Mordechai Kedar: Putting Jerusalem First
We are at faultOn Holocaust remembrance day, warnings of rising xenophobia
The truth has to be said: Israel did not do enough to establish the fact that Jerusalem is its capital, to entrench that fact in world consciousness. There are several proofs of this: important government offices, among them the Defense Ministry, work out of Tel Aviv. As a result, just two weeks ago, we heard Trump's intended secretary of defense say at his congressional hearing that Israel's capital is Tel Aviv. After all, his meetings with the defense establishment of Israel take place in Tel Aviv. Israel spent billions on building the Defense Department complex in Tel Aviv, hardly an unimportant ministry.
Most visitors to Israel come by air. The main international airport is called Ben Gurion and on world flight maps, that airport is placed in Tel Aviv. The top of the terminal building should have "Welcome to JSM" on it in different languages, because Jerusalem is serviced by this airport. Instead, its symbol is TLV.This may seem inconsequential, simply technical, but it has significance, especially among decision makers who tend to do a great deal of flying.
And if we are already on the subject of Ben Gurion airport, may I point out a most embarrassing fact to Israel's decision makers: everyone who arrives at the airport walks along the terminal to passport control, passing through a long circular hall whose walls are covered with gigantic advertisements for beer. In Hebrew the word "bira" means an alcoholic beverage known as beer, but when pronounced emphasizing the second syllable, "bira" means capital city. How shameful!! Is this the way Israel should welcome visitors? Is this the message Israel wants them to get with their first steps in the holy land? Beer? That's what counts? Why not photos of the bira, Jerusalem? Or Israel's beautiful landscapes? Its people, cities, streets? Is there a shortage of things to be proud of? Just beer? That's the highest rung of the ladder? It was the Prophet Isaiah who said: "Woe to that wreath, the pride of Ephraim's drunkards..."
There are other things Israel could do to establish the motif of Jerusalem as its historic capital in the minds of its own citizens and those of the world. For example, one could hold an annual commemoration of the First Temple's dedication on the Sukkot holiday during King Solomon's reign (Kings I, 8), letting the world know that Israel was not established in 1948 but when King David moved the capital of the Jewish monarchy from Hevron to Jerusalem (Samuel I, 5), making the Jewish state and its capital over 3000 years old.
Another very important step is to change the Arabic name for Jerusalem on Israel's road signs. They now say "Al Quds," a relatively recent appellation. The classic name for Jerusalem, appearing countless times in the Muslim Hadith (Oral Law), is "Beit al Maqdes," and anyone who looks at the name realizes that it is taken from the words Beit Hamikdash, the Holy Temple. Israel has every right to use that name as it is the one that appears in the earliest Islamic sources. And Israel could simply transliterate the word "Jerusalem" into Arabic letters. After all, that is the city's name. (h/t Elder of Lobby)
Dozens of Auschwitz survivors began a day of commemorations by placing wreaths and flowers at the infamous execution wall on the 72nd anniversary of the camp’s liberation by Soviet soldiers. The United Nations recognized January 27 as International Holocaust Remembrance Day in 2005, and many commemorative events were taking place across the world on Friday.German Muslim students protest Holocaust remembrance, attack Israel
“Tragically, and contrary to our resolve, anti-Semitism continues to thrive,” UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said in statement made in New York Thursday, and which was read out at the UN headquarters in Geneva on Friday. “We are also seeing a deeply troubling rise in extremism, xenophobia, racism and anti-Muslim hatred. Irrationality and intolerance are back.”
Guterres vowed to “be in the front line of the battle against anti-Semitism and all other forms of hatred.”
In Germany, outgoing Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said his nation sticks by its obligation to take responsibility for the crimes committed by the Nazi regime of Adolf Hiltler.
Noting the political instability in the world today, Steinmeier said, “History should be a lesson, warning and incentive all at the same time. There can and should be no end to remembrance.”
Muslim students with Arab and Turkish origins protested participation in an International Holocaust remembrance event for the liberation of the German extermination camp Auschwitz on January, 27 while the school management showed understanding for their criticism of Israel.
“Some Muslims students said they would not participate in the action,” said Florian Beer, a teacher at the school in the city of Gelsenkirchen in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia, reported the paper Der Westen on Thursday.
The Holocaust Remembrance event is part of a global commemoration action to take selfie photographs with a sign saying “I Remember“ or “We Remember.“ A remembrance plaque at the school was desecrated with the sentence: “F*** Israel, free Palestine.” The school was not able to identify the perpetrator or perpetrators.
Dr. Efraim Zuroff, the head of the Jerusalem office of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, told The Jerusalem Post on Friday, “First, Muslims students are greatest in need of Holocaust education, so it would be unfortunate if they were excused from those activities.”
Zuroff, who is the Wiesenthal’s chief Nazi-hunter, added “Given that Holocaust consciousness is a central idea of civic identity in the Federal Republic, it [Holocaust remembrance] is doubly important for families that come from countries with deep antisemitic traditions and no knowledge of the Holocaust and the destruction of European Jewry.”