Tuesday, May 18, 2021

05/18 Links: Melanie Phillips: A murderous co-operation; The left’s shameful silence on anti-Semitism; Mike Pence: Violence in Israel Is the Price of Biden’s Weakness; Associated Press, Hamas Propagandists

From Ian:

Melanie Phillips: A murderous co-operation
The idea that journalists in Gaza — or indeed most of the western media corps, with some very honourable exceptions — have ever delivered objective and balanced reporting about Israel and the Palestinians is absolutely ludicrous. The implications of this systemic corruption of journalism — the certainty of it inflaming and inciting a Muslim population already fed a diet of paranoid lies about Israel and the Jews and whipping up hatred of Israel and the Jewish people in the rest of the population — are horrific.

We’ve had decades of this abuse of journalism, with the effects that are all too appallingly obvious to those with eyes to see. Now we are experiencing the latest round in this terrible war against the Jews, truth and elementary decency.

Please bear all this in mind when you next read or tune into the Guardian, New York Times, BBC, Channel Four News, Sky News or much of the the rest of the so-called reporting on the Gaza war by the mainstream media.

Or better still, cancel your subscriptions.
Brendan O'Neill: The left’s shameful silence on anti-Semitism
The modern left’s blind spot on anti-Jewish racism is a depressing testament to the confusions and contortions of identity politics. The ideology of wokeness is obsessed with categorising people according to their levels of presumed ‘oppression’ or ‘privilege’. In this eccentric worldview, now being bought into not only by middle-class professional protesters but also by the political class, numerous institutions and the education system, ‘whiteness’ is a signifier of privilege while ‘Muslimness’ is an experience of relentless pain. Identity politics has helped to inflame and exacerbate contemporary anti-Semitism through its depiction of Jews as hyper-white, as uber-privileged, and we all know what privileged people deserve, right? Criticism, censure, ridicule, possibly harassment. They definitely cannot be empathised with as victims of racism. That doesn’t compute for a woke left that has decreed that Jews are super-white, and therefore super-privileged, and therefore super-suspect.

And it is the woke left’s paternalistic pity for the Muslim community, its tendency to infantilise Muslims as perma-victims in desperate need of our moral succour, that makes it reluctant to call out Muslim anti-Semitism in particular. Much of the vile anti-Jewish commentary and behaviour of the past few days, including in London, Bonn and Toronto, has come from Muslim pro-Palestine protesters. The identitarian left turns a blind eye to Muslim anti-Semitism because it doesn’t fit into its rigid, racialised narrative. The ‘oppressed’ being racist to the ‘privileged’ doesn’t add up. So they make a trade-off, wittingly or unwittingly. They decide that Muslim anti-Semitism is not worth talking about, far less condemning, because Muslims deserve the protections of political correctness while Jews do not. Jews are abandoned to preserve the orthodoxies of identitarianism. It is now seen as virtually Islamophobic to talk about anti-Semitism.

And then there’s the relationship between anti-Israel agitation and anti-Semitic hatred. This has got to be confronted, honestly and forcefully. Every time there is a rise in anti-Israel protest, it is accompanied by acts of anti-Jewish animus. Why? Everyone who considers himself or herself genuinely progressive, and genuinely committed to tackling racism, should at least attempt to address this question. Left-wing protesters and commentators argue that it is entirely possible to be opposed to Israel’s military actions in the Palestinian Territories without being anti-Semitic, and they are absolutely right. But the uncomfortable truth is this: the modern left isn’t only opposing Israeli militarism. It is obsessing over it, to a distorted degree. Leftists treat Israel as uniquely barbaric, distinct from every other nation that engages in war. We have to ask ourselves if this hyper-moralisation of the Israel-Palestine conflict, this denouncement of Zionism as a pox on both the Middle East and broader global affairs, contributes to the prejudicial conviction that the Jewish State is the most evil state, and the Jewish people thus a suspect people.

‘Silence is compliance’, the woke left is fond of saying. So should we take their silence on recent acts of anti-Semitism as a sign of compliance with this hateful ideology? People are setting fire to Jewish monuments in Germany. They’re driving through Jewish areas of London calling for the rape of Jewish girls. They’re parading through the streets with images of hook-nosed Jews. If this doesn’t concern the woke left, then it is clearly even more lost than some of us feared.
Mike Pence: Violence in Israel Is the Price of Biden’s Weakness
President Biden has emboldened anti-Semitic terrorist groups such as Hamas by shunning Israeli leaders and restoring more than $200 million in aid to the Palestinians that had been canceled by the Trump-Pence administration. He unilaterally took the Iranian-backed Houthis off the list of designated terrorist organizations. And worst of all, he has announced his intention to rejoin the Iran nuclear deal, destabilizing the entire region.

When asked, Biden’s press secretary couldn’t even say whether Israel remains an “important ally” of the United States.

Every tepid statement uttered by the Biden-Harris administration is built on a false equivalency between Israel and Hamas. One is a sovereign nation with a legitimate government, and a trusted ally. The other is an internationally recognized terrorist organization that has fired more than 3,000 rockets at Jewish families and businesses in the past week. There is no moral equivalency between Israel and the terrorist group Hamas. President Biden and every American leader should uphold Israel’s right to self-defense and condemn the terrorists of Hamas — as well as their supporters and apologists — in the strongest possible terms.

Apparently, Biden learned nothing from the tragic foreign-policy blunders made during his time as vice president. President Obama’s thin “red line” in Syria, his decision to “lead from behind” in Libya, and his slipshod withdrawal from Iraq each created power vacuums that were quickly filled by America’s enemies.

Now Biden is repeating those grave errors by creating a power vacuum of his own. He has replaced strength with weakness, moral clarity with confusion, and loyalty with betrayal. Biden’s void, too, is being filled by America’s enemies — and Israelis are paying the price in blood.

Americans should pray for the peace of Jerusalem and stand without apology for our most cherished ally, Israel, until the violence is quelled and Israel’s security is restored.


Associated Press, Hamas Propagandists
As more than 1,500 Hamas rockets were flying toward Israeli cities with the express purpose of murdering civilians, CNN could spare only around four minutes — in total — to cover the topic during an entire week of prime time. Typically, it’s only when the Jewish state begins defending itself that the story gets any real traction.

And, needless to say, the focus got intense after Israel destroyed a twelve-story high-rise building in Gaza that housed foreign press outlets, including the Associated Press. Israel claims that al-Jalaa Tower was home to Hamas military-intelligence assets. It called ahead to warn those inside, so, fortunately, no journalist was killed.

AP CEO Gary Pruitt said that his organization “had no indication Hamas was in the building or active in the building,” adding, “This is something we actively check to the best of our ability. We would never knowingly put our journalists at risk.”

This is nonsense. Pruitt knowingly puts journalists at risk every day he sends them to places such as Gaza, where the ruling regime wages war behind civilians it uses as shields. But how did Pruitt “actively” check? Did he ask Hamas? Did he call the landlord? Did he ring everyone’s bell? And how could we trust that a media outlet that is unable to track down a single Hamas militant shooting Qassam rockets — from dense civilian areas right near its offices — would be able to figure out who was in their building, anyway?

It is, of course, highly probable that Hamas was using journalists as human shields. This is what it does. During the last major outbreak of violence, in 2014, Gaza’s Shifa hospital became “a de facto headquarters for Hamas leaders,” who could “be seen in the hallways and offices,” according to the Washington Post — but not the Associated Press, which had around 40 journalists working on the Israeli–Palestinian story, including a number of them filing stories from inside that very hospital.
Andrew Klavan: I Read The Hamas Charter To Prove How Racist They Are
The democrats like to stick up for Hamas - but do they really know who they are defending? If they don't, then they should figure it out by watching this video! If they do...well...then they're the worst.


Commentary Magazine Podcast: Gaza Madness and Masking Madness

JPost Editorial: Israel is fighting an image war and losing - editorial
In the current conflict, Israel’s supporters have proudly shared images of the Iron Dome intercepting Hamas rockets before they can kill and damage people and property in Israel. But these are overshadowed by the images of Israel leveling the Gaza media building or a house in the Shati refugee camp in Gaza City, killing at least 10 members of the Abu Hatab family, most of them children.

After Israel celebrated Jerusalem Day, international audiences witnessed a video of Jewish men singing and dancing at the Western Wall as a fire raged outside the al-Aqsa Mosque.

Such images played into the Palestinian narrative that this conflict centers on Jerusalem, and was triggered by Israeli restrictions on Muslim prayers during Ramadan and the threatened evictions of Arab families in the east Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah.

Hamas is portrayed as the guardian of Palestinians, and Israel – which has justifiably responded to the indiscriminate firing of rockets by carrying out attacks against terrorist targets in Gaza – is unfairly perceived as the aggressor rather than the victim.

While Israel has many eloquent spokespeople, from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu down, there was no coordinated effort from the outset to counter these harmful images, which clearly play into the hands of Hamas.

Due to the lack of an interagency body, the Foreign Ministry took charge, improvised and created a task-force to run media operations. This is commendable but it is not enough.

As recent wars with Lebanon and Gaza, including the current one, have demonstrated, Israel needs to take the battleground of public diplomacy earnestly and establish an agency that will ultimately be responsible for presenting Israel’s case.

The agency should be headed by a well-respected and gifted individual, overseeing a team of experienced experts from Israel and abroad. This should be the last war in which Israel is not armed with a first-class public diplomacy team to deftly defend it on the international stage. It’s time to establish an Iron Dome system for public diplomacy, to fight back and defend Israel in the theater of public perception.
Emily Schrader: The demonization of Israel in the halls of Congress - Opinion
PERHAPS MOST inappropriately, these members of Congress all repeatedly compared the Palestinians’ situation to the struggle against police brutality in the US for blacks. Last week, Pressley stated, “Palestinians today are being told the same things as blacks in America, that there is no acceptable form of resistance.” This is an outrageous comparison that actually insults the black community in the US.

Palestinians, for decades, have had internationally recognized terrorist organizations intimately involved with their leadership, carrying out barbarous acts of violence against civilians. The American black community is doing nothing of the sort.

The black community’s struggle has absolutely nothing to do with Palestinian nationalism or the aspirations for a Palestinian state. This is one of the most pernicious and ugly demonizations of Israel being propagated today and it must be exposed and called out for what it is: bigotry.

This twisted perspective comes from a misguided view of Jews, which perceives them as “white” and thus “privileged” (despite being the leading target of hate crimes even in the US for over 20 years), and the Palestinians as “brown.” The irony of this is, of course, that Jews are not white and the majority of Israeli Jews, in fact, are brown. But facts don’t seem to be relevant to sentimentalists like Ocasio-Cortez, Tlaib, Bush, Omar and Pressley.

Israel does not have a history of slavery, nor a history of discriminatory laws that disenfranchise the Arab population. In fact quite the opposite. Israel’s basic laws demand freedom of religion and equality. Of course that does not mean Israel doesn’t deal with racism, as every nation does, but to compare this history to that of the US is to mislead and to lie, much like many of the other accusations lobbed at Israel by this bunch. Their conduct last week, at a time when Israel is facing the biggest violent onslaught in years, was completely unfit for members of Congress and each of them should be ashamed.

This is not about human rights; it’s about the selective outrage against Israel and the unfounded accusations made. The extremism of these representatives should have no place in the US Congress.
Responsibility for the Latest Upsurge in Arab-Israeli Violence Goes to US President Joe Biden
Even Mr Trump's harshest critics had to concede that, when it came to the Middle East, the Trump era had been a success.

Prior to the latest eruption of hostilities between Israel and Palestinian militants, Mr Biden's only notable intervention in the Israeli-Palestinian issue had been to restore hundreds of millions of dollars in American aid to the Palestinians, thereby reversing the Trump administration's decision to cut aid to the Palestinian Authority over its refusal to maintain a dialogue with Washington.

Now, with Palestinian militants once more targeting Israeli civilian areas with rockets and missiles, the folly of Mr Biden's ill-advised approach to the Middle East has been exposed.... Indeed, the extent of Iran's military support for Palestinian militants was revealed by an official with the Palestinian Islamic Jihad terrorist organisation who boasted last week: "The rockets we use to pound Tel Aviv, our weapons, and our food are provided by Iran."

Mr Biden's comment, made following a telephone discussion with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu last week, that he expected the violence to end "sooner rather than later" certainly seemed to be more an expression of wishful thinking than a realistic assessment of events unfolding on the ground in Israel and the Palestinian territories.


Netanyahu Defends Gaza Strikes, Says Israel Will Do "Whatever It Takes" to Defend Our People
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told "Face the Nation" on Sunday:
"We were attacked by Hamas...unprovoked attacks on Jerusalem and then thousands of rockets and missiles on our cities. And I think any country has to defend itself. It has a natural right of self-defense. We'll do whatever it takes to restore order and quiet and the security of our people and deterrence. We're trying to degrade Hamas' terrorist abilities and to degrade their will to do this again."

"If Hamas thought that they could just fire rockets and then sit back and enjoy immunity, that's false. We are targeting a terrorist organization that is targeting our civilians and hiding behind their civilians, using them as human shields. We're doing everything we can to hit the terrorists themselves, their rockets, their rocket caches and their arms. But we're not going to just let them get away with it. Neither would you. I mean, just imagine what would have happened if you had 2,900 rockets fired on Washington and New York."

Asked about the bombing on Saturday of a building in Gaza that housed the Associated Press and Al Jazeera, Netanyahu said: "[The] intelligence office for the Palestinian terrorist organization [was] housed in that building that plots and organizes terror attacks against Israeli civilians. So it's a perfectly legitimate target. And I can tell you that we took every precaution to make sure that there were no civilian injuries....No people were killed."

"We, unlike Hamas, take special precautions to tell people, leave the building, leave the premises. We make sure that everyone is gone before we bring down those terrorist facilities. And that's the difference between Israel and Hamas. They deliberately target our cities, deliberately target our civilians. They glorify the death of children and civilians and old people. They are happy with it....We grieve for every non-combatant loss in Gaza and we grieve for all our civilians who died."

"When the international community attacks Israel, they're actually encouraging Hamas to continue these attacks because Hamas says it's great, we're both killing Israeli civilians and...it gets the international community to focus their attacks on Israel instead of Hamas. That's wrong. It's both wrong and unproductive, because actually what it does is prolong the conflict and escalate and increase the number of casualties that happen as a result of the continuation of the conflict."

"If Hamas would simply move these rockets out of the civilian areas, if they moved their command posts out of these homes and offices, then there wouldn't be any problem. You know it. And I know it. But the fact is they're sending thousands of rockets on our cities with the specific purpose of murdering our civilians from these places. What would you do if it happened to Washington or to New York? You know damn well what you would do. You'd do at the very least what we're doing."
Alan M. Dershowitz: If the Perceived Enemy of the Palestinians Were Not Jews, There Would Be Little Concern for Their Plight
Why are there no demonstrations on behalf of the Kurds, the Chechens, the Uyghurs, the Tibetans?

The answer can be summarized in one word: Jews. The enemy of these groups is not the Jews. Hence, there is little concern for their plight.

If the perceived enemy of the Palestinians were not the Jews, there would be little concern for their plight as well.

This was proved by the relative silence that greeted the massacre of Palestinians by Jordan during "Black September" in 1970, or the killings of Palestinian Authority leaders in Gaza during the Hamas takeover in 2007, or the 4,000 Palestinian civilians killed by Syria during that country's civil war.

I support the legitimate rights of Palestinians to a peaceful state because it would be good for peace in the region and for Israel. But I refuse to prioritize it over other equally compelling claims just because Jews are on the other side.
NYPost Ed: If AP really didn’t know it shared space with Hamas, why trust its reporting?
If it’s true that AP was so unaware — and the evidence suggests it’s unlikely — how can anyone trust its reporting in the region?

The Israeli military ordered the 12-story al-Jalaa Tower, which hosts AP and Al Jazeera offices, evacuated an hour before the strike, saying it was being used by Hamas military intelligence. For a week, tensions between Israel and Hamas, the terrorist group that controls Gaza, have been at their highest since their 2014 conflict, with Hamas raining thousands of rockets into residential areas of the Jewish state.

Israel later shared some intelligence with the United States. “We showed them the smoking gun proving Hamas worked out of that building,” a source close to Foreign Minister Gabi Ashkenazi told the Jerusalem Post. “I understand they found the explanation satisfactory.”

Of course, we’ve known for years that, as the Israel Defense Forces put it, Hamas “intentionally locates its military assets in the hearts of civil populations,” even “hiding behind” media outlets and “using them as human shields.”

And AP knew that well, according to one account. “When Hamas’ leaders surveyed their assets before this summer’s round of fighting, they knew that among those assets was the international press. The AP staff in Gaza City would witness a rocket launch right beside their office, endangering reporters and other civilians nearby — and the AP wouldn’t report it,” says a 2014 Atlantic piece by Matti Friedman. Hamas militants would regularly “burst into the AP’s Gaza bureau and threaten the staff — and the AP wouldn’t report it.”

It seems that what AP doesn’t know — and doesn’t report — always favors Hamas over those the group terrorizes.
Israel Advocacy Movement: The truth about the al-Jalaa tower (the al-Jazeera and AP offices in Gaza)

IDF: Over 160 Terrorists Killed in Gaza Fighting
The Israel Defense Forces says it has killed over 150 terrorist operatives as of last night, the majority from Hamas, during the fighting in the Gaza Strip.

According to Gaza’s Hamas-run Health Ministry, over 200 Palestinians have been killed so far in the fighting, including more than 50 minors and three dozen women. It is not immediately clear if the ministry’s tally includes all of those killed or if there are Hamas operatives not included in the count.

According to IDF Spokesperson Hidai Zilberman, more than 120 of those killed were members of Hamas and over 25 were members of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad as of Monday night. Additional terrorist operatives were likely killed overnight, but he says he has yet to receive updated assessments regarding the exact number.
IDF believes it significantly hurt Hamas, and that’s the best it can do for now
The Israel Defense Forces believes it has achieved its major goals in this round of fighting against the Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad terror groups as of Sunday, indicating Jerusalem may soon accept a ceasefire offer, The Times of Israel has learned.

Though Israeli defense officials maintain that they have many more targets that they could destroy in the Gaza Strip if the fighting continued, the military has knocked out the terror groups’ main military assets — demolishing parts of Hamas’s sprawling underground tunnel network and demonstrating that all of its subterranean infrastructure is vulnerable to Israeli attack; destroying nearly all of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad’s rocket production capabilities and most of Hamas’s, preventing them from being able to rearm in the coming months and years; and killing a number of top terrorist commanders and weapons experts.

This current round of fighting began with Hamas’s firing of seven rockets at Jerusalem on Monday in response to clashes that took place throughout the day between Palestinians and Israeli security forces on the Temple Mount and in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood of East Jerusalem.

Since then, however, the Israel Defense Forces has used the opportunity presented by the rocket fire to launch a massive campaign, dubbed Operation Guardian of the Walls, against Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, the second most powerful terror group in the Gaza Strip.


The Palestinian Propaganda Machine Cranks Into High Gear
Palestinian leaders have refined lying during war into a fine art. Palestinian spokesmen set out to portray Israel as an outrageously repressive regime, routinely committing atrocities against the Palestinian people, who deserved aid from the international community as much as the Israelis warranted condemnation.

This initiative, too, has been wildly successful. The United Nations condemns Israel far more often than any other nation; many of these condemnations have been based on reports about Israeli atrocities that were entirely fabricated. World opinion has largely turned against Israel as well, as it has an international reputation today of being one of the world’s most unjust and repressive regimes.

Hamas was so anxious to have Palestinian civilian casualties that it could parade before the world in order to gain propaganda victories that in April 2018, as protests raged at the Gaza border, the terror group offered $500 to “Palestinians” for getting shot and wounded at the border, and $3,000 to the families of those who got themselves killed during the protests. This was too much for Mahmoud Al-Habbash, Mahmoud Abbas’ Advisor on Islamic Affairs and Supreme Sharia Judge, who denounced Hamas on official Palestinian Authority TV: “The Palestinian people…doesn’t care about those [Hamas] with ‘the emotional stories of heroism,’ those with the slogans of heroism – slogans that when you hear them, you think that the people saying them are inside the Al-Aqsa Mosque after they liberated it. And afterwards you discover that they’re only selling illusions, trading in suffering and blood, trading in victims, [saying]: ‘You Palestinians, our people, go and die so that we’ll go to the TV and media with strong declarations.’ These [Hamas] acts of ‘heroism’ don’t fool anyone anymore. The Palestinian people…sides with the PLO.”

Whether it did or not, and there was considerable evidence that it did not, that Hamas was sending Palestinians to die in order to manipulate world opinion against Israel was certain.

This is a propaganda success that Josef Goebbels and the editors of Pravda would have envied, and it became the foundation for more. Having established the Palestinians as a tiny indigenous people whose land was stolen by rapacious, well-heeled, and oppressive foreigners, it was time to return to the negotiating table – not in order to achieve any genuine accord with Israel, but to exploit the victimhood status of the new tiny people they had invented in order to win valuable concessions from the Israelis.

And it worked. Today, as the Palestinian jihadis target Israeli civilians anew, it is working once again.
IDF foils attacks on offshore gas rig, eliminates top Hamas naval commander
Cleared for publication: The Israeli military has thwarted several attempts by Hamas to target Israel's Tamar offshore gas installation over the past week of fighting between the Jewish state and the terrorist group controlling the Gaza Strip.

The IDF said that both rockets and suicide drones were launched in these attempts, but none ever posed an actual threat to the gas rig, which nonetheless was placed on alert and ordered to temporarily shut down operations.

According to Channel 12 News, Tamar is protected by a ship-borne Iron Dome air defense battery and other measures.

The military said that the Navy has been able to successfully ward off various attacks by Hamas' naval unit, adding it had also destroyed most of the terrorist group's naval infrastructure since Operation Guardian of the Walls as launched on May 10.

In another major blow to Gaza's rulers, the IDF said that the head of Hamas' naval and submarine development scheme was killed in an Israeli strike this week. An IDF official told Israeli media that contrary to some reports, the military has not been able to confirm that the head of Hamas' naval commandos has also been killed.

In the latest round of fighting, the Navy has destroyed eight warehouses that contained naval weaponry, 10 Hamas naval posts, 22 ships belonging to the groups' naval forces, and more.
2 Thai workers killed, several people injured as Hamas bombards southern Israel
Two foreign workers were killed and a number of people injured, one of them seriously, as Hamas pounded Gaza border communities and southern Israel with rocket and mortar barrages on Tuesday afternoon.

The two Thai victims were killed in a direct hit to a packing house in a community close to the border.

Both men killed were foreign nationals in their 30s, medics said. Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said that they were from Thailand.

The strike injured eight other people, including one seriously and another moderately, police said in a statement.

Police said the casualties were treated and removed from the scene while the area was under attack.

The foreign nationals were working in an area without proper fortifications, local government officials said.

“The impact was within a community without protection, which was not included in the fortification policy, and this is the terrible result we had today,” said Eshkol Regional Council head Gadi Yarkoni, referring to a requirement for all communities close to the Gaza border to have proper protection on all buildings. Iron Dome missile defense system fires interception missiles toward incoming rockets from the Gaza Strip, May 17, 2021 (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)

Under the military’s current restrictions, businesses operating in the Eshkol area are regardless only allowed to be open if they have ready access to a bomb shelter.
Palestinian tries to shoot, throw bomb at soldiers in Hebron, is shot dead – IDF
A Palestinian man attacked a group of soldiers in the West Bank city of Hebron on Tuesday, trying to throw a pipe bomb at them, but was shot dead by the troops, the Israel Defense Forces said in a statement.

The man was also armed with a makeshift Carlo-style submachine gun and attempted to shoot the Israeli troops at Gross Square in Hebron, near the Tomb of the Patriarchs, the military said.

According to IDF Spokesperson Hidai Zilberman, the man — identified in Palestinian media as Islam Zahida — appeared to be a member of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad terror group.

He first threw a number of Molotov cocktails toward a nearby checkpoint in an apparent effort to draw out the soldiers stationed at it in order to then attack them with a pipe bomb.

But the soldiers, from the Givati Infantry Brigade, opened fire at the man fatally wounding him. The pipe bomb in his hand then detonated, according to the IDF.
Biden to Netanyahu: 'Wind down' bombardment of Gaza
Israel plans to continue Operation Guardian of the Walls to strike at more high-quality Hamas terror targets, even as the US, EU and others push for a ceasefire. This as the Biden administration has encouraged the winding down of attacks on Gaza, a source told The Associated Press Tuesday.

Among those targets is Hamas’s Qassam Brigades commander Mohammed Deif, whom the IDF believes it has a chance of killing if the operation continues.

Military sources said Deif had been targeted more than once during the last week of fighting, but had succeeded at the last moment to get away. Defense Minister Benny Gantz said in a call with US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin on Tuesday that the operation will continue until Hamas is deterred for the long-term.

“The IDF’s military campaign will continue to the end of achieving long-term quiet,” Gantz said, pointing out to Austin that Hamas continues to fire rockets at civilian populations.
Arab-Israeli sector strike across Israel, Fatah calls for 'Day of Rage'
The Arab-Israeli sector held a major strike across Israel and the West Bank on Tuesday to express solidarity with the residents of Sheikh Jarrah in east Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip.

The strike was called by the Arab High Monitoring Committee, in response to “the war and attack on the Palestinians in Jerusalem, on Sheikh Jarrah and al-Aqsa Mosque.”

The committee’s terms for the strike called for an end to the “massacre” in the Gaza Strip, the aggression in Jerusalem flashpoints such as al-Aqsa and Sheikh Jarrah, and the immediate withdrawal of right-wing Jewish “settler gangs” and police forces from Arab cities and villages. The strike also called for a show of solidarity with those detained during the countrywide rioting.

The strike itself encompassed the entire Arab work sector, with the exception of the private education system and the Arab health sector. Arab activists campaigned throughout the morning, asking people not to go to work in order to support the strike. Public transportation was disrupted throughout the country, and the Transportation Ministry worked to reduce the impact as much as possible.

While most of the medical sector declined to participate in the strike, choosing to hold a peaceful protest at Rambam Health Care Campus in Haifa at midday instead, around 1,500 medical workers were absent from work today, according to the Health Ministry.
Attempted shooting, stabbing, explosive terror attack thwarted in Hebron
IDF soldiers from the Givati Brigade's Shaked Battallion foiled an attempted terror attack near the Jewish apartment complex in Hebron known as "Avraham Avinu" on Tuesday morning, the IDF Spokesperson's Unit announced.

The Palestinian man was reportedly caught with improvised explosives, a Carlo submachine gun and a knife as he approached a roadblock across the street from Avraham Avinu, that separates the Palestinian and Israeli areas of the city.

As he approached soldiers at the checkpoint, the man tried to shoot and hurl the explosives at the soldiers, the IDF spokesperson said. One of the explosives ignited and blew up while it was still in the terrorist's hand.

The IDF fatally shot the attacker before he could harm anyone. It is unusual for a terror attack in recent years in Hebron to involve multiple weapons and to take place so close to a Jewish apartment complex.

The man was reportedly affiliated with the Palestinian Islamic Jihad.
Why does Hamas insist Israel-Gaza ceasefire include Jerusalem? - analysis
Hamas’s insistence on including the issue of Jerusalem in any ceasefire deal with Israel is the main reason why efforts to end the fighting have thus far been unsuccessful.

Hamas started the fighting because of Jerusalem and cannot afford to end it without an agreement that includes the city.

Hamas needs to show the Palestinians that its attacks on Israel, which it refers to as “Sword of Jerusalem,” were not in vain and that it managed to force Israel to make concessions to the Palestinians on issues related to the city, particularly al-Aqsa Mosque and the controversy surrounding the planned eviction of Arab families from the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood.

As far as Hamas is concerned, any ceasefire agreement that ignores Jerusalem will make it appear as if the Gaza-based terrorist group did not score any significant achievement as a result of the fighting with Israel.

Hamas wants to appear as the “defender” of Jerusalem and its Palestinian residents and holy sites. That’s why Hamas last week initiated the rocket attacks on Jerusalem.

Any ceasefire deal that mentions Jerusalem, on the other hand, will be seen by Hamas and other Palestinians as a major victory. If that happens, Hamas will score points with the Palestinians for having forced Israel, for example, to halt the eviction of the families from Sheikh Jarrah or end visits by Jews to the Aqsa Mosque compound on the Temple Mount.
IDF Strikes 5 Houses of High-Ranking Hamas Commanders in Gaza
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) on Monday said that it launched strikes at five homes of high-ranking Hamas commanders in aerial attacks, adding that all of the houses were used as part of Hamas’s terrorist infrastructure.

The IDF listed the names of the Hamas commanders that the houses belonged to, including Izz al-Din Hadad, a senior member of the Hamas military wing and the head of combat support during recent hostilities.

Amjad Abu Najeh’s house was also hit. He is the Nuhba battalion chief and according to the IDF directed attacks from his home.

The other three homes belonged to Ibrahim Muhammad Mustafa Qareh, commander of the southern Khan Yunis battalion; Ahmed Shamali, commander of the Nuhba battalion in Shuja’iyya; and Nasim Abu ‘Ajuna, commander of the Beit Lahia battalion.

Since the beginning of Operation Guardian of the Walls on May 10, the IDF said it has struck more than 820 terrorist targets in the Gaza Strip and killed in excess of 130 terrorists.


Police Arrest Arab-Israeli for Lynch on IDF Soldier
The police arrested an Arab resident of Yafo (Jaffa) on Tuesday on suspicion that he participated in the lynching of an IDF soldier about a week ago in the city.

Investigators launched an investigation after the soldier was injured in the head by a rock from Arabs who attacked him.

The victim was evacuated in critical condition for treatment at the Ichilov Medical Center with fractures to his head. He underwent a long and complex surgery to save his life.

Police investigators conducted an intensive and covert investigation, in which they identified a suspect, a 27-year-old Arab.

The suspect was arrested after he was located in the southern city of Eilat, to which he fled.

The suspect was brought before the Tel Aviv Magistrate’s Court for an extension of his remand on Tuesday.
IDF Soldier Wounded by Hamas Mortar Fire While Transferring Humanitarian Aid to Gaza
An Israeli soldier was wounded Tuesday afternoon by Gaza mortar fire while transferring humanitarian aid to Gaza through the Erez land crossing in southern Israel.

The barrage of more than 50 mortar shells also killed two Thai workers and wounded 10 others, including four seriously. Gaza’s ruling Hamas terrorist organization has taken responsibility for the barrage.

The IDF soldier was wounded when one of the mortar shells hit the Erez Crossing while his unit was transferring humanitarian aid shipments to Gaza.

The 19-year-old soldier sustained shrapnel wounds to his torso. He was evacuated in a fully conscious state and in “stable” condition to Barzilai Medical Center in nearby Ashkelon, medics said.

Both the Kerem Shalom and Erez border crossings were opened temporarily at 11 am Tuesday to allow for the transfer of the aid, which included truckloads of fuel, medicine, feed for the animals and fuel tanks for Gaza.

In response to the attack, Israel closed the Kerem Shalom crossing to Gaza “until further notice,” but left Erez crossing open for “humanitarian movement.”


Jewish Man Hurt in Lod Riots Dies of Wounds
A Jewish man who was seriously wounded during Arab rioting in the central Israeli city of Lod last week has died from his wounds, reportedly becoming the first Jewish casualty since violent riots broke out in mixed Jewish-Arab cities following tensions in Jerusalem.

Yigal Yehoshua, 56, a resident of Lod’s Ganei Aviv neighborhood, was pronounced dead Monday morning.

He was allegedly attacked by Arabs who threw stones at his neighborhood when he was returning home from work last Tuesday.

The incident occurred after the funeral of Musa Hasson, 25, who was allegedly shot by a Jewish resident of Lod the day before.

Israel has struggled to contain a surge of violent rioting in mixed Jewish-Arab cities across the country that has coincided with daily barrages of rocket attacks fired from Gaza and unrest spreading to the West Bank.
Arab man beaten by Bat Yam Jewish mob calls for calm: ‘We’re all human beings’
An Arab man who on Wednesday was attacked and savagely beaten by a Jewish mob in Bat Yam has spoken about the ordeal, while still calling for Jewish-Arab coexistence.

Saeed Mousa, a father of four from Ramle, was in his car on his way to enjoy some fresh air at the beach after dark when he was accosted by dozens of far-right Jewish extremists, out rioting and vandalizing Arab property in what they said was a response to Arab riots and mob violence that erupted during the week.

Mousa was standing in traffic when he was identified as Arab by the hooligans, who attacked him.

“I was going to the beach. I didn’t know they’d started distinguishing between Jews and Arabs [in the country],” he told Channel 12 from his hospital bed at Ichilov Medical Center.

“I was in the road. Someone came to me and asked me, ‘What, are you an Arab?’ I told him ‘Yes, is there a problem with that?’ After that I saw 30 people gang up on my car,” he recounted.

Mousa attempted to reverse away from the mob but hit a car behind him. He then accelerated forward, with people jumping out of the way, before crashing into another car. He was then dragged out of the car by the mob, with some now claiming he had attempted to run over the pedestrians, and beaten badly.


UN Statement Being Blocked by US Does Not Mention Gaza Rocket Attacks
A draft statement by the United Nations Security Council currently being blocked by the United States makes no mention of the over 3,000 rockets fired by Gaza terrorists at Israeli civilians over the past week, according to a copy obtained by The Times of Israel.

The 15-member Security Council held its third emergency meeting on Sunday amid the daily barrage of rocket attacks fired by Gaza terrorists at Israeli civilians and Israeli military action in the Gaza Strip to prevent these rocket attacks from harming Israeli civilians.

For the third time, member states on Sunday attempted to pass a joint resolution calling for a ceasefire with the US being the sole member to vote against the statement all three attempts.

In a call with Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz on Saturday, US Defense Minister Lloyd Austin reiterated US support for Israel’s right to self defense and “strongly” condemned Gaza terrorists firing rockets at Israeli civilians. Lloyd also urged an end to the fighting and the restoration of calm.

The Israeli army says that the 3,000 rockets fired by Islamist terrorists from the Gaza Strip toward the Jewish state since the conflict escalated is the highest rate ever recorded.
Sirens in Northern Israel, rockets fall in Lebanon
The IDF shot down a drone that was approaching the Israeli-Jordanian border on Tuesday, traveling toward the Emek HaMa'ayanot Regional Council in northern Israel, military officials said.

IDF units collected the fragments of the destroyed aircraft for further examination. It was not clear who was operating the drone, from where it took off, and whether it was armed with explosives.

Yesterday, fearing a possible breach of the Israeli-Jordanian border, residents of Beit She'an - which sits within the regional council - were instructed to lock themselves in their homes for nearly an hour, before the IDF announced that the area had been secured, and that it was again safe for people to leave their homes.

Three suspects were observed in the Beit Yosef area near Beit She'an on Monday, fueling the IDF warnings. KAN News reported that a breach in the border fence had also been detected.

On Sunday, two Jordanians crossed the border into Israel armed with knives and were stopped in the northern town of Gilboa, police officials said.


Palestinians disappointed by int'l community’s stance on escalation
The Palestinian dissatisfaction with the position of the international community widely resonated on social media.

Kareem Abu Sharia posted on his Facebook account on Tuesday, “We don’t know what to be sad about anymore. Children who were killed in Gaza? Or Western media that only starts to talk [about Gaza] when Palestinians react?? Or how Israel succeeded in distracting our focus from the core issue that sparked all the fire, which is there are 500 Palestinians who are being forcefully and illegally evicted from their homes [in Sheikh Jarrah]?? After all, what can Israel say?? It killed 10 children with its modern American bombs, and as usual, it won’t let the ICC [the International Criminal Court] or anyone else investigate its war crimes.”

Nabil Diab, a leading member of the Palestinian National Initiative political party, told The Media Line: “The international community, and specifically the legal, humanitarian and human rights bodies, [must carry out] its responsibilities in order to forcefully pressure, by the power of international law and international humanitarian law, the occupation’s government to stop this barbaric aggression.”

Given events, the chances of de-escalation between the two sides anytime soon appear slim.

“Israel is not preparing for a cease-fire. There is currently no end date for the operation. Only when we achieve complete quiet can we talk about calm,” Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz said on Wednesday.

Abuowdah confirmed that several potential mediators are trying to achieve “calm” between Gaza and Israel.

“But if the occupation doesn’t cease the attacks and raids in Gaza and in Jerusalem as well, then we will be faced with a new round of fighting,” he said.
Italian Port Workers Attempt to Block Arms Shipment to Israel
A port workers’ union in the Italian (Tuscan) city of Livorno attempted to block an arms shipment to Israel on Friday after discovering weapons and explosives were destined for the southern Israeli port city of Ashdod.

The pro-Palestinian Authority workers refused to load the ship after receiving information about the cargo and its destination from The Weapons Watch, a Genoa-based NGO that monitors arms shipments in European and Mediterranean ports.

The shipment did eventually depart the port on its route to Naples, however, since most other port workers continued to the load the ship, according to Britain’s Al Araby news outlet.

The Weapons Watch NGO urged Italy’s government to consider “suspending some or all Italian military exports to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict areas.”

“The port of Livorno will not be an accomplice in the massacre of the Palestinian people,” L’Unione Sindacale di Base (USB) said in a statement published by multiple European news outlets.

The port workers’ union said the departing vessel carried “weapons and explosives that will serve to kill the Palestinian population, already hit by a severe attack this very night, which caused hundreds of civilian victims, including many children.”


MEMRI: Jordanian Journalist And Former Politician: Hamas Gravely Harmed The Palestinian Cause By Launching The Military Confrontation With Israel Behind The Back Of The Palestinian Authority
In a May 12, 2021 article titled "A Grave Mistake by Hamas!", Jordanian journalist Salah Al-Qallab, formerly a member of Jordan's upper house of parliament and minister of information and culture, slams the Hamas movement for launching the military confrontation with Israel without the consent of the Palestinian Authority (PA). Writing on the liberal website Elaph.com, Al-Qallab states that Hamas should have coordinated its moves with PA President Mahmoud 'Abbas and with the PLO, which, he contends, is the sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people. He implies that Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) acted in the service of Iran, and stresses that decisions of this magnitude must only be taken by the PA. By starting this round of fighting "behind the back" of the PA, he says, Hamas has "greatly harmed" the Palestinians – who previously enjoyed international support on the issue of Jerusalem – by proving to the world that the Palestinians are not united and do not have a united leadership.

The following are translated excerpts from his article:[1]
"Just as Binyamin Netanyahu – the deposed or resigning Israeli prime minister, whose political crimes are still pursuing him – raised the issue of Jerusalem on the eve of the Israeli elections with the aim of restoring his previous status, the Hamas movement, along with the PIJ – which, according to some Palestinian elements, see Iran as their source of authority and [obey] the decisions of the Jurisprudent in Tehran [i.e., Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei] – followed its usual habit of circumventing the Palestinian National Authority, headed by President Mahmoud 'Abbas (Abu Mazen), as well as the Fatah movement, of course, and entered full force into a confrontation with Israel…

"Had the goal of the Hamas movement not been, as usual, to usurp the political and military decision-making [authority] of the Fatah movement and of President Mahmoud 'Abbas, we would have expected it to coordinate [its moves] with the PA in advance, before launching this forceful attack [against Israel]. For the [Palestinian] Authority is the sole legitimate representative of this fighting [Palestinian] people, and it must not be circumvented in political or military [decisions]. A decision of this magnitude should have been taken in Ramallah, i.e., in Jerusalem, and not in Iran or in some other Arab capital, large or small.

"The international [community] supported the Palestinian National Authority on the issue of Jerusalem, which Israel, and especially [its] deposed or resigning prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, deliberately raised. Even the U.S. stressed, in a statement that was quoted by news agencies and the media worldwide, that 'the Palestinians are entitled to live in security' and that 'the West Bank is occupied territory and Jerusalem is one of the issues [to be resolved] in permanent status negotiations between the sides.'
MEMRI: Fatah's Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades Calls For General Mobilization In West Bank, Instructs Fighters To Make Life 'An Unbearable Hell' For Israelis
On May 16, 2021, The Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades in the West Bank, the military wing of the Palestinian Fatah movement, issued a statement instructing its fighters to answer its call for general mobilization, known as "Al-Nafir," to defend Jerusalem, the 1948 territories, and the Gaza Strip, which it said are under intense Israeli bombardment.[1]

The statement reads: "To all the fighters of The Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades in the cities and villages of the brave West Bank: The Martyrs Brigades of Yasser Arafat, Abu Sharkh, Abu Jandal, Al-Aybat, Zaloom, Thabit Thabit.

"You are the men of men so go forth[2] to defend our people in revolt in our eternal capital Jerusalem and in the persistent Gaza and [West] Bank, Lod, Haifa, Yafa, and Nazareth and all of Palestine. This is your role, and this is your time. Do not let the herds of coward settlers and the occupation soldiers enjoy security and stability until the unjust aggression on our wounded Al-Aqsa, persistent Gaza, and our people in the Al-Jarrah [quarter] stop.

"Make their roads, settlements, and occupation camps a target for you and unbearable hell [for them]. Prevent them from passing and travelling. Make them stay in their shelters until the persistent Palestinian people enjoy security and stability in all of Palestine.

"We urge our sons in the brave security forces to extend their support and be a shield as they always have been to our people and defend them against the incursion of the occupier to our cities and villages. Let their message to the tyrannizing occupier be: Your incursion is forbidden and shall never be easy.

"The Brigades are true to their word, and they keep their promises. Glory and eternity to the generous martyrs. Long live to the unity of our heroic people. Long live Palestine, Free and Arab."
MEMRI: Al-Azhar Scholar Ahmed Omar Hashem Calls For An 'Islamic Deterrence Force' That Will Extract Jerusalem From The 'World's Foreign Vagabonds,' Cites Prophecy About Muslims Killing Jews, Adds: 'What Was Taken By Force Will Only Be Restored By Force'
Egyptian Islamic scholar Sheikh Ahmed Omar Hashem said in a Friday sermon at Al-Azhar that the Muslims must stand as one "in order to extract noble Jerusalem from the hands of the world’s foreign vagabonds." The sermon was aired on Channel 1, (Egypt) on May 14, 2021. Hashem said that "what was taken by force must be restored by force" and that an Islamic force of deterrence must emerge in the Arab and Islamic countries. He said that the Zionists have "defiled (Al-Aqsa) and incited against the religions" with their blasphemy. Hashem continued to pray that Allah will fulfill the prophecy in the hadith, according to which the Muslims will kill the Jews in the end times.

"What Was Taken By Force Will Only Be Restored By Force"

Ahmed Omar Hashem: "The world order – the United Nations, the Security Council, human rights organizations, rulers, presidents, and everybody else... They should all stand together.

"Ramadan has taught us to close ranks and we should all stand as one, in order to extract noble Jerusalem from the hands of the world's foreign vagabonds, and to deter those who have oppressed and incited against it. Indeed, what was taken by force will only be restored by force. An Islamic force of deterrence must emerge in the Arab and Islamic countries.

"I say to all our rulers and presidents, and to all the world's human rights organizations: Fulfill your duty today, after those oppressive Zionists trampled upon human rights, and upon the sanctity of one of Allah's mosques. They have defiled [Al-Aqsa] and incited against the religions with their horrible blasphemy, which was met with a disgraceful and cowardly silence."
PMW: Israeli Arabs in Nazareth: “We are your youth, Palestine… We don’t want to see a Zionist, with spirit and blood we’ll redeem Al-Aqsa”
While Hamas was launching missiles targeting Israeli civilians, killing and injuring Israelis in Israeli cities, young Israeli Arabs - including children - demonstrated against Israel in Nazareth. Footage from the demonstration broadcast live on official PA TV shows the Israeli Arabs calling for more violence, shouting: “Rise up intifada…We are your youth, Palestine… [We say] openly, openly, openly: We don’t want to see a Zionist, with spirit and blood we’ll redeem Al-Aqsa”:
Official PA TV host: “Let us hear the shouts and hear these calls in a live broadcast.”
Nazareth protesters: “They’ve crossed the line! They’ve gone too far! Rise up intifada!” “They’ve crossed the line! They’ve gone too far! Rise up intifada…
The blessing of our revolution to proud Jerusalem
Protesters: “To those who ask who we are:
We are your youth, Palestine
We are your youth, Palestine


To those who ask us what happened:
The siege of Gaza has tightened…
[We say] openly, openly, openly, openly
We don’t want to see a Zionist
We don’t want to see a Zionist
With spirit and blood we will redeem the Al-Aqsa Mosque”

2021 violent Palestinian riots and Hamas rockets - On May 10, 2021, the terror organization Hamas launched numerous rocket barrages targeting Israeli population centers. Over a period of 8 days, Hamas and Islamic Jihad fired over 3,150 rockets into Israel from the Gaza Strip, killing 7 Israelis and wounding dozens. In response, Israel launched Operation Guardian of the Walls to target Hamas terror leaders and terror infrastructure. The Israeli army also confronted terror activity in the West Bank, and was deployed to maintain order in Israeli cities with a mixed Jewish and Arab population, where Israeli Arabs violently rioted and attacked Jews with guns, knives, and firebombs, killing 1 Israeli. In return, Jews started attacking Arabs and Arab businesses as well. Hamas’ launching of rockets followed weeks of violent Arab riots in Jerusalem.

The PA’s ostensible pretexts for the wave of Arab violence were PA elections being prevented in Jerusalem; Israeli security barricades at the Damascus Gate of Jerusalem's Old City to prevent disturbances (which were later removed following violent riots); and the planned eviction of several Arab families illegally living in properties in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood of East Jerusalem owned by Jews who were expelled in the 1948 Israeli War of Independence.
Israeli Arabs: “We are your youth, Palestine… We don’t want to see a Zionist” PLO official calls for violence: “the time has come for all our people to rise up” Palestinians call for more violence, want to die as “Martyrs" PA TV reporter: Arab rioters prevent Jews from “desecrating” Jerusalem



7 police officers wounded in east Jerusalem ramming attack
Seven Israel and Border Police officers were injured in a ramming attack on Sunday afternoon when a Palestinian terrorist attempted to run them over at a police checkpoint in the east Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah.

The assailant, a resident of east Jerusalem, was shot and killed by the troops.

Two officers reportedly suffered moderate wounds, while the rest sustained minor injuries.

Tensions in Sheikh Jarrah, where a property dispute had triggered clashes that spread to other Israeli cities, and also prompted Hamas to fire rockets at the Israeli capital, bringing about the worst military conflict between Israel and Hamas since 2014, have been simmering for weeks.


'Dead On Arrival': Psaki Claims Trump Didn't Do 'Anything Constructive' In The Middle East
White House press secretary Jen Psaki said that the Trump administration did not help Middle East peace processes during a press conference Tuesday.

“The president has reinstated humanitarian assistance and security assistance to the Palestinians. That’s something that was stopped back in 2018, and we felt that was not a constructive action by the prior administration,” Psaki said during an Air Force One press briefing. “Aside from putting forward a peace proposal that was dead on arrival, we don’t think they did anything constructive, really, to bring an end to the longstanding conflict in the Middle East.”

The Trump administration organized the Abraham Accords between Israel and Sudan, Bahrain, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), which normalized relations between Israel and the three Arab states. Israel and Morocco also normalized relations, although that agreement was not part of the Abraham Accords.

In exchange for their official recognition of Israel, the countries received certain benefits from the U.S. The White House removed Sudan from its list of state sponsors of terrorism. State sponsors of terrorism may not receive certain foreign aid and defense sales and may be denied access to financial markets.


Hungary FM slams EU’s ‘one-sided’ statements on Israel
Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjartoon Tuesday slammed the EU’s “one-sided” statements on Israel as his European counterparts called for a ceasefire between Israel and the Palestinians.

“I have a general problem with these European statements on Israel… These are usually very much one-sided, and these statements do not help, especially not under current circumstances, when the tension is so high,” Szijjarto told AFP in an interview.

EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell on Tuesday called for the implementation of a ceasefire to stop fighting between Israel and the Palestinians.

“The priority is the immediate cessation of all violence and the implementation of a ceasefire,” Borrell said after a video conference of EU foreign ministers, adding the statement was backed by all the bloc’s member states except Hungary.
Top Democrat looking to delay $735 million sale of precision missiles to Israel
US House Foreign Affairs Committee chairman Gregory Meeks is considering sending the Biden administration a letter in the coming days requesting that it delay a $735 million sale of precision-guided missiles to Israel.

Meeks wants the delay in order to give his panel time to review the purchase, a congressional staffer told The Times of Israel on Monday.

Democrats on the committee met earlier in the day to discuss the ongoing violence in Israel and Gaza, and one of the members raised a Washington Post report that broke the story on President Joe Biden’s advancing of the weapons sale at the beginning of the month, the staffer said.

Congress was notified of the proposed sale of the precision-guided munitions on May 5, at least six days before Palestinian terrorists in Gaza began firing rockets toward Israel, The Post reported. But several members said during Monday’s meeting that they had been unaware of the announcement.

Meeks responded that he was weighing a delay request in order to provide adequate time for the panel to weigh the sale, the staffer said, adding that members of the committee were split on the decision.

The chairman, who has been lauded by the pro-Israel lobby AIPAC, has long been seen to be aligned with more moderate Democrats. Other moderate Democrats on the panel like Ted Deutch and Kathy Manning rarely criticize Israel. Those backing a delay or blocking of the purchase, including Rep. Ilhan Omar, have been far more critical of the Jewish state.


German, Dutch Leaders Express Strong Support for Israel’s Right to Defend Itself
In separate calls Monday with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the leaders of Germany and the Netherlands expressed their strong support for Israel’s right to defend itself against a daily barrage of rockets fired by terrorist groups based in the Gaza Strip.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel “sharply condemned the continued rocket attacks from Gaza on Israel and assured the prime minister of the German government’s solidarity,” a statement after the call said.

The statement added that Merkel told Netanyahu that given the civilian loss of life on both sides, “the chancellor expressed her hope that the fighting will end as soon as possible.”

Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte also spoke with Netanyahu on Monday, with his office saying that Rutte expressed his “unreserved support for Israel’s right to defend itself in light of the rocket fire from Gaza.”

Netanyahu thanked Merkel and Rutte for “their unreserved support for Israel’s right to defend itself against the rocket attacks from Gaza” and reportedly thanked Merkel for the German government’s actions against a spike in antisemitism in Germany amid the violent conflict between Israel and Hamas.


Ceasefire Between Israel, Hamas ‘Absolutely Necessary,’ Says France’s Macron, Egypt’s Sisi
France and Egypt on Monday called for a rapid end to the deadly escalation between Gaza-based Palestinian terrorists and Israel.

French President Emmanuel Macron and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi agreed in Paris that it was “absolutely necessary” to end the hostilities, Macron’s office said, adding that he had renewed his support for Egypt’s mediation efforts in the conflict.
Will Dems Rebuke the Squad for Parroting Hamas Talking Points?
It all has real effects from Los Angeles to London where, this weekend, anti-Semitic activists called for the death of Jews as the head of Hamas, Ismail Haniyya, enjoyed luxury accommodations in Doha.

Has a single one of these social justice advocates even mentioned Iran's role in supplying Hamas' weaponry in the last week? Is there one example? Acknowledging Tehran's role is important for those who care about human rights because, as the chief executive officer of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies tweeted, "the cowardly regime in Iran will fight Israel to the last Palestinian."

The nominal leaders of the Democratic Party know the truth about Hamas. They know, as Bret Stephens put it in The New York Times last week, "if you want a Palestinian state to exist and succeed, you must also want Hamas to be humiliated and defeated. Hamas's sole aim for over 30 years has been to turn a difficult, but potentially negotiable, conflict into a nonnegotiable, zero-sum holy war."

But knowing the truth and holding accountable the "young stars" of the Democratic Party are two different things. If Democratic leaders maintain their silence, there will be profound implications.

The clock is ticking as key members of the caucus have pivoted from pushing for a peaceful two-state solution to denouncing our ally Israel while parroting terrorist propaganda.

Ayatollah Khamenei's "diplomats" are waiting to see how this all plays out. If the U.S. cuts a deal to end Iranian nuclear sanctions, missiles will soon fly against Israel from other Iranian missile batteries in Lebanon, Iraq, Syria and maybe even from as far as Yemen.

It's simple; bipartisan voices from Congress should demand that U.S. diplomats pick up their attaché cases in Vienna and come home unless and until Iran stops funding and guiding proxy wars.

Then, it will be to the American voter next year to decide which voices will represent us at home and abroad.
Two arrested after Chigwell rabbi hospitalised in ‘brutal assault’
Two men have been arrested over the religiously-aggravated assault of an Chigwell rabbi on Sunday.

Rabbi Rafi Goodwin was taken to King George’s Hospital with cuts to the top of his head and around one eye after being set upon by two individuals around the Limes Estate, on Sunday. It was reported he had been attacked with an unknown item following a verbal altercation,

According to Essex police, two men from Ilford, aged 18 and 25 were arrested on Monday on suspicion of Grievous Bodily Harm with intent, and are currently in custody.

Chief Superintendent Stuart Hooper said: “We know this is a very important time – a time for communities to come together, to be around each other and celebrate. We do not want anyone to feel that they cannot do that safely.

“Officers have spent the day speaking with the Jewish community to provide reassurance.

“At this time we do not believe this incident is related to events taking place overseas or incidents which have taken place elsewhere in the country.”
Erdogan: Humanity obligated to confront Israeli aggression in Jerusalem
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is continuing his efforts to incite against the Jewish state in the hope of deflecting attention from his government's failed handling of the coronavirus pandemic.

After announcing the country would extend the current lockdown aimed at reining in the outbreak in Turkey until the end of May, Erdogan went on the kind of anti-Israel tirade we have not seen since the weeks following the 2010 incident in which 10 Turkish nationals were killed and several Israeli soldiers were beaten when the Turkish vessel Mavi Marmara attempted to breach Israel's maritime blockade on the Gaza Strip.

The Turkish leader said, "We are all sad and furious at the evilness of the terrorist state that is Israel against the Palestinians. Confronting Israeli aggression in Palestinian cities and Jerusalem is an honorably duty for humanity.

"Turkey is ready to act toward the achievement of peace, and we are willing to make sacrifices. We will lead the struggle at the UN. I embrace all the Palestinian brothers who are rising up. Just as we supported Azerbaijan against Armenia, so, too, have we supported Libya and acted there. Today, too, we are ready to act. I call on the Organization of Islamic Cooperation to act quickly against Israel," he said.
Senator Warren Outraged By Israeli ‘Evictions’ In Sheikh Jarrah
Has Warren studied this case? Is she aware of the chain of title, from the Grand Rabbis who bought the Sheikh Jarrah properties in 1875, to the two Jewish organizations that subsequently bought it from the rabbinates, Va’ad Eidat HaSfaradim and Va’ad HaKlali L’Knesset Yisrael? Does she realize that for nearly 75 years, Jews lived on those properties by right, paying rent to the two organizations that owned the property, and were expelled by the Jordanians in 1948? In 1967 that property was returned to its Jewish owners, but they did not at once eject the Arab squatters on their land. Instead a long court battle ensued. Over and over again the claim of ownership presented by the Arabs, who in the end admitted that they were not owners but tenants who, however, “should not be evicted” (even though they had not been paying rent) was weighed against the Jewish claim, which was solidly based on recorded deeds of title, starting with that deed of ownership that was transferred from an Arab owner to the two Grand Rabbis who bought the property in 1875.

Senator Warren looks foolish. Why didn’t she look at the legal history of the property being disputed, and compare the competing claims, and evidence offered to support those claims, both by the Jewish Nahalat Shimon organization that, with its meticulous paper trail of recorded titles, contested the claims of ownership by the Arabs, who offered only a single forged document, and comically flimsy evidence (a vague claim that a man named “Ismail” had sold them the properties), and who have yet to convince a single judge of the remotest possibility of their claims to ownership?

Here’s what Senator Warren should have said:
“The property dispute over some properties in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood of east Jerusalem has been going on for many decades. I decided to look into the matter myself, and have now read the various briefs presented, and the judgements in the courts below. It was a lot to take in. All the courts so far have found for the Israeli plaintiffs. The Arab defendants have not offered any written evidence, save for one Turkish document that is apparently a forgery, to back up their claims of ownership. Several of the Arab claimants admitted in 1982 that they did not own the land their houses were built on, but were tenants. In 2020 more of the Arab claimants admitted the same – that they were tenants and not owners. In neither case was there any evidence that these tenants had paid rent. There was evidence of illegal building on at least one of the properties. Now the Supreme Court will issue its ruling. I have complete faith in the Israeli judicial system. However, I do urge the Israeli Supreme Court to postpone to a less fraught time the issuance of its judgment.” That’s what she should have said. But she didn’t. And she won’t.




Can Israel blast Gaza and still make friends in the Gulf?
Many Saudis have responded to the "Not My Cause" hashtag by posting pictures of King Salman, with his quote: "The Palestinian cause is our first cause".

On May 13, Saudi television aired footage of a cleric in Mecca praying for Palestinian victory against "the enemy of God", less than year after the kingdom's leading imam discouraged rhetoric against Jews following the September accords.

It would now be "inconceivable" that the Saudi leadership could contemplate normalising ties with Israel for at least a couple of years, said Neil Quilliam, associate fellow at Britain's Chatham House think tank.

Last year's decisions by the UAE and Bahrain, followed by Sudan and Morocco, to recognise Israel were denounced by the Palestinians as abandoning a unified position under which Arab states would make peace only if Israel gave up occupied land.

The UAE and Bahrain argued that their agreements would ultimately benefit the Palestinians, including because Israel had promised to abandon plans to annex West Bank territory.

Abdulrahman al-Towajry, 29, a Saudi national visiting a Riyadh shopping mall, said the countries that had made peace should "really reconsider it" as Israel could not be "trusted to abide by promises".

"There is strength in unity so if Arab and Muslim countries unite, the conflict would end. It could have ended a long time ago if they had," he told Reuters.

But the Emiratis and others probably have too much invested in the policy to change course abruptly now.

The agreements have propelled tourism, investment and cooperation in fields from energy to technology. A UAE investment fund has plans to purchase a stake in an Israeli gas field and Dubai's port operator is bidding for Haifa Port.

"The Abraham Accords are an irreversible process," said prominent Emirati commentator Abdulkhaleq Abdulla. "It was very clear that it was in keeping with the UAE's national priorities and strategic interests so there is no going back."


Rantz: I was assaulted, Israel flag burned at Seattle’s anti-Semitic rally
Seattle’s progressive activists assembled at Westlake Park to scream anti-Semitic vitriol. They are upset that Israel is defending itself against Hamas terrorists holding Gaza hostage.

In the process of covering the event, which was already tense for me as a Jew, I was assaulted by a fringe activist. I was then summarily kicked out of the public rally. As the woman hit me with a Palestinian flag, anti-Israel activists in the crowd did nothing. Some of the assault was caught on cell phone video. I wasn’t the only Jew assaulted.

Before the assault, the event was tense — for Jews, at least. A Jewish counterprotester, after being labeled a white supremacist by the hate-rally’s emcee, was attacked. His Israeli flag was stolen, stomped on, and burned.

Anti-Semitism comes to Seattle; first Jew gets attacked
The rally at Westlake Park was in response to the Hamas attacks on Israel.

When the emcee took to the mic just after 1 p.m. on Sunday, she pointed to a small group of counterprotesters across the street. One was waving an Israeli flag.

“I’m going to ask you to not engage with them, OK? They’re out here standing for white supremacy and settler-colonialism. That’s embarrassing, and we don’t need to legitimize them by having dialogue with them. Not here, not ever, do you understand?”

Antifa thugs immediately surrounded the counterprotesters.

After what looked like a scuffle and assault, anti-Semitic activists stole the Israeli flag. They stomped and danced on the flag. Then they burned it in the middle of the street.

As the flag burned, the crowd chanted, “Long live the intifada.”

Police are investigating an assault associated with the flag theft.


Mob Smashes Up Muslim YouTuber’s Home for ‘Disrespecting Palestine’
A group of masked and hooded men carrying a Palestinian flag smashed up a Muslim YouTuber’s home in Birmingham on Sunday for supposedly “disrespecting Palestine”.

Birmingham-based YouTuber Mufti Abu Layth claimed that people online had edited one of his videos to make it seem as if he was in favour of handing over the Al-Aqsa Mosque — one of the holiest sites in the Islamic tradition — to Israel.

Apparently angered by the doctored video, a group of men, all dressed in black hoodies and wearing masks over their face descended on Layth’s house on Sunday night. The gang smashed the doors and windows of the house while yelling “Free Palestine”.

One of the men is heard saying: “Yo, this is for that dirty dog Abu Layth, who disrespected our brothers and sisters in Palestine” as the others began throwing rocks through the windows of the house.

“Where the f*** is Abu Layth?” another is heard saying after they break down his door and barge into the house.

In the early hours of Monday morning, Layth wrote on his Facebook page that “some masked-up thugs” broke into his house, “rummaged the place,” and terrorised his family. He said that his family was unharmed but that his daughter was “traumatised”.


Toronto Mayor Urges Cops to Investigate ‘Disturbing Video’ of Pro-Palestinian Demonstrators Assaulting Jewish Counter-Protestors
Toronto’s Mayor on Sunday underlined a zero tolerance attitude toward antisemitism, following a pro-Palestinian demonstration on Saturday in the city’s downtown neighborhood at which some Jewish counter-protestors were “brutally assaulted,” according to some eyewitness reports.

“Hate, antisemitism and violence have no place in our city,” Toronto Mayor John Tory tweeted on Sunday. “Any violence against our city’s Jewish community or members of any other community in Toronto is absolutely unacceptable.”

Tory said that he had asked Toronto Police Chief James Ramer to investigate a “video of a particularly disturbing incident that was sent to me.”

A video of one incident at the Toronto demonstration that was shared on social media showed young pro-Palestinian demonstrators, their faces wrapped in keffiyeh scarves, savagely beating a lone middle-aged Jewish man as he attempted desperately to flee the blows.

Another victim of the same attack said she had been sexually molested during her ordeal.

The pro-Palestinian assailants “threw rocks, water bottles and glass bottles at us,” the unnamed victim was quoted as saying. She explained that the police had been “escorting us to the parking lot where our car was.”

“At the parking lot I saw an elderly Jewish guy getting jumped,” she said. “They pulled his hair and as he turned around they jumped. They beat him with sticks.”
Leading German-Jewish Group, German Interior Minister Condemn Antisemitism at Pro-Palestinian Demonstrations
A leading German-Jewish group decried on Sunday the violent antisemitism seen at pro-Palestinian protests in Germany, while the country’s interior minister pledged to crack down on the problem.

The WertInitiative called the incidents “unfortunately foreseeable” and said, “It is unacceptable that we Jews are endangered in our security and have to live in fear.”

German news outlet Deutsche Welle reported that, as thousands of people joined the rallies in support of the terrorist group Hamas in its current war against Israel, Israeli flags were burned, antisemitic slurs were shouted, and calls were heard for the bombing of Tel Aviv.

Some demonstrators marched on local synagogues shrieking antisemitic slogans and threw rocks through the synagogue windows.

In response, Interior Minister Horst Seehofer said, “We will not tolerate the burning of Israeli flags on German soil and attacks on Jewish facilities.”

“Anyone who spreads antisemitic hatred will feel the full force of the law,” he pledged.
How long before drive-by shouting turns into a drive-by shooting? Anti-Semitism, like Covid, comes in waves... this is the Palestinian variant
An Islamic State-style convoy sweeps across North London, waving Palestinian flags and screaming anti-Semitic hatred through a megaphone.

‘F*** the Jews, rape their daughters.’ For the best part of three hours, 4x4s full of anti-Israel fanatics cruise the streets of Finchley, Hendon, Hampstead, Golders Green, St John’s Wood and Swiss Cottage, home to a sizeable Jewish population.

The agitators have come from as far afield as Bradford in the north and Slough to the west. They are captured on video at traffic lights on the Finchley Road, close to Lord’s cricket ground. The Community Security Trust, which provides safety and advice to Britain’s Jewish community, says it has been ‘deluged’ with reports of abuse being shouted from vehicles.

Police eventually scramble a helicopter and detain a car heading out of town on the A40 in Hillingdon. Four men are arrested on suspicion of racially aggravated public order offences.

This drive-by intimidation happened on Sunday, at the start of the Jewish religious holiday of Shavuot. Elsewhere, on the previous day in Central London, thousands of demonstrators marched on the Israeli embassy. At the nearby Barkers building, which houses the offices of this newspaper, one protester scaled six floors of scaffolding, tore down the Union flag and hoisted the Palestinian flag.

Inevitably, the crowd was addressed by the pro-Hamas former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, flanked by an inflatable caricature with a hook nose, bloodshot eyes and horns. It was reminiscent of the grotesque mural of Jewish bankers, which Corbyn opposed removing from a wall in East London in 2012.

Protesters waved Hamas scarves and brandished deeply offensive banners comparing Israel to Nazi Germany, with a swastika imposed on a Star of David.
Four Arrested After Driving Through London in Convoy of Cars Blaring Violent Antisemitic Threats: ‘F– the Jews’
Later on Sunday police said the four men had been detained on suspicion of racially aggravated public order offenses and taken into custody at a west London police station, following a search that employed a police helicopter.

“This behavior was utterly shocking and will not be tolerated. I understand that this would have caused considerable concern within the community and we have arranged extra patrols in the St John’s Wood and Golders Green areas this evening,” said Superintendent Jo Edwards, in charge of the policing operation.

“Grateful to our hardworking Met Police officers for their swift action in response to this appalling incident today,” said London Mayor Sadiq Khan.”Here in London we have a zero-tolerance approach to hate crime. If you commit a hate crime, you will face arrest.”

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said in response, “There is no place for antisemitism in our society. Ahead of Shavuot, I stand with Britain’s Jews who should not have to endure the type of shameful racism we have seen today.”

“Utterly disgusting,” commented Labour Party leader Keir Starmer. “Antisemitism, misogyny and hate have no place on our streets or in our society. There must be consequences.”

A CST spokesperson told Jewish News, “We have seen increasingly serious ‘pro-Palestinian’ antisemitic attacks and anti-Jewish intimidation across London on Sunday. This comes after three anti-Israel demonstrations in a week, each featuring swastikas and Jihadi anti-Jewish chants, all unchallenged as usual by the supposed ‘anti-racist’ left.”


Jewish Voice for Labour suggests video of antisemitic convoy ‘may be fake’
Jewish Voice for Labour has questioned the veracity of video clips showing antisemitic and misogynistic abuse blarring from a convoy of cars in north London.

The footage went viral after being filmed in the Finchley Road area and was roundly condemned by politicians across the political spectrum, including Boris Johnson and Sir Keir Starmer. In it, protesters in cars draped with the Palestinian flag blasted their horns and screamed “F*** the Jews, rape their daughters.” Four arrests have since been made after CST helped track down the cars.

JVL, which repeatedly defended Jeremy Corbyn during his leadership of the Labour Party and even staged a counter-demonstration against the community’s Enough is Enough rally, initially took to Twitter to describe the abuse as “threatening to Jews and no help at all to Palestinians”.

But, in a comment that community figures said were “a new low”, the group’s account subsequently tweeted: “There is some suggestion this may be fake, produced to damage the Palestine solidarity movement. If so that is even more despicable than the behaviour shown. If it’s real our comment stands.”

Jeremy Corbyn, who was among the speakers at a massive anti-Israel demo in central London on Sunday, is yet to condemn the shocking scenes.


“Anything happen in Israel this week?” By Chuck Schumer (satire)
Hey Ladies and Gents! Wait, Sorry for the Gendered Language! My Staff are going to give me Heck about this when we get back to the office! But give an alter kacher some slack! I’m learning and evolving! Ha! So you like my schtick? Some people say it was dated when they did it in the Catskills 60 years ago, but what do they know, right?

OK Gang, so anyone hear any news from Israel this week? Because I was busy Tweeting about getting away from Fossil Fuels. And the Minimum Wage. And those Darn Republicans. And Affordable Housing. But I didn’t find anything noteworthy in the Middle East to Tweet about. Which is unusual, because my last name is “Schumer” which comes from the Hebrew “Shomer” or “Guardian“. Which makes me the guardian of the Jews, right? I never get tired of telling this amazing anecdote!

So yeah, pretty slow news week in terms of Israel and the Middle East. Which is great because it gives me time to reach out to some of the younger and “more rambunctious” lawmakers. Why, just this week I had coffee with that lovely girl Rashida from out in Michigan. She even taught me a song that she learned from her grandma, only Rashida called her grandma “siti”. Kind of like a “bubbe” in Yiddish right? So anyway, the name of the song was “Falastin baladna al Yahud kalabna”, and let me tell you, it had a very catchy tune! I don’t know Arabic, but it sounded amazing. Like butta! Rashida said the song was about coexistence. Who doesn’t love coexistence?
Press lies about what’s happening between Israel and Gaza
To hear most of the western media tell it, war’s afoot in the Middle East, fueled once again by Israel’s unquenchable belligerence.

“Israel struck the Gaza Strip again Monday,” began the Washington Post’s report, and readers leafing through The New York Times would have similarly learned that “Israeli warplanes began another round of attacks.”

The BBC, showing that famous British reserve, merely informed its readers that “Israel’s military operation against Palestinian Hamas militants in Gaza will continue,” while NBC added a bit of news analysis, boldly stating that “As Israel inflicts a lopsided death count on the Palestinians, it’s clear that U.S. funds merely polish the armor of a regional Goliath in its contests with David.”

Not often or ever mentioned were the following inconvenient facts: The Palestinians, not Israel, began the current round of violence, with rioting in Jerusalem quickly followed by a barrage of missiles from Gaza. As of Monday, Hamas and other Palestinian terror groups have hurled 3,313 rockets on Israel, with at least 460 of those landing inside Gaza itself and claiming Palestinian lives.

Protecting its citizens from Hamas’s deadly campaign — which, to date, has claimed the lives of 10 Israelis, including a five-year-old boy — Israel is nonetheless meticulous about minimizing civilian casualties and provides advanced warning before shelling any building where Hamas had, in violation of international law and human decency alike, hid its men and ammunition amid innocent women and children.

What we’re seeing right now is the deliberate, methodical, and cynical weaponizing of the press as a tool of political warfare. This isn’t skewed reporting; this is full-on propaganda, the goal of which is to deny Israel the right to defend itself against murderous attacks.
Andrew Bolt: 'You can't trust' mainstream media to report fairly on this 'war against Israel'

More Than 125 Entertainment Professionals Sign Open Letter Urging Peace in Middle East
As tensions continue to flare in the Middle East, Creative Community for Peace, an apolitical, non-profit entertainment industry organization, has come together to issue a collective call for “peace, balanced discourse and an end to inflammatory one-sided accounts” of the conflict between Israel and Palestinian Territories. This divisive rhetoric, notes the org, serves only to foment an already incendiary crisis that has, this past week alone, claimed more than 200 lives.

Creative Community for Peace was founded in 2012 by David Renzer, former chairman/CEO of Universal Music Publishing, and Steve Schnur, worldwide executive & Music President, Electronic Arts.

More than 125 leaders in the entertainment industry, including KISS frontman Gene Simmons, Grammy Award-winning artist Michael Bublé, Haim Saban, chairman & CEO, Saban Capital Group, and songwriter-producer Diane Warren, signed the Creative Community for Peace-endorsed open letter, which urges peace in the Middle East and implores fellow members of the entertainment industry to use their celebrity platforms to encourage productive, fact-based discourse, with peace as the main objective. The open letter also acknowledges the pain and loss impacting all parties involved in the conflict.

“I pray for peace,” says Saban, who was born in Alexandria, Egypt and moved with his family to Tel Aviv, Israel when he was 12.

“There has to be a way to sit down and talk through differences,” says Simmons, who was born in Haifa, in northern Israel, and emigrated with his family to the States at the age of eight.

“I pray for peace. For all.”
Israeli Actress Noa Tishby Calls Out Anti-Israel Celebs
Israeli actress Noa Tishby discusses anti-Israel activism in Hollywood and the need for "strategic, long-term planning to combat it."




Waters: Gaza Has “Moral Obligation to Resist the Occupation” Against Israel
Former Pink Floyd bassist Roger Waters said in a May 13 interview with the Russian state-funded RT that Palestinians in Gaza have a “moral obligation to resist the occupation” against Israel.

The RT host told Waters that the Israeli position on the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood in East Jerusalem involving the potential eviction of six Palestinian families is that the land was owned by Jews until Jordan occupied the area from 1948-1967. Water responded, “Next thing you’ll be telling me is rockets rain down from Jerusalem or some sort of equally nonsensical story.” He then compared the Gaza Strip to “a barrel full of fish and the Israelis are shooting into it… they are murdering the inmates of an open prison.”

Waters argued that some of Gaza’s “inmates” are trying to fight back and “occasionally they have resorted to sending homemade rockets across the walls of the prison that contain them, and you can’t blame them for that. In fact, they have a moral obligation to resist the occupation by a foreign power of their land.”

The host interjected that there have been “a lot” of missiles fired into Israel, which Waters dismissed as a “small amount” and contended that they haven’t resulted into any casualties yet. To date, Hamas has fired more than 3,200 rockets into Israel; 10 Israelis have been killed, including a five-year-old boy. According to the Israel Defense Forces, 439 of the rockets that Hamas and Islamic Jihad have fired into Israel “misfired and crashed into Gaza, causing around 20 Palestinian casualties.”

Later in the segment, Waters was asked to respond to accusations that he’s antisemitic. Waters replied that those lobbing such allegations “have no argument to make.” He claimed that he is simply criticizing Israel’s “genocidal, apartheid, racist policies” and “has nothing to do with disliking Jewish people.”
YouTube Censors HonestReporting CEO Interview, Sky News Australia Anchor…as Associated Press Spews Anti-Israel Venom
Quite Simply, Orwellian
Historically, the media’s modus operandi was to report facts in order to inform the public. Hence, the “gatekeepers of democracy” tagline ascribed to journalists.

Yet, media outlets have undergone a major evolution: from “trusted news source” to creating and disseminating inaccurate narratives to advance their ideological positions; then from producing fake news or hit pieces to achieve political goals to now, apparently, weaponizing their content to destroy “enemies.”
To paraphrase a quote wrongly attributed to Orwell but which resonates strongly today as we seemingly edge towards the dystopian society that he predicted:
In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act.”

As the media continues to spread lies, HonestReporting encourages everyone to speak up and convey the facts about Israel’s just battle to quash Palestinian terrorism.
YouTube Removes Video of Legal Scholar Defending Israeli Airstrikes
An Israeli legal scholar's argument about the legality of Israeli airstrikes was removed from YouTube on Monday for violating the platform's "violent criminal organizations policy."

Eugene Kontorovich, a professor at George Mason University, appeared on RT to explain why Israel’s counterstrikes in Gaza are protected by international law. After posting the video, Kontorovich received an email saying he had violated YouTube's "violent criminal organizations" policy. That policy bans "content intended to praise, promote, or aid violent criminal organizations." Its listed examples of violations include hostage videos, propaganda produced by terrorists, and terror recruitment videos.

The move continues a pattern of capricious moderation of content related to Israel from social media platforms. In April, the Chinese-owned platform TikTok hosted a series of viral videos of Arabs assaulting Orthodox Jews.

Kontorovich told the Washington Free Beacon YouTube's decision demonstrated which groups have influence on the video platform.

"YouTube is obviously in thrall to the most extreme anti-Israel actors who want to silence academic discussion of international law in relation to Israel's actions, so that the blood libels will not be refuted," he said.


Toronto Star Op-Ed Tacitly Accuses Israel of Carrying Out 9/11 Style Terror Attacks on Gaza
Toronto Star Op-Ed Tacitly Accuses Israel of Carrying Out 9/11 Style Terror Attacks on Gaza Toronto Star Op-Ed Tacitly Accuses Israel of Carrying Out 9/11 Style Terror Attacks on Gaza By Mike Fegelman May 16, 2021

In an op-ed published to the Toronto Star’s website today by writer Shenaz Kermalli (pictured right), the author outrageously draws a tacit comparison between Israeli airstrikes on Palestinian terrorists and buildings used by Hamas for terror purposes, and Al-Qaeda’s 9/11 terror attacks that killed close to 3,000 people.

Kermalli writes:
Israeli bombs and artillery shells are raining down on Gaza. Yet again, the world watches silently.

A 14-storey highrise building collapses, one tower complex at a time into piles of rubble and dirt, 9/11-style.”

To accuse Israel of carrying out attacks similar to the atrocities carried out by Al Qaeda on September 11, 2001 is appalling. Setting aside how Israel warns civilians to leave the area due to impending attacks on terrorists and terror infrastructure, to depict Israel as carrying out terrorism of the scale of 9/11 is inflammatory and of course, without foundation. We know for certain that Hamas uses Palestinian civilians as human shields and embeds themselves in civilian population centres, a bona fide war crime.

Shame on the Toronto Star for publishing this outrageous allegation not fit for publication and which has the potential to fan the flames of hatred against supporters of Israel and Jews in Toronto and worldwide. HonestReporting Canada has filed a complaint with the Star and we encourage you to do the same by sending letters to Toronto Star Public Editor Bruce Campion-Smith: bcsmith@thestar.ca.


Media Draw False Equivalence Between Arab Rioting and Internally Denounced Jewish Response
As thousands of rockets rained down on Israel over the last nine days, another disturbing development got less attention in the mainstream media. For days on end, Arab rioters carried out what have been described as “pogroms” in Lod, Acre, Jaffa, Haifa and other so-called mixed communities. The anti-Jewish violence was followed by several attacks on Arabs by far-right Israelis.

The mayor of Lod, a town in central Israel, compared the riots in his city to “Kristallnacht” and warned of a civil war. “All the work we have done here for years [on co-existence] has gone down the drain,” Mayor Yair Revivo said. Defense Minister Benny Gantz called the mob violence “no less dangerous than Hamas’ missiles.” A Jewish resident of Lod died after Arab rioters pelted his car with rocks, and an Israeli Arab man was shot dead, reportedly after throwing stones and firebombs at a Jewish-owned house. Many others have been wounded.

Nevertheless, when covered by international media outlets, the Arab-initiated violence was often devoid of context.

The New York Times on Monday reported that “mob violence erupted in the city of Lod, where rival Arab and Jewish groups attacked people, cars, shops, offices and hotels early last week.” The Washington Post described the violence as “clashes between Arab Israelis and right-wing Jewish Israelis”; CNN as “street battles” between “Palestinian and Jewish youth”; and Huffington Post as “violence within Israel between its Jewish and Arab citizens, with clashes and vigilante attacks on people and property.”

These reports did not mention which group started the violence. Indeed, Arab attacks on Jews and their property had already started last month, following a disturbing online challenge. On April 15, a Palestinian man attacked two ultra-orthodox Israeli boys on the Jerusalem light rail. The footage of the unprovoked attack went viral on the video-sharing app TikTok. In the days that followed, more and more clips of attacks on Israeli civilians started appearing on the platform.
Memo to NYT, WaPo, CNN: It’s Not Palestinians Vs. Israel, It’s Hamas Vs. Jewish People
World Leaders Condemn Violence Against Jews. Are Media Facilitating It?

German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson are among the heads of state who have slammed the antisemitic attacks.

Yet, The New York Times, CNN, The Washington Post and other major news outlets are seemingly oblivious to the connection between the racial and religious-based violence taking place and Hamas’ terrorist attacks and overt calls for the eradication of the Jewish nation.

The result: In the Unites States, for example, American Jews, who comprise around 2 percent of the population, are several times more likely to be the target of a hate crime. This has been documented by the FBI.

Uncritical news organizations fixated on pushing the Israel as “aggressor” narrative have turned a blind eye to Hamas’ annihilistic goal. In doing so, they have contributed to the spread of Hamas’s Jew-hatred around the world.
John Oliver Blames Israel for Hamas War Crimes
John Oliver is one of the world’s leading comedians, venerated by many for his passion, eloquence, and willingness to tackle important issues thoughtfully and wittily, without fear or apology.

All of this makes it all the more disappointing that Oliver got the wrong end of the stick entirely in choosing to furiously single out Israel for criticism in a segment in his eponymous HBO series Last Week Tonight with John Oliver. By the end of the segment, Oliver was describing Israel as a “war crime-committing a***hole”.

Why? Because of Israel’s totally legitimate response to the some 3,000 missiles fired by Hamas into Israeli territory over the last week.

Many Israelis and Jews have seen the video and reacted with utter shock and disgust. Oliver acts as if Israelis don’t know about the deaths of children in Gaza, or worse, don’t care. Israelis do know, and do care. Each death of an innocent child is a tragedy. But in laying the blame firmly at Israel’s door, rather than at that of Hamas, Oliver falls for the bait laid for naive observers who expect things to have a semblance of “fairness.”

Oliver’s entire monologue is predicated on the puerile view that if one side is weaker, and has more casualties, then it must automatically be in the right.

But that’s not how life works. That’s not how war works. Should Israel and the Palestinians fight round after round of endless war with each side being killed in equal numbers? Surely not. Far better that Israel defeats the terrorists once and for all, so that the rest of us — Arabs and Jews alike — can live together side-by-side in harmony.

The point of war is to win. That Israel is winning is nothing to be ashamed of.

Each missile fired by Hamas at civilians is a legitimate casus belli, cause for war, under international law. Each missile is an indisputable double war crime because they are fired at Israeli civilians, from behind the cover of human shields. And Israel has every right under international law to stop these war crimes through the use of military force.




‘The Filthy Pigs Theory’: AP Photojournalist in Morocco Has History of Antisemitic Tweets and Public Comments
An Associated Press (AP) photojournalist based in Morocco has a history of antisemitic tweets and public comments, Breitbart News has learned.

Mosa’ab Elshamy, now an AP staff photojournalist based in Morocco, sent a series of antisemitic tweets between 2010 and 2011, prior to his employment with the AP.

In one Nov. 24, 2010, tweet, a reply to an account that no longer exists, Elshamy tweeted that he believes what he called “the filthy pigs theory,” in his view, “should only be applied to Zionists (and their women).”

Calling Jewish people “filthy pigs” is an antisemitic trope.
Open Letter Signed by Major Media Figures Denounces Canadian News Coverage as Skewed Towards Israel
Over 1,500 people, including major media figures, issued an open letter on Sunday denouncing Canadian media coverage of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and demanding a more pro-Palestinian approach.

The open letter condemns a “lack of nuanced Canadian media coverage” and claims without evidence that there have been “forced expulsions” of Palestinians in recent days and “indiscriminate” Israeli air strikes.

The letter also alleges a failure to report on a recent, controversial Human Rights Watch report attacking Israel, and claims that Canadian news reports center “around Israeli politicians and organizations, and representatives of the Israeli government and military; rarely are Palestinian voices ever centered or featured.”

It further asserts that “some groups” claim that Israel’s actions in Gaza “amount to an ethnic cleansing,” and that they should be covered as such.

It then accuses Israel of a series of offenses, and despite its call for nuance, says that issues like “dispossession” and “violence against innocent civilians” are “not complicated.”


After Britain Calls for “Proportionality”, Israel to Build Terror Tunnels into Gaza (Satire)
The State of Israel has surprisingly decided to build terror tunnels into the Gaza Strip. The unconventional decision by Jerusalem comes after the British government urged Israel to ensure “proportionality” in its military actions in Gaza.

“Israel must make every effort to avoid civilian casualties and military activity must be proportionate,” said the British Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s spokesman Max Blain.

Moshe Builderman, the head of the Israel Defense Force’s new terror tunnel unit, spoke to The Mideast Beast about Israel’s new proportionality strategy.

“Israel takes proportionality very seriously. If Hamas builds ten terror tunnels into Israel, we will build ten even more terrifying tunnels into Gaza. By building separate tunnels, we avoid subterranean traffic congestion clashes between Hamas’ masked Jihad fighters and our masked badass kosher ninjas.”

In order to speed up the building process and avoid Israel’s terrorizing bureaucracy, Chinese subcontractors will swiftly build all Israeli terror tunnels.
Red Wall voters think Labour cares more about the Palestinians than them. And they're right
Labour's leader took a different tack. 'The violence against worshippers during Ramadan at the al-Aqsa mosque was shocking,' Keir Starmer said. 'Israel must respect international law, and must take steps, immediately, to work with Palestinian leaders to de-escalate tensions.'

Again, everyone knows where Labour stands on this. On the side of the Palestinians, and against Israel. What's more, it's not just another international issue for Labour, so much as a political obsession.

Coventry MP Zarah Sultana – currently being promoted by the Left as a future leader – tweeted: 'When I speak about Palestine, I get hostile replies from people outside Coventry, questioning if my constituents care. For their information: Since getting elected, the thing I've been emailed about most by my constituents: Palestine.'

Sultana seems to think this statement will come as some sort of revelation to people. Quite the opposite. The idea that a Labour MP would see solving the problems of Palestinians as their priority will not surprise a single Red Wall voter.


Professors in Country Known For Using Slave Labor Criticize Israeli ‘Persecution’
At least 75 percent of the professors at Northwestern University in Qatar on Friday condemned Israel as an "apartheid" state that commits "crimes against humanity," ignoring allegations of modern-day slavery against their host country.

In a letter sent to students and staff at the university’s Middle Eastern campus, the professors accuse the Jewish state of "persecution" and "express their full support" for Palestinians "who are fighting against continued forced displacement and for their inalienable rights and dignity."

Faculty and students at schools across the country have used ongoing Hamas attacks as an excuse to criticize Israel. The University of Michigan’s student government last week sent a letter to the student body that used the conflict to endorse the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement. A Virginia school board official referred to Israel as an "apartheid" state that "kills Palestinians" in two social media posts on Thursday.

Three more professors have signed on to the letter since it was posted Friday. None of the original 27 signatories responded to the Washington Free Beacon's request for comment.

Jonathan Schanzer, a Middle East expert at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, told the Free Beacon that Qatar’s opposition to academic freedom suggests the professors’ statement "will be viewed as carrying water for the regime in Doha."

"It’s not a good look, to put it mildly," Schanzer said. He added that Qatar itself is a "longstanding supporter of the terrorist group Hamas, as well as the Taliban, al Qaeda and other jihadist organizations."
Two killed, 184 injured in bleachers collapse at Hassidic synagogue
Two people were killed and 184 injured when newly installed bleachers at a new hassidic synagogue in Givat Ze’ev collapsed during holiday celebrations Sunday night.

Security camera footage of the incident at the new premises of the Karlin-Stolin hassidic community showed hundreds of hassidim falling away as the top three rows of the bleachers collapsed during festivities on Shavuot eve at 7:14 p.m.

The funeral of the two – Binyamin Rubinstein, 23, and Meir Globerman, 13 – took place late Monday night, starting out in Givat Zee'v and finishing at a funeral home on Shamgar Street in Jerusalem.

The hassidim were reportedly celebrating the induction of the new synagogue together with the grand rabbi of the Karlin-Stolin hassidic community, with some 600 people in attendance, according to Channel 12.


Israel's Eden Alene advances to Eurovision final
Eden Alene, Israel's contest in the Eurovision Song Contest, advanced to the finals on the opening night of the 2021 event, which was held in Rotterdam on Tuesday night.

While there was some concern that the current war would turn Eurovision audiences against Israel, Alene's flawless performance of the song, "Set Me Free," during which she hit the highest note ever achieved in a Eurovision performance, charmed voters. Alene, a rising star and Israel's first representative of Ethiopian descent, managed to contain her disappointment over the postponement of the 2020 contest due to the coronavirus pandemic and conducted herself with quiet grace throughout the year. In addition to her high note, her performance was notable for her dancing and the striking black-and-white Alon Livne costume she sported.

Some audience members waved Palestine banners and flags and an anti-Semitic Dutch club displayed posters of Alene calling Israel an Apartheid state. Others took to Twitter to tweet that "Set Me Free," should be about Palestine. There were protests outside the auditorium and calls for "the occupier" not to be allowed to perform, meaning Alene.

Russia's song, “Russian Woman,” performed by Manizha, which was written by two Israelis, Ori Avni and Ori Kaplan, also advanced to the finals. There will be a second round of semifinals on May 20 and the grand finale will be held on May 22. Both events will be broadcast on Kan 11.









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