Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News: East Jerusalem

Showing posts with label East Jerusalem. Show all posts

Wednesday, September 20, 2023

King Abdullah's speech to the UN is a study in hypocrisy and lies

Yesterday, Jordan's King Abdullah addressed the UN General Assembly with polished English and breathtaking hypocrisy.

Harking back to the long-debunked "linkage" theory, Abdullah claimed, "The Palestinian-Israeli conflict [is] the central issue in the Middle East."

This is right after he spoke about Syria, and the 1.3 million Syrian refugees that Jordan hosts!

As has been the case for decades, Arab leaders cannot resist using the Palestinian issue as a means to distract their people from their own shortcomings. Whipping up hatred against Jews means less hatred towards their own leaders.

Five million Palestinians live under occupation—no civil rights; no freedom of mobility; no say in their lives.

About 2.3 million people cross between the West Bank and Jordan through the Allenby crossing every year - most of them Palestinians. Does that sound like they have no freedom of mobility?

Some 90% of Palestinians live under Palestinian civil governance and laws. If they have no civil rights or say in their lives, how exactly is that Israel's fault?

Moreover, hundreds of thousands of Palestinians in Jordan who moved there from Gaza in 1967 have no civil rights or path to citizenship - so who exactly is curtailing the rights of those Palestinians?

And delaying justice and peace has brought endless cycles of violence—2023 has been the deadliest for the Palestinian people in the past 15 years.

No, it hasn't: it has been the deadliest in the West Bank. And nearly all of those killed have been armed terrorists or active fighters, whom Abdullah pretends are innocent civilians.

The past 18 months have been the deadliest in Israel in many years as well - where is the justice for Jews?

Jerusalem is a flash point for global concern. Under the Hashemite Custodianship of Islamic and Christian holy sites, Jordan remains committed to safeguarding the city’s identity.

First of all, Jordan has no custodianship over Christian holy sites. The original (verbal) agreement between the Supreme Muslim Council and the Hashemites was only concerning Al Aqsa. The 1994 Jordan-Israel peace agreement says "Israel respects the present special role of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan in Muslim Holy shrines in Jerusalem." Abdullah is lying.

Secondly, when he says Jordan wants to safeguard Jerusalem's identity, by specifying "Islamic and Christian," he means a Jerusalem that has no Jewish history.

But preserving Jerusalem, as the city of faith and peace for Islam, Christianity, and Judaism, is a responsibility that we all share.

Except that under Jordanian rule, no Jews of any nationality were allowed to visit the Old City. Jordan regularly condemns Jews peacefully touring the Temple Mount. Abdullah supports a Jerusalem where Jews are, at best, tolerated but have no rights. If he cared about preserving Jerusalem for all religions, he would support Israeli sovereignty - since it is only under Jewish rule that Jerusalem has ever been truly open to all.

And we must not abandon Palestinian refugees to the forces of despair. Sustainable funding is urgently needed by UNRWA, the UN agency that provides vital relief, education, and health services to millions of Palestinian refugees. This is essential to protect families, keep communities stable, and prepare young people for productive lives.

Jordan itself gave a mere $4 million to UNRWA in 2022 - much less than the $7 million it gave in 2021. And so far it has only pledged $2 million in 2023. Abdullah is not exactly walking the walk.

But there is a lot of cynicism here: Jordan's economy benefits greatly from UNRWA. Even though UNRWA has no business giving aid to most of its "refugees" in Jordan who are full Jordanian citizens, it spends over $150 million a year in Jordan alone. Abdullah is appealing for UNRWA because that money is money he saves in providing basic services to nearly 2 million of his own citizens.

He pretends his appeal to UNRWA benefits Palestinians, but in reality UNRWA saves Jordan hundreds of millions of dollars, and it injects a great deal of cash into Jordan's economy on the world's dime.

The hypocrisy does not end there. In his speech, Abdullah speaks about "justice" and about how he is against "the black flags of terror, hate, and extremism." Yet even today, Jordan is zealously protecting terrorist Ahlam Tamimi - an unrepentant, proud monster responsible for the murder of 16 civilians including 7 children at a pizza shop in Jerusalem - from being extradited to the US to face justice.

Abdullah doesn't support justice. On the contrary, he supports a celebrity terrorist walking around freely in his kingdom.

Western media and politicians love King Abdullah. He is young, articulate, and smooth. He says all the right things and is considered a "moderate." So no one bothers to fact-check his speeches and analyze his actions. But in just this short address on the biggest stage on Earth, Abdullah has proven himself yet again to be a hypocrite and a liar.

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

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European Union think tank seems think the Abraham Accords are a mistake

From the EUISS webpage:

The European Union Institute for Security Studies (EUISS) is the Union’s Agency analysing foreign, security and defence policy issues. Its core mission is to assist the EU and its member states in the implementation of the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP), including the Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP) as well as other external action of the Union.

One would think that the EUISS' analyses would be in line with mainstream EU thinking.

Last year, Algeria hosted a forgettable Arab League summit. The EUISS used this as a springboard to evaluate how well and how poorly the League of Arab States (LAS) does what it was meant to do - avoid intra-Arab wars, for example.

But one of its threads of analysis was quite concerning:

The LAS has lost credibility in recent decades due to the weakness of its institutional mechanisms,and its failure to translate the lofty statements of its leaders into action. The inability to take a united stance on the Palestinian issue, when several Arab leaders decided to normalise relations with Israel, is probably its most profound failure, especially given that an overwhelming majority of 88% of Arab citizens disapprove of their governments’ recognition of Israel, and only 6% accept a formal diplomatic recognition.

It sure sounds like the EUISS is saying that a unified Arab consensus against even recognizing Israel is far preferable to a situation where some Arab nations establish relations.

An official EU organization that apparently considers several Arab states making peace with Israel to be a "profound failure" seems to be a pretty big deal. Does this mean the EU considers earlier peace between Israel and Jordan and Egypt to have been a net negative as well?

In fact, the EUISS site does not have any analysis of the Abraham Accords at all. Even though these agreements have been perhaps the most far-reaching change in the Middle East since the Iranian revolution, they do not merit a single article.

The longstanding EU position is that the Palestinian issue is the center of any Middle East peace (the "linkage" claim) and the Abraham Accords showed that this assumption has never been true, and indeed the Arab League was the impediment to peace by pretending that its members were obligated to act as a single anti-Israel bloc instead of in their own self-interests.

In 2020, the EASS - the diplomatic service of the EU - officially welcomed the normalization agreements without using the name "Abraham Accords," but then spent more time discussing how a two state solution should be the main goal and blamed only Israel for the lack of progress on that front. Whether it is stated formally or not, the EU position seems to be that Israel has no rights or legitimate claims to the Old City, Area C or any historic Jewish sites outside the Green Line. It appears that the EU regards the Abraham Accords as a net negative because they reduced diplomatic pressure on Israel on ceding its claims and they took the focus away from the "Palestinians are virtuous, Israel is intransigent" mantra that has been its foreign policy towards the conflict since the Palestinian refusal for peace and the second intifada.

(h/t Irene)

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

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If you use the word "Judaizing" as an epithet, you just might be an antisemite

Safa has an article raising the alarm about the planned cable car over the Old City of Jerusalem.

There are plenty of legitimate reasons to oppose the plan. It would permanently change the skyline of Jerusalem. It might make the holy city look like a ski resort.

But to Safa, and its Arab "experts" it interviews, there is only one real problem with the cable car plan:

It would "Judaize the sky" of Jerusalem.

After the Israeli occupation government has completed all the necessary procedures and arrangements for its implementation, it intends, in the next few period, to start constructing the "air train - cable car" project in the vicinity of the Old City of occupied Jerusalem, which means Judaizing its sky and historical monuments, and giving a different character to its civilized face.

The High Court of Occupation in Jerusalem recently rejected all petitions and objections submitted against the Judaization project, thus giving the green light to begin its implementation, especially in light of the acceleration of Judaization and settlement operations taking place in the occupied city during the year 2023.

Just as the occupation targeted Judaizing the underground and above it, today it seeks to Judaize the sky of Jerusalem through the construction of the air train, which will allow thousands of settlers to permeate its sky every hour, reaching its old town and the Al-Buraq Wall, west of the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque.

The occupation government is moving forward with the Judaization project, as the Israeli Planning and Building Committee has approved, during the past months, several contracts indicating that it is heading towards issuing the tender for the construction of the cable car in Jerusalem as soon as possible.

The researcher specializing in Jerusalem affairs, Fakhri Abu Diab, says that the occupation government agreed to start implementing the "air train" project, which is one of the most dangerous Judaization projects in Jerusalem, after it completed all the necessary arrangements and procedures for its implementation, and all petitions and objections against it were received.

Abu Diab explained, in his interview with "Safa" agency, that the project, which will be implemented in two phases, aims to change the civilized face of the Holy City, specifically its old town, closing the horizon in front of Al-Aqsa Mosque, distorting Arab and Islamic landmarks, and imparting a new Jewish character.

He added that the air train is a Judaizing par excellence, and will circle Al-Aqsa from its eastern and southern sides, and will begin its implementation from the west of Jerusalem at the old Ottoman train station near Al-Baq’a, all the way to its eastern part.

The plan might bring in more tourists, and might be a boon for the disabled who want to visit Jerusalem, but there is nothing Jewish about a cable car. .

Throughout the article, "Judaization" is a synonym for something disgusting and ugly. It is an epithet, the worst insult possible to Safa's readership.

And if you associate Judaism with disgust, guess what that makes you?

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

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75 years ago: Arab propaganda claims Jews would be safe under their rule - while they oppress their Jews

The Palestine Post reported on June 1, 1948 that Arab airplanes were dropping propaganda leaflets on northern Israel urging Jews to surrender and assuring them that Jews are treated wonderfully in Arab countries - better than anywhere else in the world.

At the same time, Iraq - which had troops in Palestine - started forcing their Jews to pay huge sums:

In Egypt, the government started confiscating property owned by Jews who had been thrown into concentration camps::

And on the following day, witnesses started reporting on the systematic Arab destruction of anything Jews in the Old City of Jerusalem:

Arabs continue to repeat the lie, today, that Jews have always been treated wonderfully under Muslim rule.

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

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75 years ago: Jordan maliciously destroys the Hurva synagogue in Jerusalem

Hurva synagogue in 1864

The Palestine Post, May 28, 1948, reported on the gleeful and deliberate destruction of the Hurva Synagogue in the Old City of Jerusalem.

The secondary story on the right column describes the many times that this synagogue had been destroyed by Muslims, or attempted to be destroyed, and how it had always been rebuilt.

Israel complained to the world about this destruction, to no avail (May 29).

The following month, a delegation of rabbis inspected the Jewish Quarter to see the destruction.

In the end, Jordan destroyed over 50 synagogues in the Old City, over 19 years, to the deafening silence of the world.

Only Jews can protect Jewish heritage. Which is why Jews rebuilt the Hurva synagogue.

And this is why Jews are restoring the Tiferet Yisrael (Nissim Bek) synagogue which will resume being he highest domed structure in the Old City.

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Apparently, Palestinians wrote their own "congratulatory telegrams" from other countries on their "independence day"

This is the least important news you will read today, but it says a lot.

November 15 is considered by Palestinians to be their "independence day" because Yasir Arafat declared it as such in 1988, in a move that was accepted by practically nobody.

The official Wafa news agency recorded the congratulatory telegrams that Mahmoud Abbas received from national leaders on the occasion. One press release describes those sent from Mauritania, Pakistan, Senegal and Tajikistan.

The contents of these telegrams are all identical.

In their telegrams, the presidents and officials affirmed their continued keenness to develop and strengthen fraternal relations with the State of Palestine, in a way that serves common interests and contributes to the progress and stability of the region .

They stressed their continued support for the Palestinian people and their just cause to restore their legitimate national rights and enable them to establish their independent state with Jerusalem as its capital.

The wording in the second paragraph is identical to countless official Palestinian statements. It is not language that national leaders would come up with on their own when sending communications like this.

Similarly, the message from the president of Tunisia:

It gives me pleasure, on the occasion of the commemoration of the 34th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, to address you on behalf of myself and on behalf of the Tunisian people, with warmest congratulations and sincere fraternal wishes for good health and wellness, and for the Palestinian people to recover their legitimate rights that will not be forfeited by statute of limitations and to establish their independent state with Jerusalem as its capital.

What appears to have happened is that Palestinian diplomats asked their host countries to write congratulatory notes to Mahmoud Abbas, and in some cases told them what to say! (A few other telegrams, from Sweden, Malta, and Nicaragua were more generic. The ones from Turkey and Jordan mentioned a two state solution with "East Jerusalem" as the capital of Palestine. )

This way the PA can issue a press release making Abbas sound like an elder statesman with widespread support. Most of his press releases are about sending and receiving similar telegrams on the occasion of various state holidays, so he feels like he is part of the community of world leaders.

It is sort of pathetic.

But this trivial episode reveals the deep level of manipulation that the Palestinians put into all of their diplomatic efforts, alternatively threatening or cajoling or just wearing down other nations with their demands, which sometimes pays off.

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

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10/14 Links Pt1: Lapid's Two State Solution; Ruthie Blum: It makes sense to be suspicious of the maritime deal; Israel must prepare for a nuclear Iran

From Ian:

Lapid's Two State Solution

What did Yair Lapid mean by his foregoing statement? Did he mean 2 states in an undivided Jerusalem or Jerusalem undivided as an Israel state with the Palestinian Arab state established elsewhere? If the former, he would find a majority in Israel would not accept this. If the latter, no Palestinian Arab or Arab leader would accept it.

What he should have done was to make use of an expert historian to proof positive Jewish indigenous rights to the Land of Israel, After all, during Temple Times , we learn of the Jews and the Romans. Subsequently the Greeks. The words, "Palestinians" and Arabs" don't appear until many centuries later.

To begin with, he could share the words of Lloyd George, who was outraged by the claim that Arabs had been treated unfairly in Palestine---":

"No race has done better out of the fidelity with which the Allies redeemed their promises to the oppressed races than the Arabs. Owing to the tremendous sacrifices of the Allied Nations, and more particularly of Britain and her Empire, the Arabs have already won independence in Iraq, Arabia, Syria, and Trans-jordania, although most of the Arab races fought throughout the War for the Turkish oppressors---[In particular ] the Palestinian Arabs for Turkish rule."[ A Mandate for Israel by Douglas J. Feith].

Perhaps the greatest lesson for Lapid is demonstrated by history - Appeasement mostly does not work and it certainly does not win.

Ruthie Blum: It makes sense to be suspicious of the maritime deal

Jaw-dropping press conference
LAPID’S PRIME-time press conference was just as jaw-dropping. Lauding the great “achievements” that Israel made by (ostensibly) rejecting a set of Lebanon’s additional demands, he boasted that the cabinet had approved the deal and thanked Biden and French President Emmanuel Macron for their help and support. Oy.

He proceeded to acknowledge that the agreement “staves off the possibility of a flare-up with Hezbollah,” quickly averring that “Israel is not afraid of Hezbollah. The IDF is stronger than any terror organization, and if we went to battle, we would deal it a heavy blow. That being said, if it’s possible to prevent war, it’s the job of a responsible government to do so.”

Questioned by a reporter about the government’s consent to circumvent a Knesset vote, he blabbered about the legality of the decision. Then he let the cat out of the bag.

“In light of the utterly profligate behavior of the opposition, we didn’t think that it would be [the] right [thing to do],” he explained.

In other words, the risk of Hezbollah interference in Israel’s gas mining is smaller in Lapid’s eyes than a potential parliamentary thumbs-down. Which brings us to Iran.

Biden's horrific foreign policy
DESPITE THE ongoing protests across the Islamic Republic that are providing a glimmer of hope about the ultimate fall of the regime, the US administration is continuing to convey its desperation to revive the nuclear pact and fill Tehran’s coffers with billions of dollars. This travesty is typical of Biden’s horrific foreign policy.

Israel cannot afford to follow in such ill-fated footsteps. Nevertheless, National Security Adviser Eyal Hulata defended the gas deal on the ridiculous grounds that it “goes against Iran’s interest in Lebanon and weakens Hezbollah’s hold on the government in Beirut.”

Really?

No wonder Udi Adiri, Israel’s longtime lead maritime border and gas extraction negotiator, resigned a couple of weeks ago in exasperation over the contents of the document that was crafted against his better judgment. This didn’t have an effect on what is going to be a signed, sealed and delivered deal on October 31, the day of Aoun’s exit and 24 hours before Israelis head to the polls.

No, you don’t have to be a maritime expert to grasp the magnitude of the gambit. Common sense and experience ought to suffice, if not in Israel’s soon-to-be-shuffled halls of power, then at least at the ballot box.

'All my family and friends turned against me when I enlisted in the IDF'

The Israel Defense Forces' Desert Reconnaissance Battalion is one of a kind: not only are its fighters volunteers, but they come from Muslim, Christian, and Circassian backgrounds, often having left their families and friends, who opposed their enlistment, behind.

They have served on the border with the Gaza Strip for many years, protecting Israel and putting their lives on the line.

According to one of the fighters, "there are people here whose identities cannot be revealed not because of the operational aspects, but because of what would happen to them if their photos or names were made public." The unit was established in 1986 in order to regulate the enlistment of Bedouin youth in the IDF. What began as a small unit has over time grown into a battalion.

When the Oslo Accords were signed in 1993, the unit became operational and was stationed along the Gaza border. During the Second Intifada, between 2000 and 2005, the fighters participated actively in operations in the strip, especially the Philadelphia Route, combating underground tunnels and the spread of terror.

In January 2002, four of the battalion's fighters were killed in an attack on an outpost near the Kerem Shalom border crossing, where several years later Gilad Shalit would be captured, and where the fighters carried out patrols with us, the journalists, in the dead of night.

Lt. Col. Guy Madar, 33, married and father of five from the Karmei Katif settlement in southern Israel, has been commanding the battalion for the past three months. He grew up in the Givati Brigade, and when he reached the rank of major general, he naturally wanted to continue his service in the purple brigade.

But today, he says, he could not be prouder of his fighters, even though sometimes the Arabic language, which is used outside of operational activity – as that is only conducted in Hebrew – is a challenge for him.

"I manage. The soldiers know Hebrew, and othertimes, they help me. My ambition is to learn Arabic. This is my first job as a battalion commander, but I got to know the Bedouin patrol unit because they are trained in a Givati base. But you only think you know something before you actually do it. Before that, there are a lot of preconceived notions. When I joined, I discovered how amazingly they operated. I grew up in Givati and I wanted to be an officer in Givati, and I will honestly say that at first, I was a little disappointed because I had a lot of fears, we all have our prejudices. It was only when I joined that I found out how serious this unit is. The fighters really don't get the appreciation they deserve.

"When I say that I am the commander of the Bedoun patrol unit, everyone tells me that it must be challenging and asks how I manage. My answer is that it is like any fighting unit in the IDF. That it is a group of fighters who want to contribute. They are strong, good fighters, and know the sector like the back of their hand. I have a company commander who has been here since 2013. Everyone who comes across the unit discovers that they are wonderful guys, not spoiled, who just want to fight and contribute to the country."

10/13 Links Pt1: How to Lose Friends and Influence Over People; Lebanon's Bait-and-Switch Treaty; Israel Passing Intelligence to Ukraine on Iranian-Made Suicide Drones

From Ian:

Yeah, Buoy!!!

The government’s new pitch was that this would be the real benefit of the deal: preserving and enhancing Israel’s security interests through the now-famous buoy line. Barak Ravid, the local Israeli journalistic mouthpiece of the Obama-Biden policy team from the Iran deal days, relayed that government officials who briefed reporters on the deal said that anchoring the “line of buoys” was “very important” because “in the last 20 years the Israeli military operated along this line unilaterally and the Lebanese side had international legitimacy to challenge it.” The deal, however, “will allow Israel to treat it as its northern territorial border.”

In other words, in the two decades up to this moment, Israel has had total freedom to operate in the area to ensure its security against Hezbollah. However, without the deal, the terror pseudo-state to its north would suddenly have enjoyed “international legitimacy” to challenge Israel. That sounds very serious—and certainly warrants ceding territory with potential energy resources under threat of force to a terrorist group that is stockpiling and pointing tens of thousands of rockets at you.

Needless to say, the Lebanese side disagrees with the Israeli reading. Instead, it claims another point on land farther south at Naqoura. Squaring this circle, probably with some creative language, is what the U.S. mediator likely has been busy figuring out.

Meanwhile, Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz was spit-balling another set of talkers: “This is an agreement whose essence is economic,” Gantz said last week. “And if it is signed, we, as well as Lebanon and its citizens, who are suffering from a severe crisis, will enjoy it for years to come.” The logic here was that if Lebanon gets its rig in its Block 9 opposite Israel’s rig at Karish, then Hezbollah will have a stake in maintaining calm and smooth operation of both rigs. So, in the future, if Hezbollah attacks Israeli energy infrastructure, Israel can target a gas rig owned and operated by France’s Total—putting France on Hezbollah’s side.

This pretense of hard security and pseudo-deterrence posture rang even more hollow as it clashed with another key government talker: that Israel had to conclude this awful deal ASAP if it wanted to avoid a new war with Hezbollah. An IDF official sent out to make this pitch put it this way: “There is an urgency and a necessity to reach an agreement in the near future and without delay, in order to prevent an escalation of security [dangers], which is [otherwise] highly likely, and to utilize the unique window of opportunity to reach an agreement.”

The logic here was itself unique in the annals of deterrence: If your psychopathic neighbor keeps slashing the tires on your shiny Mercedes, the solution is to buy him a spanking brand-new Mercedes of his own that you can then pretend to hold hostage.

The source of this weird pitch was again the Biden administration. As a senior U.S. administration official relayed through Ravid, the reason Biden wanted Lapid to wrap up the deal within weeks was “because the issue has become urgent and the lack of an agreement could lead to dangerous consequences for the region.”

Yet when U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz tweeted that he was troubled by how the Biden administration “pressured our Israeli allies” into a comically terrible deal, the Washington arm of the Obama-Biden messaging machine sprang into action. The progressive lobbying group J Street put out a brief that “fact checked” Sen. Cruz’s ignorant partisanship. Daniel Shapiro, Obama’s former ambassador to Israel who is intimately familiar with the communications environment in Israel, weighed in, regurgitating the same exact talkers and asserting that it was “definitely NOT” American pressure that pushed Israel into this deal.

Yet the reason the Biden administration announced that a gas deal was a key priority was precisely because it’s a deal with Hezbollah. Stabilizing and investing in Iranian regional “equities” is at the core of the Obama-Biden doctrine of realignment with Iran. It’s how you achieve “regional integration”—by publicly showcasing your ability to pressure your allies to prop up Iranian assets, even as the Iranian people are being mowed down in the streets.

How to Lose Friends and Influence Over People

Americans have a reputation, with others and in their own national literature, for being careless and breaking things. Often this is because they are so admirably creative, dynamic, and unattached to the past. But for the last two decades, the epicenter of American carelessness has been the Middle East, an area of the world that seems to encourage fantasies among all Westerners, yet where real-world margins for error are small. The result has been a series of disasters for the peoples of the region and for American prestige. This week brought what looks like another unforced error in policymaking, fed by hubris, fantasy, airy talk, and a refusal to acknowledge reality.

On Tuesday, White House national security spokesman John Kirby announced that President Joe Biden will be reevaluating America’s relationship with Saudi Arabia after OPEC+ announced the previous week that it would cut oil production. Kirby’s announcement followed a statement by Sen. Robert Menendez, D-N.J., claiming that Saudi Arabia is helping to “underwrite Putin’s war” through OPEC+. “As Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee,” Menendez said, “I will not green-light any cooperation with Riyadh until the Kingdom reassesses its position with respect to the war in Ukraine.”

As a Saudi who loves the United States, and believes deeply that our two countries need each other, the only word that comes to mind regarding the contemporary “reevaluation” of our relations is: obscene.

It was the Obama administration that decided to give Vladimir Putin a foothold in the eastern Mediterranean, which it sold to the American people as a way to “deescalate” the civil war in Syria. As the United States romanced Putin, offering him Crimea and warm water ports in Syria in exchange for pulling Iran’s irons out of the fire over the past decade, U.S. allies like Saudi Arabia, the Gulf States, and Israel have had no choice but to cope. Last month, while Russian-operated Iranian drones and missiles were pounding Kyiv, Riyadh used its diplomatic leverage to obtain the release of American and British POWs from Putin.

America saddled us with the reality of a neighboring country controlled by Iranian troops and the Russian air force. Worse, as part of its Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), the Obama administration sent tens of billions of dollars flowing into Iranian coffers—money that was used to demolish Iraq, crush Syria, create chaos in Lebanon, and threaten Saudi territory from Yemen. Iranian rocket and drone strikes on oil facilities in Saudi Arabia are now routine. In response to the barrage of missiles on Saudi infrastructure last year, the Biden administration withdrew U.S. missile defense batteries from Saudi territory.

Having watched Russian forces support or directly commit atrocities against innocent civilians and facilitate the use of chemical weapons for seven years in Syria, the Saudi government was quick to condemn Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Unlike many in the West, who expected a short, parade-ground war, the Saudis understood full well what Putin was capable of. So did the Israelis.

Why Jerusalem Is the Right Location for the UK's Embassy

Up until 1948, the world generally referred to "Palestinians" as the Jews who lived in what was to become modern Israel. The "Palestinian" flag until 1948 contained a Magen David, the Palestine Post was the region's Jewish newspaper and Palestinian football teams comprised Jews.

Jews were ethnically cleansed from the Old City and eastern Jerusalem by the invading Jordanian and Arab armies in 1948. Jews were the majority of the population of the Old City. Synagogues were desecrated and destroyed and the vibrant Jewish community erased. The Jewish neighborhood of Simon HaTsadik (Simon the Just) became the Muslim area of Sheikh Jarrah.

The default position for the location of an embassy is a country's capital city, and it is for the country itself to decide its location. Israel has declared that Jerusalem is its capital city and this must be respected. The UK already has a consulate in eastern Jerusalem to serve the local Arab communities. Why, therefore, should there not be an embassy in Jerusalem to serve Israeli citizens?

The Abraham Accords and the immense benefits for the region flowing from them has shown that the relocation of the U.S. embassy in Jerusalem has had no adverse effect. Neither would the relocation of the British embassy.

Poll: More East Jerusalem Arabs would prefer Israeli citizenship than Palestinian. 22% of WB Arabs support killing Jews worldwide.

One of the best polls of Palestinians has been that of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, where they ask Palestinians questions that Palestinian pollsters tend to avoid.

The most recent poll finds that East Jerusalem Arabs have become far more moderate in the past two years.

Today, half (48%) of the city’s Palestinian residents say that, if they had to make a choice, they would prefer to become citizens of Israel, rather than of a Palestinian state. From 2017 to early 2020, that figure hovered around just 20%. Today, only a minority (43%) of East Jerusalemites say they would pick Palestine; while the remainder (9%) would opt for Jordanian citizenship. Among West Bankers, the comparable figures are Israel, 25%; Palestine, 65%; Jordan, 10%.

Significantly, this sharp contrast is now evident on other, related questions as well. For instance, in East Jerusalem, 63% agree at least “somewhat” with this purposely provocative statement: “It would be better for us if we were part of Israel, rather than in Palestinian Authority or Hamas ruled lands.” In the West Bank, the corresponding figure is less than half that proportion (28%).

Interestingly, the "Jordanian option" which had not even been a consideration at all in previous polls has become significant.

Another major divergence between Jerusalem Arabs and West Bank Arabs was the question, “I hope some day we can be friends with Israelis, since we are all human beings after all.” 54% of Jerusalem Arabs agreed, compared to just 26% in the West Bank.

But when questions were phrased in emotional or religious terms, the Jerusalem Arabs were even more extreme than those in the West Bank:

For example, 23% of East Jerusalem Palestinians agree “strongly” with this assertion: “I sincerely worry that Israel wants to destroy the Al-Aqsa mosque and harm our religion.” An additional 46% agree “somewhat” with that sentiment. Nineteen percent agree “strongly” that “we should demand Palestinian rule over all of Jerusalem, east and west, rather than share or divide any part of it with Israel”; an additional 45% offer lukewarm agreement, given that maximalist formulation. Finally, this deliberately inflammatory hypothetical arouses the harshest responses: “When I think about the occupation, I get so angry that I wish all Israelis would disappear.” A large minority (41%) “strongly” agree, with another 33% “somewhat” agreeing as well.

Support for violence across the board has lessened somewhat since the last poll in February 2020, but it is still quite significant - and under-reported.

In the West Bank, there is little distinction between Israelis, "settlers" and security personnel. 53% support and 37% oppose attacks on Jews in Israel, and a similar percentage support attacking Israelis in the West Bank as well as Israeli soldiers or police.

But a significant percentage - 23% - also support attacking tourists in Israel.

And pure antisemitism is evident in the response to the question of whether it is good or bad to attack Jews anywhere in the world. 22% say it is good - half the number from 2020, but still more than one in five West Bank Arabs want to see Jews killed everywhere.

This poll didn't include Gaza, which typically would be more extreme, meaning that at least a quarter of Palestinians support murdering Jews worldwide.

See if you can find that little fact reported in the mainstream media.

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!

Palestinians against building a sports center for Arabs in Jerusalem because it is "normalization"

The Jerusalem Post reports that ground has been broken on a new sports complex in Beit Hanina meant to serve the Arab community of Jerusalem. It will include a half-Olympic sized pool, instruction pool, exercise gyms and more. The $20 million project, once completed, will be fully managed by Jerusalem Arabs from the already successful Beit Hanina Community Center.

These will be the first public pools built in Jerusalem for the Arab population. Much of the funding is coming from the Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Foundation.

Anti-Israel activists have complained for years - with some justification - that Israel is not providing enough services to its Arab population. Here is an attempt to address that concern. So are they happy?

Of course not.

Here is how Al Resalah is reporting this story:

Jerusalem researcher: The occupation is establishing a Judaizing sports center to impose normalization in Jerusalem

Jerusalem researcher Mazen Al-Jabari says: "The Judaization Sports Center will be built on Palestinian lands confiscated by the occupation,...

According to Al-Jabari, the occupation municipality is one of the tools of the "Israeli" government, as it works to Judaize the Holy City and normalize the situation there, pointing out that the completion of the sports project will hit youth projects in Jerusalem, especially as it will provide services for free, where swimming pools and modern playgrounds.

He stressed to Al-Resalah that the goal of the Judaization project is to undermine the relationship of Jerusalemites with their youth and sports centers and to normalize Jerusalemite youth with Jewish centers, and thus the occupation municipality succeeds in changing the character of the Old City.

Regarding the occupation’s recent activity in Judaizing sports, Al-Jabari mentions that through the sports movement and the great demand for it, the occupation sees it as an important entrance to attract young people to normalize and integrate them into the "Israeli" sports machine.

As usual, everything the Jews do is awful. The haters just need to figure out the reasons why.

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

Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424.

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74 years ago: World compliments Arabs on how humanely they ethically cleansed Jews from Jerusalem

This is the 74th anniversary of the surrender of the Old City of Jerusalem.

This article shows how both the Jordanians and the Swiss acted like the Arabs were supreme humanitarians - because they didn't massacre every man, woman and child and "allowed' them to leave their homes with only a few possessions.

This was ethnic cleansing.

Not a single Jew remained in the Jordanian administered part of Jerusalem for 19 years. But since Arabs are assumed to be vicious animals, when they act a little less horribly, everyone praises them.

And in another article in the Palestine Post on May 30, 1948:

Of course, within days some 50 synagogues were deliberately destroyed by the humane Transjordanians.

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!

A 1976 book documents the ethnic cleansing of Jews from Jerusalem in 1948 with stunning photographs

Richard Pollack writes in JNS:

I recently stumbled upon a photography book shot by the acclaimed Life magazine wartime photographer John Phillips. The large, innocuous-looking book was simply titled, A Will to Survive. After flipping through the pages, I realized I entered a time capsule that memorializes the Arab destruction of Jerusalem’s ancient Jewish Quarter in 1948.

Not only is it a dramatic firsthand account of the fall of the Jewish Quarter in 1948, but it documents the Arab Legion’s scorched-earth tactics that razed and burned to the ground every structure there, including all its synagogues and yeshivahs. The Arabs expelled all of the city’s residents, mainly defenseless, old Orthodox Jews. They were given about an hour to vacate homes that most extended families had lived in for centuries.

And there never has been a reckoning by any international body about the Arab Legion’s barbaric actions after it captured the Quarter.

To get his shots in May 1948, Phillips posed undercover in Jerusalem as a British officer in the Arab Legion. He also smuggled out his photos to avoid Arab censors who were eager to keep the sacking of the Jewish Quarter secret.

Phillips faced personal danger to do the shoot. He entered the Middle East undercover and wore the uniform of the Arab Legion, a British-created Arab army led by British officers, many of whom stayed on with their units to fight the Jews. “Mistaking me for a British officer, the Arab populace left me alone,” he wrote.

He was appalled about the Arab censorship. “Aware that the sack of the Jewish Quarter would shock the western world, Arab authorities across the Middle East tried to prevent the news from leaking out. Jerusalem could not be mentioned under any circumstances,” he wrote.

“I knew my pictures of the agony of the Jewish Quarter would end up in a censor’s wastepaper basket. I did not want this to happen and decided to smuggle them out of the Middle East.”

I found a copy of the book online. The photographs in the book are stunning.

Here is the Hurva synagogue in ruins.

A view of the destruction of the Jewish Quarter from what is now the Kotel plaza, with the Porat Yosef synagogue and yeshiva in the center.

Jews gathering for deportation in front of the destroyed Tiferet Israel synagogue.

More photos of Jews as they rush to leave - they had one hour to gather their belongings.

Here are Arabs looting the remains - including taking the Torah covers from a Sephardic synagogue, and a woman with a box of matzohs on her head.

This is what ethnic cleansing looks like.

Phillips returned in 1976 and interviewed dozens of Jews who had lived or fought in the final battle for the Old City in 1948.

Know How to Answer, part 19: "Palestine is not viable without contiguity or Jerusalem"

Latest in the series...

Six years ago I gave a lecture at Yeshiva University on how to answer anti-Israel arguments. Since the lecture was over an hour and twenty minutes, I decided to break it up into 20 sections, one each to answer one popular anti-Israel argument.

Here is part 19.

We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.

Where on Earth could this be?

Here is a photo of a pretty nice looking school. Do you know where it is?

It is in Ras al-Amud, an Arab neighborhood of Jerusalem, and it is one of the many Arab schools that Israel is spending millions building and upgrading.

From Israel21c:

When the 2011-2012 school year began in the Arab neighborhoods of East Jerusalem, millions of shekels in sparkling new or renewed classrooms, computers and sports facilities greeted 42,153 students and their teachers.

Many of the 59 public schools approved and budgeted under the Jerusalem Education Authority of the Ministry of Education have been neglected, undersupplied or overcrowded for decades. Since taking office in November 2008, Mayor Nir Barkat has been implementing improvements to get these facilities on par with schools in the western sector of the city, says Stephan Miller, advisor to Jerusalem's mayor.

"The mayor and municipal professionals work regularly with members of the Arab neighborhoods of Jerusalem through the leadership of the community centers as well as organized groups of residents such as the Mayor's Forum of Eastern Jerusalem Principals and the Mayor's Forum for Welfare in Eastern Jerusalem," Miller tells ISRAEL21c.

"The completion of the Mayor's plan will lead to a significant change in education in eastern Jerusalem."

New schools, including approximately 200 classrooms, have been built in the eastern part of the city. The municipality is currently investing the unprecedented sum of NIS 300 million (about $69 million) in the planning and construction of 285 additional new classrooms for Arab schoolchildren.

This year alone, 42 new classrooms will be opened in new buildings, 18 at the start of the year and the remainder in coming months. Six additional kindergarten classrooms were completed in time for September, including one for special education. In addition, more than 40 public school classrooms were renovated and adapted to pupils' needs, with emphasis on the Shoafat refugee area in northeast Jerusalem.

The municipality also built new sports facilities in south central Beit Tzafafa and in Isawiya in the northeast.

Another NIS 750,000 (more than $170,000) per year has been approved for programs to advance gifted and outstanding pupils, strengthen girls' education and reduce school violence. An additional NIS 1.5 million is newly designated for the public schools' organizational expenditures.

The municipality and the Education Ministry have shared costs for these initiatives, says Miller, and further upgrades are still to come.

"As you can imagine, from vision to construction takes time, and the mayor has moved swiftly since taking office to fast-track these plans," says Miller, "which is why they are ready so early in his first term."

New classrooms wouldn't be as valuable without updated equipment inside them. So with the assistance of Israeli branches of companies such as Ernst & Young and Intel, the municipality rang in the new school year by distributing 1,720 mobile and desktop computers to schools, kindergartens and teachers in eastern Jerusalem.

An additional 350 new donated computers were given to schoolchildren to take home.

There was more good news for teachers: Seven classrooms in six schools in the eastern part of the city were converted into technologically sophisticated learning centers with the installation of interactive whiteboards, which can display educational software, web sites, past lessons and other features. Teachers and principals alike have been receiving computer training courses to maximize their use of these new tools.

"We are committed to investing in eastern Jerusalem and reducing the gaps, which are the result of years of neglect," said Barkat upon announcing the improvements at the start of September. "We cannot countenance a situation in which Jerusalem pupils have no classrooms, roads or basic infrastructures. These investments will lead to an increase in residents' quality of life."

If you want to have fun, ask people who claim to be "pro-Palestinian" if they support Israel improving Arab schools in Jerusalem.

By the way, it is possible that the school pictured above is the same one where, before construction, archaeologists found a handle with the name "Menachem" inscribed on it in Hebrew.

(h/t Cheryl)