Monday, November 11, 2019
Reclaiming the term ‘Zionism’
THE term “Zionist” has been stripped of its true meaning and instead become a term of infamy and curse, Alex Ryvchin says.Shmuley Boteach: This Code Pink Leader Is a Shameless Liar
This distortion is the motivation behind the Executive Council of Australian Jewry co-CEO’s just released second book, Zionism – The Concise History, which tells the history of the Jewish people from their origins in biblical Israel to their exile and the formation of the national movement that led to their return nearly two millennia later.
It examines the leaders who shaped the Zionist movement and events that impacted on it, including Chaim Weizmann’s wartime service to the British, the Dreyfus Affair, the emergence of Jerusalem mufti Haj Amin Al-Husseini and the impact of the pogroms and the Holocaust.
“It is vital that our young people understand the story of Zionism, which is not only inspiring, but is inextricably linked to every phase of Jewish history, and as such, forms a fundamental part of Jewish identity,” Ryvchin said.
“It is an organic expression of two core aspects of the Jewish people – our peoplehood and our connection to our ancestral lands.”
He said the consequence of allowing deliberate distortions of the meaning of Zionism to go unchallenged is that new generations “will only know of Zionism and Zionists as an evil to be fought”.
“The movement to liberate or at least shelter the Jewish people from antisemitism, the movement that seeks nothing more than to give the Jews a scrap of land to call their own, to ensure that the Jewish people and their contributions to humanity shall not vanish from this earth – somehow this has become akin to racism, to Nazism, to colonialism, to white supremacism, and every other popular conception of evil known today,” he said.
“These are lies that cannot be allowed to be laundered into truth.”
Last week, my organization, the World Values Network, hosted a discussion with Yair Netanyahu, son of the Israeli prime minister, and one of Israel’s best-known young social media influences.On the Anniversary of Kristallnacht and the Fall of the Berlin Wall, Remembering East Germany’s Jews
I’m a free speech absolutist and consider the First Amendment to be inviolate. I am so proud of countries like the United States and Israel for ensuring that people can speak their mind without fear of government censorship or arrest.
I allowed Ariel Gold, National Co-Director of Code Pink, to attend our event. As she entered the talk, someone spotted her and a spirited debate ensued between our organizers and security as to whether she would remain. Everyone was sure she would try and destroy the event.
So I walked up to her, and asked if she planned to disrespect our speaker and destroy the talk. She told me, and other organizers, that her sole desire was to listen and take notes. I asked her again for her commitment to not disrupt. She looked me in the eye and gave me her word. And I took her at her word. She, however, did not keep her word — and tried to ruin our event.
It turns out that in addition to Ariel Gold’s repulsive views on Israel and role as an apologist for Iran, she is also an inveterate liar who has the nerve to look people right in the eye and lie. Even after I spoke to her privately, I extracted a public commitment from her — only to witness Gold get up with scores of other protesters to try and destroy a free speech event because they disagreed with the views of our guest.
Gold would later say on her Twitter feed that she protested alone and did not lead the others. But she’s a confirmed liar, as we all saw. So why believe anything she says?
As a religious man, I have debated some of the world’s most famous atheists, like Richard Dawkins and the late Christopher Hitchens. As a pro-Israel activist, I have debated some of the world’s leading Palestinian apologists, including Peter Beinart and Hussein Ibish. All of these debates have been respectful, and we did not try to shut each other up.
It was mid-September 1988, and while shuffling through the mail in my Budapest apartment, I came upon an oversize envelope inviting me, as a journalist, to cover the events of the 50th anniversary of Kristallnacht on Nov. 9 in Berlin. That was not unusual since the city of West Berlin and the rest of the Federal Republic—West Germany—marked the event in scores of towns, villages and cities. As well they should, of course.PodCast: The Fifth Column 159 - w/ Bari Weiss "How to Fight Anti-Semitism, Shifting Political Baggage"
I did a double take. This envelope came from the press office of the East German government, the German Democratic Republic, and after a few phone calls to friends in the press corps in West Germany, they were as surprised as I was.
When did the GDR start commemorating Kristallnacht, I asked a friend at Reuters in Budapest, who called his bureau in West Berlin.
“You mean in its entire 38-year history?”
“Yes,” I said.
“Never.”
Word was that Erich Honecker, head of East Germany’s Communist Party, was trying to secure legitimacy for his country, and since Romania’s dictator, Nicolae Ceausescu, had managed to secure Most Favored Nation Trading status from the United States—mostly because he allowed the Jewish community to function and receive financial support from America—Honecker was keen to deal a Jewish card he’d never played before.
And did he ever play it. Over a two-day period in East Berlin there would be an exhibition on the history of Jews in Berlin (the first in East Germany’s history), a special session of the East German parliament, a rededication of the giant, ruined synagogue on Oranienburgerstrasse, which was going to be rebuilt as a Jewish museum, and an evening performance by the Berlin Symphony Orchestra.
Honecker would never see a return on his investment, because exactly one year later, on Nove. 9, 1989, Berliners would be tearing away at the Berlin Wall, and he himself would be sitting at home, watching history unfold on TV. Having been fired a few weeks earlier, he would soon be on trial and the German Democratic Republic would be erased from the map.
But that lay in the future. It was fall, 1988, I had my permission, an official invitation, and a few weeks later I drove up from my home in Budapest to East Berlin, arriving on Nov. 9.
GUEST: Bari Weiss
Op-Ed Staff Editor and Writer @ The New York Times
Author, "How to Fight Anti-Semitism" (2019)
Small talk till about 14min
Natan Sharansky says that @jeremycorbyn’s & his supporters stance on Israel & Zionism is similar to the antisemitic rhetoric used by Stalin. We should listen to him.
— (((GnasherJew®גנאשר))) (@GnasherJew) November 10, 2019
Natan spent 9 years in a soviet gulag.#VoteLabourVoteRacism #NeverCorbyn https://t.co/a07nelr6lt
Jeremy Corbyn reads the words of fallen Jewish soldier-poet but fails to understand his message
Yet one would have to question whether Rosenberg would approve of the use to which his words are being put today.
Rosenberg, born 1890, was the son of Barnett and Anna Rosenberg, poor Lithuanian Orthodox Jews who had fled to Britain from Tsarist-controlled Lithuania a few years before their son was born.
Isaac left school at a young age to support his impoverished family. In 1915, unable to find work, he enlisted in the British army, despite having moral objections against warfare and the idea of killing his fellow man, and asked for half his earnings to be sent to his mother.
In June 1916 Rosenberg was deployed to the trenches of France on the Western Front, where, like a huge portion of his whole generation, he would meet his end on the Somme in early 1918.
Yet throughout his life and service, Rosenberg never forgot his Jewish identity – or the brutal antisemitism faced by his family and people. Rosenberg wrote many poems with distinctly Jewish themes and subjects, including ‘The Burning of the Temple,’ ‘The Destruction of Jerusalem by the Babylonian Hordes,’ and ‘Moses: A Play’.
In his famous collection Poems from Camp and Trench, which includes ‘In The Trenches’, there is also a lesser known poem entitled simply ‘The Jew’. The Jew is a moving piece about the anti-Jewish sentiment and hostility Rosenberg experienced fighting alongside his comrades:
See the full clip of @jeremycorbyn talking about Jewish socialists frm the east end who are now zionists and not quite somehow British.
— AngloAmericanDad (@angloyankdad) November 10, 2019
Issac Rosenberg was an east end Jewish socialist and a Zionist.
By quoting him now he adds insult to injury.
pic.twitter.com/rLLg0YzVWt
UK Jewish Paper Publishes Editorial Urging Non-Jews Not to Vote for Jeremy Corbyn
The United Kingdom’s Jewish Chronicle published a front-page editorial message to non-Jews expressing Jewish concerns about Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn possibly becoming prime minister.Corbyn Sides with Outed Corrupt Bolivian President
“Putting oneself in the shoes of another person, or another group, can be difficult. But we believe it is important—and urgent—that you do that,” the paper said, citing a recent poll that found 87 percent of British Jews consider Corbyn to be an antisemite.
“Throughout his career, he has allied with and supported antisemites such as Paul Eisen, Stephen Sizer and Raed Salah. He has described organizations like Hamas, whose founding charter commits it to the extermination of every Jew on the planet, as his ‘friends.’ He has laid a wreath to honor terrorists who have murdered Jews. He has insulted ‘Zionists’—the word used by antisemites when they mean ‘Jew’ because they think it allows them to get away with it—as lacking understanding of ‘English irony.’”
That is why we are seeking your attention. If this man is chosen as our next prime minister, the message will be stark,” the editorial concluded.
Meanwhile, two former Labour Party MPs are telling voters ahead of the country’s election on Dec. 13 to support current British Prime Minister Boris Johnson and stop Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn from becoming prime minister.
Ian Austin, who left the party in February over claims that it failed to do enough to tackle antisemitism, said in an interview with BBC Radio 4 on Thursday, “I think Jeremy Corbyn is completely unfit to lead our country. Completely unfit to lead the Labour Party. … It’s really come to something when I tell decent, traditional, patriotic Labour voters that they should be voting for Boris Johnson in this election. I can’t believe it’s come to this, but that’s where we are.”
Jeremy Corbyn has once again found himself siding with a distasteful cabal of communists in defending the now former-Bolivian president, Evo Morales, who has just resigned amid national protests over his corrupt election win. So far only Cuba and Venezuela have come out in support of Morales…Labour Candidate Claimed Mural Isn't Anti-Semitic
Having initially congratulated Morales’s election victory – despite the Organisation of American States refusing to certify the election due to systematic flaws – Corbyn yesterday doubled down on his support, claiming he had been forced from office by the military. As the Foreign Secretary has said, he’s put Marxist solidarity ahead of democracy…
Corbyn claims the resignation of Morales is a defeat for democracy and social justice; an incredible accusation given a 2010 US State Department report into human rights abuses in Bolivia noted
“killings and torture by security forces; harsh prison conditions; allegations of arbitrary arrest and detention; an ineffective, overburdened, and corrupt judiciary; a ‘partly free’ media; corruption and a lack of transparency in the government; trafficking in persons; child labor; forced or coerced labor; and harsh working conditions in the mining sector“
Jeremy Corbyn’s candidate in Jacqui Smith’s old seat of Redditch used to be very active on her now-deleted Facebook account. Amongst Rebecca Jenkins’ many questionable posts was writing “Hear hear!” to a reproduction of the mural Corbyn infamously defended. The post she shared was asking “Where in this picture is it antisemistsm”…Exclusive: 'Israel lobby' row erupts among Labour MP's supporters
Corbyn himself acknowledged the mural was “deeply disturbing and anti-Semitic”, while claiming he hadn’t looked at it properly, on March 23, 2018. Six days later, on March 29, Rebecca Jenkins was claiming she couldn’t see any anti-Semitism in the picture…
In addition to this, Jenkins’ facebook feed included calling the Royal Family ‘scroungers’, sharing a fake anti-Churchill quote, and dismissing Jewish people’s concerns about Jeremy Corbyn as ‘media manipulation’. She remains the candidate in one of Labour’s target seats…
Labour candidate Margaret Greenwood's campaign to retain her Wirral West seat at next month's general election has been rocked by an "Israeli lobby" row among her own supporters.Cars and homes in Canvey Island daubed with swastikas and “Jews out!” graffiti
Messages leaked to the JC from the Margaret4WW Campaign WhatsApp group show how tensions flared last Wednesday after an activist wrote in support of the then suspended Labour MP Chris Williamson.
With the decision made that day on whether Mr Williamson could stand as a Labour candidate in Derby North, a local activist who called himself JET on the social media group, wrote: "He MUST be reinstated otherwise we may as well hand over control of the Party to the Israeli lobby."
In an angry intervention the secretary of West Wirral constituency Labour Party wrote to the 115 members of the Margaret4WW WhatsApp group saying:"I hope you will all understand that it doesn't help Margaret if we don't focus on the manifesto and her excellent record."
But the CLP secretary, known as Gail, added that while two people had been removed from the group after being asked to stop posting messages regarding Mr Williamson: "We are not removing anyone for supporting Williamson.
"We have asked that this group focus on getting Margaret re-elected."
Cars and homes in Essex’s Canvey Island have been daubed with swastikas and slogans such as “Jews out!” The swastikas were drawn the wrong way around.While Hunting for Own Whistleblower, ABC News Brings in Anti-Semite to Push False Whistleblower Narrative
The graffiti was sprayed on the homes and vehicles between late last night and early this morning.
Today is Remembrance Sunday, when the nation remembers those who lost their lives fighting against the Nazis and other enemies.
Canvey Island has a growing Jewish population as Jews in north London bringing up young families move to areas where property prices are lower. Local residents have mostly been very welcoming towards their Jewish neighbours.
An Essex Police spokesperson said: “We are investigating after several reports of criminal damage to cars in Ferrymead, Canvey Island overnight. We were called this morning, Sunday 10 November, to reports that vehicles had been sprayed with racist and anti-Semitic graffiti. If you have not yet spoken to us about damage to your vehicle please call [the police on] 101 and quote incident number 307 of today’s date.”
What do you do after you got a woman fired, in a frantic search for the whistleblower who exposed your cover-up of the Epstein story, merely because she accessed the footage, enabling the ABC News employee who did pass the video along to Project Veritas to do so?J Street Radicalization: Conference Speaker compares Netanyahu to Louis Farrakhan and stands by Tamika Mallory
If you're ABC News, you bring in Valerie Plame, an anti-Semitic relic, to push the Trump whistleblower narrative.
This is ABC News.
In discussing Ukraine whistleblower, former CIA officer Valerie Plame calls her own outing 'devastating' - ABC News
Let's see.
1. Plame wasn't a whistleblower. Her supposed outing was nonsense. Her name was never leaked. And false claims continue to be repeated about it.
2. Plame however is a racist.
While on the board [of the pro-Iran deal] Ploughshares Fund, Plame used her Twitter account to promote an article by another former CIA officer titled “America’s Jews Are Driving America’s Wars.” When decent people objected, she . . . added [that the article was] “very provocative, but thoughtful. Many neocon hawks ARE Jewish. . . . Read the entire article and try, just for a moment, to put aside your biases and think clearly.” The “thoughtful” article at issue asserted that Jews “own the media,” Jews should wear labels while on national television, and their beliefs are as dangerous as “a bottle of rat poison.”
ABC News makes no mention of the fact that the news network is promoting a racist who is running for public office.
J Street is a group that calls itself “pro-Israel.” Yet “J Street’s critics argue that J Street is nothing more than a Trojan horse meant to weaken American support for Israel.” As we wrote in 2009:Antisemite Of The Week: Linda Sarsour - Brooklyn's Biggest Bigot
J-Street is a ruse. We’ve seen this before. Only Israel is wrong. Only Israel is brought up on charges when it defends itself. Only the Jewish people’s millennial history in the Holy Land is illegitimate, while the Palestinians’ 40-year old national identity is sacrosanct.
After years of denials by J Street, in 2010 it was revealed that George Soros provided seed money to launch J Street as well as continued funding. Yet despite this history, the well-funded J Street has worked its way into the Democratic Party mainstream, backing Democratic candidates through its political action affiliate.
Yet has J Street really changed? If its recent national conference is any indication, J Street has become even more radical.
This year’s national conference was held at the Walter E. Convention Center located in Washington, D.C., on Oct. 27-29. Numerous Democratic presidential candidates and senior politicians attended.
A session about the “Impact of Identity” was doomed from the start when a J Street introductory speaker accused Jews of upholding “white supremacy quite often.” Reflecting this position, the session name had been changed from discussing the “African-American Jews’ Relationships with Israel” to a more accusatory title, “Black Jews are still systematically excluded from Jewish life, especially in the Palestine conversation in our Jewish communities.”
Linda Sarsour is a Brooklyn born and based, controversial Palestinian-American activist who is highly adept at promoting herself. She seems to always be at center stage, availing herself of photo-ops, and procuring prestigious platforms from which to preach anti-American and antisemitic views.Craig Considine to Appear with Hate Preacher Siraj Wahhaj
How does she do this? She attaches herself to trendy, progressive causes, like “Occupy Wall Street,” “Women’s March on Washington,” or “Black Lives Matter,” proclaiming herself a “person of color” – although she is white; a “feminist”, although she is an apologist for sexism in Islamic countries who defends Female Genital Mutilation while attacking Survivor Ayaan Hirsi Ali and saying: I Would Take Her ‘Vagina Away’, and a crusader for whatever cause du jour is in vogue.
Far from the tolerant, inclusive bridge-builder she pretends to be, Sarsour has been known to use her public platforms to spew antisemitism, and promote hatred towards the State of Israel. One thousand Rabbis recent accused Linda Sarsour of ‘Peddling in Antisemitic Falsehood’ and iconic singer Courtney Love called her an ‘Anti-Semitic Terrorist’
Sarsour is a strong proponent of the terror affiliated Jew-hatred Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign that delegitimizes the Jewish state— a campaign that is widely recognized as antisemitic in nature globally. Yet Linda Sarsour continues to defend, justify and promote BDS, characterizing it simply as a “free speech” issue.
Presuming herself the arbiter of participation in the feminist movement, she uses her leadership "roles" to reject anyone who supports Israel - "Is there room for people who support the state of Israel and do not criticize it in the movement? There can’t be in feminism."
Wahhaj is a telling choice. Not only was he named as an unindicted co-conspirator in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, but he has raised funds for the Benevolence International Foundation — designated a "financier of terrorism" by the U.S. Treasury for raising funds for Al Qaeda — called gays "cursed," and described non-Muslims as "corrupt" and "foul."
It's obvious that Wahhaj condemns people, argues over theology, excludes "Others," and enters debates to win. He also warns of hellfire and, for good measure, calls for stoning adulterers.
When Considine highlights the traits he doesn't like — by identifying them as actions that Jesus wouldn't do — it would appear that this a standard he applies only to Christians. If he meant to discourage excluding "Others" categorically, he wouldn't be appearing with — and validating — an Islamist like Siraj Wahhaj.
Two European #BDS activists thought they would have some fun and film and harass #IDF soldiers standing guard in #Hebron.
— Im Tirtzu (@IMTIzionism) November 10, 2019
But what they didn't know was that Im Tirtzu CEO, @matanp2, was in Hebron leading a tour of the city and caught them in the act.
WATCH what happens next. pic.twitter.com/uw74euqYgr
Guardian gets it wrong on Palestinian residents of Jerusalem (Update)
Oliver Holmes has been the Guardian’s Jerusalem correspondent for nearly two years, yet, as he shows in a recent article about the Jerusalem neighborhood of Kafr Aqab, he still often fails to grasp some basic facts about the holy city.
Here’s the relevant paragraph from the piece, “Jerusalem’s ‘love neighbourhood’: a refuge for star-crossed Palestinians”, Nov. 10th:
Under Israel’s chaotically complex occupation, Palestinians are divided into multiple categories, often dictated by where they reside. Near the top of the bureaucratic hierarchy are Palestinians in Jerusalem, a city that Israel has annexed in its entirety and claims is “undivided”. They are eligible for Israeli services and can travel in the country, although they cannot vote or be full citizens.
First, Holmes omits important context, such as the fact that, after the Six Day War when Israel united the city, all Palestinians in ‘east’ Jerusalem were offered full citizenship. The overwhelming majority declined. So, instead, they were granted permanent residency status.
Additionally, though Palestinian residents of Jerusalem they can’t vote in national elections, they can vote in municipal elections – which renders Holmes’ claim that “they cannot vote”, at best, misleading.
However, the most egregious error is Holmes’ claim that they cannot “be full citizens”. In fact, Jerusalem’s Palestinians – who have become increasingly Israeli in their identity and political aspirations – are eligible to apply for full citizenship, and thousands of such requests have been approved.
VOA Corrects BDS Support Not Illegal in Israel
Following the CAMERA-prompted correction of a Reuters article last week which erroneously reported that Israel has criminalized support for the anti-Israel BDS (boycott, divest, sanctions) campaign in Israel, CAMERA has elicited correction of the same point at Voice of America. VOA’s Nov. 4 article entitled “Israeli Supreme Greenlights Deportation of Human Rights Monitor,” had erroneously asserts that “support for BDS is illegal in Israel.” BDS refers to the anti-Israel boycott, divest and sanctions campaign.BBC News report on Jerusalem planning fails to meet impartiality guidelines
Support for BDS is not illegal in Israel.
Israel’s anti-BDS legislation treats public calls for BDS as a civil, not criminal offense. Specifically, the 2011 “Law for Prevention of Damage to the State of Israel Through Boycott,” as amended by the Supreme Court, allows businesses that have suffered economic harm as a result of such boycotts to sue for civil damages. There is no criminal component, and therefore it is not illegal.
Incidentally, the English text of the 2011 bill is helpfully provided by Adalah, an Israel-based organization which itself has engaged in BDS activity. Speaking at Cambridge University in November 2017, Adalah Justice Project Director Nadia Ben-Youssef stated:
Adalah as a Palestinian organization based in Israel – because of this law has a prohibition on it with regard to the call for BDS. The law says that if you call for boycott- it had creating a new civil wrong, you can be sued in court if you call for a boycott of Israel. So Adalah has pivoted its argument about BDS, for the right to boycott… Adalah support the right to boycott…we believe in the pillars of the BDS movement.
Thus, Adalah’s Bar-Youssef confirms that a) calling for BDS in Israel is a civil, not criminal, offense, and is therefore not illegal; and b) her own Israel-based organization supports BDS, which is not illegal.
Readers are however told nothing of that foreign funded political NGO’s “affiliations, funding and particular viewpoints” before the report moves on to promote a link to an as yet uncorrected BBC backgrounder from 2014 and highlight additional objections.BBC News coverage of terrorism in Israel – October 2019
“The Palestinian Authority and the Jordanian government – the custodian of the compound behind the Western Wall, known to Muslims as al-Haram al-Sharif (the Noble Sanctuary) and to Jews as the Temple Mount – have also expressed concern about the impact on the Old City.”
Readers then see an edited version of a problematic video made by the BBC Jerusalem bureau’s Yolande Knell in 2017 and at the end of the report they are told that:
“The status of Jerusalem goes to the heart of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Israel regards Jerusalem as its “eternal and undivided” capital, while the Palestinians claim East Jerusalem – occupied by Israel in the 1967 Middle East war – as the capital of a future state.”
As is overwhelmingly the case in BBC reporting, while the corporation adopts and uses PLO approved language such as “occupied East Jerusalem”, audiences are told nothing of the Jordanian occupation of parts of the city or of the fact that until June 1967 – as shown in Article 24 of the original PLO charter from 1964 – the Palestinians specifically stated that they had no claim to territory occupied at the time by Jordan, including the Old City of Jerusalem.
The result is that, as usual, BBC audiences are fed a politically partisan account which deliberately omits relevant context.
The Israel Security Agency’s report on terror attacks (Hebrew) during October 2019 shows that throughout the month a total of 112 incidents took place including 92 in Judea & Samaria, 16 in Jerusalem and inside the ‘green line’ and four in the Gaza Strip sector.Antisemitism reported across Europe on 81st anniversary of Kristallnacht
In Judea & Samaria and Jerusalem the agency recorded 82 attacks with petrol bombs, 14 attacks using pipe bombs, four arson attacks, one shooting attack, two stabbing attacks, one vehicular attack and one stone-throwing attack.
Incidents recorded in the Gaza Strip sector included two attacks with petrol bombs, one shooting attack and one incident of mortar fire.
Two people were wounded in attacks during October – one in a pipe bomb attack at Rachel’s Tomb on October 16th and one in a stone-throwing attack in Samaria on October 26th.
The BBC News website did not report any of the incidents which took place throughout the month.
Since the beginning of 2019 the BBC News website has covered 22.2% of the attacks which have taken place and 72.7% of the terror related fatalities. In five of those ten months no reporting on terrorism was seen at all.
As Europe marked the 81 anniversary of Kristallnacht and Remembrance Day, which commemorates the end of World War I, antisemitic incidents were rampant over the weekend.80 gravestones vandalized at Denmark Jewish cemetery
On Sunday morning, residents of Canvey Island in southern England woke up to multiple cars and garages spray-painted with antisemitic graffiti, including “Jews out,” and swastikas, all painted in red.
There were at least eight graffiti attacks between Ferrymead, Lincoln Way and Southwalter in Canvey Island.
Police confirmed on Sunday evening that they were treating the incident as a hate crime, and that investigations are under way.
Police spokeswoman Sergeant Victoria Jarvis said it was an “incredibly sad day for Canvey Island. This community has welcomed people of all backgrounds, races and religions, and for someone to publicly declare hatred of certain members of society, and damage property in doing so, is unacceptable.”
Jarvis said that local police have been working closely with local residents to raise awareness of hate crime, gather information, and have a visible presence maintained in the area to deter any further criminal activity.
On Friday evening, the Middle Street synagogue in Brighton was also vandalized with red paint just prior to the Kristallnacht anniversary on Saturday.
In Germany on Saturday, neo-Nazis gathered in both Berlin and western city of Bielefeld.
In Berlin, some 150 neo-Nazis from a far-right organization claimed that “Zionists rule Germany” and “Hitler was only a ‘contractor’ of Kristallnacht.”
Vandals desecrated more than 80 graves at a Jewish cemetery in the western Danish town of Randers, police said Sunday.On Kristallnacht anniversary, yellow stars appear on Scandinavian homes
“More than 80 gravestones were daubed with green graffiti and some were overturned” at the Ostre Kirkegard cemetery, a statement said.
“There are no symbols or words written on the gravestones but paint has been daubed on them,” the Ritzau news agency quoted police spokesman Bo Christensen as saying.
Police said a complaint had been made Saturday but they did not know when the vandalism had occurred.
Stickers shaped like yellow stars that Nazis made Jews wear during the Holocaust were placed on multiple Jewish sites in Denmark and Sweden on the Kristallnacht pogroms’ anniversary.Jerusalem to host international arts festival
In Denmark, the stickers were found on Saturday on the mailbox of Ella and Henrik Chievitz, a Jewish couple from Silkeborg, a town located 150 miles west of Copenhagen, on the home of another Jewish family in the Copenhagen area and on the Jewish cemetery of Randers, a town located some 30 miles north of Silkeborg, according to Rabbi Yitzi Loewenthal of Copenhagen.
In Sweden, the same stickers were found at the Bajit Jewish café near the Adat Jeshurun synagogue and also on the Great Synagogue of Stockholm.
Jewish buildings in Helsingborg, Sweden, where a Jewish woman was stabbed and severely injured earlier this year, and Norrkoping also received the stickers on Saturday, the 81st anniversary of the pogroms in Germany and Austria, which marked the beginning of wide-scale violence by Nazis against Jews.
Authorities in Sweden and Denmark are treating the stickers as anti-Semitic hate speech, according to Lowenthal and Aron Verstandig, president of the Council of Swedish Jewish Communities.
From international original Israeli theater to video art, music shows and stand-up comedy, the fourth annual International Jewish Festival for Contemporary Art has something for everyone.Argentina vs. Uruguay soccer match scheduled for Tel Aviv under BDS attack
Taking place from December 3-10, the festival, produced by Theater Company Jerusalem and managed by Osnat Gispan, will feature over 100 artists at Beit Mazia in Jerusalem.
Among the dozens of performances is Rega Rega, the world premiere performance of songs by Sasha Argov, created by Sasha Berger with musical arrangements by Ronit Rolan, which opens the festival.
Dani Basan, from the legendary band Tislam, will share the stories behind his songs in a performance created especially for the festival.
The Morente Forte Theatre from Brazil will present Hard Love, a play by Moti Lerner which tells the story of an ultra-Orthodox couple who suffer a traumatic divorce after Tzvi’s decision to leave the haredi world. A forced meeting 20 years later rekindles the love and passion that has not faded.
From Prague, Studio Dva Divaldlo will present the Israeli premiere of Madam Rubinstein, a sparkling comedy about the names and faces behind the glamorous world and cosmetic empires of two successful yet rival women, Helena Rubinstein and Elizabeth Arden.
The soccer match between the national teams of Argentina and Uruguay scheduled to be held later this month in Israel is under attack by the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement.With free shipping offer, Amazon launches 8th language option: Hebrew
Global soccer stars Lionel Messi from Argentina and Luis Suarez from Uruguay are in the confirmed teams to participate in the friendly match in Tel Aviv on Nov. 18. Both strikers play together on the Barcelona team in Spain’s La Liga professional soccer league.
Over the weekend, protesters demonstrated in front of the Barcelona training camp calling on the stars to cancel the sold-out match in Israel.
One year ago, a BDS campaign led to the cancellation of a match between the national teams of Argentina and Israel scheduled to be played in Jerusalem.
The official Twitter account of the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel, or PACBI, posted photos of the demonstrators in Barcelona, tweeting that “Reports confirm the players got the message loud and clear at Barcelona training ground.
Hebrew became the eighth language on Monday through which online shoppers can access the world’s largest e-commerce site, Amazon.com.Thailand’s Navy Purchases Israeli Counter-Drone System
The online retail behemoth launched a new Hebrew-language interface on Monday with a special promotion offering free shipping to Israel for some 50 million “eligible items.”
In an announcement Monday, the company said the new Hebrew “shopping experience” targeted both Israelis and Hebrew-speakers abroad, and was available on the site’s desktop, mobile browser and mobile app iterations.
Hebrew now joins English, Spanish, German, Portuguese, Korean, and simplified and traditional Chinese as options on the website’s language translation menu.
“Customers can now browse and shop in Hebrew and choose to shop in many currencies, including [New] Israeli Shekel,” the company said.
Thailand’s navy has recently acquired a counter-drone system from Israel-based Skylock Systems, the latter announced Sunday. While the financial details of the agreement were not disclosed, a person familiar with the matter who spoke to Calcalist on condition of anonymity valued the deal at NIS 15 million ($4.29 million).India Uses Israeli Drones to Combat Smuggling on Border with Bangladesh
The Thai Navy will receive the counter-drone system within the next eight months, according to the agreement.
Skylock was founded in 2018 by the Avnon Group and is based in the central Israeli town Petah Tikva. Its system enables security teams to locate and capture unauthorized drones once one has been detected. The specific system acquired by the Thai navy is designed to protect naval ports and has an operating range of 10 kilometers intended to protect their airspace.
This is not the first time Thailand has turned to Israel for counter-drone systems. In January 2018, Calcalist reported that a short-range drone defense system developed by Israeli arms manufacturer IMI Systems (Israeli Military Industries) was used for the first time by the Thai Air Force.
India's paramilitary Border Security Force (BSF) has confirmed the acquisition of Israeli-made equipment to curb illegal cross-border smuggling along the country's 4,156 km. border with Bangladesh.Filmmaker Quentin Tarantino, Israeli wife rent house in Tel Aviv
These include tethered drones, thermal imaging cameras, Electro Optical/Infrared (EO/IR) sensors, as well as pan-tilt-zoom (PTZ) cameras.
The Israeli tethered drones are equipped with day and night vision cameras that capture images over a 2 km. distance.
Screenwriter and director Quentin Tarantino and his Israeli wife Daniella Pick have rented a house for NIS 80,000 ($22,850) per month in an affluent area in northern Tel Aviv, financially daily Globes reported Monday.Holocaust survivor reunited with a baby he saved during WW2
The pair married last year in their Beverly Hills home and Pick's pregnancy was announced in late August. This is the first marriage for 56-year-old Tarantino and 35-year-old Pick.
The lavish two-story 500 square-meter (5300 square-feet) house sits on a 600 square meter (6,450 square-feet) lot and is located near the largest plaza in Tel Aviv, Kikar Hamedina. The metropolitan area is filled with boutiques, cafes, and gyms.
Daniella Pick is a singer and model, and the daughter of famous Israeli musician, Tzvika Pick. She met Tarantino while he was promoting his 2009 film in Israel, The Inglorious Basterds.
In an interview within June with Israeli media, Pick emphasized how much Tarantino enjoys being in Israel, saying, “Quentin also comes with me almost every time I fly to Israel and goes out when we’re here a lot."
Holocaust survivor Maxwell Smart has always wondered about whether a baby that he and a friend rescued during World War Two survived the conflict. A new documentary answers his lingering question.
Maxwell Smart was just nine when the war began. The boy from the Ukrainian town of Buczacz - then part of Poland - had his life turned upside down in 1939.
His story, and those of two other Canadian Holocaust survivors - Rose Lipsyzc and Helen Yermus- who are haunted by unanswered questions from their time as children during the war, is being told in a new documentary, Cheating Hitler.
Working with researchers, the filmmakers follow the survivors as they travel back to old hometowns, to killing sites, and to hiding places from the war as they seek out answers.
For Mr Smart, the experience includes meeting the extended family of a young companion who helped him survive in Nazi-occupied Poland.
And it helped to alleviate some of the guilt he has carried for decades over the boy's death shortly after the pair helped save the life of a small baby.
