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Thursday, June 18, 2020

06/18 Links Pt1: The dead horse of Palestine; The ICC has nothing to do with justice; Jordan’s King Abdullah II needs to start being helpful

From Ian:
The dead horse of Palestine
George Orwell warned against ‘flyblown metaphors’ in his wonderful essay Politics and the English Language. Yet there are times when a political writer encounters sophistry so absurd that a descent into cliché constitutes the only adequate response.

Thus, the phrase ‘beating a dead horse’ leaps front of mind after reading a spate of newspaper editorials and opinion pieces bemoaning the evils of Benjamin Netanyahu’s plan to extend Israeli sovereignty to additional regions of Judea-Samaria, aka the West Bank.

The defunct equine in question is the ‘two-state solution’ that has long been the centre-piece of diplomatic initiatives to end the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. And typical of this teeth-gnashing, garment-rending ‘woe is me’ style of editorialising was an op-ed by Australian academics Anas Iqtait and Tristan Dunning that ran in the Age on 23 May 2020.

In this article, Drs. Iqtait and Dunning expend almost 1,000 words arguing that a move by Israel to annex portions of the West Bank will be the death knell of any chance for a negotiated peace. Of course, how anyone still retains faith in the two-state solution after almost three decades of diplomatic failure recalls that famous Einstein definition of madness as doing the same thing over and over again, expecting a different result.

The creation of an independent Palestinian state in the West Bank will never happen for very good legal, strategic and moral reasons. To indulge in another Orwellian faux pas, the ship of dreams Two-State-Solution has not only sailed, but has long since sunk.

The legal argument against Palestinian statehood has particular salience as this is the centenary of the 1920 San Remo Convention, when the victorious WWI Allies decided the fate of the vanquished Ottoman Empire. By the terms of this agreement, Britain was awarded temporary governance over the land of Israel for the express purpose of establishing ‘a national home for the Jewish people’. This British Mandate encompassed pre-1967 Israel, the West Bank and the entirety of Jordan.
Israel Has Always Sought Peace with its Arab Neighbors
In 1936, the British government appointed a royal commission of inquiry headed by Lord Peel, which decided to carve this land into two sovereign nations. The Jews agreed in principle, while the Arab side refused again and again. In 1947 the Arab leadership refused the UN partition plan. Then in the 1948 Arab-Israeli war, the Arabs in the land of Israel brought disaster down upon themselves. But things did not have to be that way.

In 1944 in a document titled "To our Arab neighbors," then-Etzel leader and future prime minister Menachem Begin portrayed a different possibility. He explained to the Arabs:

"We do not see you as an enemy. We want to see you as good neighbors. We did not come to destroy you or expel you from the lands you live on. The land of Israel has enough room for you, your sons and your grandsons and the millions of Jews that have no life but in this land. The Hebrew government will grant you full civil rights. Hebrew and Arabic will be the languages of the land. There will be no discrimination between Arabs and Jews for governmental or public work."

"The Muslim holy sites will be overseen by your representatives. The Hebrew government will grant education to all....No more will there be epidemics in our towns and villages. Work pay will be lifted to European standards. Agriculture will be developed. Houses will be built instead of tents. Water and electricity will reach every household. The Hebrew state will be a shared home for all, and peace and understanding will be between it and all independent Arab nations."

"If you want, and do not give your ears to agitators, peace and friendship between our two peoples can be eternal. Together we shall build this holy land. Together we shall gain from its fruits and treasures. Together we will develop its agriculture and industry. Together we will forward our sovereign peoples into a world of justice, freedom, wealth and dignity. To our Arab neighbors, we reach our hand out to you in peace and fraternity. Do not reject it!"



Clifford D. May: Defending America’s defenders Beginning to stand up to a hostile international organization
Mr. Barr said the ICC has become “a political tool employed by unaccountable international elites.” He added that “foreign powers, like Russia, are also manipulating the ICC in pursuit of their own agenda.”

Mr. O’Brien echoed: “We have every reason to believe our adversaries are manipulating the ICC by encouraging these allegations.”

Sooner rather than later, administration officials should tell us more. However, it’s not difficult to imagine the means by which the ICC might be influenced, especially given how China’s rulers took control of the World Health Organization to the detriment of the health and well-being of people around the world.

America’s adversaries have increasingly been commandeering and subverting international organizations. The most obvious example: The U.N. Human Rights Council, long under the control of serial human rights abusers. But the People’s Republic of China is singularly adept at taking the reins.

Among the 15 most significant U.N. agencies, four are currently run by Chinese citizens who are kept on a short leash by China’s rulers. Citizens of the U.S., Britain and France combined lead the same number of U.N. agencies. Those individuals regard themselves as international civil servants who do not take instructions from their capitals.

The Trump administration, to its credit, recently succeeded in preventing Beijing’s candidate from heading up the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). Beijing, of course, steals intellectual property on an historically unprecedented scale.

Much more can and should be done about the ICC in particular, and international organizations beholden to America’s authoritarian adversaries in general.

America’s allies could help. NATO members and Japan depend on American troops to defend them. Yet they both support and fund the ICC even as it unlawfully targets the American troops putting their lives on the line for them. At a time of growing isolationism in America on both the left and the right, a time when those of us who support strong relations with America’s democratic allies are on the defensive, do they not see how unstrategic and unwise that is?


The ICC has nothing to do with justice
Just as bizarre from a judicial standpoint is the fact the court is attempting to try Israel for a “crime” for which the court has never indicted any other country—not Turkey for its illegal 1974 conquest of part of Cypress, or Russia for its 2014 invasion and annexation of Crimea.

Both Turkey and Russia violently seized territories that were undisputedly parts of sovereign nations—if any countries deserve prosecution by the ICC, these two do.

On the other hand, territories in question in the Holy Land were never under the sovereignty of the Palestinians. Rather, these lands west of the Jordan River were ceded to Israel in 1920 by the San Remo Accord and later ratified by the League of Nations and the United Nations.

Jordan, which briefly seized control of Judea and Samaria, was thrown out by Israel in 1967, and released its claim to these lands to Israel in 1994. In fact, Israel has greater claim to this territory than any nation on earth. The Palestinians have never had sovereignty over any land.

Eugene Kontorovich, director of International Law at the Jerusalem-based Kohelet Policy Forum and director of the Center for International Law in the Middle East at George Mason University, noted that Bensouda “has come to the absurd decision that a non-country can sue a non-member of the ICC for a non-crime that nobody has ever been prosecuted for.”

Finally, the ICC has shown indisputable political bias. When the Rome Statute was originally drafted, the Arab League pressured negotiators to criminalize Israel for allowing its own civilians to move into Judea and Samaria. The statute’s definition of international aggression also compromises national rights to self-defense.

No wonder most U.N. Security Council permanent members (including the United States) and emerging global powers (like Israel) declined to sign the Rome Statute and become members of the International Criminal Court.

What’s worse, according to a report by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, the ICC’s case against the United States originated by two nonprofit advocacy groups—the International Federation of Human Rights and the Center for Constitutional Rights, both related to the Palestinian NGOs that brought the complaint against Israel to the ICC.

As shown in the JCPA report, the Palestinian NGOs “maintain strong ties to the designated terror organizations Hamas and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.” These organizations are certainly not friends of the United States or Israel.

In short, the International Criminal Court is really no court at all. Rather it’s a political action agency of the United Nations, whose goal is to defame countries it views as enemies, using “lawfare” based on false charges.
Justice Department can and should prosecute Palestinian war criminals
The International Criminal Court was supposed to pursue rogue regimes unwilling to hold war criminals accountable. Now that the ICC is instead investigating the U.S. and Israel, the Trump administration has laudably taken measures to penalize those who would politicize the court. President Trump can go further, however, by targeting a party fueling the current controversy: the Palestinian Authority.

After years of refusing to negotiate in good faith, the Palestinians have adopted a strategy of extracting concessions from Israel through pressure in the international arena. In this regard, the Palestinian Authority joined the ICC and requested an examination of its conflict with Israel. The court has proven to be an all-too-sympathetic forum.

Against the objections of numerous member states, the ICC’s Office of the Prosecutor has engaged in legal acrobatics to haul Israel before a court it never joined. The ICC has even coordinated with Palestinian terror-linked groups in collecting “evidence” against the Jewish state.

Simply put, the ICC cannot be relied upon to investigate the Palestinian Authority and the terrorist organizations it enables adequately. The United States, however, has both the justification and jurisdiction to bridge this gap.

Given the frequency with which Americans visit and reside in Israel, it is not surprising that many U.S. citizens have fallen victim to Palestinian terrorism. In the past, attempts to assert jurisdiction over these crimes (most notably, the 1985 Achille Lauro cruise ship hijacking and the murder of Leon Klinghoffer) dragged on for years before evaporating.

With strong backing from the Trump administration, however, a Republican-controlled Congress took the first steps in renewing American efforts against Palestinian terror. The 2018 Taylor Force Act, named after an American military veteran killed while visiting Tel Aviv, put the spotlight on a unique feature of Palestinian terrorism: pay-for-slay.
JPost Editorial: Jordan’s King Abdullah II needs to start being helpful
While criticism of long-standing US Mideast allies such as Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Israel is commonplace in Washington, and has been for years, Jordan has generally received special treatment because of widespread recognition of its precarious strategic situation and the important role it plays in stabilizing the Mideast and in combating terrorism.

But harboring a terrorist responsible for killing 15 people, who then later boasted about it in the Jordanian media, does not align with that terrorism-fighting image.

Abdullah’s apologists will say Congress needs to take into account his precarious domestic position, that the Jordanian population is 55%-70% Palestinian and that they would oppose the extradition of Tamimi.

But the excuse of angry Palestinian public opinion in Jordan is overused. It was used last year when the king gratuitously opted out of annexes from its 1994 peace treaty with Israel that leased Naharayim and Tzofar to the Jewish state. And it is used to explain why the king has done almost nothing in his 21 years on the throne to promote people-to-people ties with its western neighbor.

Sure, the king wants Israel’s security assurances, cooperation in facing off against terrorists who also threaten him and access to Israeli water and energy. But heaven forbid he should come out publicly against Jordanian labor unions calling to boycott Israel.

The 1994 peace agreement, it is fair to say, is solid at a government-to-government level but did not filter down to the Jordanian masses. Abdullah is partly to blame for this.

While Washington appreciates the role the king plays in the region, it should also let him know it has expectations. The first is not to harbor terrorists, and the second is to look for ways to tamp down – rather than exacerbate – tensions with Israel.
Flynn transcript shows Russia opposed Obama UN resolution on Israel
Russia did not support a UN Security Council Resolution that the Obama administration considered pushing in order to force parameters for a peace agreement on Israel and the Palestinians, as indicated by recently declassified phone conversations between US President Donald Trump's former adviser Michael Flynn and Russia's ambassador to the US at the time Sergey Kislyak.

The US and Russia denied reports that in December 2016, soon after then-US president Barack Obama allowed UN Security Council Resolution 2334 condemning Israeli settlement activity to pass, he pushed a second resolution that would be damaging to the Jewish state. The resolution passed because the US abstained, as opposed to its usual veto.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ended up convincing Russian President Vladimir Putin to threaten a veto. The resolution was never actually submitted to the UNSC, because it had no chance of passing.

But the Flynn-Kislyak transcripts declassified late last month indicated that the story of Putin’s veto of a second Obama-backed resolution – first reported in Israel Hayom this week and further developed by The Jerusalem Post – is, in fact true.

Netanyahu enlisted then-president-elect Donald Trump and his staff to try to block Resolution 2334. During those efforts, an Israeli source told the Post this week, Israeli Ambassador to the UN Danny Danon found out that a second resolution was on the way.

The resolution would have forced parameters for a peace agreement on Israel and the Palestinians, including a Palestinian state based on pre-1967 borders, and was “more like what the Palestinians want and very far from the Trump plan,” the source said. Netanyahu once again appealed to Trump’s team, as well as to Moscow.
Russia denies Israel Hayom report on helping Israel in Security Council
Russia's Foreign Ministry released an official statement Thursday denying the Israel Hayom report that Moscow threatened to veto a US-led draft resolution in 2016 that would have endorsed the creation of a Palestinian state.

Israel Hayom reported earlier this week that one month before leaving office, US President Barack Obama began working on a United Nations Security Council resolution that would have forced Israel to agree to a Palestinian state based on the 1948 borders. After Israel asked Russia to veto the resolution, Russian President Vladimir Putin agreed, according to the Israel Hayom report.

At the time, the US administration denied the Israeli claim that another resolution, in addition to UNSCR 2334 that declared Israeli settlements illegal, was going to be brought before the UN Security Council.

Nevertheless, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu again sought help from Russian President Putin to prevent another resolution. In another phone conversation, he explained to Putin that Obama's new resolution would do serious harm to Israel and could destabilize the region.

Putin was convinced and told Netanyahu that if the resolution came to a vote, Russia would veto it, according to the report.

The report further said that Netanyahu said in a closed meeting that Obama was informed of Russia's intention to veto the American move and realized that if Russia vetoed a US resolution in order to protect Israel, it would be a fatal blow to the US's image as an ally of Israel and its standing in the Jewish community. Therefore, Obama decided to shelve the resolution, Netanyahu said.
Rivlin uses it, many pro-Israel advocates hate it: Is ‘annexation’ a dirty word?
As Israel moves forward with plans to legally anchor its control over parts of the West Bank, those in favor of the controversial step speak of the application of “Israeli sovereignty” or of “Israeli law” over the territory. They abhor the term “annexation,” because, they argue, it has connotations of an illegal land grab when they believe Israel has a rightful claim to these areas.

Perhaps surprisingly, Israel’s head of state does not appear to have any qualms with this a-word, which is generally defined as the acquisition of territory by force. In a statement urging a more civil discourse about the plan issued earlier this month, President Reuven Rivlin repeatedly used the term “annexation.”

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has recently been more careful about nomenclature, speaking about his desire to “apply sovereignty to areas of Judea and Samaria.” But he, too, has occasionally been heard uttering the word “annexation” (sipuah in Hebrew).

So is it acceptable to call Israel’s plan to apply its law over the Jordan Valley and all settlements in the West Bank an annexation? Or did Rivlin — who is in favor of annexing the entire West Bank with full citizenship for Palestinians — unwittingly play into the hands of those who believe Israel is about to unlawfully seize territory that does not belong to it?

“The word annexation is just the wrong word,” US Ambassador to Israel David Friedman said on January 29, one day after President Donald Trump presented his Israeli-Palestinian peace plan, which forms the basis of Israel’s planned move. “It’s not the word that would apply to this; it’s the application of Israeli law,” he insisted.
Gantz won’t support annexation of areas with Palestinian residents
Alternate Prime Minister and Defense Minister Benny Gantz expressed opposition on Thursday to Israel extending its laws to parts of the West Bank with large Palestinian populations.

"Prior to any measure, we will make sure all professional factors voice their opinion, and in any scenario, we will not support applying sovereignty to areas with a Palestinian population in order to prevent friction," Gantz said at a meeting with defense officials, N12 reported.

"I am sure Prime Minister [Benjamin Netanyahu] will not jeopardize the peace treaty with Jordan and the strategic relations of the State of Israel with the US with an irresponsible move,” he added.

US President Donald Trump’s “Vision for Peace” for Israel and the Palestinians states that all areas in which Palestinians live remain under Palestinian control and Israeli areas under Israeli sovereignty. This would mean the creation of numerous Palestinian enclaves in Israel and Israeli enclaves in what is meant to be a Palestinian state. However, the technicalities of this stipulation are still unclear, especially in the Jordan Valley.
Borrell: Annexation to have ‘significant consequences’ for EU-Israel ties
There will be “significant consequences” for the EU-Israel relationship if Israel extends its sovereignty to parts of the West Bank, European Union High Commissioner for Foreign Affairs Josep Borrell warned in remarks to the European Parliament on Thursday.

“Annexation would inevitably have significant consequences for the close relationship we currently enjoy with Israel,” Borrell said. “I will not prejudge the specific impact of a possible annexation, but let me underline that the EU has its own obligations and responsibility under international and EU law.”

Borrell added that he is using all of the EU’s “diplomatic capacities in order to put pressure for that not to happen” and that he expressed “the gravity of such an announcement” in conversations with Alternate Prime Minister Benny Gantz and Foreign Minister Gabi Ashkenazi.

At the same time, Borrell admitted that “it is difficult to find unanimity” on the matter – referring to opposition from Hungary, Austria and the Czech Republic to past warnings he released – though there is “a strong, very strong majority of countries that continue supporting a negotiated two-state solution based on international parameters and considering that any annexation would be against international law.”
EU okays landmark Israel ‘Open Skies’ aviation deal, despite annexation tensions
The European Parliament on Wednesday evening ratified a major aviation agreement with Israel. The Open Skies agreement is seen as a major boost for the Israeli economy, since it reduces airfares and promotes the creation of additional routes.

Jerusalem hailed the vote on the deal, which concluded a seven-year process, as a major diplomatic achievement.

At the same time, the European Union on Thursday indicated that the vote should not be seen as prejudging its response to a possible Israeli annexation of parts of the West Bank. It vowed to “closely monitor the situation and its broader implications, and act accordingly.”

The European Parliament voted in favor of the EU-Israel Euro-Mediterranean Aviation Agreement with a large majority: 437-102, with 147 abstentions.

Several left-wing factions had tried to postpone the vote until after Israel’s apparently imminent annexation move, but their motion was defeated in a preliminary technical vote and so the agreement moved to the EP plenary, where it was approved together with similar agreements with Jordan, China and Georgia.
Jordanian Official: We Won't Damage Security Ties with Israel for Palestinians
A senior Jordanian official in Amman told Israel Hayom on Wednesday: "The Palestinian interest is obviously important to us, but what's more acute from our perspective is Jordan's national and security interest."

"Any framework that will keep the Palestinians in the West Bank and not create a geographical connection between the independent Palestinian state and the Hashemite Kingdom is acceptable to us."

"We won't accept the presence of an international military force on Jordan's western border and certainly won't accept the presence of a Palestinian military force responsible for safeguarding the kingdom's western border."

"This is also the reason for our objection in the past to the diplomatic initiative spearheaded by Secretary of State John Kerry during the Obama administration, who wanted to transfer most of the Jordan Valley to the Palestinians, and proposed various and odd technological tools to preserve Jordan and Israel's security interests."

"From the perspective of the Jordanian security interest, we prefer an IDF presence west of the kingdom in the Jordan Valley over any other alternative."

"We have no interest or intention of damaging our security relations with Israel on behalf of the Palestinians."

"I don't see that any Arab leader is ruining relations with the Trump administration for the Palestinians."
Jordanian FM makes rare trip to Ramallah for annexation talks
Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi met with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas in the West Bank on Thursday, amid tensions with Israel over its annexation plans for parts of the territory.

Safadi traveled by helicopter for the rare trip to Ramallah, headquarters of the Palestinian Authority, Abbas’s office told AFP.

The talks were to focus on Israel’s plans to annex settlements in the West Bank as well as the strategic Jordan Valley, areas slated to be part of the Jewish state under US President Donald Trump’s peace plan.

Quoting a Palestinian diplomatic source ahead of the meeting, the Haaretz daily said Safadi would brief Abbas on talks Jordan’s King Abdullah II held with Arab leaders on annexation, including a phone call Wednesday with UAE Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed al Nahyan.

According to the source, the PA believes the pressure on Israel and the Trump administration concerning annexation is beginning to work, noting the growing receptiveness to Jordan’s position. The source also pointed to the divides in the new Israeli government between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Benny Gantz on the issue, with the latter reportedly wary the move could damage relations with Jordan

Netanyahu has pledged to begin the annexation process from July 1, prompting Jordan to warn that it would review ties.

Jordan and Egypt are the only Arab states to have peace agreements with Israel.








Honest Reporting: Media Ignore Canada’s Throwing Israel to the Wolves in bid to get a United Nations Security Council Seat
It went completely below the media’s radar – how Canada signaled that it was prepared to make Israel a sacrificial lamb and was willing to enter into a Faustian bargain with dictators, to secure a coveted seat on the United Nations Security Council.

In the final days of its campaign against Norway and Ireland for two available seats, Canada pushed back at critics of its bid by promoting its pro-Palestinian credentials and hiding its pro-Israel legacy.

On June 10, Marc-André Blanchard, Canada’s ambassador to the UN, penned a letter addressed to all member and observer states of the UN Security Council where he censured Israel for its plans to apply sovereignty to Judea and Samaria (the “west bank”) as being “contrary to international law” and for posing a “threat” to the two state solution. Not acknowledged by Mr. Blanchard, and completely ignored by the mainstream media, Israel says international law enshrines its rights to these lands, while citing pressing security concerns and biblical, historical and political connections to the land. The Jewish state plans to make the region Israel proper and to apply Israeli law to the Jordan Valley and 30% of Area C territory per the Oslo Accords of Judea and Samaria (“west bank”) per the Trump peace plan and consistent with past U.S. peace proposals that have long understood that Israel will retain these areas in a final peace accord.

Importantly, a nation cannot “annex” land which it has sovereign claims to. According to international law, these lands were promised to the Jewish people at the San Remo Conference in 1920 which led to the establishment in British-mandate Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people. Israel doesn’t regard the “west bank” as “occupied” because there was no sovereign prior to the defensive Six-Day-War in 1967. Jordan illegally occupied and administered the land from 1948-1967 after Israel’s War of Independence which was waged by pan-Arab armies seeking the nascent State of Israel’s destruction. Jordan didn’t have sovereignty over the land which was ruled under British Mandatory Palestine. As is commonly known, Israel accepted partition and the Arab world rejected it, instead, seeking the Jewish state’s annihilation.








Satisfied Sudan migrant inspires new attempts to cross into Israel from Lebanon
A Sudanese migrant detained by Israeli troops after he crossed into Israel from southern Lebanon on Wednesday morning had something unusual in his backpack — a suit to wear for job interviews.

The IDF, on constant alert for attempts by the Hezbollah terror group to breach the border, has, in recent months, had to also deal with a spate of attempts by African migrants attempting to cross the frontier.

The migrants appear to be coming to the Jewish state in search of work in light of the ongoing Lebanese economic crisis, which has left many of the country’s foreign workers unemployed or underpaid.

And they have been encouraged by the success story of the first Sudanese migrant to breach the border in January, Channel 12 news reported.

Detained by troops, the man was interrogated by the Shin Bet security service and after it determed that he had no plans to carry out terror attacks, was released and allowed to stay in Israel.

Military sources told the network that he then went to Tel Aviv where he found a job washing dishes. He has since been posting on social media about how good it is in Israel, where there is lots of work.

This has reportedly led to the uptick in attempts to cross the border.

Last month, Israeli troops apprehended three such individuals caught trying to cross from Lebanon into Israel, the IDF said at the time.

In a bid to deter further attempts, the man arrested on Wednesday was returned to Lebanon, the report said.
PMW: PA threatens Israel: You will taste the sword!
PA TV Live is one of the two official TV stations run by the PA. During the last few weeks, the PA has used this station to promote violence and terror via music videos, as Palestinian Media Watch has documented in several reports. And the PA’s inventory of terror promotion seems inexhaustible. The following is yet another example of PA threatening Israel:

“What you’ll taste is the sword!”
PA promises Israel one thing only: violence and destruction.

Lyrics: “I’ve continued to sing and burn everything [like] gunpowder…
O, usurper of my land, there is nothing in it for you other than sorrow
Your sorrow is from my response and from the revolution’s fire that won’t calm down.
[We] are coming to you with lion soldiers – and what you’ll taste is the sword!
We’ll destroy your structure, and pray at the Al-Aqsa [Mosque].”

[Official PA TV Live, June 6, 2020]

“Jihad is necessary”
Significantly, PA’s other TV channel, PA TV, has joined in, and is broadcasting a call to Palestinians and “the Islamic nation” several times daily, urging them “to act before it’s too late.” Text slides are read by a narrator followed by part of a song, which the PA used to ignite its terror wave in October 2000. The message is to go to holy war: “Jihad is necessary”:


PMW: Mothers sing with daughters about being terrorists: “No force in the world can remove the weapon from my hand”
When Palestinian mothers and young daughters participated in PA TV’s reenactment of the old bus ride from Jerusalem to Amman, Jordan, they used the bus ride as an opportunity to sing with their daughters about violence and terror:

Lyrics: “From my wounds, my weapon has emerged.
O, our revolution, my weapon has emerged
There is no force in the world that can remove the weapon from my hand
My weapon has emerged. My weapon has emerged."

[Official PA TV, Bus 47, June 2, 2020]

In its entirety, this song contains additional lyrics encouraging Martyrdom that were not aired in this PA TV broadcast:

“He who offers his blood does not care
if his blood flows upon the ground.
As the weapon of the revolution is in my hand,
so my presence will be forced [upon Israel].”

Palestinian Media Watch has documented that this song is popular in the PA.


Former Palestinian Authority official sentenced to 15 years in graft case
The former director-general of the Palestinian Pension Agency has been convicted, in absentia, of financial corruption and sentenced to 15 years in prison. He was also ordered to pay a fine of $53,000.

Two other former Palestinian Authority officials were also convicted in absentia on similar charges and sentenced to 15 years in prison. They were also ordered to pay a fine of $620,233.

The names of the three convicted officials were not released.

A woman, whose name was also not released, also received a fine of $620,233 for her role in the case.

The PA Attorney-General said in a statement that the former officials and the woman were found guilty of embezzlement, bribery, money laundering and illegal profiteering.

The verdict was issued by a “corruption crimes court” of three judges: Adel Abu Saleh, Ramez Jumhour and Mohammed Rasoul, according to the statement, which pointed out that all the accused had fled the country.
PreOccupiedTerritory: Arab MKs Warn Palestinians: If You Accept Israeli Citizenship We’ll Stop Representing You (satire)
Legislators from the alliance of several mostly-Arab parties in Israel’s parliament addressed their non-citizen brethren living under Palestinian self-rule since 1993, cautioning them that if Israel does apply its sovereignty to areas it now treats as occupied under military administration, Palestinians living in those areas who insist on becoming citizens of the Jewish State can forget about having the Joint List act on their behalf in the Knesset anymore.

MKs Ahmad Tibi, Mansour Abbas, and Mtanes Shehadeh made separate statements Thursday directed at Palestinians living in portions of the territory Israel claimed from Jordanian occupation in 1967, and warned that whereas until now the four parties in the List made the interests of Palestinians living under Palestinian rule under the Oslo Accords – and who therefore do not vote in Israeli elections, but their own, should they ever choose to hold any – a priority in their legislative and political activities, if significant numbers of those Palestinians opt to become citizens of Israel and vote directly for parliamentary representation, that prioritization will no longer operate. Recent polls indicate anywhere from ten percent to one half of Palestinians under Palestinian rule would prefer Israeli citizenship to their current situation.

“The surveys give us cause for worry,” explained Tibi. “We have spent the last several decades representing what we see as the interests of our fellow Palestinians beyond the Green Line, as opposed to the Arab citizens of Israel who actually voted for us. If those whose interests we have represented for so long decide in large numbers to remove themselves from the group we represent, we will have to reconsider our political relationship with them. That’s the grim reality.”
Hezbollah’s ‘Antisemitic Brainwashing’ of Lebanese Schoolchildren Exposed in New Report
International efforts to counter the Lebanese terrorist organization Hezbollah need to be widened to include the group’s extensive network of schools and educational institutions, a new report to be released on Thursday asserts.

The report by the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) — an advance copy of which was shared with The Algemeiner — observed that with the effective takeover by Hezbollah of Lebanon’s government in January this year, the Iranian-backed Shi’a group “now wields greater influence over a broad range of Lebanese government policies than ever before.”

That includes the country’s education sector, which exposes thousands of students to antisemitic and anti-West incitement through textbooks, group activities, and similar means.

“This kind of antisemitic brainwashing depends in part upon the silence of well-meaning observers in order to succeed,” David Weinberg — the ADL’s Washington director of international affairs and the author of the report, titled “Teaching Antisemitism and Terrorism in Hezbollah Schools” — said in a phone interview on Wednesday. “International action to call out these hateful educational institutions is important as part of a broader strategy for combating Hezbollah terrorism.”

Although Hezbollah is designated as a terrorist organization by the United States, the European Union and some Latin American countries, the notion that the educational and welfare services it supports should be exempted from international sanctions still persists.
Europe Must Join the Fight Against the Iranian Regime
Ayatollah Khamenei has underscored once more why the U.N. arms embargo against Iran must not be allowed to expire in October. His sinister tweets last month about a "final solution" for the "cancerous tumor," i.e. the "Zionist regime," rightly led to widespread condemnation—including from the U.S. and the European Union (EU).

But Khamenei is not some private internet crank who can be contained with a harsh statement or by removing his blue checkmark. He is, literally, the "supreme leader" of a clerical regime whose repeated genocidal threats against Israel are backed up with an advanced nuclear program and a four-decade-long military and terrorist campaign against the Jewish state. Europe has thus a historical and strategic duty to back U.S. diplomatic efforts at the United Nations (U.N.) to prevent Tehran from buying advanced weapons from Russia and China.

The Islamic Republic and its proxies have already caused untold deaths and destruction throughout Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Gaza, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon and Israel. Imagine the threat Iran would pose not just to Israel, but to the region, the U.S. and Western security, in general, if it could add state-of-the-art conventional weapons to its considerable ballistic missile arsenal, unconventional warfare capabilities and nuclear program. A militarily upgraded Iran, with the backing from Russia and China, would be a strategic game-changer smack in Europe's southern neighborhood.

The EU is in a bind, though. It still backs the Iran nuclear deal (JCPOA), from which the U.S. withdrew in 2018. And it is that same JCPOA which would allow Iran, in a few months, to go on a shopping spree for modern fighter jets, tanks and choppers. That's because U.N. Resolution 2231, which endorsed the JCPOA, also inexplicably weakened sanctions on ballistic missiles and turned the previously indefinite U.N. arms embargo into one with an expiration date: October 18, 2020.

The hope was evidently that through ever-closer diplomatic and economic engagement, the regime would become a more "responsible" international actor so that its eventual rearmament wouldn't much matter. The regime, though, never moderated. Instead, it used the financial windfall from sanction relief to intensify its regional aggression and domestic oppression. This was the reality even in the years before the U.S. left the deal.
MEMRI: Supporters Of Jihad, Suicide Operations Attend Annual Conference Of Qatari Religious Endowments Ministry
Since 2014, Qatar's Ministry of Endowments and Religious Affairs has been holding an annual Ramadan conference titled "And Made Them Safe from Fear" (a phrase from Quran 106:4). Attended by the Qatari Endowments Minister and by clerics and prominent figures from across the Muslim world, the conference addresses the current situation of the Islamic nation and the challenges it faces. Although its website states that its goal is "to renew [the glory] of the Islamic nation with living and moderate voices" and "to serve as a platform... for making a real contribution to the fight against zealotry and extremism, [1] the conference is regularly attended by clerics and politicians known for their extremist positions and support of terrorism.

This year's conference was held virtually due to the coronavirus pandemic. Its first session, on May 17, dealt with Islamic jurisprudence amid the pandemic, and its second session, on May 18, was devoted to coexistence between Islam and other religions.[2] Another seminar held as part of the conference on June 10, was titled "Jerusalem Is an [Islamic] Trust."[3]

The most prominent cleric to attend this year's conference was Sheikh Yousuf Al-Qaradawi, founder of the International Union of Muslim Scholars (IUMS) and a major ideologue of the Muslim Brotherhood, known for his extremist and jihadi views, who even spoke in the past in favor of suicide operations.[4] The conference was also attended by other clerics (some of them IUMS members) from various Muslim countries known for their radical views. One was Egyptian sheikh Muhammad Yusri Ibrahim, who was minister of endowments in Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood government under Muhammad Mursi and has written about the "benefits" of 9/11. Another was Indian sheikh Salman Al-Nadwi, who in 2014 congratulated the late leader of ISIS, Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi, upon his appointment as Caliph.

A report on the website of the Saudi Al-Arabiya television channel presented information about the conference and several of its participants. In noted that, although the UN Office for Counter-Terrorism (UNOCT) has established an international hub in Doha, and although Qatar and the UN recently signed a memorandum of understandings to increase their cooperation in combatting terror, [5] the conference participants included figures with extremist views. The report provided details on some of their past statements.
'Erdogan's anti-Semitism has done great harm to Turkey'
Despite Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's attempts to quash Turkish democracy since entering office, some brave Turkish politicians are willing to speak out and criticize him for the damage they feel he has done to Turkey, including to Turkish-Israeli relations.

Dr. Aykan Erdemir was a member of the Turkish parliament from 2011-2015 for the CHP party, a political entity that was established by Mustafa Kemal Ataturk.

In an interview with Israel Hayom, Erdemir did not hold back when it comes to Erdogan.

"Erdogan's state-sanctioned anti-Semitic propaganda will continue to haunt Turkey long after he is gone from office," Erdemir said, adding that "the hate and prejudice inculcated in the Turkish people for almost two decades will have lasting effects in hindering Turkish-Israeli relations and will take time and effort to reverse."

However, Erdemir, who currently serves as Senior Director of the Turkey Program at the Washington-based Foundation for Defense of Democracies, sees some cause for optimism.

"The growing realization that Turkey needs to break from its isolation in the eastern Mediterranean will push Turkish politicians in post-Erdogan Turkey to invest in rebuilding cordial relations with Israel as well with Turkey's western allies," he said.

Erdemir notes that for Turkey to detach itself from Erdogan's Islamism, it will need to tackle not only "his religious and social engineering attempts at home, but also undoing his ill-advised foreign and security policy that undermined Turkey's diplomatic, military, and intelligence partnerships in the region."


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