"Jihad against Houthis more important than Jihad against Jews"

Yemen's Sheikh Abd Al-Azim Al-Huthi has declared that the jihad against the "Houthi infidels", the Shiite sect in Yemen that has been waging a civil war against the government over the past decade, "is better than the jihad against the Jews." because these Shiite rebels "are enemies of Allah and His Messenger"

"It does not make sense to fight the Jews as long as the Houthi group exists," said Sheikh Huthi.

Don't worry - the Houthis won't become Judeophiles any time soon. Their logo says "God is Great, Death to America, Death to Israel, Damn the Jews, Power to Islam."

(There are rumors that Tehran instructed the Houthis to get rid of the "Death to America" part of their slogan! The rest of it is OK, though.)

It's so comforting to know that my people are now second in line for slaughter by Yemeni Sunnis. This makes them moderate!

Perhaps the well-known Islamic slogan should be changed to "First the other Friday people, then the Saturday people, and only then the Sunday people."

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Belgian Minister of Culture defends antisemitism on Facebook page

A Belgian professor wrote an opinion piece on the website of RTBF, Radio Télévision Belge Francophone, saying that Israel is a racist state. (He based this mostly from reading Ha'aretz.)

RTBF has a Facebook page as well, and this article was linked there as well.

Some of the comments, predictably, are insanely antisemitic.

You know, having killed Christ is not enough for them...the Jews in France are also racist! :)

Every Jew is racist to another human because for Jews they are like dogs ... they can kill a non-Jew and will not be condemned ...

Goldstein refused to do anything to save the life of a Gentile - this was not a personal quirk, but simply an command of the Talmud on which it is based.

These comments remain up on the page after moderation.

The Philosemitism blog reports that the person in charge of the page, Ms. Françoise De Their, answered that "Comments are moderated as soon as possible by the editorial departments concerned, in accordance with professional, legal and ethical requirements."

The French Community of Brussels Minister of Culture and Media, Fadila Laanan, responded that "I was assured that the comments are still on RTBF page of this social network are within the limits of the debate and are acceptable."

Incidentally, Laanan's parents were born in Morocco.

(h/t Rudi)

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Even an Arabic article about Baghdad's Jewish cemetery can't avoid antisemitism

El Bashayer Online has an interview, apparently originally done in 2012, with the caretaker of the Jewish cemetery in Sadr City, a suburb of Baghdad.

Ziad al-Bayati took over responsibility for the cemetery from his father. I did find a Forward article from 2004 that indicated that one of the last Iraqi Jews was involved in fixing up the cemetery which had been neglected for decades, and gravestones damaged during the Gulf War were rebuilt.

And yet even in this article there has to be some old fashioned Jew-hatred.

The writer interviews an Iraqi "researcher" Ahmed Jawad who says:

It is a sign of the spirit of tolerance of Muslims, who respect the lives and bodies of their offenders, while fanatical Jewish organizations attack Muslim cemeteries in Jerusalem's Old City and the cities of Palestine and even in the European continent, as in Germany and France.

Incidentally, the 2004 article notes:

Visitors to the Jewish cemetery in the turbulent Shia neighborhood of Sadr City, the scene of some of the most vicious fighting in recent weeks, have been stoned more than once by school children.

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PA TV shows cartoon Devil working with Jews to kill Mohammed

From Palestinian Media Watch:

The Devil: "I've built my plan on the burning hate and loathing of Muhammad and his supporters that fills the hearts of the Jews... "
[The Devil hovers above the Jews]
Jew: "We have lost our prestige because of Muhammad..."
Leader of Jewish tribe: "We must return to Medina and harm Muhammad and his supporters... There are [Arab-Pagan] tribes that want to destroy Muhammad and the ones who want that the most are the Quraish and their allies... These tribes are not small and they have a major conflict with Muhammad. If they unite, it will be possible to destroy Muhammad."
Jew: "And then we'll return to Medina and go back to being prestigious leaders."
Jew: "A wise idea."
Leader of Jewish tribe: "So let us go to the tribes and prepare for the war with Muhammad..."

Note: Amidst the Arab pagan population of Medina, there were also three Jewish tribes. In the year 625, Muhammad exiled the Jewish Qaynuqa and Nadir tribes. Soon afterward, he captured the Qurayza tribe and had the 750 male captives decapitated and the wives and children sold into slavery. Islamic tradition justifies Muhammad's actions, teaching that the three Jewish tribes broke their treaties with Muhammad.

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Jordanian columnist reminds readers on Eid that Jews are the devil

During the annual Hajj pilgrimage, Muslims throw a series of small stones towards three pillars (later replaced with walls) to symbolize the stoning of the Devil, done according to Muslim tradition by Abraham.

Rashid Hassan, writing in Jordan's Addustour, wants to make sure that his readers know exactly who the devil is.

The pilgrim returns from the blessed land, from his pilgrimage, cleansed from sin, and he returns to his country as his mother bore him, to keep this purity. This will only be achieved by addressing the devil and all that symbolized by the evils and sins ... This is a message to the Muslims in general.

...The Zionist occupation embodies the ugliest image of the devil. [The ritual] imposes on Muslims all over the world to address him, and the clarion call to liberate Jerusalem and Al-Aqsa, the first kiblah and third of the Two Holy Mosques, the place of the Ascension of the Prophet, peace be upon him. Jews are killers of prophets, who are working day and night to change the heart of this Arab city, to transform it into a Jewish city...

In this context, we wonder - Why didn't the Arab states implement the resolutions of Arab summits to support of Jerusalem and its people? The pledges to fund it remain unpaid, reminding us about those wealthy Jews are financed the establishment of colonies in Palestine such as Rothschild in the late nineteenth century, and now the Russian Jewish billionaire Moskowitz who funded the establishment of colonies in Arab Jerusalem and its area, to separate it from its Arab surroundings. There are now twelve of these colonies, surrounding [Jerusalem] like a bracelet.

...The cause of all tragedies, past and present, are the bullying enemies of the nation, in the forefront the Zionist enemy, who works on the Judaization of Jerusalem and Al-Aqsa throwing out all laws and international norms, and which prompted the African nations to divert the Nile waters and cause our brothers to die of thirst.

In a nutshell, the blessed pilgrimage reminds us and calls on us to respond firmly to the devil, which is embodied in all the sins and evils; greed and corruption, injustice and tyranny, and embodied in the Zionist occupation and Arab differences that are behind the Arab bloodshed and foreign intervention.

See also yesterday's post where Iran's Supreme Leader makes a similar point in his annual Hajj address. But he says "Zionists" instead of Jews, the mark of a true moderate.

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John Kerry lauds Malaysia as modern, innovative and multi-faith model

AFP reports:

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry lauded Malaysia Friday as a modern, innovative and multi-faith model for the world, heaping praise on a country the United States regards as a valuable Muslim ally.

On the final day of a curtailed Asian tour in which he has filled in for U.S. President Barack Obama, Kerry said Malaysia’s young people were an inspiration for the Arab Spring.

“Here in Malaysia, people of different heritages have been in conversation for a long time,” Kerry said in a speech to mainly young entrepreneurs in the Malaysian capital of Kuala Lumpur.

He cited the symbolism of Kuala Lumpur’s Petronas Towers - the world’s tallest twin skyscrapers - having blended modern engineering, traditional Muslim design, Malaysian vision, a U.S. architect and Asian builders.

“Together, they... are a soaring reminder that Malaysia is much more than a marketplace. It is a human and economic mosaic - and it is a model for the world,” Kerry said.

The National Post, last year:

In Kuala Lumpur, the capital of Malaysia, politicians and civil servants devote a surprising amount of time to thinking about Israel, 7,612 km away. Sometimes they appear to be obsessed by it. Malaysia has never had a dispute with Israel, but the government encourages the citizens to hate Israel and also to hate Jews whether they are Israelis or not.

Few Malaysians have laid eyes on a Jew; the tiny Jewish community emigrated decades ago. Nevertheless, Malaysia has become an example of a phenomenon called “Anti-Semitism without Jews.” Last March, for instance, the Federal Territory Islamic Affairs Department sent out an official sermon to be read in all mosques, stating that “Muslims must understand Jews are the main enemy to Muslims as proven by their egotistical behaviour and murders performed by them.” About 60% of Malaysians are Muslim.

In Kuala Lumpur, it’s routine to blame the Jews for everything from economic failures to the bad press Malaysia gets in foreign (“Jewish-owned”) newspapers.

The leaders of the country assume that Jews and Israelis deserve to be humiliated as often as possible. In 1984, the New York Philharmonic cancelled a visit because the Malaysian information minister demanded that a composition by Ernest Bloch, an American Jewish composer who died in 1959, be eliminated from their program. In 1992, an Israeli football player with the Liverpool team was refused permission to play in Malaysia; the team cancelled the visit. The government banned Schindler’s List, calling it anti-German and pro-Jewish propaganda. The same government later decided it could be shown if seven scenes were cut. Steven Spielberg refused, so the government removed all his films from Malaysia’s screens.

In 2003, the prime minister’s political party gave delegates to the United Malays National Organization copies of Henry Ford’s anti-Semitic book from the 1920s, The International Jew, a favourite of Hitler, translated into Bahasa Malay.

I'm not bringing this up to make Kerry look stupid. I'm mentioning it because, as we've seen by the refusal so far of HRW and Amnesty to condemn the "Khaybar" TV series, the people in the West who should be in the forefront of condemning Muslim and Arab antisemitism have abdicated that responsibility.

Muslim antisemitism is a given, or it is justified as a natural response to Israel's policies (or existence,) or whatever.

The problem is that by not expecting Muslims to live up to the same standards that are expected of everyone else, the West is enabling this attitude.

Arab and Muslim antisemitism is not anomalous - it is mainstream. And part of the reason is because Westerners tend to look the other way.

Muslims and Arabs aren't children. They aren't brain damaged. Like everyone else, they will act the way they are expected to act. And the only way to make them change their attitudes is by shaming them, by forcing them to face consequences for their actions. Nothing will ever change by us dismissing the uglier aspects of Muslim and Arab culture as just "one of those things."

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Former Meretz member shocked at college hatred of Israel

A must read in Times of Israel by Hen Mazzig:

As a young Israeli who had just completed five years of service in the IDF, I looked forward to my new job educating people in the Pacific Northwest about Israel. I was shocked, however, by the anti-Israel bigotry and hostility I encountered, especially in the greater Seattle area, Oregon, and Berkeley. I had been very liberal, a member of the leftist Zionist party, Meretz, but the anti-Semitism and hatred for Israel that I have seen in the U.S. has changed my outlook personally and politically.

This year, from January through May, I went to college campuses, high schools, and churches to tell people about the history of modern Israel, about my experience growing up in the Jewish state, and about my family. ...

When I served as a soldier in the West Bank, I got used to having ugly things said to me, but nothing prepared me for the misinformation, demonization of Israel, and the gut-wrenching, anti-Israel, anti-Semitic hostility expressed by many students, professors, church members, and even some high school students right here in the Pacific Northwest.

I was further shocked by how unaware the organized Jewish community is and how little they are actually doing to counter this rising anti-Semitism, which motivated me to write this article.

...To give you a taste of the viciousness of the BDS attacks, let me cite just a few of the many shocking experiences I have had. At a BDS event in Portland, a professor from a Seattle university told the assembled crowd that the Jews of Israel have no national rights and should be forced out of the country. When I asked, “Where do you want them to go?” she calmly answered, “I don’t care. I don’t care if they don’t have any place else to go. They should not be there.” When I responded that she was calling for ethnic cleansing, both she and her supporters denied it. And during a presentation in Seattle, I spoke about my longing for peace between Israel and the Palestinians. When I was done, a woman in her 60’s stood up and yelled at me, “You are worse than the Nazis. You are just like the Nazi youth!” A number of times I was repeatedly accused of being a killer, though I have never hurt anyone in my life. On other occasions, anti-Israel activists called me a rapist. The claims go beyond being absurd – in one case, a professor asked me if I knew how many Palestinians have been raped by IDF forces. I answered that as far as I knew, none. She triumphantly responded that I was right, because, she said, “You IDF soldiers don’t rape Palestinians because Israelis are so racist and disgusted by them that you won’t touch them.”

Such irrational accusations are symptomatic of dangerous anti-Semitism. Yet, alarmingly, most mainstream American Jews are completely oblivious to this ugly movement and the threat it poses. They seem to be asleep, unaware that this anti-Jewish bigotry is peddled on campuses, by speakers in high schools, churches, and communities, and is often deceptively camouflaged in the rhetoric of human rights.

...My experiences in America have changed me. I never expected to encounter such hatred and lies. I never believed that such anti-Semitism still existed, especially in the U.S. I never knew that the battlefield was not just Gaza, the West Bank, and hostile Middle Eastern countries wanting to destroy Israel and kill our citizens and soldiers. It is also here in America, where a battle must be waged against prejudice and lies.

I implore American Jews: do more.

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Egyptian media celebrating 1973 "victory" over "the Jews." Not Israel - "the Jews."

Today is the 40th anniversary of Egypt's surprise attack on Yom Kippur, 1973, and Egypt is celebrating.

But if you look at Egyptian media in Arabic, very often it says that this "victory" was over "the Jews" - not over Israel, or over Zionists.

While many of the articles only talk about the "glorious victory," without naming over whom, when the enemy is named, more often than not, they are called "the Jews."

This interview with an Egyptian general in El Balad  is peppered with referencs to "the Jews."

Vetogate, while discussing Muslim Brotherhood threats against the celebrations, notes that  it is a happy day because "this is a black day in the history of the Jews."

This interview with Sadat's sister at Al Mogaz mostly refers merely to "the enemy" but has a reference to the victory over "the Jews." Nothing about Zionists or Israel.

Al Masry al Youm incidentally talks bout the "victory over the Jews."

By the way, here is how Time magazine reported the end of the war that the Egyptians are wildly celebrating:

From a purely military viewpoint it was already clear that the Israelis had come breathtakingly close to a victory that would have matched their swift triumph in the Six-Day War. Despite the important advantages possessed this time by the refurbished Arab armies—the element of surprise, the early losses they inflicted, their easy penetration of the Bar-Lev Line along the east bank of the Suez Canal and Israeli bastions in the Golan Heights—the Israelis managed in scarcely more than two weeks to reverse the tide of battle and push the battlefronts into Syria and Egypt. At week's end the Israelis claimed that they had captured most of the city of Suez; their armies had fought to within 30 miles of Damascus and about 45 miles of Cairo.

Although the details were still obscured by censorship, the bridgehead made by an Israeli armored force across the southern sector of the canal may rank as the most brilliant military feat in the country's short but tempestuous history. In the end, Egypt may well have agreed to a ceasefire because it realized that to continue fighting would lead to another disaster.

Enlarging their bridgehead on the west bank of the Suez Canal (TIME, Oct. 29), Israeli forces last week proceeded to neutralize, both militarily and politically, the dug-in Egyptian forces on the east bank. With at least 20,000 men and 500 tanks at their disposal on the southern portion of the west bank, the Israelis cut the vital highway between Suez and Cairo, encircled and later captured most of the city of Suez and pushed on to the port of Adabiya. In the process, they trapped the Egyptian Third Army, which was still in position on the east bank of the canal.

The Egyptian public hardly realized what had happened. At the week's beginning, a mood of euphoria still persisted in Cairo. Many Egyptians initially resented the declaration of a ceasefire because they believed that it was cheating Egypt out of a clear-cut victory. In any case, full-scale fighting broke out again almost immediately. In the 24 hours that followed the ceasefire, the Israelis drastically improved their position on the west bank. They destroyed large numbers of missile and artillery sites and, most important, they isolated the Third Army, cutting it off from food for its 20,000 men and fuel for its 400 tanks. Time after time, the Egyptians fought ferociously to free themselves but failed.

By [Wednesday morning,] the Egyptian government fully realized to what extent it had blundered in underestimating the seriousness of the Israeli bridgehead on the west bank. But it was too late to change the course of battle; the Egyptian Third Army was, as Moshe Dayan put it, "technically blocked." In a particularly stinging gesture to the Egyptians, the Israelis announced that they would supply blood plasma to the Third Army, since the Egyptian government was incapable of doing so. The Israelis added that the encircled Arabs were in no immediate danger of dying from thirst or hunger.

... But already, hundreds of thirsty and hungry Egyptian soldiers were walking out of the harsh, blazing desert with their hands up and handkerchiefs waving. From their east-bank positions, the nearest fresh water was 100 miles away; the water conduit from the west was held by the Israelis, who seemed determined to supply them with water only in exchange for surrender. At best, the ones who held out could probably expect to go through what Gamal Abdel Nasser, as a young major, was forced to do in 1949: to await an armistice, after which, by joint agreement, they can walk through Israeli lines to safety.

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100 years ago: The Beilis Trial

From Wikipedia:

Menahem Mendel Beilis, 1874 – July 7, 1934, (sometimes spelled Beiliss;[1] Russian: Менахем Мендель Бейлис, Yiddish: מנחם מענדל בייליס) was a Ukrainian Jew accused of ritual murder (see Blood libel) in Kiev in the Russian Empire in a notorious 1913 trial, known as the "Beilis trial" or "Beilis affair". The process sparked international criticism of the antisemitic policies of the Russian Empire.

On March 12, 1911 (under the old Russian calendar), a 13-year-old Ukrainian boy Andrei Yushchinsky disappeared on his way to school. Eight days later his mutilated body was discovered in a cave near the Zaitsev brick factory.

Beilis was arrested on July 21, 1911, after a lamplighter testified that the boy had been kidnapped by a Jew. A report submitted to the Tsar by the judiciary regarded Beilis as the murderer of Yushchinsky.

Beilis spent more than two years in prison awaiting trial. Meanwhile, a vicious antisemitic campaign was launched in the Russian press against the Jewish community, with accusations of the blood libel and ritual murder.

The Beilis trial took place in Kiev from September 25 through October 28, 1913. The prosecution was composed of the government's best lawyers. Professor Sikorsky of Kiev State University (father of Igor Sikorsky, the inventor of the helicopter), a medical psychologist, testified as an expert witness for the prosecution that in his opinion it was a case of ritual murder.

Beilis had a strong alibi that resulted, ironically, from his habit of working on the Jewish Sabbath. Yushchinsky was abducted on a Saturday morning, and Beilis was then at work, as confirmed by his Gentile co-workers in trial testimony. Receipt slips for the shipment of bricks, signed by Beilis that morning, were produced in evidence. The prosecution was forced to argue that Beilis could have ducked out for a few minutes, kidnapped Yushchinsky, and then returned to work.

One prosecution witness, presented as a religious expert in Judaic rituals, was a Catholic priest, Justinas Pranaitis from Tashkent, well known for his antisemitic 1892 work Talmud Unmasked. Pranaitis testified that the murder of Yushchinsky was a religious ritual, associating the murder of Yushchinsky with the blood libel, a hoax believed by many Russians at the time.

Beilis was represented by the most able counsels of the Moscow, St. Petersburg, and Kiev bars: Vasily Maklakov, Oscar Gruzenberg, N. Karabchevsky, A. Zarudny, and D. Grigorovitch-Barsky. Two prominent Russian professors, Troitsky and Kokovtzov, spoke on behalf of the defense in praise of Jewish values and exposed the falsehood of the accusations, while professor of Kiev Theological Seminary Orthodox Christian philosopher Alexander Glagolev affirmed that "the Law of Moses forbids spilling human blood and using any blood in general in food." The well-known and respected Rabbi of Moscow, Rabbi Mazeh, delivered a long, detailed speech quoting passages from the Torah, the Talmud and many other books to conclusively debunk the testimony of the prosecution "experts".

The lamplighter, on whose testimony the indictment of Beilis rested, confessed that he had been confused by the secret police.

Pranaitis' credibility rapidly evaporated when the defense demonstrated his ignorance of some simple Talmudic concepts and definitions, such as hullin, to the point where "many in the audience occasionally laughed out loud when he clearly became confused and couldn't even intelligibly answer some of the questions asked by my lawyer." A Tsarist secret police agent is quoted, reporting on Pranaitis' testimony, as saying:

Cross-examination of Pranaitis has weakened evidentiary value of his expert opinion, exposing lack of knowledge of texts, insufficient knowledge of Jewish literature. Because of amateurish knowledge and lack of resourcefulness, Pranaitis' expert opinion is of very low value. Professors Troitskij and Kokovtsev, who were interrogated today, gave conclusions which are exceptionally positive for the defence, praising doctrines of the Jewish religion, and not accepting even a possibility of a religious murder by Jews ... Vipper thinks that acquittal is possible.

The prosecution's case was further undermined after it had spent a great deal of effort to link the 13 wounds which Professor Sikorsky had discovered on a part of the murdered boy's body with the importance of the number thirteen in "Jewish ritual," only to have it revealed later that there were actually 14 wounds on that part of the body.

The chief prosecutor A.I. Vipper made antisemitic statements in his closing address. There are conflicting accounts of the 12 Christian jurors: seven were members of the notorious Union of the Russian People, also known as the Black Hundreds. There was no single representative of the intelligentsia in the jury. However after deliberating for several hours, the jury acquitted Beilis.

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Sometimes you just have to go it alone (Tower)

A long but excellent essay by Benjamin Kerstein:

On October 1, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addressed the UN General Assembly. His topic was, unsurprisingly, the Iranian nuclear program and the need for the world to act in order to stop it. “I want there to be no confusion on this point,” he told the assembled delegates. “Israel will not allow Iran to get nuclear weapons. If Israel is forced to stand alone, Israel will stand alone.”

Immediately, and again unsurprisingly, he was dismissed as a global spoiler...

In 2002, with Israel deep in the horrors of the second intifada and Ariel Sharon’s Operation Defensive Shield at last fighting back against Palestinian terrorism, international condemnation of the Jewish state reached a fever pitch. Then-UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan summed up the general attitude by asking, “Can Israel be right and the whole world wrong?”

This was a fairly ugly question in and of itself, given that there is something unseemly about the leader of an international organization pitting the entire world against a single nation. It is also worth pointing out that even a first-year philosophy student knows that truth is not determined by crowd size.

Yet few can deny that there was something in what Annan said. Israelis, Diaspora Jews, and people from all communities who harbor pro-Israel sentiments are constantly challenged by the fact that, quite often, it seems that practically everyone in the world believes Israel is wrong. One often has the sense that politicians, NGOs, intellectuals, artists, professors, students, activists, diplomats, and experts of all political stripes agree on only one thing: Israel’s policies, society, culture, politics, and even very existence are deplorable, offensive, or evil.

As an Israeli, and thus something of an object—albeit a decidedly minor one—of all this opprobrium, I can testify to the fact that it is not an easy thing to deal with. After all, if everyone in the world tells you that you are a horrible person, sooner or later you will probably start to believe it. However strong our convictions may be, we have all, at one time or another, found ourselves asking Annan’s question: Is it really possible, we wonder, for us to be right when everyone is telling us we are wrong or worse?

For myself, I was gratified to discover that this question had already been asked and answered over a century ago, when the State of Israel was still a dream in the minds of a small group of activists and thinkers. And in one of the acerbic little ironies history periodically throws our way, it had been asked and answered in Mr. Annan’s own words.

...In the 1892 essay entitled “Some Consolation,” Ahad Ha’am asked Annan’s question in practically identical terms. “Since everybody hates the Jews,” he wrote, “can we think that everybody is wrong and Jews are right?” And like today, Ahad Ha’am noted that the question could not be easily dismissed. “There are many among us Jews,” he wrote, “on whom a similar question half-unconsciously forces itself.”

Ahad Ha’am’s answer was a simple one, but he used a very singular proof to make his case—the blood libel. It was indisputable fact, he noted, that for centuries, the overwhelming majority of the non-Jewish world believed that the Jews held hideous ceremonies in which non-Jewish children were murdered and their blood used in unspeakable demonic rites. And it was equally indisputable that, throughout all those many centuries, every Jew in the world knew this was a deranged fantasy.

“Yes,” Ahad Ha’am concluded, “it is possible” for the Jews to be right and the entire world wrong. “The blood accusation proves it possible. Here, you see, the Jews are right and perfectly innocent.”

As the title of his essay suggests, Ahad Ha’am took “some consolation” from this fact, and with good reason. But there is a darker side to this consolation, because it also reminds us that, although we may know that we can be right while the world is wrong, it does nothing to prevent the world from continuing to believe otherwise.

Everyone reacts to this in different ways. In the Diaspora, it often means a perpetual struggle against those who believe that because “the whole world” believes the worst of Israel, it must be true. A small minority simply gives in and, effectively, joins the other side, concluding that “the world,” if only by virtue of superior numbers, must be correct. Others defy it outright, insisting instead that Israel is always right while the world is always wrong. Still others simply trudge quietly on, keeping their heads down and hoping for the best, occasionally making small and private expressions of their Zionism.

For those who support Israel publicly, it is rarely much easier. Activists and members of pro-Israel groups do their best to use reason, logic, and public relations to change people’s minds, often thanklessly. ...

But perhaps the harshest effect is on Israel itself. From the average man in the street to the prime minister’s office, Israelis are, for the most part, convinced that the world has never and will never accept Ahad Ha’am’s argument. This has resulted in one of modern Hebrew’s most popular but depressing expressions: kol ha’olam negdeinu. “The whole world is against us.”

...The role of the prophet is one of the most revered in traditional Judaism, and it is, of course, the role of the prophet to stand against social consensus, denouncing injustice, idolatry, and evil however powerful its practitioners may be. Many cultures have similar archetypes, but in Judaism it is notably, perhaps uniquely emphasized. Indeed, without becoming unduly mystical, it is difficult to ignore the fact that, for the entirety of its history, the Jewish people have tended to keep their own counsel, to be a people apart, to not apologize for being different, and to “go it alone” despite the opposition and even hatred of the rest of the world. Perhaps the hope that a modern Jewish state would not have to do the same is asking too much.

But it must be admitted that there is a heavy psychological cost to never being able to fully trust other people. And having to go it alone, however necessary, is a lonely fate.

Read the whole thing. I edited out some caveats and counterexamples to keep this as brief as I could but it is really good.

I think that this dovetails with the previous link, about how Israel naturally has better intelligence on Arab matters than the US intel agencies due partially to the ability to have analysts who truly understand Arab language and, by extension, culture.

Now, Israel's critics could argue that paranoia can skew one's perspective as well. It can and does. However, as the joke goes, it is not paranoia if the world really is out to get you.

Obviously some in the international community are more sympathetic (and, more rarely, empathetic) to Israel's plight than others. The major point that Israel's well-meaning critics need to understand is that for them, being wrong is not an existential issue. For Israelis, it often is.

And that is true both when the decision is to act or not to act, whether to react or not, to decide whether a verbal threat is real or rhetoric. Israelis are keenly aware of the downside of going it alone; they have felt the consequences of their unilateral decisions for over six decades.

Critics consider Israel a cowboy, itching to pull the trigger, but they choose to forget that the calculus against action - and the international isolation that results - is factored in as part of the decision as well. Israel sometimes has to go it alone because only Israel has to suffer the consequences of choosing not to.

Conversely, critics conveniently forget that Israel sometimes chooses not to act, and it has paid the price for inaction as well. That is in Israel's DNA, but it doesn't make it into Western history books.

The antisemitic critics of Israel will never be mollified by whatever Israel does. The more friendly nations, along with organizations like J-Street, prefer to infantilize Israel as if Israelis aren't mature enough to understand the consequences of their actions, and therefore need to be pressured to do the right thing. These "friendly" critics choose not to realize that Israelis have thoroughly considered the next twelve chess moves while they are struggling to look past only one.

Israel has to think that far ahead  in order to survive to the next match. And she can't choose not to play.

(h/t Yerushalimey)

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"Jewish UN wants to destroy Syria to fulfill Isaiah prophecy, take over world"

Here's a new twist on the usual Arab antisemitic conspiracy theories.

The official Syrian RTV agency says that Syria is the last obstacle for Jews to finally take over the world.

All you need to do is read the Bible, the Talmud, and (of course) the Protocols of the elders of Zion, and it all makes perfect sense.

The pre-war on Syria, and the current war on Syria, is World War III. We live the war and pay for it and most of us do not know the reasons for it. ...The real reasons for war are written in the folds of old yellowing books.

What is happening today is not caused by the desire to establish democracy or freedom, or concern for the interests of the Syrian people. Control of the oil resources is the economic engine of the war prior to the final declaration of victory for Israel over the world and the establishment of a global state, which is the United Nations and its Supreme Council and the International Court of Justice, which brings together presidents and leaders to establish this state. To those who think this is just a conspiracy theory I invite them to read the Torah and the Talmud and the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, and specifically to read the policies included in the book of Isaiah 16: [sic - it is 17:]

1. The burden of Damascus. Behold, Damascus is taken away from being a city, and it shall be a ruinous heap.
2. The cities of Aroer are forsaken; they shall be for flocks, which shall lie down, and none shall make them afraid.
3. The fortress also shall cease from Ephraim, and the kingdom from Damascus; and the remnant of Aram shall be as the glory of the children of Israel, saith the Lord of hosts.

(Apparently, Aroer is similar sounding to another Syrian city.)

The article goes on to claim that other prophecies say that every Jew will have 2300 non-Jewish slaves, and all of the wars in the world are meant to fulfill that promise to enslave a good part of the planet.

The reason America went to war in Iraq? Well, there is another [Koranic?] prophecy that Iraq would destroy Israel, so the Zionist puppets in the US moved to destroy Iraq before that could happen.

But America is also $15 trillion in debt, and that is how the Zionists plan to take over the US, that is already under their control. Or something like that.

In the end, the Jews were behind the destruction of the Soviet Union, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and Syria is the last piece of the massive puzzle before Jews can exert total global domination.

Again, this is in official Syrian government media.

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Stop media demonization of Israel (petition)

From Honest Reporting:

Recent cases of anti-Israel bias have crossed the line. Demonization of Israel is recognized as a form of anti-Semitism in both the U.S. State Department and European Union Working Definitions of Anti-Semitism.

It's time for the media to adopt these recognized and considered definitions of anti-Semitism. Sign our petition and demand that the media do so.

Sign the petition here.

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Saudi paper: Never any Jews in Jerusalem; Israel using Zionism to take over world

Al Bilad, one of Saudi Arabia's oldest newspapers, has an article by Dr. Ghazi Hussein, former PLO envoy to Austria.

Jerusalem is one of the most important holy places that has been associated with the Arabs, Muslims and Christians throughout the ages. Jerusalem is the symbol of the nationalism and holy to Christianity and Islam, the first Qiblah [direction of Muslim prayer] and Islam's third holiest site and the City of Flowers and the Al-Aqsa Mosque and the birthplace of Jesus Christ and the essence of the question of Palestine Arab-Zionist conflict.

Jerusalem occupies a central position among the Arabs for its historical and religious have and to Muslims all over the world.

Arabs were the first to build the foundations of the city around 3000 BC....

The Islamic conquest of Jerusalem came during the reign of Caliph Omar ibn al-Khattab may Allah be pleased with him; when it was liberated by the Romans it had no single Jew in it.

The Patriarch of the city of Damascus signed a declaration to the caliph that Jerusalem was not inhabited by Jews.

Jews used their ambitions for the Arab land and their wealth to settle it with colonialism to serve the interests of Jewish Jerusalem saying that it had special significance to them. The rabbis and leaders of the Zionist movement cemented these allegations and superstition and greed in the minds of Jews, despite the absence of any impact of religion on the city from them at all.

The founder of Zionism Theodor Herzl supported brutality and barbarism in his books in which he says: "If we got one day to Jerusalem and I was still alive and able to do anything, we will remove and burn everything that is not holy to Jews."

The Zionist founders mockingly used the Jewish religion as a sharp weapon in the Judaization of Palestine and for hegemony over the Middle East as a prelude to world domination. And therefore they used it for the success of the colonial Jewish settlement in Palestine and to convert settler colonialism as a center of Jewish worldviews and created the illusion that Jerusalem is the capital of the occupiers.

The clear Jewish ambitions in the city of Jerusalem can be seen in the Jewish Encyclopedia, which said that they aim to control of Jerusalem and to destroy the Al-Aqsa Mosque: "the Jews wanted to go to Jerusalem and overcome the power of the enemy, and establish their own temple there. "

Don't forget - Saudis are "moderate."

Ghazi Hussein is also a Holocaust-denier, which makes him well-suited to be an honored writer for the Arabic press.

I can confidently predict that no one in the Arabic-speaking world  - no professors of history at a single Arab university - will write a response to this article pointing out its absurd lies.

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Norway press council declares that vile cartoon is not antisemitic

Last May, I reported on a disgusting cartoon published in Norway's Dagbladet. Here is my translated version:

As I noted then, this cartoon was clearly aimed at the tiny Jewish community in Norway:

Only Jews routinely circumcise boys when they are infants. (Some Muslims will have doctors circumcise boys in the hospital soon after birth, but not in their homes.)

Only religious Jews are associated with black hats and beards.

Muslim circumcision, and female genital mutilation when practiced, is not a ceremony with prepared texts from prayer books.

There are only about 1300 Jews in Norway, while there are over 100,000 Muslims.

Despite his protestations, [cartoonist] Drefvelin is clearly aiming this cartoon at the minuscule Jewish population of Norway, not the growing Muslim population.

Now the Press Council of Norway has declared that the vile cartoon is not antisemitic.

PFU Secretariat pointed out in its proposal to the opinion that in the Norwegian media hass a tradition of caricature with very wide latitude, and those who feel wronged or violated should not have a veto over what can be published.

"This is an important, a fundamental issue for the press and freedom of expression such that even if this strip was aimed at one particular religion, I would have acquitted Dagbladet," said Martin Riber Sparre in Today's Market.

He added that if the Jewish community felt threatened by the comic strip, it was a matter for the police and not the PFU.

I would still love to know why the artist would say that he chose to depict the people attacking the child as members of the tiny Jewish community rather than the far more numerous Muslim community.

We know the reason, of course - the Jews aren't going to threaten to murder him, unlike Muslims. So it is far safer to characterize Judaism as a bloodthirsty religion than to worry about ruffling Islam's feathers.

Over time, incidents like these ensure that there would be real hatred against Jews in Europe. This specific cartoon could be explained away, of course, but the cumulative effect means that Jews will be perceived as barbarians in Norwegian media.

(h/t Ian and IsraelWhat)

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Al Shaabab planned attack on London's Jewish community

From The Toronto Star last week:

A cache of intelligence detailing the training of Al Qaeda’s East Africa group that was obtained exclusively by the Toronto Star may help explain how a small group of terrorists carried out the deadly siege that took Kenyan authorities four days to stop.

“Each martyrdom seeker will be trained in Somalia preferably for two months and he will only know his mission,” says one document discovered on a flash drive beside the slain body of the former African leader, Fazul Abdullah Mohammed.

“The brothers will be pushed through many battles to see how they react under pressure and they will be analyzed to see if they can keep their composure. They will be tested mentally to see if they are smart enough to carry out these operations.”

The documents may be dated — “Fazul,” as he was most commonly known among intelligence officials, was shot dead by Somali forces in 2011 — but looking at the former Al Qaeda leader’s meticulous planning in the wake of the Westgate mall attack in Nairobi reveals chilling clues.

The Star obtained the Fazul documents last year. Described by some counterterrorism officials as a “treasure trove of intelligence,” the material was recovered on flash drives and inside the bullet-ridden Toyota Hilux that Fazul’s driver tried to ram through a government checkpoint near Mogadishu.

While there were dozens of documents, Internet frame grabs and media reports in English, Arabic, Somali and Swahili, along with more than 50 video clips, which appear to be shot from the back of a car, two documents provide the most insight.

Training instructions are part of a planning paper titled “International Operations,” where the targets identified are in the U.K. “Our objectives are to strike London with low-cost operations that would cause a heavy blow amongst the hierarchy and Jewish communities using attacks similar to the tactics used by our brothers in Mumbai,” it says, referring to the 2008 Indian attack that lasted for three days.

Some of the targets in the Fazul document include London’s prestigious hotels and Britain’s Stamford Hill and Golders Green neighbourhoods, populated “with tens of thousands of Jews crammed in a small area.” The prestigious Eton School, attended by many members of Britain’s royal elite, is also listed.

“These attacks must be backed with carefully planned media campaign to show why we chose our targets to refute the hypocrites, clear doubts amongst Muslims and also inspire Muslim youth to copy.”

But don't call them antisemitic. They hate that.

(h/t Geoffrey)

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Muslims claiming that Mount of Olives is not a historic Jewish cemetery

Arabic media are reporting that Sheikh Sabri Abu Diab, imam of a mosque in the Ras al-Amud neighborhood, is claiming that the Jewish ties to Har HaZeitim - the Mount of Olives - are fictional.

Diab claims that although the Ottoman government allowed limited numbers of Jews to be interred there, the hundreds of acres of the Mount are mostly filled with fake Jewish graves that were created only for Jews to grab more Jerusalem-area land.

In reality, the Mount of Olives has been a Jewish graveyard since First Temple times. Some 150,000 Jews are estimated to be buried there.

Tens of thousands of gravestones were desecrated by Jordan during the 19 years that the world considers a "status quo."

Here is a photo of the gravestones being used as stairs for an Jordanian army camp:

And here is a gravestone used to help build a latrine in Jordan:

Indeed, the only people ever to fake graves in Jerusalem to grab land are, naturally, Muslims.

But these are just competing narratives, and the Arab lies must be respected as much as historic truth, right? That seems to be the rule in the Middle East nowadays.

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Antisemitic TV series to be rerun in Egypt for 40th anniversary of Yom Kippur War

"Knight Without a Horse," a notorious 2002 Arab Ramadan miniseries that used the "Protocols of the Elders of Zion" as the driver for the plot, is going to be shown again on Egyptian TV this month.

Why would an antisemitic TV series be shown again? Because that is part of the celebrations of the Yom Kippur War, which Egypt considers a great victory.

But what does antisemitism have to do with the 1973 war? Well, officially, nothing. Officially, Arabs claim that they aren't antisemitic, that they are only anti-Israel. Officially, they have no reason to write, produce and air TV series that blame Jews for all strife and wars worldwide.

Yet there it is, being aired during the celebration of a war against Israel. Très intéressant.

The ADL has a synopsis of the series, which was 41 episodes long. At the time it was originally aired, Arabs felt that at least the first episode was extraordinarily boring.

The writer and lead actor of the series told Al Jazeera in 2002 that whether or not the "Protocols" was authentic, "Zionism exists and it has controlled the world since the dawn of history."

Ah. That explains it.

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A bullet that landed a little too close to home

The Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron, Judaism's second holiest site, is divided into two sections. The much
larger section is generally accessible to Muslims, while a smaller part is accessible to Jews.

The Jewish section includes the cenotaphs of Abraham, Sarah, Jacob and Leah, while the Muslim side has those of Isaac and Rebecca.

On ten days a year, Jews have exclusive access to the entire building. On ten other days of the year, Muslims have full access, and Jews are barred. The Muslims, on their exclusive days, have routinely desecrated Jewish religious objects and books.

Today was one of the rare days that Jews could visit the room dedicated to Isaac and Rebecca. Thousands of Jews came to visit the holy site.

My son, Junior Elder, was one of them.

Shortly after my son left Hebron, an Arab sniper killed an Israeli soldier - who was there to defend the visitors at the holy site.

A Palestinian sniper shot dead a soldier stationed the Tut Atarek Junction, across from the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron on Sunday.

The soldier was named as Gavriel Kobi, 20, from Tirat Carmel. He was promoted to St.-Sgt. Maj. upon his death.

The gunman fired at Kobi and another Givati Brigade infantryman positioned to defend the Jewish community, as part of the army’s holiday preparations. The soldiers were positioned near the pharmacy intersection and Beit Hamachpela, defending the road used by Jewish residents of the quarter in Hebron.

“From what we see, the shooting occurred over a long distance,” a senior IDF source said. “At this stage, we have no clear direction as to the identity of the shooter.”

The murderer was upset that Jews have access to their own holy site. His gunshot was meant to deny Jews that right. No doubt, he would not have cared if he shot a child, a woman, or my son.

Freedom of religion is a human right. The murderer, and indeed most Muslims in the Middle East, insist daily that Jews do not have the right to worship in their holiest places - the Temple Mount, the Cave of the Patriarchs, Rachel's Tomb, Joseph's Tomb. Each of these holy sites, all of which predate Islam, have been usurped by Islam and converted into mosques, an effective desecration of sacred Jewish sites.

Even so, the Jewish state bends over backwards to allow Muslims to gather and worship at these places that they have effectively stolen from Jews.

But in the Arabic media, there is daily incitement to riot and violently oppose the Jewish right to worship in these sites.

This is an issue of human rights. Freedom of religion is accepted by the UN, the EU and indeed the entire Western world. But the same people who pretend to energetically defend human rights, like Amnesty and Human Rights Watch, are mute about the daily incitement to deny Jews those very rights. In fact, they effectively support the Muslim desecration and usurpation of Jewish holy sites by saying that the land underneath every single site is "illegally occupied" and should be, effectively, Judenrein.

HRW and Amnesty want to deny my son, and thousands of other Jews, the right to worship at and respectfully visit their holy sites.

They effectively support the same goal as the murderer of Gavriel Kovi.

In the end, they don't care about human rights. They care about politically correct human rights.

Their silence in the face of daily incitement against Jewish religious rights speaks volumes.

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Yemen newspaper: "Jews are the natural enemy of Muslims"

Mainstream Yemen newspaper Al Masdar has an antisemitic op-ed today.

Starting off with the idea that Jews are Freemasons who have endeavored to destabilize the Muslim world for centuries, the piece claims that Jews are behind the turmoil and revolutions in all Arab countries, using the playbook of - you guessed it - the Talmud.

"Jews are the natural enemy of Muslims," the article continues, as they have been behind the murder of the Prophets. Now they are using their money to control the minds of weak Arab leaders. (It is unclear if he is referring to Yemen itself, which has seen lots of civil wars over recent decades.)

Now Arab rulers are themselves in the lead, "under the Masonic tunic," to destroy the Muslim 'umma.

But make no mistake - Jews are behind everything, their dirty fingers involved in all the strife in the Middle East.

The sad part is, international focus on Israel from the UN, US and EU - where leaders routinely declare that the Israeli-Palestinian Arab conflict is the core issue of the region - shows that the world's viewpoint is not too different from what crazed Jew-hating Arab op-ed writers believe.

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British Christian cultural festival indoctrinates children against Israel

This weekend:

This year, Greenbelt celebrates 40 years as a Christian arts, faith and justice festival. The festival organizers have chosen the theme ‘Life begins’, and we will be using our presence there to remember those for whom life is permanently on hold.

Our installation in the Centaur foyer aims to give a glimpse of the challenges faced by ordinary Palestinians living under Israeli occupation. There'll be a giant, interactive floor game - Occupation! - for all ages. Roll the dice and make your way through checkpoints and challenges, permit denials and poverty. On your journey, you’ll learn about the issues affecting the West Bank and Gaza and find out how you can help Embrace the Middle East to make a positive difference to the lives of marginalised people.

Occupation! is just a game, and you can walk freely away whenever you want, but the message behind it is a serious one. In the West Bank and Gaza, injustice continues to weave through the fabric of Palestinian life. Join us as we embrace the work of our Palestinian Christian brothers and sisters in their determination to be agents of change.

Not that Greenbelt is only indoctrinating children:

One of our Greenbelt highlights will be the official launch of Kairos Britain: A Time for Action, the new booklet from British Church leaders responding the 2009 Kairos Palestine Call, challenging British Churches and Christians to take action and stand with our Christian brothers and sisters in Palestine against Israel’s 46-year occupation of their land in East Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza. The launch will be at 12.30pm on Sunday. We’re hosting a reception after the launch, so do stay and take the opportunity to talk some more.

While the Greenbelt site has many, many articles about how evil Israel is, there is not a single posting there about how Coptic Christians are being attacked, today, in Egypt. In case the social justice people at Greenbelt missed it, here are the latest stats:

47 churches attacked, of which 25 were burned, seven looted and destroyed, five partly damaged, and 10 attacked without sustaining heavy damage. Nor how Christians are fleeing Lebanon.

Nor does Greenbelt discuss how Muslims have pushed Christians out of Bethlehem. They used to be a majority, including under Israeli rule; now under the PA they are almost gone. And it isn't because of Israel. It  is systemic Muslim discrimination and therefore a topic that must not be discussed.

Christians in Gaza? Not a topic that Greenbelt wants to discuss. Wouldn't want to upset Hamas, would we?

Not a word about how the Middle East is turning into a Christian-free zone, everywhere -except Israel.

And only a single article about Syrian Christians becoming refugees. In the past two years, Syria has become the only Arab country that one is allowed to criticize without worrying about losing your lefty credentials. It is still nowhere as monstrous as Israel, of course, based on the amount of attention it gets at fun, family festivals like Greenbelt. They'd have to gas at least a half million more people to death and etch crosses in their faces to start getting the same attention Israel get from good, moral, justice-seeking Christians like the ones at Greenbelt.

See also the Archbishop Cramner site. H/t to Alex for WSJ link, a very worthwhile article.

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