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Wednesday, February 03, 2021

02/03 Links Pt2: Bernard-Henri Levy: A Letter to the American President: The Killer of Daniel Pearl Must Not Go Free; Sarah Wilkinson, the Holocaust denying star of anti-Israel activism

From Ian:

Bernard-Henri Levy: A Letter to the American President: The Killer of Daniel Pearl Must Not Go Free
Mr. President,

I am one of those still living who has most extensively investigated the abduction and decapitation, in February 2002, of your fellow American, Wall Street Journal journalist Daniel Pearl.

After the killing, I conducted research and interviews in Islamabad, Karachi, Lahore, and Peshawar, which led the 2003 publication of my book Who Killed Daniel Pearl?

In it I gave the name of the man who held the knife, four years before his confession in a special court in Guantanamo: Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who was al-Qaida’s No.3 man and the probable architect of the Sept. 11 attacks.

But, above all, I retraced in detail the machinations that drew Pearl to the Akbar Hotel in Rawalpindi; that lured and deceived him through a series of emails promising him an interview with Mubarak Ali Gilani, leader of the Jamaat ul-Fuqra and one of the inspirations for the founding of al-Qaida; and that finally led him, deep into Karachi’s Gulzar-e-Hijri neighborhood, to an isolated house in which Fazal Karim, Naeem Bukhari, and others were waiting to murder him.

I arrived, then, at the firm conclusion that the brain behind the operation, the man who conceived it with an almost diabolical zeal, the one who served as the link between the various jihadist factions that cooperated to pull it off, was Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh, a British Pakistani who was immediately arrested, convicted, and imprisoned.

Moreover, I adduced proof that this man, Omar Sheikh, was no ordinary criminal but rather an influential member of a galaxy of terrorist organizations that gravitated around al-Qaida. Educated at the London School of Economics, he had been Osama bin Laden’s financial adviser and bin Laden referred to him as his “favorite son.”
David Collier: Sarah Wilkinson, the Holocaust denying star of anti-Israel activism
There is no goodwill

So remember all this the next time you see an attack on a Jewish or Israeli business led by a group such as Palestine Action or Extinction Rebellion. Think of the twisted ideologies of those behind the masks. Either they share antisemitic conspiracy theories and Holocaust denial or don’t care if their fellow activists do.

And if a Holocaust denying, antisemitic conspiracy theorist is acceptable to JVP, the PSC, Palestine Action or Tikkun Olum – then what or who isn’t? Holocaust Denial and racism against Jews does not matter to them. There is a cause, Sarah Wilkinson is valuable to the cause – if she is a toxic antisemite, well then, they can look past that. They even get to benefit from the extra motivation this provides.

100s came out to support Wilkinson. And those that follow her do not seem to care either. A sitting member of the Labour Party’s National Executive Committee, when informed about Wilkinson’s antisemitism by a campaigner, chose to block the campaigner rather than unfollow Wilkinson.

This is why those on our side, who still think through prisms of ‘fair play’ and ‘moderates’, keep getting it wrong. There is no goodwill on the other side. Stop pretending it is there. This is not about settlements or Gaza. It is ALL about the very existence of the Jewish state. A Holocaust denying antisemite is helping to lead the charge against British Jews and NOT ONE of the pro-Palestinian organisations will publicly distance themselves from her.


CAA submits evidence to Parliament’s Joint Committee on Human Rights to counter claims that International Definition of Antisemitism restricts freedom of expression
Campaign Against Antisemitism has submitted evidence to Parliament’s Joint Committee on Human Rights to counter claims that adoption of the International Definition of Antisemitism, especially by universities, stifles freedom of expression.

The Joint Committee on Human Rights comprises members drawn from both the House of Commons and the House of Lords and examines matters relating to human rights. One of its current inquiries is into freedom of expression.

The campaign to encourage universities to adopt the International Definition of Antisemitism has encountered opposition on the basis that adoption somehow stifles freedom of expression, but this argument does not have merit, and the evidence that we have submitted lays out in detail why this is the case. “The claim that adoption of the Definition conflicts with the duty on universities to protect free speech is a familiar and flawed argument, notwithstanding its persistence,” our letter says.

The letter proceeds to analyse the difference between speech that is ‘merely’ insulting or offensive, and speech that is antisemitic, and the implications for whether those types of speech are protected under Article 10 of the European Charter of Human Rights.

We also cite the legal opinion, produced for us in 2017 by Lord Wolfson of Tredegar QC and Jeremy Brier, which argued that “this Definition should be used by public bodies on the basis that it will ensure that the identification of antisemitism is clear, fair and accurate” and emphasised that “Criticism of Israel, even in robust terms, cannot be regarded as antisemitic per se and such criticism is not captured by the Definition.”


Honest Reporting: Off Media’s Radar: How Israel is Helping Combat Global Coronavirus Pandemic
HonestReporting has successfully countered various false media narratives about Israel’s ongoing battle against the coronavirus. Perhaps most pervasive has been the accusation that Jerusalem was preventing the Palestinians from obtaining vaccines. However, this week the Jewish state became the first nation in the world to share COVID-19 inoculations with any external population. Moreover, the Palestinian Authority’s prime minister has announced that tens of thousands of additional jabs would soon be arriving in Ramallah.

Lost in the mix are the multitude of ways in which Israeli ingenuity and innovation are benefiting the world amid the pandemic.

Israeli Hospital Partners With National Institutes of Health to Study and Combat COVID-19
Last April, the Sheba Medical Center at Tel Hashomer, located near Tel Aviv, announced the signing of an “emergency agreement” with the Maryland-based National Institutes of Health (NIH) to conduct applied scientific and clinical research studies in order to develop coronavirus-related treatments.

The hospital committed to supplying the NIH’s Vaccine Research Center with blood samples, plasma and the COVID-19 virus itself from infected patients in Israel. This was all made possible due to a series of clinical trials the hospital was conducting on possible treatments, including those being developed by major pharmaceutical companies.

MDA Helps Africa in Battle Against Coronavirus
In June, the Magen David Adom (MDA) emergency service announced that it had developed software for managing a drive-through coronavirus testing facility in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).

The number of drive-through centers in the DRC has subsequently increased, and now include a training program with videos and written procedures devised by MDA and shared with medical professionals in the central African country.

According to MDA Director General Eli Bin: “In the light of the fight against coronavirus, we have gained extensive experience in obtaining thousands of samples a day, efficiently and safely, and now we are happy to share knowledge with other medical entities around the world for the sake of saving human lives.”
Netanyahu: Israel aiming to vaccinate 90% of over-50s within two weeks
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Tuesday that the country is aiming to vaccinate 90 percent of those over the age of 50 against COVID-19 within two weeks, as part of its race to offset fast-spreading mutations of the coronavirus.

The prime minister also made the case for extending the ongoing lockdown until the beginning of next week, saying it would enable hundreds of thousands more to be vaccinated against the virus before some restrictions are eased.

“The vaccination drive is our key” to lifting the lockdown, Netanyahu said at a press conference alongside Health Minister Yuli Edelstein.

If the country manages to vaccinate those over 50, “then we are on our way to victory over the coronavirus,” Netanyahu said, and noted that 77 percent of that age group have already received the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine that Israel is using in it mass inoculation drive.

He noted that 97% of COVID deaths and 93% of serious cases are among those over 50.

Speaking more generally, Netanyahu urged all Israelis to get vaccinated.

“This is important for all of us, because it allows us to open the economy gradually and, above all else, to save lives,” he said.
COVID-19: 0.54% of hospital staff caught virus 1-10 days after vaccination
Medical personnel should not be quick to dismiss postvaccination symptoms as vaccine-related, and should always test for COVID-19 if symptoms are evident, a study released by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Sunday stated.

The study was written by a group of Israeli doctors and scientists from Sheba Medical Center, Tel Hashomer, all of whom have been active players in the struggle to combat the spread of the virus and treat its victims in Israel.

It focuses on the occurrence of COVID-19 symptoms and, specifically, their occurrence after being vaccinated, with the purpose of preventing cases of the disease’s symptoms being mistaken for vaccine side effects. Such mistakes, the study noted, are more common than expected.

“The co-occurrence of vaccination deployment with the rapidly climbing COVID-19 spread in many parts of the world is a confusing period in which hope is mixed with great vulnerability,” the study reads. Therefore, “every physical complaint after vaccination poses a true diagnostic dilemma as to whether an adverse reaction or a new COVID-19 infection is the cause.”

In Israel, among 4,081 vaccinated healthcare personnel who were included in the study, 22 (0.54%) developed COVID-19 one to 10 days after inoculation.
Study of an ultra-Orthodox community in London finds most caught, beat COVID
In a study of 1,800 people from a single Jewish ultra-Orthodox community in London, 64 percent of those tested appeared to have contracted and beat the coronavirus, researchers said.

The study, which researchers from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine conducted at the request of the community in question, looked into seroprevalence, which is the rate of past infection, the Financial Times reported Tuesday.

Among working-age adults tested in the sample, seroprevalence was at 74%, compared to 64% of the overall group, according to the report, which has not been peer-reviewed.

The researchers declined to name the community they tested to “avoid broader social tension,” the Financial Times reported.

The Office for National Statistics estimates that seroprevalence is around 7% in the general population of the United Kingdom and 11% in London.

Ultra-Orthodox Jews in the UK may have a higher seroprevalence rate because they tend to have large families, with closer contact between family and community members. The average number of children in ultra-Orthodox communities is more than twice the 2.3 national average, the researchers said.

In recent weeks, the British media reported at length about routine violations by ultra-Orthodox people of emergency measures to stem the virus’ spread. However, one of the researchers behind the study, Michael Marks, said the violations do not account for the unusual rate of seroprevalence among the community.
When lawmakers get international law wrong: Critics of Israel embarrass themselves in attacking its COVID vaccination plans
In recent weeks, a group of Democratic congresspeople saw fit to attack Israel for allegedly not vaccinating Palestinians. Sadly, they tarnished the good name of their party by demonstrating a complete lack of knowledge of both international law and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

The most inflammatory remarks came courtesy of Rep. Rashida Tlaib, who argued on the “Democracy Now!” program that Israel is a “racist” and “apartheid” state for supposedly denying Palestinians the vaccine.

Others chimed in with their own misguided comments. For example, in a since-deleted tweet, freshman New York Rep. Jamaal Bowman asserted that “Netanyahu must ensure that both Israelis and Palestinians have access to the COVID vaccine. This cruelty is another reminder of why the occupation must end.”

These congresspeople are wrong on multiple counts. First, they ignore the fact that the Palestinians agreed to take charge of their own health-care system — including vaccinations — when they signed the Oslo II Accords in 1995. Specifically, Article 17 states: “Powers and responsibilities in the sphere of health in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip will be transferred to the Palestinian side, including the health insurance system,” and Palestinians “shall continue to apply the present standards of vaccination of Palestinians and shall improve them according to internationally accepted standards in the field.”

Claims that Israel is responsible for Palestinian vaccinations in the West Bank due to obligations outlined in the Fourth Geneva Convention – which deals with humanitarian protections for civilians in conflict zones – are incorrect. In international law, old legal frameworks are superseded by newer ones. Upon the signing of the Oslo Accords, the Fourth Geneva Convention ceased to apply to the West Bank, and Oslo became the new legal framework by which Israel and the Palestinians had to abide. On the Gaza front, Israel relinquished control of the territory in 2005 and completely evacuated the area, after which it was overtaken by the Hamas terrorist organization.
Rep. Bowman Criticized for Saying Israel is Excluding Palestinians from Vaccinations
Representative Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.) is being criticized by some pro-Israel Twitter users for accusing Israel of excluding Palestinians from the COVID-19 vaccine rollout.

Bowman posted a letter to Twitter on February 2 to Israeli Acting Consulate General in New York Israel Nitzan, stating that while he was “heartened” that the Israeli government is providing 5,000 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine to the Palestinians in the West Bank, there are still “millions of Palestinians living in occupied territory under Israeli military rule” that have been excluded from the vaccine rollout.

“Israel, as an occupying power, has a responsibility to provide vaccines to the Palestinian people,” Bowman wrote. “It is therefore concerning that Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank will be receiving the vaccine from the Israeli government, but Palestinians in the West Bank will not.” He added that herd immunity in the region is impossible without Palestinians also being vaccinated.

“As a Black man living in American, I know the feeling of being neglected by my government and society, of feeling like a second-class citizen or not a citizen at all, in my own home,” Bowman wrote. “I can understand the feelings of hopelessness and despair that Palestinians living in the West Bank might feel, reading in the news that the Israeli government has no plans to vaccinate them from a deadly disease wreaking havoc around the globe.”

Pro-Israel Twitter users criticized Bowman’s letter.

“Dear Congressman, I suggest you may care to also read the Oslo Accords, which make clear [the Palestinian Authority] has responsibility for health matters,” international human rights lawyer Arsen Ostrovsky tweeted. “Furthermore, I suggest you write to Palestinian leadership, asking how they have money to pay terrorist salaries, but not vaccines.”

The Jewish Policy Center similarly tweeted, “PA [Palestinian Authority] leaders said they wouldn’t take a vaccine from Israel – preferring a Russian one paid for by EU. OK, fine. Israel is NOT legally required under the Oslo Accords. Israel vaccinates ALL Israeli citizens without regard to race, religion or origin.”

The Elder of Ziyon blogger similarly tweeted that Bowman didn’t have a full grasp of the Geneva Convention, which the congressman had cited as a reason for Israel to ensure that the Palestinians are vaccinated. The blogger pointed to a January 6 post about how the Geneva Convention actually states that the occupying power has to work with local authorities on medical matters.

“The bottom line is that international law of belligerent occupation says that if Israel is the occupying power, it must act with the local authorities to ensure the health of the population,” the post stated. “Which is exactly what Israel has been doing since the initial outbreak. The only party that refused cooperation was the Palestinian Authority from around June to November. If they ask for help, they will get it.”


Norwegian state radio host: “I wish the vaccine didn’t work in Israel, Israel is a shitty country”
Shaun Henrik Matheson is a radio host at NRK P13, a digital music channel run the Norwegian state broadcaster NRK. Tuesday 2 February he served the following antisemitic, Israel-hating rant to his listeners:

“Jeez, well, we had better mention the good news, even if they come from Israel (laughs). I know, how sick is this? Good news from Israel, when did that happen last time? Do you know what, I don’t know actually. But we have read about this all day today and heard it just now on the radio news.

However, both the newspapers and the radio news forgot something important, or didn’t mention it, something we should never forget: Israel is an occupying power, an apartheid regime, where some people are more worth than others, and where these “others” are subjected to systematic oppression, their land are stolen from them and their water and electricity will be cut if they step out of line. And if some homemade rocket should land somewhere over the God’s chosen people, then terrible actions of revenge are committed where thousands of people are killed, often children.

Could there really be good news from this country? In a way, yes. In a way, but only if we think about ourselves and forget about all the abuse and murders the Israelis perpetrate against the Palestinian people.

So apparently, numbers from Israel show that among more than 1 million fully vaccinated persons, less than 1000 were infected. No matter how you twist and turn it, these are good news. Only I wish it was from another country, if you get what I mean. It’s almost as though I wish the vaccine didn’t work. You cannot say that. I’m sorry, I do understand that. Damn it.

Did I say apartheid? I did, didn’t I. Just to underline it: In the beginning no Palestinian got any vaccine, 14 days ago, they got 100, yesterday they got 2000. 1.1 million “proper” people got their vaccine, 2.100 of the less proper people got their vaccine.

We must just never forget just what a shitty country Israel is, it’s desperately important that we never forget. We must never forget what a shitty country Israel is!”
BBC ‘fact-checking’ fails to deliver on Palestinian vaccinations issue
That quoted part of the agreement – Section 6 – does not specify any Israeli obligation to supply vaccinations to combat “epidemics and contagious diseases” and indeed section 2 of Article 17 clearly states that it is the Palestinians who are responsible for vaccination programmes:
“The Palestinian side shall continue to apply the present standards of vaccination of Palestinians and shall improve them according to internationally accepted standards in the field, taking into account WHO recommendations. In this regard, the Palestinian side shall continue the vaccination of the population with the vaccines listed in Schedule 3.”

Failing to inform readers of the exploitation of the topic of Coronavirus vaccinations for the promotion of a political campaign to discredit Israel to which the BBC has given considerable amplification over the past month, the article continues with promotion of the claims of “UN experts”:
“But UN experts say international law takes priority over these accords.

The experts say the fourth Geneva Convention is specific about the duty of the occupying power to provide healthcare, but Israel often argues it isn’t technically occupying the West Bank and Gaza.

It’s a matter on which international law experts disagree, and many issues surrounding the governing and final status of the occupied territories remain unresolved.”

In other words, this article by BBC Reality Check fails to actually inform BBC audiences “whose responsibility it is to vaccinate Palestinians” and instead continues to promote politically motivated claims and statements on that subject.
House Republicans Begin Effort To Remove Democrat Ilhan Omar From Committees
Several House Republicans are moving to remove far-left Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) from her committee assignments this week after Democrats announced recently that they are pushing to remove Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), a conspiracy theorist, from her committee assignments.

“The House is set to consider a measure this week that calls for Taylor Greene, a controversial first-term lawmaker known for his support of the QAnon conspiracy theory, from her assignment on the Education and Labor Committee,” Fox News reported. “A proposed GOP-backed amendment to that measure calls for Omar, frequently identified as a member of the ‘Squad’ of progressive Democrats, to be removed from her committee assignments.”

Fox News reporter Chad Pergram said that those sponsoring the legislation included Reps. Brian Babin (R-TX), Jeff Duncan (R-SC), Jody Hice (R-GA), Andy Biggs (R-AZ) and Ronny Jackson (R-TX).
The Guardian, Marjorie Taylor Green and Jewish 'supremacism'
The use of the term by the Guardian is pernicious in the context of the current amplified debate about the impact and threat posed by white supremacy, a universally despised ideology which the term “Jewish supremacy” necessarily evokes.

Whilst white supremacist American oppress and commit violence against people of color, in the minds of some of Israel’s far-left critics, Israelis (imagined as ‘white’) behave in much the same way toward its own minorities (perceived as) ‘of color’.

Those reducing the Israeli-Palestinian issue to one of racial/ethnic supremacy not only display a profound level of ignorance about the root causes of the conflict, whilst completely denying Palestinian agency and obscuring their society’s own endemic (anti-Jewish) racism, but impute racism to Israel’s very essence, and by extension, to the overwhelming majority of Jews throughout the world.

Given the centrality of Zionism to Jewish life, the use of “Jewish supremacy” in that context has the impact of toxifying Jewish identity itself.

Though there’s nothing politically that unites Marjorie Taylor Green and Guardian editors, we know that extreme ideological opposites can mirror one another in several ways: the tendency to find simple explanations for complex problems; vilifying opponents as not just wrong but evil; and by taking their cue from the loudest voices who proclaim that they know how to bring on utopia.

Though the Guardian would never conjure an idea as risible as Rothschild-controlled laser beams from outer space, their overlap with the far-right concerning which particular nation is uniquely guilty of the crime of supremacism reminds us that, when it comes to Israel, racists and ‘anti-racists’ increasingly reach the same antisemitic conclusions.
It's Time We Taught Anti-Semitism
The data tell us this has to change. Anti-Semitism is a full-blown problem on American campuses. It seems obscured now, because the American Jewish community has funded Hillels at higher education institutions across the country to serve as safe havens and home bases for Jewish students. But to effectively change our survey’s horrifying numbers, colleges and universities must make anti-Semitism education part of their explicit and implicit curricula.

Here are three steps that the American Jewish Committee will be glad to help any institution implement:
- First-year students need to learn about anti-Semitism at orientation. They need to hear about the Holocaust. In fact, 21 percent of Americans aged 18 to 29 said they know “not much” or “nothing at all” about the Holocaust, and another much-publicized survey in 2018 found that two-thirds of millennials didn’t know what Auschwitz was. They need to learn that anti-Semitism today is not the purview of one political faction or another, but that extremists on both the right and the left perpetuate it.

- We need to define anti-Semitism. That’s something that 53 percent of 18- to 29-year-olds can’t do. Fortunately, a great definition is readily available for adoption by any institution that chooses to use it for educational purposes. The International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance, a multinational organization of which the United States is a member, established it in 2016, and government agencies around the world, including by the U.S. Department of Education, have subsequently put it to use.

- We need to honor the perspectives of Jews about anti-Semitic words or actions. When dealing with different forms of hate, it has become an article of faith that a group gets to define its own oppression. Put simply: a white person doesn’t get to tell a Black person whether something is racist. No such respect is extended to Jews, however.

Our survey asked this question: “If a Jewish person or organization considered a statement or idea to be anti-Semitic, would that make you more likely to consider it anti-Semitic, less likely, or would it make no difference to you?” About two-thirds, or 64 percent, of people aged 18 to 29 said it would make no difference to them if a Jewish person told them something was anti-Semitic. Another 21 percent said that such protestation from Jews would make them less likely to consider something anti-Semitic. To fight anti-Semitism as seriously as we confront any other bigotry, we must normalize believing Jews.

We cannot, we must not, assume that the Jews will be OK. Colleges and universities must act. And, slowly, they are acting. Inspired by their work with American Jewish Committee fighting anti-Semitism, two of our interns recently met with the president of their West Coast liberal arts college to raise their concerns about anti-Semitism on campus. At their urging, the president agreed to implement an institutionwide training during next fall’s student orientation to counter anti-Semitism. Other steps seem likely to follow.

Are additional colleges and universities prepared to join them? Is yours?
Edi Cohen: A one-man hasbara machine with 409K Arab Twitter followers
Dr. Edi Cohen, a journalist and researcher on Arab Affairs, is relatively unknown to the Israeli public. But if you look at his Twitter account, you'll find 409,000 followers, almost all of whom are from the Arab world. He is a one-man hasbara (public diplomacy) machine. Blunt, evocative and controversial, but with results that are hard to argue with.

"Of course I am blunt, because that is what Arabs like," Cohen explained. "That is the style you need. It isn't the Foreign Ministry... I am the opposite, so of course I have made some enemies. And if you listen to the Foreign Ministry's version, they say I am hurting hasbara, but that is untrue: I am making it stronger.

"Arabs had a feeling that we are condescending, so my friends and I developed a dialogue to show there is a lot in common religiously and politically," he said. "Three years ago they were scared to like [my tweets] – and here we have broken that barrier down."

Cohen's personal story is exceptional. Until 30 years ago, he had grown up in Lebanon, where he lived through the bloody civil war, saw the IDF invade Beirut, and experienced the tragic death of his father, Haim, who was kidnapped and murdered by Hezbollah in the mid 80s.

When he made aliyah (immigrated) in 1995, after travelling in France and Mexico, he did not know a word of Hebrew and was not aware of the Oslo Accords. As he was learning Hebrew, he remembers seeing Yasser Arafat on television in ulpan (intensive Hebrew course) and feeling something click.

"I grabbed my head and said 'wow, we ran away from him in Lebanon and he made it to here!

"All of the Lebanese, even the Muslims, said that Arafat is the face of evil. Wherever he goes he brings trouble; no one could stand him," Cohen said. "But here, the Israeli Left thinks that the whole world loves the Palestinians and is interested in them. It is the opposite: the Palestinian issue does not interest anyone, only here they are trying to be holier than the pope."
Social Media Star Baby Ariel Calls on 50 Million Followers to ‘#SmashHate’ in New Campaign Against Antisemitism and Racism
Baby Ariel, a social media superstar with over 35 million followers on TikTok and 9 million on Instagram, called on her many young fans to fight antisemitism and racism in a new video campaign.

“As a girl of Jewish and Hispanic descent, I have received my fair share of hate on social media over the years and trust me, it always hurts to get hate because of who you are,” said the singer and actress, whose real name is Ariel Martin.

“Imagine getting targeted, arrested and killed because of your religion or skin color, your sexuality or because of your disability,” she continued. “The Nazis murdered six million Jews and another six million Catholics, Jehovah’s Witnesses, gay men and women and children with disabilities.”

Baby Ariel, who also counts 1 million Twitter followers and 3 million YouTube subscribers, is among the top 20 accounts on TikTok, the popular video sharing app.

She concluded her video message by asking her followers to “share your story of how you have received and overcome hate with the hashtag #smashhate and #neveragain.”

The campaign is coordinated with the Combat Anti-Semitism Movement, according to a press release, and Baby Ariel will join group’s annual summit in March.
NGO Human Rights Watch Demands President Biden End Criticism, Refusal to Cooperate With BDS
The leading NGO Human Rights Watch, long noted for its antipathy toward Israel, called on Tuesday for President Joe Biden to stop the US government and others from criticizing the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement, which is widely seen in the Jewish community as antisemitic.

The missive, penned by Eric Goldstein, HRW’s Acting Executive Director, Middle East and North Africa Division, decried the Trump administration’s criticism of BDS, and decisions by state governments and the federal government to condemn BDS and refuse to cooperate with it.

“Joe Biden’s inauguration as president is unlikely to end governmental efforts to malign the Global Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) Campaign against Israel, including in ways that threaten free speech,” Goldstein wrote.

He further said that the “BDS campaign advocates a peaceful boycott of Israel until it stops occupying the West Bank and Gaza Strip, grants equal rights to Palestinian citizens, and allows Palestinian refugees to return.”

The BDS movement in fact advocates for Israel to be dissolved as a Jewish state, and regularly attacks Israel as a racist nation whose very existence is illegitimate.

The International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s Working Definition of Antisemitism, adopted by the US State Department and many governments and institutions around the world, maintains that “denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination, e.g., by claiming that the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavor” is a form of antisemitism
Hostile take-over! The Israeli Jewish Antifa has hacked a KKK website
Buy these folk a beer for us.

The Israeli Jewish Antifa has left a warning on a white power website: "We never forgive, never forget, and never stop coming."

The group has allegedly hacked a website belonging to the Patriotic Brigade Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, exposing pictures, names and rap sheets of some of the organizations leaders. The group is one of the fastest growing Klan organizations in the US, with least different four cells in several states.

The altered website, still standing displays messages in English and in Hebrew, including "Shabbat Shalom! Good Night White Pride ; - ) " and "Solidarity with Oppressed People Everywhere" and my personal favorite, "Yes You mouth- breathing crackers, We Got your info"

The "Imperial Kaillif" of the organization has been identified as Kevin J. Smith.

The hacked webpage includes a link to the Texas Public Sex Offender Registry, where he is registered for the sexual assault of a 14-year-old girl.

The hackers included a receipt as proof that Smith had paid for the website , which as of today, remains altered.

Other direct actions appear to be in the pipeline. A message on the hacked website reads "Any Klansmen reading this, we know who you are, and we are coming for you."

On Twitter "Justice Jew" has taken credit for the action.


PreOccupiedTerritory: I Hope My Portion Of ‘Palestine Refugee’ Funding Gets Embezzled By Someone Cool by Gigi Hadid (satire)
My modeling career makes it unnecessary, unwise, and distracting to wade into politics, but now and then I cannot help but express my feelings on the plight of my Palestinian brethren. Chief among those feelings: of the money that the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees gives the Palestinian leadership in Ramallah, I can only pray that whichever Palestinian official ends up pocketing the amount that represents me isn’t some lame-o, but at least looks fine, or has a cool car.

UNRWA calculates a significant portion of its annual budget to provide direct aid to the Palestine Liberation Organization – either directly or by proxy through the PLO-dominated Palestinian Authority governing autonomous Palestinian areas – based on the number of “refugees,” which the UN body defines differently from every other agency. Basically, the dictionary definition of “refugee” does not include the descendants in perpetuity of the people actually forced out of their homeland, but UNRWA does. Relatively few of the hundreds of thousands of Arabs who fled their hometowns in 1948 remain alive, but that’s OK with UNRWA; their children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren now number in the millions, and regardless of whether they live refugee lives, UNRWA pays the Palestinian leadership to take care of them.

That includes such unfortunates as the Palestinians living under an Apartheid regime in Lebanon – for their own good so they don’t get too comfortable and think it’s OK not to want to go back to a place they’ve never lived! – and successful, independent folks of Palestinian heritage such as yours truly. I certainly don’t feel dependent on decisions made in Ramallah, so I’m happy to have whatever portion of those UNRWA funds that are my share go elsewhere. And since I know the Palestinian leadership loves to line its pockets and its Swiss accounts with said funds, I hope “my” funds are at least embezzled by someone dope.
Citing Erosion of ‘Mutual Respect,’ Catholic Church in France Issues Clarion Call Against Antisemitism
The leading bishops of the Catholic Church in France published an emotional declaration against antisemitism on Monday, emphasizing that the “importance of the Jewish roots of Christianity must be recalled now more than ever.”

The declaration — signed by Monseigneur Éric de Moulins-Beaufort, president of the Conference of Bishops of France, and four of his senior colleagues — was unveiled at a short ceremony on Monday in the presence of French Jewish leaders.

The text noted that France had been shocked by the brutal murder of four people last year at the hands of Islamist assailants: high school teacher Samuel Paty, who was beheaded in broad daylight in a Paris street on Oct. 16, and three worshipers at a church in Nice, one of whom was beheaded, on Oct. 29. These terrorist attacks had confronted the French people with basic questions of mutual respect, the text argued.

“In this context, the bishops call for special attention to be paid to the worrying resurgence of antisemitism in France,” the declaration asserted.

“Today, they strongly reiterate how much the fight against antisemitism must be everybody’s business and they affirm their willingness to work with all those and all those engaged in this struggle,” it continued.

Calling for “spiritual resistance against antisemitism,” the declaration said that while “faith in Jesus distinguishes and separates us, it obliges us also, in memory of the terribly dark hours of history and in preserving the memory of the victims of the Holocaust and antisemitic killings in recent decades, to recognize this: healing from antisemitism and anti-Judaism is the indispensable foundation for a genuine fraternity on a universal scale.”
Italy granted her a Holocaust survivors' pension, then asked for it back
In 2012, Messauda Fadlun received a letter from the Italian government asking her to return all the money she had been receiving as part of a restitution program for those racially persecuted by the fascist regime during World War II.

Fadlun, an Italian-Libyan Jew, and her family were shocked.

“We thought there had been a mistake,” said Ariel Finzi, Fadlun’s son, who is the rabbi of Naples. “Worst case, we presumed the government would stop paying for the pension, but not that we would have to return the money.”

They were wrong: It was just the beginning of a long legal fight with the Italian government, which claimed she had not been eligible to receive the pension, despite granting it earlier. Fadlun died in 2018, and now her 98-year-old husband, Alberto Finzi, is expected to pay the sum of 76,000 euros (about $92,000).

Fadlun’s misadventure with Italian bureaucracy is not unique. Other Jewish families over the past few years have been asked to return the pensions. Still others had to jump through bureaucratic hoops to prove their eligibility and provide decades-old documentation that’s often hard to obtain.
Austrian rapper arrested for neo-Nazi songs tied to Halle synagogue shooting
Austrian authorities said Tuesday they have arrested a rapper accused of broadcasting neo-Nazi songs, one of which was used by the man behind a deadly anti-Semitic attack in Germany.

“The suspect has been arrested on orders of the Vienna prosecutors” and taken to prison after a search of his home, said an interior ministry statement.

Police seized a mixing desk, hard discs, weapons, a military flag from the Third Reich era and other Nazi objects during their search.

Austrian intelligence officers had been trying for months to unmask the rapper, who went by the pseudonym Mr Bond and had been posting to neo-Nazi forums since 2016.

The suspect, who comes from the southern region of Carinthia, has been detained for allegedly producing and broadcasting Nazi ideas and incitement to hatred.

“The words of his songs glorify National Socialism (Nazism) and are anti-Semitic, racist and xenophobic,” said the interior ministry statement.

One of his tracks was used as the sound track during the October 2019 attack outside a synagogue in the eastern German city of Halle.
Omaha middle school apologizes for Hitler ‘quote of the day’
A middle school in Omaha, Nebraska, has apologized to students and families after a quotation from Nazi Germany leader Adolf Hitler was displayed in a school hallway as the “quote of the day,” the Omaha World Herald reported Tuesday.

A staff member had written the adage, “The man who has no sense of history is like a man with no ears or eyes” on a board that was set up in an eighth grade hallway on Monday.

Later that evening the school sent a message out to staff, students, and their families saying it was “extremely sorry,” the Herald reported.

The email, signed by Westside Middle School principal Kim Eymann and superintendent Mike Lucas, admitted, “We made a mistake today at WMS.”

The school apologized for “the insensitivity this showed to our Jewish population and to other students.”
Holocaust survivor asks Israel not to deport his rescuer’s great-granddaughter
A Holocaust survivor has been pleading with the government to allow the Dutch great-granddaughter of his rescuer to live in Israel with her parents.

Simi Liebel has written to the Interior Ministry, asking it to reverse its rejection of the residency application of Marloes Sonnenveld, a university student studying in Jerusalem. Her great-grandmother, Truus Meijerink, hid Liebel in her home for three years.

“I feel sad that I even need to help her,” Liebel told the Kan public broadcaster in a report aired Sunday. “I’m ashamed of my country that my help is even needed. But I will do anything.”

Sonnenveld, who is living in Israel on a student visa, had her application to extend the visa declined last year.

Israel’s law allows Righteous among the Nations — non-Jews who risked their lives to save Jews from the Holocaust — to live in the country and become citizens. The law extends to their children and grandchildren, but not to their great-grandchildren.

Sonnenveld’s mother, Tabitha de Boks, and her brother are living in Israel. They came in the footsteps of de Boks’ parents, who settled in Israel’s north 15 years ago. Sonnenveld, who like her mother speaks Hebrew fluently, calls Israel her true home.
Ariel University launches Aliyah Risk Calculator
Israel's Ariel University is officially releasing its Aliyah Risk Calculator, a tool which aims to measure the risks and resources that come with moving to Israel, according to a statement from the university's Center for Research on Aliyah.

The calculator, which takes 15 minutes to compute results, takes both individuals and families into account. Specific family features were pinpointed that make it more likely that they will adjust well after immigrating. These pre-aliyah features include social, financial and educational backgrounds.

An individual can be placed in one of three risk categories, providing insight into the circumstances surrounding the risk, and supplying recommendations for those who are considering moving to Israel.

"The final score and interpretation should assist potential immigrants to Israel in making an informed decision about aliyah – and will help in developing a clear plan of success if the decision to move to Israel is made," said Dr. Avidan Milevsky, Behavioral Sciences Department director and senior lecturer at Ariel University.

Earlier this week, the Aliyah and Integration Ministry launched a mental health helpline for new immigrants.

It will be staffed five days a week from 4 p.m. to 9 p.m., and mental-health experts will provide their services free of charge in English, Russian, Amharic, French and Spanish.
Intel Israel reports record-setting year with $8 billion in 2020 exports
Intel Israel

, one of the country’s largest private employers, has reported a record-setting year for 2020 despite the pandemic downturn and a rocky year for the US corporation.

The US chipmaker’s Israel branch

reported a record $8 billion in exports in 2020, marking an increase of 14% over 2019’s exports of $6.6 billion.

Intel is Israel’s largest private tech employer, with 13,950 workers. It accounts for 14% of the country’s tech exports and 2% of the national GDP, according to the Calcalist business daily.

Mobileye, an Israeli startup Intel purchased in a record-setting deal in 2017, made $967 million for Intel last year and reported 10% growth. In the fourth quarter of 2020, Mobileye made $333 million, a 39% jump over the same period in 2019.

Intel said its largest inventory of equipment and property outside the US was in Israel, with $7.8 billion in assets, followed by Ireland, then China.

Intel largely continued its operations in Israel during the pandemic as its production facilities were considered essential industries.
Oscars: Israeli team wins Academy Award for film technology
An Israeli team won an Academy Award in the Scientific & Engineering category for 2021.

The winners were announced on Tuesday night, and Prof. Meir Feder of the Iby and Aladar Fleischman Faculty of Engineering at Tel Aviv University and his former student and co-founding partner of the start-up Amimon, Dr. Zvi Reznic, shared the award with Amimon’s senior executives, Guy Dorman and Ron Yogev.

Every year, in addition to the winners of the traditional Oscars, the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announces winners in various scientific and technical categories, honored for the impact their work has had on the global film industry.

The Academy Award to this team honored the wireless video technology developed by the Amimon team, and implemented through Amimon’s chipset. Amimon was founded in 2004 by Feder, Reznic and Noam Geri, who is also a graduate of Tel Aviv University.
Building on normalization, UAE and Israeli clubs to play first soccer friendlies
United Arab Emirates club Al-Ain will play Israel’s Maccabi Haifa in two friendlies, the Emirati side said on Wednesday, the first such fixtures since the two countries normalized relations last year.

The announcement came during the virtual signing of a deal between the two clubs and follows the United Arab Emirates’ landmark move to normalize relations with the Jewish state in August. They signed a formal deal in Washington in September.

“[The agreement] will consolidate the policy of bridge-building and cooperation between the two major clubs in various fields including marketing, technical cooperation, investment, commercial activities, media and sport,” said Mohamed Thaaloob, chairman of the Al-Ain club investment company.

The clubs, two of the most successful in their respective leagues, also agreed to stage two friendlies, the first to be hosted by Al-Ain and the second to be held in Haifa at an unspecified future date, he added.

“I am pleased to witness this important moment in the history of the Israeli and Emirati game, and for sport in general,” said Yaqoub Shahar, president of Maccabi Haifa Club.

In October the Emirati and Israeli football federations signed a cooperation agreement, a first between the two nations, intended to promote closer sporting ties.
Tom Gross: Conversations with friends: Novelist Max Gross (NY): When Google meets shtetl
Deep in the forests of eastern Poland, the Yiddish-speaking orthodox Jewish shtetl of Kreskol lies forgotten, cut off from the world and undiscovered by both the Nazis and the modern Polish state – Europe’s last shtetl. Such is the seemingly absurd premise of Max Gross’s new novel.

And yet somehow Max concocts a storyline that is just about plausible in a book that is both very amusing and also raises serious questions about what it means for the modern world to meet a world where there is still no electricity, running water, or paved roads, let alone cars, computers or phones. As Tom says, it’s Google meets shtetl.

Tom and Max discuss how these shtetls, which were relatively backward places of the kind depicted in “Fiddler on the Roof,” nevertheless had such deep reverence for study and the importance of books, that the children and grandchildren of those who left the shtetl changed the world – winning Nobel prizes, revolutionizing science, medicine and commerce, as well as helping create Hollywood and the modern entertainment industry.
(Discussion by zoom with Tom Gross, February 3, 2021.)


World's oldest ‘emojis’ unearthed at prehistoric site in Israel
Did ancient humans communicate with prehistoric “emojis” over 120,000 years ago, before any form of written language was developed? According to new research by Israeli and French scholars, the answer is yes.

Researchers from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the University of Haifa, alongside a team from the Le Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique in France, identified six subparallel incisions on a bone fragment uncovered in an open-air Middle Paleolithic site near Ramle. Dating back 120,000 years ago, the fragment represents one of the oldest pieces of evidence of the use of symbols.

The results of the study were recently published in the Quaternary International journal.

The archaeologists believe that the bone belonged to an auroch (aurochs are considered ancestors of cows and oxen). The last known aurochs lived around 500 years ago. The site of the excavation, Nesher Ramle, presents remains of intense exploitation of aurochs and other animals, including tortoises, as well as knapping activities. Numerous flint tools were uncovered alongside the etched bone.

According to Dr. Yossi Zaidner of the Institute of Archeology at Hebrew University, Paleolithic hunters would gather at the site to process the game they had caught.
Byzantine Era: Historic Site of Hurvat Beith Loya Near Hebron


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