Friday, February 16, 2024

02/16 Links Pt2: Dara Horn: Why the Most Educated People in America Fall for Anti-Semitic Lies; Melanie Phillips: Never again; Bari Weiss with Natan Sharansky

From Ian:

Dara Horn: Why the Most Educated People in America Fall for Anti-Semitic Lies
The mountain of proof at Harvard revealed a reality in which Jewish students’ access to their own university (classes, teachers, libraries, dining halls, public spaces, shared student experiences) was directly compromised. Compromised, that is, unless they agreed—or at least agreed to pretend, as many Jewish students who are neither religious nor Israeli now silently do—that there was nothing wrong with wallpapering America’s premier university with demonization of Jews. Coercing that silent agreement was the goal, and it was achieved not through arguments or evidence, but through the most laughably idiotic heckler’s veto: screaming at, chasing away, freezing out, or spitting on anyone who dared disagree with supporting the most successful Jew-killers since the Nazis. This left the great minds of Harvard debating the finer points of free speech for hecklers, instead of wondering why their campus was populated by hecklers. The question of why Harvard’s hecklers were heckling in favor of Hamas’s barbarism was too disturbing to consider, and so public discussions ignored it completely.

This heckling was not unrelated to the education that Harvard itself provided. Classes existed at Harvard, it turned out, that were premised on anti-Semitic lies. A course at the school of public health called “The Settler Colonial Determinants of Health” looked at case studies from South Africa, the United States, and Israel; its premise—not a topic of discussion, but the premise on which the course was built—was that Israel is a settler-colonialist state. (A Jewish student who wrote to the professor questioning what they saw as the ideological slant of the readings was told that it was “insulting” to suggest that the course had an agenda.) The “Palestine Program for Health and Human Rights” proudly announced that it “utilizes a decolonial framework in program development, leadership, and engagement”—meaning, one might reasonably assume, the “decolonizing” of Israel through the removal of its 7 million Jews. (The program is a partnership between Harvard and Birzeit University, a Palestinian institution where an Israeli journalist was expelled from an event in 2014 just because she was Israeli and Jewish.)

An astonishing number of pop-up lectures, panels, and events at Harvard both before and after October 7 were centered on the suffering of Palestinians in Gaza—a worthy topic addressed with almost no mention of Hamas, even though Hamas has ruled Gaza for 17 years. Nor was there much mention of the fact that Hamas was founded in connection with the global Muslim Brotherhood, or of its comically wealthy sponsors in the Persian Gulf. Students had many opportunities to learn about Palestinian suffering from oppression by evil Jews, but far fewer opportunities to learn, for instance, about Hamas’s success in co-opting foreign aid and crushing dissent, or the intifada that students hoped to globalize. Outside of their engagements at Harvard, some guest speakers publicly endorsed extreme anti-Semitic lies, including the straight-up blood libel that Israelis are harvesting Palestinians’ organs or that the Israeli military uses Palestinian children for weapons testing. One could hardly blame students for repeating their educators’ claims.

Out of respect for Gay’s request that our committee’s discussions with administrators remain private, I won’t share here anything that we talked about in our many meetings. But I will say that one thing we did not discuss was Gay’s congressional testimony on this topic, for which she and other administrators never asked for the advisory committee’s advice. Instead, they consulted lawyers, a choice that backfired on national television.

The horror that the hearing laid bare was something far worse than a viral gaffe. Harvard was already being investigated by the Department of Education for allegations of violating Jewish students’ civil rights under Title VI, and perhaps the president was advised against admitting any institutional failure. (In January, a group of students sued Harvard, describing the university as a “bastion of rampant anti-Jewish hatred and harassment.”) Still, the only morally tenable position would have been to admit failure, to reveal that the problem was not all in Jews’ heads; that there truly was an anti-Semitic environment at these incubators of American leadership; that these universities, along with far too many other pockets of the country, had reverted, slowly and then all at once, into what they had been a century earlier: safe spaces for high-minded Jew hatred—not in spite of their aspiration that education should lead to a better world, but because of it.
Melanie Phillips: Never again
I made a pilgrimage this week to the the area of the south-western Negev that was devastated by the Hamas pogrom on October 7.

It was a lot to take in and process. Here are some of the things I saw and heard which particularly spoke to me.

The eerie silence of Kibbutz Kfar Aza, whose once idyllic aspect is still visible through its shrubs and spacious landscaping despite the wrecked and deserted houses.

Outside his house sits Shachar, the only kibbutz resident who is still there.

They came from five directions, he says; between 300 and 600 terrorists. There were only 11 members of the kibbutz civil defence; they were prepared for only two, three terrorists, maximum. Seven of the 11 were murdered.

When the attack started, he said, he got a knife, told his wife Ayalet to get under the bed and stood guard at the door for 30 hours. The terrorists didn’t try to get in.

Why not? He shrugs. The house stands alone: others are connected in pairs. They seemed to be killing people in one of each pair of houses and leaving the other one alone, he says. They thought no-one was inside here, he says. And they were in a hurry. They didn’t think they would have time to kill so many. The terrorists expected the army to come at any minute.

Why did he come back to his house just a few weeks after the massacre, to live here alone, in the silence, in this place of death? He spreads his hands. It’s my home, he says simply. And I hoped that if I came back, others would follow. Not yet.

Further into Kfar Aza, the scene is very different. This is not tranquil. This is a place of the utmost horror. These houses are laid out in neat rows with neighbours facing each other across the pathway. In two of these double rows, the inhabitants of every single house were murdered or kidnapped. Not one house was spared.

Every house is wrecked. Outside each one are pictures of the murdered or the kidnapped who had lived there. Most are taped off. Every house has symbols painted on the outside by those who came to retrieve the remains of the slaughtered. A circle with a dot, we are told, means a body or body parts were inside.
New Documentary Aims to Arm Jewish Students with Facts about Israel’s History to Combat Surge in Campus Antisemitism
Since Hamas attacked Israel on October 7 and Israel launched its retaliatory military operation in Gaza, college campuses have been aflame with an anti-Zionism that, more often than not, veers into antisemitism.

One recent college graduate, alongside her former professor, has created a documentary series aimed at educating people past the flashy signs and catchy slogans one might see and hear at an anti-Israel rally, toward a full understanding of what Zionism and anti-Zionism really mean. That series, “Zionism and Anti-Zionism: The History of Two Opposing Ideas” by Zoé Tara Zeigherman, had its Washington, D.C., premiere Thursday night.

The series, a five-episode look at the varieties of both its titular subjects, covers Jewish history and the development of Zionism, the intra-Jewish debates that occurred before Israel’s founding in 1948, and various strains of anti-Zionism from post-1948 Arab opposition to Israel to Soviet propaganda.

Zeigherman, alongside her former Georgetown University professor (and former member of Israel’s Knesset) Einat Wilf, began formulating the idea for the series in 2022, well before anti-Zionism and antisemitism shot to the fore of public debate following the October 7 Hamas attack. Zeigherman thinks the problem was always there, but now that college campuses are under a microscope, the documentary series is even more relevant.

“I think that what a lot of Jews have experienced since October 7 is kind of waking up to this feeling that something is seriously wrong; seeing protests on October 8, they’ve been feeling that something is mobilizing against Jews, and they don’t really understand what’s happening.” Zeigherman told National Review. “I had that feeling in the Black Lives Matter protest era when antisemitism was erupting online and I couldn’t understand where it was coming from.”

“If it can just help one young Jew the way Einat’s course helped me, that’s enough,” she told NR. “But I would really like to see it be part of something bigger, where Jews aren’t afraid to be Jews anymore — where we stand taller and prouder and go on offense as opposed to constantly defending ourselves and apologizing.”

Zeigherman initially came up with the idea for the series during her time as a Beren Summer Fellow with the Tikvah Fund, a nonprofit organization that promotes Jewish leaders and ideas, in 2022. While a fellow, she worked with individuals both inside and outside the Tikvah Fund to determine how to bring her vision to life.


Xaviaer DuRousseau: Is Israel racist? I visited to get the facts straight
HAMAS SYMPATHIZERS claim that dark-skinned people are oppressed in Israel, but the black and brown residents of Israel deny any validity in that statement. I met black Americans who love living in Israel. I could see the frustration in their faces when I asked them why people claim that Israel is a racist country.

They weren’t just annoyed by the allegation. They’re upset that false statements are made without the input (and in direct contradiction) of the people actually experiencing life in Israel. The voices of black Israelis and black Jews are often overshadowed by the voices of teenage Americans regurgitating Marxist talking points that they heard on Tiktok, including claims that Israel is an apartheid state – which is an easily debunked lie. The lone Jewish state is one of the most diverse places in the world. They’re prepared to respect anyone who doesn’t want to kill them.

In America, Jews and blacks have stood shoulder to shoulder, from Selma to Chicago, in the quest for black civil rights. And let’s not forget the ultimate sacrifice made by James Chaney (black), Andy Goodman (Jewish), and Michael Schwerner (Jewish) in Mississippi.

These young men lost their lives trying to ensure black Americans’ right to vote. Their deaths weren’t in vain, as they became a catalyst for the Civil Rights Act, a monumental leap forward in our nation’s journey toward equality.

So, when you hear allegations of animosity between Jews and black Americans, or suggestions that Jews in Israel harbor racist attitudes toward black people, you have to question where that’s coming from. It doesn’t add up. Israel itself, born out of the ashes of persecution, has been a beacon of hope, welcoming Jews from around the globe, including tens of thousands of Ethiopian Jews and others of African heritage.

It’s important to debunk the false narratives about Israel and racism because we’ve already seen the grave consequences that come with allowing antisemitic propaganda to go rogue.

I watched 47 minutes of recorded video from Hamas’s October 7 massacre. I’ve never seen evil embodied so clearly before. Babies burned alive. Parents murdered in front of their children. Wives raped in front of their husbands. The people of Israel witnessed horrors that would cause most people never to smile again. Yet, propagandists continue to add salt to Israel’s wounds by denying (or even justifying) these horrific acts and shifting the blame to Israel.

Between the Jewish community and my black ancestors, it’s hard to say who has been lied about and lied to more often. Those who stand with Israel will be on the right side of history. My two trips to Israel made that more apparent to me than ever.
As a Black leader, I spoke up against antisemitism during the Super Bowl. Here’s why
How did this 93-year-old Black man living in Palo Alto come to speak out during the Super Bowl and impress his hard-to-impress offspring in the process? Well, that’s a long story.

In the early 1960s, as a young attorney at the height of the Civil Rights Movement, I was an adviser to Martin Luther King Jr. Those were heady, vital days. But we faced long odds in our fight for the rights due to every human being. I remember one conversation with Dr. King like it was yesterday.

“Martin, I love you, and I think you’re fantastic, but let’s get real,” I said. “There is no way that Black people, just 12% of the population, are going to get the other 88% of the population to do something it does not want to do.”

Dr. King took a moment to think it over before saying, “I agree with you, but that’s our challenge, we have to reach their consciousness.”

I became fixated on this idea. Every time we held a demonstration, I’d speak to the white folks who joined us. There were always some. I’d ask: “Why are you here with us?”

I got the same response: “Well, Attorney Jones, I’m out here with you and Dr. King because that’s what my grandma and grandpa would want me to do.”

I didn’t understand. What did their grandparents have to do with it? “Our grandparents died in the Holocaust,” they’d say, “so they can’t be here, but we know they’d want us to be.”

It stunned me. And they said it so matter-of-factly. I knew well the history of the Holocaust, of Kristallnacht and other horrors, but the similarities of our different struggles had never been so obvious to me. Now they were.

I remember telling Dr. King: “From 100 yards away, all white people might look alike, but I’m telling you, all white people are not alike. Those who self-identify as Jews, they are with us.”

A few years later, Dr. King gave a speech in Washington we’d written together, telling the world, “I have a dream.” Everyone remembers those words. But few remember the words of the man who addressed the crowd before him: Rabbi Joachim Prinz. He had fled Germany before the Holocaust.

He told the huge crowd that he’d learned many things in Hitler’s Germany. “The most urgent, the most disgraceful, the most shameful and the most tragic problem is silence.”


Britain's Self-Image as Tolerant and Decent Is Being Smashed
We thought that we had progressed decisively as a society, that we had vanquished racism and religious discrimination, that the institutions of our liberal state would prevent a minority from facing persecution, and that our ruling class would never allow any subset of the population to be openly hated and othered again.

How wrong we were. That antisemitism, the oldest of hatreds, is back on the streets and screens of Britain, is terrifying enough; but the fact that this explosion of prejudice is being treated in such a cavalier fashion by the authorities and the mainstream broadcast media - and in some cases is even being rationalized and normalized - is a catastrophic development that casts doubt about Britain's very future.

This is the worst moment for Britain's Jews since the pogroms that disgraced Leeds, Liverpool and Manchester in the summer of 1947. The double-standards, the never-ending "pro-Palestine" marches that are inevitably marred by egregious, open antisemitism and evil slogans, the bullying, the victim-blaming, the spreading of fake news, the willful, blatant lies and denialism of Hamas' atrocities, the obsessive interest in, and delegitimization of, Israel - a state that accounts for just 0.25% of the Middle East's landmass, is its only multi-religious democracy and which is fighting for survival against neighbors that reject its very existence - stink of a replay of the 1930s.

Antisemites never just target Jews. They are full-service, equal opportunity bigots who oppress and impoverish and destroy all that they touch, and despise freedom and human flourishing.
A French Scholar Tries, and Fails, to Understand Anti-Semitism in America
Pierre Birnbaum’s Tears of History: The Rise of Political Antisemitism in the United States, was published in English last summer, after first appearing in French in 2022, so it can be forgiven for the fact that the picture it paints of anti-Semitism in the U.S. looks very different from the picture that has come into focus after October 7. Yet the distinguished historian of French anti-Semitism makes errors of analysis that are less excusable, beginning with his theory that the presence of Jews in prominent positions in the Obama administration—like, in his view, the presence of Jews in Franklin Roosevelt’s administration—has been a major catalyst for political anti-Semitism in America. Allan Arkush writes in his review:
That the right wing of the 2010s branded Obama’s administration as a tool of the Jews just as thoroughly as its predecessors had branded FDR’s is, it seems to me, something that Birnbaum asserts but fails to substantiate. He does not really engage in a detailed comparison that would warrant such a conclusion, and the evidence he does provide is sometimes dubious.

Enough time has now passed to answer Birnbaum’s question as to whether Biden’s appointment of many Jews to high positions in his administration would rejuvenate an American version of [the French reactionary] Édouard Drumont’s anti-Semitic and antidemocratic “myth of the Jewish Republic.” It has not.

But for Arkush what rankles most is not Birnbaum’s misapprehension of the American political scene, but his apparent prescription that Jews ought to “stay on the sidelines” of politics to preserve their safety—a prescription perhaps best articulated by the doomed Austrian Jewish writer Stefan Zweig during the Nazi rise to power. Arkush writes:
Speaking for myself, I am glad that I live in a country where a leader of the majority party could make a speech like the one Chuck Schumer delivered on the Senate floor in November. Many of the new anti-Semites in America, he declared in his remarkable address, “aren’t neo-Nazis, or card-carrying Klan members, or Islamist extremists.” They were, instead, leftists whom liberal Jews such as himself had generally regarded as political allies. . . .

If taking part in the democratic system on all levels entails certain risks—and I don’t think that they are by any means as great as Birnbaum supposes—then our leaders, like Senator Schumer, will have to ignore the message of Stefan Zweig and continue to take them.
US bill to mandate education about the Holocaust and genocides scrutinised
New York columnist Karol Markowicz discusses why a Washington state bill to mandate education about the Holocaust and other genocides is facing scrutiny.

Washington Democrat lawmakers have introduced a so-called "Hamas amendment" into the bill to include the Hamas perspective.

Ms Markowicz said it seems that the left is “uncomfortable with pointing out Jew hatred and Jew hatred alone”.

“And so what these Washington lawmakers are doing is somewhat clever – because what they’re saying is, we’re going to include other nonsense in this Holocaust bill and then when you oppose it, should you oppose it, you will be deemed hateful yourself,” she told Sky News host James Morrow.

“Because how dare you oppose a Holocaust bill.

“That’s where we are in America, it’s actually quite sad.”




Four Months Into the War Against Hamas, the IDF Is Far Outperforming American Expectations, Report Says
What is for some a slow go and daunting political landmine is for others a bigger success story than has been publicly acknowledged — namely, Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza, and the American outlook on it could be about to change.

It is no secret that the relationship between President Biden and Prime Minister Netanyahu is about as warm as the month of February. What is lost in the miasma of increasingly strained relations between Washington and Jerusalem is that irrespective of attempts by the White House to micromanage the conflict and despite comments by Mr. Biden himself that Israel’s military response has been “over the top,” the truth is that some bumps in the road notwithstanding, it has mostly been spot on.

For proof of that, one can look at how all of Hamas’s terrorist battalions in the northern Gaza Strip have been decimated or how the Hamas mastermind, Yahya Sinwar, is said to be cowering like a rat in a dark tunnel somewhere underneath Khan Younis.

One can also look at an underreported meeting that took place in Israel about a week after Hamas attacked on October 7. As journalist Amit Segal reports in this weekend’s edition of the Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth, at that time Mr. Biden dispatched a three-star Marine heavyweight, Lieutenant General James Glynn, to Israel as well as two senior officers with a view to advising Israel on what to do — and what not to do — in its operation to rout Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

According to the Yedioth report, the Americans sought, at the president’s behest, to “help the commanders of the IDF think about the difficult questions before them.” That thinking hinged mainly on trying to dissuade Israel’s military leaders from launching a ground operation in Gaza.

It was done by playing the Jewish guilt card: to wit, by prognosticating 20 daily IDF casualties if Israel went forward with a ground invasion, which by Mr. Glynn’s estimation, Mr. Segal writes, would be “time-consuming and bloody.”

While no one can dispute the fact that most wars inevitably come with a cost in human lives — and Israel’s war against Hamas is no exception — the reality is that the American casualty forecast was wrong. “The price we have paid since then is heavy,” Mr. Segal states, “but it is about a tenth of that.”
A Hundred Days after Gaza's October 7
Part 1. History has the form of a double helix: history is indeed the DNA of living memory. There is what actually happened and there is what people believe happened. They are not the same but they are inseparable....

Hamas had told Israel that it intended to focus on helping its people in Gaza and that it did not want war. Israel, to show good faith, had even provided work permits for thousands of Palestinians to enter Israel every day for better wages than in Gaza. What Israel did not know was that many of them were spies who would tell Hamas exactly where in the villages to attack.

An elated youth called Mahmoud called home to his father and mother in Gaza using a murdered Israeli woman's phone to boast about how he had just killed ten Jews with his own hands ("oh my son God bless you"... "Mom, your son is a hero"). Part of the recording was played to the judges of the ICJ as part of the State of Israel's must-see rebuttal of South Africa's accusations.

Jeffrey Gettleman, in The New York Times on 28th December, published details of the unimaginable mass depravity committed by Gazan men on Israeli women....

Many of the first responses to these events, as with the Holocaust, were denials that such savageries had ever taken place.
A Hundred Days after Gaza's October 7 (Part 2 of 4)
The BBC has used UNRWA voices -- preferably, it seems, antipodean ones -- as purportedly objective third-party commentators. That is deeply irresponsible journalism, and the BBC most likely knows why that is so.

Thus, according to the Covenant and echoing the Mufti in 1943... there is not, and cannot anywhere be a Jewish state in this world. It is what is written: here we are told that Jews in Palestine are incompatible with "true statehood" and the Mufti will tell us that it is Allah's will that Jews shall forever stateless.

It is important to remember that these are thrice legitimate Jewish lands: once from original patrimony; once by international mandate and the third time by force of arms after successfully countering assaults in 1948, 1967 and 1973. Anti-Semitic exceptionalism, however, means that only the Jewish state is not allowed to enjoy the peace of victory that winning wars brings to other nations.

Ever since the Abraham Accords, were adopted on 15 September 2020, many regional states have shown that they would prefer to skirt around the ever-rejectionist "Palestinians" and to normalise relations with the amazing mighty midget Israel, which is the region's creative powerhouse in every cultural and technological domain, as well as, by necessity, its dominant military power. Most significantly that includes the Saudis, whom Iran's Ayatollahs have declared their sworn enemies.

In his platform speech, [the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Hajj Amin] al-Husseini responded by stating that Germany "understood the Jews perfectly and decided to find a final solution to the Jewish menace," and... "Allah has determined that there never will be a stable arrangement for the Jews, and that no state should be established for them."

Thus, in anti-Semitic ideology... the inconvenient history which can be traced in evidence from the SS liquidation task forces -- the Einsatzgruppen -- to Hamas, is detailed, documented and direct.
A Hundred Days after Gaza's October 7 (Part 3 of 4)
Sir William Shawcross's much delayed and now recent report on "Prevent" - the British Government anti-radicalisation programme - which has documented the failure of efforts at integration and the degree of risk residing within Muslim extremism has secured this disturbing knowledge its place on the public record.

In a climate of Israelophobia, where moral compasses go haywire, Hamas is not being held to account. Predictably, the BBC has presented international law as superior to national law and the International Court of Justice as a higher court than any national court. Neither is true. Under the guise of "human interest", the BBC repeatedly broadcasts prurient details of injuries to individual children in Gaza. Why? It is designed to shock and anger the listener and to demonize Israel; and it leaves those implications unspoken, hence deniable.

The former Director of BBC Television asks, "When do individual errors add up to something more? When do 'mistakes' become a clear pattern of institutional bias? These are questions the BBC must answer when it comes to its reporting of Israel's conflict with the terrorist group Hamas." He then lists nine other cases of gross error since 7/10 where the bias has been always the same, namely anti-Israel. "...Is the BBC just unlucky that this keeps happening? The answer is no."

Hamas has nowhere to hide under Geneva 4. Its crimes are war crimes of the highest order. The ICJ's interim ruling is vexatious and, while unable to make an objective finding, tarnishes that Court by implying that Israel might in the future commit "genocide" when there is neither evidence of intention nor a community which meets the criteria to be victims of genocide. The same day as its ruling, evidence arrived that UNRWA on which in part it had relied had itself now been discredited by evidence of its operatives' involvement in 7/10. This is the latest form of Holocaust denial.

It is a matter of moral and legal judgment about how a country with high moral standards wages war against a terrorist enemy that has none. The framework for such an assessment has not been satisfactorily spelled out.

Israel's entire ground force is part of an interactive all-arms cyber/air/sea/land concept of operations optimised for precision targeting to minimise collateral casualties, maximise the extinction of Hamas terrorists and ensure the effectiveness of its own force protection.
A Hundred Days after Gaza's October 7 (Part 4 of 4)
Israel's cause is the cause of the Free World as is Ukraine's and Taiwan's.

Domestic supporters of Hamas, trying to constrain Israel by "lawfare" and by noisy street and media politics, are therefore a fifth column for our enemies and should be treated as such.

Unsuccessful "lawfare" at the International Court of Justice served to narrow and make harder the road out of Gaza for all local parties. The biggest losers are those Arabs who are neither Islamists nor anti-Semites: for their territorial hopes have been written out of history at present by Hamas and Iran. Prosperity and tranquillity for them will only return with resumption of the Abraham Accords.... Netanyahu is surely correct in stating that any attempt to push for a two-state solution at this moment would endanger Israel.

Globally, in the context of a developing worldwide multi-theatre and multi modal contest between the Free World and the dictatorships, the most humane and swiftest route to peace is controlled escalation on our terms which reaches out and helps Iranians to end the shaky and bloodstained regime of the Iranian ayatollahs.

The right sort of war – meaning war on Western terms, in which we and not our enemies have escalation dominance -- is sometimes the most peace-friendly option...
ICJ rejects South African request for urgent measures to limit Israeli action in Rafah
The UN’s top court on Friday rejected South Africa’s request to put more legal pressure on Israel to halt a threatened offensive against Hamas in the Gaza city of Rafah, saying it was “bound to comply with existing measures.”

South Africa had requested urgent measures to safeguard Rafah amid Israeli plans for a campaign in the city, Hamas’s last bastion in the enclave.

Pretoria has already filed a complaint against Israel in the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague, alleging that its assault on Gaza amounts to a breach of the Genocide Convention. The court has yet to rule on the underlying issue, but on January 26 it ordered Israel to ensure it took action to protect Palestinian civilians from further harm and to allow in humanitarian aid. It declined to grant South Africa’s central request to order Israel to halt its military campaign.

The ICJ said in a Friday statement that the “perilous situation” in Rafah “demands immediate and effective implementation of the provisional measures indicated by the Court in its Order of 26 January 2024, which are applicable throughout the Gaza Strip, including in Rafah, and does not demand the indication of additional provisional measures.”

The World Court added that Israel “remains bound to fully comply with its obligations under the Genocide Convention and with the said Order, including by ensuring the safety and security of the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.”
World Court holds hearings on Israel's 'occupation' of Palestinian territories
It is the second time the UN General Assembly has asked the ICJ, also known as the World Court, for an advisory opinion related to the Palestinian territory. In July 2004, the court found that Israel's separation wall in the West Bank violated international law and should be dismantled, though it still stands to this day.

“The International Court of Justice is set for the first time to broadly consider the legal consequences of Israel’s nearly six-decades-long occupation and mistreatment of the Palestinian people,” said Clive Baldwin, senior legal adviser at Human Rights Watch.

“Governments that are presenting their arguments to the court should seize these landmark hearings to highlight the grave abuses Israeli authorities are committing against Palestinians, including the crimes against humanity of apartheid and persecution.”

The advisory opinion proceedings are separate from the genocide case that South Africa filed at the World Court against Israel for its alleged violations in Gaza of the 1948 Genocide Convention. In late January the ICJ in that case ordered Israel to do everything in its power to prevent acts of genocide in Gaza.

The outcome of the advisory opinion would not be legally binding but would carry "great legal weight and moral authority," according to the ICJ.

The precise question put to the court is to give an opinion on the legal consequences of Israel's "occupation, settlement and annexation ... including measures aimed at altering the demographic composition, character and status of the Holy City of Jerusalem, and from its adoption of related discriminatory legislation and measures."

The general assembly also asked the 15-judge panel of the ICJ to advise on how those policies and practices "affect the legal status of the occupation" and what legal consequences arise for all countries and the United Nations from this status.

The court will hear over 50 states and three international organizations over six days of hearings including the United States, Russia, China and South Africa. While Israel has filed a written statement with the court, it has not asked to participate in the hearings. On Monday proceedings will start with submissions from the Palestinian authorities.


‘Terror-backing South Africa betrayed its own people at the ICJ’
If there’s one quality South African Chief Rabbi Warren Goldstein does not lack, it is courage.

Speaking to the JC in an exclusive interview, he said that his country’s push to have Israel declared a genocidal state by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) was a betrayal of millions of South Africans.

The South African government was putting precious resources into supporting a foreign terrorist organisation while its people suffer from poverty, economic crisis and institutional corruption, he said.

Speaking a week before Transparency International, a Berlin-based corruption watchdog, gave South Africa its lowest ranking yet – 83rd out of 180 countries – Chief Rabbi Warren Goldstein said that the ICJ policy was “immoral” and damaged the country’s regional leadership role.

He added, however: “The hostile ANC is not the people and the government is not the people. There are many allies of the Jewish community in South Africa and there are many who, with shared values, are supporting Israel.”

Asked whether his swingeing criticism of South Africa’s government could endanger him or his community, Chief Rabbi Goldstein responded: “I’m not scared. One of our enormous blessings here is we are a free society. We can feel secure knowing that we live in a free democracy governed by the rule of law, with an independent judiciary and a robust, tenacious free press holding government and other institutions accountable.”

He said he was currently campaigning for an immediate investigation into three major South African banks that have been reported to be holding accounts for Hamas fronts. If true, this would break international and US-imposed money-laundering sanctions.

The chief rabbi promised to “personally” pursue all legal remedies against any bank where evidence of malpractice emerges and against anyone judged to have breached anti-terror international laws.


University anti-Semitism tsar to be appointed as Jewish students face death threats
A university anti-Semitism tsar is set to be appointed after Jewish students faced death threats on campus.

The Government plans to tackle universities which “appease” anti-Semitism following a string of incidents across the UK which left Jewish students and chaplains fearing for their safety.

Robert Halfon, the higher education minister, said: “I am really worried that some universities are not safe for Jewish students”.

He said that the Government would create a new post of Expert Adviser on anti-Semitism in Higher Education because vice-chancellors are failing to be “pro-active” in tackling hatred on campus.

The Government also plans to introduce a “seal of quality” awarded only to universities that adhere to “the highest standards in dealing with anti-Semitism”, where staff have been trained on how to tackle it and where robust complaints processes are in place.

Universities have faced accusations of anti-Semitism in a string of recent incidents including a Jewish chaplain at Leeds University being forced into hiding last week after he was targeted with death threats and anti-Semitic protests. The incident prompted an open letter from 500 former students calling for the vice-chancellor to act.

A week earlier, students at the University of Birmingham chanted “death to Zionists” during a rally, prompting Jewish student groups to later issue a statement saying that safety on campus had been “broken”.
‘Wake Up Call': House Subpoenas Harvard for Stonewalling Anti-Semitism Probe
Harvard University was hit with a congressional subpoena on Friday for obstructing a House probe into rampant anti-Semitism on its campus.

Rep. Virginia Foxx (R., N.C.), who is helming the investigation as chair of the House Committee on Education and the Workforce, announced that she had served the Ivy League school with several subpoenas after it failed to produce documents related to its handling of anti-Semitic incidents on campus.

It is the first time the committee has issued a subpoena to a university, though others could follow as lawmakers investigate several prominent universities for failing to police a rash of anti-Semitic incidents that have broken out on campuses across the country in the wake of Hamas’s Oct. 7 terror strike on Israel.

Harvard has been locked in a battle with Republican lawmakers over accusations that anti-Semitism on campus has spiraled out of control, threatening Jewish students' safety. Harvard, the House committee said, was given months to provide a host of internal documents detailing leadership’s response to campus anti-Semitism, including materials that could show the school did not take steps to protect Jewish and pro-Israel students.

To date, the school has failed to produce the relevant documents, only handing over materials that are publicly available, and in other instances, heavily redacted. More than 40 percent of Harvard’s production consists of publicly available documents, and others appear to be unrelated to the House committee’s specific information request.

"Harvard’s continued failure to satisfy the committee’s requests is unacceptable," Foxx said in a statement. "I will not tolerate delay and defiance of our investigation while Harvard’s Jewish students continue to endure the firestorm of anti-Semitism that has engulfed its campus. If Harvard is truly committed to combating anti-Semitism, it has had every opportunity to demonstrate its commitment with actions, not words."


What’s going on at Rutgers?
Lisa Harris Glass is not a punch-puller.

She’s the CEO of Hillel at Rutgers, where more than 6,400 Jewish students are enrolled this year — and that’s just the undergraduates. Rutgers and the University of Florida at Gainesville regularly swap the honor of being the public university with the largest number of Jewish students in the country.

It’s always a tough job — if it’s two Jews, three opinions, how many opinions are there for 6,400 Jews? — and a gratifying one.

But this year is different.

The Hamas attacks on southern Israel on October 7, the medieval brutality unleashed on its victims, also unloosed a spew of poisonous antisemitism. Much of it, for reasons that sociologists and cultural historians will be able to study and explain later, has centered on universities.

Much of it has centered on Rutgers.

The situation there “is so much worse than people can imagine,” Ms. Glass reported.

She began her job at Rutgers over the summer. She arrived there after decades of work in the Jewish world, beginning as a synagogue executive director, then working for the United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism, and then rising through the Jewish Federation of Northern New Jersey, becoming COO, and leaving there for Rutgers Hillel.

She thought she knew what she was getting into, but October 7 changed everything. “The academic environment, predictably, is a place where you are going to run into lots and lots of ideas,” she said. “Some of them are better than others, as is true in all things. I knew I was going to an amazing institution. I was excited to be doing something new, excited to meet the students. Over the summer, the school is like a desert, and then, when the students come, it starts to bloom, and the energy that you feel all over is nourishing.”

She knew that there was a chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine on campus, and that there is an Israel Apartheid Week every year, but those did not seem to be insurmountable problems. Jewish students have flourished at Rutgers, and she was secure in the belief that she’d be able to keep that happening.

The year started with great promise, but then October 7 happened, and “I have learned a lot since then,” she said.
Penn Administrators, Professors Rally Around Anti-Semitic Cartoonist

Press Release: StandWithUs Center for Legal Justice Files Title VI Complaint Against Middlebury College Detailing Pervasive Antisemitism

Elite Vermont liberal arts college embroiled in antisemitism scandal: 'Hostile campus climate for Jews'

‘Run by the Mob’: How Anti-Semites Took Over Stanford’s Campus

ABC newsroom ‘divided’ over Israel-Hamas war coverage
The ABC newsroom has become “divided” over its Israel-Hamas war coverage with its directors facing tough questions in Senate Estimates, according to Sky News Digital Editor Jack Houghton.

ABC Editorial Director Gavin Fang revealed thousands of complaints had been lodged against the ABC for its coverage of the conflict.

"About 58 per cent of those (3000-plus) complaints have been largely about impartiality and bias … those complaints have alleged that we have been pro-Israeli or anti-Palestinian and about 41 to 42 per cent have been running the other way," Mr Fang said during Senate Estimates.

"This is a really complex story, a very fast-moving story so we are always trying to meet our editorial policies and our standing."

Mr Houghton noted it's very rare to see the national broadcaster “at odds with forces on the left”.




BBC drops Apprentice contestant from spin-off show over antisemitic posts to social media

Antisemitic Callers Overwhelm La Mesa City Council Meeting with Hate Speech
What began as a typical La Mesa City Council meeting this week to weigh local issues morphed into an antisemitic diatribe by largely anonymous white-supremacist callers.

Words turned ugly during the council’s public comment period on Tuesday when a series of callers, each held to a council-mandated three-minute limit per speaker, used their allotted time to debase and degrade Jews with callous accusations and conspiracy theories.

Caller “Julie,” no last name given, began by telling the council, mayor and city attorney that everyone should know “Jews suck the blood out from male babies like a vicious vampire.”

The ongoing war in Gaza was mentioned in passing, but the callers’ vitriol was focused elsewhere.

At one point, the commentary became so inflammatory that it provoked one council member to get up from the dais and leave the room.

Throughout the comment period it was never clear where the speakers were calling from or if their three-minute statements were live or pre-recorded.

Similar calls disrupted a meeting of the Laguna Beach City Council in Orange County on Tuesday.

Julie told the council there was a conspiracy involving “lots of groups” who “advocate for Jewish supremacy and wish to cause harm to those who call them out.” She claimed the first five books of the Bible promote the idea that “the non-Jew is consequently an animal in human form and condemned to serve the Jew day and night.”


Only 3% of Public Thinks Starmer Has Successfully Tackled Antisemitism In Poll
New polling by YouGov for The Times reveals the extent of voters’ mistrust when it comes to Labour and antisemitism. Polling carried out on Wednesday and Thursday this week, after the revelations about Ali and Jones, has only 3% of voters agreeing that Starmer has successfully tackled antisemitism. Just over a quarter think that a good start has even been made…

The polling also reveals only 29% of voters believe Starmer has made his party more fit for government, with 38% saying no difference has been made.13% say he’s actually made it worse…

Meanwhile Azhar Ali continues to campaign from his car and circulate campaign posters that pit him against “Anti-Palestine Starmer“. Some creative work has been done to turn the Labour leader into a clown. Ali’s message is: “It’s time to teach Starmer a lesson in Rochdale“. Guido predicts Reform’s pitch of “Rochdale not Gaza” will start hitting home…


How to Counter the Houthi Threat at Sea
For the first time in four decades, a core U.S. interest on which successive American presidents have based Middle East policy - freedom of navigation and the free flow of commerce - is at risk. By enabling the Houthis in Yemen to attack international vessels in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden with armed drones and sophisticated anti-ship missiles - or hijack an entire vessel - Iran is causing tremendous harm to commercial activity in one of the world's most crucial waterways. The Houthi attacks have upended global trade and forced many ships to avoid Egypt's Suez Canal.

To neutralize the Houthi threat, President Biden should task U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) with leading an effort to deny the Houthis the means and capability to attack the free flow of commerce. This effort should include an interdiction mission to counter the ability of the Houthis to be resupplied/rearmed by Iran with weapons used to attack international vessels, and denying the Houthis the use of Iranian intelligence and targeting information.
Retailers demand more action from EU to resolve Red Sea crisis
European retail industry body Eurocommerce called on European Union institutions and member states to resolve the Red Sea crisis that has disrupted trade, saying in a letter to Belgium's foreign minister that it has already had "massive impacts" on businesses.

Shipping companies have rerouted container vessels away from the Red Sea to avoid Houthi militant attacks that have multiplied since early December, disrupting supply chains for firms reliant on the Suez Canal to get products from Asia to Europe.

Eurocommerce members include supermarket giants Ahold Delhaize, Carrefour, Lidl, M&S, and Tesco, and fashion retailers H&M, Inditex, and Primark. The impact on consumers

"The longer carriers are forced to reroute, the more businesses, and ultimately consumers, will suffer from additional costs adding to the already high costs of living in Europe," Eurocommerce said in the letter.

Retailers who source from factories in China and South-East Asia have faced delays and cost increases as the alternative shipping route around Africa's southern tip takes 2-3 weeks longer, resulting in higher fuel and labour expenses.

The disruption has raised fears that inflation will take longer to unwind in Europe, at a time when cash-strapped consumers were looking forward to prices of food and clothes starting to ease.

"Given the magnitude of the impacts on businesses and the global supply chain, we appeal for continued intensified and coordinated efforts by the EU institutions and Member States to address the situation," Eurocommerce said.
U.S. Intercepts Iranian Weapons Intended for Houthis
The U.S. Coast Guard fast-response cutter USCGC Clarence Sutphin Jr, assigned to U.S. Naval Forces Central Command, boarded a vessel in the Arabian Sea on Jan. 28 that originated in Iran and was bound for Houthi-controlled areas of Yemen, CENTCOM announced Thursday. The boarding team discovered medium-range ballistic missile components, explosives, unmanned underwater/surface vehicle components, military-grade communication and network equipment, anti-tank guided missile launcher assemblies, and other military components.

"This is yet another example of Iran's malign activity in the region," said Gen. Michael Erik Kurilla, CENTCOM commander. "Their continued supply of advanced conventional weapons to the Houthis is in direct violation of international law and continues to undermine the safety of international shipping and the free flow of commerce."
U.S. Carries Out Four Strikes on Houthi Areas in Yemen
U.S. Central Command said Thursday that its forces successfully conducted four self-defense strikes on Wednesday against seven mobile anti-ship cruise missiles, three UAVs, and one explosive unmanned surface vessel in Houthi-controlled areas that were prepared to launch against ships in the Red Sea.


Iran declares Antarctica its property in direct challenge to Biden, global treaty

Top Swiss Diplomat Appointed to Mediate Tensions Between Jewish Tourists, Businesses in Davos Ski Resort
The tourism authority in the exclusive Swiss mountain resort of Davos has appointed a top diplomat to mediate the growing tensions between local businesses and Orthodox Jewish visitors as complaints of antisemitism increase.

Michael Ambühl — the former State Secretary of Switzerland previously in charge of the country’s relationship with the European Union (EU) — will head a task force to tackle the problem, Swiss media outlets reported on Friday.

The announcement of Ambühl’s appointment comes just days after the resort was roiled by the refusal of a restaurant that operates a ski equipment rental store to provide services to Jewish guests.

A sign in Hebrew at the Pischa Restaurant in Davos stated that “due to various very annoying incidents, including the theft of a sledge, we no longer rent sports equipment to our Jewish brothers. This affects all sports equipment such as sledges, airboards, skis and snowshoes. Thank you for your understanding.”

Swiss police are currently investigating the incident as a possible case of discrimination. One Israeli tourist reported that he had visited the Pischa Restaurant where he “pretended not to understand Hebrew and asked if we could rent the equipment. After the woman consulted with the manager, she rejected our request.”

The tourism authority’s decision has irritated the country’s main Jewish representative body, the Swiss Israelite Association (SIG), which had been engaged in a separate dialog with the authority about accommodating Jewish guests that was abruptly closed down last year.

“The latest case shows that something is obviously wrong in Davos,” SIG General Secretary Jonathan Kreutner said in remarks quoted by the Blick news outlet.
Lakewood Church shooter praised Hamas, Hezbollah, Osama bin Laden
Reports have revealed that the shooter who attacked televangelist Joel Osteen’s Lakewood Church in Houston on Feb. 11 had “Palestine” written on her rifle. Police also found antisemitic writings.

Analysts associated with the Anti-Defamation League have since uncovered specific online statements expressing terrorist sympathies.

The Telegram channel of 36-year-old Genesse Moreno, who had a criminal record, exhibited support for Islamist terror groups Hamas, Hezbollah and Al-Qaeda. It also showed premeditation for the attack on the megachurch, to which she reportedly once gave money.

She wrote on Jan. 3: “Don’t worry my MUSLIMS brothers I am pass the threat phase. I’m in planning mode. Please don’t message me private trying to stop me.”

On Dec. 23, Moreno posted: “I always knew I had a purpose to do for Islam and Christianity. We must all come together Christians need the heart that they had back in the day back in the revivals of the old age. But this time to kill all Jews. #warjihad #mywarjihad.” Moreno used the screen name “Die Israel” and wrote on Jan. 8, “Death to Jews in America!”
Media Stumped by Motive of Anti-Semitic Shooter With 'Palestine' Rifle
MSNBC covered the shooting for at least 24 hours without mentioning the revelations about Moreno's anti-Semitic writings or "Palestine"-branded gun.

A CNN roundup on Wednesday included those facts only in the final few paragraphs, after some 1,500 words about mental illness and "red flags." Even then, the information was presented in the context of Moreno's problems with her ex-husband's family, "some of whom are Jewish."

This would not be the first time the media have been reluctant to report left-wing motives for headline-making attacks.

After an anti-Israel protester struck and killed a Jewish man in Los Angeles in November, NBC, CNN, and other outlets whitewashed the violent political circumstances of his death.

A woman who identified as a man killed three children in a Nashville school shooting in March, leading NBC News, HuffPost, and others to suggest the real victim was the transgender community.

A former volunteer for Sen. Bernie Sanders (I., Vt.) tried to murder Republicans at a practice for the 2017 congressional baseball game, and outlets were quick to declare it wasn't Democrats' fault. USA Today reported that "political vitriol" from the left was not a factor, "experts say."


Buildings, roads in ‘huge, complete’ Roman-era military base revealed by excavations
A full, permanent military base used by Roman legionnaires almost 2,000 years ago is on a larger scale than what was previously understood, spreading over both sides of Route 66 at the foot of Tel Meggido in northern Israel, the Israeli Antiquities Authority announced Wednesday. It is the only Roman legionnaires’ permanent base camp discovered in Israel.

The 1,800-year-old site, which has been the subject of several seasons of excavations, is now known to be “a huge, complete camp. It’s not something you find every day, it’s very rare and important,” Dr. Yotam Tepper, lead archaeologist, explained to The Times of Israel.

The most recent season of exploratory digging, undertaken in conjunction with an expansion of Route 66, uncovered “extensive and impressive architectural remains of the Via Pretoria (the main road of the camp)… as well as a semicircular-shaped podium and stone-paved areas which were part of a large, monumental public building,” the IAA said in a press release.

The permanent military base housed over 5,000 soldiers of the Roman Legio VI Ferrata, known as the “Sixth Ironclad Legion,” for over 180 years, from 117–120 to around 300 CE, the IAA said. The Sixth Legion had a storied, centuries-long history in Roman annals, and fought against Judean/Jewish forces during both the Jewish War (66-73 CE) and the Bar Kochba revolt (135-136 CE).

A survey of the camp area using GPR (ground-penetrating radar) showed that most of the Roman base and all its components lie underneath the wheat fields of Kibbutz Megiddo. The ancient buildings recently uncovered were not preserved completely, “as most of the building stones were removed over the years for reuse in building projects carried out during the Byzantine and Early Islamic periods,” the IAA said.

The excavation uncovered “coins, parts of weapons, pottery sherds and glass fragments,” as well as “extremely large quantities” of roof tiles. “The roof tiles, some of which were stamped with the VIth Legion stamps, were used for various purposes, for roofing buildings, paving floors and coating walls. The technology and know-how, the building techniques, and the weapons that the Legion brought with it from the home country, are unique to the Roman army, reflecting specific Roman Imperial military footprints,” Tepper said in the IAA press release.
Bari Weiss with Natan Sharansky
On January 25, 2024, Bari Weiss interviewed Natan Sharansky at the Nalagaat Theatre in Jaffa, Israel.

Natan was born in Ukraine, in 1948, the same year as the birth of the state of Israel. A chess prodigy and a mathematician, he became a figure of international importance in 1977, when he was imprisoned by the Soviet Union on trumped-up charges of treason. His real crime was wanting to immigrate to the state of Israel. At his court hearing in 1978, he famously said, “To the court, I have nothing to say. To my wife and to my people, I say, Next year in Jerusalem.”

Getting to Jerusalem took him longer than a year. Sharansky had to spend nine years in the gulag, often in solitary confinement. In 1983, he was in a tiny cell in a prison near the Siberian border when he learned that President Reagan had labeled the Soviet Union an evil empire. That empire fell eight years later, in no small part thanks to the actions of Sharansky, who immigrated to Israel upon his release from prison in 1986 and reunited with his wife, Avital.

Natan went on to a long political career, serving as a cabinet minister in every Israeli government from 1996 to 2005. He’s the author of several books, including the must-read memoir “Fear No Evil,” and most recently, “Never Alone: Prison, Politics, and My People.” In the course of his remarkable life, Natan has been a key actor in the only true forever war, and that is the war of liberty versus tyranny.

And while many American Jews have had the luxury over the past half-century of feeling as though history had ended, or that they had been on a holiday from it, Sharansky has always lived inside Jewish history. Few people can better illuminate the way, not just for Jews and not just for Israelis, but for anyone who cares about the cause of freedom than Natan Sharansky.






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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 over 19 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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