Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Monday, May 11, 2015

Egypt blew up three mosques. For some reason, this wasn't in the news.

Al Jazeera reports that the Egyptian army blew up three mosques on Saturday night in Rafah.

The mosques were in the buffer zone that Egypt is building to curb illegal smuggling tunnels to Gaza. Clearly, the Egyptian government believed that Hamas would have no problem using mosques as entrances to the tunnels to smuggle weapons - in either direction.

What? You mean you didn't hear about the destruction of three mosques? Funny how that happens.

While Al Jazeera says that this caused a furor, I am not seeing anything about it in other media. Egypt has jailed some Al Jazeera journalists, and AJ is not a fan of the regime, so it likes to make it look bad.

Arab towns surrounded by Jewish communities have 0% unemployment

Mas-ha, Qarawat Bani Hassan and Biddya are three Arab towns that, according to the conventional wisdom, should be suffering more than most due to the suffocating presence of Jewish settlements surrounding them.

Here is a detail of B'Tselem's map showing the towns as islands of Arab brown among a sea of Jewish blue areas.

Yet today there is an Arabic article in Safa that says that the towns have a zero percent unemployment rate.

The article characterizes the issue as how the towns manage to thrive even though the evil Israelis built their evil apartheid wall (the dotted lines are for barriers that have not been built.)

The towns were commercial centers before the second intifada, and it appears that they used to get lots of Jewish customers to department stores lining their main street during the peaceful Oslo period when blowing up Jews only happened several times a year.

But when the suicide bombings became bad, they lost customers so the town leaders decided to re-orient their economy around manufacturing. Now they are filled with factories making glass, furniture and other goods.

This has caused their land prices to increase tenfold, from 10,000 Jordanian dinars per dunam to 100,000 dinars.

The new manufacturing sites are attracting Arabs from all over the West Bank, and factory owners cannot keep up with the demand for skilled workers. They claim that their wages are comparable to those of Arab workers in Jewish settlements, between 4000-7000 shekels a month.

Here's the kicker.

The business leaders of Qarawat Bani Hassan complain that the Palestinian Authority is doing nothing to help them. On the contrary, they say that they are taxed heavily by the PA and that they get literally nothing in return.

In fact, they say that the PA looks at them suspiciously. One business owner says that the Ministry of Finance considers successful businessmen to be thieves, sometimes accuse him of tax evasion, and at other times of money laundering.

The only people who seem threatened by the towns' success are the kleptocrats of the Palestinian Authority, and perhaps the NGOs who have little power over using these towns as propaganda against Israel (although they try.)

The story of Mas-ha, Qarawat Bani Hassan and Biddya shows that it isn't settlements that are ruining the economy under PA rule. It is PA rule itself, where jobs are used as political favors and corruption is the norm, where innovation is punished and laziness rewarded.

It also shows that the entire PA strategy isn't for helping their people but instead to do everything they can to demonize and diminish Israel on the world stage.

The people don't matter. "Winning" their zero sum game with Israel is the obsession of the PA, and the people who are abandoned are forced to do what they can in spite of their corrupt leaders.

From an op-ed in the popular Egyptian newspaper Youm7 by Massad Ismail:

Jews lie as easily as they breathe, a fact that we Arabs who live in our homelands since ancient times know well. We know the temperament and lies ranging from major lies like saying that God gave them the land of Palestine, causing them to kill much of the population of Arabs and forcing them out and setting up their own state, in preparation for their expansion to occupy Arab land from the Nile to the Euphrates.

And when the world discovered the extent of their ambitions symbolized in their flag, they discovered that some of their books increase the hatred of the world for them and expose their plans for corrupting the land, so they resorted to discredit these books and claim they were forged.

The Holocaust Memorial Museum of American writes about the book The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, saying

It is the most notorious and widely distributed antisemitic publication of modern times. Its lies about Jews, which have been repeatedly discredited, continue to circulate today, especially on the Internet. The individuals and groups who have used the Protocols are all linked by a common purpose: to spread hatred of Jews.

The Protocols is entirely a work of fiction, intentionally written to blame Jews for a variety of ills. Those who distribute it claim that it documents a Jewish conspiracy to dominate the world. The conspiracy and its alleged leaders, the so-called Elders of Zion, never existed.

This is a lie of lies of the Jews, who want to cleanse their evil history with big lies like the Holocaust, [but the Protocols] exposes their desire for sovereignty over all human beings

Brussels Jewish Museum invites BDS advocates to "reflect" on antisemitism

From The New Antisemite:

It is a well established fact that Israel-bashing is one of the main causes of antisemitism in Europe. Or isn't it? Well, the Museum is organising a conference entitled Reflexions on antisemitism and islamophobia" and the two guest speakers are two militant Israel-bashers and pro-BDS. They are Nadia Fadil and Anya Topolsk. Both are signatories of the BELGIAN CAMPAIGN FOR AN ACADEMIC AND CULTURAL BOYCOTT OF ISRAEL (BACBI) petition - by the way, only a tiny minority of academics signed it - of whom a couple of Jews. Sadly, these are the people the Museum has invited, and Belgian Jewish representatives don't seem either to mind or, according to a source, to be aware of their speakers' anti-Israel stance...

This is the same museum where an "anti-Israel" terrorist - one who no doubt supports BDS - walked in last year and murdered four people.

Speaker Nadia Fadil signed a petition in 2009 urging the EU to take Hamas off its terror list.

Are there no Jews left in Belgium with any self-respect?

(h/t Rudi)

At least J-Street is admitting whose side they are on

From the National Iranian American Council, April 6:

For Immediate Release

Contact NIAC: Jamal Abdi

jabdi@niacouncil.org, 202.386.6408

Contact AAI: Waseem Mardini

wmardini@aaiusa.org, 202.652.4987

Contact J Street: Jessica Rosenblum

Jessica@jstreet.org, 202.279.0005

Washington, DC – The Arab American Institute (“AAI”), J Street, and the National Iranian American Council (“NIAC”) issued the following joint statement regarding the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action framework struck by Iran and the P5+1:

We congratulate President Obama, Secretary Kerry, and the U.S. negotiating team for successfully reaching an historic agreement that provides a framework for preventing a nuclear-armed Iran and averts a disastrous war. While there is much work to be done to address our remaining concerns regarding Iran’s objectionable policies, reaching a final agreement by June on the nuclear issue is an important step to enhancing American and regional security.

As Arab Americans, Jewish Americans, and Iranian Americans, we are especially cognizant of what this agreement may mean for the Middle East. This deal may provide an important first step towards de-escalating regional tensions and pave the way for resolving the many conflicts that still persist. The lesson that we all must learn from these successful negotiations is that diplomacy works. This deal demonstrates that no disagreement should be so deeply entrenched that it cannot be resolved through the give and take of serious diplomacy.

Instead of taking the easy road and continuing to escalate, President Obama and his administration decided to give diplomacy a chance to succeed. Today, the world is better off thanks to the work of all the diplomats involved in these negotiations, and those who supported their work. If the lessons of this long process can be successfully applied to our continued concerns with Iran as well as the myriad other issues that continue to confront the region, there is hope for a brighter future in the Middle East.

The National Iranian American Council is often described as an unofficial Iranian lobby in the US.

J-Street has partnered with the NIAC since at least 2009, and NIAC has contributed thousands of dollars to the J-Street PAC.

Many Iranian Americans are very upset at the NIAC for its pro-mullah positions. But for J-Street, they make a lot of sense.

(h/t EBoZ)

05/10 Links: NGOs, Antisemitism, and Government Funding; Nepal expresses 'deep gratitude' to Israel

From Ian:

NGO Monitor: NGOs, Antisemitism, and Government Funding: NGO Monitor’s Report to the 2015 Global Forum on Antisemitism

Antisemitism is a very virulent and enduring form of racism that has unfortunately been reemerging to levels not seen since the 1930s, in the period leading up to the Holocaust. Throughout Europe, Jews have been deliberately targeted, violently attacked and murdered at synagogues, schools, kosher markets, and museums. Jews wearing yarmulkes (skull caps) or other religious markings are subject to harassment and violence. Crowds at soccer matches chant “Jews to the gas” and other genocidal taunts. Mass demonstrations in European capitals, ostensibly to protest Israeli actions towards the Palestinians, are rife with antisemitic and Nazi sloganeering and imagery. University campuses have seen extreme targeting and singling out of Jews. In Iran, state-sponsored Holocaust denial and calls to “wipe Israel off the map” are entrenched. Arab media is filled with vitriolic antisemitism and blood libels.
As antisemitism rises and reaches crisis levels in Europe, NGOs that claim to promote human rights and humanitarian agendas in the context of the Arab-Israeli conflict and executing the Durban Strategy have fueled and exacerbated hatred of and discrimination against Jews, promoting antisemitic themes and imagery, as at the Durban Conference. These groups, which include international, Palestinian, and Israeli NGOs, also fail to report on or condemn antisemitism and incitement against Jews.
Despite the extensive evidence of NGO antisemitism – egregious examples are provided below – governments, in particular in Europe, continue to fund these groups with hundreds of millions of dollars, pounds, euros, and kroner, and enable the problematic activities and rhetoric.
Click here for PDF version

Richard Millett: Galloway gone! Ward ousted! Liberal Democrats demolished! Labour decimated! SNP in.

For five years Labour has been isolationist on the foreign policy front. It voted not to assist the Syrian people being slaughtered by Assad.
There was, however, one country on which Labour was not isolationist: Israel. Precious parliamentary time was wasted by Labour MPs these last five years smearing Israel as evil and debating, and voting for, a future Palestinian state.
But despite the election results there is no room for complacency for British Jews. The Scottish Nationalist Party (SNP) have virtually swept away Labour in Scotland. They grew from six to an astonishing 56 MPs!
The SNP like to paint themselves as supportive of multiculturalism but there is, again, one country they are not too accepting of: Israel.
These are SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon’s words to the ‘Ending Scottish Arms Trade with Israel’ conference only yesterday:
“As you may be aware, during the recent conflict in Gaza the Scottish Government wrote to the UK Government urging an embargo on arms sales to Israel. The Scottish Government is a firm friend of Palestine and we will continue to press this issue after the election.”
An SNP council also once voted to ban Israeli books in its libraries.
No doubt the SNP will soon be joining forces with Labour, what’s left of the Liberal Democrats and Caroline Lucas of the Green Party to attack Israel.
In the meantime the average hard-working grassroots pro-Israel activist can enjoy some well-earned schadenfreude at the demise of Galloway and Ward.

UN Watch: Fighting Dictatorships, Defending Human Rights

May 2015 update on UN Watch's latest battles to confront dictatorships at the UN with the truth of their human rights abuses.

Fighting Anti-Israel Bigotry - UN Watch in 2014-2015

Screened at UN Watch Gala in Geneva on May 7, 2015. How Schabas was fired -- and more on incredible work of UN Watch to expose and combat the anti-Israel selectivity of the U.N. and its grossly biased Human Rights Council.

Mike Lumish has decided to put his weekly column on hold, saying it is on hiatus.

From Turkey's Anadolu Agency:

Rajab al-Toum, a 126-year-old Palestinian man, says the history books fail to accurately describe the days that followed the Palestinian Nakba ("catastrophe" in Arabic), which coincided with the establishment of Israel on May 15, 1948.

Al-Toum still vividly recalls events, including the atrocities committed by Jewish terrorist gangs against the local Palestinian population – memories that still bring tears to his eyes.

"The massacres that took place at the time remain etched on my memory," al-Toum told Anadolu Agency.

Already 59 years old when the Nakba occurred, al-Toum had been working on a farm in Beersheba (in what is now southern Israel) when violent Zionist gangs forced hundreds of thousands Palestinians to flee their homes and villages.

He remembers seeing Jewish soldiers dragging a young pregnant Palestinian woman away before killing her in front of her husband and children.

"I trembled in fear when I saw this," al-Toum said. "I was afraid they would kill me too."

Given that the oldest verified person ever was 122, and the oldest person alive is almost 116, it appears that his claim of massacres is as accurate as his claim of how old he is.

In an earlier interview:

When the British ruled, the Palestinian story began and revolutionaries emerged, he said. “I was with them and I had a gun; I knew how to carry it and shoot. We used to go at night and destroy bridges used by occupiers.”

See also Israellycool from last year where he doesn't seem to remember how many children he had.

UPDATE: In 2013 he was said to be born in 1885. So he must be 130!

(H/t Bob K)

From JTA:

Four Danish buses that had recently removed pro-Palestinian ads were destroyed in a suspected arson attack.

The buses were found burning early Friday morning at a Copenhagen bus station, BBC News reported. Danish police say a fifth bus was found with anti-Israel graffiti.

Police are investigating a possible link to the city’s transit department decision last week to remove from the buses ads that called for a boycott of Israeli goods. The ads were paid for by the Danish Palestinian Friendship Association, which according to BBC News works “to influence the Danish public and the Danish authorities to do more for the Palestinians’ right to self-determination.”

Based on the graffiti, which said "Boycott Israel - Free Gaza," it sounds like the anti-Israel community in Denmark reacted a bit strongly to their messages being removed.

Abbas joins despots in Russia to celebrate victory over Abbas' heroes

From Ma'an:

President Mahmoud Abbas was among up to 30 world leaders on Saturday to attend a huge military parade in Moscow commemorating Russia's 70th anniversary of victory over Nazi Germany.

Victory Day unites Russians from all walks of life irrespective of political sympathies and huge crowds were expected to flood into central Moscow.

But the Kremlin parade has been overshadowed by the Ukraine crisis, with the West laying sanctions on Moscow over Russia's seizure of Crimea and support for separatists in eastern Ukraine.

In what has been seen as punishment for the Kremlin's meddling in Ukraine, Western countries have been boycotting the May 9 festivities, and United States President Barack Obama has snubbed the festivities, as have the leaders of Russia's other key WWII allies Britain and France.

The most high-profile guests on the podium next to Russian President Vladimir Putin were Chinese leader Xi Jinping, United Nations chief Ban Ki-moon, and India's President Pranab Mukherjee.

Other leaders in attendance included President Abbas, Abdel Fattah al-Sisi of Egypt, Raul Castro of Cuba, Nicolas Maduro of Venezuela, Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe and Jacob Zuma of South Africa.

As I recently pointed out, Abbas considers the infamous Mufti of Jerusalem, who was a partner with Hitler in planning the genocide of Jews, a hero.

The irony of his celebrating the defeat of the Nazis when his political forebears were solidly pro-Nazi is lost on the world.

05/09 Links: Brainwashed at Bowdoin; Bye-Bye, George Galloway, David Ward and Natalie Bennett

From Ian:

William Jacobson: Brainwashed at Bowdoin: Anti-Israel Boycotters Miss a Teachable Moment

Bowdoin College in Maine recently held a student-body referendum for a full academic and cultural boycott of Israel. Unlike more common student-government resolutions seeking “divestment” from a handful of companies, the Bowdoin referendum sought an unprecedented cutoff of all academic and cultural ties. The referendum was initiated by Bowdoin Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), part of a growing national SJP movement on campuses.
I have covered SJP antics at Vassar (the picketing of a classroom because a course involved a trip to Israel, and later posting of a Nazi cartoon), Cornell (a protest leads to physical and verbal harassment of pro-Israel students — and me!), Northeastern University (a protest over suspension included chants of “Long live the intifada,” the bloody suicide-bombing and terrorist campaign), and New York University (the posting of mock eviction notices), and elsewhere.
Wherever I see SJP, I see a messianic absolutism directed at the deligitimization and demonization of every aspect of Israeli society. It is a view that presents Israel as uniquely evil, and Palestinians as uniquely pure victims.
The most messianic of all are some (not all, by any means) left-wing Jews who lead SJP chapters or are fellow travelers like the members of Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP). For that sub-group of left-wing Jews, demonizing Israel has become a religion.

Ben-Dror Yemini: A manipulation of human rights

The IDF is not perfect, and some of Breaking the Silence's claims on the fighting in Gaza may be true, but these deviations have been put on display, without any context or proof.
The report released by Breaking the Silence is already making waves around the world. Isn't it simply wonderful to preach human rights? It's a position in high demand. The thing is, we're dealing here with another piece of major deception, another link in the chain of effort to turn Israel into a living monster, and more help for the BDS campaign.
Why deception? First, when Israel is accused of harming civilians, or when people talk about proportionality, one has to ask: What are the proportions? It turns out there aren't any – and not by chance either. Because every comparative review definitively shows that Israel causes less civilian casualties than those witnessed on other similar battlefields.
Second, a country like Britain also has anti-war organizations. But no foreign country supports exposing the testimonies of British troops who have returned from conflict zones. So why the hell does Britain allow itself to finance Breaking the Silence? Why do the British think their dual morality is morality?
Third, four other countries – Switzerland, the Netherlands, Sweden and Denmark – are funding a Ramallah-based organization, the Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law Secretariat, which also aids Breaking the Silence. HR IHL funds a series of groups such as Al-Haq, BADIL, Al-Mizan and others, which are a part of the BDS campaign network.
We're not dealing with criticism of Israel, but an ideology that opposes the very existence of Israel. This is the ideological environment of the Breaking the Silence report.

Bye-Bye, George Galloway

Within that big picture are some huge specific wins. Specifically, the losses by anti-Israel maniacs George Galloway, David Ward and Natalie Bennett.
George Galloway is the poster child for anti-Israel hate, an obsessed creep who spews anti-Israel conspiracy theories, regularly appears on Iranian Press TV, attacks critics of the Mullah regime, and Jew-baits under the guise of anti-Zionism, British MP George Galloway storms out of debate when finds out opponent is Israeli:
Also losing was Liberal Democrat Party member David Ward, who had previously been suspended by his own party for his anti-Israel comments. Ward notoriously demanded that Holocaust Remembrance Day include remembrance of Palestinian refugees, and tweeted that if he lived in Gaza he would fire rockets at Israel. Ward’s reaction to the Paris unity march after the Charlie Hebdo massacre was to say he was “sick” that Benjamin Netanyahu was in attendance.
Rounding out the threesome, Natalie Bennett, Chair of the Green Party, also lost. Bennett is a big supporter of the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement. Bennett’s fanaticism was just the tip of the iceberg, England’s Green Party Has an Anti-Semitism Problem:

05/08 Links Pt2: Never Mind the Bomb--Israel Is Looking Fantastic; Let’s Call it Red-Washing

From Ian:

Joel Pollak: Never Mind the Bomb--Israel Is Looking Fantastic

True, the headlines are dominated by one crisis after another, internal and external. The riots by Ethiopians angry at police brutality. The mounting threat of a nuclear Iran. The Palestinians’ refusal to discuss peace. The near-collapse of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s new coalition.
And yet from a broader perspective, the country is thriving as never before, and maintaining a relentless day-to-day optimism in the face of its many challenges.
This past week, I returned from a whirlwind five-day trip to Israel, where I covered a conference on law and terrorism organized by Shurat HaDin, a legal advocacy group that sues terrorists on behalf of victims and their families. It was, somewhat inexcusably, my first trip back to Israel in nearly eight years. And the changes were remarkable—the result of a rapidly growing economy, an increasing birthrate, and vastly improved national security, which enables everything else.
The changes were most noticeable in Jerusalem. Eight years ago, security guards and fences were still ubiquitous around every restaurant and café. If you wanted to go out to eat, you had to be prepared to subject yourself and your belongings to a thorough search, because terrorists had made a habit of blowing themselves up in places of public accommodation.
Now the only place that still has the same level of security is the bus station—and even that is more relaxed.
The reason public life has become safer and more convenient is that the much-reviled security barrier—the so-called “wall,” which is actually a fence for most of its length—actually worked.

Let’s Call it Red-Washing

Israel has sent one of the largest aid teams to Nepal after the recent devastating Earthquake. Over 250 doctors and experts in search and rescue were dispatched to the region. Israel’s ability to respond with such a massive and effective force is not only due to decades of experience on the battlefield, but it also expresses a centuries-old tradition of Jewish devotion to the medical arts.
The great Jewish Physicians of the medieval period are more widely known for their written works in poetry and philosophy. Their ranks included Yehuda Halevi and Moses Maimonides.
And the tradition continues today where Israel is a leader in medical innovation the world over and is currently providing emergency care not just in Nepal but also on the Syrian front, where its field hospitals are overwhelmed by the non-stop stream of victims from Syria’s civil war.
And yet despite these life-saving efforts, I suspect the critics of Israel will find a way to malign the Jewish state. Positive stories about Israel’s acceptance of gays are labeled “pink-washing”, Israeli green technology, including organic farming, solar energy and water conservation – all desperately needed in the world today – are dismissed as “green-washing”. So, here’s to a new term: “red-washing”, because no matter how you paint it, Israel won’t stop providing medical aid wherever it is needed.

Giving voice to Muslims who support Am Yisrael

As busloads of frum Jews flocked to the funeral of Zidan Seif, the Druze policeman who sacrificed his life to protect Jews in the Har Nof massacre in November 2014, our community proudly and openly showed its support for righteous gentiles. Just as we reach out to those who make the ultimate sacrifice, we have an obligation to educate ourselves about those who promote peace – especially those Muslim leaders who are striving for a peaceful Islam. These leaders are on the front lines of an intellectual battle; they are defending the Jewish claim to the land of Israel, and defending the Jewish people as authentic “people of the book” – deserving of respect and protection. They are doing so at personal sacrifice and even risk from their less appeasing brethren. And they deserve our attention.
This article is a first in a series. I will be introducing you to Muslim leaders who support the Jewish people. We need to know this information because, as Jews, we are enjoined to respect the righteous among the nations, and surely to lend support to those who wish to support us. Many prominent Rabbanim have been active in dialogue with Muslims: