Wednesday, February 22, 2023

02/22 Links Pt2: Ilan Ramon and the Words That Soared; The Arab Revolt against the British That Created the Israel-Palestinian Conflict; NYT Wins Award for Debunked Anti-Jewish Hit Piece

From Ian:

The Arab Revolt against the British That Created the Israel-Palestinian Conflict
For three years before World War II, Palestinian Arabs attacked Jews and fought against British rule—leaving roughly 500 Jews and 250 British dead. Oren Kessler, the author of a new book on the episode, explains how it laid the groundwork for much of what has transpired since then:

The Great Revolt of 1936 to 1939 was the crucible in which Palestinian identity coalesced. It united rival families, urban and rural, rich and poor, in a single struggle against a common foe: the Jewish national enterprise—Zionism—and its midwife the British empire. A six-month general strike, one of the longest anywhere in modern history, roused Arabs and Muslims worldwide to the Palestine cause.

Yet the revolt would ultimately turn on itself. A convulsion of infighting and score-settling shred the Arab social fabric, sidelined pragmatists for extremists, and propelled tens of thousands of refugees out of the country. British forces did the rest, seizing arms, occupying cities, and waging a counterinsurgency. . . . When the dust cleared, at least 5,000—perhaps more than 8,000—Arabs were dead, of whom at least 1,500 likely fell at Arab hands. More than 20,000 were seriously wounded. Arab Palestine’s fighting capacity was debilitated, its economy gutted, its leaders—above all, Grand Mufti Amin al-Husseini—banished.

The revolt to end Zionism had instead crushed the Arabs themselves, leaving them crippled in facing the Jews’ own drive for statehood a decade on. . . . To the Jews the insurgency would leave a very different inheritance. It was then Zionist leaders began to abandon illusions over Arab acquiescence, to confront the unnerving prospect that fulfilling their dreams of sovereignty might mean forever clinging to the sword.
Phyllis Chesler: No one wants to hear this
Today, someone sent me an article about Iran’s plans to target Jewish leaders around the world if Israel dares attack Iran.The person who sent it my way is now worried. “What can we do?”

Yesterday, another person kept asking me: “What should we do, what can we do?”

“To stop Iran from “mapping” Jewish leaders everywhere or to educate all those, especially in the West, who might be pleased that Iran might do this?”

Merely rhetorical questions.

And so, rather recently, and rather suddenly, at least these two Jews were concerned with the lethal lies, the propaganda, that has now succeeded in turning what seems to be the entire world against the Jews and against Jewish Israel—aka, allegedly, the “Nazi, apartheid” state, the Jew of the world.

They are waking up—but do not know what to do. At least they understand that such hatred has always led to the humiliation and segregation of individual Jews, especially students and professors; to physical attacks against visible Jews globally; to the desecration and bombing of Jewish synagogues, cemeteries, schools, and centers; and, eventually, to all-out Jihad-style pogroms against Israeli civilians which consist of stabbing, car-ramming, shooting, exploding rockets, fire-kites, bombing, etc.

I don’t want to demoralize those new to the fight, but I also won’t lie.

I, and a handful of precious others, have been trying to warn Jewish and Israeli civilians, academics, human rights activists, friends, the heads of Jewish organization, UN personnel, European NGOS, anti-Islamist Muslims, about what Jew hatred is and what it does. For this, I (and others) have been dis-invited, denounced, defamed—or never even invited. Still, we all kept trying.


German Politicians Step Up Demand for Cancelation of ‘Antisemitic’ Roger Waters Concert Tour
A cross-party group of politicians on the Cologne City Council have united to demand the cancelation of a forthcoming concert in the German city by Roger Waters, the former Pink Floyd vocalist who has embroiled himself in a series of scandals over his allegedly antisemitic outbursts and his sympathy for Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.

In an open letter released on Tuesday, the Cologne politicians declared that “there must be no room for antisemitic content on our stages.”

The letter noted that this was “especially true in times when there are more antisemitic attacks, including in Cologne.” Last October, data gathered by the German Federal Criminal Police Office revealed that an average of five antisemitic outrages were reported every day during 2022, continuing the trend of rising levels of Jew-hatred registered in previous years.

Initiated by the left-wing Green Party, the letter demanding the cancelation of Waters’ May 9 concert at Cologne’s Lanxess Arena was signed by representatives of the center-right CDU and FDP parties, the center-left SPD Party and the liberal, pan-European Volt Party.

The letter boosts earlier calls from Jewish and pro-Israel organizations to nix Waters’ performance, among them the German-Israeli Friendship Society and the Cologne Society for Christian-Jewish Cooperation.

Waters has established himself as one of the most visible supporters of the campaign to subject the State of Israel to a regime of “boycotts, divestment and sanctions (BDS)” as a prelude to its elimination as a sovereign state. Waters’ concerts have included antisemitic motifs, such as a Star of David embossed on a pig, while he has made incendiary comments in a number of media interviews about the alleged power of the “Jewish lobby” in the US and Israel’s supposed program of “genocide” targeting the Palestinians.


Israel supporters hail Supreme Court ruling as validation of anti-BDS laws’ constitutionality
The U.S. Supreme Court declined on Tuesday to hear an appeal against an Arkansas anti-BDS law.

Some Israel supporters say it’s a conclusive victory for the legality of such laws, now in effect in over 30 states. Critics argue that the fight will go on, in an effort to force the high court to hear the appeal or to pressure state governments to more narrowly tailor legislation.

The Supreme Court turned back an appeal from the editor of the Arkansas Times, Alan Leveritt, after a federal appeals court upheld a state law requiring him to sign a pledge not to boycott Israel in order to qualify for advertising contracts from a state university. The Times was represented by the ACLU, which has taken up the mantle in a number of similar cases across the country.

A June decision by the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals stands as a result of the Supreme Court’s decision.

That 9-1 ruling in the case of Arkansas Times LP v. Waldrip reversed a ruling by a three-judge panel that the law was unconstitutional. It is the first full federal appeals court ruling on state anti-BDS laws.


"South African Activist Dramatically Changes Life After Not Finding ‘Black Only’ Restrooms in Israel"
Desperate to find a restroom after a nearly nine-hour flight from Johannesburg, South African university student Klaas Mokgomole grabbed his carry-on and hurried off the plane.

Urgently searching out a gate agent at Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion International Airport and praying that the man understood English, Mokgomole asked, sincerely, “Can you please show me to the blacks only restroom?”

The agent’s eyes widened in disbelief. He told Mokgomole in no uncertain terms that he never heard of such a thing and pointed him to a nearby bathroom.

That’s when it was Mokgomole’s turn to be confused.

Mokgomole — then a South African university student and outspoken youth leader of the anti-Israel, Boycott, Divest, Sanction (BDS) movement — stood in the busy airport restroom dumbfounded as Jews and Arabs went in and out. They would have been oblivious to the transformation taking place as they stepped around him on that day in July 2015.

Recalling that seminal moment, Mokgomole explained to the Tazpit Press Service during a recent visit to Jerusalem, “I was taught very emphatically, racism in Israel runs so deep, that the Jews do not even share their toilets with blacks or Arabs.”

“To see within the first few moments after landing in Israel that this clearly is not the case marked a turning point for me,” he told TPS.

His curiosity sparked, Mokgomole began what would become a transformational journey from virulent anti-Israel activist to passionate peacemaker and bridge-builder between Israel and the rest of the world.


PodCast: How Rising Antisemitism Impacts Jews on College Campuses
Unpack the findings from AJC's State of Antisemitism in America Report 2022 on young U.S. Jews, including those on college campuses, with the Senior Director of AJC’s Alexander Young Leadership Department, Meggie Wyschogrod Fredman. We also hear from Northwestern University student Lily Cohen, whose efforts to encourage constructive dialogue following a disturbing antisemitic encounter on her college campus has sparked hostility, friendship, and above all, a renewed sense of Jewish pride.
Antisemitism activists crowdfunding to fight lawsuit after Twitter argument
Jewish antisemitism campaigners Edward Cantor and James Mendelsohn have launched a crowdfunding campaign to raise money to fight a lawsuit brought following a social media argument two years ago.

James Wilson, a qualified solicitor, is suing the pair after a Twitter dispute about the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism in which the defendants shared a Facebook post referencing Mr Wilson, which he says amounts to libel, harassment, breach of data protection and invasion of privacy.

Mr Cantor and Mr Mendelsohn are currently crowdfunding £8,000 to fight the case at trial, although they are anticipating needing more than £150,000 in total.

The case centres on a Facebook post shared by a woman in December 2018, named in court as Ms K (a false name to protect her identity). She wrote that Mr Wilson was a “weirdo” and a “freak” after he allegedly banged on her car window and took photos of her and her daughter for leaving her car running.

According to court documents, the post was deleted, but it had been screenshotted by Mr Mendelsohn and was shared on Twitter by the defendants in the course of their online debate.

At a Trial of Preliminary Issue in March last year, Richard Spearman KC, sitting as a deputy High Court Judge, ruled that “the use of the words ‘weirdo’ and ‘freak’ do not connote an allegation of paedophilia,” as had been alleged by Mr Wilson.


Simon Sebag Montefiore (letter): Do not forget Jeremy Corbyn’s failure on antisemitism
Like many other people, particularly my fellow Jews, I was surprised, dismayed and disappointed by your editorial. It is extraordinary that the Guardian should devote a formal editorial to defending Jeremy Corbyn only three years after his toxic crankery led to the unprecedented shame of an Equality and Human Rights Commission investigation into racism in the Labour party – and a Tory landslide. That investigation, as well as Corbyn’s apparent affection for murderous dictatorships in Russia, Syria and Iran, repelled many Labour voters but also alarmed most British Jews.

With craven bad faith, the editorial criticises Corbyn with faint fault then praises him on the very grounds for which he was so widely and rightly rejected by decent people. To celebrate his “formidable record fighting against racism” and “speaking up for many persecuted peoples” masks both the extreme selectivity of those stands and Corbyn’s strange affinity for repressive, bigoted regimes and organisations. It also shows contempt for the EHRC, which found the party responsible for “unlawful acts of harassment and discrimination”, not to speak of Labour MPs like Luciana Berger and many Jewish members who found the environment so hostile that they left the party.

To suggest his sole fault was that he was “too slow and too defensive” would be laughable if it was not so deliberately dishonest. Worst of all, the editorial implies that antisemitism is something other than racism. In doing so, it makes light of centuries of anti-Jewish racism. It is almost as if your editorial was carefully crafted to hurt Jewish people. If this genuinely reflects the policy of the Guardian and the Scott Trust, this is a heartbreaking moment in the history of a newspaper that was once the champion of equal rights and liberal values.


Chris Williamson's parliamentary pass taken away by MPs
Disgraced former Labour MP Chris Williamson has lost his access to Parliament after a committee of MPs reviewed his security pass at a hearing earlier today.

His pass has been revoked until further notice due to his links with the Iranian-regime backed Press TV.

Concerns were raised about Williamson, the MP for Derby North from 2017 to 2019, holding a security pass to access the heart of power in the UK due to his position as a presenter of a show on Iranian state TV, MailOnline reported.

Williamson, a vocal supporter and ally of former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, was one of more than 300 former MPs that hold passes giving them access to Parliament.

The 66-year-old former MP has been hosting a show on Iran's Press TV - whose UK broadcast licence was revoked in 2012 - alongside sacked Bristol University professor David Miller since early last year.

The show, entitled 'Palestine Declassified', claims to provide "an in-depth look at the Palestine issue". However, the Community Security Trust's Dave Rich told the JC earlier this year: "Palestine Declassified is a litany of antisemitic conspiracy theories and stereotypes that has attacked Jewish schools, youth movements, interfaith groups, charities, academics and now even Jewish comedians.

"It is absurd, but also harmful, and brings shame on anyone associated with it."

The CST was forced to give security advice to Jewish schools after an episode last year that claimed that British children are being “indoctrinated”.

Williamson's Twitter account was labelled as "Iran state-affiliated media" last year, a designation he vehemently disputes.


East Bay high school teacher called out for antisemitic lessons
Students in 10th grade at a Hayward high school were given antisemitic conspiracy material by their English teacher, who on numerous occasions also made the “Heil Hitler” salute, students say.

Henry Bens, a teacher at Mt. Eden High School, introduced a required unit on the Holocaust memoir “Night,” by Elie Weisel, by handing out photocopies of a pamphlet called “The Hidden Tyranny” and asking students to annotate and mark the text, J. has learned.

“The Hidden Tyranny,” subtitled “the Satanic Power which Promotes and Directs Chaos in Order to Lay Low All Civilization in Preparation for a Well-Outlined Plan for World Dictatorship,” purports to expose Jewish secrets for world domination by explaining how Jews manipulated U.S. politicians into working for their benefit.

Students say Bens told his classes that the truth had been hidden from them and that he was helping them “remove the blindfold.”

“His reasoning for teaching it was because he was like, oh, you guys are indoctrinated,” sophomore Jolene Sa told J.

Fellow English teacher Heather Eastwood learned of the material when Bens handed a copy of the text to a colleague, she said. She told J. she was appalled.

“This is something that was written as hate speech, and it continues to be hate speech,” she said.

Eastwood and several colleagues immediately reported the material to the school administration and the Anti-Defamation League, which often works with schools on education around antisemitism.


HR Success: SBS Australia Deletes Biased News Podcast, Takes ‘Appropriate Measures’ Against Hate Journalist
HonestReporting’s efforts to promote integrity and fairness in media coverage of Israel continue to produce far-reaching results across the globe.

On February 1, 2023, we drew attention to a news podcast published by Australia’s publicly-funded Special Broadcasting Service (SBS). We noted, among other examples of bias, that SBS failed to make clear that a Palestinian who was shot by Israeli forces had attempted to carry out a terrorist attack.

Upon further inspection, HonestReporting discovered that SBS journalist Essam Al-Ghalib had once tweeted “#F*ckIsrael” and called the Jewish state “the BIGGEST terrorist in the world.” Al-Ghalib moreover described IDF troops as “bloody murderers” and claimed Jerusalem put Palestinians in “concentration camps” — shocking, nauseating charges that would be considered antisemitic under the widely-adopted International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) working definition.

With the help of Peter Wertheim, co-chief executive of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry, we filed a formal complaint under the SBS Code of Practice while simultaneously asking the broadcaster if Al-Ghalib could be trusted to report on the Arab-Israeli conflict without bias or agenda.

This week, SBS Ombudsman Amy Stockwell upheld HonestReporting’s complaint, assuring us in writing that steps have been taken to prevent future instances of anti-Israel bias:
SBS apologises for the breach of Code 3.3.1 (Balanced and impartial news and current affairs). The Director of News and Current Affairs has spoken with the relevant team to remind them about the criticality of a clear and balanced presentation of issues and events, including through the provision [of] relevant and material viewpoints. Additional training will be provided. I am advised the podcast has been removed [link].”

Meanwhile, SBS launched an internal investigation into Al-Ghalib’s hateful tweets, during which he was forced to stand down from his duties. On Wednesday, an SBS spokesperson confirmed to HonestReporting that, while the reporter was allowed to return to work, “appropriate measures have been taken to manage this issue”:
New York Times Wins Award for Debunked Anti-Jewish Hit Piece
The New York Times announced Monday that it won a George Polk Award for its “news report” about Hasidic Yeshivas, which was exposed to have been part of a political operation targeting the religious group, through an investigation published by Breitbart.

The Times bragged on its website how its report that “exposed how private schools in New York’s Hasidic Jewish community were failing to provide students with an adequate education, despite receiving more than a quarter of a billion dollars in public funds annually,” was given the once-prestigious award.

However, the Times story — alleging Hasidic students “[know] nothing” and grow up “barely [able] to support their own families” — was revealed to have been carefully curated by omitting relevant information, shunning sources directly involved with the schools, and declining to publish pertinent on-the-record statements, producing a weapon used by secular political interest groups to attack the pious community’s most sacred institutions.

The Times apparently timed its story to coincide with a Board of Regents vote to regulate the religious schools, and amid the public pressure, the board unanimously decided to impose state edicts on the schools to control curricula.

But Breitbart learned the Times did not establish communication relevant to reporting with at least two schools the story is based on — titled, “In Hasidic Enclaves, Failing Private Schools Flush With Public Money” — until days before publication, with request for comment on the final product over a year in the making. Breitbart identified two instances of relevant sources to the story speaking to the Times and having their statements disregarded. Breitbart also learned of one instance where the Times accused two schools of the same claim of corporal punishment, and two instances where request for comment was responded to but never published.

Breitbart reviewed correspondence between the Times and teachers and administrators from various Hasidic Yeshivas from different sects, reviewed class work from a Hasidic Yeshiva, a breakdown of public funding for a Hasidic Yeshiva, and public data, showing the Times obfuscated information to produce a broad story with little bearing on the complex facts of what it was talking about.

The Polk award — a once-distinguished honor — has become somewhat of a corporate media participation ribbon for producing machine propaganda.
BBC’s Knell dusts off the calendarial overlap excuse for violence
As ever she refrains from informing BBC audiences that increased violence during the month of Ramadan is the product of incitement and pre-planned acts of violence rather than some mere calendarial coincidence.

In paragraph three of her report Knell states that “Palestinian leaders are being heavily criticised for agreeing to the withdrawal of a UN Security Council resolution on settlements”. She later devotes five paragraphs to uncritical amplification of such criticism from Hamas, Mustafa Barghouti and a semi-anonymous Twitter user.

Knell closes her report with standard framing of the two-state solution which as ever whitewashes the fact that not only can the Palestinians not present a united leadership to negotiate such an agreement with Israel, but that the more popular faction is a widely-designated terrorist organisation that opposes existing agreements, dismisses the idea of a two-state solution and rejects Israel’s very right to exist.

“Palestinians seek an independent Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza, with East Jerusalem as their capital – all territories that were captured by Israel in the 1967 Middle East War.

This is the basis of the long-time, internationally-backed, formula for peace known as the two-state solution.”

Equally predictable is Knell’s failure to provide her readers with any information about the status of the “territories that were captured by Israel in the 1967 Middle East War” before they were invaded by Egypt and Jordan nineteen years earlier. And so, in what has become standard BBC practice, history begins in June 1967 and readers are told nothing about the inclusion of those areas in the Mandate for Palestine or the illegal Jordanian occupation of territory to which the Palestinians only laid claim (see Article 24) after the Six Day War.

Despite the BBC’s public purposes obligations to its funding public, coverage of Israeli and Palestinian affairs continues to be framed in a manner which, while promoting talking points such as ‘settlements’ as the prime obstacle to a peaceful resolution to the conflict, portrays the Palestinian side of the equation as entirely lacking agency or responsibility.


Actor Ben Platt Calls Out ‘Evil’ Antisemitic Protesters Outside Debut of His Broadway Play About Lynched Jewish Man Leo Frank
Tony award-winning actor Ben Platt took to social media to address antisemitic protesters who gathered on Tuesday night outside the first preview performance of the Broadway revival of Parade, which is about the true story of Jewish businessman Leo Frank who was lynched in Georgia in the early 20th century.

The Jewish actor, who plays the lead role in the Broadway musical, condemned the “ugly actions of a few spreading evil” outside the Bernard B. Jacobs Theatre in New York City.

In a video shared on Twitter from the scene, one protester asked patrons standing outside the theater on Tuesday night, “You want the truth about who you’re going to see tonight? You’re paying $300 to go f*** worship a pedophile, you might as well know what you’re talking about.” Another is heard saying, “Romanticizing pedophiles, wow, Leo Frank.” According to Broadway World, protesters also chanted, “[Leo Frank is] a Jewish pedophile” while the flier protesters were trying to hand out to patrons referenced neo-Nazi and antisemitic hate groups.

In a video posted on Instagram, Platt, 29, began by saying that the evening was “so wonderful and special” and shared gratitude for the show’s cast and crew members. He continued: “Then I got offstage and was looking at social media, and naturally the news of the fact that there were some protesters at our show has spread a lot, and that has kind of [been] the stamp on the evening, in terms of the public perception of the evening.”

Platt further criticized the “neo-Nazi protesters from a really disgusting group outside of the theater, bothering some of our patrons on their way in and saying antisemitic things about Leo Frank, who the show is about, and just spreading antisemitic rhetoric that led to this whole story in the first place.”


Unpacking the antisemitic shootings in Los Angeles
I had a humorous column prepared for this week. It had even been edited. But then, an antisemite decided to play “Shoot the Jew” in my Los Angeles neighborhood.

At least, that’s the name I’m using for his violent actions. In a recorded interview with law enforcement, Jaime Tran said he searched for Jews on the street based on their “head gear.” He found his first victim on Feb., then returned less than 24 hours later to the same neighborhood and shot his second victim. Fortunately, both victims survived.

I knew I couldn’t publish my original column for this week, which described the ups and downs of my recent Hawaiian vacation. If it had been printed now, I would have been the first to accuse myself of being fantastically tone deaf.

Instead, I knew I had to write about the shootings in Pico-Robertson, but there was one problem: What could I possibly add to the conversation? By now, the story has made headlines worldwide. In fact, it’s surreal when relatives in Israel, where there’s currently a new wave of terror from rabid antisemites, send me urgent messages asking if I’m okay in Los Angeles.

But as soon as The Jewish Journal reported last week that Tran had a history of antisemitism, I found a connection with this hate crime that came really close to home: Tran has not only expressed deep hatred of Jews, but he harbors particular hatred for Persian Jews.


Catholic school soccer team that brawled with Jewish school forfeits semifinal
A Catholic high school in Miami forfeited its semifinal game in a state soccer tournament over the weekend, days after players fought in an on-field brawl with a Jewish school’s team.

The Catholic school, however, did not offer additional comment on eyewitness accounts claiming that the fight was fueled by antisemitism.

Archbishop Coleman Carroll High School was set to play in the semifinals on Saturday after beating Scheck Hillel Community School in their regional final on Wednesday. But the school’s players came under scrutiny after video emerged of students and spectators fighting following the game. Some Scheck Hillel parents told local news outlets that students had uttered antisemitic slurs, including “Hitler was right.” Those accounts have not yet been confirmed by either school, by video or by law enforcement.

Comments by athletic director of opposing team
The athletic director of Archbishop Carroll’s slated opponent in Saturday’s semifinal told local news outlets that the school had forfeited following its role in the brawl, but did not provide further details.

Both Sheck Hillel and Archbishop Carroll are still completing their investigations of Wednesday’s fight, a representative for the Catholic school told the Miami Herald. The schools had previously acknowledged the “altercation” and said they had been made aware of reports of antisemitic language. At least one spectator was injured and required medical attention.
Israeli scientists say they cured mice of Alzheimer’s using newly developed molecule
Israeli scientists gave an artificial molecule they invented to 30 mice suffering from Alzheimer’s — and found that all of them recovered, regaining full cognitive abilities.

They stress that this was a small sample of mice and that human testing is far off, but believe the result indicates that within a decade, their synthetic molecule could be developed into a drug for treating the degenerative disease.

The peer-reviewed research, led by neuroscientists from Ben-Gurion University, was recently published in the journal Translational Neurodegeneration.

“We are taking a very different approach than efforts at Alzheimer’s medicines that we have seen so far,” Prof. Varda Shoshan-Barmatz, the lead author, told The Times of Israel. “Most are trying to address plaque that forms in the brain, but we are addressing dysfunction elsewhere. And we’re optimistic. Mice who had Alzheimer’s and received our molecule and then underwent tests had the same cognitive abilities as mice who’d never had Alzheimer’s.”

Interestingly, the molecule appears to have been effective without significantly reducing the amount of plaque, which she thinks indicates that scientists may have been overly fixated on the plaque.

There is scientific literature on the dysfunction of mitochondria among people with Alzheimer’s. Mitochondria are organelles — tiny miniature organs within cells — that provide the cell with power. Scientists believe that when they malfunction and fail to produce the normal quantities of energy, it can lead to cell death, inflammation and reduced immune response.
UAE, Israel unveil joint naval vessel as military ties grow
The United Arab Emirates and Israel on Monday revealed their first jointly created unmanned vessel, illustrating their growing military ties as maritime threats rise in the Gulf region.

The craft, which has advanced sensors and imaging systems and can be used for surveillance, reconnaissance and detecting mines, was unveiled off the coast of Abu Dhabi during the Naval Defense and Maritime Security Exhibition (NAVDEX).

The unmanned surface vessel or USV was created by Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) and Emirati defense consortium EDGE.

The busy Gulf shipping lanes have suffered years of missile and drone attacks blamed on neighbor Iran.

"We are for the first time demonstrating a mutual project that shows the capabilities and strengths of both companies" in securing coastlines and countering mine threats, said Oren Guter, who leads IAI's naval program.

Guter, a former captain in the Israeli navy, said the vessels would counter "threats here in the area" but that the aim was also to deploy them abroad.

IAI was looking to bolster cooperation with the UAE in air defense and hopes to help the wealthy Gulf state improve its naval capabilities, he said.

The UAE and Israel have steadily deepened their military partnership, including defense procurement since they normalized relations in 2020 as part of the U.S.-brokered Abraham Accords.
Israeli delegation to UAE aims to empower, connect women
Sumaiiah Almheiri, the first Emirati women to study in Israel, and Lior Gluska talk about the Friendship League from the UAE, where they are holding a special event to empower and connect women.


India’s Growing Presence in the Middle East
After the recent earthquake in Turkey and Syria, New Delhi rushed to send aid, which included a mobile field hospital fully supplied with medications, equipment, and staff. This response, explain Husain Haqqani and Aparna Pande, signifies not just humanitarian considerations but a desire to become more involved in the Middle East—made evident by a variety of diplomatic moves, among them warming relations with Israel:

India’s objective is to make sure that its interests are not left unguarded because of the vacuum created in the Middle East by Washington’s focus on peer competition with China and on Russia’s actions in Eurasia. The Middle East is a critical source of investment, energy, and remittances for India. The region also shares India’s security concerns, especially about Islamist extremism and terrorism. India wants to be ready to for any fallout from U.S. withdrawal from the greater Middle East.

Around 8.9 million Indians reside in the Gulf, with around 3.4 million in the United Arab Emirates and 2.5 million in Saudi Arabia. Fifty percent of India’s over $80 billion in remittances annually come from the Gulf countries. Trade and investment between India and Middle Eastern countries have grown exponentially over the last decade.

The United Arab Emirates is India’s third-largest global trading partner. Since the signing in 2022 of a Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA), India’s trade with the UAE has increased by over 38 percent to $88 billion. India’s strategic partnership with the UAE is at the heart of I2U2, [a group that also includes the U.S. and Israel].

India has managed good relations with not just the Arab Gulf countries but also with Israel, Turkey, and Iran. Israel is one of the top three suppliers of defense equipment to India, with 43 percent of Israel’s arms exports being sold to India. At the same time, India has been careful not to disrupt its relations with Iran, despite geopolitical challenges.


Film About Widow of German Jewish Painter Max Liebermann in Nazi-Occupied Berlin to Be Released Next Year
The true story about the widow of world-renowned German Jewish impressionist painter Max Liebermann and the difficult decisions she faced while living in Nazi-occupied Germany is the focus of a new film whose North American distribution rights have been acquired by Menemsha Films, The Algemeiner has learned exclusively.

Martha Liebermann — A Stolen Life will be released in theaters in the US and Canada in early 2024 after being shown at international film festivals, according to a representative with Menemsha Films.

Liebermann, best known as a leader of the impressionist art movement in Germany, died in 1935 in Berlin at the age of 88 from natural causes. The film takes place in Berlin in 1943 where Martha, then 85, was forced to decide if she should continue to hope for an exit permit from the Nazis or escape to Switzerland with the help of a German resistance group to avoid being deported to a Nazi concentration camp. The anti-Nazi group was led by Johanna Solf, the wife of a German diplomat.

German actress Thekla Carola Wied plays the titular character in the German-language film, giving a “tour de force performance” that made the project a “must-have” acquisition for Menemsha Films, which has represented five Oscar nominations five years in a row.

The film was directed by Stefan Bühling, with a screenplay from Marco Rossi, and produced by Regina Ziegler and Tillman Geithe through the Germany-based production company Ziegler Film. The project won the award for best TV film and Wied won best actress at the 61st Monte-Carlo Television Festival in June 2022.

“Every producer has a passion project. Martha Liebermann is one for us,” Ziegler and Geithe told The Algemeiner in a joint statement. “First, in our observation, the history of resistance against the Nazi regime is in the public perception almost exclusively a story of men. Yet resistance was also a matter for women. Women resistance fighters acted courageously and imaginatively — by no means merely passively or as moral supporters of their men. In the film Martha Liebermann, it is Johanna Solf and her daughter Lagi von Ballestrem, in addition to several men, who selflessly and boldly risk their lives to save Martha.”


The Jew who saved America in the Revolutionary War
With President;s Day just behind us, it is a good time to learn about a Jew who, while not a president, enabled America's first president to take office in the newly created country called the United States of America.

Heroes of the American Revolutionary War, such as Benjamin Franklin, John Hancock, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Paul Revere, are even familiar to schoolchildren. Yet, most American Jews have never heard of Haym Salomon, a Jew who was a hero of the American Revolution.

Who was Haym Salomon?

Early Years
Haym Salomon was born in Leszno (Lissa), Poland, in 1740 to a Jewish family descended from Spanish and Portuguese Jews. His ancestors had migrated to Poland as a safe haven following the Spanish Inquisition and Expulsion. However, the Jewish villages in Poland were also vulnerable and were attacked on numberous occasions by vicious peasants. When Haym was young, one such pogrom threatened Lissa, and he fled to Holland.

Salomon traveled to England and sailed to New York, which was already a thriving port and the center of commercial and shipping interests in North America. As he traveled through Western Europe towards safer havens, he acquired knowledge of finance and fluency in several languages, including German. He returned to Poland in 1770, but in the wake of the Polish partition in 1772, it seems he became involved in Poland's Nationalist Movement and was forced to flee the country again.

In New York, Salomon married Rachel, daughter of Moses B. Franks. Rachel Franks was the sister to Colonel Isaac Franks, a Revolutionary officer of distinction, and to Mayer Isaac Franks, a Supreme Court of Pennsylvania judge.

Salomon's knowledge of finance and accounting practices enabled him to find a job as a broker and commission agent for ships plying the Atlantic. As time would soon show, Salomon's impact would be vast, for he had arrived in America at one of the greatest moments of world history: The American Revolution.
Meir Y. Soloveichik: Ilan Ramon and the Words That Soared
I had the opportunity to ponder the pages of Ramon’s diary more carefully when Stibbe posted images of the pages on his website. Here before me were arrayed two papers of very different natures, each charred, with some words missing. One clearly describes the wonder of liftoff: “shemonah dakot, ve’od shniyot…anahnu bahalal”—eight minutes and a few more seconds…we are in space! The man who had experienced more aviation than most, and who had participated in one of the most daring air raids in history, could not contain his wonder at the launch.

On the other page were words of a very different sort. Knowing that he would be spending Shabbat in space, Ramon had brought with him the words of the kiddush, the traditional Friday-night blessing over sacred time: “Blessed art Thou…who sanctifies us with His commandments…and You gave us in love this Sabbath day…a remembrance of act of creation…first among sacred days, a remembrance of the Exodus of Egypt.”

Studying both pages, I realized that I was seeing a simple and sublime summation of one of the great works of Jewish thought: Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik’s The Lonely Man of Faith. Composed during the space race, The Lonely Man of Faith ponders two aspects of human nature that are equally ingrained with us. The first is the urge for invention, which has glorious and life-affirming results: “Man of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries who needed several days to travel from Boston to New York was less dignified than modern man who attempts to conquer space, boards a plane at the New York airport at midnight and takes several hours later a leisurely walk along the streets of London.” Or, as Ilan Ramon might have put it, eight minutes, a few seconds…and we are in space.

Yet Rabbi Soloveitchik urges modern society to remember that a world solely defined by technology would leave us less connected, not more; only in a faithful covenantal community are we truly linked to those who have come before and those who follow. The man of faith “finds deliverance from his isolation in the ‘now,’” because a covenantal community

cuts across the centuries, indeed millennia, of calendaric time and unites those who already played their part, delivered their message, acquired fame, and withdrew from the covenantal stage quietly and humbly with those who have not yet been given the opportunity to appear on the covenantal stage and who wait for their turn in the anonymity of the “about to be.”

So Rabbi Soloveitchik wrote, and suddenly arrayed virtually before me were exquisite embodiments of his themes: one page about the wonder of orbiting the earth in a few minutes of time, and one page describing the desire of Jews throughout eternity to experience sacred time and unite ourselves with those who come before. Thus it was that, as Eitan Stibbe took off on SpaceX, the pages of Ilan Ramon’s diary accompanied him, orbiting the earth until they safely returned. The paper burned, but the letters soared. The pages of a diary that survived an inferno now took flight once more, as the man who sanctified God’s name in the very heavens lived again.




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