Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Monday, October 30, 2017

10/30 Links Pt2: Human rights or racketeering?; Celebrating Israeli-Australian friendship

From Ian:

In what one human-rights activist characterizes as blackmail, the United Nations Human Rights Council is reportedly pressuring a major Israeli telecom to cease operations in disputed areas of the Jewish state or face the possibility of being designated a human-rights abuser.

It's part of a broader effort — referred to as the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement — to chill businesses serving Israelis in West Bank settlements, according to The Washington Free Beacon.

The CEO of Bezeq received a letter from the Human Rights Council, accusing the company of providing services for Israelis in presumably Palestinian territory. Up to 30 U.S. companies were similarly contacted by the council, according to Anne Bayefsky, senior editor of Human Rights Voices.

The council is threatening to add the companies to a database of presumably human-rights-abusing businesses working with Israel.

“The database is to include companies that ‘directly or indirectly' are connected to Israeli settlements,” Ms. Bayefsky told The Beacon. “It is nothing short of an assault on the economic welfare of the state of Israel, period.”

UNHRC to discuss Israeli women's exclusion

Supposed exclusion of women in Israel will be one of the main items on the agenda of the United Nations Human Rights Council—tasked with implementing the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women—when it convenes in Geneva on Tuesday.

A delegate headed by Ministry of Justice Director-General Emi Palmor headed to Geneva to counter the claims, as the ministry is part of implementing the international convention to which it acceded in 1991.

The UN Human Rights Council, which received information about women's exclusion in Israel, forwarded some preliminary questions to the delegation, which was instructed to obfuscate nothing as to the problem's breadth.

The delegation will be reporting to the UN on tackling women's exclusion in public transportation, the issue of "decency" on billboards, attitudes of the religious establishment and Haredi parties towards women and the situation in cemeteries, clinics, hospitals, public libraries, public functions, the Western Wall, the media and academia.

The Human Rights Council, whose members currently include Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt, will also deal with exclusionary aspects relating to domestic abuse and women's access to the courts system, an area in which Israel has made significant progress with pending legislation for criminalizing clients of prostitution, providing legal assistance to victims of serious sexual assault and fighting human trafficking.

“Where They Have Burned Books, They Will End Up Burning People”

Heinrich Heine’s chillingly prophetic statement that where books had been burnt people would eventually be too is now engraved on the “Bibliotek” memorial in the Bebelplatz square on the Unter den Linden boulevard in Berlin. This memorial commemorates the infamous May 10, 1933 book burning of more than 25,000 volumes there, which was presided over by the most intellectual of the Nazi leaders, Dr. Joseph Goebbels. Authors whose books were thrown into the flames by university students included such “enemies of the German spirit” as Karl Marx, Albert Einstein, Thomas Mann, and, of course, Heine himself. The memorial, designed by the Israeli artist Micha Ullman, derives its considerable power from its mute depiction of library shelves emptied of their books. Heine’s remark is a powerful and oft-quoted warning about the connection between barbarism and human evil, but its literary context has been almost entirely forgotten.

Heine’s aphorism appears in one of his earliest works, Almansor, a play written during 1820–1821 and published in 1823, when he was only 26. It takes place in Granada, after the Andalusian city had been conquered by Ferdinand and Isabella in 1492. The title character is a young Muslim who fled the city before its occupation by the Christians and has now clandestinely returned to try to rescue his beloved Zuleika, who has been forcibly converted to Catholicism and is now called Donna Clara. He meets with the remnants of the Muslim population in the city, who tell him about the atrocities perpetrated by the conquerors: killings, forced conversions, the introduction of the Inquisition. His friend Hassan laments how many young Muslims converted, some of them even willingly, “as the new heavens beckoned to many sinners.” Finally, Hassan tells Almansor that the Grand Inquisitor Jimenez had also ordered the burning of the Qur’an in the town’s square, to which Almansor responds, “Where they have burned books, they will end up burning people.”

Thus, in a play aimed at a German, mainly Christian, audience, Heinrich Heine, born to a Jewish family in Düsseldorf, criticizes Christian Spain for the burning of the Qur’an. Modern German poets did occasionally show admiration for Islamic culture, as, for instance, did Goethe in his West-Eastern Divan, but Heine’s lamentation stands out. It is emblematic not only of his empathy and his unusual insight into human affairs, but also, perhaps especially, of his conflicted identity as one of the first German Jewish intellectuals to enter the Republic of Letters.

Abbas still trying to hitch his wagon to Arafat's horse

One of the consistent themes of the Fatah Facebook page is the constant posters and videos of Yasir Arafat.

The reason is obviously because Arafat was a charismatic leader who unified the always-fractious Palestinians, a leader that has never been replaced.

But the secondary, and hilarious, theme of the Fatah page is that Abbas is that successor.

At every opportunity they will show Abbas and Arafat together to confer legitimacy on Abbas that he clearly doesn't have - because if he did, they wouldn't have to keep doing this.

For the past week or so the Fatah page has been obsessing on the 13th anniversary of Arafat's death, complete with a logo that shows exactly how much respect they have for the two-state solution.

But they have to make sure that Abbas gets some of the reflected glory:

"Staying true to the covenant"

All while they claim that Israel - the state that would disappear in every one of their maps - is the one that is killing peace:

No automatic alt text available.

Which means, of course, that their concept of "peace" is one where there is no Israel.

Abbas' party's support for terror, their obvious lies and their pathetic attempts at propaganda are public and obvious even without knowing Arabic. The Western world chooses to be blind.

(h/t Ibn Boutros)

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When an antisemitic picture is worth a thousand words: Michael Chikindas and Linda Sarsour (Petra Marquardt-Bigman)

By Petra Marquardt-Bigman

Most of you have probably already heard about Michael Chikindas, a professor at Rutgers’ Department of Food Science. His research interests sound professional and include “Bacillus subtilis and lactic acid bacteria spp. as a host for overproduction of biomolecules,” but the professor’s problem is an acute and apparently untreated overproduction of bigotry. His numerous vile posts on Facebook were first exposed on Israellycool and then reported by many other sites, including The Algemeiner and Tablet. The writer John-Paul Pagano, who authored the Tablet piece, also posted an archive with screenshots of the Facebook posts Chikindas shared with the world – though he apparently didn’t have many Facebook “friends” who noticed. (As I am writing this, I see that John-Paul Pagano keeps finding more.)

While most of the material is shockingly vile, I was particularly struck by one image – because it could have served as the perfect illustration of one of Linda Sarsour’s tweets that I documented earlier this year. As I noted back then, Sarsour wrote several tweets with a similar message, but the one I immediately recalled when I saw the Chikindas post is: “Homeless on the streets, Americans who haven’t recovered from natural disasters, unemployment, and we have extra $$$ for Israel. Smh. [Shaking my head].”

The interesting thing is of course that the image Chikindas posted will be recognized by most people as antisemitic, while the text Sarsour posted will be widely justified as legitimate criticism of US support for Israel. Some people will also argue that Sarsour didn’t blame Jews – not even “Zionists” – for the “extra $$$ for Israel” and that it is therefore entirely unfair to compare her tweet with the vile image posted by Chikindas.

However, this argument works only if you look at this one tweet in isolation, because Sarsour posted plenty of tweets suggesting that Israel was either controlling or corrupting US lawmakers. As I pointed out in my documentation, Sarsour repeatedly insinuated that American politicians who back strong bonds between the US and Israel must be suspected of dual loyalties or corruption. Echoing the “Israel-firster” slurs – which caused much controversy a few years ago and were widely considered as reflecting antisemitic tropes – Sarsour suggested in July 2014 that “Israel should give free citizenship to US politicians. They are more loyal to Israel than they are to the American people.” She also asserted that there was an “awkward moment when the White House goes off AIPAC [American Israel Public Affairs Committee] script and says ‘Israel must end the occupation;’” according to Sarsour, this meant for the White House that “#theyareintroublenow.” Sarsour apparently also believes that AIPAC lobbies to get the US to “revolve around Israel;” she therefore demanded in 2012: “Our country’s future should not revolve around #Israel. #aipac2012.” Referring to Hillary Clinton, Sarsour wondered last year, “What was in Hilary’s goodie bag at AIPAC. Had to be real nice after that speech that almost bought her a prime minister seat in Israel.” And at the end of last year, Sarsour reacted to a statement by Senator Lindsey Graham with the question “Are you a US Senator or do you work for Israel?”

It is hard to imagine that someone who is as hyperactive politically as Sarsour would not know that US support for Israel enjoys broad backing among Americans because Israel is widely regarded as “a clear strategic asset to the United States,” and the bilateral relationship is therefore widely seen as based on “tangible, steadily increasing security and economic interests.”

Seen in this context, the message conveyed by Sarsour in her repeated efforts to suggest [http://archive.is/kZpAj] that US military assistance to Israel comes at the expense of health care, education funding and various other social benefits for US citizens is not that much different from the message Chikindas tried to convey with the vile image of a greedy Jew stealing money from an American family begging on the streets.

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10/30 Links Pt1: UNRWA demands end to tunnel building under its schools; Iran: weapons-grade uranium only 4 days away

From Ian:

Melanie Phillips: The malevolent guest at London's Balfour dinner

When Labour party leader Jeremy Corbyn refused to attend this week’s dinner in London to mark the centenary of the Balfour Declaration, a dinner to which Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been invited as the guest of Britain’s Prime Minister Theresa May, Corbyn said Labour’s shadow foreign secretary Emily Thornberry would attend in his place.

Now remarks made by Thornberry inescapably imply that, like Corbyn, she too regrets the fact that Israel was ever created. Instead she supports its mortal enemies whose agenda remains Israel’s destruction.

In an interview published today with the Middle East Eye news site, Thornberry said the UK should not celebrate the Balfour Declaration, which pledged Britain’s support for a Jewish national home, because there is not yet a Palestinian state.

“I don’t think we celebrate the Balfour Declaration but I think we have to mark it because I think it was a turning point in the history of that area and I think probably the most important way of marking it is to recognise Palestine.”

And she went on to blame Israel for the fact that there was no state of Palestine.

The fact that she paid the usual lip-service to “two viable secure safe states” cuts no ice whatsoever. If she believes that the original commitment by the British government to restoring the Jewish people to their own rightful homeland is not something to be celebrated in itself, the deep hostility to Israel as a Jewish state that this inescapably implies vitiates any pious backing for “two viable states” side by side.

Her support for the existence of Israel is, by her own lights, conditional on the existence of a state of Palestine. She thus displays her profound ignorance of Jewish, Arab and Middle Eastern history by assuming that people called the Palestinians were entitled to the same promise of a national homeland.

Balfour was height of our diplomacy, Oren tells Christian audience

The 1917 Balfour Declaration viewing the establishment of a Jewish national home in Palestine was the high-water mark of the Jewish people's diplomacy, deputy minister Michael Oren said.

"It was the first time the international community recognized the right of a Jewish people to a homeland in our tribal lands, the Land of Israel," he told Erick Stakelbeck on the Trinity Broadcasting Network's “The Watchman” show presented by Christians United for Israel, over the weekend. "It was the height of our diplomacy."

Stakelbeck, the host of the 30-minute weekly show on issues of national security and the Middle East, which is geared toward an Evangelical Christian audience, asked his guest to comment on the "modern-day miracle" of the State of Israel and the reasons behind the New York-born Oren decision's to realize the prophecy of immigrating to Israel.

"I grew up in a working-class neighborhood where I was the only Jewish kid, and I was often the victim of antisemitism," he said. After his father and brother returned from Europe after fighting on Normandy Beach and liberating Nazi concentration camps, they would remind the young Oren of the importance of a strong Jewish state.

"It had a big impact one me" he said. "And I just always thought of myself as being extraordinarily fortunate to be alive at the time in my people's history where we did have this state, where we can sit in [the Knesset] here – and have a sovereign flag that represents a strong people with a formidable army."

Discussing Israel's strengthening relationship with the US and how it's gaining the upper hand in its struggle against anti-Israel forces around the world, the former ambassador to the US said the difference between the Trump and Obama administrations is glaring.

Boris Johnson: I Am Proud of Britain's Part in Creating Israel

On November 2, 1917, my predecessor Lord Balfour sat in the Foreign Secretary's office and composed a letter that laid the foundations of the State of Israel.

On the Centenary, I will say what I believe: the Balfour Declaration was indispensable to the creation of a great nation. In the seven decades since its birth, Israel has prevailed over what has sometimes been the bitter hostility of neighbors to become a liberal democracy and a dynamic hi-tech economy.

In a region where many have endured authoritarianism and misrule, Israel has always stood out as a free society. Like every country, Israel has faults and failings. But it strives to live by the values in which I believe.

I served a stint at a kibbutz in my youth, and I saw enough to understand the miracle of Israel: the bonds of hard work, self-reliance, and an audacious and relentless energy that hold together a remarkable country.

Most of all, there is the incontestable moral goal: to provide a persecuted people with a safe and secure homeland. So I am proud of Britain's part in creating Israel and Her Majesty's Government will mark the Centenary of the Balfour Declaration on Thursday in that spirit.

I am also heartened that the new generation of Arab leaders does not see Israel in the same light as their predecessors. I trust that more will be done against the twin scourges of terrorism and anti-Semitic incitement.

In the final analysis, it is Israelis and Palestinians who must negotiate the details and write their own chapter in history. A century on, Britain will give whatever support we can in order to close the ring and complete the unfinished business of the Balfour Declaration.

I’m guessing that many people reading this are dedicated activists with experience battling Israel haters in the endless physical and virtual communities where those battles take place.

People who do Jewish or pro-Israel politics for a living tend to refer to ground-level activists like many of us as “the grassroots,” indicating a separate source of people, resources, strength, wisdom, pressure, or criticism they need to take into consideration as they make their own decisions about which battles to fight.

Historically, these two groups (professionals and the grassroots) spend a great deal of time analyzing or second-guessing each other’s priorities. But as a couple of news stories over the last few weeks point out, as much as all of us want to think otherwise, there are people in positions of power who get to make the decisions that ultimately set our activist agendas.

For example, the only people who got to decide that the United Nations would put dozens of international companies on a blacklist for doing business in territories disputed between Israel and Palestinian Arabs were the leaders of nation states who dominate that organization’s Orwellian “Human Rights Council.”

Given that the countries driving this decision are dictatorships at war with the democracy they want destroyed, there was little outnumbered democracies like the United States and Israel could do to prevent the blacklist from happening. And so, once again, our activist agenda was driven by actors well beyond our control.

Now once such an agenda has been triggered, there are things we can do about it. For instance, the raft of anti-BDS legislation at the state level in the US gave friends of Israel the opportunity to show what they think of the BDS “movement.” But meaningful and substantial changes to federal anti-boycott regulations passed in the 1970s was required to deal specifically with non-government organizations like the UN stepping into a boycott space previously occupied by the nation states behind the original Arab boycott of Israel.

As this dynamic plays out, the role for we activists is to frame such legislation as (1) an example of sanctions (the holy grail of the BDS movement) being applied to the boycotters and not to Israel; and (2) a direct response to UN misbehavior (thus assigning responsibility for new US law where it belongs: to the UNHCR).

A second story-in-the-making will demonstrate what can be accomplished when an activist makes the transition to powerful decision-maker. I’m speaking, of course, about Kenneth Marcus, one of the most successful and well-known legal activists on behalf of Jewish rights, being named to the senior civil rights post within the US Department of Education.

If you wanted to prioritize dealing with the harassment Jews and pro-Israel supporters face on campus, there is no more effective path for action than to put into a position of power a thoughtful and strategic thinker like Marcus who is ready to give Jewish students the same civil rights consideration given automatically to every other minority group.

For years we’ve seen college administrators ignore complaints by Jewish students who have seen their events shut down and members harassed, at the same time those administrators take long lists of demands by mobs representing other minority groups with the utmost seriousness. Such sheepish leaders tend to select who to ignore and who to focus on based on how much damage the complainers can cause. And with someone finely attuned to this issue deciding who gets sued for discrimination, expect attitudes of those administrators to change sharply and quickly.

In the final analysis, every war, every terror attack, every boycott motion or propaganda campaign directed at the Jewish state has the same origin: the dozens of wealthy and powerful states who have decided to bring their war with Israel to every forum on the planet.

As the conflagration that is the Middle East makes clear, such political cynicism can be lethal to those who practice it. Which means the best way we protect against these toxins is to do whatever we can to help create and support an Israel that is militarily powerful, economically vibrant and allied with nations not coming apart at the seams.

In short, we must make up in quality what we lack in quantity (once again).

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Finally! The differences between antisemitism and anti-Zionism, explained (poster)

People still get confused between the terms antisemitism and anti-Zionism, so I decided to list all the major differences between the two so no one will make that mistake again. (Click to enlarge.)

Antisemites	Anti-Zionists
“Jews should go back where they came from”	“Israeli Jews should go back where they came from”
“Jews control the USA”	“Israel controls the USA”
“Jews control the banks”	“Zionists control the money supply”
“Jews control the media”	“Zionists control the media”
“Jews are inferior Semites”	“Israeli Jews are not native to the region”
“Jews poison the wells”	“Israel poisons the water supply”
“Jews were behind the Black Plague”	“Israel is creating anti-Arab biological weapons”
“Jews murder Christian children”	“Israel targets and murders Arab children”
“Jews use blood of gentile children for rituals”	“Israeli doctors steal organs from gentile patients”
“Jews cannot be trusted”	“Israel cannot be trusted”
“Jews exploit their workers”	“Israel exploits Arab labor”
“The Star of David offends me”	“The Star of David offends me”
“We don't want Jews in our clubs”	“We don't want Israel in international bodies”
“Jews controlled the slave trade”	“Zionism is racism”
“Jews are not white”	“Jews are guilty of white privilege”
“The Holocaust never happened”	“Zionist Jews were complicit in the Holocaust”
“Jews are behind all wars”	“Israel is the reason for all terrorism and ME unrest”
“Jews arrogantly believe they are 'chosen'”	“Israel arrogantly believes it is above the law”
“Greedy Jews always want more money”	“Greedy Israel always wants more land”
“Jews have secret plans to control the world”	“Israel plans to expand from the Nile to Euphrates”
“Jewish businesses must be boycotted”	“Israeli businesses must be boycotted”
“Jews not allowed in this hotel”	“Israelis not allowed in this shop”
“Universities must limit Jewish students”	“Universities must not work with Israelis”
“Germans had good reasons to hate Jews”	“Palestinians have good reason to hate Israelis”
“People I don't like must be secretly Jewish”	“People I don't like must be associated with Israel”
“If everyone hates Jews, there must be a reason”	“If everyone hates Israel, there must be a reason”
“'Jew' is the ultimate insult”	“'Zionist' is the ultimate insult”

See? One of them is filled with crazed, deranged hate while the other is filled with insane, unhinged hate.

The differences are so obvious.

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New Zealand media finally notices Holocaust denial and antisemitism in mosque where Iranian diplomat spoke

Last June, MEMRI discovered a video taken at a Quds Day even sponsored by a Shiite mosque, attended by an Iranian diplomat, where Holocaust denial and anti-Zionism went hand-in-hand.

At a Quds Day event in Auckland, New Zealand, held on June 23, Iranian cleric Hojatoleslam Shafie said that Israel and the Zionist regime "hide behind a fake phenomenon" of the Holocaust and that it was a conspiracy to infiltrate the Islamic countries. He said that Quds Day was established "to deal a powerful punch to the mouth of the cancerous tumor known as evil Israel," and cited Imam Khomeini as saying that "if every Muslim were to spit in the face of Israel, Israel would drown." Iranian diplomat Hormoz Ghahremani, presented at the event as the first secretary of the Iranian Embassy in New Zealand, said that the "sinister phenomena of terrorism and extremism in the region" were "fueled and fanned by the enemies of Islam and the Zionist circles." Community elder Sayed Taghi Derhami said that Israel was a "cancerous tumor" that had to be "surgically removed." The event was organized by the Islamic Ahlulbayt Foundation of New Zealand, in Auckland, and was posted on its YouTube channel.

Finally, this is making headlines in New Zealand:

Official complaints have been laid over comments made by Iranian diplomats at an Auckland mosque event, which include calling Israel a "cancer" and calling the Holocaust a "conspiracy".

The Israel Institute of New Zealand has laid a complaint to the Human Rights Commission and Foreign Minister Winston Peters after video surfaced online of the speech.

Israel Institute of New Zealand director Professor Paul Moon says New Zealand cannot allow the incident to go unchallenged.

Mr Moon said at the event diplomats from Iran used "very strong language" and were "talking about Jewish conspiracies, describing Israel as a cancer that needs to be removed, denying the holocaust".

He said the event began with Iranian diplomat Hormoz Ghahremani talking about terrorism in the Middle East, and his speech then turned to "accusations that there was some sort of Zionist conspiracy behind what was going on, that somehow the Jews were responsible for terrorism in the Middle East".

Mr Moon said another speaker, Sayed Taghi Derhami, called Israel a "cancerous tumour" and said it has to be "surgically removed" and Iranian cleric Sheik Shafie denied the Holocaust.

A video of the speeches, which were made in June at a mosque in Pakuranga, was posted online by the Islamic Ahlulbayt Foundation of New Zealand but it has since been removed.

Mr Moon says it's troubling that such views are being expressed in New Zealand, and said the Government should be concerned that a diplomat was involved in the comments.

He wants to see the people involved in the comments issue an apology, and to say: "We were wrong to speak in these racist terms, we were wrong to speak about the destruction of a country, it's wrong of us to deny the Holocaust, all of these things are inappropriate for New Zealand and we shouldn't have said them."

The initial reaction of the Iranian diplomat Ghahremani to the news of the event going public is telling:

Ghahremani told Stuff he agreed the speech could be seen as inflammatory, but it had to be taken in the context of the event at which it was given. He spoke at a gathering to mark the annual Quds Day, initiated by Iran in the 1970s to support Palestinians and oppose Zionism.

Contacted at the Iranian Embassy in Wellington, Ghahremani said his speech was supposed to be private and he was upset it had been put on the internet. "It was something private, a small gathering. I was there to reflect the position of the Iranian Government.

"We do not recognise the Israeli Government, that's not a secret. But we are not against their existence."

Asked if such inflammatory speeches could fuel radicalism in the Muslim community, Ghahremani said: "If it's spoken in public places yeah, you're right. But it was a small, private gathering that happens once a year. This year they make a mistake to shoot a film, to put it on YouTube."

This is the honor/shame culture! If no one knows about it, there is no problem; once the Western media finds out, now it is shameful. The problem, to Gharemani, isn't that there was a gathering of Muslims where speeches were made that he admits could fuel terrorism - the problem for him is that some idiot Muslim put the speeches on YouTube where non-Muslims can see what he and the others said and believe.

It is also notable that in the earlier interview Gharemani didn't deny attending the entire event; in the later one (quoted above) he claimed he had left before the other speeches that denied the Holocaust.

It is interesting that the complaint is more concerned with the Iranian diplomat than with the direct hate speech given (in English) at the mosques in New Zealand. One would think that the existence of a mosque where blatant hate is preached would be more of a cause of concern for New Zealanders than an Iranian diplomat condoning that hate.

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The 1939 White Paper, not Balfour Declaration, is the document that the British really DO need to apologize for

A Jewish demonstration against the White Paper, 1939

On this 100th anniversary of the Balfour Declaration, Arabs have been waging a major campaign over the past year to force Great Britain to apologize for issuing it.

This is absurd, of course, for a number of reasons. The The Balfour Declaration was incorporated into the San Remo Resolution and became international law that set aside the entire area of Palestine to become a Jewish national home. This law is still effective today. The campaign is really an effort to deny Jews their right to self-determination.

Arab media have articles about how the Balfour Declaration showed that the British were pro-Zionist, anti-Arab and so forth.

That is obviously a lie - and the proof is the one document that the British really should apologize for.

The 1939 White Paper severely restricted Jewish immigration to Palestine at the very moment that the Jews of Europe faced death.

The British who wrote it pretended that it was all fair and proper, of course:

If immigration has an adverse effect on the economic position in the country, it should clearly be restricted; and equally, if it has a seriously damaging effect on the political position in the country, that is a factor that should not be ignored. Although it is not difficult to contend that the large number of Jewish immigrants who have been admitted so far have been absorbed economically, the fear of the Arabs that this influx will continue indefinitely until the Jewish population is in a position to dominate them has produced consequences which are extremely grave for Jews and Arabs alike and for the peace and prosperity of Palestine. The lamentable disturbances of the past three years are only the latest and most sustained manifestation of this intense Arab apprehension. The methods employed by Arab terrorists against fellow Arabs and Jews alike must receive unqualified condemnation. But it cannot be denied that fear of indefinite Jewish immigration is widespread amongst the Arab population and that this fear has made possible disturbances which have given a serious setback to economic progress, depleted the Palestine exchequer, rendered life and property insecure, and produced a bitterness between the Arab and Jewish populations which is deplorable between citizens of the same country. If in these circumstances immigration is continued up to the economic absorptive capacity of the country, regardless of all other considerations, a fatal enmity between the two peoples will be perpetuated, and the situation in Palestine may become a permanent source of friction amongst all peoples in the Near and Middle East. His Majesty's Government cannot take the view that either their obligations under the Mandate, or considerations of common sense and justice, require that they should ignore these circumstances in framing immigration policy.

In short, the British gave Arab terrorists veto power over allowing Jews to enter the country because of fear of more terror.

...The alternatives before His Majesty's Government are either (i) to seek to expand the Jewish National Home indefinitely by immigration, against the strongly expressed will of the Arab people of the country; or (ii) to permit further expansion of the Jewish National Home by immigration only if the Arabs are prepared to acquiesce in it. The former policy means rule by force....Moreover, the relations between the Arabs and the Jews in Palestine must be based sooner or later on mutual tolerance and goodwill; the peace, security and progress of the Jewish National Home itself requires this. Therefore His Majesty's Government, after earnest consideration, and taking into account the extent to which the growth of the Jewish National Home has been facilitated over the last twenty years, have decided that the time has come to adopt in principle the second of the alternatives referred to above.

More Jews mean the Arabs get more upset, and more upset Arabs mean that the Jewish national home cannot survive. How's that for logic to justify the imminent deaths of millions of Jews?

Oh, but the authors pretended to care about the European Jews. Or at least a few of them.

...His Majesty's Government are conscious of the present unhappy plight of large numbers of Jews who seek refuge from certain European countries, and they believe that Palestine can and should make a further contribution to the solution of this pressing world problem. In all these circumstances, they believe that they will be acting consistently with their Mandatory obligations to both Arabs and Jews, and in the manner best calculated to serve the interests of the whole people of Palestine, by adopting the following proposals regarding immigration:

...[T]he admission, as from the beginning of April this year, of some 75,000 immigrants over the next five years. These immigrants would, subject to the criterion of economic absorptive capacity, be admitted as follows:

For each of the next five years a quota of 10,000 Jewish immigrants will be allowed on the understanding that a shortage one year may be added to the quotas for subsequent years, within the five year period, if economic absorptive capacity permits.

In addition, as a contribution towards the solution of the Jewish refugee problem, 25,000 refugees will be admitted as soon as the High Commissioner is satisfied that adequate provision for their maintenance is ensured, special consideration being given to refugee children and dependents.

The existing machinery for ascertaining economic absorptive capacity will be retained, and the High Commissioner will have the ultimate responsibility for deciding the limits of economic capacity. Before each periodic decision is taken, Jewish and Arab representatives will be consulted.

After the period of five years, no further Jewish immigration will be permitted unless the Arabs of Palestine are prepared to acquiesce in it.

His Majesty's Government are determined to check illegal immigration, and further preventive measures are being adopted. The numbers of any Jewish illegal immigrants who, despite these measures, may succeed in coming into the country and cannot be deported will be deducted from the yearly quotas.

His Majesty's Government are satisfied that, when the immigration over five years which is now contemplated has taken place, they will not be justified in facilitating, nor will they be under any obligation to facilitate, the further development of the Jewish National Home by immigration regardless of the wishes of the Arab population.

The White Paper also stated, explicitly, that Jews cannot purchase land in much of Palestine from Arabs. making antisemitism official British government policy.

The authors of the paper knew very well every Jew they barred from immigrating to Palestine was likely to be murdered. Liberal MP James Rothschild stated during the parliamentary debate that "for the majority of the Jews who go to Palestine it is a question of migration or of physical extinction".

Even the "League of Nations commission held that the White Paper was in conflict with the terms of the Mandate."

In the end, the British didn't even admit the full 75,000 Jews that the White Paper allowed.

Six million were murdered. Tens of thousands, or even hundreds of thousands, would have been saved if it wasn't for the British White Paper. The disgusting policy of appeasement of what the White Paper literally called "Arab terrorists" - led to the deaths of untold numbers of Jews.

Balfour (and San Remo) should have saved much of European Jewry. The White Paper abrogated Balfour, and violated basic human rights, to kow-tow to the threat of Arab terrorism.

If anyone is going to ask for apologies from the British, it should be the Jewish people for the immoral policy that sentenced hundreds of thousands of our relatives to death.

(This is an update of an article I wrote last year.)

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10/29 Links: Another tunnel found under UNWRA school in Gaza; UAE apologizes to Israel for judo handshake snub

From Ian:

UN finds tunnel opening under UNWRA school in Gaza

United Nations officials discovered a tunnel built under a school in the Gaza Strip run by UNRWA, the international body’s agency for Palestinian refugees, the global body said in a statement.

Since the discovery some two weeks ago, UNRWA closed the school and sealed off the opening to the tunnel. The school resumed operations last Wednesday, the UN organization said.

The statement Saturday did not say where the tunnel led, where it was found, or who was believed to have constructed it.

“The presence of a tunnel underneath an UNRWA installation, which enjoys inviolability under international law, is unacceptable. It places children and agency staff at risk,” the agency said.

UNRWA informed Israel’s Coordinator of the Government Activities in the Territories, IDF Maj. Gen. Yoav Mordechai, of the incident and also lodged a complaint with the relevant authorities in Gaza over the violation of the neutrality of a UN facility, according to a Sunday report from the Hebrew-language Ynet website.

Over the years, Gaza’s Hamas terrorist rulers have built a labyrinth of tunnels, some passing under the border into Israel which they used to launch attacks during their last conflict with the Jewish state in 2014.

On June 1, UNRWA said it found “part of a tunnel that passes under two adjacent agency schools in the Maghazi camp” during construction work.

UAE apologizes to Israel for judo handshake snub

The United Arab Emirates’ top judo official apologized to his Israeli counterpart Saturday after a tournament in Abu Dhabi saw Israeli athletes repeatedly snubbed by their hosts because of their nationality.

Mohammad Bin Thaloub Al-Darei, president of the UAE’s Judo Federation, and Aref Al-Awani, another senior Emirates sports official, apologized to Israeli Judo Association head Moshe Ponte over the fact that an athlete from the UAE refused to shake hands with an Israeli judoka after a match during the several-day tournament, according to a statement from the International Judo Federation.

Darei and Awani “apologized because of the UAE athletes not shaking hands with the Israel athletes and also congratulated the Israel team for their success here,” IJF president Marius Vizer said. He called the move a “gesture of courage.”

Stand With Us: Arab Athletes Run Away from Israelis After Losing in Judo

IsraellyCool: Not the Onion: Israeli Judo Federation Thanks UAE Counterparts for Their Hospitality

I am disgusted with this capitulation, that will likely guarantee the UAE is not penalized for their disgraceful conduct.

Not that I had high hopes of this happening, given the IJF has been complicit in it – despite their demand that the UAE treat Israel equally.

I assume this is indicative of just how much Israel wants peace and good relations with the Arab and Muslim world. But we really need to stop showing weakness – and I am not just talking about in the world of Judo.

The United Nations Development Assistance Framework and the Palestinian Authority have signed a “strategic programming framework” for 2018-2022. with a budget of over $1.2 billion to support the PA with a wide variety of political and social service programs.

For example, the 73-page document mentions "climate change" no less than 9 times as a topic that must be tackled - far more than "gender-based violence" (3 mentions.).

There is a lot to analyze in this document, but what seems most interesting is where the UN plans to spend the money.

Under the Strategic Priority 1: Supporting Palestine’s path to independence category, we have: Outcome 1.1: Human rights mechanisms are increasingly engaged to hold Israel accountable for its obligations under international law.

Its budget is $18 million. Its goal is to delegitimize Israel by demanding standards from Israel that the UN demands from no other state under the fig leaf of "human rights."

Here's the UN's description of this outcome:

The UN will increase its support for Palestinian institutions (state and non-government) and Palestinian victims of violations to effectively monitor, advocate and seek legal recourse for violations by the occupying power. This will include training, capacity-building and technical advice to ensure that Palestinian victims and institutions are equipped with the knowledge and tools to effectively access international accountability mechanisms in order to hold Israel accountable for its violations under international law. It will also aim to strengthen the capacity of Palestinian organizations to advocate effectively for the rights of Palestinians in the occupied territory. The UN will also strengthen its own advocacy on the impact of Israeli violations on Palestine’s development prospects, including through joint activities that clearly communicate the effect that the occupation and breaches of international law have on the ability of Palestine to develop economically, socially, environmentally and politically, including the responsibility of Israel vis-à-vis Palestine’s implementation of the SDGs.

Subtext: Israel is evil and the UN must do everything it can to ensure that Palestinians can use all methods to attack Israel through lawfare.

Possibly even more absurd is Outcome 1.2: A strong Palestinian national identity prevails, with a budget of $32.5M.

The UN's description:

The UN will continue to support the expression and maintenance of a strong Palestinian national and cultural identity. This will include communicating a positive Palestinian national narrative to strengthen cohesion and identity while reflecting respect for diversity and non-tolerance of violence. At the same time, the UN will support the protection and promotion of Palestinian cultural heritage as a key element of national and cultural identity. The UN will support efforts to preserve and protect the Palestinian character and identity of East Jerusalem, the future Palestinian capital pending final status negotiations.

Since the UN recognizes "Palestine" as a state, what purpose is served by the UN helping increase Palestinian national identity? Why is the UN in the business of helping any national identity, when the UN's own goals are to minimize the differences between states, not to emphasize them?

The UNDAFs for Jordan, Lebanon and Egypt don't mention "national identity" or "cultural identity" at all.

The UN Charter says "Nothing contained in the present Charter shall authorize the United Nations to intervene in matters which are essentially within the domestic jurisdiction of any state." What can possibly be a more domestic matter than strengthening national identity?

Why is it in the world's interest to strengthen Palestinian "national identity" unless the real purpose is to weaken Israel? And if the Palestinian national identity is so weak that it needs outside funding to strengthen it, then what does that say about the need for a Palestinian state altogether? Certainly Palestinian national identity is a comparatively recent development. Why does it deserve international support if not to be used as a weapon against Israel?

Of course, the last sentence shows the agenda. The UN wants to ensure that Israel has no rights over the sacred parts of Jerusalem. By declaring that Jerusalem is in fact the "future Palestinian capital" the UN is declaring a kind of war on Israel and Jews worldwide who have regarded Jerusalem as their capital since King David.

This is what the UN is spending its money on.

Any reasonable person should be outraged.

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PLO rep: "No peace without Palestinian control of ALL E. Jerusalem" (including Western Wall, Jewish Quarter)

The Holy Land Ecynemical Foundation held a symposium on Jerusalem on Saturday.

Even its description downplays Jerusalem's central role in Judaism as it pretends to be "even-handed:"

Jerusalem is the Holy City, sacred to the three monotheistic faiths of Islam, Christianity, and Judaism. Muslims connect her with the Prophet Muhammad’s Night Journey on al-Buraq, his celebrated steed, from Al-Masjid al-Haram in Mecca to Al-Masjid al-Aqsa in Jerusalem and his ascension to Heaven. For Christians, Jerusalem animates their consciousness as she marks the location of Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection. Retaining a strong presence and influence there are essential for safeguarding the Christian holy places and interests. For Jews, Jerusalem is tied to their religion and culture, symbolizing both connectedness and independence. Over the years, Jerusalem’s religious and spiritual importance has become enmeshed in national and political concerns as we witness today in Palestinian-Israeli relations.

For Muslims and Christians, the description mentions specific myths and events that supposedly happened in Jerusalem. For Jews, it is merely a "symbol" that is somehow "tied" toJudaism - not the location of the Temples, not the central point of holiness for all Jews, not the place rhapsodized about by King David, but merely somehow connected to Judaism.

The goal of the conference was, of course, to wrest control of Jerusalem away from the Jewish state - the only political entity in history that gave equal access to the city for all religions:

This symposium will focus on East Jerusalem and will provide details on the current and evolving conditions in the Holy City. It will explore practical ways by which resilient development could be stimulated via a robust economy, infrastructural projects, and tourism, as well as seek to identify opportunities to intensify local, regional, and international support for East Jerusalem to safeguard its status.

And one of their star speakers to help reach that goal was Husam Zomlot, Head of the PLO General Delegation to the US.

Zumlot said that peace is impossible unless east Jerusalem - "ALL of East Jerusalem," he emphasized - is the capital of a Palestinian state.

"I just want to tell you one thing. Those who want to see peace in the Middle East must realize that East Jerusalem would always be the Palestinian capital. There will not be a peace agreement, there will not be a final agreement without east Jerusalem - ALL of east Jerusalem - the capital of the state of Palestine," he asserts.

This means that the Temple Mount would be controlled by the terrorist and terror-cheerleaders in the PLO, of course, But also the Western Wall, the Jewish Quarter, all the synagogues and yeshivot, would become subject to the same restrictions that they had under Jordanian rule.

Zumlot claimed:

"Jerusalem, once it is under our sovereignty will be returned to what it used to be. The city of God, the city of peace." @hzomlot at @HCEF
— Palestine in the US (@PalestineUSA) October 28, 2017

When, exactly, was that? Zumlot is referring to pre-1967 Jerusalem, when no Jews (not even non-Israeli Jews) were allowed in, when Jordan burned some 50 synagogues and used Jewish tombstones to pave roads and build latrines.

The point that Jerusalem has never been what Zumlot claims was not made once in this day-long symposium. On the contrary, speaker after speaker claimed that Jerusalem was much worse off under Israeli "occupation" than beforehand, when it and all of Judea and Samaria were free of Jews altogether.

Earlier in his speech he said that the demand for Palestinians to have east Jerusalem is not a compromise - it is a concession, because by rights they should have all of Jerusalem, period. (Left unsaid is that they think the same about Netanya and Tel Aviv as well.)

This is the true position of the Palestinian Authority. Jews would enter the city, at best, the way they enter Shechem to visit Joseph's Tomb - in the middle of the night in armored buses to protect the Jews from stone throwers and small arms fire. That is the vision of equality that the PLO can offer the credulous Christians who attend their conferences that are ostensibly about "peace."

The PLO is saying, explicitly, in English, that they will never accept a peace plan without removing all Jewish control over the holy city. Jews will be allowed access. (Jordan signed agreements saying the same thing in 1948.)

Yet if the Palestinians are so oppressed, how can they at the same time make demands on the peace process as if they are in the driver's seat? If Palestinian statehood is the goal, then why is Jerusalem - which was ignored for nearly its entire history under Muslim rule - suddenly more important than statehood itself?

The answer is that they don't really want peace or a state - they just want to ensure that Jews do not have any control in their most important holy sites, including those in Hebron and Bethlehem. Which is a first stage in the PLO's real plan, a plan hatched in 1974 and which has not been modified at all, to use whatever methods they can to destroy Israel, in stages.

The primary goal is to disconnect any important Jewish sites from Israel, to destroy Israel's very soul. And it is a shame that so many Jews are so disconnected from their own roots that they are not sensitive to what is obvious to both the Arabs and to Jews who feel that 3000 year connection to the Holy Land.

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“Go forth from your country, from the land of your birth and from the home of your father to the land that I will show you.” (Genesis 12:1)

Land. God’s first commandment to Avram (who would later become Avraham the father of the Jewish people) was about land.

In the Bible, description and order is significant. Here the description is one indicative of understanding the difficulty in uprooting oneself, leaving behind the known for an unknown land. The order of the description is from the general to the personal, from the least difficult to the most difficult to leave - country, place of birth, family.

It is profound that this commandment comes before any promises to Avram and without explanation. Before discussion of his future, before the tale of the birth of his son or the story of Sodom and Gomorrah. Before Avram became Avraham, a specific land was chosen for him.

Israel.

The 7^th day of the Hebrew month of Heshvan coincides with “Lech lecha,” the Torah portion in which Abraham is told to leave his home to go to the promised land. That is the date the Israeli government chose for Aliyah Day, to celebrate the contribution of immigrants to the State of Israel. Accordingly, Aliyah Day was (officially) this past Friday. There were different events and celebrations most of last week (leave it to Israelis to celebrate one day with a week of events!).

Aliyah is the Hebrew word for immigration of Jewish people to the State of Israel. The word literally means “ascending” and is the same word that is used for pilgrimage and for reading from the Torah. These are spiritual events, where the person transcends the norm, ascending to a higher level in fulfilling this activity. This means that, for a Jew immigrating to Israel, returning to our homeland, is an act of spiritual significance.

Israel was waiting for Avram before he became the father of the Jewish people. Before God granted Moses the 10 Commandments. Before any other element that would form our Jewishness, this land was waiting to become our homeland.

Following the commandment to emigrate was the first step on the path that transformed Avram from a regular person to the father of the Jewish people (as well as the father of the Arab people), to becoming the person he was meant to be.

As an immigrant myself I can testify to the difficulties of emigration. Life in America was comfortable. We had a nice home, a good life. Moving to Israel meant a new language, a different culture, figuring where to live, how to live, work… the challenges, almost impossible anticipate and seem endless. Why bother? Why should my family leave and move to Israel?

Because we are Jewish.

We stepped in to the unknown, not for a more convenient or comfortable life but for self-actualization. For a life that is more real. To be who we are supposed to be.

“Go forth to the land that I will show you.”

For a Jew, moving to Israel goes beyond changing environment or culture. It is ascending to a place of higher spiritual fulfillment and actualization. Being in the Land is no less spiritually important than any religious activity or ritual. In some ways it may even be more important. There is a reason this is the first commandment.

A Jew can be Jewish anywhere but aliyah to Israel and living in Israel is one of the main ways a Jew fulfills his or her Jewishness. It is a matter of strengthening the tribe and actualizing oneself.

Whenever a Jew makes that step is a reason for us all to celebrate.

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.