When an Israeli Ambassador Debated a British Historian on Israel’s Legitimacy—and Won
The setting is Montreal, where the famed British historian Arnold Toynbee, a specialist in international affairs, delivered a controversial lecture to students at McGill University. And the story didn’t end with an exchange of op-eds, press releases, and public apologies. Instead, Israel’s ambassador to Canada, Yaacov Herzog, responded by challenging Toynbee to a public debate, just five days after his initial comments. On Jan. 31—53 years ago today—the two squared off at McGill’s Hillel House for an exchange that was broadcast live across the country and later that evening in Israel.10 brands you'll have to give up if you're boycotting Israel
Shimon Peres has called the ensuing disputation “one of the most dramatic debates in the history of our people.” Last week, in welcoming Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper to Israel, Herzog’s nephew Labor Party leader Isaac Herzog, cited the event from the Knesset podium. Yet as the years pass, fewer and fewer have even heard of it.
Since 2005, the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement (BDS) has called on the international community to pressure Israel economically as "a form of civil resistance to Israeli occupation, colonialism, and apartheid."Palestinian workers praise SodaStream - and Scarlett Johansson
That would mean significant lifestyle changes for some consumers. Here are 10 brands that BDS supporters have urged others to boycott, not to mention thousands of other products that contain or use Israeli-developed technology, including iPhones, iPads, MacBooks, Skype, computer firewalls, and Microsoft XP.
It's time to stop faulting Israel for all our problems, Palestinian worker says.
Several years ago, added Mitnick, the Palestinian Authority launched a major campaign to encourage Palestinians to boycott Israeli products from the settlements, but it largely failed.Honest Reporting: SodaStream Shows that BDS is the Real Obstacle to Peace
"Truth be told, the SodaStream workers and local Palestinians were downright peeved when asked about the efforts of solidarity activists and their own government to boycott SodaStream," wrote Mitnick, "That could cost the hundreds of Palestinians wage earners salaries that are significantly higher than what they would make at home."
What does Besharat think about the Palestinian Authority’s declared desire to stop Palestinians from working in settlements? “If they make other opportunities in the Palestinian areas, they can, but they need to make jobs and ensure good pay for workers.” (h/t Bob Knot)
The message is clear: boycotting a company like SodaStream has real impact on the Palestinians.Calling a company like SodaStream a negative element that needs to be boycotted is a myopic viewpoint that people are starting to see through.
And that’s the real problem with the entire Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement. It seeks only to destroy, without concern for the human consequences. And ultimately, nothing good is going to come from that.
Jason Kenney thanks the nutters at Oxfam, he's buying a SodaStream!
Michael Coren on Scarlett Johansson, SodaStream, and Oxfam
Sodastream is a factory, not a settlement
Nobody lives in the Sodastream factory: it's a factory. If ever there is peace between Israel and Palestine, Israeli owned factories in Palestine employing Palestinians is precisely the sort of thing everyone should be wishing for. Not for the "soft" advantages of people working alongside one another, which is the kind of thing one can't easily measure: for the "hard", quantifiable advantage of employment and foreign curreny.Roger Waters, stop stalking Scarlett Johansson
In any other context, this is called FDI (foriegn direct investment) and is eagerly sought by politicians and toted up by economists. When it comes to Israel-Palestine, however, normal discourse goes silent. (h/t Norman F)
Anti-Semite Roger Waters is back, this time rebuking Scarlett Johansson for her bravery in defending SodaStream, an Israeli company that employs nearly 1000 Arabs in its Maale Adumim plant. Roger, the washed up “old codger,” by his own admission, is becoming a bit of a stalker. “In the past days I have written… to Scarlett Johansson (a couple of times). Those letters will remain private. Sadly, I have received no reply… And so I write this note on my Facebook page somewhat in bewilderment.”Stand for Peace: Oxfam and Friends
Be not confused, my friend, Roger. No doubt Ms. Johansson has ignored many a stalker before you, especially when they purport to write about politics while admitting they’re becoming a bit too emotionally invested. “I confess I was somewhat smitten,” he said. “There’s no fool like an old fool.”
This report [Jan 15, 2013] reveals that Oxfam has partnered with groups that support terrorism, religious extremism, anti-Semitism and advocate violence against Jews, women and homosexuals.NGO Monitor: Oxfam Novib’s BDS Funding
But what exactly defines a partnership? Oxfam has sponsored events, issued joint press releases, and run campaigns with all these groups. Certainly, if these were far-Right groups, the criticism of Oxfam’s associations would be much more loud and severe. And yet some of these groups listed advocate ideas that are even more extreme than the evil politics peddled by far-Right.
Most importantly, Oxfam itself describes many of these relations as “partnerships”. It partnered with Islamic Relief and Human Appeal and Muslim Brotherhood-linked group MADE to produce a ‘campaigns toolkit’. Both Islamic Relief and Human Appeal have been accused by a number of Governments of being “terrorist fronts”. Further, Islamic Relief’s President, Essam al-Haddad, was the campaign manager for Egyptian President Morsi, who recently described Jews as the “descendents of apes and pigs”.
Oxfam International’s Dutch affiliate, Oxfam Novib, transfers massive amounts of funding annually to NGOs that support BDS and other forms of political warfare against Israel.My prediction – coming true with chilling precision
In 2013, Oxfam Novib transferred 406,300 NIS to Coalition of Women for Peace (CWP), a central player in international anti-Israel BDS campaigns.
Similarly, Oxfam Novib funds the Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR), a leader of lawfare campaigns against Israel, including attempts to have Israeli officials arrested in Europe. PCHR falsely accuses Israel of “apartheid,” “ethnic cleansing,” and “war crimes,” and refers to attacks against Israeli civilians as “resistance.”
Last June, I published a column, “My prediction: Please help prove it wrong,” in which I warned that “A determined domestic thrust is under way to compress Israel back into its precarious pre-1967 frontiers, imperiling the viability of Jewish sovereignty.”Israel said set to accept Kerry’s framework proposals
Three emerging threats
Elaborating on my “strong premonition of dire things to come,” I predicted the emergence of three pernicious and interconnected processes, now materializing with alarming speed before our very eyes. (h/t Bob Knot)
The TV report said Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon and Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman are all inclining to accept the US framework terms, some of which were detailed by Martin Indyk, the State Department’s lead envoy to the Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, in a conference call with American Jewish leaders on Thursday. The framework document would have to be finalized in the next few weeks, ahead of a scheduled fourth and final phase of Palestinian prisoner releases set for March, the report said.Netanyahu: Boycotts will only ‘push peace further away’
The US framework document, whose terms will not have to be signed off as fully binding by the Israeli and Palestinian leaderships, provides for talks on Palestinian statehood based on the pre-1967 lines with land swaps to enable 75 to 80 percent of settlers to come under Israeli sovereignty, relates to Israel as the Jewish state, provides for compensation for refugees but no Palestinian “right of return,” and does not go into detail on the fate of Jerusalem, Indyk indicated.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu brushed aside US Secretary of State John Kerry’s warning of more boycotts Sunday, saying that such actions are “immoral and unjustified” and will only “push peace farther away.”Kerry was warning Israel, not supporting boycotts, US says
“The attempts to boycott the State of Israel are immoral and unjustified,” Netanyahu said in his opening statement at the cabinet meeting. “Aside from this, they will not accomplish their goal. First of all, they entrench the Palestinians deeper in their positions, pushing peace farther away; and second, no pressure will force me to give up the vital interests of the State of Israel, above all the security of the citizens of Israel.”
Speaking at the Munich Security Conference Saturday, Kerry said failure to reach a peace deal would damage Israel’s capacity to be “a democratic state with the particular special Jewish character that is a central part of the narrative and of the future,” and could lead to more international boycotts.
US Secretary of State John Kerry does not support an economic boycott of Israel, State Department spokesperson Jen Psaki said Sunday, in an effort to defuse tensions with Israel. Some Israeli politicians had responded derisively to Kerry’s statement this weekend that Israel would face a growing international boycott movement if peace talks failed.Report: Livni, Saudi prince talk peace process at Munich conference
Psaki said Sunday that Kerry’s only reference to a boycott was a description of actions undertaken by others, which he has always opposed.
Livni's office confirmed Sunday that during a question and answer session at the end of a panel on the peace process, featuring Livni, Chief PLO Negotiator Saeb Erekat and American Envoy Martin Indyk, the Saudi prince asked Livni about the Arab Peace Initiative.Intelligence Min. Says Israel Must Invade Gaza, Destroy Hamas
At the end of the panel discussion, bin Faisal praised Livni, saying he "understands why [she was] chosen to be Israel's negotiator."
"If only you could sit on the same stage with me and talk about it," Livni responded, hinting at a desire to upgrade reported secret ties between Israel and Saudi Arabia to more open ones.
After a rocket was fired at Eilat by Al Qaeda-inspired Ansar Beit al-Maqdis (Partisans of Jerusalem) Friday night, and shot down by Iron Dome, Intelligence Minister Yuval Steinitz warned Saturday that at the current rate, Israel will soon have to once again enter Gaza to destroy Hamas, the Islamist terrorist group which currently controls the territory.Hamas removes its rocket-prevention squads from Israel-Gaza border
"In the last year or two there has been an improvement in the security situation, fewer rockets have been fired at Israel and fewer Israelis have been injured," noted Steinitz. "But if the trickle of rockets from Gaza continues, we'll have no choice but to enter and eliminate the Hamas rule, allowing the Palestinian Authority (PA) to rule Gaza again." (h/t Bob Knot)
Hamas has removed from the Gaza-Israel border most members of the 900-strong force it employs to prevent rocket fire into Israel, The Times of Israel has learned.'2014 is going to be a very bad year for Hamas'
Sources in Gaza said the decision of Hamas’s military wing to withdraw most members of the rocket-prevention force, which was first deployed last July, was taken in the wake of Israel’s airstrikes on targets in Gaza overnight Thursday. Those strikes were ordered in response to a rocket attack on the southern city of Netivot on Thursday.
Money is so tight that Hamas has not paid full salaries to its 47,000 employees in the last six months. The 2014 budget already has a deficit of 75 percent. Hamad said his government is performing a triage, trying to preserve the work of the security, health and education ministries and stripping down operations of other offices.UN voices concern as Lebanon car bombing kills four
The immediate cash crunch aside, Hamas's isolation has political ramifications. Israeli newspapers report that Hamas has deployed its own militia along the frontier with Israel to prevent rocket firings. Several Israeli airstrikes, including two strikes that killed three people in Gaza last week, have met with anemic responses. Shlomo Brom, former director of the strategic planning division of the Israeli army, said Hamas is doing its best to prevent Gazans from triggering an escalation with Israel.
The explosion happened at a gas station in Hermel, a stronghold of the Shiite movement Hezbollah, Lebanon’s interior minister said.Iranian commander: We have targets within America
The Al-Nusra Front in Lebanon, a group named after Al-Qaeda’s Syrian affiliate, claimed the attack on Twitter, saying it was a suicide bombing in response to Hezbollah’s involvement in Syria.
A top commander of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards boasted Saturday that his forces have plans in place to attack the United States from within, should the U.S. attack the Islamic Republic.Iran: 'We Won't Leave Zionists with Air to Breathe'
“America, with its strategic ignorance, does not have a full understanding of the power of the Islamic Republic,” Brig. Gen. Hossein Salami said in a televised interview. “We have recognized America’s military strategy, and have arranged our abilities, and have identified centers in America [for attack] that will create a shock.”
Reports indicate that terrorist Hezbollah forces — allies of Iran — have infiltrated the U.S. and have mapped out targets.
Hossein Salami, commander of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards, threatened US, the West, and Israel in a televised interview Saturday, according to Maariv.Italy police arrest man for sending pigs’ heads to synagogue
"If the Islamic nation would unite, it could minimize the breathing room of the US and the West until the Zionist regime would no longer have room to breathe," the commander threatened on Iranian state television.
Italian police have arrested a 29-year-old far-right activist on suspicion that he sent pigs’ heads to the Israeli embassy in Rome, the city’s synagogue, and the Jewish Museum of Rome, which is hosting a Holocaust exhibition.Security Council Demands Israel Stop Being So Goddamn Moral (satire)
Police on Friday said they were preparing to charge the man, who was allegedly linked to jingoist groups and was planning to found a new organization.
The United Nations Security Council endorsed a statement this morning calling on Israel to stop providing medical treatment to wounded Syrians, saying that the practice conflicts with the negative portrayal of Israel the body wishes to cultivate.IDF allows first peek into secret Golan Heights field hospital
Statement 3223 specifically denounces the treatment in Israeli hospitals of hundreds of Syrian civilians. “It is unconscionable that Israel would leverage its superior medical technology and expertise to treat wounded Syrians, as that flagrantly violates Israel’s established role in this Council’s eyes as perpetrator solely of occupation and oppression.” It called on the Israeli government to desist at once from behavior that “could only be construed as the policies of an enlightened, caring society.”
The Israeli military allowed cameras into a secret field hospital on the Syrian border for the first time.Evidence of European Sea Peoples in Jordan Valley
On Friday evening, Channel 2 News aired footage of the fenced Golan Heights facility, which has treated over 700 Syrian patients since it was established less than a year ago.
The hospital, staffed by soldiers in uniform, includes an emergency room, an intensive care unit, an operating theater, a mobile laboratory, a pharmacy and an x-ray facility. It treats Syrian patients who cross the border regardless of creed – or of where their loyalties lie.
‘We have evidence that culture from present Europe is represented in Tell Abu al-Kharaz. A group of the Sea Peoples of European descent, Philistines, settled down in the city,’ says Peter Fischer.
‘We have, for instance, found pottery resembling corresponding items from Greece and Cyprus in terms of form and decoration, and also cylindrical loom weights for textile production that could be found in central and south-east Europe around the same time.’ (h/t Yoel)