Is the olive harvest season essential to the Palestinian economy?
Let's look at some of the statistics.
How important is agriculture to the Palestinian economy?
In 2016, agriculture contributed 3.16% of the Palestinian GDP. Which means that the olive harvest contributes less than one percent of the Palestinian economy.
If Oxfam cares about the Palestinian economy so much, they should be insisting that the PA stops paying terrorists and their families - an amount that is more than double the total olive oil revenue!
Let's do the math.
This means that each family's income from olive harvest is on $1480 a year.
The average Palestinian income for one worker is over $20,000 a year.
Which means that these 100,000 families are either starving or they make most of their money doing other jobs, and the olive harvest is a sideline that they only work on a small amount of the year. (In most cases, the husband has a regular job and the wife will spend a few weeks a year on the olive harvest to supplement their main income.)
At any rate, olive oil isn't the critical economic powerhouse that Oxfam pretends.
Now, what about the supposed huge number of vandalized trees by "settlers?" Oxfam claims 1475 trees damaged this year.
There are about 8 million fruit bearing olive trees in the territories. If 1475 of them were destroyed completely, that would come out to total damage worth of about $27,000.
The research and design for this poster probably cost Oxfam more than $27,000!
If you look at the categories of damage listed, you can see that most of the alleged damages still would allow harvesting of some olives, so the real damage is even less. The number of fruit bearing trees cut down completely is probably zero, since olive trees are extraordinarily difficult to cut down or uproot.
And Oxfam is relying on lies to even come up with these figures. In tiny, tiny type, it says - absurdly:
No, Oxfam, the actual incidents are definitely lower. The Palestinian Authority deliberately lies about the attacks by settlers - for example, often claiming that religious Jewish settlers are cutting down olive trees on Shabbat, or showing photos of obviously pruned olive trees and pretending that they were cut down by Jews.
The number 1475 is highly exaggerated, which means that the total damage from "settlers" is minuscule compared to the total yield.
And one more thing: even with all the terrible Israeli restrictions and settler violence alleged, somehow the olive crop last year broke all records.
This poster is a perfect example of lying with facts. Oxfam doesn't say anything that is not truthful here, but it gives an impression of widespread, massive damage to the Palestinian economy by "settlers" and Israel that is completely false.
(h/t Tomer Ilan)
UPDATE: There is no doubt that the dollar value of damage from Gaza firebomb balloons this year far outstrips the damage to olive trees. How much effort has Oxfam made against the firebombs?
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Madame President, Honourable Members, thank you very much for having this opportunity to address you today on a very important issue, the geopolitical implications of the recent agreements between Israel and the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and, recently, Sudan. And maybe many more in the future.
On behalf of the European Union, I have welcomed these announcements...
However, although these agreements bring positive developments, it is clear that they all focus on the broader regional picture.... As we have always said, there will not be sustainable peace and stability in the region without a comprehensive settlement of the Arab-Israeli conflict and, in particular, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, on the basis of a negotiated and viable two-state solution, built upon the internationally agreed parameters.
The implication is that there is still something wrong with agreements between Israel and Arab nations that do not end the Israel/Palestinian conflict.
The idea of "linkage," that everything in the Middle East depends on Israel making Palestinians happy, is so ingrained in the EU that even when agreements prove it is not true, they want it to be true. Which means that they are unhappy with a Jewish state being accepted as a permanent feature of the Middle East unless the impossible happens first.
Later on, Borell again shows he is less than enthusiastic about these agreements, trying to downplay them as much as he can:
This normalisation of the relations has to be considered within the complex reality in the region. The United Arab Emirates and Bahrain have never been technically at war with Israel. So, to call that a peace agreement without having had a war may be an exaggeration.
Normalization is much, much more significant than a technical peace agreement - but Borell wants to pretend that it is no big deal.
But, as I said, in any case it is a positive approach that reflects a somewhat transactional rather than transformative approach....
It is clear that this normalisation comes after other strategic considerations, such as gaining military [advantages] – F35 fighters for the Emirates - or economic advantages - economic deals with Emirates and Bahrain - or for Sudan, a major gain to get out of its international isolation, by taking it off from the States Sponsors of Terrorism list, which is a major win for Sudan and its economy is on the verge of collapse and baldy needs outside investment. All these things, for sure, are being taken into consideration in these kind of agreements.
This also mimics the responses of anti-Israel pundits towards the accords. And it is false, at least for the UAE. While the F-35s were a factor, the enthusiasm shown by the UAE and its citizens for the agreements is transformational not only for the Gulf but for the entire Middle East. Arabic media across the board has shown more openness to Israel and Jews than ever before. There are discussions in public about Iraq and Lebanon eventually normalizing, as unlikely as that seems - but even the topic was off limits a few months ago.
Not only that, but Arab nations that still cannot trade with Israel directly can trade through the UAE, increasing significantly Israel's trade with the entire Arab world, not just the UAE and Bahrain.
Also, didn't Egypt receive billions of dollars in aid - plus control over the Sinai - for making peace with Israel? Didn't Jordan receive land and aid as well? Is that not also "transactional?" Does that in any way take away from how important those deals were?
Saying it is not transformative reveals Borell's own wishful thinking, not reality. It shows that he is really uncomfortable with peace happening in ways that the EU wasn't involved in, using a paradigm that the EU still rejects.
(h/t Irene)
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The Palestine Information Center has screaming headlines every day - in English - that Jews visit the Temple Mount, almost invariably saying that the Jews are "defiling" the holiest Jewish spot.
These are only 10 of the headlines - from November alone!
Sometimes is it "scores of settlers," sometimes "hordes." Always "settlers." Always "defiling."
This is every month - hundreds of these headlines.
And the photos show how terribly those Jews are acting.
How disgusting these defiling Jews are!
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Binyamin Netanyahu and Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed have been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize by prize recipient Lord David Trimble, who got it in 1998. Trimble was honored for his part in negotiations leading to the Good Friday Agreement that brought relative peace to Northern Ireland.
In my opinion, the Abraham Accords represent the first ray of light in the darkness of the Arab-Israeli conflict since 1948, and if I were a Nobel recipient I would have nominated Donald Trump and Jared Kushner as well.
Of course the chances of Netanyahu receiving anything but abuse from the “international community” of which the Nobel committee is a pillar, are close to zero. The United Nations and the human rights industry, much of it set up in direct response to the industrial murder of European Jewry by the Nazis and their enthusiastic helpers over almost all of Europe, have ironically embraced the would-be genocidaires of the PLO, the Muslim Brotherhood, and the revolutionary Iranian regime. Especially since the year 2000 (see this brilliant analysis by Mark Pickles and Richard Landes), international institutions and NGOs have picked up and carried the flags of misoziony and Judenhass relinquished by the Soviets and the Nazis.
The USA was more or less neutral with respect to Israel (although its Jewish community strongly supported her) until the 1973 war, when it adopted Israel as its Cold War proxy. But soon after, thanks to OPEC’s devastatingly effective “oil weapon,” US policy became ambivalent. Henry Kissinger negotiated multifaceted agreements with the Arabs which resulted in ending the oil boycott; but one of the conditions was that the US would work to restore all territory conquered by Israel in 1967 to Arab control. Until Trump’s presidency, this was firm American policy, followed by relatively pro-Israel presidents like Clinton and Bush II, less friendly ones like Bush I, and anti-Israel ones like Carter and Obama alike.
The policy required a certain degree of cognitive dissonance from American politicians (not to mention the liberal Jews that supported them). It was necessary for them to advocate the transfer of strategically essential territory from Israeli to Arab control, while still at least appearing to support Israel’s continued survival. This they did by providing military aid. A master stroke, the massive aid package for Israel and Egypt that began with the Camp David agreement got Israel out of the Sinai, provided the US with leverage to control Israel’s behavior, and enriched American defense contractors. Later, it served as a fig leaf to hide the dangers of withdrawal inherent in demands for Israel to leave Gaza, the Golan, and Judea and Samaria.
Anti-Israel politicians like Barack Obama had less of an internal struggle than friendly ones. With the help of the Israeli Left, he argued counterfactually that security would come from territorial concessions. His policy was to weaken Israel while pretending to help her, for example by phasing out the portion of the military aid that could be used to buy from Israel’s own military industry. No matter what he did to damage Israel’s strategic position, he could always point to those billions of dollars in military hardware as proof of his support for the Jewish state. But whether an administration was friendly or not, the policy was always fundamentally incoherent. It also distorted internal Israeli politics, leading to disasters like the Oslo Accords.
Trump turned everything upside down. New technology that increased oil production in North America and various other developments had defused the oil weapon. In addition, some of the important Middle Eastern oil producers were worried about Iranian expansionism and its nuclear program, and realized that Israel could be an indispensable ally in opposing it. American interests were now seen to lie with a strong Israel, in truth and not just in rhetoric.
So for the first time since 1973, Trump’s administration was able to introduce a reality-based policy, affirming the rationality of Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights and Jerusalem, and ending the obsequious treatment of the frankly terrorist PLO and its dictatorial Palestinian Authority. Under the Trump plan, the Palestinians would be required to give up their maximalist demands and make real compromises, if they wanted a state of any kind.
But as almost everyone finally admits, the clock has run out. There will not be a second Trump Administration. The new one, depressingly, seems firmly wedded to the old paradigm. Although most (not all!) of his appointments do not appear to be overt enemies of the Jewish state, Biden seems likely to restore the traditional deference (and funding) to the Palestinians, as well as to try to reopen negotiations about the JCPOA with Iran, which at the very least implies that sanctions on Iran will be reduced.
This is not because Biden and his people are idiots. They are fully aware that things have changed, and that the oil weapon no longer threatens America. But now the pressure comes from the home front. They can’t afford to alienate the misozionist left wing of the Democratic party, which has grown stronger in Congress. They don’t worry about American Jews, for whom Israel has little weight when they vote. They can ignore the Evangelicals, who will support Republicans anyway over social issues like abortion and LGBTx rights. And of course, they want to wipe out any traces of Trumpism. Staying in power and achieving domestic objectives is more important to them than logical consistency, or the negative consequences for America’s allies in the Middle East.
So we will go back to hearing platitudes about the “unbreakable” US-Israel relationship, while the administration complains about Israel building apartments in Jewish neighborhoods of eastern Jerusalem. What appeared to be a real possibility that Israel would extend sovereignty to the Jordan Valley – an area of extreme strategic importance – will fade away. We’ll watch as the US goes back to pretending that the failed and antisemitic United Nations can play a positive role in any sphere, and that the PLO can be made into a peace partner. Sanctions on Iran will be relaxed, emboldening the regime to push ahead on the ground and with its nuclear and missile programs.
A dark picture. Israel has a difficult four or eight years ahead of her, at least. There will be little room for mistakes and missed opportunities. It looks like we will shortly go through yet another round of elections. Is it too much to ask that we end up with a government equal to the task?
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If George Orwell is spinning in his grave these days, he's likely rolling so hard with laughter that it's bringing him and the rest of us to tears. An upcoming webinar on Jew-hatred is but one of many recent examples of phenomena that even the prescient social critic, whose essays and novels predicted with chilling accuracy the world that has unfolded since World War II, couldn't have anticipated.
The Dec. 15 event – called "Dismantling Antisemitism, Winning Justice" – is being hosted by the left-wing, anti-Israel NGO Jewish Voice for Peace, and moderated by JVP and JVP Action deputy director Rabbi Alissa Wise.
Its equally radical co-sponsors are JVP Action, If Not Now, United Against Hate, Jewish Currents, Foundation for Middle East Peace, Arab American Institute, Jews for Racial and Economic Justice, the Jewish Vote, and the People's Collective for Justice and Liberation.
According to JVP, anti-Semitism "is used to manufacture division and fear, [and] while anyone can fuel it, [it] always benefits the politicians who rely on division and fear for their power."
The group didn't have to specify which "politicians" it has in mind, but it's obvious that they are in the camp of US President Donald Trump. The stated aim of the online happening is to "explore how to fight back against anti-Semitism and against those that seek to wield charges of antisemitism to undermine progressive movements for justice."
Again, the reference is clear: Trump's team and voters are simultaneously guilty of anti-Semitism and of hurling false allegations of anti-Semitism at innocent progressives, whose only wrongdoing is to seek peace and justice.
To engage in this "discussion," whose purpose is to reach a foregone conclusion – namely, that anti-Semitism is spread by the Republican right – the sponsors of the conference enlisted four apt anti-Israel panelists: Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), columnist Peter Beinart, Temple University professor Marc Lamont Hill and the University of Illinois at Chicago academic Barbara Ransby.
Context provides one clue. Political attitudes and statements do not take place in a vacuum. And over the past few years there is no doubt that there has been a palpable rise in overtly threatening anti-Semitic sentiment, a rise that by no means has been limited to college campuses. This sentiment has also, alarmingly, metamorphosed into action.
This is the context, a fraught atmosphere, in which anti-Semitism is becoming increasingly acceptable and, for some, easily translated into virulent anti-Israel attitudes. Israel becomes the easily available vessel into which long-repressed, traditional, anti-Jewish attitudes can be poured.
This applies to the question of double standards. Some consistently portray Israel in demonic, evil terms ignoring its democratic parliamentary system and the increasing integration of its Arab citizens into the life of the country. It is a lie to accuse Israel of engaging in apartheid, racism and ethnic cleansing. It is this special venom, this single-minded animus, this double-standard that masks an anti-Zionism that is no less than an anti-Semitism repackaged.
The best way to address anti-Semitism is to understand it. In order to understand it one needs to be able to define it. Adoption of the complete International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance definition and examples of anti-Semitism is a critical first step to stopping Jew hatred in its tracks. If the United Nations, Bahrain and United Arab Emirates can do it, so too should any American institution be able to.
All this is taking place in a self-righteous, moralistically indignant “cancel culture’” intent on demonizing and delegitimizing the other. Thankfully, the First Amendment permits free speech, which also permits hateful speech, whether racist or anti-Semitic. The answer to hate speech is more speech, not silencing other viewpoints or excluding individuals because of their race, ethnicity or religion.
Universities properly condemn all forms of injustice and they need to begin to condemn anti-Semitism, especially when it denies the right of self-determination, a right of all peoples. No student should feel that there is a conflict between standing up for social and racial justice and compromising their identity; no Jewish student should feel that they should conceal their identity because they feel a connection to the State of Israel (or out of fear abandon that connection).
Both faith and their historical experience have rendered Jews particularly sensitive to discrimination of all kinds. Either when it is explicit or when it is in the form of dog whistles, these exclusionary measures are unacceptable. As Lauren Nesher, a senior at UIUC said: “The answer to anti-Semitic speech is never to do nothing. Just like the answer to racist speech is never to do nothing.”
Jews are America’s most abused minority.
FBI data recorded Jews being subject to…
🔸 Twice as many hate crimes as trans folk 🔸 Three times as many as black folk 🔸 Four times as many as Muslims
Shirley Kopelman Meyers, January 10, 1927-November 8, 2020
I like to tell people I made aliyah when I was young and stupid and that that’s the way to do it. When I made aliyah at the age of 18, I wasn’t thinking about what it would be
like to have an aging parent far away, and not be able to help. I didn’t think
about how, someday, in middle age, I would long to care for my mother, as I only
I would have cared for her had I been there. But I was not there, except in
fits and starts, two-week visits that were somehow never enough for either of
us. And now she’s gone.
In the middle of the morning, the message came: “Our mother
went to the true world this morning.”
I was not even surprised. I had seen it coming. She was 93.
She was fading. This was Sunday morning, and she had fallen asleep in the
middle of our last phone call, on Thursday night.
I watched her funeral on Zoom. Which was a blessing. I
always knew I would not be going to the States for her funeral, as she had
forbidden me to do so, some years ago.
A child of the Great Depression, my mother was practical.
She didn’t see the point of me spending all that money on a ticket when she
wouldn’t even be there to see me. Never mind that in some respects, the rituals
are for those who remain. My mother had made her wishes clear, and I was stuck
with respecting those wishes, and her.
Because of the Depression, she couldn't go to college. But at age 46, widowed with 4 children, she became a student at the University of Pittsburgh. It took her 8 years, but she got her degree in journalism.
Had there not been a pandemic, perhaps no one would have thought
to set up that Zoom funeral I got to see, so at least I had that: the beautiful
chill autumn day, some red and gold leaves still on the trees in the Beth
Shalom Cemetery, in Millvale, Pa.
We visited my dad a few years ago. Now she is next to him.
On the other hand, had there not been a pandemic, I might have been able to see her one last time. But I was terrified at the thought of picking up the virus during my travels and that I might somehow, unwittingly, bring it to her, when I loved her almost as much as life itself. The thought of making her sick was paralyzing, in its most literal meaning. That thought kept me here in place in Israel, and far away from her.
And I think that was difficult for her. Knowing that I wasn’t
going to be there that one more time. Perhaps—at least a little—she gave up
hope that I would ever come again. It was not going to happen: a thing that made life
worth living when she could no longer walk, see or hear, a visit from her baby.
It hurts that I hurt her that way. And it hurts that I
lost my mom. But in spite of the terrible pain of losing my mother—of missing
out on being able to care for her as only I would have cared for her—in spite of
depriving her of my presence at the end, and missing her funeral, I do not
regret making aliyah. “Non, je ne
regrette rien.”
I regret nothing.
Is aliyah a
selfish act? In some ways, no doubt, it is.
There’s no doubt it was excruciating for my mother not to
have me with her all these years, when she loved and needed me so. It was I who
picked up and left Pittsburgh to make aliyah
to Israel. I who made the decision, and simply did it—made aliyah—when I was young and stupid, and
unaware of what the future held. It was painful for my mother to not be close
by my children, her grandchildren, whom she loved so dearly.
I put out photos of my mother in the shiva house, and there was one photo where you could see just the
edge of her face, and she was glowing with love for a newborn grandchild she
held, and you could see it, that love, though much of the picture was in
shadow, including the object of her love, obscured. How it must have
hurt her, to be so far away from them,
her grandchildren, whom she would have loved to have cuddled and loved and
known.
As evening fell on the day my mother died, Z”L, my rabbi’s
wife came to my house to help me do kria,
to help me tear my shirt just over the heart, as one does for a mother. “This
is the price of aliyah,” I said to
her, and she knew what I meant: that I hadn’t been there to care for my mother
or be with her at the end, that I was observing the rituals from a distance: that
I wasn’t there.
It was all a part of the price: the price of aliyah.
She issued no bromides or platitudes, my rabbi’s wife. My
rabbi’s wife, who is wise, said something I’ve held onto, during the past two
weeks, through my shiva and the days that followed. “Look,” she said in her quiet voice. “That’s Lech Lecha. You did Lech Lecha.”
This was a reference to the Torah portion not long past, Lech Lecha, in which God directs Abram to leave his native land and all that he knew, for a “land that I will show thee.”
Now the LORD said unto Abram:
'Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's
house, unto the land that I will show thee.’ Genesis 12:1
One can only imagine the depth of Abram’s faith, leaving his
father’s house like that with no second thoughts. But I was no Abram. The
repercussions of the act were not clear to me at the time of the act: It is not
an easy thing to leave a mother, or to leave all that I knew. I gave up one
life for another, yet the shock and the pain of it all, came on only over
time. It was a gradual sinking in.
And now that I’ve experienced this loss, I think that
had I known how painful this all would be—the not being there—the enormity of
this thing, I might not have made aliyah, at all.
I don’t think I could have done it, though I regret nothing, “Non, je ne regrette rien.”
It was the right thing to do, to make aliyah, and I’m glad, every day, that I did.
I didn’t know what I was doing at the time. I only longed
and yearned to be here in Israel and I made it happen. But there was a cost to aliyah that makes Israel and my living
here, all the more dear to my heart. I put my people ahead of myself, and even
my own dearest mother, z"l, by moving to Israel. And how can I regret the chance to
play a part in this noble project, the building of our national home, making
Israel stronger, just by dint of being here?
“Non, je ne regrette rien.”
I wish that things had been different. I wish that my mother
hadn’t fit into Pittsburgh the way I wished I fit Israel: like a glove. Because
then she might have come here and I could have taken care of her. She would
have had the chance to really know her Israeli grandchildren and great grandchildren, growing up under a different sun, proud and free in the Jewish State.
Instead of snatching a few weeks here, a few weeks there, for a birth or a bar mitzvah.
But it was understood: my mother was a Pittsburgher, born
and bred, and she would never live anywhere else. It was who she was.
And the truth is, it is who I was, and the last several
times I visited there, I found myself touching the trees, and the buildings,
the low walls and soaring yellow street lights, and would shed a tear or two as I said goodbye, over and over again.
The smells of that place! The sight of that curb, that hill, this tree! A
sensory experience that reached down to me, toward some primal place, an essence.
But Israel had called, had always called, that nobler cause
from afar, from when I was little. This too, was me. Perhaps the ultimate me,
the place I had to grow into. The place I had to earn.
Yes, I was young and stupid when I made aliyah. I hadn’t seen the cost. But no. From afar, from this
distance, I regret nothing.
“Non, je ne regrette rien.”
I regret nothing in part because I live in a wonderful
community that embraced me in my sorrow, came to sit with me, talk with me, cook for me. The people here know they are my family, since my family cannot be
here. And they try hard to fill the breach. They know that I gave up my real
family to be here with them in our land. And that makes them my family, in some
ways more even than the real family I knew as a girl.
But community cannot replace my mother. It is hard to lose a mother. It hurts:
another one more installment on the price of aliyah, which I continue to pay in ways and amounts I never
anticipated, back when I was 18, young, and stupid. I think I never could have
done it—made aliyah—if I’d known the
price, how much it would cost, how much it would hurt.
It’s the kind of knowledge—well, it’s better not to know, to
be young and stupid: to dare to just do
the thing without knowing what’s ahead, the repercussions of the act. Did Abram
know what was ahead, the trials and tribulations? Can anyone really make an
informed aliyah, for instance know
loss of this sort without having been in it, away from a mother they love, so far
away?
Now I can say I’ve been there. I’ve dwelt in the country of my loss and I
know the price of aliyah.
And still, I am here.
Today, and hopefully for a long time, I am here in Israel. And
I do not and will not regret that.
“Non, je ne regrette rien.”
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Like most Egyptians, I never met a Jew, until I moved to Britain.
My first experience was when I was a doctor under training in an area with a high proportion of the Jewish population, and of course it did not take long until I received my first Jewish patient from the religiously observant Orthodox community.
I froze in my place when I saw her and remembered all the Egyptian TV series about Jews, from "Tears in Shameless Eyes" to "Raafat Al-Hagan", and I feared for a moment that I was facing the Israeli Mossad that was stalking me as an Egyptian.
But I quickly woke up from my delusions to the patient's voice as she was in pain, and her husband was trying to calm her down.
I noticed in his eyes that he was afraid of me, perhaps guessing that I was an Arab, but he listened to me carefully and agreed, albeit apprehensively, to my plan to treat her condition.
The next day, I saw the husband jogging towards me while I was going up the stairs outside the ward. For the second time, all the negative obsessions passed in my mind, and I imagined that this Jew, with his long beard and energy, would try to attack me, but I was surprised by his smile as he politely thanked me for treating his wife and relieving her pain.
Years passed and my job progressed, until I was appointed to the committees for selecting jobs for doctors under training, in one of them, my colleague in the same committee was an Orthodox Jew, working in the same area that I worked in at the time, but in a different hospital.
As usual, I began to think like any Egyptian, and I did not expect him to do justice to any Muslim doctor or female doctor, and I deliberately did not disclose my Egyptian roots in order to see how he deals with applicants, especially those with Muslim names.
Indeed, a Muslim doctor of Indian origin entered, and was surprised that my Jewish colleague gave her a higher score than the one that I gave her.
I asked him later why he gave generous evaluation even though the girl did not answer the questions we asked her as well. He smiled and said to me that he is always keen to help the new doctors because they have a long way ahead and many difficulties.
Gradually, I learned not to judge anyone based on their religion or race.
So the Jews, whether they carry Israeli citizenship or not, are like other people, including the good and the bad, the polite and impolite, the lover of peace, and the one who rejects it. And that the personality characteristics of any Jew have no relationship to his nationality, whether Israeli or other.
There are Jews who defend Israel, even if they do not reside inside it, and there are also Jews who criticize Israel daily, even though they live there.
The culture of rejection of normalization and demonization of the Jews flourished in Egypt during the era of former President Mubarak, despite the Mubarak regime's insistence on preserving the peace agreement between Egypt and Israel, and restoring the entire Sinai from Israel.
The rejection of normalization has become not only a political issue in support of the Palestinian people, but a means of outbidding against any opponent, and a lethal weapon for moral assassination and tarnishing reputations.
Those who reject normalization in Egypt claim that there is a difference between peace agreements signed by governments and normalization between peoples. That is, the state apparatus has the right to deal with Israel on the basis of the peace agreement signed between the two states, but no Egyptian has the right to conform to the state's policy towards Israel and the Israelis.
The case of the Egyptian actor Mohamed Ramadan, who was recently suspended from work by his syndicate on charges of normalization, is the best example of this intellectual anomaly.
Social networking sites were buzzing with a picture of the Egyptian artist Mohamed Ramadan, showing him hugging the well-known Israeli singer Omar Adam in Dubai.
Egyptians poured out their anger on Muhammad Ramadan, under the pretext that filming with an Israeli and holding a concert attended by Israelis is a total betrayal of the Palestinian cause. Indeed, the Representative Professions Syndicate hastened to suspend him from work, as if preventing him from acting would liberate Jerusalem and establish the Palestinian state.
The funny thing is that most Egyptians angry with Muhammad Ramadan have mercy on Sadat and praise his shrewdness, and also support the state’s decision to close the Rafah crossing and destroy the tunnels between Egypt and Gaza, under the pretext that peace is a strategic choice, and that Egypt's national security is the priority for all Egyptians.
The Egyptian people chose realism to deal with the security and political reality, and emotional populism in dealing with personal and social situations - and this is simply absurd.
The most dangerous thing is that this absurdity is not only reduced in dealing with Israel, but with Gulf countries, its brothers, such as the UAE and the Kingdom of Bahrain, and stood with Egypt in hardship and ease.
There are many questions that those angry at normalization have not answered:
How will Egyptians residing in the UAE and Bahrain deal with visiting Israeli citizens or working there after signing the Abrahamic Peace Agreement?
Will the Egyptian people rise up whenever a picture of an Egyptian citizen appears with an Israeli in Dubai or Manama? Or is the sword of suspension and punishment only for the well-known people whose moral assassination is?
Is the rejection of normalization really in support of the Palestinian cause, or is it an absurd weapon aimed at satisfying Egyptian pride and easing our shortcomings?
Unfortunately, we are living like cavemen, prisoners of outdated beliefs and concepts that are not in line with the reality in which we live.
The reality says that the Jews are people whether they carry Israeli citizenship or not, just like other peoples, including the good and the bad, the polite and the impolite, the one who loves peace, and the one who rejects it. And that the personality characteristics of any Jew have no relationship to his nationality, whether Israeli or other.
The Egyptian illusion, on the other hand, insists on demonizing the Jews and exaggerates the importance and impact of the Egyptian rejection of normalization, although this is the last concern of the Israelis, especially after the breakthrough in relations with many Gulf states.
I hope that Egyptians will see how the Emirati people deal with maturity and reason with their cause of peace with Israel, and how their wise leadership left the freedom for individuals to deal with the Israelis or avoid them if they wanted.
The Egyptian people are not a herd of sheep who follow a guide.
The Egyptian people are made up of individuals, each of whom has the right to agree or disagree in his convictions, as long as it does not harm the interests of the nation.
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In Israel, too, media reviews of 2020 will surely not place it in a positive light, especially given the loss of nearly 3,000 lives to COVID-19 and the havoc that the pandemic has wrought on people’s livelihoods and the country’s economy. In addition, 2020 has proven to be yet another year of political dysfunction and instability.
But not all has been dismal. This year will also go down in Israeli history as the one when the Jewish state took enormous strides, via peace and normalization treaties with the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Sudan, to further break out of its long regional isolation.
For a few weeks back in September, it seemed to be raining peace agreements. And on Sunday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met in Neom, Saudi Arabia, with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) and US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.
No, this was not the first time that senior Israeli and Saudi officials have met, nor did the meeting lead to any dramatic announcement regarding the establishment of formal ties. But that the meeting was leaked to the public – and it beggars belief that this would have happened without the consent of all the parties – sends important messages to various significant audiences.
The first audience is US president-elect Joe Biden. The message to Biden is simple: the Mideast table has been reset – including a spanking new Israel-UAE-Saudi place setting – that he and his new administration will need to take into account when re-assessing Washington’s Iran policy.
It is no coincidence that this meeting took place now, a few weeks before Biden is set to move into the Oval Office, just as it was no coincidence that the deals with the UAE and Bahrain were consummated just before the US elections.
Is there a new map emerging of countries in the Middle East, and India and Greece, a new system of partnerships, economic, diplomatic and security, shared regional views. I think so, and here's my map: pic.twitter.com/sI3UcRBXoN
News of the Abraham Accords normalizing diplomatic relations between the United Arab Emirates and Israel has been greeted with enthusiasm across Emirati society.
The positive attitude is being led from the top. One striking example is the website of the Abu Dhabi Investment Office, which appears in Hebrew if you click on it from Israel. They are also running Hebrew promotions across social media and have announced that they will open an office in Israel.
Many business executives in the Gulf already have friends and even business relationships with their Israeli counterparts. Many of us have spent time studying or working in the United States, Europe and elsewhere, and established connections with Jewish and Israeli colleagues that in some cases go back decades.
The normalization of diplomatic relations now allows us to build commercial ties on existing social ties, and new ones are already flourishing.
The initial response to the Abraham Accords from Israel’s business community was to welcome the opportunity to access funds in the UAE and Bahrain for investment in Israeli startups. While that is certainly one facet of the new relationship, it is by no means the only one—nor the most significant.
While Israel has been building its Startup Nation in the western Middle East, the UAE has been developing its own high-tech sector over in the east.
Last week, I had the honor and privilege of participating in a delegation led by Foreign Minister H.E. Dr. Abdullatif bin Rashid Al-Zayani’s to Israel – the first time Bahraini officials landed in Israel, flying on our national carrier, Gulf Air Flight number 972. While it was historic and memorable for all, it was particularly exciting for me as a Bahraini Jew.
This was my very first visit to Israel. As you may know, I was the first Jew to ever be appointed as an ambassador of Bahrain and the first woman to serve as Bahrain’s ambassador to the United States. During my five years serving in Washington, I made many new friends and was often asked if I had been to Israel. I always said, “Not yet.” In my heart, I hoped and prayed for the opportunity, but I was determined to wait for the moment when circumstances would allow such a visit. As a loyal and committed citizen of Bahrain, I naturally respected the reality of the situation. I could only dream. And hope. And wait. And dream some more. Last week, that dream became a reality.
I wish to thank His Majesty, King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa and His Royal Highness, Prince Salman Bin Hamad Al Khalifa, the Crown Prince and Prime Minister, for their leadership, vision, and courage to lead our nation proudly and boldly into the future through the signing of the Abraham Accords. I, like my fellow Bahraini citizens, express our support and enthusiasm for the opportunity our leaders have seized and the promise it represents to build a better life with security and opportunity for all of us and for future generations still to come.
2020 has been a difficult year for all of us as we continue to battle the pandemic sweeping across the world. However, 2020 was also a historic one in a positive way. It’s when Bahrain, Israel and the United Arab Emirates decided to pave the path forward for a bold vision of the new Middle East. During this time, the world has shifted on its axis in a very positive way. Amid a world dealing with so many difficult issues, a pandemic, economic challenges, social unrest, the Middle East gives all of us a ray of hope.
The UN's OCHA-oPt tweeted that Israel demolished structures in Fasayil al Wusta.
As usual, it seems to be a new community, built specifically to be a land grab.
Here it is in 2004, 2011 and more recently:
The third image is from Bing Maps since they were more recent than Google's satellite image.
Note how many more structures there are, and also the three caravans added in the southwest.
While the town of Fasayil (to the south) has been there for a while, I can find no mention of Fasayil al Wusta anywhere before 2008 or so. (It was supposedly established in 1998.)
The UN and EU are very good at monitoring demolitions but they don't easily provide the data about the illegal building, which far outpaces the demolitions.
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Director of B'Tselem USA and co-founder of IfNotNow Simone Zimmerman tweeted (and Rabbi Andy Kahn agreed:)
These bigots attacking @RashidaTlaib, Reema Dodin, & others, might as well just come out & say it: they don't believe that Palestinians have the right to speak, to act, or really to exist in American public life, at all, as Palestinians. We should not normalize this in any way.
Is this true?
The list of Palestinians who have been in Congress is pretty short: John E. Sununu, Justin Amash and Rashida Tlaib.
The only one ever attacked as an antisemite is Rashida Tlaib.
Sununu's father is John H. Sununu, former governor of New Hampshire who originally objected to repealing the "Zionism is Racism" resolution at the UN, but he then changed his mind and supported the pro-Israel 1988 Republican platform. I don't recall any Jewish organizations campaigning against him for being a Palestinian.
I've never seen any Zioinst attack Justin Amash, even after he left the Republican Party.
That's two out of three Palestinian members of Congress that Jews and Zionists have no problem with, which is evidence that Zimmerman is a liar.
Clearly, the Zionists against Tlaib and Dodin are reacting to their statements, not to their heritage.
There are plenty of other decent Arab-American politicians that Zionists have supported: Donna Shalala and Darrell Issa come to mind.
Zimmerman is the bigot. She is not defending Palestinians - she is defending those who support destroying the Jewish state.
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Although Joe Biden says he will not move the US Embassy back to Tel Aviv, he will definitely erase other Trump moves - re-opening the PLO office, restoring funding UNRWA, and restoring the Iran deal.
But to pretend that the last four years were just a bad dream and act like it's 2016 would be a major mistake.
Even if Biden will re-open negotiations with Iran on the JCPOA, he must not look too eager. At the moment, Iran is acting as if it is holding all the cards because of Biden's promises, and this is a major mistake - it means that Biden has no negotiating room to try to improve the deal.
The fact is that Europe remained in the deal, and Iran tested the waters by starting to violate it, more and more, to see if Europe would do anything. They didn't. Iran learned a lesson - that the UK and France are spineless, and they think Biden will be as well.
Biden needs to get on the same page as those two countries and push back. Iran is now violating the JCPOA in multiple ways - the IAEA has lots of documentation. Iran needs to trade with Europe more than ever.
That is leverage.
Before the US lifts sanctions, it needs to work together with the Europeans to give a solid ultimatum - that (for example) the UK can invoke snapback unless Iran immediately stops its violations. Ballistic missiles and Iranian exports to terror groups must be on the table. If Biden caves on this, then Iran know it can push the US around for the next four years.
Similarly, Biden shouldn't abandon the Peace to Prosperity plan. Ehud Barak spoke about it in Haaretz yesterday: "When you look at it, many parts of Trump’s plan made sense, but were blocked from being really tested by our government. You have to look at the actual text of the Trump plan. I’m not talking about what the settlers probably heard during visits of the ambassador – but the text that Jared Kushner and his team put in the plan. It’s very close to what came before: holding talks on two states; realizing that you can’t impose anything on the Palestinians that they don’t want; and not imposing security compromises on Israel."
In other words, even Israeli doves agree that the Trump plan is a framework that the US can start with because it is the first plan that is realistic about Israel's security needs and that wouldn't ethnically cleanse hundreds of thousands of Jews - which has been the starting point of all the other "peace" plans.
I doubt that this will be a priority for Biden but he shouldn't let the Palestinians think they can turn the clock backwithout giving up on some of their "red lines." And they certainly shouldn't be allowed to act like bullies, making entitled "demands" from the US. Biden can learn a little from Trump about how to respond when another country or organization wants to push the US around.
While this is an oversimplification, before Trump, diplomats seemed more interested in smoothing ruffled feathers than hard negotiations. Donald Trump made it clear that if the US was going to give something, the other party will give something as well. And even though the old diplomats were aghast and swore up and down that this was a recipe for disaster, it achieved results. To be sure, there is something to be said about maintaining relationships. Trump could have learned something from old-school diplomacy - but professional US diplomats can learn a lot from studying Trump's dealmaking mentality.
Unfortunately, from articles they have written, it doesn't seem like they see any value in a mindset that helped bring about a sea change in the Middle East between Israel, Gulf countries and Sudan. They hate Trump so much as a person that they do not want to admit that he accomplished things they could never have done. There is no way that could have happened under the old rules.
We need to learn that lesson, not throw it away.
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The outgoing Team Trump should issue an updated, unclassified report that provides a current estimate of the number of people receiving UNRWA assistance today who were personally displaced in 1948, aren’t residing within the borders of the Palestinian Authority and aren’t citizens or permanent residents of another country, such as Jordan.
This number should be easy to estimate by simply requesting figures from Israeli, Palestinian, UN, Jordanian and other Mideast officials. The public release of these figures could spark an international debate over UNRWA’s mandate. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo should also announce an official US policy change that for purposes of future US funding and planning, Palestinian refugees are narrowly defined as people who were personally displaced from then-Palestine between 1948 and 1949 and aren’t currently citizens or permanent residents of the Palestinian Authority or any country.
Such a move would challenge the notion that UNRWA is a refugee agency and demonstrate how it instead has kept people in poverty. Unlike the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, which has a mandate to resettle refugees, UNRWA has encouraged multiple generations of helpless people to remain erroneously identified as refugees.
The policy change would thus upend the mythology of a Palestinian “right of return” — making it clear that Israel determines who becomes Israeli citizens, not a UN agency. With all of this established, destitute Palestinians living in the West Bank might finally be encouraged to lead economically productive lives within a future Palestinian state.
The United States should not be alone in this effort. The United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia are among the agency’s top contributors. As they look to a future of peaceful coexistence with Israel, they can influence UNRWA’s mandate and remove a significant historical hindrance to the peace process. American allies in Europe may also quietly seek to reduce UNRWA’s unending financial burden. They, too, may be persuaded to join a reform coalition.
UNRWA has done enough damage. It’s time for reform.
It is not surprising that Israelis, including those, like Schwartz and Wilf, who want a two-state solution to the conflict, will not accept the putative right of return. What is surprising and dismaying is that Western governments, including that of the United States, have failed to recognize the centrality and pernicious character of this demand. How, then, should the Biden Administration approach the Israeli-Palestinian conflict beginning in 2021?
First, it should follow the lead of the Trump Administration, which declined to continue to fund UNRWA, and seek to abolish that agency. In their concluding chapter, the authors of The War of Return offer some helpful suggestions for how to do so. Second, the new administration should make clear to the Palestinian authorities that the necessary condition for the continuation of an American-sponsored peace process is a clear, unambiguous, publicly and repeatedly stated renunciation of the right of return. By retaining their claim to this right, the Palestinians signal that they continue to pursue the destruction of Israel, in which case no settlement is possible.
Third, the Biden Administration should observe the diplomatic equivalent of the Hippocratic Oath in medicine: it should do no harm. Persisting in trying to broker an agreement while the Palestinians insist on a right of return does do harm. It encourages the Palestinians to believe, or at least to hope, that the American government does not oppose the elimination of Israel, which in turn gives them reason to continue to seek it. As long as they call for millions of people to be able to make themselves at home in a country that they have never seen, with the vast majority of whose citizens they do not share a common language, common aspirations, or common values, and whom they have been taught their whole lives to despise, nothing American diplomats can do will end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Under such circumstances that is precisely what the United States should do about that conflict: nothing.
What followed was a long-running shadow play in which many American Jews and Israelis portrayed Pollard as a martyr to anti-Semitism—something that only undermined the otherwise strong case for clemency for him and also hardened the desire of U.S. intelligence to keep him in prison in order to make an example of him. Eventually, he even became a bargaining chip in which his release was offered as an inducement to make Israel make territorial concessions in peace negotiations, though in the end, Netanyahu’s efforts to get President Bill Clinton to free him in this manner ultimately failed.
While the value of his spying and the damage he did to America remains a matter of debate, what isn’t in question is that this affair created unnecessary tension between the two allies that lasted for decades.
Just as bad was the shadow that his spying cast on the loyalty of every Jew working in the Pentagon. Indeed, U.S. authorities spent many years hounding Jewish personnel searching for another mythical Israeli spy, harming the careers of many Jews. It also fed into an anti-Semitic narrative that dovetailed with the “Israel Lobby” myth that portrayed the United States as being ruthlessly manipulated by Jews who were more loyal to Israel than to America.
It is only right that the ordeal of the spy, who paid far more dearly than he should have for his mistakes (Pollard served more time in prison than many murderers), is over. Let’s hope that after so much suffering, he finds some peace in Israel and will avoid doing anything that will fuel a revival of the controversy he engendered.
But it is just as important that his many supporters not misinterpret what happened to him as being solely a morality tale of a heroic Jew who was persecuted by anti-Semites for helping Israel. Both the hapless Pollard and his cynical Israeli handlers—none of whom were ever truly held accountable for their part in this fiasco—supplied ammunition to those anti-Semites who falsely claim that there is a contradiction between being an American patriot and having a deep concern for Israel. Sadly, that will remain Jonathan Pollard’s true legacy long after he has completed his journey to the Jewish state.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday spoke by phone with Jonathan Pollard, telling the former US Navy analyst convicted of spying for Israel that the Jewish state is waiting for him to move here after his parole ended.
“When are we going to see you here? We’re waiting for you,” Netanyahu told Pollard, speaking in English.
Pollard’s reply, which caused Netanyahu to chuckle, could not be heard.
“You should feel comfortable and you should really feel at home,” the prime minister added.
He also promised to make sure Pollard’s wife Esther gets the cancer treatment she needs.
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Thursday, November 26, 2020
Elder of Ziyon
