Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Friday, January 15, 2016

Persecution of Jews in Muslim countries, 1841

From The History of the Hebrew Nation: From Its First Origin to the Present Time By Rev. Joshua William Brooks, 1841:

As regards the present political condition of the Jews, notwithstanding the decrees in their behalf which have been passed, the Christian reader will be deceived if he concludes that the reproach of Israel is yet “rolled away from off all the earth.” The public mind has recently been startled by the report of cruelties and injustice to which the Jews of Damascus and Rhodes have been subjected, as if such instances of persecution and oppression were a novelty in these times. But in the East the Jews have all along been exposed to them, though their wrongs have failed until now in arresting particular attention. In the year 1823, at the same Damascus, all the Jews suspected of having property were thrown into prison, and compelled to pay forty thousand purses or lose their heads. At Safet, in 1834, their houses were stripped, and great personal cruelties inflicted upon them, for the like purpose of extorting money; and generally in Syria they were compelled to work for the Turks without payment, being bastinadoed if they remonstrated. The lowest fallaah would stop them when travelling, and demand money as a right due to the Musselman; which robbery was liable to be repeated several times a day upon the same Jew. Throughout the East they are obliged to affect poverty in order to conceal their wealth ; the rulers in those countries making no scruple of seizing what they can discover. And though not interdicted from holding land, yet the enormous taxes demanded of them (equal to one-third of the produce, whilst the Mahometans pay only one-tenth), effectually exclude them from agriculture.

The occupation of Syria by the Egyptians did not mitigate the hard condition of the Jews of Palestine' They were still defrauded and insulted; the commonest soldier would seize the most respectable Israelite, and compel him by blows to sweep the streets, and to perform the most degrading offices. The contempt indeed in which they are held by Mahometans, however difficult to be accounted for, exceeds that which they have experienced in Christian lands. In the East they are truly become a proverb, the term Jew being applied despitefully, as the most reproachful and degrading known.

Even the Christians of Syria manifest a degree of malignity and contempt for the Jews, not witnessed in other places: the Nestorians in particular entertain a bitter hatred toward them; and were a Jew to set his foot within the church of the Holy Sepulchre at Jerusalem, he would be stoned by the Christians of all denominations. ...

In Persia the condition of the Jews is worse even than in Syria. Often whilst they are assembled in their synagogues, a soldier enters with an order from the Shah for money; they are compelled to work without payment; and their women are unceremoniously taken from them, without their daring to murmur. Their poverty and wretchedness may be best understood by the following graphic description given to Dr. Wolff, before he visited Shiraz, by a Mahometan: “Every house in Shiraz with a low, narrow entrance is a Jew's. Every coat much torn and mended is a Jew's. Every man with a dirty camelhair turban is a Jew. Every one picking up broken glass and asking for old shoes and sandals is a Jew." This description was afterwards confirmed by the doctor's own observation, who found old and young in the street of their quarter sitting and crying to every stranger, with outstretched hand and feeble voice, “Only one pool (penny) for poor Israale !”

In Morocco they are equally ground down by a barbarous despotism. The Moors consider that the object of a Jew's birth is to serve Musselmen, and he is consequently subject to the most wanton insults. The boys for their pastime beat and torment the Jewish children: the men kick and buffet the adults. They walk into their houses at all hours, and take the grossest freedoms with their wives and daughters, the Jews invariably coming off with a sound beating if they venture to resist. In 1804 those of Algiers were subjected to horrible tortures, being suspended from the walls by long ropes with hooked nails at the ends, merely because they had unsuspectingly lent money to persons who were secretly conspiring against the Dey; nor were they released without the payment of a large sum. In 1827 the Dey threw a rich Jew into prison for no other purpose than to extort from him 500,000 Spanish dollars. At Tripoli the bashaw extorted a large sum from them on account of the drought, which he declared them to be the cause of. Mr. Ewald, after describing the beauty, fertility, and prosperity of the island of Gerba in Morocco, “where, if any where, (he says) every one lives quietly beneath his own vine and fig-tree,” next speaks of the Jews as the only exception, among whom he nowhere witnessed greater poverty and oppression; insomuch that he could have imagined he was beholding the Israelites of Egypt in Pharaoh's time, under their taskmasters. They were the quarrymen, hewers of wood, and drawers of water; their food consisted entirely of barley flour with salt and water; and they were altogether in an abject state of slavery. Since the occupation of Algiers by the French, the political condition of the Jews in that part of Morocco is improved; but their religious state, from their having imbibed the French infidelity, is more hopeless.

We are doing everything we can to fight for Israel with hard work, research and - above all - the truth. I could sure use your help. Please donate today. If you have other skills you can volunteer for EoZ, send an email to volunteer@elderofziyon.com

One of the nominees for an Academy Award announced yesterday was Ave Maria, by Palestinian director Basil Khalil.

The premise sounds pretty good:

What do you get when you force Palestinian nuns and Israeli Jews to work together? Well, as evident by Basil Khalil’s Ave Maria, it’s just the right ingredients for a quirky comedy.

The 15-minute short follows a group of five Palestinian Carmelite nuns from the Sisters of Mercy convent who are forced to abandon their silent prayers after a bantering family of Israeli settlers accidentally crash into their property.

In spite of their religious differences, the nuns, who are forbidden to speak due to a vow of silence, and the Israeli family, whose own physical abilities are limited due to the Sabbath, must work together to find a solution.

From the trailers and interviews with the director, I do not sense any overtly political or anti-Israel message. It really makes fun of what seem to be arbitrary religious rules colliding with each other. That is a promising premise for a comedy. The director says that his point is to show how rules that seem strict can be broken sometimes. Without seeing the film I cannot say how respectfully he looks at either the Jews or the nuns, but there are no obvious problems in the trailers.

Although the film is considered "Palestinian," the director appears to be an Israeli citizen - he says he was brought up in Nazareth.

And in interviews he reveals his own biases, mentioning those fictional "Jews-only roads" and implying an equivalence between Palestinians today and Jews of the 1930s in Europe:

I like comedies… I like entertaining films, at the same time, stories from the Middle East are always grim and miserable, especially from Palestine, and yes the situation is quite grim and miserable, but we, especially Palestinians, have developed a sense of humor, like the ghetto humor, which you got in Europe in the 30s, where they had to alleviate their sufferings through laughing or finding jokes around their own miserable lives, as well as educating on the situation. You will find people more likely to watch a comedy than a politically charged film, and will learn that in the West Bank there are roads for Jews only; nice road, and there are roads for Arabs only, which are full of pot holes and are less maintained.

Even so, based on the trailers, the film does not appear problematic.

Here is one scene:

Here is how Ma'an reported an incident yesterday:

Israeli forces Thursday shot and killed a Palestinian near the Beit Einun junction northeast of the occupied West Bank city of Hebron after an alleged stab attempt, witnesses and Israel’s army said.

An Israeli army spokesperson told Ma’an that a Palestinian attempted to stab Israeli soldiers stationed near the junction, who responded by opening fire on the alleged assailant.

If Israel says that he tried to stab someone, it is a mere "allegation."

Even when the stabber was explicit about his plans:

The man was identified as Muayyad Awni Jabbarin, 20, by his father, who arrived at the scene following his death.

The 20-year-old’s family told Ma’an that the funeral of their son would be held on Friday, when they would bury him in the Sair village’s cemetery.

Jabbarin's family said they found a letter written by him, in which he asks his parents to forgive him for the pain he caused them.

"God, please forgive me mom and dad, I will kill two Israeli soldiers and take revenge for all the Palestinians they killed! Mom! Do not be sad! Your son died a hero,” the letter read.

“Please forgive me, and am really sorry for the pain I caused you, but may God be with you,” the letter added. “No matter how darkness stays, the sun will rise again, chains will break and we will all be free one day.”

But it might all just be a coincidence!

Of course, the Arabs consider him a hero, not a victim. Ma'an Arabic notes that Jabarn's funeral today was attended by Abbas Zaki, of Fatah's Central Committee, "and a number of national figures."

UPDATE: The letter (h/t Bob K)

01/14 Links Pt2: 1948 Palestinian: “We Fled...They Didn’t Expel Us”; Lies about Israel, lies about Jews

From Ian:

IsraellyCool: 1948 Palestinian: “We Fled..They Didn’t Expel Us”

It is one of the claims of the Israel haters: Israel expelled the palestinians living here in 1948.
As renowned Israeli historian Benny Morris has noted, while there were expulsions (as can happen during wartime with a hostile population), many of the 700,000 Arab refugees were ordered or advised by their fellow Arabs to abandon their homes. There were also those who fled in fear.
Now Israel Social TV, a group otherwise known for once utilizing the services of one DouchebloggerTM (I assume his contract was not extended, because, well, he sucked) have come out with an anti-Israel video about “palestinian refugees” planning their return.

They are young Palestinian men and women, citizens of Israel. They have been meeting for three years, imagining and planning their return to their destroyed villages. Project “Udna” or “Return” in English, aims to pass on to the younger generation awareness of the Nakba and create actual models of return. Descendants of the displaced from al-Lajjun made a film about the expulsion from the village in ’48.
Do not bother watching it. Our own Zion Mike has isolated the only part you need to watch.
An admission by the elderly man that they fled in fear due to the “real war” going on, and his insistence about this despite the interviewer (his grandson) trying to get him to say they were expelled.
The truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

Palestinian recalls 1948 "They didn't expel us"

Intersectionality: Lies about Israel, lies about Jews

The trend for the BDS movement is to make demonization of Israel the center of the progressive universe through the theory of “intersectionality.”
Israel is placed at the center of all evil in the world, the unifying focus regardless of the issue:
This anti-Semitic use of “intersectionality” theory flourishes because a generation of students — many of whom now are faculty — have been schooled based on lies about the creation of Israel and the Arab refugees created in the civil war and invasion by Arab armies. In that false narrative, the Jews are wholly evil and the Arabs are wholly innocent.
Historian Benny Morris, who rose to fame by debunking some of the pro-Israel myths about the War of Independence, has also noted that the Arab rejection of Israel primarily was a religious rejection.
In this 2008 letter to the Irish Times, which I just saw when someone tweeted the link, Morris succinctly addresses not just the Arab responsibility for the Arab failure, but also how the lies about Israel are connected to the lies about Jews that have been spread for Millennia.
Read it. It’s a good 600-word rebuttal to the haters:
Israel and the Palestinians
Madam, – Israel-haters are fond of citing – and more often, mis-citing – my work in support of their arguments. Let me offer some corrections.
The Palestinian Arabs were not responsible “in some bizarre way” (David Norris, January 31st) for what befell them in 1948. Their responsibility was very direct and simple.
In defiance of the will of the international community, as embodied in the UN General Assembly Resolution of November 29th, 1947 (No. 181), they launched hostilities against the Jewish community in Palestine in the hope of aborting the emergence of the Jewish state and perhaps destroying that community. But they lost; and one of the results was the displacement of 700,000 of them from their homes.

Michael Lumish: On Obama's Fondness for Feeding Jews Dog Biscuits

Veiling Muslim attacks on Jews as something other than Muslim attacks on Jews protects the larger Muslim community from embarrassment. It does so at the expense of the tiny Jewish minority, but that is clearly not Obama's concern.
I would argue, in fact, that president Barack Obama is now openly mocking the American Jewish community. I am sorry, but it is pathetic. Not on his part, of course, but on ours. Obama has proven beyond any doubt that American Jews are an abused lap-dog owned by this administration.
Every once in awhile he tosses us a Milk-Bone and I find it shameful.
Obama knows what he is doing. His Department of State remembers the kerfuffle over the above remarks from last year as, I am sure, does the genius in the White House, himself. This year the dishonorable refusal to mention the Hypercacher attack as anti-Semitic is one of those little ways that the Obama administration enjoys tweaking Jewish noses. It also reveals zero interest in fighting racism toward American Jews, despite the fact that the American Jewish community is the most violently attacked of any religious community in the United States.
It is not even close:

On Tuesday, the first export of the season from Gaza farmers to the West Bank was sent through Israel.

Seven tons of strawberries were shipped via the Kerem Shalom crossing.

Gaza farmers accused Israel of delaying the shipment to protect their own sales of strawberries to the West Bank. Even so, an official from the Ministry of Agriculture in Gaza said that he expected between 300 and 400 tons of strawberries to be exported to the West bank this season, besides the tons that are exported to Europe.

At the same time, the Undersecretary of the Hamas Ministry of Agriculture Mohammed Jadallah said that the Gaza Strip had exported almost 13,000 tons of vegetables during the year 2015 to the West Bank, Israel and abroad.

Besides strawberries, Gaza farmers export tons of a cucumbers, tomatoes, eggplant, sweet peppers and zucchini.

Some Arab media have been claiming that Israel has been cutting cooking gas supplies in the middle of the winter to Gaza for the past month, gas which Gazans use to heat their homes.

Looking at the COGAT statistics for the past six weeks, there has been no reduction in cooking gas except for one week. Heating fuel imports have gone up in recent weeks.

A major reason for the shortage of cooking gas is because many Gazan taxi drivers have converted their cars to use that as fuel, so less gas is available for cooking.

Meanwhile, Israel is going to pump cooking gas into Gaza on Friday, when the Kerem Shalom crossing is normally closed, to help out Gazans.

Vic Rosenthal's weekly column:

When Israel built its security barrier back in 2003, the Palestinian Arabs and their supporters squealed like pigs. Despite numerous changes to its path to accommodate Arab complaints, some ordered by Israel’s Supreme Court, it became a cause célèbre for them, a symbol of alleged ‘apartheid’ and the focus of often violent demonstrations that continue to this day.

The reason is simple. The barrier stymied one of their best weapons, the suicide bombing. It’s often said that the Second Intifada was ended by Operation Defensive Shield, in which the IDF (despite the name) went on the offense against terrorist nests in places like Jenin and cleaned them out. But according to a member of the security forces who spent those dark months frantically racing from place to place to intercept human bombs before they could explode in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, the fence, while not impermeable, greatly reduced the number of possible entry points and made it much easier to stop them.

A similar situation exists today, as Israel moves to render one of our enemies’ most important ‘soft weapons’ impotent. I refer to the Transparency Law that is presently being considered in the Knesset to limit the ability of hostile foreign powers to conduct stealth delegitimization and demonization of Israel by funding Israeli non-governmental organizations. These NGOs, usually claiming to be ‘human rights’ groups, develop and disseminate tendentious data accusing Israel and the IDF of violations of international law and generally atrocious and ugly behavior.

For example, Breaking the Silence collects anecdotes from soldiers accusing the IDF of war crimes. But these stories often cannot be corroborated, are hearsay, exaggerated, or lack context. BTS refuses to give details to the IDF so they can be checked out and actual violations prosecuted. B’Tselem does the same with accusations that Israel violates the rights of Arabs in the territories, relying on one-sided testimony from Arabs and anti-Israel activists.

This material is then used as ‘evidence’ in dishonest legal proceedings against IDF soldiers and officers, and in UN reports and resolutions condemning Israel. It is used to turn popular opinion against her, so that the ‘international community’ and the US can pressure her for concessions to the Arabs and against muscular responses to terrorism and aggression. It is used as a justification for sanctions on Israel, such as the labeling of settlement products.

Every group that wants to attack Israel, from Students for Justice in Palestine to the Obama Administration, partakes of the false, exaggerated and context-free ‘facts’ created by these NGOs. In addition, the large anti-state community that is supported by this massive pot of foreign money is an internal political danger, and a challenge to Israel’s sovereignty.

Israel has only recently awakened to the damage that is being done to it on a daily basis. The dimensions of the enterprise are massive. Prof. Gerald Steinberg of NGO Monitor, which tracks foreign money in Israeli NGOs, notes that

…in the past fifteen years, a network of about 30 groups claiming to promote human rights and peace have received large grants from the European Union and individual governments. The scale of this funding, with annual budgets upwards of $1 million, as well as the extreme secrecy and impact, are unique; there are no parallels in relations between democracies. Although the EU has funded a few U.S.-based groups that oppose the death penalty, and there are some other isolated examples, Israeli NGOs are specifically and intentionally targeted. Imagine the response if Europe were to provide $2 billion--the per capita equivalent--to fringe American NGOs focusing on controversial issues, such as abortion or immigration. [my emphasis]

While the groups claim to be impartial, they almost entirely focus on alleged Israeli misbehavior toward Arabs and ignore violations of the human rights of Jews. Recently, grants to Breaking the Silence were made conditional on their finding a minimum number of cases of IDF misconduct. The NGOs are happy to give their bosses what they want.

This is big bucks, and nobody spends this kind of money for an extended period unless they believe they are getting something for it. And of course it is a meal ticket for the large group of activists that directly benefit from it.

So when Israel threatened to pass a law that will require NGOs that receive more than half of their funding from foreign governmental sources to document this fact on all material that they produce, the Israeli Left and their allies abroad went bonkers, pulling out all the stops in their attacks on the law. Here is one example at random, from journalist Mazal Muallem:

Since [Justice Minister Ayelet] Shaked wants to brand left-wing groups with a “mark of Cain” of sorts, a far more appropriate name for her proposed piece of populist legislation could be the “Selection Law,” a reference to the way Jews were marked to distinguish them from other Europeans during World War II in Nazi camps. The justice minister never even considered postponing her efforts to advance this provocative and divisive piece of legislation so that it would not coincide with the 20th anniversary of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin’s assassination on Nov. 4, 1995. Instead, she decided to fire it off like a poison dart, right at the heart of Israeli democracy.

Opponents of the law note that it only applies to funding from foreign governments, whereas right-wing groups receive funds primarily from private individuals like Sheldon Adelson. But other than Adelson’s ownership of the Israel Hayom newspaper and his generous contributions to Birthright Israel, both of which are matters of public record, there is very little right-wing money going for propaganda purposes in Israel. And note that the so-called ‘human rights’ industry receives plenty of private money itself in addition to its subsidies from hostile governments.

This law, which Muallem called “a McCarthy-style brutal, ugly and wild persecution that is reminiscent of regimes best forgotten,” does not prevent anyone from speaking their mind and does not punish anyone for doing so. The argument that it is “anti-democratic” is an inversion of reality: what is profoundly undemocratic is hidden foreign funding of organizations which try to influence opinion and policy in ways which are contrary to the general will of the citizens of a country.

It can be argued that Israel has actually been at war with much of the Muslim world since its founding in 1948, with periods of extreme violence interspersed with cold war, all against a background of terrorism such as the flareup we are now experiencing. Despite this, Israel has maintained a very permissive public culture, in which Israelis are permitted to say and write almost anything with impunity – numerous Ha’aretz writers call Israel an “apartheid state” and accuse it of genocide on a regular basis, and the authorities do not punish them or the newspaper in any way.

During its quiet times, Israel’s long-term war is reminiscent of the cold war between the US and the Soviet Union, in which proxy conflicts predominate, and in which the world’s nations take sides with the powers in conflict. Despite public statements to the contrary, it’s clear that the European Union and many of its members are firmly on the anti-Israel side.

The Israelis who have chosen to become paid agents of foreign powers on the other side of the conflict are skating very close to treason, usually defined as “aiding the enemy in time of war.” It is a testament to Israel’s commitment to an open society that they are not treated as traitors, and now may merely be required to tell whose payrolls they are on. Benedict Arnold, Guy Fawkes and Vidkun Quisling would have welcomed such an opportunity!

The NGOs have called upon all of their friends abroad to help fight the ‘menace’ of transparency. Even the Obama Administration has stepped in, with US Ambassador Dan Shapiro meeting with Justice Minister Shaked and expressing his administration’s concern that the law would impact “free expression and peaceful dissent.” Shaked responded that she appreciated his concern, but as Israel’s democracy is in fine shape, there is “no need for other nations to intervene in internal legislation” (she might have added “…like you tried to intervene in our last election”).

Along with the big gun, some others (Mao would have called them ‘running dogs’) close to the administration have chimed in. For example, the Union for Reform Judaism, the Anti-Defamation League and the American Jewish Congress have all opposed it, using similar – and equally unpersuasive – language.

Possibly an indication of how important this issue is to the EU is the fact that B’Tselem received a 30,000 Euro grant from a group associated with it, specifically to fight the law in Israel.

It’s not surprising that the recipients of tens of millions of Euros every year are upset about anything that might threaten their gigs. Indeed, if it were possible to somehow stop the flow – which the proposed law unfortunately does not do – the government would have to create a new poverty program for the legions of activists, some of whom have never held actual jobs, who would become unemployed.

The ‘soft weapon’ of NGO money is wounding Israel no less than the suicide bombings of the Second Intifada. Like the security fence that stopped terrorist infiltration, we can build a legal fence against it. The squeals of those feeding at the trough of EU money must be ignored, and the Transparency Law passed by the Knesset.

01/14 Links Pt1: Ramadi, Gaza, and Western Hypocrisy; PA TV: “The Jews killed Arafat”

From Ian:

Ramadi, Gaza, and Western Hypocrisy

During the Hamas-Israel war of 2014, both Obama Administration officials and their European counterparts repeatedly accused Israel of excessive force over the “massive” destruction of civilian property in Gaza. But if those officials retain even a shred of intellectual integrity, the recent devastation of Ramadi during a joint Western/Iraqi effort to retake the city leaves them only two options: either hand themselves over to the International Criminal Court as suspected war criminals, or publicly apologize to Israel for all the slurs they hurled at it over far less extensive damage.
As the New York Times reported last week, the successful recapture of Ramadi from the Islamic State left the city “in ruins.” Reporter Ben Hubbard described one neighborhood as “a panorama of wreckage so vast that it was unclear where the original buildings had stood.” The city has no electricity or running water, and “Many streets had been erased or remained covered in rubble or blocked by trenches used in the fighting.” When Hubbard asked an Iraqi officer how residents would return to their homes, the officer replied, “Homes? There are no homes.”
Indeed, a different Iraqi officer told the Associated Press “that more than half of the city’s buildings have been destroyed, including government offices, markets, and houses.”
This is devastation orders of magnitude greater than what Gaza suffered. According to UN figures, 9,465 homes in Gaza were completely destroyed and another 9,644 badly damaged, out of a total of roughly 319,000 (the latter figure is my own calculation based on official Palestinian statistics: Dividing Gaza’s total population of 1.82 million by its average household size of 5.7 people gives you 319,000 households). Thus even according to the UN – which traditionally exaggerates Palestinian casualties and damage – only about 6 percent of Gaza’s homes were destroyed or badly damaged. That’s a far cry from “more than half of the city” in Ramadi. (h/t Dave4321)

PMW: Palestinian girl’s hate speech: “The Jews killed Arafat”

A young Palestinian girl expressed her belief that “the Jews killed Arafat” last week on the official Palestinian Authority TV children’s program Children’s Talk. Her father had taught her that “Arafat wanted to fight in order to free Palestine, and suddenly the Jews killed him and he died as a Martyr,” she said. The TV host immediately confirmed this to be true:
Official PA TV host: “What do you know about Yasser Arafat? You were not born yet when he died as a Martyr (Shahid). Did your father tell you a lot about him?
Girl: “Yes.”
Official PA TV host: “Very nice. What did he tell you about him?
Girl: “Yasser Arafat wanted to fight in order to free Palestine, and suddenly the Jews killed him and he died as a Martyr.”
Official PA TV host: “My dear, may Allah have mercy on his soul and on the souls of all our Martyrs. It is happening at the moment to all of our Martyrs. But he [Arafat] was the leader and the symbol... Yasser Arafat is a legend, a special man. His wish was to die as a Martyr, and he did indeed die as a Martyr. However, when the occupation understood that he would not give up on his great dream, which was the liberation of Palestine, unfortunately they killed him.” [Official PA TV, Jan. 8, 2016]
For years, the PA has been reiterating the PA libel that Israel murdered Arafat. Some versions of this libel have even implicated the US, claiming that Israel conspired with the US to kill Arafat, or that the US gave its approval of the plan. However, in March 2015, three French judges ruled that "it has not been demonstrated that Mr. Yasser Arafat was murdered by polonium-210 poisoning." The French prosecutor stated that there was "not sufficient evidence of an intervention by a third party who could have attempted to take his life." [France 24, Sept. 2, 2015] The French prosecutor also explained that the polonium and lead found in Arafat’s grave were “of an environmental nature.” [Jerusalem Post, March 17, 2015] Despite these results denying any poisoning, the PA continues to blame Israel for Arafat’s death without any proof or backing for this claim.

PMW: PA doublespeak - To Europeans: Judaism is honorable, to Palestinians: There is a falsified Biblical base to their path of blood

Speaking at the Greek Parliament in December 2015, PA Chairman Abbas proclaimed the Palestinians' respect for Judaism and Jews:
"We are neighbors and we will be friends in the future... we are absolutely not against the Jewish religion... The Jewish religion is an honorable religion and we all honor it, appreciate it and recognize its sanctity." [Official PA TV, Dec. 22, 2015]
However, when his PA TV addresses its Palestinian audience, Jews are the evil slayers of prophets, and the religion is "falsified." Palestinian Media Watch often has documented the Antisemitic hate speech on official PA TV, even to children, that would never be spoken to a European audience.
In one of his weekly broadcasts, PA TV host Imad Hamato, a preacher of Islam and professor of Quranic Studies at the University of Palestine in Gaza, explained that the Antisemitic forgery The Protocols of the Elders of Zion is an authentic Jewish plan and that it is being carried out by Israel right now.

PA TV host: The Protocols of the Elders of Zion is authentic Jewish plan

In June 2014, Al Monitor reported:

Those attending the funeral of Palestinian resistance member Nizar Issa, who was killed during an explosion at a resistance training center in the northern Gaza Strip on May 25, were surprised when Hisham Salem, a well-known figure in Gaza, declared the start of a new resistance movement in Palestine and proclaimed Issa as the first martyr in the ranks of this movement.

The new movement is called “Al-Sabirin [The Patient] for the Victory of Palestine,” or “Hosn” by its Arabic acronym. Its flag looks a lot like that of Lebanon's Hezbollah in form and color — the reason why Salem’s local opponents accused him of promoting a Shiite current — which raises significant concerns for Palestinians about an outbreak of sectarian strife in the Gaza Strip and turning Gaza into a second Iraq.

An article in Foreign Affairs last September adds some color:

After splitting from the PIJ, Salem and his followers' first move was to establish a charity named al Baqiyat al Salihat ("the enduring good deeds"); by spring 2014, they proclaimed the birth of the al Sabirin movement. It is not clear at this point how many members have joined the new militia and how militarily active it is.

Rumors among Islamist circles in Gaza claim that Salem receives an annual budget of $10 million from Iran, typically smuggled in suitcases through the tunnels along the border with Egypt. Al Sabirin allegedly distributes a portion of these funds to families of Palestinian prisoners in Israel. And it has spent relatively significant sums to commemorate, through a documentary, one of its members, Musaab al-Kheir Salah Sakkafi, whom they consider a martyr. He was killed during Israel's Protective Edge operation in July 2014 after a rocket he was trying to fire into Israel exploded during launch.

While al-Sabirin has had a rocky start in Gaza, it apparently has started its militant operations, as reported last month:

The Al-Sabirin movement took responsibility Friday for detonating an explosive device two days earlier that targeted an Israeli army patrol near Khan Younis, along Israel’s border with the southern Gaza Strip.

The movement, a Palestinian Shiite group funded by Iran and given protection by Gaza’s Hamas rulers, has in the recent past also taken responsibility for two other attacks against Israeli troops.

Now, there are reports that the Iranian proxy group is beginning operations in the West Bank.
Leader Hisham Salem says that his group has recruited members in the West Bank which he intends to provide with military and financial support, claiming to want unity among all Palestinian factions.

This is all very believable. Iran's Supreme Leader has explicitly called for an armed uprising in the West Bank, even before the current knife and car ramming attacks:

I announced and it will absolutely happen that, just like #Gaza, the #WestBank must also be armed to be ready for defense. 11/25/04
— Khamenei.ir (@khamenei_ir) September 17, 2015

Al-Sabirin seems to be using the time-honored Islamist model of starting off by creating charities and using them as a front to bring money in for weapons.

While there will be resistance among the Sunni-dominated Palestinian Arabs, a well-funded Iranian proxy can easily attract members and weapons. Given that Iran has been reportedly withholding funds from Hamas and possibly Islamic Jihad, forcing those groups to cut salaries and operations, would-be terrorists will be attracted to a group that can pay them.

We are doing everything we can to fight for Israel with hard work, research and - above all - the truth. I could sure use your help.Please donate today.If you have other skills you can volunteer for EoZ, send an email to volunteer@elderofziyon.com

BtS spokesperson's lies refuted by his former army-mates

Avner Gvaryahu is the public face of Breaking the Silence, writing articles in Western media about how immoral the Israeli army is, and relating it to his own army experiences.

Now his fellow soldiers wrote a letter saying that he is full of it.

From My Truth:

Hey Avner,

It’s us, your friends from the army, from the Orev unit. We have also decided to break our silence. Want to stop reading? Don’t.
We were there no less than he was, and now the time has come for you to hear our truth also.

He shouts in every possible forum that he needs to be heard, now the time has come that he listen to us, too. We were ready to take a bullet for him once, we were with him there on the missions that he speaks of (in which we saved many lives and prevented countless terror attacks in the heart of Israel). In fact, when he says that war crimes were committed, he’s referring to each and every one of us. In every court case both sides are heard, no?

Let’s start. This post is written together by many members of the unit. Avner served together with us in the "Orev" Paratroopers (Anti-tank) unit from November 2004 until March 2007. Some of us served in the same crew, others in a parallel crew or in the unit at the same time. We decided to describe part of his testimonies which accuse us of things which never happened, or which were utterly distorted and whose connection to reality is totally coincidental, and each testimony needs to be told truthfully. To prove that you don’t have a sister is not an easy task, so be patient, you too Avner, give the minimum of respect and read until the end.

Before we begin to try to restore our name, we have one personal question for you: If we did all that you describe, you were a part of it; you were the March 2006 sniper team sergeant (by the way, this team by definition didn’t do arrests, refer to your own testimony, No. 58601 from 2011, in which you described other things), commander! What was done was your responsibility; so why did you run from responsibility? You turned a blind eye! You led soldiers behind you; don’t say that you received orders – you gave them! If there was truth in your words, then today you should be the one facing trial.

Let’s start from the last ones, the ones from the patrol in Hebron:

You claimed that there was a position with a “machine gun” which kills with a radius of 50 meters(!) and the operator would play a kind of video game and shoot innocent people and cars, and more than this, you claimed that there would be screams of encouragement on the radio, and so he would shoot.

We were in Hebron as a team of recruits who hadn’t yet finished training, for a period of about two weeks. Which machine guns did we use? With a killing radius of precisely 50 meters? Even a grenade launcher doesn’t kill at that kind of radius. Did you even fire so much as a single live bullet anywhere other than in the direction of a cardboard target in the course of your training? We didn’t. Since when are there cries of “come on, come on, shoot!” on the radio? The normal command on the radio is that “fire is permitted”. Nobody screams at anyone, and nobody permits live fire in the direction of innocent civilians or random vehicles.

You spoke about a big football game which occurs every four years (you meant the World Cup final?) and the soldiers are frustrated that they cannot see the game, so they enter a house with a satellite dish, tie up the people there, and sit down to watch the football game (at the time of training, remember?). The only World Cup final which took place while were in the army was in 2006 in June/July – just before the beginning of the Second Lebanon War. We performed a military mission in the Nablus area and from there we proceeded northwards. We weren’t in the Hebron area at all; we were 120km away from there, in fact. In Nablus nobody went into any houses to see a football game or selected a house because of its satellite dish.

On one thing you do speak the truth, and as usual, the rest is devoid of context and distorted. The team from the unit was indeed on a mission at the time of the World Cup final. As with every mission undertaken in the unit, the house was selected according to operational parameters alone, by officers who we were blessed to be under their command. You worked closely with them, Avner, so you certainly know this. And yes, in every house like this of ‘uninvolved people’, there is indeed a family (for the most part) whose routine is disturbed. But we can attest to the fact that when we were forced to do this, dozens, perhaps hundreds, of times all of us always extended as courteous as possible an attitude to the family, while keeping in mind the operational target for which we were sent out on the mission.

The protocol for houses of ‘uninvolved people’ was that the occupants of the house would be required to go into one room, and they would generally go to sleep there while one soldier stands guard outside the room. In the case above, since the mission was longer than usual, the family watched the game in their lounge. Needless to say, nobody was tied up. Nobody is ever tied up unless they are arrested. So it’s true, the soldier who watched over the family also glanced at the television which was already on. We won’t deny this. But it’s a far cry from the picture you tried to paint of a unit of sadistic soldiers whose first interest is to mistreat the civilian population.

You present us as a barbaric bunch who kill people who are only holding a cell phone.

To remind you: In every single company discussion the general protocols for opening fire, the protocol was mentioned in the unit, and it was that before opening fire, it’s vital to verify that it’s known which weapon the suspect is carrying in hand, whether it’s a Kalashnikov, a (burning) Molotov cocktail, or an M16, and if we are unable to say which weapon he’s holding, then apparently we’re not sure that it’s a weapon at all, and we don’t fire. Should we remind you about the hospital in Jenin? From where they shot at us almost every time we passed by, including from a PK sub-machine gun, and the commands were to not return fire, and so it was.

Can you give the name of your friend who shot indiscriminately?

You tarnish the name of the unit and make claims about a lack of values in a place where if a soldier so much as sat down on a bed in the parents’ room in a house in Jenin, he would be sentenced to court martial by the unit commander for disrespect of property, and his punishment would be a month on base. These were the values, from first day of training, of the soldiers who fought with you.

[Our] War isn’t an ideal but a necessity, exceptional cases such as they are do not represent the education or the values of your friends in the unit specifically or of Israeli soldiers in general.

This biased and one-sided show which you presented in front of the UN creates a false image which fuels hatred of Israel around the world and doesn’t contribute in any way to making the army “more moral”.

Furthermore, it doesn’t match the ten commandments which the organization you represent is based upon, and more’s the pity.

We demand you to immediately cease bearing false witness about your military service and to stop demonizing your friends in the unit and crew who gave their all, and continue to give their all, in order to safeguard the security of the people of Israel.

-Members of the Paratrooper Orev unit

Here's the full video with English subtitles exposing Ezra Nawi and his underhanded methods:

The true face of Israel's radical "human rights" activists - U...
Posted by Ad Kan on Wednesday, January 13, 2016

Breaking the Silence activists were documented in the act of passing cash to Ezra Nawi, the person who organizes provocations against Israeli soldiers (that Breaking the Silence then uses as fodder.)

Breaking the Silence: Are you funding Ezra Nawi's provocations?
Posted by My Truth on Wednesday, January 13, 2016

And Arutz-7 synopsized a report from Yediot:

More details emerged Tuesday morning regarding a secret recording of a meeting between ex-diplomat Alon Liel and about five central activists in Breaking the Silence, a group that besmirches the IDF abroad. The meeting took place in the Tel Aviv offices of Breaking the Silence – which receives funding from the New Israel Fund, among other sources – on December 17, 2015, and was recorded by a "secret agent" from nationalist group Ad Kan.

According to Yifat Erlich of Yediot Aharonot, who saw the entire recording, Nadav Weiman, Breaking the Silence's coordinator of activists, started the conversation by explaining that the group has been coming under fire for attacking Israel abroad, and describing a feeling that matters were spinning "out of control."

He described Liel as "a good friend of the organization who has been accompanying us from the outset."

Liel told the group that "international activity is critical." One reason, he said, is that the Left has lost the battle for Israeli public opinion.

"I receive terrible ricochets from the Israeli public," he continued. "I am threatened. All of my friends are threatened. I believe that only the international community can change public opinion, as happened in South Africa."

One of the activists asked Liel if the group's legitimacy does not depend on the Israeli public.

Liel replied: "What legitimacy do you have? You have a two percent legitimacy, you see. But what two percent? The most moral people, the brightest ones, who can see 20 years ahead, who are not brainwashed by the messianic right-wing propaganda. Only people who do not depend on anyone. I can guarantee you that [ex-Shabak head Yuval] Diskin and [MK Yaakov] Perry think the same way. [But Yesh Atid head] Yair Lapid has come out against you, so Perry knows that if he says a word, he will be booted from the Knesset list."

This is exactly how J-Street thinks. Screw what the Israeli public wants, because we know better and we need to use outsiders to pressure Israel since we dislike their democratic processes. (But when Israeli point out how these left-wing groups are trying to hide their agenda, well, that's "anti-democratic."

(h/t Yoel, Emanuel Miller)

01/13 Links Pt2: When Anti-Semites Use Jews to Further Their Cause; Students Fail Israel IQ Test

From Ian:

PMW: PMW report on PA Antisemitism in 2015 released in European Parliament

PMW has prepared a special report about Palestinian Antisemitism in 2015. PMW director Itamar Marcus is releasing it today at a conference in European Parliament.
The report documents that the Palestinian Authority continued to emit overtly Antisemitic messages throughout 2015, portraying Jews as inherently evil, comparing them to apes and pigs, and depicting them as a threat to all humanity. The PA has also continued to lend credence to the Antisemitic forgery Protocols of the Elders of Zion, which claims that Jews conspire to take over the entire world.
View the report in PDF or read it below:

Penn State Students Fail Israel IQ Test

Lions 4 Israel, a Penn State University Jewish student group, created a woman-on-the-street-style video in which random Penn State students were asked a few questions about which country in the Middle East is the only democracy, provides full rights to women and LGBT citizens, and is a major player in the high-tech world.
Needless to say, the students' wild guesses are further evidence that our institutions of higher learning are doing the job they've set out to do: keep our youth ignorant and indoctrinated.
In response to "In what country are LGBT citizens guaranteed full rights?" one student actually guessed Afghanistan.

Israel IQ at Penn State

Dershowitz: I Need Armed Guards When I Speak in Favor of Israel on Campuses

Attorney and Harvard Law Professor Alan Dershowitz appeared on Fox & Friends to speak about free speech on campus and explained that he need armed guards when he speaks about Israel at universities.
Explained Dershowitz:
“In fact when I was first teaching in the ’50s there were attempts to censor speech by Senator McCarthy,” Dershowitz said. “The right-wing was trying to censor left-wing speech. Now it’s the hard left that’s trying to censor right-wing speech, conservative speech, Christian speech, pro-Israel speech, you name it. And this idea of safe spaces we have to distinguish between safe spaces for ideas, there should be none, and physically safe places where you’re not intimidated or you’re not threatened. And Christian speakers, pro-Israel speakers, speakers that are not politically correct today, have their physical safety endangered. I know when I speak on college campuses in favor of Israel, I need armed guards protecting me from radical leftist students who would use physical intimidation. They won’t give me a safe space. They won’t give pro-Israel students a safe space, they won’t give Christian students a safe space. For example, when a group of Christians who were against abortion said all lives matter, and you know, you may agree or disagree with that formulation, they were attacked. They were told to be subject to training, and sensitivity, and the president of Smith College had to apologize for using that term.”

Yiddish on prime time TV

JTA reports:

If the ratings for CW’s newest show, “Crazy Ex-Girlfriend,” are any indication, you probably aren’t watching it. If not, you’re missing out.

Now that creator and star Rachel Bloom is nominated for a Golden Globe for best actress in a TV series — fingers crossed for her on Sunday! — it’s time to tune in. “Crazy Ex-Girlfriend” is hilarious and zany, and as it happens, it addresses Jewish identity in unexpectedly profound ways.

On “Crazy Ex-Girlfriend,” Judaism is more than just a punchline — though it’s certainly that, too. This was apparent during the midseason finale, which begins on a boat from Europe to America in 1901.

“I know we are fleeing,” a mother tells her daughter, “but you couldn’t comb your hair?”

Jewish daughters will probably laugh in recognition. But what’s significant here is that the entire scene is in Yiddish. A sprinkling of Yiddish phrases may be heard on television here and there, but name another mainstream show that’s had an entire scene in the language.

Rachel Bloom actually won the Golden Globe.

I've watched a couple of episodes and it looks like a very funny show (although the humor too racy for nice Jewish families.)

But I had to find the Yiddish scene that JTA mentioned: (This only seems to work in some browsers.)

The accents are quite good.

At the same time, something interesting happened on Israeli TV, also in a scene of Yiddish speakers.

Alon Zingman, the director of “Shtisel” — the engaging and award-winning YES television show about the intertwined lives of a Haredi family in Jerusalem’s Geula neighborhood — knew he had reached a particular pinnacle of success after the ninth episode aired on a recent Saturday night.

In that particular episode, Grandma Malka (Hannah Rieber), while casually knitting a reel of brown cassette tape, hummed what she called Nigun Minsk, a wordless tune composed by Rebbe Cohen, her great-grandfather, as her eldest son, Shulem (Doval’e Glickman), stood in the doorway, staring quizzically at her.

Two nights later, the nigun, which was actually composed by Shtisel writer Uri Alon, was performed at an ultra-Orthodox wedding by a band of yeshiva students, Zingman. It even showed up on a YouTube clip.

“We made it up!” he said, gleeful at the notion that the ultra-Orthodox community would possibly adopt a tune created for a television show. “How would they even know about something on TV? It’s a badge of honor that they watch it.”