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Thursday, December 19, 2024

12/19 Links Pt2: Phillips: The diplomatic crisis between Israel and Ireland; Antisemitism is a public health crisis; Jesus Wasn’t Palestinian

From Ian:

Melanie Phillips: The diplomatic crisis between Israel and Ireland
Why are the Irish so bigoted against Israel and the Jewish people?

Ireland has a deplorable history. As Sa’ar said, it was at best neutral during World War II. In 1945, the Irish leader Éamon de Valera sent his condolences to the German people over Hitler’s death.

One reason often given is the country’s Catholicism with its ancient history of theological antisemitism. But this can’t be the whole reason since other Catholic countries aren’t suffused with this degree of venom towards Israel and the Jews.

An important further reason is that the Irish identify with the Palestinian Arabs as perceived victims of Israeli “colonial” oppression just as they identify the Irish as victims of British “colonial” oppression.

Some point to the critical influence in Ireland of Sinn Féin, the party that served as the political fig leaf for the Irish Republican Army. The IRA waged a terrorist war against Britain and the Protestants of U.K.-run Northern Ireland on and off from early in the last century and was responsible for a campaign of bomb attacks in disturbances known as the “Troubles” from the late 1960s to 1998.

The IRA received massive arms shipments from Libya in the 1980s, and was funded and trained by the Palestine Liberation Organization. After the IRA disarmed in the wake of the 1998 Good Friday Agreement, the Sinn Féin leader Gerry Adams met Hamas leaders in 2006 and 2009.

According to Irish journalist and anti-extremism researcher, Dr. Eoin Lenihan, the links in the Irish mind between Israeli and British “colonialists” and between the Palestinian and Irish “resistance” resulted from Adams yoking together Arab and Irish nationalism under the banner of revolutionary socialism.

This permeated more widely, he says, because, unlike other countries, Ireland doesn’t have a tradition of centrist politics. Its two big parties, Fiánna Fail and Fine Gael, have no core values; so they veer towards wherever the wind is blowing—in this case, Sinn Féin’s revolutionary leftism and the Israel-bashing NGOs such as Human Rights Watch and Amnesty.

Through Sinn Fein’s influence, Ireland has become enmeshed with the international radical left and its promotion of intersectionality and victim culture. Under this dogma, the Jews can never be victims because they are seen as all-powerful, controlling the Western world in their own interests to the disadvantage of everyone else.

Victim culture is therefore itself innately anti-Jew. So there’s a double source of Jew-hatred in Ireland—both from its Catholic heritage and from the secular religion of universalism and victim culture.

Ireland is simply a danger to Israel and the Jewish people. It should be treated as a pariah until and unless it decides to support civilization rather than its nemesis.
Biden admin, universities failed to crack down on antisemitism in ‘disturbing pattern’ after Oct. 7, scathing House GOP report finds
The Biden administration, top universities and medical institutions utterly failed to crack down on antisemitism that exploded in the wake of Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, terror attack, according to a scathing House Republican report released Thursday, which laid bare “systemic” and “astounding” shortcomings.

Six GOP-led House committees declared in a joint report that “antisemitism has been allowed to fester unchecked” due to “a disturbing pattern of defensiveness and denial,” according to a copy exclusively obtained by The Post.

“Across the nation, Jewish Americans have been harassed, assaulted, intimidated, and subjected to hostile environments — violations that stand in stark contrast to America’s fundamental values, including a foundational commitment to religious freedom for all,” the 42-page report says.

“The failure of our federal government departments and agencies is astounding.”

The outpouring of anti-Israel and anti-Jewish remarks and actions tested America’s free speech precepts and the fact that hate speech is generally lawful in the United States, unless it amounts to harassment or is an aggravating factor in a criminal act such as assault.

The Republican-led report points out, however, that federal law generally prevents recipients of taxpayer funds from tolerating discrimination — allowing a foothold to leverage recipients to stiffen policies on campuses and at medical settings should federal officials so choose.

In almost every case, institutions allegedly took almost no disciplinary action against alleged antisemites and made no changes to codes of conduct, and faced no loss of grants to stop the rapidly spreading Jew hatred.

The report focuses heavily on Columbia University and its recommendations urge federal agencies to use money to incentivize more stringent anti-discrimination policies — and also proposes potential legislation to that effect.

“The executive branch should aggressively enforce Title VI [anti-discrimination rules] and hold schools accountable for their failures to protect students. Universities that fail to fulfill the obligations upon which their federal funding is predicated or whose actions make clear they are unfit stewards of taxpayer dollars should be treated accordingly,” the Republican panels said.
Commuting federal death sentences would include Tree of Life shooter, McConnell says
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) urged U.S. President Joe Biden not to heed the call in a letter from 21 retired, liberal judges to commute the sentences of all of those on federal death row.

“President Biden’s decision earlier this month to pardon his son may well have set a unique and unfortunate precedent. But abuse of the presidential pardon doesn’t stop there,” the Kentucky senator said on the Senate floor on Dec. 18. “Last week, the president went on to commute 1,500 sentences, and the way liberal activists see it, he should have done even more.”

“More than 20 liberal retired judges—including the Boston radical, who recommended the disgraced pro-crime U.S. Attorney Rachael Rollins—have now urged the president to turn his eye to federal death sentences,” McConnell said.

“If the president heeded these former judges’ call, it would mean commuting the death sentences of the perpetrator of the massacre at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh,” the senator added.

Robert Bowers was convicted of murdering 11 people at the Tree of Life*Or Simcha Synagogue in Pittsburgh on the morning of Oct. 27, 2018.


Ruth Wisse: How the Jews Remain an Eternal People
It’s worth noting that this villainy extends to the wickedness of Arab and Muslim leaders who condemned Palestinian Arabs to perpetual refugee status instead of resettling, absorbing, and reinstating them in their bountiful lands. Jordan already occupies the largest share of mandatory Palestine. Egypt could have administered Gaza. And so on. When Hamas used civilians as human sacrifices it was doing what was done by other Arabs to their Palestinian brethren: using them to delegitimate and destroy their Jewish neighbors or die in the effort. If Palestinians were not turning the world against Israel, their coreligionists might be killing them, as other factions are doing to one another throughout the region. But this can in no way justify the Palestinian descent into barbarism.

With agency comes responsibility: now that Jews are in our ultimate destinations, with unprecedented freedom of action, we are obliged to confront and defeat those who come to destroy us. The inversions dare not be allowed to stand. American Jews should be blowing up the campaign of lies as ingeniously as the Israelis did the pagers of Hizballah. Defense is not a strategy, certainly not in the war of ideas.

Israelis defend the Jewish state bodily. The grievance coalition comes at America through its Jews: we are the portal. The moral-political inversion that works against us—Israel as apartheid, Jews as oppressors of Palestinian Hamas jihadists—this is the same moral inversion that attacks equal opportunity as class warfare and democracy as inequality, that tries to undo America’s progress from slavery to freedom by denying its exceptionalism. The intersectional coalition that marches behind the jihadist flag cultivates grievance in place of gratitude. If America betrays its Jews, it proves it is no better than Nazi Germany, Stalinist Russia, or Islamist Iran. The more the defenders of Israel allow themselves to be attacked and defamed, the more we confirm the failure of America.

The political odds against Jews are so great that our continuing survival sometimes feels as impossible as Moyshe-Itske’s, and yet we are no less confident than Sutzkever was in telling the story that we are and will remain the eternal people. Now, as against the highly charged events I have been describing, let me end with something immediate and perhaps about to become normal. I happened to watch a press conference at the end of November where New York City’s mayor Eric Adams introduced his new police commissioner, Jessica Tisch, a soft-spoken woman in her early forties who carries a prestigious Jewish family name. In accepting the position, she said that—on behalf of the police department, she was doing the work of tikkun olam—a phrase that is often misused for a progressive ideal of repairing the world, but that was appropriate in this context: we improve the world by standing up for the law by even more by enforcing the law. We improve the world, one borough, one city at a time as proud Jewish citizens by helping to maintain the Republic. A Jewish police commissioner maintaining civic order in the name of Jewish values restores the faith that brought us to this haven of refuge and keeps us determined to sustain it.

Tikvah is helping to create a new Vilna on the Hudson, and by example and patient instruction it has taken upon itself the task of helping the United States, now approaching 250 years, push onward in history. This indeed is one of our responsibilities as American Jews. We Jews are the blue and white in the red, white, and blue. The greater our strength and creative effort, the more we contribute to repairing the world. We cannot be expected to save America, but America cannot be saved by sacrificing us. We cannot save America by ourselves, but paraphrasing the Talmud, neither are we free to desist from making the effort.
Jesus Wasn’t Palestinian
At the time of Jesus’s life, the region he lived in was part of the Roman Empire and was referred to as Judea, a Roman province established following Pompey’s conquest of the Hasmonean Kingdom in 63 BCE. Like the neighbouring provinces of Galilee and Samaria, Judea was an admixture of the Roman imperial system, Hellenistic culture, and its own distinct Jewish identity. It was a hub of Jewish religious and political identity, housing the Second Temple in Jerusalem, the focal point of Jewish worship.

There was no clear concept of Palestinian identity during Jesus’s lifetime. The name “Palestine” wasn’t commonly used until the Romans changed the name of the region to Syria-Palaestina following the Bar Kokhba Revolt of 135 CE, more than 100 years after Jesus died. The Romans renamed the place in an effort to diminish Jewish identity and ties to the land. The name Syria-Palaestina was chosen in reference to the historical enemies of the Israelites, the Philistines. This meant that, in ancient times, the term “Palestine” was strongly linked to Roman colonialism.

Claiming that Jesus was Palestinian is not only anachronistic, it is as inaccurate as asserting that he was Israeli, Ottoman, Byzantine, or a Christian Crusader—since none of these identities existed in his time. Each reflects a later historical period and different sociopolitical realities. Superimposing any of these identities onto Jesus simply does not align with the reality of the first century or describe either his ministry or his followers.

Jesus’s identity was fundamentally Jewish. His teachings, as recorded in the Gospels, were thoroughly rooted in Jewish scripture and traditions and his arguments with the religious leaders of the various Jewish sects of the time—the Pharisees, Sadducees, Zealots, and others—were internal debates within Judaism. Jesus lived in a Jewish society, addressed the concerns of his fellow Jews, and was ultimately executed by the Romans as “King of the Jews,” a title that reflects the way in which both his supporters and his enemies viewed him.

We can’t just ignore all this weighty history. The modern claim that Jesus was Palestinian is being wielded as a rhetorical tool, an attempt to downplay and delegitimise the historical Jewish connection to the land. Some might claim that historical accuracy is less important than symbolism, and Jesus is a potent symbol for Palestinians because he is an important global figure. But trying to reinterpret his life through the lens of a modern national identity means losing sight of the historical reality of first-century Judea, and instead inventing a new set of mythologies.

As a Palestinian Arab myself, I don’t feel a need to embroider our identity with falsehoods or exaggerations. Our history, culture, and connection to the land are valid in their own right, without the need to appropriate or distort the narratives of others, or to try to replace Israel with Palestine. Every group of people has a right to freedom and self-determination, regardless of whether or not they can count Jesus of Nazareth among their number. The claim that Jesus was Palestinian relies on anachronisms that do not hold up to serious scrutiny and is of no relevance to the broader idea that Palestinians should have their own self-government. It’s time to put this myth to bed and move on.
Antisemitism is a public health crisis
Antisemitism should be treated like a pandemic – it transcends borders, spreading through populations with devastating impact. It is not new, but its resurgence is dangerous and insidious. It spreads through misinformation, through apathy, through silence.

During COVID-19, we saw how quickly governments could act: implementing new laws, launching prevention campaigns, and enforcing the law. Like a virus, antisemitism requires active and coordinated intervention – at prevention, response and recovery levels – to stop its spread and address its harms. But the response we have seen from our governments has been too slow, reactive and makeshift, allowing the spread to reach dangerous levels quickly.

As vice-president of Zionism Victoria, I know all too well that government-funded security measures – cameras, guards, barriers – are essential. Yet even these measures often fall short of the community’s needs, with the funding provided frequently failing to meet the scale and urgency of the challenges we face.

And while critical, security funding is only a partial solution. Funding security alone is akin to investing in masks during a pandemic without developing vaccines. Antisemitism is not just a security issue; it is a public health crisis. And it’s time governments start treating it like one.

We need a bold and unflinching public awareness campaign that exposes the real and devastating consequences of antisemitism. Just as the National Cabinet during COVID worked tirelessly to protect lives, a similar coordinated effort is needed now to address the resurgence of antisemitism.

There is no one tick-box that will make me feel safe wearing my Star of David on the train to work again. Governments must invest not only in security but also in education, legislation, and most importantly enforcement. Victoria’s recently announced reforms to tackle the rise in antisemitism are welcome – but critically, all governments must ensure police forces are emboldened to apply hate crime laws – laws that our community spent decades advocating for.

The Federal government should be ashamed that Australia is now considered unsafe for Jewish people to visit. They must stand with Jewish Australians, listen to us and use all their powers to act with urgency and resolve to confront this escalating crisis. This must be a long-term commitment – guided by a national strategy to combat antisemitism – and it must start now.

My grandparents survived the Holocaust and came to Australia for a better future. They believed that Australia would be a safe haven for their descendants. It is heartbreaking to see that belief shaken, not just by rising antisemitism, but by the lack of action to combat it.

Australia can and must do better. Treating antisemitism as the public health crisis it is, is the only way forward. Our future depends on it.
The origins of antisemitism in Canada and why it has spiked
For many long years, there were no Jews in senior leadership roles in the Canadian government, save for Louis Rasminsky, who was appointed the governor of the Bank of Canada in the 1950s.

That changed in 1968 when Pierre Trudeau became prime minister (a role that his son, Justin Trudeau, now occupies) and began appointing Canadian Jews as diplomats, justices and more. Until Trudeau’s appointments, the lack of Jews in leadership reflected a country that was systemically antisemitic. Sadly, that hate continues.

Toronto has the highest per capita hate incidents against Jews in the Western world, based on statistics from B’nai Brith Canada and the Toronto Metro Police statistics. Montreal is vying for second place.

Antisemitism in Canada, however, predates the Hamas terrorist attacks in southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023. In the 1880s, Jews immigrated to Canada escaping pogroms raging across Europe. Canada’s first prime minister, John MacDonald, welcomed Jews, and the first Jewish rural settlement was New Jerusalem in 1884. Sir Wilfred Laurier, who followed MacDonald as prime minister, was a staunch defender of Jews and continued to welcome them to the country.

At the same time, the modern Zionism movement was picking up steam in Europe. Recognition for a Jewish state spread throughout the Jewish Diaspora like wildfire, and in the 1890s, there were more than 250 Zionist clubs across Canada.

While leaders like MacDonald and Laurier welcomed the Jews, others were not as welcoming, and antisemitism both overt and subversive followed. For instance, before 1910, Jews in Toronto were prohibited from living north of Bloor Street, instead settling around Kensington Market, like my maternal grandparents. Until the 1950s, areas east of Spadina Road and Rosedale in North Toronto were also restricted against Jews.

Laurier spoke out against European “pogroms,” and The Toronto Star was a staunch critic of antisemitism; yet Jews were held as the “other,” and limited from places to live and work. Mount Sinai Hospital in Toronto, started in 1917 in Yorkville as a Jewish hospital since Jewish doctors were prevented from working in other Toronto medical centers.
When an antisemitic essay received a Jewish award
Obituaries for journalist Lance Morrow, who passed on Nov. 29 at the age of 85, heaped praise on his “elegance” and “beautifully constructed” essays. They neglected to mention the antisemitic essay he once wrote—and the award it received from a prominent liberal Jewish organization.

Morrow was part of the wave of American journalists and columnists in the 1980s who specialized in accusing Israel of having lost its soul and betrayed its moral obligations. From his longtime, self-righteous perch at TIME magazine, he frequently lectured the Israelis on how awful they had become, how unlike the nice (but often dead) Jews of yesteryear.

“The People of the Book [have] become also a People of the Gun,” Morrow announced in TIME in October 1982. Israel had adopted “an aggressive and absolutist approach to life” guided by “brute logic.” Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin was “combative” and “strikes ugly notes” and makes “invidious” remarks about Israel’s enemies, Morrow wrote.

He continued with this poison dart: “The Jewish conscience is often a splendid moral instrument, one of the most highly developed in the world,” but—of course, there was a “but”—it had “plunged abruptly into mortal fallibility” in that year’s Lebanon war.

This was an ongoing theme in Morrow’s writings about Israel: the Jew Who Has Fallen Into Sin. Morrow’s antisemitic libels echoed some of the darkest periods of Jewish history.

In April 1989, Morrow authored a TIME cover story on “Israel at 40.” Morrow was a peculiar choice for the task since before becoming a senior writer at TIME, he had mainly been a theater critic. Among his recent topics were the continuing popularity of kissing, the meaning of summer and a profile of Mary Tyler Moore.

Bertram (“Benyamin”) Korn of the Committee on Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America was the only Jewish leader to challenge Morrow’s “Israel at 40” article. Korn pointed out that the essay was “filled with inaccuracies from beginning to end,” including:
• Morrow depicted the 1967 war as Israeli aggression. No mention of Arab threats or mobilization of Arab armies, just “Israeli armies sweeping over Gaza and the Sinai to the south, the entire West Bank of the Jordan and the Golan Heights in the north.”
• Morrow drew false moral equivalence between Arab terrorism and Israeli self-defense. He listed some Arab attacks and then added: “But now the Israelis have shown a ferocity of their own.”
• Morrow described Israel’s leaders as “craven,” “weak,” “cowardly” and “dispiritingly small—visionless and timid, working the world from a defensive crouch.” The worst thing he wrote about the PLO leader Yasser Arafat, a mass murderer, was that he lacked “a larger sense of the constructive.”
The ANC’s ties to terror-linked states displays South Africa’s troubling trajectory
The irony is profound and tragic. The ANC, once the world’s symbol of resistance against oppression, now supports a political propaganda narrative that views Israel as an apartheid, colonial state, while aligning with regimes that promote hate and extremism. For those of us who supported the ANC’s original cause, the alliance with Iran, Qatar, and Hamas is a bitter betrayal of the principles we once struggled for.

The ANC’s relationship with terror-linked states and their military proxies demands scrutiny. By bringing a case against Israel to The Hague and enabling financial networks that funnel resources to organizations like Hamas, the ANC has positioned South Africa as a link in the global web of terror financing. When the ANC accuses Israel of being an apartheid state, like Iran, Hamas, and other brutal terror-supporting entities and states, it calls for the elimination of the existence of Israel. What is even more pathetic is that the ANC is doing this in the aftermath of the October 7 pogrom, the most brutal massacre of Jews since the Holocaust, in which the ideology and policies of Hamas were transparent for all to witness with clarity. For the ANC leadership to align itself with Hamas especially now, for money, is repugnant and an insult to the people of South Africa.

The international community can no longer ignore South Africa’s troubling trajectory. The ANC’s shift marks a critical turning point. It is time for the world to re-evaluate South Africa’s global role and hold the ANC to the standards of justice and human rights that once defined its struggle.
Loose Women star platforms conspiracy theories about media’s ‘Zionist’ agenda
Loose Women presenter Nadia Sawalha has platformed conspiracy theories about the media’s “Zionist” agenda and claims that terrorists are “freedom fighters”, the JC can reveal.

The remarks emerged in an incendiary interview by Sawalha – a panellist on the ITV talk show and previous Celebrity MasterChef winner – with a pro-Palestine activist, which the TV host shared with her 555,000 Instagram followers in November.

The activist, Lizzie Greenwood, a former candidate for George Galloway’s far-left Workers Party, told Sawalha that “Palestinian activists get called terrorists and traitors”, adding that "freedom fighters in Palestine get called terrorists”.

Sawalha appeared to agree with the comments and praised Greenwood for embarking on an “incredible” and “extraordinary” hunger strike for the war’s Palestinian victims.

The TV presenter went on to question why Greenwood’s “Gaza fast” had received no media coverage.

Greenwood responded: “There is a very, very clear Zionist and UK government agenda in the UK media, which at the moment is the same thing because the UK government is so unashamedly Zionist and compromised.”

Sawalha, whose father is Jordanian-born British actor Nadim Sawalha, seemed to concur, saying: “Is it not unbelievable that it [the hunger strike] is not talked about in the media? Maybe we could all have a little guess as to why that is.

“Even asking for a ceasefire has been weaponised,” Sawalha went on.

In another Instagram video, the outspoken ITV personality accused Israeli leaders of crying antisemitism when they are accused of crimes in Gaza: “If it all goes wrong you can just say everybody is being antisemitic.”


Brendan O'Neill: Israel Is Right to Cut Ties with Ireland
Last week Ireland was gushed over by Hamas, that army of anti-Semites that carried out the worst slaughter of Jews since the Holocaust. If you're getting love from racist terrorists, it's time for some self-reflection. In response to the Irish government's decision to join South Africa's "genocide" case against Israel at the International Court of Justice, Israel has taken the extraordinary decision to close its embassy in Dublin.

It's not often I feel ashamed to be Irish. But this unconscionable state of affairs, where my motherland finds greater favor among the neo-fascists of Hamas than it does with the democratic nation of Israel, makes me ashamed. Israel is right to cut ties with Ireland. It is right to say the Irish government's attitude to Israel is fueled by "double standards."

Micheal Martin, Ireland's minister for foreign affairs, said the ICJ should "broaden" its interpretation of what constitutes a genocide. To twist the rules of both war and language in order that Israel might finally get the comeuppance its Western haters think it deserves is the sign of a deeply unserious state - a state more committed to the cult of Israelophobia than to truth.

If you go mad when Israel dares to fight back against the anti-Semitic terrorists who raped and murdered more than a thousand of its people, then you are not "pro-peace" - you're just a garden variety Israel-hater. Ireland has failed the great moral test of our time, the test set by the barbarous acts of Oct. 7, and now finds itself loved more by the killers of that day than by their victims. For shame.
Israeli Ambassador to Ireland Explains Embassy Closure
Israel's decision to close its embassy in Dublin is "the correct move at this juncture," according to Israel's ambassador to Ireland Dana Erlich, who claims there is "an anti-Israel obsession" in the country. She told Israel's Channel 11 on Monday that there had been "a systematic hate campaign specifically against me, as the person who represents the State of Israel in Ireland." This involved posters on the streets and negative commentary at demonstrations.

"Ultimately, the delegitimization that Israel has been undergoing, the fact that Zionist has become a dirty word in Ireland - we know that that is the modernization of antisemitism. It is the current incarnation of ancient antisemitism. So, to our regret, yes, we see the Irish Government advancing antisemitic measures."

"Time after time we saw an anti-Israel obsession that doesn't really help peace or coexistence. There was competition who could make the most extreme anti-Israel statements and there were no voices from the opposition or the media with a different view....What we see in Ireland is disproportionate, double standards and one-sided."


How Low Is the Irish Government Willing to Stoop?
The massacre in Israel by Hamas terrorists on Oct. 7 was genocide - as defined by the 1948 UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. The intention was to wipe out people purely because of their ethnic background. How ironic that the Irish Government is accusing the Jewish state of genocide. Dublin's politicians are asking the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to broaden its definition of genocide - claiming Israel has engaged in the "collective punishment" of people in Gaza.

The move by the Irish government overlooks overwhelming evidence that Israel's campaign in Gaza is anything but genocide. Routinely Israel is lauded by military experts for the humane way in which it is fighting the war. If the determination was to kill for the sake of killing, why drop leaflets warning innocent people to take cover?

It remains unconscionable that Israel's attempts to protect its citizens and secure the release of hostages, while trying to avoid loss of innocent life, is labeled as genocide. Israel's war is not with the Palestinian people. Otherwise it would surely have flattened Gaza within days of the Oct. 7 attack. Hamas's founding charter shows that its raison d'etre is the killing of the Jewish people - in other words, genocide.
Ireland's Anti-Israel Stance
On Sunday, Israel announced it was closing its Dublin embassy because of the "extreme anti-Israel policies of the Irish government." Just last week, the Irish government called to "broaden" the definition of genocide to vaguely include civilian harm, effectively turning Israel into a perpetrator of a crime yet to exist.

For Jerusalem, this attempt to shift legal goalposts, redefining established terms to engineer guilt, was the final straw. After years of diplomatic snubs, boycotts, and genocide accusations - not to mention Ireland's recognition of a Palestinian state soon after Oct. 7 - Israel decided to cut its losses.

Ireland is for international law when it suits. That's why it now seeks to rewrite the Genocide Convention to retroactively lower the bar for convicting Israel. This more closely resembles authoritarian justice, where the accused is condemned first and the crime tailored to fit.

Ireland may claim to be "pro-peace," but when Irish peacekeepers stationed in southern Lebanon turned a blind eye to Hizbullah amassing rockets on Israel's border - in blatant violation of international law - Dublin remained silent. Had the peacekeepers done their job, Hizbullah's emboldening of Hamas, and this war, might have been avoided.

Irish Prime Minister Simon Harris declared that Israel was not "entitled to have an alternative set of facts." But this cuts both ways. The facts reveal that Ireland's government is determined to accuse the Jewish state of genocide - a term born from the Holocaust - at any cost. Ireland abandons its principles when the violators aren't Jews but weaponizes them when they supposedly are.
All the world’s a stage, and Ireland stands exposed upon it
From time to time, I get asked by readers why it is, exactly, that I spend so much time writing about official Ireland’s attitudes towards Israel.

There’s a personal answer to that question (I’ve been to Israel, have friends there, find it to be a wonderful and welcoming country where people live cheerfully even in the knowledge that there are constant plots to kill them) and there’s an substantially more important political answer: That Irish attitudes to Israel are a marker for so much else that’s wrong about the country.

The first thing I’d say is that no issue more clearly sums up the entirely performative nature of Irish politics, in which our dear leaders prance about on the stage playing at being the “goodie” in a pantomime. For example: How many times this week have we heard, solemnly, from our leaders that Ireland is committed to international law and human rights?

And how many times, dear reader, have you heard that lie – and it is a blatant lie – challenged by the Irish media?

This is, of course, the very same Ireland that literally rolled out the red-carpet last year for the visit of the Chinese Premier, while that Government perpetrates what actually is an internationally recognised genocide against the Uigher people.

It’s the same country that sends Ministers every Saint Patrick’s day to Riyadh in Saudi Arabia, where women are routinely whipped for alleged adultery, which includes being raped by a man other than their husbands. It’s the same country where the party of the official opposition used to import guns from then Libyan dictator Muamar Gaddaffi in order to murder British (and Irish) civilians.

Indeed, the President who took to his rostrum yesterday to spew more invective against the Israeli Government, and to criticise the alleged extra-territorial ambitions of Israel, is called Michael D. Higgins. He bears, not coincidentally, the same name as the Irish President who just some months ago wished his very best in their endeavours to an Iranian regime that has infringed on the sovereignty of Lebanon, Syria, Yemen, and Iraq in recent years, and which openly exports arms to terror groups right across the Middle East.

He’s the same Michael D. Higgins also who extolled in the most poetic terms the late and apparently missed Cuban dictator, Fidel Castro. That’s the fellow spluttering barely coherent outrage about the apparent fact that the Israelis might think we were unfairly singling them out for criticism.

This rank performative nonsense – which is what it is – is not confined to the international arena.

Our Taoiseach is an actor. He acts, and poses, as a man of great activity and ambition.


Suspect arrested for alleged anti-Semitic hate crime against Columbia student
The NYPD has arrested a 20-year-old man for allegedly punching a Jewish Columbia University student and taking his Israeli flag.

On Monday, police arrested Tarek Bazrouk on charges of third degree robbery and a hate crime against Columbia Junior Jonathan Lederer, the Columbia Daily Spectator reports. The incident is said to have occurred during a Dec. 9 anti-Israel protest in Manhattan.

On Dec. 11, the university’s public safety department sent a crime alert to students about the situation.

”A Columbia University student reported to the NYPD that during a demonstration an unknown individual stole their Israeli flag and ran westbound on West 116th Street,” the message read. “The student pursued the individual to Claremont Avenue and the unknown suspect punched the student in the face. This incident is being classified as a Hate Crime and is currently under investigation by the NYPD Hate Crimes Task Force.”

”There is currently no indication that the suspect is affiliated with the University,” the update noted.

The NYPD has stated that the suspect issued anti-Semitic comments prior to stealing the flag and punching the victim, The Jerusalem Post reports.

On Dec. 10, New York Governor Kathy Hochul took to X to condemn the alleged hate crime.


Luxury Holiday Chalets: The Secrets of Gaza Before the War
Life in Gaza before October 7, 2023, offered surprising luxuries. Not exactly the unlivable nightmare portrayed by the media. In this video we will see the luxury vacation villas with swimming pools Gazans loved in summer.

Gaza watcher Jacqui Peleg (@imshin on X) has been following Gazan social media since 2018, watching videos filmed by ordinary Gazans in Gaza. The picture she sees is very different than that depicted in the West.


New report lays out guidelines for Trump to engage in nuclear talks with Iran
A new report by the Jewish Institute for the National Security of America urges the incoming Trump administration to pursue nuclear talks with Iran — but only under strict conditions and paired with a serious U.S. military threat to the regime’s nuclear program.

The JINSA report begins with a stark warning: “From the day President-elect [Donald] Trump takes office, he will have almost zero time or margin for error to prevent a nuclear Iran,” arguing that efforts to re-implement a maximum-pressure campaign “including credible threats of force” must begin before Trump is sworn into office.

The report urges Trump to “at least consider Iran’s offer of talks seriously if only to build support” for stronger sanctions if the talks fall through. It also notes that Iran is already weakened, and the regime could use talks, if not handled correctly, as a delaying tactic to harden its nuclear infrastructure and ultimately run out the clock on snapback sanctions, which expire in October.

Negotiations, the report argues, should be aggressive and coercive, not conciliatory, and Trump should stick to a strict set of conditions.

“To seize this unique but fleeting opportunity, President-elect Trump should join Israel in giving Iran an ultimatum at the outset of his presidency: agree fully and immediately to verifiably dismantle its nuclear weapons program, or invite its imminent and utter destruction,” the report continues, adding that a military strike on Iran now appears to be a credible possibility.

Elliott Abrams, who served as a special representative for Iran in the first Trump administration, said in a briefing about the report on Tuesday that any diplomacy with Iran must be backed up with military force. And he said that the U.S. should make clear that it may participate directly in strikes on Iran’s nuclear program.

Eric Edelman, a former undersecretary of defense for policy and a co-chair of the Commission on National Defense Strategy, said that the U.S. should participate in joint exercises with Israel and move key munitions into position to send “strong signals of a willingness to use military force if we can’t get a diplomatic resolution.”


Canadian man pleads guilty to promoting Jew-hate speech, attempting to make 3D-printed guns
Pascal Tribout, 38, of Quebec, pleaded guilty on Friday to charges related to antisemitic hate speech and using 3D printers to create gun parts.

Following a tip from the Canadian Security Intelligence Service in November 2023, investigators found that Tribout was an active member of the GDL Chat 2.0 channel on Telegram, a cross-platform social-media messaging platform.

Police said that Tribout had posted 66 “racist, antisemitic, anti-government, conspiracy and alarmist” messages on the channel, which is known for promoting “antisemitism and white supremacist themes,” between March 14 and April 2, 2024. In one of his posts, Tribout described the COVID-19 vaccine as the “Jew Jab.”

When law enforcement searched his home, they found a document titled “Every Single Aspect of the COVID Agenda is Jewish,” along with other antisemitic propaganda and a 1947-style German military uniform.

Tribout also possessed 13 3D printers and gun casings for several types of guns, such as FGC-9, AR-15, Tec-22 and Derringer. The weapons were not functional and therefore did not meet the definition of a firearm under Canadian law.

Tribout, who was arrested by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police on June 13, pleaded guilty to possession and distribution of firearm-related computer data for use with 3D printers; willful promotion of hatred; and attempting to manufacture prohibited firearms with a 3D printer.

Tribout’s sentencing hearing is scheduled for April 7, 2025.


Mesa man charged for allegedly making antisemitic death threats
A Mesa man is facing federal charges after investigators said he sent “scores of hateful, violent, and antisemitic death threats” to several Jewish New Yorkers and others around the U.S.

Federal officials announced on Wednesday a three-count indictment of 34-year-old Donovan Hall.

Nelson Delgado with the FBI said Hall started making graphic and hate-filled calls to several victims in New York City and around the U.S.

“These malicious phone calls escalated to text messages brazenly displaying his weapons, furthering his victims’ worst fears,” he said in a news release.

The hateful statements were made during a three-month stretch, starting in August.

During that month, court documents said Hall made dozens of threatening phone calls to a Manhattan hotel owner, the owner’s family members and hotel staff.

“No individual deserves to be at the receiving end of these types of threats or to be targeted because of their religion,” acting U.S. Attorney Edward Kim said in the statement.

In October, the FBI said he texted photographs of two guns and a machete to the hotel owner and other threats to harm the owner and his family.

Investigators said that on Nov. 22, law enforcement searched Hall’s Mesa house and found the two guns shown in the texts, along with other weapons and ammunition.

Neither gun was registered to Hall, the FBI said.


Launceston Airport menorah back up
Launceston Airport in Tasmania has reversed it’s decision not to host a menorah during Chanukah this year.

In a letter seen by the Australian Jewish News, an airport official had earlier apologised for reneging on the agreement with Chabad of Tasmania, citing security concerns.

“Our security review of risk over our busiest period highlighted … that due to the current political climate of the unrest regarding right [sic] extremist activity poses a threat to our staff and visitors.

In a statement later on Thursday, an airport spokesman said, “Following discussions with federal and state agencies, the local Jewish community and other Australian airports we are now comfortable we can safely display the Menorah in the terminal during Chanukah, as we have for the past two years. We apologise for the confusion and wish all of our travellers a happy holiday.”

The AJN understands the menorah will now be erected in a secure area, but will be visible from the public part of the airport.

Rabbi Yochanan Gordon, co-director of Chabad of Tasmania, told the AJN he would have to see how visible the menorah will be before making a comment on the airport’s solution.

“It should never have gotten to this stage. The CEO was shocked when he heard about this, and I believe these decisions about not allowing the menorah were taken by people lower down in the organisation” he said.


Nova Exhibit opens in Miami following successes in NY, LA
The world-famous Nova Music Festival Exhibition is making its way to Miami.

The exhibit, which has been stationed in Tel Aviv, New York, and Los Angeles, launched on Wednesday in Miami. The project is described as a sacred space that resonates with the memories of both victims and survivors.

Nova Festival survivors will be in attendance to share their first-hand testimonies as witnessesand victims of the atrocities of the October 7 terrorist attacks.

Donations from the exhibition will go to the Nova Healing Journey, an initiative that supportsmental health treatment for victims and families of the October 7 massacre.

Remembering those lost
The Nova Music Festival founders gathered once more after October 7 to conceive this in-depth remembrance, created and directed by Reut Feingold.

The organizers joined with partners to bring the exhibit to the US, first to New York this spring, where they welcomed more than 100,000 visitors, and most recently Los Angeles. Over 260,000 people came to bear witness to this expansive commemorative installation across all three cities, from elected officials, including California Governor Gavin Newsom, Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass, and Governor Tim Walz, to members of the entertainment industry including Jessica Alba, Octavia Spencer, Will Ferrell, Kristen Bell, Cindy Crawford, and Katie Couric. The New York exhibit saw visitors, including New York State Governor Kathy Hochul and education leaders from Barnard College, CUNY, and NYU.
Ivanka Trump, Jared Kushner and Scooter Braun join Israel exhibit
Ivanka Trump and husband Jared Kushner were “very moved” as they joined music mogul Scooter Braun at the opening night of the Nova exhibit in Miami Tuesday night.

The couple attended the exhibit, which recreates the grounds of the Nova Music Festival on the fateful day of the October 7 terror attack in Israel.

The former first daughter and her husband moved to South Florida after their stint in the White House during President-Elect Donald Trump’s first administration.

Braun is one of the organizers of the project, which gives a harrowing look at what happened that fateful day when 1,200 were killed and more than 250 abducted.

Everything from the chairs and tents, to the burned vehicles and bullet-riddled portable bathrooms — all actual items from the festival — are on display.

“Ivanka and Jared walked through the exhibit, they connected with Scooter, it was a really beautiful night – they were very moved,” a friend of the family told Page Six exclusively.




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