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Thursday, July 16, 2020

07/16 Links Pt2: The Alignment of BDS and Black Lives Matter: Implications for Israel and Diaspora Jewry; Ice Cube Compares Kareem Abdul-Jabbar To Judas For Condemning Anti-Semitism

From Ian:
The Alignment of BDS and Black Lives Matter: Implications for Israel and Diaspora Jewry
International protests over the murder of Minneapolis resident George Floyd while in police custody on May 25, 2020, led by the Black Lives Matter movement (BLM), have generated expressions of sympathy and support from Western prime ministers, legislators, law enforcement officials, and local government.

American Jewish leaders unequivocally condemned the Floyd killing. World Jewish Congress President Ronald Lauder denounced it as a “horrific racist act.”2 The Union for Reform Judaism issued a statement that read, “Black Lives Matter Is a Jewish Value.”3 The Orthodox Jewish Union (OU) declared, “Racism is not a thing of the past or simply a political issue. It is a real and present danger that must be met head-on.”4

Boycott Divestment Sanctions (BDS) organizations have ratcheted up racial tensions and anti-Semitic agitation by accusing Israel of complicity in the Floyd murder.5 The BDS strategy is not new. The Jewish State has, for some years, been recast as an illegitimate “white oppressor” state.

Ongoing demonstrations across the United States have reenergized the intersectional solidarity between those protesting anti-Black racism in America and BDS organizations’ demands to “Free Palestine from the [Jordan] River to the [Mediterranean] Sea” – a clarion call to dismantle the State of Israel.

The BDS-BLM convergence, then, as it relates to the Palestinian issue, has removed the Palestinian-Israeli conflict from its territorial framework and has recast the Jewish nation-state as a racial issue – “apartheid” and illegitimate by definition.

Israel adversary Linda Sarsour applauded longtime Israel critic Peter Beinart’s recent disavowal of Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people. She praised Beinart for legitimizing Palestinian rejectionism of Jewish sovereignty, saying, “Maybe Zionists will listen to one of their own. Peter has evolved over the years, and I welcome his evolution.”

This new radical discourse demands that American Jews be neither liberal nor progressive. Those affiliations accept the existence of the Jewish State, yet are deemed unacceptable according to the “virtues” of a more drastic American dialogue.
The blatant anti-Semitism of Bill de Blasio
Those targeting Jews were other minorities, mainly black and Hispanic New Yorkers. De Blasio did not push back against the dangerous new bail-reform law, which essentially gave a slap on the wrist for criminals and those who did end up in jail ended up being released shortly after committing crimes. He did nothing to protect his Jewish residents.

When the Iranian-backed, terrorist-in-nature Al-Quds Day event was held last year in Times Square, the anti-Israel groups participating had to get a permit; that was allowed. Not even a few weeks ago, a "Day of Rage" protest/march was held in Brooklyn, these events explicitly target Israel which directly is an attack on Jews and often times leads to anti-Semitic incidents. Yet were there any neo-Nazi marches in New York City? Not that those should ever be encouraged, of course, but de Blasio would not give such an easy permit to white supremacists, as he does to every other Jew-hater.

When New York was in the throes of the COVID-19 pandemic, only the Hassidic Jewish community was the target of de Blasio's ire. Yet there were overcrowding issues in the Bronx and house parties in Harlem. Being vigilant was all in the name of beating the virus, so most Jews did not say much. However, when a legitimate Chassidic funeral on April 28 was planned not only with the approval of the New York Police Department but with pre-approval of the Mayor's Office, de Blasio showed up, "shocked" at the crowd size, and immediately fired off an anti-Semitic tweet directed at the Jewish community. The Jewish community in New York is not cohesive; dozens of vibrant groups make up the proud fabric of Jewry in New York, so to blame "all Jews" due to one pre-arranged funeral, while ignoring other groups who were gathering in large numbers, was absolutely anti-Semitic.

One would think that letting Hassidic children play in neighborhood playgrounds would be far less a crime than thousands marching, many without face masks, but no. De Blasio ordered the police to fine parents whose children went without masks. This behavior towards the religious Jewish community was an injustice when such hypocrisy was on full display during the height of the BLM protests and interwoven riots.

De Blasio's anti-Semitic culture extends beyond himself. Earlier this year, Democrat Councilman Kalman Yeger pointed out the poison of anti-Semitism permeating within the City Council. And mere days ago, a City of New York tweet reminded residents to fill out the 2020 Census. It included a "Palestinian" flag among other flags representing the homelands of the city's residents, but omitted the Israeli flag, despite nearly 2 million Jews living in New York City. To not call out de Blasio as a dangerous anti-Semite is a farce.
Former NYPD commissioner warns US Jews: Protect your communities
Jewish communities in America should follow the example of those in Europe and put security measures in place in synagogues, Former NYPD Commissioner Ray Kelly has said in an interview, as he warned that “we are in a dangerous place in history.”

Budget cuts due to the coronavirus lockdown and an erosion of respect for police officers are creating a perfect storm that will see safety decline in New York and elsewhere, Kelly told Matthew Bronfman, chair of the International Steering Committee of Limmud FSU during an online interview.

“In the US the Jewish community needs to be more alert about who is entering community premises,” Kelly said, warning that in today's environment, synagogues cannot be fully open environments.

Kelly, who now heads the Anti-Semitism Accountability Project (ASAP), has visited ten European countries to meet with government and faith leaders to examine how antisemitism is being tackled on the Continent in comparison with the US, he said.

“Antisemitism there is not new. Neo-Nazis have never gone away, and populism is helping them flex their muscles,” Kelly noted. He acknowledged that the threat was slightly different in the two areas - in France, for example, antisemitism is driven by the left's support for the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement and the Muslim community, combined with a government which, thanks to a national culture of secularism, is slow to recognize the religious rights of minorities. Consequently, people can walk around with openly antisemitic messages on their t-shirts without consequence, he said.
Hen Mazzig: How Jewish Twitter users and celebrities took down a virtual anti-Semitic mob
When I saw "#JewishPrivilege" was trending on Twitter last week, I cringed. White nationalists had created the hashtag to spread anti-Semitic conspiracies about Jews being "privileged" - that we control the media, the banks and the world. Seemingly progressive Twitter users soon piled on with false claims that Jews don't face any discrimination, while also suggesting they are responsible for the discrimination and other ills many minorities face. This felt like an organized attack - as if everyone was in agreement that Jewish people are to be blamed for all that is wrong in the world.

The virtual mob of anti-Semites sparked flashbacks to my Iraqi grandma retelling stories of surviving the Farhud, a massacre in which a real-life mob of Iraqis murdered all the Jews they could in Baghdad back in 1941. So I urged Jews on Twitter to share their personal stories to refute the #JewishPrivilege falsehood. In a matter of hours, Jews shared their experiences of discrimination, violence, exile and mass murder.

The notion that Jews of any background are the oppressors rather than the oppressed erases our history - including the Holocaust and pogroms of many decades past, as well as more recent chapters, like the plight of the Ethiopian Jews who escaped persecution in Ethiopia by airlifts to Israel in the 1980s and '90s. Seeking to deny the entire Jewish people's generational struggles and erase us from the collective of minority groups denies our humanity and identity, and is thereby an act of deep-seated anti-Semitism.



Honest Reporting: Bari Weiss Leaves NYT: HonestReporting Responds
Journalism vs. activism

Some journalists will argue that no one can be truly objective, and this is true. However, that’s like saying that a doctor cannot possibly save every patient. That is also true, but a doctor can try. And therein lies the difference: a journalist can always try to be objective and enlightening, to put their own opinions to the side and to inform people in a way that enriches our society, rather than trying to dominate it. Many journalists do the opposite: they try to be activists, and even act abusively toward their colleagues who do otherwise. And if Weiss’ resignation is any indication, those activists are winning.

Certainly there is a place for activism: many people and groups do excellent work lobbying for specific, worthy causes, and even unworthy causes. However, to call yourself a “journalist,” and yet behave as an activist, is simply dishonest: you are declaring to the world that you are a source of reliable, unbiased information, even as you work with specific intent to do the opposite.
Optimism

Despite it all, we at HonestReporting remain optimistic. Bari Weiss eloquently captured the source of our optimism in this statement:
“Even now, I am confident that most people at The Times do not hold these views. Yet they are cowed by those who do.”

This is, apparently, the state of journalism today: an industry made up of many thoughtful, competent people who work in fear of a minority who are the loudest, most hateful, and most driven by cynical agenda.

These are dark times for professional journalism, but not devoid of hope. We see that hope every time HonestReporting achieves a correction, adds context or changes and informs the background that guides a journalist’s story. We see it every time a journalist thanks us for our help: for teaching them something new or for giving them the solid support they need in order to speak truthfully in the face of pressure. We even see this hope when some journalists, who are intractably infected by agenda or antisemitism, find they have no viable choice but to issue retractions and corrections or simply step back and remain silent.

Most of all, we see hope when we issue a “call to action,” and thousands of readers like you jump in to help: like this week when you spoke up, and then YouTube removed Louis Farrakhan’s antisemitic 4th of July speech from their platform.

On behalf of HonestReporting, I commend Bari Weiss for her courage and diligence, and cannot wait to see where she ends up next.

She, and journalists like her, are a source of inspiration and hope – for all of us.


Noah Rothman: A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Epistemic Closure
The resignations of New York Times opinion editor Bari Weiss and New York Magazine writer Andrew Sullivan effectively punctuated a week in which the center-left press went to war with itself over the notion that the atmosphere they’d cultivated might not be the most conducive to free and open debate.

Both writers—centrist but heterodox insofar as they wrote for liberal publications while being sharply critical of the identitarian excesses and groupthink to which the left has succumbed—are frequent objects of abuse. Their views, which remain well represented within the Democratic coalition, are regularly anathematized by their “very online” colleagues in opinion journalism as “controversial,” “bigoted,” “racist” “reactionary”—even targets of the left’s “hate.” As Vanity Fair’s Joe Pompeo revealingly wrote, Weiss’s conventionally liberal “commentary often appeals to conservatives”—an unforgivable sin.

Criticism of their work bordered on (and regularly veered into) ad hominem. The suppression of their work within their institutions and the internal harassment to which they were subjected simply became too much. So, they will be taking their considerable talents elsewhere.

This mounting pile of dead canaries within the liberal coal mine has inspired not introspection but withering mockery and derision. You see, goes this response, there really is no such thing as “cancel culture.” These voices are free to go wherever they want, just so long as it’s somewhere they can be easily ignored.

There is a sickness settling over the center-left intellectual landscape. It is one the left could recognize when its symptoms were observed in their political rivals: the plague of “epistemic closure.” Bruce Bartlett described it as the condition in which an intellectual movement abstains from the necessary work of questioning itself. Rachel Maddow blamed the Republican Party’s 2012 losses on the “factual bubble” in which the conservative movement was cocooned. As the right’s more self-critical voices became “marginalized, even self-marginalizing,” Marc Armbinder observed, it would only settle deeper into a self-reinforcing feedback loop that would foreclose on the prospect of representing a majority constituency.

A funny thing has happened as the right has progressed down this intellectual cul-de-sac. Even in the age of Trump, amid the standard pressures on the White House’s allies to comport with the party line compounded by this president’s unique insecurities, it’s been the right that has nurtured an environment of wildly dynamic discourse and philosophical exploration.
Seven Unanswered Questions About Bari Weiss’ New York Times Exit
The public resignation of Bari Weiss from her job as an editor and writer at The New York Times editorial page leaves many questions unanswered. Among them:
4. Will the Times take any action to improve its workplace climate? Doing so would concede that Weiss is correct and accurate in diagnosing the problems there, but failing to do so would be a signal that the paper’s leadership is indifferent to the bullying she describes. In a Times news article about the resignation, a Times spokeswoman, Eileen Murphy, said, “We’re committed to fostering an environment of honest, searching and empathetic dialogue between colleagues, one where mutual respect is required of all.” But the Times news article provided no specifics about what the company would do differently to foster that environment, or why and how it has fallen short of that.

5. Will the Times bring in another centrist or Zionist voice to replace Weiss to try to combat her claim that the organization couldn’t tolerate her views? The same Times news article quoted the acting editorial page editor, Kathleen Kingsbury, as saying, “I’m personally committed to ensuring that The Times continues to publish voices, experiences and viewpoints from across the political spectrum in the Opinion report.” The question is whether the Kingsbury definition of “across the political spectrum” is the spectrum between Elizabeth Warren and Amy Klobuchar, or between Peter Beinart and Mohammad Javad Zarif, or whether it extends further than that. The Times is already under pressure to fill Weiss’ spot with someone of similar ideological ilk. An editor at The Washington Free Beacon, Stephen Gutowski, tweeted, “If Bari Weiss is wrong and The New York Times opinion section is still committed to intellectual diversity then they will soon hire a center-right columnist who is respected among their ideological cohorts to replace her, yes?”

6. Who uttered the Bari’s “writing about the Jews again” comments? Weiss’s resignation letter said, “I have learned to brush off comments about how I’m ‘writing about the Jews again.’” Who at the Times made those comments and what do they have to say for themselves?
ZOA Sets Up Antisemitism Hotline for New York Times Staffers
The Zionist Organization of America (ZOA), the nation’s oldest pro-Israel organization, has set up a special antisemitism hotline for Jewish staffers at the New York Times and other outlets who are victims of antisemitism from their colleagues.

The ZOA was reacting to the resignation of Times opinion editor Bari Weiss on Tuesday, who left the Times over what she alleged was an increasingly intolerant environment, including antisemitism directed toward her: “My own forays into Wrongthink have made me the subject of constant bullying by colleagues who disagree with my views. They have called me a Nazi and a racist; I have learned to brush off comments about how I’m “writing about the Jews again,” she wrote.

In response, the ZOA has set up a phone number and email account to receive complaints about media antisemitism.

In a statement, ZOA President Morton A. Klein and Chair Mark Levenson said Wednesday:

ZOA condemns the hostile antisemitic work environment now on full and public display at the NY Times. Bari Weiss’s decision to resign from her position as a writer and editor at the Times highlights the problems of journalists who call out antisemitism on the right and the left, and stand up for Israel.

No journalist should pay a price for expressing these views. In her resignation letter, Weiss revealed that her Times colleagues called her “a Nazi and a racist.” They criticized her for “writing about the Jews again.”

To all journalists: We are with you and we are here to help you. ZOA has a long and proud record of effectively fighting antisemitism and standing up for the rights of Jews and those that support Israel. We do it in the courts, in Congress, in the media, in schools, and on college campuses. Rest assured, ZOA will stand up for you, too.
Anti-Racism Erases Anti-Semitism
Political conspiracism has its roots in the low religion of the European middle ages. In those terrible times of disease, deprivation, and war, the peasants and townsfolk, and their representatives in the lesser clergy and laity, sought relief by identifying the influence of Satan and his earthly agents: witches and Jews. Contemporary conspiracy theories are often shorn of content that is explicitly paranormal, but the medieval contours remain: They constitute a kind of secular magic that seeks to expose the devil and his collaborators. The oppressed, both perceived and actual, use them to deflect pain and misery from themselves to a scapegoat. And that scapegoat is us.

In February, the American Studies Department at Vassar College sponsored a talk about Israel and the Palestinians by the prominent queer theorist Jasbir Puar of Rutgers University. She was introduced by a professor who admonished the assembly against recording her remarks. When Puar took the podium, she congratulated Students for Justice in Palestine, which had helped publicize her appearance, for introducing a Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions resolution at Vassar. The crowd reciprocated with cheers and cries of “Free, free Palestine!”

It became quiet again. Puar began her talk, claiming that the recent spate of stabbings by Palestinians, which she quaintly called a “people’s rumble,” had served as a pretext for Israel to stage 120 “field executions” of young Palestinian boys. Seventeen of these boys’ bodies were held, she said, for two months without explanation. Then a convoy of 17 ambulances, one for each body, suddenly left a morgue in West Jerusalem and unfurled along a “convoluted” route towards Bethlehem. “Some speculate that the bodies were mined for organs for scientific research,” Puar said.

What kind of state would do this? One that claims “the right to maim and debilitate Palestinian bodies and environments as a form of biopolitical control.” Israel is the apex of predatory imperialism, Puar explained: It controls “infrastructure” so it can “modulate calories … to provide a bare minimum for survival.” And to what end? To transform the Palestinians into a population of half-fed zombies whose “dismantled and dismembered bodies” can be subjected to “gendering,” “ungendering,” and “epigenetic deterioration” through biological “hacking.” This not only enables the extraction of Palestinian resources right down to their very flesh, but it nourishes the Jewish privilege conferred by the Holocaust: “[Israelis] need the Palestinians alive in order to keep the kind of rationalization [sic] for their victimhood and their militarized economy.”

I think any Jewish resident of medieval Cologne or Worms would recognize this scene for exactly what it is: In this occulted room, Puar chanted an abracadabra of quasi-religious jargon and blood libels that must have struck her audience as wondrous. Some philosophers important in Puar’s field rely on a concept of jouissance, which might adequately be translated as transgressive rapture. Traducing the ideas of Freud, Marx, and Foucault in order to drape medieval Jew-hatred in a sumptuous fabric of critical theory is certainly not what Derrida and Lacan had in mind.

It’s not enough for the wretched of the earth to identify their oppressors. The people of darkness must be rooted out. They have earned the undying contempt of the children of light. Today the witches are gone, but the Jews remain.
The rise of part-time antisemitism blurs traditional definitions
There is much debate about whether some people are antisemitic. While many write about antisemitism, very few who do so understand its current complexities. One of the issues many observers have to come to grips with is that much of contemporary Jew-hatred can best be called part-time antisemitism. These are people who commit antisemitic acts or make such statements intermittently. On other occasions, some may even make positive remarks about Jews and/or Israel.

Until the Second World War, antisemitism had a limited number of core motifs. These recurred over the centuries. Gradually there were also new mutations of these motifs, while occasionally a new motif appeared. Since the Holocaust, further new expressions of hatred have emerged.

One of these is Holocaust inversion: “Israel behaves toward the Palestinians like the Nazis did toward the Jews.” Yet one can also consider this a mutation of an almost 2,000-year-old core motif: “Jews are absolute evil.” In our days, being a Nazi is often considered the greatest evil in Western society.

There are other changes in expressions of antisemitism taking place. These are often related to general culture. Living in post-modern societies means that many themes have fragmented.

That is also the case with antisemitism. This makes the analysis of contemporary antisemitism far more difficult than that of historic antisemitism. Even the widely accepted antisemitism definition of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) covers only part of what Jew- or Israel-haters say or do.

The foremost antisemite in the United States is probably Louis Farrakhan, leader of the Nation of Islam. He has called Judaism a “gutter religion” and a “religion of Satan.” Farrakhan has also used the word “termite” to describe certain Jews. He has called Hitler a “great man.” Farrakhan joined students in Tehran in 2018 shouting “Death to Israel,” and “Death to America.”

Nevertheless, Farrakhan has on occasions said that he doesn’t attack all Jews. He, albeit marginally, doesn’t qualify as a full-time antisemite.

One cannot describe former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn as a full-time antisemite either. He regularly states that antisemitism is vile and may not even hold any of the anti-Jewish prejudices that the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) used in its global survey. It is, however, clear that he is a part-time antisemite.
The Louis Farrakhan problem
This admiration of Farrakhan by popular cultural figures gives him the kosher stamp of approval. Millions of Americans take what he says seriously. This is an obvious problem which people do not want to discuss for obvious reasons. It's a deadly problem. Last year, the machete-wielding psycho who went on a murderous rampage in a New York rabbi's home was apparently an avid fan of Farrakhan. During the past few years, Orthodox Jews in New York have been the target of numerous attacks by black perpetrators. How many of them were influenced by Farrakhan?

It's no wonder the official Black Lives Matter statement of principles includes condemnation of only one foreign country: Israel. Black Lives Matter rallies have desecrated synagogues and chanted anti-Israel slurs.

Where are the black leaders and politicians calling out Farrakhan and his malign influence in their community? Where are the Obamas? Where is Eric Holder? Where is Kamala Harris? Where is Stacy Abrams? Where is Lebron James? Where is Don Lemon? For that matter, where are the Jewish leaders? Besides the Zionist Organization of America's Mort Klein and a few others, there's been silence. Should anti-Semitism only be condemned when it can be blamed on white supremacists?

An obscure food brand is undergoing a massive boycott because its Latino owner expressed support for Trump. Will any of Farrakhan's supporters be boycotted?

We must condemn all intolerance. There cannot be a double standard. If being perceived as someone who supports racism is enough to get you "canceled," then supporting the country's most popular and dangerous anti-Semite should, as well.

In this time of skyrocketing anti-Semitism around the world – and with knowledge of what Jew-hatred has led to in the past – the Jewish community does not have the luxury of remaining silent about anti-Semitism for fear of being politically incorrect or somehow distracting from the Black Lives Matter movement. History is not kind to societies that ignore or excuse hatred towards Jews.
Ice Cube Appears To Compare Kareem Abdul-Jabbar To Judas For Condemning Anti-Semitism
On Wednesday, rapper Ice Cube appeared to liken NBA Hall of Famer Kareem Abdul-Jabbar to the Biblical Judas after Abdul-Jabbar wrote a column published in The Hollywood Reporter in which he criticized Ice Cube and other black celebrities for promoting anti-Semitism.

Ice Cube tweeted, “Shame on the Hollywood Reporter who obviously gave my brother Kareem 30 pieces of silver to cut us down without even a phone call.”


On June 11, The Daily Beast noted Ice Cube’s recent and not-so-recent forays into anti-Semitism, reporting that he “offered up a dog-whistle to his 5.3 million Twitter followers: a Star of David enveloping a black cube. He posted the image above a quadriptych of similar black cubes in four places around the world: California, New York, Denmark, and Australia … The image in question, what those with vivid imaginations have come to call the ‘Black Cube of Saturn,’ has ties to the occult—the entirely unsubstantiated idea being that it’s a sign of chaos. Further, placing it inside a Star of David heavily implies that the Jewish people are stoking the flames.”

Just prior to the Star of David post, Ice Cube posted a meme showing a mural by the graffiti artist Mear One that the Daily Beast said was “clearly intended to be anti-Semitic.”

“Some of the older white Jewish folk in the local community had an issue with me portraying their beloved #Rothschild or #Warburg etc as the demons they are,” Mear One said of his mural.
Young Israel praises ViacomCBS over Nick Cannon, asks FOX to follow suit
The National Council of Young Israel (NCYI) praised American television network ViacomCBS for firing celebrity and TV personality Nick Cannon after he released an antisemetic podcast that also propagated conspiracy theories, yet the group is still calling FOX, which airs another one of Cannon's shows, to follow suit.

"We have spoken with Nick Cannon about an episode of his podcast ‘Cannon’s Class’ on YouTube, which promoted hateful speech and spread antisemitic conspiracy theories," The New York Times quoted a ViacomCBS statement as saying.

“While we support ongoing education and dialogue in the fight against bigotry, we are deeply troubled that Nick has failed to acknowledge or apologize for perpetuating antisemitism, and we are terminating our relationship with him.”

NCYI is a synagogue-based Orthodox Judaism organization in the United States. Cannon released his podcasts on YouTube in June, which earlier this week, sparked the organization to ask the question of why his offensive podcast continued to remain on YouTube’s platform if it violates their guidelines for hate speech, as YouTube's guidelines state that “[h]ate speech is not allowed on YouTube” and that YouTube will “remove content promoting violence or hatred against individuals or groups based on religion.”

In his "Cannon's Class" video podcast, Cannon interviewed "Professor Griff" Griffon, known for having been fired from the rap group Public Enemy in 1989 for making antisemetic remarks in an interview with The Washington Post. In the interview he reportedly said that Jews were responsible “for the majority of wickedness that goes on across the globe.”
‘We Are For Our People First’: Diddy Defends Nick Cannon, Invites Him To Join ‘Truly Black Owned’ Revolt TV
It seems that some prominent media figures with mega-platforms have come out in defense of television host Nick Cannon after ViacomCBS fired him in response to blatantly anti-Semitic/anti-white comments.

In a tweet on Wednesday, rapper and all-around music icon Diddy said that black people need to stand with Cannon and invited him to join the “truly black-owned” Revolt TV.

“[Nick Cannon] come home to [Revolt TV] truly BLACK OWNED!!!” tweeted Diddy. “We got your back and love you and what you have done for the culture. We are for our people first!!! For us! By US! Let’s go!!!”

Many followers of Diddy agreed with his sentiments about Nick Cannon, who called white people “true savages” and who suggested that black people are the “true Hebrews.”

“This is finally the year for all BLACK OWNED businesses,” tweeted one follower.
Charlamagne Tha God: Nick Cannon Getting Fired For Anti-Semitic Remarks Proves Jews ‘Have The Power’
Left-wing radio host Charlamagne tha God suggested on Wednesday that ViacomCBS terminating its relationship with Nick Cannon following remarks by Cannon that were viewed as anti-Semitic and anti-white was proof that Jewish people “have the power.”

“Listen, Nick is my guy,” Charlamagne tha God said. “I hate it had to be him, but that’s what you can do when you have the power. And if there’s one thing Jewish people have showed us, it’s they have the power.”

“I can’t wait until the day black people are able to fire people for saying things about us that we deem racist,” he continued. “We can barely get cops fired for actually killing us. They fired Nick for referencing a theory written by a psychologist on racism.”

Right-wing pundit Candace Owens responded to Charlamagne tha God’s comments by tweeting: “I respect @cthagod, but his comment that Nick Cannon’s firing proves ‘Jews have the power’ is off base. Did the hundreds of white people who have been fired over these past few months for disagreeing with the radical goals of black lives matter prove that we have the power?”

“Thousands of blacks promoted to comply with BLM,” Owens continued. “Thousands of whites fired for disagreeing, and everyone pretended it was cool. ONE black man gets fired and now it’s ‘the Jews have power’? Nope.”
Dwyane Wade Tells Nick Cannon To ‘Keep Leading’ After Cannon Fired For Racist Remarks; Wade Later Tries To ‘Clarify’
Former NBA star Dwyane Wade voiced support for Nick Cannon on Wednesday afternoon after Cannon was terminated by ViacomCBS for making remarks that were widely deemed as anti-Semitic.

Wade tweeted, “@NickCannon We are with you??? Keep leading!”

Seattle-based conservative radio host Jason Rantz tweeted out a screenshot of Wade’s tweet after Wade deleted the tweet a couple of hours after posting it.

“After Nick Cannon was fired for his disturbing anti-Semitic vitriol, Dwayne Wade tweeted his support… but then deleted the tweet,” Rantz said. “I screenshot it below. What leadership was @DwyaneWade supporting?”

Wade later claimed in a tweet that he was not expressing support or condoning Cannon’s remarks.

“I want to clarify my now deleted tweet,” Wade tweeted. “I was not supporting or condoning what Nick Cannon specifically said, but I had expressed my support of him owning the content and brand he helped create.”






Rachel Riley wins opening round of High Court legal battle over Twitter fight
Countdown presenter Rachel Riley has won the opening round of a legal battle after complaining about being defamed and harassed by the operator of an anonymous Twitter account.

A High Court judge has ordered barrister Daniel Bennett, who “admits responsibility” for the now dormant Harry Tuttle account, to disclose tweets which refer to the 34-year-old television presenter.

Mr Justice Saini said Mr Bennett should also provide tweets to a blogger, David Collier, who has also complained of being defamed and harassed.

The judge said Mr Collier and Ms Riley were Jewish and took “active positions” against antisemitism in the UK over recent years.

He said they used Twitter in order to “speak out against this phenomenon” and claimed that the Harry Tuttle account had been used “as a medium to attack a number of Jewish people, by harassing and defaming them”.

The judge made the orders on Wednesday after analysing arguments at a recent High Court hearing.

He ruled that Mr Collier and Ms Riley were entitled to know who had used and had access to the Harry Tuttle account between March 2018 and July 2019, when it became dormant.




Bias and bigotry on the Syracuse University campus
What appeared to be a noble effort to discuss bias at Syracuse University ironically turned into a vicious exercise in bias and bigotry as the conversations turned into an anti-Semitic witch hunt. A few students recently created multiple Instagram pages, inviting fellow students and faculty to post stories about incidents of bias on campus. Those who share their stories are permitted to remain anonymous, but the students and professors accused of perpetrating bias are freely and fully identified—and targeted.

One of the pages has warned their viewers to look out for “openly Zionist” professors on campus, naming one professor in particular and attacking students who support the faculty member.

Miriam F. Elman, who teaches about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, isn’t the only Jewish professor who works at Syracuse, but she is openly Zionist and isn’t afraid to say so. Despite being on leave for the past year, she is being singled out by a malicious and libelous smear campaign on one Instagram page that is demanding that she be fired because of her Zionism and former service in the Israeli Defense Forces.
A screenshot of a tweet targeting Syracuse Professor Miriam Elman.

The message for Jewish students is clear: Shed your identity or get canceled. It reeks of pure McCarthyism. The Instagram pages, ironically touting an “inclusive” agenda with words such as “unity,” will tolerate only those Jews who disavow Israel and shed their Zionism, which for most Jews is a major component of their faith.

Adding to the irony is that the Instagram pages have inspired hardcore anti-Semites outside of their group to send hate emails to Elman’s university account. Inexplicably, while the university administration has engaged in public-relations calisthenics for months to show its sensitivity to campus discrimination, they have been silent on this particular brand of hate.
Brazilian hospital suspends doctor for comparing COVID-19 to Holocaust
A prominent Brazilian physician was suspended by Latin America’s leading Jewish hospital after comparing the fear of the coronavirus pandemic to the Holocaust.

Nise Yamaguchi, an oncologist and immunologist at Sao Paulo’s Albert Einstein Israelite Hospital, made the comparison in an appearance on the “Impressoes” television show on July 5. She was suspended by the hospital on Saturday after working there for 35 years.

“Fear is harmful to everything,” Yamaguchi said. “First, it paralyzes you. It makes you easy to manipulate. Anyone. Do you think that a few Nazi soldiers would be able to control the hungry Jewish herd if they did not subject them to that daily humiliation?”

The suspension drew massive media coverage in Brazil. The Albert Einstein hospital is one of Brazil’s strongest Jewish institutions and is considered by many to be the best hospital in all of Latin America.

Yamaguchi’s remarks were “unfortunate and an unfounded analogy,” Sidney Klajner, the hospital’s president, told the Correio Brasiliense newspaper. “The Holocaust is an extremely important moment for us, where 6 million Jews were killed, and many survivors contributed to the foundation of our hospital.”

The Sao Paulo Jewish federation also condemned Yamaguchi, saying she her remarks “minimize the horrors of Nazism and offend the memory of victims, survivors and their families.”

Yamaguchi apologized on Sunday, saying her comments were not never anti-Semitic, paying tribute to her late Jewish mentor, and recalling her support for her sister’s conversion to Judaism.
Two synagogues vandalized on same day in Sarasota, Florida
Two Reform synagogues in Sarasota, Florida, were vandalized with swastikas and other unspecified hateful messages.

The incidents at Temple Sinai and Temple Emanu-El reportedly took place early on Wednesday morning, the Sarasota Herald-Tribune reported.

The Temple Sinai campus was extensively vandalized, including many walls made of porous Jerusalem stone, making the removal of the messages difficult. It is the second time that Temple Emanu-El has been attacked in the last four months. In April, swastikas were spray-painted on the doors of the synagogue.

The Sarasota Sheriff’s office told the newspaper that a man was seen on surveillance video on the grounds of Temple Emanu-El at around 2 a.m. Video shows the same man on the grounds of Temple Sinai later on the same morning.

PLEASE RT: Help us identify the suspect who spray-painting swastikas on two Jewish temples overnight in Sarasota. He was seen wearing a blue cap, dark shirt, jeans with red bandana covering his face. Have info? Call detectives at 941.861.4900. https://t.co/bgAtpcPFX2
— SarasotaSheriff (@SarasotaSheriff) July 15, 2020

The two temples issued a joint letter on Wednesday to their memberships to inform them of the vandalism.

“We will be ever vigilant in looking after the safety and security of our members and our children. But we will not allow hate to distract us from the holy work that defines our temple missions,” the letter said.
‘Death to Jews’ and swastikas drawn on gravestones in southern France
About 20 gravestones in a cemetery in southern France were vandalized with swastikas and the words “Death to Jews” and “Death to the French.”

The graffiti was discovered in the Gruissan municipal cemetery in the Aude region on Sunday.

The gravestones appear to have been chosen at random and were not broken or toppled, France 3 television reported.

The cemetery has been closed to the public. No suspects have been identified in the attack.

The National Bureau for Vigilance Against Antisemitism, or BNVCA, in a statement condemned the desecration of the cemetery. The statement noted that the town of Gruissan is “usually rather calm, rather peaceful, and this aggression surprises and scandalizes us.”
Jews in German City of Cologne Angered by Defacing of Holocaust Memorial by Animal Rights Extremists
The Jewish community in the German city of Cologne was locked in a battle with animal rights activists this week, following a demonstration last weekend in which a Holocaust memorial fountain was vandalized with red dye to simulate blood, alongside slogans protesting cruelty to animals.

Abraham Lehrer — the deputy chairman of the Central Council of Jews in Germany and a leader of the community in Cologne — declared in a statement that the defacement of the Löwenbrunnen children’s memorial was “an act of boundless tastelessness and a mockery of the victims of the Holocaust, especially children and young people and their surviving relatives.”

Designed in 1997 by artist Hermann Gurfinkel, the memorial is located on the former site of Jawne, a Jewish school, in the center of the city. An exhibition on the history of the school is also based there.

The fountain commemorates more than 1,100 Jewish children who were deported from Cologne to concentration camps during the period of Nazi rule in Germany. The names of the children are recorded on eight bronze plates at the base of the fountain.

Activists associated with the “Animal Rebellion” organization which staged the protests angrily denied that the fountain had been targeted for antisemitic reasons.




Spanish Diplomat Saved over 5,000 Jews from Nazi Persecution
Angel Sanz Briz, a Spanish diplomat who reportedly saved over 5,000 Jews from Nazi persecution in Hungary, was given an online tribute 40 years after his death.

Sanz Briz was appointed to a diplomatic post in Hungary in 1944. As the Holocaust worsened there, he offered to protect Jews of Spanish origin and bring them Spanish passports. He received the consent of the Hungarian authorities to enable 200 Spanish Jews to receive them, but he turned that into 200 families, and kept increasing the number, according to Yad Vashem, the Israeli Holocaust museum that recognized him as Righteous Among the Nations in 1966.

It is believed that in the last seven months of 1944, Briz issued forged Spanish documents to 5,200 Jews.

Thursday’s tribute, which was hosted by the chief Sephardic rabbi of Buenos Aires, Isaac Sacca, was organized by Menora, an Argentine Sephardic institution, with the support of the Center Sefarad Israel in Spain, the Argentine Jewish political umbrella group DAIA and the Federation of Jewish Communities in Spain, or FCJE.

Among those on hand were Sanz Briz’s daughter Angela; a Holocaust survivor, Eva Bohrer; and Spain’s ambassador to Argentina, Javier Sandomingo.

“My father thought that what he had done in Budapest was the most important and rewarding thing in his life,” Angela Sanz Briz said after the event. “He also considered that he had simply done his duty, that he could not look the other way. And he used all the means at his disposal to do so.”

“He never expected recognition or thought he had to have it.”

Sanz Briz died in 1980 at 69 years old.
UK-Jewish spy’s pivotal role in French espionage ring revealed after 95 years
Just a week after the Locarno Treaties — a peace pact between Germany, Belgium, France, Great Britain, and Italy — were signed in London in 1925, the French secret police very publicly broke up a British espionage ring in the heart of Paris engaged in stealing French military secrets.

Among the uncovered spies was William “Wolf” Fisher. The details of his role in the espionage case have been secreted in British intelligence archives for nearly a century — until now. (Full disclosure: The author of this article is related to Fisher and was raised hearing tales about him.)

On December 8, 1925, the French secret police arrested three British citizens, John Leather, Oliver Phillips, and Fisher, along with two young French women. The Brits were accused of, and later convicted for, recruiting the two women to spy on various naval and aviation installations.

Publicly, the British government denied all knowledge of the ring; privately the British ambassador to France, Robert Crewe-Milnes, wrote that the evidence implicating the men as British spies was “absolutely damning.”

The espionage ring collapsed when one of the two French accomplices, Marthe Moreuil, was arrested and confessed to her role in stealing secrets on behalf of Great Britain.

Moreuil had infiltrated French air force and naval facilities, even qualifying as a parachutist to gain access. It also emerged in court that Moreuil was Fisher’s lover. The press referred to her as “Mademoiselle Foxtrot,” claiming that she secreted documents out of French bases in her corsets.
Do some cisterns in the Negev date back to the time of Abraham?
For many years, researchers have been puzzled by the question of how the Negev desert was home to settlements and communities in ancient times, in spite of its inhospitality and aridity. Now a group of researchers from Ben-Gurion University has, for the first time, devoted attention to the ancient cisterns scattered around the highlands of the desert – its driest region – which might hold the key to understanding some of the secrets of human life in the area several thousand years ago.

As explained in a paper recently published in the Journal of Archaeological Science, among the findings of the study was that some of the simplest structures might not, as has been assumed, date back only to the Iron Age beginning around 1200 BCE, but to the previous Bronze Age, which covered over two millennia between 3500 and 1200 BCE. According to the prevalent biblical interpretation, the second millennia BCE also marked the time of the life of the Jewish patriarch Abraham, who according to the Bible journeyed through the desert on more than one occasion.

“In ancient times, the combination of a semi-desert or desert climate and the presence of natural water sources encouraged populations to settle in those areas, as we see in the cases of Egypt, Mesopotamia and the Jordan Valley. However, settlement sites in the heart of a region lacking water sources like the Negev, and especially its highlands, is very surprising,” Gabriel Ore, the leading author of the paper, explained to The Jerusalem Post.

“The question is, why develop methods of collecting runoff water in an environment with so few rain events in a year?” he asked. “Why did those ancient populations invest a lot of resources in quarrying and digging water cisterns in a sparse area without natural vegetation?”
The researchers analyzed different types of structures uncovered in the desert: open cisterns dug in soft clay marl and bell-shaped, small-bowl-shaped and roofed cisterns excavated in hard limestone or chalk.
First Jewish kosher service launches in UAE, making Gulf food history
A member of the UAE’s Jewish community has made culinary history with the launch of the first kosher food service in the Gulf region.

As prominent Jewish leaders from around the world arrived in the UAE for interfaith events during the official Year of Tolerance last year, they sought kosher meals - food that follows traditional Jewish dietary laws.

Longtime Dubai resident Elli Kriel, who provided kosher food to Jewish travelers informally over the years, noticed an increase in requests in the run-up to the Year of Tolerance and saw an opportunity.

Kriel started “Elli’s Kosher Kitchen” a food delivery and catering service offering certified kosher food in February 2019, two months after the Year of Tolerance was announced.

“I realized there was an opportunity to do more and in a very adventurous moment, I decided to take the plunge,” Kriel said in an interview with Al Arabiya English.

“The simultaneous recognition of our community also bolstered my confidence. I don’t think I would have done it before then,” she added.

Two more events affirmed Elli’s decision. In May, Rabbi Yehuda Sarna, a chaplain at New York University, was appointed by the Jewish Community of the Emirates as its first Chief Rabbi. In September, the UAE announced the construction of an interfaith complex in the capital Abu Dhabi that will house a Jewish synagogue, Christian church, and Islamic mosque.
Mike Vigoda, founder of the legendary Mike’s Place, dies
His many friends and musicians around the country and beyond were shocked on Wednesday to learn that Mike Vigoda, the founder of the legendary, North American-style music bar known as Mike’s Place had died by committing suicide the previous evening.

Born in Toronto, where he became a photojournalist, Vigoda arrived in Jerusalem in the early 1990s after covering the civil war in what was then Yugoslavia.

Seeking a calmer yet soul-elevating form of income, he opened a music bar on Horkanos Street in the capital’s Russian Compound, where he conducted nightly jam sessions.

The place was tiny, and many of the customers were under the impression that this was Vigoda’s private living room, which in a sense made it even more attractive. It was packed every night. Vigoda was not much of a businessman, and therefore chose Assaf Ganzman, who was born in Haifa but raised in Jerusalem, to be his business partner.

Although he took over the business, he didn’t change the name. However, he did expand, and took in his brother Gil as a partner.

In 2000 Ganzman opened Mike’s Place in Tel Aviv, which in April 2003 made international headlines in the aftermath of a terrorist attack that had taken place during a late-night jam session. Three people were killed and more than 50 wounded.

In response to the thousands of goodwill messages and condolences from Israel and abroad, Ganzman decided to carry on.

Branches of Mike’s Place, which have experienced changes in venue but not in name, can now be found in Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, Herzliya and Eilat.
Jason Alexander to host Israel Cancer Research Fund August 5 virtual gala
The Israel Cancer Research Fund (ICRF) will host a star-studded virtual gala on August 5 to support efforts to fund Israel's leading cancer researchers.

Titled Ribbons of Hope, the gala will be hosted by American actor and comedian Jason Alexander, famous for his iconic role as George Costsanza in the TV series Seinfeld.

“They say laughter is the best medicine. But you know who says that? Comedians,” Alexander said in a statement. “The best medicine is actually the product of brilliant cancer researchers working diligently and tirelessly in labs in Israel and across the world. That’s why I am so
honored to contribute in some small way to this important cause.”

Alexander has a history of promoting Israeli medical research. In October 2018, he hosted a gala in Los Angeles in honor of Sheba Medical Center.

Other noted individuals attending the gala are famous longtime NBC broadcaster Tom Brokaw, Israeli Nobel laureate Prof. Aaron Ciechanover, musician Benji Pasek, actress Bonnie Hunt and Canadian actor Eugene Levy, among others.
Israeli Singer-Songwriter Noy Merison Finds Stardom Among the Congolese


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