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Friday, June 14, 2024

06/14 Links Pt2: The looming choice for diaspora Jews; How António Guterres betrayed the Jews; The chilling rise of the Hamas red triangle

From Ian:

Melanie Phillips: The looming choice for diaspora Jews
Diaspora Jews tend to hold their noses at anything on “the right” because they associate “the right” with antisemitism. They need to wake up fast. While there are certainly troubling increases in neo-fascist groups, the main threat to the Jews today is posed overwhelmingly by left-wingers and Muslims.

Some European “populist” parties are indeed unsavoury. Others are merely authentically conservative. Most support Israel, although some have troubling antisemitic roots.

In other words, this is a mixed picture. And as a result, the pushback against those determined to destroy the west is likely to be messy and complicated.

Whether or not it’s time to uproot is necessarily a personal decision. However, Jews remaining in the diaspora will find themselves having to choose between the devil and the deep-blue sea. Quite apart from any dangers, the political choices they face are likely to make for an uncomfortable ride.

This alarming situation didn’t suddenly burst out of nowhere on October 7. The writing has been on this particular wall for decades. But most diaspora Jews refused to see it.

In America, the majority of Jews have actually signed up for the liberal ideas that are driving anti-Israel hysteria and Jew-hatred. In Britain, most Jews have been too frightened, too craven or too muddled to talk publicly about the threat from Muslim antisemitism and mass immigration.

Of course, diaspora Jews can reasonably point out that, at present, Israel is hardly a safe haven. And unfortunately, there may well be yet more horrors for that beleaguered little country to endure.

But Israel is where everyone knows what they’re fighting for. It’s where there is zero ambiguity about their enemy or its genocidal intention. It’s where the overwhelming majority understand that they are living through another seismic moment in the sacred history of their people. It’s why they know they have no alternative but to win.

That’s why Israel will survive. The same cannot be said for the west.
The chilling rise of the Hamas red triangle
The use of the inverted red triangle to target Pasternak’s home is particularly chilling. This symbol is directed at anyone deemed to be pro-Israel or who does not explicitly condemn the Jewish State.

When used by Hamas, the red triangle essentially denotes that someone is being targeted for execution. It first started using this symbol last November in propaganda videos produced in Gaza. In these, the red triangle was marked on Israeli soldiers or armoured vehicles about to be attacked. Since Hamas started promoting the symbol, it quickly began appearing throughout the Arab world, on everything from children’s comic strips to social-media memes. In the latter, it often appears over images of Israeli soldiers or the Star of David.

Now this repulsive glorification of violence against Israeli targets has been adopted by anti-Israel protesters in the West. As the Anti-Defamation League, a Jewish civil-rights group, has noted, students at the New School, Emerson College and New York University ‘have all advertised their [Gaza solidarity] encampments using inverted red-triangle imagery’.

Its use by protesters isn’t confined to America, either. In the German capital, Berlin, it has been seen at both Humboldt University and the Free University of Berlin, and it was also daubed on an Apple Store and other shops. In Britain, the red triangle sign can sometimes be seen on anti-Israel protests and it’s now available to buy as a t-shirt design.

Some will no doubt try to downplay the significance of this red-triangle symbol. They will point to its similarity to the red triangle on the Palestinian flag, in order to suggest it has another, simpler pro-Palestine meaning. But that is disingenuous. Any correspondence between the inverted red triangle of Hamas propaganda videos and the sideways triangle on the Palestine flag is coincidental.

Anyone doubting the threatening intent behind this symbol should see how it is used by anti-Israel protesters whenever they come across peaceful and relatively small pro-Israel counter protests. They will form their fingers into a triangle shape as if they are aiming a weapon at the pro-Israel protesters. This is little more than a coded version of drawing a finger across the throat. It is a threat.

The fact that this sinister symbol is being daubed on Jewish people’s homes ought to be a serious wake-up call.
WOL of sound: Following the money and activism behind anti-Israel ‘days of rage’
WOL and its members
Kiswani originally founded WOL as the New York City branch of the campus group Students for Justice in Palestine. Renamed in 2018, WOL maintains connections with many SJP groups and, according to Canary Mission, is “a pivotal bridge between campus and community.”

Both SJP and WOL receive funding from the Westchester People’s Action Coalition Foundation, according to the New York Post. The WESPAC Foundation receives funds from billionaire hedge fund manager George Soros and Felice Gelman, a retired investment banker who contributes to pro-Palestinian causes.

Like National SJP and individual SJP chapters, WOL is not registered as a 501(c)(3) organization. As such, its donors are not publicly known unless, as in the case of the WESPAC Foundation, it chooses to identify funding recipients themselves.

WOL has organized numerous protests throughout the city since Oct. 7, including supporting efforts to shut down Terminal 4 within John F. Kennedy International Airport on Jan. 1 and again on Jan. 27, International Holocaust Remembrance Day. Canary Mission cites WOL’s other targets as the New York City Marathon, the Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree Lighting, the New York Public Library, the Museum of Modern Art, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, Grand Central, Penn Station, and the Manhattan Bridge.

Canary Mission’s dossier on Kiswani is extensive and includes multiple instances of her calling for the abolition, annihilation, and defeat of Israel. Her arrest on May 31 was not her first in 2024. Kiswani was arrested on Jan. 26 for using sound amplification without a permit at a rally against Israeli corporations and entities. She was handcuffed during WOL’s participation in April 15 Tax Day protests, which were organized across the country to “block … the arteries of capitalism and jam … the wheels of production.”

Mohammed, WOL member, has shared frightening antisemitic language online, according to a Canary Mission dossier. “May every Zionist burn in the hottest pit of hell,” she posted on May 8, 2021. “I pray upon the death of the USA,” she wrote on X the following day. On Nov. 21, 2023, she posted, “Nothing but the complete dismantling of zionism will suffice.”

Video Mohammed shared on Instagram on May 7 is said to show protesters at Hunter College burning an American flag. She shared a post of the burning Israeli flag on April 14 and has shared multiple posts showing the badges of NYPD personnel with Arab last names whom she says “hammer a baton on the backs of their people.”

Akl has used social media to stoke hate. In an Instagram video shared on Nov. 26, 2023, Akl led protesters in chants on a crowded subway car to “globalize the intifada.” According to Canary Mission’s dossier on Akl, he led chants in Arabic on March 30, directing Hamas’s armed wing to strike Tel Aviv. Video on X from March 19 shows Akl being arrested at a protest.

Louder than hate
WOL is one of the numerous entities propelling hatred and decreasing public safety in an effort to promote a one-sided interpretation of peace in the Middle East, where Israel would be denied existence. As tensions mount amid continued conflict in Israel and Gaza, antisemitic actors inflict unending pain on Jewish communities worldwide.

In the face of fringe activists dominating media coverage, this hate speech and destructive rhetoric require a firm response from people of goodwill. Malign influences will not promote a future of peace and stability where Israelis and Palestinians can coexist without fear of terrorism.


How António Guterres betrayed the Jews
Because if Guterres really did believe in the points he made during his Munich speech, then he would not have assented to Israel’s inclusion on the blacklist. If he really appreciated the centrality of Israel as an anchor of security for Jews the world over, if he really grasped the mass trauma provoked by Oct. 7 for Israelis and Jews around the world alike, if he really knew in every fiber of his being that the Jewish people have only this one country that is currently facing a campaign of deadly violence orchestrated by Iran and its regional proxies, then Israel would not be sharing space with militaries whose sole raison d’être is the murder, torture and wholesale destruction of innocent civilians.

That is why Jews have every right to feel betrayed by Guterres. At least his predecessors, who included the late Austrian Nazi Kurt Waldheim, never raised our expectations and never cheated us into thinking that the United Nations was changing direction on Israel. Guterres dangled precisely that hope and then snatched it away.

Now he has lent his imprimatur to one of the worst antisemitic blood libels to emerge from the halls of the United Nations—and there have been many. The twisted logic that places Israel on such a list could easily be applied to the United States, the United Kingdom and France—all permanent U.N. Security Council members whose militaries have faced war-crime charges in countries like Algeria, Iraq and Afghanistan. But only Israel faces this treatment because targeting the Jewish state has become routinized and normalized in the U.N. setting.

That will only change when a successor to Guterres honestly appraises the world body’s own record of antisemitism and pledges to end it, first of all by dismantling all the elements—the committees, the various “independent” commissions, the anti-Israel agenda items set in stone—that contribute to this institutional bias. Only then can Jews gain any kind of trust in the United Nations. And that, for the foreseeable future, isn’t going to happen.
Amb. Alan Baker: Draft International Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Antisemitism
The widespread outbreak of antisemitism throughout Europe and North America is no longer the covert, under-the-surface, and passive antisemitism that has always existed. Perhaps the most severe and worrying aspect of this phenomenon is that it has now become acceptable and even fashionable to express antisemitic sentiments openly and to call for the boycotting and annihilation of the Jews.

The international community has never considered criminalizing antisemitism as an international crime in a manner similar to the criminalization of such acts as genocide, racial discrimination, piracy, hostage-taking, crimes against humanity, war crimes, and terror.

To correct what is a vast, long-standing international injustice, this document is intended to universally criminalize antisemitism within the world community in the form of an "International Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Antisemitism."

The Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs first proposed this in 2015. Regrettably, for fear of reactions by Muslim groups and out of a misplaced sense of "political correctness," it was not taken up.

In light of the present and most dangerous renaissance of antisemitism, this updated and revised draft convention should be reconsidered at the highest levels, with a view to its urgent adoption by the international community.
Lawfare, Newspeak, and Corruption | NGO Monitor exposes the seedy underbelly of "Human Rights Orgs"
Since October 7, Israel has been saying it’s fighting FOR humanity, on the frontlines of humanity, but in the information war—Israel’s own humanity is being called into question. And that charge is being led by NGOs with ideological agendas that pass themselves off as great defenders of humanity, with names like Save the Children, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International. They have been active combatants in the information war against Israel. Amplifying some of the worst lies and propaganda against Israel. Failing to stand up for the victims of Oct. 7th. Failing to fight from the hostages. Even allegedly taking funding from the Saudis and Qataris.

Today’s guest is pushing back. Because if sunlight is the best disinfectant, then shedding light on these NGOs’ funding and practices should expose all the dirt. Professor Gerald Steinberg, founder and president of NGO Monitor, has spent his life challenging the global system of anti-Israel NGOs. NGO Monitor has worked for years to hold the watchdogs accountable and warn Israel’s supporters of the damage that they are doing by abusing the banner of human rights. Israel is losing the information war, thanks to the political activities of these NGOs. What can it do to turn the tide?


Progressives Realize They Have a Jew-Hate Problem
The attack on Pasternak’s home was doubly irresistible. “I hate that this is happening but I hate even more that the progressives who run the Brooklyn Museum advocated for the rise of woke that led directly to this moment,” The Post Millennial’s Libby Emmons posted on X. Anne Pasternak is a liberal Jew, director of one of New York’s great cultural establishments who once told New York magazine, “white staff and trustees have to do the work of learning about our nation’s history and looking at their own education, conditioning, and biases, before we can lead meaningful change. That work is deep, hard, and essential.” She’s championed exhibits on themes of gender and race, lynching, and one that examined Picasso’s misogyny through the critical eye of comedian Hannah Gadsby. Her programming is like a woke Mad Lib.

Even so, her own museum has been mobbed twice since her tenure began, by members of the Decolonize This Place movement in 2018 and by pro-Palestine protesters affiliated with Within Our Lifetime just last month. They stormed the lobby of the building and scaled the facade to hang a banner from the roof. Instead of repudiating the bullies literally storming the gates, museum officials were quick to tell CBS they did not call the police, even though 34 people were arrested by the NYPD that day. They offered this frankly surreal response to the mobbing: “Displaying banners inside the building or affixed to the building is against museum policy and security protocol.”

Today, we see that the revolution Pasternak and Lander and AOC fomented is eating its own. But that doesn’t mean it’s deserved.

Putting on woke exhibitions at the Brooklyn Museum and mouthing woke platitudes doesn’t mean Pasternak signed off on her own doxxing. No one deserves antisemitism—no matter how dumb their politics.

There should have been plenty of wake-up calls for the progressive left that the antisemitism was coming from inside the house. Often, they’re footing the phone bill. But if the alarm is finally rousing them out of their slumber, we shouldn’t pour cold water on their heads. We should welcome them back to reality. But an apology would be nice.
Andrew Pessin: Refuting the Common Campus Lies Told About Israel
Big Lie 1: “There once was a country called Palestine, existing from time immemorial, ruled by the Palestinians and home to a few Jews with whom they got along nicely.”

In short—no.

Let’s start with the name “Palestine” itself.[3] There are two main theories about its origin. The first is that it derives from the Biblical Hebrew word (p’lishtin) that means “invaders” and refers to the Philistines, a Biblical era people who invaded the Land of Israel from the Aegean Sea. The other, noting that the term first appears outside the Biblical context in a Greek history text dated several centuries BCE, is that it derives from the Greek word for “wrestlers.”[4] If you wonder why ancient Greeks would name that region after “wrestlers,” consider that (1) the Jews referred to themselves collectively as “Israel,” (2) they referred to their land as “the Land of Israel,” and (3) “Israel” in Biblical Hebrew means “wrestled with God.” Either way, the name “Palestine” appears to be connected to Jews, rather odd on the claim that it names the ancient homeland of the Palestinian Arabs. Would they name their own country by a Hebrew name or by the Greek name for the Jews?

For those who know the history, the Israelites/Jews had either sovereignty, autonomy, or a dominant presence in that land from about 1200 BCE (the approximate date of the Exodus from Egypt, if that is a historical event) through at least the year 70 CE, when the Romans defeated the country of “Judea” (also named for the Jews, or Judaites), destroyed the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem, and sent many Jews into exile.[5] On finally conquering the Jews for good after the Bar Kochba revolt, in 136 CE, the Romans then gave Judea the new name of “Syria Palestina,” allegedly a humiliating gesture to nullify the then 1400-year Jewish history in the land by renaming it after those now long disappeared invaders, the Philistines. From that point onward “Palestine” became a largely European name for the region, not widely used by Arabs or other Middle Easterners, many of whom referred to the region as Southern Syria. Nor from that point on was there ever an independent country called “Palestine,” much less one ruled by the Arab people known today as “Palestinians.” Nor, then, was it the case that immigrating Jews arrived in this “pre-existing Arab country” and took it over, as the False Narrative would have one believe.

Indeed there was not even a clearly defined region, with determinate borders, known as “Palestine” under the Ottoman Empire. The region was divided into at least two distinct provinces, the northern half of the country being part of a province stretching north of today’s Lebanon into Syria and administered from Damascus—hence “Southern Syria”—while the southern half was an entirely distinct administrative unit. “Palestine” only came into being as a distinct entity with well defined borders with the British Mandate in 1920, but most Arabs in the region rejected both the name and the borders, seeing them as a colonialist imposition or invention. When anti-Israelists refer to “historic Palestine,” then, it’s not at all clear what they are referring to; there is nothing corresponding to it “from time immemorial,” so they can at best be referring to 1920 British Mandate Palestine—territory that not only initially included the enormous eastern territory to be called “Transjordan” (and later just “Jordan”), but which the Arabs themselves rejected both in name and in borders—another odd thing to do if “Palestine” is your ancestral homeland.

As for the Palestinian identity, though there were traces of the use of the term early in the twentieth century, few identified as “Palestinian” in the sense of “Palestinian Arab” until perhaps the 1950s. In fact the region had much immigration in the 19th century from all areas of the Ottoman empire and beyond and consisted of a wide mix of different people, Arabs and non-Arabs. Joan Peters’ well known book, From Time Immemorial, documents the 19th-century immigration of “Circassians, Algerians, Egyptians, Druses, Turks, Kurds, Bosnians, and others” (p. 196);[8] another widely cited source documents that today’s “Palestinians” are immigrants from many nations: “Balkans, Greeks, Syrians, Latins, Egyptians, Turks, Armenians, Italians, Persians, Kurds, Germans, Afghans, Circassians, Bosnians, Sudanese, Samaritans, Algerians, Motawila, Tartars, Hungarians, Scots, Navarese, Bretons, English, Franks, Ruthenians, Bohemians, Bulgarians, Georgians, Syrians, Persian Nestorians, Indians, Copts, Maronites, and many others.”[9] Similarly, Daniel Pipes writes:

The authoritative Encyclopædia Britannica of 1911, written by Irish archeologist Robert Alexander Stewart Macalister, lists no less than 23 ethnicities under the "Palestine" entry: Afghan, Algerian, Armenian, Assyrian, Bedouin, Bosnian, Canaanite, Circassian, Crusader, Egyptian, German, Greek, Italian, Jewish, Kurd, Motawila, Nowar, Persian, Roman, Samaritan, Sudanese, Turkish, and Turkoman. Long as this list is, Macalister missed a number of ethnicities (including the Arabian, Chechen, Ethiopian, Iraqi, Lebanese, and Yemeni). He further found that "no less than 50 languages [were] spoken in Jerusalem as vernaculars."[10]

Palestinian last names often indicate their family’s heritage: al-Masri (the Egyptian,), al-Djazair (the Algerian), el-Mughrabi (the Moroccan), al-Kurdi (the Kurd), and so on. There was no sense of their being a “single people” or an “ethnic identity” before the twentieth century, and arguably the identity really only arose in response to the onset of modern political Zionism, particularly after the disastrous failed war they launched against the Jews in 1948. But if the identity only arose in response to Zionism, it’s simply false to say that Jewish immigration was to a previously existing country called “Palestine” populated by “Palestinians”—for there simply was no such country and no such people.
Yisrael Medad: ‘Palestine’: An Arab- or Jewish-created entity?
There is a very basic question of the Arab-Israeli conflict, which, due to political correctness, is avoided or immediately confronted with harsh castigation: Is Palestine an Arab creation or was Palestine created for the Jews? Can it be that Palestine, a geopolitical defined entity, actually existed historically?

Following a recommendation by Nonviolence International, I visited a website called Decolonize Palestine, which purports to be “a collection of resources for organizers and anyone who wants to learn more about Palestine.”

In its Palestine Throughout History section, one can learn that Palestine was “first documented in ancient Egyptian tablets as Peleset” and it covered “the region between the Mediterranean and the river Jordan.” Moreover, as far back as 9,000 BCE, there were “Palestinian agricultural practices” that “can be traced back to the Natufians.” Unpicking their narrative

All that, of course, is misleading or better, creationary. The Peleset were thought to be from the “Sea Peoples,” who appeared in fragmentary records in the late 2nd millennium BCE. They probably participated in the Battle of the Delta circa 1175 BCE and then exited history. Some, wrongly, seek to link them to the biblical Philistines.

Another proof of Palestine’s supposed existence is Herodotus, who, writing in the 5th century BCE, refers to a region “stretching from Phoenicia along the coast of Palestine-Syria till it comes to Egypt.” That, however, leaves out any inland territory. Other classical writers, Hecataeus of Abdera and Clearchus of Soli, as early as 300 BCE, reference a “Judaea,” which most probably was the hill country, as well as noting a “Palestine.”

Upon the return of the Jewish exiles from their Assyrian captivity in the 6th century BCE, their Persian province was known as Judea. When the Maccabees revolted in 167 BCE, Judea became independent. Rome eventually assumed the administration of a country called Judea in 63 BCE.

After the failed Jewish revolt in 70 CE, Judaea Capta coins were struck to celebrate its capture and the destruction of the Second Jewish Temple. These coins were issued for 25 years. In addition to numismatic evidence, archaeological, literary (in a range of genres), and epigraphic evidence all attest to the existence over the past eight centuries of a Judea, not a Palestine.

Palestine, as a term applied to the country known as Judea, only appeared at the end of the Bar Kochba Revolt in 135 CE. That name continued under the Byzantine Empire, with three districts, Prima, Secunda, and Tertia, and it was that name adopted by the Arabs who, coming out of Medina, first conquered and occupied it in 638 CE. It is of Latin etymology and was corrupted into Arabic as Filastin. Arabs of the Middle East referred to the area as Bilad al-Sham, of which Filastin was one of four districts.

The next date this introduction mentions is 1516 CE, when the Mamluks were defeated at the battle of Marj Dabiq and the Ottoman Empire’s reign over the territory began. Skipping over almost 900 years of history when the country was still populated by Jews who continued to live in and visit the country, was fought over by Christian Crusaders and more is another form of obliterating history.

They add another twist when the content editors of the Decolonize Palestine site stress that in referring to Palestine, “we are not talking about a Palestinian nation-state.” After all, during most of history, they note, “the concept of a nation-state did not exist.” A nation-state, they assert, “is the foundational myth of many reactionary ethno-nationalist ideologies.” If that is the case, why do they demand the establishment of a state of Palestine?
How Public Schools Became Ideological Boot Camps
A pair of teachers at New Jersey’s Fort Lee High School recently taught students that Hamas is a peaceful “resistance movement” and Israel is committing genocide. Teachers at California’s Berkeley Unified School District are “indoctrinating students with antisemitic tropes and biased, one-sided anti-Israel propaganda disguised as education,” according to a complaint by the Anti-Defamation League. Meanwhile, students recently chanted “from the river to the sea” at college campus “tentifadas”—but when pressed could identify neither.

Why does this keep happening? And how can public schools at once be hotbeds of radicalism and “woke” indoctrination, yet produce students who are so poorly informed about the radical causes they ostensibly espouse?

The answer has a lot to do with one of American education’s dirty little secrets: on any given school day in nearly every public school in the country, curriculum materials are put in front of children that have no official oversight or approval. It’s true that schools might have a state- or district-adopted curriculum, but that doesn’t mean it’s getting taught. Nearly no category of public employee has the degree of autonomy of the average public school teacher—even the least experienced ones. Teachers routinely create or cobble together their own lesson plans on the widely accepted theory that they know better than textbook publishers what books kids will enjoy reading and which topics might spark lively class discussions.

Not your child’s school or teacher? Wanna bet? A 2017 RAND Corporation survey found that 99 percent of elementary teachers and 96 percent of secondary schools use “materials I developed and/or selected myself” in teaching English language arts. The numbers are virtually the same in math. But putting teachers in charge of creating their own lesson plans or scouring the internet for curriculum materials creates an irresistible opportunity for every imaginable interest group that perceives—not incorrectly—that overworked teachers and a captive young audience equal a rich target for selling products and pushing ideologies.

This ungoverned mess is how the majority of high-profile curriculum controversies happen.
Massachusetts Jew-hatred summit aims to change policies, rein in teachers association
Students and teachers put the Massachusetts Teachers Association under a microscope and legislators promised action at a virtual summit on combating antisemitism hosted by affected Bay State organizations on June 10.

Billed as a “community hearing,” the meeting featured disturbing testimonies of rampant antisemitism in Massachusetts K-12 schools, especially in the wake of Hamas’s Oct. 7 terrorist attacks and Israel’s military reaction.

“The speakers, especially the students and the teachers, were just unbelievable,” Robert Mayer, national co-chair of the Israeli-American Civic Action Network, told JNS. “Their stories were so powerful, heart-wrenching and angering. I told the community that I feel shocked, angered, moved, but most of all, energized, because we have to take action now.”

ICAN co-hosted the summit with Massachusetts Educators Against Antisemitism, CAMERA Educational Institute, Christians and Jews United for Israel, StandWithUs K-12 Educator Network, the Combat Antisemitism Movement and the Consulate General of Israel to New England.

Speakers at the event urged politicians and public officials—several of whom attended—to recognize the problem of antisemitism on Massachusetts campuses and take necessary steps.

The Massachusetts Teachers Association, a union that is affiliated with the National Education Association, called in December for an immediate ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war without mentioning Hamas’s atrocities or urging the return of hostages held captive in Gaza.

In March, the Massachusetts union’s task force on “anti-racism” hosted a webinar titled “The Struggle Against Anti-Palestinian Racism,” which reportedly included a slide identifying Jewish organizations to be condemned as part of a Zionist “machine.”

Nirit Friedlander, the Massachusetts co-chair of ICAN, told JNS that the union “encourages a restrictive and potentially dangerous concept for the safety of our children, claiming anti-Zionism is not antisemitism,” adding that “it promotes content that favors the Palestinian narrative while consistently disparaging the Israeli side.”
'Rampant Zionism': Top staffers at left-wing private equity watchdog praised anti-Israel college protests
Leading members of a liberal nonprofit private equity watchdog group expressed strong support for the anti-Israel college protests plaguing campuses in the spring.

Several top employees of the Private Equity Stakeholder Project (PESP), a left-leaning watchdog funded by Soros-backed groups, were "proud" of the college campus protests, many of which called for the destruction of the Israeli state, a FOX Business review found.

K Agbebiyi, PESP's senior housing campaign coordinator, is a self-pronounced "Communist" and vocal supporter of the college campus protests against Israel.

"I have a ton of different interests like basketball, queer line dancing, fashion, glitter, pink, but also I’m striving to be a disciplined Communist," Agbebiyi wrote in a blog post. Agbebiyi also wrote in support of the anti-Israel protesters at Emory University.

Agbebiyi went on to say it was "amazing" that her graduate school alma mater, the University of Michigan, had an anti-Israel encampment "given the rampant Zionism within the University and the recent backlash against organizers for disrupting an Honors convocation."

"After what I’ve witnessed to sadly be a lull in public support for Palestine, the encampment movement has seemingly reinvigorated the fight by putting activism against ‘Israel’s’ genocidal reign of terror back on the front pages of the internet," Agbebiyi continued. "I want to be clear, I am in full support of these brave and passionate students. As a former student organizer I understand the risks of the actions they are taking."

Agbebiyi made several posts at the height of the college campus protests, calling those arrested for refusing to comply with law enforcement "political prisoners" and asking people to donate to their bail funds.

Agbebiyi also posted a list of demands from the protesters on social media, which included an "Academic Boycott Of All ‘Israeli’ Universities."

Additionally, the PESP employee posted a photo to help fundraising for campus protestors in Atlanta. The post was from an account under the username @Dissentergsu, a group whose Linktree links to a page calling for "No More USA" and "No More Israel."

Several additional staffers have expressed support for the anti-Israel protests on social media while employed at PESP, a group which has been previously funded by the Soros-backed Foundation to Promote an Open Society, the Ford Foundation, and Surdna Foundation, among other left-leaning groups, according to Influence Watch. (h/t MtTB)
I'm your huckleberry
This is a rant. R-rated: language, depictions of potential violence, graphic insults that may prove discomforting only to “sensitive” people who don’t read Howlin’ anyway. But NSFW if you are using the transcript reader. Thanks for allowing me to vent my spleen.

Yo, you keffiyeh-wearing, anti-Semitic protesters holding hostages in college buildings, defacing monuments and private homes, and threatening people on public buses. Eighty-five years ago, your philosophical forebears got away with facilitating genocide because not enough people saw through their bullshit until it was too late. Unfortunately for you, that was then, and this is now. In the here and now, you mistakenly put way too much stock in how the media and academia think about and handle you with kid gloves, and not enough in what ordinary Americans think about and would handle you if you pulled your shit outside of safe progressive enclaves.

I triple-dog dare you to test this thesis. I'm your huckleberry, and I'm nowhere near the front of the line. Please, please, step onto the bus I'm riding and ask if there are any Zionists onboard. I'll convert to Judaism on the spot. I’ve had about as much as I’m going to take from you clueless, morally-bereft, historically-challenged dipshits. It’s time for a reality check.

Anyone making threats on behalf of a terrorist organization, Hamas, whose military tactics include targeting women and children and having over a million men identify as women and children to hide among them from the ass-whipping they’ve got coming, isn’t to be feared. Hamas should be mocked for the cowards that they are. That’s what I’m doing right now. You have a problem with that? I’m easy to find. Bring help.

Your fool’s confidence is based on your notion that most of the people in this country are like the woke, compliant media who parrot Hamas’s verifiably false claims about the conflict in Gaza, officials in blue cities, or the intellectually lazy and morally timid academic cowards you are able to steamroll on college campuses. You may be able to get administrators like Cal State Los Angeles president Berenecea Johnson Eanes to cower in their offices when you turn over a few tables to barricade and occupy a building, but try pulling that most anywhere else in America and see how it works for you.

Let me give you a hint: It would be very similar to what would happen if you were stupid enough to pose as a journalist and hold hostages that terrorists kidnapped at a music festival in your home when retribution arrived. Along that line, I'm reasonably sure that if you are either a terrorist, a representative of, or an apologist for a terrorist organization dedicated to the erasure of my kind and you kidnap my kids to strike a blow for your cause, that I give zero fucks about what my special forces do to you while rescuing hostages.

The thing about you Hamas-loving anti-Semites that galls me in particular is that you encapsulate everything about wokeness that I and many others have come to despise. Ignorance of history? Check. Ignorance of facts? Check. Ignorance of reality? Check. Exceptional suspension of disbelief? Check. Bigotry not incredibly well disguised as anti-bigotry? Check. Reeking of totalitarianism? Check. Cowards masquerading as freedom fighters? Check. Can only sell your poisonous sophistry to the very young, very woke, and very stupid? Check, check, and check.
When the price of loving Israel is ostracism
Today, expressing support for Israel, or identifying oneself as a Zionist is not just a point of disagreement with others who hold different views. It can mean being excluded and shamed, even becoming a target of hate. How, then, does one cultivate a commitment to the very thing that might result in social ostracization? This is a painfully unfamiliar challenge for educators and parents.

And yet this is not an unprecedented state of affairs. For hundreds of years, Jewish communities faced similar challenges. In European Christendom, Jews were assumed to hold heretical and unsavory views. They were occasionally required to debate their case in public disputations, ritualized debates that bear a striking resemblance to those in which Israel has had to participate in recent months at the Hague. Then, as now, some of their most outspoken opponents were those who had switched sides and who announced they had grasped a more universal set of truths. (For Pablo Christiani read Peter Beinart.)

In their magisterial study of Jewish education during those centuries, The Chosen Few, Maristella Botticini and Zvi Eckstein, argue that Jewish communities survived and even thrived during long centuries as ideological outcasts, by doubling down on a set of distinctive values, on literacy and community solidarity. Jewish education, costly as it was to sustain in such circumstances, enabled the few who were willing to invest, to maintain and sustain Jewish dignity. Remarkably, pariah Jewish communities sustained a sense of chosenness, a belief that the Jewish People have something of value to offer the world. To be clear, Jewish education was not focused on the training of disputants – those who could confront the demonizers head-on – it was concerned with the nurture of devotees, people with a love and appreciation for Jewish culture and practices. Jewish education underpinned intellectual and social resilience and, paradoxically, as Maristella and Eckstein argue, it subsequently enabled Jews to make a distinct contribution to humanity.

In truth, the situation today is not as bleak as it was during those centuries of Christian supersessionism. Israel and the Jewish people have many allies, millions of them. They may not write op-eds in the New York Times or The Guardian; they’re more likely to live next door or sit in the adjacent seat when we take a flight or train ride. This constitutes a marked difference from the Middle Ages.

At the same time, if we are to overcome this moment, it is evident that the work of Israel education can no longer just be about connecting young Jews to Israel. It must be part of a larger Jewish educational project. It should not be narrowly focused on training advocates for Israel – although such individuals make an important contribution. Drawing a lesson from the past, to resist those who demonize us, we should double down on building Jewish communities supported by Hebrew literacy, an appreciation for Jewish values, and the capacity to create Jewish culture for ourselves and for others. Resilience, at this time, will spring from an appreciation of collective Jewish self-worth.

We’ve done it before, we can do it again.
Jonathan A. Greenblatt: The hard bigotry of no expectations
Decades ago, President George W. Bush spoke of the concept of the “soft bigotry of low expectations,” the notion that expecting less from a group of people is to think less of them, a stereotyping that in and of itself is pernicious. Now, at a very different time and in a very different context, this idea from long ago rings in my ears.

Over the weekend, in the reaction to the heroic rescue of four Israeli hostages in the middle of Gaza, it became clear that many world leaders, commentators and protesters in the street have zero expectations for moral, ethical behavior for Hamas and those supporting them in the streets of Gaza or in the streets of cities around the world. They assign no agency to Gazans, relegating them to the role of perpetual victim – a soft bigotry – while at the same time, seeing Israel and the Jewish people as eternally evil – a hard bigotry to be sure.

To start, let’s remember who these hostages were: innocent men and one woman who were attending the Nova festival. They were not soldiers; they were not armed. Unlike the nearly 400 other civilians at the Nova site, they were not murdered and mutilated. Instead, they were viciously kidnapped against their will. In the case of Noa Argamani, we have the video of her being thrown on the back of a motorcycle and taken to Gaza.

As the details of their captivity came to light, we learned that these particular hostages had not been caged in subterranean tunnels deep under the enclave where they might never be found. Rather, they were placed in residential neighborhoods adjacent to a Western-style shopping mall and held captive in the homes of prominent members of society.

This is shocking, but perhaps not surprising. The scholar Daniel Jonah Goldhagen called the ordinary Germans who went along with the Nazis “Hitler’s willing executioners.” Here, we have Hamas’s willing kidnappers – and a similar phenomenon of people acquiescing and abetting evil.

However, just hours after the hostages were rescued, the great and good throughout the Western world did not start a discussion of the war crimes of Hamas kidnapping civilians or basing their operations in a residential neighborhood. Instead, the crime was Israel’s – for the unfortunate, and unavoidable, civilian deaths that happened as a result of the intense firefight Hamas unleashed on the rescue teams.
The Jewish Question in French Politics
In the first act of Prayer for the French Republic, Joshua Harmon’s 2024 play about a French Jewish family struggling to decide whether to remain in France, the son, Daniel—who wears a kippah in public, despite his mother’s pleading—comes home with his head and face bloodied. “Who did this to him?” his mother cries. “Who do you think?” responds the father.

The audience understands that the assailants are French Muslims or Muslim migrants, though the fact remains unspoken. By the third act, the family decides to leave France for Israel. But in the end, the biggest factor in their painful decision is not the real threat of Islamist violence that began the drama. It is the belabored but entirely hypothetical threat of Marine Le Pen and her right-wing National Rally party winning the next election. The Benhamou family is therefore spurred to question their future in France because of the danger posed by the country’s Muslim immigrant population—and ultimately leaves because the political party that promises to reduce Muslim immigration to France might win. Harmon tips his hand in an unintentionally funny scene, when the family refuses to consider migrating to the United States not because they are French, but because of the still more severe threat to Jewish safety posed by Donald Trump.

No one could mistake Prayer for a French play, given the distinctively American confusion that pervades it. But in the pains it takes to avoid appearing Islamophobic at all costs, seeking refuge instead in the more comfortable threat of right-wing Jew-hatred (remember the Nazis!), it does reflect an intellectual trap that has ensnared the left in France as much as its counterpart in the United States. Which is why when I saw the play on Broadway in January, I thought—as I often have since Oct. 7—of Manuel Valls.

France’s Socialist prime minister from March of 2014 until December 2016, Valls has a legitimate claim to be the man who did more than any other to hold France together during its greatest crisis in half a century. During a spate of anti-Jewish terror incidents in 2014, and the even more deadly equal-opportunity terror wave that followed in 2015-16—including the killings at Charlie Hebdo and the Hypercacher kosher market in Paris, the Bataclan massacre, and the mass murder in Nice on Bastille Day—France was riven by debates over the sources and meaning of Muslim terror, not to mention the basic ability of the state to protect its citizens. Did the conservative Muslim and Islamist networks in France have decisive influence over the killers, or were they all “lone wolves”? Was it a coincidence that the Bataclan was owned by two Jewish brothers, and that Charlie Hebdo was seen as being “Zionist-controlled”? To what extent could Israel’s military actions in Gaza at the time be blamed for the bloodshed in France?
Hitler’s Unnecessary Rise
Review of 'Takeover' by Timothy Ryback
Adolf Hitler’s capture and destruction of the fragile Weimar Republic is a cautionary tale without rival. To tell the story in his new book, Takeover, the historian Timothy Ryback has narrowed the action to the six months leading up to Hitler’s elevation to national leadership. He relies heavily on newspaper reports, diaries, and memoirs to recount in vivid detail how the infighting between cocky, short-sighted members of the Prussian establishment eventually opened the door to the Nazi leader. But also ever-present in Ryback’s account is the role of chance—unplanned encounters, missed opportunities, hidden resentments. Conditions were ripe for this political catastrophe, but it wasn’t inevitable.

In the Reichstag elections of July 31, 1932, the Nazis increased their share of the vote from 18 to 37 percent, securing 230 of the 600 seats. Hitler believed that General Paul von Hindenburg, the German president, would be obligated to appoint him Reichskanzler. General Kurt von Schleicher, the minister of defense and Hindenburg’s most trusted confederate, encouraged him in this conviction. And while Hitler despised the “von-von-vons” who dominated the Weimar government as they had the previous imperial regime, the support of Berlin’s kingmaker flattered him. Schleicher did not spell out his intentions—to control Hitler and use his 400,000-strong Nazi Sturmabteilung (SA) as a counter force to the Communists, who had also gained seats in the election, and their Red Front fighters.

But the 84-year-old Hindenburg refused to play along. He considered Hitler fit only to be postmaster. With Hitler en route from Munich to claim his prize, Schleicher and Franz von Papen, the hapless politician who had been installed as chancellor in June 1932, agreed to tell Hitler that he must serve as vice chancellor for a time, under Papen, to gain Hindenburg’s confidence.

“Hitler was staggered. The Nazis were being fobbed off,” Ryback quotes from the memoir of John Wheeler-Bennett, a British government adviser. In his diary of the same day, August 13, Joseph Goebbels reported that Hitler now suspected that Schleicher had lured him to Berlin only to discredit him in the eyes of his followers and the public. A phone call late in the afternoon, summoning Hitler to meet Hindenburg, temporarily reignited Nazi hopes.

During a brief audience, the pre-sident didn’t even ask his guests—Hitler, associate Wilhelm Frick, and SA chief Ernst Röhm—to sit down. A Hindenburg aide, Otto Meissner, described how the old fighter stood leaning on his walking stick, “a veritable monument of a man, towering over them by a full head and a half.” When Hitler reiterated his refusal to participate in a new government unless he was head of it, Hindenburg responded crisply, “Nein.” He castigated the Nazis for their intolerance and violence, warning them that SA members would be prosecuted for any acts of terror, including the murder of a Communist miner in Potempa in Upper Silesia four nights earlier. Hitler, famous for verbosity, was dismissed before he could get a word in edgewise.

The presidential dressing down in August could have marked the end of Hitler’s political ascent. The Nazi’s July surge, Ryback writes, “had been driven primarily by independent voters who had initially seen Hitler as a bulwark against the radical left and assumed he would enter into a coalition with centrist conservative parties, bringing stability to years of political chaos.” Hitler not only demanded full power for himself, but he also sent an incendiary telegram to the five Potempa killers when they were found guilty and slated to be executed. “My comrades!” he declared. “In the face of this monstrous blood sentence, I feel bound to you in eternal loyalty.” Voters punished Hitler in the polls on November 6, in another Reichstag election, with the Nazis losing 34 seats. In December, in a local election in the state of Thuringia, voters again moved toward the center, cutting the Nazi’s support by nearly a quarter. The party was nearly bankrupt by this point.

The documentarian Leni Riefenstahl was at the post-election debrief that Hitler organized at the Sterneckerbräu beer hall in Munich and was surprised to hear him speaking as if he had won. Ryback portrays Hitler as possessing a nature resilient to adversity: “Whether that was as a result of some form of emotional or psychological imbalance that inclined him toward the delusional, or a fierce, even ruthless determination…is not clear.”
The world forgot Auschwitz, of course they have forgotten the hostages too
"Where they burn books, ultimately they will burn people”, our guide Ron said, quoting Heinrich Heine as we stood in Humboldt Square. Eighty years ago, the students of Humboldt University held a cult-like ceremony during which they threw thousands of books into flames. Six million souls would soon follow.

“And now, follow me and we will visit the exhibit they have set up here on behalf of the hostages currently held by Hamas,” Ron continued.

This was the first day of our history of antisemitism and Holocaust tour through Europe. Twenty of us, all Christian leaders and practitioners in Jewish-Christian relations and Israel education, were about to spend the next few days tracing the history of the Jewish people in Europe.

Bring them home
We walked across the square where chairs had been set up with the photo of a hostage’s face affixed to each backrest. “Bring Them Home Now,” read one banner. Another read, “Time is running out.”

The police stood nearby, monitoring the scene and ensuring that the installation was protected. Our group felt it fitting to say a prayer in that place for the release of the hostages. So we prayed in the square where students turned against sanity and reason, the square where the public demand for a Final Solution began. We prayed for those still held in captivity by terrorists fueled by antisemitic fervor, and we cried out for their release.

I had been standing outside of Columbia University just a few weeks prior, holding a poster that read, “We won’t rest until they are home.”

As we walked deeper into the heart of Berlin, we entered the Jewish Quarter, and were greeted by the faces of the hostages – this time lining the gate in front of a 100-year-old synagogue. Memorial candles lined the street, and police officers walked back and forth guarding the posters. I stopped, astounded.

Another in our group said, “How depraved is your society when the police need to protect hostage posters?” I was stunned, but he was right. I was comforted that German police protect these posters, and I am saddened that they even needed protecting.

WE LEFT Berlin for the Wannsee Villa, the opulent German villa where the so-called “Final Solution” was perfected. At the front gate was another hostage’s face – a Holocaust educator named Alex Danzig. My eyes filled with tears.
The enemies within – Australian Jews are endangered by hostile agents
While the ABC keeps recycling the same handful of Jews to attack their own community, I don’t recall them ever once highlighting an Australian Muslim who rejects that community’s demonisation of Israel.

Legitimising anti-Jewish positions, emboldens enemies of our community and poses a safety risk for Australian Jews.

The phenomenon of Jews turning against their own community is sadly not new.

Our history is riddled with informers who denounced sacred Jewish texts, causing countless Jews to be burned at the stake. People like Johannes Pfefferkorn, who left Judaism after committing a burglary and led calls to enslave and expel his brethren.

In the Soviet Union, the Yevsektsiya turned in their fellow Jews and destroyed Synagogues, while demanding the “total liquidation” of Zionism. It didn’t save many of them from Stalin’s purges.

The sickness of antizionism is so great that there was even an antizionist, Pro-Nazi group in Germany in the 1930s, Verband nationaldeutscher Juden (Association of German National Jews). Its leader was later imprisoned by the Gestapo.

The Jewish chess master and antisemite, Bobby Fischer hated his people so much that he even wrote a letter to the Encyclopaedia Judaica demanding they remove his name.

Those who turn on their fellow Jews are sometimes called ‘Kapo’, but I prefer not to use the word, since those Jews who were forced to work for the Nazis often had no choice, while today’s anti-Jewish Jews seem to relish the opportunity.

More appropriate is the term, ‘unJews’, used by Natan Sharansky and Gil Troy. The Jerusalem Post said of anti-Zionist Jews, “They are as Jewish as the Westboro Baptist Church is Christian.”

An important lesson from October 7 has been the need for Jewish unity. While I may disagree with policies of other Jewish organisations from time to time, I try hard not to contribute to public disagreement. I know that I’m not alone.

The deadliest day for Jews since the Holocaust has been a wake-up call for the 99%.

I have been inspired to see left-wing Jews who spent the prior year protesting Israel’s Government, now join hands with right-wing Jews.

The Jewish community is a broad tent. There is room for those who support and those who criticise the Israeli government and the Jewish establishment.

The line must be drawn at those who endanger our safety and make a mockery of the Holocaust.

Like the wicked son in the Pesach Seder, they have chosen to cut themselves off from the Jewish story and we must make it clear that they are not part of us.
TikTok ad moderator calls to make Oct. 7 'international holiday,' claims 'Death to Zionists'
A TikTok ad moderator has been posting inciting, vile remarks on social media, wishing death to Zionists and calling to make October 7 an international holiday. Zeina Ismail, a Lebanon-born and Ireland-based ad moderator at TikTok, has been seen posing with flags of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.

The PFLP, which participated in the October 7 massacre and is responsible for multiple plane hijackings, mass shootings, and cold-blooded assassinations of Israelis throughout the years, is designated as a terror group by the US, EU, Israel, and others. Ismail’s posts with the flags included commenting “burn them all!!” to news of trying to set fire to the Israeli embassy in Mexico City, as well as promoting “resistance by all means necessary,” a euphemism known to mean urging armed struggle against Israel.

Ismail’s responsibilities in the capacity of ad moderator can include moderating and ensuring advertising content is compliant with stipulated policies and local laws, moderation of user-generated content (UGC) by capturing screenshots of violations and the tagging of all applicable labels, staying abreast on all policy changes and/or developments, and adhering to defined policies and procedures while meeting performance expectations.

TikTok's response to Ismail's statements
The Jerusalem Post queried TikTok as to whether positions such as Ismail’s were accepted in the company, how the social media giant can ensure that the company’s work ambiance remains safe from workers wishing for the death of other workers, and how the company can make sure that ad and content moderators work professionally without letting their personal beliefs obstruct their work.

The organization said in response: “TikTok does not tolerate antisemitism on our platform or in the workplace and takes any allegations extremely seriously. We have been investigating this issue but cannot comment further while the investigation is ongoing.”
House ed committee won’t tolerate Northwestern’s ‘obstruction,’ chair says
Rep. Virginia Foxx (R-N.C.), chair of the House Education and the Workforce Committee, sent a letter to Northwestern University accusing the private school in suburban Chicago of having “obstructed” and “impeded” congressional efforts to monitor the school’s antisemitism problems.

“Unfortunately, rather than being cooperative and transparent, Northwestern has obstructed the committee’s investigation of this matter,” Foxx wrote.

Michael Schill, president of the school in Evanston, Ill., “pointedly refused to answer questions from committee members, made statements at odds with the public record…and demonstrated an overall attitude of contempt for the committee.”

Northwestern didn’t comply adequately with the committee’s prior data request, according to Foxx. “Northwestern produced a mere 13 pages of documents responsive to the committee’s priority requests that were not already public—all of which were formal records of Board of Trustees meetings that lack substantive details of the board’s discussions,” added Foxx.

“Despite the committee’s specific request for records such as notes, summaries and recordings that would offer real insight into the board’s deliberations, Northwestern failed to produce any such responsive documents or certify that they do not exist,” she wrote.

In the letter, Foxx asked the school to provide documents, including communications about the “Northwestern Liberated Zone” encampment, antisemitic incidents on campus since Oct. 7 and Qatar funding, by June 17.
Santa Monica College professors assign ‘anti-Israel propaganda’
Professors at Santa Monica College required students to adopt antisemitic views in their assignments, according to StandWithUs.

“Your students are so afraid of retaliation from SMC administration, faculty and other students that they have asked to remain anonymous,” the nonprofit told the public school in Los Angeles County.

StandWithUS noted two assignments in particular.

An introduction to ethnic-studies course, which is required for most students at the school, taught by Elias Serna, called on them to adopt “his personal political point of view as objective truth,” StandWithUs said.

“What are your thoughts on the ongoing destruction and genocide by Israel in Palestine? What forms of protest have you witnessed or observed?” read part of an assignment in Serna’s course, according to StandWithUs. “What effect does protest have on the political situation in Gaza? What effect is it having on this generation?”

An art history course taught by Ali Ahmadpour included an assignment to design an art exhibition at an “often illegal” encampment on the college grounds “to educate the community about the ongoing conflict in Gaza on the occupied Palestinian lands,” said StandWithUs.

“These questions are premised on the factually incorrect assertion that Israel is committing ‘genocide’ in Israel, the West Bank and Gaza, and that Israel is occupying Palestinian land,” the group said. “It is clear from both assignments that Serna and Ahmadpour proceed from the premise that their political opinions are facts that must be unquestioningly accepted by students as they complete their coursework.”

Requiring students to adopt antisemitic views “is constitutionally impermissible,” the NGO said.
Ohio county drops bid to divest from Israel bonds after warning from state AG
Ohio’s Cuyahoga County will no longer consider a resolution seeking to divest from its ownership of $16 million worth of State of Israel Bonds, after the state’s attorney general warned the move could violate Ohio law.

Council Vice President Cheryl Stephens and Councilman Patrick Kelly say they are withdrawing their resolution, which had touched off an impassioned debate within the council and the larger Cleveland metro area, according to Cleveland.com.

However, the pair are continuing to urge county Treasurer Brad Cromes to drop all foreign investments, as the resolution had called for, “until a thorough review of the policy can be conducted,” they say in a letter to Cromes and county executive Chris Ronayne.

Earlier Thursday, Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost warned in a letter to Ronayne that approving the resolution would violate a 2016 law prohibiting boycotts of Israel.

Ohio holds over $260 million in Israel Bonds, making it among the largest public holders of the asset in the US.

According to Cleveland.com, divesture would cost the county some $95,000.
Art center in Buffalo apologizes for declining to work with Jewish school
Locust Street Art, a center in Buffalo, N.Y., that has received tens of thousands of dollars in public funding, declined to work with an Orthodox Jewish school in the city’s Amherst suburb, citing the war in Gaza.

“Upon further review of your organization, we have found our missions are not aligned and we will not be able to set up programming with your school,” the art center wrote to the Ohr Temimim school, WKBW reported.

“It seems we are on opposite sides of a great ethical divide and cannot in good consciousness work with a pro-Israel organization that supports the ongoing genocide in Gaza,” the center wrote.

Chris Greene, a Republican legislator in Erie County, which includes both Buffalo and Amherst, said he was “completely shocked,” WKBW reported. “They coin themselves ‘Art for all’ and therefore it is shocking and disappointing.”

The center “stated it had to do with the conflict between Israel and Hamas, and in the end, there is no mention of Israel or Hamas on this school’s website,” Greene added. “The only thing that it mentions is that they’re Jewish, so it is very clearly antisemitic in nature as far as why they were rejected for partnership.

“They’ve received a lot of money from Erie County and [as] such we’re expecting both personal and financial responsibilities to come with that, which means they need to act certainly within federal guidelines and Title VII seems to be ignored here based on the fact, that again, they were rejected for their faith,” he added.


Anti-Israel activists allegedly throw firebomb at UC Berkeley building
Anti-Israel activists claimed to have thrown a firebomb at a University of California, Berkeley building on Thursday in retaliation to the university system's response to anti-Israel protests at University of California, Los Angeles.

The University of California Police Department recieved a report of an arson outside Koshland Hall on Thursday, according to UC Berkeley, who noted that the case is under investigation.

According to a notice published the same day on The San Francisco Bay Area Independent Media Center by an author identifying as "student intifada," the attack was conducted by anti-Israel activists motivated by revenge.

Student intifada claims retaliation
"UCLA Students were attacked last night so we retaliated with a firebomb on UCB Campus," said Student Intifada. "Not sure what building it even was. Honestly don't really care. Every single building on the UC Berkeley campus deserves to be incinerated following the UC system's treatment of student protesters."

The document claimed that the fire spread across trees and bushes next to the building.

"UC System must divest from Israel or face our wrath of revenge," said the communique. "Blessed is the flame."

The manifesto referred to a Students for Justice in Palestine UCLA student with a megaphone who had been seized by police, but later released, according to SJP UCLA.


UCLA Has Not Apologized to Campus Rabbi Assaulted on Camera
UCLA’s Chabad House rabbi was assaulted, called a "f—ing pedophile" and "fake Jew," and told to "go back to Poland" by campus anti-Israel protesters on Monday. University officials have yet to reach out to him or apologize.

"We haven’t had any communications since then with anyone in the administration," Rabbi Dovid Gurevich, who has directed the campus Chabad House for the last 18 years, told the Washington Free Beacon. He added that the lack of communication isn’t unusual, noting that parents have been complaining that the university isn’t keeping them apprised on what is happening with the campus protests.

Gurevich filmed the entire incident in a live Instagram video of the demonstration, which kept moving to different parts of the campus whenever police tried to disperse the activists. The rabbi’s reel depicts two main male aggressors who had their faces covered with keffiyeh scarves while they lobbed obscenities at him. Protesters told him to "go back to Poland," called him a "pedophile rabbi" and "f—ing traitor," and tried to hit his phone out of his hand. The rabbi said neither of the two primary antagonists appeared to be students.

The administration’s failure to apologize to Gurevich comes as UCLA faces widespread criticism for its handling of anti-Israel protests. Early last month, state police had to come in to break up a weeklong encampment where activists took over a central part of campus and blocked students who didn’t pledge fealty to their cause from main thoroughfares. Weeks later, members of Congress grilled UCLA’s retiring chancellor Gene Block on why he allowed the encampment to persist as long as it did.

UCLA’s media representative did not respond to a request for comment.


Columbia administrator claims campus hate used as ‘fundraising potential’
A two-hour panel discussion on the past, present and future of Jewish life at Columbia University during a class reunion weekend resulted in a childish flurry of offensive reactions from four school administrators, according to The Washington Free Beacon.

The group talk on May 31 featured David Schizer, the former dean of Columbia Law School who co-chaired the college’s task force on antisemitism; Brian Cohen, executive director of Columbia’s Kraft Center for Jewish Life; Ian Rottenberg, dean of religious life; and junior Rebecca Massel, a writer for the Columbia Spectator student newspaper.

Photos from the event revealed a text-message chat between four administrators sitting in the audience: Josef Sorett, dean of Columbia College; Susan Chang-Kim, vice dean and chief administrative officer of Columbia College; Cristen Kromm, dean of undergraduate student life; and Matthew Patashnick, associate dean for student and family support.

Incorporating an antisemitic trope about Jews and money, Patashnick wrote that one of the panelists “knows exactly what he’s doing and how to take full advantage of this moment. Huge fundraising potential.”

Chang-Kim chimed in that the panel is “making the administration look like jokers.”

She continued, texting Sorett: “This is difficult to listen to but I’m trying to keep an open mind to learn about this point of view.”

“Yup,” he replied.

She also doubted the experiences of Jewish students on campus, asking: “Did we really have students being kicked out of clubs for being Jewish?”

The Beacon wrote that “the text messages betray an attitude of ignorance and indifference toward the concerns of Jewish students on a campus” that was rocked with some of the worst anti-Jewish, anti-Israel actions and rhetoric in the United States this spring.
Columbia Dean Who Accused Jew of Exploiting Anti-Semitism for Money Has Cool New Profile Pic
Matthew Patashnick, the associate dean for student and family support at Columbia University, changed the profile picture on his now-private Instagram account after the Washington Free Beacon reported on disturbing texts he sent colleagues during a panel discussion of anti-Semitism on campus.

The new photo appears to show Patashnick standing in the Billy Rose Art Garden at the Israel Museum in Jerusalem, the capital city where former president Donald Trump opened a U.S. embassy in 2018. (Patashnick supported President Joe Biden in 2020.)

The Columbia dean might be seeking to allay widespread criticism of his texts to university administrators last month, when he accused one of the Jewish panelists at an alumni weekend event of conniving to take "full advantage of this moment" for the "fundraising potential." The advocacy group Documenting Jew Hatred on Campus denounced Patashnick for promoting "the antisemitic trope of 'the greedy Jew.'"

Text from Matthew Patashnick, the associate dean for student and family support, stating that one of the panelists is trying to "take full advantage" of the moment's "fundraising potential."

Patashnick made his shocking remarks in a group text with Susan Chang-Kim, vice dean and chief administrative officer of Columbia College, and Cristen Kromm, the dean of undergraduate student life. "Double Urgh," Chang-Kim wrote in response, a follow-up to her previous comment, "Urgh."

Later on in the conversation, Kromm used a pair of vomit emojis to describe her feelings about an op-ed written by Columbia's campus rabbi, Yonah Hain, in the wake of the Oct. 7 terrorist attack. Titled "Sounding the alarm," the op-ed warned that the university had "lost its moral compass" by enabling the "normalization of Hamas."
Columbia College Dean Says Disparaging Texts, Vomit Emojis Sent During Panel on Jewish Life Don't Reflect the 'Views' of Administrators
The dean of Columbia College, Josef Sorett, issued a private apology on Friday for the text messages he and other administrators exchanged badmouthing panelists who participated in a talk about Jewish life at Columbia, writing that the dismissive and vitriolic remarks do not "indicate the views of any individual or the team."

In an email to Columbia's Board of Visitors, an alumni body that advises the dean, Sorett apologized for the "harm" the exchange caused and pledged that "it will not happen again"—though he did not acknowledge his own texts were captured in the exchanges.

"I have already spoken to each person involved and we understand that, as leaders, we are held to a higher standard," he wrote.

Sorett also took a swipe at the "unknown third-party" who photographed the messages—sent in real time during the panel—decrying the "invasion of privacy" and suggesting that the exchange, while "upsetting," had been taken out of context.

"These texts are not emblematic of the totality of their work," Sorett said. "It makes the hard work that we are committed to even more challenging."

Sorett did not respond to a request for comment regarding whether disciplinary proceedings are underway, why he omitted any reference to his own role in the scandal, and why the photographs constituted an invasion of privacy.
Camp intifada? Anti-Israel encampment to host revolutionary
An anti-Israel protest encampment at the Canadian McGill University is set to host a revolution summer camp for youth starting Monday, Solidarity for Palestinian Human Rights McGill announced on Thursday.

Posted on Instagram with a promotional image of keffiyeh-garbed men armed with light machine guns and rifles reading, the summer camp doesn’t clarify the age of campers, but promises to “educate the youth of Montreal and redefine McGills’s ‘elite’ institutional legacy by transforming its space into one of revolutionary legacy.”

“The daily schedule will include physical activity, Arabic language instruction, cultural crafts, political discussions, historical and revolutionary lessons,” said SPHR McGill. Topics of the camp

The first semester of the camp is set to run for four weeks. The first week will cover “the history of Palestinian resistance,” followed by weeks devoted to the “ongoing Nakba,” the different fronts of the movement, and media after October 7.

The subjects of the first camp week are “the beginning of resistance,” “pan-Arabism,” “The Palestinian Liberation Organization: From Al Karameh to Oslo,” “Islamic Resistance,” and the “Axis of Resistance.”

The program has been launched in coordination with SPHR Concordia University.


Jewish, pro-Israel groups slam National Press Club for renting space to ‘Hamas-adjacent’ group
Jewish leaders are raising concerns about the National Press Club serving as the venue for a conference organized by Democracy for the Arab World Now (DAWN) earlier this week.

The event, which took place on Tuesday, was titled “Unmasking the UAE: Transnational Repression & Lobbying Power” and placed a critical lens on the United States’ relationship with the United Arab Emirates. The NPC regularly rents out event space to groups that are unaffiliated with the venue itself, though the decision to permit DAWN to use their facilities was met with condemnation in the Jewish community.

William Daroff, who leads the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, told Jewish Insider that allowing DAWN to hold an event at the Club gave the group unwarranted legitimacy.

“There’s a reason people go to the National Press Club. They go to the National Press Club for events. It gives the imprimatur of the organization being a part of the sort of Washington media establishment – they’re having this event in the heart of the American media, with the coverage that comes from that, with the apparent stamp of approval that flows from that,” Daroff said.

AIPAC spokesman Marshall Wittmann told JI: “Legitimacy should not be granted to an explicitly anti-Israel organization which is extremely hostile to America’s ally.”

Reached for comment on its decision to rent space to the organization, a spokesperson for the National Press Club told JI that, “As we are also a business and we are open, same as a hotel or convention center, we are renting spaces and providing food and beverage to the client, like any rental business without discrimination.”

Daroff pushed back, saying, “The idea that they would rent to anybody is ridiculous, because clearly they would not rent to anyone. They would not rent, I would hope, to the Ku Klux Klan. They would not rent, I would hope, to Louis Farrakhan. Certainly, this organization, DAWN, is one that should be beyond the pale, and is, in fact, beyond the pale.”

“I am deeply disappointed in the National Press Club for either not having standards or having standards that are so low as to be useless,” he continued.

“I’ve been attending events at the National Press Club for decades and have deep respect for them as an organization, but am deeply concerned that they would lease space to an organization that, charitably spoken is Hamas-adjacent, but which certainly has ties to dangerous anti-American and antisemitic elements. I would encourage the National Press Club to reassess their policy of renting space to ‘anyone.’”
More narrative-driven BBC coverage of the hostage rescue in Nuseirat
Previously we discussed three BBC reports – two written and one filmed – which appeared in the hours following the June 8th rescue of four Israeli hostages from Nuseirat.

As documented:
None of those reports inform readers that Nuseirat is administered by UNRWA due to its status as a ‘refugee camp’.
Only one of the reports clarifies that the hostages were imprisoned in residential buildings in a civilian neighbourhood and none of them discuss the implications of that deliberate use of human shields.
All the reports quote unverified Palestinian casualty figures supplied by Hamas which, as is standard policy for that terrorist organisation, do not distinguish between civilians and terrorist combatants.
None of the reports discusses the possibility that some of the civilian casualties may have been killed by the terrorists who attacked the rescuers at one of the locations.
Guardian corrects Arwa Mahdawi's lie about Israel
Guardian columnist Arwa Mahdawi fancies herself a feminist. However, her hatred of the Jewish state is so deep-seeded that in her frequent pieces demonising Israel in its war against Hamas, she hasn’t once engaged in even a brief moral throat-clearing condemning the terror group’s systemic rape, torture and mutilation of Israeli women and girls.

We mention this to put her frequent inaccuracies about Israel into context, as what she writes about the region represents pre-determined, ideologically-driven conclusions in search of ‘evidence’, rather than anything resembling serious thought or research.

It’s not surprising, then, that her ‘evidence’ is often deeply flawed, or represent outright lies. A recent column, vilifying Jewish-American comedian Jerry Seinfeld for his support for Israel, and for his putatively offensive views on masculinity, is a case in point. As we noted in our post on her piece, it included that false claim that the “United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) described” Israel’s war as “genocidal violence”.

If you open the link provided in the sentence, it, in fact, clearly shows that it wasn’t the UNHRC itself which charged Israel with genocide. The accusation was made by the widely discredited, and antisemitic, UN ‘Special Rappatour’ Francesca Albanese – in a report she sent to the UNHRC. In addition to her anti-Jewish rhetoric, Albanese’s lack of credibility was most glaring in her appalling legitimisation of Hamas’s Oct. 7 massacre.

We contacted Guardian editors pointing out this substantive error, and our complaint was upheld.
Whitewashing Red Triangles_ AP Scrubs Pro-Hamas Graffiti
Even as authorities from Sydney to Brooklyn were still investigating and removing pro-Hamas graffiti, the Associated Press engaged in a scrubbing of a different sort.

In a June 10 article about the anti-Israel vandalism of the U.S. Consulate in Sydney, the Associated Press initially whitewashed a menacing symbol used to denote support for Hamas since the terror organization’s Oct. 7 orgy of murder, rape and countless other atrocities (“Australia PM urges activists to ‘turn down the heat’ after US consulate vandalized over Gaza war“). AP euphemistically reported about the symbols used to express support for the designated terror organization as follows:
Two inverted red triangles, seen by many as a symbol of Palestinian resistance, were also painted on the front of the building.

A screenshot of AP’s headline about the vandalism in Australia, along with an accompanying video which briefly shows the red triangles

Given that Hamas uses the red triangle in its videos documenting attacks on Israelis, it signifies support for the designated terror organization. “Resistance” doesn’t quite convey the horrors that went down on Oct. 7.

The New York Post detailed the association of the red triangles with Hamas terrorism:
The triangle became a prevalent symbol online and offline beginning in November 2023 following Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on Israel and Israel’s aggressive retaliatory offensive, according to the Anti Defamation League.

It first appeared in propaganda videos from the al-Qassam brigades — Hamas’ military wing — to highlight an Israeli soldier that was about to be killed or wounded in a targeted attack by the terrorists.

In the clips, the red triangle followed the target, which was then hit with a sniper’s bullet, a rocket-propelled grenade or another deadly blast.

“Though it can be used innocuously in general pro-Palestine social media posts, the inverted red triangle is now used to represent Hamas itself and glorify its use of violence in many popular anti-Zionist memes and political cartoons,” the ADL says on its website.

For example, the group said, anti-Israel protesters will put the symbol over an image of Israeli soldiers or on a Star of David “as a way to call for further violent resistance.”

In response to communication from CAMERA’s Israel office, AP moderately improved its explanation of the red triangles, revising the sentence to at least include reference to Hamas:


House Bans US Funding of Gaza Reconstruction
The House voted on Wednesday to block US funding for the reconstruction of Gaza. The provision was introduced by Reps. Brian Mast (R-Fla), Claudia Tenney (R-NY), and Eli Crane (R-Ariz.) as an amendment to the 2025 National Defense Authorization Act, which is the annual defense budget. House Democrats opposed the amendment, which passed by a simple voice vote.

The amendment appears at the end of subtitle A of title XVII, and says, “Add the following new section:

SEC. 17ll. PROHIBITION ON ASSISTANCE FOR BUILDING IN, OR REBUILDING GAZA

None of the funds authorized to be appropriated by this Act or otherwise made available to the Secretary of Defense for fiscal year 2025 may be made available to build in or rebuild the Gaza Strip on or after the date of the enactment of this Act.”

During his June 6 press briefing, State Dept. Spokesman Matthew Miller said, “In all of his calls, the Secretary has underscored the benefits of this proposal to both Israelis and Palestinians. For Palestinians, a ceasefire would see an end to the daily death toll in Gaza, and an end to the destruction that has torn so many families apart, and robbed children, women, and men of their lives and their futures. It would allow hundreds of thousands of Palestinians to begin returning to their neighborhoods as the international community surges humanitarian assistance into Gaza and launches a major reconstruction effort.”

Amendment sponsor Mast said on the House floor before the vote, “They are absolutely at war with one of our major and best allies anywhere across the globe.”

In January 2015, Mast volunteered with the IDF, working at a base outside Tel Aviv packing medical kits and moving supplies. After the October 7 Hamas attack on Israel, Mast wore his IDF uniform in Congress.
House Dems Brainstorming How To Spoil Netanyahu's Speech to Congress: Report
House Democrats are brainstorming possible events to spoil Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech to Congress, according to an Axios report released Friday.

Many Democrats already said they would boycott the speech, but they are now developing "counter-programming" events to spoil the speech and demonstrate their dissatisfaction with the leader of the Jewish state and the way he's waged war against Hamas in Gaza.

Some of the ideas Democrats have proposed reportedly include a press conference, a vigil, and an event with the families of Israeli hostages who believe Netanyahu is not doing enough to secure their release.

According to the report, Democrats in leadership positions, not just progressives, have been involved in the discussions. Former House majority whip Rep. Jim Clyburn (D., S.C.) told Politico he participated in one of the discussions to counter Netanyahu’s speech. Axios reported that many House Democrats are upset with Netanyahu’s plan to hold the speech next month and believe it undermines the Biden administration’s work to put an end to the war.

The plans to undermine the speech come after months of tensions between Netanyahu and President Joe Biden, who has threatened to withhold military aid from Israel if it moves forward with an assault on the Hamas stronghold of Rafah.

Democrats protested Netanyahu the last time he addressed the legislative branch, nearly a decade ago. In 2015, 58 members of Congress, as well as then-vice president Biden, skipped Netanyahu’s speech to a joint session of Congress.


‘Zionists should f– off’: Sen. Maye Quade staffer under fire for anti-Semitic comments
A staffer for Minnesota Sen. Erin Maye Quade remains an employee in the DFL caucus after publicly attacking one of its senior members and blaming “Israeli terrorism” for creating Hamas.

Legislative assistant Ayana Smith-Kooiman’s comments were called “unacceptable” by Republican Sen. Julia Coleman, R-Waconia.

“It’s not an easy time to be raising children with Jewish blood pumping through their veins. I see growing antisemitism everywhere, unchecked and in some cases, embraced. Now I have to see it at the Senate too. This behavior is unacceptable,” Coleman said.

She was referencing social media posts written by Smith-Kooiman throughout November and December of last year following Hamas’ Oct. 7 terror attack on Israel.

“Hamas this, Hamas that, I do not give a flying f– about Hamas because the root of the problem is a colonial government segregating, ethnically cleansing, murdering Palestinians, stealing their land with impunity and not expecting a resistance group to violently fight back,” Smith-Kooiman wrote in a Nov. 23 tweet, according to screenshots of her social media posts published by former Crystal City Councilmember Jeff Kolb.

“Israeli terrorism created Hamas and the cycle will go on and on until Israel, Britain and the US are held accountable for their violence and thievery,” she added.

In another post, Smith-Kooiman wrote: “Personally, I think Zionists should f– off.”
Dave Rich: The radicalisation of David Miller
Back in 2013, when he was working as an academic at the University of Bath, David Miller co-authored a booklet about the pro-Israel organisation BICOM in which he addressed the dangers of straying into antisemitic rhetoric. “Critiques of Israel and Zionism can potentially absorb anti-Semitic ideas”, he wrote, before quoting Brian Klug on the subject:
As Klug notes, where anti-Semitic fantasies ‘are projected on to Israel because it is a Jewish state, or Zionism because it is a Jewish movement, or Jews in association with either Israel or Zionism: there you have anti-Semitism.’

It’s good advice: if only Miller himself had heeded it.

Fast forward eleven years, and you’ll find Miller tweeting that it is “organised and established Jewry and Jewish institutions” that are the cause of the left’s problems in Britain, and that anyone who can’t see this is “in thrall to the religion of Judeophilia”.

The same week, Miller claimed that the British state has been “totally captured by genocidal Jewish supremacists”; that the Jewish Labour Movement is a “Jewish supremacist sect”; that “most British Jews” support a “genocidal ideology which fuels the mass murder of Palestinians, including infants”; and that all Zionists are “genocidal, bloodthirsty Jewish supremacists” who “come from Odessa, Warsaw, Brooklyn and Finchley to rape [Palestinians], kill their children and steal their land.” He even has a thing about “Jewish representation in the civil service”, and I don’t think it’s because he’s worried they won’t have a weekly minyan.

Miller has always peddled conspiracy theories about Zionists. He made his name as an academic with his theory that Zionist money was to blame, in part, for fuelling Islamophobia. It is “networks of money or power” involving “Wealthy businessmen and financiers, and conservative and pro-Israel trusts and foundations” that are involved, was how he put it back then. But he was always careful to distinguish in his writings between Zionists and Jews; to argue, as he did in that 2013 booklet about BICOM, that his is merely a political critique of Zionism, not an assault on Jews as such. Whether he believed that at the time is beside the point; this was his line, and he tried carefully to stick to it.

Yet now his language is redolent of nothing other than fascist antisemitism. Oswald Mosley often referred to “organised Jewry” as fascism’s main enemy, telling a rally at the Royal Albert Hall in 1934: “I have encountered things in this country which, quite frankly, I did not believe existed. And one of these is the power of organised Jewry, which is today mobilised against Fascism.” It represents “unclean, alien influence on our national and imperial life”, declared the fascist newspaper Blackshirt. As for all his talk about “Jewish supremacists” having a stranglehold over the British state, this echoes none other than David Duke, a former Klan leader, one of the most prominent and influential neo-Nazis in the United States, and author of the book Jewish Supremacism: My Awakening on the Jewish Question. This book was based on Duke’s PhD thesis on “Zionism as a Form of Ethnic Supremacism”; a sentiment that chimes perfectly with Miller’s current politics.


Greens refuse to deselect candidates accused of ‘antisemitic’ slurs
The Green Party has endorsed half a dozen general election candidates despite allegations that they shared “antisemitic” slurs, conspiracy theories or offensive comments online.

The party has persisted in rejecting the accusations and claimed that legitimate criticism of Israel was being confused with antisemitism. Last week The Times revealed that its candidates had accused Israel of child trafficking and appeared to justify Hamas’s October 7 attacks on Israel, as well as sharing articles online that claimed they were a “false flag” operation carried out by Israel itself. As details of the terrorist atrocity were emerging on October 7, one wrote “resist”.

Zack Polanski, deputy leader of the Green Party, wrote on Twitter/X that “antisemitism must be treated with intention and care”, adding: “We must be clear about the conflation between legitimate criticism of the Israeli government and antisemitism.”

All six candidates named in the article have since been announced as official Green candidates.

When asked about the issue on the BBC’s Today programme on Wednesday, Adrian Ramsay, the party’s co-leader, said he could not be expected to know details of each of the Greens’ 574 candidates. He said that when concerns were raised about a candidate, they were assessed by an independent panel, and that training or sanctions would follow if appropriate. The party blocked four other candidates after allegations of antisemitism, he added, in a process independent of the leadership.

On Friday, The Times revealed that Nataly Anderson, the Woking candidate, shared online her suspicions that the October 7 attacks were “orchestrated” and claimed that there were connections between human traffickers and the Israeli intelligence agency, Mossad.

Since publication she has accused this newspaper of trying to discredit “uncomfortable truths” by describing them as conspiracy theories.

On October 7, Adam Pugh, the candidate for Deptford & Lewisham North, in London, wrote on Twitter/X that “there is no peace without freedom. Resist.” He separately posted the image of a Palestinian flag and wrote: “You don’t have to be neutral when it comes to apartheid, colonisation and genocide.” When news broke on October 12 that the Royal Navy was sending two vessels to the Mediterranean to support Israel, Pugh wrote: “I hope they sink.”
More Than Six in Ten Muslims Backed French Far-Left Party in EU Elections
The European Parliament elections saw over six in ten Muslims in France back the far-left party of Jean-Luc Mélenchon, who like other leading leftists in Europe has faced accusations of antisemitism and of cozying up to radical Islamists.

A study conducted by Ifop for the Catholic La Croix newspaper found that 62 per cent of Muslims voted for the La France Insoumise (France Unbowed/LFI) list in the European elections on Sunday in which the far-left party won nearly 2.5 million votes for a projected 9 seats in the European Parliament.

The LFI was distantly followed by the centre-left neo-liberal Place Publique party of Raphaël Glucksmann which received 8 per cent of the Muslim vote and then by President Macron’s Rennaisance and Marine Le Pen’s National Rally, both of whom secured 6 per cent of the Muslim vote.

According to the survey, the strong support for the far-left party was “particularly motivated by the war in Gaza”, with 83 per cent of Muslims in France citing the conflict between Israel and Hamas terrorists as their top issue in the European elections, compared to 25 per cent for the overall population.

La France Insoumise, led by 72-year-old Jean-Luc Mélenchon — a socialist often described as France’s equivalent to America’s Bernie Sanders or Britain’s Jeremy Corbyn — has long catered to the Muslim vote, with Mélenchon winning 69 per cent of Muslims in the 2022 presidential election.

The widespread support for his leftist party among Muslims comes as the LFI made the issue of Gaza a central theme of its campaign, having even selected prominent Franco-Palestinian activist Rima Hassan to represent the party in the EU Parliament.


Top Fatah official: Geneva Conventions permit terror, Hamas terror leader is a “hero”
Fatah Central Committee member Abbas Zaki: “[Muhammad] Deif (i.e., Hamas terror leader) was wanted as an international terrorist, even though he is a hero of a war of liberation, because the Palestinian people lost its land, and the Geneva Conventions give it the right to resistance to restore the land (sic., international law doesn’t legalize terror)... I also maintain that whoever is fighting Israel is worthy of the public’s esteem.”
[Fatah Central Committee member Abbas Zaki, Facebook page, May 7, 2024]


Top Fatah official: Hamas’ Oct. 7 massacre “will be studied in universities
Fatah Central Committee member Abbas Zaki: “People are surprised given the mighty [Palestinian] resolve and how the entire NATO treaty, all the West’s capabilities, together with all their [Israel’s] mercenaries and collaborators, were unable to silence the [resistance’s] fighters’ rifles and rockets… ‘The Al-Aqsa Flood’ (Hamas' name for its Oct. 7 attack) will be studied in the universities and echo widely, because the owners of the right (i.e., the Palestinians) held onto their homeland and succeeded in defeating every kind of tyrannical party or alliance… They are a source of pride. If [Ahmad] Sa’adat, Marwan ]Barghouti[, and Nael ]Barghouti[ (i.e., all terrorist prisoners) will be released, if all these prisoners… if they will be released, they are a precious treasure. It is enough that we succeeded in releasing them from the enemy’s claws.”
[Fatah Central Committee member Abbas Zaki, Facebook page, June 2, 2024]


Former Jordanian minister: October 7 is not the cause, but the result of a seven decades old problem
Former Jordanian Minister of Government Communications and Minister of State for Media Affairs Faisal Shboul: “When the occupation (i.e., Israeli) government, and behind it many of the Western states, tried to say that Oct. 7, [2023] (i.e., Hamas’ massacre) is the root of the problem, Jordan said clearly that Oct. 7 is a result and not the cause. It is a result of a problem that is more than seven decades old (i.e., Israel’s creation)... It is a result of non-recognition of the Palestinian people’s rights to establish its state in its land.”
[Official PA TV, With the Editor in Chief, May 18, 2024]


Israel “lives on war,” strives “to fragment the region” and “control” it – political commentator
Writer and political commentator Monther Howarat: “The project that is Israel lives on wars. It lives on wars in the West Bank and Gaza Strip… What motivates it, its fuel, is war. Therefore, it will not stop with this war (i.e., the 2023 Gaza war)... It is working on a large project: To fragment the region and turn it into [separate] entities so that it will be the powerful country among these entities and will be able to control them… It can infiltrate the institutions of every state and destroy its financial structure, and it is not striving for peace. Israel is striving for war because it lives on war.”
[Official PA TV, Capital of Capitals, May 25, 2024]


Israelis ”are Nazis more than the Nazis themselves” – Fatah official
Fatah Revolutionary Council member Tayseer Nasrallah: “What has become clear during the last eight months (i.e., 2023 Gaza war) is that this occupation (i.e., Israel) and [Israeli Prime Minister] Netanyahu and his government are Nazis more than the Nazis themselves, and also fascists, and this has become clear to the entire world.” [Official PA TV, June 2, 2024]


US and West implanted Israel - "the distorted entity" - to control the Middle East
Fatah member Jihad Al-Harazin: “The Middle East region… arouses the colonialist states’ desire for control. Therefore, the Western states, and foremost among them the US, saw a need to implant this distorted entity (i.e., Israel) in this region so that it would realize all the goals required of it, such as dividing the region and attempting to completely control the region’s economy and its states.”
[Official PA TV, Capital of Capitals, May 1, 2024]

Al-Harazin is also international relations lecturer at Al-Quds University.




Iraqi Archives Reveal Saddam Hussein’s Obsession with Jews
When the U.S. and its allies overthrew Saddam Hussein in 2003, they seized control of his government’s vast archives. Samuel Helfont describes the “tortured journey” that these troves of documents have taken since then, as well as some of the noteworthy things they contain:

Saddam and the Baathists had an anti-Semitic obsession with Jews. They not only tracked the dwindling population of Iraqi Jews, including those who had converted, but the Iraqi Intelligence Service also maintained an archive that included the personal property of Jews who had fled Iraq during their mass exodus in the 1950s. Apparently, Iraqi intelligence officers thought things such as medieval religious texts and modern school notebooks could provide some insight into the Jewish cabal that secretly ran the world through shadowy conspiracies.

The Americans found the Jewish records in the flooded basement of the Iraqi Intelligence Service. They took the waterlogged documents and artifacts outside into the arid desert air; they rolled Torah scrolls out in the sun in an attempt to dry them. It soon became evident, however, that these records and artifacts risked being eaten away by mold. They needed professional attention from a conservationist. So, these archives . . . were removed from Iraq.
US Navy faces ‘most sustained combat’ since WWII against Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthis
The US Navy prepared for decades to potentially fight the Soviet Union, then later Russia and China, on the world’s waterways. But instead of a global power, the Navy finds itself locked in combat with a shadowy, Iran-backed rebel group based in Yemen.

The US-led campaign against the Houthi rebels, overshadowed by the Israel-Hamas war in the Gaza Strip, has turned into the most intense running sea battle the Navy has faced since World War II, its leaders and experts told The Associated Press.

The combat pits the US Navy’s mission to keep international waterways open against a group whose former arsenal of assault rifles and pickup trucks has grown into a seemingly inexhaustible supply of drones, missiles and other weaponry.

Near-daily attacks by the Houthis since November have seen more than 50 vessels clearly targeted, while shipping volume has dropped in the vital Red Sea corridor that leads to the Suez Canal and into the Mediterranean.

The Houthis say the attacks are aimed at stopping the war in Gaza and supporting the Palestinians, though it comes as they try to strengthen their position in Yemen.

All signs suggest the warfare will intensify — putting US sailors, their allies and commercial vessels at more risk.

“I don’t think people really understand just kind of how deadly serious it is what we’re doing and how under threat the ships continue to be,” Cmdr. Eric Blomberg with the USS Laboon told the AP on a visit to his warship on the Red Sea.

“We only have to get it wrong once,” he said. “The Houthis just have to get one through.”
Houthis strike cargo ship in Red Sea with cruise missiles, seriously wounding civilian
Yemen’s Houthi rebels launched two anti-ship cruise missiles and struck a commercial ship Thursday in the Gulf of Aden off Yemen, setting it on fire and severely wounding one civilian mariner, authorities said.

The M/V Verbena was still ablaze and the mariner was flown by a US helicopter based on the USS Philippine Sea to another nearby ship for medical treatment, the US military’s Central Command said.

In a statement, Central Command said the Verbena is a Palauan-flagged, Ukrainian-owned and Polish-operated bulk cargo carrier that had docked in Malaysia and was on its way to Italy carrying wood. “The M/V Verbena reported damage and subsequent fires on board. The crew continues to fight the fire,” the statement said.

The attack is the latest such assault in the Houthis’ campaign over the Israel-Hamas war.

Earlier Thursday, the British military’s United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations center said a vessel had been attacked and had caught fire. And the private security firm Ambrey said a merchant vessel made a radio distress call saying it had been struck by a missile.

The Houthis later claimed the attack on the Verbena, as well as attacks on two other ships in the Red Sea. Central Command said the Houthis had launched two ballistic missiles in the Red Sea that caused “no injuries or significant damage.”
UN watchdog says Iran activated new advanced centrifuges, plans to install more
Iran has started up new cascades of advanced centrifuges and plans to install others in the coming weeks after facing criticism over its nuclear program, the United Nations’ atomic watchdog said Friday. The US called the moves “nuclear escalations.”

Spinning up new centrifuges further advances Iran’s nuclear program, which already enriches uranium at near-weapons-grade levels and boasts a stockpile enough for several nuclear bombs if it chose to pursue them. However, the acknowledgement from the International Atomic Energy Agency did not include any suggestion Iran planned to go to higher enrichment levels amid wider tensions between Tehran and the West as the Israel-Hamas war rages in the Gaza Strip.

The IAEA said its inspectors verified Monday that Iran had begun feeding uranium into three cascades of advanced IR-4 and IR-6 centrifuges at its Natanz enrichment facility. Cascades are a group of centrifuges that spin uranium gas together to more quickly enrich the uranium.

So far, Iran has been enriching uranium in those cascades up to 2% purity. Iran already enriches uranium up to 60%, a short, technical step away from weapons-grade levels of 90%.

Iran also plans to install 18 cascades of IR-2m centrifuges at Natanz and eight cascades of IR-6 centrifuges at its Fordo nuclear site. Each of these classes of centrifuges enrich uranium faster than Iran’s baseline IR-1 centrifuges, which remain the workhorse of the country’s atomic program.

Tehran did not immediately acknowledge the decision. However, it comes after Iran threatened to take action following a vote earlier this month at the IAEA’s Board of Governors that censured Iran for failing to cooperate fully with the agency.


Teen neo-Nazi jailed over Hove synagogue bomb plans
A teenage neo-Nazi has been jailed for eight years for creating a detailed plan to carry out a suicide bomb attack on a synagogue because he wanted “to make Jews afraid again”.

Mason Reynolds, 19, of Moulsecoomb Way, Brighton, was convicted at trial of possession of an article connected with the preparation of an act of terrorism against the synagogue in Hove.

He had also pleaded guilty to five counts of possessing material likely to be useful to a person committing or preparing an act of terrorism, as well as five offences of sharing terrorist publications dating back to when he was aged 16.

The defendant had shared right-wing videos and possessed bomb instruction manuals, Winchester Crown Court was told.

The court was also told that Reynolds had annotated a Google street map and satellite image of the synagogue detailing “entry points and points to attack”.

Naomi Parsons, prosecuting, said: “Whilst preparation is described as limited, it is not absent, for Mr Reynolds had a neo-Nazi mindset and he had prepared an extensive library of manuals, explosives manuals, gun-making manuals.”

She added: “There was the potential to endanger many lives, he included references to the days when the the synagogue would be busiest, Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur and Passover.”

Ms Parsons continued: “He had an entrenched and violent neo-Nazi mindset and had expressed an intention to commit terrorist acts – I wanna strap multiple pipe bombs to my chest and blow myself up in a synagogue.
Belgium's Extremely Alarming Antisemitism
What is striking about the survey is that, for every question, anti-Semitic prejudice is much higher in Brussels than at national level. It happens that the population of the capital of Belgium and the EU is between 30% and 40% Muslim.

In the country as a whole, 43% of Muslims think that Belgian Jews are not really Belgians like the other inhabitants of Belgium.

These figures are staggering. Many other signals testify to the sad reality that Jews are no longer safe in Brussels.

The compulsory Holocaust curriculum has not been taught in most Brussels schools for a long time now; teachers are afraid to broach the subject in classes where the majority of the pupils are Muslim.

The rise in anti-Semitism, appears, in fact, to coincide with the growth in Muslim immigration, which accelerated from 2000 onwards. The political world behaved as if they were the three monkeys: did not see, did not hear, did not speak. At Holocaust commemorations, the authorities repeat with their hands over their hearts that anti-Semitism has no place in Belgium, while passively witnessing its rise without ever acknowledging it.

The Muslim vote has become essential to the success of the left-wing parties, whose electoral weight in Brussels, as a result of immigration, has risen in 20 years, from 34% to 54%. Compared to the now hundreds of thousands of Muslim votes, those of the 30,000 Jews in Belgium, a genuine minority, do not carry much weight. Over the past 20 years, some of us have tried in vain to draw attention to this serious trend, which neither the media nor the political world has been willing to see.

The fate of Belgian Jews seems to be sealed. These testimonies are worth every analysis. Belgium is gradually becoming free of Jews -- Judenrein -- while joyfully and conscientiously celebrating the high mass of a highly racist multiculturalism.
The street-fighters who taught British fascists: don’t f*** with the Jews
When the Community Security Trust (CST) decided they needed a documentary charting the history of the Jewish fight against antisemitism and fascism in the UK, they turned to a film-maker with a slew of Netflix shows to his name who spent his youth hanging around Edgware Station with his friends to pick up girls or fighting pitch battles on the streets of north and north-west London with skinheads and neo-Nazis.

“I’m proud of that,” says producer and director David Herman, whose latest film Jews Defending Jews will be screened at JW3 on Tuesday.

The title is not one that can be found on Herman’s IMDB page along with Bad Surgeon: Love Under the Knife, Vendetta: Truth, Lies and the Mafia, and Ross Kemp: Extreme World. But perhaps it should. Among the film’s historical footage showing the British Union of Fascists stalking the East End in 1936 and the National Socialist Movement in the 1960s under the leadership of Colin Jordan, are interviews with Jews who took down Britain’s fascists by confronting them head on.

Some of them would not look out of place in a Guy Ritchie film.

“They were tough Jewish boys who were second generation born here,” says CST founding chairman Sir Gerald Ronson in the film.

“We’re not talking about sophisticated lawyers, accountants, doctors and all the rest of it. We’re talking about taxi drivers, market traders – tough guys who had come out of the East End and who can look after themselves.”

The film looks at muscular Jewish anti-fascist activism from 1936, the year Oswald Mosley failed to march through the East End. “The actual battle of Cable Street was grandmothers and bubbas and women throwing bottles not at fascists, but at the police [who were defending the fascists]. And I just love that. I love the idea that regular Jewish people, mothers, women just weren’t having this,” says Herman.
4 Mossad Stories You've Never Heard About | Unpacked
The Mossad’s exploits are legendary, inspiring countless stories and international admiration. Poison-laced toothpaste, a rigged cell phone, a soda can filled with poisonous gas, and a disguised manhunt are just a few of the Mossad’s legendary feats.

From assassinating terrorists to rescuing hostages and hunting Nazis, Mossad operations are marked by relentless and ingenious strategies in the pursuit of justice and security for the State of Israel and the Jewish people.

Chapters
00:00 Intro
00:40 Mossad strategy
01:58 Munich Massacre & Operation Wrath of God
5:28 Assassination of PFLP co-founder Wadie Haddad
7:45 Assassination of Hamas engineer Yahya Ayyash
9:36 Botched assassination of Hamas leader Khaled Mashal
13:38 The Mossad missions you never hear about


Israeli director Tom Nesher’s film wins top prize at Tribeca Festival
The Tribeca Festival announced Thursday that Come Closer, a movie by Israeli director Tom Nesher, won the Viewpoints Award, the top prize in its category.

The jury said in its statement: “The diverse films of the Viewpoint category inspired all of us to think and feel deeply. However, when choosing a winner, our decision was unanimous. This film pulled us all in from the first few frames, and we felt that we were in skillful hands. It was fiercely executed and superbly performed.”

Tom Nesher said, "I don't have enough words to describe the huge excitement, joy, and pride I feel right now. I give thanks to my talented cast, the production, the festival directors Jane Rosenthal and Robert De Niro, who stood up to the pressure and chose an Israeli film for the festival, and the judges who chose it as the winner." Come Closer is her directorial debut.

Israeli films taking the lead
Israeli films have often won important prizes and critical acclaim at the Tribeca Festival, which was created by Rosenthal, De Niro, and Craig Hatkoff to help revitalize lower Manhattan following the 9/11 terror attack.

David Volach’s My Father My Lord and Talya Lavie’s Zero Motivation each won the Best Narrative Feature Award. Ohad Knoller received the Best Actor Award for Yossi & Jagger, while Shira Haas and Joy Rieger won Best Actress Awards there for the films, Asia and Virgins, respectively.

The Nora Ephron Prize, named in honor of the great American Jewish writer, was given to Israeli directors Ruthy Pribar for Asia and Lavie for Zero Motivation.

But this year, Nesher’s movie was the only film by an Israeli director chosen to take part in the festival, which prompted concern that the organizers may have bowed to pressure from anti-Israel factions to keep the number of Israeli films competing in the festival low this year.
To fight anti-Zionism, NY philanthropist showcases artifacts that tie Jews to Israel
Holding out an ancient and surprisingly heavy silver coin, New York-based philanthropist and antiquities collector George S. Blumenthal explained that it was a shekel piece from 68 CE, the third year of the Jewish Revolt against Rome, inscribed with the words “Jerusalem the Holy” on one side and “Shekel of Israel” on the other.

“It’s material culture. You put it in someone’s hand and they feel the connection,” Blumenthal said, before nonchalantly slipping the 2,000-year-old shekel back into his satchel.

This connection, provided by a physical object attesting to the ancient Jewish presence in Israel, has been a central theme of Blumenthal’s philanthropic efforts.

Often working in concert with Israeli photographer and imaging technology expert Ardon Bar-Hama, Blumenthal, through what he called a series of “serendipitous” encounters over the last 20 years, ended up funding the groundbreaking high-resolution digitization of the Dead Sea Scrolls and also of the Aleppo Codex, one of the oldest surviving Torah scrolls, dating from the early 10th century CE, among other projects.

He has also worked closely with The City of David, financing a series of animated films about the history of Jerusalem, and is currently partnering with the Central Zionist Archives to digitize the original diaries of Theodor Herzl. This is in addition to other efforts relating to American Jewish life and American history.

Blumenthal, 80, the son of Holocaust survivors, grew up in Cleveland and made his fortune in the telecommunications industry in the 1990s. He then turned to philanthropy, quietly backing a myriad of causes. A longtime friend of actor Michael Douglas, Blumenthal has appeared in small parts in several of Douglas’s movies, including the classic “Wall Street.” Image collage from the Israel Archaeological Proof website, showing, from left to right: The Tel Dan Stele, a scan of a 19th-century document, and a photo from Operation Magic Carpet in the 1950s. (Courtesy/used in accordance with Clause 27a of the Copyright Law)

Talkative, gregarious and unassuming, Blumenthal recently met with The Times of Israel in the lobby of the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in central Jerusalem to discuss his latest project, Israel Archaeological Proof, a website that compiles archaeological and historical documentation that shows the millennia of Jewish presence in the Holy Land.

The idea, he said, is to educate people about the deep roots of the Jewish people in the Land of Israel and provide ammunition against narratives suggesting that there are none, a mission that has become more urgent than ever after the October 7 Hamas massacres in southern Israel and subsequent outburst of antisemitic incidents and campus demonstrations in the US.




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