Showing posts with label Linkdump. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Linkdump. Show all posts

Monday, January 14, 2019

From Ian:

NGO Monitor: EAPPI: The World Council of Churches’ Training Camp for Anti-Israel Advocacy
Executive Summary Click Here for Full Report [pdf]
  • EAPPI, the World Council of Churches’ flagship project on Israel and the Arab-Israel conflict, has brought 1,800 volunteers to the West Bank to “witness life under occupation.” The World Council of Churches does not run similar activities in other conflict zones. By singling out Israel, EAPPI embodies antisemitism, as defined in the International Holocaust Remembrance Association’s working definition.
  • Despite marketing itself as a human rights and protection program, EAPPI places significant emphasis on political advocacy before, during, and after the trip. When volunteers return to their home countries and churches, they engage in anti-Israel advocacy, such as BDS (boycott, divestment, and sanctions) campaigns and comparing Israel to apartheid South Africa and Nazi Germany.
  • Participants are selected by country-specific non-governmental organizations (NGOs) known as “National Coordinators.” The National Coordinators are also active in BDS and other delegitimization campaigns against Israel.
  • EAPPI receives funding from a variety of sources, including the WCC and National Coordinators. Funding from different governments is directed to EAPPI through the National Coordinators and via UNICEF.
  • EAPPI contributes to a UN “Working Group” consisting of a number of UN agencies and NGOs that collaborate on and coordinate politicized anti-Israel campaigns in the West Bank. In this capacity, EAPPI does “a lot of administrative work which is fed into UN systems.”
  • EAPPI partners with a number of political NGOs in the region, including groups that support BDS campaigns against Israel and/or that accuse Israel of “war crimes.”
  • The significant problems with EAPPI, as laid out in this report, should be seen in light of the antisemitism1 and demonization that emerges from EAPPI’s parent body (World Council of Churches), partners, and affiliated staff.
World Council of Churches trainees use antisemitic rhetoric, advocate BDS
WCC leadership and EAPPI volunteers have repeatedly made comparisons of Israeli actions to those of Nazi Germany in their advocacy sessions. For example, WCC general secretary Dr. Olav Fyske Tveit said: “I heard about the occupation of my country during the five years of World War II as the story of my parents. Now I see and hear the stories of 50 years of occupation.”

In 2017, an observer Rev. Gordon Timbers of the Presbyterian Church of Canada gave a presentation. When an audience member asked if “Jewish people who go in to see...the model of the gas chambers” see similarities between that and the West Bank, Timbers responded that “there are similarities,” including the use of identification papers.

South African EAPPI activist Itani Rasalanavho said during an “Apartheid Week” event in his home country that “the time has come to say that the victims of the Holocaust have now become the perpetrators.”

In a presentation by Rev. Joan Fisher, an EAPPI activist, she quotes a Palestinian cleric as saying: “We are sympathetic to the suffering of our Jewish brothers and sisters in the Holocaust, but you don’t deal with one injustice by creating another injustice.”

The IHRA Working Definition of Antisemitsm states that “drawing comparisons of contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis” is an example of antisemitism.

The WCC supports boycotts and divestment from settlements, but EAPPI activists have called for a boycott of all of Israel.

The EAPPI publication “Faith Under Occupation” called in 2012 for “sanctions and suspension of US aid to Israel,” to “challenge Israel in local and international courts” and “economic boycotts.”

EAPPI National Coordinator in South Africa Dudu Mahlangu-Masango signed a letter to then-president Jacob Zuma calling “on our government and civil society to instigate broad-based boycott, divestment and sanctions on Israel” in 2012. She repeated this call in a 2018 television interview, calling for “total sanctions” on Israel.
Caroline Glick: The New York Times' War on Israel and Jews Who Support It
Following the 2016 presidential election, Weisman wrote a book which purported to be about anti-Semitism titled, (((Semitism))): Being Jewish in America in the Age of Trump.

Weisman did three things in his book. He used the presence of antisemitism on the right as a means to castigate the entire Republican party and conservative movement as antisemitic. He ignored and dismissed antisemitism on the Left. And finally, Weisman attacked Judaism, Jews who observe Judaism, and Jews who support Israel.

Weisman accused pro-Israel American Jews of disloyalty to America, arguing, “The American Jewish obsession with Israel has taken our eyes off not only the politics of our own country, the growing gulf between rich and poor, and the rising tide of nationalism but also our own grounding in faith.”

Weisman’s January 4 article in the Times was an amplification of the arguments he made in his book. Again he ignored left wing anti-Semitism. He regurgitated Goldberg’s allegations of Israeli moral infirmity. He defended Tlaib and Omar and their hatred for Israel. And thne, Weisman insisted that American Jewry should forget its ties to Jewish tradition and to the Jewish people and instead embrace an identity based entirely on leftist ideology and propaganda.

In his words, “American Jewry has been going its own way for 150 years, a drift that has created something of a new religion, or at least a new branch of one of the world’s most ancient faiths.”

It is hard to know how influential the Times‘ ever-escalating campaign against Jews will be on the American Jewish community. Survey results and other data indicate that the vast majority of American Jews are not buying the claim that Israel is morally infirm, incapable of discerning its national interest, and deserving of hatred and destruction.

Most American Jews don’t think that American Jews should tell Israel how to handle the security and other challenges it faces. And even as anti-Israel groups in the American Jewish community receive adulation and attention disproportionate to their small numbers, they do not seem to have built major inroads into the Jewish community. This explains why their efforts are directed towards weakening existing Jewish institutions rather than building their own. Their constituencies are too small to support them.

But whether the New York Times succeeds or fails in its campaign to mainstream leftist antisemitism, shame pro-Israel American Jews, and detach the Jewish community in the U.S. from Israel and the rest of the Jewish world, it is worth taking note of, and condemning, what the newspaper is attempting to do.

From Ian:

'Israeli strike targeted Iranian, Hezbollah commanders'
The Israeli strike on Iranian warehouses in Damascus on Friday was timed to target a meeting of Hezbollah and Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps commanders who were meeting with Syrian military leaders, the Kuwaiti newspaper Al-Jadira reported Monday.

Al-Jadira quoted sources in the Revolutionary Guards who said the Syrian, Iranian, and Hezbollah commanders had convened to discuss a joint Russian-Turkish plan to attack the al-Qaida-affiliated jihadist Nusra Front group in Idlib in northwestern Syria.

The sources told the Kuwaiti paper that the strike came moments after the meeting adjourned and badly wounded two Revolutionary Guard commanders and a number of Hezbollah and Syrian military personnel.

In a highly unusual step, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu confirmed on Sunday that Israel was responsible for the strike on the Damascus airport.

"Just in the past 36 hours the IDF struck Iranian targets in Damascus, proving we are more determined than ever to take action against Iran in Syria," Netanyahu said in the weekly cabinet meeting.

Syrian state media reported the strike and claimed that air defenses intercepted most of the missiles. Hezbollah's Al-Manar television reported that the attack covered a wider area than usual, ranging from the eastern Damascus suburb of Dmeir to the village of Dimas in the west near the Lebanon border.

Also on Monday, an Iranian cargo plane crashed in the city of Karaj, near Tehran.
Satellite photos show Iranian missile depot allegedly leveled by Israeli strike
On Sunday evening, Israeli website Intelli Times published photos showing the devastation at the site, saying the same structure had been struck in 2016 after it was identified as a depot housing M-600 surface-to-surface missiles, the Syrian version of the Iranian-made Fateh-110 missiles.

The intelligence blog said the building had been restored later that year, but was now completely destroyed.

It published side-by-side satellite photos, saying one was taken on Friday — where the building can be seen — and the other was taken on Sunday, with the building gone.

On Saturday, Intelli Times reported that hours before the Israeli strike, an Iranian Boeing 747 cargo plane had landed at the airport and unloaded its cargo at a site previously targeted three times by Israel. The aircraft then returned to Iran through Iraqi airspace.

On Friday, the official news agency SANA reported that Syrian air defense batteries opened fire on “hostile Israel missiles” and intercepted “most” of them, a common claim of the Syrian military, which many defense analysts believe to be false or overstated.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor said that “two areas hosting military positions of Iranian forces and the Lebanese Hezbollah movement have been targeted.”

The sites were near the airport and around the Kisweh area south of Damascus, the observatory said.

Why Israel Chose to End Its Ambiguity over Syria Strikes
It is important to note that this internal debate is a major factor in why Israel suddenly chose to end the ambiguity over its operations against Iran in Syria, the transfer of high-quality weapons to Hezbollah, and the advancement of precision missiles and rockets in Syria and Lebanon.

In an interview with The New York Times, the outoging chief of staff Gadi Eisenkot said that Israel had carried out thousands of such attacks, most of them from the air, and others by special units and surface missiles. Prime Minister Benjamin Netayahu repeated this message in the weekly cabinet meeting on Sunday, partly perhaps because Israel wants to make sure that the Iranian leadership is fully aware of the losses and damage they are suffering in Syria under Suleimani, and of the resources they have expended in vain trying to entrench themselves there.

Israel has an intelligence and aerial advantage in the region, and this led to Suleimani's inability to set up shop in Syria. In fact, he wasted tens or even hundreds of millions of dollars on this adventure. None of that has harmed his standing in Iran, however, which is still allowing him to continue his plans to make Iran and Shiite Islam the true powerhouse in the Middle East.

Iran has already cut some of its budgets to foreign proxies, including Hezbollah, and the debate inside the country goes on. Israel meanwhile, is trying to show the all different Iranian camps what the truth is. Israel has an interest in making Iranians understand that these efforts by Suleiman — which Israel has foiled in recent years — cost huge sums, something that is terrribly lacking in the welfare of the people.

As such, Israel decided that it was time to end its policy of ambiguity so that Iranians will finally know why senior Revolutionary Guards officials are coming home in coffins.
Why Lift the Fog Off IDF Actions in Syria?
Former Foreign Ministry director general Dore Gold said that there are always military operations around elections, “and now given the nature of the threat it is certainly reasonable that those military operations that have started already a couple of years ago will continue.”

He said that those attributing political considerations to Netanyahu going public now with the attacks would be on stronger ground “if these military operations just started now.” But, he said, “considering this is a continuation of past policy as articulated by the outgoing chief of staff, I think these arguments lose ground.”

Gold said that when Israel takes credit for an operation of this sort, “it becomes part of its deterrence posture – there is no longer a doubt, and it is now clear that Israel will do what is necessary to prevent the buildup of an Iranian military presence on Syrian soil.”

Taking responsibility, he said, “adds credibility to Israel's statements about not allowing Iran to convert Syria into a satellite state.”

The timing, he said, is not connected to the elections, but rather to the US intention to remove its forces from Syria.

“I think the discussion of a US withdrawal has perhaps given the Iranians a sense that they now can just take over Syria.,” he said. Israel's taking responsibility for attacks there sends them a clear message that they cannot. It also sends a message that even with the lingering tensions with Moscow over the spy plane incident, Jerusalem will not be deterred from taking action in Syria when it deems it necessary.

Jacob Nagel, who formerly served under Netanyahu as his national security advisor, also mentioned the withdrawal of the US troops as one of the reasons to take credit now.

He said that Israel has spelled out its red lines in Syria for a long time: that it will not allow a terrorist presence on the Golan border, that it will not allow the transfer of precision arms from Iran to Hezbollah, and that it will not allow an Iranian military buildup in the country.

Nagel said regarding the reason for taking responsibility for the attacks now: “Israel wants to make clear to everyone who will listen that we are determined, and will not allow our red lines be crossed.”

Sunday, January 13, 2019

From Ian:

Keep Mahmoud Abbas out of the U.S. for funding terror
If someone paid a terrorist in order to murder an American, the US would certainly prohibit that person’s entry into the country. If someone who funded terror against Americans traveled to the US, the US would certainly be expected to arrest him as soon as he set his foot on American soil.

If someone paid a terrorist after he murdered an American, the treatment should be no different. Americans would expect their government to prohibit the entry of that person who rewards killers of Americans, and should he arrive at America's borders they would expect that he be detained for interrogation.

Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas, who plans to come to New York City this week, does exactly that. He pays terrorists after they murder not only Israelis but also Americans.

Abdallah Barghouti built the bombs that murdered 67 people. One of his bombs was planted at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem in 2002 and also killed five Americans: Janis Ruth Coulter, David Gritz, Marla Bennett, Dina Carter and Benjamin Blutstein. Under PA law from 2004 and regulations instituted by Abbas himself in 2011, terrorist murderer Barghouti has been rewarded with a monthly salary which by today exceeds over $200,000 in payments.

Ibrahim Hamed planned bombings in which 53 people were murdered, and Americans were among them. Shoshana Judy Greenbaum, aged 31, who was murdered in the Sbarro Pizza shop suicide bombing in 2001, was 5 months pregnant when killed. Another American citizen who was murdered in that bombing was Malki Roth, aged 15. Under Abbas' “Pay for Slay” program Hamed has already received $143,000.

Boston teenager Ezra Schwartz and two others were murdered by terrorist Muhammad Al-Hroub in 2015. Abbas’ reward program has already paid him nearly $16,000 in salary payments.
Top minister suggests barring Abbas from West Bank over PA’s anti-Hamas steps
Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan on Sunday suggested barring Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas from returning to the West Bank when he next travels abroad, claiming the PA leader was “one of the main instigators of violence on the southern border” and contributed nothing to the diplomatic process.

Abbas, Erdan told Israel Radio, was responsible for the ongoing turmoil on the Israel-Gaza border through his ongoing economic pressure on Hamas as he tries to break the terror group’s grip over the enclave.

“The one really responsible behind the scenes for all that is happening is Abu Mazen,” he said, using Abbas’s nickname. “He is the one to move inspectors out of the Rafah Crossing, he is the one sanctioning Hamas in order to pressure Hamas — pressure that is bleeding over to us.”

The Likud minister said the government should consider taking action against Abbas in the coming months as his policy is “undeniably to foment unrest and incite against Israel, whether directly or through sanctions on Hamas.”

“Maybe we should go as far as to consider one of the next times Abu Mazen leaves not to allow him to come back, because today he makes no contribution to the diplomatic process. He’s only doing damage with his attitude toward Hamas,” he said.
Conservatives Can Fix the United Nations
Many conservatives despise the United Nations. “The Secretariat building in New York has thirty-eight stories,” John Bolton said in 1994 while a lawyer in the private sector. “If it lost ten stories, it wouldn’t make a bit of difference.” Bolton’s subsequent tenure as ambassador to the United Nations and now National Security Advisor has not changed his attitude. While Bolton focused his criticism on UN inefficiency, criticisms of the almost seventy-five-year-old institution range the gambit: encroachment on sovereignty, impunity of its officials, corruption, anti-Semitism , obsession with if not malice toward Israel, and even violations of the Geneva Conventions.

The Many Criticisms of UN

On most counts, critics are correct. The UN of today bears little resemblance to the body envisioned at its creation. The UN had its beginnings against the backdrop of World War II, when the United States, United Kingdom, Soviet Union, and Republic of China met at the Dumbarton Oaks Conference to begin the process that would culminate in the UN’s formation on October 24, 1945. The original UN had four goals : To keep peace throughout the world; to develop friendly relations among nations; to help nations work together to improve the lives of the poor, and to encourage respect for each other’s rights and freedoms; and to harmonize nations to achieve these goals.

In practice, such broad and heady ambitions have given cover to an ever-expanding array of organizations, easy to form, easier to expand, and almost impossible to end. The UN created the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) in 1949, for example, to address Palestinians displaced by Israel’s 1948 War of Independence. In 1951, UNRWA outlined a three-year plan to resettle Palestinian refugees and, yet, sixty-five years later, UNRWA has a nearly $1 billion budget , even as the number of first generation displaced or refugees dwindles to just a few thousand. Or, consider the United Nations Mission for the Referendum in Western Sahara (MINURSO), created in 1991 to survey Sahrawi refugees about desired final status for the Western Sahara. Almost thirty years later, the UN has spent hundreds of millions of dollars, and no referendum has been held. The UN funds special rapporteurs to promote the Venezuelan model, even as millions of Venezuelans choose between flight from their socialist paradise or starvation. The UN has only retired one specialized agency—the International Refugee Organization—but that quickly replaced by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). A quarter century after Palau, the last trustee, won independence, the UN Trustee Council technically still exists . Put another way, when founded, the UN Secretariat included three hundred persons, a number which expanded ten-fold in its first six months. In 1991, the UN more broadly employed fifty-two thousand people worldwide. Twenty-five years later, the number was approaching one hundred thousand.

In Congress, many Republicans seek to curtail, if not end U.S. funding of the United Nations over that organization’s inefficiency. Rather than effectively supervise the UN’s internal operations, successive secretaries-general have viewed their position as an invitation to jet set and bloviate. Other UN officials saw in budget talks an opportunity to drink free booze rather than promote accountability.
United Nations grapples with financial woes, decline in global influence
The United Nations says it’s running out of cash, with a budget deficit that comes as experts observe a steady decline in the organization’s influence in many parts of the world.

Late last week, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned that member states have been slow to pay their dues to the UN, with 81 countries still owing a total of $810 million to the world body as of late July.

What’s more, the cash shortfall is worse than in previous years, Guterres said, and appears to highlight a disturbing pattern in late payment by member countries.

“Our cash flow has never been this low so early in the calendar year, and the broader trend is also concerning: we are running out of cash sooner and staying in the red longer,” the Portuguese diplomat wrote in a letter to member states.

Canada is one of 113 member states to have paid their budget assessments in full. Countries are assessed according to their capacity to pay and gross national income — Canada’s assessment for 2018 came to just over $71 million.

But 81 states are yet to pay. These include under-developed and conflict-ridden states like Afghanistan, Syria and Somalia, as well as richer countries like Saudi Arabia and the United States, which pays 22 per cent of the UN’s core budget — some $1.2 billion — and traditionally pays later because of its budget year.

Saturday, January 12, 2019

From Ian:

Netanyahu: Every Palestinian who killed an Israeli in 2018, dead or arrested
All the terrorists who killed Israelis in 2018 have either been killed or arrested, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Thursday during a visit to the base of the Yamam, Israel’s elite Counterterrorism Unit.

The visit comes after the arrest on Tuesday of Assam Barghouti, accused of killing soldiers Yuval Mor-Yosef and Yosef Cohen outside Givat Assaf last month.

Barghouti’s arrest follows the killing in December of Ashraf Walid Suleiman Na’alwa, the terrorist who killed Kim Levengood-Yehezkel and Ziv Hagbi in the Barkan industrial park in October, as well as the arrest of four Palestinians suspected in the shooting attack outside Ofra last month and the killing of a fifth suspect in that attack, Saleh Omar Barghouti. Seven people were wounded in the Ofra attack, including Shira Ish-ran who was 30 weeks pregnant. Her baby, whom the couple named Amiad Israel, was delivered in an emergency operation, but died three days later.

Netanyahu praised the Yamam and the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) for their actions in apprehending those responsible for the Ofra, Barkan and Givat Assaf attacks.

The Yamam and Shin Bet combination gives Israel “the best counterterrorism units in the world,” Netanyahu said, adding that many countries come to Israel and say, “‘bring them to us, so we can learn from them.’”

“What Israel’s citizens need to know, is that anyone who killed an Israeli citizen last year was either killed or apprehended,” Netanyahu said. “This is an unparalleled achievement in the world, and it is because of these guys, because of their daring heroism, creativity and commitment.”

All of Israel’s enemies knew that “Israel’s arm would reach them, and it reached them through the Yamam fighters and through the Shin Bet.”

Fourteen people, according to the Foreign Ministry, were killed in terrorist attacks in 2018, compared to 19 people killed in attacks in 2017. The 2018 figure was the lowest number of people killed in terrorist attacks since 2013, when seven people were killed. At the height of the Second Intifada in 2002, 457 people were killed in terrorist attacks.

A Warning from Robert P. George: Dems Will Turn On Israel
Robert P. George of Princeton offers this prediction:

You will be able to watch something as if in slow motion over the course of the next few years: the collapse of support for Israel by Democratic Party politicians who harbor ambition for national office. It will follow the pattern we saw of collapse of support for the pro-life cause by leading Democrats in the period of 1973-80 (and particularly 1973-76). One by one, major pro-life Democrats, perceiving the writing on the wall, flipped to supporting abortion and, eventually, even its public funding: Teddy Kennedy, Bill Clinton, Richard Gephart, Al Gore, Jesse Jackson, Joe Biden, and many others. (Something similar happened on marriage, by the way, in the period of 2000-2012, especially 2004-09, culminating in Barack Obama’s “evolution” and Hillary Clinton’s change of heart.)

Similarly, today’s leading Democrats will move from support for Israel, to merely nominal support for Israel, to neutrality, to quiet, somewhat ambiguous opposition, to something effectively indistinguishable from “Zionism is racism.” The left calls the tune, and just as the left settled in on abortion in the early 1970s and marriage redefinition in the 90s, it has now settled in on opposition to Israel–not merely the policies of its government, but its very existence as a Jewish state and homeland of the Jewish people. Do you doubt me? You can do a test of your own. Go to the center of campus at your local university and hoist a placard bearing a large blue star of David and the words “Long Live Israel!” (Notice: Please make sure your health and life insurance coverage are in good order before conducting this experiment.)


Of course, we already saw this shift taking place in the Obama Administration. The big question is whether Jewish voters will start voting Republican in response.
Paralympic Committee ‘disappointed’ by Malaysia ban on Israeli swimmers
The International Paralympic Committee expressed disappointment Saturday after Malaysia said it would not allow Israeli swimmers to attend a competition in the country that will serve as a qualifying event for the Tokyo 2020 Paralympics.

Malaysia is one of a number of Muslim-majority countries that has no formal diplomatic ties with Israel, with entry to the country on an Israeli passport prohibited.

The city of Kuching in the eastern Sarawak state will host hundreds of swimmers from 70 countries from July 29th to August 4th.

But on Thursday, Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad said Kuala Lumpur would deny visas to Israeli para swimmers seeking to attend the meet.

“We maintain our stand on the prohibition. If they do come, it is a violation,” he was quoted as saying by the official Bergama news agency.

“If they [the International Paralympic Committee] want to withdraw Malaysia’s right to host the championship, they can do so.”

The IPC said in a statement that it was “disappointed” with Mahathir’s comments, although it would aim to “find a solution” to the issue.

Friday, January 11, 2019

From Ian:

BDS ban is not about free speech
Activists on one side of this debate have maligned anti-boycott laws as requiring a "loyalty oath to Israel," arguing that "the government cannot force people to subscribe to a specific political viewpoint." When so framed, these laws appear to be intolerable censorship. The First Amendment enables anyone to freely express their views without fear of government retribution – even if those views are racist or anti-Semitic. But ACTING on such views is in many cases illegal, particularly when the effect is discriminatory. So while First Amendment arguments must be evaluated in these lawsuits, ignoring the well-established distinction between speech and action grossly misrepresents the controversy.

Contrary to the challengers' free speech narrative, these state laws do not actually impact anyone's ability to hold, express or advocate any viewpoint. Instead, they only require businesses seeking government contracts (or investments) to certify they are not engaged in discriminatory boycotts. This is actually milder than many other anti-discrimination laws at the federal, state and local level, which require companies – regardless of their financial relationship with any government – to disregard traits such as religion or national origin in hiring practices and business dealings. The laws in question here, instead of directly regulating conduct, are intended to spare the public from subsidizing companies that act contrary to the collective interest.

The key question that free speech advocates (and the courts) have to answer is whether a boycott of Israel, in its current form, is merely a political viewpoint rather than a form of discrimination. For if such a boycott does nothing but express a political viewpoint, these laws should be struck down. The collective interest is never served by stifling one side of a genuine debate. However, if a boycott represents discrimination against a protected category, it would be on par with any other uncontroversial law safeguarding public funds from being used toward discriminatory ends.

While much discourse on this subject has uncritically assumed Israel boycotts are the former, there are good reasons to believe they're the latter.

Most Israel boycotts today are conducted in solidarity with the BDS movement, founded in 2005. As just the latest in a long line of Jewish boycotts, BDS is arguably discriminatory in both its goals and its effect. Ignoring countries engaged in far more egregious behavior, the movement singles out Israel as exceptionally and uniquely evil among all nations of the world. It spuriously places all blame for a two-sided conflict on "Jewish colonialism." And though there may certainly be times when Israeli policies or government actions warrant criticism, BDS does not merely target any individual Israeli policy or government. Rather, it rejects Jewish self-determination outright. Co-founder Omar Barghouti has said he opposes a Jewish state "in any part of Palestine," which BDS sees as being a single state between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea.

Members quit Birmingham board that rescinded award to Angela Davis
Three board members have resigned from the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute, which rescinded its award to African-American activist Angela Davis, allegedly due in part to complaints from Jewish leaders.

The resignations follow controversy over the museum and educational center’s decision last week to withdraw the Fred L. Shuttlesworth Human Rights Award from Davis. She was intended to receive the award next month in a ceremony that has since been canceled.

Davis, a Birmingham, Alabama, native and leading civil rights activist, is an outspoken critic of Israel and an advocate of the movement to boycott the country. She also was a far-left leader in activist movements of the 1960s and ’70s.

The board members who resigned Wednesday were its chairman, Mike Oatridge; its first vice chair, Walter Body; and its secretary, Janice Kelsey. Their names were removed Thursday afternoon from the museum’s website.

Birmingham Mayor Randall Woodfin said in a statement that the decision to rescind the award, which was announced in September, came “after protests from our local Jewish community and some of its allies.”

Davis wrote in the pro-Palestinian publication Mondoweiss that she learned her “long-term support of justice for Palestine was at issue.”

Who made it an issue is still not clear. None of the people who reportedly were involved in the decision agreed to a request from JTA for comment, including the Birmingham Jewish Federation’s CEO, Richard Friedman, and the civil rights institute’s president, Andrea Taylor, who did not respond to a call and text message.
Those Who Boycott Mosque Holocaust Exhibit Do Not Speak for Muslims
The polticisation around Israel and Palestine choked any voices that wanted to document these stories, as though they would legitimise Israel. This perverse logic meant many of these oral histories were lost, helped the claim, pushed by, that Muslims were part of SS Gestapo Units in Bosnia - who were involved in rounding up and exterminating Jews - dominate. This is true and cannot be washed over. It highlights how the SS used Islam and antisemitism to attract some who were Muslims from the Balkan regions. Serbian nationalists used this piece of history to whip up hatred against Bosnian Muslims between 1992 and 1995.

Yet, the vast majority of Muslims fought against Hitler and the courageous stories of Muslims saving Jews are now a forgotten history. As a Muslim, a part of my heritage has disappeared, hyper-politicised into a silence that will stay for eternity.

You would think that hosting an exhibition highlighting some of these stories would be a chance for Muslims to reclaim their history at a time when so many wrongly align Islam and Muslims with just terrorism and extremism. But a decade after launching the Righteous Muslims booklet, only a handful of the three milion British Muslims even know of any stories of Muslims who saved Jews in the Holocaust. I put this down to those who believe they are speaking for the Palestinians by denying Muslims their own history and heritage.

I have met Palestinians in the West Bank and Jerusalem who want to hear the stories of Muslims who saved Jews in the Holocaust. Granted there are Palestinians who will revere and laud the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Haj Amin al-Husseini, who asked Hitler to help an Arab revolt against the British in 1941, but there are others who are ashamed of that history. The latter have said to me that “Muslims need pride in their actions when they have done the right thing”, when I talked about the stories of Righteous Muslims.

Who exactly are those seeking boycotts against Yad Vashem speaking for? They are not speaking for the Palestinians. They are also not speaking up for Muslims. They are speaking up for those who want to keep the status quo going, the very status quo that throttled the life and voices out of the stories of Muslims who saved Jews.

Much like Haj Amin al-Husseini, they are on the wrong side of history and worst still, on the side of those who deny the voices of the dead and murdered from speaking to the living today. We cannot allow this to happen, for the sake of all of our histories.

From Ian:

Blood money, not benevolence: The PLO's Justification of 'pay for slay'
In the Palestinian Athority’s 2018 budget, funding levels for “pay-for-slay” programs and the Palestinian Athority’s social welfare programs are disclosed. Terror payment programs include salaries to prisoners set at nearly $150 million. Allocations to those killed or injured in “wars” with Israel is budgeted at over $180 million, together more than $330 million overall — consuming over 7 percent of the annual Palestinian budget. These payments go to approximately 10,500 imprisoned and released prisoners and some 37,500 families of martyrs and injured. In contrast, the entire 2018 budget for the Palestinian Athority’s social welfare system is about $214 million dollars, and supports 118,000 households: a much larger group subsisting on a much smaller budget.

Enshrined in Palestinian law, imprisoned terrorist payments are almost entirely dependent on length of incarceration, and not on personal financial circumstances. Prisoners receive 1,400-12,000 shekels, paid monthly, regardless of any need-based qualifications. Families of those killed perpetuating terror attacks receive 6,000 shekels immediately, then a minimum of 1,400 shekels monthly, for life.

True social welfare recipients, in contrast, are only eligible based on need, and they do not get automatic payments. Once approved, they receive benefits of only 250-600 shekels per month, paid quarterly. The maximum welfare payment is 57 percent less than the minimum pay-for-slay salary.

As defined by Palestinian law, payments to prisoners are restricted to the “fighting sector” (“alsharicha almunadila” in Arabic) who are involved in “the struggle against the occupation.” Common incarcerated criminals are not eligible even if they are destitute. Payments to prisoners are labelled as “ratib,” or salary in Arabic. Prisoners are eligible for payments even if they are young and unmarried, with no dependents. Furthermore, released prisoners continue to receive salaries, regardless of need.

Terrorists and their families have no need for the Palestinian social welfare system, and they would be foolish to use it. Palestinian terrorists have access to a far superior system that pays better than the miserly public assistance system. And Palestinians, aware of this gap, capitalize on it. If one’s family is in a tough economic situation, terror becomes a solution, with hero status as a bonus. What do the Palestinians see as their government’s priority? Helping the destitute, or promoting terror? Follow the money and it’s clear — terror is more attractive, quantitatively and qualitatively.

So when a Palestinian official conflates payment for terrorism with social welfare, remember that in reality, there are two distinct systems operating here. Do not be deceived by blood money masquerading as legitimate social welfare. By intent and by design, the “pay-for-slay” program is simply money for murder.

Evelyn Gordon: Peace: The Missing Israeli Election Issue
Israel’s election campaign has only just begun, but one key issue is already notable by its absence: peace with the Palestinians. To many Americans—especially American Jews, who overwhelmingly consider this the most important issue facing Israel—the fact that almost none of the candidates are talking about the peace process may seem surprising. But several recent incidents help explain why it’s a very low priority for most Israeli voters.

Not so long ago, of course, the peace process was Israel’s top voting issue, almost its only one. But in a poll published last month, self-identified centrists and rightists both ranked the peace process dead last among six suggested issues of concern. Even self-identified leftists ranked it only third, below corruption and closing socioeconomic gaps.

There are many well-known reasons why Israelis have stopped believing peace is possible anytime soon. They range from the failure of every previous round of negotiations, to Palestinians’ refusal to negotiate at all for most of the last decade, to the fact that every bit of land Israel has so far turned over to the Palestinians—both in Gaza and the West Bank—has become a hotbed of anti-Israel terror. Yet the root cause of all the above receives far too little attention overseas: Israel’s ostensible peace partner, the Palestinian Authority, educates its people to an almost pathological hatred of Israel.

I’ve discussed the way this plays out in Palestinian textbooks and the Palestinian media many times. But nothing better illustrates the problem than three incidents over the past two months.

The most shocking occurred in November when a Palestinian accused of selling real estate to Jews in eastern Jerusalem was denied a Muslim burial by order of the imams of Jerusalem’s Muslim cemetery, religious officials at Al-Aqsa Mosque and Jerusalem’s PA-appointed grand mufti. He was finally buried, with approval from Jerusalem’s chief rabbi, in the non-Jewish section of a Jewish cemetery.
Yisrael Medad: On the East Side of the Jordan
Found here:



In "historic Palestine".

And you thought Jabotinsky was, well, extreme.

Thursday, January 10, 2019

From Ian:

Will backing anti-BDS bills be a liability for 2020 Democratic hopefuls?
April 14, 2016. The day Democratic Party officials might have realized something was brewing on the American left. In the middle of a fiery primary debate between former secretary of state Hillary Clinton and Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, the two were asked about the 2014 Gazan conflict, also known as Operation Protective Edge.

Clinton defended Israel, which she said did not invite Hamas’ relentless rocket attacks. She further excoriated the terror organization, which she said had squandered an opportunity to rebuild Gaza. For this blazing defense of the Jewish state, she received mild applause.

Jewish maverick politician Sanders, meanwhile, castigated Israel for what he deemed its excessive use of force during the 51-day offensive.

“We had in the Gaza area some 10,000 civilians who were wounded and some 1,5000 that were killed. If you’re asking not just me but countries all over the world, was that was a disproportionate attack, the answer is yes, I believe it was,” Sanders said, to uproarious applause. “In the long run,” he continued, “if we are ever going to bring peace to that region, which has seen so much hatred and so much war, we are going to have to treat the Palestinian people with respect and dignity.” That line brought down the house.

According to long-time member of the Democratic National Committee James Zogby, the founder and president of the Arab American Institute, that moment sent a message to Democrats. “I think Sanders discovered at the Brooklyn debate that there is a constituency that wants to hear about this,” Zogby recently told The Times of Israel.

Today in the Senate, most of the party’s leading 2020 prospective candidates seem to want to avoid creating a vulnerability with the pro-Palestinian constituency Zogby described.

Reuters Misrepresents New Congress’ Anti-BDS Bill
Reuters’ article yesterday on the “Strengthening America’s Security in the Middle East Act,” a bill which stalled Tuesday in the Senate, opens with a misleading and ominous reference to the legislation’s “measure to punish Americans who boycott Israel” (“First bill of new U.S. Congress, on Middle East policy, stalls in Senate“).

Further down, the article repeats this inaccurate and overly broad characterization of the bill’s supposed application to Americans at large, stating that it “would let state and local governments punish Americans for boycotting Israel.”

In fact, the bill would not sweepingly apply to “Americans” at large, but to “entities” engaged in geographically specific boycott activity. Thus, the bill clearly defines what constitutes an entity and what constitutes “activities described.” The bill states:
(a) State And Local Measures.—Notwithstanding any other provision of law, a State or local government may adopt and enforce measures that meet the requirements of subsection (c) to divest the assets of the State or local government from, prohibit investment of the assets of the State or local government in, or restrict contracting by the State or local government for goods and services with—

(1) an entity that the State or local government determines, using credible information available to the public, knowingly engages in an activity described in subsection (b);

(2) a successor entity or subunit of an entity described in paragraph (1); or

(3) an entity that owns or controls or is owned or controlled by an entity described in paragraph (1).
US Muslim group sues to block anti-BDS measure in Maryland
A Muslim civil rights group is suing to block the US state of Maryland from enforcing an executive order barring state agencies from contracting with businesses that boycott Israel.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations sued Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan and state Attorney General Brian Frosh on Wednesday on behalf of software engineer Syed Saqib Ali, a former state lawmaker.

The October 2017 executive order requires contractors to certify that they don’t boycott Israel. Ali’s federal lawsuit says the order bars him from bidding for government software contracts because he supports boycotts of businesses and organizations that “contribute to the oppression of Palestinians.”

CAIR says 26 states have enacted anti-BDS legislation similar to Maryland’s that prohibits the state from working with entities that boycott Israel, though none have passed measures making participating in a boycott of Israel illegal.

CAIR attorney Gadeir Abbas noted that other federal lawsuits have challenged the anti-BDS measures in Arizona, Arkansas, Kansas and Texas.

In December, CAIR filed a motion in a Texas federal court on behalf of a speech pathologist who was fired for refusing to sign an anti-BDS pledge included in her employment contract.

From Ian:

Prof. Eugene Kontorovich: Send the Hebron observer force home
The Temporary International Presence in Hebron is Israel's perpetual own-goal. The special task force oversees Jewish areas of Hebron and – beyond its members' diplomatic passports – is similar in its activities to left-wing rights groups such as the B'Tselem and Breaking the Silence. At the end of the month, Israel will have an opportunity to send TIPH home.

Israel has more observers than any other country, from the U.N. presence in Jerusalem's Armon Hanatziv neighborhood to the U.N. Disengagement Observer Force on the Golan Heights. But the TIPH is an entirely different animal. It isn't operated by the U.N. yet it is still an international force in Hebron. And unlike other such forces, which only the U.N. can abolish, it maintains an ongoing presence in Hebron because Israel says it can.

Israel was pressured to accept TIPH's presence after Baruch Goldstein massacred 29 Palestinians at the Cave of the Patriarchs in 1994. The organization received its current mandate as part of a 1997 agreement stipulating that its validity must be renewed every three months – hence its "temporary" status. For 20 years now Israel has renewed the hostile organization's mandate to operate in Hebron. Otherwise, its presence would have ended long ago. It is now one of the oldest observer forces in the world, and it contributes to Israel's image as an outlaw state that demands special observation.

The anti-Israel bias of TIPH is built into its mandate, which tasked organization members with the one-sided mission of "promoting by their presence a feeling of security" for Palestinians in Hebron. Protecting Jews from constant terrorist attacks is not part of their job description. Members of the organization even "succeeded" in veering from this narrow definition by attacking Jews in Hebron in the last year. The attackers were later pulled out of the country by the TIPH leadership without ever having to stand trial. TIPH has cooperated with radical groups like Breaking the Silence and leaked confidential reports to the press. The organization's reports are full of anti-Israel claims that have no connection to its stated task. According to media reports, TIPH asserts that Jews have no right to any presence anywhere in Hebron.
Jonah Goldberg: Why the UN Is Awful: Part Eleventy Billion
Via the inestimable Hillel Neuer, I learned that the UN elected Yemen to the vice-presidency of the organization that promotes gender equity.


You should read his whole tweet-storm. Yemen is not a woman-friendly place.

But this is yet another example of how the worst actors flock to the organizations charged with “fixing” various problems. Human-rights abusers race like moths to a flame to sit on human-rights bodies, precisely because that is the best way to protect themselves from international condemnation and, all too often, focus international fury on Israel. Also via Hillel:


NGO Monitor: Palestinian NGO Inadvertently Exonerates IDF
A Palestinian non-governmental organization (NGO), Defense for Children International – Palestine (DCI-P), has, in two documents, compiled information demonstrating Palestinian violence along the Gaza border during the “Great March of Return.” Despite DCI-P’s claims that the march is a series of “protests” led by “civilians,” the actual evidence provided in their documentation proves otherwise.

For example, in its December 31, 2018 “Year in Review” report, DCI-P states that “protestors’ activities have involved…burning tires, efforts to pass through the perimeter fence on foot or the Israeli-enforced ‘no go zones’ at sea on fishing boats, launching incendiary balloons across the perimeter fence, and throwing stones, molotov cocktails, firebombs or other objects toward the perimeter fence” (emphasis added). Individuals committing these acts of violence are combatants, or civilians directly participating in hostilities.

DCI-P labels other undoubtedly military acts as civilian, claiming that “some civilians have developed other protest strategies such as the ‘night confusion unit’ whose goal is to create distractions for Israeli forces late at night with loud sounds and fireworks. Another group has self-organized to construct large kites with flaming tales to be flown across the perimeter fence in order to start fires in Israeli agricultural fields and forests” (emphasis added).

In the second publication, “Two children died from Palestinian armed group activities,” DCI-P simultaneously claims that children participating in the violence along the Gaza border were both “recruited and used” as child soldiers and killed as civilians. For instance, DCI-P states that “a 15-year-old boy killed by Israeli forces on May 14, was a member of Islamic Jihad’s youth ‘Scouts’ program, known as Al-Faris” adding that “According to eyewitness testimony, Ahmad was throwing two tires toward the remnants of burning tires…he was unarmed and dressed in civilian clothing” (emphasis added).

DCI-P also explains that a 16-year old was “shot him while he was attempting to set fire to a tire near the perimeter fence…while wearing civilian clothing and unarmed”.

Wednesday, January 09, 2019

From Ian:

Yes, Anti-Zionism Is The Same As Anti-Semitism
In a recent New York Times op-ed titled “Anti-Zionism isn’t the same as Anti-Semitism,” columnist Michelle Goldberg defended Ilhan Omar, a newly elected House representative who has claimed that Jews have hypnotized the world for their evil works. A person can oppose “Jewish ethno-nationalism without being a bigot,” Goldberg explained. “Indeed,” she went on, “it’s increasingly absurd to treat the Israeli state as a stand-in for Jews writ large, given the way the current Israeli government has aligned itself with far-right European movements that have anti-Semitic roots.”

It’s true, of course, that anti-Zionism isn’t “the same” as common anti-Semitism. Anti-Zionism is the most significant and consequential form of anti-Semitism that exists in the world today. Anti-Zionism has done more to undermine Jewish safety than all the ugly tweets, dog whistles, and white nationalist marches combined. It is the predominant justification for violence, murder, and hatred against Jews in Europe and the Middle East. And it’s now infiltrating American politics.

What was once festering on the progressive fringes has found its way into elected offices and the heart of the liberal activist movement. As Democrats increasingly turn on Israel, Jewish liberals, many of whom have already purposely muddled Jewish values with progressive ones, are attempting to untether Israel from its central role in Jewish culture and faith for political expediency.

Now, of course, merely being critical of the Israeli government isn’t anti-Semitic. No serious person has ever argued otherwise. I’ve never heard any Israeli official or AIPAC spokesman ever claim that Israel is a “stand-in for Jews writ large,” nor have I ever heard an Israeli prime minister profess to speak for all Jews. (We have the ADL for that.) Israel has featured both left-wing and right-wing governments, and like governments in any liberal democracy, its leaders can be corrupt, misguided, or incompetent. Israelis criticize their governments every day.

However, opposing “Zionism” itself — the movement for a Jewish homeland — is to deny the validity of a Jewish claim to a nation altogether. It puts you in league with Hamas and Hezbollah and the mullahs of Iran. The Palestinian Liberation Organization’s 1968 charter states that “Judaism, being a religion, is not an independent nationality. Nor do Jews constitute a single nation with an identity of its own; they are citizens of the states to which they belong.” This, it seems, is now also the position of a number of Democrats.

Daniel Gordis: The American ‘Zionist’ assault on Israel
“American Jews and Israeli Jews Are Headed for a Messy Breakup,” a column by Jonathan Weisman announced in the New York Times earlier this week. He’s probably right. But only “probably.” The relationship does not have to crash, if both sides can acknowledge the profound ways in which the world’s two largest Jewish communities are profoundly different, and cease imposing their own worldview on the other.

To heal this rift, both sides are going to need to accept that we are invariably going to continue disappointing each other, because American Judaism and Israeli Judaism are, by this point, very different animals. As I describe in my forthcoming book, We Stand Divided: Competing Visions of Jewishness and the Rift Between American Jews and Israel, they now rest on almost entirely different foundations. One is universal and one particular, one focuses on Judaism as religion while the other sees Judaism as nationality, one largely exempt from the messiness of history, while the other is the product of a movement that expressly sought to restore the Jews as players into the complexities (and ugliness) of history.

Ultimately, both Israel and American Jews will have to change much about their views of and discourse about the other. At this moment, though, I want to focus on the ways in which American Jews need to rethink their discourse about Israel, since this side of the equation was much in evidence both in Weisman’s column and in another piece week, by Peter Beinart, in the Forward.

As part of the IfNotNow-instigated brouhaha about Birthright, Beinart issued a characteristic warning this week: “Birthright Will Fail If It Doesn’t Evolve With Young Jews,” arguing that Birthright trips do not offer a balanced picture of the conflict, which in turn will lead many young American Jews to ignore the program.

Now, to be clear, I have never worked for Birthright, have never been on a Birthright trip, and am not in any way privy to their curricular conversations. But here is what I do know. Many children of friends of ours, sophisticated and thoughtful young people, have been on Birthright trips, and have had life-transforming experiences. They did not feel that they’d been brainwashed or worked over – they just fell in love not only with the State of Israel, but with Judaism writ large. Also, for the record, I like Peter Beinart. He’s intelligent and I believe he’s being honest when he says he cares about Israel. For a while, Peter and I did a podcast together in which we modeled how two people who disagree deeply can engage in respectful dialogue. (We’ve also debated each other a few times, and are doing it again on February 7 at Harvard Hillel.)

But in many ways, Beinart’s column reflects a fundamental decision American Jews are going to have to make when it comes to Israel. They will have to decide what matters to them more, Israel’s welfare or their own good standing in their progressive American circles. Though he would of course say that he disagrees, I believe that Beinart is more committed to the latter. That is why he takes a complex issue, oversimplifies it and assumes that the only reasonable read of the situation is that held by American progressives; and then, since he knows that Birthright cannot accommodate his demand (and because he sees Birthright as part of the American Jewish establishment of which he is relentlessly critical), he essentially threatens to join the crowd seeking to destroy it.
In NY Times, Jonathan Weisman Misrepresents Quotes and Polls to Push Jewish “Breakup” Narrative _ CAMERA
Jonathan Weisman insists that the tribulations of 2018 brought American Jews and their Israeli counterparts “ever closer to a breaking point.” That, at least, is how he put it in the opening sentence of his Jan. 4, 2019 news analysis piece in the New York Times.

So convincing did the author seemingly find his own arguments that, at some point between his first and last sentences, the breaking point went from near to already here: “The Great Schism is upon us,” Weisman concluded in his dramatic final sentence.

It’s a sweeping hypothesis. And yet the analysis, published in the newspaper’s Opinion section, doesn’t offer a single statistic to directly substantiate his claim. Do any surveys confirm the existence of a Great Schism? Or the idea that “neither side sees the other as caring for its basic well-being,” a view Weisman approvingly attributes to a Chicago rabbi? Or that Israeli citizens “are increasingly dismissive of the views of American Jews”? Or that younger American Jews see in Israel “a bully, armed and indifferent”? If so, Weisman doesn’t share them.

The author does cite some polling numbers from the Pew Research Center meant to give credence to his case. But those numbers aren’t just wrested from their context in a way likely to mislead. They are flatly misreported.
For Jews, 'Never Again' is right now
Australia: The St Kilda rally, which was part of a move by far-right adherents to move their activism from the virtual to the real world, violated and betrayed the values and convictions that we hold dear.

My friend Rabbi Marvin Hier reminds us that on April 29, 1945, a day before he committed suicide, Hitler predicted that it would take centuries for anti-Semitism to return.

But he was wrong. It has taken less than seven decades.

The climate for Australian Jews remains hostile, with 2018 seeing a number of alarming incidents across the country.

Last year, a Jewish woman driving in Elsternwick was abused by a couple who screamed, "Hitler was right and should have killed you all" and "move your f---ing car or else I will come out and hit you".

A teacher in a car park in Bentleigh was subject to frightening tirade with a man and woman yelling at her, "Hitler had the right idea". A woman sitting in a cafe in Waverley was called "a bloody Jew", and a mother, her daughter and granddaughter on Australia Day were called "f---ing Jews".

And what about the 13-year-old Jewish girl at a public school who was sent a Snapchat video with a classmate rapping about her, "going to the shower, the gas shower", or the 15-year-old Jewish teen at a private school whose friend posted an image on Instagram, dressed as a Nazi, with the tagline, "We’re going to a place called Auschwitz, it is shower time little Jews", or the 16-year-old Jewish girl who was told she would be raped in the gas chambers.

Neo-Nazi groups such as Antipodean Resistance are invading our streets with vandalism, last week defiling a residential aged care facility that houses many Holocaust survivors with a swastika, while other right-wing extremists distributed flyers last year in Footscray describing Jews as "The whole world’s enemy ... pure evil", or plastering universities with Holocaust denial material.

From Ian:

Elliott Abrams: Abbas Celebrates 14th Anniversary of His Four-Year Term
On January 9, 2005—exactly 14 years ago today—Mahmoud Abbas was elected president of the Palestinian Authority. For a four-year term.

Today Abbas begins serving the fifteenth year of his four-year term.

That 2005 election was actually a milestone for Palestinians. Yasser Arafat had died the previous November, and this election was to choose his successor as head of the PA. It was a good election—free and fair in the sense that the votes were counted accurately and people could campaign against Abbas. There were loads of international observers, including a U.S. team led by former President Jimmy Carter and then-Senators Joseph Biden and John E. Sununu. According to The New York Times, Javier Solana, who was then the European Union's foreign minister, said "It has been a very good day. The moment is historic."

Abbas won only about 62 percent of the vote (compare Egyptian president Sisi’s ludicrous claim to have won 97 percent of the vote in the 2018 election there) and one challenger won 20 percent. Hamas boycotted the election, but was not forced to do so—as we saw when it competed in the elections for the Palestine Legislative Council (PLC) in 2006.

That 2006 parliamentary election was the last parliamentary election held in the Palestinian territories, and there has similarly been no presidential election since 2005. Abbas just holds on and on and governs by decree. He has now undertaken machinations that will in fact eliminate the PLC entirely, replacing it with an unelected PLO organ. The PLC has been dissolved by the Palestinian constitutional court--whose own term of office expired over a decade ago.
Dissolved Palestinian Legislative Council removes PA president Abbas from power
In the latest development in the rift between Palestinian factions, the Palestinian Legislative Council in Gaza voted to remove Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas from power on Wednesday.

In a text submitted by prominent Hamas political committee member and spokesperson Salah al-Bardawil, the assembly called the president an "enemy of the state" for committing "a number of constitutional, legal, security and humanitarian violations, which seriously and seriously affected the Palestinian national project."

The resolution then asked the politician to immediately step down, or face constitutional proceedings aimed at his destitution. It also appealed to national, regional and international institutions to "stop dealing" with the president or any of his delegations.

The PLC, which has largely had a symbolic function since the last elections in 2007 due mainly to the impossibility of assembling in one location. It was dissolved by Abbas at the end of 2018.

The Fatah leader dissolved the institution, in which Hamas has a majority, in order to put pressure on the Gaza-based movement as reconciliation talks between the two factions degenerate into an open conflict.

Last week, Hamas called dozens of Fatah members in the coastal enclave for questioning, and de facto prevented a rally that was meant to commemorate the movement's 54th anniversary.


PMW: Abbas’ deputy participates in burning “coffin” with photos of US Pres. Trump and PM Netanyahu
Celebrating the 54th anniversary of the Fatah Movement, which is commemorated on the day of its first attempted terror attack against Israel, Abbas' deputy chairman of Fatah, Mahmoud Al-Aloul, participated in a ceremony at which a black "coffin" decorated with photos of Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and US President Trump was burned in front of a large crowd.

A red "X" is painted over the faces of Netanyahu and Trump. [Official Fatah Facebook page, Jan. 3, 2019]

Text on coffin: "The deal of the century (i.e., Trump's as yet unpublished Middle East peace plan) will not pass, to hell with it and good riddance"

At the event, Al-Aloul praised the terror attacks and the Palestinian waves of violence and terror against Israel (the intifadas) as "accomplishments" of Fatah's "self-sacrificing fighters," and "battles of honor," which have "brought glory to the nation":
"The Palestinian revolution... depended on our people's will and was characterized by suffering, sacrifice, and pain. However, it was also full of victories and achievements that Fatah's self-sacrificing fighters (Fedayeen) accomplished on the ground; and they returned the spirit to the nation. Starting from Eilabun (i.e., attempted bombing of Israel's National Water Carrier) ... the intifadas (i.e., Palestinian wave of violence and terror against Israel killing approximately 200 Israelis from 1987-1993, and PA terror campaign killing approximately 1200 from 2000-2005), and the rest of the battles of honor and heroism with which the Fatah Movement has brought glory to the nation."

He pointed out that Fatah "is loyal to the team of Martyrs (Shahids)" and that the movement's identity is one of a "national liberation movement that is fighting for our people's freedom and independence":
"We in Fatah are not being lured away by anything - neither power nor government - and we again emphasize our identity as a national liberation movement that is fighting for our people's freedom and independence. We will complete the path, without any shadow of a doubt, and we still see that our most important priority is to fight our primary enemy - the occupation - and those who assist it."
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Jan. 4, 2019]

Tuesday, January 08, 2019

From Ian:

Twitter hashtag #firstantisemiticexperience reveals harrowing stories
Swastikas. Hate speech. Bullying. Threats.

As the year 2019 kicks off, Twitter users around the globe are showing that antisemitic behavior is not something relegated to history books. Using the hashtag #firstantisemiticexperience, people have been sharing stories of their first exposure to antisemitic taunting and abuse.

The hashtag appears to have been started by Rabbi Zvi Solomons, the spiritual leader of the Jewish Community of the Berkshire synagogue in Reading, England.

On Monday morning, Solomons posted the hashtag, asking his followers to use it – allowing it to become a link on Twitter showing tweets from all those who include it – and share their own experiences.

And the stories began to pour in.

Carly Pildis, a Tablet Magazine writer and nonprofit professional, said that her first antisemitic experience “was when I was 13 and someone drew a swastika on my synagogue.”

Annika Rothstein, a political adviser and activist from Sweden, said hers “was in 7th grade; 6 neo-nazis at school stood next to my locker saying I should be turned into soap like ‘the others.’ For three years they tormented me to the point where I ended up shaving off my big, curly hair, hoping to hide my ‘Jewishness.’”

The New York Times Whitewashes Voltaire and ‘The Dark Enlightenment’
Historians of antisemitism have yet to fully explain why great satirists from the Roman Juvenal to Voltaire to Gore Vidal hated Jews and the Jewish religion.

Gore Vidal’s 2012 obituaries, including a front-page New York Times tribute to the “prolific, elegant, acerbic writer,” generally ignored his hatred of Judaism and Jews, often dismissing it as “anti-Zionism.” After all, his life-long companion was Jewish — Howard Austen, an advertising executive.

Vidal’s solution to the antisemitism that his partner faced in the advertising industry was for him to change his name from “Auster” to “Austen.” He apparently believed that if others took his advice, and abandoned particularism for assimilation by changing names, that would go a long way toward solving the embarrassment of Jew hatred.

But Vidal’s disdain went much deeper than the embarrassing last names, accents, and mannerisms. Vidal loathed The New York Times as not only “homophobic,” but for being unwilling to sell advertising space to Nasser’s Egypt, while Commentary was “the Pravda of our Israeli Fifth Column.” Other literary celebrities like Capote and Mailer were contemptible, but worse were Bellow, Malamud, and Roth — Jewish-American writers unable “to put themselves into gentile skins — much less foreskins.”

Israel’s American supporters like Midge Decter and Norman Podhoretz should be forced to register with the Justice Department as agents of a foreign power, Vidal claimed. And America — “a nation that worships psychopaths” — was “a corrupt society” made up of “ongoing hustlers.” About the country of which Vidal the historical novelist claimed to be “the biographer,” he warned: “We must never underestimate the essential bigotry of the white majority in the United States.”

What is clear is that Hertzberg was correct that Voltaire “opened the door” to the horrors of the 20th century. It is also true that Vidal — who as a young man backed the isolationist “America First” Movement that sought to appease Hitler — did not really try to close the door to intolerance. The Times has forgotten Hertzberg’s 1990 warning in its own columns about Voltaire, just as it ignores the antisemitism of so many bigots masquerading as “anti-Zionists” today.

Voltaire’s motto was “Écrasez l’infâme” — by which he meant that all organized religion, not just infamous prejudices, should be eradicated. Be careful whom you glorify as you seek to slay dragons.
12 CAMERA Accomplishments in 2018
  1. CAMERA broke last year’s record of 185 media corrections. We prompted 206 corrections in US, UK, Spanish-language, Hebrew and Arabic publications.
  2. CAMERA Arabic launched its Arabic website, the first media-monitoring body to monitor Arabic-language reports from Western media outlets, ensuring accurate coverage of Israel and the Middle East and promoting adherence to professional journalistic standards.
  3. CAMERA’s UK Media Watch set a record number of media corrections this year, prompting 51 corrections from publications such as The Guardian, The Independent, The Telegraph, Times of London, The Financial Times, The Daily Mail, Evening Standard, Irish News and Irish Examiner.
  4. CAMERA ran hundreds of student workshops and events at 86 colleges and universities, including Ivy League schools, as well as Oxford University, Cambridge University, and the University of London.
  5. CAMERA’s Spanish department launched a new college campus program – “CAMERA on Campus Latinos for Israel” – bringing a pro-Israel message to Spanish-speaking students across the world.

From Ian:

Jpost Editorial: Terrorism is terrorism
The Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) on Sunday revealed details of a serious case of suspected terrorism. Three Jewish minors are being investigated as suspects in the death of Aysha Rabi, a Palestinian woman and mother of nine, who was hit in the head by rocks when the car she was driving was pelted near the Tapuah Junction in the West Bank.

The agency’s statement said that the minors studied at Pri Haaretz Yeshiva in Rehalim, near where the incident occurred, adding that on the day after the Friday incident, a group of Yitzhar residents drove to Rehalim – despite being Shabbat observant – to instruct the youths on how to handle the Shin Bet questioning.

Further details revealed a video of the burning of an Israeli flag, a placard bearing the inscription “death to Zionists” and a swastika on an Israeli flag which, according to the Shin Bet, were connected to some of the suspects. These were obviously presented to indicate that the youths oppose the state out of extremist religious ideology.

The families of the detainees have complained that the rights of their children are being brutally infringed upon and that the youths are being held and interrogated in harsh conditions. Itamar Ben-Gvir, a lawyer for one of the suspects and well known for his support of far-right causes, complained that the youths had not had initial access to legal representation and had been traumatized by their treatment at the hands of the Shin Bet.

The Shin Bet statement said the interrogations have been carried out in accordance with proper procedure, supervised by the state prosecution and with court oversight.

“Since the arrests, the Shin Bet has identified a continuous and active effort from interested parties to slander the organization and its agents and to delegitimize its activities,” the agency said.

“This attempt should be condemned and should not be assisted, and nothing should be done to weaken the Shin Bet from continuing its efforts to thwart terror in any form – Jewish or Palestinian. All of this is based on the values of the state and for the sake of national security.”

Here lies the rub. Terrorism is terrorism. The state cannot treat cases of suspected Jewish terrorism any less seriously than similar incidents of Palestinian terrorism. Every effort must be made to find those responsible for the death of Rabi, no matter what age or religion they are.
David Singer: United States and Israel Quit over UNESCO’s Love Affair with “Palestine”
UNESCO’s admission of “Palestine” to membership breached Article II (2) of UNESCO’s Constitution which only allows States to be admitted to UNESCO. “Palestine” was not a state under the criteria laid down under international law by the 1933 Montevideo Convention.

107 states voted to admit “Palestine” whilst the remaining 86 voted “No”, “abstained” or “did not vote”.

UNESCO’s legally questionable decision was never referred by UNESCO to the International Court of Justice or an arbitral tribunal for confirmation under Article XIV (2)of UNESCO’s Constitution.
Given what has transpired – such failure was a monumental misjudgement.

President Trump’s National Security Adviser – John Bolton – recently exposed the fiction that there is a legally-constituted entity called “Palestine”:
'[Palestine] is not a state… It does not meet the customary international law test of statehood. It doesn’t control defined boundaries. It doesn’t fulfil the normal functions of government…calling it the so-called "State of Palestine" defines exactly what it has been — a position that the United States government has pursued uniformly since 1988 when the ‘Palestinian’ Authority declared itself to be the state of "Palestine". We don’t recognize it as the state of "Palestine". We have consistently across Democratic and Republican administrations opposed the admission of ‘Palestine’ to the United Nations as a state, because it’s not a state.'

Australia’s Head of Mission – Ms Gita Kamath – gave Australia’s reasons for its negative vote on admitting “Palestine” at the time of the 2011 UNESCO vote:
“Our decision to vote against reflects Australia’s strong concern that consideration of Palestinian membership in UNESCO is premature. The matter of Palestinian membership of the UN has recently been placed before the UN Security Council for its consideration. We should allow the United Nations Security Council process to run its course rather than seek first to address this question in different UN fora. Our decision also reflects our concerns with the possible implications of a successful vote on UNESCO funding.”

The Security Council course is still being run in 2019 with the finishing line nowhere in sight and UNESCO’s funding in tatters.

UNESCO’s credibility, integrity and self-created fantasy dream world has imploded.

UNESCO’s seven-year love affair with a non-existent “Palestine” has produced an international humanitarian crisis.



Monday, January 07, 2019

From Ian:

Melanie Phillips: How western humbug gives antisemitism a free pass
Of course they don’t accept that calling Israel’s policies racist and criminal is an example of antisemitism. But it is. That’s because it singles out Israel for an obsessional campaign of double standards, demonisation and delegitimisation based solely on malevolent falsehoods, distortion and selective reporting – treatment afforded to no other country, people or cause.

At the same time, such people ignore the true racism, prejudice and antisemitism displayed by Palestinians. They ignore the constant incitement to murder Jews, the relentless terror attacks against Israelis, the Nazi style deranged discourse demonising not just the State of Israel but also the Jewish people as a source of cosmic conspiracies and evil intent.

There was recently a graphic example of this egregious double standard. Jamil Tamimi was jailed for 18 years at Jerusalem district court for the murder of 21 year old British student Hannah Bladon whom he stabbed repeatedly with a seven-inch knife.

Her parents were outraged by what they as an unjustifiably lenient sentence. But the court had found that Tamimi was mentally ill, possibly trying to provoke the police into shooting him dead by stabbing someone. “This was not a terrorist incident,” the prosecutor told the court. “This was a terrible murder carried out by a mentally ill person.”

A few days later a Palestinian Arab, Issam Akel, did get a life sentence. He was convicted at Ramallah high court, in the Palestinian-run territories, of acting to broker the sale of a house in the Muslim quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem to a Jewish organisation.

Palestinian law deems it treasonous to sell land to Jews, a crime for which the maximum penalty is execution. It was commuted here to a life sentence with hard labour, possibly because Akel also held American citizenship.

So Israel showed leniency to a Palestinian Arab convicted of murder – while the Palestinians imposed a far harsher sentence on a Palestinian convicted of selling land to a Jew.

The Israelis saw the killer as a person just like any other human being whose mental illness had diminished his moral agency; they treated him accordingly with a total absence of racism. The Palestinians jailed for life a Palestinian who had dared reject the racist law requiring him to discriminate against Jews. The Palestinians thus made not just the Jewish people a victim of their antisemitism but one of their own, too.
How Chaim Weizmann Crafted the First Arab-Zionist Alliance
“No true Arab can be suspicious or afraid of Jewish nationalism. . . . We are demanding Arab freedom and we would show ourselves unworthy of it if we did not now, as I do, say to the Jews—welcome back home.” These words were spoken by Faisal al-Hashemi—the future king of Iraq—at a banquet in honor of Chaim Weizmann on December 29, 1918. T.E. Lawrence (a/k/a “Lawrence of Arabia”) served as the translator. While many today see the Israeli-Arab conflict as both eternal and inevitable, the idea of an alliance between Jews and Arabs in the Middle East seemed perfectly natural to Weizmann and to Faisal, who were seen by the British empire as the representatives of their respective peoples. Rick Richman tells the story of this alliance:

On January 3, 1919, a few weeks after World War I ended, the Zionist leader Chaim Weizmann met with Emir Faisal, the commander-in-chief of the Arab uprising against the Ottoman empire, at a London hotel. . . . At the meeting, Weizmann and Faisal signed an agreement, brokered over the preceding month by Lawrence, exchanging Arab acceptance of the Balfour Declaration for Zionist support of an Arab state in the rest of the Ottoman lands. In February, they traveled to the Paris Peace Conference, where the victorious Allies would remap Europe and the Middle East, and made complementary presentations about the future of the region. . . .

Faisal and his father, [King Hussein of the Hejaz], believed Zionism would bring financial resources and technical expertise to Palestine, transforming the economic circumstances of the Arabs in both Palestine and beyond. In January 1918, D.G. Hogarth, director of Britain’s Arab Bureau in Cairo, had traveled to Jedda to deliver to King Hussein a formal message regarding British policy: the Arabs would be given “full opportunity of once again forming a nation,” and “no obstacle should be put in the way” of the return of the Jews to Palestine. All holy sites would be protected, and the religious and political rights of all residents preserved. The message emphasized the importance of “the friendship of world Jewry” to the Arab cause.

In an article published in March 1918 in al-Qibla, the daily newspaper in Mecca, the king wrote that Palestine was “a sacred and beloved homeland” for “its original sons” [abna’ihi-l-asliyin], and the “return of these exiles [jaliya] to their homeland” would be beneficial to the region.

Devotees of the Liberal Order—Unlike Its Founders—Underestimated the Importance of Nationalism and Religion
The year 1948, writes Yehudah Mirsky, saw the birth of the basic elements of what came to be known—perhaps misleadingly—as the “liberal international order.” These included the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the Genocide Convention, the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, and the creation of Israel with the imprimatur of the United Nations. Mirsky argues that some of the failures of this order stem from a fundamental misunderstanding of those committed to defending it:

[Many] thought human rights and nationalism were antithetical, and that promoting the former meant pushing back on the latter. The architects of the world of 1948 understood better. As the historian James Loeffler has shown in his remarkable new book, Rooted Cosmopolitans, so many key figures in the human-rights revolution of mid-century were not only Jews but Zionists. For them, an international regime of protecting individual human rights as well as nation-states for persecuted minorities were necessary to overcome the Holocaust’s ghastly trauma of statelessness. The deep structural suspicion of the idea of state sovereignty woven into the human-rights framework, it seems, has unwittingly fostered the legalistic abstraction and airy disregard for political realities that has made that framework such a supple tool in the hands of dictators who couldn’t care less. . . .

[Moreover, many] underestimated the role of religion not only in people’s lives but in human rights and liberalism’s own foundations. Religion is about the search for the absolute and how that ultimate truth shapes what it means fully to be human. Liberalism and human rights are understood by many people in different ways, but there is no denying they make serious claims about the ultimacy of human dignity, so ultimate that there are certain things that no state, or collective body of any kind, can do to harm human dignity.
Why the US Diaspora Misunderstands Israel
What does the Diaspora find alienating about Israel? Eric Goldstein, CEO of UJA-Federation of New York, recently criticized the Israeli government for its treatment of the Palestinians, its attitude towards asylum-seekers, and the dominance of the Orthodox rabbinate in Israel.

But these concerns show a fundamental misunderstanding of Israel and of the conflict. Progressives (and not just in the United States) think that the two-state solution would fulfill Palestinian aspirations. In reality, the ultimate Palestinian objective is the “right of return” — overrunning Israel proper with Arab refugees. They believe that time is on their side.

The US Diaspora also misunderstands what makes Israelis tick. Israeli support for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is a response to rockets and terror tunnels. But many Israelis view the Palestinian jihad as just the latest chapter in a long story of Arab and Muslim antisemitism predating anti-Zionism. Anti-Jewish hatred goes to the very heart of the conflict.

More than 50 percent of Israeli Jews have their roots in Arab and Muslim states. The American Diaspora, on the other hand, is overwhelmingly Ashkenazi: Their background is European antisemitism and the Holocaust. They project a Eurocentric world view and their own Western values on the Arab and Muslim world.

Most Jews are in Israel because of the Arabs, not the Nazis (although Arabs and Nazis were allied during World War II). They vote for Netanyahu because of this legacy of bitterness and mistrust. Arabs will only respect a strong Israel, they believe. These Jews, their parents, and their grandparents left Arab countries due to pogroms, institutionalized inferiority, and state-sanctioned laws. Most left as destitute refugees with a single suitcase. Israel rescued them. Jews in the West may take their freedoms and rights for granted. Jews from the Middle East and North Africa do not.

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