Sunday, April 30, 2023

04/30 Links: Gil Troy: 'If you will it, is no dream!': What would Herzl think of Israel today?; The Cost of Obama’s Foreign Policy; Remembering San Remo: When the world powers recognized our rights to the land

From Ian:

Gil Troy: 'If you will it, is no dream!': What would Herzl think of Israel today?
Eventually, Herzl decided the only answer was to transform “the Jewish Question into a Zion Question.” We’re not just a religion, he realized, “We are a people,” with a particular history, heritage, and homeland, Zion, meaning the land of Israel. Knowing that a national political renewal requires a strong cultural foundation, Herzl deemed the Jewish national liberation movement, Zionism, “a return to Jewishness even before there is a return to the Jewish land.”

Unfortunately, especially when examining Eastern Europe’s Jewish masses, this proud Westernized Jew, with his piercing dark eyes and impressive black beard, saw a paralyzed people demoralized by poverty and persecution. He wanted his Zionist Congress to reawaken the Jewish people. Sensitive to optics, he insisted that the 197 delegates – including 13 women and some non-Jews too – attend the Congress in formal eveningwear, reflecting the Jewish people’s dignity.

This frustrated playwright valued the script more than the costumes. As a peoplehood-person, Herzl appreciated the past; but, as a dreamer, a social-experimenter, and a liberal-democratic nation-builder, he was future-oriented too. “Our hearts cling to the old, it is true; we love the glorious past of our people, so full of struggle and suffering,” he warned, “but we do not want to revert to any narrowness of spirit.”

Appreciating a good prop, Herzl insisted that a flag was not just “a stick with a rag on it…. With a flag, one can lead men wherever one wants to, even into the Promised Land.” The flag carried a people’s “imponderables,” their “dreams, songs, fantasies,” because “visions alone grip the souls of men.” While charmed by the spread of individualism, industrialism, and capitalism, he nevertheless believed that individuals cannot help themselves “politically nor economically as effectively as a community can help itself.”

In 1899, reflecting the 19th century faith in humanity’s redemptive capacity, Herzl defined “the chief tenet of my life: Whoever wishes to change men must change the conditions under which they live.” Preempting any impulses toward narrow-minded illiberal nationalism, he challenged Zionists: “Make your State in such a way that the stranger will feel comfortable among you.”

He labeled this Jewish state-to-be Altneuland – old-new land, envisioning what is now this 75-year-old State in the ancient Land of Israel. In emphasizing Jewish rootedness, the term itself proved that Zionism isn’t European colonialism.

Every day, when 9.7 million Israelis, Jewish and non-Jewish, wake up in their beds, at home in their homeland, most know that every crane that builds, every start-up that starts, and every new investment through the Abraham Accords that appreciates, helps explain why they are safer, freer, and more prosperous than their great-grandparents would have dared imagine. And that’s why Herzl would also think, it worked! It’s really true – if you will it, is no dream!
This was not his dream - Opinion
Many critics of antizionism argue that it is a form of bigotry that singles out the Jewish state and holds it to a double standard, which is recognized by the IHRA working definition as antisemitism. Some point out that Israel is the only Jewish state in the world and that opposing its right to existence can be a form of discrimination against the Jewish people. However, there is agreement among Jews about the role that Israel should play in promoting Jewish unity. Some argue that Israel’s policies often do not take into account how they can affect Jews in the Diaspora, while others argue that Israel is a beacon of democracy and human rights in the region and that focusing on defending the country against its enemies and should have unilateral support from communities worldwide.

There is a growing consensus among many Jewish organizations that the solution to antisemitism is unity among the Jewish people and support for a Jewish state. The existence of a Jewish state provides a safe haven for Jews worldwide and gives them a sense of pride and belonging. Jewish unity is also seen as a way to combat the divide-and-conquer tactics of antisemites, who often try to pit different segments of the Jewish community against each other. This is seen on US campuses, where the culture of boycotting often makes Jewish and Israeli students feel unsafe and even has led to antisemitic attacks due to misinformation and incendiary rhetoric.

One of the challenges in combating antisemitism is that many people do not understand the difference between antizionism and antisemitism. The two concepts are often conflated. While it is ok to criticize a government and its policies, it is as important to call out real instances of antisemitism. It is also important to be careful not to label all critics of Israel as antisemitic, but to make sure that blatant antisemitism hiding behind antizionism doesn’t go unchecked.

Looking back on Herzl’s vision, the world is reminded of the importance of supporting the Jewish state and combating antisemitism. He lived in a time when Jews felt great sorrow living without a land. Israel is a beacon of hope for Jews around the world. Furthermore, it is essential to recognize that antizionism can be a form of antisemitism, and Israel has the right to exist. One can criticize a country’s policies, but one cannot rule out the right of the state to exist and govern itself.
Remembering San Remo: When the world powers recognized our rights to the land
The events in San Remo in April 1920, Iyar 5620, were foundational historic events unparalleled since the destruction of the Second Temple in the first century CE and gave the Jewish people the right to re-establish an independent state in its historical homeland. Chaim Weizmann celebrated: "The decision in San Remo, this recognition of our rights in Palestine which was included in the treaty with Turkey (Treaty of Sèvres) and became part of international law – is the biggest political event in our movement [the Zionist movement]. And maybe, it would not be an exaggeration to say – in the entire history of the Jewish people since the diaspora."

In the wake of the conference, the Sèvres Treaty was signed in August 1920, with Turkey renouncing its ownership rights over the territories in the Middle East in favor of the Allied Powers. Article 95 enshrined the text of the Balfour Declaration in international law. This is the Magna Carta of the Jewish people that was born in San Remo. Article 2 of the Mandate states: "The mandatory shall be responsible for placing the country under such political, administrative and economic conditions as will secure the establishment of the Jewish national home, as laid down in the preamble, and the development of self-governing institutions..." What does the preamble state? That recognition has been given to the historical connection of the Jewish people with their land and to their right to reconstitute their national home there.

This decision by the League of Nations has not been annulled since. Article 80 of the United Nations Charter, established after the Second World War, protects all the rights granted by the League of Nations prior to the signing of the UN Charter.

In my conversations with politicians and in my speeches before the two houses of the Italian parliament, and the media, I reiterated that supporting a diplomatic compromise is one thing, but the statement that Israel violates international law by building settlements in its historical homeland is a lie because binding international law – which Italy is a signatory to as the host of the historic San Remo Conference – has not changed since.

Now is the time for Education Minister Yoav Kisch to make the San Remo Conference part of the core study curriculum!


Two narratives of the US-Israel relationship
These arguments go so far as to claim the Soviet Union was more supportive of Israel than America. Critics say that the Soviets were the first to grant Israel de jure recognition and allowed their satellite Czechoslovakia to send massive arm shipments to Israel, giving it the weapons it needed to survive.

These arguments are false.

It is true that Truman only granted Israel de facto recognition and that the U.S. not only refused to sell Israel arms but participated in the global arms embargo for years. It is also true that Israel defended itself without America’s help for decades.

Moreover, anti-Zionists have indeed distorted the U.S.-Israel relationship by portraying it as a colonial conspiracy to rob Palestinians of their land rather than as a partnership between two freedom-loving countries.

But none of this takes away from the strength of the longstanding U.S.-Israel relationship.

This relationship, in fact, predates Zionism itself. For well over a century, many Americans, including presidents like Abraham Lincoln, Franklin D. Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson believed in the Jewish people’s right to the Land of Israel. Many Americans actively tried to reestablish a Jewish state in the Land of Israel and supported the Zionist movement when it began.

The U.S.-Israel relationship has grown stronger year after year. It has evolved from a one-way relationship into a partnership that benefits both nations. The core of the relationship is the shared values of freedom, human rights and justice, which both Americans and Israelis stand for every single day.

Common strategic objectives strengthen this relationship. Today, the Israeli and American militaries, intelligence services and national security institutions work hand in hand to stop the world’s worst actors. It is true that neither country is dependent on the other, but that does not take away from the importance of the relationship.

The truth about this relationship is obvious to any rational thinker. It is important not to allow irrational and agenda-driven narratives to sway Zionists from their core belief that the Jewish people have a right to their historic homeland and the state they have built shares America’s most basic values.
The Cost of Obama’s Foreign Policy
Biden, meanwhile, has mostly followed in Obama’s footsteps and is leading America and its allies to the same destination. At the beginning of his presidency, he decided to ignore Russia, or, in his administration’s parlance, to “park” it. He has since cast the Ukraine war as part of a global struggle between democracy and autocracy, but his actions at the beginning of the war demonstrated that he agreed with Obama that Russian domination of Ukraine was a foregone conclusion. As the Russians prepared to attack, Biden underscored his and his allies’ lack of resolve, noting that he might be willing to tolerate a “minor incursion” by the Russians into Ukrainian territory. The State Department evacuated the Kyiv embassy as the invasion loomed, but unlike our braver allies who stayed in western Ukraine, the Americans retreated all the way to Poland. It was the Ukrainians who eventually stiffened Biden’s spine, not the other way around.

Biden has also tried to revive Obama’s trademark second-term foreign-policy initiative, the Iran nuclear deal. But halfway through his term, Biden’s many attempts to cajole and entice Tehran back into the accords have all failed, perhaps in part because the Iranians have wangled limited sanctions relief out of the negotiations without giving up anything themselves. Now that Iran is enriching uranium of up to 84 percent purity — just shy of the 90 percent typically used in a nuclear weapon — Biden is trying to talk U.S. allies into offering Iran another deal.

The pivot to Asia is, similarly, on ice. Obama, who believed that America’s foreign policy had been too militaristic, placed the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal at the center of his Asia strategy, but he failed to get it ratified by the Senate before leaving office, after which Trump withdrew from the agreement. Biden has no trade policy to speak of and seems content to let Asia be drawn into Beijing’s economic orbit, much to Japan’s consternation and other Asian countries’ disappointment. Meanwhile, America’s Asian allies view Biden’s ballyhooed democracy summits and human-rights crusades with polite dismay. Instead of having the U.S. lecture neutral countries about their internal affairs, they would rather focus on the preservation of international norms — such as respect for territorial sovereignty and the peaceful resolution of disputes — or, in other words, the enforcement of red lines.

Biden is tougher on China than Obama was, at least rhetorically, but it is not clear that he is willing to back up his talk. This is the second year in a row that Biden has tried to cut the defense budget in inflation-adjusted terms. Last year, Congress overruled him, and it must do so again if we are to keep pace with China’s military buildup.

At the outset of the Obama presidency, Charles Krauthammer — who years before had urged U.S. policy-makers not to squander the country’s post–Cold War moment of global hegemony — warned that “decline is a choice,” and that Obama and his allies in government and the Washington elite had set us on a course toward it. But Krauthammer also counseled: “Nothing is inevitable. Nothing is written.”

Yet.
US House speaker arrives in Israel, to address Knesset
U.S. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) arrived in Israel on Sunday, where he will meet with top officials and become the second-ever holder of his post to address the full Knesset.

McCarthy is leading a 20-member delegation of Republican and Democratic lawmakers.

He was received at Ben-Gurion Airport by his Israeli counterpart Amir Ohana and then traveled directly to the Western Wall in Jerusalem before heading to the Knesset for a formal dinner.

“Israel, you are a blessed nation,” McCarthy wrote in the Western Wall visitor book, adding: “Our shared values unite a bond that will never break.”

On Monday, the speaker will visit the Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial and lay a wreath in honor of the 6 million Jews exterminated by the Nazis and their helpers during World War II.

He is also slated to meet with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

In the afternoon, Ohana will open the Knesset’s summer session and speeches will commence, including McCarthy’s address in English.


JPost Editorial: World Rugby’s decision allowing disinvitation of Israel is unsporting
World Rugby, the sport’s global governing body, has ruled that the decision by the South African Rugby Union (SARU) to disinvite an Israeli team, Tel Aviv Heat, from an international competition last month was not discriminatory.

World Rugby’s decision sets a bad precedent and compounds the unsporting move by SARU that should raise a red flag not just in the world of sport but also in the arena of international diplomacy.

Let’s first review the sequence of events. SARU announced on February 3 that the Tel Aviv Heat team was no longer invited to the March 24 competition, called the 2023 Mzansi Challenge. The decision came following pressure from the South African BDS Coalition, an affiliate of the Palestinian BDS National Committee that promotes the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement against Israel.

SARU president Mark Alexander said that after listening to the opinions of “important stakeholder groups,” the decision had been made to disinvite Tel Aviv “to avoid the likelihood of the competition becoming a source of division, notwithstanding the fact that Israel is a full member of World Rugby.”

In an interview with The Citizen, a South African newspaper, South African Jewish Board of Deputies vice president Zev Krengel said Alexander had told him that the invitation to Tel Aviv Heat had been pulled “when BDS and other antisemitic groups put pressure on them and [issued] death threats.”

The irony, Krengel said, is that the same SARU that had barred black players from playing for the Springboks under apartheid was now “behaving in the exact same way” against Israeli players.
As Russia’s shadow grows, Europe is increasingly turning to Israeli defense tech
As the Russia-Ukraine war enters its second year, European states are scrambling to modernize their armed forces and air defenses.

The result has been a spike in European defense spending, totaling some $345 billion for central and western European countries in 2022—30 percent higher than in 2013, according to data compiled by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI). That, in turn, has translated into growing acquisitions of Israeli defense technology.

In Ukraine itself, the government is reportedly planning to soon test an Israeli-made early warning system for civilians, alerting them to incoming aerial threats, according to an Axios report dated April 20.

The Israeli system is to connect Ukrainian military radars and air defense networks to the alert system, enabling more precise warnings in targeted areas, according to the report. The technology is similar to the Israel Defense Forces Home Front Command Color Red early warning system, which generates area-specific sirens, phone alerts and media messages, and has divided Israel into 250 alert zones. The more precise the alert, the less disruption it causes.

Bradley Bowman, senior director of the Center on Military and Political Power at the Washington, D.C.-based Foundation for Defense of Democracies and assistant professor at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, noted that “this Israeli assistance will save Ukrainian lives, helping Kyiv more effectively respond to attacks by invading Russian forces, many of which employ Iranian drones.”


Netanyahu: We will not allow Iran to put a noose of terror around our neck
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed on Sunday to prevent Iran from putting a “noose of terror” around the Jewish state’s neck.

“At all times, of course, we maintain security. We will not allow Iran to put a noose of terror around us. We are working on this matter around the clock, all the time, even today, and we will continue to act both offensively and defensively against the aggression of Iran and its terrorist satellites,” said Netanyahu at the start of the weekly Cabinet meeting.

The premier also praised the nation for its conduct during last week’s Memorial and Independence Days.

“We saw in these days and ceremonies the people of Israel unite around the things that are sacred to it, the national symbols that we all share. We have one country, and it is precious and important to all citizens of Israel,” he said.

“We have a fundamental disagreement on judicial reform but we are making an effort to resolve this dispute through dialogue. With the goodwill of both sides, I am convinced that it is possible to reach an agreement—and I fully back it,” added Netanyahu.
Ruthie Blum: The Jerusalem rally was a reminder that democracy didn’t lose; the left did
Those of us who were among the hundreds of thousands of participants in the right-wing rally in Jerusalem on Thursday evening weren’t surprised when the “resistance” bloc pulled a two-fer: downplaying the significance of and attendance at the event, on the one hand; and treating the happening as evidence that Israeli democracy is in danger of annihilation at the hands of fanatics, on the other.

Nor did we imagine that coverage from most media outlets would be accurate, let alone fair, since they’ve been acting all along like a branch of the protest movement. Instead, we drew encouragement from the throngs of fellow members of the national camp who turned up to bolster the government and urge it not to be bullied into backtracking on its mandate.

Both were necessary under the circumstances, with the Orwellian doublespeak of the opposition having become so blatant that it’s putting regular propaganda to shame. Indeed, the projection on the part of the protest instigators isn’t merely jaw-dropping (calling the government, rather than those trying to topple it, a “coup,” for instance); it’s actually been successful at sowing self-doubt in coalition circles.

Ahead of the opening of the Knesset’s summer session on Sunday, then, it was particularly crucial for lawmakers to be reminded of the populace that isn’t drinking the Kool-Aid—those still expecting and demanding judicial reform, with or without a broad consensus. It was also important to highlight that compromise on this or any other issue isn’t on the agenda of the forces spearheading the weekly demonstrations.

The points were made amid much good cheer and lots of applause for the speakers. Justice Minister Yariv Levin was given an especially warm welcome, in addition to cautionary chants of “Don’t be afraid!”

The message was that he shouldn’t cave on the judicial-reform process that the government had put on hold. This was done to allow for negotiations to bring about an agreement and prevent civil war.
Netanyahu Convinced Judicial Reform Agreement ‘Can Be Reached’
Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday during the cabinet meeting ahead of the opening of the summer session of the Knesset (Israeli parliament) that he is convinced that agreements on the controversial judicial reform could be reached.

The prime minister commenced the meeting by speaking about unity that Israelis demonstrated during the days of remembrance and independence “that are sacred to all of us.”

“There is also a fundamental debate between us regarding legal reform, but we are making an effort to resolve this debate through dialogue. With the goodwill of both parties, I am convinced that agreements can be reached – and I fully support this,” he said.

Netanyahu pointed out that one of the first tasks during the summer session of the Knesset would be approving the state budget, stating that it would bring “economic stability and invigorate the economy to new achievements.”

“Precisely in the days of economic slowdown and global inflation, precisely in these days Israel can and should charge forward. We did it during coronavirus, we did it in previous global economic slowdowns, and we will do it this time as well. We will bring economic stability, expand competition, and introduce international marketing chains to reduce prices,” the prime minister vowed.
Netanyahu 'convinced' a Judicial Reform deal is possible
Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday during the cabinet meeting ahead of the opening of the summer session of the Knesset (Israeli parliament) that he is convinced that agreements on the controversial judicial reform could be reached




BBC WS and website promote distractions in Israel protests reports
Davies refrains from informing readers that while some Arab leaders have encouraged Arab Israelis to take part in the protests since early on, the co-opting of the demonstrations for the advancement of the political agenda of NGOs such as ‘Standing Together’ is seen by some of those Arab leaders as counter-productive. He also fails to clarify that Arab Israeli participation in the cost of living protests over a decade ago was similarly low.

Davies closes his article with promotion of another representative of an inadequately presented NGO:

“Ibrahim Abu Ahmad, who works for a non-governmental organisation, is one of the handful of Israeli Arabs who has spoken at the Israeli rallies.”

That unnamed NGO is called ROPES and it is part of the ‘Alliance for Middle East Peace’ but once again “appropriate information about their affiliations, funding and particular viewpoints” was not provided to BBC audiences.

In both these items Davies promotes representatives of political NGOs without conforming to BBC editorial guidelines concerning contributors’ affiliations. In both items he promotes campaigning narratives already seen in previous BBC reporting on the topic of the protests while providing very little information about the factors that have actually prompted so many Israelis from all sectors of society to participate in demonstrations for seventeen weeks.

Davies’ amplification of the unevidenced claim from a political NGO that “protests against the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories are becoming a larger part of the demos” does not stand up to scrutiny but remarkably, that was the messaging the BBC News website chose to promote on Israel’s Independence Day.


PMW: PA defies the world to continue terror reward payments
While the Palestinian Authority continues to hide its finances from the international community, a recent statement by PA Prime Minister Muhammad Shtayyeh again demonstrates the clear effectiveness of Israel’s Anti-Pay-for-Slay law and the pressure being put on the PA by the international community.

The PA government recently approved its 2023 budget. Presenting the budget to the cabinet, Shtayyeh explained that the budget included a deficit of US$610 million. While acknowledging that the PA’s terror reward payments are causing financial damage to the PA, Shtayyeh clarified that the PA has no intention to abolish the payments:
Shtayyeh: “The Israeli monetary deductions and the decrease in the number of donors are meant to pressure us and subdue us, but everyone knows that we will not trade in policy for money, and what is important is that we rely on each other and understand the reality we live in.”

[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, April 4, 2023]

“The Israeli monetary deductions” Shtayyeh complained about, refer to deductions made pursuant to Israel’s Anti-Pay-for-Slay law. The law, passed in 2018 with the assistance of Palestinian Media Watch, provides that Israel must deduct from the taxes it collects and transfers to the PA, the sum the PA spent in the previous year paying salaries to imprisoned and released terrorists and allowances to the wounded terrorists and the families of dead terrorists – cumulatively known as the PA’s Pay-for-Slay policy.

Since the law was first implemented in February 2019, Israel has made decisions to deduct 2,479,478,454 shekels – a sum equivalent to the PA’s Pay-for-Slay payments in 2018 through 2022. As of the end of March 2023, Israel had actually deducted 2,014,058,985 shekels, and the remainder will be deducted during the rest of 2023.

According to the law, the sums deducted are frozen and held till such a time when the PA abolishes its policy.
Palestinian students reach Gaza after fleeing outbreak of violence in Sudan
Palestinians embraced at the Egyptian border with Gaza on Friday as students returned home after fleeing the eruption of violence in Sudan.

Gaza’s crossing and border authority said “172 students arrived home through the Rafah border crossing, as the first batch of students coming from Sudan.”

There were hugs and tears at the southern gateway to Gaza as relatives greeted the young Palestinians fleeing fighting which broke out on April 15.

“The situation was really difficult, it hit everywhere in Khartoum,” university student Nasser Qishta told AFP.

“The Palestinian embassy in Sudan contacted us, gathered up the students and transferred us to Gaza,” added Qistha, who remained determined to return to the Sudanese capital “when conditions improve.”

Governments have rushed to extract their citizens from Sudan amid the deadly violence between the army, led by General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) commanded by his former deputy Mohamed Hamdan Daglo.

More than 500 people have been killed, according to health ministry figures which are believed to be incomplete.


Antisemites' vile attacks on Robbie Williams: Former Take That singer, 49, is compared to Nazi sympathisers by Twitter trolls for agreeing to perform at a summer festival in Israel
Robbie Williams has been targeted with antisemitic abuse after announcing that he is to appear at a festival in Israel this summer.

Among the most offensive remarks on social media was one claiming that he would have been happy to perform for the Nazis in the Second World War.

Other posts also made Nazi slurs about the singer and Israel. The 49-year-old former Take That star – whose wife Ayda Field, 43, is Jewish – is facing a barrage of hate from anti-Israel fanatics and Left-wing extremists after agreeing to sing at the Summer In The City festival in Tel Aviv on June 1.

Habib Naser tweeted: ‘Robbie Williams is garbage – he’ll perform anywhere to get a dollar. He’ll perform for Nazi soldiers if it was the 1940s.’

Another post read: ‘Israel is an illegal occupation similar to Nazi Germany... you gotta pay people to spread propaganda.’

A further tweet featured two cartoon images of an Israeli soldier, and a German Nazi soldier, with the wording directed at Williams, saying: ‘@Robbie Williams look like you have sold your soul to the devil.’

Douglas Fur tweeted that ­Williams had agreed to the concert because ‘Israel pays a lot more than other countries doesn’t it?’

He added: ‘That’s why Robbie’s selling out again and why he says a lot of b****** about loving the apartheid state.’

Claims that Israel uses money to purchase support have been a theme of antisemitic tropes about Jews for decades.

Williams and Sam Smith will be the headlining acts at the festival, but it is unknown whether Smith has also been targeted.
World Press Photo Jury Blames Israel for ‘Lack of Press Freedom’ in ‘Palestine’
The World Press Photo Foundation — which has partnered with UNESCO to promote its vision of a “fairer world with a free press and freedom of expression” — recently peddled the claim that Israel suppresses the civil liberties of Palestinians in the eastern part of its capital, as well as the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

This, as the world prepares to mark the 30th UNESCO World Press Freedom Day on May 3. The annual observance serves as a show of support for news organizations that have been unfairly targeted by authorities and implores governments around the world not to restrict journalists’ freedom to report the truth.

In a Middle East characterized by authoritarian regimes, and in the face of ongoing conflict with Arab neighbors, Israel’s unwavering commitment to free media is something to be celebrated. In fact, Freedom House, a nonprofit that researches and promotes democracy worldwide, in its 2023 Freedom in the World report ranked the Jewish state’s reputation on press freedom among that of much older democratic nations, including Australia.

Yet in a topsy-turvy distortion of the facts, the five-member World Press Photo jury praised the World Press Photo 2023 Regional Winner for Asia, an Associated Press (AP) picture of Al Jazeera reporter Shireen Abu Akleh’s contentious funeral in Jerusalem, arguing that the image “represents multiple aspects of the ongoing occupation of Palestine [sic]– the lack of press freedom and the inability for Palestinians to lay their dead to rest and mourn,” adding: “For the jury, the image serves as an emotional reminder of the continued fight for press freedom and a world where journalists are noncombatants who should be able to depict truth.”

In addition, the highly political website entry falsely asserted that the International Criminal Court (ICC) launched an investigation into Abu Akleh’s May 11, 2022 death. While Qatar-funded Al Jazeera filed a complaint in The Hague four months ago, the Office of the Prosecutor has yet to take any action in response.
Why Can’t The Guardian Stop Publishing Antisemitic Cartoons?
Moreover, The Guardian has refused to apologize for its latest editorial misjudgment, instead issuing a 23-word correction that simply said the cartoon has been taken down from its website because it “did not meet [its] editorial standards.”

As for Martin Rowson, he explained that “sometimes, like in this case, in the mad rush to cram as much in as possible in the 5 or so hours available to me to produce the artwork by deadline, things go horribly wrong.”

Indeed they did.

While Rowson has issued a detailed explanation and apology, it is clear that like The Guardian, he has a serious blindspot when it comes to Jews and Israel that prevents him from recognizing the antisemitism dripping from his own pen.

As he says in his apology, hopefully, this incident has served as a wake-up call: “Mea culpa. Mea maxima culpa. To work effectively, cartoons almost more than any other part of journalism require eternal vigilance, against unconscious bias as well as things that should be obvious and in this case, unforgivably, I didn’t even think about.”

While Rowson didn’t think about this before, it was The Guardian’s editors who, while claiming to be acutely sensitive to racism, prejudice and bigotry, equally failed to recognize what was in front of them before publishing. It is they who need to start recognizing antisemitism and issue a proper apology.
The Guardian editor Katherine Viner must resign following the newspaper’s publication of an antisemitic cartoon
Campaign Against Antisemitism is calling upon Katherine Viner, editor-in-chief at The Guardian, to resign after the newspaper published an antisemitic cartoon on Friday night.

The now-deleted cartoon, drawn by Martin Rowson, depicted Richard Sharp, who last week resigned as Chairman of the BBC, and evoked several antisemitic tropes.

Mr Sharp, who is Jewish, is portrayed with a large nose and swarthy, gruesome features, like those commonly seen in Nazi propaganda about Jews.

Mr Sharp is seen to be carrying a box containing, among other items, a puppet of Prime Minister Rishi Sunak. Nazi, Soviet and other antisemitic propaganda has consistently portrayed Jews as puppet masters, secretly pulling the strings and manipulating politics.

The box Mr Sharp is holding in the cartoon appears to read “Goldman Sachs” and contains a squid. He formerly worked at Goldman Sachs, which was once described in a Rolling Stone article as a “vampire squid”.

However, one must ask, why is that foregrounded in a cartoon about his resignation from the BBC? Nazi and Soviet propaganda portrayed Jews as tentacled monsters, controlling and sucking the life from society, and since medieval times, Jews have been cast as miserly moneymen exploiting workers to enrich themselves.

Also featured in the grotesque cartoon is a pig vomiting blood. In antisemitic images, pigs often refer to the ‘otherness’ of Jews for not eating pork, whilst blood can be a reference to the medieval ‘blood libel’ which accused Jews of drinking the blood of non-Jewish children, leading to massacres of Jews.
Guardian apologises for ‘explicitly racist’ cartoon
The artist who drew the image, Martin Rowson, also apologised and provided a detailed account of how he created the cartoon.

“Satirists, even though largely licenced to speak the unspeakable in liberal democracies, are no more immune to f**king things up than anyone else, which is what I did here,” he wrote in a statement published to his website.

He knew Sharp was Jewish, he added, because he had known him at school.

“His Jewishness never crossed my mind as I drew him as it’s wholly irrelevant to the story or his actions, and it played no conscious role in how I twisted his features according to the standard cartooning playbook,” he said.

“Likewise, the cute squid and the little Rishi were no more than that, a cartoon squid and a short Prime Minister, it never occurring to me that some might see them as puppets of Sharp, this being another notorious antisemitic trope.”

The cartoonist concluded: “So by any definition, most of all my own, the cartoon was a failure and on many levels: I offended the wrong people, Sharp wasn’t the main target of the satire, I rushed at something without allowing enough time to consider things with the depth and care they require, and thereby letting slip in stupid ambiguities that have ended up appearing to be something I never intended.”


Does criticism of George Soros stem from antisemitism?
Gorge Soros... The very name has become a flashpoint of controversy throughout the world.

Supporting liberal and progressive causes in the U.S and around the world has made him a target in conservative and right-wing circles and antisemitic invective


Anne Frank’s best ‘helper’ Miep Gies is center of new National Geographic miniseries
Dutch Holocaust rescuer Miep Gies is best known for hiding Anne Frank, but Gies also battled Amsterdam’s German occupiers in ways that never made it into “The Diary of a Young Girl.”

Beginning on May 1, a televised miniseries called “A Small Light” will take viewers deep into Nazi-occupied Amsterdam, where Miep Gies (played by Bel Powley) and her husband Jan Gies (played by Joe Cole) risked their lives to help many Jews and Dutch resisters who were forced into hiding.

“Even an ordinary secretary or a housewife or a teenager can turn on a small light in a dark room,” wrote Gies later in life.

Co-starring Liev Schreiber as Otto Frank, the miniseries’ multi-network launch of two episodes is simulcast across National Geographic, Nat Geo WILD and Lifetime.

The eight-part series details aspects of the Gies couple’s lives that are unfamiliar to most of the public. For example, after the hiding place was raided, Gies visited Gestapo headquarters in a high-risk attempt to “ransom” her Jewish friends.

In addition to provisioning the “Secret Annex” for more than two years, Miep and Jan Gies hid another Jew in their own apartment. Jan was heavily involved in the Dutch underground, providing people in hiding with forged ration cards and doing other tasks for the resistance. Actress Bel Powley as Miep Gies and Liev Schreiber as Otto Frank in German-occupied Amsterdam, ‘A Small Light’ miniseries, 2023 (Courtesy)

In the eyes of Anne Frank, the stylish Gies and her dapper husband were capable, elegant and helpful. Of modest means, Gies stayed fashion-forward by teaching herself to sew the dresses seen in store windows.

“Miep is never far from our thoughts,” wrote Frank in her diary.

“She is just like a pack mule, she fetches and carries so much,” wrote Frank, who received the gift of second-hand high-heel shoes from Gies while in hiding.


Yeshiva U. to launch Jewish studies conference in Dubai
Yeshiva University and the Mohammed Bin Zayed University for Humanities will launch the first-ever joint conference between an American Jewish university and an Emirati university at the Crossroads of Civilizations Museum in Dubai next week.

The conference will strengthen academic partnerships between Yeshiva University and the United Arab Emirates and promote opportunities for dialogue between Jews and Muslims in the Middle East.

Titled “Interacting Philosophies, Shared Friendships,” the program will cover social dynamics, philosophical exchanges and mutual influence between Judaism and Islam, with a particular focus on the great medieval scholar Moses Maimonides (Rambam). A kosher dinner will be served and local dignitaries, religious leaders, scholars and university students from the two universities will be in attendance.




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