Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Saturday, July 09, 2016

A dog trainer defends Max Blumenthal’s vilification of Elie Wiesel at Mondoweiss (Petra Marquardt-Bigman)

Guest post by Petra Marquardt-Bigman

Max Blumenthal is a proud antisemitic anti-Zionist endorsed by the likes of David Duke, but after reacting to the news of Elie Wiesel’s recent death with abuse and vilification, he has now become the victim of a “witch hunt” – or so his loyal friends and fellow-Israel-haters would like everyone to believe. At the “hate site” Mondoweiss, the new and eminently qualified contributor Yakov Hirsch (“Professional Poker Player and Dog Trainer”) has a post (archived here) whose length presumably reflects how strongly he feels that Hillary Clinton was wrong to denounce Blumenthal’s vilification of Wiesel as “offensive, hateful, and patently absurd.” Naturally, Mondoweiss founder Philip Weiss eagerly promoted the output of his new writer on Twitter, where he asserted that Clinton’s denunciation of Blumenthal was a “witchhunt” and that Clinton “empowers ethnocentric violent extremists.”

Weiss is of course one of the professional anti-Israel activists who insist that their ardent anti-Zionism has nothing whatsoever to do with antisemitism. The output of Mondoweiss and other sites catering to anti-Israel activists undermines such claims on a daily basis by offering content that could be summarized with the slogan “The Jewish state is our misfortune” – which is just an updated version of the Nazi slogan “The Jews are our misfortune.” The defense of Max Blumenthal offered by Mondoweiss is a good example of the antisemitic anti-Zionism that is so typical of anti-Israel activism.

After highlighting some tweets denouncing the vilification of Wiesel by the popular Avi Mayer, the “professional poker player and dog trainer” who now writes for Mondoweiss muses:

“What is going on here? Why is it so difficult to understand that Elie Wiesel cannot be sacred to people whose sympathies lie with the Palestinians? … Even though it undoubtedly hurts Avi Mayer’s feelings that these people don’t show deference to his religious icons, this particular icon– Weisel [sic!] – was an enemy to the Palestinian people. … There are a lot of reasons for this blind Jewish ethnocentrism … But I’d like to use the Hillary Clinton statement on Wiesel yesterday to show the egregious role American politicians play in this phenomenon. It doesn’t take politicians long to figure out where the money is: Just try to talk as crazy as the craziest Jew and watch the money pour in. You can see this dynamic play out at every AIPAC conference.”

Well, where to begin? Does it really have to be pointed out to the “anti-Zionists” at Mondoweiss how incredibly offensive it is to describe “Weisel” as one of the “religious icons” of an observant Jew like Avi Mayer? And is it really necessary to explain what’s wrong with a statement like “Just try to talk as crazy as the craziest Jew and watch the money pour in”? How often does it have to be explained that American support for Israel reflects broad popular support and has deep historical roots? And why describe Wiesel as “an enemy to the Palestinian people”? Is it because he denounced Hamas as a “death cult” and felt that “Palestinian parents want a hopeful future for their children, just like Israeli parents do. And both should be joining together in peace”?

But it’s by no means only the “professional poker player and dog trainer” now moonlighting at Mondoweiss who can’t do without invoking age-old antisemitic tropes. The site’s founder Philip Weiss isn’t doing much better in his own recent post, where he writes under the title “In latest pander to Israel lobby, Clinton smears Max Blumenthal’s criticism of Wiesel as ‘hateful’”:

“Bernie Sanders was able to build a campaign with us because he had escaped the financial clutches of the elitist Israel lobby … Clinton can’t escape those financial clutches. And she thinks she can only gain politically from smearing Max Blumenthal. … And: isn’t becoming president by marrying neoconservatism the definition of a deal with the devil? What does that do to U.S. foreign policy? Is that why she sought power? Is Hillary Clinton even in touch with her soul?”

Let me suggest an update for Weiss’s post: as reported in the Times of Israel, a cartoon program “recently aired on a Fatah-owned Palestinian TV station showed Jews siding with the devil to fight Muslims and the Muslim prophet Muhammad.” I think there are some scenes in this program that could illustrate the point Weiss is trying to make just beautifully.

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Iran's Mehr News Agency reports that a top advisor to Iran's Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) has slammed Hamas.

In an interview, Brigadier General Khosro Orouj accused Hamas of seeking to sign a treaty with Israel via Turkey.

Hamas "took up the banner of struggle and fight for the destruction of Israel, but today we see from them different words and thoughts, a different approach than Imam Khomeini, who refuses to sit down with the oppressor at the same table. "

Hamas recently made overtures to get back in Iran's good graces with a top Hamas official lavishly praising the Ayatollah Khamanei.

Apparently it didn't work.

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07/08 Links: Do houses matter more than Jews?‎; Judea and Samaria - it's all in a name

From Ian:

In Africa, Lion King Bibi begins to outroar the Palestinians

Offering high-tech and security know-how in return for diplomatic support, Netanyahu was welcomed like a superpower chief
A life-size stuffed lion greets visitors to the National Palace in Addis Ababa, lying on a red carpet adorned with Stars of David. Always aware of a good frame, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu did not pass up on the opportunity to have his photograph taken with the lion on the sidelines of his meeting with Ethiopian Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn Thursday morning.
A few hours later, the country’s president, Mulatu Teshome, took his Israeli guest down to the palace garden, where they gazed at real lions. Netanyahu is the first statesman to have been allowed to get so close to the animals; even US President Barack Obama wasn’t granted this honor during his recent visit.
Posing for the cameras with President Teshome, as two lions strolled in the background, Netanyahu said the occasion gives new meaning to the verse “They were swifter than eagles, stronger than lions” (2 Samuel, 1:21).
In Africa, Netanyahu could be forgiven for feeling like Lion King Bibi. During his four-day tour this week to Uganda, Kenya, Rwanda and Ethiopia — which required unprecedented security arrangements, including special forces and armored personal carriers brought from Israel on Hercules planes — he was treated like the chief of a global superpower.

Do houses matter more than Jews?‎

There was no outrage over the fact that the PA paid for the mourning tent of the family whose son ‎murdered the Israeli girl in her bedroom, nor over the visit by a Palestinian Authority official closely ‎associated with President Mahmoud Abbas to the mourning tent to pay his respects to the family of ‎the murderer. ‎
Nor did the U.S. show any outrage at the fact that the funeral procession for father of 10 Rabbi ‎Michael Mark was hit by rocks thrown by Arabs who were apparently not satisfied that the victim was already ‎dead.‎
Nor was there any outrage at the attempted rekindling of medieval European blood libels by Abbas in the ‎European Parliament, when he claimed that Israelis were poisoning Arab wells. When AP reporter Matt ‎Lee tried to get Kirby, the same State Department spokesman who threw a temper tantrum over ‎Jewish building in Judea and Samaria, to condemn Abbas' statements, Kirby ‎could not make himself utter the words. Pressed by Lee, he made himself say, "We have long ‎said what we want is for both sides to ratchet down not just the violence but the rhetoric, which can ‎inflame some of the violence. And we just don't find that sort of rhetoric helpful."
What a pitiful ‎statement. Especially given that all the inflammatory rhetoric and the ensuing terrorism ‎is coming from the PA, not from Israel. It has always been this way and the State Department is ‎perfectly aware of this. There is no moral equivalence and no "cycle of violence." It is all very one-‎sided, but by consciously making statements such as this, the State Department legitimizes the false ‎narrative of the conflict and ensures that it continues at full speed. Essentially, it tells the PA to just continue ‎its dirty business, because no matter what it does, there will be no consequences politically or, ‎even more importantly, financially. Just like the EU, the U.S. treats the PA as an unruly toddler who can do ‎no wrong and must be indulged in all its whims. That, too, is a racism of low expectations, coming from ‎the country that has recently elevated political correctness into something of a second U.S. Constitution. ‎
We know that for the U.S. administration, in particular the State Department, the building of houses ‎matters. The question that remains is this: Does the administration also believe that Jewish lives ‎matter?‎

Judea and Samaria - it's all in a name

What is in a name? What difference does it make if we refer to this land as the 'West Bank' or Judea and Samaria? The answer is everything. We lose our souls, more, we surrender our identity. We sacrifice our past, diminish the incredible connection we have with this land.
And worse, we allowed quasi-Israeli media outlets to damage our standing in the world by catering to their ghetto mentality. When someone who lives in this area writes that it is the ultra-right who use this terminology, we all lose.
I live in the land of Israel, my home, my heart. My home graces the mountains of Judea.
And when this great grandfather dies, it will be Yisrael written on his tombstone, not Harpo. His neighbors can recognize his name or call them whatever he wants, but his family must know. This is what he was born, this is how he should live.
Two of my children and all of my grandchildren have been born in this land. We will name it as it was, as it is. The larger question is not why we want to be known by our ancient and reborn name, but why others seek to take it away and more, why we let them.
Judea. Samaria. Yehudah and Shomron. Home. Ours. Forever. Our heritage, our rights, our history and our future really IS in the name.
We are Israel.

As we continue on with showing the short talks given by the presenters and awardees of the Hasby Awards last Sunday....

In this award, Brian of London from Israellycool discusses the relevance of Israeli whiskey to public relations and Varda describes how she became such a wonderful commentator.

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The only blockade in history that allows tons of expensive chocolates to pass

Ma'an reports that Gazans somehow manage to buy tons of imported chocolates for Eid, "despite the blockade."

The chocolates are imported from imported from Spain, Italy and Greece as well as chocolate produced under the PA regime.

Six companies import chocolate through the Kerem Shalom crossing that Israel controls.

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Fatah cartoon for kids calls Jews messengers of Satan

From Palestinian Media Watch:

In honor of Ramadan, Fatah TV broadcast a cartoon series for young children that presents Jews as the representatives of several satans, fighting battles for these satans, and doing their work on earth. The educational message to Palestinian children is that the satans are scheming to fight and destroy Muhammad, and in order to succeed in this, they use the Jews to fight Muhammad.

The series shows the satans (who oppose Muhammad) being upset that the Jewish tribes left Medina without fighting Muhammad, thus enabling Muhammad an unopposed victory. One of the satans then plants the idea in the minds of the Jews to organize all the tribes to fight against Muhammad so that the Jews can regain their prestige. This plan succeeds because the satan knows "the burning hate and loathing of Muhammad and his supporters, that fills the hearts of the Jews."

Finally, viewers are taught that Muhammad was preparing for battle by digging trenches to protect himself from the Jews, even though he already had a treaty with them because, as one Muslim explains: "Since when do Jews keep their treaties?"

The text of the first part of the cartoon will be relevant to my speech being given Sunday night in Jerusalem.

Muslim man: "Prophet [Muhammad] agreed [that the Jews] would leave with their possessions, but not their weapons, so they would not fight with the [weapons] again."
Muslim boy: "So we drove them out without fighting. What a great victory...Praise and thanks to Allah..."
Satan 1: "We (i.e., Jews and satans) suffered a defeat from one of the soldiers of Allah, who we have no power over."
Satan 2: "What sort of soldier was it, my lord? I didn't see any fighting in this raid."
Satan 1: "It was 'fear' (i.e., Allah's soldier) that defeated the Jews and caused them to leave their lands [in Medina] in shame and disgrace, and it's what prevented me from going down to make them fight... Yes, satan. Don't you see that my hands are shaking [from 'fear']? ..."
Muslim man: "The Jews left while playing flutes and drums. How strange!"
Muslim boy: "They did not want to show their frustration over the defeat, [and behaved] as if they had won. May Allah humiliate them."

You can guess what the theme will be....

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Israel is accused of stealing cattle and kidnapping shepherds from Lebanon

From Al Araby:

Proving yet again that it is the modern-day, heavily armed equivalent of a Wild West criminal gang, Israel has now expanded its activities from occupation and illegal settlement, into cattle rustling.

On Wednesday, Israeli forces snatched hundreds of goats from a south Lebanon border village after failing to kidnap a goat herder, according to the National News Agency.

Israeli soldiers first tried to kidnap the Lebanese shepherd named as Mohammad Qassem Hashem near the Israeli-occupied Shebaa Farms.

When Hashem slipped from their hands, the soldiers stole more than 400 goats he owned, in an apparent act of revenge.

The Lebanese army and UN peacekeepers are attempting to retrieve them, according to the state-owned news agency.

Israeli soldiers routinely attempt to abduct Lebanese shepherds for a variery of reasons, including forcing them to provide information on Lebanese army and Hizballah positions.

Israeli soldiers are also known to snatch livestock animals from the border area, possibly meaning to intimidate locals hostile to Israel.

If Israel routinely attempts to kidnap shepherds and snatches sheep, one would expect that a formal complaint would be lodged with UNIFIL, which patrols the border and reports on all violations.

So I did a search for "sheep" and "shepherds" at the UNIFIL site. And here is what I found:

August 18, 2006

Violation of the Blue Line on the ground in Shebaa area has resumed. Yesterday, two Lebanese shepherds and approx. 100 sheep crossed the Blue Line towards Israel. Such incidents can endanger very fragile and tense situation.

Report from July 2011:

UNIFIL has finalized its investigation into the incident of 12 January, when the Israel Defense Forces apprehended another shepherd in the same area. The investigation concluded that available evidence pointed to a likely Blue Line violation by the shepherd. As a result of the number of incidents in this area, UNIFIL has intensified daily foot and vehicle patrols and increased the number of observation posts along the Blue Line in this area. UNIFIL also called upon the Lebanese Armed Forces to increase their activities and sensitize local shepherds concerning the grazing of their livestock close to the Blue Line. There were other ground violations of the Blue Line, mostly inadvertent, by Lebanese shepherds and farmers tending livestock or working in fields, mainly in the Shab’a Farms and KfarShouba areas.

June 2013 report:

During the reporting period, UNIFIL observed an increase in the number of ground violations of the Blue Line committed by shepherds or farmers, which occurred on an almost daily basis. Most of these violations were inadvertent and occurred mainly in the Shab’a Farms area. UNIFIL protested the violations to the Lebanese Armed Forces and recalled that it is the primary responsibility of Lebanese authorities to ensure full respect for the Blue Line in its entirety.

February 2015 report:

Most ground violations of the Blue Line were perpetrated by farmers or shepherds for short periods of time in the vicinity of Shab’a, Kafr Shuba, Bastara, Blida, El Majidiye (Sector East) and Rumaysh (Sector West). In some c ases, the shepherds, along with their flocks, stayed south of the Blue Line for several hours.

Virtually every incident I saw was of Lebanese shepherds violating the Blue Line. Not a single example of Israelis stealing sheep or kidnapping shepherds.

And since a high percentage of these violations occur around the Shebaa Farms area, that Hezbollah claims as its own, this means that it is likely that Hezbollah is encouraging farmers to enter that land to assert control.

Either way, Lebanese media is lying.

(h/t Yigal)

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07/07 Links Pt2: The Great Arab Implosion and Its Consequences; UNRWA Caught Lying Again

From Ian:

The Great Arab Implosion and Its Consequences

Who or what will replace a century of failed Sunni Arab dominance? What, if anything, can the West do to help shape the future?
In 2007, in a seminar room in Jerusalem, a day-long session was devoted to Israeli regional strategic perspectives. I was among the participants together with several other scholars, a former Israeli interior minister, a future Israeli defense minister, and two future Israeli ambassadors to the U.S. At a certain point, the talk turned to various scenarios for the regional future and the opportunities or dangers each of these entailed for Israel. When the possible breakup and partition of Arab states like Iraq or Syria was raised, the near-unanimous response was that this was simply too fantastic a scenario to contemplate.
Now we live that scenario. The great Sunni Arab implosion that began with the 2011 “Arab Spring” was unforeseen in its suddenness, violence, and extent. But some, both inside and outside the Arab world, had long suspected that, sooner or later, a day of reckoning would indeed arrive. (Among Westerners, the names of Bernard Lewis and David Pryce-Jones come most readily to mind.) Today, those in the West who acknowledge this great collapse for what it is will be better able to face the emerging realities. But the first and most important step is to recognize that there is no going back.

Why Are American Jews Abandoning Israel?

Dov Waxman, Trouble in the Tribe: The American Jewish Conflict over Israel (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2016) 328 pp., $29.95.
What transpired in Boston distressed the American Jewish community. Yet it didn’t come as a total surprise. The controversial nature of AIPAC is well known, and the unique ideological proclivities of younger American Jews are rapidly becoming better known. What went down the next day in Manhattan, nevertheless, did shock the community—or rather the vast majority of it. On April 20, IfNotNow marched into the lobby of the building that houses the Anti-Defamation League (ADL). Around one hundred activists donned shirts reading, “No liberation with occupation,” and belted out songs in Hebrew. This was an arrow straight through the heart, for the ADL is possibly the most cherished institution of “mainstream” American Jewry. Established in 1913 in response to Eastern European pogroms, its slogan is “Imagine a World Without Hate” and its agenda involves advocating not just for a two-state solution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, but also for LGBT rights, voting rights, disability rights, immigrants’ rights and women’s reproductive rights.
Many who want Israel to withdraw from the “Palestinian territories” (which, at the moment, usually means the West Bank, including East Jerusalem) also participate in the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement (BDS). Jews, it’s estimated by various sources, constitute at least 20 percent of the economic-pressuring BDS, which is akin to the campaign once waged against apartheid-era South Africa. Jewish Voice for Peace, a pro-BDS nonprofit based in Oakland, California, “is perhaps the fastest-growing Jewish organization on campuses nationwide,” a professor at Brooklyn College posited in the New York Times recently. In a late-March interview on the Michael Medved Show, Sen. Cory Booker, a New Jersey Democrat, went so far as to brand BDS “an anti-Jewish movement.” (It’s not a stretch to deduce from Booker’s remark that BDS is anti-Semitic and, hence, Jews involved with it are “self-haters.”)
If this wasn’t enough to raise blood pressure, mainstream American Jews are realizing that they’re vanishing and, as a result, a lot that’s precious is being lost. Spend a day at a Reform temple—about 35 percent of Jews subscribe to Reform Judaism, making it the largest Jewish denominational movement in the United States by a wide margin—and you’ll discover that baby boomer parents and, especially, greatest generation grandparents are alarmed. The sound of thousands of light switches switching off in cavernous sanctuaries across the country rings in their ears—and hearing aids.
Within several generations, perhaps two or three, it’s possible that very few people in the United States not adhering to some variant of “observant” Judaism will readily self-identify as “Jewish.” Pew found that 30 percent of American Jews have no denominational affiliation while 22 percent have “no religion.” Before 1970, intermarriage was under 20 percent among American Jews of all denominations. Since 2000, it’s been over 72 percent among non-Orthodox American Jews. Additionally, and it almost goes without saying, religious ritual, custom and belief drop precipitously in intermarried households. Even Judaism as a “culture,” which in the Land of the Free today means hardly more than an affinity for bagels, sarcasm and social justice, will soon be more common among non-Jews than Jews, if it isn’t already. From coast to coast, mainstream American Jews reared on a love of Israel and a Judaism of progressive values are despondent and desperately eager to understand what’s happening.

IsraellyCool: UNRWA Caught With Their Lying Pants On Fire Again

Poor Ali Farahat. He needs surgery, but he can’t get out of Gaza.
Well, little does Ali Farahat know, people leave Gaza all the time to take advantage of the many wonderful medical facilities the Zionist Entity has to offer.
All you really need to do is fill out a little paperwork. Hey, us Israelis do it all the time when we need medical care.
And that’s when COGAT Israel, the agency responsible for coordinating civilian issues in the territories, replied to UNRWA’s very disingenuous tweet and accompanying article with 3 simple tweets that not only demolished this lie but turned it into a plea for the public to help Ali’s parents issue the paperwork necessary to facilitate his treatment.

Those apartheid beaches

Today, at a beach in Bat Yam, I saw a bunch of giggling Muslim girls, fully covered, who were showering the sand off their hijabs after hanging at the beach for a while along with lots of Jews.

Just like South Africa during apartheid.

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Vic Rosenthal's Weekly Column

Today I came across an article by Rabbi Baruch Efrati in which he opposes cooperation between Israelis and the Reform Movement.

So what, you say. Another Orthodox attack on the heretical reformim. Perhaps so, but here is what caught my attention:

The secular Jewish world does not want to take over the religious world from a theological point of view, but to live beside it – hence, the possibility of influencing that world, listening to its hearts' desires, elevating its holy sparks to their heavenly source. The secular are actually non-observant Orthodox, they do not present an alternative organized religion that turns transgressions into an ideology intended to take the place of the Torah. They have not invented a made up religion but are in the midst of a process where secularism is withering and faith is blossoming, as one can see over the last few years in which there is constant strengthening of ties to Torah, baruch Hashem.

“Non-observant Orthodox,” or as the saying goes, ‘the synagogue that they don’t go to is Orthodox’. At worst, thinks Efrati, they won’t interfere with the religious world while at best they might join it. On the other hand, the Reform are a threat. “It’s either we or them [sic],” he adds.

One wonders why he is worried, because only about 3% of Israeli Jews identify with the Reform movement, and most of those are English-speaking immigrants. The ‘non-observant Orthodox’ aren’t rushing to join them, either. Those that I talk to simply don’t see the point of Reform Judaism, maybe because just living in Israel provides the sense of Jewish community that many American Jews seek from their congregations, and because even the least observant Jew in Israel is likely to have a stronger background in Jewish history and ideas than most American Reform Jews. And of course, they already speak Hebrew!

The real possibility of religious change in Israel today comes from Orthodox Jews (including well-known rabbis) who ask why certain customs, in particular in respect to women, are adhered to when they are not required by Jewish law. They also ask why certain rabbis should have a monopoly on kosher certification, conversions, and so forth. These folks will certainly have a much greater effect on the nature of Jewish observance in Israel than Reform Jews, because they can’t be accused of ‘inventing a religion’.

Nevertheless, the American Union for Reform Judaism does present a problem for Israel, but it has little to do with theology. It is because the Reform Movement is conducting a left-wing political campaign targeting both American Jews (primarily) and Israelis.

The campaign focuses on issues like mixed prayer at the Western Wall, ‘segregated’ Haredi buses, and the Rabbinate, which is widely perceived as arbitrary and even corrupt in its behavior in regard to marriage and conversion. Another issue is ‘religious pluralism’, which means the fact that Orthodox synagogues and rabbis are subsidized by the government’s Religious Affairs Ministry while liberal streams of Judaism are not. The URJ’s associated groups have filed numerous lawsuits in connection with these issues. The controversies are presented as evidence for Israel’s failure as a liberal democracy.

They resonate as civil rights issues in the US. But they haven’t ever become serious concerns for most Israelis, who are much more concerned with security and economic problems. The average secular Israeli sees both the Women of the Wall and the Haredi Rabbi of the Kotel as radical extremists, and their struggle as having nothing to do with ‘normal people’.

The URJ also takes a strong position for a ‘2-state solution’ and is critical of Israel’s settlements across the Green Line. In the US it has supported the Obama Administration’s policies (after agonizing for a time, it decided ‘not to take a position’ on the Iran deal that was strongly opposed by both the Israeli government and opposition). Many American Reform rabbis belong to J Street, and the President of the URJ, Rabbi Rick Jacobs, is a former activist in both J Street and the New Israel Fund.

Jacobs wasn’t shy about his intention to intervene in Israeli politics when he outlined his positions in his 2015 biennial address and announced that the URJ would not “check [its] commitment to tikkun olam at the door.”

The American Reform Movement, in its 1885 Pittsburgh Platform was explicitly anti-Zionist. After the state of Israel was established it was grudgingly accepted, but it wasn’t until the 1997 Miami Platform that Reform Judaism began to present itself as a Zionist movement. But two years later it began to specify the kind of Jewish state it wanted Israel to be, and the proprietary attitude has only gotten stronger. Like the Obama Administration and J Street, Reform seems to love us to death.

All of this fits neatly with the program of the tiny but loud Israeli Left, which lately has been arguing that the liberal Israel that they knew and loved is being replaced by an undemocratic, theocratic and militaristic monster, the Jewish counterpart of the Islamic State. They too want to make us better.

Just as very few Israelis are attracted to Reform Judaism, very few agree with the political point of view that the URJ espouses. And neither secular nor religious Israelis buy the idea that Israel is becoming undemocratic, theocratic and militaristic. What is happening is that the cultural elites that have set the tone here since 1948 are finally changing to match the more right-wing political landscape. Naturally, those being deposed are unhappy.

Regardless of whether they think Reform Judaism is a “made up religion” or even care, most Israelis think that decisions affecting life in this country should be made here, and not by a liberal American organization that represents very few of us. And that is the real issue.

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07/07 Links Pt1: PA pays $140 Mil a Year to Terrorists; Fatah TV: Jews do the satans' work on earth

From Ian:

The End of Palestinian Nationalism

When a movement devolves into a death cult, it’s time to rethink our assumptions
The Palestinian genius for nay-saying is well-documented, but what’s at play here is something new, something that transcends the dull boundaries of international negotiations and seeps into the hearts and minds of the young. Once the essential No that has guided Palestinian policy for decades has been turned inward, it could find no other outlet but destruction and no better target than the Jews next door. Anti-Semitism has something to do with fanning this derangement, but it is not its essence; neither are pure yearnings for an independent Palestinian homeland. The revolt we’re seeing now is more profound, more ontological in nature: It’s the revolt of an educated and relatively well-off generation—note how many of the stabbers have come, like Tarayrah, from comfortable and stable families—that looks for meaning and honor and sacrifice and can find it nowhere in the vastly compromised world outside, succumbing instead to the all-consuming fire of utter annihilation. We’ve seen this tide rise before under similar circumstances, and we’ll see it rise again.
It’s easy to argue that Tarayrah and his fellow pogromists are merely youth pushed into murder by the constant torrent of incitement prevalent in every corner of Palestinian culture; this is true, but it eerily assumes, like the looniest moralists do when they argue that violent video games or gangster rap will inevitably lead to shootouts in the streets of suburban Connecticut, that adolescents are spongy creatures incapable of doing much more than soaking violence and spurting out violence in kind. It’s even easier to continue to blame that mythical horned beast, the Occupation, as if there was no other reason for young Palestinians to feel hopeless—like, say, the fact that their own government is one of the world’s most repressive and corrupt—and as if hopelessness necessarily translated into taking knives to the throats of slumbering children. If we abandon these simplicities, and acknowledge instead that what bedevils Palestinian society is a much more wicked problem, we’re left to make some uneasy decisions of our own.
First, we should realize that we must approach a death cult differently than we would a healthy national movement. The latter calls out for compromise. It rewards negotiations, and it reassures its foes by offering indications, real and symbolic, that future reconciliation is likely and at hand. This is why we often forgive it its missteps, and are willing to look away even when it occasionally unleashes bloody hell, as even the most well-tempered and responsible national movements sometimes do. The former, however, has no appetite for anything but destruction, and measures its triumphs with the crude arithmetic of body counts and death tolls. It cannot be reasoned with. It can only be forcefully stopped. Until it is, any attempt to pretend that Palestinian nationalism is still viable is simply grotesque.
This should come as little surprise to any serious student of national movements throughout history. Reread Herder’s remark that, in a certain sense, every form of human perfection is first and foremost national in spirit, and reflect again on the Treaty of Westphalia, which sliced Europe into nation-states erected on the basis of self-determination and committed to diplomatic congress as a means of resolving disputes. Then go forth and observe the myriad national movements that failed miserably to live up to this new spirit of creative nationalism. Ask the Moravians or the Transnistrians about their efforts at self-determination, and that’s just one small corner in Europe. The world is thick with failed national movements that, for one reason or another, saw their dreams disintegrate into violence, or irrelevance, or both. Sadly, the Palestinians now join them. This will have many implications, for Palestinians and Israelis alike, but if history is any guide, the only way to counter a No is with an equal or greater Yes, a spirit that meets death by loudly and enthusiastically affirming life.

PMW: Jews do the satans' work on earth - Fatah TV cartoon for kids

In honor of Ramadan, Fatah TV broadcast a cartoon series for young children that presents Jews as the representatives of several satans, fighting battles for these satans, and doing their work on earth. The educational message to Palestinian children is that the satans are scheming to fight and destroy Muhammad, and in order to succeed in this, they use the Jews to fight Muhammad.
The series shows the satans (who oppose Muhammad) being upset that the Jewish tribes left Medina without fighting Muhammad, thus enabling Muhammad an unopposed victory. One of the satans then plants the idea in the minds of the Jews to organize all the tribes to fight against Muhammad so that the Jews can regain their prestige. This plan succeeds because the satan knows "the burning hate and loathing of Muhammad and his supporters, that fills the hearts of the Jews."
Finally, viewers are taught that Muhammad was preparing for battle by digging trenches to protect himself from the Jews, even though he already had a treaty with them because, as one Muslim explains: "Since when do Jews keep their treaties?"
Presenting Jews as agents of the satans who do evil on earth is a part of the PA's religious ideology, although the PA claims to the international community that their conflict with Israel is only territorial. Mahmoud Abbas' advisor on Islam recently stressed that the Palestinian Authority ideology is to see the conflict with Israel as a conflict with Satan. Israel, Mahmoud Al-Habbash taught, is "Satan's project":

Fatah TV cartoon: Jews sided with satans to fight Muhammad and the Muslims

Palestinian Authority Pays Terrorists and Their Families $140 Million a Year

The Palestinian Authority spends roughly 10 percent of its annual budget paying terrorists who attack Israelis and supporting their families, according to expert testimony to congressional lawmakers.
Yigal Carmon, the president and founder of the Middle East Media Research Institute, told the House Foreign Affairs Committee Wednesday that the Palestinian Authority is investing $137.8 million this year in salaries to terrorists jailed in Israel and payments to the families of imprisoned terrorists or suicide bombers, in violation of the Oslo peace accords with Israel.
Wednesday’s hearing took place following a months-long wave of violent attacks waged by Palestinians on Israelis in the West Bank. Last week, a Palestinian attacker broke into a home in the West Bank and stabbed to death a 13-year-old Israeli-American girl in her sleep.
There have been 250 such attacks or attempted attacks by Palestinians on Israelis since October 2015, according to the report of the Middle East Quartet—comprised of the United States, Russia, the European Union, and the United Nations—issued last week. The assaults have killed at least 30 Israelis and resulted in dozens of Palestinians being killed by Israeli police.
Official Palestinian Authority media have glorified perpetrators of these terrorist attacks. Bashar Masalha, a Palestinian who stabbed U.S. Army veteran Taylor Force to death and wounded several others in March, was hailed on official media outlets as a “martyr” at the time of his funeral.

MEMRI President Yigal Carmon's Testimony To House Committee On Foreign Affairs

Palestinian Authority Support For Imprisoned, Released, And Wounded Terrorists And Families Of 'Martyrs'
The following is written testimony submitted to the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, July 6, 2016, by Yigal Carmon, President and Founder, The Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI), Washington, D.C.
Mr. Chairman, Ranking Members, and Members of the Committee,
My testimony today is dedicated to a persistent problem: the financial and other support given by the Palestinian Authority (PA) to those who have continued their terrorist activities after the Oslo Accords, in which Yasser Arafat made a commitment, on behalf of the Palestinian people, to stop all terrorist activity.
By providing this support, the PA is encouraging terrorism in violation of its Oslo commitment.
Furthermore, the PA has been using money granted by donor countries for this purpose, and by doing so, has made them complicit in encouraging terrorism as well.
The details of this support, which I will cite in my testimony, may sound somewhat tedious, and I apologize for this in advance. They are taken both from the Palestinian media and from official PA records, available online.
MEMRI, as you may know, has been monitoring and analyzing the Middle East media for nearly 20 years. My testimony today is based not only on an analysis of the PA 2016 budget, but on years of research.

An anecdote from Iran, 1979

During my current trip to Israel I am getting the opportunity to speak with many fascinating people. Yesterday I spoke on the phone to an expert on Iran, and when I introduced myself as the Elder of Ziyon he said he had to tell me a story that happened to him - about me.

This scholar was in Iran studying at a religious school in the late 1970s. He was 28 years old at the time. His fellow classmates knew he was Jewish and they told him all about the conspiracy theories they "knew" about Jewish world domination and the Elders of Zion.

He tried many times to disabuse them of this notion, but absolutely nothing he said could shake their conviction that the Elders guide the Jews who control the US which controls the world.

Finally, after months of not being able to convince them otherwise, this scholar decided to "confess" with the most outrageous conspiracy theory he could devise.

He told them that we Jews are superior and have extraordinarily advanced technology. All of us have been fitted with a nearly invisibly tiny zipper, a nano-zipper if you will, between the forehead and the hairline. If you look very, very closely, you can just about make it out, although he admitted that he couldn't quite see it in the mirror, perhaps they could see it.

Every night, the zipper is remotely opened and the Jews' brains are uploaded to "Conspiracy Central" there they are programmed by the Elders of Zion. When they wake up, they know what to do that day. Perhaps the program is activated by saying the "Modeh Ani prayer," I don't know.

The Jewish student went on to say that he was frustrated about this process, because he didn't want to be programmed - he wanted to be one of the Elders who create the program to tell other Jews what to do. Alas, he was too young to join the Elders at that time. Maybe one day.

He told me that you could have heard a pin drop as he spun this tale. The Iranian students bought this story completely.

Every one of these Iranian religious school students lined up to see if they could detect the tiny zipper on his forehead.

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