Tuesday, January 09, 2018
Melanie Phillips: Time to shame those who spread prejudice
That would be helpful in stopping the most egregious antisemitic bigotry, which should be as unthinkable as speakers insulting or defaming black people. It is shocking that university authorities stand by while thugs disrupt pro-Israel speakers, as happened in 2016 when Hen Mazzig, a gay IDF veteran, was prevented from speaking at University College London by a violent mob.
But much obnoxious activity takes the form of falsehoods about Israel’s behaviour or Jewish history. These may be anchored in antisemitism but they are not in themselves irrational. They are simply lies and distortions. Trying to prevent them from being expressed, at all, risks crossing the line into censorship. Academic debate, after all, involves testing possible falsehoods to destruction in order to arrive at the truth.
The core problem lies not with the students putting on these vile meetings but the professors and lecturers who teach courses in which the narrative of lies about Israel is presented as academically sound — and then stand by while Jewish students are abused.
Irrational prejudice is immune to reason. False claims, though, can be disproved and those who promulgate them can be held up for public scorn. The focus, therefore, should be on universities and teachers who facilitate this. Instead of protesting from the back foot against these meetings taking place, defenders of the Jewish people need to go on to the offence.
They should be staging their own meetings setting out the facts that these universities are denying. They should be calling out specific universities and named professors and lecturers for incompetent scholarship, discriminating against students for telling the truth about the Middle East, substituting falsehoods for facts, facilitating incitement against Israel and Jews — and sometimes being funded thus to subvert academic standards by huge donations from Saudi Arabia and other Arab states.
The universities are temples of reason which, on Israel among other issues, have been hijacked in order to deny rational thought and promote instead hate-mongering lies, propaganda and prejudice. We therefore need not less but more and different speech which can turn this bigotry into a boomerang.
Paris Kosher Store Set on Fire on Anniversary of Hypercacher Massacre
A kosher grocery store in the southern Parisian suburb of Creteil was set ablaze and completely gutted early Tuesday morning, three years to the day after the 2015 attack on a Hypercacher kosher superette in the Porte de Vincennes suburb of Paris, which followed the Charlie Hebdo shooting two days earlier. The same Islamist gunmen who murdered eight Charlie Hebdo staff members, two police officers and two bystanders, then murdered four Jewish hostages in the Hypercacher, and police ended the siege by storming the store and killing one gunman.
This Tuesday, the attacked kosher store was also vandalized with anti-Semitic graffiti, according to Creteil prosecutor Laure Beccuau, who told AFP “The damage is believed to be very severe.”
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The kosher grocery was completely destroyed in the fire, with the shelves blackened and charred, according to AFP.
The store, Promo & Destock, on René Arcos Street in Creteil, is owned by a Muslim. On Wednesday last week, it and another kosher store next door were vandalized with swastikas. The second kosher store caught some of the fire Tuesday morning.
Israel’s ambassador to France Aliza Bin Noun called the fire a “shameful provocation.”
An estimated 23,000 Jews live in Creteil, whose overall population is about 90,000.
Ruthie Blum: Calling Out Europe: Where Is the Diplomacy of Truth?
Gatestone's Person of the Week: Fiamma Nirenstein, Counter-Terrorism ExpertNGO Monitor: [Opinion] Letter to Mr. Halbe Zijlstra, Netherlands Foreign Minister, on the Occasion of Your Visit to Israel
The "Lawrence of Arabia" syndrome goes back to Old Europe. It is the snobbery of people who become enamored with exotic cultures. There is a romanticism surrounding the Middle East, associated with magic carpets and Aladdin lamps. But with that romanticism comes fear, as well – fear of... invading Islamists who slit people's throats.
This fear has led European states to try and do business with terrorist groups. In the early 1980s, for example, Italian officials forged a secret deal with Palestinian terrorists, which culminated not in cooperation, but in a series of deadly attacks...
Too many lies have been the basis of international relations. These include "dialogue" between religions to counter Islamist terrorism; the false notion of the "peaceful aspirations" of the Palestinians; the view that Turkey is a "bridge" to the Muslim world; the ridiculous view of Iranian President Hassan Rouhani as a "moderate"; the belief in a "united Europe" as the future of the old continent; and faith in the U.N. as a legal arbiter for international affairs. Policies based on these lies are not only fruitless; they are dangerous.
Dear Minister Zijlstra,Shmuley Boteach: Will BDS-bully Roger Waters refuse to debate?
Your official visit to Israel on January 9 provides an important opportunity to address some critical issues that concern both the Netherlands and Israel.
Unfortunately, as we have brought to your attention on multiple occasions throughout the past year, much of this funding goes to highly politicized NGOs that act in ways that are antithetical to the values inherent in democracy and civility. Some recipients of Dutch government funds promote antisemitism, as defined by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) and as adopted by a June 1, 2017 European Parliament resolution; use language that refers to “resistance” in order to justify and excuse terrorism; have alleged links to terror groups; and engage in legal warfare against Israeli officials and companies that do business with Israel.
As you noted in a parliamentary meeting on November 15, 2017, another NGO funded by the Secretariat, the Women’s Affairs Technical Committee (WATC), was involved in a youth center named after Dalal Mughrabi, a terrorist who murdered 38 Israelis, including 13 children. As a result, on June 30, 2017, in correspondence with NGO Monitor, you confirmed that “in cooperation with the other donor countries of the Secretariat, the Netherlands has decided to suspend cooperation with WATC until further notice.” But there is no indication that the broader NGO funding failures have been addressed.
Your upcoming visit presents a unique opportunity to add the voice of the Netherlands to the moral statements by Norway, Denmark, and Switzerland in denouncing this discredited NGO funding framework. Funding terror-affiliated groups and activities that spread antisemitic poison in no way benefit the relations between our two countries. Promoting democracy, human rights and civility is too important and should not be entrusted with such groups.
BDS does nothing to advance the cause of peace, tolerance and understanding, and actually hurts the Palestinian people. Most proponents of the boycott live thousands of miles away and do not represent the will of the Palestinians in the disputed territories who must live with the consequences and therefore oppose the boycott. Tens of thousands of Palestinians benefit from going to Israeli universities, from working for Israeli companies, and from employment in Israeli communities.Howard Stern Bashes Lorde for Cancelling Israel Concert, Asks, ‘Why Is Israel the Bad Guy in the World?’
The reality Lorde is conveniently shielded from is that the Palestinian Authority refuses to negotiate peace, denies its own people civil and human rights and cannot provide jobs or meet the basic needs of Palestinians. I wonder if the BDS supporters are aware of how women and gays, for example, are discriminated against in Palestinian-controlled areas? Do they know that women can be murdered in “honor killings,” or gays may be killed for violating Islamic prohibitions on homosexuality?
Do the BDS advocates explain to their followers that PA President Mahmoud Abbas is a corrupt dictator who is now entering the 13th year of a four-year presidential term and that is why an overwhelming majority of Palestinians tell pollsters he should resign? I hope that Lorde will take advantage of the invitation from Israel’s ambassador to New Zealand to meet and learn more about the country she has chosen to demonize.
I hope she will speak to performers like Madonna, Lady Gaga and Elton John who had the courage to stand up to the pressure and found that Israel is a beautiful country, and a model of tolerance, full of people that crave peace and that differs completely from the imaginary place BDS advocates have invented. I hope she will speak to legends like Ringo Starr who announced, just days after Lorde’s cancellation, that he will be performing in Israel.
Most of all, I hope that Lorde admits she made a mistake and reschedules her concert. She will be forgiven and find a welcoming audience in Tel Aviv. More important than the music, however, will be her demonstration that she supports peace and tolerance and utterly repudiates earlier errors of bigotry.
As for Roger Waters, I put out a challenge. Rather than write boring letters about me to The Guardian in which you hide behind 100 of your fading Hollywood lackeys, stand up and agree to debate me on Israel and the Middle East. You claim to know how awful Israel is and that “You Don’t Need No Education.” So utilize a public debate as a stage to make your case. Surely this exactly the kind of offer you’ve been waiting for.
Famed shock jock Howard Stern went on a profanity-ridden tirade on his Sirius XM satellite radio show last week against international singer Lorde for cancelling her scheduled concert in Israel.IsraellyCool: Reader Post: How Generation If Became Generation Why (A Perspective on the Conflict)
Stern said he was furious and confused after the “Royals” singer called off her upcoming June show in Tel Aviv — following pressure she faced from anti-Israel boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement activists — but kept her scheduled concerts in Russia, part of her world tour. The talk show host criticized Lorde for discriminating against Israel, but not Russia, a country he accused of “planting all kinds of problems around the world, all kinds of terrorism.”
“She has no problem with Russia,” Stern said about the 21-year-old performer. “The only place in the world where she can’t play is Israel. So what do you think’s going on? What’s the one thing about Israel that’s different than all other places. There’s Jews there…I hope Lorde has a good time in Russia.”
Stern then lambasted former Pink Floyd bassist Roger Waters and questioned why Israel is a constant target of criticism. Stern asked his listeners, “Why is it that Israel is the bad guy in the world? Why Israel? Jews get enough s**t [and] get dumped on all the time.”
What do we miss about millennials and young liberals when it comes to Israel? What does the diaspora need to know about Israel?Experts Praise Inclusion of Anti-Israel Campus Groups on BDS Blacklist
Throughout my travels, I’ve heard strange comments about Israel from young people around the world, remarks that led me to think: what did we do wrong? Is the state of Israel really that bad? Do we honestly need to change? That’s almost a progressive rule in life: if everyone around you tells you to change, perhaps you really have to. A more well-phrased version of this instructive lesson would be: If someone calls you a horse, punch him. If someone calls you a horse three times, you better buy a saddle. It sounds quite reasonable, until you hear the former Iranian president Ahmadinejad saying that if Israel has so many enemies, perhaps Israel is the bad guy in this story. I must say I appreciate his originality. [Note the sarcasm]
Among the remarks I can hear are sentences such as:
“This country is so annoying! why wouldn’t they sign the peace treaty with all of the countries around them? If you’d only just give them the Golan and the West Bank, you would have peace!”
“Israel has the best technology, the best army in the region, worst case if they cause you any trouble – you’ll beat them once again, just like in 1967… anyway warfare nowadays no longer requires strategic depth, it’ll be a ballistic warfare… just go back to 1967 borders!”
“You can’t rule the Palestinians forever, they are a nation striving to be independent!”
“You can’t occupy people and deny them their natural right for freedom. Just withdraw from the west bank, respect the Arabs, let the refugees come back to their homes, keep your borders open, and you’ll see how Palestinians accept you… just like with Sadat and Hussein! So why can’t you let the poor Palestinian refugees return?”
They could be Americans, Europeans, Australians or South Africans; The common denominator they have is that they’re all young liberals, and most of them live or come from Western countries. I could talk for hours about what’s wrong with their attitude, but that isn’t the point. We all know that the mainstream approach towards Israel, as we could see in mainstream Western media, is a dishonest, delusional and dangerous fantasy that laments in their hearts for various reasons. But what are those reasons? Why are so many liberals refusing to support Israel, and even becoming activists against it? Why do liberals around the world refuse to understand the complexity of the Israeli position? And why do so many of them constantly deny some indisputable and undeniable facts about our history even though they’re right in front of them?
Experts and activists have praised the Israeli government’s inclusion of American anti-Zionist student groups in a new initiative announced on Sunday that will prevent the entry to the country of foreigners that promote a boycott of the Jewish state.The BDS Blacklist Ban: HR Debates Peace Now's Yariv Oppenheimer on i24News
The blacklist published by the Israeli government includes 20 organizations, among them Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) and Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP), which spearhead boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) resolutions on campuses nationwide, and have been criticized for whitewashing Palestinian terrorism and creating a hostile environment for Jewish students.
Several experts who spoke to The Algemeiner on Monday pointed to the incendiary nature of the groups and their adverse impact on many college campuses.
Dan Diker, project director of the program to counter political warfare and BDS at the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs think tank, said Israel’s move may send a message to “university administrations that have been reluctant to draw a line in the sand.”
SJP activists “threaten, intimidate, and harass students on campus,” argued Diker, who co-authored an extensive report on the group in November. “They shut down free speech and they promote anti-normalization of relations not only with Israel, but with Jewish students on campus.”
He observed that individual SJP members and chapters have been found to glorify terrorist groups like Hamas, Hezbollah, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.
HR's Daniel Pomerantz debates Yariv Oppenheimer from Peace Now on BDS blacklist law, i24 News' The Rundown.
How Israel’s BDS blacklist falls short of its own goals
In America, Jewish Voice for Peace badly jeopardized its standing even among individuals broadly sympathetic to their anti-occupation agenda when it honored Rasmea Odeh, who was convicted by Israel of murdering civilians in a terror act even as she – and JVP – contests the legitimacy of the conviction.Los Angeles Times Errs on International Law, Israeli Entry Law
Countries are not obligated to permit entry to outsiders; countries engaged in hostilities are certainly not obligated to permit entry to outsiders who deny their fundamental legitimacy and implicitly or explicitly support violent resistance against it. I believe in a big tent for Zionism, but that doesn’t mean the tent should have no boundaries; and for me, the JVP’s gaslighting of terror against civilians is a clear indicator of having left the consensus.
But the question of the legitimacy of the blacklist is different from the question of its prudency, and here I believe the State of Israel has gone off course.
There is likely no better boon to a marginal movement than the kind of publicity that Israel is now offering the BDS movement. There is ample data on the movement’s failures and weakness, especially in America: Their campaigns on college campuses make a lot of noise but have yet to score any meaningful victories; no major corporations have shown signs or interest in divestment; and Israel still enjoys a broad bipartisan consensus among elected officials and the electorate.
Nonetheless, the Jewish community and the Jewish state amplify the movement’s significance with the disproportionate allocation of resources to combat it, and especially with public action that turns BDS activists into martyrs for free speech and democracy even though they themselves endorse policies that run afoul of those values.
The decision to make the blacklist public is especially problematic: Israel could, more easily, publicly ignore the BDS movement and quietly turn away activists at the border. The blacklist approach, in contrast, galvanizes support for a polarizing movement from people who don’t even support its goals. It turns BDS into a symbol for a set of ideas — free speech and democracy — that its leaders don’t endorse themselves.
In an article about the Israeli Strategic Affairs Ministry's publication of a list of 20 pro-BDS (the anti-Israel campaign calling for boycott, divest and sanctions) organizations whose key activists will be denied entry into the country, The Los Angeles Times' article errs regarding international and Israeli law, including the entry law in question ("Organizations that promote a boycott of Israel are no longer welcome there," in print June 8, page 4).The real and unabridged 'Black List' of BDS groups
Special correspondent Noga Tarnopolsky writes:
At the same time, Israel is defying norms and conventions relating to international freedom of movement and its own laws.
Immediately after the list was published, the Jewish Agency for Israel, the quasi-governmental body that facilitates the immigration of Jews to the country, announced it would ignore the order.
““There's a difference between immigrating and visiting, for whatever purpose,” said Yigal Palmor, the agency’s director of public affairs and communications. “Those individuals who wish to have a future for themselves and their families in Israel will continue to be welcomed.”
Which norms? Which conventions? Which laws compel states to admit each and every non-citizen who wishes to enter? Tarnopolsky doesn't say, because there are none.
As Professor Gerald Steinberg of NGO Monitor correctly observed:
All democracies have regulations governing the issuance of visas and border entry regulations -- there are inherent in state sovereignty. Countries routinely ban racists; individuals who incite to violence and create social disorder/polarization etc. Tourist visas are not natural rights.
The United States, for its part, has long had similar restrictions, as CAMERA's Gilead Ini previously noted:
Israel’s Interior Ministry and the Office of Strategic Affairs, run by Israeli official Gilad Erdan, has compiled a list of close to 20 BDS groups worldwide to be dealt with by a 72 million dollar campaign budget allowing Israel the funds to fight back.Berlin museum poster ignores Jerusalem's Jewish symbols
One of the main thrusts of the planned campaig is that people from these groups are to be refused entry to Israel.
"The boycott organizations need to know that the State of Israel will act against them and not allow [them] to enter its territory to harm its citizens. No country would have allowed critics coming to harm the country to enter its borders," Erdan explained.
Interior Minister Arye Deri, whose ministry is responsible for implementing the list, said: "These people are trying to exploit the law and our hospitality to act against Israel and to defame the country. I will act against this by every available means."
While Israel's keeping them out is laudable, they almost always find ways to get in and then Israel is reluctant to create international incidents by deporting them, so it ends up letting them stay and make trouble.
But those on the list are not the only problem.
An informed look at the list shows that right out of the starting gate, the list is going to snatch defeat from the hands of victory by not including some of the biggest and most damaging BDS groups in the United States.
Berlin's Jewish Museum has been harshly criticized for using a controversial poster to advertise an exhibition on Jerusalem that opened last month. The poster, which ironically highlighted the city's Muslim symbols rather than its Jewish ones, sparked outrage among Germany's Jewish community.
"Jerusalem is now in Berlin," the poster reads in German. Attached to the letter "A" is a minaret with a moon on top, an obvious symbol of Islam. Jewish symbols are nowhere to be found on the poster.
Other advertisements for the exhibition also shockingly downplay the Jewish character of Jerusalem. A model of Al-Aqsa mosque is touted in a promotional brochure as one of the exhibition's main attractions, instead of any Jewish site.
After the grand opening of the exhibition on Dec. 11, it became clear the museum had trimmed the city's Jewish history in the modern age, adopting an Arab-Palestinian narrative of Muslim ownership instead, especially in the Old City.
Other sections of the exhibition present the Zionist movement and Israel as aggressors that wrested control over Jerusalem and the land of Israel from the Palestinians. Meanwhile, acts of terrorism committed by Palestinians receive only minimal coverage and are explained away as a "choiceless response" in light of the "violent" Jewish takeover.
Sanitizing the BDS Movement?
The announcement of 20 pro-boycott organizations that have been blacklisted by Israeli authorities and denied entry to the country has brought the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement back into the news.BBC radio’s inconsistent coverage of charges against Ahed Tamimi
First prize for sanitizing BDS goes to the Irish Times for this description:
Of course plenty of people, Israelis included, criticize Israeli policies, which is a perfectly legitimate activity. To simply say that this is what BDS is all about is to utterly downplay its real aims, which are to delegitimize Israel and bring an end to the country as a Jewish state.
Credit then to the New York Times, which did include some vital context in its story. However, while describing how Israelis perceive BDS and how its aims would have the practical effect of destroying Israel, there does appear to be an error in the Times’ text:
It is highly significant that the NY Times states that the BDS support for the so-called Palestinian right of return “would probably spell the end of Israel as a Jewish state.”
However, “Palestinian citizens of Israel” are Israeli Arabs and already have full equality under the law. The BDS movement’s website doesn’t even go as far as to suggest that this is not the case, referring instead to general “discrimination.”
The New York Times has thus taken a BDS charge against Israel and made it worse, falsely suggesting that Israeli Arab citizens are legally discriminated against.
HonestReporting has requested a correction.
After having told BBC audiences that Tamimi is a “star on social media”, seen as “a symbol of resistance”, “a Palestinian hero” and that she is “very brave, it seems”, Knell stated:BDS campaigner’s falsehoods go unchallenged on BBC World Service
Knell: “Now there are 12 charges against Ahed Tamimi. She’s appeared before a military court. These relate to six different incidents. She’s charged with 5 counts of assaulting soldiers, also with throwing rocks, incitement to violence…”
Two days later, on January 3rd, BBC Radio 4’s ‘Today‘ programme also aired an item on the same subject. Presenter Carrie Gracie opened the item (from 02:32:15 here) by telling listeners that:
Gracie: “A 16 year-old Palestinian girl who has a history of protesting against Israel has been charged with assaulting Israeli soldiers near her home in the occupied West Bank and she has appeared in a military court.”
No mention of the additional charges of rock-throwing and incitement was made throughout the item, which included interviews with Israeli MK Dr Michael Oren and B’tselem’s research director Yael Stein. Neither were listeners told that Ahed Tamimi’s mother Nariman has collaborated (along with additional members of the family) with B’tselem’s ‘armed with cameras’ project.
Vilkomerson’s claim that the BDS campaign’s leadership is found in “civil society within Palestine” is of course inaccurate (as has been admitted even by one of its prominent supporters) but Coomarasamy made no effort to challenge that deliberate falsehood. Neither did he bother to clarify to listeners that the BDS campaign’s demand for the so-called ‘right of return’ to Israel for millions of Palestinian refugees would – as its supporters know full well – bring an end to Jewish self-determination in the sole Jewish state and it is precisely that ‘condition’ which would “dissolve” the State of Israel.BBC reports on fictional counter-terrorism but not the real thing
The conversation continued with Vilkomerson claiming that the Israeli move is “an indicator of the growing power of the BDS movement”. When she stated that the goal of her own organisation is “to change US policy” Coomarasamy refrained from asking her exactly what that entails and so listeners did not hear, for example, that JVP has hosted and lobbied for Palestinians convicted of terrorism or that last year it launched a campaign that aims to “end police exchange programs between the US and Israel”.
Although this item dealt specifically with the subject of the BDS campaign, once again we see that the BBC did not provide audiences with the clear picture of its aims that they have lacked for years. Rather, in addition to providing an inaccurate definition of the campaign’s goals himself, James Coomarasamy allowed his second interviewee to muddy the waters even further by failing to challenge her inaccurate statements and claims.
In addition, the photograph illustrating the programme’s webpage is inaccurately captioned as follows:
“Photo: A tourist photographs a sign in Bethlehem in 2015, calling for a boycott of Israeli products coming from Jewish settlements.”
BBC Watch asked a professional to translate the Arabic script on that sign. It makes no reference to a selective boycott of “products coming from Jewish settlements” but rather urges:“boycott your occupation…support your country’s produce” and it is credited to “the national campaign for boycott of the occupation and its goods”.
Throughout the rest of her article Jane Corbin employs the standard (and long-standing) BBC euphemism ‘militants’ – even when interviewing actual terrorists who, she claims, “carry out attacks on Israelis”.MEMRI: Sermon In Raleigh, North Carolina-Area Mosque: 'Al-Quds [Jerusalem]... Jaffa, Acre, And Haifa... It Is Our Land... And Will Return To Us'; 'We Will Fight Those Jews Until The Rocks And The Trees' Say 'Oh Muslim, This Is A Jew Behind Me'; 'Those Occupiers Made Some Legends' About The 'Wall Of Buraq' And 'Made It Their Own Wall' And 'Distorted The Facts'
“I am on the set of Fauda, the Israeli television thriller that portrays the murky world of Israeli undercover army units and Palestinian militants during the Second Intifada (Palestinian uprising against Israeli occupation).”
“We wanted to show how they [militants and their families] live, their experiences, the price they’re paying for their actions,” says Lior. “For the Israeli audience we open a window for them to see how people live over there.”
“This strong Arab woman is an unusual lead character in a television drama in this region. The character faced a moral crisis when militants in her own family used her to surgically implant a bomb inside a wounded Israeli undercover soldier.”
“After our own game of cat and mouse to find Palestinian militants willing to talk, we met two heavily armed masked men in a house in Shuafat refugee camp, on the outskirts of occupied East Jerusalem. They carry out attacks on Israelis and try to outwit the undercover units hunting them down.”
As we see, the BBC has expanded its selectively applied guidance on ‘language when reporting terrorism’ to apply even to reporting on fictional Palestinian characters in a TV drama show. Can it get any more ridiculous?
In a Friday, December 8, 2017 antisemitic sermon delivered in a mosque in the Raleigh, NC area, Imam Abdullah Khadra stressed: "Al-Quds [Jerusalem]... Jaffa, Acre, and Haifa... will remain our land, and will return to us sooner or later." Referring to a Hadith that states that on Judgment Day the Muslims will kill the Jews, he said: "The Prophet Muhammad gave us the glad tidings that... we will fight those Jews until the rocks and the trees will speak: Oh Muslim, this is a Jew behind me." The continuation of the well-known Hadith is that the rocks and the trees say: "Come and kill him." The listeners presumably know the continuation, even though Imam Khadra did not complete it. For another recent sermon citing this Hadith, by Houston Imam Raed Saleh Al-Rousan, click here, and for another such sermon, by California Imam Ammar Shahin, click here. In the December 8 sermon, Imam Khadra also said that "these occupiers, aggressors, and murderers" had made "some legends" about "the Wall of Buraq," and had "made it their own wall' and "distorted the facts," noting, "May Allah destroy everyone who wants evil for Islam and Muslims."
The Syria-born Khadra, who was cleared for entry to the U.S. on a religious work visa and came to Raleigh, NC in 2011,[1] and later applied for political asylum,[2] is principal of Cary Masjid's IQRA Academy educational program,[3]and teaches at Islamic centers, including, in the past, at the Islamic Association of Raleigh.[4] He is an active preacher in several mosques in the Raleigh area. His YouTube channel, which posts videos of himself speaking on religious topics, has over 2,000 subscribers,[5] and on his Facebook page he posts similar videos, along with some pro-Palestinian content and, in December 2017, some Christmas greetings. [6] He was in the news in early 2017 when his four-year-old daughter was not allowed to reenter the U.S. after a visit with relatives in Lebanon in October 2016 due to a visa issue; she was reunited with her family in February 2017.[7] In April 2017 interview about the U.S. airstrikes against the Assad regime in Syria, he expressed satisfaction at the strikes, and added that without the removal of the regime, the massacres of the people there will continue, and much more needs to be done to stop the regime.[8]
The following are Imam Khadra's statements in his December 8, 2017 sermon. The video did not identify the mosque where this sermon was delivered.
Friday Sermon in the Raleigh Area, NC, by Syrian Imam Abdullah Khadra: Haifa, Acre, Jaffa Are Muslim Land; Jews Distorted Facts about Western Wall; At the End of Time, We Will Fight the Jews pic.twitter.com/ahofU5im2c
— MEMRI (@MEMRIReports) January 8, 2018
Canadian Holocaust denier arrested in Germany
A Holocaust denier from Canada has been arrested in Germany and is under investigation for crimes related to incitement of hate, a spokesperson for the Bavarian State Public Prosecutor in Munich confirmed to JTA.‘Ugly Jews,’ circumcision jokes: Delta workers detail anti-Semitic abuse
News of the arrest of Monika Schaefer first broke in the Canada-based online news agency Fitzhugh. Schaefer is known for posting a YouTube video in 2016 in which she called the Holocaust the most “persistent lie in all of history.”
Though prohibited by German law from revealing the name of a suspect under investigation, spokesperson Andrea Mayer confirmed that a woman fitting her description had been recognized in the public audience at a trial in Munich of another person charged with incitement to hate, Sylvia Stolz, a former lawyer in Germany who already has been convicted of Holocaust denial. Stolz represented Holocaust denier Ernst Zundel, who died in 2017.
Acting on a tip, police arrested the Canadian woman and are holding her in custody during an investigation of charges based on her dissemination of hate materials via the internet.
It wasn’t long after Nahum Amir began working for Delta Airlines as a mechanic that he says his manager started calling him “the Jewish guy.” Then Amir says the manager accused him and other Jews of “killing kids in Gaza.”
During the same period, Yaron Gilinsky was working as a Delta flight attendant on flights from New York to Tel Aviv. Except, he says, his non-Jewish co-workers would call it “Hell Aviv.” Gilinsky remembers some, including managers, making fun of ultra-Orthodox Jews’ beards and sidecurls. One non-Jewish fellow attendant called them “ugly Jews.”
“At some point, it makes me feel ashamed and it makes me feel this person doesn’t respect me,” Gilinsky, 38, told JTA about his co-workers’ comments. “I was brought into this company because I speak Hebrew. I was brought into this company to take care of the clients that support that flight, and here this person is talking very derogatorily and putting down my faith, my people, everything that I grew up on.”
Amir, an Israeli-American, and Gilinsky, who was born in Israel and lives in the United States, are each separately suing Delta in federal court for violating the Civil Rights Act, which prohibits discrimination based on ethnicity. Gilinsky is in the process of formally joining a suit filed last week by four other Delta employees who also allege anti-Semitic and anti-Israeli discrimination. Amir’s suit was filed Monday evening.
Did you know that about 70% of Arab students in Israel are women? This is ground shaking change for Arab women in the Middle East pic.twitter.com/lXMYdc94LE
— Reda Mansour (@AmbRedaMansour) January 8, 2018
Israel Plans to Launch Unprecedented Coordinated Nanosatellites
The Israel Space Agency announced on Wednesday that it plans to launch an unprecedented group of nanosatellites in a coordinated formation at the end of 2018.IsraellyCool: I Guess BDS-Holes Need to Boycott Seinfeld Reruns
The expected launch, which will be carried out by Netherlands-based Innovative Solutions in Space using an Indian-made Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle, is a joint venture between the Israel Space Agency and Technion – Israel Institute of Technology. The Israeli firms Rafael Advanced Defense Systems and Israel Aerospace Industries were also involved in the project, providing propulsion systems, a digital receptor and a navigation system.
Researchers hope that the launch will prove that nanosatellites can maintain their flight formation for an entire year while orbiting the Earth at an altitude of 373 miles.
“Satellite miniaturization together with advanced Israeli technology will enable us to take Israel an important step forward in the field of nanosatellites,” said Pini Gurfil, director of the Asher Space Research Institute at Technion.
“If we manage to prove in space that flying in formation is possible, it will be a major boost for the development of small satellites and technologies related to the miniaturization of electronic components, for efficient space processing and for space propulsion systems,” he added. “The degree of innovation here can be compared to switching from a PC to a laptop and then to a mobile phone, which offers far more capabilities than its predecessors.”
Jerry Seinfeld’s recent visit to Israel included making Israelis laugh (a certain crime in the eyes of the Israel haters and BDS-holes), as well as visits to Ramon airbase, and the old city of Jerusalem – all while looking happy to see us.
Now it has been revealed he also had a gun in his pocket. Well, almost.
I’ll let Ha’aretz explain what Caliber 3 is, because I assume it hurt them as much to write about the visit as the amount of joy I received learning about it.
Located in the Gush Etzion region of the West Bank, Caliber 3 is a counterterrorism and security training academy that in recent years has built on its expertise to create a new line of business: special programs for tourists seeking a taste of the Israeli military experience.
Caliber 3 offers a basic package which includes a simulation of a suicide bombing in a Jerusalem marketplace, immediately followed by a stabbing attack, a live demonstration with attack dogs and a sniper tournament. The cost of this basic package is $115 per adult and $85 per child, with discounts available for large groups.
Let’s see that photo one more time.
Drop what you're doing & watch Gloria Greenfield's film on @Amazon "Body and Soul-The State of the Jewish Nation". Powerfully enlightening & jam packed with truth. Watch for cameos from @ymedad @EVKontorovich @EWilf @AlanDersh @BretStephensNYT @IrwinCotler #Retweet pic.twitter.com/DTWazbwyAJ
— Adina🇿️ (@lackboys3) January 8, 2018
British teenagers Avi & Benji will be hiking across Israel from the Mediterranean Sea to the Sea of Galilee for The Royal Marines Charity @theRMcharity. You can support them via this link. https://t.co/LH78opZG5C
— Rɪᴄʜᴀʀᴅ Kᴇᴍᴘ (@COLRICHARDKEMP) January 9, 2018
