Thursday, February 04, 2021
Gil Troy, Natan Sharansky Explain Jewish Unity at StandWithUs Conference
Former Jewish Agency Chairman Natan Sharansky and McGill University Professor Gil Troy explained the meaning of Jewish unity on January 31 at the virtual StandWithUs 2021 International Conference.
Sharansky, who recently co-authored a book with Troy titled “Never Alone: Prison, Politics and My People,” said that when he was imprisoned in a Soviet Union gulag for nine years, he never felt alone because he knew that the Jewish people were with him. During his time serving in the Israeli government from 1996-2005, Sharansky knew that despite all of the various disagreements that went on, they all had the same goal of fighting for the principles of Judaism.
“You are never alone once you’re part of a Jewish family,” Sharansky said.
Troy said that in a recent conversation with Journal Editor-In-Chief David Suissa, he realized that the Jewish people now have a positive message: It’s no longer about simply being on the defensive against anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism; “We do what I call the Jew-jitsu… from never again to never alone, and that’s our message,” Troy said, adding that “we’re all together in this fight.”
Sharansky proceeded to explain how he came up with the 3Ds — demonization, delegitimization and double standards — to determine when criticism of Israel veers into anti-Semitism. He said he had heard accusations of Israel committing war crimes at U.S. universities during the Second Intifada; he even heard European politicians say that accusations of anti-Semitism are being used to censor criticism of Israel. Sharansky argued that he wants there to be plenty of room to criticize the Israeli government since “we are a democratic society which is full of self-criticism” and that he just wants to ensure that the “red line” isn’t crossed into anti-Semitism.
Where things stand with California’s ethnic-studies curriculum
For more than a-year-and-a-half, StandWithUs has worked tirelessly together with concerned citizens and partners to remove anti-Semitism, anti-Israel bias and other destructive ideas from California’s draft Ethnic Studies Model Curriculum (ESMC). At the same time, we have pushed for the inclusion of positive education about anti-Semitism and the Jewish people. The stakes are extremely high because California public schools serve 6 million students, and the ESMC is likely to be used as a model in many other states as well.
As the ESMC receives increased national attention, we are providing an update about this critical challenge for California and the nation as a whole.
It is important to put this issue in context.
We face a massive statewide and nationwide threat: Extremists are shamelessly exploiting ethnic studies to promote hate and one-sided political agendas. We cannot allow hatred and ignorance about Jews and Israel to be institutionalized in American public education.
At the same time, we have a huge opportunity: The subject of ethnic studies is meant to give marginalized communities better representation in the classroom. The bill that led to the creation of the ESMC envisioned a “culturally meaningful and relevant curriculum,” educational standards guided by “equity, inclusiveness and universally high expectations,” and an “objective of preparing pupils to be global citizens with an appreciation for the contributions of multiple cultures.” These are goals we fully support for other communities and for our own. We can counter anti-Semitism and ignorance by teaching millions of high school students about the struggles and successes of the Jewish people.
The threat is amplified by the fact that a significant faction in the field of ethnic studies, represented by the Critical Ethnic Studies Association, institutionally promotes anti-Zionism and discriminatory boycotts against Israel. Too often, this faction engages in outright anti-Semitism by framing Jews as “white, privileged, colonial oppressors.” This is why, in September 2020, a program within San Francisco State University’s College of Ethnic Studies hosted an anti-Semitic event shamelessly glorifying convicted terrorist Leila Khaled. It is also why the first draft of the ESMC was so deeply problematic.
That horror originated in medieval England with the accusation that Jews murdered Christian children to drink their blood, a demented fabrication which directly incited the murder of countless thousands of Jews. And there have been many other instances over the centuries of baseless accusations levelled against the Jews for spreading disease, notably when Jews were blamed for outbreaks of plague as a result of which thousands of Jews were slaughtered.
Today’s vaccine libel sits squarely within that horrific trajectory. For it promotes the grotesque lie that the Jews of Israel are deliberately helping cause the spread of disease and death among the Palestinians by refusing to make available to them a life-saving vaccine.
This not only weaponises yet another lie to demonise and delegitimise Israel. More fundamentally and devastatingly, it presents Israeli Jews as evil. It denies the fact that Israel is the most humane and moral country in the world, not least in the consideration it repeatedly extends to its Palestinian neighbours who never stop trying to murder its citizens and colonise its land. Instead, the vaccine blood libel suggests that Israeli Jews are devoid of compassion, empathy or moral sense and would callously cause the Palestinians to die from Covid-19.
And that is is one of the reasons why antisemitism isn’t just “another kind of racism,” as it is so ignorantly and often described, but is uniquely malevolent and murderous. For it presents the Jews as evil, a blight on humanity, a mortal threat to the rest of the world. In doing so, antisemitism incites the obvious impulse to eradicate such an evil, which has resulted over the centuries in countless massacres, pogroms and eventually the Nazi attempt to wipe the Jewish people off the face of the earth. And presenting Israeli Jews as similarly evil fuels exactly the same impulse to destroy them.
The claim is often made that the venomous falsehoods about Israel are not antisemitic but merely legitimate criticism of its policies. Well, the vaccine blood libel graphically demonstrates that this is not so. It is instead the latest, foul iteration of the attempt to demonise and destroy the Jews.
As the eternal people, the Jews will survive this. The society which gives rise to it will not.
The Palestinian Authority Uses COVID Vaccine Against Israel
The Palestinian Authority (PA) has been playing a double game for the past few weeks. It has touted its decision to obtain COVID-19 vaccines from Russia as proof that it is able to take care of the needs of its people, while also claiming Israel is harming Palestinians by refusing to give them vaccines.COVID: Just 0.06% Israelis sick after two shots, no one serious – study
It is perfectly reasonable for the PA to decide to obtain vaccines from Russia. Article 17 of the Oslo Accords states specifically that “Powers and responsibilities in the sphere of Health in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip will be transferred to the Palestinian side” and “the Palestinian side shall continue the vaccination of the population.” The result is that the Palestinian Authority is in charge of vaccinating the people it governs.
Still, the PA and its shills in the West have been attacking Israel for not providing Palestinians with COVID vaccines. Logically, it doesn’t make sense, but then again, this is the PA we’re talking about.
Whatever angle the PA can use to delegitimize Israel, it will use.
If Israel had intervened and given Palestinians the vaccine, we would likely have seen President Mahmoud Abbas find a way to use it to attack and demean the Jewish state. Any difficulties in the vaccine rollout in the West Bank and Gaza would have been blamed on Israel and the Jews.
The hypocrisy is even more evident when you consider the PA’s hostility toward Jewish sovereignty and self-determination. Between them, Yasser Arafat and Mahmoud Abbas have turned down multiple firm offers of statehood because it would have forced them to affirm once and for all the legitimacy of the Jewish state.
Yet, despite the PA’s refusal to accept the legitimacy of the Jewish state, it allegedly wants this state to provide its citizens with a vaccine. Something’s not right here.
Sadly, media outlets have assisted the PA’s campaign to portray its own decision to obtain vaccines from Russia as a sin on the part of Israel.
New data released by the Maccabi Healthcare Services has confirmed the effectiveness of the Pfizer coronavirus vaccine.Israeli Hospitals’ Capacity at 120% and Doctors Warn Against Ending the Lockdown
As of Thursday, only 254 individuals out of the 416,900 who were already a week after the second Pfizer shot – the time where the immunity is considered to kick in – got infected with the virus, the organization reported. Moreover, those who were found to be positive only had light symptoms, with just four of them being hospitalized, all of them in light condition.
Over the same period of time, some 12,944 new cases of COVID-19 emerged in the control group of some 778,000 people having a diverse health profile.
A comparison between the data from the two groups shows that the vaccine is 91% effective seven days or more after the second injection is administered.
From a segmentation of the infections that did occur, it appears that the immunity increases as the days go by. Among the 254 people who contracted the virus, 76 of them were infected after seven days, 44 on the eight day, and 24 on the ninth day. Between day 22 and 24 – when the test period ended – no one was infected.
According to the studies conducted by Pfizer, the vaccine had an efficacy of about 95%, which is considered very high.
Almost all the hospitals in Israel report occupancy of more than 120%. At the same time, there is an unusual rate—which many doctors say they have never seen before—of early discharges from hospital, Maariv reported on Thursday morning.14 of 16 severe COVID patients in trial recover with experimental Israeli drug
As of Wednesday, 58 corona patients are in critical condition at the Herzog Hospital in Jerusalem, 52 in moderate condition, and another person in mild condition. The wards are currently full, with more than 110 patients, half of them in critical condition. According to the doctors there, the bright spot at the moment is that fewer patients are arriving from outbreaks in nursing homes and geriatric institutions. Most patients come from other hospitals that have passed the peak of their capacity.
97 patients are hospitalized at Shaare Zedek Medical Center in Jerusalem, 65 of them in critical condition and 31 in critical condition.
At Rambam hospital in Haifa, 74 patients are hospitalized, including 31 on extracorporeal membrane oxygenation respirators (ECMO), 3 patients under the age of 40, and another 9 under the age of 50.
At Ziv Medical Center in Tsfat, 46 patients are currently hospitalized, including 14 in critical condition and on respirators, 22 in severe condition, and 10 in moderate condition. This means 116% capacity is taken up by Corona Intensive Care and 70% by the Corona Outbreak Department.
At Assuta Ashdod Public Hospital, 28 patients are hospitalized, including 18 in critical condition, 6 in moderate condition, and 4 in mild condition.
Israeli immunotherapy company Enlivex Therapeutics said Wednesday that 16 severe and critical COVID-19 patients who received its experimental treatment had survived a 28-day Phase II clinical trial period.The Economist [!!]: Israel’s vaccine programme gives hope to the world
Two of the patients, who were critical cases at the start of the trial when they received the company’s Allocetra treatment, were still in intensive care and on ventilators at the end of the trial.
The other 14 patients recovered, were discharged from the hospital by the end of the trial and were reported to be healthy. The average duration of hospitalization after receiving Allocetra, for those who were discharged, was 5.3 days, the company said.
At the start of the trial, nine of the patients were in severe condition and seven were critical.
The company did a preliminary trial of five COVID-19 patients last fall. All of those patients, who were in severe to critical condition when they received the drug, were released from the hospital with an average stay of under 10 days after getting Allocetra.
The two trials together, therefore, had a mortality rate of zero percent in 21 severe to critical cases, although the fate of the two patients still in the ICU remains uncertain.
The majority of patients in both trials had preexisting risk factors including obesity and hypertension, the company said.
In the Phase II trial, 12 of the patients were at Hadassah Medical Center in Jerusalem, three at Barzilai in Ashkelon and one at Ziv in Safed. The first trial was held at Hadassah.
Following the successful Phase II trial, the company will submit the data for review by regulators later this month in the hopes of using the drug widely for the treatment of severe and critical COVID-19.
OVER ONE-THIRD of Israel’s population has received a vaccination against covid-19 since December 19th. Binyamin Netanyahu, the prime minister, has campaigned heavily for vaccinations, personally lobbying the boss of Pfizer, an American drugmaker, to secure early shipments of its vaccine. He was the first Israeli to be jabbed, live on television. He promised that “Israel will be the first country in the world” to emerge from the pandemic—by the end of March. (Conveniently, this is when Israel will be holding a parliamentary election and Mr Netanyahu believes success will boost his Likud party.) This was a bold claim considering nobody was sure that vaccines would successfully lower infection rates by enough to lift lockdown restrictions.
There is now evidence that the vaccination programme is having an impact. Analysis from Eran Segal, a computational biologist at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, and his colleagues, has found that covid-19 cases are falling appreciably among old people in Israel. The effect is especially pronounced in hospital admissions: among people aged over 60 severe hospital cases have fallen by 26% since their peak on January 19th (see chart). In contrast, among those between 40 and 59—a group further back in the queue to be vaccinated—such severe cases have increased by 13%.
The vaccination programme, rather than the national lockdown enacted a week later (and strengthened on January 5th), is the likeliest cause. As Israel’s vaccination programme progresses down the generations, cases and hospitalisations are expected to fall further across the board. Even though Israel has been giving out doses to nearly 2% of its population every day for the past fortnight, on average, there remains some way to go: 65% of people over 60 have received both doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine; less than one-third of 30-year-olds have received their first.
Despite the encouraging falls in cases and hospital admissions attributed to vaccinations, political factors have hampered progress in other respects. Mr Netanyahu has been eager to highlight a diplomatic agreement he signed with the United Arab Emirates. Tens of thousands of Israelis flocked to Dubai for shopping holidays, and some returned with new, more infectious variants of covid-19. The government closed down its sole international airport on January 24th. And Palestinian authorities in the occupied West Bank and Gaza have barely started vaccinating their populations.
BBC ‘fact-checking’ fails to deliver on Palestinian vaccinations issue
That link directs readers to the statement put out by two UNHRC special rapporteurs which audiences have already seen promoted and quoted in other BBC content but the article provides no explanation of the fact that they are not UN members of staff and does not make any mention of the obviously relevant anti-Israel record of one of the two.A House of nut jobs and bigots
Failing to provide a link to the relevant section of the Oslo Accords, the report goes on to claim that the PA has “oversight of public health” rather than “[p]owers and responsibilities in the sphere of Health in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip” as actually stated in the agreement.
“But Israeli health minister, Yuli Edelstein, told the BBC: “We can also look into the so-called Oslo agreements where it says loud and clear that the Palestinians have to take care of their own health.”
The Oslo accords – which Israel signed with the Palestine Liberation Organisation – give the Palestinian Authority oversight of public health under the principles of self-determination.
But the Palestinian authorities point to another part of those accords which says: “Israel and the Palestinian side shall exchange information regarding epidemics and contagious diseases, shall co-operate in combating them and shall develop methods for [the] exchange of medical files and documents.””
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”:
What can I say? From day to night I read Mainstream Media attacks on Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA). The quotes and tweets ascribed to her raise eyebrows. Is she a nut job? The Mainstream Media agree that she is. The Democrats agree. So do Mitch McConnell and Mitt Romney. But all of those reporters and politicos have lost a bit of credibility, shall we say, over the past four years.
And, besides, if McConnell is correct that Greene is a “cancer” for the GOP, then Rashida Tlaib is the bubonic plague and Ilhan Omar is blood-frogs-lice-mixed species-pestilence-boils-hail-locusts, etc.
Inasmuch as I am a rav (Orthodox rabbi), I obviously get annoyed every time some new crazy thing is spread about Jews. Did Greene really say that “the Rothschilds” were going to start wild fires in California with some “Jewish laser beam” from the sun? Hmmm.
Crazy People always go after “the Jews.” It’s a shame because, like the boy who cried “Wolf!” they give an opening to others to yell false charges of “Anti-Semitism!” when good Americans very legitimately go after the evil George Soros. Soros indeed is evil. He has used his money for evil, in contrast from how the recently departed righteous Sheldon Adelson of blessed memory used his money to advance good in so many ways. It is not at all anti-Semitic to attack George Soros. I do it all the time, as do millions of Jews who love America. Not surprisingly, many prominent Jews call Soros an “anti-Semite” because he is a major enemy of Israel’s policies, in league with some of her worst enemies.
Inasmuch as some Crazies go after “The Jews” in crazy ways, they create interference and protection for those on the Left eager to pounce on anyone who calls out the really evil George Soros.
There are all kinds of Jews. Every single poll and survey in Israel — the only Jewish country in the world — shows that the forthcoming March 23 national election will see 70 percent of all votes cast for right-wing parties. Since that polling includes Arab voters, the polling more starkly shows that approximately 80 of the approximately 110 Knesset parliamentary seats that will be won by Jewish parties in March will go to the right-wing. That is 72.7 percent right wing among the Jewish voters.
Can American Catholics say that they are 72.7 percent right wing? Can American Protestants? Likewise, the Jews in the United Kingdom are the British conservative party’s highest-percent demographic. The Jews of the former Soviet Union, from Russia to Ukraine to anywhere there, are the most anti-Communist people anyone ever will meet.
Why does Halie Sofer of @USJewishDems insist on excusing #Antisemitism on the Left? Those that are truly committed to fighting Jew-hatred and Antisemitism, will call it out no matter where it comes from!https://t.co/4Tasj4AX6s
— Arsen Ostrovsky (@Ostrov_A) February 3, 2021
In this case, the comparison is actually quite apt. @mtgreenee and @IlhanMN are two sides of the same racist, conspiratorial coin. What actually unites the two, is their Jew hatred and Antisemitism. https://t.co/CqwkXBkHFW
— Arsen Ostrovsky (@Ostrov_A) February 3, 2021
The most passionate critics of Israel? Because for Jeremy Ben-Ami and J-Street, there is no red line, no bounds for Jew hatred and Antisemitism, as long as one hides behind the veneer of ‘Israel’ . https://t.co/6cPJLw5DL7
— Arsen Ostrovsky (@Ostrov_A) February 4, 2021
What an absurd excuse for Antisemitism and Jew hatred by @RepAndyLevin! https://t.co/XD7CosI7M0
— Arsen Ostrovsky (@Ostrov_A) February 3, 2021
Piers Corbyn, ex-Labour head’s brother, arrested for anti-vax Auschwitz leaflets
Piers Corbyn has been arrested over posters on which his name appears comparing vaccines to Auschwitz.
Police confirmed “officers investigating reports of malicious material in the form of a leaflet being circulated in south London in late January have made two arrests.”
“A 73-year-old man was arrested in Southwark on Wednesday, 3 February on suspicion of malicious communications and public nuisance.”
Another man, 37, “was arrested earlier the same day in Bow, east London, on suspicion of a public order offence.”
“Both men were taken to a south London police station. They have since been bailed to return on a date in early March.”
“The leaflet contained material that appeared to compare the Covid-19 vaccination programme with the Holocaust.”
Corbyn, 73, who is an anti-vaccination activist, came up with the ‘concept idea’ for the poster which depicts Auschwitz, but changes its infamous phrase at its gate from ‘Arbeit Macht Frei’, meaning ‘work sets you free’, to “vaccines are safe path to freedom”.
Underneath the illustration, which uses the Evening Standard’s name and logo, it says ‘concept idea Piers Corbyn and drawing by Alexander Heaton’.
Piers Corbyn, elder brother of @jeremycorbyn has been arrested on suspicion of malicious communications after Auschwitz anti-vaxx flyers were circulated. He denies antisemitism, saying he was married to ‘“Jewess” - we’ll leave our followers to decide where the truth lies. 👇🏻 pic.twitter.com/00Vv0cKkz7
— (((GnasherJew®גנאשר))) (@GnasherJew) February 4, 2021
“It is time that Piers Corbyn faces the legal consequences of his trolling of Jews” after the anti-lockdown activist is arrested over flyers comparing pandemic rules to Auschwitz
The Metropolitan Police has disclosed that it arrested a 73-year-old man in Southwark yesterday on suspicion of malicious communications and public nuisance.
Campaign Against Antisemitism and others have reported recently that Piers Corbyn, the brother of the former Labour leader, conceived and has been distributing grotesque flyers comparing lockdown rules to Auschwitz. Referencing a headline in the Evening Standard that the new COVID-19 vaccines are a “safe path to freedom”, the leaflets show the slogan atop the infamous gates to Auschwitz.
Mr Corbyn has distributed the leaflets in heavily-Jewish Barnet and now in Southwark, which has prompted his arrest.
Responding to his arrest, Mr Corbyn absurdly argued that he could not be antisemitic because he had been married to a Jewish woman and once employed a Jewish person who was a “superb worker” in a comment attributed to him in the JC. Mr Corbyn reportedly protested: “The idea we’re antisemitic in any way is completely absurd. I was married for 22 years to a Jewess and obviously her mother’s forebears fled the Baltic states just before the war because of Hitler or the Nazis in general. I’ve worked with Jewish leading world scientists over the last 30 years. I’ve also employed Jewish people in my business Weather Action, one of whom was a superb worker.”
Mr Corbyn, the brother of the former Labour leader, is a vehement opponent of pandemic lockdowns and has spoken at numerous rallies against lockdown rules, including appearing alongside the antisemitic hate preacher David Icke. Recently, the former BNP leader, Nick Griffin, also compared the lockdown to Auschwitz.
Anti-lockdown and anti-vaccination networks have become known as hotbeds of antisemitic conspiracy theories and tropes.
So the shvantz who founded @pal_action has been arrested for ‘blackmail’ and he’s not happy
— SussexFriendsofIsrael-Unit 8200 (@SussexFriends) February 4, 2021
If you say ‘unless you do this, we are going to do this’ what would you call it?
Actions have consequences boychick and your actions just bit you on the tuchas https://t.co/hIgYUiDz2J
PreOccupiedTerritory: Study: Attacks On Jews Need ‘Context;’ Jewish Misdeeds Need None (satire)
A survey of media principles covering violence between Jews and non-Jews revealed an underlying mechanism that offers a scientific explanation for the way journalists report on it, researchers disclosed today: stories about Jews suffering violence from non-Jews, especially Muslim Arabs, can only exist with mention of factors that drove the perpetrator to said violence, whereas reports of a Jew or Jews committing violence or engaging in behavior that endangers others can exist independent of any such ancillary information.Report: Campus Anti-Semitism Skyrockets Even as Coronavirus Forces Remote Learning
Writing in the journal Judenhaas, a group of journalists and sociologists documented hundreds of instances of the phenomenon over the last several decades, and offered a hypothesis to explain it that has so far held up to repeated testing: non-Jews, being complex creatures with numerous, conflicting emotions, considerations, and impulses, attract explanatory, mitigating context; whereas Jews, being inherently corrupt, selfish, and [to the editor: insert whatever evil current sensibilities deem the most heinous of all – EZ], commit atrocities great and small as easily as they breathe, and therefore repel what for other people would serve as factors that decrease the absolute heinousness of the act – but that, for the Jew, merely serves to highlight the evil manifest in the act itself.
Researchers observed the phenomenon and tested the hypothesis across multiple reporting environments, in both individual Jewish cases and in cases of Jewish groups, institutions, and collective entities, the latter category principally consisting of the State of Israel. They report that the Konfirmation: Israelites Kommit Evil (KIKE) principle, as they call it, explains each case.
“The KIKE principle provides a parsimonious mechanism for a long-observed phenomenon,” the authors write. “Using KIKE, one arrives at a unifying explanation for the contrast between Palestinian attacks on Israeli Jews and Israeli self-defense actions; between coverage of COVID affecting most minority populations and its impact on visibly-observant Jews in, for example, Brooklyn; between deadly suppression of violent riots by police that NGOs insist received Israeli training and attacks on visibly-Jewish New Yorkers, whom reporters feel compelled to describe as being, or at least standing in, in the mind of the attackers, for exploitative Jewish landlords; and numerous other contrasting instances.”
Anti-Semitic incidents on American college campuses are rising at "alarming rates" and have migrated to online spaces as students have moved to remote learning due to the coronavirus pandemic, according to a new report obtained by the Washington Free Beacon.Stop hate at Brown University
At least 2,000 anti-Semitic incidents in total have been recorded since 2017—and include swastikas being spray painted on a Jewish professor's office, a campus performer inviting students to sing a song endorsing anti-Semitism, and scores of students being harassed for being Jewish and having pro-Israel views.
"Although campuses closed when coronavirus erupted, and nearly half of colleges began their fall semesters entirely or primarily online, antisemitism has continued both online and offline," states the new report by Alums for Campus Fairness, an advocacy group that codified 50 of the most flagrant examples of campus anti-Semitism reported in the past three years.
The report comes as colleges, including San Francisco State University, the University of Illinois, and others, grapple with a sharp rise in anti-Semitic incidents. San Francisco University, for instance, was the subject of a civil rights lawsuit alleging "institutionalized anti-Semitism," while the Department of Education launched an investigation last year into University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, citing a string of anti-Semitic incidents. More than half of Jewish students on American college campuses have reported witnessing or being the subject of anti-Jewish harassment. More than 80 percent of American Jews say anti-Semitism in America has increased during the last five years, according to a 2019 study by the American Jewish Committee.
"Anti-Semitic incidents on campuses across the U.S. are on the rise at alarming rates, creating a toxic environment for Jewish students," Avi Gordon, executive director of Alums for Campus Fairness, told the Free Beacon. Gordon is calling on alumni communities to help combat rising Jew hatred on campus, saying their access to school trustees, leadership, and faculty is critical to curbing anti-Semitism.
Despite all evidence to the contrary, detractors of Israel continue to make the case that forcing colleges and universities to divest from Jewish-owned businesses in Israel can somehow better the lives of Palestinians. Brown University has become the latest U.S. campus targeted by the BDS movement, and, as a Palestinian, I urge the Brown community not to fall for it.Palestinian Ambassador Draws Harvard Invite Despite a Sketchy Record on Antisemitism
Under the banner of “Brown Divest,” and spearheaded by the radical Students for Justice in Palestine, anti-Israel campus activists are pushing for the Corporation of Brown University, the institution’s governing body, to divest from what SJP calls “Israeli settler colonialism and apartheid” in a vote to take place this week.
Israeli “apartheid” is nothing more than a political slogan that has nothing to do with reality, however. I will be the first to acknowledge that conditions between Israel and the Palestinians are not perfect, but demonizing our Jewish neighbors is not the answer.
Far from having any measurable impact on Israeli policies, the most frequent outcome of BDS campaigns—wherever they appear—is to spark anti-Semitism and create hostile environments for Jews. They do nothing to improve conditions for Palestinians. On the contrary, they often have the opposite effect.
For all of the divisive rhetoric spurred by outside groups, Palestinians and Israelis are interdependent, particularly when it comes to economic matters. Attempting to punish Israelis for their supposed sins against Palestinians with divestment and sanctions actually harms Palestinians, tens of thousands of whom are employed in Israel and work for Israel-based companies.
By boycotting Israeli-owned businesses, BDS is actually jeopardizing the livelihoods of all Palestinians who rely on Israel for work. Take, for example, the hundreds of Palestinians who were laid off when the manufacturing company SodaStream was targeted by anti-Israel boycotts.
Husam Zomlot has tried to explain away a comment denying the Holocaust, rationalized the Palestinian Authority (PA)’s policy of paying families of terrorists, and minimized rocket fire from Gaza that targets Israeli civilians. But to two Harvard University centers, Zomlot is the right person to discuss “The United States and Palestine: Defining Requirements for Change” on Thursday afternoon.
Zomlot leads the Palestinian Mission to the United Kingdom, and previously served in a similar capacity in the United States. An example of his reflexive hatred for Israel came last September, as the United States hosted a historic ceremony formalizing peace between Israel and the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain. When Zomlot appeared on a Sky News program that night, his first thought was to minimize the terrorist threat Israel faces.
“As I just arrived in the studio,” he said, “I saw in the news that there was a rocket coming from Gaza and sirens, and alarms were going all over Israel. What are they talking about? This is a media stunt.”
No, it was a real attack — with real rockets — that caused real injuries to two Israelis in Ashdod. It might have been worse, but Israel’s Iron Dome system intercepted one rocket before it could do any damage.
Zomlot’s immediate reaction was not to condemn the attacks. Rather, he derided Israel’s attempts to protect its citizens from Gaza terrorists trying to murder them as “a media stunt.”
Sadly, this wasn’t the first time the ambassador played down the genocidal ambitions shared by terrorist groups like Hamas, Hezbollah, and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ).
Um...
— StopAntisemitism.org (@StopAntisemites) February 3, 2021
Theresa Montaño, one of the authors of California’s new 'Ethnic Studies Curriculum' labeled horrifically antisemitic by nearly EVERY Jewish organization and VETOED by @GavinNewsom, refers to the ADL as ...
READY for it?
‘right wing, conservative, white supremacists’ 🤦🏽♀️ pic.twitter.com/KJDtJSqjSw
The BBC is sorry they showcased a terrorist. But do they actually grasp the problem?
I’m not a broadcaster, not a journalist, not a policy-shaping official. But I have things I feel ought to be heard and known about one of the world's most important media platforms, the BBC.Shame of BBC Arabic as systematic bias revealed
I am writing now because there is an important, sober and factual expose of the problems there in today's edition of a British weekly ["Shame of BBC Arabic as systematic bias revealed | A JC investigation shows a pattern of anti-Israel bias and inaccuracies", Jewish Chronicle, February 3, 2021].
I am quoted briefly there but want to raise some larger aspects of the deeply disturbing affair.
On November 9, 2020 I took part in an intense meeting with senior executives at the BBC. The subject was a complaint I had published some weeks earlier [see “Why does BBC promote my daughter’s murderer?” Arnold Roth/Palestinian Media Watch, October 13, 2020] about a Jordanian woman, a fugitive from US justice, being given the celebrity treatment before a global audience tuned in to a BBC show that has a huge following among Arabic speakers.
The meeting, by video conference, was at my request.
I was and continue to be impressed that the senior executive at BBC World Service responded positively to me and without hesitation. He could easily have ignored or deflected what was clearly an uncomfortable proposal. That’s pretty much what the vast majority of media organizations and their editors and management with whom I have tried to engage have done during the past four years.
Is this because I am rude? Nasty? Perhaps, but I believe it has more to do with how I bring disturbing messages with me.
The BBC’s Arabic service stands accused of ignoring the corporation’s own impartiality guidelines as a JC investigation reveals large numbers of examples of apparent anti-Israel bias and inaccuracies.Outrage as Spotify hosts songs filled with hate and Holocaust denial
Alleged infringements include systematically downplaying terror attacks on Israelis; repeatedly using Hamas-inspired language; showcasing extreme views without challenge; and publishing a map in which Israel was erased.
A detailed dossier of apparent breaches was handed to Broadcasting House this week. A BBC spokesperson responded: “BBC Arabic shares exactly the same principles of accuracy and impartiality as BBC News in English, and we strongly reject the suggestion that its impartiality is compromised.”
Today, the JC discloses that the BBC was forced to acknowledge 25 mistakes in its Arabic coverage of Israel in just over two years, issuing on average nearly one correction every month.
One high-profile BBC apology came after Ahlam Al-Tamimi — a Hamas terrorist who masterminded the killing of 15 Israelis in 2001 before becoming a celebrity in Jordan — was the focus of a fawning BBC story last October, causing concern and distress to the victims’ families.
“I apologise for this lapse in our editorial standards,” Jamie Angus, head of the World Service, said in response to the outrage. “[We] will ensure that the appropriate lessons are learned.”
But Arnold Roth, 69, whose teenage daughter was killed in Al-Tamimi’s 2001 plot, responded: “From the poison they are putting out, I sense a toxic culture at BBC Arabic.
An investigation into Spotify has found the music streaming platform riddled with antisemitic songs attacking “paedophile Jews”, apparently calling for a “second Holocaust” and stating that “Zionism must be destroyed”.Spotify's neo-Nazi problem
Other tracks contained Holocaust denial, homophobia and hatred towards other religions, including inciting listeners to burn mosques and “molest all Islamic believers”.
After being contacted by the JC, the multi-billion-pound tech giant removed some of the problematic tunes. But others remained available as the paper went to press.
The company was accused of “providing a pulpit for modern day hate preachers” after a pro-Israel activist revealed the bigotry running rampant on the music streaming service.
Joseph Cohen, of the Israel Advocacy Movement, scoured Spotify to highlight the worst of the prejudice.
One of the most alarming examples was a song called “Zyklon B”. Named after the poison gas used in Nazi death chambers, the track appeared on Brazilian band Unearthly’s 2003 release, Black Metal Commando.
In an email to Spotify, the JC cited multiple websites that had transcribed the song’s vitriolic lyrics as: “Unleashing second Holocaust / For punishment shall be repeated / Attack their greedy new found joy / Zionism must be destroyed”, and “They are targets of our rage! / We’ll destroy the entire race / We’ll bring Holocaust back / Zionism’s disgrace.”
Guardian corrects suggestion Palestinian was convicted of 'insulting a soldier'
As we noted in our complaint to editors, the very source Shehadeh included in that paragraph (a Reuters article) was clear that the six counts he was convicted of did not include “insulting a soldier”. He was convicted however on the charge of “assaulting” an Israeli settler.Baby Ariel releases message urging followers to combat hate, antisemitism
We also noted that Amro, a resident of Hebron, faces additional charges in the Palestinian Authority courts, which includes one count of “insulting” Palestinians authorities in a Facebook post, which shows that the Guardian writer either accidentally or intentionally conflated the charges Amro faces within the two legal systems.
The Guardian upheld our complaint and revised the relevant sentences thusly:
On 6 January, Issa Amro, a UN-recognised human rights defender, and the founder and coordinator of Youth Against Settlements, a Hebron-based group, was convicted in an Israeli military court near Ramallah on six counts, including protesting without a permit, obstructing soldiers’ activities and assault — charges that he denied.
The correction is important because the broader narrative advanced by Shehadeh, that we refuted in our post, was that Amro is a ‘progressive’ and strictly non-violent protester.
Social media sensation Baby Ariel is currently participating in a campaign against antisemitism and hatred, calling on her 47.5 million followers to spread awareness on the matter in a series of videos posted to her official pages and accounts.Germany upgrades IHRA's legal status
Baby Ariel, whose real name is Ariel Martin, rose to fame on the social media platform known as musical.ly, now TikTok, and had been recognized previously as one of the top influencers on the internet by USA Today, Forbes and Time Magazine.
She is well known for her musical covers across her social media platforms, and has also been featured in a Disney Channel feature film. She was also awarded the Teen Choice Award for "Choice Muser" in 2016 and 2017. Her work also landed her on the Billboard Top 100 in 2016.
Baby Ariel currently has 34.5 million TikTok followers, 9 million Instagram followers, 1 million Twitter followers and her YouTube channel has 3 million subscribers.
Since her rise to fame, Baby Ariel has been outspoken against racism, bullying and hate, and had been recognized by People magazine for her efforts in the past.
For her most recent project, Baby Ariel, who is Jewish, teamed up with the Combat Antisemitism Movement (CAM) to send a message to her fans, revealing her own personal experiences with hatred.
Germany recognized the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance as an international institution on Wednesday, strengthening in law its commitment to fighting antisemitism.German commission rules museum must return Nazi-looted painting to Jewish heirs
German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas said his country's one-year presidency of IHRA will come to a close next month, "ending a year in which denial and playing down of the Holocaust reached new, shameless lows."
Maas mentioned examples such as protesters against COVID-19-related restrictions comparing their situation to concentration camps, and someone wearing a "Camp Auschwitz" sweatshirt storming the US Capitol last month.
"These images made us all the more determined in our work for the IHRA," Maas said.
Germany will put IHRA "on equal footing with other international organizations," Maas explained, saying this is "a signal of international cooperation."
"For only by joining forces can we take action against the growing trend to distort the historical record and discriminate," he stated. Germany’s move came the day after the Biden administration reaffirmed US support for the IHRA definition of antisemitism.
A commission in Germany has ruled that a painting by expressionist Erich Heckel that is in a German art museum was likely unlawfully obtained under the Nazis and should be returned to the heirs of a Jewish historian who once owned it, officials said Tuesday.US Supreme Court sides with Germany in $250m Nazi-era treasure dispute
Heckel’s “Geschwister,” or “Siblings,” was owned by Jewish historian Max Fischer until 1934, the year before he fled Germany to avoid Nazi persecution, according to Baden-Wuerttemberg’s state commission on Nazi-looted art.
The 1913 oil painting ended up back with Heckel, and the artist donated it to the Kunsthalle Karlsruhe museum in 1967.
The state commission said it could not be determined when and under which circumstances Heckel came into possession of the piece, sometime between January 1934 and January 1944.
The commission said that given the circumstances, however, it had to be assumed that Fischer, who immigrated to the United States, lost possession of the painting due to Nazi persecution. It ordered the artwork returned to his heirs.
The US Supreme Court’s ruling Wednesday in a multimillion-dollar dispute over a collection of religious artworks will make it harder for some lawsuits to be tried in US courts over claims that property was taken from Jews during the Nazi era.Germany Prevails at Supreme Court in Dispute Over Jewish Art Extorted by Nazis
The justices sided with Germany in a dispute involving the heirs of Jewish art dealers and the 1935 sale of a collection of medieval Christian artwork called the Guelph Treasure. The collection, called the Welfenschatz in German, is said to now be worth at least $250 million.
The court ruled unanimously that Germany had sovereign immunity in US courts from claims over the Guelph collection of gold crosses, jewels and other religious works from the 11th to the 14th centuries.
But they avoided comment on the merits of the claim that a group of art dealers was illegally forced to sell the collection at cut-rate prices in 1935 to Prussia, then run by Gestapo founder Hermann Goering, as the Nazis increasingly threatened Jews.
“It was simply not possible in 1935 for any Jewish business, least of all dealers who are in possession of the German national treasure, to get a fair deal with perhaps the greatest, most notorious art thief of all time,” Jed Leiber, whose grandfather Saemy Rosenberg was one of the dealers, told AFP in December.
The heirs originally pressed their claims in Germany, but a German commission found the artworks’ sale was made voluntarily and for fair market value. A suit was then filed in the United States. Germany and the state-run foundation that owns the collection, which is on display in Berlin’s Museum of Decorative Arts, argued the case did not belong in American courts.
The Liveauctioneers website is asking for bids for Adolf Hitler’s toilet seat ‘captured’ at the Berghof— Hitler’s home in the Obersalzberg of the Bavarian Alps near Berchtesgaden, Bavaria, Germany.You Too Can Be the Proud Owner of Adolf Hitler’s Commode
“Guaranteed to be one of the most eye-catching items one could ever add to a collection of World War II relics,” the auction website reveals that the two-piece wooden toilet seat with a lid was removed by an “enterprising GI” from Adolf Hitler’s bathroom at his retreat.
“The seat measures 19 inches front to back and 16 inches wide, with two chromed steel fittings joining the two pieces. These fittings have long threaded shafts that passed through the porcelain bowl, and the wing nuts that secured them were replaced once the seal was removed.
“The seat is set in an old, rather battered period shadow box along with two snapshots of Borch with his immediate superior officer at the ‘Eagles Nest’ at Berchtesgaden, and a satirical anti-Hitler newspaper clipping.”
Since the end of the war, the “ensemble” has remained untouched in the basement of the soldier’s home in the northeastern US. According to the website, “the ruins of the Berghof were entered by American MP Ragnvald C. Borch, one of the first Americans on the scene and fluent in German and French when he was sent to liaison with the French 2nd Armored Division, the first Allied troops to reach Hitler’s home.”
According to a detailed letter of provenance signed by Borch’s son, when his father arrived on the scene, the soldier was told to “get what you want.” He made his way to Hitler’s bedroom, taking a World War I armored vest on display and two oil paintings. He saw the toilet seat and removed it.
Israel’s embassy in Guatemala on Sunday finished its Guatelinda housing project in the town of Escuintla for families that lost homes in the 2018 Fuego volcano eruption.Israel builds houses for 39 families that lost homes in Guatemala volcano blast
The blast killed more than 190 people in the Central American country.
Matty Cohen, Israel’s ambassador to Guatemala and Honduras, personally handed over the deeds to all 39 families who received new homes.
“The State of Israel promised, and we are happy,” said Cohen. “Israel will always continue to assist our friend and ally Guatemala.”
The homes sit on “Jerusalem Capital of Israel Street,” the 19th street in Guatemala with that name, according to the Foreign Ministry.
Guatemala moved its embassy to Jerusalem in May 2018, two days after the US ceremoniously opened its own mission in the city.
As of today, the US and Guatemala are the only countries that operate embassies in Jerusalem, though Kosovo is slated to become the third after it establishes diplomatic relations with Israel Monday.
Israel’s embassy in Guatemala on Sunday finished its Guatelinda housing project in the town of Escuintla for families that lost homes in the 2018 Fuego volcano eruption.Israeli Firm WalkMe Prepares to Go Public at a $4 Billion Valuation
The blast killed more than 190 people in the Central American country.
Matty Cohen, Israel’s ambassador to Guatemala and Honduras, personally handed over the deeds to all 39 families who received new homes.
“The State of Israel promised, and we are happy,” said Cohen. “Israel will always continue to assist our friend and ally Guatemala.”
The homes sit on “Jerusalem Capital of Israel Street,” the 19th street in Guatemala with that name, according to the Foreign Ministry.
Guatemala moved its embassy to Jerusalem in May 2018, two days after the US ceremoniously opened its own mission in the city.
As of today, the US and Guatemala are the only countries that operate embassies in Jerusalem, though Kosovo is slated to become the third after it establishes diplomatic relations with Israel Monday.
Israeli website navigation company WalkMe has begun preparing to go public on Nasdaq. According to a person familiar with the move who spoke to Calcalist on condition of anonymity, the company, which developed a digital adoption platform to simplify user experiences on websites, has joined forces with Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, who will be leading its IPO.Scientists: Bone carving found in Israel could be earliest human use of symbols
WalkMe plans to carry out the move in the third quarter of 2021, assuming the US stock market remains as accommodating to tech companies as it is now.
WalkMe is aiming to raise $500 million at a valuation of $4 billion. Unlike a slew of other Israeli companies who have chosen to merge with a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC), WalkMe has chosen to enter Wall Street through the front door and prepare a pre-IPO prospectus.
In an age in which most communications between a company and its clients is done digitally, companies need large and sophisticated websites that can answer a wide range of needs. WalkMe develops platforms that aid companies in carrying out digital transformations, enabling them to maximize their technological systems both from the user side, with guidelines and training, and on the analytics side, providing management with insights on what works and what doesn’t, to assist in their rapid transitions to digital platforms.
Six lines carved on a 120,000-year-old bone fragment found in central Israel could be one of the earliest known uses of symbols found on Earth, if not the first, according to Israeli and French researchers.
The bone fragment, found recently during an excavation near the city of Ramle, has six similar etchings on one side of the bone, leading researchers to conclude that they were deliberately carved symbols, according to a joint statement from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and Haifa University released Wednesday.
“It is fair to say that we have discovered one of the oldest symbolic engravings ever found on earth, and certainly the oldest in the Levant,” said Yossi Zaidner of the Institute of Archeology at Hebrew University. “This discovery has very important implications for understanding of how symbolic expression developed in humans.”
The researchers also included a team from Le Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique in France.
According to the findings, which were recently published in the scientific journal “Quaternary International,” the six engravings range from 38 to 42 millimeters.
“Based on our laboratory analysis and discovery of microscopic elements, we were able to surmise that people in prehistoric times used a sharp tool fashioned from flint rock to make the engravings,” said Iris Groman-Yaroslavski from the University of Haifa.
They used three-dimensional imaging, microscopic methods of analysis, and experimental reproduction of engravings in the laboratory and were even able to determine that the work was performed by a right-handed craftsman in a single working session.
#Israel ranked No.7️⃣ Most #Innovative Economy in new #BloombergInnovationIndex. The 2021 rankings reflect a world where the fight against #COVID19 has brought innovation to the fore. 💪 🇮🇱 https://t.co/cOlAux8eeb pic.twitter.com/rpZxuAlzS2
— Arsen Ostrovsky (@Ostrov_A) February 4, 2021
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