08/06 Links Pt2: The Poisoned Lancet; Jewish Revolt era coins discovered near Jerusalem

From Ian:

---

Ryan Bellerose: Of Skullcaps And Asshats

I had people tell me they didn’t think I should wear something so offensive, which I found odd. I have some T shirts that even I think are offensive, yet nobody in Canada has ever said a word to me, even when I wore a T shirt with a woman in a hijab saying “ Thank you for not provoking my uncontrollable lusts.” Or “Save the trees, wipe your ass with an owl.” So can someone explain to me why a simple cap with some Hebrew on it is considered to be so damn offensive?
The last one is the most annoying, the “reasonable” guy who explains how he doesn’t hate Jews, he hates Zionists, and the Rothschilds and the people who control the banks and the media who happen to be Jewish. I met two of those guys, the asshats not the Rothschilds. On the asshat scale they are about a 10.5. I have no doubt they tell themselves they aren’t bigots, but what they say is every bit as offensive to me as the one guy who told me I was a genocidal baby killer. The odd thing is that wearing a kippah doesn’t mean you support Israel. I have debated Jewish people like Lucas Koerner who wore a kippah and hates Israel. I wish that kid would walk through one of these neighbourhood wearing his kippah. Maybe he would understand why the world needs Israel.
I am halfway through the week, the week I decided to wear a Kkippah. I have had some good experiences but they have been vasty outweighed by ignorance and outright bigotry. I think people are unaware of the bigotry. I have to believe that this is the case because if they knew and still said nothing , I would have to say they are asshats.

College Democrats of America Student Leader Equates Israel With Nazi Germany

In a shocking exchange uncovered by citizen journalist Aaron Robinow, high ranking student officials in College Democrats of America equated Israel with Nazi Germany and told a pro-Israel member of the CDA to "go f**k himself." Robinow highlighted the exchange on his website:
[S]enior officers from College Democrats of America took to Facebook to bully a colleague for supporting Israel’s right to defend itself. Giovanni Hashimoto, a member of CDA’s national communication team posted on Facebook to support Israel as a “peace loving.” Within minutes he was harassed, name called with classic leftists tactics–by his colleagues at CDA. Chris Woodside, a social media coordinator for the national organization, equated Israel with Nazi Germany, exclaimed Israeli PM Netanyahu is a war criminal and perpetuating genocide and declared being pro-Israel and a “good person” mutually exclusive. Evan Goldstein, also listed by College Democrats of America as a social media coordinator, told the pro-Israel student to “go (f**k) himself” and described him as a “douchebag” for supporting the Jewish state.

The Poisoned Lancet

These are the people whose Israel-hating letter was featured by the Lancet, ostensibly a medical journal. Not one is identified as the lifelong defender of Israel’s enemies and radical activist against Israel’s existence that each one is.
Lancet has a history of poisoning medical reporting with its radical left-wing politics. It made worldwide headlines in 2006 by reporting what were ultimately deemed wild exaggerations, if not outright lies, about the number of Iraqis killed during the American war in Iraq.
Lancet perfectly embodies four observations about our world.
One is from the prophet Isaiah: “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil.”
The second is from the legendary American screenwriter Ben Hecht (1894–1964), a two-time Academy Award winner: “How sad that in the warmest hearts I knew lurked always a little cold spot for the Jew.”
The third, if I may quote myself, is one of the earliest realizations of my life: “Those who don’t fight evil hate those who do.”
And the fourth is that, from the universities to the arts to religion, the Left damages everything it touches. Lancet was once a great medical journal.

Kent State Under Fire For Anti-Semitic Professor Who Likened Israel To 'Nazism'

On Tuesday, the Simon Wiesenthal Center sent a letter to Kent State University asking that they condemn professor Julio Pino. Pino wrote a letter to “academic friends of Israel” holding Israel responsible for deaths in Gaza and claimed Israel was the “spiritual heir to Nazism.”
“We urge you to condemn the recent, highly offensive and blatantly anti-Semitic remarks of Julio Pino – an Associate Professor of History at your university," the organization wrote to Kent State University president Beverly Warren.
The Simon Wiesenthal Center highlighted that "Pino addressed the ‘academic friends of Israel’ with the following vitriol: 'Your names are scrawled on every bullet fired, bomb dropped, body buried and burnt forehead in Gaza. May your names become a curse word on the lips of every justice-loving person on earth, along with 'Obama' and 'Netanyahu.' Pino then went on to remark, “Jihad until victory!” and '[Zionism is] a regime that is the spiritual heir to Nazism.'"

Anti-Israel Prof. loses job offer at U. Illinois over hateful tweets

We previously featured Virginia Tech, and soon-to-be U. Illinois (at Urbana-Champaign) Professor Steven Salaita, someone committed to the destruction of Israel, for his tweet partly blaming Zionism for anti-Semitic outbursts around the world:
That was not even the worst of his tweets. I’ve been following his account for months now, and his Twitter action was hateful against Israel to the point of deranged (view his tweets at the bottom of the post and see if you agree).
Apparently, these tweets have cost him his job offer at U. Illinois, but not before he resigned from Virginia Tech. It appears that because his “offer” was contingent on various approvals, he thought he had an actual “offer” but really only had nothing but a promise to consider hiring him and a departmental recommendation to hire.

J Street Boston Again Declines Chance To Rally In Solidarity With Israel

Even so, J Street declined to co-sponsor the event. “The executive director of every JCRC member organization was given the same opportunity and information about how to be a sponsor of our community rally this Thursday,” Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Boston Executive Director Jeremy Burton told TruthRevolt. Burton did not have specific information as to why J Street did or did not respond. J Street controversially became a JCRC member in 2011.
“The invitation to be a sponsor entailed letting us know that an organization wanted to be listed. Thanks to the generosity of CJP there was no financial commitment associated with being a rally sponsor,” Burton added.
The event is sponsored by organizations across the political and religious spectrum:

David Singer: Jews Condemned Whlle ISIS Decimates Christians

Patrick Coburn does not mince his words in The Independent:
“It is the greatest mass flight of Christians in the Middle East since the Armenian massacres and the expulsion of Christians from Turkey during and after the First World War."
Yet the media shows little interest in exposing the decimation and dispersal of the Christian communities in Syria and Iraq.
Google reports on the Israel-Gaza war outnumber reports on the much more deadly ISIS-Christian conflict by about 20:1.
The West is equally as disinterested at this appalling ethnic and religious cleansing and forced transfer of Christians.
An impotent United Nations shows its unwillingness to intervene.
Israel meanwhile ensures that Jews will never find themselves in the same boat as the abandoned and hapless Christians.

Tricycle Theatre refuses to host UK Jewish Film Festival over Israeli sponsorship

A major London theatre has refused to host the UK Jewish Film Festival because it is sponsored by the Israeli embassy.
The Tricycle Theatre was scheduled to be the main venue for the UKJFF in November, with 26 films due to be screened there as well as six gala events.
But in a statement issued on Tuesday, UKJFF executive director Judy Ironside said: “The Tricycle told us that they cannot be associated with a festival which in turn is associated with the UK’s Israel embassy”.

Slippery slope at The Tricycle

I welcome a protest planned for Thursday outside the Tricycle Theatre, hosted by a group called the Campaign Against Anti-Semitism, but anyway feel utterly bewildered by this decision. Ms. Rubasingham, you have already gone some distance to alienating your massive existing and potential Jewish client base. You have allowed the Tricycle Theatre to slide down an extremely slippery slope of politically motivated programming, and you have unwittingly contributed to the growing sentiment that Jewish people face an expiry date of when they will no longer be welcome in multi-cultural London.
You have given the UK Jewish Film Festival a choice: publically disagree with Israel by rejecting any funding from the Israeli Embassy, or look for another home. Whichever way you look at it, Ms. Rubasingham, it doesn’t look good for a supposedly politically neutral arts venue, does it?
A few years ago I sat in an Israeli theatre called Nalaga’at in Jaffa, watching a deaf-blind group comprised of 11 Jews and Arabs, perform a play called ‘Not By Bread Alone’. I sat in floods of tears, marveling at this group of inspirational people, all of whom have faced trials I cannot begin to comprehend. I felt so proud of Israeli ingenuity and originality, for creating such a fulfilling professional life for these challenged individuals, for bringing them together and subsequently touring internationally with their play, encouraging audiences to view the world differently. I felt like we, together as human beings, can bridge any gap and achieve anything; I was full of hope. Today, thanks to Indhu Rubasingham and the Tricycle Theatre, I am full of despair.

Douglas Murray: Baroness Warsi was over-promoted, incapable and incompetent

Farewell then Sayeeda, Baroness Warsi. The most over-promoted, incapable and incompetent minister of recent times has finally done the nation one service and resigned. This morning she announced on Twitter that she can ‘no longer support government policy on Gaza.’ That would be government policy that now includes reviewing all arms export licenses to Israel? Not strong enough for Sayeeda, it would seem.
It was not hard to see this coming. Not just because Warsi’s Twitter activity in recent weeks has mainly consisted of pumping out support for Hamas-run Gaza and berating supporters of Israel for saying things she disagrees with, but also because she has shown a career-long sympathy for Hamas and other Islamic radicals.
In 2006, on an ‘Any Questions’ on BBC Radio 4, Warsi welcomed the election of Hamas in Gaza. This was after the group had killed hundreds of Israelis in suicide bomb attacks. Apparently unable to imagine that Hamas governing Gaza might be a problem,

Baroness Warsi resigns on a lack of principle over Gaza

To put it with brutal frankness, Warsi is giving Hamas every reason to continue to sacrifice the children of Gaza in future conflicts. This sickening policy works, and Warsi has proved the point.
The other part of her message is almost as shameful: Britain's reputation in the world will now be tarnished. In a sense, not the sense in which she means it, she's right, of course. To repeat, anti-Israel bigotry is the most widely held bigotry in the world today.
What you really have to do at this stage is to establish very clearly whether you want the applause of bigots. We at The Commentator don't. Which is why, in sum, we have a simple take-home message for Baroness Warsi in light of her resignation:
Good riddance.

In Europe, They Call For Death To Jews. Again.

Few European Jews speak or understand much Arabic. But there is one phrase many have recently come to know: "Khaybar Khaybar ya-Yahud, jaish Mohammad saya'ud." The words refer to the battle of Khaybar, in which the Prophet Mohammed slaughtered and enslaved hundreds of Jews, including women and children; "Mohammed," it means, "is coming back for you." It is a death threat to Jews everywhere, and it is being shouted out with growing frequency these days on the streets of Paris, London, Amsterdam, and Berlin.
What's worse, increasingly the threat is not merely idle: in one of the worst episodes of anti-Semitic violence to hit Europe since the Holocaust, Jews are being attacked in their synagogues, their shops, and even in their homes.
And most experts believe things are going to get worse.

How should we fight Hamas?

At its core, this decay stems from the West’s basic aversion to using force in the pursuit of justice.
As a spectator, it is unwilling to do the heavy lifting necessary to discover the truth within the conflict.
Instead of weighing out the moral dimensions involved, and assessing the motivations central to the struggle, the West sits in its ivory tower and is satisfied with a more simple method of indictment: guilt by spreadsheet.
As the Obama administration and European leaders continue their mantra of proportionality while mouthing empty platitudes of Israel’s right to defend itself, the pressure continues to mount on Israel to lay down its arms and accept an untenable status-quo. Yet what the West fails to understand is that its warped call for proportionality will inevitably rob it of its own power to face such a radical enemy – one which we should remember has made it crystal clear that once Israel is defeated, New York, London and Paris will be next.

CAIR, ANSWER, Hamas and Terrorism

ANSWER also claims no evidence has been presented linking the kidnapping and killing of three Israeli teenagers to Hamas. The killings were only a ploy, it claims, while "Fascist Israeli politicians are ratcheting up their genocidal rhetoric." There is no mention of the over 2,700 rockets that Hamas and PFLP have proudly admitted to having launched against civilian targets in Israel in the last few weeks or of the tunnels used by terrorists to attack and kidnap people in Israel. After all, destroying the tunnels and the rocket stockpiles are the objectives of the Israeli operations.
It is Hamas that wants the war it started to continue. It has rejected every cease-fire, even those proposed by Egypt and the Arab League. CAIR is not interested in Muslim peace efforts. By joining ANSWER, CAIR in effect has chosen to align with Hamas and its terrorist allies since these are the fighters who are in the field opposing Israel.

Bill Clinton's Mistake Haunts Israel in Gaza

In recent days, the news media have been reporting that a Hamas military commander named Mohammed Deif is one of the senior figures directing the thousands of Gaza rocket attacks against Israel. What the media have not mentioned is that the Clinton administration had numerous opportunities to put Deif behind bars, but instead led him slip right through its fingers.
The bombings that Deif masterminded took the lives of hundreds Israelis, as well as a number of American citizens, including Ira Weinstein and Jewish Theological Seminary student Matthew Eisenfeld and his fiancé, Sara Duker of New Jersey, who were passengers on a Jerusalem bus that Deif's men bombed on February 25, 1996; Yitzhak Weinstock, the teenage grandson of Los Angeles rabbi Simon Dolgin, murdered in a drive-by shooting on December 1, 1993; and American-Israeli soldier Nachshon Wachsman, , kidnapped and murdered by Hamas in October 1994.
After my daughter Alisa was murdered by Palestinian bus-bombers in 1995, I was invited to take part in numerous meetings and conference calls with Jewish leaders and Clinton administration officials, in which we raised the issue of American victims of Palestinian terror. Deif's name came up often.

At What Moment Should European Jews Leave?

At what moment prior to the Holocaust should the Jews of Europe have chosen to leave? Was it in 1933, as Hitler was on the rise? Was it in 1938, when the Germans went on a killing spree, burning Jewish stores, homes and synagogues and beating Jews in the streets? Was it in 1939, when World War II began?
What was the moment in time when it became too late, that their fates were sealed...and where would they have gone? The United States turned them back to death; so did the British and many others.
The buildup was, as it is today, subtle. Too subtle for us to understand, then, the full extent of destruction and death that can result from such hatred. We honestly didn't know, didn't believe. Sure, we'd been hated for centuries, but we lived by the absurd concept that it was good once, it would be good again. All we had to do was wait for it.

The anti-Semitism sweeping Europe

There are those who say that these premonitions of 1930s Germany have little to do with today’s Europe and everything to do with the many young, unemployed, and culturally isolated Muslims who are raging against Israel, and their own bleak circumstances. The gravitational pull of Gaza is being taken to the European streets where Muslims now just happen to live.
It is true that many of the European protesters are Muslim immigrants – along with a smattering of left- and right-wing extremists who suddenly have something to unite them. It is also true that European foreign ministers have been steadfast in condemning these anti-Semitic attacks against the remnants of European Jewry.
Nonetheless, the sickness of anti-Semitism was surely not cured with the liberation of Auschwitz. As Daniel Jonah Goldhagen argues in his book, The Devil That Never Dies, Jew-hatred may have dissipated during the postwar era, but it still lay dormant, always ready to resurface and reclaim its title as the world’s favorite prejudice.
European Jewry, hardened by history, now more mobile, surely better informed and with Israel as a safe haven, has to decide whether these demonstrations are mere flashpoints, or represent something far deeper.

Gaza: What Could the Press Corps Have Done Differently?

Although the IDF has since withdrawn from Gaza, the question isn’t academic. Soldiers remain massed along the border, poised to re-enter Gaza if necessary. And if the ceasefire takes hold into something long-term, journalists will have greater access to get a clearer picture of the casualty count.
So what do I think reporters should be doing better? I’ll sum it up in a 12-letter word.
Transparency.
Transparency demands that reporters be frank with their audiences about the circumstances they work under, and the methodology they use to gather and verify information.
I haven’t seen many journalists openly say things like “Hamas doesn’t allow reporters to . . .” or, “Some people from Hamas threatened me when . . . .”
I haven’t seen statements such as, “These casualty figures are based on Gaza health officials who are employed by Hamas.”

London Times rejects Wiesel ad about Hamas ‘child sacrifice’

The London Times refused to run an ad featuring Nobel Prize winner Elie Wiesel speaking out against what the ad says is Hamas’ use of children as human shields.
The ad is sponsored by The Values Network, which was founded by Rabbi Shmuley Boteach. It has run in The New York Times, Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal, among other U.S. newspapers. The rejection was first reported by the New York Observer.
The London Times refused the ad because “the opinion being expressed is too strong and too forcefully made and will cause concern amongst a significant number of Times readers,” according to a statement from a representative of the newspaper, the Observer reported.

London Times rejects anti-Hamas advert for fear it could upset their readers

The ad will reportedly appear in The Washington Post, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Chicago Tribune, The Los Angeles Times, The Miami Herald, but NOT in the London Times (aka, The Times).
A representative of The Times said: “In brief, [The Times] [feels] that the opinion being expressed is too strong and too forcefully made and will cause concern amongst a significant number of Times readers.”
Interestingly, The Sunday Times (sister publication of The Times) didn’t seem so concerned with the feelings of their readers when they published a cartoon Holocaust Memorial Day in 2013, depicting the bloody trowel wielding Israeli Prime Minister torturing innocent souls.

Electronic Intifada; “BBC is biased against Palestinians”

You’d have thought that an organization campaigning so hard for Palestinians would have paid some attention to summary executions of Palestinians by Hamas. but you’d be wrong. One might also think there’d be at least a whimper of criticism for the Hamas leaders who ducked down deep underground and allowed Gazans to suffer the fallout of their own catastrophic policies but, again, you’d be wrong.
This is because it’s not about helping Palestinians it’s about attacking Israel. It seems that Hamas aren’t the only ones willing to fight Israel to the last Gazan, hoping that Israel will give up first. But what’s got me going is the sheer nonsense involved in arguing that the Beeb is guilty of prejudice in their reporting in favour of Israel. Arguing that the people on the BBC who take positions in favour of Israel in the various debates and panels they have strikes me as ludicrous. Yet these are arguments they make nonetheless.

The Media are a Bunch of Anti-Israel Hypocrites

The fact that Israel’s civilian population is targeted by Arab-Islamic terrorists does not fit “the narrative” of most of the journalists. After all, the world, according to these Western journalists, is divided into “oppressors” and “oppressed” and Israel is viewed as the “oppressor”. Therefore, any Palestinian attack may be justified, even the killing of baby Hadas Fogel.
The state of the Jews must always be brought to this public trial. Why? Perhaps because it put itself there in the first place.
When they write about the Jews, the Western media are not merely witnesses or observers. They are guilty of inciting against Israel. All the cameras, both video and still, are perpetuating the Arabs’ legitimate warfare.
It is a media pogrom. They all sympathize with murderers and terrorists and blame Israel for defending herself. What bunch of hypocrites. What a gang of purveyors and disseminators of hatred.

Fool Me Twice: CNN Falls for False Casualty Numbers

Wolf Blitzer should have known better.
Nabil Shaath, the senior Palestinian official who on CNN several days ago fervently charged Israel with conducting "a war against the Palestinian people," has a history of lying about Palestinian casualties.
In 2002, after Israel's difficult and costly battle with Palestinian gunmen in Jenin, Shaath told the CNN journalist that the Israeli army "massacred" Palestinians and "snatched" their corpses, which they supposedly "buried elsewhere in unidentified graves." It was pure fabrication. So was Shaath's statement to AFP that 300 Palestinians were killed during the battle. In fact 52 were killed, mostly combatants.
Lessons were not learned. In his July 25 interview with Blitzer, Shaath insisted that one thousand Palestinians in Gaza have been killed, and that "700 of them are women, children and elderly civilians."

On Separation Between Israel, West Bank Palestinians, NPR Deceives

"A separation of the two communities is now complete in almost every way," reports National Public Radio yesterday about Israelis and Palestinians, completely distorting the porous reality in which Palestinians work, pray and tour in Israel.
Yesterday's broadcast by Soraya Sarhaddi Nelson on "Morning Edition," entitled "Is there any empathy left in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict?" was premised on the notion that due to the "complete" separation, the two groups have less opportunity to interact and develop empathy, as host Steve Inskeep described it.
While it is true that dating back to even the first Intifada, Israel has placed many restrictions on Palestinian entry into Israel which did not previously exist due to Palestinian violence -- Nelson distorts and obscures the particulars concerning the current situation, including the fact that some one million Palestinians reportedly entered Israel one month alone in 2013.

Foul-Mouthed Australian Columnist Quits Over Israel Flap

After stirring up a hornet’s nest of tension with the Jewish community, editors, and executives at his parent company Fairfax Media, the Sydney Morning Herald columnist Mike Carlton quit over a string of foul-mouthed replies to readers.
Unfortunately for Carlton, his rude, crude and lewd replies became The Story. Andrew Bolt, one of Australia’s most widely-read columnists, called out Carlton, and the The Australian picked up on the controversy, creating a graphic of Carlton’s worst invective to readers. Both The Australian and Bolt’s paper, the Melbourne Herald Sun, are owned by Fairfax rival, Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. According to The Australian, dissatisfaction with Carlton reached Fairfax’s board of directors and apparently advertisers too.

Mike Carlton resigns from Fairfax Media after intense pressure from anti-semitic backlash.

FAIRFAX has confirmed columnist Mike Carlton has resigned after intense pressure to apologise after using anti-semitic and abusive language towards readers.
Carlton was caught out sending abusive emails and tweets to readers who questioned his position on the conflict in Gaza, calling one critic a “Jewish bigot” and telling several others to “f**k off”.
According to Mr Alymer, representatives from Fairfax Media called Mr Carlton last night to enter into discussions to fix the issue.
“We said we’d suspend him and he’s resigned on the spot,” Mr Alymer said.
“He was apologetic. He accepted he had gone too far. As more emails emerge we kind of figured we needed to suspend him. We need to put the readers first.
“It wasn’t one or two emails, It was several emails. You just can’t do that.”
Last night, The Sydney Morning Herald’s editor-in-chief Darren Goodsir apologised to readers and called Carlton’s behaviour “completely unacceptable”.

Hollywood Execs ‘Furious at Javier and Penelope’ for Anti-Israel Letter

Hollywood executives are reportedly “furious at Javier and Penelope” for accusing Israel of “genocide” in a recent widely circulated letter, particularly Relativity Media CEO Ryan Kavanaugh, the first to come out publicly to condemn them.
"As the grandson of Holocaust survivors, I know that anyone calling what's going on in Israel 'genocide' vs. self-defense is either ignorant and shouldn't be commenting or is truly anti-Semitic," Kavanaugh told The Hollywood Reporter this weekend, saying letter “makes my blood boil.”
After Kavanaugh’s statement was published, he said he received over 500 calls, emails, and texts of support—many from high-ranking Hollywood executives.
THR reports that though they declined to go on the record, “many top execs” they contacted expressed agreement with Kavanaugh, one saying he is “furious at Javier and Penelope” for the stunt, adding that he wondered whether they would ever work as a couple again due to industry pushback.

TruthRevolt Petitions Lancome To Condemn Jew-Hatred

In response to Penelope Cruz signing an open letter "clarifying" her previous claim that Israel is committing “genocide” in Gaza, TruthRevolt has launched a petition to Lancome, where Cruz is an Ambassadress, asking the company to condemn Jew-hatred.
“The below signatories are requesting that Lancome condemn the remarks of your Ambassadress Penelope Cruz for accusing the State of Israel of genocide. Your silence is deafening and disappointing to millions of Americans who support and love the Jewish state,” reads the petition. “Israel is the only country in the Middle East where people of all ethnicities, faiths and political parties can live in peace without fear of government imposed segregation and hate. Cruz's decision to call Israeli self-defense 'genocide' is malignant and should be condemned by you and your company immediately.”

Pro-Israel Mensch of The Day: Jon Lovitz

We already knew comedian Jon Lovitz was pro-Israel and not afraid to show it. So it is no surprise that in the past days, he has been busy on Twitter defending Israel and blasting Hamas.

A Zionist porn star shows his solidarity

Michael Lucas, the gay pornography kingpin, has always been a staunch supporter of Israel. The Russian Jew, who was born Andrei Lvovich Trelvas and made his way to New York City to build an empire of homosexual porn under the shingle Lucas Entertainment, holds Israeli citizenship and is the filmmaker not only of “Men of Israel,” the first-ever porno film with an all-gay cast, but also of “Undressing Israel: Gay Men in the Promised Land,” a documentary touting Israel’s gay-friendly appeal and forward-thinking culture.
When war broke out with Gaza last month, Lucas saw that would-be tourists and Jewish tour groups were canceling their reservations left and right. So he got on a plane and flew here in order to prove them wrong.
“What I wanted to do is show people that it’s okay to come here, even in a difficult time,” Lucas said over breakfast at Orna and Ella, the iconic gay-run café on Tel Aviv’s Sheinkin St.

The brainwashing of the British public into believing the Hamas narrative

Not a single newspaper or TV report has made clear that all their Gaza reporters are under the total control of Hamas, even though other countries' reporters have documented the abuses after they have left. With very minor exceptions, the ONLY reports from Israel have been those where the media sensed an opportunity to further demonize Israel (such as the story of civilians in Sderot cheering when missiles were targeted at Gaza, and where a group of extreme leftist 'anti-war' protesters in Tel Aviv were confronted by an angry crowd). The obsession with the Sderot story is especially telling since, for 15 years, the media has completely ignored the missiles that have rained down on that town almost every day from Gaza.
We are not talking about 'anti-Israel' bias here. That has been going on for years. We are talking about a totally uniform effort by the entire UK media to brainwash the public with hatred for Israel. While some of the newspapers have carried rare commentary pieces supporting Israel, these have been drowned out by the tsunami of anti-Israel commentaries; to the uninformed reader the pro-Israel commentaries must seem ludicrous since they speak of things that have NEVER been reported as part of the news, like: Hamas use of human shields, the Hamas charter to destroy Israel; the extent Israel goes to avoid civilian casualites; the thousands of Hamas rockets fired at Israel, etc.

NY Mag viral story about Israel making up Hamas involvement in teen kidnapping falling apart

Paul Hirschson from the Israeli Foreign Ministry discloses that the order to kidnap three Israeli teens, whose bodies were found in June, came from Hamas in Gaza:
Why is this important?
Because Katie Zavadski of NY Magazine spread far and wide the story that Israel essentially made up the claim that Hamas was behind the kidnapping.
That assertion was based on tenuous and speculative reporting by Sheera Frenkel of BuzzFeed and Jon Donnisson of the BBC that an Israeli police official, who was not even in charge of the investigation, had admitted that at most it was a “lone cell” of Hamas in the West Bank.
I explored this development in NY Magazine’s contribution to the propaganda war against Israel
The police official denied making the statement.

O'Reilly Unwittingly Fosters Anti-Semitism

O'Reilly stated, "historically, in Europe, many of the people who controlled the land and the banks were Jewish” and "there was resentment by those who didn't have money or land." I am sure O'Reilly was not intending to toss out one of the many libels used against Jews, but this one is so egregious, not to mention, dangerous, that it boggles the mind. In fact, for much of European history, Jews were not allowed to own land!
As for banking, while Jews had been involved in banking and finance over the centuries, they never, at any period, "controlled" the banks. This canard that O'Reilly so lazily tosses out is, in fact, ironically, one the great seeds of anti-Semitism, the supposed purpose of having this segment air.
When O'Reilly then asked his guest for help in explaining why anti-Semitism exists, his "expert" guest, Dr. Bucci, went on about how the far right and Nazis thought Jews were subhuman. He continued that even though many Jews started the Communist movement, Stalin then turned against them. Nothing more?

New York Times Stumbles on Human Shields, Occupation

The newspaper stumbled again when it reported, as an undisputed fact, that the Gaza Strip is still under Israeli occupation. A July 31 story by Jodi Rudoren asserts that in the years since Israel's 2005 withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, the country "has maintained an uneasy occupation" there.
But not all international law experts agree with the counterintuitive allegation that Gaza remains occupied. As CAMERA pointed out in 2011, Eugene Kontorovich, Yuval Shany, Eyal Benvenisti, Ruth Lapidoth, Elizabeth Samson, Salon Solomon, Benjamin Rubin and others have argued that the territory is no longer occupied.
Ironically, Hamas has said the same.
Another New York Times reporter, Steve Erlanger, was flatly wrong when he recently referred to the this question. Israel "insists it has not occupied the territory since withdrawing its troops and settlers in 2005," he wrote. "But it controls Gaza's borders."
Israel controls its own side of its shared border with Gaza, but certainly does not control the territory's border with Egypt.

Americans support Israel and the press hates it

Over a month into the current crisis, a NBC News/Wall Street Journal/Marist poll found that a significant plurality continue to sympathize with Israel over Palestinians. 43 percent of Americans said they back Israel compared to just 14 percent who claim to support Palestinians generally. This is, however, misleading as Israel’s current conflict is not with the Palestinian Authority but with Hamas – the ruling faction in Gaza. Unsurprisingly, Americans are even less friendly toward this group which the U.S. State Department lists as a terrorist organization. Only 7 percent of Americans told NBC/WSJ pollsters that they back Hamas while 54 percent support Israel.
America’s sentiments are not unfounded or chauvinistic display of support for a historic ally. In spite of being lectured endlessly by the American government to expend even more energy in order to limit civilian casualties in Gaza, Israel’s rules of engagement are far more self-limiting and crippling than any to which the U.S. would agree to abide by.

An Inventory of Recent Anti-Semitic Incidents in Europe

In France, eight synagogues were attacked within a week in July.
Among other attacks in France, reports the Sunday Times Leader, on July 20 ”a mob of 400 armed with petrol bombs rampaged into the mainly Jewish Paris suburb of Sarcelles and attacked a synagogue, a pharmacy, and a kosher supermarket. Their banners, reading ‘Death to Jews” and ‘Slit Jews’ throats,’ were chilling.” The supermarket burned to the ground.
In Hamburg, Germany, anti-Israel protesters attacked an elderly Jewish man in during a pro-Israel event, and then began beating his daughter when she rushed to his aid.
In Wuppertal, Germany, an 18-year-old Palestinian was arrested on July 31 for hurling three Molotov cocktails into the Bergische synagogue. Noted the London Times, “the symbolism of the target has not been lost on the Jewish community, which rebuilt the synagogue after it was burnt to the ground on Kristallnacht, the Nazi pogrom against Jews in November, 1938.”

LA mayor, city leaders weigh in on Gaza conflict in support of Israel

LA Mayor Eric Garcetti and city council members joined the debate on Tuesday night, holding a ceremony supporting the Jewish State. Dubbed “City Leaders Stand with Israel for Peace,” they held a moment of silence to commemorate the many lives lost during the conflict.
In 28 days of fighting, 64 IDF soldiers were killed as well as three Israeli civilians; the Palestinian death toll stands at 1,867.
“We must also of course, pause…and say that the loss of civilian life is something that is heartbreaking for all of us,” Garcetti said at the event. “To see the lives that have been lost, it has hit home here.”
That was a reference to Los Angeles-born Sgt. Max Steinberg, a soldier who was killed when an anti-tank missile hit his vehicle in Gaza City two weeks ago.

South Africa – Quo Vadis?

I am astounded that the ANC denies Israel’s right to self-defense. Under International Law, the Israeli government has both the right and the duty to protect its citizens. No country can allow its citizens and cities to be targeted by rockets hour after hour, day after day, week after week, month after month, year after year. In the past 10 days alone, more than 1,500 missiles were fired at Israeli cities and towns. Each one of these missiles was launched with the aim of killing and maiming as many innocent civilians as possible. Under International War, this represents more than 1,500 war crimes committed against Israel. Hamas rejected the terms of the Egyptian ceasefire after Israel reluctantly agreed to the ceasefire despite the imminent military threat facing its citizens. Israel did what she did to limit the suffering of innocent people on both sides of the border. Hamas focuses its efforts on shedding as much blood as possible.
I am appalled that the ANC has the gall to blame Israel for the latest escalation of hostilities thereby condoning these grave violations of International Law. It is Hamas and only Hamas who is to blame for the unnecessary loss of life on both sides of the border.

Behind Europe's anti-Semitic slurs

A Belgian doctor refuses to provide emergency medical care to a Jewish woman, telling her, “I’m not coming . . . Send her to Gaza for a few hours, then she’ll get rid of the pain.” A Spanish writer calls (yes, again) for the expulsion of the country’s tiny Jewish community.
Renowned Italian philosopher Gianni Vattimo declares, “I’d like to shoot those bastard Zionists.: A German teen firebombs a synagogue. French anti-Israel protestors attack synagogues full of worshippers. An Irish Sinn Fein city councilman urges the shelling of Israel.
Rabid anti-Israeli sentiment that bleeds into pathological anti-Semitism has also infected the Netherlands, Britain, Sweden, Denmark, Austria and Poland.
These latest blips are supposedly in reaction to Israel’s most recent offensive against Hamas.
But they run deeper than that.

The American Studies Association Returns to the Middle East Fray

As has become standard practice in the academic BDS movement, the ASA’s Executive Committee has an academic pretext for its intervention in the Middle East: the recent strike on the Islamic University of Gaza. The committee understands that most observers will think an organization devoted to American culture should not have a stance on the Gaza conflict. But the statement almost immediately drops that pretext and concedes that the ASA’s stance is really about “Israel’s long-standing practice of denying an entire people the basic necessitates [sic] of life and freedom.”
There follows a link you can click to give the ASA money to “to join in financially supporting our principled response to attacks on the organization and our continued growth and impact as an association.” As Rahm Emanuel once said, you never want to let a serious crisis to go to waste.
Of course, the ASA stand is sheer self-indulgent theater. Still, it is revealing. Last year, it was at least possible to imagine that the American Studies Association distinguished between the West Bank and Gaza, understanding Israel’s need to defend itself against Hamas, an organization devoted to its violent destruction and to violence against Jews altogether. Today, like others in the BDS movement, the American Studies Association has openly sided with Hamas’s military wing, or, as BDS darling Ali Abunimah likes to call its members, “resistance fighters.”

Israeli M&A Continues on Pace for a Record Year

As we move squarely into the second half of 2014, Israeli startups are experiencing what portends to be a record year. In fact, total transaction volume has already exceeded all that in 2013.
In the first half of 2014, Israel has had 37 mergers, acquisitions, and IPOs. The average acquisition price an Israeli company fetched through June 2014 was $101.77 million.

Nano-sensor ‘sniffs out’ explosives

A revolutionary new electronic chip with nano-sized chemical sensors is about to change the way security forces worldwide safeguard airports and other public areas against terrorist attacks.
The Israeli-designed nanotechnology-inspired sensor, devised by Prof. Fernando Patolsky of Tel Aviv University’s School of Chemistry and Center for Nanoscience and Nanotechnology, and developed by the Herzliya company Tracense, picks up the scent of explosives molecules better than a detection dog’s nose.
Research on the sensor was recently published in the journal Nature Communications.
Existing explosives sensors are expensive, bulky and require expert interpretation of the findings. In contrast, the new sensor is mobile, inexpensive, and identifies in real time — and with great accuracy — explosives in the air at concentrations as low as a few molecules per 1,000 trillion.

Trove of Jewish Revolt coins discovered near Jerusalem

A hoard of coins from the fourth year of the Jewish Revolt against Rome — minted months before the fall of Jerusalem in 70 CE — was found outside the capital and announced by the Israel Antiquities Authority on Tuesday to coincide with the Ninth of Av, the date commemorating the destruction of the Second Temple.
The trove, which consists of 114 bronze coins, was unearthed during the expansion of Route 1, the major highway connecting Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, in February. In the past several months, the IAA team led by Judea District chief archaeologist Pablo Betzer has excavated the remains of a small Roman-era Jewish village near the modern town of Abu Ghosh. Amid the ruins was a broken juglet containing the verdigris-coated coins.
The coins are all of identical size and age, and possibly from the same mint. Their value has yet to be determined, but they are likely quarter or one-eighth shekel bits, Betzer said. They are all marked with the words “For the redemption of Zion” and “Year four,” indicating they were made during the fourth year of the revolt against the Roman Empire, or between spring 69 and spring 70 CE. They are decorated with the Biblical four species — palm, myrtle, citron and willow — and a vessel that may symbolize those used in the temple. The coins are still encrusted in nearly 2,000-year-old dirt and oxidation, and await cleaning and study by IAA specialists.