Sunday, March 06, 2022

03/06 Links: With the world in crisis, Israel steps up; Israelis be warned: Ukraine shows how Biden treats friends; PLO renounces all agreements with Israel

From Ian:

With the world in crisis, Israel steps up
What Maccabi Tel Aviv did in 1977 after defeating CSKA Moscow and leading Israel to the FIBA European Champions Cup, Prime Minister Naftali Bennett did Saturday with his dramatic meeting in the Kremlin with Russian President Vladimir Putin: put Israel on the map.

"We are on the map! And we are staying on the map – not only in sports, but in everything," Israel-American basketball star Tal Brody, in heavily accented Hebrew, said in an emotional interview after the victory over CSKA Moscow, a remark that has become iconic.

By flying to Moscow on Saturday Bennett put Israel on the map in terms of international diplomacy. That he made the trip on Shabbat, unheard of for Israeli politicians, even more so for one who is Shabbat-observant, underlined the life-and-death urgency of the trip.

Just weeks after Amnesty International called Israel an apartheid state in an effort to isolate the Jewish state and turn it into a pariah, Bennett shows up in Moscow in what on the surface seems an attempt at mediating the Russian-Ukrainian crisis.

Rather than being a pariah, Israel - it is turning out - is a necessary mediator in one of the most severe crises the world has seen in decades.

Bennett's trip was reportedly coordinated with Washington, Berlin and Paris, who all encouraged it. And it was also done with the knowledge of the Ukrainians, whose President Volodymyr Zelensky has been critical of Bennett and the Israeli government for not having taken a more forceful position against the Russians

But it seems that Jerusalem’s measured approach - balancing a real concern for Israel's interests in maintaining good relations with Russia because of Moscow’s control of Syria’s skies with humanitarian concerns for Ukrainians caught in the fighting - has paid dividends.

It is Bennett that Putin agreed to see in Moscow, not France's Emmanuel Macron, not Germany’s Chancellor Olaf Scholz, nor the prime ministers of other countries that traditionally play the role of mediator: Norway and Switzerland.

Rather Israel, little Israel.
Bennett: Israel has ‘moral duty’ to mediate between Moscow, Kyiv even if chances low
hours after returning from a surprise whirlwind trip to Moscow and Berlin, Prime Minister Naftali Bennett said Israel had a moral obligation to work to broker peace talks between Russia and Ukraine — even if the likelihood for progress was slim.

“I returned from Moscow and Berlin a few hours ago,” Bennett said at the start of the weekly cabinet meeting on Sunday. “I went there to assist the dialogue between all of the sides, of course with the blessing and encouragement of all players.”

Bennett said that he could not “go into greater detail” on the talks he held with Russian President Vladimir Putin or his phone calls with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

The Prime Minister’s Office said Sunday morning that Bennett had spoken once again with Zelensky, the third phone call between the two leaders in less than 24 hours. Neither side has released details of any of the conversations.

“We will continue to assist as needed,” Bennett said at the cabinet meeting. “Even if the chance is not great — as soon as there is even a small opening, and we have access to all sides and the capability — I see this as our moral obligation to make every effort.”

“As long as the candle is burning, we must make an effort and perhaps it will yet be possible to act,” the prime minister added.


Bennett’s Mission to Moscow Could Help Ukraine. But Can He Stop a New Iran Deal?
One of the odder sidebars to the invasion of Ukraine was a recent report that Putin was threatening to withdraw his support for the new Iran deal unless the Americans backed down on their efforts to sanction Russia as punishment for its aggression. As a member of the P5+1 group of powers that concluded the original pact, Moscow is deeply involved in the effort to revive it in Vienna.

Indeed, according to some sources, Russia played a key role in getting the Iranians — Russian allies and partners in another brutal war waged by Putin to slaughter Syrians opposed to the regime of President Bashar Assad — to go along with this fiasco that will greatly benefit it.

This means that while Biden and the West have been inveighing against Putin for his crimes in Ukraine, they are simultaneously counting on him to assist them in producing an agreement with Iran that they will falsely claim to be a diplomatic triumph. The administration has defended its willingness to continue working with the Russians in Vienna as unrelated to their efforts to isolate Moscow. But Biden’s willingness to reward Iran while punishing Russia is not so much hypocritical as it is amoral.

So while Bennett was undoubtedly sincere in offering his good offices to help arrange for peace talks to end the fighting in Ukraine, his priority ought to be somehow persuading Putin to help stop Biden’s appeasement of Iran. The same applies to his subsequent trip to Germany, which is also involved with both the sanctions on Russia and the attempt to use Putin to end the sanctions on Iran.

It’s far from clear that Bennett will be able to either assist diplomacy in Ukraine or stop the new Iran deal. But as much as the Jewish world is, like just about everyone else, completely riveted by the unfolding tragedy in Ukraine, it should not be treating Iran as a secondary issue.

That’s a difficult sell at a moment when Ukraine’s fight for independence has captured the hearts of supporters of democracy and those who sympathize with underdogs seeking to resist much stronger predators, such as Putin’s Russia. Jewish communities are mobilizing to provide aid for the refugees created by the war and calling for America and the West to do whatever they can to aid Zelensky — a new Jewish hero who has won praise for his Churchillian performance since the war began — to save Ukraine.

But to ignore, rationalize or excuse Biden’s efforts to enrich and empower Iran while granting it a clear path to a nuclear weapon with which it could potentially make good on its repeated threats to eliminate the one Jewish state on the planet just because Ukraine is the current priority is indefensible.

Bennett could win a Nobel Peace Prize for ending the war in Ukraine, while sabotaging diplomacy with Iran will only earn him opprobrium from the international press. But being as admired as Zelensky is now shouldn’t concern him. Stymying Biden’s feckless appeasement of Iran must be his sole priority.


Behind the scenes of Bennett's secret trip to Moscow
Planning of Naftali Bennett's secret trip to Russia on Saturday actually began on Wednesday, when the prime minister spoke with Russian President Vladimir Putin on the phone.

Bennett advised the U.S. of his intentions and received President Joe Biden's "blessing". The prime minister also called Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky right after his meeting with Putin to brief him on the discussions. Bennett also spoke with French President Emmanuel Macron.

Before leaving for Moscow on Saturday, Bennett called Foreign Minister Yair Lapid, Defense Minister Benny Gantz and Finance Minister Avigdor Liberman, to advise them on the planned meetings.

After the three-hour meeting in the Kremlin, Bennett flew to Berlin to meet with the German chancellor. According to the Prime Minister's Office, Bennett and Olaf Scholz, spoke for 90 minutes and shared a meal. "The leaders discussed several matters including the Russian-Ukraine conflict," said the official statement following the meeting.

Ynet analyst Ron Ben Yishai said on Sunday that Zelensky's office doubted the mediation efforts would be successful. After the president spoke with Bennett, his press secretary said he would be willing to meet Putin if the Russian president was amenable.

"We cannot evaluate the outcome of Prime Minister Naftali Bennett's mediation until we receive a clear indication from either Bennett or Putin that such a meeting could take place," Sergey Nikiforov said, adding that no new development was reported on Bennett's call with Zelensky.

The need for a ceasefire is said to have been the primary topic of discussion in the meeting in Moscow. Putin reiterated Russia's demand that Israel refrain from providing any weapons to Ukraine.

But Israel's concern for the safety of Ukraine's Jewish communities and of Israelis stranded in the war, was also addressed.


Melanie Phillips: Israelis be warned: Ukraine shows how Biden treats friends
Israel’s former prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, used a virtual megaphone to go over the heads of the Obama administration and warn the American people of the dangers of that Iran deal.

Bennett thinks that didn’t work because Obama went ahead anyway; Netanyahu merely became a bogeyman for the Obama administration and Israel suffered as a result.

But Obama was no friend of Israel. He would have done that 2015 deal and been just as hostile, even if Netanyahu had remained silent.

Bennett and other Israeli top brass believe Donald Trump’s re-imposition of sanctions didn’t work either, because Iran wasn’t put back in its box.

Wrong again. Sanctions actually put Iran under enormous pressure. But from halfway through Trump’s presidency, the expectation that he would lose the next election threw the regime a lifeline, since the Democrats said repeatedly they intended to return to the deal.

Now Bennett’s silence over the new Iran deal means that the American public has no idea how lethal it is. So there’s no pressure on Congress to oppose it. After all, American politicians can’t be more Zionist than the Israeli government.

The shameful fact is that anything Netanyahu did, Bennett won’t do. Bennett has turned Israel into a US vassal by ignoring warnings not to allow himself to become co-opted into Biden’s Iran policy.

Ukraine is a red flag for Israel. Aside from the belated sanctions and military aid, the West has done little more than wring its hands.

Biden’s muddled comment last week that “no-one expected the sanctions to prevent anything from happening” to Ukraine suggested that the US wrote off that country long ago. The suspicion is that it has done the same with Israel over Iran.

The fate of Ukraine tells us that Israel will have to fight its existential foe in Tehran alone.
Richard Kemp: A Plan for Peace in Europe
[Putin] is now also demanding the nuclear disarming of Europe.

Putin's next targets could be Moldova or the Baltic states which, like Ukraine, he reportedly considers illegitimate and properly part of Russia's sphere. If further suffering and bloodshed are to be avoided, the West must do all it can to ensure his current aggression fails.

To halt Putin's broader ambitions, it is also essential that NATO keep the Ukrainian army fighting and that includes financing the war effort and getting lethal weapons and military equipment to Ukrainian forces.

Russia must be isolated and turned into an international pariah not just while Putin's army is assaulting Ukraine but for as long as necessary. These actions will inflict damage on us as well, as Russia retaliates with its own sanctions and restrictions. The short term pain can be ameliorated in the medium term by eliminating dependence on Russian energy, increasing gas supplies from North Africa, the Adriatic and the Mediterranean. Also by reopening in the United States the world's largest supply of energy, which President Joe Biden began closing down his first day in office, and by fracking and building nuclear power plants.

The development of our cyber defences, as well as offensive capabilities must be accelerated urgently and intelligence services expanded to counter and inflict severe damage to Russian espionage agencies.

Some argue that punitive Western moves will drive Russia into China's arms. It is already there: Russia is the biggest single recipient of Chinese financial support globally, and Putin and Xi have established a military alliance.

Where Putin demands that NATO pull back, it should push forward. Some may see this as provocative, but it is in fact a sign of strength which will do more to deter Putin than appeasing him.

[Putin] knows that NATO poses no military threat to Russia and that it is a purely defensive alliance. If it is to restore the credibility it once had, which Biden's Afghanistan debacle did much to undermine, NATO must regain its strength — not only in military power but also the demonstrable political will to use it.

As Israel often reminds us over Iran, if a leader threatens us with annihilation we cannot afford to hope he is not serious. Had the world focused on getting rid of Hitler in the 1930s rather than appeasing him, we may not have seen the horror of a global war that killed 70 million people.

The urgency of a Western message of strength goes even beyond Russia. China's President Xi has greater territorial ambitions than Putin, and they are being played out today in every continent around the world. Xi's Ukraine is Taiwan, and it may be that visiting catastrophe on Russia's dictator will deter his friend in Beijing.
Putin and the Law of Unintended Consequences
The most striking illustration of this so far is the debunking of Putin's brazen claim that there is not and has never been a Ukrainian nation and that Ukraine is nothing but Russia misspelled. Putin insisted that Ukraine was nothing but a creation of Lenin, ignoring the fact that it was Lenin who signed away Ukraine to the Germans in the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk.

Ukrainians have suddenly realized that looking east towards Russia means suffering invasion and colonization, while looking west towards Europe could mean freedom and prosperity... Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky was reflecting his people's wishes when he asked for immediate membership in the European Union.

The current crisis, however, showed that the Europeans can take the lead in being much tougher than the Americans under the risk-averse Joe Biden.

For 20 years, the Putin wolf played grandmother in disguise. That disguise enabled him to get away with invading Georgia, dominating Belarus, massacring Syrians, propelling the mullahs of Tehran, annexing Crimea, taking joyrides in various parts of Africa, poisoning people in Europe, and trying to disrupt elections in several countries through cyber-attacks. All that time, almost a quarter of his income came from oil and gas sales to Western democracies -- oil and gas produced thanks to Western capital, technology, management and marketing.


Israel to set up field hospital in Ukraine: Watch
Israel will set up a field hospital in Ukraine next week, according to the country’s Health Ministry.

“This is the least we can do to help the Ukrainian people in the face of a brutal Russian invasion,” Health Minister Nitzan Horowitz said on Sunday morning during a visit to the Sheba Medical Center at Tel Hashomer, where the components of the field hospital are being prepared.

The hospital is being built through a collaboration between the state, Sheba and HMO Clalit Health Services, and will be staffed by their own personnel and that of other Israeli hospitals.

It will include an internal-medicine ward for adults and children, an emergency room, delivery room and primary-care clinic, the ministry said. It will also use advanced remote telemedicine technologies spearheaded by Sheba.

Israel prepares a field hospital to be sent to Ukraine. Credit: Israeli Health Ministry.

“It is our moral duty to increase humanitarian aid and extend assistance to the people of Ukraine,” said Horowitz. “We will continue to help as much as necessary to save the lives of citizens whose worlds have been destroyed in an instant,” he added.
UN: 1.5 million Ukrainians in ‘fastest growing refugee crisis in Europe since WWII’
The number of people fleeing Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has topped 1.5 million, making it Europe’s fastest-growing refugee crisis since World War II, the United Nations said on Sunday.

“More than 1.5 million refugees from Ukraine have crossed into neighboring countries in 10 days,” the UN High Commissioner for Refugees tweeted.

The UN described the outflow as “the fastest-growing refugee crisis in Europe since World War II,” having reported on Saturday that nearly 1.37 million refugees had fled.

UN officials said they expected the wave to intensify further as the Russian army pressed its offensive, particularly toward the capital Kyiv.

Since Russia invaded on February 24, a total of 922,400 people have fled Ukraine to Poland, Polish border guards said Sunday.

Hungary, Moldova, Romanian and Slovakia have also seen Ukrainian refugees arrive.

The World Health Organization said meanwhile that signs of attacks on health centers in Ukraine were increasing, which it said amounts to a violation of medical neutrality and international humanitarian law.
90 Jewish orphans who fled Ukraine greeted by Bennett, ministers at airport
Prime Minister Naftali Bennett and other cabinet ministers were on hand at Ben Gurion Airport Sunday to greet a group of 90 Jewish orphans who fled Ukraine after Russia invaded last month.

El Al, Israel’s largest airline, said the flight was part of a special operation to rescue some 300 Jews from the fighting in Ukraine.

The airline said Ukrainian-speaking staff were on board the flight to assist. Some of the orphans have family members who are still in fighting areas, it added.

Bennett, who was accompanied by Immigration Minister Pnina Tamano-Shata, entered the aircraft to welcome the children, introducing himself to one boy by saying, “I am Naftali, prime minister of Israel. Would you like to come into Israel?”

“We are now seeing children immigrating to Israel. It is the most moving thing there is,” Bennett told media at the bottom of the steps from the plane as the children disembarked.

He later tweeted that he had told the children, “You are safe now, you have reached safe shores.”
Ukraine says second evacuation attempt from Mariupol halted, blames Russian shelling
Plans to evacuate civilians from a besieged port city in Ukraine failed to materialize Sunday for the second time along with an expected Russian ceasefire, a Ukrainian official said, as officials tried to persuade Russia to agree on establishing other evacuation routes near Ukraine’s capital.

Residents expected to leave the port city of Mariupol during a 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. local ceasefire, Ukrainian military authorities said earlier in the day. Interior Ministry adviser Anton Gerashchenko said the planned evacuations were halted because of an ongoing assault by Russian troops.

“There can be no ‘green corridors’ because only the sick brain of the Russians decides when to start shooting and at whom,“ Gerashchenko said on Telegram.

During a phone call with French President Emmanuel Macron on Sunday, Russian President Vladimir Putin blamed “Ukrainian nationalists” for the failed civilian evacuations, claiming Kyiv was using the ceasefire to “build up forces and means in their positions,” according to a statement from the Kremlin.

The news dashed hopes of progress in easing, much less ending, the war in Ukraine, which is now in its 11th day and has caused 1.5 million people to flee the country. The head of the UN refugee agency on Sunday called the exodus “the fastest-growing refugee crisis in Europe since World War II.”

The presidents of Turkey and France, as well as Pope Francis, appealed to Putin to negotiate to end the conflict.

Separately, Ukraine’s national security service said Russian forces fired rockets at a physics institute in the city of Kharkiv that contains nuclear material and a reactor. Russian troops already took control of the Zaporizhzhia plant in Ukraine, as well as Chernobyl, the site of the world’s worst nuclear disaster.
China adopts Russia’s ‘denazification’ myth to rationalize invasion of Ukraine
Many countries have roundly rejected Russian President Vladimir Putin’s argument that his attack on Ukraine is needed to achieve the “denazification” of that country. But the argument is alive and well in Chinese state-run media.

“Russian President Vladimir Putin mentioned in a televised speech a few days ago that the military operation against Ukraine is aimed at protecting the people who have suffered abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years. For this reason, Russia will seek to demilitarize and de-Nazify Ukraine,” one article on the state-backed site Wen Wei Po read.

China is in an awkward position as Russia wages its war in Ukraine: Beijing has interests in both Russia and with the West, so it has refrained from antagonizing Putin while also not openly supporting him. The New York Times reported that, behind the scenes, Chinese officials had asked Putin to delay his planned invasion until after the Beijing Olympics. Publicly, Chinese officials have said that China respects Ukraine’s territorial integrity.

Last week, China was one of 35 countries to abstain from a United Nations vote to condemn Russia — placing it well outside the mainstream, but also not in the tiny minority of nations to side with Russia and oppose the resolution.

Chinese media offers another clue about where the government stands on the war Putin started, and on his reasons for starting it. (Chinese news media is subject to heavy government censorship and can be understood as reflecting the official state position.)

Official Chinese news sites have published baseless claims in recent articles claiming that the United States trained Ukrainian neo-Nazis to destabilize Hong Kong during protests there in 2019.


UN rights chief unable to defend appointment of BDS campaigner Navi Pillay to inquiry on Israel
In a UNHRC interactive dialogue today with UN human rights chief Michelle Bachelet, UN Watch’s Hillel Neuer asked her to comment on the appointment of Navi Pillay, who has repeatedly lobbied governments against Israel, as Chair of the new commission of inquiry on Israel. In her reply, delivered after statements by some 40 speakers, Bachelet failed to respond to Neuer’s questions or to defend the appointment of Pillay. See full text below.

Testimony by Hillel Neuer before the United Nations Human Rights Council, March 4, 2022, after a report presented by High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet

High Commissioner, your report is entitled, “The Human rights situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, and the obligation to ensure accountability and justice.”

At page 11, you cite Resolution 30/1, which also speaks of “justice and respect for the rule of law.”

And so today we ask: Do you believe, High Commissioner, that this Council is ensuring justice and the rule of law?

You mention, at paragraph 34, that the Council created a new commission of inquiry in May 2021.

This inquiry is special. It has an unusually broad mandate to investigate all violations connected to the war that month between Hamas and Israel, as well as incidents in Jerusalem in April, and all events leading up to that period, and since.

Second, unlike all previous inquiries, this one has an all-encompassing mandate to investigate the “root causes of current tensions,” including alleged “systematic discrimination” on the basis of race.

Finally, whereas all other inquiries have a defined term—typically for a year, to produce one report—this inquiry on Israel is the only one mandated to report “on an annual basis.” For perpetuity. The size of the inquiry’s budget and staff, costing millions of dollars, is also unprecedented.
Iran has used advanced air defense batteries against Israel in Syria
Iran has used advanced air-defense batteries against Israeli planes carrying out war-between-war operations in Syria in an attempt to challenge IAF pilots.

Tehran first deployed the batteries to Syria last year as Israeli strikes against Iranian weapons and military infrastructure intensified.

Since Israel began its war-between-wars campaign (known as mabam in Hebrew) in 2013, the IAF has carried out thousands of strikes to thwart Iranian entrenchment and the smuggling of advanced weapons to Hezbollah in Syria and Lebanon. According to foreign reports, it has also carried out strikes in Iraq and Yemen.

The Syrian Arab Army is equipped with a range of older Russian-made surface-to-air missile systems, including the SA-2, SA-3, SA-5, SA-6,-SA-8, SA-11, SA-17, SA-19, SA-22 and the Pantsir 1.

Russia has also deployed advanced S-300 and S-400 air-defense batteries but has not given them to the Syrians; instead, they are manned by Russian forces. They have yet to be used against Israeli pilots due in part to the ongoing safety mechanisms in place between Jerusalem and Moscow.

The response time of Syrian SAMs has decreased, and more than 1,000 missiles have been fired at IAF jets over the past seven years, but they have been unable to deter their missions.

Iran also separates the radars of their SAMs from the missile launchers, leading the IAF to change its operational procedures by sending up larger formations to hit more targets at once rather than having jets return to the same target and risk being downed.
Jerusalem Stabbing Attack: Two Officers Wounded, Suspect Shot Dead
Two policemen were lightly to moderately wounded on Sunday during a stabbing attack in Jerusalem’s Old City, the Israel Police said.

The suspected attacker, 19, from East Jerusalem, was shot dead.

The attack took place at the Bab Huta Gate in the Muslim Quarter at around 4:30 am.

The suspect approached police officers stationed at the gate, pulled out a knife, and stabbed one of them, according to police. The officers responded by firing at and neutralizing the suspected terrorist.

Jerusalem District Commander Superintendent Doron Turgeman arrived at the scene of the incident and was conducting a situation assessment.

The wounded officers were evacuated for medical treatment.

A spokeswoman from Hadassah Medical Center, Hadar Elboim, said that one of the wounded officers, 32, was in the trauma unit with injuries to the lower extremity and was in a “light state and fully conscious.”
As Ramadan approaches, Palestinians anticipate more violence
Less than a month before the start of Ramadan, observed by Muslims as a month of fasting, prayer and reflection, a number of Palestinian terrorist groups have called for stepping up attacks on Israel.

Palestinian activists said on Sunday that they expect an increase in violence before and during Ramadan, which begins at the beginning of April.

The activists said that there were a number of reasons why they believed tensions would escalate in the coming weeks, especially in the West Bank and Jerusalem.

The reasons include, among other things, mounting tensions in Israeli prisons, where thousands of Palestinian prisoners are threatening to go on hunger strike in protest of Israeli “repressive” and “punitive” measures; IDF “incursions” into Palestinian cities, villages and refugee camps; house demolitions in Area C of the West Bank and some Arab neighborhoods of Jerusalem; threats to evict families from the Sheikh Jarrah (Shimon Hatzadik) neighborhood and Israeli security measures in the Old City, including the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound.

Some activists said that they are currently making an effort to bring the Palestinian issue back in the focus of the world’s attention in wake of the Russia-Ukraine war.

“We want to make sure that the world does not forget about the Palestinians,” one activist from east Jerusalem told The Jerusalem Post. “In the past year, we managed to attract a lot of attention because of the Gaza war and the protests in Sheikh Jarrah.”
PMW: PLO renounces all agreements with Israel
Speaking after the recent meeting of the Palestinian National Council (PNC), its Deputy Chairman Ali Faisal clarified that there is a binding Palestinian decision to “renounce… all agreements with Israel.” He added that from the point of view of the Palestinian leadership, the Palestinians “have entered a path of resistance in all its forms” – a term that clearly includes the use of violence and terror.

Palestinian National Council Deputy Chairman Ali Faisal: “The decision of the [Palestinian] National Council was a recommendation to the [PLO] Central Council to renounce all the commitments of the Oslo Accords and stop the security coordination [with Israel]. Now there is a binding decision. The Central Council decided to renounce the commitments of all the agreements with the State of Israel, whether by the PLO or the PA. Currently we are outside the path of Oslo, the security coordination, and the economic Paris Agreement (see note below -Ed.), and we have entered a path of resistance in all its forms and a realization of sovereignty.”

[Official PA TV, From Beirut, Feb. 18, 2022]

To understand the ostensible importance of this statement, it is necessary to explain what the PNC is and what authority it carries.

Constitutionally, the PNC is the highest authority in the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and is responsible for formulating its policies and programs.

The PLO Central Council was established by the 11th PNC meeting, in January 1973, as a legislative organ to function when the PNC is not in session and to follow up and implement its resolutions. Its members are drawn from the PNC (including the entire PLO Executive Committee) and it is chaired by the PNC president.

The Executive Committee is the PLO’s primary executive organ, its “cabinet,” and represents the organization internationally. The Executive Committee answers to the PNC.

In other words, the PNC is the primary and most senior organ of the PLO. Its decisions are binding on the entire organization.
PMW: Palestinian psychologist on how to explain why Israel doesn’t release terrorist fathers
Tell kids “Israelis are evil” - Palestinian psychologist on how to explain why Israel doesn’t release terrorist fathers [Official PA TV, How Will I Answer Them?, Feb. 20, 2022]

Treatment and Rehabilitation Center for Victims of Torture, Psychologist Khader Rasras: “We can explain to [the prisoner’s child] what it means that your father can’t leave prison. Like sometimes I [as your mother] don’t let you leave the house. But I don’t let you leave the house because I love you and am concerned about you. [The Israelis] don’t let him leave because they are evil. They do not respect people's rights, or human rights in general.”




David Collier: How an undercover activist exposed London’s Jew-hating elites
‘Keyboard Warrior’ – How an undercover activist exposed London’s Jew-hating elites – repost from Mishpacha Magazine

Not all he seemed
It was a remote place to pick for a high-level strategy meeting. In late 2016, a group of activists made their way to a building on an industrial estate in west London, climbed a staircase to the second floor, and seated themselves around a few tables.

The group was a Who’s Who of the anti-Israel movement in the BDS capital of the world. Just a few months before the centenary of the Balfour Declaration — and mere miles from where British foreign secretary Arthur Balfour had written his historic letter of support for Zionism — the activists were planning to mark the occasion with a new offensive against Israel.

All except one of the assembled. Despite his kaffiyeh, BDS badges, and regular appearances on London’s pro-Palestinian scenes, “John” Collier was not all he seemed.

That’s because his real name was David, he was actually a pro-Israel investigative blogger, and he was wired up with recording devices to share details of the meeting with the world.

“I sat next to one of the key figures in the movement talking about strategy,” recalls David Collier from the comfort of his North London home, “and suddenly it occurred to me that here I was in the belly of the beast, and that if they found out, I would be in real trouble.”

Six years later, with Amnesty International — a UK heavyweight in the anti-Israel world — releasing a report accusing Israel of apartheid, Collier connects the dots between that meeting and London’s status as BDS capital of the world.

The gathering at the industrial estate was just one of a steady stream of stories about the anti-Israel scene that Collier reported. His painstakingly researched investigations lit the fuse on the scandal of Corbynite anti-Semitism that blew up in 2018, contributing to the Labour Party leader’s downfall the following year.

But as the Amnesty report shows, Britain’s anti-Israel scene is as viciously effervescent as ever. Coming just three years after Jeremy Corbyn’s close brush with power, it raises the question of why one of the most historically tolerant of countries has become a central hub of bigotry.

From close encounters with the mix of hard-left and Islamist activists who drive the BDS campaigns, Collier has the answer: It’s a “Red-Green” coalition, or Britain’s history of socialism colliding with failed policies on representation of Muslim communities.

David Collier has an academic background, but he’s also a fighter. Now too well-known to his foes to report from the trenches, his blog and social media accounts are the conduit for a torrent of lacerating reportage and commentary trawled from the cesspools of the anti-Israel ecosystem. His language is combative — “the enemy,” he calls his foes, “hateful anti-Semites.”
Nick Cave responds to “double standard” criticism over Palestine views after cancelling Ukraine gigs
Nick Cave has responded to criticism over his views on Palestine after cancelling forthcoming gigs in Russia and Ukraine.

Earlier this week (March 1), Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds announced that they had cancelled their scheduled concerts in Russia and Ukraine this summer due to Vladimir Putin’s invasion, saying: “Ukraine, we stand with you.”

In a post on his Red Hand Files website, Cave responded to a fan criticising him for cancelling these gigs, but refusing to do so with shows in Israel back in 2017, when he went ahead with shows and told local press that doing so would be a defiant statement against anyone “who tries to censor and silence musicians”.
....
In response, Cave wrote: Dear Ahmet. There is little I can disagree with in your letter, other than to say that the invasion of Ukraine by Russia is simply not the same thing as the ongoing conflict between Israel and Palestine; one is a brutal unprovoked attack on one state by another, in the hope of revising the entire security structure of Europe, and the other is a deeply complex clash of two nations that is far from straightforward. What the two conflicts do share is the tragic fate of all innocents who must cower in bomb shelters in fear of their lives, and I sympathise deeply with all such communities wherever — and whoever — they are.

“With respect, I do not wish to repeat my views on Israel/Palestine but with regards to showing my support to the Palestinian people, perhaps you should know that over the last twenty years I have taken part in several events to raise money for schools within their communities. But this is not the time for these debates, Ahmet. This is the time to unite in unequivocal support and love for the people of Ukraine.”

Cave added: “Right now, a catastrophe is unfolding and I stand with all Ukrainians at this horrific moment in history. I would like nothing more than to play in Kyiv and I was very much looking forward to our show there. I also have some wonderful fans in Russia and I know, through these very Files, that many people there vehemently oppose the actions of Putin’s regime. If I could play for those people too, I would.

“At this time let us just stand together with the people of Ukraine, and all those who cherish freedom and principles of national self-determination and want to live in peace and security with their neighbours.”


BBC report on Ukraine refugees omits Israel information
Some 200,000 people in Ukraine are eligible for immigration to Israel according to officials and those arriving in the country will be recognised as refugees fleeing a war zone and hence entitled to a government grant.

Some two thousand people have already made their way to Israel and three flights carrying new immigrants from Ukraine, including 100 orphans, are due to arrive on March 6th.

“Hundreds of Ukrainian Jews fleeing the ongoing war will land in Israel at the beginning of next week, the Jewish Agency for Israel said Wednesday.

The refugees will immigrate to Israel on three separate flights, leaving from Poland, Moldova and Romania.

They will reach Israel on Sunday. […]

“[Ministry of Immigration and Absorption] teams will provide each immigrant with an extended benefits package and will arrange temporary housing in hotels across the country,” the Jewish Agency said.”

Notably, the BBC’s report on refugees from Ukraine and where they are going does not provide worldwide audiences with any information about the Israeli aspect of that story.
Lior Raz: 'Fauda can build bridges in the Middle East'
Lior Raz! Even his name sounds rugged. There he is, in my kitchen; the star and co-creator of the hit Netflix series, Fauda. Even on Zoom he oozes testosterone. He’s just come from rehearsals for series four of Fauda. Unshaven, in a plain black T shirt, in a day of pretty boy film stars, Raz is unforgivingly masculine. A deep scar on his forehead, thanks to a car crash when he was younger, gives him an almost roguish air. He’s passionate and articulate. When he smiles – say when he’s talking about his wife and children — he’s almost like a little boy, a tad cheeky. It’s easy to see why he’s also achieved heartthrob status. But mention this and he laughs, loudly.

“If I am a sex symbol, every man on earth can be! I’m just an ordinary, bald, 50-year-old rough guy!”

He’s match-fit now, but admits he put on 15lb during lockdown. He blames baking. “I gave up smoking,” he says. “I baked everything. Cinnamon buns, cakes, amazing bread. I fell in love with dough and made love with it every day.” Oo-er.

But he’s back in front of the camera. Filming schedules for the fourth season of Fauda have had to be rejigged at the last minute, because Ukraine was due to be a location. Instead, the team is heading for Budapest for two weeks at the end of March.

Raz won’t reveal anything else about the fourth season, other than to say it’s set in many locations, including for the first time in Europe.

He adds, with that same disarming smile: “I could tell you more, but then I would have to kill you.”






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