capita GDP only increasing to $1,100.

He uses this as evidence that the ending of the secondary Arab boycott of Israel helped Israel far more than it helped Palestinian Arabs, and therefore for Arab nations to be more careful about how they treat Israel.

The logical fallacies here are breathtaking, and cannot be anything but purposeful.

Firstly, let's look at his numbers themselves. From what he is saying, in the same time period that Israeli per-capita GDP increased by 14%, those of Palestinan Arabs rose by - 22%! So even by his own numbers he proves the exact opposite of what he is trying to say.

Now let's look at the bigger picture. He is implying that Israel's GDP increased because the Arab boycott had been removed. But Israel's per-capita GDP had been increasing steadily before, during and after this time period, showing no causality at all:

Israel	2007	23,383
Israel	2006	20,863
Israel	2005	19,612
Israel	2004	18,804
Israel	2003	17,926
Israel	2002	17,259
Israel	2001	19,143
Israel	2000	19,871
Israel	1999	18,085
Israel	1998	18,418
Israel	1997	18,627
Israel	1996	18,579
Israel	1995	17,601
Israel	1994	15,689
Israel	1993	14,424
Israel	1992	14,939
Israel	1991	13,905
Israel	1990	12,611
Israel	1989	10,973
Israel	1988	11,266
Israel	1987	9,402
Israel	1986	7,944

The only dip that Israel experienced in its growth of GDP was during the depths of the second intifada.

If one wants to see what drives the Palestinian Arab GDP, look at the same time period:

Occupied Palestinian Territory	2007	1,359
Occupied Palestinian Territory	2006	1,261
Occupied Palestinian Territory	2005	1,288
Occupied Palestinian Territory	2004	1,213
Occupied Palestinian Territory	2003	1,117
Occupied Palestinian Territory	2002	1,029
Occupied Palestinian Territory	2001	1,168
Occupied Palestinian Territory	2000	1,307
Occupied Palestinian Territory	1999	1,376
Occupied Palestinian Territory	1998	1,348
Occupied Palestinian Territory	1997	1,312
Occupied Palestinian Territory	1996	1,238
Occupied Palestinian Territory	1995	1,230
Occupied Palestinian Territory	1994	1,123
Occupied Palestinian Territory	1993	936
Occupied Palestinian Territory	1992	1,105
Occupied Palestinian Territory	1991	932
Occupied Palestinian Territory	1990	899
Occupied Palestinian Territory	1989	860
Occupied Palestinian Territory	1988	940
Occupied Palestinian Territory	1987	925
Occupied Palestinian Territory	1986	871

There are two major dips in the Palestinian Arab per-capita GDP - in 1989 and in 2000-2001. They both coincide perfectly with the first and second intifadas!

So if you want to draw conclusions from the statistics, the inescapable conclusion is that Palestinian Arab terror is the major driver for a reduction in Palestinian Arab standards of living. Conversely, relatively peaceful periods show that the Palestinian Arab GDP steadily increases when they aren't as focused on killing Jews.

If Zogby wants to help his Palestinian Arab friends, he should be encouraging them to stop their obsession with violence.

The fact that he isn't doing that speaks volumes.

Read More

James Zogby, Hypocrite

"Best of the Web Today" has a couple of quotes from James Zogby, of the Arab American Institute, blaming Israel wholly for Lebanese civilian deaths:

Cooper: Jim, do you deny that Hezbollah uses civilians or at least, you know, works among and/or hides among women and children?
Zogby: The resistance movement in south Lebanon, I haven't supported the tactics that they've used in the bombings that they've participated in. I cannot see the Israelis attempting to justify the carpet bombing of many areas of Lebanon as continuing to say that they're simply targeting Hezbollah.....
Cooper: Jim, though, I mean, does Hezbollah bear any of the responsibility for any of the civilian casualties?
Zogby: I've said from the beginning that their behavior was reckless and provocative. But Israel bears the responsibility. It's like saying what Mort is saying and what those who want to make that case is saying, the girl who wore the short skirt deserved to get raped--

Now, his logic is abhorrent and offensive, but the only way you can justify Zogby's claim that Hezbollah has no responsibility for the deaths of civilians it is hiding behind is if you claim that the party doing an action is wholly responsible for that action. (Obviously even that is ridiculous, as one cannot compare the morality of purposeful acts with those of inadvertant acts. Beyond that, it completely ignores the fact that Hezbollah started this war.) The only way this makes sense is to assume in this case this is his position - that each action occurs in a vacuum and must be judged as such.

So, one would assume that Zogby would be equally adamant that Palestinian Arabs are wholly responsible for their terror acts, right? That they should be judged in a vacuum, right? Riiiiiiiiight....

ZAHN: Mr. Zogby, how much responsibility do you think Yasser Arafat should bear for the ongoing troubles in the Middle East?

ZOGBY: Well, listen, it's -- we live in a kind of an "Alice in Wonderland" world here, where Ariel Sharon is the man of peace and Arafat becomes the obstacle to peace. We've lionized one and demonized the other, and I simply don't think this picture is accurate. The man has flaws...

ZAHN: But you didn't answer the question. OK, he has...

ZOGBY: The man has flaws. There's no question about it. But remember, they were negotiating up to Taba, right before Ariel Sharon was elected, and they came awful close. It was Barak who pulled his people back. And frankly, I believe that if this administration in Washington had continued to push and if Ariel Sharon had continued the negotiations, we'd probably have a peace settlement by now.

I don't believe that the process fell apart for the reasons that this mythic-historic narrative that Israel constructed is, in fact, right. I think the Palestinians wanted -- Arafat wanted a two-state solution on the West Bank, Gaza with East Jerusalem as a capital. And frankly, the Israelis just weren't willing to give it, and they still aren't willing to give it.

And look at what they're doing now is the best -- the best answer I have. Settlement sizes have doubled. We're building roads and tearing up Palestinian houses and orchards. Palestinians are living in despair. And that before the intifada even began.

According to Zogby, responsibility is something only Jews have. Palestinian Arabs are not responsible for their actions, of course. Israel has no right to respond to terror attacks but PalArabs have every right to respond to "despair."

Even at the end of the first interview above, Zogby shows his double standard by putting Hezbollah terror in "context" but refusing to give israel the same courtesy:

ZUCKERMAN: OK. Let me just say this, we are in a situation here which is called war. War which is instigated by a terrorist organization called the Hezbollah, which attacked innocent people. They had pulled -- the Israelis had withdrawn from a U.N. sanctioned border. It was started by Hezbollah, which has it's (UNINTELLIGIBLE) to attack Israel and to destroy Israel.

Israel is doing this as a matter of self-defense against people who hide among women and children deliberately.

ZOGBY: After 22 years of occupation of the south, a lot of bitterness, a lot of wounds. They're not going to go away overnight. And Israel has not been an innocent bystander all this time, even in the last six years, Mort.

This man, who is a moderate compared to most Arabs, still has an almost psychotic double standard that reflects his own bigotry and bias, and for all the smooth words he speaks on CNN, he is nothing but a hypocrite.

Read More