Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Monday, March 21, 2016

Will Congress restrict funding the PA for its ICC actions?

Palestinians met Saturday with representatives of the International Criminal Court to brief them on the details of claims filed against Israel at the court which they hope will lead to the opening of formal cases and investigations of Israeli officials, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

The Palestinians provided the ICC team with data and aerial photographs of settlement activity and how it effects their lives, Haaretz reported on Sunday citing the Jordanian newspaper Al-Ghad.

This is interesting, because the FY 2016 Omnibus – State and Foreign Operations Appropriations description says:

The bill stops economic assistance to the PA if they obtain membership in the United Nations or UN agencies without an agreement with Israel, restricts aid if the PA pursues actions against Israel at the International Criminal Court, prohibits funds for Hamas, and halts funds unless action is taken to counter the incitement of violence.

It seems pretty clear cut that Congress must restrict funding the PA. (The wording from the FY2015 bill seems to have been changed to get around a tortured loophole that the White House used to keep funding going after the PA's move to accept ICC jurisdiction in retroactive to the events prior to the 2014 Gaza war.)

There is one other loophole, though, that the Palestinian leaders may be relying on. If Congress only limits a token amount of funding to them, it could be argued that funding was "restricted." Knowing that the current administration is unlikely to support any real restrictions on funding, this might very well be part of their calculus.

(h/t EK)

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03/21 Links Pt1: The International Community Justifies, Funds Palestinian Terrorism; Erdoğan is paying the price

From Ian:

Ben-Dror Yemini: Erdoğan is paying the price

The Islamist trend led by President Erdoğan has succeeded above and beyond. Maybe even a bit more than it appeared. The Turkish regime tried to claim that the Kurdish resistance (the PKK) was behind the terrorist attacks. The truth has been revealed. It was jihad. In fact, this isn't surprising.
Because the states that tolerate terrorism the most are the states with the highest concentration of supporters of radical Islam, Wahhabism and Salafism. It's happening in Pakistan, in Afghanistan, in Somalia, in Nigeria and in Libya. The fact that Muslim states and Muslims are the principle victims doesn't deter terrorism's supporters. They commit suicide inside of mosques in Nigeria just like in Pakistan. They're not Sunnis against Shiites. They're Sunnis against Sunnis.
One could argue that terrorism is a result of changes in alliances, and maybe even the cessation of Turkish support for ISIS. This is not exactly correct. Because terrorism flourishes wherever radicalization grows.
On Saturday, terrorism tried to wound Turkey and Turks. Israelis apparently were injured unintentionally. Erdoğan is leading Turkey to Islamization. Turkey is paying the price. There's no paradox here. To the contrary: this is the obvious result. Almost predictable. So Erdoğan has only himself to blame.

Daniel Pipes: Turkey's Erdoğan Gambles and Loses

Erdoğan's error of backing ISIS and other Sunni Islamist organizations in Syria has hurt him in another way, leading to a massive influx of Syrian refugees to Turkey, where, increasingly unwelcomed by the indigenous population, they cause new social and economic strains.
Which brings us to Erdoğan's latest gambit. The many Syrian refugees wanting to go on to northwestern Europe provide him with a handy mechanism to blackmail the European Union: pay me huge amounts of money (€6 billion at latest count) and permit 80 million Turks to travel visa-free to your countries, or I will dump more unwelcome Syrians, Iraqis, Afghans, Somalis, et al. on you.
So far, the ploy has worked. Led by Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel, the Europeans are succumbing to Erdoğan's demands. But this may well be a Pyrrhic victory, hurting Erdoğan's long-term interests. In the first place, forcing Europeans to pretend they are not being blackmailed and to welcome Turkey with clenched teeth, creates a foul mood, further reducing, if not killing off, Turkish chances for membership.
Second, Erdoğan's game has prompted a profound and probably lasting shift in mood in Europe against accepting more immigrants from the Middle East – including Turks – as demonstrated by the poor showing of Merkel's party in elections earlier this month.
This is just the start. In combination, these errors by Erdoğan point to more crises ahead. Gökhan Bacik, a professor at Ipek University in Ankara, notes that "Turkey is facing a multifaceted catastrophe," the scale of which "is beyond Turkey's capacity for digestion." If Iran is today the Middle East's greatest danger, Turkey is tomorrow's.

JPost Editorial: Terror in Istanbul

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu voiced doubt that the horrific suicide attack in Istanbul on Saturday was directed at Israelis, although it took a heavy toll: Three of the four dead were Israelis – Yonatan Suher, 40, Simcha Damri, 60, and Avraham Goldman, 69. Suher and Goldman also held American citizenship. The fourth fatality was an unnamed Iranian citizen. Half of the 22 wounded were Israelis, and Israel dispatched planes to fly those who could travel home.
Damri, a retired kindergarten teacher from Dimona, was in Istanbul with her husband, Avi, taking part in a culinary tour along with other Israelis. She is also survived by three sons (two of whom flew to Istanbul to be with their father) and a daughter.
Suher had been on vacation with his wife, Inbal, to celebrate his 40th birthday. He is survived by Inbal, who was wounded in the attack, and their two children.
Goldman, who lived in Ramat Hasharon, worked as a tour guide, mostly taking important visitors around Jerusalem.
He is survived by his wife, Nitza, three children, and eight grandchildren.

From Ma'an:

Hundreds of Christian Palestinians from the Gaza Strip will travel to celebrate Easter in Bethlehem and occupied East Jerusalem after the Israeli authorities agreed to grant them permits, a Palestinian Authority official said Saturday.

Muhammad al-Maqadma, a public information officer for the Palestinian Ministry of Civil Affairs, told Ma’an that Israel had granted around 850 permits to Gaza Christians of different ages to travel to the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem.

Al-Maqadma said the permits were the result of “dedicated efforts” by Minister of Civil Affairs Hussein al-Sheikh in order to enable hundreds of Christians to celebrate the holidays within a span of 45 days.

This is the first time such a large number of Christians from Gaza received permits to travel to the West Bank and Jerusalem, al-Maqadma added.

Ma'an Arabic adds that the permits include Christians aged 16 to 35, which has not happened before.

This happens after Israel revoked permits for Muslim Gazans to go to Jerusalem every Friday, saying that many of them never returned to Gaza and thereby violated agreements that allowed them to go in the first place.

It shows that even after such a violation, Israel keeps trying to accommodate the legitimate needs of Palestinians while protecting its own security. And too often, these accommodations end up being big mistakes.

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The LA Times reported last week:

University of California officials are proposing to include "anti-Zionism" as a form of discrimination that is unacceptable on campus, according to a long-awaited draft statement on intolerance released Tuesday.

The inclusion immediately drew sharply divergent reactions, with pro-Israel groups hailing it as a needed step to protect Jewish students from hostility and those supporting Palestinian rights criticizing it as a naked attempt to suppress criticism of the Jewish state.

Scholars were similarly divided over whether a statement meant to express the UC regents' principles against intolerance should include Zionism -- historically an international movement to establish a Jewish homeland and now viewed as the belief in Israel's right to exist.

One letter signed by more than 130 UC faculty members supported naming anti-Zionism as an expression of anti-Semitism, saying students need guidance on "when healthy political debate crosses the line into anti-Jewish hatred, bigotry and discrimination, and when legitimate criticism of Israel devolves into denying Israel's right to exist."

But another letter from more than 250 UC professors expressed fear that the proposed statement would restrict free speech and academic freedom to teach, debate and research about the complex and tumultuous history of Israel and the Zionist movement.

Eugene Volokh, a strong supporter of Israel who is a law professor at UCLA and someone I admire a great deal, wrote an op-ed in the Washington Post against the proposed language of the guidelines:

But I think the regents are flat wrong to say that “anti-Zionism” has “no place at the University of California.” Even though they’re not outright banning anti-Zionist speech, but rather trying to sharply condemn it, I think such statements by the regents chill debate, especially by university employees and students who (unlike me) lack tenure. (For more on that, see here.) And this debate must remain free, regardless of what the regents or I think is the right position in the debate.

Whether the Jewish people should have an independent state in Israel is a perfectly legitimate question to discuss — just as it’s perfectly legitimate to discuss whether Basques, Kurds, Taiwanese, Tibetans, Northern Cypriots, Flemish Belgians, Walloon Belgians, Faroese, Northern Italians, Kosovars, Abkhazians, South Ossetians, Transnistrians, Chechens, Catalonians, Eastern Ukranians and so on should have a right to have independent states.

Sometimes the answer might be “yes.” Sometimes it might be “no.” Sometimes the answer might be “it depends.” But there’s no uncontroversial principle on which these questions can be decided. They have to be constantly up for inquiry and debate, especially in places that are set up for inquiry and debate: universities. Whether Israel is entitled to exist as an independent Jewish state is just as fitting a subject for discussion as whether Kosovo or Northern Cyprus or Kurdistan or Taiwan or Tibet or a Basque nation should exist as an independent state for those ethnic groups.

I am a strong supporter of free speech. I am certainly sympathetic to Volokh's arguments. But there is a fundamental difference between how anti-Zionist rhetoric is espoused and how any of the other issues Volokh lists are discussed.

And the difference is hate.

Nearly all anti-Zionist discourse, on campus and off, is based on an irrational hate of the Jewish state. The pseudo-logical arguments that follow are not meant to be sober reflections on whether the idea of Zionism is a valid expression of nationalism for the Jewish people, but as elaborate cover for the hate that animates the discussion.

There is no violence on campus associated with pro-Tibet or pro-Kurdish political activity. There are no death threats, no cursing, no intimidation.

Yes, in theory there is no difference between the idea of Jewish nationalism and Basque nationalism, and in theory there shouldn't be any restrictions on speech about both. But the number of examples of how anti-Zionist discourse on campus is merely a convenient cover for pure hate cannot be ignored.

As UC specifically, here are some examples from the current school year, courtesy of AMCHA:

2015 – 2016
• A Jewish member of the UC Santa Cruz student government was warned to “abstain” from voting on an anti-Israel divestment resolution because of his presumed “Jewish agenda.”

• In responding to a pro-Israel post by actress Mayim Bialik, a UCLA student and employee posted vile anti-Semitic comments on social media including, “Fucking Jews. GTFOH with all your Zionist bullshit. Crazy ass fucking troglodyte albino monsters of cultural destruction. Fucking Jews. GTFOH with your whiny bullshit. Give the Palestinians back their land, go back to Poland or whatever freezer-state you’re from, and realize that faith does not constitute race.”

• The online promotion of an anti-Israel UC Berkeley SJP event stated, “No to University Coordination and Strategizing with the ADL, JCRC, AJC, StandWithUS, ZOA...” The targeting of Jewish organizations, the Anti-Defamation League, the Jewish Community Relations Council and the American Jewish Committee, demonstrates how anti-Israel student groups target and alienate all Jewish groups.  

• A male member of SJP at UC San Diego recognized a fellow female Jewish student and followed and harassed her. The female student reported, “They followed me...calling my name...yelling that I was a ‘racist Zionist cow.’ I have never felt so unsafe in my life...I didn’t know anyone would...put me in danger...This problem is way more serious than I had imagined.”  

2014 – 2015
• At UC Davis, swastikas were spray-painted on a Jewish fraternity days after fraternity brothers spoke against divesting from Israel.

• At UC Berkeley, “Zionists should be sent to the gas chamber” was scrawled on a bathroom wall in the wake of a student senate campaign to pressure the university to divest from American companies that do business with Israel.

• At UCLA, “Hitler did nothing wrong” was carved into school property after a contentious BDS campaign.

• At UC Davis, “grout out the Jews” was scrawled on the university’s Hillel House following a heated BDS debate.  

• At UC Santa Barbara, stereotypical and demonizing statements of Jews were made during a divestment resolution vote. One student explained, "I am disgusted by the normalization of anti-Semitic language so casually thrown around at the [divestment] meeting. In those eight hours, I was told that Jews control the government, that all Jews are rich, that Zionism is racism, that the marginalization of Jewish students is justified because it prevents the marginalization of other minority groups.”  

• At UC Santa Barbara, flyers blaming Israelis and all Jews for 9/11 were posted on campus.  

• At UCLA, a Jewish student running for office was questioned about her eligibility by anti-Israel activists simply because of her religion.  

• At UCLA, campus activists led a pledge drive to keep Jewish students known to support Israel from serving on the student government.  

This is not free speech. This is hate speech, and it is all prompted by supposedly noble anti-Zionist goals that are used for cover.

Any time that anti-Israel activity crosses the line into hate - not necessarily antisemitic hate, but hate altogether - it should be regarded to be as offensive as any other hate speech against any other group. The hate of Zionist positions is no less reprehensible than hate against blacks or gays on campus, and must be treated the same.

If pro-Tibetan activists were being followed, harassed and cursed routinely as they went about their day on campus, and anti-Tibetan graffiti were scrawled on areas where they gather, I don't think anyone would object to the idea that they are victims of hate. However, nowadays there is only one group that is being subject to hate for their political beliefs, and those are the people who openly support the State of Israel. The hate is no less odious.

There are two other differences between anti-Israel hate speech and valid political discourse about the idea of realizing other groups' nationalist ambitions. One, which Volokh mentions, is that Israel already exists - alone among all nations it is criticized for its very being. The very nature of the "discussion" is dismantling of one state among all the nations on Earth. Valid criticism of Israel is legitimate, saying that it is uniquely evil and must be destroyed shows that the motivation is not justice but hate.

Finally, evidence that the anti-Israel forces are motivated by hate and not legitimate criticism comes from how they treat pro-Israel speech on campus. Instead of engaging in debate or allowing a multiplicity of views, they do everything they can to shut down any free speech rights of Zionists. Speakers are shouted down and even threatened, and students who want to hear them are harassed.

It is their intolerance that makes them intolerable.

Where to draw the line between hate speech and valid political criticism is always going to be an issue. But theory is one thing, and facts are another. If campuses are going to protect students from irrational hate then there is no difference between the hate associated with anti-Zionism and any other hate.

One may be able to design a reasonable sounding argument to support a return to slavery, but everyone understands that the most soaring pro-slavery rhetoric is just a cover for racist hate. The fact that there is a theoretical way to express anti-Zionist opinions without crossing over into hate speech is wonderful, but it isn't the reality and it cannot be used to support the continuous hate that Zionist Jews experience on campus under the cover of free speech.

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Iranian media silent on Israeli victims of Istanbul suicide bombing

Three Israelis and one Iranian were killed by the suicide bomber in Istanbul on Saturday.

Iranian English-language media have been covering the story closely, but based on coverage in state-run PressTV and IRNA, not one article has mentioned that Israelis were victims.

I see six articles in IRNA English and at least five more in PressTV that discuss the terror attack.

The idea that Israelis could be terror victims is anathema to Iran, which styles itself as a major player fighting terrorism. Which is funny for a major world power behind terrorism.

Now, Turkish media is reporting that the Israelis were the targets of the bombing, and the bomber tailed an Israeli tour group, waiting for them to exit a restaurant before blowing himself up.

Iran tries to paint ISIS as an Israeli organization. Last year the regime held an ISIS cartoon contest, modeled after their cartoon contests making fun of the Holocaust. One of the winning cartoons associated ISIS with Jews.

So the idea that ISIS is anti-Israel or antisemitic cannot and must not be mentioned in Iranian media, and Israeli victims of terror are stripped of their nationhood.

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Let's compare Columbia's pro-Israel and anti-Israel faculty, shall we?

From The Columbia Spectator:

Over 200 faculty members have signed a petition expressing their commitment to Columbia’s ties with Israel and opposing divestment from companies that conduct business in the country.

This petition, released Sunday afternoon, follows the launch of Columbia University Apartheid Divest, which is calling on the University to “divest from corporations that supply, perpetuate, and profit from a system that has subjugated the Palestinian people.”

Addressed to the Board of Trustees, the petition—the fourth in a series of petitions both in support and in condemnation of boycott, divestment and sanctions at Columbia—argues that the “shared values and interests” between the University and Israel are worth preserving through formal ties, though not every Israeli government policy is worth supporting.Over 200 faculty members have signed a petition expressing their commitment to Columbia’s ties with Israel and opposing divestment from companies that conduct business in the country.

“It would not be just or principled to respond to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict by disengaging from Israel or from companies that do business with Israel,” the petition said. “It would be unjust to blame only one side for this conflict, and unprincipled to single out Israel for this sanction, while maintaining ties with other nations that – unlike Israel – are undemocratic, repressive, and much less restrained in their use of force.”

The list of signatories includes prominent members of the University’s faculty and administrators, including Glenn Hubbard, dean of the Business School, Dorothy Denburg, former dean of Barnard College, Nicholas Lemann, former dean of the Graduate School of Journalism, and University Professor Eric Kandel, the co-director of the Mind Brain Behavior Institute.

Former New York City mayor David Dinkins, who serves as a professor at the School of International & Public Affairs, also signed the petition in support of Columbia’s ties with Israel, which emphasizes that Columbia benefits from its links to Israeli academia, research, and technology.

“Israel is a thriving democracy. It has democratic elections, a free press, rule of law, and strong protections for the individual rights of all citizens, including Arabs as well as Jews,” the petition said. “Israel also is the home of great universities, a vibrant culture, and an innovative high-tech sector.”

Of the 69 Columbia professors who signed a pro-BDS petition. 15 of them work in the anthropology department, six in philosophy, 13 in Middle East studies, two in Gender & Sexuality Studies, four in art history, six in history and eight in English, and only one in law.

The pro-Israel petition, on the other hand, has 26 signatures from the College of Physicians and Surgeons, 75 from the Columbia Medical Center, 27 from the Law School, and many others in the engineering and other medical fields.

In other words, the professors who support Israel are overwhelmingly specialists in fields where the truth often means the difference between life and death, and the ones who are anti-Israel largely do their work in fields where truth is a quaint and elastic concept.

This explains a lot.

(h/t Diana)

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From Hebrew Tales, by Hyman Hurwitz, 1826, a collection of midrashim and other old Jewish stories translated to English and embellished.

The Quadruple Tale: Or, Rabbi Joshuah instructed.

"No person," said Rabbi Joshuah, "ever conquered me (in wit), except two children,— a little girl and a widow." He then related the following tales.

The Wise Child.

Once on my travels, I came near a town where the road separated to right and left. Not knowing which to take, I enquired of a little boy who happened to be there, which of the two led to the town. "Both," replied he; "but that to the right is short and long — that on the left is long and short." I took that on the right; but had not Tar advanced, when my progress was stopped by a number of hedges and gardens. Unable to proceed, I returned, and asked the little fellow, how he could be so cruel as to misdirect a stranger? "I did not misdirect thee," replied the boy. "I told thee what is true. But art thou a wise man amongst Israel, and canst not comprehend the meaning of a child? —It is even as I said. This road is the nearest, but still the longest, on account of the many obstructions. Unless thou wouldest trespass on other people's ground, which I could hardly suppose from so good a man. The other road is, indeed, more distant, but it is, nevertheless, the shortest, being the public road; and may, therefore, be passed without encroaching on other people's property."—I admired his wit, and still more his good sense, and went on.

The Little Boy.

Arriving in the city, I met another little boy carrying a covered dish. "What hast thou in that dish, child?" demanded I. — "My mother would not have covered it, master, had she been willing that its contents should be known;" replied the little wit! — and went on.*

The Little Girl kind and witty.

Another time, during my travels, I came near a well, where a little girl was drawing water. Being very thirsty, I asked for a draught. She handed me the pitcher.— "Drink," said she, "and when thou hast done, I will draw some for the beast on which thou ridest."

I quenched my thirst, and the good girl gave some to the poor animal. As I departed, I said, "Daughter of Israel! thou hast imitated the virtuous example of our good mother Rebekah.

"—"Rabbi," said the little girl, (with a smile, that indicated the most kindly feelings, and that the reply was a mere play of wit.)—" Rabbi, if I have imitated the example of Rebekah, thou hast not imitated that of the faithful Eliezer."*

* And it came to pass, as the camels had done drinking, that the man (Eliezer) took a golden ear-ring of a half shekel weight, and two bracelets for the hand, of ten shekels weight of gold (and gave them to her). Gen. xxiv. 22.

The Widow.

I Happened once to take up my lodging at the abode of a widow. She prepared something for my dinner, which she placed before me. Being very hungry, I eat the whole, without leaving the customary remnant for the servants.* The next day I did the same. The third day, my hostess, wishing to make me sensible of the impropriety of my conduct, so overseasoned the dish she had prepared for me, that it was impossible to eat it. Ignorant of what had been done, I began to eat ;but finding the food so very salty, I laid down the spoon, and made my repast on bread. "Why eatest thou not of what has been prepared for thee?" asked my hostess. — "Because I am not hungry," answered I. —" If so," rejoined she, "why eatest thou bread I Do people eat that by way of desert. — But," continued she, with a significant smile, "I can perhaps guess thy motive. Thou leavest this for the poor servants whom thou didst, yesterday and the day before, deprive of their due! Is it not so Rabbi?" I was humbled, and I acknowledged my fault.

* It Was a custom amongst the ancient Hebrews to leave a portion in the plate for the use of the waiters or servants, that they might partake of the same food as the rest of the family.
T. Erubin.
Medrash Echoh.

This interesting story follows, from which Arthur Conan Doyle possibly owes a debt.

The Athenian and his one-eyed Slave.

An Athenian went to study at Jerusalem. After remaining there three years and a half, and finding he made no great progress in his studies, he resolved to return. Being in want of a servant to accompany him on his journey, he went to the market-place and purchased one. Having paid the money, he began to examine his purchase more closely, and found to his surprise that the purchased servant was blind of one eye. "Thou blockhead," said he to himself—" see the charming fruits of thy application. Here have I studied three years and a half, and at last acquired sufficient Avisdom to purchase a blind slave !" — " Be comforted," said the person that sold the slave; "trust me, though he is blind of one eye, he can see much better than persons with two." The Athenian departed with his servant. When they had advanced a little way, the blind slave adr dressed his master—"Master," said he, "let us quicken our pace, we shall overtake a traveller, who is some distance before us." "I can see no traveller," said the master.— "Nor I," replied the slave; "yet I know he is just four miles distant from us." — "Thou art mad, slave! How shouldest thou know what passes at so great a distance, when thou canst scarcely see what is before thee?" — "I am not mad," replied the servant, "yet it is as I said; nay, moreover, the traveller is accompanied by a she-ass, who like myself is blind of one eye: she is big with two young, and carries two flasks, one containing vinegar, the other wine." "Cease your prattle, loquacious fool,"—exclaimed the Athenian. — "I see, my purchase improves: I thought him blind only; but he is mad in the bargain."—" Well, master," said the slave, "have a little patience, and thou wilt see I have told thee nothing but the truth." They journeyed on, and soon overtook the traveller; when the Athenian, to his utmost astonishment, found every thing as his servant had told him; and begged him to explain how he could know all this without seeing either the animal or its conductor.—"I will tell thee, master," replied the slave. "I looked at the road, and observing the almost imperceptible impression of the ass's hoofs, I concluded that she must be four miles distant; for beyond that, the impression could not have been visible. I saw the grass eaten away on one side of the path, and not on the other; and hence judged she must be blind of one eye. A little further on, we passed a sandy road, and by the impression which the animal left on the sand where she rested, I knew she must be with young. Further, I observed the impressions which the liquid had made on the sand, and found some of them appeared spungy — whilst others were full of small bubbles, caused by fermentation, and thence judged of the nature of the liquid." The Athenian admired the sagacity of his servant, and thenceforth treated him with great respect.

Medrash Echoh.
T. Sanhedrin.

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Hasby Award winner for Best Celebrity Tweeter

And the winner, in a close race, is...

(drumroll)

Mayim Bialik

Mayim Bialik is one of the stars in the Big Bang Theory and a very proud, religious Jew. She is an unapologetic supporter of Israel although it is not a major part of her Twitter feed. But this was a voters' choice award and she won, edging out Roseanne Barr.

Mazel tov!

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03/20 Links: Israelis killed in Istanbul named; Implications of NGO Espionage for European Funders

From Ian:

NGO Monitor: Implications of NGO Espionage for European Funders

A March 17 investigative report on Israel’s Channel 2 TV showed activists from Breaking the Silence apparently collecting sensitive information on IDF methods and equipment. Beyond the ramifications for the NGO and its members, this has severe implications for their funder-enablers.
NGO Monitor’s research shows that during 2012-2015, 78% of this group’s budget (some NIS 6.8 million, or $1.8 million) was provided by European governments, including Switzerland, Denmark, the Netherlands, Sweden, France, and the EU. Additional amounts came from the US-based New Israel Fund.
“Major donations from European governments have enabled the members of Breaking the Silence to implement their radical agenda, including obtaining potentially classified information with no connection to ethics or human rights,” Professor Gerald Steinberg of NGO Monitor said. “All of Breaking the Silence’s activities, including false campaigns regarding alleged war crimes and revelations regarding potential espionage, are enabled by the financial support of foreign governments. The latest revelations highlight the need for European governments to implement vital transparency and oversight, without the excuses offered in the past, and adopt strict guidelines regarding secret funding processes for political NGOs that do so much damage in the Arab-Israeli context.”
In correspondence with NGO Monitor following the Channel 2 program, EU Ambassador to Israel Lars Faarborg Andersen stated that the EU was unaware of Breaking the Silence’s activities in collecting sensitive information on the IDF, and had not requested nor received such information from the NGO.

Breaking the Silence About Spying

What we’ve learned about Breaking the Silence should shame those of its foreign backers who claim to be friends of Israel. That is particularly true of some liberal American Jews that enabled it to play a role in destroying Israel’s image, especially on college campuses. Seen in the context of competing claims by the overwhelming majority of IDF veterans who discount the atrocity stories the group peddled — and which have been largely discredited by army investigations — its time to strip away the public and the media’s illusions about Breaking the Silence. It ought now to be seen for what it is: a subversive organization whose purpose appears to be to undermine the efforts of the IDF at a time when Israel is under assault by a wave of bloody terrorism, as well as from threats from Hamas and Hezbollah. Its members are not victims of incitement but people who are actively attempting to impede the army from protecting Israel’s citizens.
The narrative promoted in the New York Times and other venues about the Jewish right trying to destroy Israeli democracy in an effort to silence well-intentioned human rights activists on the left who only want to save the nation’s soul and protect helpless Palestinians is a myth. Left-wing NGO’s like Breaking the Silence are not content to merely sabotage IDF counter-terrorism. The fundamental purpose of these organizations is to overturn the verdict of Israeli democracy as expressed by the overwhelming majority of the country’s voters who continue to re-elect Netanyahu and Knesset majorities for his governments. It is those who back foreign pressure to force Israel’s government to submit to Palestinian demands that are trying to kill democracy, not Netanyahu’s supporters.
Israeli authorities will investigate this spying on the army. But those who have cheered on efforts to promote Breaking the Silence and other like-minded organizations from abroad must now do some soul searching about their choices. No one, either in Israel or here is obligated to support every policy of the government in Jerusalem or to refrain from speaking out against actions they deem to be wrong. But there is a line between democratic dissent and espionage or other efforts that materially aid the efforts of terror groups. Breaking the Silence has crossed that line. Those who claim to be friends of Israel should never again grant it a platform or a penny of financial support.

Israeli Soldiers Speak Out

Former Israeli soldier Sagie concurs. He is an artillery officer in the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF), serving as a platoon commander in the Israeli Artillery Crops, a commander in the Officers Artillery Course, and today is a deputy commander of an artillery battery. He feels “the media never shows the real picture. For example, they will show me as a soldier up against a young Palestinian child. People then get the impression that the Palestinian is the underdog. Sometimes the strong can also be underdogs. Even when reporting a terrorist attack inside Israel, people hear two Palestinians killed with two Israelis. But in actuality, the Palestinians were the terrorists and the Israelis were the innocent civilians.”
Sometimes it appears that the world is going back to the dark times of the Holocaust era. Just last month, Iran, flush with cash from the sanctions relief, announced that they will give slain Palestinian terrorists $7000 if they become “martyrs of the intifada in occupied Jerusalem.” Since the Palestinian knifing attacks have started, thirty-four Israelis have been killed and 404 injured, with 202 stabbings/attempted attacks, 83 shootings, and 42 vehicular (ramming) attacks.
Sagie noted, “We are fighting on our own land. So when I am taking my soldiers with me to fight in Gaza, sometimes the missiles that we are viewing, that Hamas shot headed to Israel, sometimes my soldiers, even me myself, can see the missiles going towards my home and to my soldiers' home. That's something that you can't understand from just watching the news. Regarding the stabbings, not only is Army personnel attacked, but also civilians, mothers, and children. The minute they know it’s an Israeli, it’s a Jew, they attack them. We want to protect ourselves and it is difficult because you can’t judge someone who is under attack, if he made the right decision by killing the attacker or by running away. It is very difficult to judge someone when you haven’t been in that situation yourself.”

{Author's note - this is a slightly edited retread from a few years ago. I thought that it was worth revisiting because it remains as true now as it was then.}

The progressive movement's main claim to political legitimacy is a moral claim. The movement claims to stand for social justice and equality of rights throughout the world. Any legitimacy the left has as a political movement is grounded in the notion of universal human rights. But if the left has quietly abandoned that ideal, which it has, then it loses both moral and political legitimacy. After all, if the left does not stand for universal human rights, then just what in this world does it stand for?

The sad truth is that the left has abandoned its core reason to be. By holding different people, and different countries, to different moral standards it has effectively abandoned its alleged cor values. One cannot claim to stand for social justice, after all, if you only care about social justice for some people, but not others. If you constantly speak out against supposed Israeli human rights abuses but remain silent about the truly horrific situations in Darfur or Congo or Syria... circumstances that make the Arab-Israel conflict look like a picnic on a summer Sunday afternoon... then you cannot claim to stand for universal human rights and, therefore, any claims you may have for moral or political leadership, as a member of the left, are entirely unfounded.

This is the situation that we find ourselves in, currently, and it probably represents at least part of the reason why many Jews are becoming more and more dissatisfied with the Democratic Party and the progressive movement. Most diaspora Jewish supporters of Israel are people who at one time, if not currently, considered themselves on the progressive-left. Certainly, I did. As someone who grew up in the political aftermath of the counterculture and the New Left, I was impressed with the ideals of those movements. I was impressed with the counterculture for its apparent spontaneity, its anti-authoritarian values, and its sense of community. I was impressed with the New Left for standing against jingoism, for its anti-war agenda, and for its championing of the human rights of women and Gay people and other minorities.

Today, looking back on the movement that was for decades my political home, what I see are the ruins of what was and the rank hypocrisy of what is. The left has essentially broken itself on Israel's back and they don't even know it, yet. The reason for this is that if, as a movement, the progressive-left intends to constantly fire-off Katyushas of Hatred and Qassams of Malice toward Tel Aviv, while snuggying up to Iran, then they lose all moral legitimacy. This is particularly true given the fact that the left could hardly care less about the 5.5 million dead in the Congo, about Tibetans living under Chinese occupation, about rape as a tactic of war in Darfur, about the hanging of Gay people from cranes in Tehran, or about an Arab and Muslim world rife with anti-Semitism, homophobia, and gender apartheid.

In this way the left, which claims to be both moral and anti-racist proves itself to be, in fact, neither.

On the progressive-left, Israel is the Jew among nations. Just as prior to establishment of the state of Israel Europeans tended to ascribe a host of negative characteristics to the Jewish people, so today they ascribe those same specific characteristics to the Jewish state and they do so... gallingly enough, hypocritically enough... under the banner of social justice. For 2,000 years we lived in diaspora, that is, we lived or died according to the pleasure of non-Jews. For 1,300 years we lived as second and third-class non-citizens under the imperialist boot of Muslim rule, i.e., as dhimmis. And today, directly after the historical moment in which we re-took our freedom, progressives tell us that the institution within which we manifest that freedom, the state of Israel, is a racist, colonialist, imperialist, apartheid country which, if it should not be dismantled as the national homeland for the Jewish people, must jump through whatever hoops they lay down. If Israel fails to jump through each and every one of those hoops then clearly they do not want peace and thus deserve whatever they get.

Well, some of us have definitely had enough of this nonsense.

The Palestinians refuse to negotiate a peaceful conclusion of hostilities and the progressive-left blames Israel. The Gazans shot thousands of rockets into southern Israel for years, but the progressives only spoke up when Israel sought to defend its citizenry from those rockets. Did the progressive movement have anything to say about the Fogel family murders? No, it did not. Does the progressive movement have anything to say about Hamas's genocidal charter or the larger Jihadi movement out of which Hamas sprang?

No. It does not.

The left can barely even bring itself to tsk, tsk ISIS.

In fact, as Egypt transitioned from a military dictatorship, under Hosni Mubarak, to an Islamist dictatorship under the Muslim Brotherhood this result was, in part, through the efforts of the current president of the United States. But, then, the left has always had a weakness for the very worst actors in world history. Just as leftists often supported the Soviet Union for decades, despite the tens of millions of innocent dead due to that regime, so it now (usually tacitly, but sometimes directly) supports Political Islam.

For me, personally, the real wake-up call came during the Mavi Marmara incident in May of 2010. There were two groups of people aboard that vessel. There were the violent Jihadis seeking martyrdom... which progressives referred to as "peace activists." And the second group? Well, they definitely weren't Tea Party people. They were, in fact, progressive-left activists from around the world. Progressive-left activists literally, physically, morally, and financially supporting Jihadis in an effort to kill Jews, while telling the world that their mission was humanitarian.

The irony and cruel hypocrisy could not be more rich.

So, just why would you expect Jewish people to remain a part of such a political movement? The progressive-left may have been our home for a very long time, but clearly their values have shifted away from anything that could possibly be acceptable to the great majority of western Jews. Most of those Jews don't really get it, yet, but people are awakening. There are reasons why more and more of us are leaving the Democratic party and the progressive movement.

Because the progressive-left accepts, if not encourages, generalized malice toward the Jewish state it thereby shows the rest of us the door.

I say we walk through it.

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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.

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Last week we discussed the video expose from Israel's Channel 2 on how Breaking the Silence was acting in ways that look startlingly like espionage against the IDF.

Now part of the report has been subtitled in English by My Truth:

Meanwhile, Haaretz is defending the group in a fact-free editorial:

Breaking the Silence has become the biggest threat to Israel’s security, at least according to a Channel 2 investigative report last week. The report presented alleged “evidence” showing the NGO’s activists trying to obtain sensitive military information from a right-wing activist posing as a former soldier.

The “exposé” – which, it transpired, was made by the rightist NGO Ad Kan – made it to Immigrant Absorption Minister Zeev Elkin, who said he was “seriously concerned that Breaking the Silence is being used for espionage.” Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon hastened to order a probe into the incident and, on his Facebook page, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stated that Breaking the Silence “crossed another red line” and “security officials were looking into the matter.”

Of course, Yair Lapid (Yesh Atid) took advantage of the opportunity to portray himself as a rightist, body and soul. “The NGO is undermining the State of Israel and causing it great damage internally and externally,” he announced. “While Israel is struggling against a wave of terror, Breaking the Silence is taking information and using it against the state. Israel must do everything to protect its soldiers – this organization has no right to exist in a state that is fighting terror daily for its people’s safety,” he said.

All that remains, it seems, is to demand that the cabinet declare Breaking the Silence a terror organization, arrest its members and put on trial the treacherous soldiers who passed on information about the Israel Defense Forces’ crimes in the territories. Then we will have to congratulate Channel 2 for its journalistic achievement, saving Israel from its destroyers, as it previously did with the program “Uvda,” which exposed another “enemy of the state,” left-wing activist Ezra Nawi.

This will apparently solve all the security problems that Israelis are suffering from, and for which the government has yet to devise a solution – the recent terror wave, the intifadas, military operations and other ills deriving from the prolonged occupation.

It is regrettable that instead of leading and finding real solutions to terror, the government is applying a nasty strategy of wild incitement against a human rights organization. All this is taking place in a state that boasts of its democracy and compares itself favorably to the region’s other nations.

Breaking the Silence is a vital, critical organization, whose goal is to cleanse the IDF of its soldiers’ illegal acts – abusing and harassing Palestinians, and interpreting orders in a violent way. The NGO’s objective and insistent activity against the occupation are not acts of treason. In fact, a democracy should be proud of this organization’s existence, give it full backing and stop the populist witch hunt carried out against it.

The government and right-wingers must stop their violent attempts to silence Breaking the Silence, and their repeated use of the NGO as a political scapegoat.

There is literally nothing accurate about this piece. An organization that uses anonymous stories that cannot be checked for accuracy in order to smear the IDF is not improving the IDF. The IDF has repeatedly asked for details from BtS in order to investigate these alleged abuses - and BtS refused. So how exactly is BtS a "vital, critical organization" when it cannot provide any evidence that can be used to help the IDF fix any problems yet it trumpets these anonymous, impossible to prove stories as evidence of IDF immorality?

Haaretz does not bring an iota of evidence that the information in the report is inaccurate in any way, unless you assume that anything anyone on the Right does is automatically a lie without the need to ask any further questions.

Outside of Meretz and the Arab list, members of all parties of Knesset were aghast at this report and how it apparently shows Breaking the Silence acting as foreign agents. Yet Haaretz calls all the critics "rightists."

Compared to Haaretz, I suppose that's true. But this editorial proves yet again that Haaretz represents the fringe Israeli left that hates the Jewish state, not the mainstream Israeli opinion that welcomes opportunities to improve it.

And as this report further shows, Breaking the Silence is not trying to improve Israel - it is trying to destroy it.

(h/t Yoel)

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The Shin Bet counts over a hundred firebomb attacks every month. Every one of those attacks has the potential to be as deadly as the firebomb attack that killed members of the Dawabshe family in Duma.

Yet these incessant attacks are simply not reported by the media.

Here is a video of an attack last night where about eight terrorists throw a dozen Molotov cocktails near the Beit Orot yeshiva in Jerusalem.

Imagine how your local police would respond to incidents like this. Imagine how your local media would cover it.

This happens every single day in Jerusalem. But it simply isn't considered news.

(h/t Yisrael Medad)

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