Thursday, September 19, 2019
Is Israel Abandoning the Liberal Order? Robert Kagan Says Yes. He's Wrong about Israel, and Wrong about the Liberal Order
Considering Israel’s relationship to what he calls the liberal world order and the new anti-liberal world order peopled by nationalist and authoritarian leaders, Kagan poses the question, “Which side does Israel want to be on?” And he answers: “in recent years Israeli foreign policy has been trending in a decidedly anti-liberal direction,” thus showing that the country actively desires to join the anti-liberal camp.
In justification of this charge, Kagan notes that Israel has pursued and maintained relations with the new leaders around the world whose authoritarian power and politics are replacing, to his dismay, the old liberal international order created by the United States after World War II and again at the end of the cold war. Kagan cites many such leaders: Putin of Russia, Xi of China, Modi of India, Orban of Hungary, and others, including the authoritarian leaders of Middle Eastern countries.
Setting aside the question of whether there are any Middle Eastern leaders besides Netanyahu who are not and have not long been authoritarian, the burden of this account would seem to be completely vitiated by two elements that Kagan himself mentions: first, that the new anti-liberal order is a fact of life, however unfortunate; and second, that Israel, despite its present success, is a tiny country endangered in a truly existential way by truly mortal enemies from its founding 71 years ago down to the present day, most recently in the form of the Islamic Republic of Iran.
Indeed, in the course of his essay Kagan goes out of his way to insist on how ultimately small, weak, and thus inconsequential Israel is. He describes it as essentially a burden to the U.S. ever since its founding. Even at present, on his reckoning, were it not for America’s concern for the Jewish state, neither Iran nor Israel’s efforts to defend itself and even others in the region from Iran’s predations would matter to the U.S. Iran itself, he reassures us, is “not yet” a threat to America.
If so, what’s the big deal? The obvious conclusion to be drawn from these facts is that Israel, in order to continue to survive, is adapting to a new order created by forces much greater than its own and very much beyond its control. In so doing, it is behaving the same way other small states must behave, now and always—as a historian like Kagan well knows. From time to time in his essay, he even seems to draw the same conclusion. How, then, does the behavior of this small and ultimately inconsequential state matter as anything more than another sign of our lamentable times? Why Kagan’s preoccupation with Israel, of all the small states faced with the same circumstances?
The Tikvah Podcast: Micah Goodman on Shrinking the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict
If you follow Israeli politics, then you know that within the past year, the Jewish state has experienced two deadlocked elections. What explains this political stalemate?Better Relations with Israel Are in Pakistan’s Interests
According to Micah Goodman, one of Israel’s leading public intellectuals, Israeli politics is trapped in a Catch-67. Most Israelis have been persuaded by the Right that peace with the Palestinians isn’t feasible and that withdrawal from Judea and Samaria would be a security nightmare. But they are also persuaded by the Left’s argument that Israel’s control over the West Bank poses a demographic time-bomb that threatens the nation’s character as a Jewish and democratic state. They think that establishing a Palestinian state right now would be a disaster and that remaining in the territories would be a disaster.
How can Israel get out of this impossible situation? By abandoning comprehensive peace plans and messianic solutions, argues Goodman. Rather than solving the conflict or ignoring it, Israel ought to focus on shrinking the conflict by improving the day-to-day lives of Palestinians while maintaining an unwavering commitment to national security. In his Altantic essay, “Eight Steps to Shrink the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict,” Goodman describes how Israel can do just that. And in this week’s podcast, he joins Tikvah to explore his vital book and thought-provoking essay.
In 2003, Pakistan’s then-dictator Pervez Musharraf floated the idea of establishing diplomatic ties with the Jewish state, a position he has also repeated even after stepping down—although little came of the suggestion. A few weeks ago, the country’s current government told reporters that it is considering an overture to Jerusalem. Ephraim Inbar explains what Islamabad would gain from doing so, and that Israel’s ever-closer friendship with India—Pakistan’s chief rival—is an inducement, not a hindrance, to a thaw between the two countries:
Pakistani national interests dictate better relations with Jerusalem. Israel’s new relationship with India was gradually transformed into what Prime Minister Narendra Modi termed “a strategic partnership.” Israeli technology and arms served the Indian military effort well in the 1999 Kargil war against Pakistan. Moreover, closer Indian-Israeli cooperation after the 2008 Mumbai terrorist attacks enhanced Delhi’s capacity to deal with Pakistan-sponsored terror. It can be argued that better relations with Israel might balance the intensified Indian-Israeli military ties. . . .
Iran is also a point of convergence. Pakistan fears Iran, its neighbor to the west, less than Israel does. Yet it’s hard to imagine that Islamabad is indifferent to the possibility of having another nuclear-armed neighbor on its western border. In addition, both countries play games with the Baluchi minorities beyond their borders and compete over influence in Afghanistan. Therefore, the Israeli campaign against Iran, which weakens an adversary, is not [inimical] to Pakistani interests. . . .
Israel, a state in quest of international legitimacy for many years, has always welcomed Pakistani overtures. Pakistan is a large Muslim state, and better relations with Islamabad could be useful in further diluting the religious dimension of Israel’s regional conflict. Israel desires a normalization in relations with all capitals of the world. Furthermore, the Pakistani-Saudi special relations could be leveraged to let both states overcome their inhibitions on relations with the Jewish state.
David Collier: The Guardian – anti-Israel bias, more obsessive and vindictive than you think
A simple test. The website has a search function. All things being equal, the number of returns that nations receive should ‘rank’ them in order of relevance and importance. False positives should equal out. And it seems to work. Germany has 338k, France 225k, Russia 245k and the USA 302k. China gets 286k and New Zealand 90k. The UK is an important global power situated in Europe and with deep connections to the Commonwealth. These results appear to include every reference to those nations, so we can assume New Zealand’s 90k has a fair few rugby and cricket references included.A Reporter From Hell
How about Israel? Not in the commonwealth, nor in Europe. Israel receives 101k. What can we compare Israel with? Geographically, Syria for a start. A nation that has seen 500k deaths – 94k. Saudi, the Arabian Kingdom that controls so much of the world’s oil? 63k. What about Lebanon – 21k. For a regional power, how about Pakistan, a nation in the commonwealth that also plays cricket. 79k. What is most interesting about Pakistan is that unlike Israel, it really is a brutal oppressor of human rights. Yet only 79k hits, including of course ‘x’ amount of cricket scores.
A few more. Bangladesh 26k. Turkey? Erdogan’s Turkey only gets 81k, and that probably includes Christmas recipes along with all those holiday recommendations in Antalya. How about Cyprus, an invaded and occupied Island? 18K. Lesser nations in Europe? Sweden 59k, Romania 22k and Poland 41k. I looked at the eight bloodiest conflicts of the 21st century. Syria (94k) I already mentioned. There is also Congo (21k), Darfur (6k) Afghanistan (79k), Yemen (20k) and Ukraine (45k). Only Iraq, a war that actually involved the UK for years, scores more highly than Israel. Fun stuff huh?
It gets really silly. ‘Palestinian’ gets 60k results. 300% more than Lebanon. Kurds only get 17k. Perhaps if even more of the Kurds had been killed through Genocide, they may have made 20k, but it does seem as if the Kurds have to make Israel their enemy for the Guardian to really take any notice. ‘Palestine’ gets a whopping 50k, which is 10x the number of references to Kurdistan. In fact, ‘Palestine’ gets more mentions than the illegal occupation of Cyprus and the bloody conflicts of Lebanon combined. Think about it. On what planet can ‘Palestinian’ return as many results as the Saudi Arabian Kingdom that controls so much of the world’s oil? Perhaps it is a good thing that Palestinians don’t play much cricket.
Hamas, a terror organisation in a tiny regional spat in the Middle East gets 14k returns, which is more than Boko Haram (4k) and Al Qaeda (7k) combined. Guardian editors sure seem to have funny priorities.
An Israel obsession? Never mind. I am sure this is all just an editorial error.
The title of the talk was “The War in Syria Is Not Over,” but it was more like Nir Rosen’s valedictory address. For roughly 20 minutes, the gonzo war-journalist-turned-mysterious-diplomatic-operator—who counts top advisers to both former U.S. President Barack Obama and Syrian dictator Bashar Assad among his acquaintances and admirers—laid out his narrative of Syria’s civil war, the most lethal and defining conflict of the 21st century. In the speaker’s view, no one but he had gotten it right.Women's March vote off new board member Zahra Billoo over tweets about Israel and Zionism
The U.S., Europe, and others that continued to sanction and isolate the Assad regime would be culpable for the “new social collapse” likely to follow Assad’s reconquest of much of his devastated country, Rosen told his audience at a Valdai Discussion Club event in Moscow in late February of 2019. “The same countries who claimed to care about the Syrian people and speak on their behalf supported insurgents, tried to overthrow the government and now are trying to starve Syrians,” the published version of the speech reads. “That the Syrian government behaved abhorrently does not justify the international intervention that followed and in fact the intervention helped cause these crimes.” The West’s motives for these ongoing “crimes” in the Levant were so obscure that they could only be described in theoretical terms. “Capitalism doesn’t work the same way everywhere,” he explained. “[T]he value of the Middle East is the accumulation of capital through war.”
In the text, one can forget Rosen is discussing a government that had murdered tens of thousands of people in a network of secret torture camps, bombed bread lines and hospitals, and gassed entire towns. In fact the Syrian dictator and his backers deserved thanks for defending the global order against the jihadist hordes at a steep cost in manpower and prestige. “The world owes Russia and Iran a debt of gratitude for preventing the collapse of the Syrian state,” Rosen said, to an audience that included senior Iranian and Russian foreign policy officials, as well as Robert Malley, the National Security Council’s Middle East director for most of Barack Obama’s second presidential term.
The fact of Rosen speaking on-record was more surprising than any of his actual statements. The Moscow speech represented some of Rosen’s only attributed public statements since 2012—a long public silence that would once have been unthinkable. In the 2000s, Rosen emerged as one of the edgiest American journalists working in the Middle East, embedding with Iraqi insurgents, Hezbollah, and the Taliban and publishing richly detailed, sometimes-admiring accounts of their operations.
A newly appointed board member of the Women’s March has been voted off it just days after her new role was announced, after tweets promoting extreme anti-Zionism and conspiracy theories were revealed.
Zahra Billoo, a lawyer and executive director of CAIR (the Council on American Islamic Relations) in San Francisco, tweets included: “Zionism is the violent ideology responsible for the genocide and displacement of indigenous Palestinians and the destruction of Palestinian land.”
She described Zionism as “racism”, and wrote in 2015: “I’m more afraid of racist Zionists who support Apartheid Israel than of the mentally Ill young people the #FBI recruits to join ISIS.”
The previous year, she tweeted: “Blaming Hamas for firing rockets at [Apartheid] Israel is like blaming a woman for punching her rapist.”
The Anti-Defamation League (ADL), the American antisemitism watchdog, had called on the Women's March to "condemn the statements and sentiments" of Ms Billoo, describing her "long history of deeply offensive and antisemitic statements.
"Fair criticism of any government and its policies, including Israel, is an important aspect of democracy. But outright rejecting Jewish nationhood and singling out solely the Jewish state with inflammatory and virulent rhetoric is antisemitic, plain and simple."
In a Twitter thread she sent after she was removed, Ms Billoo claimed to have been the subject of “an Islamophobic smear campaign led by the usual antagonists, who have long targeted me, my colleagues, and anyone else who dares speak out in support of Palestinian human rights and the right to self-determination.”
— The Reagan Battalion (@ReaganBattalion) September 16, 2019
I'd like to be the first to congratulate Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on becoming the next board member of the Women's March. https://t.co/piLKdNZejX
— Noah Rothman (@NoahCRothman) September 19, 2019
Please join me in signing the petition calling on @umnews to cancel upcoming @NationalSJP conference aka terror-and-antisemitism-fest https://t.co/6j6GVakyXU— (((David Lange))) (@Israellycool) September 19, 2019
.@AMPalestine -NJ director of community outreach Mohamad Habehh has a terrible approach to outreach: “If you work with the Jews you deserve any punishment possible in this dunya [world]."https://t.co/crnXkU6e8X pic.twitter.com/TEWy221Wse— Canary Mission (@canarymission) September 18, 2019
Labour conference fringe events to feature individuals suspended or expelled from Party over antisemitism
Next week’s Labour Party Conference Fringe in Brighton includes events hosted by groups that claim that the Party’s antisemitism crisis is a smear and featuring speakers who have been suspended or expelled from the Party over antisemitism.Chuka Umunna blasts Corbyn on antisemitism and failing to support the ban on Hizballah
On 24th September at 19:00, Labour Against the Witchhunt, a group that was set up to protest the expulsion of Labour members for alleged antisemitism and that opposes “the false antisemitism smear”, is hosting a public meeting with Ken Livingstone and Asa Winstanley.
Mr Livingstone was suspended from the Labour Party over antisemitism and eventually resigned from the Party in 2018 during a two-year investigative process that was never concluded. He went on to dismiss Labour’s antisemitism crisis as “lies and smears” manufactured by an “elite” wishing to protect their “tax-dodging in the Cayman Islands”. Mr Winstanley, meanwhile, has called the Jewish Labour Movement an “Israeli Embassy proxy” and was reportedly suspended from Labour in March, pending an investigation.
The Labour Representation Committee, a pro-Corbyn pressure group which has a long history of belittling claims of antisemitism and publishing extremely disturbing articles, is reportedly hosting an event with Chris Williamson MP and Jackie Walker. The president of the organisation is the Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer, John McDonnell.
Mr Williamson, was suspended from Labour and then readmitted, only to be resuspended following a public outcry after claiming that Labour has been “too apologetic” over antisemitism.
In a barnstorming speech at the Liberal Democrats’ party conference, Chuka Umunna, an MP who left Labour for reasons including antisemitism and recently joined the Liberal Democrats, shared his thoughts on Jeremy Corbyn.Labour Friends of Israel will not exhibit at party conference
“The Labour Party likes to think of itself as a champion of liberal values at home and abroad,” Mr Umunna said, before lamenting that Labour is in fact no longer “the party of [Clement] Atlee and [Ernest] Bevin: this is Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour.”
Mr Umunna warned Labour that “you cannot be a champion of liberalism if you are currently subject to a formal investigation by the Equality and Human Rights Commission for institutional racism against Jewish people.” He was referencing the full statutory investigation by the Equality and Human Rights Commission, which was launched on 28th May following a formal referral and detailed legal representations from Campaign Against Antisemitism, which is the complainant.
Mr Umunna went on to criticise Mr Corbyn for “lauding authoritarian regimes in Venezuela and Iran [and] failing to support the proscription of Hizballah as a terrorist organisation.” Hizballah was banned in the UK earlier this year following years of campaigning by Campaign Against Antisemitism and others.
Labour Friends of Israel has revealed today it will not have a stand at this year’s party conference over safety concerns.Head of European Jewish Association: We're not wanted here
LFI will not be joining organisations such as the BBC, the British Red Cross and Sky News exhibiting at the five-day conference in Brighton this weekend until next Wednesday.
But the parliamentary group, which did not exhibit last year for the first time in recent memory, will hold a fringe event on Tuesday evening chaired by Dame Louise Ellman MP, with Deputy Leader Tom Watson and Israeli Ambassador Mark Regev speaking.
LFI claimed it would not be “responsible” to place staff on a stand at the five-day conference due to safety concerns after “incidents of antisemitism in previous years.”
“The ongoing abuse of Jewish party members – highlighted by July’s Panorama programme – and the failure of Jeremy Corbyn to do anything to deter his supporters from engaging in it, means that we have decided it would not be appropriate for us to have a stand at Labour party conference this year,” LFI said.
“Our staff have faced incidents of antisemitism in previous years and, given that the situation appears to have further deteriorated, we do not feel it is responsible as an employer to put them in this environment.”
The latest ban on kosher slaughter in Europe is just another restriction placed on the continent's Jews and adds to the sense that the community is not wanted, says the head of the European Jewish Association (EJA).We Must Fight BDS Lies and Manipulation on Campus
"This is a true tragedy for the entire Jewish community," says Rabbi Menachem Margolin, regarding the recent prohibition of kosher slaughter in the Wallonia region of Belgium
The Wallonia ban joins a prohibition on kosher slaughter in the northern Flanders region of Belgium, making the Jewish ritual effectively illegal in two thirds of the country, where more than 40,000 Jews reside.
The rabbi, himself a Belgian citizen, sees growing restrictions and limitations on the rights of the European Jewish communities all over
the continent, and does not accept the humanitarian reasons legislators cling to in explaining the ban on kosher slaughter.
"Hunting for fun and sport is still allowed in Belgium," Margolin tells Ynet. "More animals are killed by hunting across Belgium than by kosher slaughter, not to mention the problemetic conditions of regular slaughter, which are allowed throughout the country.
"From the way the animals are transported to the food they eat and the conditions they live in, there are endless problems regarding the treatment of animals in Belgium. Jewish people care for the animals, and kosher slaughter is much more humane then any other forms of slaughter."
Although anti-Semitism in Europe is on the rise, Margolin doesn't see it as the reason for the new law; instead he blames political lobbyists.
"The real tragedy is the fact that the politicians who were so moved by the animal rights lobbyists ignored the pleas of the Jewish community, and this kind of law makes the entire Jewish population of the country feel unwelcome."
Over the last few years, thousands of Americans Jewish adolescents who were raised in Zionist households have been taught that Israel is unworthy of their support. And some have been persuaded to believe that if they join the BDS campaign, they will become champions of social justice.New Jersey Makes Strides to Help Pro-Israel Students on College Campuses
The truth, however, is that these Jewish students have been seduced and manipulated by a dangerous cult that has stripped them of the opportunity to think and reason independently and interact with whomever they choose, as well as sometimes damaging their familial and childhood relationships.
Proponents of the BDS movement sometimes use the practices of cult leaders, which can be illustrated by analyzing Steven Hassan’s “BITE” model of mind control. Hassan, an American Jew, former cult member, and now one of the world’s leading authorities on cults, created the “BITE” model, which is used to describe Behavioral Control, Information Control, Thought Control, and Emotional Control.
Throughout my years as an anti-BDS activist, I have witnessed the outrageous behavior of pro-BDS student groups, who shout down and physically intimidate pro-Israel speakers and threaten Zionist students verbally and in writing. This is behavioral control.
In February 2016, I communicated with an Oberlin College student who described how pro-BDS student groups expect behavioral compliance in exchange for social acceptance.
In addition, I have observed pro-BDS student groups such as Students for Justice in Palestine refuse to engage with Zionists, which these groups present as a self-righteous refusal to “normalize Israel.” However, when viewed within Hassan’s framework, it becomes clear that instructing SJP members not to engage is actually an attempt to limit their access to information.
How does one distinguish antisemitism from legitimate criticism of Israel? The answer is rather simple: One can criticize Israel and its government just as one would any other nation and its government. Far too often, however, Israel is relentlessly demonized on college campuses, which frequently devolves into harassment of Jewish and pro-Israel students.Swastika hung on dorm door of Jewish student at Tufts
Anti-Israel advocates decry the putative evils of Israel, and endlessly pontificate as if Israel were the source of the entire world’s evil. Unsurprisingly, this creates a dangerous situation for the safety of the Jewish community.
Fortunately, two New Jersey lawmakers have decided to tackle this crisis head-on. State Senators Steve M. Sweeney (D) and Robert W. Singer (R) proposed an amendment to New Jersey’s Statute 18A that would establish protections for Jewish people against discrimination on the basis of their religion. It extends protections to specifically include the Jewish people as a religious/ethnic group, and it prohibits acts of antisemitism in public schools, colleges, and universities.
The amendment targets:
Notably, the amendment also includes anti-Zionist manifestations of antisemitism:
- Calling for, aiding, or justifying the killing of harming of Jewish people, often in the name of a radical ideology or an extremist view of religion;
- Making mendacious, dehumanizing, demonizing, or stereotypical allegations about Jewish people or the power of Jewish people as a collective, especially, but not exclusively, the myth about a world Jewish conspiracy or of Jewish people controlling the media, economy, government, or other societal institutions; and
- Accusing Jewish people as a whole or the State of Israel of inventing or exaggerating the Holocaust.
- Demonizing Israel by using the symbols and images associated with classic antisemitism to characterize Israel or Israeli people, drawing comparisons of contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis, or blaming Israel for all inter-religious or political tensions;
- Delegitimizing Israel by denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination and denying Israel the right to exist;
- Applying a double standard to Israel by requiring behavior of Israel that is not expected or demanded of any other democratic nation, or focusing peace or human-rights investigations only on Israel; and
- Clarifying that criticism of Israel that is similar to criticism toward any other country may not be regarded as antisemitic.
A Jewish student at Tufts University found a swastika affixed to the door of his dorm room.Los Angeles Times Corrects After Calling Jordan Valley ‘Palestinian Territory’
The swastika was discovered Sunday night when the student returned to his room, according to a letter Tuesday from President Anthony Monaco to the school community.
Monaco called the incident a “cowardly act of hatred and ignorance.”
“It is a direct attack on our Jewish community and an affront to our values as an institution,” he wrote.
Campus police and the school’s Office of Equal Opportunity are investigating, he said.
Monaco noted the incident at the beginning of a scheduled address on the suburban Boston campus by Holocaust scholar Deborah Lipstadt, who spoke Tuesday evening to a standing-room-only crowd about the rise in anti-Semitic rhetoric in the country.
Lipstadt, whose most recent book is “Antisemitism: Here and Now,” praised the university’s unambiguous and forthright response, but also sounded a note of caution about painting Tufts as a place where there is anti Semitism. She said it is important to “keep things in perspective” so that it doesn’t “make it seem more dire than it is.”
"This was an attempt to intimidate a Jewish student," Rabbi Tzvi Backman of the Rohr Chabad House that serves Tufts students, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
Noga Tarnopolsky, who, along with Laura King, wrote today’s story, herself rightly referred to the West Bank as “disputed” in a Dec. 15, 2017 article. Similarly, an Associated Press article reproduced in the LA Times on Aug. 20, 2019 referred to the West Bank, along with eastern Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip, as “territories the Palestinians want for a future state.” This too is correct. Josh Mitnick, formerly of The Los Angeles Times, also used similar precise language in 2017, referring to the West Bank as “which Palestinians claim as the site of a future state.”Moroccan article ridicules Israeli support for Amazighen
If the West Bank were simply Israeli-occupied Palestinian territory, in particular territory belonging to another sovereign state and acquired by aggression, then Israel would be required to withdraw and no negotiations would have been necessary. But since Israel is the obligatory military occupational authority, having won the territory from Jordan in a war of self-defense in 1967 and retained them in a similar conflict in 1973, and competing claims remain unresolved, the West Bank is land Palestinians want for a future state, and land at least some of which many Israelis claim for Israel.
In response to communication from CAMERA, editors issued a speedy and forthright correction to the digital edition, changing the reference to “Palestinian territory” to simply “territory.” Moreover, the following correction appears prominently at the top of the article:
An earlier version of this article incorrectly referred to “Palestinian territory” in the Jordan Valley. The land in question was seized from Jordan in 1967 and has been occupied by Israel. Palestinians want it as part of a future state.
CAMERA previously prompted correction of the identical error at The Washington Post. The Post’s Sept. 6, 2014 correction stated:
A Sept. 5 A-section article about Jordan agreeing to buy natural gas from Israel incorrectly referred to Israel’s occupation of ‘Palestinian lands’ in the West Bank. The Israeli-occupied territories are disputed lands that Palestinians want for a future Palestinian state.
Morocco World News has been poohpooh-ing an article in The Times of Israel about an Israeli called Martha Retthig who is giving financial support to an Amazigh (Berber) called Mohamed. The implication is that the Zionists are trying to subvert Morocco's quiet Atlas villages and to foster Amazigh nationalism which, it claims, only a small minority supports. In order to affirm Moroccan loyalty to the Palestinian cause, the article alleges that relations between Morocco and Israel are going through a rough patch.City council candidate in Idaho running to ‘challenge Jewish power'
Mohamed’s village and his last name are not revealed because, the Israeli paper writes, his university teachers and friends—and even perhaps his neighbors—will surely harm him if they knew that he is pro-Israel or his family and education is sustained by Israeli generosity.
“Some people here are crazy and I’m afraid for my safety. Please don’t use my pics or family name I beg you, because it’s serious here,” Mohamed told the newspaper shortly before they ran the report.
What is “serious,” the piece comments throughout, is both the unbearable lives of the village-dwelling Amazigh and the supposed Arab supremacy under which they live. They have been “Arabized” and “Islamized” and are denied access to Morocco’s most visible jobs and government positions, the kinds of promotion that bring political and economic clout.
Rettig and Mohamed met on Facebook and the Israeli woman was immediately “touched” by his life story. But implied in the larger narrative of the story is a supposed historical affinity between Jews and Berbers. This is based on the claim that Islam and Arabs somehow constitute an existential threat to the survival of both peoples.
Patrick Little, a known white supremacist who espouses antisemitic views, is lowering his sights after running for the U.S. Senate and flirting with a 2020 presidential candidacy.ADL: ‘Internationalization’ of White Supremacism Grows, Fueling Hate Crimes
Little is running for a City Council seat in Garden City, Idaho, a Boise suburb. He filed his candidacy form and will run as a Republican, Little told the Idaho Press.
“The only way to challenge Jewish power in this country now is with local elections because it would have to be word of mouth,” he said Tuesday.
Little told the newspaper that the “top priority” of the Jewish people is to displace white people specifically, and that he believes Jews control the media, the entertainment industry and politics.
He had a brief run for the presidency as a “Nationally Social Democratic American Patriot Republican,” according to his campaign’s webpage. His platform included a plan to require the death penalty for any politician introducing a bill to provide aid to Israel and to introduce “a bill in the Senate making it illegal to raise funds for any foundation related to the perpetuating of propaganda related to a ‘holocaust,’ formally making the U.S.’s stance on ‘the holocaust’ that it is a ‘Jewish war atrocity propaganda hoax that never happened.’”
Little was endorsed by former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke for his California Senate run. He was banned from the state Republican Party convention.
The report, titled “Hate Beyond Borders: The Internationalization of White Supremacy,” chronicles how American white supremacists are coordinating with foreign counterparts to export their message and activities by meeting online and in person, sharing ideas and tactics, and recruiting new followers.Entire NJ Congressional Delegation Condemns Trenton Council President’s Anti-Semitic Remarks
The report profiles 18 European influencers and nearly a dozen white-supremacist leaders from the United States and Canada who are having a major effect on one another and on the white-supremacy movement internationally.
Several factors that have aided the internationalization of white supremacy are also identified.
According to ADL’s report, “American and foreign white supremacists are increasingly coordinating their activities and messaging, and this newfound collaboration has led to a cross-pollinating of ideas, jointly holding events and conferences, and building a global network of followers both online and off. Global white supremacist ideology is easily disseminated across borders on various social media platforms, and noxious anti-immigrant and pro-white rhetoric are finding their way into mainstream politics and society.”
“This activity has fueled a rise in hate crimes and antisemitism in both the US and in Europe as minority communities—particularly, Jews, Muslims and immigrants—are increasingly threatened with racism, antisemitism, xenophobia and nativism.”
The report is a collaboration between ADL and extremism researchers from anti-hate organizations in five European countries.
Every House member from New Jersey (there are 12) on Wednesday condemned the anti-Semitic remarks made last Saturday by Trenton Council President Kathy McBride, NJ.com reported.NJ politician apologizes for use of anti-Semitic trope
McBride said during an executive session of the council in early September that a city attorney had been able to “Jew her down” in negotiations over a lawsuit settlement.
Trenton Mayor Reed Gusciora emailed McBride: “It has come to my attention that on September 5, 2019, at the Executive Session of City Council to discuss settlement of a claim for personal injuries, you said that a member of our Law Department was ‘able to wait her out and Jew her down’ to some lesser amount than she would have somehow been entitled to make otherwise.”
Gusciora continued: “This anti-Semitic remark, particularly about an attorney in our law department that happens to be Jewish should have no place in our public discourse. I hope that after reflection you would apologize for these remarks.”
The city council president in New Jersey's capital city apologized Tuesday for using an anti-Semitic trope while discussing actions taken by the city's Jewish attorney.ADL Offers $10,000 Reward for Info on Attackers Who Beat Orthodox Jew in Brooklyn
Trenton City Council President Kathy McBride said at a council hearing she was sorry for the language she used.
"I am apologizing to the community at large," said McBride, a Democrat, according to The Trentonian newspaper. "Because in my position you cannot make anyone feel insulted or you cannot be insensitive to any ethnic backgrounds, so I am apologizing to the community at large."
McBride's comments were initially made in a closed-door session of the council on Sept. 5, but became public after a local newspaper, The Trentonian, obtained an audio recording.
On the recording, McBride is heard expressing concern over a $22,000 legal settlement that the city struck with a woman who sued over an injury suffered on a city sidewalk.
"I'm sad for her that they were able to wait her out and Jew her down for $22,000 with pins in her knee that can never, ever be repaired," McBride said.
The ADL is offering a $10,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of a group of men who beat and robbed an Orthodox Jew in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, on Tuesday.
The attack was caught on video, which shows an Orthodox man walking alone at night who is then set upon by several men. They begin beating him and pursue him as he flees.
The attackers apparently demanded the victim’s belongings before attacking him.
The incident was only the latest in a series of such assaults against identifiably Orthodox Jews in Brooklyn. Statistics show a serious rise in antisemitic hate crimes in New York City.
The ADL announced its reward in a press release, and its New York and New Jersey regional director, Evan R. Bernstein, said, “The video footage of this violent encounter is incredibly disturbing, and we are glad that the NYPD Hate Crimes Task Force is assisting in the investigation of this horrific crime.”
“This incident comes at a time when visibly observant Jewish individuals are unable to walk the streets of Brooklyn without feeling fearful that they may be assaulted or attacked because of their religion or faith,” he added.
“This is completely unacceptable and contrary to everything we stand for as New Yorkers,” said Bernstein. “The violence must stop now.”
With another violent antisemitic attack on an identifiable Jew last night, it’s all the more imperative that New Yorkers come together to denounce this hatred & demand proper protection!— Dov Hikind (@HikindDov) September 18, 2019
Join the rally against antisemitism this Sun, 9/22, 12pm at City Hall Park (249 Broadway) pic.twitter.com/uxpAcZBPk0
Annual Crown Heights unity festival takes on greater significance after attacks
At the end of August, the New York Police Department Hate Crimes Task Force investigated an alleged anti-Semitic attack near Brower Park in the Crown Heights neighborhood of Brooklyn.Miami Holocaust survivors urge Congress to let them sue European insurance companies
Someone had allegedly thrown a block of ice at a Hasidic man driving a car. It was the second allegedly anti-Semitic attack that week, coming days after an assailant had bashed a Hasidic man’s head with a brick.
Two weeks later, at the same park, the famously fraught neighborhood projected a much different image: one of a diverse and peaceful community.
At a community festival on Sunday, a popular Orthodox Jewish children’s singer shared the stage with a Caribbean dance group on stilts. Jewish and African-American children played together on a closed-off street. And inside a tent behind the stage, attendees sat in a circle and discussed contentious issues like hate crimes and gun violence.
This was the fourth annual #OneCrownHeights festival, but it felt especially relevant this year following a string of attacks on Orthodox Jews in Brooklyn that has heightened tensions in the area.
Crown Heights, a majority African-American neighborhood with a sizable Hasidic Jewish community and a growing population of hipsters, was the site of some of those attacks.
The president of the Holocaust Survivors of Miami-Dade County wants to allow survivors and their families to use the courts to get payouts from European insurance companies for policies that were upended by Nazi Germany.Righting a Holocaust-era wrong in Serbia
And after years of advocacy from South Florida lawmakers, David Mermelstein might have the White House on his side.
Mermelstein was sent to Auschwitz when he was 16 years old and was the only member of his family to survive the Holocaust. After two years in a displaced persons camp, Mermelstein came to the United States in 1948, met his wife in New York, and then decided to stay in Miami for the rest of his life after honeymooning there.
Now, 75 years after leaving Auschwitz, the 90-year-old Mermelstein is pushing to get a law passed that gives Holocaust survivors the right to use the U.S. court system to compel private European insurance companies to look through their own records and pay out the money owed to survivors and their families, which could total up to $25 billion when factoring in compound interest over time.
“Without action by Congress, the insurance companies will be the heirs of the victims of the Holocaust,” Mermelstein said. “This is unacceptable.”
After the killing of Naboth and the seizure of his vineyard, Elijah thundered at Ahab, “Hast thou murdered and also inherited?”Muslim World League leader to travel to Auschwitz with Jewish, Christian delegation
That Bible story found chilling modern-day expression in the dispossession of Jewish property that was part and parcel of the annihilation of European Jewry in the Holocaust. The lure of plundering Jewish assets was often a catalyst for the involvement of local citizens and collaborationist authorities in killing their Jewish neighbors or subjects, and the Holocaust became the greatest act of larceny in modern history.
Seventy-five years after the war ended, the fast-dwindling number of survivors and heirs are still seeking recognition and restitution for their material losses – often to no avail. Certainly, one of the best models in modern Europe for equitable legislation to contend with these claims can be found in an unlikely place: Serbia.
In the spring of 1941, Germany quickly and ruthlessly subjugated Yugoslavia. The multi-ethnic kingdom of the South Slavs was carved into several territorial units, parts of which were occupied by Germany, Italy, Hungary and Bulgaria. Croatia was granted independence and spun off as a German satellite.
Serbia fell under direct German control, and its Jews were immediately subjected to the full force of the Nazis’ murderous anti-Jewish policies. In May 1942, after presiding over the slaughter of the Jews held in the Sajmište camp, SS-Standartenführer Emanuel Schäefer hastened to cable Berlin that Belgrade was the only European capital that was now Judenrein, “cleansed of Jews.” The destruction of the Jews of Serbia, including in a gas vans specially imported for this purpose, was accompanied by the wholesale plunder of Jewish assets, both private and communal, movable and immovable.
In an effort to promote religious tolerance and understanding between the world's great monotheistic religions, the Chief Rabbinate of France, the Council of Christian Churches in France (Catholics, Protestants, and Orthodox) and the Muslim World League will all embark on an extraordinary trip to Auschwitz next year.Ukraine plans to implement Magen David Adom EMS model
According to Agence France-Presse, delegations from these three parties "will travel jointly to Auschwitz in the first quarter of 2020 on the occasion of the 75th anniversary of the liberation of the Nazi death camps."
The visit was confirmed during the annual International Peace Conference, currently being held in the Netherlands, which also brought together high-level religious leaders from around the world.
"This is the first time that dignitaries of the MWL will go there," said Ghaleb Bencheikh, President of the Foundation of Islam of France.
A "Memorandum of Understanding and Friendship between the Three Monotheistic Religions" was also signed between the three parties during the conference, which commits to fighting against "extremism and terrorism."
"The parties pledge to promote freedom of conscience and religious freedom," the text stated.
The journey looks to provide "young Jews, Christians and Muslims tools for reflection and places of training to address the problems of the contemporary world and address the ethical challenges that face especially young people," the statement adds.
When Mikhail Radotsky’s mother became ill, Radotsky – adviser to the Ukrainian president for health and medical affairs – brought his ailing parent to Israel for treatment.Israeli researchers identify biblical kingdom of Edom
He was so impressed by the Israeli healthcare system’s “professionalism and efficiency” – in particular the Magen David Adom (MDA) national emergency medical and disaster service – that Radotsky later promised his mother on her deathbed that “we would try to bring to Ukraine what we saw here in MDA.”
Radotsky, who also holds the title of head of the Ukrainian State Health Committee, was in Israel this month along with Sergiy Shefir, first assistant to the president of Ukraine, to learn more about MDA’s technology and methods in order to “improve response and arrival times in Ukraine.”
The two surveyed MDA’s system for quickly activating volunteers and the organization’s range of rescue vehicles, including mobile intensive care ambulances and mini electric vehicles. They also toured MDA’s emergency ambulance driving simulation system.
“We believe that by using your technologies, we will be able to shorten patient arrival times in Ukraine, thereby saving lives,” Radotsky said after the visit.
The biblical kingdom of Edom has always been a significant puzzle for biblical archaeology. Although evidence is supplied in the Bible, the archaeological record has always had trouble interpreting the text, which said that it existed as a kingdom long before the kings of Israel.The State of Israel イスラエル国 Anime Intro
But research has uncovered the untold story of a thriving and wealthy society in the Arava Desert – in parts of Israel and Jordan – that existed during the 12th-11th centuries BCE.
“Using technological evolution as a proxy for social processes, we were able to identify and characterize the emergence of the biblical kingdom of Edom,” explained Tel Aviv University’s Prof. Ezra Ben-Yosef, who led the study with Prof. Tom Levy of the University of California, San Diego. “Our results prove it happened earlier than previously thought and in accordance with the biblical description.”
According to the study, which was published on Wednesday on the site of the scientific journal PLOS ONE, the kingdom’s wealth appears to have been built on a “hi-tech network” of copper, the most valuable resource in the region at the time. Copper was used in ancient times to craft weapons and tools, and the production process for copper is incredibly complex.
“Copper smelting was essentially the hi-tech of ancient times,” Ben-Yosef told The Jerusalem Post.
Using a methodology called the punctuated equilibrium model, the research team analyzed findings from ancient copper mines in Jordan and Israel to create a timeline of the evolution of copper production from 1300-800 BCE. The investigation found a significant decrease of copper in the slag – the waste of copper extraction by smelting – at the Arava site, implying that the process became more efficient and streamlined.
Researchers say the more efficient process was a result of the military invasion of Pharaoh Shoshenq I of Egypt (the biblical “Shishak”), who sacked Jerusalem in the 10th century BCE. Rather than result in destruction in the region, the researchers argue that it instead sparked a “technological leap” in copper production and trade.
Here’s everything we know about this video clip which compresses Israel, the election campaign and lots and lots of Benjamin Netanyahu, including an amazing martial arts bout between the PM and Avigdor Liberman (don’t ask).
According to Google Translate, イスラエル国 means “Israel,” pronounced “Isuraeru kuni.”
Directed & Motion Graphics: Akim Dolinsky & Theo Dolev
Produced: FRANKENDO
Based on the manga: ALTNEULAND by Benjamin Ze’ev Herzel
Main Illustrator: Vu Dinh Lan
2nd Illustrator: Art0ni – Daniel Johnson
So, without further ado, the State of Israel Anime Intro.
2 years ago today, an IDF humanitarian delegation of 71 soldiers and officers flew to #Mexico after it was struck by a 7.1 magnitude earthquake.
— Israel Defense Forces (@IDF) September 19, 2019
Saving lives should know no borders.
🇮🇱🇲🇽 pic.twitter.com/eOTF3lMX0k
