Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Monday, August 03, 2015

08/03 Links Pt2: There is NO Demographic Time Bomb; The enemy’s sneer: the anti-Semitic Jews

From Ian:

In the enemy’s sneer: the anti-Semitic Jews

Those who hate Israel use anti-Zionist Jews as examples to “prove” that anti-Zionism is not anti-Semitism. As can be seen from the high proportion of Jews among the fake peace activists who are anti-Israel extremists and Hamas apologists, anti-Zionist Jews play an important role in the international coalition aiming to delegitimize and destroy the Jewish state. As the theory goes, since there are Jews who hate Israel then hating Israel is not anti-Semitic. “Are you telling me that these Jews are anti-Semitic?” anti-Zionists ask with a sneer. Yes actually, that is exactly what I am telling you. Anti-Zionist Jews are anti-Semites, just like all the other anti-Zionists.
According to Bernard Lewis, a professor emeritus of Near Eastern Studies at Princeton University, anti-Semites believe that Jews must be “judged by a standard different from that applied to others”. The website “Dictionary.com” defines anti-Semitism as “discrimination against or prejudice or hostility toward Jews”. These definitions do not require that anti-Semites hate all individual Jews, which is the naïve definition of anti-Semitism that anti-Zionists would like us to use. Except for a tiny minority of truly self-hating Jews, anti-Semitic Jews do not hate themselves; they in fact have an over-inflated opinion of themselves, imagining that they are the only real Jews, the saviors of Jewish morality, and the self-sacrificing defenders of peace.
Many of the anti-Zionists, Jews and non-Jews, are highly educated. They are denouncing Israel while knowing very well about all the wars, terrorist campaigns, and attempts at genocide directed at Israeli Jews. They are denouncing Israel while knowing very well that the methods used by Israel to defend herself are far more ethical than the methods used by her enemies to attack Israel. Educated anti-Zionists pretend to not know all this, but anti-Zionist Jews do not need to pretend although many do so anyway. Anti-Zionist Jews are proud to say that their objective is to correct flaws in Jewish behavior while letting non-Jews worry about correcting flaws in the behavior of Israel’s enemies.
For anti-Semitic Jews, it is wrong for Israel to kill terrorists if there is any risk at all to civilians, regardless of what terrorists may do to ensure that civilians are within harm’s reach. For anti-Semitic Jews, killing terrorists is even wrong in itself because in their view, other ways must be used to appease and reform terrorists. Anti-Semitic Jew Norman Finkelstein referred to Israel’s attacks on Hamas in Gaza as a “massacre”, even implying that it was a “Holocaust”. For anti-Semitic Jews, Israel is ethical only if she totally disarms and if she endures attacks without ever defending herself, but since Israel dares defend herself, anti-Semitic Jews do not hesitate to use the wildest rhetoric against Israel, rhetoric that they would never use against anyone else.

Ben-Dror Yemini: No dark secrets, just a propaganda film

There are two ways to deal with materials of this kind. The first way is a historical outlook. The testimonies should also be presented in the overall context of the events. In the years, months and weeks before the war there were specific threats of annihilation.
The Arab League decided in 1964 that "the completion of the military preparations will lead to the final destruction of Israel." In 1966, then-Syrian Defense Minister Hafez Assad, who later became president, declared: "We are determined to soak this land in your blood, to throw you in the sea." Nine days before the war broke out, Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser said: "Our basic goal is the destruction of the State of Israel." A week before the war broke out, PLO founder and leader Ahmad al-Shukeiri said: "Whoever survives will remain in Palestine. But I don't think anyone will survive."
That's the historical background. That's what those who went out to fight heard. That doesn’t justify any war crimes. And in practice, there were only a few testimonies of war crimes.
But there is another approach – neither historical nor scientific, but propaganda-related. It's the approach who prefers to manipulatively emphasize testimonies over exceptions. It's the approach who joins, perhaps knowingly, the massive campaign aiming to present Israel as a monster. It's the approach of the PR campaign of "Censored Voices," which includes the distorted claim that "70 percent of the material was censored" in order to create the suitable atmosphere to convey the message.
The film will not only be screened around the world, but also in Israel. That's the way it should be. Israel is a democracy. But we should know that it's not an exposure, and there was no exposure there. Everything has already been published. The film's director didn't hesitate to present her political agenda. The result, we should all know, is a propaganda film.

Air France wipes Israel off of the map...literally

An Air France in-flight map omits Israel, according to a passenger who sent a photo to the Facebook page of the pro-Israel organization StandWithUs. In the photo of the map, there were only indicators of where the West Bank and the Gaza strip are. Since posting that photo, other members of the Facebook page have started posting their own photos, taken on Air France flights, of the in-flight maps sans Israel.
In a letter to Air France chairman and CEO, Frédéric Gagey, the Simon Wiesenthal Center director for international Relations, Dr. Shimon Samuels, noted that, “French members of our center have sent us reportedly captured shots from the English and French language of an Air France flight-path, taken last week between New York and Paris, and the locations ‘Israel’ and ‘Tel Aviv’ are glaringly absent.”
The letter noted that, “We are asked whether Air France has succumbed to the BDS [Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions] campaign to delegitimize the Jewish State by literally wiping it off the map?”
Air France issued an apology, saying they “deeply regret this incident, due to a map scale and display problem which is currently being resolved.”
In 2009, British Midland International Airlines, a subset of of British Airways, apologized for omitting Israel from their in-flight maps, also attributed the mistake to a technical error. (h/t Yenta Press)

There is no reason Gaza cannot import grand pianos

Usually I don't bother wasting my time with the Mondoweiss blog, but I happened to come across a piece by a person who teaches Gaza kids the violin over Skype because Israel doesn't allow him into Gaza.

Here is a representative excerpt:

Israel’s tight grip on life in Palestine is spun as the regrettable consequence of its right to self-defense. This, like the very idea that putting down resistance to its oppression is “defense”, is a lie. Stifling Palestinian achievement is itself the goal of Israel’s interference, because the Zionist narrative requires the dehumanization of anyone in the way of its ambitions. Israel needs to depict Palestine, and above all Gaza, as a nest of marauders. Palestine must never be seen as a civilization nurturing artists, writers, scientists, scholars—and violinists.

The BBC recently aired a piece entitled “Saving Gaza’s only grand piano”, a feel-good item that reported the discovery and restoration of a grand piano damaged in Israel’s 2014 “Protective Edge” attacks. In a virtually Orwellian reversal, the BBC referred to that onslaught as a “war with Israel”, and left its audience with the impression that Gaza would have a more flourishing music scene if only—well, if only ruling Hamas weren’t so conservative. One need not make any excuses for Hamas’ faults to point out that it is not Hamas that bombs Gaza to ruins and suffocates it under siege.

Apparently, those Jews are so evil that they actively work to ensure that Gazans cannot enjoy culture. Because somehow they are in the way of Zionist ambitions. Which makes it hard to understand why those Zionists left Gaza. But consistency is not exactly a hallmark of Mondoweiss - hate is, and this piece is filled with it. But it is hate dressed up as a love of culture, so it is an acceptable - nay, an admirable - expression of hate.

I have news for the author. That Zionist entity that he claims is besieging Gaza both physically and culturally would not block the import of more grand pianos. I have been told by the people who run Kerem Shalom that they have seen Jacuzzis and Mercedes and other luxury products pass through without a problem. But the haters at Mondoweiss don't want people to know that.

There is one other word not mentioned at all in this anti-Israel screed: Egypt. While the author whines that "Israel blocked me from entering the coastal strip" he neevr says that he attempted to enter it through Egypt, the Rafah crossing that Israel has no control over.

The crossing that has allowed exactly zero people to cross in either direction since Ramadan. While Israel has allowed thousands to cross in both directions.

No, this hater doesn't want to water down his criticism of Israel by mentioning that Gaza is besieged by their fellow Arabs. The Goliath Jew vs. David Arab narrative is so much easier for propaganda purposes, and Egypt's security fears from Gaza cannot be as airily dismissed as the author pooh-poohs Hamas rockets which he claims are only in retaliation to Israeli actions towards a sector that they left.

Sometimes you just have to shake your head that people actually believe this crap.

How the UN obfuscates its false Gaza casualty statistics

The UN OCHA-OPT also has a website for the one-year anniversary of the Gaza war.

On its Data page, it says "2,251 Palestinians, including 1,462 civilians, were killed." Its footnote references the summary of the UNHCR report.

The UNHCR report, in turn, uses as its reference - the OCHA! "Data compiled by the OCHA Protection Cluster, 31 May 2015. For its methodology, seeA/HRC/28/80/Add.1, para. 24, footnote 43."

When you look in that reference, you see:

The Protection Cluster is the mechanism for coordinating humanitarian action by humanitarian organizations (UN and non-UN) working in the protection sector. It is one of several such sectoral clusters. OHCHR leads the Protection Cluster in OPT. For more on the cluster system, see www.ochaopt.org/content.aspx?id=1010056. OHCHR compiled figures on fatalities in its capacity as leader of the Protection Cluster. The methodology used involves the compilation of initial reports of fatalities from the media and other sources which are then crosschecked and verified in collaboration with a number of international, Palestinian and Israeli partner organizations. Where available, each individual’s name, age, sex and place of death is determined, as well as their status as a civilian or combatant where this can be determined. Multiple sources are cross-referenced, not only from media and various human rights organizations, but also information released by the IDF and by the Palestinian armed groups regarding the identity of combatants. Information from the Ministry of Health in Gaza is one, but not an exclusive, source of information. Verification of the information collected is continuing. Figures are published on the website of OCHA on behalf of the Protection Cluster.

So we have OCHA referring to the Human Rights Council referring back to OCHA referring back to the statistics compiled by the Human Rights Council. It is a bit...incestuous.

And even though they publish this supposedly detailed description of their methodology, in the end it is all a scam. The UNHRC is the one that determines if someone is a militant or a civilian and it chooses which evidence to believe and which evidence to ignore.

Documentation of scores of "civilians" who turned out to be military targets have been published, both on this blog and from the Meir Amit ITIC. UNHRC is aware of the Meir Amit ITIC because they quote it in their Gaza report. But they choose to ignore its findings when compiling their statistics. (This is obvious because their numbers have not changed for at least six months while the ITIC has issued new reports.)

Which means that all of these footnotes are a smokescreen for the fact that the anti-Israel UNHRC is making up the statistics based on its own bias and using a spaghetti system of footnotes to obfuscate its methodology.

The UN is supposed to be transparent. As such, I call on the UNHRC Protection Cluster and OCHA to publish their list of the names of all the victims of the Gaza war with their sources and classification of the casualties as civilian or not. This would be necessary for independent researchers to see exactly how the UN's Protection Cluster does its work. And if they knew that they were being checked, they would be a lot more careful with their statistics.

They won't do this, of course, because they don't want people to find out that their methodology ,and therefore their statistics, are wrong, and that the truth exonerates Israel of many of their accusations.

08/03 Links Pt1: Israelis mourn pride parade stabbing victim; Antisemitic Al-Aqsa Sheikh arrested

From Ian:

Khaled Abu Toameh: Who Is Destroying the Palestinian Dream?

The confrontation between Hamas and its rivals inside the Gaza Strip is likely to escalate in the coming weeks and months. Hamas now has so many enemies inside the Gaza Strip that to combat them, it would have to step up its repressive measures. These measures, however, will only lead to more retaliatory attacks by anti-Hamas forces, and plunge the Gaza Strip into a state of increased anarchy and chaos. Many Palestinians are worried that the Gaza Strip will sooner or later fall into the hands of Islamic State or Al-Qaeda.
In the West Bank, meanwhile, such a threat does not exist, largely thanks to Israeli security measures against terror infrastructure and cells. The Palestinian Authority, for its part, is also waging a massive campaign against Hamas and other Islamist groups in the West Bank. The PA is not doing this out of concern for the "peace process" with Israel; Mahmoud Abbas and his lieutenants know that these Islamists will kill them first on their way to killing Jews.
The growing state of anarchy in the Gaza Strip, as well as the continued power struggle between Hamas and Fatah, do not bode well for those who still believe that the creation of a Palestinian state will bring about peace and stability in the region. The way things are going these days, particularly in the Gaza Strip, it seems that a future Palestinian state will be added to the list of Arab countries that are currently witnessing civil wars and bloodbaths.
It is time for the international community to wake up and realize that the Palestinian dream of establishing an independent state is being destroyed by none other than the Palestinians themselves.

PMW: Antisemitic teacher of Islam arrested after PMW supplies recordings to police

Following Palestinian Media Watch’s exposure of the Antisemitism lessons by Sheikh Khaled Al-Mughrabi in the Al-Aqsa Mosque, PMW was contacted by Israeli police and asked to supply all the original recordings. The police investigation has now led to his arrest:
"Today, Sunday [Aug.2, 2015] the occupation forces arrested Sheikh Khaled Al-Mughrabi, a cleric at the Al-Aqsa Mosque, who gives religious lessons to children at the mosque." [WAFA (official PA news agency), Aug. 2, 2015]
PMW first reported on the Sheikh’s hate speech on June 2 and has since released five additional videos documenting the Sheikh’s antisemitic teachings. (h/t Bob Knot)

Sheikh Khaled Al-Mughbari being arrested by Israeli police

Sheikh at Al-Aqsa: Jews of Israel will be annihilated by Muslims, according to Allah's decree

Sheikh Khaled Al-Mughrabi teaches Islam twice a week in the Al-Aqsa Mosque ‎Mosque in Jerusalem:‎
"When a group (i.e., PMW) from the Children of Israel ‎comes and puts our lesson under a microscope, and publicizes our lesson in a way ‎that contradicts the truth, in other words, they omit some parts of it and leave in others, ‎what happens then? The message becomes inappropriate. Because we have two ‎types of messages: When I speak with the Jews, I talk to them with wisdom and gentle ‎rebuke, as Allah commanded me. When I talk to you about the Jews, I talk about them ‎as they really are.‎
When they come uninvited to our lesson, coming to hear what we say, what does that ‎mean? It means they chose to hear the truth about themselves as Allah has exposed it ‎and made it clear. They chose this. I didn’t turn to them... The fact that this group [PMW] ‎chose to come uninvited to our lesson, and follows our lessons and publicizes them all ‎over the world and puts them on its websites in all the countries of the world - since ‎they chose this – first, praise Allah for this, Allah puts them [PMW] at our service to say:‎

Honor/shame and UNRWA budget cuts

I found this Ma'an article to be interesting:

Hundreds of Palestinian refugees on Sunday staged a sit-in in front of the UNRWA headquarters in Gaza City to protest a reduction in services provided by the UN agency.
The sit-in was the second Sunday protest in a row, as refugees in Gaza faces cuts to health and educational services.

Protesters waved flags and posters as they chanted slogans slamming the reduction of UN services.

“We want schools! Stop the policy of humiliation and contempt!” the protesters chanted.

Notice that the slogans aren't about the importance of education, but that cutting services is the equivalent of humiliation.

The sign in this file photo says "We are not beggars! We have rights," again putting the issue in terms of humiliation and shame.

The subtext is that Palestinian Arabs have the right to unlimited funds from the West, and to not get billions of dollars is humiliating.

The Palestinian Authority is publicly saying that it is not their responsibility to educate their own people whom they call "refugees."

Secretary-General of the Palestinian Cabinet, Ali Abu Diak, Sunday rejected UNRWA’s proposal to postpone the start of the new academic year for over half a million students across the Middle East for a period of four months due to severe finical crisis.

He called on the UN, and the rest of the world countries to uphold their responsibilities toward Palestinian refugees’ issue

Abu Diak stressed the need for UNRWA to resume its work and provision of assistance to Palestinian refugees as long as there is no political solution to the refugees’ issue on the basis of international legitimacy resolutions, particularly resolution 194; the right of return and compensation.

The argument is not based on humanitarian concerns but on "rights" that simply don't exist. They aren't asking for money because they cannot afford schooling and medical care for their kids; they are demanding money because they believe that the world owes it to them, forever.

Meanwhile, Jordan has told the world not to expect them to pick up the slack for educating their own Palestinian Arab citizens.

Minister of Education Dr. Mohammad Thunaibat said that the Ministry of Education does not have the ability to accept UNRWA schools students in its schools. He said that Jordan is already stretched thin because of the many Syrian refugees that it has accepted.

But this begs the question of why there is a parallel UNRWA school system in Jordan to begin with for students who are nearly all full Jordanian citizens?

Another day, another Amnesty tweet that shows that it is anything but objective:

Evidence #Israel killed civilians in #Rafah in direct or indiscriminate attacks. End the impunity NOW: http://t.co/3GKbln9lhs #50Days4Gaza
— AmnestyInternational (@AmnestyOnline) July 31, 2015

Israel doesn't act with impunity. It has an army with a large number of checks and balances. Israel's conduct in the Gaza war that Amnesty claims shows Israeli war crimes has been praised by the real experts in Western armies.. When a mistake happens the IDF investigates it and prosecutes the relatively rare number of times that crimes are committed. Every single bomb dropped by a plane is checked by teams of people to ensure that the target is of high enough military value and that there is a low likelihood of innocent casualties relative to its value.

Amnesty International, however, does act with impunity. It writes reports and creates online "resources' that are filled with sloppy research, clear errors and evidence of knowing lies. I've written some 19 articles in the past three weeks showing how Amnesty utterly disregards truth, context and fairness.

Israel has to answer to international law. Israel gets pressured from its friends about its actions. Israel is under withering attack from news organizations and from NGOs like Amnesty which regularly generate reports that are covered admiringly in the media. And all of these facts affect how Israel acts, to the point that the IDF will put soldiers and citizens at risk unnecessarily in order to forestall criticism.

Amnesty, on the other hand, has no concerns about criticism. It completely ignores the issues leveled against it by organizations like NGO Monitor or blogs like mine, no matter how well documented those criticisms are.

Amnesty, HRW and other NGOs have no independent oversight. They have no regulations. They have no auditors for their reports. They have no objective third party standards. They have no professional association that can ensure that they adhere to consistent standards of objectivity. They don't have to report to anyone outside their own organizations. They emphatically reject international fact-finding standards that would all but eliminate bias. They misinterpret international law. They do not hire any experts who might contradict their pre-ordained conclusions. They do not have to issue corrections.

In other words, these NGOs can publish reports filled with lies with complete impunity.

So when Amnesty and HRW accuse Israel of acting with impunity, they are nothing but hypocrites.

According to Shin Bet, in June there were 98 firebombs thrown by Arabs in June, 50 of them in Jerusalem.

This was lower than the 129 Molotov cocktails hurled in May.

I don't know how many were aimed at residential buildings and how many at other objects like cars, but one can find plenty of photos and videos of Arabs throwing Molotov cocktails at houses.

Luckily, no one was burned to death in these cases that happen multiple times every day,

These stories often don't even make the Israeli news. But the people who throw these firebombs intend exactly as much harm as the presumed Jewish terrorists who threw the firebomb at the house in Duma.

Al Aqsa preacher: "Jews manufacture and spread diseases"

From Palwatch:

Sheikh Khaled Al-Mughrabi, who teaches Islam twice a week in the Al-Aqsa Mosque on the temple Mount in Jerusalem, taught in his most recent class that Jews own 95% of the pharmaceutical industry and therefore train doctors to create new diseases in order to increase profits for the industry:

According to what is told about the Rothschild family, they own more than half of the world's wealth... There are approximately 950,000 billion dollars in the world. Out of this amount, 500,000 billion dollars belong to the Rothschild family. The Rothschild family owns the World Bank, which gives loans to countries, not to private individuals or to organizations, it gives [loans] to countries. For instance, if Egypt wants a loan, it will take it from the World Bank. The World Bank is owned by the Rothschild family. The Rothschild family are Freemasons. At the End of Days they will fight God alongside the Antichrist...

They own about 95% of the world's pharmaceutical industry. Why do I mention the pharmaceutical industry? Many diseases were created in labs - viruses created by doctors who were bought, trained and taught by the Rothschild family, the Freemasons, the Zionists, or the Jews to create and spread disease so they will be able to sell medicine for it. More than 95% of the pharmaceutical industry and the pharmaceutical trade is owned by the Children of Israel.”

[Al-Msjed Al-Aqsa YouTube channel, July 31, 2015]

It's nice to know that they update the "jews poisoning the wells" canard every once in a while.

UNICEF issued a press release:

NEW YORK, 31 July 2015 - “The death of an 18-month old Palestinian baby in an arson attack on his home in the West Bank is a tragedy -- and an outrage. UNICEF condemns this and all violence against the innocent. Who could be more innocent than an 18-month old baby? This demands that the guilty be brought to justice. And it demands that everyone refrain from such senseless, horrific violence.”

UNICEF is one of the better UN agencies. it is not obsessed with Israel and it genuinely tried to help children worldwide.

And there is nothing wrong with condemning this incident. Israel's government and entire political spectrum condemned the horrific act.

But there is still a problem.

UNICEF never condemned the murder of Yehuda Shoham, a five month old American-Israeli murdered by a Palestinian Arab throwing a stone through that smashed through a car windshield and crushed his skull.

UNICEF never condemned the murder of Shalhevet Pass, a ten-month old girl who was murdered by a sniper who aimed at her as she was sitting in her stroller.

UNICEF never condemned the murder of Hadas Fogel, a three month old who was decapitated by depraved Palestinian Arabs who also murdered her 11-year old and 4-year old brothers and their parents.

As horrific as the incident last week was, there is no evidence that the arsonist intended to kill. But in these cases, and countless others, Israeli infants were murdered in cold blood.

I can only find one time that UNICEF condemned the murder of specific Israeli children, and that was only to provide balance for their condemnation of the murder of a Palestinian child:

The justified outrage at the killing of a Palestinian teenager in Jerusalem today, and that seen at the funerals yesterday of three young Israelis murdered in the West Bank, are a reminder that we must never become accustomed to such attacks against children, anywhere, in any way, and at any time.

If the Arab teen hadn't been murdered, UNICEF would not have mentioned the three Israeli teens at all.

UNICEF's double standards, showing how their condemnations of Palestinian Arab terror are only made in context of what they consider far worse Israeli crimes, could also be seen in this press release from 2002:

Suicide bombings targeting Israeli civilians are morally repugnant and we condemn them. However, self-defense against such acts does not free Israel of its obligations under international humanitarian law or justify derogation from internationally recognised human rights. We strongly condemn the disproportionate use of force against civilian populations.

The Israeli response to suicide bombings is worse than suicide bombings themselves, according to UNICEF.

You can see that UNICEF crafts their statements to avoid any charges of bias, but as we have seen many times before, bias can be proven not only by what people and organizations say but by what they don't say. In no moral universe is the death of Ali Saad Dawabsheh - as contemptible as it is - more heinous that the deliberate, depraved murders of Shalhevet Pass or the Fogel family.

The pattern here cannot be ignored. UNICEF, and organization dedicated to protecting children, considers Jewish children's lives cheaper than those of Arab children.

This shows that anti-Israel bias is pervasive even among groups that truly do important work. Being humanitarian does not inoculate you against bias.

08/02 Links: 16-year-old girl stabbed at Pride Parade dies of wounds; Dear President Abbas

From Ian:

16-year-old girl stabbed at Pride Parade dies of wounds

A 16-year-old girl who was stabbed during Jerusalem’s Gay Pride Parade on Thursday died Sunday after succumbing to her wounds, hospital officials said.
Shira Banki had been hospitalized at Ein Karem in the capital in serious condition following the attack, in which five other people were stabbed as well.
One other person, Yarden Noy, was injured critically in the stabbing but has since recovered and is set to be released from the hospital in the coming days.
The other four people stabbed by Yishai Schlissel were lightly to moderately injured.
Banki’s family said they would donate her organs.
Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat expressed deep sorrow over Banki’s murder, and vowed to protect the rights and security of all the capital’s residents.

Dear President Abbas

I’m writing to express my horror at the vicious terror attack that occurred yesterday in Duma, and my hopes that the survivors will have a full and speedy recovery. I’m sure that virtually all Israelis join me in this.
You see, we know how you feel.
I can only imagine how the surviving members of the Dawabsha family feel, but there are countless remnants of Jewish families ripped apart by terrorism who don’t need to imagine.
For at least a hundred years, Palestinian Arabs have been murdering our children, our athletes (you personally know something about that one), our bus passengers, pizza eaters, disco-goers and random Jews in the wrong place at the wrong time. They’ve been shot, stabbed, blown up, beaten or burned to death, or had their throats slit. Whole families, like the Dawabshas, have been destroyed.
You have sent your bestial terrorist filth out to kill us and then welcomed them back, dripping blood, as heroes.
And it turns out, not so surprisingly, that we have bestial terrorist filth amongst us as well. What did you expect? After a hundred years of terrorism directed at us, some members of our nation have learned to imitate yours.
We’re human too. We have our criminals, our assassins, and even our terrorists. Of course we don’t treat them as heroes. We don’t broadcast incitement on our radio and television stations. Rabbis don’t exhort their congregations every Shabbat to go out and kill Arabs. We don’t hand out sweets when a murder is committed.

Edin Black: Why Jonathan Pollard spent 30 years in prison

What follows is an article written and first published by Edwin Black 13 years ago. For this piece, author and journalist Black visited Jonathan Pollard in prison. He extensively interviewed Pollard’s attorneys and reviewed their evidence, and also interviewed then ex-prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, former US secretary of defense Casper Weinberger, and many other key figures.
Now that Pollard is being released under statutory conditions — he will be paroled on November 20 — “the nagging questions linger,” says Black today. “Jonathan Pollard has spent thirty years in prison – 3 times longer than more egregious offenders.”
This article — unedited from the 2002 original — explains why.
On January 7, 2002, former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stepped through the two-doored entry chamber of a prison sally port. After the first fudge-brown steel and armored glass door slowly closed right-to-left behind him, Netanyahu passed his hand beneath a black light reader along the left wall. It illuminated a small security stamp on his hand, not unlike the type disco clubs use. Behind opaque, silver-tinted windows, watchful security officers in the control room completed their checklist, approving Netanyahu’s access. Then in a low mechanized rumble, the entry chamber’s long second door opened left-to-right, admitting Netanyahu to an inner corridor of the prison. He was ushered just down the hall and then into a large room on the right, filled with vending machines and tables. There, waiting for him was the man Netanyahu wanted to see.
The prison was not in Israel, it was in North Carolina. Netanyahu had flown to Raleigh Durham and then driven the forest-lined 20 minutes to the Federal Correctional Institution at Butner. It was all to talk to America’s most controversial Jewish prisoner, now serving his 17th year of incarceration. The prisoner, 09185-016, was Jonathan Jay Pollard, the American Jew who pleaded guilty in 1986 to spying for Israel, and was abruptly sentenced to life imprisonment despite a binding plea bargain that restricted any request for so harsh a term.

This is the bit of satire, dated 3/10/10, that got me booted off of the left-liberal political blog Daily Kos at a time when I was writing under the nom de blog, Karmafish.

I like this bit because I think that it is funny, as did some others, as you can plainly see if you are crazy enough to slog through all 423 comments.

Of course, many others considered this piece to be the very height of insensitivity.

At the time, by the way, I still believed in a little something that people call "East Jerusalem." Today I would just say the eastern section of town or the "Old City" depending upon the specific story.

But, without further ado:

Breaking: Jew Builds Second Bathroom in East Jerusalem

Sheikh Jarrah, East Jerusalem --- The entire world was shocked yesterday when this reporter revealed that retired electrician, Ehud David Netanyolmert, shook the peace process to its roots by building an illegal second bathroom in his East Jerusalem home.

“This is yet another example of Israeli intransigence,” said Palestinian Authority PM, Mahmoud Abbas. “We cannot negotiate with the Israelis if they insist upon violating international law with the continued building on Palestinian lands. Israel must pressure Mr. Netanyolmert to dismantle the illegal mini-settlement that he has constructed.”

Only slightly taken aback by the world community’s rejection of the second bathroom, Benjamin Netanyahu told the Jerusalem Post, “Israel wants peace and two states for two peoples. The Palestinians need to sit down at the negotiating table and I honestly do not see what some guy's second bathroom has to do with anything.”

In Washington, US President Barack Obama convened an emergency meeting with his cabinet in order to evaluate the situation and to determine the best response to this most recent Israeli aggression. In response to the crisis US diplomat George Mitchell claimed, “Israelis have rights, but so do the Palestinian people. While the United States remains deeply committed to Israeli security, it is entirely unclear how the second bathroom promotes that security or in any way advances the cause of peace.”

When queried about this blatant Zionist violation of international law Mr. Netanyolmert objected to the entire line of inquiry. “You people are meshuganah,” Netanyolmert said while standing in his doorway, wearing his jammies and blinking into the morning sun. “Are you honestly telling me that Vladimir Putin objects to my second bathroom on the grounds that it is an impediment to peace? Vladimir Putin? Really?”

It should be obvious to any reasonable observer that Mr. Netanyolmert’s myopia regarding Zionist aggression, and his willingness to derail the peace process, cannot be allowed to go unchallenged. The Palestinian peace organization, Hamas, therefore responded today with a flurry of Qassam and Katyusha rocket attacks on S’derot and Ashkelon. The typical Israeli myopia extended to former S’derot mayor, Eli Moyal, who, while quivering under his desk, is alleged to have told his secretary, “Second bathroom? What second bathroom? What the hell are these people talking about?”

Meanwhile, a variety of Israeli left-of-center organizations are planning a mass rally in opposition to The Second Bathroom. Naomi Chazan, of the New Israel Fund, said that dozens of people will gather outside Mr. Netanyolmert’s home in solidarity with Palestinian activists in a No Second Bathroom rally. The protestors will carry signs reading, “Get the Hell out of the Bathroom, Already!” and “Netanyolmert, Zionist Criminal Baby Killer!” and “Who Do These Jews Think They Are, Anyways?!”

Some fear that just as Ariel Sharon's stroll on the Temple Mount inevitably caused the Al-Aqsa Intifada, so Mr. Netanyolmert's violation of Palestinian sovereignty might spark a third... The First Second Bathroom Intifada.

One hopes that if the Israeli government makes the necessary concessions by evacuating the bathroom then the Palestinian Authority might be persuaded to sit down for peace talks.

But who would blame the PA if they refuse?

From the comments at the time:

In poor taste just 2 weeks before the anniversary (21+ / 1-) of Rachel Corrie's death on March 25, 2003, by an Israeli bulldozer while trying to protect a Palestinian home from being demolished.

I have only one suggestion for this diary: flush it.

http://www.rachelcorrie.org/

by heiderose1 on Wed Mar 10, 2010 at 03:01:31 PM PST

Rachel Corrie? So I published this thing two weeks before the seventh anniversary of the accidental death of American anti-Israel activist Rachel Corrie and that represents poor taste?

If it was ONLY the building of a second bathroom (14+ / 0-)that was going on in E. Jerusalem, but it is not. There is much more going on in terms of expanding settlements and building activity than this snarky diary lets on.

by True Independent on Wed Mar 10, 2010 at 01:56:25 PM PST

Who the hell are these people to complain about Jews building housing for themselves in the ancient Jewish capital of Jerusalem, east, west, or otherwise? That was the whole point of the piece!

That's right Karma.. (26+ / 0-)..the Neyanyahu government smacking the Obama admin in the face by announcing the day Biden arrives in Israel to advance "peace talks" that they're going ahead with building 1600 housing units in northeastern Jerusalem is a joke.

You should be banned.

by sofia on Wed Mar 10, 2010 at 02:09:27 PM PST

Well, sofia got her wish.

For daring to mock western-left anti-Jewish racism I was, in fact, banned from Daily Kos.

I know it must seem silly to remark upon five year old comments in an old Daily Kos "diary," but I remain amazed at the ease with which so many on the western-left condemn Jews for building housing for themselves in Israel.

These are people who think of themselves as anti-racists concerned with social justice.

The hypocrisy is just staggering.

Michael Lumish is a blogger at the Israel Thrives blog as well as a regular contributor/blogger at Times of Israel and Jews Down Under.

Vile antisemitic cartoon causes anger in Arab world - but not because of antisemitism

This cartoon, showing a Jew raping a Palestinian Arab woman while murdering her two infants, is making some Arabs very angry:

No, the vile and naked Jew-hatred isn't the problem. That's actually taken for granted.

The reason this cartoon is making so many angry is because a Hamas-affiliated news outlet published it, and it is charging the Palestinian Authority with not caring as Jews rape and massacre woman and children in the West Bank.

The masked man behind the fence represents Gaza, and he says to the woman representing the West Bank, "Rise, oh (West) Bank, defend your honor and your children." She answers ""By Allah, I would do it, but I [need] a permit [to work inside Israel.]"

The man on the left is a PA security officer ignoring the crime.

The representation of West Bank Arabs as being willing to be humiliated by Jews is the controversy, not the theme that Jews routinely rape and murder Arabs.

This cartoon came on the heels of another one where a man representing the PA in the West Bank is smoking a hookah, pays lip service to defending the Dome of the Rock but is expecting only Hamas to do something about it by shooting rockets.

This complete lack of criticism over the antisemitism of the cartoon at the top of this post again shows the basic fact that pundits, reporters and human rights NGOs refuse to speak out about: the Palestinian Arabs are not just against Israel but they hate Jews.

(h/t Ibn Boutros)