Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Tuesday, August 09, 2016

08/09 Links Pt2: Brazil Nuts: Anti-Semitism at the Summer Olympics; The tourist Trojan horse

From Ian:

Israeli judoka Yarden Gerbi wins bronze at Rio

Israeli judoka Yarden Gerbi overcame an early loss to win the bronze medal at the Rio Olympics on Tuesday, becoming the first Israeli athlete to win a medal at the 2016 games, and the first Israeli Olympic medalist since windsurfer Shahar Tzuberi took home the bronze in the 2008 games in Beijing.
Gerbi defeated Japan’s Miku Tashiru in the repechage to claim the third place spot in the under-73 kg competition.
Gerbi, 27, and the 2013 world champion in her class, thus became the seventh Israeli athlete in history to be honored on the Olympic podium. She was also only the second woman to do so — the first being judoka Yael Arad, Israel’s first-ever medal winner, who took home the silver in Barcelona 1992.
She promptly received a call from President Reuven Rivlin, who called her a “champion” and said that “today, you are our hero.”

David Collier: Norman Finkelstein, the University of Westminster and antisemitism

So why is it antisemitism at Westminster?
The antisemitism doesn’t exist in the supply, it exists in the demand. In theory, for every speech given by an anti-Zionist Jew, there would be scores of Zionist Jews lining up to respond. All things being equal, we should never have heard of these Jewish anti-Zionists. They are insignificant outliers whose presence would only be recognised by sociologists and statisticians before being cast off into the bin titled ‘not to be taken into consideration’. Perhaps a study or two could analyse them to try to find correlating variables that could push forward a theory into their very presence. Bullying at school? The trauma of children of holocaust survivors? I am certain an innovative list could be created.
Yet where these people are selected, for the specific purpose of attacking what it means to be Jewish to the absolute majority, there exists a problem. You cannot hide behind a Jewish anti-Zionist to deflect accusations of antisemitism because the very act of turning the insignificant into a weapon against Jews is an antisemitic act.
I have heard people suggest people like Blumenthal are antisemites themselves. This is a mistake. People like Blumenthal are simply oddities. A handful of people displaying bizarre and obscure thought. When you see their name in print, you see antisemitism at work. When you hear them speak, when you see them listed in a programme, when you see them quoted, shared or retweeted – all antisemitism.
So someone in the States is so messed up he believes you can overstate the Holocaust. A child of holocaust survivors, he dates the rising awareness of his fictitious industry to 1967. Nothing of course to do with the Eichmann trial of 1962, where finally the world got to hear the true horror of events. Nothing to do either with the trauma of the genocide. It’s a money thing, a power thing, don’t forget after all, it’s the Jews we are talking about.
The antisemitism isn’t in his train of thought, it is in those that take the absurd and reward him, fund him and applaud him. Antisemitism is the adoring crowd of the village idiot.
So yes, the appearance of two of the anti-Zionist clowns in a single conference at the University of Westminster that spent so much time dealing with Zionism, Israel and Jews is an antisemitic act. It is about time everyone started realising this is the case.

Bernard-Henri Lévy: A Long-Awaited and Critical Appeal Falls Short

The letter begins with an enumeration of the recent terrorist acts that have beset France.
It does not omit Charlie (“the murder of cartoonists”), Bataclan (“the murder of young people listening to music”), of Magnanville (“the murder of a pair of police officers”). Nor, of course, does it fail to mention Nice (“the murder of men, women, and children celebrating the national holiday”) or Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray (“the murder of a priest celebrating Mass”). Clearly, it purported to present an exhaustive list of the attacks.
Except it left one out. And what it left out was the hostage-taking at the kosher supermarket on January 9, 2015, which occurred less than three years after Mohamed Merah’s murders at the Jewish school in Toulouse.
The omission was immediately noticed. I was disturbed by it, and said so on Twitter — which earned me (and others, I’m sure) an avalanche of insult: “You’re never satisfied … When Muslims are silent, that’s bad; when they speak up, that’s bad, too … What are you doing to national unity? Maybe you’re the one who’s trying to pit French people against one another?”
But the fact is that a slip like this cannot be allowed to go unremarked. And, given the prominence of those who signed the letter, it cannot fail to be upsetting.
What could have been going through the head of the person who (as is typical with this sort of group letter) composed the first draft? Or through the heads of the 41 others who, in the hours that followed, read and re-read the draft (as is also the usual practice), weighing each word, suggesting changes and talking things through before eventually signing?

Michael Lumish: This week on NOTHING LEFT (9 Aug 2016)

This week Michael Burd and Alan Freedman, from Nothing Left of mighty J-Air, out of Melbourne give us:
3 min Editorial: World Vision /Gaza scandal
10 min Noni Darwish, former Muslim talks about Interfaith,Muslim immigration, Sharia Law & the Jews
38min Michael’s view on interfaith (inc R’ J Hausman's view on why his colleagues are not doing their homework/ clip)
46 min Mike Lumish, Israel Thrives blog, USA
51 min David Bedein, investigative journalist
1 hr 14 min Ron Jontoff-Hutter, Berlin based writer
My piece is the final in my Failures of Progressive-Left Zionism series and is concerned with the tendency, which we also see from the Obama administration and the progressive-left, more generally, is the tendency to join with enemies (such as, for example, Black Lives Matter) while spitting hatred at friends.

It is actually against international law to prohibit Jews from praying on the Temple Mount, according to legal scholar and former Israeli ambassador Alan Baker. I interviewed him on July 12.

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Israel doesn't do things the way other nations do and our national anthem is no exception to that rule.

What other nation on earth has had a national anthem at a time when they did not have a State they could call home?

התקווה כּל עו̇ד בַּלֵּבָב פְּנִימָה נֶפֶשׁ יְהוּדִי הוֹמִיָּה וּלְפַאֲתֵי מִזְרָח קָדִימָה עַיִן לְצִיּוֹן צוֹפִיָּה.	The Hope As long as in the heart within, The Jewish soul yearns, And toward the eastern edges, onward, An eye gazes toward Zion.
עוֹד לֹא אָבְדָה תִּקְוָתֵנוּ הַתִּקְוָה בַּת שְׁנוֹת אַלְפַּיִם לִהְיוֹת עַם חָפְשִׁי בְּאַרְצֵנוּ אֶרֶץ צִיּוֹן וִיְרוּשָׁלַיִם.	Our hope is not yet lost, The hope that is two thousand years old, To be a free nation in our land, The Land of Zion, Jerusalem.

The words of Israel's national anthem were written as a nine-stanza poem by poet Naftali Hertz Imber and were first published in 1876 or 1877 (the exact date is unknown). It served as the anthem of the Zionist Movement at the 18th Zionist Congress in 1933.

The original poem was called Tikvatenu (Our Hope), was revised over the years, including by Imber himself and eventually became the two stanza anthem, Hatikva (The Hope), sung today.

Although Hatikva was firmly established in the public’s consciousness as Israel’s national anthem, it was not formally legislated as such until 57 years after the establishment of the state.

For other nations, the anthem is a tool to build and reinforce national consciousness. Their songs speak of pride, superiority, the glory of battle and/or upholding the reign of the ruler. The lyrics reinforce the cohesion of a people based on their similar traits, taking part in the same battles and living in the same land.

Here too Israel is different.

Hatikva mentions no battles, no fight against oppressors and no similar traits belonging to our nation.

The consciousness of Israel as a nation has existed for thousands of years. There is no need to "pump" ideas of brotherhood or belonging together, the "our" in the lyrics comes quietly, naturally, without fanfare.

A people scattered across the globe, we are not bound by similar traits but by our Jewish soul.

Hatikva speaks not of external struggles, although oppression and survival against all odds have been (and still are) a common experience for our people. After the re-establishment of Israel as the Jewish State there were many battles and victories that could have inspired anthems like those of other nations. Instead, Hatikva, The Hope, remained. It was never an external circumstance that held the Nation of Israel together, it was a state of mind or rather a state of spirit.

That was true during the exile and it is still true today.

The hope, the yearning of a people to be free in their own land is the story of the Jewish people but it is also a universal sentiment. The yearning of the soul to be free and shape its own destiny is a human truth, something that all people can identify with.

Our national anthem is unusual because we are unusual. One could say that, as Israel serves as an example of possibility and potential for all people, so does our anthem. Hatikva is the story of hope even in the darkest times, when there is no logical reason to retain hope. It tells us that the soul is stronger than any external circumstances.

Yearning to be free in a place one can call home, is a sentiment that resonates with all souls. To belong, to be safe, to be free are basic human needs.

Zion and Jerusalem are the home of the Jewish soul but they are also the example, the proof that all people can find the home their soul yearns for. Possibly this is the secret of Israel, why she fascinates and why she gives so many, including non-Jews, the feeling that coming to Israel is coming home.

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08/09 Links Pt1: Israel charges UN employee with aiding Hamas in Gaza; Why ISIS Fears Israel

From Ian:

Israel charges UN employee with aiding Hamas in Gaza

Israel on Tuesday accused a United Nations employee of taking advantage of his position to assist the Hamas terrorist group in the Gaza Strip, the third such allegation in less than a week.
According to the Shin Bet security service, Wahid Abd Allah Borsh, 38, an engineer in the UN’s Development Program, both funneled resources to the terrorist group and kept Hamas out of trouble with the international organization.
In July, Shin Bet officers arrested Borsh, a resident of Jabaliya in the northern Gaza Strip, as he made his way into the coastal enclave through the Erez Crossing, the security service said.
During his interrogation, Borsh told investigators that in 2014, he was directed by Hamas to “focus on his work in the UNDP in a way that would allow Hamas to extract the greatest possible benefit from him,” the Shin Bet said.
“This investigation also demonstrates how Hamas exploits the resources of international aid organizations at the expense of the civilian population of the Gaza Strip,” the security service said.
The UNDP did not have an immediate response to the allegations, but said it planned to release a statement “within the hour.”

IDF Blog: UN Employee Suspected of Directing Humanitarian Aid to Hamas

Earlier today, Waheed Borsh, a United Nations Development Program (UNDP) official, was indicted in a civilian court in southern Israel for using his position to provide assistance to Hamas’ terror activities in Gaza. He’s admitted to helping Hamas use humanitarian aid funding to build a dock for its naval forces in 2015 and confiscate weapons at building sites marked for demolition. Borsh was arrested in July 2016 in a joint operation by the Shin Bet security service and the Israel Police.
UN employeeWhile working as an engineer at UNDP since 2003, Borsh was responsible for the demolition of buildings damaged during military conflicts and the removal of waste from the demolitions.
In his interrogation, he revealed information on Hamas military posts, terror tunnels, and weapons storage facilities. He began using the program’s funding, information, and access to aid Hamas after being co-opted by a senior Hamas official in 2014. In 2015, he acted to persuade UNDP managers to prioritize the rehabilitation of housing in areas populated by Hamas members. Borsh was acting in response to a request by Hamas. When weapons or terrorist tunnel openings were discovered in houses being handled by the UNDP, Hamas would take control of the site and confiscate the arms and other materials. This is in direct violation of internationally recognized and agreed upon UN procedures.
Hamas continues to exploit humanitarian aid and international funding meant to help the people of Gaza. Instead of acting to reconstruct and build homes, schools and hospitals, the terror organization uses any means possible to further entrench its terrorist stronghold on the Gaza Strip.

British Charity ‘Save the Children’ Investigating Claims Employee Recruited by Hamas

A British charity said it is investigating Israeli claims that one of its employees was recruited by Hamas, the Daily Mail reported on Monday, days after a Gaza-based staffer at an international NGO was revealed to be acting on behalf of the terrorist group.
“We do take any allegations of this nature very seriously and are making inquiries into this matter,” Save the Children said in a statement, adding that it had “not been notified or contacted by the (Israeli) authorities on the details of the allegations.”
The investigation follows Israel’s indictment on Thursday of Mohammed El-Halabi, the head of the Gaza office of the charity World Vision, who was found to be funneling millions of dollars in foreign aid to Hamas.
According to the Shin Bet internal security agency, the investigation into El-Halabi’s activities uncovered a network of additional Hamas terrorists posing as aid workers. In 2014, for example, El-Halabi recruited a Palestinian worker associated with Save the Children, the Daily Mail said.

Rabbi Mark's funeral

In July, I reported about the Arab heroes who helped save the children of the fatally wounded Rabbi Miki Mark. Yet the names of the heroes were not publicized at that time. Only a little later did the New York Times report his name.

At the same time, Palestinians were honoring their versions of "heroes" - a group of children who had viciously attacked Jews with knives.

I wrote then:

The first set of Arabs, the true heroes, do not allow their names to be publicized [the NYT did publish their names afterwards - EoZ}. They don't want their neighbors and friends to know that they saved the lives of Jews.

The families of the second set of Arabs, terrorists who are treated as heroes, are very proud of their sons and are thrilled to announce the names and publish the photos of these murderers and would-be murderers to the world.

Anyone who self-righteously tries to describe the Israelis and Palestinian Arabs as morally equal - those who say that both sides have suffered, both sides are at fault, both sides are in a "cycle of violence" - are very, very wrong. And the proof is right here.

Terrorists like those who murdered the Marks are heroes to the Palestinians, as we have seen countless times.

The actual Arab heroes - the people who saved the lives of their enemies - are not heroes at all to their people, and in fact their heroism is something not to be spoken about in public. Their names and faces are not known. The only articles about them are from Israeli media, not from Palestinian media.

There is no moral equivalence between the two sides. For Palestinians, terrorists are heroes and real heroes are an embarrassment.

Israelis and Palestinians are moral opposites.

This has become even more apparent in this update from Times of Israel:

The Palestinian man who saved the children of a West Bank rabbi after a deadly terror attack that killed him has been fired from his job, according to the head of Har Hevron Regional Council.

In a Facebook post on Sunday, Yochai Damari said that the man is now unemployed due to Palestinian opposition to his actions and should be assisted by Israel.

“I met with him and he asked me to help remove any obstacle preventing him from receiving a work permit,” Damari wrote. Such a permit would allow the man to obtain employment inside Israel.

The idea of Palestinians honoring those who save Jewish lives is ludicrous.

What is worse is the hypocrisy of the scores of "human rights" NGOs operating in the territories.

They could step in and honor the couple who first arrived to help the Mark family. They could offer a job for someone who obviously cares about human rights. They could publicize the failings of Palestinian society to help make it better. (Don't they claim that this is why they criticize Israel?)

But they are silent. They condone Arab antisemitism by not saying a word when it manifests itself, and they shy away when given the chance to practice what they preach. And they certainly don't say anything when Arab murderers are honored.

Their concern for human rights ends when the humans involved happen to be Jews - or even Arabs who don't consider Jews to be their enemy.

(h/t Gary Willig, who also wrote about this incident at Times of Israel)

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Now I get it - taking photos is a Talmudic ritual!

The Palestinian Authority's official Wafa news agency reports that "120 Jewish settlers stormed the Al Aqsa Mosque" today and attempted to perform "Talmudic rituals" there.

I found video that claims to show today's Talmudic rituals:

I looked very hard for these Talmudic rituals but all I saw were families strolling and taking photos.

Then I realized the truth: since smartphones use Israeli technology, the taking the photos were the Talmudic rituals!

There was some singing after the group exited the gates but the claim was that these "rituals" occurred within the Temple Mount itself.

I'm also always amazed at how the Palestinian Authority knows that the Jews visiting are all "settlers." They must have a sophisticated database and elaborate face-recognition technology.

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The BBC reported on August 5:

Authorities in Iran have banned the Pokemon Go app because of unspecified "security concerns".

The decision was taken by the High Council of Virtual Spaces, the official body overseeing online activity.

Iran follows a number of other countries in expressing its worries over security related to the game.

But it becomes the first country to issue a ban of Pokemon Go, that challenges players to visit real-world locations to catch cartoon monsters.

Al Hurra (Arabic) gives more details:

Iran, which bans many global news sites and social networks such as Facebook and Twitter, banned Pokemon Go days after the launch of the game at the beginning of July because of national security concerns due to the very popular game leading users to sites using GPS on their mobile phones.

Deputy Prosecutor General Abdul Samad Khurram Ebadi told the Tasnim news agency on Friday, "Since this game is a mixture of virtual and physical games it may pose a lot of problems for the country and people for security reasons."

Ebadi stressed that the High Council of Virtual Spaces unanimously decided to ban this game.

Analyst Ali Reza Daoud, a defender of the government's position, told Tasnim, "These games could become a tool to launch guided missiles, and may cause interference with work of ambulances and fire-fighting equipment."

Daoud expressed his fear that the American developers of the game would use it to spy on Iran.

The Al Hurra/AFP Arabic article went on to say that young Iranians are playing the game anyway using virtual private networks to get around the ban.

Because the game concentrates its characters on publicly known popular spots like parks and historic monuments, there are relatively few places in Iran to catch the virtual characters due to a paucity of knowledge about Iran. Many of the players are gravitating to only a couple of major parks in Tehran. Players from towns as far as 30 kilometers away go to the Tehran sites to try to "catch them all."

The authorities expressed concerns over improper mixing between males and females playing the game, but the players are so engrossed in their phones that it doesn't seem to be an issue, according to the article.

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Palestinians say attempts to increase Arabs at Israeli universities is "racist." Really.

Look how diverse the PA's Higher Education Ministry is.

Haaretz reported on Sunday:

The Jerusalem Affairs and Heritage Ministry is expected to provide special funding topping 20 million shekels ($5.2 million) for the small minority of schools that teach the Israeli curriculum in East Jerusalem, where nearly all the city’s Palestinians live.

Most schools in the city's east teach the Palestinian curriculum, while graduates of those schools take the Palestinian Authority’s matriculation exam. But in recent years, more schools have begun offering the Israeli curriculum.

This lets students take the Israeli matriculation exam, easing their acceptance into Israeli colleges and universities. Surveys have also found that increasing numbers of East Jerusalem Palestinian parents prefer that their children study the Israeli curriculum to improve their children’s educational and employment prospects.

In Palestinian areas of the city there are 180 schools that are either government institutions or private schools that receive Israeli Education Ministry funding. Last year only 10 of those schools offered classes geared toward the Israeli matriculation exam.

That number is expected to rise to 14 this year, but at most of these schools only some of the students study for the Israeli exam, representing only about 3 percent of the students overall.

The Jerusalem municipality and the Israeli Education Ministry plan to stoke the modest trend. About a year ago, the ministry approved a plan for East Jerusalem that gives priority to schools teaching the Israeli curriculum.

Seems uncontroversial - Israel is trying to encourage Arab schools to use Israeli standards which helps students go to Israeli universities and become productive members of society.

Which naturally means that Palestinians are freaking out over this.

Wafa has a overview of daily Palestinian newspaper stories and this story was the top story in all major papers:

Al-Quds reported Higher Education Minister Sabri Saidam describing the Israeli request as a “declaration of war against the Arab and Palestinian existence in East Jerusalem.”

As far as I can tell, the plan does not take away existing funding; it is purely a reward, not a penalty. But the PA media is pretending otherwise, and the over-the-top statement by Saidam is par for the course.

In fact, Saidam went further and offered free textbooks for schools that refuse to use the Israeli curriculum. His over the top rhetoric continued:

Saidam called this an ugly Israelization campaign, stressing the protection of the Palestinian national identity in the holy city by refusing all attempts of Israelization and policies to impose the Israeli curriculum and fight the national curriculum. The ministry renewed its call to all institutions and human rights organizations and media to address these unfair practices that affect the Jerusalem schools, especially nowadays, which is witnessing a war like no other against education in Jerusalem.

It gets better.

Ma'an reported "The Higher Education Council denounced the racist practices of the occupation concerning the right to education in Jerusalem, led the onslaught being waged against the Palestinian curriculum and procedures by the occupation which seeks to attract Palestinian students to Israeli universities."

Yes, the Israelis are violating human rights by trying to increase the number of Arabs that attend Israeli universities.

If that isn't racism, what is?

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08/08 Links Pt2: The "Anti-Normalization" Campaign and Israel's Right to Exist; Combating Anti-Zionist Antisemitism

From Ian:

Khaled Abu Toameh: The "Anti-Normalization" Campaign and Israel's Right to Exist

For many Arabs and Muslims, the conflict with Israel is not about a withdrawal to the pre-1967 lines. These opponents have no intention of recognizing Israel's right to exist, even if it allows for the creation of an independent and sovereign Palestinian state in the West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem.
A leading cleric, Dr. Ali Daghi, Secretary-General of the International Muslim Scholars, wrote: "There is a consensus among Muslims, in the past and present, that if an Islamic land is occupied, then its inhabitants must declare jihad until it is liberated from the occupiers."
"Anyone who calls for peace with the Zionists should be brought to trial for high treason. Normalization is treason." — Ramzi Al-Harbi, Saudi writer.
Let us be clear: these are not fringe voices. This is mainstream Arab and Islamic society. What bothers them is not the "normalization" with the "Zionist entity," but the fact that Israel exists. For the masses, jihad against Israel is the solution, not another peace initiative endorsed by unelected Arab dictatorships.

Settler leader intervenes as Palestinian loses job for saving terror victims

A Palestinian man who saved the children of a West Bank rabbi after a deadly terror attack that killed him has been fired from his job, according to the head of Har Hevron Regional Council.
In a Facebook post on Sunday, Yochai Damri said that the man is now unemployed due to Palestinian opposition to his actions and should be assisted by Israel.
“I met with him and he asked me to help remove any obstacle preventing him from receiving a work permit,” Damri wrote. Such a permit would allow the man to obtain employment inside Israel.
Rabbi Miki Mark was murdered in the July 1 shooting, his wife Chava was seriously injured, and their two teenage children were also hurt. The Palestinian rescuer and his wife, residents of the Hebron area, helped the surviving members of the Mark family escape their overturned vehicle and administered first aid until first responders arrived at the scene.
Now, Damari wrote, Israel owes it to the couple to help them find work.

Combating Anti-Zionist Antisemitism

On Sunday, July 31, 2016, I drove down to Ithaca, NY to give a talk titled “Hate Speech and the New Antisemitism: Why Anti-Zionist Extremism is on the Rise and What We Can Do to Stop It”.
The lecture was sponsored by the Ithaca Area United Jewish Community (IAUJC).
The Ithaca Coalition for Unity and Cooperation in the Middle East (ICUCME), a local grassroots anti-racism organization, assisted with the event logistics and publicity.
A video of my 60 minute lecture is now available on You Tube (full embed lower in the post).
Below I highlight its main themes, breaking the hour-long lecture into segments so that readers can click on to those portions of the talk that are of most interest.
I also summarize several small-group discussion exercises that I moderated after the lecture with the nearly 70 people who attended the event.
Relevant images and hyperlinks to the sources cited in the video have been added to this post. References to prior Legal Insurrection posts that offer background information are also included.

Petra Marquardt-Bigman, whom I worked with to make the video posted earlier about Ben Ehrenreich and the Tamimi clan, published an article in Tablet on the same topic.

It is important to understand that the Tamimis see their “struggle” not just as a fight against Israel’s occupation of the West Bank, but against Israel’s existence as a Jewish state in any borders. Because one might expect that open support for terror and the ambition to physically eliminate a UN member state are the kinds of opinions that remain beyond the pale for writers who hope to receive plaudits from The New York Times and the Economist, it is fair to assume that Ehrenreich must have been bamboozled by his subjects or is unable to read basic Arabic—neither one of which reflects particularly well on the likelihood of him having achieved a more advanced form of journalistic truth.

It is obviously also possible that Ehrenreich knew about the Tamimis’ political leanings. Not unlike the Tamimis, Ehrenreich has long believed that “Zionism is the problem,” as he explained in a 2009 op-ed in the Los Angeles Times. When it comes to the methods the Tamimis support in order to solve this “problem,” it is certainly disingenuous to ask—as Ehrenreich does—if there is “no form of Palestinian resistance so innocuous that it wouldn’t be condemned.” There is absolutely nothing “innocuous” about the Tamimis’ ardent support for terror and their equally ardent Jew-hatred. (Ehrenreich declined to comment for this article.)

Despite the headline that emphasized the "bamboozled" part, the answer is actually quite clear (Tablet created the "bamboozled" headline, not the author, and Tablet edited the article apparently to emphasize this idea.)

Ehrenreich knows exactly how much the Tamimi family supports terror attacks - and he purposefully tries to fudge that information by making it appear that other relatives or residents of Nabi Saleh are the ones that support terror, not his saintly friends.

In 2013, writing for the New York Times on the article that in many ways became this book, Ehrenreich notes:

In 1993, Bassem told me, his cousin Said Tamimi killed a settler near Ramallah. Eight years later, another villager, Ahlam Tamimi escorted a bomber to a Sbarro pizzeria in Jerusalem. Fifteen people were killed, eight of them minors. Ahlam, who now lives in exile in Jordan, and Said, who is in prison in Israel, remain much-loved in Nabi Saleh. Though everyone I spoke with in the village appeared keenly aware of the corrosive effects of violence — “This will kill the children,” Manal said, “to think about hatred and revenge” — they resented being asked to forswear bloodshed when it was so routinely visited upon them.

Ehrenreich waters this down much further in his new book.

In one early bombing in August 2001, a woman named Ahlam Tamimi, a twenty-year-old journalism student from Nabi Saleh, escorted a young man named Izz al-Din al-Masri to a crowded Sbarro pizzeria in downtown Jerusalem. Shortly after she left him there, he detonated an explosive, wounding 130 people and killing himself and 15 others. Eight of the dead were children. ...Her relatives in Nabi Saleh still speak of her with great affection.

Yet Ehrenreich doesn't draw the line between Ahlam Tamimi and the relatives that he relied on to write this book that showed him such wonderful hospitality in Nabi Saleh. It isn't only Ahlam's immediate relatives who love her bombing kids in a pizza shop, it is the entire community including the main subjects for the book. Ehrenreich's mission to canonize Bassem and Nariman and Bilal and Manal Tamimi would be jeopardized by noting that they cheer the murder of dozens of Jews, including 13-year old Hallel Yaffe Ariel, as the video shows.

Here is how Ehrenreich looks at the Tamimis, explicit supporters of murder and terrorism who he considers generous, kind and wise.

The Tamimis aren't the subjects of the book - they are co-conspirators to write a piece of anti-Israel propaganda by pretending to be something that their social media posts prove they clearly are not.

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Hamas releases video showing how beautiful Gaza is

This is part of a social media campaign Hamas is embarking on ahead of local elections, with the hashtag (in Arabic) of "Thanks_Hamas!"

Of course, they must show off their accomplishment of creating rockets that could reach millions of Jews.

Nearly all of the grown women pictured have a hijab.

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08/08 Links Pt1: World Vision: a Christian charity on an anti-Israel mission; PA Police Break Legs of Arab Children

From Ian:

NGO Monitor: Terrorist Aid Hijacking and NGO Oversight Failure: Learning from the World Vision Case

NGO Monitor identified World Vision as susceptible to aid diversion in its 2015 book, Filling in the Blanks, concluding that there is “little doubt as to World Vision’s willingness to negotiate and coordinate with armed groups. This raises questions as to whether the group would prevent components of its aid from being misappropriated by terrorist organizations, if it felt that taking a stand would jeopardize the organization’s ability to continue its operations in a given area.”
The failure to properly prevent the siphoning of funds stems in part from a lack of will on the part of humanitarian organizations. Many international NGOs reject attempts to incorporate security concerns into funding guidelines, decrying them as politically motivated. The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has argued that legislation designed to prevent hijacking of aid by terrorist organizations should not apply to humanitarian groups, and the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) has stated that “counter-terrorism measures remain the primary obstacle to humanitarian action within Gaza.”
Humanitarian NGOs operate in conflict zones around the world, risking the diversion of aid by terrorist groups. The recent decision by USAID to suspend its humanitarian assistance to Syria due to this issue, as well as the multiple UN reports on commandeering of aid by terrorist organizations in Somalia, underscore this point.
Prof. Gerald Steinberg adds that, “World Vision’s failures in Gaza highlight the problems of a multi-billion dollar NGO industry that remains largely unregulated and unexamined. While World Vision is currently the focus of attention following the arrest of El-Halabi and the scale of the allegations, this should be a cautionary moment for many other international aid organizations that have similar operations in Gaza, such as Oxfam, Care, Christian Aid, and UNRWA – the United Nations Relief and Works Agency.”
As NGO Monitor has warned repeatedly, humanitarian efforts in warzones are inherently susceptible to extortion and theft by violent actors, including terrorist organizations. In particular, Hamas has a history of raiding aid warehouses and convoys as well as developing tax schemes designed to skim money off of international largesse. UN Gaza aid mechanisms similarly suffer from corruption, compromising the integrity of imported materials. Any consideration of humanitarian projects in Gaza must, therefore, include vigorous, concrete, and effective policies that address the risk of aid diversion, both on the part of the implementing organization and on the part of the funder.

IDF Blog: Aerial photo reveals Hamas misuse of international donations to Gaza

Donations from the United Kingdom made to the Christian aid organization World Vision were used by Hamas to build one of such 70 military bases that operate in Gaza. The allegations are part of the June 15, 2016 arrest of Mohammed El-Halabi, a senior World Vision worker facing charges of funneling $43 million in charity funds to Hamas.
Eighty thousand dollars of aid donated to World Vision by the United Kingdom, which was intended to help the civilians of Gaza, build badly-needed infrastructure, and provide food and medical care to those in need, was instead invested in building a Hamas military base and pocketed by the terrorists who constructed it.
“In this compound we have identified surveillance and observation capabilities facing north, towards Israel.” IDF Spokesperson Lt. Col. Peter Lerner said. “I can also tell you that in June 2015 we targeted components within the compound following a rocket attack against Israel.” The active Hamas military base, codenamed “Palestine,” was built, among other things, for close-quarter combat training in the northern Gaza city of Jabalia, the third-largest Gazan city. The relatively large base is 600 by 200 meters, and is a short distance from residential buildings, as seen in the below declassified aerial map.
The World Vision investigation exposed that sixty percent of the charity group’s annual budget was funneled to terror activities by Halabi, the Palestinian manager of the World Vision’s Gaza branch. Forty three million dollars of aid earmarked for agriculture, treatment for the disabled, and public health was instead used by Hamas to buy weapons, build military bases, and fund the construction of tunnels, which were used in the past to kidnap Israeli soldiers and stage attacks against Israel.

World Vision: a Christian charity on an anti-Israel mission

I would like someone to explain to me how pumping millions of dollars of good Christians' money to the radical Islamic terror regime of Hamas, the Palestinian Arab wing of the Muslim Brotherhood, whose history is replete with oppressing the people of Gaza and killing all opposition to its stranglehold and whose founding charter expresses their desire for a global Islamic Caliphate and for the murder of Jews, advances the aims of World Vision.
Unless proven otherwise, it seems to me that World Vision has been so blind to the injustice done to the Jewish state by Hamas and Palestinian terror that it has been deliberately myopic to the massive misuse of money that has been eagerly used by Hamas in their vain attempt to attack Israel and kill Jews.
Either Hamas has exploited World Vision, or World Vision has exploited its global donors. There is no other explanation for what has been exposed.
Truth be told, the fund-raising appeal that appears on World Vision’s official website, so full of anti-Israel false statements, makes me feel that the former is true, unless they can convince me otherwise.
As I write this report, Australia and Germany have suspended their funding to World Vision for spending on Palestinian causes. Hamas is designated as a terrorist organization by the United States. I hope we will hear that the US Administration and all Americans will refuse to donate to World Vision until they put their house in order and return to their original Christian charitable roots.

Look at all of those Talmudic Jews!

From Egyptian news site El-Shamal News, which looks like a normal, respectable news site based on the stories on its front page.

Global Talmudic Zionism has succeeded in planting a Talmudic Zionist gang who are staunch enemies of Islam and Muslims in the very land of Muhammad, since the 284-year-old when Zionism succeeded and convinced Britain to install the Mordechai family whose lineage started with the Jews of Khaybar to take the name of the Al-Saud and (Britain) enabled them and international Zionism to British colonial occupation of the Hijaz led by the name of Muhammad ibn Saud and Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab who have committed the most heinous crimes against the people of Hijaz and the people of Iraq.

(More on the supposed jewish origin of the Saud family can be seen in lots of conspiracy websites like this.)

The Talmudic family is hungry for the killing of Muslims for several reasons:

First: the revenge of their ancestors for the (massacre of the) Jews of Khybar.

Secondly, because the Talmud says to kill a lot of non-Jews to draw near to God and enters the supreme paradise. Therefore the Wahhabists killed more than 600,000 Muslims in addition to the thousands of pilgrims and also destroyed many Islamic monuments in the Hijaz and Iraq, while they kept their ties to their ancestors the Jews of Khaybar.

After the release of Mohamed Ali Pasha Hijaz of the Wahhabis in 1814, colonial England decided to return the ring of the Talmud to the rule of Hejaz and provided them with the latest types of weapons at the time and enabled them to occupy the Arabian Peninsula after the killing of tens of thousands of people of Hijaz. Also a gang of Talmudic Yemenites occupied three Yemeni governorates - Asir, Jizan and Najran- and gave the Mordechai family the first waiver of Palestine while also continuing destruction of Islamic monuments.... as support for the Zionist gangs that came to the rape of Palestine.

The Talmudic descendants continued killing Muslims either via US, British, French and Israeli wars, or by supporting terrorist groups that target only Muslims, or through fatwas that allows the killing of those hostile to the Jews and their associates.

The Talmudic family uses large amounts of money looted from the wealth of the Hijaz in the killing of Muslims and to finance all Western colonial wars of Zionism....The Talmudic gang were involved in the bombing of mosques and markets to ensure the Dar Al-Fatwa in the Kingdom of the Talmud paradise ....

The Talmudic family killed more than 10 million Muslims because of the Talmudic motto that everyone who kills a lot of non-Jews will enter Paradise, and 10 million dead Muslims would ensure the highest levels of Paradise.

The article goes on to say that the Shah of Iran as well as Saddam Hussein were all Talmudic agents, and it praises Hezbollah and the Iranian regime as well as the Houthis in Yemen as the only true Muslims willing to stand up against these Talmudic Jewish fake Muslim murderers.

This strongly indicates that the people that are behind this antisemitic screed are from Iran. The author's name is Shahat Shata, and he has written similar articles for Arab media in the past, so it appears that he is part of an Iranian psych-ops campaign against Saudi Arabia and other enemies of Iran.

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An ordinary story of corruption that hides a bigger story

Fadi Elsalameen is a non-resident fellow at The Foreign Policy Institute at The Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies.

He shared something very interesting on Facebook:

You couldn't make up this stuff even if you tried. But here it goes:

Ali Jouma (the guy with Mickey Mouse) is a Palestinian intelligence officer, his wife wanted the parking spot of another person (a young man). The young man naturally refused to give it to her. She threw a fit. Cussed him, and called her husband to the rescue. The husband being an intelligence officer, found out where the young man lives, went with his body guards, beat up the young man, and even chased his mom in a car trying to run her over.

The next day, Majid Faraj, head of PA intelligence asks Ali Jouma to leave the country for few days to escape any backlash.

The whole country is now outraged.

See why PA intel have things under control? No problem is too big for them to solve.

This story was first reported by Faten Elwan a Palestinian journalist working for the US funded alhura TV station. (How about we fund anger management and then crises management classes too?) what a mess!!

This appears at first to be an ordinary story of corruption that one may find in any country. But I think that there is a bigger story here.

The journalist whom he quotes removed her story and replaced it with one that does not include any names. She also apologizes for censoring out some comments to the story, saying that her goal is to help improve the country and not to only complain about corruption. She is a very reluctant whistle-blowing journalist.

Elsalameen says that the whole country is now outraged, but I cannot find this story in the Palestinian media that I monitor, nor by searching for likely keywords in Arabic media.

If the "whole country" is outraged, it is only happening on social media and face to face. The Arab media itself doesn't want to touch the story, at least not yet. The journalist who broke the story doesn't seem to want to push it and is defensive about even bringing it up to begin with, and has been apparently frightened by something that happened after she initially named names.

Which means that this is not just a story about corruption, but also a story about how anything that makes the Palestinian Authority look bad is swept under the rug for as long as possible.

No wonder the Arab rumor mill is considered the most reliable source for information by the community. Palestinians literally cannot believe the news in their own media as being accurate or independent.

Yes, the PA is corrupt, and the people know it. But the donors and funders who keep sending over more and more cash, especially from the West, are kept in the dark about it.

The honor/shame mindset exists on a national level.

(h/t Gidon Shaviv)

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Mahmoud Abbas has said many times, including in front of the EU, "I assure you that we are not in favor turning the political conflict into a religious conflict." Other PA officials parrot that line in English to Western audiences as well.

In Arabic, things are a bit different. The entire "knife intifada" from last autumn was sparked by Abbas calling on his people to use any means to "defend Jerusalem" which was clearly heard by his people as a call to violence. PA officials explicitly have called for "jihad".

Today, the PA issued another statement in Arabic inciting Muslims to fight Jews.

The Israel Antiquities Authority started taking baby steps towards doing its job last week (many years too late) by stopping some illegal Waqf renovations on the most sacred spot on the planet. Today the IAI returned and filmed what the Waqf was apparently doing anyway.

The reaction by the Palestinian Authority was to say that the very existence of the Israel Antiquities Authority on the site is "a rabid campaign being waged by the Israeli occupation forces against the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque" and "contrary to religious laws, and moral values, and humanity."

Government spokesman Yusuf Mahmoud also said "This attack is part of the attacks, and intrusions, and desecration daily suffered by Haram al-Sharif which is one of the most sacred sanctities of Muslims" done by Israel to "plant illusions and myths around Al-Aqsa."

He said that daily visits by "herds of settlers" to the Temple Mount "shows the size of extremism and racism which dominate the mind and thinking of the Israeli government."

He concluded by saying "This assault is an attack on 1.7 billion Muslims" and he called on the whole world to "immediately intervene to deter the occupation attacks."

This is incitement. And as we have seen in the past, this incitement often directly leads to violence.

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