Monday, September 08, 2014
Everything You Need to Know about International Law and the Gaza War
War crimes. Disproportionate response. Collective punishment. Targeting civilians. Throughout Operation Protective Edge, these terms have been fired off at Israel with the same intensity and frequency as Hamas’ rockets. Arab government spokesmen constantly refer to Israel’s actions as “aggression.” In extreme cases, Israel is accused of “genocide” and “ethnic cleansing.”How Hamas Destroys Its People, as Seen Through the Eyes of IDF Soldiers
When politicians, pundits, or the public misuse these terms, one can only think of a quote from The Princess Bride: “You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.” But when a respected jurist like Navi Pillay, the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, calls Israel’s military campaign “disproportionate,” claims the IDF’s “disregard for international humanitarian law and for the right to life was shockingly evident” in many of its attacks, and says that Israel is insufficiently protecting Gaza’s civilians “in a manner that could amount to war crimes,” the accusations cannot be so easily dismissed. At the same time that Israel is exercising its right to self-defense against terrorists who violate and shamelessly exploit international law, human rights lawyers and UN officials aim to manipulate the laws of war to reduce its ability to lawfully use military force.
Since the beginning of the Gaza War, Israelis have insisted that Hamas uses its own civilians as “human shields.” Hamas denies it, and certain international voices take their side. Now some of those who saw it with their own eyes are speaking out.On Those "Spontaneous" Pro-Hamas Demonstrations
Below is a collection of personal stories gathered from soldiers who saw with their own eyes Palestinian civilians being used as strategic elements of Hamas’ fight against Israel. In some cases, only first names have been used in order to protect identities, as some were still in the midst of the operation when interviewed.
While they all served in different units, and fought different battles, some from the sky and some from the ground, all of them spoke of their painstaking efforts to protect the lives of Palestinian civilians at the risk of their own lives. Each soldier interviewed for this story had his own personal account, sometimes several accounts, of trying to avoid civilian casualties in the face of Hamas efforts to exploit them. And all of the soldiers shared the same frustration that despite all of their painstaking efforts, the world continues to view Israel’s war in Gaza as a war against humanity, when in their eyes, it is very much a war against a terrorist organization that has taken its own people hostage.
To what extent were Muslim Brotherhood-linked organizations involved in the many, sometimes violent, anti-Israel and pro-Hamas demonstrations we saw throughout Europe during the recent war?
“Let’s look at the country which is the most important hub for all of this - the UK. There is absolutely no doubt that the Brotherhood is the prime mover behind the demonstrations, because the coalitions, they are always the same people, the same organizers. Primarily, they are the British Muslim Initiative, Friends of Al-Aqsa, the Palestine Forum in Britain - those are all Brotherhood/Hamas groups. They’ve been behind the demonstrations for years, together with far-left coalition partners such as Stop the War Coalition and the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament.
Every time there’s a problem with Gaza, it’s the same sponsors, same groups, same signs. […] Some people would then say that these organizations are not the same as the Brotherhood, but they are part of the larger Global Muslim Brotherhood (GMB), that is, something more than these individual groups but less than a structured, hierarchical organization. In other words, a network. In general, the Brotherhood plays a big role in the demonstrations in Europe, but in terms of sheer political agitation and as a country serving as the command and control node.
Inside jobs and Israeli stooges: why is the Muslim world in thrall to conspiracy theories?
Nor is this about ignorance or illiteracy. Those who promulgate a paranoid, conspiratorial world-view within Muslim communities include the highly educated and highly qualified, the rulers as well as the ruled. A recent conspiracy theory blaming the rise of Islamic State on the US government, based on fabricated quotes from Hillary Clinton’s new memoir, was publicly endorsed by Lebanon’s foreign minister and Egypt’s culture minister.Dutch Security Official Haifi Champions Libelous "Protocols of Zion"
Where will it end? When will credulous Muslims stop leaning on the conspiracy crutch? We blame sinister outside powers for all our problems – extremism, despotism, corruption and the rest – and paint ourselves as helpless victims rather than independent agents. After all, why take responsibility for our actions when it’s far easier to point the finger at the CIA/Mossad/the Jews/the Hindus/fill-in-your-villain-of-choice?
As the Egyptian intellectual Abd al-Munim Said once observed, “The biggest problem with conspiracy theories is that they keep us not only from the truth, but also from confronting our faults and problems.” They also make us look like loons. Can we give it a rest, please?
Yasmina Haifi, a Dutch woman from a Turkish background, was the textbook example of a successful and integrated Muslim. A cultural anthropologist by trade, in 2013 she was nominated for the award of Ethnic Manager of the Year by a platform for ethnic Dutch businesswomen. As a former Labour Party city council member in The Hague (1994-98), she was a Labour Party talent scout from 2011 onwards. In 2012 she started her most prestigious job to date: a high-ranking Human Resources manager and Project Leader at the Dutch National Cyber Security Centre [NCSC] in The Hague -- a sub-department of the Dutch government's National Coordinator of Anti-Terrorism and Security.Claudia Rosett: The U.N.: Clueless or Complicit in Gaza?
On August 13, Haifi tweeted: "ISIS has nothing to do with Islam. It's a preconceived Zionist plan who want to deliberately make Islam look bad."(sic) Even though the tweet got Haifi suspended the same day, she said on a radio interview that "I've taken the liberty of expressing myself and apparently I have to pay for that. I wouldn't know why I should renounce my statement. This is how I feel about it. ... Apparently certain things cannot be said. I did not give my opinion. I didn't make that up about Zionism. I read countless articles about it."
Although Haifi did not specify a source for her claims, chances are it involves Moroccan media outlets such as The Moroccan Times and Intellectually yours, which regurgitated the Iranian fabrication that Edward Snowden "admitted" that ISIS leader Sheikh Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was trained by Israel's Mossad.
If UNRWA officials did know that Hamas was building terror tunnels, but raised no public alarm — which they certainly did not — then that should be grounds for a major inquiry into UNRWA complicity with terrorists.Errors, Omissions, and Bias – Oxfam’s Reporting Failures on Gaza 2014 Conflict
There’s also the question of whether UNRWA employs or directly supports members of Hamas. If so, that should block the agency from receiving money from the U.S., which is its longtime top donor — contributing $294 million in 2013. Officially, these days, UNRWA eschews hiring members of Hamas. But there may be some precious distinctions at work here.
Since 2005, UNRWA and the U.S. have had a formal partnership, via a “Framework for Cooperation,” in which UNRWA promises to comply with various requirements of “neutrality.” The aim is to avoid triggering a provision of the U.S. Foreign Assistance Act of 1961, which forbids funding to UNRWA unless UNRWA takes “all possible measures” to ensure that no U.S. assistance goes to any refugee who has received “military training” as a member of the Palestine Liberation Army, or any other “guerrilla-type organization,” or who has “engaged in any act of terrorism.”
There are enough loopholes here to drive a Hamas cement truck through. In the most recent version of the U.S.-UNRWA partnership, signed last November, UNRWA promised to ensure “neutrality” of its facilities and staff, by conducting regular inspections and checking its staff against specific U.N. sanctions lists. But those U.N. sanctions lists are not that relevant to Gaza: They cover al-Qaeda and the Taliban, not Hamas (there is no U.N. sanctions list for Hamas).
On August 27, Oxfam International released a report, “Cease Failure - Rethinking seven years of failing policies in Gaza,”1 in response to the July-August 2014 Gaza conflict.Tony Burke praises the “bravery” of Palestinians “engaging in politics in different ways”
Like most of Oxfam’s publications on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, “Cease Failure” is highly tendentious in its presentation of material, includes numerous factual errors, and promotes a fundamental political bias against Israel. The 13-page report highlights the sharp contrast between Oxfam’s stated mission to fight poverty and provide humanitarian aid, and an agenda that exploits a façade of legal and military analysis – two complex areas where Oxfam has no expertise.
Labor frontbencher Tony Burke savages Israel and praises Palestinians fighting it:Socialist Alternative student club deregistered
You don’t need to be of any particular religious faith to be opposed to the bombing of children....And then this astonishing statement:
[T]he Friends of Palestine group ... brought me photographs of what had happened to the water supply for the people who lived downstream from one of the [Jewish] settlements… [W]hen you see people who have had their drinking water trashed by a settlement upstream, you get a sense very quickly of proportion…
[W]hen settlements are being built between Bethlehem and Ramallah, all the way south of Jericho, that’s about preventing a two state solution. It cannot be about anything else…
If you are serious about justice, then we need to acknowledge and acknowledge the truth, that all Israeli settlements on Palestinian land are illegal. If we’re serious about speaking the truth then we must unequivocally be able to say that East Jerusalem is occupied.
For those who are political advocates within Palestine itself, I will never know the bravery that comes with putting your life on the line and at risk, in engaging in politics in different ways.What the hell does Burke mean with “engaging in politics in different ways”? I know how it would have sounded to Muslims in favour of jihad.
Note that in Burke’s speech there is not a single reference to what Israel is actually up against - a terrorist-led government in Gaza, pledged to its destruction and preaching the most vicious Jew-hatred.
Left-wing group the Socialist Alternative was deregistered as a club by the Monash University Student Association on Tuesday, the same day a student from the same group at La Trobe University was threatened with expulsion following allegations of harassment of a Jewish student on campus.Yale University Chaplain Who Blamed Anti-Semitism on Israel Resigns
The Monash association has simply said the Socialist Alternative is "prejudicial to the interests of clubs and societies", but the Socialist Alternative has blamed a recent article by Education Minister Christopher Pyne to The Australian calling on universities to respond to increasing anti-Semitic behaviour on campus.
The deregistration would mean the group can no longer hold political meetings or information stalls at Monash University's Clayton campus.
The student making the complaints at La Trobe, Jessica Cornish, 25, is now represented by Arnold Bloch Leibler in her complaints of harassment and intimidation against the Socialist Alternative and Students for Palestine.
She said that after she voted down a motion condemning Israeli's "ethnic cleansing" and "genocide" in Gaza, posters were pasted on campus walls accusing her of supporting genocide. She also faced taunts by the students who called her a "Zionist piece of shit" and "genocidal pig". at the end of July, believing it to be "inciting violence" she faced hundreds of posters pasted on campus naming her and accusing her of supporting genocide. She also faced taunts by the students who called her a "Zionist piece of shit" and "genocidal pig".
"It's been the worst semester I've ever had," Ms Cornish said.
Rev. Bruce M. Shipman, who recently came under fire for blaming the Israeli government for rising anti-Semitism in Europe, has resigned as priest-in-charge of the Episcopal Church at Yale University.Senior German politician wants to stop arms exports to Israel
The Episcopal Church stated Sept. 4 that Shipman resigned “on his own initiative.” The Church did not directly mention the Israel-related controversy surrounding the chaplain.
“It is our belief that the dynamics between the Board of Governors and the Priest-in-Charge occasioned the resignation of the Rev. Shipman,” the Church said.
In a letter to the editor in the New York Times last month, Shipman responded to an op-ed by Deborah E. Lipstadt, a Jewish history professor at Emory University, by writing that Lipstadt “makes far too little of the relationship between Israel’s policies in the West Bank and Gaza and growing anti-Semitism in Europe and beyond.”
Stegner clarified that his position is not to be understood to be anti-Israel – “I’m just against arms exports into crisis areas and dictatorship!” he tweeted.BDS Buster of the Week: 14-Year Old Shelly Dvir
Other German politicians rejected Stegner’s statement. “Israel is a beacon of democracy in the Middle East and a friendly state. Due to our history, Israel enjoys special care,” said Florian Hahn, defense spokesman for the CSU party, which is close to Merkel’s Christian Democrats. Therefore, he said, Israel’s request for arms are being evaluated differently than those from other states in the region.
Germany is one of Jerusalem’s staunchest friends in the diplomatic arena and has been delivering advanced weaponry to Israel. So far, Germany has delivered four advanced Dolphin-Class submarine to Israel’s naval fleet, and Jerusalem is scheduled to receive a fifth later this year.
Never underestimate what can happen when you speak out against Israel haters.Bethlehem Bible College: Anti-American, Anti-Israel, All in the Name of Love
That’s the lesson we learned this week from Shelly Dvir, a 14-year old heavy metal fan from Ashkelon, who stopped a band she loved from cancelling an upcoming show in Israel with…a heartfelt comment on Facebook.
According to Ynet, the BDS movement nearly convinced the Irish band Cruachan to cancel its show next week in Tel Aviv. However, the band decided to keep the date as scheduled because of Dvir’s letter.
In a video posted on Youtube on August 8, 2014, Bethlehem Bible College (BBC) reveals a palpable anti-American and anti-Israel stance through the statements of individuals who address the recent Hamas/Israeli conflict. And it's all done in the name of Christian love.Israel-bashing Illinois rabbi, Brant Rosen, quits congregation
The video, titled Bethlehem Voices on Gaza, purports to “interview people on the streets of Bethlehem regarding the war in Gaza.” It includes a 35-second introduction by Awad, followed by six minutes and twenty seconds of statements from twelve unidentified people.
These twelve speakers, who, for some reason, remain unidentified, perpetuated an anti-Israel, and sometimes anti-American, narrative through an absence of historical or political context, factual error, emotional appeals, and even threats. All of them addressed their comments directly to Americans, and appealed for US intervention in the Hamas/Israeli conflict.
A prominent rabbi whose outspoken criticism of Israel became too divisive for his congregation announced this week that he is resigning his pulpit.Academic: Gaza War Started When Israel Fired Back
Brant Rosen, rabbi at the Jewish Reconstructionist Congregation in Evanston, Ill., made the announcement Tuesday. Aside from his pulpit position, which he has held for 17 years, Rosen is also the founder and co-chair of the rabbinical council of Jewish Voice for Peace, a group that promotes boycotts of Israel and has been listed by the Anti-Defamation League as one of the top 10 anti-Israel organizations in the United States.
Rosen said the synagogue board did not force him to step down; rather, the decision was driven by his concern for his own and the congregation’s well-being.
UK-based Israeli academic and longtime Israel critic Avi Shlaim has weighed in on the Gaza war in the Guardian’s Comment is Free section, and predictably, he unleashed a scathing critique of Israel.IDF “Secret Weapons” Slur Revived
To do so, however, Shlaim invokes a logic so twisted, it’s hard to believe he himself subscribes to it.
For example, he insists that Israel is responsible for starting the war and for “initiating the cycle of violence.”
Accusations that Israel employs diabolical and sometimes even secret weapons against its enemies are not new.The Media Feeds Right Into Hamas’ Narrative
Back in October 2006, Robert Fisk was given the front page of the UK’s Independent to spread the libel that Israel had used uranium-based weapons in southern Lebanon. The charge was debunked yet Fisk and the Independent have never, to this day, retracted this libel.
Fast forward to the present day and the Irish Times has published the following, written, incidentally, by Robert Fisk’s ex-wife, Lara Marlowe:
The penny should have dropped well before today’s Gaza crisis. No later than April 11, 2003, in fact.NYT sheds new light on the topic of BBC expert guests
That day, CNN admitted in the New York Times that it hid and manipulated reality, though the wording was more delicately self-regarding. Prior to the 2003 defeat of Saddam Hussein, CNN couldn’t reveal fully the monstrous excesses and threatening nature of his Iraq, because, said chief news executive Eason Jordan, the network’s Iraqi staff risked retaliation.
Problem: Jordan didn’t explain why, having been prevented from reporting honestly there, CNN nonetheless insisted on keeping its financially rewarding Baghdad post operating before and during the 2003 war. Some critics concluded that an appetite for big, wartime money-making ratings outstripped CNN’s taste for truth, with some ambitious journalists playing along.
Have media done similar things in Gaza?
A New York Times article titled “Foreign Powers Buy Influence at Think Tanks” from September 6th makes for fascinating reading. There we discover, for example, that there is such a thing as the Norway lobby and that one of the prominent contributors to the Brookings Institution – from whence came the US special envoy to the last round of negotiations between Israel and the PLO and to which he returned – is Qatar; the country which harbours the Muslim Brotherhood’s antisemitic, homophobic and misogynistic ‘spiritual leader’ Yussuf Qaradawi and which of course finances Hamas.How Plausible Hamas’s Deniability?
The appearance of such scholars as expert guests of the media is of course not a rare occurrence and the BBC is no exception. In the past couple of months alone the Atlantic Council has, for example, been represented by Damon Wilson, Shuja Nawaz and Bilal Saab on BBC World News. Employees of the Center for Strategic and International Studies cite BBC appearances as part of their biographies – see for example here and here. In July 2014 an article titled “Will Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood return to political violence?” appeared on the BBC News website. That analysis was written by Dr Omar Ashour – a Non-Resident Fellow at the Brookings Doha Center.
During the second intifada, Yasser Arafat was a master of denying any links to terror attacks thanks to the layers of “bureaucracy” between him, Fatah, and Fatah’s Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades. But in the end, a cache of seized documents confirmed that he authorized and funded a lot of murderous mayhem without being involved in the specifics of the planning.Daily Mail characterizes Israeli tourists at Syrian look-out point as “ghoulish”
I’m feeling deja vu regarding the plausible deniability of Hamas leaders with the June kidnapping of three Israeli teens. The people who kidnapped the boys were members of Hamas, incited by Hamas, and financed by Hamas. The indicted mastermind, Hussam Qawasmeh, confirmed all this.
The issue of how directly involved the Hamas leadership was in the planning is of little interest to most Israelis.
Why?
The Hamas leaders proudly confirmed that their operatives were responsible for the grisly triple-murder. Sheikh Saleh Arouri “blessed the heroic action” of the kidnappers. And Khaled Mashaal said Naftali Fraenkel, Gil-ad Shaar, and Eyal Yifrach were “aggressors” who got what all settlers deserve.
No regret or remorse — not that I expected any lip service to that.
The issue isn’t what Mashaal knew and when he knew it. The kidnapping may have caught the Hamas brass by surprise. But they’re not treating Qawasmeh as a loose cannon or the murders as a rogue operation. So why should Israel? Or the media? Or anyone else?
The Mount Bental Look-Out point in the Golan is one of the more popular Israeli mountain peaks, due in part to the beautiful views of the Golan, Mt. Hermon and Syria, and because it was the site of a battle during the Yom Kippur War in which 160 Israeli tanks successfully held off nearly ten times their number of Syrian tanks.How BBC News transformed the PUG into a Cheshire Cat
Sightseers can also of course look down at the Syrian town of Quneitra and the Quneitra crossing point, the only border crossing between Syria and Israel on the Golan Heights – the sight, quite recently, of fierce fighting between rebels from the Nusra Front and Syrian government forces.
Here’s the Daily Mail’s headline, evidently inspired in part by an EPA photo of the Bental look-out point, published on Sept. 5th.
Now here’s a photo (and caption), used to illustrate the Daily Mail article, of those “ghoulish” Israeli daytrippers:
One very notable feature in the BBC’s coverage of the recent conflict in Israel and the Gaza Strip was the fact that the Palestinian Unity Government (PUG) suddenly disappeared from the corporation’s reporting rather like the Cheshire Cat in the Alice in Wonderland story. Concurrently, the roles played by Fatah and the Palestinian Authority in the run-up to the hostilities and throughout them were heavily censored in BBC reports.BBC’s Knell continues the Gaza border restrictions PR campaign
As readers no doubt recall, the weeks preceding Operation Protective Edge saw generous, enthusiastic and yet very superficial coverage of the Hamas-Fatah reconciliation deal which was announced on April 23rd 2014.
On June 2nd the Palestinian Unity Government was sworn in and the previous Hamas government in the Gaza Strip stepped down. Again, BBC coverage was positive yet simplistic and it notably refrained from informing audiences of the significance of the failure to disarm Hamas as part of the reconciliation deal.
If there is one thing which should have become perfectly clear to foreign journalists since the beginning of July it is that the entry of building supplies into the Gaza Strip – which was increased in recent years due to intense pressure from assorted international bodies and aid agencies – was abused by Hamas to construct cross-border attack tunnels rather than for the advancement of projects which would have improved the lives of the people of Gaza.New Jersey Yeshiva Defaced with Swastikas
However, not only has the BBC shown no interest whatsoever in discussing Hamas’ misappropriation of those building supplies or the very serious subject of the accountability of the aid agencies and international bodies which were supposed to be supervising and guaranteeing the construction projects for which those materials were destined; it continues to present the issue in terms of “Israel says”.
A yeshiva in the New Jersey town of Lakewood was broken into last Wednesday night by a vandal who defaced the Jewish study hall with swastikas and other anti-Semitic hate symbols.Babe in arms: The tale of a teenaged resistance fighter
Students and staff of the Mesivta Ohr Chaim Meir Yeshiva discovered the crime last Thursday morning when they arrived, and reported it immediately to the police, according to the local news source The Lakewood Scoop.
After police arrived on the scene they investigated the yeshiva's security cameras, and soon found a tall black male caught on tape committing the hate crime.
The Polish-born writer and former soldier has just recently published “Warsaw Boy,” which Borowiec began writing on a roll of toilet paper as he was convalescing in a German Prisoner of War camp in the winter of 1944.How rabies attacks the brain, seen in Israel for the first time
Having taken 70 years to finally make it into print, the book is a brilliant first-hand account of day-to-day life inside a country that Nazi Germany had little else in their plans for except total annihilation. And it describes a number of journeys he took across Poland during World War II.
If Nazi policy during this period exemplified the depths of depravity mankind could sink to when ultimately committed to one ideology, Poland was the physical landscape where these dark fantasies turned into a living nightmare.
At 15 Borowiec joined the Home Army, the main Polish resistance movement at that time. He fought in the Warsaw Uprising, which was a Polish-led rebellion against the Nazis that lasted 63 days, but that eventually failed despite a long and arduous effort.
Using powerful live cell imaging, the scientists found that the virus hijacks the “train” that transports cell components along a neuron, and drives it full throttle into the spinal cord. From there, the virus likely takes other trains to the brain and then throughout the peripheral nervous system, they say – shutting down the body as it goes along.Shameless Copper-washing in San Francisco
“The rabies virus is transported through railway-like machinery in the neurons,” said Shani Gluska, a doctoral student at Tel Aviv University, who led the study along with Prof. Eran Perlson, a physiologist at the university. “With very high-end microscopy, we saw for ourselves how the virus not only hijacks the transport machinery, but also makes it go faster.”
The scientists say their findings, published in the journal PLOS Pathogens in August, could one day enable scientists to take control of the neuron train system to treat rabies, as well as other neurodegenerative diseases.
"Masters of Fire", an exhibition organized by the Institute for the Study of the Ancient World and the Israel Antiquities Authority in collaboration with The Israel Museum is now at the San Francisco Legion Of Honor.These clothes crush viruses, bacteria and fire
Expect Jewish Voice to Peace to stomp up and down in a snit, accusing the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco of "copper-washing" Israeli war crimes.
In 1961, a hoard of hundreds of objects were discovered in a cave , 820 feet above the canyon floor, by Israeli archaeologist Pessah Bar-Adon. The extraordinary discoveries in the Cave of the Treasure at Nahal Mishmar included 432 copper, bronze, ivory and stone decorated objects; 240 mace heads, 100 scepters, 5 crowns, tools and weapons. Aside from the beautiful craftsmanship, the items show a clear picture of the emerging social stratification of the Chalcolithic era.
Jeff Gabbay ignites the end of a foot-long cotton fiber tuft with a cigarette lighter, and the entire tuft is ablaze in an instant. When the lighter touches the same length of fiber impregnated with a natural fire retardant invented at his Argaman Technologies, the flame stops dead in its tracks.Backstreet Boys' Howie reaches out to Israel after nixed visit
The new multifunctional textiles aren’t only fireproof. They can be made into “bio-inhibitive” bedding, shirts, socks and underwear that permanently self-sterilize against the bacteria that ordinarily make for smelly laundry, and even inactivate viruses that might penetrate the fabric.
In an exclusive interview with ISRAEL21c, the Argaman CEO/CTO reveals that NASA and the US Army Special Forces are testing garments made with the Jerusalem-based company’s proprietary technology platform.
After the Backstreet Boys postponed their much-anticipated first visit to Israel, one of the former pop band's members, Howie Dorough, personally reached out to Israeli fans in a video posted Sunday.Syrian child rides donkey from Damascus to Israel
The entertainer apologized for the cancellation of three sold-out performances in Ra'anana set for the nights of July 29-31, which were set to be rescheduled from their original dates in light of the security situation during the Gaza conflict.
"I wanted to reach out to you personally to tell you we're so sorry we didn't make the dates in July. We were really excited about coming there for the first time," Dorough said.
"Don't worry, we're looking to reschedule the dates. We're tentatively looking to come out there, hopefully, sometime in spring of 2015," he reassured fans.
Doctors at the country’s northern hospitals are used to middle-of-the-night calls to come and treat wounded Syrians brought across the border for Israeli medical aid. The 12-year-old Syrian boy who arrived in serious condition over the weekend to the IDF border post was the first to make the trek by donkey from Damascus.‘The Farewell Party’ bids hello to international film deals
The boy told doctors that he sustained serious injuries – to his arms, one of his legs, and loss of vision in his eyes – when a mortar shell exploded near his home in the outskirts of Syria’s capital city.
The boy told Israeli doctors that his family had initially taken him to a hospital in the Beqaa Valley in Lebanon where doctors amputated his right hand. He was discharged after being administered first aid to his other injuries but said the route home to Syria was blocked by civil fighting. He told doctors that his brother had the idea to seat him on the back of a donkey and cross the Syrian side of Mount Hermon to the Israeli border. IDF soldiers transferred the boy to the Ziv Medical Center.
There may have been dozens of films – many with high profile directors and actors — trying to win notice at the Venice Film Festival recently but it was an Israeli dark comedy, The Farewell Party, that was among the most memorable screenings. The film, which adds a jolt of comedy to the serious subject of assisted suicide, won the Venice Days’ People’s Choice Award.Joan Rivers’ Jewish Funeral Held in NYC, Star Requested No Rabbi, ‘Meryl Streep Crying, in Five Different Accents’
Now it’s also winning deals from across the globe.
The Farewell Party (in Hebrew, Mita Tova) tells the story of a group of friends at a Jerusalem retirement home who decide to build a self-euthanasia machine to help their terminally ill friend. But as word spreads, they’re faced with a long line of people asking for their help and thus putting the group in an ethical and emotional quandary.
A star-studded private funeral was held for late comedian and TV host Joan Rivers on Sunday at Temple Emanu-El on New York City’s 5th Avenue.
The event included a eulogy from fellow Jewish media personality Howard Stern and elements from plans she had outlined over the years.
In her 2012 book I Hate Everyone… Starting with Me, Rivers wrote that she wanted her funeral to be “a huge showbiz affair with lights, cameras, action” and “Hollywood all the way.”
“I want Craft services, I want paparazzi and I want publicists making a scene!” she wrote. “I want it to be Hollywood all the way. I don’t want some rabbi rambling on; I want Meryl Streep crying, in five different accents. I don’t want a eulogy; I want Bobby Vinton to pick up my head and sing ‘Mr. Lonely.’ I want to look gorgeous, better dead than I do alive. I want to be buried in a Valentino gown and I want Harry Winston to make me a toe tag. And I want a wind machine so that even in the casket my hair is blowing just like Beyonce’s.”
