Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News: Arab News

Showing posts with label Arab News. Show all posts

Monday, June 12, 2023

Kuwaiti journalist who has denounced Hezbollah is barred from entering Lebanon

There was uproar in Lebanon on Thursday after Kuwaiti media writer and producer Fajer Al-Saeed was prevented from entering the country.

Al-Saeed was stopped at Beirut’s Rafic Hariri International Airport on Wednesday evening, with Lebanon’s General Security rejecting a request from Kuwaiti Embassy officials to allow her to spend the night there before leaving on the first flight to Kuwait.

Instead, she was deported back to her country on Thursday morning after spending the night at the airport.

Joseph Al-Kosseifi, head of the Lebanese Press Editors’ Syndicate, told Arab News: “We are against obstructing the work of any journalist in Lebanon — whether Lebanese or visiting from abroad.

“What happened requires clarification. Some claim that Al-Saeed was prevented from entering Lebanon due to an Israeli stamp on her passport, while others argue that her bold stance against Hezbollah was the reason...."

Ya Libnan also blamed Hezbollah:

One analyst who did not want to be named for fear on his life told Ya Libnan, "There is always a Hezbollah official at the airport who decides if a person can enter Lebanon or not , because the General Security is controlled by Hezbollah."

Hezbollah itself (via Al Akhbar) claimed that the reason she was barred was because there was an Israeli stamp on her passport.

But Fajer Al-Saeed herself said that was a lie - she has visited the West Bank more than once at the invitation of the PA, but she doesn't have an Israeli stamp. Which is almost certainly true since Israel doesn't generally stamp passports but inserts a piece of paper to allow visitors avoid exactly these sorts of situations.

Al Saeed has also been a guest on Israeli social media and has publicly called for peace between Arab states and Israel.

So there were plenty of reasons that Hezbollah would not want Al-Saeed to enter the country. And apparently they make the real decisions in some aspects of Lebanese life.

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!

Arabs accuse Israel of taking over a building at a historic vantage point overlooking the Temple Mount

Arab News reports:

Dozens of Palestinian parents staged protests in East Jerusalem on Saturday over plans by Israeli authorities to merge two schools in the Old City.

Parents joined protests at the Omariya and Mawlawi schools to speak out against what they said was an unjust and dangerous decision that might lead to an emptying of schools in the Old City.

Jerusalemite activist Ahmed Al-Safadi said the Israeli move is designed to turn the Al-Qadisiyah school building near Bab Al-Sahira into a school for settlers.

Jerusalemites have condemned Israeli education proposals as “racist.”

Israeli authorities have threatened to withdraw the licenses of some schools and forced principals to sign a petition obliging them not to teach the Palestinian curriculum.

Abu Ziyad, a lawyer, writer and former minister of Jerusalem affairs in the Palestinian government, told Arab News: “If the goal of the Israelis is to control the Omariya school, then it is an ancient building and an Islamic Awaqaf, and it forms one of the borders of Al-Aqsa Mosque.”

It is possible to control the northern squares of Al-Aqsa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock through this step, he said.

The school is administered by Israel's Education Ministry, as a virtual walk using Google Street Maps shows.

I cannot say if or why Israel might be consolidating the two schools. Perhaps attendance is down; according to this article, only one floor of three is used for classrooms.

The school was built on top of the remains of the Antonia Fortress built by Herod to protect the Second Temple from the north.

In 1996, deadly riots broke out when Israel opened up an ancient tunnel whose exit was directly under this school.

The main floor is built into the northern wall surrounding the Temple Mount. The upper floors have a stunning view of the Mount:

In the 19th century, when Jews and Christians were banned from the Mount by the tolerant Muslims, this would be the spot from which non-Muslims would view the Mount:

View of the Temple Mount. Painting by William Henry Bartlett from 1843

I don't know the legal issues of ownership. Muslims say this is Waqf property, Israeli apparently says it belongs to the Jerusalem Municipality. A close look at the school sign indicates that it does belong to Jerusalem.

If the latter is true, this would be an awesome spot for a shul!

One very interesting footnote: While the Muslims are saying that any Jewish presence at the school is unthinkable, the school accepts lots of money from The Jerusalem Foundation for upkeep and renovations.

. The Jerusalem Foundation renovated the school auditorium, which served as a venue for school and larger community cultural events, in 1972. It later supported renovations to the school library (which opened as a public library branch in 1968) and renovations to the school courtyard. It undertook a major renovation project that included repair of the building’s electrical system, installation of the school’s first central heating system, improvements to the courtyard and installation of play equipment in 1992.

The donors to repair and improve the school? Nehemia and Naomi Cohen, and William and Lisa Wishnick, both American Jewish philanthropists.

The Muslims might not want Jews to be there, but they sure have no problem with Jewish money.

(h/t GnasherJew)

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!

Making up an Arab history of Jerusalem

In 2020, Arab News published an article titled "Arabs founded Jerusalem, says Jordan-based institute."

Among the many references the document uses to make its point is the Amarna Correspondence, a series of diplomatic letters between Canaanite city-state kings and their Egyptian overlords during the 14th century B.C., which mention Jerusalem. The paper presents pictures of the cuneiform tablets uncovered in Egypt in the late 19th century to validate its argument.

Along with archaeological discoveries, the Biblical record is also used as a source to establish original Arab presence in Jerusalem. The Bible, the paper says, shows that “the Arabs, Hamites, Canaanites, and Jebusites were the original inhabitants of the land of Palestine, including the area of Jerusalem.” Canaanites and Jebusites were there long before the Jews, even before Judaism was revealed.

The 108-page document quotes passages from the Old Testament to establish that “Jerusalem was always an Arab city” and notes that, “the Palestinian Arabs of today are largely the direct descendants of the indigenous Canaanite Arabs who were there over 5,000 years ago. Modern-day Arab Muslim and Christian Palestinian families (such as the “Kanaan” tribe, direct descendants of the Canaanites) are the oldest inhabitants of the land.”

The bolded quote makes it sound like the Torah mentions the "Arabs" as one of the Canaanite nations along with the Hamites, Canaanites and Jebusites. And indeed that is what the paper by the Jordanian Royal Aal Al-Bayt Institute for Islamic Thought says.

Obviously the Torah never mentions a nation called the "Arab" nation along with the nations that occupied the land of Canaan. The author made that up.

The paper's argument is contradictory and circular. It doesn't prove at all that Arabs were there - it merely asserts that Canaanites and Jebusites were Arabs, after saying that Arabs were separate from the Canaanites and Jebusites. Then it mentions how the Tanakh mentions that Canaan was inhabited by these nations as if that proves they are Arab.

It also brings as "proof" that "Jerusalem is mentioned by name in the Amarna Correspondence, a series of diplomatic letters between Canaanite city-state kings and their Egyptian overlords during the 14th century."

But no one disputes that the Torah says that it was the land of Canaan and that those nations lived there.. What the paper pretends to do, and fails, is find a connection between Jebusites and Arabs, or Canaanites and Arabs.

The word "Arab" is quite rare in the Hebrew scripture, and never refers to the residents of Canaan. A character named Geshem the Arabian is mentioned in Nehemiah; in Jeremiah 3:2 the word "Arab" is used as a synonym for "bandit."

The term was clearly known to the writers of the Hebrew scripture, and clearly none of them said that Canaan was an Arab land.

Clearly the authors of the paper knew this, and pretended that the Tanach said things it never says.

But why would we expect anything else?

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

Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424.

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There are crypto-Jews, today - in Lebanon

The former Jewish quarter in Tripoli

From The Arab News in 2020:

In 2014, when the Magen Abraham Synagogue reopened in Beirut, Lebanese politicians from across the spectrum were present, bathed in the glare of TV cameras. They all reiterated their support for a community they said they cherished as much as the other 17 sects that make up the Lebanese government.

Former prime minister Fouad Siniora declared: “We respect Judaism. Our only problem is with Israel.”

Even Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah weighed in: “This is a religious place of worship and its restoration is welcome.”

Hussain Rahal, a spokesman for Hezbollah, likewise said: "We respect the Jewish religion just like we do Christianity. The Jews have always lived among us. We have an issue with Israel's occupation of land."

This is a standard lie we hear throughout the Arab world, and nowhere is it as obviously false as in Lebanon.

Because there are still a handful of Jews in Lebanon - modern day crypto-Jews, frightened to be revealed to their neighbors.

Monte Carlo Doualiya reports that there are only 27 Lebanese Jews left. They live in great fear and hide their true religious identity. In Tripoli in northern Lebanon, the remaining members of the Jewish community are not known to their neighbors and practice Judaism in complete secrecy.

The Magen Abraham synagogue is not used as a house of worship. The Jews are too frightened to go there publicly.

If the Lebanese have no problem with Jews, then why do the remaining Jews have to hide?

The Arab News article, which is pretty good, describes the fear in starker terms:

The story has it that a Jewish woman from Beirut who was keen to meet other Jews heard of a coreligionist living in the town of Zahle, 50km east of the capital. She went there and searched for her. It was difficult as the woman had changed her name, something many Jews have done for safety reasons. But when she finally found her, the Zahle woman met her with a glacial stare. She spoke one word: Leave. The woman was obviously scared of the attention her visitor might awaken.

Those who are still there preserve a total silence about their identity. They gather secretly in each other’s houses for their prayers.

The Arab News feature notes that Lebanese Jews who now live in New York are nostalgic for the good times in the past, but in Lebanon they were attacked every time something happened in Israel.

True, Lebanese Jews were not rounded up and thrown out like their Egyptian, Iraqi and Syrian counterparts, yet “whenever something happened in Palestine, people would take revenge on the Jews,” said (author of a book on the Jews of Lebanon) Zeidan.

“They would throw a bomb at a synagogue or kidnap a Jewish man. Protests would erupt, inciting violence against the Jews.”

It seems almost unbelievable that there are crypto-Jews today, hiding their Jewish identity the way that their ancestors did in Spain and Portugal out of fear for their lives. But they still exist, and they are living proof that "anti-Zionism" always was, and always will be, antisemitism.

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!

Saudi newspaper fawns over bulldozer terrorist

The Arab News goes even beyond calling terrorism "natural" for Arabs:

Israelis killed a Palestinian youth for driving a bulldozer onto the midst of a crowd in the heart of East Jerusalem and killing three Israelis last week. But the reaction of the Western political leaders to the action of the Palestinian worker, one of over a million and half living in humiliation of the Israeli occupation, amounted to killing him and other Palestinians a thousand times.

Yes, this brilliant writer from our "moderate" friends in Saudi Arabia considers a condemnation of the purposeful killing of Jews to be equivalent to killing a thousand innocent Palestinian Arabs. This is the sort of sick mentality that is mainstream in the Arab world.

While the Western leaders did not feel any compunction in condemning the poor building worker in the harshest words they could find in the dictionary, they did not have the guts to describe the incident as the natural and likely reaction of a human being put to indignities beyond his endurance powers.

Indeed, a fully employed Palestinian Arab, who gets paid by evil Jews hellbent on destroying his dignity, is quite justified in killing them en masse because of his abject humiliation. In other words, Arabs are naturally (really, genetically) prone to murder because their honor is far more important than mere Jewish lives, and the West doesn't have the guts to realize this simple fact and start praising the murderer instead of condemning him.

Over the past six months 365 Palestinians have been killed by Israel, most of them civilians, with children accounting for 50 percent.

I don't know about the 365, but the 50% number is wholly fictional, but it must be OK for an Arab to make up statistics making Israel look bad because, after all, he is being humiliated by the very existence of a Jewish state in the Middle East. If killing is justifiable, certainly lying is.

It is high time that we made a clear distinction between the acts of terror, particularly from a state that calls itself a democracy, and the acts springing from frustration, injustice and humiliation.

In one sentence the author has just justified every single Arab and Muslim terror act over the past century, because each one must have sprung on some level by someone's "frustration" or perceived "humiliation." This, of course, also includes terror attacks against Saudi Arabia itself, not to mention 9/11.

This Palestinian youth was a human being with normal feelings of pride and honor. He could not be blamed for losing his equanimity for a moment when he thought about the plight of his brothers and sisters who are being treated like dirt in the Gaza Strip and West Bank and put under a blockade denying them the most basic requirements of life.

Our good editorialist has now descended from pure fantasy into mind-reading as he not only justifies a terror attack, he places it in a context where such an attack is positively praiseworthy. The author, Abdul Aziz Al-Suwaigh, is a diplomat who has been an employee of Saudi Arabia's Ministry for Foreign Affairs. And this is all done in English in a newspaper that cannot publish anything without the approval of the Saudi royal family.

A blog post by Richard Landes about this post here