Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News: Arab League

Showing posts with label Arab League. Show all posts

Monday, August 23, 2021

Even after the Abraham Accords, the Arab League still spouts antisemitic conspiracy theories

I have been mentioning how Arab media and Palestinian schools still promote the idea that Israel was behind the Al Aqsa fire in 1969 set by a deranged Australian Christian. in order to replace it with a new Jewish Temple.

On the anniversary of the attack on Saturday, the Arab League itself issued a statement that cemented this antisemitic conspiracy theory as official Arab policy.

The statement from the Secretary General of the Arab League said that the arson was a "deliberate and orchestrated crime from the highest level of the Israeli Occupation authorities." It "comes In the context of a systematic and ongoing occupation policy and plans targeting the Holy Mosque and Christian and Islamic sacred places." It goes on to list various imagined Israeli crimes in Jerusalem, including "desecration of Al-Aqsa and attempts to destroy its structure" even today.

Interestingly, Arab attackers who store weapons and rocks in the Al Aqsa mosque are never said to desecrate the holy site. Furthermore, if Israel wanted to build the Third Temple, Al Aqsa wouldn't be the target - the Dome of the Rock would be.

I could not find any similar statements from the Arab League on the anniversary for the past two years. It seems likely that the Palestinian delegation drafted this absurd statement to remain relevant and top-of-mind for the Arab world when interest in the Palestinian issue is waning - and pretending Al Aqsa is in danger is the biggest stick the Palestinians have, a direct continuation of the methods of the Nazi-collaborating Mufti of Jerusalem.

It is a disappointing, however, that the UAE, Bahrain and Morocco continue to allow these lies to be spouted by the Arab League in their name.

Original sources of the Arab threat to "drive the Jews into the sea"

Back in 2014, I looked at the origins of the phrase "drive the Jews into the sea," because some have claimed that the expression was a hoax by Jews and Arabs never used that phrase in reference to Jews in Israel.

I found solid evidence that it was used after 1948, and then saw that the phrase was documented in the book "O Jerusalem" as having been used first by a Jerusalem police chief Kamal Irekat, adopted by the infamous Mufti of Jerusalem and then used by Fawzi el Kaukji, an Arab League field commander.

Yisrael Medad looked at the issue and found a British memo from August 1948 from Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin:

It is quite untrue to suggest that we have let the Arabs down or failed in any obligations towards them. We did not urge them to intervene by force in Palestine, nor did we promise them support if they did so. They went in of their own accord, in most cases without telling us beforehand. Very small measure of military successes which they achieved shows that their forces, while capable perhaps of occupying friendly territory, were not prepared for and incapable of undertaking major military operations, which would have been necessary to achieve the announced object of the Arab states, namely to drive the Jews into the sea.

I wanted to see if I could find an earlier version in contemporary newspapers.

An AP dispatch from June 10, 1948, said that Jews were amused at Arab claims that they already had thrown Jews into the sea:

This article from the News York Daily News in April 1948 quotes Fawzi al Kaukji directly:

An AP analysis from February 8, 1948, uses quotation marks for the phrase referring to Arab leaders in 1947:

The earliest quote I can find is from AP from a December 19, 1947 dispatch, quoting "Arab informants:"

That is a lot of different sources for an identical expression. It sounds like this was a common Arab response to the 1947 partition plan.

Medad also found this cover of an Egyptian pamphlet literally titled "Throw the Jews into the sea" before the 1967 war:

Jerusalem declared "permanent" capital of Arab culture

Back in 2009, the Palestinian Arabs were jubilant that they managed to get Jerusalem declared to be the "capital of Arab culture" for the year, in between Damascus and Doha.

It looks like this UNESCO/Arab League initiative has ended, as the last capital of Arab culture was Sfax, Tunisia in 2016.

So the Palestinians got the Arab League to declare Jerusalem to be the permanent capital of Arab culture!

At a meeting in Cairo, the Palestinians made it clear yet again that their interest in Jerusalem has nothing to do with culture and everything to do with Israel. Their representative said, "The identity of Jerusalem is well established and the attempts of the occupation will collapse in the face of the steadfastness of Palestinians and Jerusalemites in particular." He "reviewed the Israeli attempts to obliterate the Arab identity of the city."

The Palestinian delegation also presented two films, the first about the destruction of the Mughrabi Gate and the second about the theft of the Palestinian heritage by Israel.

Nothing about how important Jerusalem is to them. Only about how awful it is that Jews claim it to be theirs.

Richard Landes, in his talk during my symposium in Jerusalem on Sunday, described the Palestinian desire for the city as "mimetic envy" - a desire that is wholly driven by someone else possessing something you don't have, even though you showed no interest when you did have it.

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Palestinian Arabs in Iraq complain of discrimination

Apartheid, anyone?

Palestinian refugees in Iraq say they face widespread discrimination and have appealed to President Mahmoud Abbas to intervene.

The Iraqi Palestinian Brothers Association said Tuesday that it sent a letter to Abbas, who is in Baghdad to attend the Arab League summit, detailing their plight.

The association said Palestinians have been refused medical care in Iraqi government hospitals and must use fake ID cards to receive treatment. The Palestinian Red Crescent lacks support from the PLO and cannot provide adequate medical care, it added.

Meanwhile, some 90 percent of Palestinians in Iraq are unemployed, Palestinians are refused government jobs and young male Palestinians face particular discrimination in finding work, the association said.

The group said Palestinians were arbitrarily detained because of their nationality or because they are Sunni Muslims. Palestinian students are treated as terrorists and some have left school over fears they will be kidnapped, it said.

They said pressuring the government would not be enough to resolve the problems, and that Abbas should ask the Iraqi government to issue passports to Palestinian refugees, most of whom were born in Iraq, so they can travel internationally.

They also urged Abbas to coordinate with the UN and the president of the Kurdistan Regional Government to transfer Palestinians to Kurdistan, which it said had agreed to receive them.

By any objective measure, Palestinian Arabs in Iraq are treated worse than those in the territories (with the possible exception of Fatah members in Gaza.)

So where are the "pro-Palestinian" rallies outside Iraqi embassies? Where are the anguished articles by Arabs worried that Iraq is turning into an apartheid state? Where are the dozens of books begging Iraq to save its soul by treating its minorities equally? When is the Global March to Baghdad?

I could have sworn that the world was filled with people who are so very dedicated to the Palestinian Arab cause who would move heaven and earth for them.

I guess they are all spending all their free time to ensure that grocery stores don't stock hummus made by a company with partial Israeli ownership. Well, that's important too, I guess.