Showing posts with label Cave of the Patriarchs. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Cave of the Patriarchs. Show all posts

Wednesday, August 16, 2023



Every year, the Tomb of the Patriarchs is open exclusively to Jews for ten days and open exclusively to Muslims for ten days. The shrine is split between the two groups all the other days of the year.

The schedule is publicized well ahead of time (although the Muslim days may move by a day depending on when the new month is declared.)  There are no surprises. The Waqf and Israeli side cooperate with each other; when one of the exclusive days comes up the other side puts away their prayer objects. 

But in the Palestinian media, every time a Jewish day comes along, they try to incite violence and hatred.

The Palestine Information Center published this morning:

The Zionist occupation authorities closed, this morning, Wednesday, the Ibrahimi Mosque in the city of Hebron, in the southern occupied West Bank, until ten o'clock in the evening today; under the pretext of Jewish holidays.

The director of the Ibrahimi Mosque in Hebron, Ghassan Al-Rajabi, said in press statements that the occupation authorities closed the mosque from ten o’clock yesterday, Tuesday, until ten o’clock today, and prevented the call to prayer and worshipers from entering the mosque.
He believes that this closure is a crime against the Ibrahimi Mosque and a flagrant violation of it, stressing: “The mosque is a purely Islamic endowment, and the Jews have no right to it.
Let's look at that last sentence.

When the Palestinian Muslims deny that the Temple Mount was ever the site of the Temples, they are obviously lying, but that lie is the justification for their insistence that Jews have no right to visit the holiest Jewish site. 

But they cannot deny that the "Ibrahimi Mosque" is the burial place of the Biblical patriarchs and matriarchs - because they believe it too. They cannot deny that the three (or four) couples buried there are the ancestors of the Jewish people, while only one of them is an ancestor to the Arab people. 

So when the director of the mosque at the site says "The mosque is a purely Islamic endowment, and the Jews have no right to it," he is denying that Jews have even a historical or emotional right to visit the burial place of their own ancestors. Somehow the Muslim claim to the burial place of Jacob, who at best is just a prophet to them, is exclusive, while the Jewish claim to their own ancestors' burial place is meaningless.

It is impossible to interpret that statement as anything other than official antisemitism. 

The Israeli side always tries to respect the rights of all religions. The Palestinian side expresses nothing but contempt for Jewish rights. And the world is more sympathetic towards the side that is institutionally antisemitic.




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Monday, June 12, 2023




I'm in the middle of reading "Betrayal: The Failure of American Jewish Leadership,"  collection of essays edited by Charles Jacobs and Avi Goldwasser:

This book—perhaps the first devoted to this topic—documents the devastating failure of the Jewish establishment, including its leaders and major donors, to defend and protect American Jews as anti-Semitism surges across the country....Betrayed by their leaders, the essayists argue, American Jews require new, strong leadership.

While it is not an American Jewish organization, the World Jewish Congress - led by Ronald Lauder - may be a perfect example of this problem.

The World Jewish Congress issued this statement this morning:

World Jewish Congress President Ronald S. Lauder issued the following statement praising the return of the United States to UNESCO: 

“The World Jewish Congress welcomes the decision by the United States to rejoin UNESCO after a five-year absence.   

“Under the leadership of Director-General Audrey Azoulay, UNESCO has made an immeasurable impact on the world stage by safeguarding history amid tumultuous and complex global events, so that current and future generations can be exposed to and better understand the lessons of the past.   

“WJC, a longtime UNESCO partner on Holocaust remembrance and interfaith initiatives, is hopeful that the agency will now be able to share its critical work with even broader audiences.”
One of the themes of this site is Jewish unity, and infighting among Jews is one of the organized Jewish community's worst problems. I do not like to attack Jewish organizations. But this statement is outrageous.

The entire reason the US left UNESCO in 2017 was because if its anti-Israel and anti-Jewish bias. That bias was consistent for years, with UNESCO regularly issuing biased reports and statements:

Denying any Jewish connection to the Temple Mount and even the Western Wall
Deploring Jews visiting the Temple Mount
Ignored Israeli casualties in the May 2019 Gaza war
Complimenting Jordan's plan for rebuilding the public ramp to the Temple Mount while condemning Israel's
Calling Maimonides a Muslim named Moussa ibn Maïmoun and refusing to apologize

I'm not saying that there might not be good reasons for the US to rejoin UNESCO. After months of lobbying by current UNESCO director-general Audrey Azoulay where she tried to reassure Israel she won’t allow anti-Israeli bias in the organization, Israel told the Biden administration last year that it wouldn't oppose the US re-joining.  The US is concerned that China is now leading UNESCO in ways against US interests.

All this may be true, but: 

The WJC claims that it "protects Jews everywhere and constantly defends the State of Israel against these threats." But Jews and Israel are missing in this press release. Instead, it is cheerleading an organization with a history of horrifying antisemitism and anti-Zionism. 

How could it welcome the US decision, and praise UNESCO, without saying a word about UNESCO's antisemitic history? This is not the time for celebratory press release, but for a warning that UNESCO will be watched closely to see if there has been any significant change in its anti-Israel, antisemitic bias. 

But the WJC is not saying that UNESCO is on its radar. On the contrary, WJC is giving UNESCO a kosher certification. 

It is true that UNESCO has become less noxious under the leadership of Azoulay, but it has hardly ended its bias. Every year UNESCO reaffirms all previous resolutions minimizing the Jewish connection to Jewish holy sites (although it has returned to including the non-Muslim names of the Temple Mount, Tomb of the Patriarchs and Rachel's Tomb) as it condemns every Israeli move at all those sites. All the bias and hate are still there, but "softer." 

This is hardly reason for celebration. 

This is not Jewish leadership. This is capitulation. This is giving the message to world Jewry that their self-appointed leaders care more about access to powerful people than actually fighting for Jewish interests. 

Real leaders tell the truth even if that will upset the powers that be. Ronald Lauder is a billionaire - he can say what he wants without any fear of personal consequences. This episode shows that he is no Jewish leader.

(Graphic courtesy of @iTil972)



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!

 

 

Sunday, March 26, 2023



The official Palestinian Wafa news agency reported that thousands of Muslims jammed the Tomb of the Patriarchs and the surrounding streets on Friday, the first Friday of Ramadan.

It is one of the ten days of the year that Jews are banned from the sacred site, the second holiest site in Judaism. 

Wafa interviewed one of the worshipers, who explained why she came. "It is our duty, we, the people of Hebron in particular, and Palestine in general, to stay in it by praying in it, because our presence here enrages the occupation and its settlers who are trying to Judaize the Haram, and we must protect it through our permanent presence and prayer in it." 

The main reason to go to the site is apparently not for prayer, but to send a message to Jews and enrage them.

This point was repeated by Palestinian officials as well.

The Director General of the Hebron Endowment, Nidal al-Ja’bari, told Wafa, “Today, thousands of worshipers came the first Friday of Ramadan in all the Ibrahimi Mosque's corridors, squares, and internal and external courtyards. The sanctuary will remain purely Islamic, and the Jews have no right to it."

He added, "Jerusalem, Hebron, and Palestine, along with the unified Arab and Palestinian sanctities in them, will remain, and will not be the legacy of the abhorrent Israeli occupation."

The preacher of the sanctuary, Sheikh Atta al-Muhtaseb, urged during his Friday sermon that Palestinians  flock and pray in the building, to protect it and provide for it in light of the arrogance of the occupation and its settlers.

The language is never how holy or sacred the site is. It is never about the importance of Abraham to the Islamic religion. Invariably, when Palestinian are talking about the holy sites in the land, it is is terms not of their importance to Islam but their desire to rid those sites of Jews

The Tomb of the Patriarchs and the Temple Mount were off-limits to Jews altogether when Muslims controlled the region. They make no secret that they want things to return to the way they were - a status quo from the 19th century. 

And much of the world agrees with this official antisemitism of the Palestinians. 




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!

 

 

Monday, January 09, 2023

From Ian:

Mark Dubowitz: Obama’s Anti-Imperialist Fantasy Bears Bitter Fruit
Unsurprisingly, Iran often seemed to exist for Obama not as a threat to U.S. interests but as a historical victim of Western imperialism, which supposedly overthrew a “democratically elected” Iranian prime minister and installed the shah. Iran’s repressive theocratic regime seemed less notable for its blatant offenses against its own people, or its efforts to destabilize neighboring states, than for its role as the bête noire of warmongering neoconservatives in the United States, who supported a regional structure that put America on the side of troublemakers such as Israel and Saudi Arabia. Faced with the choice between the Islamic Republic and its enemies, Obama found it surprisingly easy to take the side of the mullahs—putting himself and the United States crossways both to U.S. interests and the hopes and dreams of the Iranian people.

Obama’s big Iran play, which continues to shape U.S. regional policy to this day, was therefore neither “values-driven” nor purely pragmatic. His apparent goal was to extricate the United States from a cycle of endless conflict—one of whose primary causes, as he saw it, was Western imperialism. In doing so, Obama sought to be the first anti-imperialist American president since Dwight Eisenhower, who had backed Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser against the British, French, and Israelis in the 1956 Suez war. (Eisenhower later admitted that backing Nasser and abandoning the United States’ traditional allies had been one of the biggest mistakes of his presidency.)

Yet the Iranians were not, in fact, powerful enough to play the “balancing” role Obama envisioned for them, as their failure to stabilize Syria proved. He therefore stood aside, willingly or not, as the Russians intervened on the Iranian side to bomb the Syrian resistance. For rescuing the Islamic Republic and its allies in Syria, Putin was allowed to invade Crimea and the Donbas with minimal opposition from the Obama administration.

Anti-imperialist narratives were clearly important to Obama, and make sense as products of his unique upbringing. The fact that they utterly failed to correspond to regional realities caused multiple problems on the ground in the Middle East. Obama’s policy of trying to put the United States on the side of his own preferred client states created a slaughter in Syria that in turn led to multiple other slaughters throughout the region. The rise of ISIS was fueled partly in response to vicious Iran-backed attacks against Iraqi and Syrian Sunnis. The shocking rise of the Islamic State required Obama to send U.S. troops into Syria and back into Iraq. It also emboldened Putin, who invaded Ukraine for the third time in 2022.

Obama’s ongoing and catastrophic policy failure, which has blocked the Biden administration from developing any kind of workable strategic vision for dealing with current realities in Iran and throughout the region, demonstrates that substituting American narratives about purity and guilt for hard-power realities is a dangerous business. Ideologically driven anti-Western narratives led the United States to place dangerous and wrongheaded bets on Sunni Islamists and Shiite theocrats at the expense of our own interests and friends. Poorly executed policy led to a fatally flawed nuclear agreement that continues to bedevil the Biden administration and America’s European and Middle Eastern allies. The JCPOA was a big mistake. The longer we refuse to admit that, the higher the price we will continue to pay.
The European Union's War on Israel
A confidential leaked document, composed by the EU mission in east Jerusalem, shows that the Europeans are actively working with, and on behalf of, the Palestinian Authority to take over Area C of the West Bank -- although the area was clearly agreed on, by both Israel and the Palestinians, until further negotiations, to be under Israeli control.

"[T]he EU... insists that its positions are based on meticulous compliance with international law, EU law and charter, and also the Oslo Accord. This claim is surely defied by the leaked document in which we can see an activist EU striving to help the Palestinians take over Area C, the very area that is designated to Israel's control per the Oslo Accord which the EU claims to uphold." — Jenny Aharon, Jerusalem Post, December 28, 2022.

Aharon noted that while the EU was insisting that Israel abide by the Oslo Accords and that a Palestinian state should be established within the framework of a comprehensive peace agreement, the EU, at the same time, is trying to strip Israel of its rights according to that same agreement, which gave Israel responsibility over security, public order and all issues related to territory, including planning and zoning, in Area C.

The EU, in short, is encouraging the Palestinians not to return to the negotiating table with Israel. Instead, the EU is telling the Palestinians that the EU will help them steal land as an alternative to reaching a peaceful settlement with Israel through negotiations.

"The EU's reported clandestine activity to undermine Israeli control in Area C and to advance illegal Palestinian development in those areas constitutes a clear and present threat to the security of the State of Israel, and is an act of blatant hostility and aggression." — Letter from the Israel Defense and Security Forum, consisting of 16,000 former military, security and police officers; i24 News, December 21, 2022.

"As this document confirms, Europe's use of labels like support for 'civil society' and 'human rights' were designed to hide the millions of euros given every year to selected allied NGOs, particularly in Area C, to create facts on the ground." — Dr. Gerald Steinberg, quoted by JNS, January 5, 2023.

These revelations show that no one should be surprised when the E.U. condemns the new government for trying to save land in Yehuda and Shomron [the West Bank] — they [the EU and Palestinians] are the ones responsible for stealing it. – Dr. Eugene Kontorovich, quoted by JNS, January 5, 2023.

In 2022, illegal Palestinian construction in Area C increased by 80%. The report documents 5,535 new illegal structures built in 2022, compared to 3,076 structures in the same period in 2021. — Regavim, October 11, 2022.
Jews are the owners of the Temple Mount - opinion
The Sages said: “There are three places about which the nations of the world cannot deceive Israel and say we have stolen them out of their hands, and they are the Cave of the Patriarchs, the Temple and the Tomb of Joseph.” All three sites were purchased by our forefathers, Abraham, Jacob, and King David, at a fair price.
“There are three places about which the nations of the world cannot deceive Israel and say we have stolen them out of their hands, and they are the Cave of the Patriarchs, the Temple and the Tomb of Joseph.”
The Sages
The First Temple stood proudly on the Temple Mount, 1,500 years before the Prophet Muhammad was even born.

It goes without saying that security and diplomatic acumen are extremely important, but we cannot forget the basic facts. We Jews are not guests on the Temple Mount; we are its original owners. No other nation shares this history, no other nation has had the same capital for 3,000 years and has never had another one, and Jerusalem was never the capital of any other nation.

The criticism aimed at Israel is ludicrous and outrageous. It ignores the 3,000-year connection between the people of Israel and Jerusalem and the Temple Mount.

Jordan’s audacious response of summoning the Israeli ambassador for a reprimand is particularly egregious. What is the Jordanian royal house anyway? A Saudi Arabian family that ruled the Islamic holy places in the Hejaz, Mecca and Medina, for hundreds of years. When it was defeated almost a century ago by the Al Saud family, it fled.

The British, to whom the family offered its services against the Turks in World War I, found it a new job and established the “Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan” in a bid to maintain an open route to the oil fields in Iraq. The royal family, which lived very well at the expense of the British taxpayer, protected British interests in the region.

The peace agreement between Israel and Jordan stipulates that Jordan has a “special role” at holy shrines in Jerusalem, including the Temple Mount.

That’s ridiculous. What is Jordan’s connection to the Temple Mount? Does the fact that Jordan conquered east Jerusalem in the War of Independence, razed the Jewish Quarter along with its synagogues, and ruled over it for 19 years give it some sort of special privileges?


Wednesday, January 04, 2023

It is important to examine two events in recent days, as they both severely limit the freedom of Westerners - and signal far worse things that could come.

The first is the visit by Israeli minister of security Itamar Ben-Gvir to the Temple Mount.

The second is the publicizing of the removal of an instructor at Hamline University for including depictions of Mohammed in his art history course.

In both cases, nobody did anything wrong by any reasonable metric: 

- Even though many would say that he has the right to pray on Judaism's holiest site, Ben-Gvir did not. He did exactly what tens of thousands of Jews and hundreds of thousands of Christians have done in 2022 and earlier - he took a quiet stroll on the Temple Mount, without even reporters. There was no violation of the (illusory) status quo. 

- In the case of Hamline University, the instructor told the class ahead of time - in both the syllabus and verbally - that two medieval images of Mohammed, painted by Muslims, would be shown to the class, and he gave any Muslims the opportunity to not look at them. 

In both cases, there is no consensus that even Islamic law was violated: 

- Noor Dahri, a religious Muslim and counterterrorism expert, tweeted, "The rule to allow only Muslims to pray in Makkah is conditioned by the Holy Quran, however such conditions dsn’t apply to the Temple Mount.  Islam doesn’t forbid Jews to worship at the Temple Mount, [just a] political agreement which is called “Status Quo”. It is nothing but racism and religious discrimination against the Jewish people. Jews can freely worship at the Temple Mount according to Islamic rules because the land belongs to them, not Muslims - it’s only holy to Muslims."

- Muslims have included Mohammed in their own artwork for centuries, and Shiites do it today. And while mainstream Sunni Islamic law nowadays is against Muslims creating such depictions, it does not (and cannot) say that non-Muslims cannot create or view such pictures.

In both cases, ignorant Westerners who should be supporting freedom and equality are in the forefront of quashing that exact freedom in order to avoid hurting the feelings of irrational, potentially violent Muslims:

- State Department spokesman Ned Price repeatedly said in response to Ben-Gvir's visit that the US supports the "status quo," implying that the visit violated it and was "provocative:" "We oppose any unilateral actions that undercut the historic status quo. They are unacceptable.... it’s absolutely critical that all sides exercise restraint, refrain from provocative actions and rhetoric, and preserve that historic status quo at Haram al-Sharif/Temple Mount, both in word and in practice....We’re deeply concerned by any unilateral actions because – precisely because they have the potential to exacerbate tensions, or worse. "

- Hamline University issued a statement claiming, falsely, that what the instructor did violated Islamic law: "Students do not relinquish their faith in the classroom. To look upon an image of the prophet Muhammad, for many Muslims, is against their faith."  But it is not at all clear that Islamic law addresses viewing such depictions, only creating them. And as mentioned, the Muslim students could have chosen not to view them.

These are perfect examples of "proleptic dhimmitude," where Westerners act (often beyond what Muslims demand)  in fear of anticipated Islamic responses that had not even occurred.

This illustrates the real unwritten law that has increasingly dominated the West: "Don't piss off the Muslims." All of the moral posturing about "tolerance" and "status quo" are fig leaves to obscure the fact that Westerners live in fear of Islamic terror, and are willing and even anxious to give up on our own freedoms to pander to the most extreme Muslim positions, human rights be damned. 

By using the yardstick of banning anything that is "provocative," the West is allowing the most intolerant and violent Muslims to dictate Western behavior in all aspects of life. Because anything and everything can provoke Islamists. 

Because in both cases the dhimmified Westerners are giving a green light for extremist, potentially violent Muslims to expand their demands ad infinitum:

- Palestinians do not only claim that Jews are violating their feelings by visiting the Temple Mount, but the Western Wall as well - which they also consider part of the "Al Aqsa complex." In fact, every single Jewish holy site, from the Tomb of the Patriarchs to Rachel's Tomb to Joseph's Tomb and scores of others - are all claimed by Palestinians to be Muslim shrines. If Israel gives in to western pressure on abandoning Jewish rights, it wouldn't be the end - it would be only the start of the bigoted, antisemitic demands that Jews have no rights in Israel altogether.

- The same Islamic law against creating depictions of Mohammed also apples to every Muslim prophet.  This includes Abraham, Moses, David and Jesus and, according to many, Mary. Beyond that, depictions of Roman and Greek gods would similarly violate Islamic laws against idolatry. The exact same logic that caused Hamline to cave to Muslim intolerance can eviscerate every single art history course in the Western world. 

It isn't hard to picture that as only the beginning, not the end. Imagine a world where every website, every encyclopedia, every outing, every college course, every newspaper article and indeed every activity must be approved by extremist Islamic gatekeepers. We've already seen most Western media refuse to print the Mohammed cartoons from Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten in 2005, even though they are undoubtedly newsworthy and important to see to understand the story. But that and similar incidents are exactly what is driving today's cowardice: the fear of pissing off Muslims, because they might murder you. 

Jews will only write angry letters, so offending them is "free speech" and "brave." Muslims might kill you, so submitting to their dictates is twisted into "tolerance."

Unless there is serious pushback by those who still value freedom, this is where things are going. 



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!

 

 

Friday, November 18, 2022


By Daled Amos


Last week, while reading online articles about the political situation in and surrounding Israel, I wasn't really expecting to come across articles discussing Chumash.

Then again, with a title like Abraham The Zionist, and this week being Parshas Chayyei Sarah, Rabbi Chaim Steinmetz's article in JNS should not have been a surprise. 

The Parsha begins, of course, with Avraham buying a burial plot for his wife Sarah in Hebron, and the Torah goes over the negotiations for the land in some detail. The commentators ask why so much attention is paid to the circumstances surrounding the sale and they offer various answers.

Rabbi Steinmetz refers to one commentator in particular:

As Ibn Ezra [23:19] notes, the purchase of a burial plot for her marks the beginning of the future Jewish state. [emphasis added]

In an article on the HaTanakh.com website, Rabbi David Silverberg makes a similar point and expands on it. He notes that

Ibn Ezra further comments that this incident is significant in that it marks the first stage in the fulfillment of God’s promise that Avraham and his offspring would possess Eretz Yisrael.

 This promise is made to Avraham earlier in Bereshit 17:8:

To you and your offspring I will give the land where you are now living as a foreigner. The whole land of Canaan shall be [your] eternal heritage, and I will be a G_d to [your descendants]. [translation: Aryeh Kaplan]

But Avraham is not the only one of the Avot (forefathers) who bought land in Eretz Yisrael. Just as Avraham bought land in Hebron, so too did Yaakov buy land -- just outside of Shechem [33:19]. 

In fact, Avraham and Yaakov were not the only two who bought land in Canaan -- just as Hebron and Shechem were not the only two areas where land was acquired on behalf of the Jewish people.

In her New Studies in Bereshit (p. 208), Nechama Leibowitz quotes from the Midrash in Bereshit 79:7


This is reminiscent of the first Rashi in Chumash, which explains that the Torah begins with the creation of the world in order to provide Jews with a counter-argument against those who would accuse them of "stealing" the Land of Israel.

Hebron.
Shechem.
Jerusalem.

All 3 cities established as Jewish cities, central to Jews.

In his Sefer, Eretz Yisrael in the Parashah: The Centrality of the Land of Israel in the Torah, Rabbi Moshe D. Lichtman points out another verse in the Chumash that highlights this Jewish connection to the land:


Land of the Hebrews

However we understand this phrase, this verse indicates that on some level, despite being a small group -- albeit 70 members -- living in Canaan, the family of Yaakov was recognized for its connection to a specific area in that part of the land of Canaan.

This points to the ancient history and connection of the Jewish people in the land that long precedes the appearance of the Arabs, who after all are indigenous to Arabia.

But there are Jewish groups today who recognize the Jewish connection to Eretz Yisrael, yet still maintain their distance while at the same time demanding the right to have a say in how the Jewish state conducts itself.

I mention this because of another article I came across this past week with an unexpected interpretation of the Chumash. While I enjoy Melanie Phillips's articles, I generally don't read her for her insights on the Torah. But she did have an interesting perspective on Jewish groups who criticized the recent Israel elections and took it upon themselves to advise Netanyahu on who should not be included in his cabinet.

In Dragons and Dragon-Slayers in Israel and America, Phillips writes:

Israel is indeed a state for the Jewish nation. However, membership in a nation confers obligations on its people to behave as a nation.

After all, the Torah itself tells us that when the tribes of Reuben, Gad and half of Manasseh said they wanted to settle east of the Jordan because the pastures there were more fertile, they were told they could do so only on condition that they first fought alongside the other tribes to conquer the land of Israel.

But American Jews such as those in Mercaz Olami [the Zionist umbrella arm of Conservative-Masorti Judaism] don’t feel bound by any such obligation. They not only choose not to live in Israel but also choose not to fight in its defense.

Instead, ensconced in a faraway land they prefer, they lob verbal missiles at the tribe from which they have separated themselves when it defends its Jewish identity in ways of which American Jews disapprove.

Today, the long and established Jewish connection to the land does not automatically guarantee an equally well-established sense of Jewish identity and pride in the Jewish people.





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!

 

 

Wednesday, November 09, 2022

Palestinian terror apologists like to say to clueless Westerners, "Don't Palestinians have the right to defend themselves?"

On the surface, it sounds like a reasonable question. Only when you know a little about what's going on do you realize that shooting rockets at civilians is in no way "self defense." It is terror.

We now have proof positive that Palestinians are not motivated by self defense but by Jew-hatred.

Palestinian armed groups announced on Tuesday afternoon that they intended to start a battle in Nablus last night. 

The reason? To stop Jews from performing "Talmudic prayers" at Joseph's Tomb.

The IDF entered Nablus last night, not to arrest a wanted militant, or to frustrate a planned terror attack. Unlike most incursions, this one was known to all ahead of time. Because the terrorists knew that the Jewish pilgrims were visiting and they wanted to stop them from visiting, and that the IDF would be there to protect them.

The terrorists - part of the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, which is part of the Fatah group headed by Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas - started shooting towards the worshipers. The IDF fired back. 

One of the attackers was apparently killed when the homemade bomb he was holding exploded before he could throw it to the IDF, although the specific circumstances are unclear - the IDF admits to shooting towards him.

The dead terrorist was apparently 15 years old, although some Palestinian media say he was 17. Either way, he was a child soldier - another little fact that won't get mentioned by self-proclaimed progressives whose interest in such matters vanishes when it comes to Palestinian antisemites.


There was no pretense of "self defense." The entire reason to attack, freely admitted by the Palestinians themselves, was to stop Jewish prayer at a Jewish pilgrimage site. 

It is pure hatred of Jews and denial of Jewish rights. 

In fact, the terrorists complained that the Jewish pilgrims apparently didn't arrive on buses, as they usually do, but in armored vehicles - making it more difficult for them to kill Jews.

This isn't "self defense." This is hate for Jews.

_________________________________________________________

A few more points:

Under existing agreements, Jews should have the right to freely visit Joseph's Tomb anytime they want without fear of being fired upon. Clearly, the Palestinian Authority has not held up their end of the deal.'

Usually, Palestinians pretend that the site isn't really Joseph's tomb, but a tomb of a Muslim scholar coincidentally named Joseph (Yusuf) as well. But Iranian media, reporting this story, refers to the site as the tomb of The Prophet Joseph, meaning that they agree that this is a Jewish holy site. 

Whether it is indeed the exact site of Joseph's real burial place is controversial, but there is no doubt that Jews have been visiting and praying at this site for hundreds of years, as this 1839 account attests - and local Muslims in the 19th century didn't dispute that this was Joseph's burial spot.









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

Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424. 

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Tuesday, October 04, 2022




A popular Palestinian blogger, Jihad Helles, wrote on Twitter his reaction to seeing Jews singing and dancing in the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron:

In a chilling scene, herds of settlers have now stormed the Ibrahimi Mosque, the second most important and oldest Palestinian mosque after Al-Aqsa Mosque, and expelled the worshipers from it, desecrated it and danced in it to the sounds of loud music!!
Oh God, Muslims live in humiliation, weakness and humiliation that no one knows but You. Oh God, help them and cherish them!!
For ten days a year the shrine is exclusively for Jews, and for ten days it is for Muslims. This week, during the holidays, it was for Jews - and every time that happens Arab media makes it sound like this is a brand new thing.

Arabic media breathlessly reported about how terrible it is that Jews are singing and dancing in the "second most important mosque in Palestine" - not to mention how they were performing the ever-dangerous "Talmudic rituals."

But it wasn't only Muslims who were upset at Jews dancing and singing and praying. 

Anti-Israel activist Miko Peled tweeted:

This barbaric act of desecration is part of the colonization by Israel

It is antithetical to Judaism and to the ancient traditions of tolerance that were part of Palestine before Zionism. Until 1948 Jews and Muslims worshiped side by side at this ancient holy site in Hebron  
Peled not only apes the ridiculous charge of "desecration" - as if Jewish law does not allow celebrations in synagogues! - but he adds the insane lie that Hebron Muslims were tolerant of Jews before 1948, and prayed side by side in the shrine.

Um, Muslims slaughtered Jews in Hebron in 1929. And they weren't treated wonderfully before that, either. And Muslims did not allow Jews to enter the Tomb of the Patriarchs from the 13th century until Israel captured Hebron in 1967. 

Peled is lying - and he almost certainly knows it. But, like many Jewish antisemites, he can post any lies he wants, and is guaranteed to get lots of attention from his fellow antisemites.




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!

 

 

Sunday, September 11, 2022

Palestinian media is reporting:

Today, Sunday, September 11, 2022, a group of settlers, accompanied by the Israeli occupation forces, stormed the Ibrahimi Mosque in Hebron.

The director of the Ibrahimi Mosque, Ghassan Al-Rajabi, said that a group of settlers accompanied by the occupation forces stormed the Ishaqiah (Isaac) section and the prayer hall in the Ibrahimi Mosque, coinciding with the noon prayer.

Al-Rajbi added that the guardians of the Ibrahimi Mosque tried to prevent a group of settlers dressed in obscene clothes from entering the Ishaqiah chapel...

For his part, Minister of Awqaf Hatem Al-Bakry denounced the settlers storming the Ibrahimi Mosque in obscene clothes to perform Talmudic rituals.

Al-Bakri said: "The continuation of these crimes from time to time, with the blessing of the Israeli political level and in public, obliges the world to stand up to its responsibilities and to intervene seriously to put an end to these violations."
So what did these "Jewish settlers in obscene clothing" look like?



Needless to say, these are not "Jewish settlers." They are non-Jewish tourists, visiting the Muslim side of the holy site (the centotaph of Isaac is on the Muslim side.) The guards have been known to ask tourists if they are Jewish and will not admit Jews to begin with. 

Apparently, the Muslim bigots have been so enthralled at the publicity they received by falsely claiming that Jews were dressing obscenely at the Temple Mount that they have decided to play the same trick on the world by pretending that non-Jewish tourists, dressed like normal tourists, are really "Jewish settlers".







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Thursday, May 26, 2022




Today, construction started on an elevator at the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron.

It took years any many court cases. The Jewish community offered to work with the Hebron municipality on the design, only to be refused. The elevator will be available to Jews and Muslims. Up until today, people who are wheelchair bound had to be literally carried up in order to see the holy site.

In other words, this is a no-brainer.

Except - anything Jews do is automatically awful.

Palestine Today describes it this way: 
The attempts of the “ Israeli ” occupation to Judaize in the Ibrahimi Mosque in the city of Khalil al-Rahman never stops. The installation of the metal structure of the electric elevator comes within the framework of strengthening the comprehensive Jewish grip on the city, including the Ibrahimi Mosque , and transforming the Islamic aspect into a Jewish one.
The Mufti of Jerusalem also says this is a Judaization crime:
The Grand Mufti of Jerusalem and the Palestinian territories and the preacher of Al-Aqsa Mosque, Sheikh Muhammad Hussein, affirmed that the occupation authorities yesterday removed parts of the Ibrahimi Mosque, the “White Staircase”, as a “racist Judaization crime.”

In a press statement, Sheikh Hussein said: "What is happening comes within the framework of the occupation authorities' plans to change the landmarks of the archaeological site and complete the "electric elevator" project, which it intends to build to serve the settlers' incursions."

He explained that these measures of the occupation authorities lead to depriving Palestinian citizens of performing their religious rites in their mosques....
The funny thing is that the exact types of people who support disability rights will be the ones who are the most adamantly against this.

In the hierarchy of social justice issues, Jew-hate is at the top.

UN Declaration on the Rights of Disabled Persons







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Sunday, May 15, 2022

I looked up the Maarat HaMachpelah, Hebron's Cave of the Patriarchs in Google Maps.  Here's what it found:
Muslims have been usurping Jewish holy sites from the beginnings of Islam. But there is no reason for Google to go along with it. 

Let's them call it the Ibrahim Mosque in Arabic, but it is an insult to Jews to make that the default name. 

UPDATE (September): Google now shows both names, not sure when it started. (h/t MN)

Friday, November 05, 2021

It's Friday, which means that tens of thousands of Muslims will be visiting the Temple Mount as they do every Friday. 

Here is what it looked like one Friday in October, when 50,000 Muslims visited to pray.


.
Muslim media typically reports 40,000-50,000 visiting every Friday. Even during COVID there were tens of thousands visiting every week when it was open.

As far as I can tell, more Muslims visit Judaism's holiest site, under Jewish rule, on a typical Friday than ever visited even on Muslim holidays under Muslim rule, in history.

I have looked for any photo or description estimating the number of Muslims that visited the holy site even during Muslim holidays, and while some descriptions mention "thousands" of worshippers, never have I seen anyone report "tens of of thousands" as the site sees every single week nowadays.

A letter from a British resident of Jerusalem in the November 23, 1937 Manchester Guardian disputes the claim that 10,000 Muslims carried the Mufti around the Temple Mount by pointing out that only perhaps once a year does the Haram esh Sharif attract that many Muslims:


Only 13,000 Muslims lived in Jerusalem in 1922 and 40,000 in 1948 (compared to over 300,000 today) so 40,000 visitors would have been an astronomical figure to visit at any time under Muslim rule. 

Now, during Fridays in Ramadan, Israel allows some 200,000 Muslims to visit Judaism's most sacred spot. 

I am confident in my claim that more Muslims will visit the site today, on a typical Friday, walking past Israeli guards, than had ever visited at one time in the entire 1200 years of Muslim control of Jerusalem.

The contrast to how Muslims didn't allow Jews to visit the Temple Mount or the Cave of the Patriarchs at all under their rule couldn't be more striking. 

Never in history has there been as free access to holy sites for all religions than under Jewish rule,  yet earlier this week the UN again accused Israel of "racial and ethnic discrimination." 

We are truly living in 1984 where ignorance is strength.









Friday, September 17, 2021




Media outlets like Haaretz and the New York Times warn about how dangerous it is for Jews to pray in the holist Jewish site, the Temple Mount, that was claimed as an Islamic holy sites over a millennium later. Their argument is that such prayer is lighting a fuse for a global jihad by Muslims. Jewish religious rights, according to these "experts," are not nearly as important as appeasing Muslims who usurped the site.

By that logic, Jews should not be allowed to pray in the second holiest Jewish site either - the Ma'arat HaMachpela, the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron, from which Jews were banned for centuries by intolerant Muslims. 

Just like the Temple Mount.

From reading the NYT and Haaretz, one would think that Muslims have accepted Jews worshipping in the Hebron site so it is not an issue any more. After all, there was a signed agreement between Israel and the Palestinian Authority dividing up the site into sections where Jews and Muslims can worship, and on ten days a year Jews can use the whole site while on ten other days Muslims take over the whole site.

But while the PA may have accepted this agreement, the Muslims have not.

Just this morning, Shehab News tweeted the scandalous video of Jews praying in the holy site - something done every day but the video is still meant to incite hate and violence.

The caption says "Settlers perform Talmudic prayers inside the Ibrahimi Mosque in Hebron."

Yom Kippur is one of the ten annual days Jews can pray unimpeded in their holy site, and Palestinian media are calling this a "desecration," claiming that the Jews rolled up the Muslim prayer rugs for the services.

Hundreds of citizens performed dawn prayers today, Friday, at the Ibrahimi Mosque in Hebron, despite the restrictions of the occupation, and hours after it was stormed and desecrated by dozens of settlers.

Citizens from all parts of Hebron arrived at the mosque to perform prayers and participate in its reconstruction, in light of the dangerous Judaization operations it is being exposed to. 

The freed prisoner Issa Al-Jabari said, "The settlers removed the carpets from the Ishaqi Hall, where the citizens prayed on the tiles on which light, worn mats were spread." 

The settlers posted on their sites scenes of their performance of Talmudic rituals inside the Ishaqi hall in the Ibrahimi Mosque after removing the prayer rugs and storming it with their shoes.  

The settlers deliberately photographed the mosque and its pulpit during the performance of rituals and chanting Talmudic heresies. 

Dozens of Jewish women also participated in the desecration of the Ibrahimi Mosque to celebrate the so-called Jewish Day of Atonement, which the occupation takes as a pretext to close the mosque and allow settlers to storm it.

Here's a photo of the rolled up prayer rugs. Awful, isn't it?

 


Except that these rugs aren't removed by the Jews and left there in a mess for the Muslims to clean up. The Muslims roll up the rugs to avoid the dirty Jews from walking on them! As this 2015 article notes:

Before relinquishing their side, Abufilat and his attendants rolled up the wall-to-wall prayer mats.

“We remove our carpets because we don’t want them to get dirty. The Jews come here, they conduct their dances, their celebrations, and also their drinking,” Abufilat says. It’s a reference to Jews drinking wine during holiday rituals.

Muslims know that the secular Jews who write these articles about Jewish "provocative" prayer at the Temple Mount are cowed by Arab threats. Every single time an Isabel Kershner or Eric Yoffie writes about how Jewish prayer on the Temple Mount is bad because it upsets Muslims, the Muslims have more incentive to incite more anger and violence.

The articles about the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Arab media are intended to roll back the gains that Jews achieved in being able to return there after being banned for centuries. And the Jewish useful idiots happily will agree that the right of Jews to their own holy places is less important than appeasing Arab Muslims - who will never be appeased until every Jew has been pushed out of the region.

(h/t Yoel)





Tuesday, September 14, 2021

There is a phrase that is seen often in Palestinian Arabic media, especially around this time of year: "Under the pretext of Jewish holidays."

Ma'an wrote on Monday, "The Israeli occupation forces, on Monday evening, restricted Jerusalemites, especially those residing in and around the Old City, under the pretext of the Jewish holidays and to facilitate the settlers' storming of the Old City and the Al-Buraq Wall [Kotel]."

Al Wafd, Wafa and many others headlined, "On the pretext of Jewish holidays, Israel closes the Ibrahimi Mosque in Hebron to [Muslim] worshipers."

Al Quds, last week: "Gaza: Israel's closure of commercial crossings under the pretext of Jewish holidays worsens economic conditions."

El Balad: "On the pretext of days of repentance, settlers storm Al-Aqsa Mosque, instigated by 'temple groups.'"

They don't mention that Egypt and Jordan close crossings on holidays. They don't mention that for every day the Cave of the Patriarchs is closed to Muslims, there is one day it is closed to Jews for Muslim holidays.

The wording makes it appear that they think that Israel uses the holidays as an excuse to make Palestinians suffer.

Indeed, that is exactly what they think. 

An Al Jazeera reporter interviewed Palestinians and "experts" about the fact that there are so many Jewish holidays during the week this month. 

The specialist in Israeli affairs, Ismat Mansour, describes the closures, which are carried out under the pretext of Jewish holidays, as a ritual of restricting the Palestinians and disturbing their lives on security grounds, although the situation today is closer to calm. There are no commando operations and no security tension, according to what the occupation describes. Despite this, the closure has become a reality, according to Mansour.

The problem with the Jewish holidays - according to Mansour - is that they are many, and the closures may extend for long days, as happens on the Passover holiday, in which the closure extends for a week, as well as the way the celebrations become against the Palestinians and their sanctities.

In addition to this, the national holidays, especially the Independence Day, are considered a history of the catastrophe for the Palestinian people.

Mansour believes that the Jewish holidays for the Palestinians are occasions of restrictions, closures, sieges and incursions by settlers, which are often reinforced by the occupation police and army, and these incursions may be a spark for confrontations and arrest.







Thursday, September 02, 2021

 


 

Al Jazeera (Arabic) writes about the hardship of Palestinian Arabs who work in Israel who are forced to not work during the upcoming Jewish holidays this month.

Israel closes the crossings to the territories during Israeli holidays.

Of course, Egypt closes its crossing to Gaza on Egyptian holidays, but no one seems overly concerned about that.

That isn't the only horrific human rights violation that Palestinians complain about for Jewish holidays. They are also upset that Jews visit Jewish shrines on Jewish holidays, including Rachel’s Tomb in Bethlehem, Joseph’s Tomb in Nablus, the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron, the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, and many others. 

Specialist in Israeli affairs, Ismat Mansour, describes the closures, which are carried out under the pretext of Jewish holidays, as a ritual of restricting Palestinians and disturbing their lives on security grounds, although the situation today is closer to calm....The problem with the Jewish holidays - according to Mansour - is that there are many of them, and the closures may extend for long days, as happens on the Passover holiday, in which the closure extends for a week
 
 In addition to this, the national holidays, especially the Independence Day, are considered a history of the catastrophe for the Palestinian people
There you have it. Jewish holidays are a violation of Palestinian rights, and Israeli holidays are designed to humiliate Palestinians. 

The funny thing is, when they make this stuff up it is to make themselves feel important. Because the truth that Jewish holidays and Israeli special days have nothing to do with Palestinians offends those  who insist they are the center of the universe.





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