Tuesday, December 03, 2019
Douglas Murray: The failed lessons of the London Bridge attack
Some readers have been asking me to comment on the latest London Bridge terrorism incident. And if I have some reluctance it is only because although ennui comes from writing the same article over and over again, that’s nothing like the feeling you get from writing the same article so often that you don’t even need to change the name of the location of the attack each time now.Terrorists are not like other criminals
London Bridge 2 has been pored over enough in recent days. The heroism of certain members of the public has rightly been noted. Politicians of all the main parties have tried to pin the blame for the attacker’s early release on their political opponents. And everything goes on as usual.
But there are a couple of remaining things still worth noting about all this. The first is that if two innocent people hadn’t been killed and others wounded there would be something un-satirisable about Friday’s incident. A convicted terrorist is allowed out of prison after learning how to game the system, serves only half his sentence and then, at a prisoner rehabilitation session, goes full-crazy again and kills two of the young people involved in the rehabilitation business. The fact that the workshop Usman Khan was attending had one of those soppy modern Britain titles – ‘Learning Together’ – just completes the picture.
The problem remains that while we are happy to get caught up on discussions about prisoner release protocols and the like, we avoid the wider, and more sceptical, conversation we should have had by now. Conversations like the one we ought to have had about the whole de-radicalisation business, or industry.
Here in October, I mentioned in passing the whole phoney academic ‘discipline’ of ‘de-radicalisation’. I wonder whether now mightn’t be a good time to reassess some of our reliance on the claims and expertise of that industry?
We have come to see jihadists as passive individuals with little or no moral agency. This is why the discussion seems focused not on their ability to change, but on whether or not the resources are available to provide the correct intervention and monitoring.Prof. Phyllis Chesler: Pay attention, dreamy-eyed Western do-gooders
Whether or not Islamists can ever be redeemed is a complex question. But Khan had certainly not ‘deradicalised’. Nor had he rehabilitated. It is wrong that Khan and people like him are entitled to be released without any consideration of the risk that they still pose to the public.
We have to recognise that someone who plots to blow up pubs in the name of a foreign fighting force is no longer, in any meaningful sense, a citizen. Of course, we should still show humanity towards those accused of any crime. They are entitled to a fair trial on the evidence, which Khan avoided by pleading guilty. But when people are convicted, or when they plead guilty to being committed jihadists, then normal rules cannot continue to apply.
Our belief in people’s capacity for rehabilitation should not extend to letting murderous jihadists back on to our streets. James Ford appears to have made a decision to change his life. It is important that society helps him to do that. But Khan and his terrorist friends are not criminals – they are traitors. They demand to be treated differently.
This brings me back to London Bridge. To jihadists, all the world either once belonged to Islamic jihad or is now again about to belong to Islamic jihad and sharia law. This is true for most countries in Western Europe where Islamists have created no-go zones, and engaged in gang-related crimes and in the mass rapes of infidel women. Some predict that by 2050, Europe will become, as Bat Ye’or once predicted, “Eurabia.”
All dreamy-eyed western do-gooders should pay close attention.
But here’s one of many problems: Our Jewish and Christian values dictate humanitarian concern for those in trouble and in need and for “victims” of alleged Western success. Both Christians and Jews strongly believe in helping, saving, and subsidizing immigrants, those in war zones, and/or mired down in poverty, illiteracy, and disease. We don’t want to become like our enemies i.e. intolerant, cynical, selfish, and more than “half in love with easeful death;” nor do we want to live in militarily patrolled sovereign entities, constantly on the lookout for and at the mercy of lone or collective jihad attacks—just as Israel has to do.
Western progressives still hope that we will not find ourselves surrounded by jihadists, both within and externally, although that is the position in which the West increasingly finds itself.
While a welcome break in this pattern seems to be happening, (some Arab states may make temporary alliances with the Jewish state), Israel has nevertheless been surrounded by jihadists on every border. Danger lies within as well. Contrary to all the Big Lies, the battle of Israel/Palestine has little to do with a land or refugee dispute and everything to do with the historical and indoctrinated Islamist hatred of and religious mandate to murder infidels.
This overwhelmingly clear fact is so overwhelming that most people refuse to consider it.
French parliament decides anti-Zionism is antisemitism
Anti-Zionism is a form of antisemitism, France’s National Assembly determined on Tuesday, voting on a resolution calling on the government to adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s definition of antisemitism.NGO Monitor: NGO Funded by France Lobbies the Government against Motion on Antisemitism
The motion proposed by lawmaker Sylvain Maillard of LREM, President Emmanuel Macron’s centrist party passed 154-72 in the parliament’s lower house.
“For some years now, France, the whole of Europe, but also almost all Western democracies are facing a rise in antisemitism,” the resolution states. “Anti-Zionist acts can at times hide antisemitic realities. Hate toward Israel due to its perception as a Jewish collective is akin to hatred toward the entire Jewish community.”
In France today, “dirty Zionist… means dirty Jew,” Maillard told La Croix.
The IHRA definition says some forms of hatred against Israel are antisemitic, such as comparing Israel to Nazi Germany, claiming Israel’s existence is a racist endeavor, and using classic antisemitic claims and symbols to characterize Israel and Israelis.
Maillard’s resolution was highly controversial and debated in the French media in recent weeks. A letter from 39 organizations penned in October said that antisemitism should not be defined separately from other forms of racism, and that the motion stifles freedom of expression for supporters of Palestinians and critics of Israel. (h/t Dave4321)
IntroductionWant to Keep Jews Safe? Criminalize Marijuana
Since the beginning of 2019, French organizations that promote an anti-Israel agenda have been lobbying French elected officials to oppose a “motion for a resolution to combat anti-Semitism.” Some of these groups receive French government funding.
The Platform of the French NGOs for Palestine (PFP) is spearheading this pressure campaign, falsely claiming that the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) working definition of antisemitism is merely one of “the tools” by which “Palestinian rights organizations are increasingly targeted by attacks and attempts to equate their actions with antisemitism.”
PFP states that it will oppose any resolution that includes “reference to a largely fantastical antizionism,” and does not “explicitly exclude ‘examples’ supposed to illustrate the ‘IHRA definition’.”
The Resolution
On December 3, 2019, a “motion for a resolution to combat anti-Semitism” will be discussed in the French National Assembly. The purpose of this motion is to “endorse the working definition of antisemitism used by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance as a useful guidance instrument for education and training in order to support judicial and law enforcement authorities in their efforts to detect and prosecute antisemitic attacks more efficiently and effectively.”
This follows France official endorsement of the IHRA working definition of antisemitism. During the Representative Council of French Jewish Institutions (CRIF) annual dinner (February 2019), President Emmanuel Macron declared that “antizionism is a modern form of antisemitism.”
Sarah Halimi’s case marks a new milestone for the already embattled French Jewish community. After a drawn out court case, on Wednesday, Nov. 27, a Paris judge dropped the murder charges against Halimi’s killer, Kobili Traoré, 29, on the grounds that smoking pot had caused him to suffer a massive “psychotic episode.”Muslim man who stabbed Jews at Amsterdam market ruled unfit to stand trial
According to police records, Traoré beat and tortured Halimi for hours—at one point with French police standing just outside her door as they waited for another unit to arrive, while calls to the police reported hearing a woman’s screams and a man shouting “Allahu akbar.” The torture ended when Traoré shoved Halimi, a retired kindergarten teacher, off of her third-floor balcony and she fell to her death.
The London based Jewish Chronicle quotes a lawyer representing the Halimi family on the consequences of the decision: “You’re saying that people can walk free after carrying out criminal action just because they were allegedly not aware of the effects of drugs or other substances?” asked Francis Szpiner. “Will this also apply to drunk drivers who kill children on the road?”
The verdict comes in the midst of ongoing efforts in France to legalize marijuana, leaving open the possibility that future murderers of Jews will have an even easier time getting away with their crimes.
A Muslim man charged with trying to kill a Jewish father and son at an Amsterdam market has been found not criminally responsible for his actions and sent for psychological care.Outrage after activists place ashes of ‘Auschwitz victims’ outside Reichstag
A Dutch judge ruled that Taha Ewis Bakri Abdel Ghani suffered from delusions, heard voices and experienced psychosis at the time of the March 16 stabbing incident at the Albert Cuyp Market, the NIW Jewish paper reported Monday. The judge based the ruling on a psychiatric report.
The ruling follows several recent cases in Western Europe involving Muslim men who assaulted Jews and were deemed unfit to stand trial.
Abdel Ghani was charged with manslaughter in the stabbings of Martin Colmans and his son Sharon, who were lightly and moderately injured, respectively. The Colmans and Abdel Ghani owned neighboring stores in the market.
According to the victims, Abdel Ghani assaulted them following weeks in which he would read the Quran at the entrance to his store and leer at them.
Jewish groups expressed outrage on Tuesday at an oversized urn placed in front of the German parliament that those behind it claim contains Holocaust victims’ remains and is meant to highlight the dangers of far-right extremism.YouTube removes video of pastor saying Trump impeachment is a 'Jew coup' but doesn't ban him
The International Auschwitz Committee condemned the action by the Center for Political Beauty, which unveiled the urn near the Reichstag building Monday, calling it a “pillar of resistance.”
“Auschwitz survivors are aghast at this installation, which hurts their feelings and the eternal peace of the dead of their murdered relatives,” the organization said.
The Center for Political Beauty, a Germany-based activist group known for provocative stunts, said the urn contained victims’ remains that it had unearthed from 23 locations near Nazi death and concentration camps in Germany, Poland and Ukraine. Soil the group said contained the remains could be seen in the transparent orange urn, which is about the size of an oil drum, set atop a metal pillar.
The group defended its installation, saying it did not open any gravesites.
“We only looked for earth-covered human remains that were hidden by the Nazis in the surroundings of the former death camps.”
YouTube has removed video of a Florida pastor and radio host claiming the effort to impeach Donald Trump is a ‘Jew coup’ - but his channel remains online.
Rick Wiles is known for his anti-semitic conspiracy theories and posted a video on his TruNews YouTube channel saying: “That’s the way the Jews work, they are deceivers, they plot, they lie, they do whatever they have to do to accomplish their political agenda.”
He went on to claim, in the November 21 video, that the country will devolve into a civil war if Mr Trump is impeached.
“We have until Christmas to take a stand because of this Jew coup in the United States,” he said.
“We have weeks to stop it. That’s why I’m speaking out. That’s why I’m putting everything on the line saying this is a coup led by Jews to overthrow the constitutionally elected president of the United States.”
The video has since been removed by YouTube, but the channel itself is still online.
YouTube has a three-strike policy which sees channels permanently removed when they receive three strikes in three months.
The Independent has contacted YouTube to ask why the channel remains online.
Just reached out to the Press Secretary's office at the White House and asked them about @TruNews.
— Dexter Van Zile (@dextervanzile) December 3, 2019
Response: “They are not credentialed to cover the White House."
Op-ed at The Times: Corbyn is merely a ‘critic of the Likud government’
In an op-ed at The Times, Gabrielle Rifkind, a psychotherapist and “Middle East specialist in conflict resolution”, argues that British Jews and Jeremy Corbyn need to “reconcile” their ‘differences’.Israel Advocacy Movement: Corbyn stands with terrorists
The piece, “We need a path towards reconciliation for Labour and British Jews”, Dec. 3, includes the following:
There is now a need to hold morally complex ideas together that both abhor antisemitism but are also even-handed and capable at looking at constructive solutions and outcomes to the Palestine-Israel conflict. The election of Jeremy Corbyn as leader has exacerbated the problem as his sympathies lie with the Palestinians. Whilst it is understandable that one identifies with the weaker party, to resolve conflict it is essential to engage with all sides to find solutions.
Jeremy Corbyn is seen as hostile to the state of Israel. More accurately, he is a critic of the current Likud government. He had a close relationship with the progressive activist Uri Avnery who was on the political left in Israel and his natural homeland is the politics party Meretz.
Before we get to the most egregiously inaccurate claim (in bold), we should briefly note Rifkind also errs in associating Avnery, the late Haaretz columnist, with the Israeli Meretz Party. In fact, he’s far left of the Zionist Meretz Party, having founded the radical left group Gush Shalom which calls for the full Palestinian right of return, and having personally promoted BDS.
But, Rifkin’s assertion that Corbyn is not hostile to Israel, but only a “critic of the current Likud government” is risible, and obviously contradicted by the fact that the Labour leader has spent his entire political life demonising and delegitmising Israel, and supporting those who espouse antisemitism and advocate for the state’s total destruction.
Corbyn says terrorists should not be forced to serve their full sentences in jail.
He would say that…
He's spent the last 30 years sharing platforms and standing in solidarity with them!
Pressed repeatedly, UK’s Corbyn finally says sorry for anti-Semitism in Labour
The comment, made after repeated prodding by a reporter, came just over a week after Corbyn refused several times to apologize during a BBC interview, following extraordinary comments from the country’s chief rabbi about anxiety gripping the Jewish community.Hugh Grant backs Chief Rabbi Mirvis, criticizes Jeremy Corbyn
Appearing Tuesday on the ITV channel’s “This Morning” show, Corbyn was again asked if he was prepared to apologize for anti-Semitism in Labour.
“Our party,” began Corbyn, but he was interrupted by presenter Philip Schofield who pressed him, saying “No, just say sorry.”
“Can I just make it clear our party and me do not accept anti-Semitism in any form,” Corbyn tried again but was stopped by Schofield.
“So are you sorry?” Schofield said.
“Obviously I’m very sorry for everything that’s happened but I want to make this clear I am dealing with it,” Corbyn replied. “I have dealt with it.”
“Other parties are also affected by anti-Semitism,” he continued. “Candidates have been withdrawn by the Liberal Democrats and the Conservatives and by us because we do not accept it in any form whatsoever.”
Famous British actor, Hugh Grant, is the latest to come out and criticize the British Labour Party for not doing "anything like nearly enough" to root out the "antisemitic element" within the party, it was reported in the Jewish Chronicle.Corbyn was 2019 Keynote Speaker at Islam Channel After it Was Censured Over Antisemitism and Advocating Marital-Rape
Grant supported the statement of Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis last week, which was extensively reported in the media. He said, "If you ask do I think there is an antisemitic element within the Labour Party – the answer is 'yes'.
If you ask me do I think the present Labour leadership has done anything like near enough to root it out, my answer is 'no'."
Grant said that he "very much doubted" he would shake hands with Boris Johnson. He was speaking after campaigning with Luciana Berger, the Liberal Democrat candidate for Finchley and Golders Green.
Grant paid a visit to the north London constituency, as part of his campaign of "tactical voting" where Remain candidates stand a chance of victory in the general election next week.
Grant joined Ms Berger on the entrance of the north London marginal meeting locals and listened to their questions and worries.
Grant spoke of his respect at Ms Berger's decision to leave Jeremy Corbyn's Labour Party, when talking to the Jewish Chronicle.
As Guido reported yesterday, Corbyn has a history of appearing on the Islam Channel – who have been censured twice by Ofcom, and fined over £30,000, for supporting marital rape and violence against women. During one interview, Corbyn said two men convicted for raising funds for terrorism ‘haven’t done anything wrong’…Corbyn: Terrorists should 'not necessarily' serve full sentences
It has now emerged Corbyn’s links to the channel continued well into his time as Labour leader – and after he will have been aware of the channel’s number of Ofcom censures. In 2018, the channel was once again disciplined for hate speech, including “expressions of hatred based on intolerance of Jewish people”, warning that the channel’s broadcast “had the potential to promote, encourage and incite such intolerance among viewers” after it labelled Jewish people as “tyrannical”.
In June this year, Corbyn was then billed as the “Keynote Speaker” for the Islam Channel‘s Eid Gala Dinner, which he attended and thanked the channel for “the contribution [they] make to our society”.
Corbyn wasn’t alone at the dinner, however, and was joined by such luminaries as Sir Iqbal Sacranie – who likened Hamas suicide bombers to Mandela and Gandhi – and ‘comedian’ Tez Ilyas, who has appeared at multiple events for organisations connected to Hamas.
Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn told Sky News that a person convicted of terrorism offenses should "not necessarily" serve their full sentence.
"It depends on the circumstances, it depends on the sentence, but crucially it depends on what they've done in the prison," he said.
Foreign Minister Dominic Raab suggested a Conservative government would strengthen sentencing measures and end the practice where serious offenders can be automatically let out of prison early.
"We've said we would expect for the serious terrorist offenses a minimum 14-year sentence," Raab told Sky News's Sophy Ridge on Sunday.
"We don't think that it is the case that they should all necessarily be released, we think for some offenses they should be imprisoned for life, and we also think that terrorist offenders should serve their full sentence."
Corbyn shoots a video to blame the US & Britain for the attack on London Bridge. Shameful but not surprising. This is his answer to everything: we are to blame, not those who want to kill us. His solution: throw British taxpayers’ money at them to appease them. A national jizya. https://t.co/Lrm1GAqkTf
— Rɪᴄʜᴀʀᴅ Kᴇᴍᴘ ⋁ (@COLRICHARDKEMP) December 2, 2019
No surprise as the woman who vandalised the Warsaw Ghetto now campaigns for Labour
A woman who was roundly condemned for vandalising the Warsaw Ghetto to advance her political opinions about Israel is now campaigning for the Labour Party.
Activist Ewa Jasiewicz sprayed political “Free Gaza and Palestine” on the walls of the Warsaw Ghetto in 2010, the largest and most well-known of the ghettos designated by the Nazis in German-controlled territory, from which hundreds of thousands of Jews were sent to death camps or killed by shooting and another hundred thousand died of starvation and courageous revolt. Essentially a mass grave, the Warsaw Ghetto serves as a salient symbol of the Holocaust for all and evokes sensitivity and strong emotion on the part of Jews in particular.
The vandalism of the Warsaw Ghetto was condemned across the Jewish community. That the political messaging of the graffiti was directed toward Israel meant it also clearly breached the International Definition of Antisemitism, adopted by the British Government, which illustrates manifestations of antisemitism, inter alia, as
- drawing comparisons of contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis – which the political messaging did by using the setting of the Warsaw Ghetto, which was established, operated and liquidated by the Nazis, to criticise Israeli policy and imply that it replicates that of the Nazis; and
- holding Jews collectively responsible for actions of the state of Israel – which Ms Jasiewicz did by deliberately targeting a site of Jewish suffering to draw the attention of Jews to the policies of Israel and to associate Jewish suffering with those policies in the minds of the rest of the world.
This woman daubed graffiti on the last remaining wall of the Warsaw Ghetto - graffiti described by Yad Vashem as“tainted with antisemitism”.
— Stephen Pollard (@stephenpollard) December 2, 2019
Now she is out leafleting for Labour.
It figures. https://t.co/qx6tXJNfib
I’ve seen many Jews extremely angry at Labour candidates at hustings so far this election campaign.
— Daniel Sugarman (@Daniel_Sugarman) December 2, 2019
I haven’t seen anything CLOSE to the vitriol the Tory candidate for West Sussex gets here for just mentioning Labour antisemitism. The cries of “liar”...
pic.twitter.com/eoohkI6Dnv
Spectator corrects on the nationality of a major Jewish donor
An essay in the Spectator by Dominic Green (Allegations of anti-Semitism are damaging to Labour, but not toxic, Nov. 28) is interesting, nuanced, in some ways counter-intuitive, and, almost entirely unproblematic.
However, we flagged a highly misleading – and potentially loaded – word choice in one of the paragraphs, in the context of Green’s broader argument that “calling Jeremy Corbyn and his followers anti-Semitic might not improve [the Tories’] chances, and might even make things worse for Boris Johnson.”
Here’s the paragraph in question:
Once, a credible accusation of anti-Semitism would be enough to put a party leader beyond the pale. But times change. The Corbynites oppose big banks and transnational finance in general, and London’s legal-financial-media nexus in particular. That position is popular. They challenge the existence of the state of Israel and portray Palestinians as victims of a racist aggressor. That isn’t exactly going against the grain. When the Conservatives — the party of business and banks, with an Israeli co-treasurer — call Labour anti-Semitic, they’re giving Corbyn and his followers a perverse endorsement.
Before getting to the significance of the writer’s claim that the Tories have an Israeli co-treasurer, we should point out that, based on our reading of the article, it’s clear he’s not suggesting that people are justified in viewing charges of antisemitism against Corbyn as an “endorsement” of the Labour leader, only that it may have that impact.
Nonetheless, Green does seem to impute some significance to the alleged Israeli nationality of the Tory co-treasurer – as confirming Labour stereotypes about the Conservative Party, and their motivation for accusing Corbyn of antisemitism. So, we researched the matter, and found out that though the co-treasurer, Ehud Sheleg, a big Tory donor, was born in Israel, he lives in the UK and is a full British citizen. (His father was British, and in fact served in the RAF during World War 2).
This distinction matters.
If @GoogleAds doesn't act, they're choosing to make money from content that threatens "another Kristalnacht" if Jewish leaders don't stop criticising Jeremy Corbyn.
— Stop Funding Fake News (@SFFakeNews) December 2, 2019
Will you be taking action? @RonanHarris @nishmarobb @Malbonnington pic.twitter.com/1rb1tkEPFN
Anti-Semitic conspiracy theories reign supreme at annual pro-Palestinian conference
Thanksgiving weekend may have seen most give thanks for the blessing in their lives as they gear up to spread some holiday cheer, but others opted for spreading hate and anti-Semitism instead.
Pro-Palestinian advocates on Friday addressed the annual American Muslims for Palestine (AMP) conference in Chicago took turns swinging at Israel and spared no effort to challenge the legitimacy of the Jewish state.
AMP is a radical Muslim group that rejects Israel's right to exist and some of its members have been flagged by the Israeli government over their past activity and their potential questionable associations (see the damning report here).
Among the keynote speakers in Friday's conference was Nihad Awad, co-founder of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), a Washington-based Muslim civil rights group that is often criticized for pursuing a radical Islamist agenda. CAIR has also been rumored to have ties with Hamas.
The United Arab Emirates has designated CAIR as a terrorist organization.
Addressing the audience, Awad – a former IAP employee – stated that his organization "fights Zionism on a daily basis," and further labeled the ideology on which the State of Israel has been predicated as "inherently hateful."
Anti-Semitic Islamist activist Linda Sarsour, who Awad praised as "one of our best examples in the [Muslim American] community," also address the conference, stating that "progressive Zionists cannot be allies."
Linda Sarsour backs Bernie Sanders, but not his support for Israel
Nov. 29: Sarsour appears at the annual conference of American Muslims for Palestine, and says in a speech at the Chicago event that Zionists, not pro-Palestinian advocates, should be on the defensive. In particular, she calls out progressive Zionists, suggesting they have no place in the larger progressive movement. (The blog Israelly Cool first reported the Facebook posting with the video of Sarsour’s remarks.)
“Ask those who call themselves progressive Zionists to explain to you how they can be against the separation of children on the U.S.-Mexican border, how can they be against building a wall between us and Mexico, how can they be against agencies like ICE … but then you tell me ‘Oh, you can’t push me out of the movement because I’m also against white supremacy,’” Sarsour said at the conference. “Ask them this, how can you be against white supremacy in America and the idea of being in a state based on race and class, but then you support a state like Israel that is based on supremacy, that is built on the idea that Jews are supreme to everyone else.”
This appears to be confirmation that Sarsour unequivocally rejects Zionism in any form. In 2017, she told The Nation that “It just doesn’t make any sense for someone to say, ‘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.”
Sarsour’s defenders seized on the clause “and do not criticize it” to insist that Sarsour was not excluding Zionists who are critical of Israel. Sarsour declined to further clarify her remarks.
Is there wiggle room to reconcile Sarsour’s rejection of a “state like Israel that is based on [Jewish] supremacy” and Sanders’ label for those who deny “the right of self-determination to Jews” as anti-Semites?
It’d be good to hear from Sanders and Sarsour themselves.
Let me shorten this for Linda:
— Blue Cord Brotherhood (@SantaClaritaSGM) December 3, 2019
"Over the weekend I confirmed to the world that I am a rabid anti-semite that doesn't think Israel has the right to exist".
Fixed it for you. You're welcome.
Nice try @LSarsour, but you think we did not anticipate this? https://t.co/3ZB26FLhpy
— (((David Lange))) (@Israellycool) December 3, 2019
IPT: A Weekend with American Muslims for Palestine: Awad Says CAIR Fights Zionism "On a Daily Basis"
Its leaders won't condemn terrorist groups like Hamas or Hizballah, but the founder and executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) says his organization deals with "Zionism on [a] daily basis."
NIhad Awad, who co-founded CAIR in 1994 and is the only person to run it, cast Zionism as inherently hateful Friday in a speech to the anti-Israel group American Muslims for Palestine (AMP).
"For me, at CAIR, as the executive director of CAIR, the nation's largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization, we deal with racism, Islamophobia and Zionism on [a] daily basis," Awad said.
AMP is a radical group that opposes Israel's existence. It is suspected of being the alter ego of a defunct Hamas propaganda arm in the United States called the Islamic Association for Palestine (IAP). Osama Abuirshaid, now AMP's national policy director, has said the organization seeks "to challenge the legitimacy of the State of Israel."
Awad and others who spoke at AMP's national convention held in Chicago during Thanksgiving weekend happily obliged. You won't find references to "deal[ing] with Zionism" on any CAIR web page. To the general public, CAIR casts itself as a civil rights organization focused solely on protecting the rights of Muslim Americans. But the record tells a far more disturbing story.
Awad and his CAIR co-founder Omar Ahmad previously worked at the IAP. It was part of a network created by the Muslim Brotherhood to support Hamas politically and financially in the United States. CAIR was added to the "Palestine Committee" roster as soon as it was created. That's why CAIR was included in a list of unindicted co-conspirators in a 2008 Hamas financing trial, and why federal prosecutors say CAIR was "a participant in an ongoing and ultimately unlawful conspiracy to support a designated terrorist organization, a conspiracy from which CAIR never withdrew."
The conspiracy was to support Hamas in its efforts to destroy Israel. In saying CAIR deals with Zionism daily, Awad puts that assertion in a new light. It also could help explain his praise for fellow speaker, anti-Semitic Islamist activist Linda Sarsour.
#RashidaTlaib (D-Mich) used her appearance at @AMPalestine convention to pitch for intersectional politics, equating problems facing Palestinians to systemic oppression facing black people in America. AMP is a radical group that opposes Israel's existence https://t.co/QpQxD3sV9I pic.twitter.com/Je0pU9IjxK
— Adam Milstein (@AdamMilstein) December 2, 2019
Of course the crickets from her fellow Democrats and @ADL aren’t surprising, but worth noting for posterity https://t.co/8Ji4Ygm1nf
— Seth Mandel (@SethAMandel) December 3, 2019
Actual line from a @washingtonpost "profile" of Valerie Plame: "She looks astoundingly good, at 56, as if the high-altitude desert air has preserved her skin since the day she arrived here 12 years ago." Not mentioned: Anti-Semitic tweets - https://t.co/tWK9A9ZBsL
— Eliana Johnson (@elianayjohnson) December 2, 2019
THESE HOLOCAUST SURVIVORS HAVE A MESSAGE FOR @BernieSanders:
— Dov Hikind (@HikindDov) December 2, 2019
?Stop supporting antisemites!
?Stop using your Jewishness to undermine the Jewish people and Jewish state!
?Stop Corbynizing the Dem party by making antisemitism acceptable!
?Say NO to ALL antisemites! pic.twitter.com/CZLtyZgRao
Activists For Palestinians Threaten: Your College Campus Will Be Scene Of Intifadas
This is what Jews on college campuses across America may soon have to face: people who believe that an intifada should be launched against them. On November 15, 2019, at a pro-Gaza rally in Times Square in New York, speakers led the crowd in chanting. “There is only one solution: Intifada, revolution!” and “Intifada in every classroom.”Italian professor to be disciplined for tweeting Hitler praise
As Memri reports, Nerdeen Kiswani of an organization called Within Our Lifetime shouted, “Intifada! Intifada! There is only one solution: Intifada, revolution!” Husam Kaid of the City College New York branch of Students for Justice in Palestine, echoed, “There is only one solution: Intifada, revolution!” He shouted, “The intifada does not have to be in Gaza or Palestine! We’re going to have an intifada in every classroom! We are going to have an intifada on every college campus! We are going to shut down all the Zionist events and start an Intifada everywhere!”
Kaid yelled, “Just the other day, as Gaza was being bombed, the Zionist leader, Consul general Dani Dayan, was invited to speak at Harvard law and 100 students walked out of his talk and they shut the whole event down! Got to do that on every college campus! Let’s shut down all the Zionists and start an intifada everywhere we are!”
Sayel Kayed, a pro-BDS activist belonging to American Muslims for Palestine, yelled, “We are here today to let everybody know that Palestine has a right to defend itself. Palestine. We have a right to resistance. It is a God-given right. People ask, ‘Does Israel have a right to exist?’ No! Israel has no right to exist on Palestinian land.” He called out to the crowd, “Does Israel have a right to exist?
The crowd yelled back, “No!”
Kayed: “Does Israel have a right to exist?”
Crowd: “No!”
Kayed: “Does Palestine have a right to resist it?”
Crowd: “Yes!”
Kayed: “Does Palestine have a right to resist it?”
Crowd: “Yes!”
Kayed then made abundantly clear what he meant when he said, “Israel has no right to exist on Palestinian land.” He yelled, “Palestine is all of Palestine: from the river to the sea.”
Italy’s education minister said a state university professor will be disciplined for Twitter posts defending Hitler.McGill U. administration condemns council for targeting Jewish student
Minister Lorenzo Fioramonti tweeted University of Siena’s rector informed him Monday that he intended to take unspecified “measures’’ against Professor Emanuele Castrucci.
Castrucci, in a reply on his Twitter feed, wrote: “Hitler, even if certainly no saint, in that moment was defending the entire European civilization.”
Rector Francesco Frati decried the “revisionist and neo-Nazi” posts as “shameful.”
Castrucci’s reply followed his posting a photo of the Nazi dictator flanked by a dog. The professor’s caption read: “They said I’d been a monster to not inform you that I fought against the true monsters that today govern you, dominating the world.”
McGill University has condemned calls were made by Students' Society of McGill University (SSMU) members for a Jewish student leader to resign from her position in the student government for accepting an invitation to travel to Israel and the Palestinian territories with Hillel: The Foundation for Jewish Campus Life.Brown University Committee on Corporate Responsibility Votes in Favor of BDS
In the statement, Fabrice Labeau, deputy provost for Student Life and Learning, expressed deep concern about the “increasing polarized debate among some members of the student community and student associations on political issues, particularly regarding the State of Israel.
“We are thus highly disturbed by the vote taken on November 28, 2019, by the SSMU Legislative Council, in relation to some student leaders enrolling in Hillel Montreal’s Face to Face program to visit Israel and the Palestinian territories,” he said, highlighting that the “motion approved by the SSMU Legislative Council purposely” singled out Jordyn Wright, who represents her peers on the Students’ Society of McGill University (SSMU) Legislative Council and serves on the Society’s Board of Directors.
At the meeting the SSMU claimed that Wright’s participation in the trip was a conflict of interest “despite the SSMU Board of Directors previously assessing that enrolling in this program does not constitute a conflict of interest.”
The Advisory Committee on Corporate Responsibility in Investment Policies (ACCRIP) at Brown University in Providence, RI, voted on Monday in favor of the BDS movement that aims to boycott Israel.Belgian Jews Pledge to Maintain Pressure on Antisemitic Aalst Carnival After Organizers Sever Links With UNESCO
The final tally of the committee was six in favor, two against and one abstention.
The ACCRIP, which consists of university students, faculty, staff and alumni, vote on resolutions surrounding “ethical and moral issues or issues of alleged social harm with respect to the activities of corporations in which the University is an investor,” according to its website.
The resolution consisted of the following language:
“We recommend that the Brown Corporation exclude from Brown’s direct investments, and require Brown’s separate account investment managers to exclude from their direct investments, companies identified as facilitating human rights violations in Palestine. In addition, the Investment Office will share with all investment managers the University’s desire to adhere to this investment philosophy. We recommend that the Corporation and Brown’s separate account investment managers maintain the withdrawal of investments from said companies until they cease to engage in social harm … ”
The vote occurred several months after Brown students voted overwhelmingly in favor of a referendum, calling on the school to separate itself from companies that conduct business with the State of Israel.
A leader of the Belgian Jewish community has warned the annual carnival in Aalst will remain under close scrutiny for the crude antisemitic caricatures it features, after the mayor of the town dismissed critics over the weekend by announcing that he was withdrawing the carnival from the UN’s international cultural heritage list.Prominent Israeli Rabbi ‘Shocked and Traumatized’ After Brutal Antisemitic Attack in North London
Despite severing links with UNESCO, the UN’s cultural and educational agency, the Aalst carnival organizers were “not at liberty to spew any more antisemitic dirt,” Hans Knoop — the head of the Belgian Forum of Jewish Organizations — told The Associated Press news agency on Sunday.
We will keep a close eye on Aalst,” Knoop pledged.
Knoop was speaking following a TV interview in which Christoph D’Haese — the Flemish nationalist mayor of Aalst — declared that he had lost patience “with the grotesque complaints,” adding that “Aalst will renounce its UNESCO recognition.”
An annual event with its origins in the Middle Ages, the Aalst Carnival was recognized in 2010 by UNESCO as belonging to the “Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.”
Ostensibly dedicated to humor, the carnival has included floats that mock the Holocaust and invoke the antisemitic stereotype of Jews as grasping moneylenders.
A leading Orthodox rabbi from Israel was reported on Monday to be “shocked and traumatized” after he was subjected to a vicious antisemitic assault by two men in the Stamford Hill area of north London while walking from Shabbat services at a local synagogue.Swastikas, anti-Semitic slurs carved in door of Washington’s Sixth & I synagogue
Details of Friday night’s assault on the unnamed rabbi were disclosed by the head of a group that provides security to the Jewish community, during an interview on Monday with the Hackney Gazette newspaper.
The rabbi “had been walking home at 9:45 p.m. when he was attacked by two young men,” Rabbi Hershel Gluck — the chair of the Shomrim organization in Stamford Hill, which is home to a large Orthodox Jewish community — told the paper.
“He said to them he didn’t have any money, or a phone as it was Shabbat,” Gluck explained. “But they just carried on hitting him and shouting antisemitic abuse.”
The assailants shouted “F__ the Jews” and “Kill Jews” during the attack.
Gluck said the victim was “a notable rabbi from Israel, a very scholarly, learned man who a lot of people turn to with queries and questions.”
The Sixth & I synagogue in downtown Washington, D.C., was vandalized with anti-Semitic graffiti.New Hallmark Hanukkah Movies Are Anti-Semitic
Michelle Eider, the synagogue’s communications manager, said the vandalism contained swastikas and anti-Semitic language and was discovered on Monday morning.
In an email to congregants, the synagogue’s three rabbis said the damage was minimal and would be quickly fixed.
“In these moments, it’s important to remember that it is not a shame but an honor to be a Jew,” said the email. “It is no small irony that it was our doors, symbols of welcoming and inclusivity, onto which someone spewed hatred and bigotry.”
The Hallmark channel has introduced two Hanukkah movies to its Christmas lineup this year. There's just one problem: Neither movie is a Hanukkah movie. They are Christmas movies with Jewish characters. And they rely on some of the oldest anti-Semitic tropes in the book.Pixies head back to Israel
In "Holiday Date," a woman hires a Jewish actor to pose as her boyfriend and join her at her family's house for Christmas, but the family grows "suspicious" about "whether he knows how to celebrate." The trope of the sneaky, untrustworthy Jew, who is a perpetual outsider, is an enduring and pernicious anti-Semitic stereotype.
"Double Holiday" follows a Jewish woman as she plans a company Christmas party with her office rival to further her professional ambition to get a promotion. In the movie, Hanukkah stands only in relation to Christmas, not on its own terms. Indeed, it functions as an obstacle to the rest of the characters getting to celebrate as usual.
Along with the coming Lifetime movie "Mistletoe and Menorahs," these stories hinge on Jewish characters being compelled to observe Christmas, and the tension only resolving when these outsiders learn how to participate in or appreciate the dominant religious tradition.
At their worst, these movies traffic in bigoted stereotypes at a time when anti-Semitic hate crimes are on the rise. I, for one, would prefer to have been overlooked by the network than handed down insulting content that treats me as an obstacle to someone else's celebration.
Veteran American rockers the Pixies will be returning to Israel next year on July 14 at the Tel Aviv Expo, two years after their well-received 2017 show in Caesarea.Israeli scientists find way to treat deadly pancreatic cancer in 14 days
The American alternative rock pioneers also performed here to a sold-out audience in 2014 at Bloomfield Stadium in Jaffa.
The Boston-based band, who broke up in the mid-1990s and reformed bigger than ever in 2003, is considered one of the most influential outfits of the late '80s and '90s, with albums like Surfer Rosa and Doolittle setting a blueprint for post-punk diversity.
Led by the iconic Black Francis (Frank Black) and including his co-founders David Lovering on drums and Joey Santiago on lead guitar, along with bassist Paz Lenchantin – a replacement for longtime mainstay Kim Deal – the Pixies released their seventh album this year – Beneath the Eyrie.
A new treatment developed by Tel Aviv University could induce the destruction of pancreatic cancer cells, eradicating the number of cancerous cells by up to 90% after two weeks of daily injections of a small molecule known as PJ34.Intel in Advanced Talks for Habana Labs Acquisition for Over $1 Billion
Pancreatic cancer is one of the hardest cancers to treat. Most people who are diagnosed with the disease do not even live five years after being diagnosed.
The study, led by Prof. Malka Cohen-Armon and her team at TAU’s Sackler Faculty of Medicine, in collaboration with Dr. Talia Golan’s team at the Cancer Research Center at Sheba Medical Center, was recently published in the journal Oncotarget.
Specifically, the study found that PJ34, when injected intravenously, causes the self-destruction of human cancer cells during mitosis, the scientific term for cell division.
The research was conducted with xenografts, transplantation of human pancreatic cancer into immunocompromised mice. A month after being injected with the molecule daily for 14 days, “there was a reduction of 90% of pancreatic cells in the tumor,” Cohen-Armon told The Jerusalem Post. “In one mouse, the tumor completely disappeared.”
“This molecule causes an anomaly during mitosis of human cancer cells, provoking rapid cell death,” she said. “Thus, cell multiplication itself resulted in cell death in the treated cancer cells.”
Moreover, she said, PJ34 appears to have no impact on healthy cells, thus “no adverse effects were observed.” The mice, she said, continued to grow and gain weight as usual.
Intel is in advanced negotiations for the acquisition of artificial intelligence chip developer Habana Labs Ltd., according to one person familiar with the matter who spoke to Calcalist on condition of anonymity. The valuation negotiated is between $1 billion and $2 billion, the person said. If the deal is completed, it will be Intel’s second-largest acquisition of an Israeli company, following its $15.3 billion acquisition of automotive chipmaker Mobileye in 2017.
An Intel spokesperson has stated that the company does not respond to rumors.
Habana Labs has yet to respond to a request for comment.
Founded in 2016, Habana Labs develops processors optimized for artificial intelligence applications. The company was founded by David Dahan and Ran Halutz, both former executives at PrimeSense Limited, acquired by Apple for $360 million in 2013. Habana raised $120 million to date, $75 million of the sum in a November 2018 round led by Intel Capital. Other investors include San Francisco-based WRV Capital, Bessemer Venture Partners, and Battery Ventures.
Habana Labs’ first investor and its chairman is Israeli tech entrepreneur Avigdor Willenz, who was one of the founders of Galileo Technologies Ltd., sold in 2001 to Marvell Technology Group Ltd. for $2.7 billion. He also co-founded Annapurna Labs, sold to Amazon for $370 million in 2015.
Arab Israeli diplomat George Deek becomes the new Israeli Ambassador to Azerbaijan.
— AZ (@americanzionism) December 2, 2019
To put it another way, the only Jewish majority nation in the world appoints a Christian diplomat to the top post of a Muslim majority nation. The convergence of the 3 Abrahamic faiths. https://t.co/UKLz0pTXbi
Allan Gerson, who prosecuted Nazis, defended Lockerbie victims, dies at 74
Allan Gerson, a lawyer and legal scholar who pursued Nazi war criminals and pioneered the practice of suing foreign governments in US courts for complicity to terrorism has died at the age of 74.IDF Humanitarian Aid Team Heads to Albania Following Earthquake
Gerson died Sunday at his home in Washington, DC, from complications of the degenerative brain disorder Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, his wife, author Joan Nathan, said, according to The Washington Post.
Gerson wrote an opinion piece for the newspaper in 2017 in which he detailed his lengthy legal career and identified himself as a former “dreamer,” drawing a parallel between his undocumented entry into the United States and those of immigrants currently targeted by the Trump administration.
A deputy assistant attorney general under US president Ronald Reagan, Gerson was also a child of Jewish refugees who fled Poland during the Holocaust.
His father had been a bookkeeper at a family candy store, and his mother was a dressmaker. They spent part of World War II in Siberian labor camps. Gerson was born in Samarkand in June 1945. After the war, the family adopted false identities to secure US immigration visas. (h/t IsaacStorm)
An Israel Defense Forces emergency humanitarian aid delegation has left for Albania following the 6.4-magnitude earthquake that devastated the country on Nov. 26, the IDF announced on Tuesday.
“We just dispatched an IDF humanitarian aid delegation to Albania following the devastating earthquake that took 50+ lives and left thousands injured,” the military posted on the official IDF Twitter feed, adding the hashtag “#IDFinAlbania.”
The Israeli team will join disaster experts from the United States, France, Italy, Greece, Romania, Turkey and Serbia.
The 10-member IDF team will focus on determining the structural soundness of the buildings still standing after the natural disaster, and is led by Israel’s Home Front Command and supported by the Israeli Foreign Ministry.
Authorities have estimated that 7,900 buildings have been damaged throughout Albania by the quake, with some 6,000 people having been left homeless. An estimated 1.9 million people have been affected by the quake.
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