Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News: Zionism

Showing posts with label Zionism. Show all posts

Thursday, July 21, 2022

Did Jews buy land in Transjordan as early as the 1870s?

Jamil Youssef Al-Shaboul, writing in Sawaleif, tells a story about a brief episode of Jewish settlement in Transjordan.

Palestine was not alone as a destination for the Jews and the Zionist movement. With the intention of establishing the slandered national homeland, the eastern part of the river was also targeted.

When the Zionist Montefiore built the first neighborhood for the Jews outside the walls of the city of Jerusalem in 1862, after he purchased a plot of land specifically for that, the first two agricultural settlements for the Jews were built in both Jerash / on the Zarqa River and Salt, and through bribes received by some Ottoman officials to facilitate their entry into the country and their ownership for the land.

The Jordanian clans sensed the seriousness of the matter early on, especially after the Jews tried to buy other lands adjacent to the Zarqa River in order to bring in another group of immigrants. The northern and Bani Hassan clans came together and held a meeting in the guesthouse of Sheikh Mustafa al-Ayasra headed by Sheikh Mufleh al-Obaidat, the father of the martyr Kayed al-Obaidat, and they unanimously agreed to expel these Jews. With all the simple light weapons they had, they burned the settlement of Rachel in Jerash and expelled the Jews from it. They headed towards Al-Balqa and burned the settlement of Kfar Ehud near Salt. The presence of these bastards from East Jordan ended.

The Jordanian clans were able to save Jordan from the clutches of the Zionist movement, which was announced at the Basel Conference in Switzerland in 1891, and this confirms that the choice of force in the time of lies and hypocrisy is the one who restores things to their rightful place and that the thief will not escape punishment.

Notice that they admit that the land was purchased by Jews but the author still considers the land "stolen."

A similar story was published in 2020 in Rai al Youm, another Jordanian news site. It said that the Jews were there from 1870 to 1876 when thy were driven out, and the names of the settlement are the same.

The writers are gleeful that they ethnically cleansed Jews from Transjordan, and they regard this as an honorable story to tell today.

I cannot find English-language documentation of any of these Jewish settlements in Transjordan in the 19th century. But the story is not altogether implausible. Zionists did buy land across the Jordan, in the Golan Heights. See my previous articles about that here and here.

Moreover, I found an Arabic book about about a dozen plans for Jews to include parts of Transjordan in the Jewish homeland, from the mid-19th century up until the 1940s. Dr. Issam Muhammad Al-Saadi wrote "Zionist Aspirations in Transjordan, 1862 - 1946." It includes all of these attempts (autotranslated so the names might be misspelled):

■ February 1867 AD, Charles Warren publishes his study, which called for the necessity of beginning Jewish settlement in the region of "Gilead" in eastern Jordan

■ January 1871 AD, Yehoshua Yellin establishes a company to invest and reclaim the lands of the "Nimrin Valley" northeast of the Dead Sea in preparation for the Jewish settlement operations in eastern Jordan

■ April 1879 CE, Lawrence Oliphant after his trip to the Golan and Ajloun lays out the "Gilead Settlement Plan" that called for the establishment of a Jewish political entity in Transjordan

■ June 8, 1880 AD, Ottoman historical document, Sublime Porte rejected Lawrence Oliphant's proposal to establish a Jewish settlement with some privileges in Gilead "Sanjak of Ajloun, Transjordan"

■ July 27, 1888 AD, Eliyahu Shed was able to purchase land as part of Baron Rothschild's plan for the settlement of Jews in northeastern Jordan.

■ January 1891, Paul Friedman put forward the "Midian Project" for Jewish settlement in Midyan / the western region of the Arabian Peninsula

■ May 1891 AD, Lord Ghosh presented to the Ottoman government his project for the settlement of Jews in the regions of Gilead and Moab in eastern Jordan

■ October 7, 1894 AD, Zionist settlement attempts in Karak, Transjordan in 1896, and the letter of the Mutasarrif of Karak to the Mutasarrif of Jerusalem

■ June 1896 AD, the expulsion of Jewish settlers and the destruction of their property in Jerash and Hauran, east of Jordan

■ March 22, 1901 AD, Hillel Yefeh's plan and a meeting with the representative of the Zionist movement "Aes Nattoot" to purchase large lands in Karak, Transjordan, for Jewish settlement

■ March 8, 1903, Aharon Blum signs a lease contract for Zizia lands south of Umm al-Amad for the settlement of Jews in eastern Jordan

■ November 24, 1904 AD, a delegation from the Zionist movement headed by Yitzhak Levy visits Transjordan to learn about the "Lepontine" project for Jewish settlement in southern Jordan

■ On April 29, 1905 AD, Aharon Blum signed a contract to purchase land in Hamra in the Salt region for the settlement of Jews in eastern Jordan.

■ On September 20, 1906 AD, Aharon Blum signed a contract to purchase land in Tanib, in the Madaba region, for the settlement of Jews in eastern Jordan.

■ October 1910 AD, Najib al-Asfar's project for Jewish settlement in the Ottoman princely lands in the Jordan Valley

■ On February 15, 1917 AD, the Zionist movement announced through the "Palestine of Palestine" the borders of the national home it aspired to.

■ On June 28, 1919, the Zionist movement announced its strong protest against the separation of Transjordan from Palestine and expressed the importance of Transjordan for the future of the Jewish state in Palestine

■ July 13, 1928 AD, Pinhas Rotenberg presented to the British commissioner Henry Cox his plan for the Jewish settlement in the lands of Al-Baqura east of Jordan

■ January 18, 1931 AD, The New York Times publishes a land lease agreement in Ghor Kebd.

■ March 8, 1936 AD, Pinhas Rothenberg presented his plan for the Jewish settlement in Wadi Zarqa, east of Jordan

■ August 15, 1936 AD, a meeting was held in Ghor al-Safi for members of a Jewish group to discuss the plan for the Jewish settlement in the al-Safi Valley in eastern Jordan

Outside of Pinhas Rutenberg, I have never heard of any of these plans. But I found Aharon Yitzchak Blum did indeed attempt to buy lands across the Jordan and even founded an organization called "חברת חלוצי עבר הירדן", Association of Pioneers of the Transjordan.

This may be a very neglected chapter of Zionist history. I found this paper in Hebrew about Blum that begins with confirmation that there were many Jewish attempts to settle across the Jordan as well as the resistance of the local tribes.

In the second half of the nineteenth century and in the first half of the present century, until close to the establishment of the state, organizations, institutions, individuals and sometimes even private entrepreneurs made attempts to acquire land for settlement across the Jordan. ...There was no hesitation about moving across the Jordan; It was, like the West Bank, part of the Ottoman Empire and was perceived in the minds of the many as an integral part of the land, the land of the patriarchs, emphasizing the acuteness of the security problem there, due to the Bedouin ruling the land. The idea of settlement there was intertwined with political ideas, both during the Ottoman rule - to establish Jewish autonomy - and of a desire - especially during the rule of the French and British Mandates - to secure the full territory of the country.

There may be lands in Jordan that were purchased by Jews who were ethnically cleansed by the Arab tribes!

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!

Jews have always been Zionist (posters)

I created these in April but cannot find that I posted them, so here is a series of graphics showing that Zionism is an integral part of Judaism.

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!

Lapid's speech

Here is the text of Yair Lapid's first speech as new Israeli prime minister. It is a good one.

I want to start by thanking the 13th Prime Minister of the State of Israel, Naftali Bennett. For your decency, for your friendship and for leading the government this past year to economic and security achievements not seen here for years. A special thank you for allowing the citizens of Israel to see this week an orderly transition between people who keep agreements and believe in one another.

The State of Israel is bigger than all of us. More important than any of us. It was here before us, and will be here long after us. It doesn’t belong only to us. It belongs to those who dreamed of it for thousands of years in the Diaspora, and also to those yet to be born, to future generations.

For them and for us, we must choose the common good; that which unites us. There will always be disagreements, the question is how we manage them, and how we make sure they don’t manage us.

Disagreement isn’t necessarily a bad thing so long as it doesn’t undermine the stability of the government and damage our internal resilience. So long as we remember that we all have the same goal: a Jewish, democratic, liberal, big, strong, advanced, and prosperous Israel.

The deep Israeli truth is that on most of the truly important topics – we believe in the same things.

We believe that Israel is the nation-state of the Jewish people. Its establishment didn’t begin in 1948, but rather on the day Yehoshua Bin Nun crossed the Jordan and forever connected the people of Israel with the land of Israel, between the Jewish nation and its Israeli homeland.

We believe that Israel must be a liberal democracy in which every citizen has the right to change the government and set the course of their life. Nobody can be denied their fundamental rights: respect, liberty, freedom of employment, and the right to personal security.

We believe we must always preserve our military might. Without it, there’s no security. I am the son of a Holocaust survivor — a 13-year-old Jewish boy who they wanted to kill and who had no one to protect him. We will defend ourselves, by ourselves. We will make sure we always have the Israel Defense Forces, an army with undeniable strength, that our enemies fear.

One night in the winter of 1944, in the Budapest Ghetto, my grandmother called out to my father, and told him: “My child, you don’t know it, but today is your Bar Mitzvah. I can’t bake a cake, your father won’t return.” My grandfather perished in the Mauthausen Concentration Camp.

“But there’s one thing I can do.” And she took out a small bottle of perfume, Chanel 5, which was the perfume of elegant ladies before the war. We’ll never know how she kept it all that time. She shattered it on the floor and said “at least it won’t stink at my son’s bar mitzvah.”

We believe that Israel is a Jewish state. Its character is Jewish. Its identity is Jewish. Its relations with its non-Jewish citizens are also Jewish. The book of Leviticus says, “But the stranger who dwelleth with you shall be unto you as one born among you, and thou shalt love him as thyself.”

We believe that so long as Israel’s security needs are met, Israel is a country that seeks peace. Israel stretches out its hand to all the peoples of the Middle East, including the Palestinians, and says: The time has come for you to recognize that we’ll never move from here, let’s learn to live together.

We believe there is a great blessing in the Abraham Accords, a great blessing in the security and economic momentum created at the Negev Summit with the UAE, Bahrain, Egypt, and Morocco, and that there will be a great blessing in the agreements yet to come.

The people of Israel won’t dwell alone. It is our job to continue to strengthen our position in the world, our relations with our greatest friend and ally, the United States, and to harness the international community in the struggle against antisemitism and the delegitimization of Israel.

We believe that it’s the job of the government to uphold the law, and the job of the law to uphold the standards of government. The law is what protects us from corruption and violence. A court is what protects the weak from the strong. The law is the basis for our lives together.

We believe that the Israeli economy must be based on free-market principles, on the creativity and dynamism of Israeli technology, and that our job is to protect those who have nothing. To provide a fair opportunity for every child, everywhere.

We believe that the Iranian threat is the gravest threat facing Israel. We’ll do whatever we must to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear capability, or entrenching itself on our borders.

I stand before you at this moment and say to everyone seeking our demise, from Gaza to Tehran, from the shores of Lebanon to Syria: don’t test us. Israel knows how to use its strength against every threat, against every enemy.

We believe in, and pray for the well-being of our soldiers and police officers, in the air, at sea, and on land. As it’s written in the prayer for the well-being of IDF soldiers, “May the Almighty cause the enemies who rise up against us to be struck down before them.” We won’t be quiet and won’t rest until our sons are returned: Hadar Goldin and Oron Shaul of blessed memory, Avera Mengistu and Hisham al-Sayed.

There’s something else that we believe in: that we’re allowed to disagree. Freedom of expression is a fundamental principle. Freedom of the press is a component without which democracy cannot survive. It’s incumbent upon us to put effort into revealing the facts and understanding the truth.

The great Israeli question is actually why in a period in which we have wide national agreement on all the important topics, the levels of hate and anxiety within Israeli society are so high? Why is polarization more threatening than ever?

The answer is – politics. In Israel, extremism doesn’t come from the streets to politics. It’s the opposite. It flows like lava from politics to the streets. The political sphere has become more and more extreme, violent and vicious, and it’s dragging Israeli society along with it. This we must stop. This is our challenge.

The State of Israel — Israelis — are better than this. Here, there’s brainpower, imagination, and strength that can’t be found anywhere else. The Israeli economy is a pilgrimage destination for the entire world. Precisely in a time of global crisis, our potential grew. We know how to change, to improve — we just need to do it together.

There are two photos hanging in my office in the Knesset, one alongside the other: David Ben-Gurion and Menachem Begin. Two political rivals, but also the two most important prime ministers we’ve had. They often argued, but they also always remembered they had the same goal: building the strength and moral character of the State of Israel.

This goal is greater than all that divides us. Our test is not whether or not we win the argument, but rather, if we learned to find a way to work together with those who don’t agree with us.

Many people who didn’t vote for this government are listening to this speech, many people who don’t and won’t support it. I thank you for your willingness to listen. I ask to work together with you for the good of our country. I’m committed to serving you as well. I embrace the words of my predecessor, and want to repeat them: we are brothers.

The challenges before us are immense. The struggle against Iran, terror at home, the Israeli education crisis, the cost of living, strengthening personal security. When the challenges are so great, we can’t let disagreements consume all our strength. In order to create a common good here, we need one another.

Our children are watching us. What do we want them to see? We want our children to see that we did everything to build a Jewish and democratic, strong and advanced, benevolent and good Israel.

Only together will we prevail.

Thank you.

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

Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424.

Read all about it here!

A new Arab myth created about Churchill

An Egyptian newspaper has come up with a brand new story:

An Old Jew Tells What Churchill Said About Palestine: Nothing Here Grows Without Roots

A Jewish old woman who celebrated her 106th birthday a few days ago, said: “One hundred years ago, I was a six-year-old girl at that time who was commissioned to give Winston Churchill a bouquet of roses when he visited Palestine as Minister for the Colonies in 1921."

He went to visit the municipality of Tel Aviv, which the British established in 1909 (!) to be the first seed that they planted to grow later, so that Israel will be the desired homeland for the Jews of the world at the expense of the Palestinian Arab people of the land.

The old woman said that as part of decorating the Churchill reception area in the Tel Aviv municipality garden, the party organizers had to cut down pine trees near the borders of Lebanon and bring them in a hurry to Tel Aviv and planted them in the sandy soil of the municipality garden to beautify them to make them appear more beautiful and elegant and closer to the gardens of Europe!

The little girl, who is very old these days, said that she was bored minutes after the guest started giving his speech, and she leaned on one of the trees, so the tree leaned over towards the other trees and the deception appeared.

She said, as she watched Churchill burst out laughing he leaning toward the mayor and whispered in his ear words that the (old) girl later learned that he had told the mayor:

“I am afraid that your state will fall one day, even if we help you and the whole world helps you to establish it.. Nothing grows here without roots.”

A very nice story that is almost certainly a lie. If this old lady had said this story in a Hebrew newspaper, the Arabic account would have mentioned her name and the newspaper it came from.

Churchill was very pro-Zionist when he visited Palestine in 1921. The Jerusalem Post had a nice article about it on the hundredth anniversary, and quoted him:

[Churchill told a delegation of Arabs seeking his opposition to Zionism,] “It is manifestly right that the Jews should have a National Home where some of them may be reunited. And where else could that be but in this land of Palestine, with which for more than 3,000 years they have been intimately and profoundly associated.”

Churchill told the Jewish delegation which followed:
“The cause of Zionism is one which carries with it much that is good for the whole world, and not only for the Jewish people; it will bring prosperity and advancement for the Arab population.”

Before returning to Cairo the evening of March 30, Churchill visited the then twelve-year-old Jewish town of Tel Aviv, meeting with its Mayor Meir Dizengoff, and the agricultural settlement in Rishon LeZion. On his return to London, he told the House of Commons:

“Anyone who has seen the work of the Jewish colonies will be struck by the enormous productive results which they have achieved from the most inhospitable soil.”

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!

Nikos Kazantzakis vs. a 20 year old Jewish woman, 1926

Nikos Kazantzakis (1883-1957) was the famed 20th century Greek writer whose novels included Zorba the Greek and The Last Temptation of Christ.

In 1926 and 1927, he traveled to Palestine and wrote of his experiences.

He had a very telling conversation with a young Jewish woman where he - less than a decade before the rise of Nazism - claimed that Zionism was a disaster in the making because Jews belong in the diaspora, forever.

Even though he professed his love for Jews, he proved himself to be a racist and, in hindsight, his young adversary bested him.

-----------------------------------

We walked along the broad, dusty road bordering the Valley of Josephat at the foot of the Mount of Olives. The tombstones on the Jewish graves, deeply imbedded in the ground, were drowned in the glaring noonday light. The little village of Gethsemane, just two paces ahead, was blotted out in darkness, so blinding was the brilliance of the sun. Unexpectedly, there among the graves, two camels filed silently by, one behind the other, their necks swaying slowly. For a moment their patient black eyes, with the long lashes, gazed at us gently and my heart lightened as I felt the presence of a warm living thing moving through this inhuman wilderness.

Walking and breathing easily beside me in this furnace was a young Jewess, a teacher named Judith, who had come to show me a garden for Jewish children. She was about twenty years old, short, lissom, with hooked nose and restless jet-black eyes. Her hair was curly and coarse, her chin broad, firm, wilful.

“How did you happen to become a Zionist?” I asked.

“I was studying medicine. I had no ties to either religion or country. People had always interested me. I felt compassion and pity for all mankind, knowing how every one shares in illness and joy and grief. But I was restless. All of Europe seemed old and familiar and archaic to me. I was thirsty for something new. And so I came to Palestine.”

“Why didn't you go to Russia? They say a new world is being created there . ."

“Because there's no freedom there. A small, harsh circle governs all the others. The fact that this circle is the proletariat didn't comfort me at all. I wanted freedom.”

“And you found it here in Palestine?”

“Here we work free. We try, we experiment, we search to find. You can meet people here and work together according to your individual temperament - from the most revolutionary to the most conservative. Freedom. Here, for the first time. I feel alive, strengthened, able to love the earth that I had never even noticed in Europe, and able to feel joy that I am from the Jewish race.”

“You are beginning, in other words, to lose your freedom. You're beginning to tie yourself down to a certain corner of the Earth, and to constrict your heart; first it had room for all the world, now it's beginning to distinguish and choose and to accept only the Jews. Don't you feel the danger?”

The Jewess protested angrily, slightly fearful:

“What danger?”

“What danger? I'll tell you: The leader of the gypsies forbids his people to build houses or plant trees or put up fences. They prop up their tents on the ground for a while and then move on freely. One day, as they were taking down their tents, a young girl was bending over the earth and tarrying. The leader approached and saw the girl had broken his order and had planted a sprig of basil at the entrance of her tent. And now the little sprig of basil had blossomed and the young girl was crouched over it crying, reluctant to leave it. In a rage, the leader uprooted the basil and trampled on it. He struck the girl with his riding whip and shouted: ‘Why do you break my order? Don't you know that whoever builds a house is tied to it and whoever plants a tree is tied to that tree?'

“We don't want to be Wandering Jews any longer!” the Jewess cried out.

“But that is exactly the danger I'm talking about; you don't want to advance any longer. If the purpose of life is happiness - to eat well, to sleep in peace, to live in security - then you are justified in wanting to escape the persecutions and scorn and take roots finally in your own country. Although I'm encouraged by the belief - thank God - that you will not find happiness and security here in Palestine!

“But if the purpose of life, and especially the purpose of a people, is much harder: to struggle to convert as much matter as possible into action, thought and beauty; to climb upward with agony - then, without a doubt, the Zionist movement is contrary to the highest interest of your race.”

“Why don't the English or French or Greeks undertake this role of the Wanderer? Or could you possibly think that their contribution to the Whole was lessened because they had a country?”

“Every race has its special virtues and vices and, consequently, its special road to reach its summit. The Jews have this supreme quality: to be restless; not to fit into the reality of the time; to struggle to escape; to consider every status quo and every idea a stifling prison. With this poignant quality of theirs they save mankind from his contrived efforts at contentment - that is to say, from his impasse. This spirit of the Jews shatters the equilibrium, pushes evolution further, sparks off the proudest element of life: never to be satisfied, never to stop anywhere, to leap from plants to animals and from animals to man and again to torment man, as though wanting to go further still.”

“Our fathers in the land of Canaan were farmers; rooted to their country they created their civilization.”

“That was the nature of your race then. The Jews didn't always have the Lucifer quality of rebellion. They acquired it. The persecutions, slaughters, scorn, exile, all the things you call Diaspora, hammered away at the Hebrew race for two thousand years and forged it, against its will, by force, into the leaven of the earth.”

“By force?”

“Does the word annoy you? Isn't it true that force is the most secret law of history? Many races would have wanted to escape their bloody and glorious fate and live without History, happily - clandestinely. But economic necessities, wars and some prophets who are born in their midst don't leave them alone. With force and with the lash, they prod them upward.

“Thus, scattered over the world for so many centuries, the Jews suffered, trembled and were killed. And this dyed their soul indelibly and created in them the hatred for every tyranny - either from individuals or from systems or ideas. This is why they agitated nations, undermined the status quo and set fire to all the old ideas. This is their fate; without them the world would rot.”

Judith laughed. “Thank you for the role you assign us. I must confess we are greatly honoured to be slaughtered, to be forever restless, to make others restless. But we don't want to any more.”

“You're tired? But the historical necessity that pushes the races doesn't ask you. It prods you relentlessly, whether you want it or not. And this modern Zionist movement, too, is a mask that your unsmiling Pate wears to deceive you for an instant. This is why I don't fear Zionism: how many of the fifteen million Jews will be able to squeeze themselves in here? You will never find security here. Behind you, don't forget, you have the dark fanatical swarm of Arabs.

“And so, like it or not, you will become the instruments of the spirit of our age. And our age is an age of revolution. That is, a Jewish age. Someone once said: “The twenty-second of March, 1832, when Goethe died, an era closed and a new one opened: the era of the reigning of the Jews.” And it's true. Goethe was the last complete representative of Harmony; after Goethe our contemporary age truly begins the violence, which is equally valuable, to rupture the old harmony and create a new one. This is why the Hebrew race prevails today, because its substance is precisely this rupturing of every harmony. This is why the highest intellects and leading men of action are Jews. Why all this flowering? Because you are restless, scattered all over the world in a transient age that destroys. Diaspora is your country. In vain you struggle to escape your Fate and you seek out happiness and security in this out-of-the-way province. I hope I hope, because I love the Jews - that sooner or later the Arabs will drive you out of here and again scatter you all over the world.”

We had finally arrived at the children's garden. Blond, brunette and raven-haired Jewish youngsters were playing beneath the trees, chirping away like birds. I caressed their soft curly hair with unexpected emotion; a sudden, tragic foreboding overwhelmed my heart.

---------------------------------------------------------

His foreboding was misplaced - anticipating (and also cheering) a slaughter of Jews by what he considered a "dark fanatical swarm of Arabs," when it was the sophisticated Europeans who were preparing the slaughter of the Jews he pretended to love.

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!

60 years ago: A conference to ensure US Jews remain Zionist

In June, 1962, the American Jewish Congress sponsored a conference in Jerusalem about maintaining the relationship between American Jews and Israel, which they were afraid would fray within 10-20 years.

American Jews remain overwhelmingly Zionist even 60 years after those dire predictions.

Not to say we should be complacent, but it is interesting to see what the perspective was then,

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!

Judaism has always been Zionist (posters)

There is a flip side to saying that anti-Zionism is antisemitism.

It is that Judaism is inherently Zionist.

Some posters I made .... and there are plenty more examples.

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!

Antisemite David Icke to speak at city-owned theatre in Vancouver for ten hours

From CBC News:

A British conspiracy theorist known for his outlandish ideas about lizard people and "Zionists" controlling the world is set to perform in a Vancouver civic theatre this weekend, provoking outrage from Jewish groups.

David Icke, a former sports broadcaster, is scheduled to give a full-day presentation at the Orpheum Theatre on Saturday. The theatre is operated by the city, and officials have denied requests to cancel the show from groups like B'nai Brith Canada and the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs.

Aiden Fishman of B'nai Brith Canada described Icke's views as "classic anti-Semitic ideas" and said the booking should never have been allowed.

"It's totally, totally incompatible with the City of Vancouver's role as an open and tolerant multicultural municipality to allow Mr. Icke to speak at a city-owned facility, after we've brought all these concerns to their attention," Fishman told CBC News.

Deep concern from Jewish groups

In an interview Thursday, Icke was furious about the campaign against his show, describing the claims made by Jewish groups as "libellous."

His presentation, according to his website, will cover everything from "reptilians" — shape-shifting alien-human hybrids — to the truth about the moon, which he believes is a hologram projected from Saturn.

"If what they say is true, why will I spend 10 hours talking on Saturday and not even mention Jewish people once? They need to explain that," Icke asked.

But in videos of his lectures posted online, he frequently uses another phrase, "Rothschild Zionists." These are the people he suggests are responsible for causing the 2008 financial crisis, staging the 9/11 attacks and generally controlling the world's banking and political systems.

That phrase, according to Fishman, is pretty obvious code for Jewish people.

Icke claims that he is not against Jews at all, but only "Rothschild Zionists".

In this 2010 essay on his site, he says

Ask most people about Zionism and they will say ‘that’s the Jews’, but while this is the impression the Rothschild networks in politics and the media have sought very successfully to ‘sell’ as ‘common knowledge’, it is not true. It represents only a minority of them and many others who are not Jewish.

Yet when he goes through a list of who he considers "Rothschild Zionists" in positions of power, surprise, they all happen to be Jews (with many of them unknown to be Zionists at all.)

So Icke says with a straight face:

[T]he Rothschild Zionists control the mainstream media; Hollywood and the movie industry; governments, not least in the United States; and crucially in the light of current events, they control global finance and commerce....

Nah, nothing to do with Jews.

Hilariously, Icke quoted a 2008 humor column by Joel Stein, about how proud he was that Jews control Hollywood, to prove that "Rothschild Zionists" control Hollywood - but then he lamely says it has nothing to do with Jews:

The Los Angeles Times columnist, Joel Stein (Rothschild Zionist), wrote an article proclaiming that Americans who don’t think Jews (Rothschild Zionists) control Hollywood are just plain ‘dumb’:

‘I had to scour the trades to come up with six Gentiles in high positions at entertainment companies. But lo and behold, even one of that six, AMC President Charles Collier, turned out to be a Jew! … As a proud Jew, I want America to know of our accomplishment. Yes, we control Hollywood.’

I emphasise again that we are not talking here about ‘the Jews’ owning the media, Hollywood, politics, banking and big business, but a tiny clique answering ultimately to the secret society that I call Rothschild Zionism.

The City of Vancouver is saying that as long as Icke only talks about "Zionists" controlling the world and being responsible for 9/11, then there is no violation of Canadian laws:

In an email, a spokesperson for the City of Vancouver wrote that it cannot infringe on Icke's freedom of speech without evidence that his presentation will include illegal hate speech.
"The City has explicit requirements in its theater rental agreements that govern the conduct of renters and has confirmed with Mr. Icke and his team their obligation to comply with all Canadian laws relating to the content of their presentation," the email reads.

A simple replacement of the word of "Jews" with "Zionists" in any Nazi text would ensure that they can be read in public in Vancouver without violating hate laws.

Come to think of it, this is exactly how the "pro-Palestinian" crowd thinks, too.

And remember that Alice Walker, the prize-winning novelist of the "anti-Israel" crowd, believes in Icke's theories as well.

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.