Sunday, January 21, 2018
Revlon Award Winner Has History of Anti-Semitism
Amani Al-Khatahtbeh, founder and editor-in-chief of MuslimGirl—an online magazine where “Muslim women talk back” to combat “misconceptions surrounding Islam”—made headlines last week when she turned down an award from multinational beauty giant Revlon because of the company’s engagement with Israeli actress Gal Gadot.New York Times on Israel’s “Biological” Racism?!
“I cannot accept this award from Revlon with Gal Gadot as the ambassador,” Al-Khatahtbeh announced in a statement on Twitter. “Her vocal support of the Israel Defense Forces’ actions in Palestine goes against MuslimGirl’s morals and values.”
The rejection, of course, is well within Al-Khatahtbeh’s rights, but it’s also an invitation to examine precisely what MuslimGirl’s morals and values truly are. A good place to start may be a piece, published by MuslimGirl in 2016, entitled “Israel’s Organ Harvesting and the UK’s BDS Movement”.
Written by “Yelena,” a mysterious doula from San Francisco, the piece is mostly a rehash of professional anti-Semite Alison Weir’s riff on the blood-libel—a conspiracy theory in which Israel occupies Palestinian territory in order to murder the locals and loot their body parts. But like all knockoffs, the piece’s craftsmanship is poor, so Yelena’s version is helpful in that it sheds Weir’s usual scrupulosness and directly cites anti-Semites as sources. What sources does “Yelena” offer to document the ghoulish crimes of which she accuses the Jewish state? These include Iran’s PressTV and 9/11 Truther Michel Chussodovsky’s conspiracist web site, GlobalResearch. Both are classic “fake news” media, distributing anti-Jewish conspiracy theories by the shipping container throughout the Internet. Most troubling, however, is the article’s quotation of retired Cal State psychology professor Kevin MacDonald, a darling of far-Right anti-Semites, who couches standard white-supremacist teachings about Jewish “white genocide” in trappings of evolutionary psychology. Here’s what “Yelena” took from MacDonald: “Organized American Jewish lobbying groups and deeply committed Jews in the media are behind the pro-Israel U.S. foreign policy that is leading to war against virtually the entire Arab world.”
The Forward: Why MuslimGirl’s Rejection Of Gal Gadot Is A Good Thing
In the pages of The New York Times, columnist Roger Cohen concludes that Israel is a racist country.
His logic?
Shuhada, a road within Hebron, a particularly violent area in the West Bank, is closed except to those passing through security checks, and sometimes closed to the public entirely.
In almost every country and language in the world, this type of security arrangement is referred to as a “sterile area,” meaning that it is kept free of potential security threats. In fact, the term “sterile area” is used around the globe in airport security, domestic crowd control, and military operations.
But Cohen has unilaterally decided that in Israel, and only in Israel, that word means racism:
The Israel Defense Forces refer to “tzir sterili,” or sterile roads, because no Palestinian is allowed on them, whether in a car or on foot…. Jews did not go to the Holy Land to deploy for another people the biological metaphors of classic racism that accompanied their persecution over centuries. But the exercise of overwhelming power is corrupting, to the point that “sterile” streets, presumably freed of disease-ridden natives, enter the lexicon.
Presumably?
By Cohen’s logic, governments around the world presumably consider all air travellers to be “disease-ridden natives,” as well as football fans, local residents in military towns, anyone who attends a presidential speech, and more.
But no, Cohen’s presumptions apply only to Israel. Even when Israel uses exactly the same terminology as…well, everyone.
Ben White tries to refute fact that 99% of Palestinian “refugees” are NOT real refugees
Absolutely nothing in White’s argument even slightly undermines the argument that descendants of refugees are not real refugees, that Palestinians are the only people in the world given the right to bestow “refugee” status and benefits to their descendants (and their descendants, in perpetuity), and that that there are only 20,000 or so real refugees from 1948 remaining.Jewish compassion for real refugees
The one example he provides from a UNHCR report, noting that some Afghans have been refugees in Pakistan for 30 years, does not contradict the fact that these Afghan refugees can not pass on their refugee status to children who were born in the host country and never lived in their parent’s country of birth.
He’s right that the mere “passage of time” shouldn’t necessarily remove refugee status from a genuine refugee, but dying most certainly should.
Remarkably, not only does UNRWA still legitimise and defend the “right of return” and resist resettlement of Palestinian “refugees”, but consider, as refugees, people of Palestinian descent who are citizens of new states (like Jordan or Lebanon), and even Palestinian citizens of Palestinian ruled territories in the West Bank and Gaza.
As we’ve argued previously, if UNRWA’s definition was applied to the 800,000 Jewish refugees from Arab lands between 1945 and 1967, it would make millions of Israeli Jews (who are descendants of those 800,000 refugees) eligible for UNRWA-style refugee status and benefits.
There are good humanitarian-based arguments for maintaining current UNRWA funding until a long-term solution can be found, but there can be no serious argument to maintain the fiction that there are over 5 million actual Palestinian refugees and that these non-refugees of Palestinian descent should be “repatriated” to a place they never once stepped foot.
Indian-born British Jewish artist Anish Kapoor announced earlier this month that he would be donating the $1 million Genesis Prize he was awarded last year to five nongovernmental organizations that help refugees.Debunking Defamations, Defending Israel
Let's hope his donation will help hundreds or thousands of people forced to flee from civil wars and mass killings, as has been the case in many third-world countries.
Kapoor is famous for his large sculptures that both reflect reality but also distort it through fascinating arrangements of mirrors.
Some 40 to 50 million people worldwide have had to flee their homelands because of mortal danger. They are real refugees, who had to leave their homes not in search of better living conditions but because their affiliations with certain ethnic groups or religions turned them into walking targets by other ethnic or religious groups.
Millions of Kurds fled Iraq during the rule of Saddam Hussein. Other ethno-religious groups had to flee parts of Iraq when the Islamic State thugs took over a few years ago. The civil war in Syria has led millions to leave, knowing that staying there under the rule of a hostile ethnic group would have meant certain death. There are no good guys and bad guys there – the Sunnis and the Shiites have shown the same ability to be evil and slaughter civilians.
Review: 'Industry of Lies: Media, Academia, and the Israeli-Arab Conflict' by Ben-Dror YeminiColumbia Faculty Boycott Bookstore After it Apologizes for Promoting Palestinian Violence
"Seventy years after the Holocaust, which saw Nazi Germany propaganda turn the entire Jewish people into a monster threatening the world, a new industry of lies has arisen. … But this time it is not the goose-stepping Nazis pushing the lies. It is liberal-minded academics, intellectuals, and human rights activists."
So writes Ben-Dror Yemini, an Israeli journalist and former opinion page editor of Maariv, who thoroughly debunks these defamations in Industry of Lies. Yemini is at his best when he stands long-held assumptions on their head. Thus Israel has often been accused of forcibly evicting the Arabs from Palestine in 1948 in what the Arabs term the Naqba or "catastrophe." Yemini not only shows this is nonsense (the Arabs mostly fled at the behest of their own leaders), but he puts Israel's accusers in the dock. He describes the Jewish Naqba—a forcible eviction that actually happened—in which some 800,000 Jews were driven from Arab lands and their property stolen.
Similarly, while debunking accusations that Israel practices apartheid, Yemini talks about Arab apartheid, which Arabs practice against their Palestinian brethren. Arab countries from Egypt to Lebanon force Palestinian Arabs into ghettoes, deny them citizenship, and restrict their employment, all to keep the refugee problem alive for use as a weapon with which to bludgeon Israel.
What Yemini calls the "Big Lie" is that Israel carries out genocide. "If a Palestinian was killed for every time the word ‘extermination' is used in relation to Israel, there would indeed not be a soul left." Yemini's strength is in focusing on the context Israel's detractors ignore. He points out that huge numbers are killed annually in conflicts around the planet, while the world barely notices. But although the relative contribution of the Israeli-Arab conflict to violence and to the number of refugees worldwide is marginal, Israel "has mysteriously become ‘the most dangerous country to world peace.' The focus on it is nothing short of obsessive."
Over 200 Columbia University faculty, students, and alumni have pledged to boycott a New York bookstore after its owners apologized for promoting and selling a children's book that praised Palestinian violence against Israel.David Singer: PLO Ditches Trump, Undermines Future UN and EU Support
The petition condemns Book Culture, an independent bookstore with a location near Columbia, for apologizing after Jewish and non-Jewish communities objected to its selling P is for Palestine by Golbarg Bashi, a book for young children that glorified the intifada.
The petition, first reported by Campus Reform, includes a refusal to buy books from or order course materials through Book Culture and a promise by faculty to remove their course books from the store.
The petition calls on the bookstore owners to "retract their statement and issue an apology for choosing to participate in the censorship and slander of already-underrepresented Palestinian voices."
The co-owners of Book Culture, Chris Doeblin, Annie Hedrick, and Rick MacArthur, apologized in a statement published Nov. 29 on the website of the Stephen Wise Free Synagogue for the "pain and distress" caused by its funding the publication of and hosting an event for author Golbarg Bashi‘s book.
PLO Chairman Mahmoud Abbas’s extraordinary two-hour-long anti-American and Jew-hating diatribe delivered on January 14 must inevitably see:NYPost Ed: Mahmoud Abbas just got exactly what he asked for
Israel refusing to resume negotiations with the PLO
Another Arab partner replacing the PLO to negotiate with Israel in implementing President Trump’s eagerly-awaited ultimate deal.
The viciousness and vindictiveness of Abbas’s attack on the internationally-recognised legal right of the Jewish people to its own independent State – as endorsed by:
· the United Nations (“UN”) 1947 Partition Plan
· the European Union (“EU”) 1980 Venice Declaration
· UN Security Council Resolutions 242 and 338
· The 1993 Oslo Accords
· President Bush’s 2003 Road Map - supported by both the UN and the EU
requires the UN and EU to unequivocally reject Abbas’s racist, false and misleading claims.
Abbas’s speech was delivered at what has been described as “a Palestinian Central Council meeting in Ramallah”.
In fact it was a very well stage-managed event involving the attendance of some 80 of the 132 Councillors and about 500 other persons. One vacant seat was reserved for the “Republic of Lithuania”. Diplomats from other countries were undoubtedly present.
The backdrop included two huge screens each containing five maps of Palestine from 1947 onwards – conveniently excluding 78% of Palestine – today called Jordan - granted independence by Great Britain in 1946.
“Damn your dollars!” Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas railed at the United States and President Trump during his recent maniacal tirade.Palestinians in race against time
Well, OK: On Tuesday, Team Trump took him at his word, cutting $65 million of the $125 million Washington sends to the UN outfit that handles Palestinian aid, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency.
Hey, Trump had warned Abbas long ago that PA funding was at risk if its leaders refused to engage in peace talks with Israel.
And Abbas’ 2 ½-hour rant in Ramallah pretty conclusively showed that he’s not remotely ready to do that.
First, he again specifically rejected any thought of playing along with the latest US effort to restart negotiations: “We told Trump we will not accept his project, the ‘deal of the century,’ which has become the ‘slap of the century’ ” — referring to US recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.
More, he denied the Jewish state’s legitimacy, claiming, “Israel is a colonialist project that has nothing to do with Jews.” How can Israel bargain with a guy who insists the Jews have no links at all to the Holy Land?
For many years, the Arabs believed that in all aspects of their struggle against Israel time was on their side and all they had to do was wait for victory over Israel to eventually fall into their laps.Ahead of Pence visit, PM says no progress on peace without American involvement
But the majority of Arab states, the first among them Egypt under former President Anwar Sadat, have come to understand that time is actually on Israel's side and that every day that passes without peace prevents them from treating their problems at home and ultimately inches them, not Israel, closer to social and economic ruin.
The Palestinians, and we must admit quite a few Israelis along with them, have steadfastly held to the belief that the passing of time without a peace agreement works against Israel, and that thus it was to their advantage to avoid making tough decisions and painful concessions for the sake of peace in the hopes that Israel would blink or collapse first, or that the international community would force Israel to accept the Palestinian position.
U.S. President Donald Trump's efforts, buoyed by Egypt and even Saudi Arabia, to think outside the box and try to dismantle some of the landmines blocking the path to peace – such as the Jerusalem question – has thrown Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas off balance and undermined his faith that all he has to do is wait, until the end of time if need be, for the conflict to be resolved according to his demands.
Abbas' response was to declare diplomatic war on the United States under Trump. In doing so, however, he is squandering an opportunity that likely will not reappear, to entrust the diplomatic process to the only player who can move such a process forward. Abbas can cry his crocodile tears on the EU's shoulders, but the only country that can truly help the Palestinians, and which in actuality has helped them more than anyone else to this point (diplomatically and financially), is the United States.
Speaking ahead of the arrival of US Vice President Mike Pence in Israel on Sunday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said there can be no progress toward peace in the region without the US playing a leading role.Fatah leader calls for general strike during VP Mike Pence visit
His comments come with the Palestinians and other prominent Arabs refusing to meet with US officials in anger over President Donald Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.
“This evening a great friend of the State of Israel, a true friend, US Vice President Mike Pence, will arrive in Israel,” Netanyahu said at the weekly cabinet meeting.
“We shall discuss efforts by the Trump administration to hinder Iran’s aggression and the Iranian nuclear program, and of course to promote security and peace in the region,” Netanyahu said. “Anyone who truly strives to achieve those goals knows there is no alternative to the leadership of the US.”
Highlights from Pence’s trip will include visits to the Western Wall and the Yad Vashem Holocaust museum, as well as a speech at a special plenary session in the Knesset which Arab lawmakers have said they will boycott.
Netanyahu called the boycott plans a “disgrace.”
A senior Fatah official on Sunday called for a general strike later this week to protest US President Donald Trump changes to American policy on Jerusalem, official Palestinian Authority radio reported.Protesters in Jordan: US Vice President Pence 'not welcome'
On December 6, Trump recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and initiated the relocation of the US Embassy in Tel Aviv to the city, breaking with decades of American policy and infuriating the Palestinian leadership.
Fatah Central Committee member Jamal Muhaisen, who is responsible for overseeing his party’s local cadres, urged Palestinians in “all sectors and government institutions,” except for those who work for in healthcare and education, to strike on Tuesday.
Munir Jaghoub, a Fatah spokesman, said the strike was planned to coincide with US Vice President Mike Pence’s visit to the region.
Protesters rallied in Amman on Saturday, ahead of U.S. Vice President Mike Pence's arrival in the Jordanian capital, saying he was "not welcome."Jordan urges Pence to ‘rebuild trust’ after Jerusalem pivot
Almost 70 people gathered near the U.S. Embassy in Amman, holding banners and shouting slogans in protest against the visit. The protests have been fueled by President Donald Trump's Dec. 6 recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, a decision strongly supported by Pence.
The vice president arrived in Amman late Saturday to meet with Jordan's King Abdullah, after first visiting Egypt, where he met in Cairo with President Abdel Fatah el-Sissi.
From Jordan, he will travel to neighboring Israel, where he will hold talks with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the White House said in a statement earlier this month.
Jordan’s king appealed Sunday to US Vice President Mike Pence to “rebuild trust and confidence” in the possibility of a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, following fallout from the Trump administration’s decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.Jordan's king says east Jerusalem must be capital of Palestinian state
Pence, in turn, tried to reassure the King Abdullah II that the Trump administration remains committed to restarting Israeli-Palestinian peace efforts and views Jordan as a central player.
The vice president also said that “the United States of America remains committed, if the parties agree, to a two-state solution.” Such a caveat deviates from longstanding US support for a two-state solution as the only possible outcome of any peace deal.
Trump’s pivot on Jerusalem last month infuriated the Palestinians, who seek the Israeli-annexed eastern sector of the city as a future capital. They accused the US of siding with Israel and said Washington can no longer serve as a mediator.
In remarks during talks with US Vice Mike Pence in Amman, the king said the only solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was a two-state one.Netanyahu thanks US for ‘behind-the-scenes’ work to end Jordan embassy impasse
"The US decision on Jerusalem ...does not come as a result of a comprehensive settlement of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict," the monarch told Pence at the start of the talks in the royal palace.
Jordan lost east Jerusalem and the West Bank to Israel during the Arab-Israeli war in 1967.
Pence was in Amman on the second leg of a three-country tour that concludes in Israel.
In comments delivered in Egypt, he said Washington would support a two-state solution for Israelis and Palestinians if the two sides agreed to it.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Saturday thanked the United States for its “behind-the-scenes efforts” to solve Israel’s diplomatic standoff with Jordan over a shooting incident at the Israeli embassy in Amman.Report: Israel says won't prosecute guard over Amman embassy shootings
“Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu expressed his appreciation to [Jared] Kushner and [Jason] Greenblatt for their behind-the-scenes efforts, which helped solve the crisis,” the Prime Minister’s Office said in a statement.
Following the July incident, in which an Israeli security guard shot dead two Jordanians after one allegedly attacked him, Jordan had prevented Israel from reopening its embassy or returning its ambassador to Amman in protest of the warm reception given to the guard and embassy staff upon their return to Israel in the immediate aftermath of the incident.
Israel will pay $5 million in compensation to the families, diplomats in Jordan told the al-Rai newspaper Saturday. Israeli officials have previously said an undisclosed sum would be paid to the Jordanian government and not to the families. The paper reported that the sum will be transferred by Jordan’s leaders to the families.
Israel will not prosecute a guard from its embassy in Amman who killed two Jordanians in July, as had long been demanded by the kingdom, two Israeli sources said on Sunday.Belgium, Netherlands to supplement UNRWA funds cut by U.S.
Instead, the Foreign Ministry and Shin Bet security agency will review protocols surrounding the actions taken by the guard, and his conduct, "and share the results with the Jordanians," a diplomatic source said.
The killings led to a rift between the countries, which both said last week had been mended.
Jordan said Israel had apologized for the embassy deaths, would compensate the victims' next of kin and "implement and follow up legal measures" in the case.
Jordanian officials were not immediately available to comment on the diplomatic source's account. Israel's Foreign Ministry spokesman declined comment.
Amman had previously demanded a homicide trial for the guard, whose repatriation under diplomatic immunity and hero's welcome by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu angered Jordanians.
The Netherlands and Belgium pledged a total of $38 million for the UN agency that provides aid to Palestinians following US funding cuts of $110 million.Settler growth rate declines for sixth straight year
Belgium’s government pledged $23.3 million in extra funding for UNRWA and the Dutch government said it would fast-track another $15 million in funding.
The United States announced its cuts on Thursday. State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert told reporters that a $45 million payment pledged for the UNRWA food aid program would not go through for the time being. Earlier this week, the US said it would freeze $65 million pledged to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, transferring only $60 million.
According to UNRWA, the United States provided more than $350 million in aid to the organization in 2017.
In the Netherlands, International Aid Minister Sigrid Kaag, who used to work for UNRWA and is married to a Palestinian former Cabinet minister, said she would make available immediately her country’s annual budget of $15 million for UNRWA, which was planned to be dispensed in several payments.
Three lawmakers, including one from the ruling People’s Party for Freedom and Democracy, submitted questions to Kaag in parliament this week about the decision.
“Why are you fast-tracking funding for UNRWA when there are so many potential groups with urgent needs?” they asked.
The growth rate among Israeli settlers in the West Bank declined last year for the sixth consecutive year, but remained above the national average, according to government statistics seen by The Times of Israel on Sunday.IsraellyCool: EXCLUSIVE: Shirley Temper’s Mother Actually Instructed Her to Cause Trouble with the Soldiers
The number of Israelis living over the Green Line increased by 14,299, or 3.4 percent, in 2017, demographics information gathered by the Interior Ministry’s Population Immigration and Border Authority (PIBA) showed.
In 2016, the population increased by 15,765 or 3.9%.
The figures do not cover Jewish neighborhoods in East Jerusalem, which Israel, as opposed to the international community, does not consider settlements.
While the growth rate among Israeli settlers has not risen since 2012, the 3.4% figure from 2017 was still higher than the national average, which stood at 2% in the past year.
You have already seen the infamous video of Ahed “Shirley Temper” Tamimi and her cousin Nour Tamimi violently attacking IDF soldiers, video that was filmed by her own mother Nariman Tamimi.'Hamas is turning hospitals into terrorist bases'
According to this Times of Israel report:
While Nariman was also charged with aggravated assault, footage from the incident did not appear to show the mother doing anything beyond pushing the soldiers off the family’s property.
But a very observant Israellycool reader noticed Nariman speaking softly right before Ahed and Nour went and starting attacking the soldiers. It has been confirmed by two Arabic speakers that she was saying “utrodo” (“اطرد”), which means kick them out/expel them.
In other words, Nariman deliberately told her young daughter Ahed and cousin Nour to go down there and start trouble with the soldiers, in order to kick them off the property.
Filming her young daughter attacking soldiers is bad enough; but actually instructing her to do so is even worse child abuse.
What kind of mother would treat their child like this?
Israeli President Reuven Rivlin accused the Hamas terrorist organization Sunday of turning hospitals and other civilian buildings in the Gaza Strip into terror bases.Nasrallah warns Israel against continued construction of border wall
President Rivlin visited the headquarters of the Gaza Regional Division of the IDF Sunday. He then toured the new neighborhood being built at Kibbutz Nirim, and met with some 250 students and residents at the Nofei Habesor School.
Rivlin received a briefing on the current challenges in the sector from Deputy Chief of Staff Maj.-Gen. Aviv Kochavi, Southern Command Commander Major General Eyal Zamir and Gaza Division Commander Brigadier General Yehuda Fuchs who accompanied the visit.
"I am coming to you now from meetings with the security forces and from operational surveys," Rivlin said. "We fought for the houses, the kindergartens and the schools, the paths and the fields. It was a war for our existence and daily life."
The president said that Israel remains at war with the Hamas terrorist organization which rules the Gaza Strip. "The campaign is over, but the war is not. The mission of the State of Israel has not been completed. We are fighting a terrorist organization that is cruel, extremist, and murderous. It is a terrorist organization that devotes no thought to the future and well-being of Israel, the people of Gaza, and for whom "reconciliation" of one kind or another is only a step towards advancing the war. It is a terrorist organization that does not recognize our existence and whose goal is to destroy and destroy the State of Israel."
Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah has warned Israel against continued construction of a wall along its border with Lebanon, after Beirut said the project was undermining peace.
“After liberating the Lebanese occupied territories from the Zionist enemy in 2000, the UN demarcation of the national border with the Palestinian territories left 13 controversial positions, and the Lebanese government informed the UNIFIL about its rejection for any Israeli measure in this concern,” Nasrallah was quoted by Hezbollah website al-Manar as saying.
“The Islamic Resistance backs the Lebanese government and army, and the Zionists must take Lebanon’s warning seriously,” he continued.
On Friday, Lebanese President Michel Aoun met in Beirut with UNIFIL Head of Mission and Force Commander Maj.-Gen. Michael Beary and stressed that a border fence within the demarcated Blue Line “isn’t compatible with the efforts that [UNIFIL] is exerting in cooperation with the Lebanese Army to preserve security and stability along the southern border.”
Iranian MP Mojtaba Zolnour: Nothing Will Be Left of Israel following the First Wave of Hizbullah Missiles pic.twitter.com/6ZYX2eUfJq
— MEMRI (@MEMRIReports) January 21, 2018
Michael J. Totten: Time to Kick Turkey Out of NATO?
The case for evicting Turkey from NATO got stronger this week.Palestinian women’s group out of Women’s March over Scarlett Johansson
First, the United States announced the backing of a Kurdish security force—the People’s Protection Units, or YPG—in Rojava, the quasi-independent Kurdish region in northeastern Syria along the Turkish border. Then Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan says he will “strangle” that American-backed force “before it’s even born.” Russia, Iran and Syria’s Assad regime are standing with Erdogan.
The YPG, along with the multiethnic Syrian Democratic Forces which the YPG dominates, are the only armed groups indigenous to Syria that are willing and able to take on ISIS and win, and they’re the only significant armed faction in Syria’s dizzying civil war that isn’t ideologically hostile to the West. In October of last year, they finally liberated Raqqa, the “capital” of the ISIS “caliphate,” while the Russian and Syrian militaries were busy pounding rebels instead in the west.
The Turks would rather have the Assad regime—and by extension Russia, Iran and Hezbollah—rule over the Syrian Kurds whom they consider terrorists. The United States is “building an army of terror” along the southern border, Erdogan says. “Either you take off your flags on those terrorist organisations, or we will have to hand those flags over to you, Don’t force us to bury in the ground those who are with terrorists…Our operations will continue until not a single terrorist remains along our borders, let alone 30,000 of them.”
This is not how a NATO ally behaves. It’s how an enemy state behaves. There is truly no getting around this. We can argue all we want—and I have—that keeping Turkey in NATO is better than kicking Turkey out of NATO because it’s better to deal with a troublesome country inside an ostensibly friendly framework than outside one.
A Palestinian women’s group pulled out of the Women’s March Los Angeles over the inclusion of Jewish actress Scarlett Johansson as a featured speaker.New Orleans mayor-elect disavows BDS-backed resolution she authored
Several other pro-Palestinian groups also boycotted the march held on Saturday, one of dozens that took place across the United States to fight for women’s rights and progressive causes. The first march held last year took place in cities around the world the day after President Donald Trump’s inauguration.
The Palestinian American Women’s Association cited in a post on Facebook Johansson’s “unapologetic support of illegal settlements in the West Bank, a human rights violation recognized by the international community whose calls only led to a reaffirmation of her position, sending a clear message that Palestinian voices and human rights for Palestinians do not matter.”
Johansson is a former spokeswoman for SodaStream, whose main plant was formerly located in the West Bank. The plant was moved to the Negev Desert in southern Israel in 2015, where it employs 1,400 employees, one-third of them Bedouin Arabs. More than 70 of the West Bank Palestinians who worked for the company when it was located in Maale Adumim, also work at the new plant.
Johansson resigned as a goodwill ambassador for Oxfam, which supports boycotting West Bank settlements, over her employment by Soda Stream.
New Orleans Mayor-elect LaToya Cantrell has walked back her support for a resolution she authored and supported that lends support to the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement against Israel.BDS winning PR war by ‘influencer-marketing’
The resolution to boycott investments with human rights violators, which passed the New Orleans City Council on January 11, with all five members present voting in support, mentions neither Israel nor the Palestinian territories, but BDS and anti-Israel activists claimed the passage as a victory for their cause.
Cantrell was not present for the vote on the resolution, which she wrote and introduced as part of her Welcoming Cities initiative, reportedly in collaboration with the New Orleans Palestinian Solidarity Committee.
In a statement issued on Saturday, Cantrell said she would support the council in its plans to reconsider and withdraw the resolution.
On Wednesday City Council President Jason Williams called for reconsideration of the resolution, saying he was not aware of the boycott movement or its mission when he and the council voted, the New Orleans Advocate reported. Other council members have told the local media that they will move to reconsider the resolution at their next council meeting.
“After extensive discussion and deliberation about the impact of this resolution, I can say that the unintended impact does not reflect my commitment to inclusivity, diversity, and respect and support for civil rights, human rights and freedoms of all New Orleanians,” Cantrell, who takes office in four months, said in her statement.
Whoever believes that BDS is for LGTB rights or women’s rights is naïve, to say the least. BDS is emotionally manipulative. By juxtaposing images of suffering kids, intimidating artists who visit Israel, referring to UN resolutions as their legal validation and neglecting to mention that those resolutions are non-binding – it is winning people over who often cannot not even point to Israel on a map.IsraellyCool: NZ BDS-Holes Behind WOMAD Boycott Campaign Are Real Pieces of Work
How do we fight this far too well-organized media bash? First, we need to acknowledge that is difficult. It is difficult because the Arab-led media backs it up, because today even the UN backs it up, because it works as a spreading net. No matter the name of the NGO, they all have one aim: to go against Israel (at a minimum). If you repeat a lie often enough, people will believe it as the truth.
On the other hand, pro-Israel organizations, NGOs and influencers often fight alone.
When an influencer stands against BDS, he or she is accused of being a propaganda machine of the Jewish hasbara, or public diplomacy. If the influencer is Jewish it is even worse, as being Jewish means you are not credible.
If the influencer is not Jewish, the person is said to be paid to spread propaganda the Israelis prescribed.
But I see another disheartening challenge: While in general pro-Israel voices have the same good intentions and fight with their own tools, oftentimes they compete for slightly different desired outcome, which results in a weakening of the power of one strong voice – something BDS has.
While the BDS movement is certainly not succeeding in the way it hopes, it still poses a danger of brainwashing the generation to come. This why we need to keep fighting back – with one strong voice, together.
On Friday I posted about the New Zealand BDS-holes who were calling on organizers of the March 2018 WOMAD festival to dis-invite Victoria Hanna -for the crime of being Israeli.Israel’s Annual Antisemitism Report Highlights Rising Jew-Hatred in Europe
The scum and villainy who penned the letter are:
John Minto
Debbie Abbas
Roger Fowler
Janfrie Wakim
Since I published the post, I have learned more about some of these people. And not surprisingly, they are vile.
John Minto
A veteran “political activist”, Minto has defended burning the Israeli flag.
“I can’t see what the problem is,” Minto said. “Flags have been burnt in demonstrations and protests for hundreds of years so it’s no big deal.”
He has also compared Gaza to the Warsaw ghetto.
Roger Fowler
Roger Fowler is the spokesperson for Kia Ora Gaza, shown to be a hate group.
1. Kia Ora Gaza supports terrorism
Kia Ora Gaza has recently affirmed its support for a third intifada. In other words, it supports thecurrent wave of knife attacks, car rammings and shootings aimed at Israeli civilians; parents murdered in front of their children, a 13 year old boy stabbed on his bike, a Rabbi run down by a car and then hacked to death with a meat cleaver. Kia Ora Gaza justifies all of these attacks as a legitimate response to “occupation”, and considers stabbing an elderly person, or a 13 year-old boy “an act of self defence”.
2. Kia Ora Gaza promotes anti-Semitic libels
The “blood libel” has been used for centuries to justify and incite mob violence and pogroms against Jews. In the Middle Ages it was said that Jews murdered Christian children for ritual purposes. These days, replace “the Jews” with “Israel” (the Jewish State) and we see a whole new type of blood libel. Many of these are being spread by Kia Ora Gaza. Recently, for example, Kia Ora Gaza has been posting articles with the bizarre and fraudulent accusation that Israel has been harvesting organs from dead Palestinians.
Israel’s newly released annual report on global antisemitism has drawn attention to rising Jew-hatred in several notable areas, particularly in Europe.Youngest living Schindler's list Holocaust survivor to address UN
Presenting on Sunday to the Israeli government, Minister of Diaspora Affairs Naftali Bennett stated, “We must act with all available tools against current antisemitism to ensure the security of the Jewish people, in Israel and the Diaspora.”
Among other findings, the report — released ahead of International Holocaust Remembrance Day on Jan. 27 — highlighted results from a May 2017 Pew Research Center survey of 18 European countries which revealed that 30 percent of respondents would not want Jews as neighbors, while 20 percent are not interested in accepting Jews into their countries. In Romania and Poland — two European countries with relatively strong bilateral ties to Israel — 22 percent and 18 percent of local respondents, respectively, would like to revoke the citizenship of local Jews.
More than 50 percent of refugees in Western Europe hold antisemitic views and opinions, according to the report, which noted a 30-percent increase in the number of antisemitic events in the UK, with a 78-percent increase in physical attacks.
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Israeli PM Netanyahu Welcomes ‘Great Friend of Israel’ US Vice President Mike Pence on Official Visit
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warmly welcomed the arrival in Israel on Sunday of US Vice President Mike Pence. "This evening...
Israel’s report noted that a new annotated edition of Adolf Hitler’s antisemitic manifesto “Mein Kampf” has become a bestseller in Germany. Antisemitic incidents are also on the rise in that country.
Eva Lavi, the youngest living Holocaust survivor saved by German industrialist Oskar Schindler, will participate in a ceremony marking International Holocaust Remembrance Day at the United Nations headquarters in New York on Jan. 31.The Holocaust and justice in France and Germany
At the ceremony, Lavi will share the story of her family's rescue by being placed on Schindler's famous list, along with some 1,100 other Jews.
Nazi party member Schindler and his wife, Emilie, were recognized as Righteous Among the Nations for their heroic actions during World War II. The story of how he compiled a list of Jews employed first in his enamelware factory in Krakow and then in his armaments factory in occupied Cezchoslovakia, saving them from being sent to the Auschwitz death camp, was the subject of a Booker Prize-winning book by Thomas Keneally, "Schindler's Ark," and then of director Steven Spielberg's Academy Award-winning 1993 film "Schindler's List."
Lavi, then a young child, and her parents, Fela and Wolf Ratz (Rac), were on Schindler's list as metalworkers.
Now 80, Lavi said in an interview with Israel Hayom, "My mother always told me never believe anyone and to always hide when someone comes around, and I hid well. I didn't cry, I didn't make a sound, and in the end, I survived."
In one of his essays Henry James remarked that "Life is , in fact, a battle. Evil is insolent and strong...goodness very apt to be weak."British Lawmaker’s Moving Speech – Holocaust Memories Are ‘Seared Into Me’
Recognizing that this is not illusion, it is heartening that individuals, rare though they might be, devote their life to one essential task, displaying the strength of goodness in fighting the battle against evil and injustice, roguery and villainous men.
High on the list of those who dedicated their life to this battle are an incomprobable couple, a French Jew born in Romania and a Protestant German, daughter of a man who fought in the Wehrmacht in World War II, but was not a Nazi.
A new book, Hunting the Truth: the Memoirs of Beate and Serge Klarsfeld, reminds us of this couple whose activity was in hunting, exposing and helping bring to justice Nazi crimimals and French collaborators and participants in the Holocaust, the memory of which they perpetuated.
The couple pointed out and fought antisemitism in Europe and elsewhere, and also modern day acts of genocide, such as that against Bosnian Muslims in 1996, all over the world. The Memoirs, written in alternating voices, relates the story of their exploits, if not always presented elegantly. But the very appearance of this book is a reminder of problems not only of the dark years in wartime Europe but also still at large in contemporary France.
Serge, born in Bucharest in 1935, was brought to France as a child and lived in Nice. His father was arrested by the Gestapo on September 30, 1943, sent to Auschwitz where he died at age 39.
Serge who had hidden behind a false wall in a cupboard when his father was arrested, was saved from capture by help from a charity organization, and members of the Resistance. Beate, born in Berlin, Germany in 1939, was the daughter of an insurance agent. The couple had improbably met in a Paris metro station, and spent their lives together creating the family business of tracking down evil criminals.
A British MP has spoken movingly of how the Holocaust tore apart his family and left memories “seared” into him after he learned that the Nazis experimented on a relative.
Labour’s Alex Sobel (Leeds North West), speaking during a debate focused on Holocaust Memorial Day, said the Holocaust still casts a “dark spectre” over his family with “all the relatives I never met, that never survived, the children they never had.”
Mr. Sobel, who won the Leeds North West seat for Labour at last year’s general election, said:
I remember as a young child sitting in my great aunt’s kitchen in Tel Aviv, seeing the numbers tattooed on her arm and asking my father why – she was in the camps.
She didn’t have her own children or grandchildren, I had no aunts and uncles or cousins to play with, because the Nazis experimented on her and she couldn’t have children.
This hollow shell casts a dark spectre over my family – all the relatives I never met, that never survived, the children they never had.
This is my own living memory of what happened and this is seared into me, when I make my own judgments politically, when genocide comes now to the Rohingya, to the Yazidi, round the world.
But not just that, but when thinking about decisions more locally.
Daniel Kawczynski, Conservative MP for Shrewsbury and Atcham, said the role of Christians who gave their lives to save Jewish families during the Shoah should also be honoured.
His great-uncle, Jan Kawczynski, had hid Jewish families on his estate, he said.
