Showing posts with label Shireen Abu Akleh. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Shireen Abu Akleh. Show all posts

Monday, August 28, 2023

From Ian:

JCPA: The Deadly Militia "Spotters" of Jenin
In recent months, Palestinian militias in the West Bank have introduced improvised explosive devices (IEDs) and roadside bombs into their arsenal.

Palestinian spotters alert other units of the approach of an Israeli vehicle so ambushes can be set and roadside bombs triggered.

Palestinian Salim Awad showed CNN a 16-minute video of Israeli military vehicles in Jenin during the fighting in which Al Jazeera reporter Shireen Abu Akleh was killed.

The footage tells us that the spotter was filming and transmitting the location of Israeli armored vehicles.

A plausible answer to the question of Abu Akleh's death is that she stood between Israeli soldiers who believed they were in danger and spotter Salim Awad, filming their location and transmitting his video.
Daniel Greenfield: Biden’s Terror Funding Just Killed an Israeli Preschool Teacher
Batsheva’s murder, like that of the 74 terror victims killed under Biden, was paid for directly and indirectly through foreign aid to terrorists and sanctions relief on Iran’s terror regime. These policies were not undertaken in ignorance, the OFAC documents provide clear evidence that the Biden administration had been warned that it was funding terrorism and that people would die.

That’s why the number of Israelis continues to climb every year that Biden has been in office.

After 7 Israelis, including a 14-year-old boy, were killed in a Sabbath terrorist attack outside a synagogue in January 2023, Secretary of State Blinken met with Mahmoud Abbas and promised another $50 million to UNRWA which acts as the employment agency for Hamas. Earlier that same month, the Biden administration warned Israel to turn over $39 million in tax revenues to terrorists rather than providing that money to help terror victims rebuild their lives.

In August, with 4 Israelis already murdered, the Biden administration demanded that Republicans stop blocking $75 million in “humanitarian aid” to the UN agency. Sen. Jim Risch and Rep. Michael McCaul are determined to block that aid until Secretary of State Blinken certifies that UNRWA “is not affiliated with U.S. designated foreign terrorist organizations”. And yet the Biden administration can’t seem to even manage to clear that lowest of legal bars.

In Batsheva’s hometown of Efrat, which the Biden administration considers an “illegal settlement” despite being referenced numerous times in the bible, the children have lost a teacher and a friend.

The murdered preschool teacher had been on the way to “prepare the kindergarten for the start of the year.” A woman who worked with her described how “every time I entered the kindergarten, she welcomed me with a beaming smile that always accompanied her. The children were everything to her, she always hugged them and gave what she could to the children, the staff, the parents.”

Batsheva did not have to die. None of the 26 already killed this year did. The 3 dead in 2020 show what’s possible. The Biden administration is knowingly funding the murder of the innocent.


Bassam Tawil: How US Politicians Empower Anti-American Jihadists and Other Aggressors
When people such as Vivek Ramaswamy, a candidate for the Republican Party nomination in the 2024 US presidential election, call for decreasing aid to Israel, they are actually sending a message of support to the mullahs in Tehran and their proxies, Hamas and PIJ, as well as the Iran-funded Hezbollah terrorist militia in Lebanon and to nations that would like to see Israel and America "out of the way."

For Israel's enemies, statements such as "cutting aid" are a sign that America is about to throw Israel under the bus, paving the way for them to proceed with their plan to destroy Israel.

The timing of Ramaswamy's call for cutting US aid to Israel could not have been worse. It came at a time when Jews are being murdered by Palestinians on an almost weekly basis. The terrorists are waging their campaign of murder because they want to drive all Jews out of Israel. The terrorists are undoubtedly happy to hear a Republican candidate talk about decreasing aid to Israel. They are hoping Israel will be made weaker. With less US backing, it will be easier to destroy.

The terrorists and others have, even more, long been seeking to end US "hegemony" in the Middle East. They consider the US an enemy of Arabs and Muslims and dictators everyplace. Ending US aid to Israel would not just be the first step toward undermining Israel, it would also be the first step to ending US influence in the Middle East -- the way then US President Barack Obama's abandoned Syria -- the best gift the US could ever give to Iran, Russia, China, Turkey, Qatar, Iraq, Lebanon, Syria, Pakistan, Algeria, Afghanistan, Sudan, Somalia and on and on.

The terrorists who want to destroy Israel also want to destroy the United States -- for supporting exactly those freedoms both countries embrace, and which their detractors falsify as "biased."

"Instead of prioritizing social programs and economic development, the PA rewards and encourages this violence, spending more than $300 million a year incentivizing murder. This "pay to slay" policy, funded by the UN, EU, and many governments, rewards those who commit violence (including children) with cash payments. The greater the crime and the more victims injured or killed, the more money received. This campaign targeting children begins from birth and continues throughout childhood and the teenage years. It takes place through state media, schools (including those run by UNRWA), youth groups and centers, and sporting and cultural events in both the West Bank and Gaza." — NGO Monitor, March 1, 2023.

Tuesday, August 08, 2023

Here is a list of attacks on journalists by Hamas, the PA and Palestinian protesters in just the past two weeks by the Palestinian Center for Development and Media Freedoms (MADA).

August 1:

The Palestinian General Intelligence Service had kidnapped the freelance journalist SAMI SAEED ALSAAI (43 years old) at around 12:00PM yesterday, Monday, in Nablus, and took him to an unknown place. According to the journalist’s wife, four masked men dressed in black came to the journalist’s workplace in two cars, one of which had yellow license plates, and kidnapped him at gunpoint.

MADA also strongly condemns the attack by members of the internal security of Hamas government in Gaza Strip against journalists in Gaza Strip while covering the peaceful demonstrations that took place therein, calling for an improvement in the living conditions of citizens. Individuals in civilian clothes - identifying themselves as members of the Internal Security Service - assaulted Palestine TV and Abu Dhabi TV reporter, journalist WALID ABDEL RAHMAN, while covering the peaceful event in Jabalia Camp, in the northern Gaza Strip, last Sunday. They insulted him and forced him to stop the coverage.

In the same context, the freelance journalist EHAB AL-FASFOUS was threatened by the investigation and internal security members while covering the same event in Khan Younes, southern Gaza Strip.

The security services of the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank, and the Internal Security Forces in Gaza Strip, have increased their aggression against journalists in a violent manner that threatens the professional work of journalists, which is a bad indicator of the reality of media freedoms that is witnessing bloody violations. For instance, the reporter, ALI AL-SAMOUDI, was injured by shrapnel in the head as a result of the shooting in Jenin camp yard, while the citizens were celebrating the shooting attack that took place in "Tel Aviv" yesterday, Saturday. The security personnel also targeted the reporter of "Quds News Network" MOHAMMED ABED with a gas bomb directly at the event.

This was preceded by a group of Al-Shabibah members assaulting a group of journalists at Hebron University a few days ago, during which journalist NIDAL AL-NATSHEH was flagrantly assaulted.

The situation in Gaza Strip is not any better than this, as the attacks of the Internal Security Service affected many journalists yesterday, Saturday, as the security services of Hamas Authority arrested a number of journalists, namely, MOHAMMED AL-BABA, the cameraman of the French Agency, and the journalist, BASHAR TALIB, for about 45 minutes inside Jabalia police station, north of Gaza City, before they were released after their cameras and mobile phones were searched.

The security members also arrested journalist MOHAMMED FAYEZ ABU AOUN, journalist YAHYA HASSOUNA, journalist MOHAMMED AL-HADDAD, and journalist IHAB AL-FASFOUS, who was attacked, and his phone was confiscated before it was returned to him. As for the journalist, MOHAMMED ISMAIL AL-HADDAD, he was threatened by a person in civilian clothes who identified himself as a member of the Investigation Department, as soon as he was filming, and informed him that "there is a decision to ban filming and asked him to stay away from the place”.

Meanwhile, journalist FOUAD JARADA and his colleague MUAMMAR ABU TABIKH were threatened via phone of a special number “not to engage in any journalistic work on the "We Want to Live" movement in Gaza”.
At least two of these journalists have received major media coverage when they were injured by Israeli forces.

Ali al-Samoudi was injured last year in the incident that killed Shireen Abu Akleh, and he was interviewed extensively at the time. This time, Palestinian and world media have not written a word about his being injured in the head by a bullet.

AFP cameraman Mohammed al-Baba was injured at a Gaza rally in 2018 by a gunshot blamed on Israel and that story was covered by wire services.  But when Hamas arrests the same AFP journalist and confiscates his equipment, even AFP doesn't report it.

Perhaps even more shocking is that even though all these attacks and far more are documented by MADA, including in their monthly reports, the Committee to Protect Journalists has not said a word about Palestinian repression of press freedoms since February 2022. In that same time period they have issued dozens of alerts against Israel.

 CPJ routinely reports on journalists injured and arrested worldwide - but ignores when it is done by Palestinian authorities. This means that even the major international NGO whose mission is to protect press freedoms is actively suppressing news of Palestinian violations of those freedoms.


(h/t GnasherJew)



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

Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424. 

Read all about it here!

 

 

Wednesday, March 22, 2023



Can “The Whole World” Be Wrong? Lethal Journalism, Antisemitism, and Global Jihad is a book that makes you shake your head a lot. You just can’t believe how stupid people are. The stupid things they say and do to make themselves feel better about themselves; the stupid things and the lies they say that allow them to hate Jews and look the other way at the jihadists who target the liars, their loved ones, and their way of life. It’s hard to watch—you want to look away from this slow, global, own-goal suicide. But the author, Professor Richard Landes, has made this work so compelling, you have no choice but to continue reading, even when, as a sane person, it leaves you, the reader, feeling rather queasy. 


Richard Landes

The book takes its title from the words of two men on the subject of blood libels, issued a century apart. There are the mocking words of writer Ahad Ha’am (Asher Ginsburg), who in 1897, echoing the oft-expressed sentiment by European non-Jews when confronted with proof that, no. Jews don’t use the blood of Christian babies in the manufacture of matzah: “Is it possible the whole world is wrong and the Jews are right?”

Ahad Ha'am (Asher Ginsburg)

In 2002, little more than 100 years later, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, referring to Israeli denials of a massacre in Jenin that never occurred, said, “I don’t think the whole world, including the friends of the Israeli people and government, can be wrong.”

In this way, antisemitism takes its path. Because there are plenty of Jew-haters in the world. And the more there are, the more they give themselves moral permission to hate. The media, of course, is there to help things along with its own rendition of the modern blood libel. It’s called “lethal journalism.” They use fake footage, knowing it’s fake. They lie, because the lies are what their audiences want to hear. And they demonize Israel every time, because again: it’s exactly what their audiences want to hear.

Landes takes you on a journey, beginning in 2000 with the Al Durah hoax, moving on to 9-11, the phony Jenin “massacre,” and the Danish cartoon scandal (Danoongate). At the end of each chapter, Landes summarizes the stupid things that various figures have said in relation to these events. For example, journalist Catherine Nay said of the faked viral photo of the dead boy in his father’s arms, “This death erases, replaces the image of the boy in the Warsaw Ghetto.”

Every bit as shockingly stupid are the words of George W. Bush, spoken at the Islamic Center of Washington only days after 9-11, on September 17, 2001, “Islam is peace.”

Regarding the fictional Jenin massacre, journalist Janine di Giovanni wrote, “Rarely in more than a decade of war reporting from Bosnia, Chechniya, Sierra Leone, Kossovo, have I seen such deliberate destruction, such disrespect for human life," 'Inside the Camp of the Dead,' The Times, April 16, 2002.

And off Danoongate, the French Director of Intelligence speaking in 2005, said, “These riots have nothing to do with Islam.”

Landes has been documenting this astounding stupidity and world folly for more than a decade. The result is this 500-page compendium with its prodigious, painstaking footnotes that leave the reader open-mouthed and astonished. You wonder: “How on earth did we get here?”

But you already know. Landes has connected up all the dots: the lies and lethal journalism, and the way the world gave jihad a pass, while damning the Jews. The facts and the progression of this deadly state of affairs have been amply covered by the author and you begin to understand the depth of the threat to our world, today. 

This a book you want on your shelf. It is not an easy read, but a necessary one if you want to understand how we got here—and how we are to dig our way out of this ugly, Jew-hating, jihadi, fake news mess. I put some questions to author Richard Landes to learn more about his book and its implications for the future:

Varda Epstein: Most writers think about who they’re writing for and gear their writing to that reader. “Can The ‘Whole World’ Be Wrong?” seems to be identifying who the reader is not. The book begins with a warning, but it’s more like a dare, or even a threat—like you’re trying to scare the reader off: “If you feel up to the task . . . turn the page. If not, just sit in your tub tweeting about white, racist privilege, while you bleed out.”

Who do you envisage as your reader? Who is it you’re trying to reach?

Richard Landes: My ideal reader is someone who really does care about liberal and progressive values. I actually lay out my concerns in the introductory chapter by contrasting zero-sum and positive-sum values, and stating my unequivocal preference for the latter, while conceding that the former has an inevitable presence in our lives and warning that those thinking they can eliminate zero-sum are not only fooling themselves with messianic dreams, but ultimately opposed to key life forces.

What I document in the book, however, is a massive shift in what was considered “liberal” or “progressive” in the new century/millennium. By 2003 it became a “litmus test of liberal credentials” to be pro-Palestinian (Buruma in NYT), at a time when the Palestinians were engaged in a suicide-mass murder war against Israeli civilians. By any standards of real liberal values that was a travesty which continues to this day (think Gays and LGBTQ for Palestine). So in a sense, the book is an attempt to go back to the moment this travesty first “took” and rethink how it could have happened so quickly and thoroughly. But since I firmly believe that the willingness to hear criticism and take it seriously is one of the key components of the liberal sensibility, I address this criticism to liberals sufficiently committed to their values to take it seriously.

Varda Epstein: Do you worry you’re preaching to the choir? Do you even aspire to reach the masses?

Richard Landes: Well that’s hard to say. Obviously a 500-page book with notes at the bottom of each page is not for “the masses.” But, between masses and choir lies many a circle of readers. Obviously, the “choir” of pro-Israel people are going to find it congenial. A number of people have written me about devouring the book in one sitting and thanking me: “Someone finally has the words for everything I’ve been struggling to say!” wrote one person. And if it helps them make the point to others, that’s great. But my real audience is what we might call the goats. As shepherds know, if you have about one goat to every ten sheep, then when there’s a problem, the sheep look to the goats. If they’re calm, the skittish sheep settle down. Similarly, I don’t think I’m going to reach some gay guy so caught up in his peer group that he repeats nonsense about being passionately for a political culture that hates gays. But if I can reach the thoughtful ones, then maybe they can explain it to him.

Varda Epstein: You write, “In a sense, this book should not have had to be written and I should be able to work on the origins of modern Western civilization in the demotic millennialism of eleventh-century France to my heart’s content.” Why did the “Can The ‘Whole World’ Be Wrong?” have to be written, and why by you, Richard Landes? After all, as you suggest, lethal journalism, antisemitism, and global jihad are not your chosen field.

Richard Landes: Well, actually, global jihad is my field since it’s an apocalyptic millennial movement, and it came on my screen in the mid-90s through the (then) graduate work of David Cook (now at Rice U.). Actually, in the mid-1990s, in my work on the 11th century, I began to work out a model of antisemitism that went in waves starting with philo-semitism, leading to important socio-economic changes that eventually produced an antisemitic reaction. Given that the period after the Holocaust (i.e. my life) was the longest and most philo-semitic period in recorded history (especially in the USA where I grew up), I speculated that the advent of 2000 might mark the reappearance of antisemitism in the West. At the time I thought it would come from the apocalyptic “right” – fundamentalist Christian Zionists disappointed that the Rapture didn’t happen, and Jihadi Muslims who were already openly and ferociously antisemitic. What I didn’t see coming were two linked phenomena: 1) the attraction of the “Left” for the Jihadi apocalyptic narrative that Israel and the US were “Satans”/Antichrists, and 2) the utter failure of liberals, who had a huge presence in the public sphere, to resist. As a result, what I thought would be a wave of Jew-hatred that we could resist, has, over 20 years of astonishing and self-destructive mishandling, become an existential threat not only to Israel (its purported target) but to democracies around the world.

Why did I have to write it rather than someone else? I don’t know. But someone else didn’t write it. It’s such a hard thing to grasp, a history of your own time. Maybe working historians in the early 11th century writing histories of the turn of that millennium made it a conceivable project. Obviously I don’t write about everything (and neither did they). I write in depth about what I think were errors of judgment on a civilizational plane, which continue to be made by very smart people. We all love the story of the emperor’s new clothes, but few of us want to entertain the notion that it’s actually happening. Someone jokingly said that Amazon should bundle my book not with another book, but with antidepressants. It’s dark stuff. Very depressing. Without a deep sense of humor, I wouldn't have been able to keep my eye on this ball over the course of decades.

Varda Epstein: How, if at all, does your work as a medievalist inform your book, and in particular your interest in eleventh-century France? Does your work on the al Durah story, which you mention in your book, have anything to do with that? You cite many French sources and drop French phrases in your book. I’m getting the idea that you’re a Francophile—but not!

Richard Landes: As for the Middle Ages, there are three key issues:

1)      Honor-shame societies: As a medievalist I work on a society in which gaining/keeping honor and avoiding/revenging shame were key components of public life, where it was legitimate, accepted, even required that one shed blood for the sake of honor. Without understanding those dynamics, you don’t understand Arab political culture. Now Edward Saïd made it taboo to discuss these matters (the quintessence of “Orientalism”), and in doing so blinded the West to the cultural dynamics of this region. In my book I show how the Oslo Accords were based on thinking that Arafat and Arab political culture were ready to give up the view that the very existence of Israel was so shameful that it must be destroyed, and go for the positive-sum, win-win, of “land for peace,” to the benefit of both the Israelis and the Palestinians. And how ignoring those dynamics meant that right up to the last second, the peace negotiators thought we were “sooo close.” And still do.

2)      Apocalyptic millenarian: the jihadis are a classic expression of a distinctly (but not exclusively) medieval form of eschatological thinking, namely they embrace an “active cataclysmic apocalyptic scenario” – evil permeates the world and we are God’s agents in destroying it – aiming at a hierarchical millennium – Islam will dominate the world, infidels either accept dhimmitude (subjection), or convert, or die. It’s really hard for moderns to take apocalyptic beliefs seriously because every time in the past that people have been so moved, they’ve been wrong, sometimes disastrously so. (This included modern historians of the Middle Ages.) As a result of this cognitive lapse, and the pressures of political correctness in the 21st century, to avoid anything too negative about Islam (don’t say “radical Islam”), has produced a Western culture that cannot see its enemy (embodied in the absurd formula “war on terrorism”).

3)      Public Secrets: for reasons that I’m not sure about, both my academic career and my journalistic one have found and investigated public secrets, that is, something everyone “in the know” knows about, but when it comes to the public record, they deny any knowledge or existence of the issue in question. In the Middle Ages it was about how Charlemagne was crowned on the first day of the year 6000 from Creation – a millennial date Christian chronographers had been tracking for over 6 centuries – and yet no one who wrote about the coronation, or his imperial period, mentioned it. In this book, the main public secret I deal with is that the Palestinians fake news footage all the time, and that the press is so profoundly intimidated by them, that they run Palestinian “lethal narratives” as news. This unacknowledged, even denied phenomenon, has immense impact on the kind of lethal journalism that we get constantly from our news media.

Varda Epstein: There’s a lot about stupidity in your book—you call it when and where you see it, using exactly that word “stupid” in its various forms. Why is it important to you to use precisely this descriptor and how do you account for the sheer amount of it that exists in the world? 

Richard Landes: First because it’s a technical term in economic and game theory for someone who hurts someone else without gaining any advantage (Cipolla). Secondly because it’s so stunningly prominent in our times. I define “astoundingly stupid” as creating advantages for an avowed enemy. And as far as I can make out, that has been a consistent pattern among the Western opinion leaders – journalists, academics, public intellectuals, politicians, and policy makers – for the last two decades. As Elder of Ziyon put it, my book is a “modern take on the Emperor’s New Clothes.” Then, when I found the comment by Bonhoeffer (which I included in the epigrams)—who also lived at a time when his society was being seized by apocalyptic memes—about the impossibility of arguing with precisely this kind of self-destructive stupidity, I knew I was on the right track. 


Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Varda Epstein: How did you decide on the structure of the book? How does the first part complement the second? Why not have it in, say, two volumes? Oh, and you must tell us about the haikus! That must have been fun.

Richard Landes: The structure wrote itself. The first four chapters are my “history of my time,” namely four incidents in the early aughts (‘00s) that chronicle key moments in the assault of global jihad on western democracies, and the astoundingly stupid way in which the West processed what was happening to them: the outbreak of the intifada and the al Durah affair; 9-11; the “Jenin Massacre”; and the Danish cartoon scandal.

Then, to explain how this could happen, I went through the key players: 1) Shame-Honor driven Arab culture; 2) Apocalyptic-Millennial driven Jihadi beliefs – what I call Caliphators; 3) Liberal Cognitive Egocentrics: people who project their positive-sum values onto cultures that don’t share it; 4) radical progressives who, blinded by Saïd’s assault on Orientalism, end up allying with the most imperialist movement in the world because it’s “anti-imperialist,” i.e. anti-USA and Israel; 5) the lethal journalists who radically disorient their audiences with their Palestinian-compliant “news” reports; and 6) the virtue-signaling Jews who adopt their enemy’s narrative (something an apocalyptic Caliphator predicted in 2001), thereby giving wings to the very kind of exterminationist antisemitism that fueled the Nazi madness.

The last part sketches developments over the next decade and a half (mid-aughts to now), identifying some of the phenomena so striking in our current culture that I think this turn-of-the-millennium seizure helped set in motion – woke, cancel-culture politics, fake news, anti-racism discourse, and what I call pre-emptive dhimmitude, namely the adoption by our information elites of a posture of subjection to Muslim demands for respect which ends up attacking not the invaders of democratic culture, but those (like me) who warn and mobilize against those enemies.

As for the haikus, I’ve been writing them ever since I ran across the form in my youth. The one for al Durah (chapter one) was originally written for Y2K: “We need not have been/ Mouths open inhaling, when/ The sh*t hit the fan.” My favorite is the one for the chapter on Jews against themselves: “Have ever before/ lambs denounced lambs who refuse/ to lie with lions?”

Varda Epstein: I so appreciated all the detailed footnotes you included at the bottom of each page (I hate it when writers put them the end and I have to flip back and forth). But that would have been a daunting task! You must have been taking voluminous notes for years on end, as you read, watched, talked . . . does that about sum it up? How many years was this book in the making? 

"A book that keeps writing itself,"
Tat Aluf Yossi Kuperwasser



Richard Landes: Yes, it does sum it up nicely. Thanks to Evernote (I have over 35,000 notes clipped there), I’ve been able to preserve access to articles that no longer can be found online. I’m ashamed to say the book was over a decade in the making. The working title – They’re so smart, cause we’re so Stupid – was inspired by the Fort Hood Massacre (2009) in which a Palestinian-American major in the army, after extensively displaying his jihadi sympathies, shot dozens of his fellow-soldiers, and inspired Mark Steyn to write an article entitled: “These days, it’s easier to be even more stupid after the event.” It’s just hard to write a history book about your own time. As Yossi Kuperwasser put it, “It’s a book that keeps writing itself.” When Shireen abu Akleh was killed, I knew I couldn't include this ongoing, slow-motion train wreck.

As for the footnotes, I feel passionately about a) having many, and b) at the bottom of the page. I took out all the URLs one can find for oneself easily from the hard-copy book, but for those who want to get them, I have them up at my personal webpage for the book: https://richard-landes.com/the-whole-world/

Varda Epstein: There are so many shocking parts in your book still rattling around in my head. For instance, that remark from a peer, “Well, the Jews have been asking for it, and now, thank God, we can say what we think at last.”

Richard Landes: For me it will always be Charles Enderlin, when I pointed out how much faking was going on at Netzarim Junction the day Muhammad al Durah was allegedly shot, saying to me “Oh yes, they do that all the time.”

But the two worst comments by far were a) when a colleague in the history department responded to my bemoaning the suicide terror war of the Palestinians with the comment, “What choice do they have?” and b) the journalist Catherine Nay saying that the image of al Durah “erased, replaced” the picture of the boy in the Warsaw Ghetto. Hard to get more empirically and morally disoriented, and yet people heard these kinds of remarks and nodded knowingly.

What would you say shocked you most about your findings? I’m guessing it’s the stupidity. . .

Richard Landes: That’s one way to put it. Cowardice is another. The way I’d put it, in the ‘90s, I may have seen a wave of antisemitism coming in 2000, and even a wave of Jihadi attacks on the West, but I never dreamed that Western democracies would be so feckless in responding.

Varda Epstein: What do you want the reader to take away from your book?

Richard Landes:

1) that when “the whole world” agrees on something (whether it’s the emperor’s courtiers or the academics and journalists and pundits who think they speak for “the whole world” and are sure they’re right) they can (and have, and are and will) be, sometimes, wrong.

2) that the meanings of “liberal” and “progressive” have been terribly distorted, even betrayed, in the 21st century. 

3) that when the legacy media reports Israel has done something terrible and Israeli sources deny it (or even admit to it only partially) it’s possible that the legacy media is wrong.

4) that we’ve gotten into this mess because a lot of nice and well-intentioned people have allowed themselves to be pushed around, silenced, and cowed by those filled with passionate intensity, and we need to speak up.

5) that to continue down this path spells disaster.

***

Landes, R. (2022). Can “The Whole World” Be Wrong?: Lethal Journalism, Antisemitism, and Global Jihad (Antisemitism in America). Boston : Academic Studies Press, 2022. 

(available on Amazon.)



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!

 

 

Tuesday, December 13, 2022

From Ian:

Jonathan Tobin: The Triumph of Trump’s Amateurs
And yet the conflict served an unexpectedly creative purpose. It provided the leverage the United Arab Emirates needed to justify its decision to normalize relations with Israel. In the Israeli newspaper Yediot Ahronot, Yousef al-Otaiba, the UAE ambassador to the United Nations, published an op-ed blasting the annexation idea. But while ostensibly critical of Israel, the column offered the possibility that the Arab world would open its arms to the Jewish state—because putting off annexation indefinitely would provide a rationale for normalization by Arab nations that were eager for an excuse to ditch the Palestinians.

Kushner and his chief aide, Avi Berkowitz, with the enthusiastic support of Secretary of State Mike Pompeo (who had replaced Tillerson in 2018), went to work securing what would become the Abraham Accords. The UAE went first, but the Kushner-Berkowitz team also got Bahrain and then Morocco (at the cost of American recognition for its occupation of the former Spanish Sahara) to join in.

The establishment of Israeli diplomatic relations with these countries was by any objective standard a historic achievement. It added to the total of Arab nations that recognized Israel after more than seven decades of the Jewish state’s existence; only Egypt and Jordan, both former direct combatants in the wars against Israel, had normalized relations before this point. Even more important, as Kushner’s book makes clear, the normalization was also done with the acquiescence of Saudi Arabia. The accords demolished the claims that peace with the Arab world could only follow a resolution of the conflict with the Palestinians.

Trump’s amateurs proved that John Kerry’s notorious 2015 answer of “no, no, no, no,” when he was asked about the possibility of a wider peace, had been a function of the foreign-policy establishment’s tunnel vision and not a reflection of diplomatic reality. It provided the template for future peace agreements along the same lines with other Arab nations and could, in theory, prod a new generation of Palestinian leaders to seek an agreement with Israel and the United States that would be similar to the Peace Through Prosperity formula.

That the amateurs had arrived at this point by an indirect route, and only after years of struggle both inside the U.S. government and in futile attempts to engage the Palestinians, doesn’t detract from their achievement. But so deep is the contempt for Trump and Netanyahu within the ranks of the Washington establishment, and so entrenched are their preconceived notions about the Middle East, that not even the reality of the Abraham Accords and their significance are enough to change minds.

With the same cast of characters who so conspicuously failed in the Middle East under Bill Clinton and especially Barack Obama now back in control of American foreign policy, the familiar refrains about Israel needing to make concessions to encourage the Palestinians are once again in vogue. Though the Palestinian reputation for intransigence has made it difficult for even President Joe Biden’s team to find any meaningful way to appease Abbas and Company, Trump’s successor has failed to follow up on the Abraham Accords, thus squandering the opportunity for more peace deals and a united front against Iranian aggression and nuclear threats.

That is why the four books by Trump’s amateurs deserve to be read—and, despite their pedestrian renderings of everyday diplomacy (and Kushner’s deeply unattractive efforts at revenge and score-settling), understood as a useful guide to how Washington can break its addiction to policies that have been tried and proven to fail. Their authors may suffer from the opprobrium that the educated classes attach to anyone connected to Trump. But their successes deserve to be remembered and honored, and they stand as a lesson to all who will follow in their footsteps.
Ruthie Blum: The making of a Palestinian martyr
Her grieving uncle’s contradictory accounts of the night in question were just as big a giveaway, albeit unintentional. He told one outlet that his niece had been at home minding her own business when the sound of gunshots overhead spurred her to race to the roof. He was quoted on Twitter as claiming that she had gone to the roof to find her missing cat.

Both stories are revealing; most young girls would have responded to the noise of gunfire, all-too-familiar in Jenin, by cowering under their beds, not rushing to get in on the action. It’s puzzling that no adult blocked her exit from the apartment under the circumstances.

As Israeli soldiers and Border Police were in pursuit of terrorists, three of whom were known to be plotting imminent attacks, residents of the area hurled rocks, Molotov cocktails and explosives at them. Experience has taught both the murderers and those seeking to arrest them that rooftops are the best perch for this. IDF snipers were thus appropriately positioned.

The one who ended up shooting Zakarneh was simply doing his extremely difficult, dangerous job—in pitch darkness, no less. Had the young woman not been next to the targeted terrorist, filming the exchange to post on social media for propaganda purposes, she would still be alive and well.

But, then, mobs of hate-filled Palestinians would have been robbed of the ritual of carrying her flag-draped body through the streets of the West Bank (Judea and Samaria) city that has become a key base for arms-hoarding and terrorist activity against the “Zionists.” It’s par for the making of a martyr, whose family will be rewarded with a generous monthly stipend from the P.A.

That’s a given, as is the vile way in which the whole scenario will be depicted in Gamba’s report.
Amb. Alan Baker: The Annual UN General Assembly Resolution Calling on Israel to Give Up Nuclear Weapons – “Much Ado about Nothing”
As part of the annual three-month “Israel-bashing” festival at the United Nations General Assembly, an automatic majority of 146 states adopted, on 7 December 2022, one of its annual resolutions calling upon Israel to renounce possession of nuclear weapons and to place its nuclear facilities under international supervision. Only six states voted against the resolution – Canada, the U.S., Palau, Micronesia, Liberia and Israel.

Anyone familiar with the annual ruminations and musings of the UN General Assembly should not be surprised or even bothered by the automatic repetition of old, archaic resolutions, year after year, singling out Israel for all the various ills of the world.

Apart from elements within Israeli media seeking to sensationalize and dramatize such resolutions, as well as some politicians and officials unfamiliar with the machinations of the UN, no one gets excited or bothered by such resolutions.

Even within the UN itself, the annual festival in the General Assembly of “Israel-bashing” resolutions based on an automatic, politically driven majority has for decades become a routine and unavoidable annoyance and irritant for all except the Arab and African states that sponsor them. Such resolutions certainly do not and are not intended to advance the cause of Middle East peace. Nor do they achieve anything other than stain the reputation of the organization.

They are endured by most states that, out of political correctness and fear of Muslim backlash, simply go along with them and even support them, knowing that they are meaningless.

Substantively and legally speaking, such resolutions, like all General Assembly resolutions, have no binding legal authority and represent nothing more than the collective, partisan political viewpoint of the automatic majority of states that regularly vote against Israel, no matter what the subject.

Monday, December 12, 2022

From Ian:

Matthew Continetti: Why Is the FBI Investigating Israel?
The State Department treated the IDF statement as the final word. “We welcome Israel’s review of this tragic incident, and again underscore the importance of accountability in this case, such as policies and procedures to prevent similar incidents from occurring in the future,” said spokesman Ned Price. The bureaucratic tut-tutting was unnecessary and offensive to Israeli ears—American history, after all, is replete with evidence that the best policies and procedures cannot prevent human error or freak occurrences. Still, though, after months of controversy and two investigations, the unfortunate matter appeared finally settled.

Then things got weird. On November 14, months after the IDF report and not long after elections in both Israel and the United States, Israeli defense minister Benny Gantz acknowledged that the FBI had opened an investigation into the Akleh killing. Even more remarkable than this unprecedented move was the fact that neither the White House nor the State Department seemed to be aware of it. The National Security Council provided Axios a banal statement of regret for Akleh’s death. Both the White House and the State Department let it be known that they had had nothing to do with the FBI inquiry. And the Department of Justice would not comment.

The only government that seemed to have its business in order was Israel’s. Gantz said the obvious thing: There was no way Israel would cooperate with the FBI. Van Hollen, meanwhile, cheered the news from his office in Washington. Yet imagine his reaction if the Shin Bet announced an investigation into the U.S. Army.

At the time of writing, no one knows the details of the FBI inquiry, or the identity of the official who authorized it, or how long it will go on before the U.S. government realizes its ineffectuality. What is known is that the anti-Israel gang successfully bullied an agency of the United States government into taking the extraordinary step of treating the military of the Jewish state as a criminal enterprise, with no consideration of the potential fallout in the Greater Middle East or the precedent that might be set for U.S. soldiers in future actions.

Tyrannical governments in China, Iran, Venezuela, and the West Bank and Gaza Strip murder, unjustly imprison, and violate the dignity and human rights of individuals every day, yet the Biden administration sees fit to crack down on Israel. It’s hard to decide whether to be more outraged at Biden’s appeasement of Israel’s enemies or at the confusion and incompetence of his lieutenants.

In early December, Secretary of State Blinken spoke to the anti-Israel group J Street and pledged his commitment to expanding the circle of peace encompassing Israel and her Arab neighbors. “Integrating Israel,” Blinken said, “also means continuing to fight for Israel to be treated the same way as every other nation—no more, no less.” Maybe he should tell that to the FBI.
HonestReporting EXCLUSIVE: Shireen Abu Akleh Death ‘Witness’ Turns Out To Be Islamic Jihad Terrorist
A key “civilian” eyewitness in the formal complaint against Israel filed by Al Jazeera at the International Criminal Court (ICC) over the death of Shireen Abu Akleh Tuesday is a terrorist affiliated with the US-designated terrorist organization Islamic Jihad, HonestReporting discovered exclusively on Sunday.

Jenin resident Sleem Awwad’s social media profiles reveal that he is a staunch supporter of Islamic Jihad, having posed with the flag of the jihadist terror group. Our editorial team found at least five photos of Awwad brandishing firearms, including military-style rifles with scopes.

“The credibility of the investigations of Al Jazeera in probing Abu Akleh’s death are questionable now that HonestReporting exposed their chief witness as an active member of a murderous terrorist organization,” HonestReporting executive director Gil Hoffman said.

On December 6, Al Jazeera filed a formal complaint against Israel with the International Criminal Court over the death of Abu Akleh, the Palestinian-American reporter tragically shot on May 11 during a counter-terrorism operation in Jenin.

A thorough Israel Defense Forces probe previously concluded that she was likely mistakenly shot by a soldier who failed to identify her as a member of the press. After pinpointing every spot where troops had come under fire, the investigation found that they had strictly complied with the IDF’s rules of engagement.

In July, a report issued by the US State Department similarly said that Israeli forces probably fired the deadly shot, but that there was no indication Israelis intentionally killed Abu Akleh.

Nevertheless, Al Jazeera last week announced it contacted ICC prosecutor Karim Khan in the wake of “new evidence” it uncovered “based on several eyewitness accounts.” Without presenting proof, the Qatar-run broadcaster argued that their correspondent was somehow “targeted” as part of a campaign by “Israeli Occupation Forces [sic]… to silence Al Jazeera.”

The network’s submission under article 15 of the Rome Statute, the founding treaty of the ICC, followed just days after the airing of “The Killing of Shireen Abu Akleh,” a 40-minute documentary produced by Al Jazeera’s Fault Lines series, which set the stage for Israeli soldiers to be prosecuted in The Hague.


Defending the Jewish State: HonestReporting Exposé Featured on Israeli Prime-time News Program
In an exclusive report, HonestReporting revealed that the star witness in the complaint against Israel filed by Al Jazeera at the International Criminal Court over the death of Shireen Abu Akleh is a terrorist affiliated with the US-designated terrorist group Islamic Jihad.

On December 11, 2022, HonestReporting Executive Director Gil Hoffman was invited to discuss our findings on Channel 13, one of Israel’s most-watched television stations. In the broadcast, outgoing Diaspora Affairs Minister and former IDF spokesperson Nachman Shai praised our work in defending Israel from media bias.


When antisemites sue the Jews: Lessons for Al Jazeera - opinion
The Al Jazeera media network has filed suit against Israel over the accidental shooting of its reporter, Shireen Abu Akleh, last May. The history of extremists suing prominent Jews suggests that Al Jazeera may regret what its lawsuit will reveal.

The lawsuit that Al Jazeera has filed in the International Criminal Court (ICC), could shine an embarrassing spotlight on the network itself. Those who do not regularly follow Al Jazeera might be surprised to learn that it is, “a major exporter of hateful content against the Jewish people, Israel, and the United States,” according to the Anti-Defamation League (ADL).

The ADL points out that Al Jazeera: “has sought to cast doubt upon the Nazi genocide of the Jewish people” (referring to it as “the alleged Holocaust”); “routinely glorifies violence against Israeli Jews”; and has ranted against what it calls, “the control of the Jews over the pornography industry.”

Al Jazeera also has a record of “providing a platform to all manner of virulent anti-Israel and even antisemitic extremists” in its commentary sections, the ADL notes.

Another question is whether Al Jazeera should be compelled to register with the US Justice Department as a foreign agent, just as the Russian television channel RT was required to register as an agent of the Russian government. Al Jazeera was founded by the government of Qatar, receives funding from the government, and maintains “extensive ties to the Qatari regime,” according to the ADL.

Both Al Jazeera and the Qatari corporation for public broadcasting are overseen by the same government official. The US ambassador in Doha “determined a number of years ago that Qatar’s government uses Al Jazeera as a tool of Qatari statecraft,” the ADL reports.

Hearings before the ICC about the Abu Akleh case, would enable the defense to ask uncomfortable questions about both the content of Al Jazeera’s reporting, and the details of its relationship with Qatar.
BBC News again promotes Al Jazeera lawfare
Readers are not informed that the UK based lawyer’s previous activities at the ICC include representation of the IHH Humanitarian Relief Foundation in the Mavi Marmara case.

As has been the case in the past, BBC audiences are not provided with any of the relevant context concerning Al Jazeera such as its throwing of a birthday party for a terrorist, its record of Holocaust revisionism, its hosting of antisemitic content from the late Muslim Brotherhood leader Qaradawi, its acceptance of an award from Hamas for ‘exemplary coverage’ or the fact that it is funded by the same government that has poured millions of dollars into the Gaza Strip.

Gritten’s report continues with amplification of a statement from a person who was invited to Al Jazeera’s press conference concerning its submission to the ICC: “Abu Aqla’s family, who submitted their own complaint to the ICC in September, said they supported Al Jazeera’s submission.

“The evidence is overwhelmingly clear, we expect the ICC to take action,” her niece, Lina Abu Aqla, told a news conference in The Hague.”

Thursday, December 08, 2022

From Ian:

Lies, libels and the justification of terror
Nov. 29 marked the 75th anniversary of United Nations Resolution 181, which called for the creation of two states, a Jewish state of Israel and an Arab state of Palestine. The Jewish community accepted those terms, and declared the State of Israel, while the Arab community refused, and launched a war that they then lost. Over time, however, Palestinians developed their own version of the “big lie” in the form of the “nakba” myth, a retelling of the 1948 Arab-Israeli war in which the would-be genocidal Arab armies that failed in their mission to eliminate the Jewish state are reimagined as the helpless victims of a horrible catastrophe (or “nakba,” in Arabic) of destruction and displacement. The legend of the nakba is at the heart of much of modern anti-Zionism.

Right on cue, on Nov. 30 the United Nations General Assembly voted to officially commemorate the founding of the State of Israel as a nakba. U.N. resolutions are not legally or morally binding, and they obviously cannot create truths. But they do lend a sheen of credibility to an otherwise ridiculous claim. Such a resolution makes it easier for the big lie to spread, because people can rely on and appeal to the GA’s “authority” on the matter without having to defend or even care about the details of such a heinous accusation. And once a lie has become officially acceptable to speak in the halls of power, it is only a matter of time before it gets picked up and amplified by popular culture. This one certainly did not take long.

On Thursday, Netflix began streaming the Jordanian film “Farha,” which purports to focus on the experiences of a young girl during the 1948 Arab-Israeli War. The hero watches as Israeli soldiers, portrayed as inhumanly cruel, brutally and graphically murder innocent Palestinian families, including children. While the film claims to be “based on” true events, the director has admitted that it is not factual, and that these scenes did not actually occur. But that does not mean they will not have a very real-world effect on anti-Jewish hate and violence, because many will watch the movie, and few will read the disclaimer.

There are two reasons to publicly correct the record on the nakba. First, it is simply not true. There are primary sources, from the Jordanian side, attesting to the fact that the vast majority of Arabs who left their homes did so voluntarily, or under orders from the invading Arab armies, not the invaded Israelis. Many left confident that the combined armies of Jordan, Syria, Iraq, Lebanon and Egypt would quickly overwhelm the tiny Jewish state. As the Jordanian newspaper Filastin reported, “The Arab States encouraged the Palestine Arabs to leave their homes temporarily in order to be out of the way of the Arab invasion armies.” But as another refugee quoted in another Jordanian newspaper, Ad Difaa, explained that “The Arab government told us: Get out so that we can get in. So we got out, but they did not get in.”

Second, it is incredibly dangerous. In 1976, Mahmoud Abbas said that “The Arab armies entered Palestine to protect the Palestinians from the Zionist tyranny but, instead, they abandoned them, forced them to emigrate and to leave their homeland, and threw them into prisons similar to the ghettos in which the Jews used to live” (emphasis added).
Israeli Ambassador to Ireland Lironne Bar Sadeh (Irish Times): Israel Is Not an "Apartheid" State
The letter in the Irish Times, "Israel and the Palestinian people" (Nov. 30), signed by various Irish luminaries, repeats the usual canard that Israel is an "apartheid" state.

This is an outrageous falsehood. Israel is in fact the only long-lasting liberal democracy in the entire Middle East. It is the only country in the region with freedom of speech, party, press, and association and judicial transparency.

It has equality under the law for all its citizens, a fifth of whom by the way are Israeli Arabs, both Muslim and Christian. It is also the only country in the region with rights and equality for the LGBTQ+ community. In terms of its legal and political systems, its vibrant press and rich civil society, Israel is remarkably similar to Ireland.

Those who signed the letter think they are helping in the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians, but in fact they are not. By constantly demonizing Israel and ignoring the deep flaws on the Palestinian side, such as the Islamic fundamentalism of Hamas, and the squalid corruption of the Palestinian Authority, they make themselves morally and intellectually bankrupt.

People who genuinely want to help the Palestinians should encourage democratic, moderate forces within Palestinian society and those who will eventually realize that peace with Israel can only come about through dialogue and mutual compromise, not by demonization and intransigence. It is tragic that some people in Ireland, instead of supporting Israel and the moderate Arab forces in the region, prefer to demonize Israel as much as possible and fail to condemn Iran and the forces of extremism which blight the region.
12% of Gazans Have Fled Gaza Since Hamas Took Over
In the 15 years since Hamas seized control of Gaza, 12 percent of the Strip’s population has fled, according to a study released by an organization associated with the terror group. The report appears to mark the first time Hamas is acknowledging — indirectly — widespread Gazan emigration since it violently seized control of the Strip in 2007.

The report, written by the Hamas-affiliated Council on International Relations, was published in September and recently seen by the Tazpit Press Service. It claims that over 60,000 Gazan residents have migrated from the Gaza Strip in recent years to escape poverty and war.

The CIR report blamed Israel’s blockade of Gaza for the Strip’s poverty driving Gazans to flee. Israel and Egypt imposed a blockade on Gaza in 2007 to prevent weapons smuggling.

The Strip has seen several waves of immigration due to dire unemployment rates, growing poverty, sanctions imposed by the Palestinian Authority, and rounds of conflict with Israel. The CIR did not acknowledge Hamas’s authoritarian rule as a contributing factor.

“Gaza is being emptied of its residents,” the authors of the report said.

The Palestinian Authority has no data on the scope of migration from the Gaza under Hamas rule. Till now, Hamas hid the data, making accurate numbers difficult for human rights organizations to gather. The CIR’s chairman of the board is Basem Naim, who is also a senior figure in Hamas.

Various estimates in the past year shed some light on the Gaza exodus.

Between 2007-2021, approximately 236,000 Gazans left the Strip, the Palestinian Authority’s official news agency, WAFA, reported during the summer. That number is also about 12 percent of the total residents of the Strip.

Based on those numbers, it appears that an average of around 17,000 Palestinians have left Gaza every year since 2007.

Wednesday, December 07, 2022

From Ian:

Two former diplomats display their inveterate animus towards Israel
We must ask: Why are Miller and Kurtzer not calling on the Biden administration to simply uphold U.S. law—namely, the Taylor Force Act—which stipulates that American financial aid misappropriated by the P.A. in order to reward terrorism must be withheld? Why do the authors not criticize the administration’s decision to continue funding the P.A.— $816 million this year from American taxpayers—despite the law?

In contrast to the kind words for the P.A., Miller and Kurtzer refer to the incoming Israeli government in the most vitriolic terms: “Radical, racist, misogynistic and homophobic.” Yet Israel’s next Gay Pride Week and Parade are scheduled for June 2023. There is no such celebration scheduled in any territory controlled by the P.A. or Hamas. In fact, gays are routinely murdered—often thrown off buildings head first—in Hamas-controlled Gaza. As for misogyny, do Miller and Kurtzer really believe that women in Palestinian-controlled territories are living as equals to men and enjoy greater rights than women in Israel?

It is telling, moreover, that Miller and Kurtzer do not even mention the issue of religious tolerance. Christians live in peace and freedom in Israel. This is most definitely not the case in P.A.- or Hamas-controlled territory. Seventy years ago, Bethlehem was 86% Christian; in 2022, it is 12% Christian. Of course, Israel is routinely blamed for this, but Christians who dare to speak the truth are unequivocal: Islamists are the cause of this mass exodus, as has occurred in Christian communities in Muslim-majority states such as Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Turkey and Egypt.

Miller and Kurtzer do not confine their vitriol to Israel. Their contempt for Muslims—especially those from the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Morocco and Sudan, which have normalized relations with Israel—is palpable. The authors believe that the United States should coerce those Arab states into adopting the policies preferred by Miller and Kurtzer themselves.

It is shocking and sad that, after decades of work persuading Arab governments to adopt non-ideological and pragmatic foreign policies that could stabilize the Middle East, there are spiteful Americans like Miller and Kurtzer who want to bully those governments into prioritizing the Palestinians over the needs of their own people. It is remarkable that former diplomats, allegedly dedicated to peace, have taken positions that are inherently anti-Israel, anti-Arab and anti-peace.

Miller and Kurtzer also have unabashed contempt for their own countrymen. They fulminate, for example, over the “blindly pro-Israel Republican majority soon to control the House.” Yet Miller and Kurtzer have never had a harsh word to say about the current Democrat-controlled House, which has “blindly” tolerated antisemitic and anti-Zionist members like Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib.

Under Democratic control, the House has summarily ignored the proposed Anti-Semitism Awareness Act (2019) and the Israel Relations Normalization Act (2021). Miller and Kurtzer, so far as I know, have never referred to the “blindly anti-Israel and antisemitic Democrat majority that controls the House.”

The International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s definition of antisemitism, which has been adopted by the State Department, recognizes that criticism of Israel that is not leveled against any other country constitutes antisemitism. What Miller and Kurtzer have done in their screed is to judge Israel by one standard and its enemies by quite another, more generous, standard. I leave it to the reader to ponder the implications.
Nearly 50 lawmakers urge Thomas-Greenfield to work to defund U.N.’s Israel inquiry
House lawmakers are urging the U.S. delegation to the United Nations to work through the body’s upcoming budgeting process to limit funding to, and ultimately shut down, the U.N. Human Rights Council’s dedicated Commission of Inquiry investigating Israel — a new push in ongoing congressional efforts to scrap the open-ended probe.

A bipartisan group of 49 lawmakers wrote a letter, obtained by Jewish Insider, to U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Linda Thomas-Greenfield on Tuesday, in which they encouraged “the United States delegation to strongly advocate to restrict this biased commission’s funding from within the UN system, and take steps to eliminate the commission completely.”

The commission was launched in the wake of the May 2021 conflict between Israel and Hamas in Gaza. The letter was organized by Reps. Dean Phillips (D-MN) and Brian Fitzpatrick (R-PA).

The lawmakers note that the U.S. led efforts in 2021 to cut the commission’s budget for 2022 by nearly 25%, and argue that the U.S. delegation should “assemble a coalition of like-minded allies and partners to ensure a timely end to the operations of this commission through the restriction and ultimate elimination of its funding from within the UN system.”

The letter highlights a string of concerns about the commission, referring to its “profoundly problematic” and “incomplete and biased reports,” “numerous antisemitic comments” by commission staffers and the body’s ongoing mandate.

“Respect for human rights is a core American value, and an ideal to which all international actors must be held accountable. That accounting must be done in a balanced manner consistent with international norms, and the U.N. Commission of Inquiry abjectly fails to meet these standards,” the letter continues. “The coming weeks will require the administration to redouble its diplomatic efforts to ensure that funding to this discriminatory investigation ultimately ceases. We stand ready to assist you in any way in defending our democratic ally, Israel.”
US State Department spokesman mute on Israeli ‘war crimes’ accusation
U.S. State Department spokesman Ned Price on Tuesday failed to push back on a reporter’s accusation that Israel was perpetrating “war crimes” against the Palestinians.

“I mean, what we have seen in the past couple weeks is really an uptick of Israeli aggression against the Palestinians. We see war crimes being committed on—in front of everybody. So that would not bother the United States of America, despite the fact that these guys [Religious Zionism Party head Bezalel Smotrich and Otzma Yehudit leader Itamar Ben-Gvir] have such a long rap sheet?” a reporter asked Price during the daily press briefing.

Answered Price: “Said, whether it—whether the question is government formation or any other hypothetical, we just don’t entertain those types of questions. It doesn’t do us any good to comment on something that may or may not come to pass. When it comes to governments that haven’t been formed, I’ve been asked this question from this podium for any number of democratic countries around the world—how, whether, will we work with various individuals around the world—and our answer’s always the same. We are going to judge a government on how it governs, once it is in place—on the policies that it pursues.”

Price also failed to correct the reporter’s assertion in a follow-up question that an Israeli policeman had shot “at point blank an unarmed Palestinian,” when in fact the officer in question had fired on a terrorist in the process of attacking him.


Palestinian refugee: We were told in 1948 to “leave and go to Jordan. It's just for a few weeks”

Tuesday, December 06, 2022

From Ian:

JPost Editorial: Herzog's Abraham Accords trip and the Palestinian elephant in the room
Bahrain’s Foreign Minister Abdullatif bin Rashid Al Zayani said as much speaking to reporters Sunday night, saying the Abraham Accords will ultimately only succeed if a two-state resolution to the conflict is achieved.

Hamad also made sure to speak of the Palestinians in his public remarks at the start of his meeting with Herzog. There is firm support in Bahrain for “achieving a just, comprehensive and sustainable peace that guarantees the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people and that will lead to stability, development and prosperity for both the Palestinian and Israeli people as well as for the people of the region,” Hamad said.

The incoming Israeli government needs to take those words seriously. The status quo of continued terrorist attacks on Israelis, as well as Palestinians acting against Israel being shot by security forces on an almost daily basis, might be manageable on a military basis, but it is unsustainable for the long-term stability and future of the Israeli and Palestinian people.

The Palestinian issue is likely to be number 999 on the to-do list of the Benjamin Netanyahu-led coalition, due to the obvious reasons of the coalition partners having no interest in pursuing any kind of negotiations with the Palestinian Authority.

Granted, during both Naftali Bennett and Yair Lapid’s tenures there was little to no movement with the Palestinians, with the strategy seeming to punt the issue down the field for later.

That’s likely what the Biden administration surmised as well, knowing the tenuous makeup of the “change” government in which there was no consensus for engagement with the Palestinians.

With the likely new government, there will be a consensus, and it will not be about jump-starting negotiations about a two-state solution. It’s unclear if US President Joe Biden will push back now that Netanyahu is back in power.

Even if he doesn’t, it behooves Netanyahu to take the Bahraini comments to heart. Taking the Abraham Accords for granted, and ignoring the Palestinian issue, will only come back to hurt Israel in the end.
Foreign Ministry summons UN Mideast envoy over sympathy for Palestinian attacker
Wennesland later tweeted that he was “horrified by today’s killing of a Palestinian man, Ammar Mifleh, during a scuffle with an Israeli soldier near Huwara in the o[ccupied] West Bank.

“My heartfelt condolences to his bereaved family. Such incidents must be fully & promptly investigated, & those responsible held accountable,” he added.

Wennesland’s comments were lambasted by Israeli officials.

Prime Minister Yair Lapid backed the officer who shot the attacker.

“Any attempt to distort reality and tell false stories to the world is simply a disgrace,” tweeted Lapid. “Our security forces will continue to act determinedly against terror wherever it raises its head.”

Foreign Ministry spokesman Emmanuel Nahshon also slammed Wennesland’s statement, calling it a “total distortion of reality.”

“This is NOT a ‘scuffle’ — this is a terror attack!” he added.

Defense Minister Benny Gantz also said he “strongly condemned” Wennesland’s remarks.

“I want to praise the police officer who neutralized a terrorist yesterday. I strongly condemn the attempts to present the event in a false and manipulative manner, and the statement of the UN envoy to the Middle East against the [officer], who acted with determination and professionalism,” Gantz said on Twitter. Injuries caused to a police officer following a stabbing attack in the northern West Bank town of Hawara on December 2, 2022. (Israel Police)

Huwara Mayor Moein Dmeidy and others on Saturday cited secondhand accounts that said there had been an altercation between Mifleh and an Israeli motorist after a car accident, but Associated Press journalists were unable to find witnesses to the events that led up to the shooting.

Dmeidy argued the officer had no justification to kill Mifleh after he had already overpowered him. Mifleh was “killed in cold blood,” said the mayor, who arrived at the scene moments after the shooting.

Dmeidy said a Palestinian ambulance arrived minutes after the shooting but security forces prevented the medics from administering aid. Dmeidy said Israel has not handed over Mifleh’s body for burial.

Border Police said that the officer with stab wounds was subsequently taken for medical treatment, as was the officer who subdued the attacker. A knife used by an alleged Palestinian attacker in the West Bank town of Huwara on December 2, 2022 (Israel Police)

Images of the officer who killed the stabber were posted to social media on Saturday, some including threats against him.

The officer himself said it could have been a “more significant attack” had the attacker managed to grab his gun.

“During a struggle with the terrorist I understand that if he succeeds in stealing my rifle, there will be a more significant attack here. I manage to pull out my handgun and I shoot the terrorist until he is neutralized,” he said in a video published by police.


From Reuters:
 Al Jazeera on Tuesday said it has filed a lawsuit at the International Criminal Court against Israeli forces over the killing of Palestinian-American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, who was shot during an Israeli raid in the West Bank in May.

The lawsuit following an investigation by the television news network's legal team, Al Jazeera said on Twitter.

The ICC must identify the individuals who were directly involved Abu Akleh's killing, Al Jazeera lawyer Rodney Dixon KC told a news conference in The Hague on Tuesday.

This is a joke.

There is no such thing as a "lawsuit"  at the ICC. Al Jazeera cannot initiate any sort of legal action at the ICC. Only the UN Security Council, a state party to the ICC, or the ICC prosecutor can initiate any action at the ICC.

The ICC only is tasked to prosecute four war crimes: genocide, crimes against humanity, grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions and the crime of aggression of one state against another. 

All Al Jazeera did was send a letter to the prosecutor. They made it look like a big deal, flying a group to the Hague to hand in the envelope, but that it all they did.


You can write to the prosecutor, too: otp.informationdesk@icc-cpi.int. It doesn't mean anything.

The prosecutor has no obligation to do anything just because he received a letter. Sending a letter that will be ignored is hardly newsworthy. 

In other words, this is nothing more than a publicity stunt on the part of Al Jazeera. 

As usual, the media just parrots Al Jazeera's press release as if it is real news, without asking a single international law expert what this means. 




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Thursday, December 01, 2022



Yesterday, the UN passed five anti-Israel resolutions

Through the terms of the resolution titled “Peaceful settlement of the question of Palestine”, the Assembly called for an immediate halt to all settlement activities, land confiscation and home demolitions, for the release of prisoners and for an end to arbitrary arrests and detentions. It also stressed the need to urgently exert collective efforts to launch credible negotiations on all final status issues and for intensified efforts by the parties towards a just, lasting peace in the Middle East based on relevant United Nations resolutions, including Security Council resolution 2334 (2016), the Madrid terms of reference, the Arab Peace Initiative and the Quartet road map.

By the text titled “Division for Palestinian Rights of the Secretariat”, the Assembly requested the Division to dedicate its activities in 2023 to the commemoration of the seventy-fifth anniversary of the Nakba, including by organizing a high-level event at the General Assembly Hall on 15 May 2023.

By a resolution titled “The Syrian Golan”, the Assembly declared that the Israeli decision of 14 December 1981 to impose its laws and jurisdiction on the occupied Syrian Golan is null and void and has no validity and called upon Israel to rescind it.

The Assembly also adopted drafts titled “Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People” and “Special information programme on the question of Palestine of the Department of Global Communications of the Secretariat”. By the terms of the latter text, the Assembly condemned the killing of Palestinian-American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh and welcomed the decision of the United Nations to honour her legacy by renaming a training programme to “Shireen Abu Akleh Training Programme for Palestinian Broadcasters and Journalists”.

“Peaceful settlement of the question of Palestine” passed, 153-9 with 10 abstained.

Dedicating 2023 to commemorating the Nakba passed by 90-30-47.

“Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People”  passed 101-17-53.

“Special information programme" passed 149-11-13.

And still the Palestinians whined - that the votes were not lopsided enough in their direction.

Riyad Al-Maliki, Palestinian foreign affairs minister, complained that there weren't as many anti-Israel votes as in other years, calling on the countries that did not support the resolutions to "stop their double standards, and their coercion and encouragement of the occupation authority in its crimes."

He said that anyone who was against the resolutions engaged in "abusive behavior" and they "contribute to weakening the international system." 

He then said that the only way to resolve the issue is to end and dismantle the "existence of a settler colonial occupation and apartheid regime" as soon as possible, to create a Palestinian state with Jerusalem (not "East Jerusalem") as its capital, and the "return" of the Palestinian "refugees" to the homes of their ancestors in Israel - in other words, nothing less than the destruction of Israel and its replacement with two Arab majority states. 

That's the Palestinian formula for "peace," and it always has been. And they will never stop their demands until Israel is destroyed.

They say this every day, and the world refuses to listen.





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