Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News: TOI

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Monday, September 04, 2023

Today's Jenin raid was remarkable - and it shows how Israel adheres to human rights law in even impossible conditions

The Israeli military arrested three members of the Hamas terror group during a raid in the Jenin refugee camp in the northern West Bank on Monday morning, marking the first overt entry of forces to the camp since a major operation was carried out in the area two months ago.

In a joint statement, the Israel Defense Forces, Shin Bet security agency, and Border Police said troops entered the camp and nabbed Abdullah Hassan Mohammed Sobeh, Ward Sharim, and Mus’ab Ja’aydah.

The IDF said troops opened fire at the wanted gunmen as they attempted to flee a building when the forces arrived. One of the armed Palestinians shot in the leg and seriously wounded, and was taken by helicopter to Rambam Hospital in Haifa.

An assault rifle belonging to one of the wanted Palestinians was seized, the IDF said.

The IDF said troops also responded with live fire against Palestinian gunmen who opened fire at forces in the area, and Palestinian rioters hurling stones.

A local wing of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad terror group said its gunmen opened fire at Israeli forces on the outskirts of the camp.

The Palestinian Authority health ministry said four people were lightly wounded by Israeli fire in the area and taken to nearby hospitals.

No Israeli soldiers were wounded in the operation.

The IDF did injured the captured terrorists, and transported them by helicopter to a hospital.

Imagine the difficulty of such an operation.

The goal, as always, is to arrest terrorists - not to kill them. The IDF knows that it will be attacked from all directions in a crowded camp that is filled with booby-traps, IEDs and angry youth with stones, firebombs and automatic weapons.

And in the end, no one was killed on either side. The terrorists were captured alive.

This must have involved many, many hours of planning, intelligence and practice.

But this result is always what the IDF wants to see. It doesn't want to kill people, but when under fire, soldiers must return fire towards the source. Nearly every person killed in the past two years were involved in fighting or members of terror groups. For urban warfare, this is incredible, and military experts know this.

But the media ignores all of that. "Human rights groups" insist on perfection in a war zone and that the IDF use peacetime, law enforcement standards when the enemy is often a heavily armed military group. As much as they can, Israel tries to live up to those standards, and it showed that today, even if it is not at all clear that the more flexible laws of armed conflict wouldn't apply to Jenin today.

The world is so obsessed with demonizing Israel that it ignores how unique it is for an army to have so few civilian casualties in urban war zones.

Try to find stories where US or British troops entered a crowded town and extracted wanted men under constant fire without killing anyone. If it has ever happened, it is incredibly rare. Yet the IDF strives to do that each and every time - and its success today proves that.

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It's happening again:

A delegation of top American officials is slated to travel to Riyadh this week to meet with Saudi counterparts in order to discuss a potential normalization agreement between the Gulf kingdom and Israel, a US official and a Palestinian official told The Times of Israel on Sunday.

The visit by White House Middle East czar Brett McGurk and Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs Barbara Leaf will come just over a month after US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan visited Saudi Arabia with the same objective, pointing to Washington’s continued determination to broker an elusive deal. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken also visited Riyadh on the same mission in June.

McGurk and Leaf’s visit will overlap with that of a Palestinian delegation led by Palestine Liberation Organization executive committee secretary-general Hussein al-Sheikh, who will be in Riyadh to discuss what Ramallah is hoping to obtain from a Saudi-Israeli normalization deal, the two officials said.

So the US is speaking to Saudi Arabia about conditions on Israel to accept a normalization deal.

The US is speaking to Palestinians about conditions on Israel to accept a normalization deal.

The Palestinians are speaking to the Saudis about conditions on Israel to accept a normalization deal.

Everyone is speaking to each other - about Israel, but not to Israel.

Are there backchannels from Israel to Saudi Arabia? Probably. Is the Israeli government in charge of these backchannels?

We have no idea.

But we do know that the Biden administration and the Palestinians are not keen to negotiate with Netanyahu, so my guess is that some Israeli peacenik organization is leading the backchannel negotiations with the intent to manipulate the Israeli government, not to appease it, about what strings would be attached to the deal.

Maybe I'm being a bit too sensitive after reading the Gidi Grinstein book I reviewed on Sunday and how a backchannel was used by the Israeli Left, the US and Palestinians to collude to bring down Netanyahu in his first term, but the impression I am getting is that a purpose of these negotiations may include finding a way to make the current coalition government fall, something that would being a sigh of relief to the Americans, the Palestinians and not a small number of Israelis.

Holding these meetings in Saudi Arabia is a convenient way to exclude Israeli officials who cannot officially travel to the kingdom. But all other negotiations between Israel and its erstwhile peace partners took place in neutral territory - Europe or the US.

Excluding Israel from these talks seems to be a way to marginalize the Jewish state and put it on its back foot when the offer is revealed - a deal that, it appears, will be all but imposed on Israel rather than one that Israel has a say in. If Israel refuses an offer backed by the US, Saudis and tacitly Palestinians it will look like an intransigent player who only pretends to want peace. If Israel accepts a bad deal, the government probably will fall.

It feels like deja vu.,

Most Israelis and Zionists would love to see Saudi normalization, myself included. Every new revelation makes me wonder if the price would be too high - especially when the major benefits of peace are already effectively there.

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Apartheid! Israeli firefighter dies, another seriously injured trying to rescue an illegal Palestinian worker who fell into a pit

Another story of how little Israel cares about Palestinian lives:

Two people were killed and a third was in critical condition after falling into a pit in the northern village of Deir al-Asad on Sunday.

Two of the men were firefighters who fell into the hole during an attempt to extract the third, a Palestinian laborer who had earlier plunged inside and lost consciousness.

The firefighters were pulled from the eight-meter-deep hole by other rescue personnel at the scene, according to a Magen David Ambulance service statement.

Medics tried to revive them while they were being taken to Nahariya’s Galilee Medical Center in critical condition, MDA said.

One of them was later declared dead. He was named as Adnan Assad, 40, from Beit Jann.

Rescue workers at the scene also pulled the Palestinian man, in his 20s, from the hole. He was also taken to the hospital in critical condition and was declared dead several hours later.

According to police, he was a Palestinian laborer staying in the country illegally.

Two firefighters risked their lives - and one paid the ultimate price - to save a Palestinian.

And notice that the Israeli firefighter was an Arab himself - working on helping people alongside his Jewish colleagues. There is no distinction between them.

In other words, reality is completely different from the lies you see in the anti-Israel media.

But anyone who cares to know the truth already was aware of this.

Adnan Assad was a 40 year old father of three, including a two month old baby. May his memory be a blessing.

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Palestinian PM claims Israeli law to strip citizenship from terrorists is illegal under international law. Of course he is lying - and a hypocrite.

From Times of Israel:

The Knesset approved a law on Wednesday to strip convicted terrorists with Israeli nationality of their citizenship — provided they receive funding from the Palestinian Authority or an associated organization.

The law, an amendment to Israel’s 1952 Citizenship Law, applies to both Israeli citizens and permanent residents incarcerated following a conviction for terror, aiding terror, harming Israeli sovereignty, inciting war, or aiding an enemy during wartime, and enables the interior minister to revoke their status after a hearing.

The law enables citizenship to be revoked even if the person lacks a second citizenship, provided they have a permanent residence status outside of Israel. Once citizenship is revoked, the person would be denied entry back into Israel.

The Palestinian prime minister Muhammad Shtayyeh reacted angrily, claiming the law is "racist" and illegal:

Prime Minister Muhammad Shtayyeh said in a statement that this decision is a racist practice and a flagrant violation of international law and international humanitarian law. calling on the United Nations, the United States, and the European Union to denounce the resolution, and to put pressure on Israel to force it to cancel it .

Is it illegal to revoke citizenship of terrorists? Of course not. Western nations do it all the time. The US Department of Justice has an entire section for pursuing denaturalization for terrorists and other criminals. The UK, France and Britain have laws to strip citizenship away from terrorists, and the European Court of Human Rights has upheld their decisions.

There are two potential arguments against stripping citizenship.

One is that this law is discriminatory, since it only applies to Palestinians and not Jewish terrorists. But that is only because the only recipients of Palestinian Authority payments are Arabs - if Jews would be convicted of terrorism for the Palestinian cause, and if the PA would pay them, the law would apply to them as well. Similarly, any Israeli Arab in prison can refuse to accept payments from the Palestinian Authority and therefore be immune from being denaturalized. The fact that they accept money from those who want to see Israel destroyed is a pretty good argument that they are not good citizens.

The second argument is that stripping nationality, leaving someone stateless, is illegal altogether. There is a UN Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness written in 1961 that never received a majority of UN votes - but even many of its signatories included reservations that made it clear that they maintain the right to revoke citizenship for specific acts by citizens. For example, Austria said, "Austria declares to retain the right to deprive a person of his nationality, if such person enters, on his own free will, the military service of a foreign State."

Shtayyeh's calling denaturalization "illegal" and "racist" is especially hypocritical. Only a day beforehand, he called on Western nations to revoke the citizenship of Jews (and only Jews!) who live across the Green Line. Arabs who moved across the Green Line are, of course, not "settlers."

There would be a further irony if critics refer to the UN Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness to claim that this is illegal. Because nearly all Arab states refuse to sign that convention - if they did, they would be required to provide citizenship to children born to Palestinians there, and the Arab League says that Palestinians should remain stateless!

Once again, we see that "critics of Israel" aren't basing their critiques on international law, or morality, or really any framework that doesn't prove that they are hypocrites. The only consistency they show is antisemitism.

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Is the bogus FBI Akleh investigation meant to insult Israel's right-wing government?

Times of Israel reports:

The US Federal Bureau of Investigation is launching an investigation into the killing of Palestinian-American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, apparently by an Israeli soldier, officials said Monday, with Israel immediately rejecting cooperation with the probe.

US officials updated their Israeli counterparts earlier this month about the decision, an official familiar with the matter told The Times of Israel on Monday, confirming a Channel 14 news report.

There is a lot that doesn't make sense about this.

First of all, the US has insisted for months that they will accept the results of Israel's internal investigation. This a very strange about-face, with no obvious reason.

Secondly, the FBI has - as far as I know - never done an independent investigation of an ally without their cooperation. Normally they will work together with, often upon request from, allies to add investigative expertise that other countries cannot do. To publicly disrespect an ally like this is extraordinary.

Thirdly, this is even extraordinary according to official FBI policy described in this document:

The FBI becomes involved in investigating crimes against U.S. citizens under the following two circumstances:

When the FBI has authority under the U.S. criminal code to investigate certain crimes such as terrorism, the homicide or kidnapping of U.S. citizens, or international family abduction.

When a foreign government requests FBI assistance with an investigation.

This only makes sense if you consider Abu Aklehs' death a homicide, which is again an amazing assumption.

Combine this with the huge number of civilians that have been killed by the US Army in various circumstances - the US armed forces certainly know the difficulties of avoiding unfortunate deaths - and there is only one way to look at this investigation.

It is a gross, deliberate insult to Israel.

So why is the US knowingly insulting its ally? And why now?

The TOI article says that "US officials updated their Israeli counterparts earlier this month about the decision." That's about the time of the results of Israel's elections.

Abu Akleh's death and investigation were not under a right wing government, and the US respected Israel's decisions at the time.

The Biden administration and traditionally friendly Democratic members of Congress have been increasingly willing to criticize and show displeasure at Israel's upcoming government. It seems more than coincidental that this insult, which could have happened at any time over the past six months, is timed right after the Israeli elections.

The Biden administration is sending a profoundly passive-aggressive message that it will treat Israeli governments it does not approve of with little respect, and only lip service towards being an ally.

If I am correct, expect things to get much uglier in coming months, at the UN and maybe even an unofficial move of diplomatic resources from Jerusalem back to Tel Aviv.

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Where is the State Department outrage at Mahmoud Abbas personally honoring child-murderers?

Times of Israel reports:

US State Department spokesman Ned Price condemned far-right MK Itamar Ben Gvir’s attendance at a memorial event for Meir Kahane on Thursday, in what was the first public rebuke from the Biden administration of the Religious Zionism-Otzma Yehudit lawmaker aiming to become Israel’s next public security minister.

“Celebrating the legacy of a terrorist organization is abhorrent. There is no other word for it. It is abhorrent,” Price said when asked during a press briefing about Ben Gvir’s participation in the memorial event hours earlier. Price was referencing the Kach group that the American-born rabbi founded in 1971 and its offshoot Kahane Chai.

If celebrating the legacy of Meir Kahane is abhorrent, then certainly the State Department would be even more appalled at....Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas.

Because by any metric, Abbas has celebrated and praised far worse people than Meir Kahane.

For example, Abbas has repeatedly praised the rabidly antisemitic Nazi collaborator Mufti of Jerusalem.

Apologists might argue that Abbas was not praising the Mufti's antisemitism and the pogroms he organized, but only his leadership of Palestinians.

But Mahmoud Abbas has personally honored many, many people whose only accomplishments in life have been killing Jews. And not just Jews - Jewish children.

Here is Abbas in a private meeting with Amna Muna, who pretended to be a teenage girl to seduce a 16 year old Israeli boy in a chat room to meet her - and she had him brutally murdered.

The video of the meeting is still on Abbas' own YouTube channel! He is proud of her - today.

That is not the only child murderer Abbas has honored. In a 2008 visit to Lebanon, Abbas went out of his way to visit and pay homage to one of the most notorious terrorists in Israeli history, Samir Kuntar.

Abbas also planned to honor another child murderer, Ahlam Tamimi, who was behind the Sbarro pizza shop bombing - he changed his mind after Israeli outrage.

Abbas has honored Maryam Farhat, whose only accomplishment in life was to raise three Hamas terrorist sons, one of whom murdered five students studying in a yeshiva.

And Abbas eulogized Ahmad Abu Sukkar, saying his life was "a journey of struggle full of exceptional giving and devoted activity for Palestine and for the freedom and honor of our people."

Sukkar murdered 15 people in a Jerusalem bombing in 1975, including an 11-year old boy and girl.

Of course, Abbas also has personally met with and praised plenty of other famed Palestinian terrorists.

Meir Kahane didn't kill anyone. But Mahmoud Abbas celebrates Palestinians who have directly murdered Jewish men, women - and children.

When will the State Department describe Mahmoud Abbas as "abhorrent"?

(h/t Dovid L)

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Latest "Iran catches Mossad spy ring" story doesn't add up

From Times of Israel:

An alleged Israeli spy network made up of five individuals has been arrested in Iran, an Iranian media outlet claimed Thursday, the second such group detention announced within a week.

The semi-official Iranian Labour News Agency said the five suspects were the leader of the cell and four associates, all of whom were “affiliated with the Israeli regime” and had allegedly been in contact with the head of Israel’s Mossad.

The report said Iran claimed the alleged spies had told the chief of the Israeli spy agency that they would “collect information from important and vital areas.”

Maybe they caught some spies and maybe they didn't. But you can be certain that whoever Iran arrested was not in direct contact with the head of the Mossad!

That is not how any organization works, let alone an intelligence operation!

And if the absurd story was true, Iranian spy agencies are idiots, because they could use these spies to directly send misinformation to the head of Israel's Mossad! That is a lot more valuable than exposing them.

This alone is enough to make one think that the entire story is fabricated.

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

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Real apartheid: Jews who build illegally in the Negev get expelled in 24 hours, Bedouin build with impunity (with 2013 EoZNews video)

From Times of Israel:

In the Negev, a few dozen right-wing activists, reportedly residents of the south and students at yeshivas in the area, set up a new outpost overnight Tuesday on state land close to the Bedouin city of Rahat.

Two prefab structures were brought to the location, which the activists declared as a “new community” named Ma’ale Paula in memory of the wife of Israel’s first prime minister, David Ben Gurion. Ben Gurion had advocated for Jewish communities to be established in the Negev during the early years of the state.

Activists said that Ma’ale Paula was set up because of “the conduct of the government and the abandonment of the Negev to a Bedouin takeover,” a reference to illegal Arab construction in the region.

Two people were arrested, the Kan public broadcaster reported.

A complaint against the outpost was filed by the Israel Land Authority, the Israel Police said in a statement.

The outpost was demolished.

But:

The right-wing, pro-settlement Regavim group said in a statement that some 3,500 illegal buildings are constructed each year by the Bedouin community.

“Worse than the lack of law enforcement is the selective enforcement,” the group said, according to Kan.

In 2013, I went on a tour of the Negev with Regavim. The group is not a bunch of anti-Arab, right-wing fanatics as they are often portrayed in the media. They want to find a humane and legal solution to the problem of the Bedouin in the Negev, and they admit that the Israeli government has not treated the Arabs fairly over the decades. But still, the Bedouin build thousands of illegal structures and villages in the Negev every year, and besides my own video, I have not seen any English language news reports that describe the issue accurately at all.

This is not the most professional video I've ever done, but it is still the best description of the complexities of the intersecting problems of Bedouin ignoring the laws of the state that they are citizens in, Israel trying to find solutions - including giving them land for free, the criminal acts of destroying infrastructure meant for Arabs, and even polygamy. The sheer amount of illegal building in the Negev is mind-boggling and the news media rarely reports it.

Today, the problems is much worse than it was when this was made nine years ago.

You will not regret spending.the 12 minutes to watch this video.

Checking Both Moshe and Mohammed: Moral Relativism is Not Equality (Judean Rose)

New Media Editor Sarah Tuttle-Singer, of the Times of Israel introduced her newest blog, Why I want the security guy at the train station to search me, on the Times of Israel bloggers’ Facebook page with these words, “There are two things I care about when it comes to Israel: Security and equality. And this is why I say with no hesitation: Search Muhammed. And search me. Search everyone.”

The fallacy of these words hit me with immediate clarity. I knew what her blog said without reading it. She was going to say that everyone has to be checked by security guards, both Jew and Arab, in order to protect democracy—that equality means checking everyone, irrespective of whether or not they might be guilty.

But that isn’t equality. Equality is about holding everyone to the same societal standards. If Moshe is a bad boy, he goes to jail. If Mohammed is a bad boy he goes to jail. Because everyone is supposed to be good and obey the law. And when they don’t, there are repercussions.

Because that is how the security apparatus protects our liberties. They have intel. They use it to protect everyone. The intel is what it is. It’s what Moshe or Mohammed make it. And should Moshe’s or Mohammed’s relatives tend to be rowdy, they then become “the usual suspects” and anyone who looks, sounds, or acts like them is identified and scrutinized.

That’s how we protect equality. By making sure that everyone has the right to safety and security. And by setting standards of appropriate behavior. And making sure there are consequences to bad behavior.

And if Moshe or Mohammed don’t want their families scrutinized, they need to behave. Period.

But let’s say one relative doesn’t go along with the rowdy bunch. He’s a good guy. Is it fair that he be profiled, scrutinized, his liberties temporarily curtailed?

Absolutely. Because these standards protect him, too. Which is why, by no stretch of the imagination can it be called collective punishment to more carefully scrutinize Arabs going through Israeli security points. Because 99% of terror attacks in Israel are carried out by Arabs.

Enforcing the law and being tough on criminals or those at risk of becoming criminals, is how we protect our civil liberties and our security. For everyone. Equally. If a terrorist blows up a train, Arabs get hurt, too. The entire point of security is to prevent everyone from getting hurt, both Arab and Jew.

That is real equality, while checking everyone would be a mere performance, a show of equality, not the real thing.

I monitored the comments on the TOI bloggers’ Facebook page. No one was saying what I was thinking. The next day I read the blog, and the comments below. No one had written what I was thinking (as of this writing). So I ventured to say it myself, on the Facebook TOI bloggers’ page:

Equality, yes. Hold peoples to the same standards. Jews are, by and large, not carrying out terror attacks against people in malls and train stations. You can tell by looking at them if they are the rare exception. Which is how the intelligence community managed to infiltrate the youth group of Rabin's assassin (and incite the killer to murder): they knew this was a rare extremist group because of the way they looked, spoke, acted [Tuttle-Singer had referenced Yigal Amir in an earlier comment on the thread, “The only person to assassinate an Israeli PM was a Jewish Israeli.”]

So why should manpower and money be wasted to check every single Jew, when the Jews are by and large, a peaceful people? Equality under the law means holding people to the same standard. A people with a large proportion of terrorists must unfortunately be scrutinized with care, also for the sake of those among them who are innocent and might be harmed by the actions of those among them who are violent.

I too, always thank security guards for checking me, as I know this is for my own safety. But I am also grateful when they use their common sense, look me over, know I'm a granny with arthritis, without a violent bone in my body, and wave me through without further ado.

I am tempted to blog about this, so I hope you will answer me, Sarah Tuttle-Singer. It is not equality to check every single person, when you know which people are the ones [who] may or may not endanger society. Equality is holding peoples to the same standards.

Jews, in general, don't deserve to be treated with suspicion. Certainly not Feige Rochel, for example, whose sector has never perpetrated a terror attack at a bus station, AFAIK. That would just be holding up people to make a show of equality, when the real equality is to hold her sector to the same standard: are Haredim perpetrating terror attacks?

Equality doesn't mean an inconvenient show. It means societal standards of behavioral norms.

Sarah did, in fact, respond to me, as follows:

Varda, for the sake of our Jewish and democratic state we should demand equality. It's essential or we wither.

I'm willing to be inconvenienced and we can and should find budget for more guards if necessary. The prime minister's ice cream budget ought to cover some of the costs.

Search everyone.

Feige Rochel and Varda Epstein and Sarah Tuttle singer and Igal Amir and

Yosef Chaim Ben David and ruvi rivkin and that random barista and Omar al-abed and

Muhammad salim and george dabit and the woman who works in the clothing store on Hebron road and EVERYONE should be subject to same rules

And treatment.

And the guilty should go to jail.

As I didn’t feel this answered my question, I tried narrowing things down further, as follows:

There's an issue with this idea: it means focusing on everyone, which dilutes/diverts the focus away from probable troublemakers.

It harms everyone by making the security apparatus LESS effective.

It's not about the inconvenience or money. It's about the fact that this is not real equality, but a show of equality. The real equality is holding people to the same standard, which deters actual terrorists.

I really hoped that Sarah would see my point and speak to it. But she didn’t deign to respond. She’d doubled down, reiterated her talking points, and closed shop.

Which is a pity. Because I want security and equality every bit as much as she. I want both Moshe and Mohammed to be safe. I want the terror and the fear to end.

And that requires true equality, equality under the law, and not some silly superficial spectacle masquerading as the same.

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

Palestinians continue to prioritize paying terrorists over paying hospital staff. (So does the world, incidentally.)

From Times of Israel:

Shifa Hospital, the largest medical complex in the Gaza Strip, announced on Sunday that it was suspending all surgeries, with the exception of emergency cases, due to a cleaners’ strike over unpaid salaries.

“It has been decided to postpone all scheduled surgeries, including those for patients with tumors,” the hospital said, noting that the decision excluded “life-saving cases.”

The strike, which began on Sunday, threatens patients’ and workers’ lives because of the dangerous accumulation of medical garbage in the hospital, the staff warned.

It was the second time in recent weeks that the hospital cleaners in the Gaza Strip went on strike.

Last month, the cleaners agreed to return to work after the Palestinian Authority government promised to pay them their salaries. However, the government has since paid salaries for only two months, prompting the cleaners to renew their strike.

Hamas officials have accused the PA government of failing to provide funds to the health system in the Gaza Strip despite a Hamas-Fatah “reconciliation” agreement signed in Cairo in 2017. According to the officials, many hospitals are suffering from a severe shortage in medicine and generator fuel as a result of the PA’s failure to carry out its duties.

More than 830 cleaners work in 13 hospitals and 73 other medical centers in different parts of the Gaza Strip. The cleaners are employed by 13 companies at a cost of NIS 943,000 ($267,000) per month.

To put this in context, the PLO budgets over $28 million a month to pay both prisoner salaries and and families of "martyrs."

They willingly pay 100 times the amount needed for keeping hospitals open - to terrorists.

The entire world is complicit with this.

Which is more important, UNRWA schools where they teach support for terror and destroying Israel, or hospitals? Obviously, UNRWA, because that's what gets the funding.

The World Bank looks at the PA budget every year and makes recommendations to help its economy - but doesn't say a word about the high percentage of the funds that go to pay terrorists and their families.

"Pro-Palestinian" NGOs? Don't be absurd - their money goes towards political initiatives to fight Israel, not to actually help Palestinians.

The hospital situation in Gaza shows, in no uncertain terms, what the priorities of the "State of Palestine" are - and they are not to help their own people.

Yet the world continues to fund these leaders who willingly sacrifice their own people.

(I have to wonder why the many NGOs in Gaza cannot find volunteers to clean up the hospitals. Chances are they'd be threatened.)

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Who are the US Jews that Abbas met, and why are they so stupid?

From WAFA:

President Mahmoud Abbas urged leaders of the American Jewish community to support efforts to bring peace to the Middle East.

He told a group of Jewish community leaders he met in New York Monday evening that this is the time to make peace.

“We have a real opportunity to achieve lasting, just, and comprehensive peace,” he said on the eve of the opening sessions of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA). “We can do it, make no mistake. No one gains more from reaching an agreement than Palestinians, and no one loses more if we fail to reach an agreement. Failure in not an option for us,” he said.

“We need your support to ensure the successful conclusion of the peace negotiations so that the State of Palestine can live side by side with the State of Israel in peace and security on the 1967 borders,” said Abbas.

Abbas said that he speaks the same language everywhere in the world, urging the Jewish community leaders to listen to his speech at the UNGA in which he will reiterate the Palestinian position of an independent state on the 1967 borders with East Jerusalem as its capital along with resolving all final status issues.

I cannot find any mention of this meeting in the news media. (UPDATE: TOI has the story now, h/t Ian.)

Which brings up two questions:

Who are these "leaders" that are so eager to meet Abbas?

And if they are pro-Israel, why are they so ignorant that they cannot ask him any real questions?

For example:

If you are so interested in peace, why did you go out of your way to meet with child-murderer Samir Kuntar?
Why does the PA name institutions after terrorists who targeted innocent civilians?
Why is there still daily incitement on PA TV against Israel?
Do you believe, as Arafat did, that there was never a Jewish Temple in Jerusalem? Do you realize that this position is at odds with what Muslims said openly before 1967?
Do you agree with many of your people that there should be no "normalization" with Jews in Israel?
Why did you threaten your citizens who dared to shop in a Jewish-owned supermarket that has low prices?
Recently you said that you believe that the Holocaust occurred. You wrote a book that claimed that it was exaggerated. Were you lying then, or are you lying now?
Do you really believe that Jews are raising dogs and wild boars and training them to attack Arab farms, as you have stated?
Do you really believe that Hamas would accept Israel's existence if you reconcile with them? Do you actually read any of their material?
Why does the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades terror group still exist, if you are the leader of Fatah? How do they get funded?
Do you agree with the Fatah platform that terrorism is legal under international law?
Why does some 6% of the PA budget go towards terrorist prisoners and released terrorists?
Do you consider the Mufti of Jerusalem who collaborated with Hitler to be a hero?

There are plenty more questions like these that an educated Zionist leadership should know to ask. I have lots of examples of Abbas' lies and outrageous actions through the years.

Any Western politician who could be accused of any one of these positions would be mercilessly pilloried if they met with these same "leaders," but Abbas is given a free pass with only perfunctory questions that he knows how to sidestep.

So were the "Jewish leaders" simply members of J-Street and writers for Open Zion, or were they clueless heads of local federations, or what? And even if they were J-Streeters or Peter Beinart's gang - shouldn't intellectual honesty force them to ask these questions of Abbas anyway?

Jordan tells Syrian Palestinians to drop dead. No one cares.

From Times of Israel earlier this week:

Jordan has turned away dozens of Palestinian refugees on the Syrian border fleeing regime bombardment of the Yarmouk refugee camp south of Damascus.

Palestinian refugees living in the Yarmouk refugee camp south of Damascus have tried to enter Jordan through the Jaber border crossing after their camp was bombarded by Assad regime forces in previous weeks. They told Al-Jazeera earlier this week that while Palestinian refugees carrying Jordanian IDs were allowed to enter Jordan, children of Jordanian women who were not citizens are being refused.

Jordan has absorbed some 126,000 Syrian refugees, but Palestinians fleeing Syria are placed in a separate refugee camp at the Cyber City compound, under stricter conditions, and are banned from entering Jordanian cities. The Jordanian government fears that an influx of Palestinian refugees may tilt the demographic balance in Jordan even more towards the Palestinians, who are already believed to comprise a large majority of the population.

“Jordan is not obligated to pay a political price for the Syrian crisis,” Jordanian government spokesman Samih Maaytah told Al-Jazeera when asked why the Palestinians were not being let in.