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Tuesday, August 17, 2021

08/17 Links Pt2: Cancel the Durban IV Review Conference; Israeli Survey of US Universities Sees Left-Leaning Groups as ‘Significant’ Source of Campus Antisemitism

From Ian:

Amb. Alan Baker: Cancel the Durban IV Review Conference
In what can only be seen as an amazing act of institutional masochism and hypocrisy by the international community, the upcoming UN General Assembly’s opening meetings in September 2021, attended by heads of state and government, will “commemorate” the 20th anniversary of the infamous 2001 Durban conference.1

The 2001 Durban World Conference, aiming to address the struggle against racism, was abused by Muslim and Arab states and anti-Israel non-governmental organizations and became a blatant antisemitic and anti-Israel hate-fest, singling out and lynching Israel in such a manner as to permanently taint the name of the Durban conference.

The damage caused by this public condemnation of Israel laid the groundwork for a concerted campaign in the international community to undermine and delegitimize the State of Israel and served as the inspiration for the launching of the infamous BDS (boycott, divestment, and sanction) campaign that continues to be waged against Israel.

The UN and its respective High Commissioners for Human Rights have attempted to re-legitimize the Durban process through Review Conferences in 2009 and 2011, which reaffirmed the Durban I conference declarations and plans of action, thereby in effect reaffirming and sanctioning the calls to delegitimize Israel.

This process will be repeated soon at the upcoming Durban IV conference at the UN in September 2021.

Durban must be expunged and forgotten. The international community must set about dealing with racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia, and antisemitism in a genuinely serious, a-political, and non-hypocritical manner, far from Durban.


Daniel Gordis: Forego the Jewish State to save Liberal Zionism?
Two guys are sitting in a bar in Amsterdam. (They aren’t—but bear with me.) One of them was born in the United States, yet left years ago, brimming with distaste for what America had become. Now he lives in Amsterdam and teaches continental philosophy at a university there, enjoying the tulips and the beer.

The other was born in Holland. He spent a few years in the U.S. but hasn’t been back in a while, either. He didn’t like America much, either. Nasty place—anti-intellectual red states, terrible treatment of immigrants on the Texas border, the politics of masks trumping science. The list goes on. “Yup, America’s done,” they say to each other, with knowing nods, as they clink their bottles, taking another swig of the ice-cold Heineken.

They’ve met up at the bar to celebrate the new book that the one who was born in the US but now lives in Holland wrote about the US. The point of the book? Well, the US is highly imperfect, and he can’t really see any way to fix it. The only way to save the American dream is to break up the Union. Create a “more perfect union” by having no union at all.

Oh, and he wrote the book in Dutch.

So here are my questions: First, aside from perhaps getting himself a few reviews in his echo-chamber and maybe another notch on the proverbial academic bedpost, what’s the point of the book? Does he imagine that anyone in America is going to think about disbanding the union because of a guy who was born in America, left it, and bereft of solutions to complex problems, has decided to end the project? Does he really imagine he’s going to move any policy needle in America? And if he really hoped he’d engender a conversation, why did he write the book in Dutch?

I begin with that little analogy because of two very different sorts of conversations that crossed my screen this week, two pieces that I think are emblematic of the radically different conversations unfolding about Israel—one in the US and one in Israel, the latter conversation sadly almost never making it into the English press and thus remaining pretty much unknown in America. (Hence, Israel from the Inside.)
The Israel Guys: This Little Girl Was Used by the BBC As Anti-Israel Propaganda
The BBC ran an article recently with a heart-wrenching photo of a little girl sitting on a pile of rubble in Gaza. What they failed to mention however, is that the photo was staged, and the pile of rubble was home to a terrorist organization.

When will the international media be held responsible for their discrimination and lies? When will Hamas be rightfully held responsible for child abuse, instead of Israel falsely accusing Israel of the same crime?

*Correction at 1:41: should be "600 rockets were fired at the civilian population of Israel" (not Gaza)

This is an important topic. Please share this video widely.


Blinken: Poland must ‘provide justice’ for Holocaust victims
Poland must find a way to justly compensate for property confiscated from victims of the Holocaust, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Monday night in response to Poland’s new law making restitution nearly impossible.

“We deeply regret the adoption of these amendments,” Blinken said.

That law, which Polish President Andrzej Duda signed into effect on Saturday, is at the center of a diplomatic crisis between Israel and Poland, with both sides withdrawing their ambassadors. Foreign Minister Yair Lapid has said he and Blinken are coordinating their responses. The secretary of state urged the Polish government “to consult with representatives of affected parties and to develop a clear, efficient and effective legal procedure to resolve confiscated property claims and provide some measure of justice for victims.

“In the absence of such a procedure, this legislation will harm all Polish citizens whose property was unjustly taken, including that of Polish Jews who were victims of the Holocaust,” he said.

Blinken also commented on a Polish law that would severely curb independent media by prohibiting foreign investments in them, saying that Duda should act on the values of “freedom of expression and sanctity of contracts” with regards to that legislation.

Lapid thanked Blinken “for standing shoulder-to-shoulder with Israel against the Polish law,” in a tweet on Tuesday.

On Monday, Poland officially recalled its ambassador to Israel, Marek Magierowski, until further notice in response to Israel calling back its head of embassy from Warsaw.

About 3,000,000 Jews were murdered by the Nazis in Poland, about 90% of Polish Jewry.

Polish Communist authorities confiscated property across the country in the 1940s and ‘50s, including property that had been owned by Jews before World War II. Some of the property had been seized illegally and could theoretically be reclaimed through Polish courts.
Israeli Survey of US Universities Sees Left-Leaning Groups as ‘Significant’ Source of Campus Antisemitism
A number of “politically liberal or progressive organizations” were seen as generally unsupportive of Jewish students on campus, as compared to conservative groups, Mansdorf wrote.

The focus group participants work as emissaries at Hillel offices through the Jewish Agency for Israel, which assigns them to a college chapter following the completion of their mandatory service in the IDF. Their answers, Mansdorf said, were nearly identical to those by Hillel directors surveyed by JCPA in 2015.

“When we asked in 2015, ‘What drives anti-Israel activity on your campus?’ we found that 53% felt that ‘Muslim or Arab students on campus’ contribute to this at least a moderately significant amount, with 58% citing that students belonging to ‘progressive’ or ‘revolutionary’ groups also contribute at least to a moderately significant level.”

In 2021, 93% of the sample identified Muslim or Arab students as among those contributing to antisemitism on college campuses, with 39% reporting that they contribute “a fairly significant amount.” 58% said progressive groups contribute to a “fairly significant” and “very high” amount of antisemitism.

Mansdorf argued his findings should prompt a harder look at antisemitism in left-wing circles, and that liberal and progressive organizations should not be “immune from criticism.”

“Effecting change based on confronting attitudes from the progressive left would appear to represent a significant albeit essential challenge.”


Republican lieutenant governors ready for March 2022 Israel trip
A delegation of Republican lieutenant governors from at least four states will visit Israel on a week-long trade mission this coming March with the goal of bolstering economic and diplomatic ties with the Jewish state, Jewish Insider has learned.

Scheduled for March 18-25, the trip is sponsored by the State Government Leadership Foundation, the policy arm of the Republican State Leadership Committee, a national organization dedicated to electing GOP candidates in all 50 states. The SGLF, which shared news of the upcoming delegation exclusively with JI, last hosted a trade mission for lieutenant governors in 2016.

Participants who have signed on so far include Jeanette Nuñez of Florida, Adam Gregg of Iowa, Mike Foley of Nebraska and Jon Husted of Ohio. But that list could expand as the SGLF shores up plans for the 2022 trip, a spokesperson for the group told JI. The delegation, according to an announcement, will meet with Israeli government officials and business leaders for discussions on such matters as agriculture, manufacturing, cybersecurity and aerospace technology.

The SGLF emphasized that it hoped to show solidarity with the Jewish state following the recent conflict between Israel and Hamas as well as a controversial mid-July announcement from Ben & Jerry’s that the Vermont-based ice cream company will stop selling its products in “Occupied Palestinian Territory,” including the West Bank. .

“As Ben & Jerry’s move to boycott Israel violates several states’ laws and damages the U.S.-Israel relationship,” the GOP advocacy group told JI, “the delegation will aim to strengthen relations with our strongest ally in the Middle East and expand growth opportunities through networking opportunities with Israeli companies, local chambers of commerce and other U.S. companies already doing business in Israel.”
Arizona is the 8th state to launch review into possible Ben & Jerry’s sanctions
Arizona has become the eighth state to begin reviewing whether Ben & Jerry’s plans to withdraw from doing business in the West Bank merits sanctions under its law targeting the Israel boycott movement.

In emails obtained by the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, the state’s treasurer last week asked Unilever, the ice cream manufacturer’s parent company, to comply with its 2016 law. It requires state entities, including pension funds, to divest from companies boycotting Israel or businesses in territories under Israel’s control, explicitly including the West Bank. The treasurer’s office gave Unilever 90 days to do so.

Unilever and Ben & Jerry’s have said they are not observing the movement to boycott, divest and sanction Israel, or BDS, because they are only seeking to pull out of the West Bank, and plan to continue sales in Israel.

There are 34 states in total that require their governments to stop doing business with companies that boycott Israel — and 21 of those, like Arizona, include West Bank settlement boycotts in their definitions.

So far eight states are known to have triggered similar reviews that could result in divesting from Ben & Jerry’s and Unilever. In addition to Arizona, New York, New Jersey, Florida, Texas, Illinois, Maryland and Rhode Island have launched formal proceedings.
Guardian piece on Ken Loach's expulsion from Labour omits his antisemitism
Tellingly, unlike the Guardian, The Times report on Loach’s expulsion was clear about the reason in the opening sentence of their article:
Labour has thrown out the film-maker Ken Loach over his support for groups that denied the existence of antisemitism in the party.

The Guardian also failed to inform readers of Loach’s history of antisemitism.

In 1987 Loach directed Perdition, a play that was widely viewed as antisemitic and ultimately cancelled by the Royal Court Theatre. The CST’s Dave Rich wrote the following, summarising the play:
“[It] argues that there was a deliberate and knowing strategy by the Zionist movement to sacrifice European Jews in return for getting a state of Israel. Morally, in this argument, the people who created the state of Israel were no better than the Nazis and actually collaborated in the Nazis crimes and therefore Israel has no legitimacy.”

In 2009, the EU’s Fundamental Rights Agency reported an increase in European antisemitism. Loach said that the rise in antisemitism was “understandable” given Israel’s actions, and called the report a “red herring” designed to “distract attention” from Israel.

In 2018, when asked about a Labour fringe event where one speaker denied the Holocaust, Loach answered “I think history is for us all to discuss, wouldn’t you?” (After fierce criticism, he later ‘acknowledged’ that the Holocaust was real.)

The reporter’s obfuscation of the reason why Loach was expelled from Labour, and their whitewash of the film-maker’s racism, is yet another example of the lengths the Guardian will go to distort or obfuscate facts which demonstrate antisemitism by those who share the media group’s ideology.
Claim that allegations of Jew-hate in Labour were a ‘scam’ trends on Twitter
Accusations that claims of antisemitism within the Labour Party were part of a ‘scam’ to smear left-wing politicians have been trending on Twitter.

Supporters of former leader Jeremy Corbyn, who presided over the party’s antisemitism crisis, have driven ‘#ItWasAScam’ to national prominence on the website.

The trend was described as “a celebration and exposé of the antisemitism smearing industry” by Brighton-based writer Simon Maginn, who has admitted he has been investigated by the Labour Party over antisemitism allegations.

He called for Labour supporters to, "stop talking about 'antisemitism' and start talking about fraud. Cold, deliberate, intentional fraud, on a gigantic scale".

The campaign follows director Ken Loach’s expulsion from the Labour Party over his support for others who have been booted out of the party. The 85-year old Palme d'Or winner said this weekend: “There is indeed a witch-hunt … Starmer and his clique will never lead a party of the people.”

On Twitter last night, prominent left-wing accounts echoed the filmmaker’s claims.

Former Momentum vice-chair Jackie Walker, herself expelled from Labour after questioning Holocaust Memorial Day for only commemorating Jewish victims, retweeted an account using the divisive hashtag and referred to the party’s antisemitism scandal as “one s. [sic] of the greatest mass political frauds”.


BBC News reamplifies HRW claims of ‘no military targets’
This latest BBC report does include a rare reference to the human cost of shortfall missiles:
“The report says Palestinian rockets and mortars which misfired killed and injured an undetermined number of people in Gaza. It said one misfire above the city of Jabalya which it investigated killed seven civilians and injured 15. According to the Israeli military, 680 rockets and mortars fired by Hamas fell inside the Gaza Strip.

The Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies, an Israeli think-tank, has estimated the misfires killed 91 people.”

However it also once again promotes Hamas’ narrative concerning the background to the conflict in May:
“It began after weeks of spiralling Israeli-Palestinian tension in East Jerusalem which culminated in clashes at a holy site revered by both Muslims and Jews. Hamas – the militant Islamist group which rules Gaza – began firing rockets after warning Israel to withdraw from the site, triggering retaliatory air strikes.”

The report recycles a film in which “Two children from Gaza City and Israel describe their experience of the Israel-Gaza conflict” that was first seen in May and which was previously discussed here.

As we noted last month when HRW published its report on Israel’s “apparent war crimes”, its intent was already evident in its sub-heading: “Israeli, Palestinian Violations Show Need for International Criminal Court Inquiry”. We observed that:
“There is of course nothing surprising in the least about that ‘conclusion’ because HRW has been promoting (with BBC amplification) the notion that Israel should “face justice” at the ICC for some time.”
Daily Beast to review editorial standards after writer calls Israel ‘genocidal’
The Daily Beast has edited an article to remove the word “genocidal” as a description for Israel’s military.

Criticizing the choice of Mayim Bialik as a host of the game show “Jeopardy!”, the article, published on Thursday, said that in 2014, the Jewish actor had “proclaimed her donation toward bulletproof vests for the genocidal Israeli Defense Forces.”

Accusations that Israel is committing genocide of Palestinians spiked during the recent conflict between Israel and Hamas in Gaza, despite the objections of human rights lawyers. Such claims do not have serious backing in the global community.

The story drew condemnation from Jews and Jewish organizations on social media, including the American Jewish Committee.

Appearing to respond to the criticism, the article’s author, Tirhakah Love, who recently joined the Daily Beast as an entertainment reporter, tweeted on Friday, “the Zionists should really stop emailing me cus girl I do not care.” In a subsequent tweet, Love said Zionism was “an articulation of white supremacy.”

The word remained in the story on Monday morning. But later in the day, it had been removed.

A subsequent sentence was also added about the April 2021 Human Rights Watch report that said some of Israel’s actions in the West Bank and Gaza “amount to the crimes against humanity of apartheid and persecution.”

“The story has been updated to replace the word genocidal in reference to the IDF,” the Daily Beast said in response to a request for comment from the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. The website added, “The Daily Beast is developing an editorial standard for future use of the word.”
BDS fails, Aug. 2021 Stories you likely didn't see in the British media
Here’s the latest installment in our ongoing series of posts documenting BDS fails – stories of Israeli success and BDS failures that are rarely covered by British media outlets.

Political BDS Fails
Israeli and American militaries tighten air-defense cooperation
(August 11, 2021 / JNS) Representatives from the U.S. and Israeli Air Forces met last month to discuss a remarkable development: what the Israel Defense Forces described as “updated orders for the cooperation between the two nations’ air-defense systems during emergency situations.”

South Korea adopts International Definition of #Antisemitism

Australian PM confirms Australia recognizes Jerusalem as Israel’s Capital
Prime Minister Scott Morrison confirmed a shift in the Australian government’s policy on the Middle East, recognising West Jerusalem as the capital of Israel.

He said however, any relocation of Australia’s embassy to Jerusalem would be delayed until a peace settlement in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

The decision announced on Shabbat – the Jewish day of prayer and rest – was welcomed by Jewish groups with the peak representative body the Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ) hailing it as “groundbreaking”.


On This Day: US Jew Leo Frank lynched by antisemitic mob
August 17, 2021 marks the 106th anniversary of the death of Leo Frank, a Jewish American living in Georgia who was lynched by an antisemitic mob after being convicted of murdering a 13-year-old girl despite being widely held to be innocent.

Frank grew up in Brooklyn and eventually moved to Atlanta, home to the largest Jewish community in the US South, where he became the superintendent of a National Pencil Company factory. He was openly Jewish and even served as president of the local B'nai B'rith chapter.

However, a young 13-year-old girl named Mary Phagan was found murdered in the early hours of April 27, 1913 inside the factory basement. Phagan had been an employee of the factory and had come the previous day to collect payment when she was evidently brutally murdered.

Based on the evidence found at the scene, police believed she had been killed on the second floor of the factory - where Frank's office was located - and later moved.

Soon, Frank was arrested and charged with her murder. There were some in the police who thought from the start that he was guilty, and an attempt to enlist the help of detectives from the Burns Agency. However, as noted by historian Steve Oney, the agency had withdrawn from the case. The agency, Oney wrote in the words of detective C. W. Tobie, "quickly became disillusioned with the many societal implications of the case, most notably the notion that Frank was able to evade prosecution due to his being a rich Jew, buying off the police and paying for private detectives."
71 year-old speaks of shock after kippah knocked from his head outside theatre
A 71-year-old has spoken of feeling “shaken up” after his kippah was knocked from his head in an alleged hate crime last week as he left a showing of the play Leopoldstadt, which is about the Holocaust.

Scotland Yard said it was investigating reports of a religiously-aggravated assault on Charing Cross Road shortly before 10pm last Thursday.

An “unknown suspect is believed to have grabbed the victim’s kippah from his head and threw it on the floor,” the force said.

No arrests have been made, a spokesperson said Tuesday.

The victim, Ronnie Phillips, a chief accountant visiting from Israel, said the incident occurred as he left the Wyndham's Theatre, having seen Tom Stoppard’s Holocaust drama.

Speaking to the JC on Monday, he said he was not injured but felt “a bit traumatised”. He also called for increased security outside the West End theatre during the production.

Mr Phillips, who made aliyah in May, said he felt safer in Israel.
Why are we still so obsessed with Hitler? Unconventional docu tries to find out
“Is it possible to make a film like this without contributing to the Nazi Cinematic Universe?”

This line of narration comes early in “The Meaning of Hitler,” a fiery new documentary about the persistent hold Nazism has on our culture, directed by Petra Epperlein and Michael Tucker. It’s a cheeky reference to the Marvel Cinematic Universe, a world shared by the comic book giant’s many onscreen superhero characters. Like Marvel fandom, Hitler and Nazi obsession encourages cult-like devotion to a sprawling, interconnected alternate reality — except the Nazi Cinematic Universe’s shared fantasy is that Hitler had the right idea about the Jews.

Based on the classic book-length essay by the German journalist Raimund Pretzel (published under his pseudonym of Sebastian Haffner), “The Meaning of Hitler” is a globetrotting excavation into the heart of our society’s fascination with Nazis, antisemitism and fascist ideology. Why does he remain so visible today? Why have we anointed him as a figure of unique evil, rather than an evil that could be replicated in the modern day? And why do so many people still seem to admire or — worse — unconsciously emulate him?

Using Pretzel’s original text as a jumping-off point, Epperlein and Tucker throw side-eyes at the entertainment and political apparatuses that have propped up the Hitler myth in the decades since his bunker suicide. Their efforts, like the “Nazi Cinematic Universe” line, simultaneously hope to be sarcastic, self-deprecating, and genuinely insightful.
OurCrowd looking to go public at $1b. valuation
Investment platform OurCrowd is looking to go public on the Nasdaq market with a valuation of $1 billion in a special purpose acquisition company merger, according to a report in the Hebrew media.

Representatives from the Jerusalem-based venture-capital fund declined to comment.

According to the report, OurCrowd is on track to reach an agreement in the coming months.

OurCrowd, founded by Jon Medved in 2013, offers accredited investors the opportunity to put money into start-ups. The fund is rated by PitchBook as the most active venture investor in Israel, with $1.8b. in committed capital, and approximately 100,000 investors in over 195 countries. The firm has investments in more than 250 companies and has scored 40 exits, including recent IPO stars Lemonade and Beyond Meat.

The fund has been very involved with developments in the Arab world following the signing of the Abraham Accords and has opened an office in Abu Dhabi. Medved sees himself as a sort of business ambassador for Israel, and frequently promotes the country in talks abroad.

In a presentation in June at the Global Investment Forum in Dubai which was cosponsored by The Jerusalem Post and the Khaleej Times, Medved said Israeli companies need to expand into the United Arab Emirates “to reach the other half of the world.”

“It is a gateway to billions of people who we have not been able to reach with our products and services from our start-up,” he said at the time.
Israel’s Economy Jumps 15.4 Percent, in Part Boosted by Car Imports
Israel’s economy grew by 15.4 percent in the second quarter of this year compared with the previous quarter, according to an estimate by the Central Bureau of Statistics.

Most of the growth was due to car imports.

The jump came as a result of the removal of coronavirus restrictions that caused the contraction of the economy in the first quarter due to the lockdown, reported the Israeli business daily Globes on Monday.

The second-quarter growth was better than other OECD countries such as Belgium (14.5 percent), Canada (13.8 percent), the United States (12.2 percent) and Austria (11.4 percent), but lower than France (18.7 percent).

Private consumption grew 34.1 percent per capita on an annualized basis in the second quarter compared to the first quarter, noted the report.
IAI’s Heron Drone Assists in Firefighting Efforts in Greece and Jerusalem
Israel Aerospace Industries’ Heron unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) has been taking part in the firefighting efforts against the Jerusalem area blaze days after Greek forces used the same type of platform to battle wildfires in Greece.

In Jerusalem, the Heron drone has been assisting in gathering information and pinpointing the source of the fire, while also playing a role in helping firefighters forecast the future pathway of the flames, IAI stated.

The Heron is a medium-altitude, long-endurance type platform used around the world for strategic and tactical missions.

According to IAI, it can fly for up to 45 hours and is able to reach an altitude of 35,000 feet.

The Heron has been activated by more than 20 forces around the world. It previously served Western air forces in Afghanistan, and the German Air Force used it in Mali.

It is also monitoring the European Union’s southern borders as part of a four-year leasing contract.
Biopic of a nationGordis’s ‘Concise History’ of Israel to become 6-part docuseries
Author Daniel Gordis is about to enter showbiz, now that his 2016 nonfiction work “Israel: A Concise History of a Nation Reborn” has been acquired for a six-episode TV documentary series.

Gordis, a US-born Jerusalem resident and senior vice president at Shalem College, a right-leaning institute of higher education, will be creatively involved in the development of the series, which was acquired by producer Bradford Schlei’s Stone Canyon Entertainment and will be directed by Matthew Mishory.

A winner of the 2016 National Jewish Book Award, “A Concise History” was Gordis’s 11th book, followed by 2019’s “We Stand Divided: The Rift Between American Jews and Israel.”

The producers will film additional material to cover the period since the book’s publication, including the Abraham Accords, shifting alliances in the Middle East, Israel’s new, diverse governing coalition, and the Israeli green economy. Production is expected to begin in 2022.

Mishory and Stone Canyon recently completed principal photography in Israel and the US on the documentary feature “Who are the Marcuses?” about a mysterious couple whose half-billion-dollar gift imagines regional conflict resolution in Israel and peace through water.







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