Showing posts with label UN Watch. Show all posts
Showing posts with label UN Watch. Show all posts

Sunday, July 09, 2023

Amnesty International tweeted on Saturday:

Reminder: Everyone has the right to freedom of expression

Really?

Because on more than one occasion, Amnesty showed exactly how little it cares about freedom of expression.

Amnesty provides various spaces for rent in its London offices. There are no policies listed on its webpage saying who is allowed to rent their space. Yet in 2018, months after the Jewish Leadership Council made arrangements to rent out space for a debate on UN policy towards Israel, and only days before the planned event, Amnesty canceled the rental agreement and refused to allow the debate to take place.

Their reason? “We reserve the right to withhold permission for our building to be used by organisations whose work runs directly counter to our own. The presence of UN Watch is of significant concern and they have been active in the promotion of the event. We have partners and colleagues – both Israeli and Palestinian – working on the ground and this does put some of their working relationships at risk." They also told the JLC that they did not think it was appropriate to allow speakers who support Jews living in Judea and Samaria while Amnesty campaigns a boycott of "settlement goods."

This means that Amnesty will only rent their space to those whom they do not have any political disagreements with. Which includes antisemitism, since Amnesty-UK did rent their space to an organization that featured a speaker who justified and praised the terror attack murdering Israeli children in the Mercaz Harav yeshiva  massacre. 

And it is not only Amnesty-UK that only rents out its public spaces to those it agrees with. In 2014, when the Columbia University branch of Amnesty invited Alan Dershowitz to speak, Amnesty International told them to cancel the event, which they did. 

Which proves that it isn't that Amnesty opposes pro-settlement speech - but any kind of Zionist speech.

Similarly, Amnesty - so opposed to Zionist speech - has never condemned explicit Arab antisemitism and incitement to terrorism against Jews. This is even though Amnesty admits that incitement and hate speech is not covered by freedom of expression. 

This is about as hypocritical as it gets. 



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!

 

 

Thursday, March 02, 2023




We've discussed the transparent hate that "UN Special Rapporteur on Occupied Palestinian Territories" Francesca Albanese has towards Israel many times, yet she somehow continues to outdo herself.

UN Watch published a well-researched article that showed that Craig Mokhiber, head of the New York office of the UN Office of the High Commissioner of Human Rights, has a history of anti-Israel bias to the extent of accusing Israel of “genocide,” “large-scale atrocities” and “right-wing white ethno-nationalist terrorism.” 

Albanese responded with something that really goes beyond her previous anti-Israel statements:

Shooting the messenger is the only card left to those whose sole purpose is to shelter Israel from accountability. Unfortunately for them - and for Palestinians- Israel's brutal occupation has grown out of control. It can no longer be whitewashed by smearing human rights voices.
How, exactly, is quoting Moktuber's own words "smearing" him and "shooting the messenger"?

If Albanese considers him the "messenger" that means that she agrees that Israel is engaging in "genocide," a truly sickening and antisemitic position. Genocide is the deliberate and systematic destruction of a group of people because of their ethnicity, nationality, religion, or race. Accusing Israel of the worst human rights crime - a crime that Jews have been the most prominent victims of over the past century - is not meant to protect Palestinians but to cause pain to Jews. 

(The Genocide Convention has a much looser definition which could be twisted to apply to nearly every nation that has ever been in a conflict; using it against Israel and not against the Palestinians who specifically target anyone Jewish they can find is further evidence of antisemitic double standards that apply only to Israel.) 

In this tweet, Albanese is herself accusing Israel of genocide, and she is defending anti-Israel bias. Given that her job description demands impartiality, this means that she has dropped all pretense of objectivity herself.

It would be refreshing if the UN would act according to its own standards and dismiss her. But the UN doesn't adhere to its own standards of objectivity, so this is clearly not going to happen. 




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, January 03, 2023

From Ian:

Israel should put an end to Palestinian diplomatic terror
Palestinian Authority leaders should start to feel overwhelming pressure at every turn. They have become used to a limp response by Israel to its attacks in the international arena and have become further emboldened.

There is no better time than a brand-new Israeli government to state unequivocally that the rules of the game have changed, and there will be a strong and paralyzing response by Israel to the continued Palestinian attacks.

Israeli leaders shouldn’t just send threats behind closed doors but announce very publicly a series of steps it will take in response to the passing of the United Nations General Assembly resolution, with a further set of steps should they continue.

These steps should be designed with one singular goal in mind, to break the will of the Palestinian Arabs to continue fighting this war.

This is not just good for Israel; it will also be good for the Palestinians.

If their leaders end their obsessive war against Israel on all its fronts, legal, economic, diplomatic and of course, through violence, it will free up energy and resources for building Palestinian Arab society in all arenas, social, education and infrastructure.

The Palestinian Arab war against Israel is also a war against a decent future for the Palestinian Arabs.

Nevertheless, a more peaceful, prosperous and secure future for both peoples can only be attained once the Palestinian leaders have given up.

This can only happen when Israel forces them to do so.

It will take a change of direction by our security and political establishment, but all other paths have failed.

It is time for more drastic action.

It is time for an Israel victory against Palestinian Arab rejectionism on the front, which is crucial to ending the conflict.
The United Nations for Empowering Terrorists
Hammouri's affiliation with the PFLP and his involvement in planning terror attacks against Israelis, does not, however, seem to concern the UN Human Rights Office. Instead of condemning the convicted terrorist, the UN Human Rights Office chose to condemn Israel for daring to take measures to protect its citizens against terrorism.

This is also the same UN whose representatives have failed to condemn Hamas for building tunnels beneath schools run by its United Nations Relief and Work Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) in the Gaza Strip.

Take note: here is a senior UN official sitting with representatives of a terror group whose charter calls for the elimination of Israel and who is expressing "concern" over the rise of right-wing parties in Israel.

The UN official appears unaware that many Israelis voted for right-wing parties because of the increased terror attacks by Hamas and other terrorist groups.

It is ironic that a UN official, whose title is "Special Coordinator of the Middle East Peace Process", sits with a Palestinian group that is entirely dedicated to sabotaging peace.

As Article 13 of the Hamas charter states: "There is no solution for the Palestinian question except through jihad. Initiatives, proposals and international conferences are all a waste of time and vain endeavors."

This is hardly how to "prevent and remove threats to peace," as the UN claims in its charter. In fact, the actions of the UN clearly demonstrate that the organization is actually cozying up to terrorists while denouncing those who combat terrorism.

In its defense of, and engagement with, terrorists, the UN is boosting the ability of Hamas and the PFLP to continue their slaughter and genocide.
Ismail Haniyeh’s Son Draws Scorn for Life of Luxury As Gazans Scrape By
One of the sons of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh is living in luxury in Turkey and even received a Turkish passport to continue his expensive lifestyle, according to an Arab media report.

Elaph, a Saudi website based in Britain reported from its sources that Maaz Haniyeh recently received a Turkish passport enabling to travel the world with his family while enjoying a rich life in Turkey.

A source in Gaza commenting on the Elaph report told the Tazpit Press Service, “The Hamas apparatus follows Gaza residents who go out for medical or commercial needs and collect sums of money from them and part of the profits, and on the other hand, Maaz was awarded a Turkish passport for free, due to his father’s status.”

The article, titled “Maaz Haniyeh: A Life of Extravagance, Alcohol and Women,” reports that Maaz is known in Gaza as Abu Al Aqarat, or “The Father of Real Estate” for his ownership of several apartments, villas and buildings in different areas of the Strip. Its sources said that outside of Gaza, Haniyeh’s sons drink alcohol — which is prohibited for Muslims — and hang out prestigious clubs accompanied by women.

A journalist who lives in Gaza told TPS, “Maaz Haniyeh was forced to leave the comfortable life in the Gaza Strip and embark on the difficult and arduous resistance missions in the streets of Turkey and in its hotels.”

Two years ago, Maaz was photographed next to his father, Ismail, when he was showing off a new luxury car on the streets of Gaza.

Maaz, one of Ismail Haniyeh’s 13 children, is not the only family member drawing scorn.

Friday, December 30, 2022

From Ian:

Caroline Glick: Where the Netanyahu government differs from its predecessor
Over the course of the campaign, and in a steadily escalating fashion as he prepared to return to office, Netanyahu has spoken enthusiastically about the prospect of reaching a peace agreement that will formalize Israel’s relations with Saudi Arabia. Those still sub rosa relations were the foundation of the Abraham Accords.

The rationale for a Saudi deal is overwhelming for both countries. Leaving aside the economic potential of such an agreement—which is massive—the strategic implications are a game changer. An Israeli-Saudi normalization agreement, like the agreements Israel concluded with the UAE, Bahrain, Morocco and Sudan in 2020, is a means to withstand the Biden administration’s realignment away from America’s allies and towards Iran. By strengthening its bilateral ties with the Arab states bordering Iran and other key states in the region, Israel expands its strategic footprint and is capable of developing defensive and offensive capabilities by working in cooperation with likeminded governments. By working with Israel openly, Saudi Arabia sends a clear message to Iran and its people that Saudi Arabia will not be cowed into submission by the regime that is currently brutalizing its youth.

Netanyahu has already made a statement in support of the revolutionaries in Iran. At this point, with most experts assessing that Iran has crossed the nuclear threshold and has enough enriched uranium to produce up to four bombs per month, it is obvious that Biden’s nuclear diplomacy has nothing to do with nuclear non-proliferation.

There are only two ways to prevent Iran from becoming a nuclear-armed state—direct action targeting Iran’s nuclear installations and regime change. Netanyahu’s willingness to stand up to the Biden administration and stand with the Iranian people and Israel’s regional partners makes regime change more likely, and direct action against Iran’s nuclear installations more likely to succeed.

Over the two months since the Israeli elections, the opposition and its supporters on the Israeli and American Jewish left have stirred up hysteria by claiming that the most significant distinction between the Lapid-Gantz government and the Netanyahu government centers on social policies related to non-religious Jews. This claim is false, and maliciously so. The Netanyahu government has no intention—and never had any intention—of curtailing the civil rights of non-religious Jews. Their goal is to expand civil and individual rights, by among other things, placing checks and balances on Israel’s hyper-activist Supreme Court and state prosecution.

There are many differences between the previous government and the Netanyahu government. None of them have to do with civil rights. The main distinction is that the Netanyahu government has made securing Israel’s national interests its central goal in foreign and domestic policy. Its predecessors were primarily interested in getting along with the hostile Biden administration, under all conditions. Netanyahu and his ministers will work with the Biden administration enthusiastically, when possible.
Jonathan Tobin: Can US Jews love the real Israel—or only the fantasy version?
For the first decades of Israel’s existence, the above differences with Americans were papered over by the dominance of Labor Zionism, whose universalist rhetoric meshed nicely with liberal sensibilities, even if the security policies it pursued did not. But even in its most idealized form, a particularistic project such as Zionism has been a difficult sell for American Jews, the overwhelming bulk of whom see sectarian concerns not only as antithetical to their well-being, but possibly racist, as well.

Having found a home in which they were granted free access to every sector of American society, and in which the non-Jewish majority proved willing to marry them, they unsurprisingly have had difficulty coming to terms with an avowedly ethno-religious state with such a different raison d’être.

Moreover, an American-Jewish population in which the acceptance of assimilation has created a large and fast-growing group the demographers call “Jews of no religion” is bound to take a dim view of a country that specifically defines itself as a Jewish state, no matter how generous its policies toward the Palestinians or the non-Orthodox denominations might be. If many American Jews are no longer certain that their community’s survival matters, how can one possibly expect them to regard the interest of Israeli Jews in preserving their state against dangerous foes with anything but indifference?

Many Jews talk about their willingness to support a nicer, less nationalist and religious Israel than the one that elected Netanyahu and his allies. They support efforts by Democrats to pressure it to make suicidal concessions to Palestinians who, whether Americans are willing to admit it or not, purpose Israel’s elimination. They also want it to be more welcoming to liberal variants of Judaism that Americans practice, and for the Orthodox have less influence.

But even if you think those changes would make Israel better or safer, a majority of Israelis disagree. So, while much of the criticism is framed as a defense of democracy to sync with Democratic Party talking points that smear Republicans, there’s nothing democratic about thwarting the will of a nation’s voters or seeking to impose a mindset they regard as alien to their needs.

The challenge for liberals is not just how to cope with an Israel led by Netanyahu, Smotrich and Ben-Gvir, or to put aside the partisan hyperbole branding it as a fascist or fundamentalist tyranny. It’s accepting the fact that Israel is not a Middle Eastern variant of the blue state enclaves where most American Jews live.

They need to grasp that simple, but still difficult-to-accept concept and forget about the Israel of liberal fantasies. If they can, it should be easy for them to understand that no matter who is running Israel—or how its people think, worship or vote—the sole Jewish state’s continued survival is still a just and worthy cause.
Ruthie Blum: Israel’s new government and ‘Pauline Kael syndrome’
Following the late and former US president Richard Nixon’s landslide re-election in 1972, New Yorker magazine film critic Pauline Kael voiced a mixture of dismay and surprise.

“I live in a rather special world,” she commented. “I only know one person who voted for [him]. Where they are I don’t know. They’re outside my ken. But sometimes when I’m in a theater, I can feel them.”

Her famous acknowledgment of existence in an elitist bubble, insulated from a faceless mass of aliens lurking menacingly in the shadows, may have been irritating, but at least it was honest. It also perfectly described the chasm between the chattering classes and the majority of the voting public.

Though this type of divide in the West tends to be viewed and treated as political – since it’s inevitably expressed at the ballot box – it’s actually more cultural in nature. The response in Israel and abroad to the outcome of the November 1 Knesset election is a case in point. What were the reactions to Netanyahu's coalition?

The initial shock and subsequent hysteria surrounding the emergence of Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu’s “full, full right-wing” coalition has been emanating from circles of the Pauline Kael variety. To them, it’s worse than irrelevant that the new government in Jerusalem is the result of the people’s clear choice; they call the rejection of the Left’s increasingly woke post-Zionism “undemocratic” and a sign of societal downfall.

Such baseless charges on the part of the “anybody but Bibi” camp would be funny if they weren’t welcomed so heartily by those in the international community who delegitimize the Jewish state, regardless of its leadership, and by fellow travelers putting Israel on perpetual probation. Take the hundreds of American rabbis (none Orthodox, of course) who signed “A Call to Action for Clergy in Protest of Israeli Government Extremists,” for instance.

Thursday, December 01, 2022

From Ian:

Caroline Glick: Cultural appropriation and the Jews
The notable aspect of West’s behavior is that whereas Irving issued a groveling apology for his antisemitic outburst, West doubled down. In every public appearance since he openly defended Irving’s anti-Semitism, West has not only restated his antisemitic positions, he has expanded on them, and escalated his attacks on Jews as a people, a community in America, and as individuals. In redefining himself as an antisemite first and a rapper and public figure second, West has chosen to associate himself most closely with other antisemites, particularly white supremacist Nick Fuentes.

West’s decision to act as a bridge between black antisemitism, which is generally associated with the progressive political camp, and white supremacist antisemitism, which is generally associated with the political far right, exposes a much-ignored but fundamental fact about antisemitism: it isn’t a political position. It is a cultural outlook; a way of understanding the world. Antisemites hail from the political left, center and right. They come from all religions. Their antisemitism directs their politics. Consequently, antisemitic policies have advocates in all political camps.

This brings us back to the Israeli reporters in Doha.

Black Israelites and the Nation of Islam, which base their identity on the appropriation of Jewish identity, comprise a small but powerful minority of the black community in America. They impact the Congressional Black Caucus and other key black power centers, which in turn impact the Democratic Party. And while their cultural and political power are growing, they are still limited.

In contrast, embrace of the Palestinian narrative is all but universal across the Arab world, across the wider Muslim world and across large sections of the Western world. It is nearly universally accepted in Europe and by progressives in America. All of the people who accept and champion the Palestinian narrative accept the validity of a political cause that is entirely based on the appropriation of Jewish peoplehood.

Shechnik and his fellow reporters were stunned to discover the truth about the war against them as Jews, and against their state. The antisemitism that animates their antagonists in Doha has nothing to do with who leads Israel’s government or what the Israeli military does in any given war or operation. Support of the Palestinians, and their goal of wiping Israel off the map, is rooted in Jew hatred, shared by billions of people across the world.

The Palestinians are popular because they provide a vehicle for expressing and advancing that hatred, including in the halls of power across the world. Israel’s endurance is unacceptable, because simply by surviving, simply by having reporters to send to cover the World Cup in Doha, the Jewish state proves that the Palestinian narrative is untrue, and based on a rejection of observable reality and the historical record, not on justice or truth.

Likewise, American Jews are stunned to discover that black antisemitism, like Palestinian-predicated assaults on Jews from Peoria to Miami, has nothing to do with who is in power in Israel or whether American Jews identify with progressive or conservative politicians and causes. It has nothing to do with whether or not American Jews are willing to accept “white guilt.”

Irving, West, the Black Israelites, the Nation of Islam and their ilk don’t hate Jews because of anything any particular Jew may or may not think, say or do. They hate the Jews because they have stolen Jewish history, heritage, nationhood and culture and appropriated all of them to themselves. Having done so, they have no choice but to demonize the Jews, because Jewish endurance and legitimacy expose the fraud at the heart of their invented identity.
From New York City to the Negev Desert: Who Are the Black Hebrew Israelites?
From Jews to Israelites: The Third Wave
The third wave of the Black Hebrew Israelite movement began in the 1960s and 1970s as a response to the civil rights movement and the subsequent Black Power movement.

The third wave is defined as a period when BHI denominations emerged that were more patriarchal, more militant and more extreme.

The third wave is also when the movement began to self-identify as “Black Israelites” instead of “Black Jews.”

Initially, the third wave continued in the footsteps of the second wave by adopting Jewish traditions and learning Jewish texts.

However, as the third wave continued, new BHI denominations began to emerge that were influenced by Black separatism and the militancy that colored 1960s America.

One of the most prominent Black Hebrew Israelite denominations that emerged during this period was the Israeli School of Universal Practical Knowledge (commonly known as “One West”).

Founded in the late 1960s by Eber Ben Yomin (also known as Abba Bivens), a former member of the Commandment Keepers, One West espouses the belief that white Jews stole the identity of Black, Latin and Native Americans (who are the true Jews) and that the mainstream Jewish community is responsible for all the challenges that face these communities.

One West also adopted the tactics of confrontational street preaching and wearing colorful garments, emulating the clothing that they believe that the original Israelites wore thousands of years ago.

Some of the most radical, militant and bigoted Black Hebrew Israelite sects to emerge in the past 40 years are offshoots of One West.

These groups include Israel United in Christ, the Israelite school of Universal Practical Knowledge, the Israelite Church of God in Jesus Christ, the Sicarii, House of Israel, True Nation Israelite Congregation and Israelite Saints of Christ.

Of all these groups, Israel United in Christ (IUIC) is one of the most vocal and public. They are also one of the most militant and bigoted. They are known for street-preaching, rallying (including on behalf of Kyrie Irving) and marching.

In its writings and speeches, IUIC has made a wide variety of antisemitic statements, including that Jews are demons, that “everything they [Jewish people] do is about lying” and that Jewish people are responsible for a “Holocaust” that Black people have been experiencing since the 1400s.

The Black Hebrew Israelites in the State of Israel
One of the sects that emerged during the third wave was the Original African Hebrew Israelite Nation of Jerusalem.

This sect was founded by Ben Ammi Ben Israel, a Chicago-born man who claimed that he had received a vision in 1966 that he was to return the African-American descendants of the ancient Israelites to the Promised Land.

By 1967, Ben Israel had persuaded 400 people to leave the United States with him for the Promised Land. After a brief sojourn in Liberia, that was seen as a means of purging the negative influence of captivity, this group arrived in Israel in 1969.

When they arrived in Israel, the group was given temporary visas and housing in the southern Israeli development town of Dimona.

Soon after the initial group’s arrival in the country, the Israeli government noticed that more members were arriving and illegally staying in the country (since it was determined that they were not Jewish, they were not eligible to become citizens under the Law of Return).

The State of Israel’s attempt to bar more members of the African Hebrew Israelite Nation from moving to the country led to a protracted conflict between the state and the sect.

During this nasty fight, which lasted 13 years, members of the sect took part in a public campaign against the State of Israel, which included calls for a halt to American aid to Israel and a boycott of Jewish-owned businesses.

In 1990, the Israeli government and the African Hebrew Israelites came to an agreement whereby members of the sect would be granted permanent residency.

In 2004, the first member of the African Hebrew Israelites enlisted in the Israel Defense Forces and by 2006, 100 members were serving in the Israeli military. In 2009, the first member of the sect gained Israeli citizenship.

There are currently between 3,000 to 5,000 members of the African Hebrew Israelites living in Israel, the majority of whom are in the southern towns of Dimona, Arad and Mitzpe Ramon.

The African Hebrew Israelites place a strong emphasis on healthy living. They follow a vegan diet and highly limit their intake of sugar and salt. In addition, members are forbidden from smoking, taking drugs or drinking alcohol (aside from naturally fermented wines). The African Hebrew Israelites also follow a strict exercise schedule.

Until 1990, members of the African Hebrew Israelite community practiced polygamy due to its existence in the Biblical tradition and because there were many more women than men in the first years of the community.

Aside from the Biblical holidays, the African Hebrew Israelite community also holds a special festive celebration every May: New World Passover, which commemorates their exodus from the United States in 1967.


UN envoy to Hamas: ‘You have the right to fight Israel’
Italian lawyer Francesca Albanese, the United Nations’ special rapporteur for the Palestinians, spoke at a Hamas-organized conference in Gaza on Monday.

She plans to continue on to Israel, which is considering refusing her entry.

Senior members of the U.S.- and E.U.-designated terror groups Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) were among those in attendance, including Hamas’s Basem Naim, Ghazi Hamad, Isam al-Da’alis and Abdul Latif al-Qanu, and PIJ’s Ahmad al-Mudallal and Khadr Habib.

In her speech, translated in real-time to Arabic, Albanese told the crowd: “You have a right to resist this occupation.”

The UN official recently said, “If they [Israel] don’t let me in….I’ll be able to claim that I’ve been denied access.”

Albanese has a history of supporting violence against Israelis. In June, she said, “Israel says ‘resistance equals terrorism,’ but an occupation requires violence and generates violence.”

Wednesday, November 16, 2022

From Ian:

Caroline Glick: The Biden administration weaponizes the FBI against Israel
Even if the crisis passes quickly, the incoming government needs to understand that so long as the Democrats are in power, the next crisis is just a progressive rally away. As the midterm elections demonstrated, today, there are two Americas, not one. The Republican America, led by the likes of Sen. Cruz, Gov. Ron DeSantis and former President Donald Trump, is the best friend Israel has ever had.

The Democratic America hates Israel and the Republicans. They view both as fundamentally illegitimate.

This state of affairs, where one America loves Israel and the other hates it, is unlikely to change for the better in the foreseeable future. The Abu Akleh affair makes clear that moderates in the Democratic Party—like Biden himself—have transferred policymaking power regarding Israel to their all-but openly anti-Semitic progressive base.

What awaits us will be even worse than what Israel suffered with Barack Obama. We can expect to see the Democrats’ America backing arrest warrants of IDF soldiers and commanders. Democrats can be expected to cut off critical arms supplies. We can expect them to do in public what they are already doing in private—namely funding Palestinian terrorists. We can expect them to support economic boycotts of Israel and to enable the passage of anti-Israel resolutions at the UN Security Council.

To contend with the threat posed by the Democrats’ America, the incoming government must move to swiftly diminish Israel’s strategic dependence on the United States. We should end our receipt of U.S. military assistance. We should move production lines for critical platforms, including Iron Dome missiles, from the United States to Israel, regardless of the economic cost. And we should withdraw the outgoing government’s offer to allow the United States to fund the completion of our military laser program. Full ownership and control over the critical program should be restored to Israel’s military industries, again, regardless of the cost.

Apparently, the FBI informed Israel that it was opening the probe a few weeks ago—presumably before the Nov. 1 election. Gantz and outgoing Prime Minister Yair Lapid hid the news from the public, for obvious reasons. For a year and a half, they had insisted that Netanyahu was the cause of Israel’s troubled relations with the Democrats. The Biden administration’s probe of our soldiers makes clear that this was never the case. Netanyahu was right to stand up to Obama, and he will be right to stand up to Biden. Israel cannot be beholden to those who view our boys and girls as murderers for defending our lives and our nation. We can only defy them, even when they are former friends in Washington.
FBI has a double standard for Abu Akleh, Israeli victims - comment
What is behind Washington's double standard?
In a way, this fits in with the way the Biden administration has treated other allies in the Middle East, as though the accidental killing of someone caught in a crossfire is akin to the horrific murder of columnist Jamal Khashoggi, whose body was dismembered and dissolved in acid, ordered by the Saudi leadership. The Washington Post also recently published details of a leaked National Intelligence Council report on Emirati efforts to influence US policy. It must be said that those countries are not democracies and the actions Washington is criticizing were not followed with cooperation and transparency, in contrast with Israel following Abu Akleh’s death.

Some have talked about it being a shot across the bow to prime minister-designate Benjamin Netanyahu as he’s expected to form a far-right government, though Washington is expressing dissatisfaction at events that occurred under a government to the left of Netanyahu.

Another argument made is that this is about US politics. The midterms just took place and US President Joe Biden may feel freer to take more controversial actions than he did before. The left-wing of the Democratic Party pushed for a probe of Abu Akleh’s killing and, as Netanyahu says in his recently-published memoir, Biden professed to feeling pressure on Israel issues in what is “not Scoop Jackson’s Democratic Party.”

US Senator Ted Cruz certainly sees it that way, saying the FBI investigation “underscores how corrupt and blatantly politicized the Justice Department has become, and how entirely beholden to the radical left-wing Squad Democrats really are. This administration has spent its time in office weaponizing the DOJ to target their political enemies as a matter of policy, and now they have allowed that tactic to bleed into their obsession with undermining our Israeli allies.”

Whether it’s about the Biden administration’s moralistic approach to the Middle East or about Democratic Party dynamics, this just contributes to a broader sense that the FBI has used and abused as a political tool in recent years.

The Abu Akleh investigation announcement happened to take place in the week in which Commentary released an issue with a cover story by intelligence reporter Eli Lake about how the FBI is desperately in need of reform.

“FBI officials routinely deceive not only the public but also the institutions designed to protect the public from FBI overreach. Agents lie to supervisors. Supervisors lie to judges. FBI directors mislead Congress. And almost no one is ever punished,” Lake wrote, following it up with a litany of recent abuses.

FBI leaders who leaked to the press and went after certain politicians are feted, Lake pointed out, asking: “What lesson will others draw from this, except that there are no consequences for abusing authority against the right political targets?”
JPost Editorial: Would the FBI come to different conclusion of Shireen Abu Akleh's death?
We are dismayed by the news that the FBI is launching an investigation into the killing of Palestinian-American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh in Jenin on May 11. Israeli officials confirmed media reports on Monday that the US Justice Department had recently informed Israel’s Justice Ministry of the move, and they also voiced their firm opposition to the probe.

Israel conducted several thorough investigations into the circumstances of Abu Akleh’s killing, with the IDF concluding in September that she was most likely killed in “unintentional fire” from an Israeli soldier who did not realize she was a journalist. The US even participated in one of the investigations, including examining the bullet that the Palestinians said was the fatal one. The results of all the investigations were shared with the US, and particularly with the State Department.

Why then does the US administration believe that a new FBI investigation is necessary? As Defense Minister Benny Gantz succinctly said in a statement, the FBI probe is a grave error and there is no reason for Israel to cooperate with its investigation, even though it has nothing to hide.

“The decision taken by the US Justice Department to conduct an investigation into the tragic passing of Shireen Abu Akleh is a mistake,” Gantz said. “The IDF has conducted a professional, independent investigation, which was presented to American officials with whom the case details were shared. I have delivered a message to US representatives that we stand by the IDF’s soldiers, and that we will not cooperate with an external investigation.”


Thursday, November 10, 2022

From Ian:

Melanie Phillips: Dragons and dragon-slayers in Israel and America
Israel is indeed a state for the Jewish nation. However, membership in a nation confers obligations on its people to behave as a nation.

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

But American Jews such as those in Mercaz Olami don’t feel bound by any such obligation. They not only choose not to live in Israel but also choose not to fight in its defense.

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

Their statement said Netanyahu’s coalition would include politicians “whose positions regarding basic elements of democracy and diversity … significantly differ from the values which have guided Zionism since its inception.” As a result, it threatened, Israel would lose the support of American Jews.

But that support is being lost anyway. Indeed, America’s Jewish community is losing its own members at an alarming rate.

The Conservative-Masorti movement’s pick-and-choose approach to Jewish laws, and their emptying out of Judaism by claiming as Jewish values ideologies that actually negate them, are causing the American Jewish community to hemorrhage.

The core reason is that such Jews have lost any sense of themselves as a nation. Instead, they have chosen to endorse a “progressive” view of the world that views the nation as illegitimate and therefore to be superseded by kumbaya universalism.

This is why most American Jews are on the wrong side of the titanic struggle in the U.S. over whether it still wants to be the nation it has always understood itself to be—or whether, given the divisions over uncontrolled immigration, it wants to be a nation at all.

The one thing all Israeli Jews understand is that Israel is their nation state. Therefore, their overwhelming concern when electing a government is that it should defend that state against the dragons that breathe fire against it.

That’s why, regardless of the undoubted unease within Israel over its new government and the internal battles that are unquestionably to come, its people are in a far better situation than those in America and the West—both Jews and non-Jews—who are now reloading their fraying slingshots to attack it.
With Europe at War, Israel’s Position Has Grown Stronger
Since Russia greatly expanded its war on Ukraine in February, much has changed in international relations. Eran Lerman examines how these changes have affected the Jewish state:
Israelis are sensitive to the tragic aspects of the crisis, and sentiments of support have been aroused by the Ukrainians’ resolute stance and by the unique figure of Zelensky. . . . At the same time, in almost all aspects, the war has enhanced Israel’s national security equation—and bolstered its position in world affairs.

An element of immense importance, from a national and Zionist perspective, is the dramatic rise in the number of people making aliyah, in the face of danger and deprivation in both warring nations. Over 13,000 olim from Ukraine have arrived in Israel since February, and almost alone among the millions of war refugees, it has been the Jews (including those who may be non-Jews but are entitled to aliyah because they have one Jewish grandparent) who had a home to go to. A steadily growing flow is coming from Russia, as socioeconomic conditions keep deteriorating and the partial mobilization of reserves has been declared.

Meanwhile, . . . Israel’s defense industries, which provide an indispensable contribution both to the IDF’s qualitative edge and to the national economy, have been on the unimaginable brink of really taking off ever since the war broke out. During Prime Minister Lapid’s visit to Berlin, the option of a contract with Germany for the sale of Israel’s Arrow 3 missile defense system for more than $2 billion was put on the table.


Moreover, Lerman notes, the war has made the West more sensitive in general to the sorts of military threats Jerusalem faces every day, and in particular to the dangers posed by Iran, which has remained loyal to Moscow.
"Palestinian Authority to End Push for International Court Ruling on ‘Occupation’"
A senior Palestinian Authority (PA) official close to PA President Mahmoud Abbas confirmed to the Tazpit Press Service that Ramallah has acceded to a request by the U.S. and Israel to end efforts to refer Israel’s “occupation” to the International Court of Justice.

The International Court of Justice, based in The Hague, offers legal opinions on questions referred by either the United Nations Security Council or General Assembly. Jerusalem regards the court as biased and fears that a ruling would give a legal imprimatur to the Boycott, Divestment Sanctions campaign against Israel.

Although the US has veto power in the Security Council, the PA has wider support in the General Assembly.

The source also confirmed that PA leadership is sticking to its positions for the end of “attacks by the Israeli occupation,” settlement activity, Israel’s so-called “assault” on the Al Aqsa Mosque, and the return of tax money Jerusalem is withholding from Ramallah over the PA’s controversial stipends for PA terrorists and the families of “martyrs.”

He also said the PA particularly wants Israel to end to Operation Breaking the Wave. Near-nightly arrest raids, mostly in the areas of Shechem (Nablus) and Jenin, have foiled hundreds of Arab terror attacks. The operation was launched following a spate of deadly Arab terror attacks in the spring.

The source stressed that while US President Joe Biden has previously opposed unilateral PA measures, Jerusalem and Washington refuse to respond to Ramallah’s demands.

Thursday, November 03, 2022

From Ian:

A New Israeli Film Purports to Expose the Story of a Massacre That Never Happened
Beginning this evening, the Manhattan Jewish Community Center is hosting its Other Israel film festival. Featured movies include Boycott, described as an “inspiring tale of everyday Americans” engaged in “legal battles that expose an attack on freedom of speech across 33 states in America”—namely, legislation that prevents states from doing business with entities that discriminate against and boycott Israel. Another film featured at the festival is about smugglers who help Palestinians evade Israeli soldiers, while a third film focuses on Mizra?im who were “denied their right to a better life in Israel” by the Israeli government.

At the festival’s opening night, there will be a screening of the documentary Tantura, directed by Alon Schwartz, which investigates allegations of a massacre perpetrated by the Haganah during the 1948 war. But like the “massacre” at Lydda, or the more famous one at Deir Yassin, it’s unlikely this atrocity ever took place. The distinguished historian Benny Morris sets forth the evidence:

In both [a recent article published in Haaretz] and the film, Schwarz maintains that Israeli forces, specifically the 33rd Battalion of the Alexandroni Brigade, perpetrated a large massacre against the inhabitants of Tantura immediately after they captured the seaside village on May 23, 1948. The film is based on the allegations made by Teddy Katz in his master’s thesis, submitted to the University of Haifa in 1998. . . . Katz is the film’s hero and chief narrator.

Schwarz maintains in the article that his film is based on Katz’s paper and on “documents, military aerial photographs, and other archival materials.” This is just another crude lie, which points precisely at the central historiographic problem with Katz’s thesis and Schwarz’s film: there is no written evidence from 1948—not in Israeli archives, not in United Nations’ archives, and not in the archives of the Red Cross or the Western powers—that describes or even mentions a big massacre at Tantura. Katz and Schwarz base the “big massacre” thesis entirely on interviews with Arabs and Jews who “remembered” or claimed that they remembered it 40 years after the event.


Particularly damning is the absence of reports on this supposed outrage from contemporaneous Palestinian sources. Radio Ramallah, for instance, reported on the Israeli victory at Tantura, but said nothing about a massacre.

It’s noteworthy that a memorandum of the Arab Higher Committee, titled “The Atrocities of the Jews,” which was sent to the UN in early July 1948, makes no mention of Tantura—another puzzling omission if a large-scale massacre had recently taken place there. It’s worth noting that Palestinian historiography in the decades after 1948 also did not mention a massacre at Tantura. The book deemed the Nakba bible, the six-volume al-Nakba published between1956 and 1960 by the chronicler Aref al-Aref, does not mention a massacre at Tantura.
Melanie Phillips: The Jihadi Onslaught Against Christians
Last Saturday, there was violence in the vicinity of Bethlehem. You won’t have read a word about this in the mainstream media. That’s because the perpetrators weren’t Israelis but Muslim Arabs, and the targets weren’t Palestinians but Christians.

This was but the latest in a serious of attacks on Christian Arabs in the Bethlehem area. You won’t have read about those in the mainstream media either — just as you will have read hardly anything there about the horrific attacks on Christians that continue to take place in Nigeria and other African countries.

This is what happened on Saturday, according to contemporaneous reports on social media. A Christmas bazaar opened in Beit Sahour, a town near Bethlehem. A young Muslim Arab went to the bazaar and started taking videos of Christian girls wearing western clothes, which to his eyes probably seemed immodest.

A Christian scout leader threw him out of the bazaar. A short time later, he returned with a gang of men. They started stoning the Holy Forefathers Greek Orthodox Church near the bazaar. They smashed up cars parked nearby belonging to Christians and struck the scout on the face. In the absence of the Palestinian police, the church rang its bells — a known danger alert for churches.

Videos of these events started circulating on social media. You can see one here, in a tweet which suggests the perpetrator had tried to enter the church.
2008: The Deception of Palestinian Nationalism
The evidence that simple autonomy in the West Bank and Gaza was never the PLO’s true goal is everywhere. In 1970, US Secretary of State William Rogers suggested that the West Bank and Gaza be given up by Israel in return for peace and recognition. This plan was accepted by Israel, Jordan, and Egypt. Only Yasser Arafat, leader of the PLO, rejected it, opting instead to attempt an overthrow of Jordan’s King Hussein.

The evidence runs deeper. Yassir Arafat, who was head of the PLO until 2004, was under the direct tutelage and control of the KGB. Ion Mihai Pacepa, KGB officer and onetime chief of Romanian Intelligence, was assigned to handling Arafat. Pacepa recorded several of his conversations with Arafat when they met in Romania at the palace of brutal dictators Nicolai and Elena Ceausescu. In these conversations, Arafat unequivocally states that his sole aim is to destroy Israel.

Pacepa and the KGB were delighted. They consulted General Giap, a close associate of Ho Chi Minh, who was involved with the North Vietnamese propaganda effort during the Vietnam War. Giap recommended to Arafat that he “stop talking about annihilating Israel and instead turn your [Arafat’s] terror war into a struggle for human rights.” It had worked in Vietnam, he claimed, because transforming the conflict from one of ideologies (Socialism vs. Capitalism) to one of an “indigenous” people’s struggle for liberty had turned the tide of popular support in the West against the war.

Similar advice was provided to Arafat by Muhammed Yazid, minister of information in two Algerian wartime governments. He wrote “wipe out the argument that Israel is a small state whose existence is threatened by the Arab States, or the reduction of the Palestinian problem to a question of refugees; instead present the Palestinian struggle as one for liberation like the others. Wipe out the impression that in the struggle between the Palestinians and Zionists, the Zionist is the underdog. Now it is the Arab who is oppressed and victimized in his existence because he is not only facing the Zionists but also world imperialism.”

Yasser Arafat heeded this advice, and with the help of bi-weekly plane-loads of Soviet supplies brought in through Damascus as well as the Soviet propaganda machine, he began to portray the Palestinian Arabs as a supposedly indigenous population whose human rights were being tarnished by Israel.

The fact is that after the War of 1967, Israel inherited Arab refugees living in the West Bank and Gaza that were forced to live there in the period of Egyptian and Jordanian control from 1948 to 1967. Israel immediately offered to return the lands it won in 1967 (West Bank, Gaza, Sinai, and the Golan Heights) in return for a peace treaty. This offer was rejected by the Arab countries in the Khartoum Conference (Aug. 29- Sep. 1, 1967). In Arafat’s authorized biography, Arafat: Terrorist or Peace Maker, Arafat claims this moment as one of his greatest diplomatic victories.

It is telling that Zahir Muhse’in, member of the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) Executive Committee, said the following in a 1977 interview with the Amsterdam-based newspaper Trouw. “The Palestinian people does not exist. The creation of a Palestinian state is only a means for continuing our struggle against the state of Israel for our Arab unity. In reality today there is no difference between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians, and Lebanese. Only for political and tactical reasons do we speak today about the existence of a Palestinian people, since Arab national interests demand that we posit the existence of a distinct ‘Palestinian people’ to oppose Zionism.”

Palestinian nationalism is therefore a historical fabrication born out of a communist thirst for expansion and an Arab resentment of the existence of Israel. The “need” and “desire” for Palestinian is a veiled expression of the “need” and “desire” to end Israel’s existence.

Tuesday, November 01, 2022

From Ian:

Seth Frantzman: How Israel’s elections may impact the Middle East
As Israelis voted for the fifth time in less than four years, the region could greet these latest elections with a shrug. After all, another election will probably come in a year or so.

However, the current government of Prime Minister Yair Lapid and alternate Prime Minister Naftali Bennett made major strides in the region. Lapid, Bennett and Defense Minister Benny Gantz put a premium on public meetings and outreach around the Middle East, including hosting such important forums as the Negev Summit.

On the other hand, Lapid also rushed into the agreement with Lebanon days before the election. This matters, and on policies from Ukraine to Turkey, there could be shifts after the election that impact the region.

Israel and Turkey
One of the most important shifts in the last year has been Israel’s decision to work with Turkey. After years in which Ankara had bashed the Jewish state, comparing Israel to Nazi Germany and backing Hamas, Turkey sought to change its tone over the last year. This resulted in numerous high-level meetings and visits.

The normalization between Ankara and Jerusalem may be only on the surface, because Turkey’s ruling AKP Party is the same party as before the reconciliation. But it could also mark a shift that continues after the election.

It’s clear that with Turkey, there was a choice to normalize relations after former prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu left office. Ankara had increased its extreme rhetoric and anti-Israel behavior during Netanyahu’s 10 years in power. This included the launching of the Mavi Marmara flotilla, as well as hosting Hamas leaders and vocal threats to “liberate al-Aqsa.”

Ankara’s behavior occurred against the backdrop of close Turkey-US relations during the Trump administration and its increasing role in Syria. It’s not entirely clear what led to Turkey’s increasingly anti-Israel behavior, especially considering that in the early 2000s, the countries had managed to continue amicable relations despite the differences between the AKP and Israel. The party is rooted in the Muslim Brotherhood and is close to Hamas ideologically, making it naturally hostile to Israel.

During the Netanyahu era, there was little chance of reconciliation with Turkey. Netanyahu always believed that Israel had to exude strength in the face of threats, and he wasn’t afraid to critique Turkey’s actions.

Today, both Ankara and Jerusalem have shifted rhetoric, and this has enabled major changes on the political and diplomatic fronts.
The Commentary Magazine Podcast: Will Bibi Make a Comeback?
Dan Senor joins the podcast today to map out five scenarios for the Israeli election results—Israel is voting today. And then we discuss why professional Republicans seem a little more anxious than thrilled about the clear pattern in the polling about what’s going to happen next Tuesday here in the American elections. Give a listen.


Netanyahu's peace plan with the Saudis may also end the Arab-Israel conflict
Israel’s Leader of the Opposition Benjamin Netanyahu has broken his silence - giving his nod of approval to examining the Saudi-proposed Hashemite Kingdom of Palestine solution (Saudi Solution) :
“I think the big prize is peace with Saudi Arabia, which I intend to achieve if I go back into office… The rise of Israeli power facilitated the Abraham Accords, and the continual nurturing of Israeli power will also nurture a broader peace with Saudi Arabia and nearly all of the rest of the Arab world. I intend to bring the Arab-Israeli conflict to a close.”

Peace with Saudi Arabia and ending the Arab-Israeli conflict will require Netanyahu to successfully negotiate to make the Saudi Solution - published in June - acceptable. That would see:
· Jordan, Gaza and part of Judea and Samaria ('West Bank') being merged into one territorial entity to be called The Hashemite Kingdom of Palestine - with its capital in Amman - not Jerusalem
· Abandonment of the 74 years-old Palestinian Arab demand to return and live in Israel
· Recognition of Jewish sovereignty in part of Judea and Samaria ('West Bank') for the first time in 3000 years
· No new Palestinian Arab state between Israel and Jordan

Yesh Atid Party Leader - Yair Lapid, Blue and White Party Leader - Benny Gantz - and Labor Party Leader - Merav Michaeli - have all rejected the Saudi Solution outright - aligning their respective parties policies with President Biden’s to continue pursuing the failed unachievable two-state solution first dreamt up by the European Union in 1980 and endorsed by the United Nations in 2003.

The leaders of all other Israeli political parties have yet to comment on the Saudi Solution.

Netanyahu, however, indicated his thinking was clearly in sync with the game-changing proposals.
Hundreds of Jews visit Temple Mount on election day
Twice the number of Jews visited the Temple Mount in Jerusalem on election day this year compared to last year, the Temple Mount Administration reported on Tuesday afternoon.

“The visitors said they took advantage of the election day vacation to go up and visit the site where the House of God stood,” the administration said in a statement. “It reminds them of how fortunate they are to be in a Jewish state, voting for a Jewish government.”

Nearly 300 Jews had already visited the mount by 10:30 a.m., the administration said.

Visits to the Temple Mount by Jews have been on the rise over the past year in general.

Some 47,988 Jews visited the Mount last year, in Hebrew year 5782—a 94% increase over the year before.


Tuesday, October 25, 2022

From Ian:

Herzog to present Biden with evidence Iranian drones being used in Ukraine
President Isaac Herzog is expected to present US President Joe Biden with evidence indicating that Iranian UAVs are being used against Ukrainian civilians as part of Russia's war in Ukraine.

Herzog arrived in Washington Tuesday morning, ahead of the meeting with Biden.

According to Herzog’s office, through a visual analysis, the Israeli defense establishment “has established that there are UAV fragments in Ukraine that are identical to those developed in Iran.”

“President Herzog will present US Government officials with images of Shahed-136 exploding UAVs prepared for a launch in a military exercise in Iran in December 2021. Another photo shows the same type of drone downed during the fighting in Ukraine,” Herzog’s office said.

“Despite Iranian denials and attempts to obscure their Iranian origins by adding Russian stamps, the photos show that the drone stabilizers are identical in their structure, dimensions, and numbering,” the statement reads.

“Yet again, Iran has proven that it cannot be trusted and wherever there is killing, destruction, and hatred—it’s there,” President Herzog said. “Iranian weapons play a key role in destabilizing our world, and the international community must learn its lessons, now and in the future.”

He went on to say that the world must speak with Iran in the same language: “a tough, united, and uncompromising language. As we are repeatedly discovering, for every hesitation about Iran—there is a price. In recent months, the Iranian regime has shown the world its true colors, which Israel has known for years. Nobody can ignore that the Iranian regime uses violence against its own citizens and is brutally suppressing the hijab protests with blatant human rights violations.”


UN's Pillay Commission is "objective, impartial and credible like the Spanish Inquisition
UN Watch's Hillel Neuer interviewed on ILTV, October 23, 2022.

The UN's Commission of Inquiry that was supposed to examine Israel and the Palestinians issued its first report to the General Assembly, and it only condemns Israel.

"This UN's Pillay Commission of Inquiry is objective, impartial, and credible like the Spanish Inquisition," said Neuer.

"The entire report only targets Israel. There is no mention of Hamas, the Islamic Jihad, the Lion's Den, pick your Palestinian terrorist group, or pick the Islamic Republic of Iran, which is funding and financing and arming these groups, no mention whatsoever."


Friday, October 21, 2022

From Ian:

Caroline Glick: Yair Lapid, Authoritarian and Unafraid
Under Israel’s constitutional law Basic Law – Referendums, to come into force all international agreements that involve the concession of sovereign territory require the approval of two-thirds of the Knesset or must pass in a public referendum. Since Lapid’s deal involves the concession of Israel’s territorial waters, under both the spirit and letter of the law, Lapid is supposed to submit the deal to the Knesset for two-thirds approval. In the event, Lapid tried to avoid even presenting the agreement to the Knesset for review. Although Attorney General Gali Miara Baharav issued an opinion that the agreement doesn’t need to be considered under the Basic Law – Referendums (for reasons that aren’t clear), she still insisted that the Knesset must approve the deal by a simple majority.

Lapid, for his part, doesn’t care what his attorney general thinks or what the law says. In response to a reporter’s question at the press conference, Lapid explained how he justifies his decision to act in clear contempt of the law and his attorney general and suffice with government approval of his radical deal with Hezbollah’s stand-in government in Beirut.

As he put it, “In light of the opposition’s unrestrained behavior, we have decided not to bring the agreement before the Knesset for a vote.”

That is, given that his political opponents oppose a gas deal that cedes Israeli territory and natural resources to its sworn enemy, under the gun, and just weeks before a national election, Lapid has decided that the Knesset is unworthy of the honor of approving his deal.

Several commentators have noted that Lapid’s statement demonstrated a contempt for his opposition. But the real problem with his statement, and the sentiment it expressed, is that it demonstrated an utter contempt for the most basic institution in Israel’s parliamentary democracy—the parliament, and for democratic norms.

Probably the worst thing about Lapid’s anti-democratic behavior is that his supportive press is letting him get away with it. While the CEC made Yesh Atid pay Channel 14’s legal costs, it didn’t require Lapid’s party to reimburse the television station for the fortune it paid to run a public campaign against Lapid’s efforts to shutter it. Channel 14 felt compelled to launch its campaign because for the most part, it received no support from its counterparts in the progressive, Lapid-supporting media. Israel Hayom, which changed its editorial line to support the Bennett-Lapid government was the only newspaper to express opposition to Lapid’s campaign against Channel 14. And it did it in a house ad, on page 20 of the paper. With the exception of two or three journalists on the right that broadcast for the other stations, Channel 14’s competitors either said nothing, or expressed support for Lapid’s effort to shut it down.

As for the deal with Hezbollah-controlled Lebanon, most of the media coverage has played down Lapid’s apparent breach of a Basic Law to ram his deal through on the eve of elections. Opposition to the deal has been painted in partisan colors, effecting the sense that the controversy over an agreement which requires Israel to make massive concessions in response to Hezbollah threats is nothing but electioneering.

It is impossible to know how the elections will pan out. There are always last-minute surprises. Netanyahu’s right-wing bloc is consistently polling between 59-62 seats, which makes it far from certain that Netanyahu will be able to form a coalition without making a deal with members of Lapid’s left-Arab bloc. But Lapid’s behavior since taking over the caretaker government makes one thing clear. If he forms the next government, the foundations of Israel’s democratic system and the basic freedoms that citizens of a free society expect, including freedom of the press and representative government, will be imperiled.
David Singer: Roth confounds UN, USA & Australia: Two-State solution “is gone” Kenneth Roth – recently retired Executive Director of Human Rights Watch – has undermined the continuation of the policy espoused by the UN, USA and Australia for the last 20 years supporting the the creation of a new Palestinian Arab State between Israel and Jordan for the first time in recorded history (two-state solution).

Addressing a recent discussion hosted by the Washington-based think-tank - Arab Center - Roth declared:
“The two-state solution is great but it's gone”

Roth’s bombshell admission was followed by this statement made by Hady Amr - US deputy assistant secretary for Israeli and Palestinian affairs:

"We remain committed to rebuilding our bilateral relationship with the Palestinian people, with the US president's goal of a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict along the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps,"

In reversing Australia’s decision to recognise western Jerusalem, later revoked, as the capital of Israel – Australia’s Foreign Minister Penny Wong said:
“Australia is committed to a two-state solution in which Israel and a future Palestinian state coexist, in peace and security, within internationally recognised borders. We will not support an approach that undermines this prospect.”

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has been repeating a similar mantra since 2017:

“A two-state solution that will end the occupation and, with the creation of conditions, also the suffering even to the Palestinian people, is in my opinion the only way to guarantee that peace is established and, at the same time, that two states can live together in security and in mutual recognition,”

This blinkered approach by the UN, USA and Australia has seen each of them refusing to acknowledge – let alone discuss – the merits of a new alternative solution emanating from Saudi Arabia in June : Shredding the failed two-state solution and calling for the merger of Jordan, Gaza and part of the 'West Bank' into one territorial entity to be called The Hashemite Kingdom of Palestine whose capital will be Amman – not Jerusalem (Saudi Solution).

Friday, October 07, 2022

From Ian:

PMW Special Report: PA summer camps - terror training camps for kids
In recent months, many young Palestinians have died as “Martyrs” while carrying out terror attacks against Israelis – be it throwing Molotov cocktails and rocks, stabbings or shootings. What is it that make kids want this? The answer is what Palestinian Media Watch has pointed out for years: That the PA and its leading party Fatah – both led by Mahmoud Abbas – as policy encourage kids (and adults) to carry out terror and seek Martyrdom - and thereby become heroes.

Now that the summer holiday is over it is important to examine the values the PA and Fatah decided to bestow on Palestinian kids via their summer camps – one of the “tools” the PA uses to inculcate the ideals of terror against Israel and Martyrdom.

One distinctive PA message was that terrorist murderers are heroes. Being presented with this strong role modeling for decades impacts on kids, and many young Palestinians set out to die as Martyrs, seeking to earn the ultimate glory in Palestinian society.

Announcing the opening of the summer camps, PLO Supreme Council for Youth and Sports Head Jibril Rajoub explained that 42,000 young Palestinians were to participate in 600 camps. Rajoub stated that:
Fatah Central Committee Secretary and Head of the PLO Supreme Council for Youth and Sports Jibril Rajoub: “The goal of these camps is to serve as a melting pot and formulate the consciousness of these children according to the Palestinian national ideology.”

[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, July 19, 2022]


Same Rajoub strongly hinted at the content of the teachings in the PA/Fatah summer camps when he in his opening speech singled out terrorist murderer Thaer Hammad who killed 10 Israelis as “deserving of blessings”:
Jibril Rajoub: “[Silwad] is the town of Thaer Hammad (i.e., terrorist, murdered 10), who deserves blessings, and who constituted a milestone in proactive national action. Blessings to him, his family, and our prisoners from Silwad and from throughout the homeland.”

[Facebook page of Fatah Central Committee Secretary Jibril Rajoub, July 18, 2022]


Prior to Rajoub’s opening of the camps, a Fatah “registration announcement” for participation in a camp under Fatah’s military unit Al-Asifa explained the camp activities which clearly sound like military training and combat, among them: “military order and discipline, infantry, combat skills and Shooting live ammunition at a shooting range”; (emphasis added)


Melanie Phillips: Democracy’s watchdog has abandoned its role
It has often been said that the media is a pillar of democracy because it keeps our politicians honest.

Lifting the veil of secrecy in which authorities like to cloak themselves, revealing inconvenient truths that expose the inadequacies and worse of government actions and subjecting all politicians to forensic questioning without bias—this is how the media acts in the public interest.

But when the media doesn’t deliver, truthfulness goes out of the window, propaganda and ignorance take over and democracy stumbles.

We see this in much Western coverage of Israel, with newspapers often delivering nothing more than thinly disguised Palestinian propaganda. So, people with no knowledge of Israel or Jewish history get a wholly false impression.

It’s in America, however, that we see most graphically and frighteningly the media’s abdication of its professional role.

The most influential mainstream media outlets have turned into brazen shills for the Democratic Party and became willing accomplices in the attempt to remove President Donald Trump via the bogus Russian conspiracy smear, which involved elements of the FBI, Justice Department and the Democrats.

At same time, the media refused to report troubling revelations of corruption involving President Joe Biden’s son Hunter’s dealings with Ukraine, which implicated Biden senior as well.

And they have left Americans largely in the dark about the acute peril into which Biden’s policies are putting America, Israel and the West.
Jonathan Tobin: Blame Biden’s disastrous Iran and energy policies for Lapid’s Lebanon fiasco
Unfortunately, however, the Americans clearly hope that strong-arming Israel in order to help Iran-proxy Hezbollah—which will presumably profit, directly or indirectly, from Lebanon’s natural-gas business—will influence its masters in Tehran to stop stalling and sign a new, and even weaker, nuclear deal with the West.

If this happens after more humiliating U.S. concessions to Iran in the negotiations that will likely resume after the midterms, it ought to get Iranian oil flowing freely to the West. That could impact the price of oil in the long term and help the Democrats’ efforts to hold onto the White House in 2024, even if it also guarantees that the Iranians will eventually obtain a nuclear weapon. It will also constitute a betrayal of the courageous demonstrators who have taken to the streets in Iranian cities to resist the theocratic regime.

Lapid walked into this trap because he is committed to a strategy of avoiding public disputes with Biden at all costs. For months, as the Americans moved closer to an agreement with Iran that he knew was antithetical to any notion of protecting the security of Israel or its Arab allies, he spoke of trying to influence the U.S. not to go down the path of appeasement.

Iran’s hardline stance in negotiations momentarily seemed to vindicate him. Yet, when Biden gave him his marching orders on Lebanon, he appeared to have believed that he had no choice but to blindly obey.

Seen from this perspective, it’s clear that Lapid was not so much surrendering to Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah as he was to Biden, though the blow to Israel’s national interests was much the same.

It remains to be seen whether Biden will tolerate, even if only for the five weeks until the election, Lapid’s act of political survival in moving away from the Lebanon pact that the U.S. administration has ordered him to accept. What is obvious, however, is that Lapid has not yet learned what Netanyahu came to understand during the course of his 15 years as prime minister.

Managing relations with Israel’s sole superpower ally is the nation’s top foreign-policy priority. And though doing so is vitally important, Washington can’t be allowed to dictate to its small Israeli ally. The true measure of an Israeli prime minister’s diplomatic acumen is not how close he can stay to an American president. The real test is showing that a premier can say “no” to the Americans when it’s absolutely necessary, as it was with respect to the natural-gas-fields dispute.

Lapid failed that test. Biden and his team now understand how far they can push him, even when Israeli security is on the line. That’s a fatal flaw in any leader.
Behnam Ben Taleblu: You cannot stand with Iran’s women while seeking a deal with Tehran

Wednesday, June 29, 2022




UN Watch reports (via email):
 The UN agency that runs schools for Palestinians announced to donor states yesterday that it has just placed six employees on administrative leave after a report on Thursday by UN Watch exposed UNRWA teachers who publicly call to murder Jews.
This has upset a Gaza-based "human rights" NGO, called the Hemaya Center for Human Rights:

Today, Wednesday, Hemaya Center for Human Rights sent a letter to the UNRWA Commissioner-General regarding arbitrary administrative measures against a number of Palestinian UNRWA employees.

The Center expressed its disapproval of the position of the Administration of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Refugees (UNRWA) against ten of its employees in its various areas of work, due to their expression of their adherence to national principles and rights on social media pages and websites, and participation in national events and activities.
Yes, this NGO with "human rights" in its name supports teachers who call to murder Jews - because terrorism is part of their national principles and rights.

I didn't say this - they did.

 I wonder what European country funds this anti-human rights organization. (It is not on NGO Monitor's radar.) 

Just a reminder that some organizations that say they are for human rights are actually quite the opposite.



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

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Saturday, May 09, 2020

From Ian:

JPost Editorial: The US administration's effective peace work in Israel
On May 14, 2018, the US embassy was officially inaugurated in Jerusalem, and a double standard applied to Israel in the US for 70 years finally came to an end.

The moving of the embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem not only recognized Israel’s capital as it had seen it since the establishment of the Jewish state in 1948, but also removed a myth from any future negotiating table. Jerusalem, the United States determined, was non-negotiable. It was Israel’s capital.

“We were applying [until then] a double standard to Israel, relative to every other country in the world,” US Ambassador to Israel David Friedman told The Jerusalem Post last week. “We were telling Israel, you don’t have the right to choose your capital city.”

That changed with the moving of the embassy even as some critics claim that beyond the symbolism of the move, it didn’t achieve much more. Other countries did not follow suit and the fact is that peace negotiations seem no farther away today than they were before.

Friedman did not agree. Don’t, he said, underestimate the power of symbolism.

“Americans who support Israel understand the significance of Jerusalem,” he said. “It’s what the Statue of Liberty, the Lincoln Memorial, Plymouth Rock and Valley Forge are. We understand symbols are more than symbols. Every nation that made a mark on this world stood for something. Nations that stand for something stand for deep historic principles. Because America was founded on those types of principles, Americans profoundly understand the importance of Jerusalem to the State of Israel.”

We agree. The moving of the embassy not only put an end to a historic travesty but also made clear to the world something everyone anyhow already knew – Jerusalem is not for sale. While the Palestinians can still lay claim to parts of the eastern side of the city, Jerusalem is Israel’s capital as it was 3,000 years ago when designated so by King David.

With that said, peace is not made between Jerusalem and Washington DC. It needs to be made between Israeli and Palestinian leaders and sadly, for the last three years of the Trump administration, when it comes to direct talks, there has been no tangible progress.

Benjamin Netanyahu, who is expected to swear in his fifth government in a few days, has served as Israel’s prime minister for 14 years. The thought that in his 15th year as prime minister he will suddenly change his policies and engage with the Palestinians in ways he has not until now also seems unlikely.
Republicans threaten to sanction Jordan for not extraditing terrorist
Seven Republicans in Congress warned Jordan that the United States was now in a position to sanction that country unless it extradites one of the terrorists who plotted the 2001 bombing of a Jerusalem pizzeria.

“The potential seriousness of these sanctions provisions reflect the deep concern of the Congress, the administration and the American people,” said the letter sent April 30 to Jordan’s ambassador and released this week by EMET, a pro-Israel group lobbying for the letter.

Why it matters: The letter was initiated by Rep. Greg Steube, R-Fla., and signed by Congress members known for their closeness to the Trump administration. That signals an increase in pressure on Jordan to extradite Ahlam Al-Tamimi, who facilitated the bombing of the Sbarro restaurant that killed 15 people, including two Americans.

Jordan, a key ally to the United States and Israel, gets $1.7 billion in U.S. assistance.

The United States has sought Al-Tamimi’s extradition for years, but the law allowing the State Department to leverage aid to demand extradition did not go into effect until late last year.

Al-Tamimi was sentenced to life in Israel but released in a prisoner exchange with Israel in 2011. She has since become something of a celebrity in Jordan.

The parents of one of the victims, 15-year old Malki Roth, have led an effort to make Al-Tamimi face U.S. charges under American laws that allow the prosecution of terrorists who have harmed Americans overseas.
US Secretary of State Confirms Israel Trip Next Week, Says Ties Have ‘Never Been Stronger’
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo confirmed on Friday he would travel to Israel to next week, in what will be his first overseas trip since the coronavirus crisis began.

Pompeo will be in Israel next Wednesday, May 13, and he will meet in Jerusalem with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Knesset Speaker Benny Gantz “to discuss US and Israeli efforts to fight the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as regional security issues related to Iran’s malign influence,” a State Department statement said.

“The US commitment to Israel has never been stronger than under President Trump’s leadership,” the statement added. “The United States and Israel will face threats to the security and prosperity of our peoples together.”

“In challenging times, we stand by our friends, and our friends stand by us,” it concluded.

One issue that could be on the agenda during Pompeo’s visit is the possible Israeli annexation of parts of the West Bank in the near future.

Pompeo himself said last month that such a move was up to the Israeli government.
Masks, virus tests, closed meetings: How Pompeo will visit Israel amid pandemic
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo next week will become the first senior foreign official to visit Israel since it put in place strict travel restrictions to stem the spread of the coronavirus.

Pompeo’s visit will require medical precautions to prevent infections, which were coordinated with Israeli officials, Israel’s Channel 13 reported Friday.

Dr. William Walters, the US State Department’s deputy chief medical officer, said Friday that everyone flying with Pompeo will be tested for the virus one or two days before the flight, will be checked for symptoms before boarding, and will wear face coverings during the trip.

Pompeo and his small traveling party will be exempt from Israel’s virus restrictions that bar foreign visitors from entering and require returning Israelis to self-quarantine for 14 days. Pompeo is currently undergoing daily checks by medical personnel, Walters said.

Pompeo will be on the ground in Israel for only several hours on Wednesday before returning to Washington from his first overseas trip since making an unannounced visit to Afghanistan in March.

Everyone who meets with the US team during the trip will be checked for COVID-19 symptoms. Pompeo’s movements will be strictly controlled and limited to working meetings and the airport, and he will not meet with anyone in public settings.

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