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Wednesday, July 25, 2018

From Ian:

Caroline Glick: President Trump and Jared Kushner Target Hamas in Gaza
Last week, President Donald Trump’s Middle East team signaled a shift in the administration’s policy for contending with Hamas-controlled Gaza — one no prior administration had the courage to make.

On July 19, Trump’s son-in-law and senior adviser Jared Kushner, his special representative for international negotiations Jason Greenblatt, and U.S. Ambassador to Israel David Friedman published a joint op-ed in the Washington Post in which they made clear that they are walking away from their earlier efforts to rebuild Gaza’s economy as a means of advancing the prospects for a broader peace between Israel and the Palestinians.
(This columnist had argued for exactly that policy just two days before.)

Noting that the blame for Gaza’s humanitarian crisis rests squarely on the shoulders of the Hamas regime, the three wrote:
International donors are conflicted: Should they try to help the people directly, at the certain risk of enriching terrorists, or withhold funding to Hamas and watch the people it is supposed to govern suffer? In the past, investments in badly needed infrastructure have been diverted for weapons and other malign uses, and even the projects that are built are often destroyed as a consequence of Hamas’ aggression. Until governance changes or Hamas recognizes the state of Israel, abides by previous diplomatic agreements and renounces violence, there is no good option.

Kushner, Greenblatt and Friedman acknowledged as well that “the international community also bears some blame.”

“More countries want to simply talk and condemn than are willing to confront reality, propose realistic solutions and write meaningful checks,” they wrote.

The President’s Middle East policy team concluded by noting that the time has come for the international community to base its policy towards Gaza on reality rather than platitudes. In their words, Hamas is the root cause of the endless rounds of war with Israel and the suffering of the people in Gaza.

“Hamas leadership is holding the Palestinians of Gaza captive,” they explained.

“This problem must be recognized and resolved or we will witness yet another disastrous cycle [of war].”
Isi Leibler: Trump: A balance sheet
Israel
Trump's election has proved to be a gift to Israel.

Trump was the first American president to formally refer to Israel as an ally. He ended Obama's policy of moral equivocation between Israeli self-defense and Palestinian terrorism and refused to maintain the façade that Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas was a peaceful moderate. He also drastically cut U.S. aid to the Palestinians.

He has made it clear that the U.S. would not tolerate the Palestinian diversion of aid money to reward terrorists and their families.

The administration placed full blame on Hamas for the Gaza escalation of terror.

Envoy Nikki Haley aggressively defends Israel at the U.N. The U.S. also withdrew from the U.N. Human Rights Council, an organization dominated by anti-Israel tyrants and rogue states.

Despite howls of protest, Trump has fulfilled his electoral promise to move the U.S Embassy to Jerusalem.

Trump and Putin issued an unprecedented joint press statement following their recent meeting in which they explicitly proclaimed their commitment to "work together to ensure the security of Israel." Trump said, "I think that working with Israel is a great thing, and creating safety for Israel is something that both President Putin and I would like to see very much."

To sum up, Trump is clearly calling the shots and rearranging the existing global order.

For Israel, Trump has been like manna from heaven. That does not mean that we endorse all his actions, and we continue to squirm at his cruder outbursts.

PMW: PA: What is “Zionist ISIS-ism”? Israeli MPs visiting the Temple Mount
Abbas' advisor on religious affairs said that the presence of Jewish Israeli MPs in Jerusalem and on the Temple Mount, "defiles" the Islamic holy sites and in particular the Al-Aqsa Mosque.

Earlier this month, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rescinded his previous ban on Israeli Parliament members visiting the Temple Mount - which had been in place for nearly three years as a precaution against violence - and allowed them to visit once every three months.

According to PA Supreme Shari'ah Judge and Mahmoud Abbas' advisor on Religious and Islamic Affairs Mahmoud Al-Habbash, Netanyahu's decision is no less than a "war crime" and the presence of Jewish Israeli MPs at Islamic holy sites constitutes "defilement":

"The prime minister of the extremist right in the occupation state [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu] has committed a complete war crime against the Islamic holy sites in Jerusalem, and particularly at the Al-Aqsa Mosque...
The prime minister of the occupation state is engaging in bullying, arrogance, and Zionist "ISIS-ism" against the members of our people and its holy sites, both in Jerusalem and Hebron, by giving relief, support, and protection to the break-in campaigns of the extremist Jews into the holy sanctuaries in Jerusalem and Hebron, to [the sanctuaries'] defilement, and to the attack on the Muslim worshippers, who have the right to manage their holy sites with complete freedom and without the interference of the tyrannical occupation authorities."
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, July 5, 2018]

Al-Habbash further threatened that "a continuation of the crime mentality led by the occupation government will drag the entire region and the world into a religious war whose results will be disaster for everyone."

In a later statement, Al-Habbash repeated his antisemitic accusation, claiming that "the series of Israeli crimes against the holy sites has severely escalated due to occupation [Israeli] Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's decision to allow the Israeli Parliament members to invade the Al-Aqsa Mosque plazas and defile them." [Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, July 11, 2018]

Thursday, July 19, 2018

From Ian:

Nikki Haley Slams Human Rights Council as ‘Greatest Failure’ of the UN
U.S. Ambassador Nikki Haley said Wednesday the United Nations' Human Rights Council is the "greatest failure" of the international organization given its continued support to dictatorial regimes and entrenched bias against Israel.

"The Human Rights Council has provided cover, not condemnation, for the world's most inhumane regimes," Haley said in remarks at the Heritage Foundation in Washington, D.C.

"It has been a bully pulpit for human rights violators. The Human Rights Council has been not a place of conscious, but a place of politics. It has focused its attention unfairly and relentlessly on Israel. Meanwhile, it has ignored the misery inflicted by regimes in Venezuela, Cuba, Zimbabwe, and China."

Haley doubled down on the Trump administration's decision last month to withdraw the United States from the council amid what she viewed as a "chronic" anti-Israel bias that led to over 68 condemnations of the Jewish state over a 10-year period versus just six for Iran. She also accused the council of allowing notorious human rights abusers as members.

She cited the council's acceptance of the Democratic Republic of Congo as a member in October even as mass graves were being uncovered there, and its unwillingness to confront habitual human rights abuses in Cuba, Iran, and Venezuela.

She said American participation was the "last shred of credibility" the council had.

"It has taken the idea of human dignity—the idea that's at the center of our national creed and the birthright of every human being—and it has reduced it to just another instrument of international politics and that is a great tragedy," Haley said.


Khaled Abu Toameh: Why Iran Supports Palestinian Terror Groups
The Iranian general did not offer to build the Palestinians a hospital or a school. Nor did he offer to provide financial aid to create projects that would give jobs to unemployed Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. His message to the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip: Iran will give you as much money and weapons as you need as long as you are committed to the jihad (holy war) against Israel and the "big Satan," the US.

The same Hamas that is telling UN representatives that it wants to improve the living conditions of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip is the one that is reaching out its hand to Iran to receive funds and weapons.

Now, someone needs to step in and stop Iran from setting foot in the Gaza Strip and using the Palestinians as cannon fodder in Tehran's campaign against the US and Israel. How might someone do that? It is not so complicated. Any international aid to the Gaza Strip must be conditioned on ending Iran's destructive effort to recruit Palestinians groups as its soldiers. It is that simple.
Employee of European NGO caught puncturing Israeli’s tire in Hebron
An employee of a European pro-Palestinian NGO called Temporary International Presence in Hebron (TIPH) was filmed puncturing the tire of a vehicle that belongs to a Jewish resident of Hebron, according to a police report.

A nearby security camera in the area captured the incident last year. The footage was subsequently turned over to the district police, which determined that a TIPH activist in uniform emerged from a vehicle emblazoned with the organization’s markings and proceeded to puncture one of the vehicle’s tires.

According to Haaretz, the police report described the entire incident, which included two accomplices standing watch as the suspect damaged the vehicle, which belonged to a Jewish resident of Hebron named Nili Dvorah.

Dvorah explained to the police that the incident represented the third time her car’s tires had been punctured in a one week period.

TIPH operates in the Hebron area and is staffed by individuals from Italy, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland and Turkey who “enjoy diplomatic immunity” and “cannot be detained or arrested,” according to the organization’s website.

Last Friday, a TIPH “observer” was caught on video slapping a 10-year-old Jewish resident of Hebron so hard that he knocked the boy’s skullcap off of his head.

Tuesday, July 17, 2018

From Ian:

The Israel Victory Project: “25 Years Since Oslo, Time for New Thinking”
Launched by the Middle East Forum in Fall 2016, the Israel Victory Project maintains that peace can only be reached when the Palestinians are forced to concede the futility of their century-long rejectionism and accept Israel’s right to exist. To advance this goal, the Forum created an Israel Victory Caucus in both the U.S. Congress and the Knesset, as well as apprised key members of the Trump administration of the concept, in order to promote legislation and policies that will supplant the failed Oslo “peace process” with persistent pressure on the Palestinians to come to terms with Israel’s existence. Such measures can range from stopping financial support to the Palestinian Authority so long as it continues to pay lifetime allowances to families of killed and/or jailed terrorists, to ending the “Palestine refugee” farce, to harnessing the widest international backing behind Israel’s political stance and sustained military effort to defeat Palestinian terrorism.

Gregg Roman, director of the Middle East Forum, was interviewed by Land of Israel podcast host Eve Harrow on July 3rd’s Knesset meeting of the joint US-Israel program, the Israel Victory Caucus.


Palestinian rejectionism is two parts Palestinian, one part international community, and one part lack of Israeli strategy. Palestinian’s rejectionist Waqf-Fiqh mentality (“waqf” is the Islamic holy trust, and “fiqh” is Islamic legal doctrine), with its Islamic concept of never relinquishing lands that were once in Muslim hands, can be challenged by citing the precedent of the Balkans, and ancient Andalusia, now Spain, where Muslims gave up lands in 1492. The second rejectionist idea, “samud,” (steadfastness), encourages Palestinians to wait millenia, if need be, to defeat the Israelis, but Palestinians want to better their lives now and partake in the benefits of Israeli innovation. Third, the international community (and far left) indulge Palestinian “no’s” with donations that perpetuate the rejectionist cycle, but there are organizations working to separate monies for strictly humanitarian concerns apart from the political ones. Fourth and final is the Israeli security apparatus, fearing escalation or increased risk, which prefers keeping the status quo, instead of bringing about a resolution to the conflict on Israel’s terms.


Falcon found near Gaza with flammable material attached by string
A falcon was discovered near the Gaza border on Monday with strings attached that contained flammable material.

The falcon was found dead, hanging by the attached string from a burned tree near the Nahal Habesor riverbed.

It was not immediately clear if the bird was launched from Gaza to spark fires in Israel, as Gazans have done hundreds of time in recent weeks with kites and balloons, or if the predatory animal attempted to attack a balloon or kite carrying an incendiary device and became ensnared in its attached strings.

The falcon was found on a day when firefighters battled 15 separate fires started by Gazan kites and balloons in the border region.

Nature and Parks Authority officials who examined the bird said it wore a harness, suggesting it was a trained hunting bird, and strengthening speculation that it was deliberately sent to start fires, the Ynet news site reported.

Monday, July 16, 2018

From Ian:

PMW: Fatah: Teach children about Palestinian terror
Abbas' Fatah is encouraging Palestinian parents to teach their children about a terror bombing in which 15 Israelis were murdered and over 60 wounded in 1975.

In a post on Facebook, Fatah writes about the terror attack in which terrorist Ahmad Abu Sukkar filled a refrigerator with explosives and had it driven to the center of Jerusalem where it was detonated:
"Share so that our children will know about it."
Fatah for years has glorified this murderous attack as the "refrigerator operation."

Fatah also honored the terrorist himself by posting three photos of him:
Posted Text: "38 years since the refrigerator operation, which caused the death of 13 Israelis (sic., 15) in Jerusalem's markets
Share so that our children will know about it From the memory:
The refrigerator bomb operation, Jerusalem, 1975
The Palestinian National Liberation Movement - Fatah
The operation was carried out by Ahmad Jabarah Abu Sukkar, born in July 1936. He was taken captive long after the operation and sat in the Israeli prison for 27 years."
[Official Fatah Facebook page, July 5, 2018]
Seized archive shows Iran nuke project was larger than thought, had foreign help
The archive of Iranian nuclear documents seized by the Israeli Mossad from a Tehran warehouse in January shows that Iran’s program to build nuclear weapons “was almost certainly larger, more sophisticated and better organized” than was suspected, unnamed nuclear experts were quoted as saying in the New York Times on Sunday, after being shown selected documents from the haul by US reporters.

One of the Iranian documents specifies plans to build a first “batch of five weapons” and discusses sites for possible underground nuclear tests, the Times reported, after one of its reporters was given limited access to the haul last week, along with a reporter from the Washington Post, and another from the Wall Street Journal.

“None were built, possibly because the Iranians feared being caught, or because a campaign by American and Israeli intelligence agencies to sabotage the effort, with cyberattacks and disclosures of key facilities, took its toll,” said the Times.

“It’s quite good,” Robert Kelley, a nuclear engineer and former inspector for the UN’s nuclear watchdog, the IAEA, told The Times dryly, after being shown some of the documents. “The papers show these guys were working on nuclear bombs.”

The documents also reinforce Israel’s contention that Iran remains determined to attain a nuclear weapons archive, despite its commitments under the 2015 nuclear deal (the JCPOA), the US reporters noted.

The materials they were shown include documentation that names current Iranian President Hassan Rouhani as a member of the “Council for Advanced Technologies” that approved the rogue nuclear weapons program, the Washington Post said, and indicate “a supporting role by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, as well as the Quds Force.” Previously released documents indicate that the Iranian army was charged with overseeing the conversion of low-enriched uranium to weapons-grade fuel suitable for nuclear bombs.
NYTs [$]: How Israel Stole Iran's Nuclear Secrets
The Mossad agents moving in on a warehouse in a commercial district of Tehran on Jan. 31 knew they had exactly 6 hours and 29 minutes to disable the alarms, break through two doors, cut through dozens of giant safes and get out of the city with a half-ton of secret materials. When time was up, they fled for the border, hauling 50,000 pages and 163 compact discs of memos, videos and plans.

Last week, at the invitation of the Israeli government, three reporters were shown key documents from the trove. Many confirmed that Iran had worked in the past to systematically assemble everything it needed to produce atomic weapons. "The papers show these guys were working on nuclear bombs," said Robert Kelley, a nuclear engineer and former inspector for the International Atomic Energy Agency.

American and British intelligence officials, after comparing the documents to some they had previously obtained from spies and defectors, said they believed the trove was genuine.

The Iranian program to build a nuclear weapon was almost certainly larger, more sophisticated and better organized than most suspected in 2003, according to outside nuclear experts consulted by The Times. The documents detailed the challenges of integrating a nuclear weapon into a warhead for the Shahab-3, an Iranian missile.

Clearly, the Israelis had inside help. They had learned which of the 32 safes held the most important information. They studied the alarm system, so that it would appear to be working even though it would not alert anyone when the agents arrived.

Among the most fascinating elements are pictures taken inside key facilities in Iran, before the equipment was dismantled in anticipation of international inspections. One set of photos shows a giant metal chamber built to conduct high-explosive experiments, in a building at the Parchin military base near Tehran.

Friday, July 13, 2018

From Ian:

JPost Editorial: Northern exposure
In the last six months, the threats have grown. An Iranian drone flew into Israel near Beit Shean in February. A salvo of twenty rockets was fired at the Golan in May.

Each action has led to a reaction by Israel, usually punishing Iran and the Syrian regime. But the attacks have not deterred the regime or Tehran. Tehran knows that it can continue to threaten Israel in a variety of ways. Israel has sought to warn Damascus via Moscow to stop the Iranian threat. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu repeatedly stressed that Iran must leave Syria. Assad responds that there are no Iranian forces in Syria. Beneath the war of words the airstrikes and Iranian presence continue.

In retaliation for the drone incursion, the IDF struck three targets in Syria. Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman has warned that Syria must refrain from any actions that violate the border area. “I made it clear here, both to the commanders and to the representatives of the UN Disengagement Observer Force that any Syrian entering into the buffer zone, every Syrian soldier in the buffer zone, would endanger his soul.”

A new report at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies argues that “Israel now seeks to ensure this does not develop into a pattern, where Iran is allowed to test Israel and simply absorb limited retribution.”

On the heels of Netanyahu’s trip to Moscow and US President Donald Trump’s meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin next week, the message must be clear: Iran must leave Syria.

The regime and Moscow must take this seriously and not continue the rhetorical charade of claiming there are no Iranian forces in Syria or that they are not “foreign” or that they consist merely of militias or advisors. The Golan border must not become another Gaza, it must remain quiet or Assad will pay the price for allowing threats to fester.
Eugene Kontorovich: The U.S. Must Stop Funding UN Agencies That Admit the Palestinian Authority
In 1990 and 1994, Congress enacted laws requiring the government to cease funding any “specialized agencies” or “affiliated organization[s]” of the United Nations that grant full membership to the Palestinian Authority (PA). These laws have become relevant since Mahmoud Abbas began a campaign to join international institutions as a stepping stone to a unilateral declaration of statehood and a tool for lawfare against Israel. Since 2016, the PA joined four such groups, which nonetheless continue to receive funds from the U.S. Eugene Kontorovich argues that these organizations should be defunded, not only on strictly legal grounds but also as a matter of policy:
PDF
The acceptance of [the PA as a] member state turns these UN agencies into political tools for Palestinian unilateralism, rather than technical agencies dealing with specialized tasks. Moreover, as evidenced by the Palestinian membership in UNESCO, once it is a part of these agencies, the PA will hijack their agendas and divert them to anti-Israel policies and polemics. . . . [I]f the U.S. does not enforce non-waivable statutory measures triggered by PA action, it will lose its credibility as a potential broker of Middle East peace. Any peace plan will require U.S. assurances to Israel in the event the Palestinians take certain hostile measures. Implementing those assurances will always have a cost, a downside. If the U.S. will not abide by its own statutes when doing so might be uncomfortable, it can hardly be expected to do so with mere diplomatic assurances.

[Furthermore], a failure to implement the funding restrictions will only encourage the PA to step up its “internationalization” campaign. . . . Finally, the UN agencies admitted the PA with full knowledge of the consequences. The UN itself has thus put the promotion of the PA’s agenda above the original goals of these agencies. If mandatory U.S. funding cuts would be destructive to the mission of these organizations, they would not have accepted PA membership. If cutting funding impedes the functioning of these organizations, the solution consistent with U.S. law is not to continue funding, but rather defunding [in order] to pressure the PA to quit the organizations it has already joined.

Thursday, July 12, 2018

From Ian:

Isi Leibler: Balancing dangers and opportunities
The speed of recent changes is breathtaking.

On the negative side, an escalation in anti-Semitism has reduced the quality of life for most Jews. Most European governments do not conceal their contempt for Israel, and their foreign policies and U.N. voting records display an absence of moral compass.

Nothing illustrates this better than their reaction to Israeli self-defense against incursions by Hamas terrorists and rocket attacks. To depict Israel's efforts to defend itself from violent mobs as a disproportionate response to "peaceful demonstrators" is obscene. No country would have shown as much restraint.

The behavior of the ailing Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and his acolytes has descended to levels of anti-Semitism that would have made the Nazis proud.

A rabid hatred for U.S. President Donald Trump has led many American Jews to distance themselves from Israel. Forty-two percent of them even opposed moving the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem.

On the broader Jewish political level, the Anti-Defamation League, the once respected apolitical body whose mandate was to combat anti-Semitism, today aggressively seeks to slander Trump and often criticizes Israel.

The Democratic Party has become radicalized with the emergence of anti-Israeli agitators. The primary election defeat of Rep. Joe Crowley, the Democratic caucus chairman and a firm supporter of Israel, was a significant blow. Jewish voters were not dissuaded from supporting his opponent, 28-year-old Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who has made no secret of her hostility to Israel. She is affiliated with the Democratic Socialists of America, which supports the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement.

The situation for Jews on college campuses has worsened. Many pro-BDS agitators are fringe Jews working with radical Arabs and far-left extremists.

But outside this gloom, there is also light.
JPost Editorial: The hypocrisy of the Socialist International
How did we get here? For the better part of a century, Labor Zionism was a major ideology in the pre-state Zionist movement and in Israeli political life, and a major player in the Socialist International, where the Poalei Zion movement became a member in 1923. Shimon Peres was vice president and honorary president of the Socialist International, and Collette Avital, a former Labor MK, is currently a vice president.

But the progressive world has been hijacked by the idea of intersectionality, which creates a hierarchy of grievances in which Israel’s success is considered a demerit, and the Palestinians somehow are championed by all. The Socialist International reflects a trend seen in Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour Party in the UK – with whom Israeli Labor has already cut ties – and a slow but steady rise in ultra-leftist candidates running with the Democrats in the US midterm elections this year.

Never mind that Labor and Meretz members advocate for progressive causes – whether for women, LGBT people or the Arab minority in Israel – while Fatah, the Palestinian party in the Socialist International, led by Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, is far from progressive on social issues, reeks with corruption and openly rewards terrorists who murder and maim Israeli civilians to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars each year.

It’s no wonder that Labor left an organization where it had no say and was doomed to lose, despite the party’s storied history in the Socialist International. This only begs the question of why Meretz chose to remain in this den of hypocrites.
Ignoring Extradition Request, Russian President Putin Meets With Senior Iranian Envoy Wanted by Argentina for 1994 AMIA Bombing
Argentina’s government voiced its frustration with Russian President Vladimir Putin’s administration on Thursday, after Moscow ignored a formal request from an Argentine judge to arrest a senior visiting Iranian official implicated in the 1994 bombing of the AMIA Jewish center in Buenos Aires.

Putin met on Thursday with Ali Akbar Velayati, a senior adviser to the regime’s “supreme leader,” Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, greeting him warmly in front of reporters. Velayati was Iran’s foreign minister at the time of the AMIA atrocity on July 18, 1994, when 85 people died and hundreds more were wounded after a truck packed with explosives drove into the Jewish organization’s main building in the Argentine capital.

Velayati was also present at a meeting of top Iranian security officials in the city of Mashhad on August 14, 1993, where the decision to bomb the AMIA building is understood to have been made.

Velayati’s face-to-face with Putin on Thursday came just 36 hours after Judge Rodolfo Canicoba Corral requested his arrest by the Russian authorities. It was Judge Corral who issued international arrest warrants for Velayati and seven other Iranian and Lebanese operatives in 2006. Corral also tried unsuccessfully to secure Velayati’s arrest under the same warrant in 2016, when the Iranian visited Singapore and Malaysia.

Argentine news outlet Infobae.com reported that both Argentina’s foreign minister, Jorge Faurie, and its ambassador to Moscow, Ricardo Lagorio, had reached out personally to their Russian counterparts to enforce Corral’s arrest warrant.

Wednesday, July 11, 2018

From Ian:

PWM: What makes a Palestinian parent proud?
One of the signs of the Palestinian Authority’s successful indoctrination of its population to admire terrorists who have murdered civilians, is when parents of terrorists openly say they are “proud” of their terrorist sons, or describe their actions as “honorable.”

The parents of Islamic Jihad member Muhammad Aql who recruited and prepared the suicide bombers who attacked a bus at Karkur Junction near Hadera on Oct. 21, 2002, murdering 14 and wounding 50, are such parents. When interviewed on official PA TV they described his actions as bringing them “honor”:

Mother of terrorist prisoner Muhammad Aql: “Our hope is that Allah will release them from prison. These are heroes we raise our heads thanks to them...”
Father of terrorist prisoner Muhammad Aql: “Praise Allah, he is imprisoned for an action that honors us, and not for anything else.”
[Official PA TV, Giants of Endurance, June 17, 2018]

Terrorist Aql was also involved in additional shooting and bombing attacks and is serving 14 life sentences.

By law, the PA pays Aql and thousands of other terrorist prisoners a monthly salary, as documented by Palestinian Media Watch.
UK Taxpayers Sponsor Palestinian Terror
As support for the Palestinian cause drops off even in the Arab world, news that Australia has cut a $7 million ‘lifeline’ to a death-cult is welcome indeed.

Maybe it’s also time for Britain to get real – especially in the wake of the barely reported stoning of Prince William’s vehicle – and acknowledge the need to stop encouraging terror with taxpayers’ money.

Australia has decided to discontinue direct aid to the Palestinian Authority because it suspects the cash is freeing up funds used to back political violence. And we have recently learnt that the UK gave £20 million in aid to Palestinian schools, where they teach children about Jihad (holy war) and martyrdom.

A report by the Institute for Monitoring Peace and Cultural Tolerance in School Education reveals that the PA school curriculum “utilizes a variety of tools to convince children – mostly boys – to risk their lives and die as martyrs”.

It goes on to highlight some of the lessons being funded by British aid. For example, a science textbook explains Newton’s second law of physics – on power, mass and tensile strength – by using an image of a boy with a slingshot targeting soldiers.

Meanwhile jihadists continue their desperate attempts to engage Western sympathy by stoking up further flames in Gaza, sending burning kites to destroy Israeli crops while also trying to force their way through the border fence in order to kill Jews.
PA Promises to Only Pay Families of Nice Terrorists (satire)
The Israeli parliament’s decision to bring forward legislation to financially penalize the Palestinian Authority by the amount they pay out to families of terrorists, has led to a call for compromise by the West Bank leadership.

“We get it, honestly. We understand why the Israelis might be a bit pissed with us for dishing out dollars to encourage more stabbings”, a spokesman said. “But, not all our guys are that bad, Zionist-killing aside of course. More than one of them could be described, as I believe those Jews would say, as a ‘true mensch’. They never forget to call their grandparents and are always promising to find a nice young girl to start a family with. Well, before they go out and kill Jews anyway. So, all we’re asking is that Israel is just a bit more understanding and will let us to continue to pay out funds to the families of these nice guys.”

Israel, unsurprisingly, did not react positively to the PA’s proposal. One government spokesman said that “while we can all get behind a good mensch, we don’t appreciate the Palestinians abusing the term. However often they call their grandmother, these guys are no Kevin Hart or Dwayne Johnson.”
David Singer: PLO-Hamas anti-England, anti-Israel Hatred Politicises FIFA World Cup
FIFA’s admission of the Palestinian Football Federation as a member of FIFA in 1988 had also contravened Article 10.1 of FIFA’s then governing articles:
'Any Association which is responsible for organising and supervising football in its country may become a Member of FIFA. In this context, the expression “country” shall refer to an independent state recognised by the international Community.'

FIFA started living in its own dream world 26 years before Sweden joined it. Who will replace Sweden as Britain’s nemesis was summed up by another fan:
“Anyone supporting England is supporting Israel itself. These teams represent their countries and governments and will raise their flags in the stands. How can I support the country that allowed the Jewish state on our land?”

The Gazan fans are in for a shock and a reality check when they begin choosing one of the three remaining teams – France, Belgium or Croatia – to topple the evil Brits.

France, Belgium and Croatia just happen to have all voted in favour of the Mandate for Palestine incorporating the Balfour Declaration.

The semi-finals, final and third-place playoff will be agony for Gazan viewers as one of these last four countries holds up the trophy on the winner’s podium come finals day – the others the three minor places - with their flags filling Gaza’s TV screens.

The moral is clear – international law cannot be turned on and off as circumstances dictate – because one day the perpetrator will become entrapped in the hopeless position that the Arab States, the PLO and Hamas now find themselves.

Throwing out binding international law – the Balfour Declaration and the Mandate for Palestine – and falsely creating fake international law – “the State of Palestine” – goes to the heart of why the Arab-Jewish conflict still remains unresolved in 2018.

Sunday, July 08, 2018

From Ian:

David Singer: Hamas and PLO Entrench Apartheid in Gaza and West Bank
The British Foreign Office showed appalling judgement when scheduling a visit by Prince William to a refugee camp in the West Bank which should have been closed down long ago. The Prince – obviously moved by what he saw – remarked:
“I saw at Jalazon (refugee camp) the tremendous hardships faced by the refugees, and I can only imagine the difficulties of life lived under these conditions, the ed (sic) resources and the lack of opportunity”

Regrettably Prince William failed to question why:
1. Jalazon had not been dismantled during the past 25 years after it came under Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) control.

2. Jalazon’s inhabitants should still be classified as “refugees” when they are living in part of former Palestine now under PLO occupation.


Prince William’s visit was closely followed by a meeting between Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and United Nations (UN) Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process – Nickolay Mladenov.

During their meeting Abbas stressed the UN's important role in providing protection for
the “Palestinian people” and the necessity of continuing to provide services to the “Palestinian refugees” through the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA).

Undiscussed between them was why the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) in the West Bank and Hamas in Gaza have failed to close down the 27 refugee camps still remaining within their respective fiefdoms.

Caroline Glick: Democrats Reject Israel Because They Reject American Nationalism
The problem is that over the past twenty years or so, the American left has undergone a profound shift in values, from liberal nationalism to radical post-nationalism. This process, facilitated and accelerated during Barack Obama’s presidency, and expressed most emblematically in Democratic support for open borders, has made post-nationalism the sine qua non of the Democrats since Trump’s electoral triumph in 2016.

Israel’s relations with the American left, then, are a collateral victim of a wider shift in American society. Jewish nationalism, with its inherent affinity to American nationalism, was once the basis of Israel’s relationship with the American people as a whole. But now nationalism is the main cause of the Democrats’ increasingly fraught and antagonistic relationship with the Jewish state, while remaining the foundation of ever increasing levels of Republican affinity and support for Israel.

Perhaps Israel will be able to heed Ross’s advice, at least in terms of the Democrats. Perhaps it will be able to develop a common language with the U.S. based on shared interests. There are certainly a number of steps Israel can take to advance that goal.

But the fact is that the Democrats’ shift in values from nationalist to post-nationalist, rather than any action Israel has taken in its domestic or foreign policy, is what has caused the rupture in Israel’s ties to the American left.

So long as Meretz remains a marginal force in Israeli society on the one hand, and post-nationalist forces continue to rise in the Democratic party on the other, bipartisan support for Israel, like bipartisan support for American nationalism, will remain a thing of the past.
David P. Goldman: The Real Modern Anti-Semitism
A Brezhnev-era joke asked whether it was a crime to say that the party chairman was an idiot. The answer was yes, because it’s a state secret. For those who miss Soviet-era humor, French President Emmanuel Macron has provided some consolation, by firing the French ambassador to Budapest for observing in a private memorandum that the president of Hungary is not an anti-Semite. Evidently that is a state secret in France.

In a June 18 dispatch, Eric Fournier, the French ambassador to Hungary, reported that the alleged anti-Semitism of Hungarian President Viktor Orban was “a fantasy of the foreign press.” He added that the allegation diverted attention from the “real modern anti-Semitism,” whose source is “Muslims in France and Germany.” The private memorandum was leaked by the left-wing website Mediapart and reported widely in the French press. Hungary’s “management of illegal immigration” might be a model for France, Fournier added.

The French president denounced the memo as “contrary to the French official position,” saying that if it were shown that Fournier’s views had been made in public, he would be removed. The memo was private, but Macron fired him anyway. Fournier’s memo had struck a raw nerve. On April 18, 250 French notables, including former president Nicolas Sarkozy, had denounced the “new anti-Semitism” arising from “Islamic radicalization,” declaring: “We demand that the fight against this democratic failure that is anti-Semitism becomes a national cause before it’s too late. Before France is no longer France.” Nearly a tenth of France’s half-million Jews have emigrated in the past decade in response to Muslim violence against Jews.

Ambassador Fournier was entirely correct: Polling data provide massive evidence of Muslim anti-Semitism in France. Fifty-six percent of believing and practicing Muslims in France believe that there is “a Zionist conspiracy on a global scale,” according to a 2014 Fondapol study. French soldiers guard synagogues and Jewish schools. French Jews are advised by their community leaders not to show themselves on the street with visible signs of Jewish identity, such as a kippah.

By contrast, Hungary’s 100,000 Jews—a larger presence relative to the country’s population of 8 million—walk unmolested to synagogue in traditional Jewish costume and hold street fairs with minimal security presence. During a visit to Budapest in May, I walked from my hotel to synagogue on Friday night and Saturday wearing a kippah, crossing the city four times. No one looked at me twice. I wouldn’t attempt that in France or Germany.

Saturday, June 30, 2018

From Ian:

MEMRI: Fatah Announces 'National Campaign To Thwart The Deal Of The Century,' Publishes Posters Against The Deal And Its Initiators
Even before its terms have been publicized, the Trump administration's Middle East peace plan, known as "the Deal of the Century," has encountered harsh opposition from the Palestinian Authority (PA), on the grounds that it does not promote peace but seeks to eliminate the Palestinian national identity and the Palestinian state and to topple the Palestinian leadership.[1]Against this backdrop, PA elements have directed personal attacks at the U.S. officials promoting the deal. For example, a statement by the PA Foreign Ministry called Trump's advisor and son-in-law Jared Kushner a "political novice who reads history through Israeli eyes."[2] An editorial of the PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida likened U.S. President Donald Trump to "the last Roman emperor, Nero, who burned Rome down, so that the roads no longer led to it..."[3] Al-Hayat Al-Jadida columnist 'Omar Hilmi Al-Ghoul called Trump "a disgrace for America and its people," whose "populist policy" is "dangerous" for the U.S. and the world at large. [4]

Harsh criticism against the deal and its proponents was also voiced by Fatah, whose chairman is Palestinian President Mahmoud 'Abbas. Recently the movement announced the launching of "a national campaign to thwart the Deal of the Century."[5] An announcement on behalf of the campaign, which was also posted on Fatah's official Facebook page, stated that its objective is "to clarify the dangers posed by this deal, which is known to be a bad deal, and explain how it can destroy our national cause [by] proposing alternative solutions that circumvent the Palestinian people's eternal rights [in favor of] humanitarian gestures and economic enticements." The announcement states further that the Deal of the Century is an American attempt "to impose [on the Palestinians] the vision of the Israeli occupation state and to end the dream of the Palestinian state and of national independence."[6]

Fatah Spokesman Osama Al-Qawasmeh announced that the movement supported the campaign and called on Palestinians to join its activities "on the ground and in the media, and in every language, in order to voice [the protest of the] Palestinian people that will not accept surrender and disgrace."[7] In addition, following the launching of the campaign, Fatah Central Committee member Jamal Muhaisin met with the heads of the movement's branches in the West Bank in order to prepare "The March of Refusal of the Deal of the Century,"[8] and also announced that protests would take place in Ramallah on July 2, 2018 against "the American crime of our era."[9]

Melanie Phillips: The hurdles in front of the Trump peace plan
President Trump’s peace plan for Israel and the Palestinian Arabs, his attempt at the “deal of the century,” will apparently soon be revealed to the world.

His envoys, Jared Kushner and Jason Greenblatt, have been making the rounds in the region to get Arab allies on board. Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyhau has paid a visit to the King of Jordan.

No one yet knows the terms of this deal. Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas has refused even to talk to the United States about it and has presumptively rejected it sight unseen.

The message he has received, however, is that the days of using such rejectionism to stymie progress are over. If he won’t agree to these terms, the Israelis will have U.S. backing in doing what they need to do to safeguard their security. And the Arab world has indicated that it will raise no serious objection.

Abbas and his camp are in effect being told: “You lost. Now get over it.” So will they?

As has been clear for decades, there are no terms on which the Palestinian Arab leadership can ever accept the existence of the State of Israel.

Until now, the West didn’t believe that. It thought that if only Israel would give more, and then more again, there could be a two-state solution and an end to the conflict.

This merely demonstrated the delusion born of Western hubris that the agenda of everyone in the world is negotiable. It failed to grasp two crucial aspects of the Palestinian Arab story—one dating from the 1930s, and the other going back to the seventh century.

Consider this: Strikingly, the image Palestinian Arabs present to the world systematically appropriates for themselves characteristics of the Jewish and Zionist experience.
Ben-Dror Yemini: The Palestinian paradox: 70 years of perpetuating refugeeism
“The Palestinian side won by a knockout,” said Lt. Col. Jonathan Conricus, the IDF’s international spokesperson.

Well, of course. That’s the result of the “wait and see” policy. Hamas knows it won’t defeat Israel in the battlefield. But it knew in advance that it would defeat Israel in the global public opinion. Hamas wasn’t the only one that knew that. Any sensible person knew that.

Israel should have made the Palestinians in Gaza, including Hamas, an offer they couldn’t refuse a long time ago. I have repeated this claim, I must say, like Cato the Elder.

Now, Hamas is proposing a hudna. The proposal’s precondition, senior Israeli officials responded, doesn’t meet Israel’s demands. Such foolishness. Not only is Israel failing to initiate anything, it is also rejecting a Hamas proposal.

When Hamas propose something, Israel should first of all say yes, and add that the hudna must be based on the international community’s terms. Does Israel have anything to lose? No.

But Israel, once again, is winning on the Gaza border and suffering a defeat in the global media. That’s what Hamas wanted. That’s what Hamas got. And the admission of senior Hamas official Salah Bardawil, that 50 of the Palestinians killed on May 14 were Hamas members, doesn’t help Israel in any way. We have lost this conflict—not because of Hamas, but because of Israeli foolishness.

Thursday, June 28, 2018

From Ian:

Australian Unions channelled millions of dollars to an organisation that employed a terrorist leader
AUSTRALIAN taxpayer funds are being funnelled to a Palestinian aid organisation that has employed and supported a leader of a terrorist group in Gaza.

The Daily Telegraph can reveal the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) has given at least $21 million in the past decade to a Sydney-based charity set up by the unions, Union Aid Abroad (APHEDA).

This charity then channelled millions of dollars to the MA’AN Development Centre — a Palestinian organisation that employed a leader of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP).

The revelations have prompted Foreign Minister Julie Bishop to announce an audit of the union funding, understood to have been decided by her department.

PFLP has been on the official terror lists of the United States, European Union and Canada as a result of its hijacking of planes, assassinations and suicide bombings, while Australia has the group on its “Consolidated” list of organisations subject to financial sanctions as a result of security threats.

One of the MA’AN Development Centre’s 36 staff working in Gaza was Ahmed Abdullah Al Adine, 30, who held the job of Project Co-ordinator and Field Monitor since 2012.

Al Adine was also a leader of the PFLP in Gaza until he was killed in border protests last month. The terror group now hails him as a “martyr” and gave him a grand funeral last month, attended by at least a dozen PFLP terrorists.
Caroline Glick: Trump Must Respond to Putin’s Double-Cross in Syria
President Donald Trump will soon meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin. When he does, he must respond to a challenge Putin threw down in Syria, on the heels of Trump’s diplomatic breakthrough with North Korea.

How Trump and his administration respond to that challenge will affect not only the future of U.S.-Russian relations, but also Trump’s ability to operate credibly on the international stage. And, more acutely, it will impact the prospect for a major war in the Middle East.

Last July, despite nearly desperate Israeli opposition, Trump and Putin concluded a ceasefire accord regarding southern Syria. Jordan was also a party to the deal.

On Saturday, in a highly destabilizing and contemptuous move, Putin threw the deal into the garbage can.

The deal, the “Memorandum of Principle for De-escalation in Southern Syria” had three main components.

First, it defined the area of southern Syria below Quneitra and Suwayda as an “exclusion zone” for fighters of “non-Syrian origin,” including Iranian forces and their proxies, and fighters linked to al Qaeda and the so-called Islamic State.

Second, the deal called for maintaining existing governance and security arrangements in opposition-held areas in southwestern Syria. In other words, it barred the Syrian regime from seeking to retake the border area with Jordan and Israel.

Finally, it called for unimpeded access for humanitarian aid workers and the creation of conditions to allow the 650,000 Syrian refugees in Jordan to begin to return home.
PMW: "With our skulls we are paving the path to certain victory," PA TV host quoted arch-terrorist Abu Jihad
When Palestinians marked the anniversary earlier this year of the death of arch-terrorist Abu Jihad who was responsible for the murder of at least 125 Israelis, a PA TV host quoted the terrorist, encouraging death for "Palestine":

Official PA TV host: "Thirty years since the death as a Martyr of Khalil Al-Wazir Abu Jihad, the First Bullet and the First Stone. On this day we remember what Prince of Martyrs [Abu Jihad] said: 'Our heads will remain in the sky and our feet are planted in the homeland. With our skulls we are paving the path to certain victory and return. The compass will never err and the path will continue to guide towards Palestine.'" [Official PA TV, Good Morning, April 20, 2018]

Palestinian Media Watch has documented that PA and Fatah leaders have turned terrorist Abu Jihad into a role model for Palestinians. Fatah, for example, recently named a futsal championship after him.

PMW has also exposed that the PA encourages Martyrdom-death, for example a song on PA radio stated that "Palestine is etched on the heart of the fetus, a proud Martyr in his mother's womb," and Abbas' Fatah broadcast this song, asking Allah to grant Palestinians "Martyrdom" in Jerusalem:

Friday, June 22, 2018

From Ian:

Israel then and now shows power of a good defense and a strong wall
What impressed me on this visit was the confidence of the Israeli people. The security was much less oppressive. I barely saw a handful of weapons out in the open during 10 days in the country.

The Israeli military wasn’t present in heavy numbers in the border towns, at least not out in the open. Ashkelon and Sderot were thriving, expanding, growing, with families and lots of children everywhere. No one was concerned about Palestinian terrorists. The walls were working, keeping the killers away from the Israeli people.

I had lunch with a journalist colleague who lives in Jerusalem. He laid out for me the altered facts on the ground in the region over the years and how an effective security wall can rewrite the strategic balance of power.

“The Palestinians are screwed,” he started off. “They have tried suicide vests, car bombs, stabbings, tunnels, rockets, etc. Nothing has worked. They have been opposed by Israeli might at every turn. What do they do now?” he asked.

While standing on the top of a yeshiva in Sderot a few days before I left, I looked out at the Gaza border. This time there were several large plumes of smoke. “Now Hamas is reduced to flying flaming kites to burn Israeli grassland. They are defeated,” my friend said.

Israel will survive this phase of the conflict as well and come out even stronger. In fact, her people will continue to thrive. With President Trump in the White House, the U.S. is once again unambiguously on her side — as it should be.

Take it from one who has just been there: For all the media hand-wringing and pro-Palestinian forces at the U.N. and in Europe, Israel is stronger than ever.

Two months of burning kites from Gaza


Thursday, June 21, 2018

From Ian:

Caroline Glick: The Road to Peace Does Not Run Through Ramallah
Last week, hundreds of Palestinians in PA-controlled Ramallah took to the streets to demand that PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas end his economic war against Gaza. Rather than bow to the public’s demand, Abbas declared the protests illegal. His security forces attacked protesters with truncheons and tear gas.

To date, then, not only has the PA done nothing to help the people of Gaza, but the same regime that also uses every international stage to condemn Israel for the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, has taken active measures to deepen the suffering and poverty of the population.

Monday, PA leader Mahmoud Abbas’s spokesman released a statement responding to the Trump administration’s reported plan to help the people of Hamas-controlled Gaza. Promising that the Kushner-Greenblatt regional tour would end in abject failure, the PA spokesman insisted that the U.S. is trying to “divide the Gaza Strip from the West Bank under humanitarian pretexts.”

His statement also accused the U.S. of using the cause of “humanitarian aid or rehabilitation” as a means to defeat the Palestinian war against Israel by transforming the suffering of the people of Gaza into a “humanitarian issue rather than a political one.”

In other words, as far as the PA is concerned, Gaza’s humanitarian crisis is not something that is supposed to be dealt with on a practical level. No one is actually supposed to improve the lot of the residents of the Hamas-controlled enclave. Rather, Gaza is nothing more than a launching pad for human cannon fodder in the war against Israel. The purpose of the Palestinians’ existence in Gaza is to suffer and die to advance the cause of Israel’s annihilation. Anyone who treats the people of Gaza as human beings is harming the Palestinian cause.
Khaled Abu Toameh: The Palestinian Authority’s Policy of Denormalization
Conclusion
The Palestinian leadership and its NGO partners and supporters have distracted the international focus from addressing Palestinian economic development, liberalization, and infrastructural development. Instead, they have focused international attention on boycott and denormalization campaigns against Israel. Unlike much of the developing world, which has sought stronger economic relations in an age of technology, globalization, and economic integration, the Palestinian leadership has refused to develop its economy in conjunction with its economically thriving Israeli neighbor, who is potentially the prospective Palestinian state’s strongest trading partner.

Following the Oslo Accords, the Palestinians had the unique advantage of receiving aid from Israel, unlike other newly formed states. However, under the pretext of refusing to bolster Israel’s “occupation economy,” the Palestinian leadership has publicly declined to cooperate on joint projects with the Israeli government or the Israeli private sector that would benefit both economies.

Instead, the Palestinian leadership has been complicit in its own economic stagnation, due to questionable business ventures and investments that have largely failed to benefit the Palestinian people, and instead have denormalized relations with Israel.

The BDS movement and the Palestinian and foreign NGOs that subscribe to its destructive doctrine have also worsened the economic situation for Palestinian workers, by limiting access to Israel, the largest labor market for Palestinians. Instead of allowing its own people to find well-paying jobs, including salaries that could be taxed by the Palestinian Authority, and encouraging disposable incomes that could be reinvested in Palestinian services, the Palestinian leadership has operated not as a developing state, but a corrupt and even failing regime. This fact has long been evident to large sectors of Palestinian society. They recognize that the Palestinian leadership’s failure on the economic and political fronts has resulted in their attempts to refocus the debate on attacking Israel as an illegitimate, apartheid, colonial implant that is the source of all Palestinian ills.
Nikki Haley Blames Human Rights Orgs for Undermining Efforts to Reform U.N. Human Rights Council
The New York Times reports that Haley criticized the groups for opposing her efforts to garner support in the U.N. to reform the council. One of the groups Haley sent the letter to, Human Rights Watch, opposed Haley's push for a U.N. General Assembly vote on the reforms.

"The risk was that it would have opened a Pandora’s box of even worse problems," Human Rights Watch U.N. director Louis Charbonneau said.

Haley told the groups that they have aligned themselves on the side of Russia and China, which possess a murky record on human rights.

"You put yourself on the side of Russia and China, and opposite the United States, on a key human rights issue," she wrote. "You should know that your efforts to block negotiations and thwart reform were a contributing factor in the U.S. decision to withdraw from the council."

The Times reports that Haley grew frustrated with the groups after they sent a joint letter to member states of the U.N., asking them to oppose Haley's resolution.

Tuesday, June 19, 2018

From Ian:

Noah Rothman: The Triumph of Reason at the United Nations
This leads us to the UNHRC’s irredeemable flaw: Its institutional biases are so skewed in favor of murderers, dictators, and bigots that it serves primarily to legitimize the dregs of the earth.

The Council has a permanent agenda item—item seven—which obliges it to regularly survey potential abuses committed by Israel in the Palestinian territories. Item seven is such a blatant misuse of the Council’s time that Europe and North America boycott the group when that article is invoked.

In 2008, the commission appointed Richard Falk, a 9/11 conspiracy theorist and Hamas apologist, to serve a six-year term as a United Nations Special Rapporteur for the human rights situation in the Palestinian territories. In 2011, Falk was reprimanded by UN General Secretary Ban Ki-moon for endorsing the idea that the U.S. was behind the attacks on its own territory.

Jean Ziegler, co-founder of the Muammar Qaddafi International Prize for Human Rights—which is a real thing that has been awarded to such paragons as Hugo Chavez, Fidel Castro, Recep Tayyip ErdoÄŸan, and Louis Farrakhan—currently serves in an elected role on the United Nations Human Rights Council.

The Council’s special rapporteur on “unilateral coercive measures,” Idriss Jazairy, is alleged by UN Watch’s Hillel Neuer in testimony before Congress to have executed an “aggressive campaign of non-democracies to muzzle UN rights experts.” One of Jazairy’s most recent reports to the UNHRC is a typical jeremiad attacking the civilized world for maintaining strict sanctions against Bashar al-Assad’s government as punishment for Damascus’s use of genocidal tactics and chemical weapons on civilian populations.

Despite Haley’s earned hostility toward the United Nations for its biases against both Israel and the general appearance of sanity, she has proven to be a particularly effective ambassador. Last week, amid a rote condemnation of the Jewish State for engaging in targeted self-defense amid a flare up on its border with Gaza, Haley managed to expose something new: cracks in the UN’s anti-Israel consensus.
The United Nations’ Flawed Condemnation of Israel
As a thought experiment, one may consider, “What was Israel to do?” It is a shame that there were innocent civilian casualties and injuries — Palestinians that did not take part in the violence were harmed. It is important, however, to make a clear distinction that Israel did not see these protests as an opportunity to kill as many Palestinians as possible. These protests, especially when they turned violent, thrust Israel into a position to defend its border. Of course, Israel and Palestine have differing stories on the militant status of the protestors killed.

During the protests, the IDF has been running a live twitter feed of their defensive actions with video recordings for reference. In addition to this, the IDF have on several occasions dropped leaflets from aircraft warning protestors not to approach the border fence.

In response to the Israeli defense, Hamas fired approximately 100 rockets toward heavily populated Israeli towns and cities. The Iron Dome Missile defense system was able to prevent the projectiles from causing any civilian casualties. Again, the UN failed to make any mention of this in their latest condemnation towards Israel, even after the United States proposed an amendment enumerating such.

In the UN general assembly chamber, Turkey, Algeria, and Palestine, some of Israel’s most outspoken critics, proposed a resolution condemning Israel for “excessive use of force.” The Palestinians also formally requested heavier security apparatus to defend themselves against the Israelis. A majority of countries also chose to neglect the defensive position Israel maintained or any mention of Hamas’ involvement. The only nations that voted against this measure were Australia, the Marshall Islands, Micronesia, Nauru, Solomon Islands, Togo, the United States, and Israel.

The greater community of the United Nations chose to forgo objectivity, and opt for a one-sided narrative.
Elliott Abrams: More Evidence that the UN's Automatic Majority Against Israel is Fraying
A few days ago (here) I analyzed the recent UN General Assembly vote on Gaza and concluded that the UN's automatic majority against Israel is fraying.

Now there is an important piece of new evidence. In his first address to the UN Human Rights Council, British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said this:
I will say that we share the view that a dedicated agenda item focused solely on Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories is disproportionate and damaging to the cause of peace and unless things change, we shall move next year to vote against all resolutions introduced under Item 7.

Thus the British are now saying they will next year automatically vote against any and every resolution brought under this agenda item, regardless of its content. Britain's move is likely to open the door for others in the EU or the Commonwealth to follow suit, or at least give Israel and the United States a powerful new argument against that agenda item that singles out Israel. There are some good candidates on the Human Rights Council who ought to follow the UK--and, it should be said, Australia, which already takes this position. Among them are Belgium, Germany, Hungary, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, and Switzerland in Europe and Japan outside it. They should be the targets of an American and Israeli campaign for some basic standard of fairness. The alternative will be the withdrawal of the United States from the Human Rights Council.

Having criticized the Foreign & Commonwealth Office recently (in this blog post) it is only fair to give credit where it is due. Hat's off to Johnson and the FCO on this one.

Monday, June 18, 2018

From Ian:

Ruthie Blum: Gaza Media Coverage: Snipers and Lies
"We will take down the border [with Israel] and we will tear their hearts from their bodies." — Yahya Sinwar, Hamas political leader.

"[W]hen we talk about 'peaceful resistance,' we are deceiving the public. This is a peaceful resistance bolstered by a military force and by security agencies, and enjoying tremendous popular support." — Mahmoud Al-Zahar, senior Hamas official, on Al Jazeera.

When a doctor in Gaza announced that a congenital heart defect was likely the cause of her death, the Gaza health ministry removed her name from the list of those killed in clashes with Israel, pending an autopsy.

"Hamas' goal is to have Israel kill as many Gazans as possible so that the headlines always begin, and often end, with the body count. Hamas deliberately sends women and children to the front line, while their own fighters hide behind these human shields." — Alan Dershowitz, Esq.

Khaled Abu Toameh: Palestinians: Victims of Arab Apartheid
Tens of thousands of Palestinians are now living in a Lebanese ghetto called Ain Al-Hilweh, and the world seems to be fine with that.

No one cares when an Arab country mistreats and discriminates and kills Palestinians. But when something happens in the West Bank or Gaza Strip, the international media and community suddenly wake up. Why? Because they do not want to miss an opportunity to condemn Israel. One can only imagine the uproar in the world were Israel to pass a law denying Arabs jobs or the right to inherit property.

There are no protests on the streets of London or Paris. The UN Security Council has not -- and will not -- hold an emergency session to condemn Lebanon. Of course, the mainstream media in the West is not going to report about Arab apartheid and repressive measures against Palestinians. As for the leaders of the Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, they do not have time to address the problems of the camp residents. The Palestinian Authority and Hamas are too busy fighting each other, and the last thing they have on their minds are the interests and well-being of their people.
Former Israeli minister Gonen Segev charged with spying for Iran
Former minister Gonen Segev was charged last week with spying for Iran, giving Israel’s arch-foe sensitive information about locations of security centers and the country’s energy industry, the Shin Bet security service said Monday.

He was allegedly an active agent at the time of his arrest, and had twice been to Iran to meet his handlers.

Segev, a disgraced politician who served time in jail for drug smuggling, was extradited to Israel from Equatorial Guinea and charged with spying for Iran last month.

According to the Shin Bet, Segev, whose former ministerial responsibilities included energy and infrastructure, has knowingly been in contact with Iranian intelligence officials since 2012, making first contact with them at Iran’s embassy in Nigeria.

“Segev gave his operators information about [Israel’s] energy sector, about security locations in Israel, and about buildings and officials in diplomatic and security bodies, and more,” the Shin Bet said in a statement.

“Segev even visited Iran twice to meet with his handlers in full knowledge that they were Iranian intelligence operatives,” the security service said.

The Shin Bet said Segev met with his Iranian handlers in hotels and safe houses around the world and used a special encrypted device to send them messages in secret. (h/t Yenta Press)

Saturday, June 16, 2018

From Ian:

When Does Pro-Palestinian End … and When Does Anti-Israel Begin?
In a 2013 news item on Iran’s annual Quds Day march, the Associated Press reported that newly elected President Hassan Rouhani said at the event that Israel was an “old wound” that needed to be removed.

The AP later provided some context for those remarks, “Rouhani spoke at an annual pro-Palestinian rally marking ‘Al-Quds Day’ — the Arabic word for Jerusalem — and although his remarks appear contrary to his outreach efforts to the West, they should also be seen in the context of internal Iranian politics where softening the establishment’s anti-Israeli stand is not an option.”

Despite the AP’s efforts to downplay the extremism of Rouhani’s comments – that he had no choice but to express his opposition to the Jewish state – it also reported, “In the capital, Tehran, tens of thousands took to the streets, chanting ‘Down with America’ and ‘Death to Israel.'”

In a report about last week’s cancelled soccer match between Israel and Argentina, The Washington Post reported, “The BDS movement aims to pressure Israel into complying with international law vis-a-vis its policies toward the Palestinians by discouraging the purchase of Israeli goods, pressuring international companies not to conduct business in Israel and urging celebrities not to visit or perform in the country.”

Omar Barghouti, one of the founders of the Boycott, Sanctions, and Divestment (BDS) campaign, has been clear about the goal of his movement. He has said, “A Jewish state in Palestine in any shape or form cannot but contravene the basic rights of the indigenous Palestinian population and perpetuate a system of racial discrimination that ought to be opposed categorically….Definitely, most definitely we oppose a Jewish state in any part of Palestine. No Palestinian, rational Palestinian, not a sell-out Palestinian, will ever accept a Jewish state in Palestine.”

Nor is Barghouti alone among proponents of BDS in calling for an end to the modern state of Israel.
Elliott Abrams: The UN's Automatic Majority Against Israel is Fraying
On June 13, the United Nations General Assembly voted once again to condemn Israel, this time for its actions against Hamas in Gaza when tens of thousands of Hamas supporters and terrorists stormed the Israeli border. The condemnation is not news, but the voting patterns are worth a look.

The final resolution passed 120 (yes) to 8 (no) with 45 abstentions. Who were the eight countries voting no? The United States and Israel, several Pacific island states (Marshall Islands, Nauru, Micronesia, Solomon Islands), Togo—and Australia.

Last year Australia’s government announced that it was through with unfair and unbalanced UN treatment of Israel and would henceforth vote against such resolutions in all parts of the UN system. And so it has. For example, on May 18 of this year, the UN Human Rights Council adopted yet another worthless resolution condemning Israel. The vote was 29 to 2, and the two countries voting no were the United States and Australia. So the first thing to note about the recent General Assembly voting was the Australian vote: a rare show of principle and determination on the international diplomatic scene, and a model for other democracies who all ought to be following Australia’s path.
In Israel, U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Calls to Turn the Tide Against Terrorists
U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen told the International Homeland Security Forum in Israel on Tuesday:

Our alliance has been fortified through crises and strengthened by collaboration. Following the 9/11 attacks - the deadliest terror assault in modern world history - you were right there by our side. We knew we could not win the coming fight alone. And we turned to you for guidance because the State of Israel has withstood decades of violence at the hands of fanatics - and has proudly defended freedom against relentless terrorist enemies.

From Ottawa to Berlin, our communities are now on the frontlines. All countries represented here have experienced this evil in one form or another, whether your nationals have been victims or your homelands have been hit directly. We are at war. And we must respond accordingly.

Victory in this struggle begins with moral clarity. We are engaged in a generational struggle against Islamist militants, the preeminent terror threat to our lives, our livelihoods, and our way of life.

Whether it is global jihadist groups such as ISIS and al-Qaeda and their legions of digital followers, or the proxies of rogue nation states such as Iran, our enemies have perverted a major religion to justify horrific violence and lust for power. Their goal is to establish a totalitarian empire governed under a backwards and repressive worldview. And the danger they pose is at its highest point in decades.

There have been more than 100 terrorist attacks in Western countries since the rise of ISIS in 2013, resulting in thousands of casualties. The U.S. has been the victim of around 25 of those incidents. Most were carried out by homegrown violent extremists inspired by the group's heinous propaganda.

The good news is that we have put clear-eyed, focused pressure on terrorist groups around the world. We have obliterated the core safe havens of groups such as ISIS and taken tens of thousands of them off the battlefield. The U.S. is standing up to rogue regimes that bankroll terror and use proxies to advance their malign goals.

Friday, June 15, 2018

From Ian:

What an Israeli Wishes Palestinians Could Understand
In Letters to a Palestinian Neighbor, Yossi Klein Halevi, an American-born Israeli who now spends much of his time fostering Jewish-Muslim dialogue, makes the case for Israel to the Palestinian people. He has even made an Arabic translation of his book available for free online. In an interview with Adam Rubenstein, he explains why peace has so far proved impossible:

The conflict [with Israel] is at the heart of Palestinian identity in a way that’s not true for [Israel’s] other neighbors. The Palestinian national movement, in all its factions, tends to see compromise [with the Jewish state] as a betrayal of justice. What we’ve just seen on the Gaza border in these last weeks is an expression of what’s wrong with Palestinian national identity. Why are Palestinians who live in Palestine demanding the “right of return” to a country that is no longer Palestine? Return to where from where? Leave Gaza—Palestine—and go to Israel? Why, for that matter, are there refugee camps in Gaza—in Palestine? Aren’t they already home? Or does the Palestinian right of return only play out literally, to the actual ancestral homes that were lost in war 70 years ago? Those homes are never going to be retrieved; in most cases they no longer even exist. No Israeli government will agree to national suicide by allowing the descendants of refugees to move to the Jewish state.

The Palestinian demand for right of return to the state of Israel is an expression of the rejection of Israel’s right to exist. . . . I believe that that rejection is the source of the conflict. If there was an indication that even part of the Palestinian people was publicly challenging the official narrative about Israel and the Jewish people—namely, that we are thieves and colonialists and liars who have invented our own history—if there was only some indication on the other side that this is now being debated in Palestinian society, that would be a moment when many of us in Israel would say, “well, maybe we really do have a partner.” In the absence of any debate within Palestinian society over Israel’s legitimacy, it’s hard to argue with the Israeli consensus that there is no partner for peace among the Palestinian leadership.
'BDS efforts harm the Palestinians'
Like the authors of the study, Diker is all too familiar with the ‎main obstacle to coexistence – violence. Dajani Daoudi's car was ‎rigged with explosives in 2014 after he took his students to visit ‎the Auschwitz concentration camp. Aloush refuses to have her ‎photo featured here for fear of retaliation, and Basherat was ‎questioned by Palestinian intelligence after participating in a ‎conference promoting coexistence that was sponsored by the ‎Peres Center for Peace and Innovation. ‎

The study, which has already been published in English, will ‎soon be published in Hebrew, but releasing it in Arabic is a ‎highly sensitive matter and Diker, as the editor, is careful when ‎he addresses the issue. ‎ ‎"The Arab world for 'normalization' can also be used to mean ‎‎'collaboration,' and that has a very negative connotation of ‎helping Israel," he explained. "This is why we opted for 'shared ‎perspectives on a new path to peace.'" Sensitivities aside, the ‎paper will soon be issued in Arabic, as well. ‎

JCPA President Dore Gold explained that the study is directed at ‎the international community but also at the Arab and Jewish ‎sectors. ‎ ‎"We must bring about a change in awareness, not only among ‎the Palestinian public but also in the international community, ‎which must understand that any progress towards a solution ‎between us and the Palestinians has to be based on cooperation ‎and not on the approach promoted by the BDS movement.‎

‎"That's something that has to be said and it's one of the goals of ‎our publications. Moreover, there are those in the Jewish ‎community abroad who think that BDS is what we need now. We ‎have to say – loud and clear – that this is the wrong approach ‎and that the right path is cooperation. If we don't say that, we ‎will lose the battle and that is why it is so important," he ‎concluded. ‎

From Ian:

Haley: UN Makes ‘Morally Bankrupt Judgement’ by Passing Resolution Against Israel
The UN General Assembly on Wednesday overwhelmingly voted to condemn Israel for using “excessive force” against the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip in recent weeks.

The resolution, “Protection of the Palestinian civilian population,” which was proposed by Algeria and Turkey, was passed with 120 “yes” votes, eight “no” votes, and 45 abstentions. A similar resolution was rejected by the UN Security Council earlier this month after a US veto.

According to the language of the resolution, it condemned the “excessive, disproportionate and indiscriminate force by the Israeli forces against Palestinian civilians,” while calling on UN Secretary-General António Guterres to submit a report within 60 days on his proposals for “ensuring the safety, protection and well-being of the Palestinians.”

Prior to the resolution’s adoption, the United States attempted to add an amendment condemning Hamas. However, that amendment, which was supported by a slim majority of countries, 62-58, was ultimately rejected on procedural grounds after failing to achieve a two-thirds majority.

“The nature of this resolution clearly demonstrates that politics is driving the day. It is totally one-sided. It makes not one mention of the Hamas terrorists who routinely initiate the violence in Gaza,” US Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley told the UN body.

In his address prior to the vote, Israeli Ambassador to the United Nations Danny Danon harshly criticized the countries supporting the resolution.

“The resolution before you today does not protect innocent Palestinians. It does not protect innocent Israelis. It does not condemn, does not even mention, Hamas, the internationally recognized terrorist organization directly responsible the violence in our region,” he said. “By supporting this resolution, you are colluding with a terrorist organization. By supporting this resolution, you are empowering Hamas.”


UN rights body reopens amid US threat to withdraw over anti-Israel bias
The UN Human Rights Council will kick off a new session Monday under a cloud of growing US criticism and the threat of Washington withdrawing from the body altogether, primarily over its anti-Israel bias.

Longstanding US criticism of the council for its bias against Israel has escalated since UN-skeptic Donald Trump came to power.

US ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley gave a fiery speech before the Geneva-based council a year ago, demanding deep reforms to fix its “chronic anti-Israel bias.”

She also demanded the body throw out abusive regimes, like Venezuela and Burundi, which hold seats on the rotating 47-seat council.

Despite the tough US rhetoric — which essentially said reform or we are leaving — little has changed.

Tired of waiting for reform, Washington a few weeks ago circulated a proposed resolution unilaterally laying out the full makeover it was looking for.

But the US received little support and has not yet formally tabled the resolution, sparking fevered speculation it was about to quit, and fears of the impact that would have.
David Singer: PLO Rejects Trump Lifeline on Negotiations with Israel
President Trump – still mulling over the release of his ultimate peace deal to resolve the Arab-Jewish conflict – has seen the swift rejection of the call by Jason D. Greenblatt – Trump’s Special Representative for International Negotiations – to have Dr Saeb Erekat replaced as chief negotiator for the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) in future negotiations with Israel.

Greenblatt raised America’s objection to Erekat in stark and uncompromising terms – alleging Erekat
- failed to contribute to an atmosphere conducive to peace
- used rhetoric and made claims that were in many respects simply inaccurate
- had baselessly claimed that Trump’s decision to move the American Embassy to Jerusalem was part of a U.S. attempt to force an Israeli-written agreement on the Palestinians.
- had failed to acknowledge a significant escalation of rockets fired by Hamas and other militant groups into Israel, which clearly represented the danger that Hamas and these groups present.

Greenblatt asserted that the Palestinian leadership need not shackle themselves to Hamas’s failure – in fact, this should be the Palestinian Authority’s opportunity to do the right thing for the people they lead.

Greenblatt called on Erekat and the Palestinian Authority to reject Hamas’s violence and lies and work with America to bring relief to Gaza where America believed real progress could be made that would lay the foundation for a more hopeful future.

Greenblatt’s reference to the “Palestinian Authority” was strange indeed – since it had been disbanded by written decree issued by PLO Chairman Mahmoud Abbas on 3 January 2013.

Greenblatt stressed it was time to stop indulging in overwrought rhetoric and give the Palestinian people something beyond words. Palestinian leadership must create better lives, not sacrifice those lives for Hamas’ grim agenda of terror.

Greenblatt claimed he had heard many Palestinian voices over the past 16 months and many did not agree with Erekat or his approach. Yet, the sad thing is that most would only meet and speak honestly and openly in private because they are afraid to speak publicly.

White House to present Trump peace plan 'not before August'
The White House is unlikely to present its Middle ‎East peace plan before August, a source familiar ‎with the issue told Israel Hayom Thursday. Jerusalem ‎officials confirmed they had no information ‎regarding an earlier rollout of a peace plan. ‎

A U.S. National ‎Security Council spokesperson said ‎senior presidential adviser Jared Kushner and ‎Special Representative for ‎International ‎Negotiations Jason Greenblatt are expected to travel ‎to ‎Israel, Egypt and Saudi Arabia "to discuss the ‎situation ‎in Gaza and to discuss the next stages of ‎the peace effort, as well ‎as get some ideas from ‎players in the region about some remaining ‎questions ‎the White House peace team has. The trip may include ‎‎other stops as well."‎

While in Israel, Kushner and Greenblatt are scheduled ‎to team with U.S. Ambassador to Israel David ‎Friedman ‎for meetings with Prime Minister Benjamin ‎Netanyahu. ‎

Since U.S. President Donald Trump's Dec. 6 recognition of Jerusalem as ‎Israel's capital, the Palestinians have refused to ‎meet with American officials, citing their "gross ‎biased" toward Israel. As such, Kushner and ‎Greenblatt are ‎not scheduled to meet with anyone ‎from Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas' ‎government.‎ ‎

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