Saturday, April 08, 2023

04/08 Links: Israel on the Brink: Rockets Fired From Gaza and Lebanon, Riots on Temple Mount & Israeli Sisters Murdered in Terror Attack; No Worse Friend: The West’s Treatment of Israel

From Ian:

Seth Frantzman: How has Netanyahu confronted Iran in the first 100 days of his post?
In this context Iran’s current position in the region is important. Iran recently agreed to a China-brokered deal with Saudi Arabia. It wouldn’t be logical for Tehran to build a bomb that threatens the region, after just agreeing to tone down tensions with Riyadh. This means that Iran’s enrichment may be reaching a dead end. It will have a lot of enriched uranium and be close to breaking out for a weapon, but it may be held back by Russia, China and other countries.

On March 6 the US and Israel issued a joint statement on the meeting of the US-Israel Strategic Consultative Group. This came in the wake of a meeting between Assistant to the US President for National Security Affairs Jake Sullivan and National Security Adviser Tzachi Hanegbi, Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer and a senior Israeli interagency delegation at the White House on March 6. The statement said that “the officials reviewed with significant concern advances in Iran’s nuclear program, and affirmed their mutual objective of further enhancing the long-standing security partnership between Israel and the United States. In this regard, officials pledged to enhance coordination on measures to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon and to further deter Iran’s hostile regional activities.”

The question is whether Iran is actually deterred. Considering Iran’s continued attempts to move weapons to Syria and also its work with Russia and China, it does not seem deterred. It may be deterring itself temporarily by keeping enrichment at around 84%.

Another issue that has plagued Israel is Iran’s precision-guided munitions. These are weapons that can maneuver or carry out precise attacks on Israeli strategic infrastructure. Unlike “dumb” rockets, these weapons can be a game changer in the hands of Israel’s enemies. Iran has moved these systems to Hezbollah, and Hezbollah is making its own PGMs. This was once considered an issue of major concern for Israel. However, Israel now has a maritime deal with Lebanon that relates to sensitive energy exploration off the coast. Israel would be concerned about any strike on Hezbollah’s PGMs, because of that deal.

Hezbollah was allegedly behind infiltrating a man into Israel in March. The man then placed an IED near Metulla junction. Israel is concerned about this threat. Hezbollah may also have been behind moving a UAV capability to Dabaa airbase near Qusair in Syria. That UAV capability was hit by an airstrike on April 1, according to foreign reports.

Netanyahu has been relatively modest in his recent condemnations of Iran. He blamed Iran for an attack on an oil tanker in February. Israel also blamed Iran for being behind a plot in Greece. In both cases Iran was trying to strike at “soft” targets far from Israel. Iran has been targeting ships and tankers off the coast of Oman for many years. It has increasingly targeted ships it thinks are linked to Israel. Iran uses drones flown from Chabahar to carry out those attacks.

The first 100 days of Netanyahu’s administration illustrate how Israel can walk softly and carry a big stick, in the sense that one doesn’t need to peddle fear about Iran’s nuclear ambitions in order to continue to confront Iran in the region.
Seth Frantzman: Did Israel walk into another Tehran trap with recent tensions?
THE ROUND of fighting that began on Thursday, or the day before, depending on how one defines it, clearly had aspects similar to what happened in 2021. It involved tensions over “al-Aqsa” and then plans by Hamas and other terror groups to threaten Israel from Gaza and Lebanon. This not only presented the threat of a multi-front conflict, but it also led to rioting in several Arab communities in Israel. This is similar to the communal clashes of May 2021.

It’s unclear if Israel walked into the conflict and into a kind of “trap” that Iran had put in place. However, what is clear is that the tensions in 2021 and now are similar and that Iran seeks to benefit from them. For example, Iranian media is bragging about the “resistance” targeting Israel.

The fact that Iranian-backed groups such as Hamas and PIJ are openly saying they are ready to confront the Jewish state is part of the rhetoric amplified by Iranian media. Hezbollah’s involvement is clear, because the Lebanese terrorist organization hosted the Hamas leader as the rockets were being prepared to be fired at Israel and also because the rockets were shot from an area Hezbollah controls. It killed an Irish UN peacekeeper last year in the same area.

Iran appears to be trying to increasingly threaten Israel from multiple fronts. Iran may want to increase Hamas’s strength in Lebanon so it can use the terrorist group as a proxy from Lebanon, rather than Hezbollah, to create plausible deniability for the latter.

The fact that the Hamas leader openly arrived in Beirut before the rocket fire indicates Iran’s advanced planning.

It’s unclear if Iran also planned the al-Aqsa tensions and also put out messaging for riots on Thursday, but it appears that Tehran did seek to heat up the region for a conflict on the eve of Passover.

This is not a coincidence. The timing is clear. Leaders of groups like Hamas don’t just show up in Beirut by mistake while their armed units are moving rockets into position to be fired.
No Worse Friend: The West’s Treatment of Israel
And the pretexts have worked: as Ronald Reagan’s UN Ambassador Jeane Kirkpatrick once said, “The long march through the UN has produced many benefits for the PLO. It has created a people where there was none; a claim where there was none. Now the PLO is seeking to create a state where there already is one.” Our collusion over the years in this assault on an ally, this mistreatment of a “friend,” has been a stain on the West, one particularly outrageous given our incessant preaching and preening about the “rules-based international order.”

Finally, the biggest lie in the anti-Israel catalogue of slanders was referenced in Kirkpatrick’s statement. Just recently, the Biden administration has publicly condemned an Israeli minister for saying that “there is no such thing as Palestine because there is no such thing as a Palestinian people.” Of course that statement is historically true.

In fact, as Sha’i ben-Tekoa documents in his three-volume study Phantom Nation, the first UN resolution referencing “Palestinians” instead of “Arabs” occurred three years after the Six Day War, marking the international recognition of a “Palestinian people” and nation as yet another Arab tactic in gaining support in the West by exploiting an idea––nationalism––alien to traditional Islam. Before then “Palestinian” was a geographical term, more typically applied to Jews. Numerous quotations from Arab leaders reveal not a single reference to a Palestinian people, but numerous ones identifying the inhabitants of the geographical territory Palestine as “Arabs.”

For example, in 1937, Arab Higher Committee Secretary Auni Abdel Hadi said, “There is no such country as Palestine. ‘Palestine’ is a country the Zionists invented. ‘Palestine’ is alien to us.” The Christian Arab George Antonius, author of the influential The Arab Awakening, told David Ben-Gurion, “There was no natural barrier between Palestine and Syria and there was no difference between their inhabitants.” Later in his book he defined Syria as including Lebanon, Palestine, and Jordan. In testimony to the UN in 1947, the Arab Higher Committee said, “Politically the Arabs of Palestine are not independent in the sense of forming a separate political identity.”

Thirty years later Farouk Kaddoumi, then head of the PLO Political Department, told Newsweek, “Jordanians and Palestinians are considered by the PLO as one people.” A few years, after the Six-Day War a member of the Executive Council of the PLO, Zouhair Muhsin, had been even more explicit: “There are no differences between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. We are all part of one nation. It is only for political reasons that we carefully underline our Palestinian identity . . . Yes, the existence of a separate Palestinian identity serves only tactical purposes. The founding of a Palestinian state is a new tool in the continuing battle against Israel.”

Clearly, the continuing statements about a Palestinian people as a distinct nation that deserves its own borders and sovereign territory have been a tactic for pursuing the eradication of Israel by casting the struggle in Western terms of “national self-determination” and the struggle against neo-imperialism.

That the West has endorsed and legitimized this lie for nearly 80 years is perhaps its worst mistreatment of Israel and its people. At a time when Israel is facing internal division, riots, terrorist attacks, an enemy on the brink of acquiring nuclear weapons, and one American political party that sympathizes with Palestinian Arabs more than with Israelis, Biden’s meddling in Israel’s domestic policies, and harping on “settlers” living in their ancestral homeland, are despicable. And that’s no way for a great nation to treat a friend and ally.


Beset On All Sides
Few subjects have attracted more attention from both press and policymakers than the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. And arguably few have been more misunderstood. As Oren Kessler highlights in his new book, Palestine 1936: The Great Revolt and the Roots of the Middle East Conflict, the origins of that conflict predate the Jewish state’s re-creation in 1948.

A former journalist and longtime Middle East analyst, Kessler examines a period that is as formative as it is overlooked in this well-written volume. Kessler utilizes recently declassified documents and memoirs, among other sources, to paint a briskly moving picture of what might properly be considered the first Palestinian Intifada.

The word "intifada" is variously translated as "shaking off" or "uprising." But in practice, the term is far less innocuous and has become synonymous with coordinated campaigns of anti-Jewish violence. It is commonly held that the First Intifada began in 1987 and was, in its initial stages at least, organic. The Second Intifada, launched in 2000 and lasting nearly five years, was a supremely bloody affair, with more than 1,000 Israelis being murdered as part of an organized terror wave launched by Yasser Arafat, the head of the Palestine Liberation Organization and the Fatah movement.

But as Kessler’s book illuminates, the so-called Arab Revolt of 1936 marks the moment in which the outlines of today’s conflict were first set in stone. The events of eight decades ago have, he notes, made a "tragic template" for Arabs and Jews alike.

That template begins, first and foremost, with an unwillingness by many Arabs to accept Jewish social and political equality, let alone self-determination, in the Jewish people’s ancestral homeland. This is the undeniable core of the conflict.

World War I shattered empires throughout the world, including the Ottoman Empire, which had ruled, if haphazardly, over most of the Middle East for centuries. In the final year of the war, the British issued the Balfour Declaration, which called for a "national home for the Jewish people" in the Ottoman region often referred to as "Palestine" or "Southern Syria." The 1920 San Remo Agreement and the 1924 Anglo-American Convention also enshrined Jewish territorial claims into law. Zionism, or the belief in Jewish self-determination, had achieved a signal victory.

From nearly the beginning, however, there was opposition. Some leading Arab families in the area hoped to weaken British commitment to the Balfour Declaration. Both 1920 and 1921 saw organized pogroms against the Jewish population, with Arab leaders like Amin al-Husseini jockeying for influence and power while simultaneously eschewing attempts by both ruling British authorities and Zionist leaders to broker a compromise.

More violence would follow in 1929 when Arab politicians and clerics provoked riots by falsely accusing Jews of plotting to take control of Jerusalem’s al-Aqsa Mosque. For several years after, a tenuous peace would take hold. But it was not to be.
Israel: Protests Against Judicial Shakeup Carry on Despite Terror Wave
Protest organizers said a planned mass demonstration against the Israeli government’s proposed judicial overhaul would go ahead as planned in Tel Aviv on Saturday night despite several recent deadly terror attacks and violence.

They have agreed, though, to a police request to cancel a march through the city streets afterward.

Israeli police addressed the organizers of the anti-reform protest movement earlier on Saturday, asking them to avoid blocking roads or interfering with on-duty police in any way, due to the volatile security situation amid an ongoing wave of Palestinian terror.

A statement from a police spokesperson said that thousands of police officers will be deployed at tonight’s protests in Tel Aviv and elsewhere in Israel. The protest movement against the judicial overhaul proposed by the government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has seen numerous clashes between police and protesters.

Last week, some 450,000 Israelis participated in various protests across the country, according to a count by an anti-overhaul NGO – including some 170,000 in Tel Aviv, where protesters have regularly blocked the Ayalon highway, one of Israel’s main traffic arteries.

While the reform has been put on hold by Netanyahu following a political crisis, there are no signs that the popular mobilization against it is on the wane, even though it has been displaced from the headlines in the past week by an upsurge in deadly Palestinian terror attacks.

“At a time of a heightened security alert across the country, it is important to keep the roads open for the passage of emergency vehicles,” the police statement said. It also called on the public to report any suspicious objects of behavior.
Ehud Barak deletes tweet on Israel's nuclear weapons
Former Prime Minister Ehud Barak has deleted the problematic tweet he published on Tuesday, in which he revealed that Israel possesses nuclear weapons. Israel has long maintained a policy of ambiguity on the nuclear issue.

In the tweet, Barak sought to describe the concerns among Western countries over the government’s proposed judicial reform and wrote, "It sounds weird to us. But in Israelis' conversations with diplomatic officials in the West, their deep concern emerges about the possibility that, if the coup d'état in Israel succeeds, a messianic dictatorship will be established in the heart of the Middle East, possessing nuclear weapons, and which fanatically wishes for a confrontation with Islam centered on the Temple Mount. In their eyes - it's really scary. It's not going to happen. Have a happy holiday."

Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich was shocked by Barak's words and claimed that he was echoing lies in order to harm the State of Israel.

"This delusional and irresponsible man, along with Yair Lapid and several hundred other BDS activists from the left, have been traveling the world in recent weeks, making contact with foreign government officials, Jewish leaders, and economic agents, selling this abominable lie, sowing terror, and mobilizing everyone to harm the foreign relations and the economy of the State of Israel," said Smotrich.

"This is one of the biggest and most serious BDS campaigns that Israel has known, and everything is homemade and done in the name of hatred and jealousy for Netanyahu and the national camp."

Smotrich added, ''But they won't succeed. They will be remembered forever in the pages of the history of the Jewish people, and the Jewish and democratic State of Israel will continue to prosper and develop."


Honest Reporting: Israel on the Brink: Rockets Fired From Gaza and Lebanon, Riots on Temple Mount & Israeli Sisters Murdered in Terror Attack
As Passover celebrations began in the Holy Land, a crisis was brewing as Palestinian leaders encouraged rioting on the Temple Mount under the pretense of protecting the religious site from Israeli incursions.

On Tuesday evening, Palestinian agitators armed with rocks, fireworks and other projectiles barricaded themselves inside the Al Aqsa mosque, forcing Israeli police to enter the compound and evacuate worshipers using stun grenades and rubber bullets to repel rioters.

The media response was quick and somewhat inevitable.

Several mainstream news organizations published inaccurate reports that Israeli police had “attacked worshipers,” which HonestReporting acted to correct:

In addition, we pointed out that the presence of Israeli police was necessitated by the longstanding agreement between Israel and the Jordanian Wafq, the religious body that administers the site, that explicitly forbids worshipers from staying at the mosque overnight outside of Thursdays and Fridays and the last 10 days of Ramadan:

The unrest continued overnight into Wednesday when Hamas terrorists in the Gaza Strip fired 10 rockets in three waves toward Sderot and the Yad Mordechai kibbutz in southern Israel, hitting a factory located in the Sderot industrial zone.

Hazem Qassem, a spokesman for Hamas, said in a statement: “Our Palestinian people will not allow the occupation’s plans to be implemented in al-Aqsa Mosque, and we call on our people to inflict upon the occupation the price of this crime.”

In response, the Israeli Air Force launched strikes on two weapons manufacturing and storage sites in the Strip on Wednesday morning before later hitting a military compound controlled by Hamas.

Terrorist organizations ramped up their campaign of incitement, including Islamic Jihad’s Secretary General Ziyad al-Nakhala urging Palestinians to prepare for a “confrontation” on the Temple Mount and Hamas describing the clashes as “an unprecedented crime” while calling on Palestinians to assemble at the Jerusalem flashpoint.

For the second night in a row, dozens of Palestinian youths — many wearing masks — threw rocks at police and attempted to barricade themselves inside the mosque, stopping other worshipers from leaving. Israeli police were again forced to enter the compound and arrest rioters.

However, numerous news outlets erroneously suggested the disturbance was a result of Israeli forces “storming” the Al Aqsa mosque to remove “worshipers”:
IDF calls up reserves in preparation for possible large-scale military op
Israel Defense Forces Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi on Friday ordered the call-up of reserve troops amid an explosion of terror emanating from Lebanon, the Gaza Strip and Judea and Samaria.

Halevi said the military would enhance its readiness to conduct aerial-related operations, after a barrage of rockets was fired over the past 24 hours from southern Lebanon and Gaza, and following a deadly Palestinian shooting attack in the Jordan Valley.

The Hamas terrorist group on Thursday afternoon fired 34 rockets from southern Lebanon towards northern Israel, in the biggest attack emanating from the Hezbollah-controlled country since the 2006 war.

According to the IDF, at least five of the projectiles struck within Israel. Another 25 were intercepted by the Iron Dome missile defense system, and the remaining four were still being investigated.

Overnight Thursday, terrorists in Hamas-ruled Gaza launched 44 projectiles, including rockets and anti-aircraft missiles, towards southern Israel, setting off sirens in Sderot, Nir Am, Mefalsim, Gavim, Nachal Oz, Alumim and Ibim.

One rocket struck a populated area in Sderot and eight were intercepted by Iron Dome. Fourteen rockets hit open areas inside Israel, nine fell short in Gaza and a dozen were fired in the direction of the Mediterranean Sea, said the military.

The rocket that hit Sderot damaged a home but caused no injuries.


West Bank settler leader: Israel must apply sovereignty to Jordan Valley
The Israeli government must apply sovereignty in the Jordan Valley, Samaria Regional Council head Yossi Dagan said in response to the deadly terror attack which claimed the lives of two Israelis on Friday.

"The Jewish People are up against a murderous and barbaric wave of terror led by the terrorist in a suit Abu Mazen [Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas] and his murderous friends at the PA," Dagan said in a statement. "Unfortunately, the Israeli government is not taking the appropriate action."

"The Israeli government must convene today," Dagan said, calling on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to declare annexation and application of Israeli sovereignty in the Jordan Valley "today."

According to Dagan, that will be a "determined Zionist response which will show both to our enemies and ourselves that, 'Am Yisrael Chai.'"
Explainer: Violent escalation during Passover in Israel

Is Israel in a third Intifada? What is the response going to be?

Israeli home hit by rocket: 'I don't want to raise my child like this'
Rocket sirens blared in southern Israel throughout Thursday night and Friday morning, with over 40 rockets fired from the Gaza Strip towards Israel overnight.

A resident of Sderot in southern Israel whose home was hit by a rocket fired amid the barrages from the Gaza Strip early Friday morning told Israeli media that she's considering leaving the town in order to protect her baby daughter.

"In my view we should leave Sderot now. I don't want to raise my child in this situation and ruin her soul at the age of nine months," said Sari Vazana to Ynet.

Vazana added to Army Radio that "I don't think we will stay here much longer, we are with our first child, she was in danger - and here, they're already not playing around."

Rocket alert sirens were heard in Ashkelon at 4 a.m. on Friday morning, and in the southern town of Yated at 5 a.m. Sderot, Ibim and Nir Am received rocket alerts a few minutes later, at approximately 5:10 a.m., 5:30 a.m and 6:45 a.m.

Also at 6:45, sirens sounded in the regions of Gavim, Sapir, Nachal Oz, Alumim and Mefalsim.

Sirens were also heard twice more in Sderot and Ibim in the earlier hours of Friday morning. They were heard once in Karmia and Netiv HaAssara as well.

Just before 2 a.m. on Friday morning, sirens sounded in the towns of Nirim, Mefalsim and Nir Am near the Gaza Strip.

The mayor of Sderot, Alon Davidi, called on the government to act to restore deterrence on Friday, stating "Our Passover holiday was violated by the murderous terrorists who are trying in every way to harm us."
Hamas rocket hits familyhome in southern Israeli city of Sderot



Israel strikes Hamas assets in Gaza, Lebanon in response to rocket attacks
Terrorists in the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip fired 44 projectiles, including rockets and anti-aircraft missiles, towards southern Israel overnight Thursday, setting off sirens in Sderot, Nir Am, Mefalsim, Gavim, Nachal Oz, Alumim and Ibim.

According to the Israel Defense Forces, one rocket struck a populated area in Sderot and eight were intercepted by the Iron Dome missile defense system. Fourteen rockets hit open areas inside Israel, nine fell short in Gaza and a dozen were fired in the direction of the Mediterranean Sea, said the military.

The rocket that hit Sderot damaged a home but caused no injuries.

In response, Israel Air Force jets hit more than 10 Hamas targets in the Palestinian enclave, including weapons manufacturing sites and attack tunnels.

The military also struck Hamas assets in southern Lebanon, after the Palestinian terrorist group fired 34 rockets from the Hezbollah-controlled country towards northern Israel on Thursday. At least five of those projectiles struck within Israel and another 25 were intercepted by Iron Dome.

Two Israelis in the Western Galilee city of Nahariya were lightly wounded by shrapnel from the rockets, which also damaged several locations.

“The state of Lebanon is considered responsible for everything that happens in its territory, including the firing of rockets by Hamas. We will not allow Hamas to operate from Lebanon,” said IDF spokesman Daniel Hagari on Friday morning.

“The IDF is prepared to carry out its missions—the offensive activity tonight in more than one arena is a clear indication of this. Israeli residents in the north and south constitute a strong civilian home front. We are entrusted with protecting them and their resilience allows us to continue to fulfill our duties,” he added.
Three rockets fired from Syria as IDF beefs up forces
Three rockets were launched at Israel from Syria late Saturday night, as the army beefed up its troops in the West Bank and sent soldiers to reinforce the police following a tense three days during which two terror attacks claimed three civilian lives and rockets were launched across the country’s southern and northern borders.

One of the Syria rockets landed in Israeli territory and fell in “an open area in the southern Golan Heights,” the IDF said.

On Saturday night the focus shifted to Jerusalem’s Old City as security forces fear further unrest could break out on Sunday when Jewish worshipers are expected to flock to the Western Wall for the priestly blessings that take place on Passover.

Jewish visitors are also expected to ascend to the Temple Mount, known to Muslims as al-Haram al-Sharif. An additional 2,300 police troops have been deployed throughout the city.

“Israel is taking every measure to ensure that Muslims, Jews and Christians can celebrate Ramadan, Passover and Easter peacefully,” the Foreign Ministry said.
IDF strikes Hamas targets in Gaza, Lebanon as over 44 rockets fired
The IDF struck sites belonging to the Hamas terrorist movement in the Gaza Strip and Lebanon early Friday morning after dozens of rockets were fired towards Israel in recent days and as dozens more were fired overnight from Gaza.

In southern Lebanon, three targets belonging to the Hamas movement were hit. According to Lebanese reports, the sites were located in the vicinity of al-Qulayla and the al-Rashidiah refugee camp, south of Tyre. No injuries were reported in the strikes.

The Hamas movement condemned the strikes in Lebanon, stating on Friday morning that the strikes "reflect the brutality of the leadership of the fascist occupation, and its policies that threaten security and peace in the region by violating the sovereignty of brotherly Arab countries and the sanctity of Islamic and Christian sanctities, foremost of which is the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque."

The movement added that it holds Israel "fully responsible for the repercussions of this dangerous escalation."

The Lebanese Army announced on Friday morning that it found a rocket launcher containing multiple unlaunched rockets in the Marjayoun area, north of Metula.

UNIFIL stated on Friday morning that it is working to restore calm and that both Israel and Lebanon had said that they are not interested in a conflict.

"The measures taken during the past day are dangerous and warn of a dangerous escalation," said UNIFIL.
Iran condemns Israeli strikes, Hezbollah says resistance remains 'vigilant'
Iran's foreign ministry on Friday condemned Israeli strikes in Lebanon and Gaza, carried out in retaliation for rocket attacks, and called for action by international bodies, state media reported.

Spokesperson Nasser Kanaani said the ministry "strongly condemned the attacks... as a violation of Lebanon's sovereignty and territorial integrity and a gross violation of international law and human rights of the oppressed Palestinian nation, and called for an effective response by world bodies", state media said.

Kanaani also referred to phone calls the president and foreign affairs minister of Iran made with counterparts of other Islamic countries, as well as with Secretary General of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation Hissein Brahim Taha, where the foreign ministry spokesman emphasized the need for an emergency meeting and need to take a strong position "in support of the oppressed Palestinian nation," the report said.

Kanaani also emphasized that the phone call included the need to prevent another desecration of the al-Aqsa mosque.


Italian tourist killed, seven others hurt in terror attack on Tel Aviv promenade
An Italian tourist was killed and seven others were hurt in a suspected terror attack on a promenade in Tel Aviv on Friday night, police and medics said.

According to law enforcement officials, the alleged terrorist carried out a car-ramming attack and appeared to try to access a weapon to open fire on Kaufmann Street, leaving a trail of carnage along several hundred meters and into the adjacent Charles Clore Park, a popular seaside promenade.

The Magen David Adom ambulance service said one of the victims, a man in his 30s, had died, and seven others were hurt, with three in moderate condition. On Saturday morning Tel Aviv’s Ichilov Hospital said only three patients remained hospitalized, all in good condition.

The fatality was later identified as Italian national Alessandro Parini, a 35-year-old lawyer from Rome. The wounded victims were also tourists from Italy and the United Kingdom, according to hospital officials. They were not named.

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni expressed her solidarity with Israel following the “cowardly attack” in Tel Aviv in which seven other people were injured, including other tourists.

“Deep sorrow and condolences for the death of one of our nationals, Alessandro Parini, in the terrorist attack that took place in the evening in Tel Aviv. Condolences to the victim’s family, to the wounded, and solidarity with the State of Israel for the cowardly attack that hit him,” she wrote on Twitter. Meloni said her government was in contact with Israeli authorities about the wounded victims, some of whom are also Italian nationals.


One killed, six injured in Tel Aviv terrorist attack



Murdered sisters are daughters of former Radlett rabbi
The two sisters shot dead by terrorists in the West Bank on Friday have been named as British-Israeli nationals Rina and Maia Dee, the daughters of British-born Rabbi Leo Dee.

Rina, 16, and Maia, 20, were murdered as they travelled with their mother to a hiking spot in the Jordan Valley.

Their mother, Lucy, is still fighting for her life.

Their father, Rabbi Dee, had been following in another car with other family members and reached at the scene of the attack shortly after paramedics arrived.

Rabbi Dee served as the Assistant Rabbi for Hendon United Synagogue in 2008- 2011 and Senior Rabbi in Radlett United Synagogue from 2011 until 2014 until making aliyah.

Lucy Dee has a background in social work and is known in their community for helping younger women and families in the community.

Daniel Tarlow, a family friend of the Dees who lives in the settlement of Elazar, said: “I heard on the news that this has happened - my family didn’t want to tell me. There were people here whose children go to school with the Dees’ children. There are special prayers being said for Lucy, there is in fact a prayer service for her tonight in Efrat, and a tehillim service. We are all saying tehillim for her.

“The family are lovely and warm and engaging , it’s such a tragedy . They invited us for Purim for example and they spent Chanukah with us.

“Unfortunately we are used to these things happening and have been involved in these attacks before . We have to have a keep calm and carry on attitude - you struggle.”


Terrorist attack in the Jordan Valley: Two Israeli women killed



THIS Is How to NOT to Get Shot By the IDF in the WEST BANK
The IDF shot down a drone from Gaza this week and there were several terror attacks across Israel.

Ben gives a word of advice for Palestinian Arabs in Judea & Samaria on how to NOT get shot by the IDF.




CNN Compounds Inaccurate Reporting with One-Sided Commentary
For a network that proclaims it is the “most trusted name in news,” CNN sure can’t seem to get the story right. Its coverage of the security situation in Israel over the last few days is a stark example. In its April 7, 2023 article, “The situation in Jerusalem is boiling over. Here’s how it all happened” by Nadeen Ebrahim, the network compounds factual errors with skewed commentary and context. Factual Errors and Omissions

Ebrahim’s very first sentence contains a blatant and material omission, claiming: “Israel said it struck targets belonging to the Palestinian militant group Hamas in southern Lebanon and Gaza early Friday, hours after dozens of rockets were fired from southern Lebanon into Israeli territory…” An uninformed reader would be forgiven for wondering why Israel struck targets in Gaza given that Ebrahim only mentions that rockets were only fired from southern Lebanon. In fact, rockets were launched from both southern Lebanon and Gaza, with at least 40 rockets reported as having originated from the Gaza Strip, including one that hit the home of a mother and her infant daughter near the Gaza border. Nowhere in the text of the article is this mentioned.

The article’s attempt to cover the situation in Jerusalem is especially problematic. Some errors are basic, such as Ebrahim’s false claim that Jordan governs both Muslim and Christian holy sites in Jerusalem. Jordan’s authority is, in fact, only for Muslim holy sites, not Christian ones.

But other errors are more serious and work to decontextualize the situation in such a way as to erase the responsibility of Palestinian actors.

Referencing the Israeli police raids on rioters in al-Aqsa Mosque, the article states that “[t]here is no explicit agreement restricting overnight worship at the mosque.” The problem? Israeli police have repeatedly stated there is an agreement with the Waqf, which administers the Muslim holy sites, “to only allow overnight stays at mosques outside the complex.”

Ebrahim downplays this by quoting Mairav Zonszein (see below) who acknowledged “understandings” to the effect have been reported, but simply claims “Palestinians are unlikely to have agreed to them.” The conclusory statement is presented without any explanation for the partisan Zonszein’s doubts.

Ebrahim went on to claim that “Israeli entry into the al-Aqsa mosque is forbidden by the status quo agreement.” In fact, the status quo places Israel in charge of maintaining security in the compound, and this includes entering “the mosques when riots originate therein, to seize stockpiles of rocks and iron bars, or to make arrests.”

This relates to the present situation. According to police, the “Palestinians who tried to stay overnight in the past week and a half were planning to try and attack Jewish visitors to the site during the morning visiting hours.”


EU denounces terror attacks, rocket fire at Israel, urges ‘restraint’
The European Union on Saturday condemned deadly attacks in Israel and a barrage of rockets fired from Lebanon that triggered Israeli strikes and called for “restraint.”

“The EU expresses its total condemnation of these acts of violence. This must cease,” the bloc’s foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said in a statement after Friday’s attacks in Israel.

Two British-Israeli sisters, aged 15 and 20, were killed and their mother seriously wounded in a shooting attack in the West Bank, while an Italian tourist was killed and seven others wounded in Tel Aviv when an Arab Israeli man drove his car into people walking on a cycling path.

Borrell also condemned the “indiscriminate” rocket fire from the Gaza Strip and Lebanon.

There has been an escalation of violence since Israeli police clashed with Palestinians on Tuesday inside Jerusalem’s Al-Aqsa Mosque on the Temple Mount, with dozens of rockets fired into Israel by Hamas terrorists in Gaza and Lebanon. Israel responded with strikes in both places.

“We urge all parties to exercise maximum restraint, to avoid further escalation and promote calm for the ongoing religious holidays,” Borrell said, referring to the Jewish festival of Passover and the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.

“Israel has the right to defend itself. At the same time, any response must be proportionate,” he said.

Borrell added the “status quo of all the holy sites must be preserved.”

The statement from the EU comes after last month Israel signaled that Borrell was not welcome in Israel after he appeared to draw a comparison between Palestinian terror attacks and IDF operations.


MEMRI: Qatar-Funded And Operated International Union Of Muslim Scholars (IUMS) And Hamas Leaders In Qatar Call Palestinians To I'tikaf In Al-Aqsa Mosque With Intention Of Waging Jihad Prior To April 5 Clashes, Declare April 7 As 'Day Of Rage'
On April 4, 2023, top Hamas leaders, including political bureau head Isma'il Haniya, who is also a member of Qatar-supported International Union of Muslim Scholars (IUMS);[1] the leader of the Hamas movement abroad Khaled Mash'al; political bureau member Moussa Abu Marzouq; and senior Hamas Official Khalil Al-Hayya met with IUMS Secretary-General Ali Al-Qaradaghi and other IUMS officials in the Qatari capital of Doha. In the meeting, the IUMS officials asserted their commitment to support the Palestinian issue and praised the role played by Hamas and other resistance factions. The IUMS published on April 3 a fatwa calling upon Palestinians to perform I'tikaf[2] in Al-Aqsa Mosque with the intention of waging jihad and declared April 7 a "Day of Rage."

Over the years, there has been a cooperation between the Qatar-supported IUMS and senior Hamas officials, some of whom reside in Doha and are also supported by Qatar, such as political bureau chief Isma'il Haniya, who is an IUMS member. Recently, on April 4, 2023, a Hamas leadership delegation met with a group of scholars in Doha, in response to an invitation from IUMS Secretary-General Ali Al-Qaradaghi. According to a report from the Hamas Palinfo.com [3] website, Isma'il Haniya "highlighted the crucial changes that occurred in the region and with regard to the Palestinian issue" and he "focused on the dangers to which the Jerusalem and Al-Aqsa Mosque are exposed under the current Zionist government, which is considered the most racist, extreme and dangerous that seeks to end the Palestinian issue and implement the plot of taking control over the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque to assume control over it and divide it temporally and spatially."

The report also mentioned that the meeting was attended by a group of senior scholars from numerous countries and that Haniya praised the "historic and crucial role played by the scholars of the ummah throughout history especially in supporting the Palestinian issue as they considered it the central issue of Muslims."

Haniya then praised the "heroic resolve" of the people of the West Bank and the courage that they display in all confrontations, attributing it to "the legacy of jihad of our people and our ummah and the conviction of the Palestinian youth in choosing resistance to attain liberation."

The scholars reasserted their "firm position in supporting the Palestinian issue... [and] supporting the resistance project against the occupiers," and also praised the role of Hamas and the resistance factions, while highlighting the religious dimension of the Palestinian issue and the conviction of their "inevitable triumph."


Muslim world must unite against Israel, Erdogan says to Iran's Raisi
Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan told his Iranian counterpart Ebrahim Raisi over the phone that the "Islamic world should be united against Israel's attacks in Palestine," Turkish media reported.

The two world leaders also discussed the incidents at the al-Aqsa mosque and Iranian-Turkish relations, the report said. The Turkish president also noted the importance to preserve the status of holy areas and emphasized "reasonable thinking" in order to prevent further escalation of violence in Israel and the Palestinian territories, sources said.

Israeli foreign minister Eli Cohen then told his Turkish counterpart Mevlut Cavusoglu the same day that the IDF will respond to any attempt to terrorize civilians. The incident came during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan and on the eve of the Jewish Passover.

Additional condemnations by Erdogan
Erdogan condemned the Israeli police's actions at the al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem on Wednesday, calling such acts in the mosque compound a "red line" for Turkey.

"I condemn the vile acts against the first qiblah of Muslims in the name of my country and people, and I call for the attacks to be halted as soon as possible," he said.

Erdogan also condemned the US ambassador to Turkey for meeting with the main opposition alliance’s presidential candidate less than two months before elections in the country.
MEMRI: Bangladeshi Islamic Scholar Enayetullah Abbasi: Bangladeshi Muslims Will Fly The Flag Of Islam In Delhi; We Will Gouge Out The Eyes Of Our Enemies
In a video tweeted by @VoiceOfHindu71 on March 23, 2023, anti-Hindu Bangladeshi Islamic scholar Enayetullah Abbasi said that the Islamists in Bangladesh will gouge out their enemies’ eyes and that if anybody invades Bangladesh, every madrasa will take up arms. He said that every Muslim would stand alongside the Bangladeshi Army for Jihad, adding: “Myanmar is insignificant to us. Bangladeshi Muslims have the power to fly the flag of Islam in Delhi, and the future will show that. Abbasi’s audience cheered as he spoke, and they chanted: “The enemies of Islam are the infidels, beware!”

"Every Muslim Will Stand Shoulder To Shoulder With The Bangladesh Army For Jihad"

Enayetullah Abbasi: "The Islamists in this country will gouge their eyes out. If anyone comes to invade even an inch of Bangladesh. Every Madrasa in Bangladesh will turn into cantonment with weapons. Every Muslim will stand shoulder to shoulder with the Bangladesh Army for Jihad. Myanmar is insignificant to us. Bangladeshi Muslims have the power to fly the flag of Islam in Delhi too, and the future will show that inshallah. Nar-E-Taqbir. Allahu Akbar. Nar-E-Taqbir. Allahu Akbar. The enemies of Islam are the Kaferr [i.e., unbelievers]. Beware, beware."
McGill University ends research with antisemitic Iranian university
The Montreal-based McGill University pulled the plug on its research program with one of the world’s leading antisemitic institutions, Tehran University, The Jerusalem Post can first reveal.

“Currently, there is no active research program associated with the Tehran Branch and McGill has no formal partnership agreement with the University of Tehran,” the McGill University Media Relations Office wrote the Post by Email on Wednesday.

Tehran University is a sponsor of genocidal antisemitism targeting Israel and one of its law professors defended the regime's fatwa to murder Salman Rushdie. Iran's regime imprisoned McGill alumnus Niloufar Bayani, a wildlife conservationist, over five years based on trumped-up spying charges, according to Amnesty International.

"No place for Zionist regime"
The Iranian regime cleric Hojjatoleslam Mohammad Javad Haj Ali Akbari declared on Al-Quds Day in 2022 on the campus of Tehran University that “There won’t be any place for the Zionist regime in the world future.”

Al-Quds Day is an annual regime-sponsored event across Iran that calls for the destruction of the Jewish state.

The Tehran University professor, Mohammad Sadegh Koushki, endorsed the assassination of Rushdie in August 2022, following the pro-Iranian regime suspects Hadi Matar’s attempt to kill Rushdie in upstate New York.

The founder of the Islamic Republic of Iran, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, authorized the fatwa to murder Rushdie in 1988 because he said his book, “The Satanic Verses,” denigrated Islam.
Columbia Faculty Oppose Planned Israel Center Because of ‘Human Rights.’ The School’s China Center Gets a Pass.
Faculty at Columbia University are protesting the school's proposed Global Center in Tel Aviv over human rights concerns in Israel despite remaining silent on human rights abuses in China, home to the university’s Beijing Center.

Ninety-five faculty members signed a letter in opposition to the Global Center over human rights and free speech concerns, though an opposing letter in favor of the center gained more support, the New York Times reported.

The state of Israel "refuses to abide by international human rights laws and norms both domestically and in its treatment of Palestinians," the anti-Israel letter, which the Columbia Spectator reported was first circulated by law professor Katherine Franke, said.

But faculty in support of the Israel center noted in their letter, which has received 172 signatures, that the university maintains centers in countries with human rights controversies of their own—China, Jordan, and Turkey—that are ranked by the Freedom House democracy index as far more unfree than Israel.

"To apply a separate standard to Israel—and Israel alone—would understandably be perceived by many as a form of discrimination," the letter in support of the Israel center read. "One does not have to support the policies of the current government of Israel—and many of us do not—to recognize that singling out Israel in this way is unjustified."

Franke told the Washington Free Beacon she opposes the Tel Aviv center because it would "conform to Israel's apartheid policies, thus implicating Columbia in that illegal regime." She said she did not take issue with the university's centers in China, Jordan, and Turkey because they act as a "haven" for "local academics and students" against the "repressive regimes in which they live and work." Israel, Franke said, has no need for a Global Center because there has been "no domestic call" for such a "safe haven."

Columbia has maintained its center in Beijing since 2009, even as the United States has declared China’s imprisonment of more than a million Uyghurs a genocide. The United Nations in August declared that China’s activities "may constitute international crimes, in particular crimes against humanity."


WWE issues apology for using Auschwitz footage in promo video
World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) issued an apology on Friday for using footage of the Auschwitz concentration camp used during the Holocaust for a promotional video for its recent WrestleMania 39 two-day event held last weekend.

The footage was used in a video promoting a match between WWE wrestler Rey Mysterio and his son Dominik. Domink Mysterio stated "You think this is a game to me? I served hard time. And I survived,” in reference to his December arrest and jail time. As he made the statement, an image of Auschwitz concentration camp appeared on screen.

WWE issued a public apology stating that they “had no knowledge of what was depicted. As soon as we learned, it was removed immediately. We apologize for this error."

Many were quick to question the circumstances around the “error” including the Auschwitz memorial museum.

The museum tweeted, “The fact that Auschwitz image was used to promote a WWE match is hard to call "an editing mistake". Exploiting the site that became a symbol of enormous human tragedy is shameless and insults the memory of all victims of Auschwitz.”


Jewbotinsky: Algeria did WHAT?!
We're starting a new series on our channel. Hope you like it!


A Passover tale of imprisonment and release in Nasser’s Egypt
During the Passover holiday, when Jews reflect on their liberation from slavery, we feature an account by Ibrahim ‘Berto’ Farhi of his imprisonment by Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser. Farhi was an Egyptian-Jewish journalist and an old friend of Nasser’s. He was arrested after a French colleague, carrying news of Egypt’s 1967 defeat, gave Berto’s address as his own. Berto was one of 350 Jews arrested and jailed as ‘Israeli PoWs’ and had his story published in the French newspaper L’Express after his release four months later. Farhi was stripped of his Egyptian nationality and expelled, as were prisoners who were foreign nationals: the refugee agency HIAS paid Generalissimo Franco US$ 5,000 per Sephardi Jew so that the Spanish consulate in Egypt might declare them Spanish nationals and issue them a passport to leave Egypt. The Karaite prisoners, most of who were Egyptian, were not so lucky: they remained in jail for up to three years. (With thanks: Alain):

At an Arab League meeting Syria and Iraq had urged President Nasser of Egypt to liquidate his Jews

I was arrested by telephone on 25th June 1967. Kamel Daoud was the name of the special services officer who called me on the evening of the 23rd. He had arranged an appointment for the following day at l pm. I waited for him: he didn’t come. I called him again on Saturday evening. We made an appointment for the next day.

On Sunday morning before going to the club as I did every Sunday, I made a detour through the political police bureau. He was there. I allowed myself the luxury of a premonition: was he going to arrest me?

“Never on Sunday,” he said and burst out laughing. Since when did one arrest people by telephone? He offered me coffee and asked if I could prove that I was Egyptian. I could.

“And of course you have a certificate of nationality?” That had been my act of triumph. A certificate of nationality proved that one had not always been Egyptian. I was Egyptian well before the birth of Egypt, when everyone was still Turkish. I had never had anything to prove it. The real Egyptians are as much Egyptians as the Bororos are Araras.

He said I was certainly a son of my country, asked me to excuse him a moment, slipped on a fitted jacket over his creased yellow shirt with the brown jabot-tie, and an hour later I found myself with a senator, a little Jew obsessed by kasher food, a fat landowner and three policemen in an old administrative jalopy from the wrong century but knowing the way very well.

“In ten minutes we’ll break down. I know it.” He was an old senator, I had interviewed him at the time when things in Cairo were still normal. Since the revolution he had been arrested each time there had been trouble, but always, like this time, after the event. In 1948, he had been arrested after the fourth ceasefire. In 1956, he had been picked up on New Year’s Eve. By the time he got to prison it was 1957. He knew all about the prisons. Abu Za’abal was the administration’s three-star entertainment. Turah was an old English jail; Barrages and Citadelle weren’t like they used to be in the good old days. He did not know the concentration camps in the oasis but he knew they were building a new prison in Wadi Natrun. It would be just as it was for the public institutions, and the Khetta (the Plan), he said: medieval chaos in beautiful modern buildings.

And then the vehicle broke down. Since we were not handcuffed, the senator and I got out and pushed with the three soldiers who had laid their guns at the feet of the landowner and the poor little accountant. We got going again.
Unpacked: Is the book of Exodus the story of America?
The ancient Jewish Exodus from Egypt began the formative nation-building epoch of the Jewish people. The experience is so renowned that it continues to reverberate in freedom struggles across the globe. Long before the colonies united to form the United States of America, and ever since, the Exodus story has been a touchstone for American intellectual, religious and social thought, influencing everything from the White House to best-selling books, the fight for the abolition of slavery to the filming of Hollywood mega-hits.






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This blog may be a labor of love for me, but it takes a lot of effort, time and money. For 20 years and 40,000 articles I have been providing accurate, original news that would have remained unnoticed. I've written hundreds of scoops and sometimes my reporting ends up making a real difference. I appreciate any donations you can give to keep this blog going.

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