Prominent Jews will explain how anti-Zionism is the new antisemitism at Congress today (live video at 11 AM EDT)

Today, the US House of Representatives Committee on Foreign Affairs, Subcommittee on Global Health, Global Human Rights, and International Organizations will hold hearings on "Responding to Anti-Semitism and Anti-Israel Bias in the UN, Palestinian Authority, and NGO Community."

Prominent leaders in the field of antisemitism and anti-Zionism will be speaking. Most of their testimonies have been published ahead of time. Here are some highlights.

Natan Sharansky, the famous Soviet dissident, describes how the Soviet Union's pretense of using "anti-Zionism" as a proxy for antisemitism has now been widely adopted by much of the world:

In the Soviet Union, where I grew up,...each time when official Soviet propaganda starts a new round of attacks on Israel, every Jew, whether he knows what Zionism means or not, knows that he has a problem. They are all treated as not loyal to the Soviet Union, but loyal to Zionist Israel. Attacks on the Jews have always been a convenient platform for attacks on Israel and vice versa. Assuming that all this is a direct result of the dictatorial regime of the Soviet Union, which needs a convenient scapegoat for accusations, an external and internal enemy, and a more convenient scapegoat than the Jews and Israel cannot be imagined. Therefore, when in 1975 the Soviet Union initiated a resolution that Zionism is racism, it was adopted only thanks to the communist bloc. The Free World voted against it. 

I thought that in the free world, this would not happen. 

It was all the more surprising when at the beginning of 2000 at the first U.N. conference against global racism in Durban - the only result of this conference was the accusation of Israel as an apartheid state. Soon the cartoons published in the international press against Israel surprisingly began to resemble those in the Soviet and Nazi press against the Jews. Israel, which fights against terrorist attacks daily in defense of itself, has been declared to be fighting the Palestinians, as the Nazis fought the Jews, and Palestinian refugee camps were compared to Auschwitz. All this had nothing to do with constructive criticism of the policies of Israel, which deserved this or that criticism like any other democratic country. It was then, 20 years ago, that I proposed my three-D test to distinguish justified criticism of Israel from new antisemitism.

Over the 20 years, I have visited about 100 American campuses, where I have clearly seen how the new antisemitism is creating a very difficult environment for Jewish students who consider themselves Zionists. There is much evidence of how the growing attacks on the Jews are encouraged, developed and reinforced by the attacks on Israel, like colonial white racism. Much like in Soviet times, antisemitic attacks on Israel are weakening the sense of security of Jewish students at American universities. And attacks on Jews are often accompanied by anti-Israeli slogans. It is impossible today to analyze the growth of antisemitism without seeing that these phenomena are very closely linked. 

That is why there must be one explanation linking the demonization of the Jews, the double standard towards the Jews, the denial of the Jews as a nation with the demonization of the State of Israel, the double standard towards the State of Israel and the denial of Israel's right to exist. 

There can be no success in the fight against antisemitism if we do not fight it on all fronts. Therefore, the exact definition of antisemitism is crucial. It is very important that the US administration adheres to this definition of antisemitism in its policy.

Prof. Eugene Kontorovich shows why the IHRA Working Definition is important and how the "Nexus Document" that was welcomed in the Administration's strategy plan against antisemitism is an effort to whitewash modern antisemitism:

Not surprisingly, the IHRA definition is opposed by those who wish to engage in precisely the kind of anti-Israel double standards that it warns of. In an effort to confound or counteract the legitimacy and clarity of the IHRA working definition, a few other groups have offered definitions of antisemitism that greatly minimize the role of Israel-focused antisemitism. One such effort is the Nexus Document, a project hosted by Bard University. The Nexus definition differs from IHRA primarily in its treatment of Israel-focused conduct. Nexus does not regard as presumptively antisemitic either the questioning the basic legitimacy of Israel’s existence or the application of double standards to Israel.  According to Nexus, such views may have legitimate grounds. 

Unlike IHRA’s adoption by a wide range of countries (including many states that are often sharply critical of Israel), not one single country has adopted the Nexus Declaration. The IHRA definition was developed by an international group of scholars not known for their views on Israel or their politics one way or another. The Nexus Advisory Board, by contrast, is overwhelmingly left-wing and includes people, like the head of J-Street, who can only be described as professionals in the field of Israel bashing. Members of Nexus’s advisory board have described Israel as “fascist,” denounced it as an “apartheid state,” and justified those who say it should have never existed. 

While IHRA has become the global benchmark, the narrow Nexus definition has languished in total obscurity—that is, until the White House suddenly announced its “welcome and appreciation” of the Nexus Document last month, while still “embracing” IHRA.  Nexus leaped from the discussions of like-minded academics straight into a White House policy document. While the IHRA definition remains the only one officially used by the government, the White House’s National Strategy harms efforts to respond to antisemitism by referring to two different, and fundamentally contradictory, definitions 

...The obsessive focus on the supposed wrongs of this one tiny group has resurfaced across an amazing array of cultures and epochs. From the Romans to the Crusades. From the Reformation to the Inquisition. From National to International Socialism. The justifications change, the target remains same. Then after two thousand years, the Jewish people reconstituted their nation—and immediately found it the subject of unparalleled international defamation and libel—accompanied by ongoing efforts at physical elimination. Jews have been hated sometimes as adherents of a faith, sometimes as members of a people. Now the extraordinary enmity is aimed at their State. The coin lands on the same side on every toss. The segue from earlier modes of antisemitism to “anti-Zionism” is a remarkable coincidence.

...The accusations leveled against Israel often resemble those made by antisemites throughout history. Instead of the Jews being accused of killing Gentile children,  Israel is accused of deliberately killing Palestinian children;  instead of Jews being accused of causing plague among Gentiles, Israel is accused of causing disease among Palestinians. And the accusation of “apartheid” is a modern blood libel—an absurd “Big Lie,” but inciteful in ways that cannot be rectified by mere refutation. Just as the classic blood libel resonated with the theological preoccupations of earlier ages, today’s claims resonate with the ethnic justice concerns of our times.

Yair Rosenberg of The Atlantic ties all forms of antisemitism, from Left to Right, to conspiracy theory:

For almost as long as there have been Jewish people, there has been anti-Jewish prejudice. This bigotry predates the United States of America and the modern state of Israel. It is older than capitalism and communism, Republicans and Democrats, progressives and conservatives. And it precedes Christianity and Islam. Because of this, while antisemitism is expressed by these communities, it cannot be caused by them. The source is something much more fundamental. 

Consider recent antisemitic incidents that on the surface seem to have little connection to each other. In 2018, a white supremacist massacred 11 congregants in Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life synagogue. In 2019, assailants tied to the Black Hebrew Israelite movement shot up a kosher supermarket in Jersey City, killing three. And in 2022, an Islamic extremist held an entire congregation hostage in Colleyville, Texas, for much of the Jewish Sabbath. 

To take another odd example: Both the supreme leader of Iran’s Islamic theocracy and Robert Bowers, the Pittsburgh shooter who hated Muslims, posted memes on social media alleging Zionist control of American politics. During the 2016 presidential race, supporters at campaign events for both Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders were captured on tape claiming that “Zionists” run America’s finances.

What unites all of these seemingly disparate antisemitic actors? Not their identity or background, but their adherence to a conspiracy of Jewish control. The Pittsburgh white supremacist believed that Jews were responsible for flooding the country with the brown people he hated, as part of the so-called “great replacement” of the white race. One of the Black Hebrew Israelite sympathizers in Jersey City wrote on social media about how Jews controlled the government. And the British Islamic extremist who targeted the Texas synagogue did so because he thought American rabbis held sway over the U.S. authorities and could free someone from prison. 

...Because people have long been conditioned to conceive of Jews in an underhanded fashion, it doesn’t take much to update the ancient conspiracy theory to persuade contemporary audiences. And thanks to centuries of material blaming the world’s problems on its Jews, conspiracy theorists seeking a scapegoat for their sorrows inevitably discover that the invisible hand of their oppressor belongs to an invisible Jew.

Itamar Marcus of Palestinian Media Watch explains how antisemitism forms the core of Palestinian Authority ideology:

PA Antisemitism is not a collection of disconnected hate-speech; it is a systematically disseminated ideology that is by now deeply ingrained in the Palestinian national and political identity. It serves as a primary source of loathing towards Jews and Israelis and is a significant motivator for Palestinian terror. 

The PA’s Political Antisemitism asserts the following:

1. Jews are inherently evil, endangering not only Palestinians but all of humanity. 

2. Accordingly, Jews themselves are responsible for the antisemitism and hatred they have faced throughout history. 

3. The PA turns this demonization of Jews into its political ideology: the Western countries were anxious to get rid of the Jews and solve their "Jewish problem,” so they initiated the establishment of a Jewish state. The Jews would never have come to Palestine on their own because the Jews have no history in the land. Israel is defined as an illegitimate result of "settler-colonialism" with no right to exist. 

This ideology is disseminated by PA leaders, Mahmoud Abbas appointees, and through the structures controlled by the PA.

Other speakers include Hillel Neuer from UN Watch, Yona Schiffmiller from NGO Monitor, and the ADL's Sharon Nazarian, all of whom show how anti-Israel bigotry is a proxy for anti-Jewish bigotry. 

The webcast can be seen here at 11:00 AM EDT.

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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!

 

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11/25 Links Pt1: Phillips: The humbug of the West over murdered Israelis; New US Palestinian affairs representative bodes ill for Israel; Kanye West takes white nationalist Nick Fuentes to dinner with Trump

From Ian:

Melanie Phillips: The humbug of the West over murdered Israelis

To Western liberals, the suffering of Israeli victims at the hands of the Palestinian Arabs is all but invisible. So too is the suffering of Palestinians under their own leaders.

Western liberals appear not to see that Palestinian leaders jail, torture and kill their own people. They don’t see Palestinian attacks on Christians or Druze. They don’t see Hamas throwing gays off roofs to their deaths.

Last month, Ahmad Abu Marhia, a gay 25-year-old Palestinian Arab living under asylum in Israel in fear for his life at the hands of his family and residents of his village, was abducted and beheaded in Hebron.

The liberal media was mostly silent. There were no demonstrations on American campuses. U.S. Ambassador to Israel Thomas Nides tweeted his horror at the murder but conspicuously failed to say the victim had fled his Palestinian village for sanctuary in Israel because he was gay.

Western liberals have fixed in their heads the falsehood that Palestinians are the oppressed victims of Israel and therefore can do no wrong. In parallel, these liberals have blanked Israel out of their moral universe, so that Israelis don’t have the same right to exist as Western liberals do themselves.

How can we explain this astounding and shocking mindset?

The history of the Jewish people tells us that when cultures are beset by terrifying forces apparently beyond anyone’s control, Jews are identified as the cause. Pinning the blame on the Jews is how the simple-minded have tried to make sense of incomprehensible threats for generations.

But there’s always a catalyst: The people who actually point the finger at the Jews and incite the mob against them. In the Middle Ages, it was the Church. In the last century, it was Hitler. Today, it’s the Palestinian Arabs.

The common factor is their psychotic demonization of the Jewish people. Yet there is an even more devastating connection.

War was waged against the Nazis to defend the free world, which was duly saved from invasion, enslavement and tyranny. The war was not waged, however, to save the Jews. Indeed, the West shut its eyes to the extermination of the Jews, of which Western leaders were made well aware at the time.

Much of the West regarded Hitler as a monstrous aberration who managed to brainwash the Germans into supporting his psychotic ravings. But in the Middle East, the Palestinian Arabs were Hitler’s legion. They were led by the Mufti of Jerusalem, Haj Amin al-Husseini, who pledged to exterminate every Jew in the Middle East if Hitler won the war.

JPost Editorial: West Bank lawlessness is a threat to Israelis and Palestinians alike

The PA is the recipient of huge largesse internationally. Probably per capita, the West Bank has received more international financial support than any other place in the world over the last decades.

This has included European Union support for Palestinian police institutions and US support for the Palestinian Security Forces.

However, despite almost two decades of all this support for law and order and institutions, basic things like treating a victim of a car accident and not letting a body be kidnapped from a hospital elude their security forces.

This kind of lawless criminal behavior is not an aberration. Recently, Israel and the PA have been forced to take on the gunmen of the rogue Lions’ Den group in Nablus.

This is in addition to the daily raids in the West Bank under Operation Breaking the Wave that the IDF undertakes.

It was one of these raids that led to the death of Shireen Abu Akleh in a gun battle between Israeli forces and Palestinian terrorists – that has resulted in international condemnation of Israel and even an FBI investigation of Israel’s actions.

The lawlessness, therefore, is not just a threat to human life and a violation of basic rights of human dignity, such as being treated in a hospital; it is also responsible for incidents that are of international importance to Israel.

The lawlessness could also represent an emerging threat to Israel and the Palestinians. This is because it appears there is a flood of illegal firearms in the West Bank.

The images of Palestinians killed in recent gun battles with Israeli forces has illustrated that many of the Palestinians have access to an arsenal of M-16s and other types of arms.

The men who use these weapons are now turning them on the PA and seem to be taking over more areas in the West Bank, exerting more influence.

With the leadership of the PA aging and increasingly out of touch with average people, the institutions decaying and lawlessness spreading, it’s imperative for all those who care about peace and stability to focus on reducing the role that lawless gangs, armed men, militants and terrorists are playing in the West Bank.

Israeli authorities coordinate with the Palestinians on a variety of issues, as the return of Ferro exemplifies.

However, both sides, as well as the US, EU and other international players, need to take a realistic assessment of how we can improve the situation.

Ruthie Blum: New US Palestinian affairs representative bodes ill for Israel

The promotion this week of Hady Amr, who’s been serving as US deputy assistant secretary of state for Israeli and Palestinian affairs since President Joe Biden’s inauguration nearly two years ago, is the latest example of Washington’s disastrous Mideast policies. But at least the heretofore non-existent role that was concocted for the Hamas and Muslim Brotherhood sympathizer more accurately describes his true leanings, as well as those of his bosses at Foggy Bottom.

The only thing that this already obvious and therefore unnecessary transparency required – other than an undoubtedly handsome pay hike for the proud author of the Brookings Institution’s 2004 report, “The Need to Communicate: How to Improve US Public Diplomacy with the Islamic World”– was the dropping of “Israeli” and addition of “special representative” to his title.

It’s not a shabby career elevation for the founding director of Brookings’ Doha Center in Qatar, among whose additional works for the dubious think tank include “The Opportunity of the Obama Era: How Civil Society Can Help Bridge Divides between the United States and a Diverse Muslim World.”

NOR DID the timing of the announcement to Congress on Tuesday about Amr’s newfound position seem to cause Secretary of State Antony Blinken the slightest bit of embarrassment, despite virtually coinciding with a vile act of Palestinian aggression in Jenin against Israel’s Druze community. It also preceded by less than 24 hours a double bombing in the Jewish state’s capital, which left 16-year-old Aryeh Shechopek dead and some 20 other innocents wounded.

About the latter, Blinken declared in a statement on Wednesday: “The United States stands resolutely with the people of Israel in the face of the terrorist attacks that occurred this morning in Jerusalem. We express our condolences to the family of the deceased and wish all victims a speedy recovery. We remain in close contact with our Israeli partners and reiterate that our commitment to Israel’s security remains ironclad.”

He failed to mention the previous day’s murder of 18-year-old Tiran Fero from the town of Daliat al-Carmel in the Haifa district. The Israeli-Druze car accident victim was being treated for multiple injuries at the Ibn Sina Hospital in the Palestinian Authority-controlled city of Jenin, the area of the crash, when gun-wielding terrorists stormed into his room, threatened the relatives at his bedside, pulled the plug on his ventilator and snatched him from the premises.

Caroline Glick: The face of the Palestinian war of succession

Rather than kill each other, Palestinian terrorists seek to build their power and influence by murdering Jews. The more Jews the various factions murder, the more powerful they become. This conceptual model explains both the expanded involvement of the P.A. directly in attacks, and the rise overall in attacks. It also explains why Iran has decided to get involved directly in Palestinian attacks. Iran’s regime wants its proxies to replace Abbas, and by getting involved in directing their attacks, Iran increases its chance of taking over. Indeed, the nature of the Palestinian power struggle is tailor-made for the mullahs.

Since all the Palestinian factions share the same enthusiasm for killing Israeli Jews, none of them has an ideological problem with accepting Iranian money or guidance for the operations. If Iran wants to take over the Palestinian theater, now is the time to act. So it is.

These circumstances are rife with strategic implications for Israel’s war planners. But specifically with regards to the Palestinians, they expose the utter futility of the Israeli left’s hopes of disengaging from the Palestinians by among other things, withdrawing from Judea and Samaria along the lines set out by the Oslo peace process and supported by the Biden administration.

Israel cannot stand back and watch the Palestinians kill each other because that is not what they are doing now, and it is unlikely that that is what they will be doing after Abbas dies. Instead, we are likely to see more of what they are doing now, and worse. After Abbas passes away, Palestinian factions, including the P.A., will continue to compete for power and turf by killing Israelis, wherever they are.

Given this reality, the only way for Israel to defend itself in the short and long run is by ending the conceit that the P.A. is a legitimate governing body and carrying out a military operation that will dismantle the P.A. militias along with the rest of the terror groups operating in Judea and Samaria. For a short while, Israel may need to take on functions of civil governance in the Palestinian population centers. But once it asserts its full security control over the areas, will be able to delegate those powers to local leaders.

In light of the Biden administration’s obsessive support for the Palestinian Authority, and its refusal to acknowledge either the P.A.’s central role in cultivating hatred of Israel and Jews as the central organizing principle of Palestinian society, or the true nature of the power struggle already going on among the Palestinian terror groups, such an Israeli move can be expected to provoke an angry response from Washington.

But Wednesday’s attacks in Jerusalem are a clear indication that Israel’s incoming government will have no choice but to order such an operation sooner rather than later. To this end, upon assuming power, the incoming Netanyahu government will have to embark on a two-pronged strategy. It must prepare contingency plans for taking over the Palestinian population centers by force. And to the extent possible, it must prepare the ground diplomatically for the inevitable.

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11/04 Links Pt1: Ruthie Blum: Israel’s right to sideline the Left; No Call to Bibi: Biden Has Yet to Congratulate Newly Elected Israeli Leader; Teenage Israeli girl shot in the head in Kiryat Arba

From Ian:

Ruthie Blum: Israel’s right to sideline the Left

The emerging landslide victory for the camp headed by Israeli opposition leader Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu is causing more than the average stir. Though there’s nothing unusual about a losing side feeling disappointed by an unwanted result at the ballot box, the outcome of Tuesday’s Knesset elections – the fifth round in three-and-a-half years – is generating a level of disgruntlement not seen in the country since 1977.

That was the year when Menachem Begin, founder of the Likud Party now chaired by Netanyahu, became premier. The upheaval ended three decades of Labor Party dominance.

Panic on the Left was palpable and shrill, with detractors calling him a terrorist, likening him to Mussolini and bemoaning Israel’s inevitable downfall at his hands. Not only was the frenzy unwarranted but in retrospect, it was laughable.

Today’s equally undue apoplexy surrounds two phenomena: Netanyahu’s smashing comeback, which his foes had been doing everything to quash, and the meteoric rise to mega-popularity of Otzma Yehudit MK Itamar Ben-Gvir.

At Netanyahu’s behest prior to the election, Ben-Gvir and Religious Zionist MK Bezalel Smotrich merged their factions so as to prevent the possibility of split and wasted ballots. The move turned out to be a brilliant one, as together they garnered a large number of seats.

The haredi parties Shas and United Torah Judaism also increased their mandates. The upshot is a strong majority for the Right with Netanyahu at the helm. In other words, for the first time in its history, Israel will have an exclusively nationalist and religious governing coalition.

Jonathan Tobin: The panic in the US surrounding Israel’s next government is about politics, not values

As far as many American Jews are concerned, this time the Israelis have gone too far. After more than four decades of tolerating, with decreasing patience and growing disdain, Israeli governments that were led by the Likud Party, the results of this week’s Knesset election go beyond the pale for a lot of liberals.

Their angst is not so much focused on the return to power of Benjamin Netanyahu for his third stint as the Jewish state’s prime minister, even though he is widely viewed by many Jewish Democrats as the moral equivalent of a red-state Republican. The panic about the election results is caused by the fact that the Religious Zionist Party and its leaders, Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben-Gvir, will play a leading role in the next governing coalition. The party won 14 seats, making it the third largest in the Knesset and an indispensable part of the majority that Netanyahu is about to assemble.

The prospect of Smotrich, and especially Ben-Gvir, sitting in Netanyahu’s Cabinet has not just set off a bout of pearl-clutching on the part of liberal Jewish groups. It’s also led to the sort of ominous rhetoric describing a crack-up of the relationship between American and Israeli Jews that goes beyond the usual rumblings about the growing distance between the two communities.

There are legitimate questions to be posed about Smotrich and Ben-Gvir. Time will tell whether they are up to the challenge of their new responsibilities and act in a manner that helps, rather than hurts, Netanyahu’s efforts to consolidate support for his government at home and abroad. But what no one seems to be considering is whether the rush to judgment about them says more about Diaspora Jewry’s obsessions than it does about the embrace of nationalist and religious parties by Israel’s voters.

The pair are the embodiment of everything that most American Jews don’t like about the Jewish state. Their unapologetic nationalism and perceived hostility to Arabs, gays and non-Orthodox Judaism are anathema to liberal Americans.

But the interesting thing about the statements coming out of groups like the Anti-Defamation League, the American Jewish Committee and more unabashedly leftist organizations is the way they highlight their worries about the new Israeli government by pointing to the supposed threat that the Religious Zionist Party poses to Israeli democracy.

The Return of Bibi Netanyahu

In Israel, just as in the U.S., the Right typically tends to perform better when the public votes on issues pertaining to the economy and, above everything else, crime, public safety, and national security. Israel has generally been in a shakier place, from a public safety perspective, ever since the Jewish state's last full-scale war with Gaza-based Hamas in May 2021. There have been a number of terrorist attacks and shootings, not merely in Judea and Samaria but even in the liberal/secular heart of Israel, Tel Aviv, that have shocked the national conscience. Israeli-Arab violence, and even the occasional vandalism of synagogues, has at times escalated in mixed Jewish/Arab cities. The Israel Defense Forces has also been forced to step up its counterterrorism operations to thwart the now-ascendant jihad waged by the "Lions' Den" militant group, which is based in Nablus.

At the same time, the Islamic Republic of Iran, which is still dealing with the domestic fallout of its state-sponsored murder of protester Mahsa Amini, inches ever closer to the bomb. Iran poses a significant threat to the West and to the U.S., but it poses an existential threat to Israel. In fact, it is, at this time, Israel's only true existential threat. And there is no one Israelis trust more to handle the Iran portfolio than Netanyahu, who gave a tremendous speech to the U.S. Congress in March 2015 excoriating the then-ongoing Iran nuclear deal negotiations, oversaw the daredevil Mossad operation to expose and airlift out Iran's nuclear secrets a few years later, and who helped achieve the 2020 Abraham Accords peace with the U.A.E., Bahrain, and Morocco, which is best understood as an anti-Iran regional containment coalition.

Put simply, Israelis finally sobered up and (correctly) realized that Netanyahu is the best person to steward the Jewish state on issues pertaining to law and order, public safety, national security, and even Israel's international diplomacy. Israelis should be applauded for this decision. The so-called international community will undoubtedly blanch at the inclusion of Smotrich and Ben-Gvir in Netanyahu's governing coalition, but, frankly: Who the hell cares? The Israeli people, and only the Israeli people, can deem what is best for them and their country. The Biden administration, and other Western actors, should respect their judgment.

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10/29 Links: Biden Admin Probed Over ‘Illegal Efforts to Undermine Israeli Sovereignty Over Jerusalem’; What the Kanye West scandal can teach the UN

From Ian:

Biden Admin Probed Over ‘Illegal Efforts to Undermine Israeli Sovereignty Over Jerusalem’

A legal advocacy group says the Biden administration is violating U.S. law by funneling more than half-a-billion dollars to the Palestinian government and is demanding the administration release a slew of internal documents that the group believes will reveal an illegal effort "to undermine Israeli sovereignty over Jerusalem," according to a copy of the Freedom of Information Act request provided to the Washington Free Beacon.

America First Legal, a group of conservative lawyers and activists, hit the State Department this week with a FOIA request that instructs it to furnish a slew of internal documents about U.S. funding for the Palestinian Authority, which was frozen under former president Donald Trump but resumed when President Joe Biden took office.

The legal group suspects that a portion of this taxpayer aid is being used to support Palestinian-led projects in Jerusalem that could undermine Israel’s control of its capital city. The Trump administration recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s undivided capital, but the Biden administration, while formally upholding the policy, has moved to open a Palestinian Affairs unit in the city, fueling concerns that the consulate is working with the Palestinian government to erode Israel’s sovereignty over Jerusalem.

The Biden administration’s funding may also violate a bipartisan U.S. law that prevents taxpayer funds from reaching the Palestinian government until it ends a terrorist payment program known as "pay-to-slay," in which imprisoned militants and their families receive stipends. The Free Beacon reported earlier this month on a non-public State Department report to Congress that determined the Palestinian government is still paying terrorists, even as U.S. aid dollars flow.

"Make no mistake—the purpose here, contrary to U.S. law, is creating facts on the ground to undermine Israel’s borders and sovereignty and to reverse the United States’ recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital city," Reed D. Rubinstein, America First Legal’s senior counselor and director of oversight, said in a statement. "The Biden administration is pumping hundreds of millions in U.S. taxpayer dollars into ‘projects’ that directly benefit both the corrupt Palestinian Authority and the terrorist Hamas dictatorship."

The organization’s FOIA centers on a State Department fact sheet from March that outlined projects run by the United States’ Palestinian Affairs Unit, which was opened to increase diplomacy with the Palestinian government. The State Department says this office is responsible for partnering "with Palestinian and American organizations to support projects in Jerusalem, the West Bank, and Gaza [Strip] that increase exchange between our two peoples and advance shared goals on topics such as education, entrepreneurship, environmental protection, English language learning, science and technology, art and culture, gender equality, human rights, and democracy, among others."

These programs also include "university linkage projects connecting American and Palestinian universities directly for exchange and collaboration for students and faculty," according to the State Department.

US Democrats Oppose Israel’s Admission to Visa Waiver Program

A group of 20 Democratic members of Congress called on the Biden administration this week to oppose Israel’s membership in the US Visa Waiver Program, Haaretz reported Friday.

The program would waive the current onerous requirements faced by Israelis when they want to visit the United States and would instead automatically authorize 90-day visits for business or tourism purposes.

But Representative Don Beyer sent a letter Thursday – signed together with 19 other Democrats – telling Secretary of State Antony Blinken, “It is clear that Israel cannot and should not be admitted into the visa waiver program under the status quo.”

Israel has been negotiating with the United States over this issue for more than a year.

Israel Among Candidates Being ‘Considered’ for US Visa-Waiver Status
Last month Knesset lawmakers voted to approve the first reading of a bill that would allow Israel to join the program. Under the bill, sponsored by the Justice Ministry, passenger data gathered by airlines during the reservation process are coded into a “passenger name record” (PNR) which would then be transferred to a national center to be set up at the Israel Tax Authority – and is a condition set by the US for Israel’s entry into the visa waiver program.

Last month Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary for Legislative Affairs Alice Lugo said Israel “does not currently meet all [program] designation requirements, including extending reciprocal visa-free travel privileges to all US citizens and nationals.”

Lugo was referring to Israeli security personnel at Ben Gurion International Airport who pay close attention to Palestinian Authority Arabs who hold US citizenship and others, particularly so-called “peace activists” and supporters of the Boycott, Divest and Sanctions (BDS) campaign against Israel.

Ben Cohen: What the Kanye West scandal can teach the UN

The Israeli Ambassador to the U.N. Gilad Erdan offered a telling quip during a debate last week at the international body concerning the latest report of its Commission of Inquiry into Israel and its apparently irredeemable offenses against international law. (The fact that the commission’s formal name is “The United Nations Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and in Israel” itself suggests that its conclusions are hardly likely to be favorable, let alone neutral, towards the Jewish state.)

Referencing the viscerally anti-Zionist and often anti-Semitic utterances of the commission’s members—the canard the Israel is an “apartheid” state, the assertion that Israel shouldn’t be permitted to participate in the U.N. system—Erdan told the assembled delegates that “maybe the U.N. could learn from Adidas when it comes to hiring blatant anti-Semites!”

That, of course, was a reference to the decision of the sportswear company to sever ties with Kanye (“Ye”) West over the rappers’ revolting anti-Semitic comments. But Erdan didn’t have to cite Adidas alone; Foot Locker, Gap, Balenciaga, Def Jam and a host of other companies in the music, sports and fashion spaces have all cut links with West because of his hateful outbursts, while an unauthorized visit to the headquarters of Skechers in Los Angeles last Thursday resulted in him being escorted out of the building. “We condemn his recent divisive remarks and do not tolerate anti-Semitism or any other form of hate speech,” declared a gratifyingly clear statement from the footwear manufacturer, adding for good measure that “we again stress that West showed up unannounced and uninvited.”

In the space of a fortnight, West’s image has shifted from that of a hip-hop artist and fashion mogul with eccentric, often unpalatable opinions to an out-and-out racist and bigot who dresses models in “White Lives Matter” shirts, ostentatiously celebrates his violently anti-Semitic views and flirts with neo-Nazi and white supremacist ideology. In the process, West has lost all of the sponsorships mentioned above and many more on top, at one point piteously crying out that he had netted a loss of $2 billion in one day. One can only hope that particular claim is true.

The contrast between the speed with which the private sector moved to condemn West’s anti-Semitism and the stubborn persistence of outdated, unhelpful and anti-Semitic notions about Israel at the U.N. is frankly painful to observe. And it compels us to ask why it is that established multinational companies with thousands of employees are nonetheless nimble enough to call out anti-Semitism in a timely manner, while the governments gathered at the U.N. building in Manhattan either enthusiastically endorse or turn a wearily blind eye towards that body’s long-established, hard-wired hostility towards the world’s only Jewish state.

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10/27 Links Pt1: How Americans, Europeans Embolden Palestinian Terrorism; Republicans must defund the UN and stop appeasement of Iran; Russian official: Chabad Lubavitch is a neo-pagan cult

From Ian:

Bassam Tawil: How Americans, Europeans Embolden Palestinian Terrorism

Instead of assuming its responsibility for halting terrorist attacks from areas under its control, the Palestinians continue to violate the agreements they signed with Israel.

In the Gaza Strip, the Palestinian Authority did not take real measures to stop Hamas from building a massive terrorism infrastructure. Hamas later used its weapons arsenal not only to attack Israel, but also to overthrow the PA regime and seize full control of the Gaza Strip.

The same scenario is now being repeated in the West Bank, specifically in areas controlled by Mahmoud Abbas's security forces.

This is the twisted logic of the Palestinian leadership: Instead of denouncing the terrorists for targeting Israelis, as they have officially and repeatedly committed to doing, they lash out at Israel for defending itself against the current wave of terrorism.

When a senior Palestinian official such as Habbash says that the terrorists are entitled to carry out "resistance" attacks, he is actually telling them to continue targeting Israelis. Such statements are not only a violation of the agreements the Palestinians signed with Israel, but also incitement to launch more terrorist attacks against Israelis.

The Palestinian leadership, in a policy is known as "pay-for-slay," already provides monthly stipends to Palestinian terrorists..... The families of the Nablus terrorists will also presumably benefit from these payments.

The Palestinian leadership's endorsement and glorification of terrorism comes as no surprise. What is surprising – and intensely disturbing – is that those foreign governments that are providing financial and political aid to the Palestinian Authority, especially the Americans and the Europeans, are not calling out Mahmoud Abbas and the Palestinian leadership for their public support of terrorism and their ongoing breach of the agreements they voluntarily signed with Israel.

"We will not resort to weapons, we will not resort to violence," Abbas declared in his last speech before the United Nations General Assembly, "we will not resort to terrorism, we will fight terrorism." His words were directed to the international community, not to his own people.

The silence of the Americans and Europeans toward the actions and rhetoric of the Palestinian leaders is tantamount to a green light to the Lions' Den and other terrorists to continue their terrorist attacks.

If the Biden administration and the Europeans believe that Abbas or any other Palestinian leader is going to stop a terrorist from murdering Jews, they are engaging in staggering self-deception.

Jonathan Tobin: Republicans must defund the UN and stop appeasement of Iran

While the U.N. as a whole is an ongoing disgrace, last week’s report of the HRC’s Commission of Inquiry on Israel has highlighted the issue of the world body’s anti-Semitism. The HRC can’t be reformed. The only proper response is to do everything possible to shut it down and to punish those of its officials who are responsible for its trafficking in blatant Jew-hatred and its efforts to isolate and destroy the one Jewish state on the planet.

While some find it hard to work up much indignation against the U.N., or regard efforts to rein it as tilting against windmills, the Commission of Inquiry’s effort to aid the destruction of Israel illustrates how dangerous it can be. Indeed, documents like this report are useful tools for the spread of anti-Semitism via the BDS movement and to those wishing to aid the likes of Iran and its terrorist allies, which seek Israel’s extinction. While the administration opposed the Commission’s report, it isn’t prepared to hold those responsible for this outrage by withdrawing from or defunding the HRC.

It’s up to Republicans to pass legislation defunding the HRC and the Commission of Inquiry. More than that, the House, with the backing of Senate Republicans, must use its leverage over the funding of the State Department to ensure that the administration doesn’t find a way to evade restrictions in this realm.

That will require a degree of intestinal fortitude that past GOP congressional leaders have lacked. But what must be understood about this is that by refusing to use its fiscal power, the DC establishment has stood by while this administration uses taxpayer dollars to enable the U.N. to spread anti-Semitism.

If the GOP is serious about stopping Biden’s toxic policies, it can’t waste precious time on rhetorical exercises. 2023 must be the year this comes to an end.

continues a longstanding pattern of unfairly singling out Israel and does nothing to establish conditions for peace.” /2

More on the UN’s Pillay Commission which reports today to the UNGA: https://t.co/lVRGTkoo2s pic.twitter.com/jTaE6SpVKs

— Hillel Neuer (@HillelNeuer) October 27, 2022

Today's report to the UN by the Pillay Commission condemns only Israel & underscores why the inquiry is a travesty of justice that is as fair and objective as the Spanish Inquisition. We drafted this resolution to begin the process to disband the inquiry: https://t.co/RZdOBkGw6f pic.twitter.com/5oNQjbH9w6

— Hillel Neuer (@HillelNeuer) October 27, 2022

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10/24 Links Pt1: UN report on human rights in West Bank and Gaza serves only terror supporters; Israel should stay out of the war in Ukraine; Iran thinks it beat 'Zionists,' US hegemony in Lebanon maritime deal

From Ian:

Ben-Dror Yemini: UN report on human rights in West Bank and Gaza serves only terror supporters

How can Pillay, Kothari and Sidoti be appointed to a committee scrutinizing the Israeli-Palestinian conflict? Well, everything is possible when it comes to Israel.

The report’s findings correspond well with the views of the three. Gaza, the report reads, is under occupation. The reason? The closure in the border crossings between Gaza and Israel.

Since the committee is working under the UN, the report could have mentioned the offer the UN itself presented to Gaza leaders - open borders in return for adherence to international rules of conduct.

Other offers could’ve also been mentioned, like that of the EU, which offered Hamas a reconstruction of Gaza in exchange for demilitarization. Hamas rejected every one of them. This is the reason the so-called blockade has still not been lifted. The report has no mention of this, it doesn’t need to because it wants to draw a target on Israel.

Hamas, which is undoubtedly happy with the report, is not even mentioned in it. Other words not mentioned in the report include: “Jihad,” “terror” and “rockets”. The committee’s information sources include many radical Israeli far-left organization and outlets, such “B'Tselem” - mentioned 17 times, “Peace Now” - 12 times, and “Haaretz” - 10 times.

Occupation is the report’s focal point, and it is becoming permanent, the authors claim. Maybe they have a point. But as usual, they ignore every peace offer tabled in front of the Palestinians in recent decades, and no mention of the Palestinians refusing all of these offers.

But not everything in the report is an anti-Israeli propaganda. The criticism against Jewish settlements in the West Bank is justified, but the subject is under great scrutiny inside the Israeli society already. There’s no need for them to take part in it.

Sometimes you need and have to wonder about the ease with which international bodies, among them the UN, cultivate hostile views of Israel, using the excuse of human rights. This new report sets a new bar.

The report is written in a legal manner, featuring notes and footnotes. Some of its claims are true, but even so they don’t undo the fact that the report sets a new record for incitement against Israel, written by a committee made up of three antisemites.

This is what demonization looks like. This is not the way to achieve peace, this is how a UN committee becomes a propaganda machine for supporters of terrorism.

Jonathan Tobin: Israel should stay out of the war in Ukraine

The international community has always opposed allowing Israel to achieve the kind of complete military victory over its enemies that would force them to give up their struggle against its existence. World opinion also dismisses terrorist attacks on the lives of Israelis as being part of a “cycle of violence” that ought to be stopped, regardless of who is in the right.

In contrast, many otherwise sensible people think Ukrainian ambitions for a military victory over Russia should be indulged, including if that means, as even President Joe Biden recently acknowledged, a risk of a nuclear confrontation.

Anger and disgust with Russia are justified, as are economic sanctions, even if they are clearly hurting the West more than the Putin regime. Yet, now that Ukraine’s extinction is no longer possible, a rational rather than an emotional response to the situation shouldn’t involve an open-ended commitment to an endless war that—Zelenskyy’s boasts and Biden’s promises notwithstanding—isn’t going to end in a total Ukrainian victory or anything like it.

Instead of ganging up on Israel in an effort to force it to join a war that has nothing to do with its security, perhaps the virtue-signalers should start considering whether it wouldn’t be more sensible for the United States to begin exploring a way to end the war. Instead, they are supporting policies geared to ensure it goes on indefinitely, and speak as if advocacy for a negotiated settlement is Russian propaganda. They have no coherent exit strategy or achievable goal and accuse those who point out this inconvenient fact of being insufficiently supportive of the cause of freedom.

This fuels the paranoia that helps sustain Putin in Russia and the patriotic fervor that is bolstering Zelenskyy’s maximalist position. It ignores the cost in Ukrainian and Russian lives, as well as the price for American taxpayers who thought they were done financing unwinnable foreign wars.

The idea that Israel should be dragged into this morass simply for the sake of a dubious romanticizing of the conflict, to assert its status as a world power or any other reason is as irresponsible as it is reckless.

Khaled Abu Toameh: Biden Embraces America's Fiercest Enemies: Whose Side Is He On?

[T]he Biden administration was damaging America's relations with its historical friends and allies while sending "positive messages" to America's fiercest enemies and haters. — Dr. Ibrahim Al-Nahhas, Saudi political analyst, Al-Riyadh, October 19, 2022.

[T]he Biden administration has preferred to attack Saudi Arabia than deal with the use of Iranian drones by the Russians in Ukraine... Were it not for American and European leniency, especially since the era of Barack Obama, who tried with all naivety to rehabilitate the Iranian regime, Iran would not have interfered in the internal affairs of Europe and four Arab countries (Syria, Iraq, Lebanon and Yemen) — Tarik Al-Hamid, former editor-in-chief of the Saudi-owned Asharq Al-Awsat, October 19, 2022.

Since Barack Obama admitted erring in his failure to support Iran's protestors in 2009, however, has US policy changed? Apart from painfully feeble lip-service to the protestors in Iran, Biden and his administration, through their inaction, appear still to be totally committed to their initial alliance with Russia and Iran.

Biden and his administration , it appears, would rather align themselves with the mullahs in Iran and the new "Russian-Iranian Axis of Evil," than strengthen their ties with America's longstanding partners, the Arabs in the Gulf.

The winners: Russia and Iran.

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10/12 Links Pt1: Israel’s far-left is no better than the anti-Zionist Arab parties; Israeli Security Cabinet OKs Lebanon maritime accord; The real threat to U.S.-Israel relations comes from anti-Semitic Democrats

From Ian:

Left-wing lawmaker causes uproar after saying IDF 'executes' Palestinian children

An Israeli lawmaker caused a firestorm Wednesday after footage emerged in which he accused Israeli troops of carrying out deliberate killings of Palestinian minors. MK Ofer Cassif, who represents that Arab-Jewish party Hadash in the Knesset, said in a speech on Tuesday that the recent deaths in Judea and Samaria have only one side to blame – Israel.

In the footage obtained by Israel Hayom on Wednesday, a day after it was filmed, the lawmaker can be seen saying that the recent spate of terrorist attacks on Israelis, including deadly shooting incidents in Jerusalem and Samaria in successive days, could be explained by Israel's overall actions throughout the years and that the real victims were the casualties on the Palestinian side who died during Israeli counterterrorism raids.

"The root cause is the occupation, it is an injustice in and of itself; 12 Palestinians were murdered in the occupied territories, including minors, children who were executed. This bloodshed is terrible, the occupation is a form of injustice," he said, ignoring the fact that Israeli troops targeted armed Palestinians during the raids.

During the event, which was attended by other lawmakers from Arab parties, the participants were asked whether they would agree that terrorist attacks on IDF soldiers should stop. Joint Arab List leader Ayman Odeh tried to evade the question, saying that "everyone is a victim of this wicked occupation... Arabs and Jews are dear to everyone and we do not want even one person to die. We have to end the occupation."

In the wake of Cassif's comments, Defense Minister Benny Gantz issued a harsh rebuke. "Cassif has once again crossed a red line with lies and incitement precisely when the IDF soldiers are protecting all Israelis – Arabs and Jews alike – from murderous terrorism. They have been doing this with professionalism, determination, and in accordance with IDF values and purity of the arms, and we should all praise them for this." Gantz vowed to provide "full backing" for the soldiers and added that "precisely because of statements like that no government will have the Joint Arab List in it," referring to the Nov. 1 election, from which he hopes to emerge Israel's prime minister.

In response to Gantz's comments, Cassif said, "If a war criminal like him attacks me, then I am in a good place."

Ruthie Blum: Israel’s far-left is no better than the anti-Zionist Arab parties

One campaign mantra of the camp of Israeli opposition and Likud leader Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu ahead of the Nov. 1 Knesset election is that interim Prime Minister Yair Lapid’s Yesh Atid will not be able to form a coalition without the Arab parties.

Barring a miracle—or an egregious manipulation of the system similar to that which Lapid and Naftali Bennett pulled last year—this numerical given is a truism that the “anybody but Bibi” politicians have been trying to obfuscate.

Though having no choice but to lean on the support of Hadash-Ta’al and Balad in order to keep Netanyahu from returning to the helm, they are aware that the public is none too fond of MKs who openly side with Israel’s sworn enemies. As a result, they prefer to point to the one Arab parliamentarian, Mansour Abbas, who distanced himself from his more treasonous colleagues.

The United Arab List (Ra’am) chairman made a historic move by being the first of his ilk to join an Israeli coalition. In fairness to the head of the political wing of the Muslim Brotherhood-affiliated Southern Branch of the Islamic Movement in Israel, he did acknowledge that Israel is both a Jewish state and here to stay.

Still, Netanyahu has been highlighting Ra’am’s dubious record to admonish voters not to be lulled into considering it kosher. But there’s another party that warrants at least as much, if not more, negative attention: Meretz—without which Lapid also has no chance of coming even close to a 61-mandate majority.

Like Ra’am, Meretz is polling at four-to-five seats. In other words, each is straddling the electoral threshold.

Meretz, too, moderated its rhetoric when it became part of the now-defunct coalition. This is probably why its members penalized the faction’s top honchos in the Aug. 23 primary, and elected Zehava Gal-On to replace Nitzan Horowitz as party leader.

It was an ironic turnaround.

Horowitz brought the party out of backbench exile and into the glory of government, serving for the past year and a half as health minister. Gal-On, on the other hand, resigned five years ago from her post as chair of the far-left party, reappearing on the scene to resume her coveted spot.

In an interview on Oct. 8 with the Mako Weekend magazine, Gal-On let her radicalism rip. This wasn’t novel. She’s never been one to hide her aversion to Jewkhaish settlement and sympathy for the “plight” of Palestinian terrorists “under Israeli occupation.”

Khaled Abu Toameh: Palestinians' New Enemy: British Prime Minister Liz Truss

The defamation campaign against the British prime minister is yet another sign of the ongoing radicalization of Palestinians not only against Israel, but anyone who dares to say a good word about Israel. This radicalization is the result of the massive campaign by Palestinian officials and media outlets to delegitimize Israel and demonize Jews.

The campaign coincides with the Palestinian leaders' continued talk about their commitment to the so-called two-state solution.

If the Palestinian leaders are so committed to the "two-state solution," they should cease and desist from their lethal incitement against Israel.

It is this campaign of hate that is the real obstacle for peace between Israel and the Palestinians. For many years, the Western countries that fund the Palestinians have utterly ignored Palestinian incitement against Israel.

Now, as is evident from the attacks on the British prime minister, Western leaders are themselves becoming victims of the Palestinians' smear campaigns. This is what happens when Western governments lavish untold millions of dollars on the Palestinians without requiring accountability and without demanding an end to the venomous Palestinian rhetoric against Israel and Jews.

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09/13 Links Pt1: The Palestinians and the World Do Not Need Another Corrupt, Failed Terrorist Arab State; Fatah boasts: Arafat deliberately started the intifada terror campaign

From Ian:

Khaled Abu Toameh: The Palestinians and the World Do Not Need Another Corrupt, Failed Terrorist Arab State

The truth, however, is that neither the Palestinian Authority leadership nor the Palestinian people is ready for statehood. And the responsibility for that fact lies squarely with the ruthless and failed Palestinian leaders.

The Palestinian bid to obtain UN recognition of a Palestinian state comes at a time when the PA appears to be losing control over some parts of the West Bank, where gunmen belonging to several groups have replaced the Palestinian security forces... [and] are responsible not only for terrorist attacks against Israel, but also the growing scenes of anarchy and lawlessness....

Abbas himself has long been praising and glorifying Palestinians who carry out terrorist attacks....

Abbas, who is unable (and unwilling) to rein in a few hundred gunmen in two major Palestinian cities in the West Bank, wants the United Nations, its member states and the rest of the world to believe that he is ready to run a state of his own.

If Abbas cannot send his officers to confiscate an M-16 rifle from an unruly gunman in Jenin or Nablus, how can he be trusted to prevent the future Palestinian state from turning into a launching pad for regional terrorism?

Abbas wants the UN to grant the Palestinians the status of full member state, but cannot provide any guarantees that the aspired-for state would not be turned into a terror entity that is armed and funded by Iran's regime and its proxies.

Abbas wants the UN to recognize "Palestine" as a state when he literally has no control over half of the Palestinians... If Abbas dares to go to the Gaza Strip, Hamas will hang him at the entrance to the area on charges of "collaboration" with Israel.

Abbas is seeking full UN recognition at a time when he continues to block general elections for the PA, arrests and intimidates his political opponents, refuses to share power with other Palestinians and muzzles freedom of expression.

More than they need a state, the Palestinians need good leadership. They need to rid themselves of the corrupt leaders who have deprived them of international aid and led them from one disaster after the other since the early 1970s, when the PLO was expelled from Jordan for undermining the kingdom's sovereignty.

[T]he Palestinians' biggest tragedy by far has been failed leadership and more failed leadership. It radicalizes them toward Islamic fundamentalism and deprives them of elections, freedom of expression and international aid. The UN member states would be doing a great service to the Palestinians if they asked Abbas about the absence of freedom of speech and a functioning parliament under his regime.

They would also be doing the Palestinian people a huge service if they asked Abbas about torture in Palestinian Authority prisons and the continuing crackdown by his security forces on human rights activists and journalists. And they should definitely ask him what measures he has taken to end financial and administrative corruption in the PA.

These issues are more pressing for the Palestinians than another worthless document by the UN recognizing a fictitious Palestinian state that is already marked by the intrusion of other brutal radical Islamist dictatorships.

MEMRI: Semi-Frozen: The Middle East's Intractable Conflicts

The term "frozen conflict" came into vogue in recent decades to describe a variety of border conflicts between Russia and neighboring countries, often over breakaway regions like Abkhazia or the Donbass.[1] There are also historic conflicts like Kashmir or the Arab-Israeli Conflict that go on for decades, sometimes hot and sometimes cold, that seem to also be "frozen," neither conclusive war nor outright peace, but an uneasy, volatile reality in between.

But aside from the old conflict over Palestine, the Middle East seems to have engendered new conflicts in recent decades that are, at least, semi-frozen, lasting for a decade or longer. Often extremely violent and damaging to the future of nations, they also simmer down to situations approaching some type of wary truce, mere political turmoil or low-grade instability only to flare up again. This seems to be the case in places like Libya, Yemen, and Iraq, all three countries where the overthrow of a longtime brutal dictator unleashed forces that have not yet played out years later.

Of course, the region is flush with conflict. In Lebanon and Syria, one side (Hezbollah and Assad) is more or less victorious and dominant, though there is still some opposition on the ground. Morocco and Algeria are increasingly at loggerheads, though not at war. In Sudan, political crisis and societal turmoil could lead to open conflict between rival groupings inside the military regime. Transnational Salafi-Jihadism and Iranian-inspired terrorism still exist in the region and still claim victims.

But it is the cases of Iraq, Libya, and Yemen that are particularly haunting and costly to the future of the region. All three countries had been ruled by long-standing dictatorships that while they may have provided some of the aspects of stability, were still very volatile regimes. Two of them, Saddam's Iraq and Qaddafi's Libya, were actually major "exporters" of instability, promoting terrorism globally, repressing local citizens internally and attacking their neighbors.

Iraq has been at war, albeit sometimes at relatively low levels, since the Americans overthrew Saddam Hussein in 2003. But even before that was the Kuwait War of 1990-1991 and the Iran War of 1980-1988. On top of that were internal conflicts, the regime's decades-long war against the Kurds, the savage repression of a Shia insurgency in 1991, and then after the American forces left in 2011, an increasingly sectarian Iraq under Prime Minister Nuri Al-Maliki and the war against ISIS beginning in 2014. That war greatly increased something that had already existed, Shia paramilitary groups, which echoes today in the ongoing conflict between the militias and parties closest to Iran against those arrayed with Muqtada Al-Sadr.[2] The open armed clashes in Baghdad and Basra of August 2022 have ebbed thanks to the mediating efforts of Iraq's prime minister and of the Shia clerical authorities in Najaf, but the political crisis continues.[3]

The American overthrow of Saddam Hussein in 2003 essentially dethroned Sunni power in Iraq and handed it over to the long-oppressed Iraqi Shia. Today's clashes in Iraq are less about good versus evil than an internal civil war within different factions of the Iraqi Shia political establishment, all of whom in one way or another, have colonized, subverted, and become parasites on the Iraqi state.[4] A 40-year-old Iraqi citizen alive today knows nothing but war and violent political turmoil inside the borders of his country.

Moscow’s invitation to Hamas could be meant as warning to Israel, analysts say

Hamas politburo chief Ismail Haniyeh arrived in Moscow on Sept. 10 at the head of a senior delegation from the terror group for talks with Russian officials. Analysts speculate that Moscow’s invitation to Hamas, like an earlier one in May, is meant to send a message of dissatisfaction to Israel.

“The Russians typically use meetings with Hamas to signal displeasure with Israel, perhaps in relation to Ukraine,” Hillel Frisch, senior fellow at the Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security (JISS), told JNS.

A noteworthy aspect of the May meeting is that it came a month after Israel Prime Minister Yair Lapid, then foreign minister, accused Russia of war crimes in Ukraine, specifically in relation to alleged atrocities committed outside Kyiv. Of the current meeting, Frisch said it was unclear what specifically Russia may have found objectionable about Israeli statements or actions.

Anna Geifman, senior researcher at Bar-Ilan University’s department of political science, told JNS that it might be a general warning, a way for Russia to tell Israel that if it takes a “wrong step” it will strengthen relations with the region’s hostile actors. “The message may be: ‘If you become our enemy, we’re going to deal with your enemies,’ ” she said.

For Geifman, the important point is that this isn’t something new. “The Russians have always played the anti-Israel, or anti-Western, card whenever it was convenient for them, from the Soviet days. They’ve always talked to terrorists. It’s not even a question of talking—it’s collaborating,” she said.

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07/20 Links Pt1: Caroline Glick: The strategic fallout of Biden’s failure; When Iran Says ‘Death to Israel,’ It Means It; Biden Administration Funds Anti-Israel Curricula, Hate Messages

From Ian:

Caroline Glick: The strategic fallout of Biden’s failure

States that support Palestinian-centric diplomacy include Jordan and Qatar, and of course also the Palestinian Authority also supports it. All of these are harsh opponents of the Abraham Accords. Indeed, they condemned them. Jordan does not view Iran as a threat. Hamas and to a degree the Palestinian Authority view Iran as a sponsor and ally. And Qatar is Iran’s close ally and partner.

All the same, the Biden administration’s policy is to bring the two sides together. The first sign of this came with Secretary of State Anthony Blinken’s visit to Israel and the Palestinian Authority in March. At the time, Blinken tried to force the foreign ministers of the Abraham Accord nations to bring the Palestinians into their deliberations. He failed.

But rather than walk away, the administration has doubled down. They have sought to bring Iranian allies and proxies Qatar and Iraq, as well as Jordan, into the regional air defense alliance that the United States seeks to create through CENTCOM. But bringing Qatar and Iraq into the alliance means emptying the alliance of all meaning. Similarly, Biden seeks to bring Jordan and the P.A., which oppose the Abraham Accords, into the summits of Abraham Accord partners, a move that would, again, gut the accords and reduce them to strategic incoherence, at best.

Immediately after Biden left Jeddah empty-handed, Egypt and the UAE beat a path to Tehran’s door looking to reopen their embassies and formally reinstate relations with a state pledged to their destruction. With the U.S. effectively batting for Iran’s team, they need to explore their options.

All of this, of course, is devastating for Israel, on every level. The move Israel has to make is fairly obvious. Israel needs to pander to the Biden administration just as emptily as Biden and his hostile advisers pander to Israel. And then they need to pursue policies that actually defend Israel’s interests.

Unfortunately, our caretaker leaders, Prime Minister Yair Lapid and Defense Minister Benny Gantz, are doing no such thing.

For reasons that have nothing to do with strategic rationality or reality, both men are apparently operating under the impression that Israel is required to advance policies towards the Palestinians and Iran that are devastating to Israel’s existential security interests.

Israel has apparently no plan to attack Iran’s nuclear installations, despite the fact that we are at crunch time. We have no policy to defend or preserve the Abraham Accords. Indeed, both Gantz and Lapid seem to have no clear understanding of the accords’ purpose or rationale. It’s hard to know whether their positions are based on ideological blindness or simple incompetence. Both men have demonstrated both, and in similar ways.

But all the same, Biden’s cataclysmically failed visit, which was followed immediately by Russian President Vladimir Putin’s triumphant visit to Tehran on Monday, means that Israel has no time for its leaders to learn remedial statecraft.

Biden’s pandering was irritating and insulting. But it’s the devastating substance of his policies that is truly alarming. Israel has to stand up for itself now, because nothing it says, no pandering on its part, will change America’s trajectory.

Gil Troy: Biden actually did a good job in Israel

Admittedly, I would have preferred to see unanimity between Israel and Biden. I toast Biden’s growing awareness regarding the dangers of Iran’s sick quest for nukes and its evil Revolutionary Guards, yet I cringed when Biden’s staff removed Israel’s flag from his limousine before entering east Jerusalem. (As a presidential historian, I deem this an unnecessary error: the limousine should fly only two flags everywhere – America’s and the president’s seal.)

Nevertheless, these minor frictions reinforced the broader message of a friendship resilient enough to absorb policy differences.

HERE IS where Biden’s age is a factor – for the good. Born in 1942 to pious, patriotic Catholics, Biden grew up understanding that, as he said, “the ancient roots of the Jewish people [in Israel] date back to biblical times,” and the once homeless Jews deserve a national home. Biden’s sympathy for Zionism contrasts with the Israel-bashers, both Jewish and non-Jewish, who echo today’s trendy vocabulary of delegitimization, sloppily and cruelly applying a critique of Western imperialism to Jews’ unique story.

Biden’s pro-Zionism contrasts with woke extremists like the Democratic member of Congress, Cori Bush, who on Saturday attended a fundraiser organized by Neveen Ayesh. The government relations coordinator for the St. Louis chapter of American Muslims for Palestine, Ayesh has tweeted out filth saying “I tried befriending a Jew once. Worst idea ever” and “I want to set Israel on fire with my own hands & watch it burn to ashes along with every Israeli in it.”

But Biden’s mature example also resists the silliness of Peace Now, which hung a huge poster in Tel Aviv proclaiming – in Hebrew – “welcome to the two states we love the most.” As the election campaign intensifies, and people wonder why Israel’s Left lacks credibility, remember that sign.

Beyond the obvious facts that Biden doesn’t speak Hebrew and the “state” of Palestine doesn’t exist, the entities currently representing Palestinians are corrupt, terrorist-addicted, dictatorships, fueled on anti-Jew hatred, abusing their own people in the West Bank and Gaza, and particularly hostile to Zionists – as well as fellow Palestinians advancing American liberal-democratic ideals. Ignoring those realities, falsely equating your own democratic country with its authoritarian enemies, confuses peacemaking with breast-beating.

Pit stop
Admittedly, a cynical British friend of mine was correct. Biden’s Israel visit was a most elaborate rest stop on the way to the Saudi Arabian “petrol station.” Still, Biden done good. He showed Democrats at home – and peaceniks in Israel – how to recognize the eternal ideals that make Israel Israel and link Americans and Israelis in our unique and mutually beneficial bond. For that, we should say, “Toda raba! Thank you, Mr. President.”

Biden Administration Funds Anti-Israel Curricula, Hate Messages

US taxpayer money, thanks to the Biden administration, is now once again going directly to an international agency that promotes messages of hate against Israel and denies its right to exist.

The claim that the UNRWA services contribute to maintaining regional stability is not only false, but, sadly, ridiculous.

On the contrary, most of the refugee camps have since become hotbeds for extremist and terrorist groups and individuals, especially in the West Bank, Gaza Strip, Lebanon and Syria.

A study published earlier in early July.... found that children attending UNRWA schools are exposed to textbooks that include references to violence, martyrdom, overt antisemitism, jihad (holy war), rejection of the possibility of peace with Israel, and the complete omission of any historical Jewish presence in the region.

"[W]e found material that does not adhere to international standards and that encourages violence, jihad and martyrdom, antisemitism, hate, and intolerance...." — IMPACT-se study, July 2022.

Instead of pressuring UNRWA to change its policies and stop the anti-Israel incitement in its schools, the Biden administration has decided to reward the agency for encouraging hate, violence, martyrdom and the delegitimization and demonization of Israel and Jews.

The Biden administration, in short, has just sent a message to the Palestinians and all the Israel-haters that it supports their efforts and shares their dream of obliterating Israel.

Those who fund school textbooks that glorify terrorists and deny Israel's right to exist are complicit in the global jihad against Israel.

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MUST READ: Why the Schabas Report Will Be Every Bit as Biased as the Goldstone Report (Hillel Neuer)

This is the must-read article of the day, from The Tower. Excerpts:

For more than five years, the question of who exactly authored the UN’s 2009 Goldstone Report has been an enduring mystery. The report, written under the auspices of South African Judge Richard Goldstone, was a shocking 500-page indictment of Israel that accused its political and military leadership of deliberately targeting Palestinian civilians during the 2008-2009 Operation Cast Lead in Gaza, and condemned the Jewish state as a whole for systematic and institutionalized racism, among other atrocities and abominations.

The answer to that riddle—which involves a radical Marxist law professor who held the equivalent of a general’s rank in the global lawfare movement against Israel, and more broadly, the UN department that selected her—has additional importance today because of the controversy swirling over the upcoming sequel to the Goldstone Report dealing with 2014’s Operation Protective Edge, which will be presented to the UN Human Rights Council (HRC) in Geneva on March 23.

Understanding who wrote the 2009 report—and how the establishment behind it remains in place—constitutes a direct rebuttal to the latest campaign by HRC backers and activist groups to salvage the reputation and legitimacy of the Goldstone II commission of inquiry into alleged Israeli war crimes.

[W]hat no one has understood or appreciated until now is the decisive role in the “process”—to use the words of the current HRC president—played by the UN’s Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR).
To understand the OHCHR, one must understand the close relationship between two distinct but closely related UN entities. One is the 47-nation Human Rights Council, a political body heavily influenced by the vote-trading power and petrodollars of the Arab and Islamic states. It meets regularly three times a year for month-long sessions.

At the Arab states’ initiative, and with varying degrees of complicity by the EU and others, half of the resolutions passed by the HRC condemn Israel; there is a special agenda item against Israel at every HRC meeting; and the HRC has produced more emergency sessions and inquiries against Israel than any other country in the world.

The OHCHR is based nearby in Geneva. It is a thousand-strong bureaucracy that serves the council by carrying out its investigations, writing requested reports, staffing the council sessions, and acting year-round as its secretariat. From 2008 until this summer, the office was headed by High Commissioner Navi Pillay, who famously said that “the Israeli Government treats international law with perpetual disdain.”

Those who work in the OHCHR see themselves as an independent and neutral agency of the UN dedicated to promoting and protecting human rights. ....

From time to time, some OHCHR bureaucrats act on the margins, and only in small ways, to try to resist the more absurd and harmful dictates they receive from the political body. Yet when it comes to Israel, the position of the OHCHR under Navi Pillay has been more in line with the HRC than ever before. The most inflammatory and vitriolic notes from Arab speeches delivered to the council find their echo in the reports drafted by European nationals working for the OHCHR, many of whom are graduates of British universities and come from organizations like Amnesty International. If that weren’t enough, their work is subject to the scrutiny and constant pressure exerted by the 56-nation Islamic bloc.

Something that is vital to understand about UN commissions of inquiry is that, in practice, their commissioners don’t write the resulting report. The secretariat does. To be sure, some commissioners may provide directions and revisions—and it is clear that Schabas would have been more hands-on than others—but the bulk of the work is performed by a professional staff that can be comprised of human rights officers, forensics experts, and lawyers. As a result of this, chief-of-staff Marotta had the power to oversee the entire [Goldstone] project.

Thus, through [Francesca ] Marotta, senior officials within the OHCHR would have had the ability to exercise influence over the report—officials like Mona Rishmawi, a Palestinian lawyer who, prior to joining the OHCHR, had written articles comparing Israelis to Nazis.

The role of Marotta and the OHCHR was known at the time, if not fully appreciated. What a probe by UN Watch has now revealed, however, is that outside staff recruited by OHCHR included some of the most radical anti-Israel activists in the world.

One of the known staff members was Sareta Ashraph, whose job, as she described it, was to assist in the investigations, conduct interviews with victims and witnesses, and gather exhibits. Ashraph has also revealed that she was “responsible for drafting several chapters of the final report.”

When it comes to Israel, Ashraph is, to put it mildly, less than impartial. She was and remains a member of Amnesty International, one of the leading groups accusing Israel of war crimes in 2009, and which pushed for and defended the UN inquiry. She was the main organizer of a London lecture on behalf of Lawyers for Palestinian Human Rights, featuring anti-Israel lawfare activists Raji Sourani (head of the Palestinian Center for Human Rights) and Daniel Machover. She also worked in the West Bank on “investigations of allegations of violations of international humanitarian law following ‘Operation Defensive Shield’ in 2002.”

What has not been known until now is that the other key figure on the staff was, through her substantial anti-Israel publications, activism, and leadership role in waging lawfare, exponentially more problematic—someone whose life’s dream was to prosecute Israelis for war crimes and who devoted several years of her life to making this dream come true.

Grietje Baars [is]a Dutch-born law professor who teaches in London. In contrast to Ashraph, who in the immediate aftermath of the report wrote in detail about her role in the Goldstone Report, Baars took pains to obscure her participation.

It is easy to see why. If people knew who Baars was and her role in the report, there would have been justified outrage at OHCHR for selecting her.

The world has the right to know the identities and roles of people involved in writing Goldstone II, to prevent a repeated of the biased staffers of Goldstone I.

[W]hen OHCHR hired her to work on the Goldstone Report, they must have known about Baars’ scholarship. They must have known that she was a self-described Marxist whose doctoral thesis was “a radical Marxist critique of law and capitalism,” and that her academic focus included “anti-occupation struggles and their intersection with other solidarity/liberation struggles” such as “anti-capitalism, anarchism, animal, and queer liberation.”

OHCHR would certainly have known of Baars’ prominent advocacy scholarship against Israel, such as her 2007 law journal article in the Yearbook of Islamic and Middle Eastern Law, entitled “Corrie et al. v Caterpillar: Litigating Corporate Complicity in Israeli Violations of International Law in the US Courts.” The article analyzes case law and suggests best practices regarding Palestinian lawfare efforts against Israel and the movement to boycott companies doing business with Israel, with numerous comparisons to the Nuremberg trials against the Nazis. Publications by Baars subsequent to her time on the Goldstone Report have also accused Israel of “war crimes, crimes against humanity, and grave breaches.”

But OHCHR must also have known that Baars was much more than a scholar: She was a hardcore anti-Israel activist who has risen to become a leading figure in the global lawfare movement—a worldwide campaign to erode Israel’s international standing through the misuse of the language and mechanisms of international law, with the goal of blunting Israel’s ability to defend itself by putting the country on notice that any measures taken against terrorists based among civilians will be put under an international microscope.

By 2009, Baars already had a disturbing track record of extreme hostility against Israel. Because of the sensitive nature of her position, OHCHR must have examined her resume and conducted a basic Google search, all of which would have revealed her prejudice and made it clear that prosecuting Israelis in international courts was essentially her life’s dream. In other words, that she was the very opposite of the impartial, neutral, and objective member of the secretariat envisioned under the UN Charter.

An email Baars sent to her activist colleagues as the Gaza conflict unfolded in December 2008—the war she would later investigate for the Goldstone Commission—preemptively declared that Israel was conducting a “massacre” in the territory and ranted about Israeli “lies we have to fight.”

Baars sent the email after receiving a purportedly leaked copy of guidelines for pro-Israel spokespeople responding to questions about the incursion. “These are the lies we have to fight to end the massacre in Gaza,” her email says. “This has been leaked from sources in Washington DC. Please study this and prepare a response as defiantly yet respectfully as you can do. This is easy to trash, but do so in a civil manner please. Outrage is our weapon, but respect is our salvation.”

Beyond what it says about the credibility of the Goldstone Report, Baars’ involvement raises serious questions about the impartiality of OHCHR, which filled the inquiry’s secretariat with a mixture of its own staffers and outside hires. Why has it refused to reveal the make-up of the secretariat, leaving the public in the dark except for a few names that have inadvertently leaked out?

There seems no question that Goldstone was duped. He never suspected that OHCHR, the UN agency in charge of providing him with professional staff support, had quietly embedded one of the world’s top anti-Israel lawfare strategists into the team. After all, only four years before, Goldstone had worked on another UN inquiry on the oil-for-food program. In that case, he was supported by a highly professional staff based in New York, with most if not all of them lawyers and experts hired from the outside. Goldstone assumed the Gaza inquiry would be the same.

But it was not the same. The culture of the Geneva-based OHCHR secretariat is known to be far more anti-American, anti-colonial, and anti-Israel than the one in New York. In his naiveté, Goldstone was blind to the prejudice and political agenda of his own bureaucracy. Indeed, there is not the slightest indication that Goldstone had any knowledge of Baars’ extremist activism. But OHCHR knew—and that is why they hired her.

What do we know so far about the actual staff members of Goldstone II? As in 2009, OHCHR refuses to respect the principle of transparency by revealing who is on the staff, even though this is common practice elsewhere, such as in the UN’s 2005 oil-for-food report.

I have seen this bias with my own eyes. When I met with the Schabas Commission on September 17, 2014 to personally hand them a written demand for Schabas’ recusal, there were only two staff members in the room, both of them from OHCHR’s Arab section, known as Middle East and North Africa: One was Frej Fenniche, a Tunisian who was a spokesman for the UN’s notoriously anti-Semitic Durban conference on racism in 2001. The other was Sara Hammood, a former spokesperson for the UN’s most anti-Israel committee. Hamood also worked as a “policy advisor on Israel and the occupied Palestinian territory” for Oxfam Novib, where she wrote one-sided reports and joined others in critical statements against Israel. This was the initial staff of OHCHR, who were presumably involved in hiring the others.

The current staff—Schabas has mentioned that it is composed of “a dozen specialists”—includes Karin Lucke, OHCHR’s former coordinator of the Arab region team, and now listed as working for the UN in New York. Amnesty notes that the current team includes the OHCHR staff from “Geneva, Ramallah, and the Gaza Strip.” According to Geneva sources familiar with the probe, a number of the staff members are from the Arab world.
In summary, there is every reason to suspect that OHCHR has manipulated the staffing for Goldstone II just as it did in 2009.

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