Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News: 2004

Showing posts with label 2004. Show all posts

Monday, August 14, 2023

Since 1948, in any given situation, there seem to always be exactly 420,000 Palestinians

Here's an interesting coincidence.

The UN in 1994:

An estimate made by Abu Lughod indicated that the average number of indigenous Palestinians was about 420,000 in the West Bank and about 80,000 in the Gaza Strip by the end of 1948.

News wires, March 2004:

Schools and virtually every shop were closed in this city {Gaza City], where 420,000 people live.

Internal Displacement Monitoring Center, 2007:

Estimates of IDPs in Israel vary widely. There is no government or United Nations estimate. Sources for estimates are accademics, Palestinian NGOs and Israeli papers. The lowest estimate is 150,000 and the highest is 420,000, which includes the children and grandchildren of Arab villagers displaced in 1948, as well as Bedouin communities displaced later on.

Human Rights Watch, 2010:

Israel’s differential treatment in law, regulations, and administrative practice directly affect the roughly 490,000 Jewish settlers and 420,000 Palestinians in areas under its exclusive control in the West Bank (including in Area C and East Jerusalem).

Daily Sabah, 2018:

The 420,000 Palestinians who currently reside in East Jerusalem possess permanent residency ID cards and are treated as foreign immigrants by the Israeli government. (The article predicted that Israel would take away the residency permits of all those Palestinians, a prediction that, like all of them, never came close to being true.)

Eurasia Review, 2018, headline:

What’s Behind The ‘Disappearance’ Of 420,000 Palestinians In Lebanon?

WASH Cluster, State of Palestine, 2020:

WEST BANK: 482,509 of people suffering limited access to water; 420,000 persons consume less than 50 l/c/d.

OpenDemocracy, April 2020:

Palestinians in East Jerusalem: living under a deadly virus and a violent occupation: "There is inescapable and particular on-going acute anxiety about the future of these 420,000 Palestinians."

World Food Programme, August 2020:

In support of the MoSD’s response plan, which estimated that 70,000 families (420,000 people) have been affected by the spike in COVID-19 in Gaza...

UNRWA, 2021:

UNRWA is a lifeline to nearly 420,000 of the most vulnerable Palestine refugees in Syria.

Jeff Halper in Arena, June 2021:

Of the 150,000 Palestinians who remained in the country, the war displaced 30,000 to 40,000. Not allowed to return to their homes (which were either demolished or turned over to Jewish Israelis) and wanting to remain sumud (steadfast) near their lands, this population of internally displaced Palestinians has today grown to 420,000.

Middle East Monitor, July 2022:

The Nakba resulted in 750,000 Palestinians being driven from their homes; the 1967 Naksa saw another 420,000 forced to leave.

Al Jazeera, October 2022:

Since the attack, Israeli forces have imposed a continuing blockade on the area around Nablus, restricting the movement of about 420,000 Palestinians, including patients, elderly people and children, who must wait for hours before being able to cross.

UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese, July 2023: (Video, 2:04:33)

“This year, actually over, since the beginning of my mandate [May 1, 2022], I have borne witness to a series of deeply distressing events. 420,000 Palestinians, including 91 children, and 56 Israelis, including five children, have been killed. ”

(She later walked this back, saying the number was 426.)

That's 14 separate times, in different contexts, that "expert" quoted a figure of 420,000 Palestinians.

I am not saying this is a conspiracy or anything like that. It is just a very strange coincidence for that number to pop up in such disparate ways.

420,000 seems like a more realistic, solid estimate than "400,000" or "450,000."

(h/t Irene)

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"Human rights expert" from EU-funded Al Haq supports and praises murdering Jews

In late 2021, when Israel declared Al Haq and several other Palestinian NGOs to be illegal, the reaction from "human rights" groups was immediate and fierce. Amnesty and Human Rights Watch called the move "a brazen attack on human rights" and referred to their members as "human rights defenders." The New York Times called them "human rights groups," as did AP. The UN issued a statement from 17 "experts" calling it "a frontal attack on the Palestinian human rights movement, and on human rights everywhere."

As usual, Israel is right and the "experts" are wrong.

Meet Isam Abdeen, "human rights defender." Although it is unclear whether he stills works there, he was the head of the Local and Regional Advocacy Department at Al Haq when Israel labeled it a terror group and his papers are still on its site. As of last summer he was described as a legal advisor for the Al Haq Foundation.

Abdeen, considered one of the more prominent Palestinian human rights activists, fully defended the murder of seven Jews outside the synagogue in Neve Yaacov on Friday night.

His immediate reaction on his Facebook page was to say, "The shooting by the son of the capital alone in occupied Jerusalem is legitimate in international law, and no justification is needed."

Abdeen expanded on that in a full article where he wrote, "What happened in the occupied Jerusalem, that a holy young man of the capital, alone, committed a resistance act on Palestinian land (occupied Jerusalem) the land of his parents and ancestors, a legitimate act under international humanitarian law, human rights law and dozens of United Nations resolutions that all pour into the pot of the original right of peoples in destiny determination; And he is a legal argument on the world."

Murdering civilians is illegal under international law under all circumstances. The entire Fourth Geneva Convention is meant to protect civilians in a time of war. In 2004, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan directly dismissed the argument of terrorists and their supporters: "There is nothing in the fact of occupation that justifies the targeting and killing of civilians."

This Al Haq "human rights defender" is directly supporting, advocating and praising murdering Jews.

And this supporter of murdering Jews also trains other human rights professionals!

There cannot be a more grotesque perversion of human rights than having a "human rights lawyer" train others that murdering humans is not only allowed but praiseworthy.

And this is who Amnesty and Human Rights Watch and the UN support.

Al Haq is funded by the European Union, Norway, Ireland, Italy, France, Sweden, Denmark, Germany and Spain.. It has never condemned any terror attack against Jews, to my knowledge. it has ties to the PFLP terror group which recruits and brainwashes child soldiers - another human rights violation the group has never condemned.

And now one of its prominent members directly praises the murder of innocent civilians.

The only way this can be considered a human rights organization is if it considers Jews to be subhuman.

Exposing this hypocrisy is the single most important thing that can be done to combat terror. In this sense, the media has failed in its most basic responsibility.

(h/t NGO Monitor)

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Libyan politician says Libyan Jews have equal rights. Only one problem.

From EanLibya:

Fathi al-Shibli, head of the People's Voice Party and the official spokesman for the Gathering of Libyan Parties, said that Libyan Jews are Libyan citizens, with no difference between them and any other Libyan citizen in terms of rights and duties.

He added in his statement: “There is a Libyan Arab, there is a Libyan Tariq, there is a Libyan Tabawi, and there is a Libyan Berber, all of whom are components of the Libyan people..and all of them have the right to live and citizenship..we never differentiate between them.”

Al-Shibli continued: “Judaism is a heavenly religion that we Muslims recognize and respect.

He concluded by saying: “As for the position on the Zionist movement, that is another matter.”

What a great guy! He emphasizes that Libyan Jews have the same rights as any other Libyan. He's so liberal!

Except for one tiny detail. There are no Libyan Jews, and there hasn't been a single one for 20 years.

They were discriminated against, slaughtered, plundered and chased out of Libya. They were placed in concentration camps during World War II, and then afterwards...

In November, 1945 there was a vicious, three-day pogrom against the Jews in Tripoli: 120 Jews were murdered, hundreds more were wounded, and at least five synagogues were completely destroyed. The rioters not only destroyed and looted the city’s synagogues, but they also ruined hundreds of homes and businesses as well.

Again in 1948, coinciding with the declaration of the State of Israel, anti-Semitism escalated and rioters killed 12 Jews and destroyed 280 homes. This time, though, the Jews fought back and prevented even more deaths and injury. As a result of the rampant anti-Semitism, 30,972 Jews immigrated to Israel.

A new law in 1961 required a special permit to prove Libyan citizenship. Virtually all Jews were denied this permit. By 1967 the Jewish population had decreased to 7,000. Following Israel’s Six Day War, antisemitic rioting began again. The King of Libya, as well as Jewish leaders, urged the remaining Libyan Jews to emigrate. An Italian airlift saved 6,000 Jews and relocated them to Rome, though they were forced to leave behind homes, businesses and possessions. In 1969, when Muammar al-Qaddafi came to power, there were only 100 Jews remaining in Libya. His government confiscated all Jewish property, cancelled Jewish debt and made emigration for Jews legally prohibited. Some Jews still managed to get out. By 2004 there were no Jews left in Libya.

So this is nothing but virtue signaling.

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When a Palestinian journalist @HosanSalemG says that all Palestinian journalists support terror, is he an anti-Palestinian racist?

A photo of Hosam Salem from his Facebook page

Yesterday, Gaza photojournalist Hosam Salem tweeted that his contract with the New York Times had been terminated. Here's his thread:

After years of covering the Gaza Strip as a freelance photojournalist for the New York Times, I was informed via an abrupt phone call from the US outlet that they will no longer work with me in the future.
I began working with the newspaper in 2018, covering critical events in Gaza such as the weekly protests at the border fence with Israel, the investigation into the Israeli killing of field nurse Razan al-Najjar, and more recently, the May 2021 Israeli offensive on the Gaza strip
As I understood later, the decision was made based on a report prepared by a Dutch editor - who obtained Israeli citizenship two years ago - for a website called Honest Reporting.
The article, which the New York Times had based its decision for dismissing me, gives examples of posts I wrote on my social media accounts, namely Facebook, where I had expressed support for the Palestinian resistance against the Israeli occupation...
... My aforementioned posts also spoke of the resilience of my people and those who were killed by the Israeli army - my cousin included - which Honest Reporting described as “Palestinian terrorists”.
The editor later wrote an article stating that he had succeeded in sacking three Palestinian journalists working for the New York Times in the Gaza Strip, on the basis of us being "anti-Semitic”.
Not only has Honest Reporting succeeded in terminating my contract with The New York Times, it has also actively discouraged other international news agencies from collaborating with me and my two colleagues.
What is taking place is a systematic effort to distort the image of Palestinian journalists as being incapable of trustworthiness and integrity, simply because we cover the human rights violations that the Palestinian people undergo on a daily basis at hands of the Israeli army

He doesn't link to the Honest Reporting article that shows that he praised the massacre of four rabbis and a Druze policeman in 2014, that he has repeatedly praised suicide bombers that killed 10 in 2004, and he has continued to explicitly support terror attacks even after starting his work with the Times:

On November 18, 2014, Hosam Salem again used Facebook to express his joy over the massacre of four rabbis and an Israeli-Druze police officer in a synagogue in the Jerusalem neighborhood of Har Nof.
Citing the Quran, he encouraged his followers to “smite the necks” of unbelievers, adding: “[This is the] summary of the Jerusalem operation [sic] today.”
There’s more. In 2015, Salem applauded two acts of terror (see here and here); a shooting at the Gush Etzion Junction that killed an American teenager, an Israeli man, and a Palestinian bystander; and a Jerusalem stabbing that killed three.
Some three years later, after being hired by The New York Times, Salem called for more violence following an attack that killed two IDF recruits in the West Bank. “Shoot, kill, withdraw: three quick operational steps…to bring peace to the hearts of sad people like us,” the inciting post read.
Finally, he has repeatedly eulogized Mohammed Salem and Nabil Masoud. The two were responsible for a 2004 suicide bombing that killed ten workers at the Ashdod port, Israel’s second-busiest harbor (see here and here).

(It is possible that suicide bomber Mahmoud Salem was a relative.)

Now let's look at Salem's words defending himself again. "I had expressed support for the Palestinian resistance against the Israeli occupation..." That is an admission that he considers praising murdering innocent people to be "supporting Palestinian resistance."

And he concludes by saying that "What is taking place is a systematic effort to distort the image of Palestinian journalists as being incapable of trustworthiness and integrity..."

Salem is positioning his explicit support of terror as being a mainstream view among all Palestinian journalists. He says that exposing his praise of terror attacks is an attack on all Palestinian journalists.

In other words, he is saying that his opinions are mainstream, not anomalous.

If a Zionist would say that all Palestinian journalists cannot be trusted to be objective because they all support terror, the Zionist would properly be branded a bigot. Each journalist must be judged on their own merits and their own words. Stereotyping them is wrong.

But what does it mean when a Palestinian journalist insists that all Palestinian journalists like him support terror? When he claims that his noxious support for murdering rabbis and others is simply the same "covering human rights violations" that all reporters supposedly do? He isn't apologizing for his views - he is claiming that he, like all Palestinian journalists, is just covering the news. Praising the murders of Jews is indistinguishable from journalism.

He puts all Palestinian journalists in the same bucket as himself. (And so does Al Jazeera.) Does that make him a racist?

The reality is that support for terror is a mainstream Palestinian opinion, across multiple surveys for decades. Sometimes the majority support terror, other times is drops to less than 50%, but it is always an accepted, popular opinion. Assuming that all Palestinians support terror is indeed racist, but understanding that there is a high chance that a random Palestinian who is hired for a position at a major Western media outlet might indeed be a terror supporter is prudent. As the New York Times has learned, vetting one's social media posts before hiring anyone is essential.

As far as the many who are claiming that Salem is the victim of anti-Palestinian racism, they are the ones who are racist - because they are claiming that all Palestinians support murdering Jews.

Buy the EoZ book, PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism today at Amazon!

Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424.

Read all about it here!

Today, I am a man (under international law.) It's EoZ's 18th birthday!

This blog began on August 14, 2004.

At the beginning, it was mostly links to articles that looked interesting to me, with brief comments. But soon it became more like it is today, a place to find news and analysis about the Middle East and antisemitism that you cannot find anywhere else.

Here's what the blog header looked like in January, 2006: (I don't have any earlier snapshots)

And in 2008:

EoZ has grown a lot since then, and I'd like to thank my loyal readers and fans, as well as columnists, for making it a success.

Thanks!

Buy the EoZ book, PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism today at Amazon!

Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424.

Read all about it here!

PA official who calls for "jihad" tells Christians "it is not a religious conflict"

Mahmoud al-Habbash is Mahmoud Abbas's adviser on religious and Islamic affairs and also the chief Islamic judge of the Palestinian Authority.

Yesterday he greeted a delegation of Christian. human rights and interfaith leaders from Belgium, where he assured them that "Palestine" has nothing against Jews and that the conflict is not a religious one.

As usual, the delegation didn't research who they were meeting with beforehand, and eagerly lapped up Habbash's words.

Habbash, who tells non-Muslims that the Palestinians are not interested in religious conflict, in 2014 he said that Jihad should be directed toward Jerusalem. "Jerusalem is still waiting. Jerusalem is the direction. Jerusalem is the address," Habbash stressed, adding that "evil hands" (Jews) were "conducting a filthy game" intended to weaken the Islamic nation and "to divert the compass away from its true direction."

In 2018 he was even more explicit that there was a coming religious war between Islam and Islam's enemies, which presumably include the people who visited him from Belgium:

As always, these delegations from around the world are so thrilled to meet with Palestinian leaders - but they never check out these very same leaders' hate beforehand. In the end, they legitimize it.

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