Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Monday, May 15, 2017

The first victims of the Nakba were Jews

In the revisionist history on Palestinian Arab sites today, "Nakba Day," it is claimed that this was the day that war broke out, when Arab nations fought unsuccessfully to protect Palestinian Arabs from Jewish militias in 1948.

But the war didn't start in May 1948. It started in November 1947 hours after the UN Partition vote.

For months before the vote, Arab terrorists held their fire, hoping that the UN would not recommend a truncated Jewish state along with an Arab state in the area of the British Mandate. But within hours of the UN partition resolution, the gloves were off.

7 Jews were murdered that first day.

Arabs threw grenades at an Egged bus traveling from Netanya to Jerusalem, and one exploded inside.

Devora Yaari was injured, and her husband Shalom Yaari rushed to her aid. He was shot dead in cold blood.

Shoshana Mizrahi Farhi, 22, was on her way to Jerusalem to get married. She was killed.

The other victims were Hirsh Starer, Mrs. Hanna Weiss, and Haya Yisraeli.

Another Egged bus was attacked a half hour later, and Nechama Hacohen, a pathologist at Hadassah Hospital, was killed.

Moshe Goldman was killed with a gunshot in the chest.

Palestinian Arabs started the war that resulted in their abandoning their supposed homeland to let their Arab brethren finish off what they started. Some of them wanted peace but their leaders did not even consider it,

The refusal of Arab leaders to accept Jews as human beings who deserve rights - the decision to oppose the Jews "by all means" - was the beginning of the Nakba.

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Mothers Day/Lag B'Omer/Administrivia open thread

A busy day at stately Elder Manor, so here is an open thread.

Also, administrivia: some people have been asking what happened to Mike Lumish's weekly column. He told me several weeks ago he was unable to continue posting here. I appreciate his writing for EoZ for over two years (and hooking me up with other columnists) and I wish him much hatzlacha!

Happy Lag B'Omer and happy Mothers Day!

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05/14 Links: The unexpected death of BDS; Bennett: Israel must ditch ‘bunker’ diplomacy

From Ian:

The unexpected death of BDS

That bastion of the Boycott Divestment and Sanctions movement the Electronic Intifada recently leaked a copy of a report co-written by the Anti-Defamation League and the Reut Institute. If the authors of the report had taken a look at the BDS movement in the UK they would have realised that we are watching the movement in its death throes.
People in the United Kingdom are tired. They’re tired of hypocrites saying they’re against occupation by occupying their lecture theatres. They’re tired of hypocrites campaigning for rights for Palestinians by depriving Jews of theirs. They’re tired of hypocrites claiming to be in favour of free speech while insisting Zionists be silenced. They’re tired of hypocrites telling them what they can and can’t buy or where they’re allowed to eat by holier than thou activists using Israeli made products to preach their message. Examples of this hypocrisy are everywhere.
Kamal Hawwash the Vice Chair of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign was recently in the news for being denied entry to Israel. The rights and wrongs of Israel’s new law notwithstanding how can one of the most outspoken advocates of BDS really display righteous indignation that he’s not allowed to visit the very country he’s calling on others to boycott?
Malia Bouattia the outgoing president of the National Union of Students may have eleven and a half thousand followers on Twitter but scraped only 270 votes in her failed bid to hold onto her position for another year. David Ward the one time Member of Parliament who was recently called an antisemite in the House of Commons has been sacked by the head of his party and Ken “Hitler” Livingstone the former Mayor of London can look forward to nothing more than infamy for the rest of his career. The fact that the Labour Party refused to expel him simply contributed to Britons finding the party unfit for government.

Macron expected to support two-state solution, says BDS is antisemitic

A succession of ceremonies marked the inauguration of Emmanuel Macron as France’s eighth president under the Fifth Republic. Outgoing president François Hollande received his successor at the Élysée Palace on Sunday morning and the two men spoke in private for more than an hour, after which Hollande left en route for the Socialist Party headquarters.
Guided by rigid French protocol, Macron’s day was still very much in his image. Similarly to his long walk on election evening, when he walked for several minutes, alone, across the Louvre Museum courtyard until he reached the stage, Macron walked alone on Sunday on the red carpet at the Élysée court toward his former boss and mentor Hollande.
The speech Macron delivered an hour later was sober, with the new head of state saying he is “fully aware of the high expectations of the French citizens.
“The French people has chosen hope and a spirit of achievement over a spirit of division and breaking away from the global market,” he said, adding that he now carries the responsibility of convincing French citizens that their country has all the resources necessary to once again be a leading country within the family of nations.

Anti-Semitic politician taken off En Marche ticket

The party of French President-elect Emmanuel Macron withdrew from its parliamentary elections ticket a politician who made statements deemed anti-Semitic.
Christian Gerin, a journalist, was taken off the En Marche ticket Friday, a day after he was nominated to represent the party in next month’s elections for the French parliament, in connection with messages he wrote in 2013, throughout last year and this year on Twitter.
In one tweet, flagged as “anti-Semitic” by the LICRA watchdog against anti-Semitism and racism, he wrote: “When will there be a separation between CRIF and state?”
CRIF is the umbrella group of French Jewish communities, whose critics say wields too much influence over French politicians.
He also wrote that Manuel Valls, a former prime minister under outgoing President Francois Hollande, is “virulently Zionist, racist and an Islamophobe.”
Gerin also wrote on Twitter: “The only solution: BDS.”

Daphne Anson: Brats & Braves (videos)

For anyone who has not yet seen them in all their infantile shame, Israel-hating brats at the University of California at Irvine use bully boy tactics to disrupt a meeting and silence a speaker. The totalitarian Left in action once again.
In Toronto, a chanting kid on a grown-up's back leads the anti-Israel protest. Pro-Israel demonstrators face the mob, with its obscene and very telling cries of "From the River to the Sea ..."
A brave Englishman's delicious satire on Islamofascism and its totalitarian leftists allies:

Another Arab myth exploded: Jews actually HELPED Arab workers in the 1920s

The Arab narrative is that Jews came to Palestine and took their livelihoods. But this news article from The Palestine Bulletin from exactly 90 years ago shows that the Jewish labor leaders did everything they could to aid Arab workers, to the praise of international unions.

When the article says that most of the Arabs in the transport sector are "not residents in the places they work" it is referring to the tens of thousands of Arabs, mostly from Syria and Lebanon, who worked in British Mandate Palestine (often seasonally) because the economy was booming there, and they sent money back home.

You know what those people are called nowadays? "Palestinians."

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Translated from the Turkish "Shalom" Jewish newspaper:

Israel's 69th Independence Day was celebrated with a reception and award ceremony held by the Consulate-General of Israel in Istanbul. Speaking at the reception at the Hilton Bosphorus Convention Center, Israeli Consul General Shai Cohen pointed to the rapid development of Turkey-Israel relations after the normalization treaty. Stating that they are in serious cooperation in bilateral trade, as well as bilateral developments in art, culture and academia, Cohen stated that the relations between the two countries are increasing and that efforts are being made to move to higher levels. At a ceremony where Israeli Ambassador to Ankara Eitan Na'eh was present, he stated that the situation of the Syrian refugees deeply affected the Israelis coming from a refugee community. The Consul General, in Istanbul for the benefit of Syrian children,

Chief Rabbi Rav Isak Haleva and Ishak Ibrahimzadeh, the President of the Turkish Jewish Society, were present at the ceremony attended by the representatives of the Turkish Jewish Society as well as the world of business and academia.

In the framework of the arranged reception, the institutions and persons contributing to the development of the relations between the two countries were also rewarded. Within this scope, Turkish companies including Turkish Airlines, Koç, Zorlu, and Bank Hapoalim, and Israeli firms including Netafim were awarded for their contributions to the bilateral relations.

There is clearly no love between Turkey's leader and the State of Israel. Erdogan made a speech last week attacking any Jews who visit the holiest site in Judaism and Israel responded sharply.

I don't know how large this gathering was. But as far as I can tell, this event in a major hotel in Istanbul didn't have something that you would find in nearly any similar Zionist gathering in Western Europe or the US:

Protesters.

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The Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics issued a document for "Nakba Day" that proves, if anything, that Palestinian statisticians lie just as much as their politicians do.

The document starts off with "Ms. Ola Awad, President of the PCBS, reviews the conditions of the Palestinian people via statistical figures and findings, on the eve of the sixty ninth anniversary of the Palestinian Nakba."

And statistics don't lie, right?

Well, maybe, but Palestinian statistics and statisticians sure do.

It starts off defining the "Nakba" this way:

[T]he Nakba in Palestine describes a process of ethnic cleansing in which an unarmed nation was destroyed and its population displaced to be replaced systematically by another nation. Unlike a natural catastrophe, the Palestinian Nakba was the result of a man-made military plan with the consent of other states, leading to a major tragedy for the Palestinian people.

Sure, except that there was no "nation" that was destroyed, the "unarmed" people they are referring to were the ones who started the war, there was no "ethnic cleansing" (except for the Jews of Arab countries,) there was no "Palestinian people" and the vast majority of them left voluntarily to escape the fighting, assuming that their side would win.

Yeah, there is not one part of that paragraph that reflects reality.

But that is just a preamble. How about cold, hard facts?

Population Density: Gaza Strip is the most crowded place in the world

The population density in Palestine at the end of 2016 was 811 individuals per square kilometer (km²): 526 individuals/km² in the West Bank and 5,239 individuals/km² in Gaza Strip.

The most crowded countries and territories in the world are:

Territory	Density (people/km2)
Macau	55,001
Monaco	18,589
Singapore	7,797
Hong Kong	6,644

But the most crowded places are cities, with Manila at over 100,000 people per square kilometer. In fact, Gaza City itself doesn't rank in the Wikipedia list of most crowded cities - while Bnei Brak in Israel is #6 with over 70,000 per square kilometer.

The document also calls every dead terrorist a "martyr."

Oh, and for good measure, this document filled with lies says,"The Israeli Occupation narrative is based on falsification of the culture, civilization and history of Palestine."

Well they sure know about falsification.

This document comes in handy just in case anyone thought that the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics was any more dedicated to facts and truth than any other Palestinian Arab political entity.

Here's a video I made in 2009 about the "most crowded" meme:

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05/13 Links: Pierre Rehov:The UN's Obsession against Israel; Lawsuit Targets American Muslims for Palestine

From Ian:

Pierre Rehov: The UN's Obsession against Israel

The United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) met once again on March 20 to debate "Agenda Item 7," a mandatory subject of debate since June 2006, the only one whose goal is systematically to condemn the Israeli democracy for crimes the existence of which remain to be proven.
The agenda, officially designed to assess the humanitarian situation in the Palestinian territories, in the light of the reports submitted by Fatah, the PLO and various NGOs, is part of a wider campaign, carried out by countries such as Libya, Algeria, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Sudan and Yemen. Israel is thus the only country on the planet to benefit from the doubtful privilege of being scrutinized on the least of its actions, through an agenda decided by its enemies.
If it were only a question of expressing this obsession, born out of an old habit for the Arab-Muslim dictatorships to turn the Hebrew state into their scapegoat, responsible for all the misfortunes plaguing their societies, Agenda Item 7 would be a mere oddity, especially since the session is regularly boycotted by a majority of Western countries, and systematically by the United States.
Unfortunately, this Israelphobia has been spreading throughout the United Nations. In 1948, when Israel, after being officially recognized as a sovereign state by virtually all Western democracies, had just repelled the genocidal aggression of five neighboring countries, and hundreds of thousands of Jews were fleeing the oppression of Arab dictatorships, the UN gave birth to UNRWA, an organization designed to help Palestinian refugees exclusively. This was despite there already being a program for refugees at the UN, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).
The mandate of UNRWA was for one year. Seventy years later, the organization, now a lavish UN jobs program, continues to function within the Palestinian territories and neighboring countries, with an annual budget close to one billion dollars. Part of that covers salaries and pension funds for 25,000 to 27,000 employees (including many members of Hamas); schools in which the descendants of descendants of "refugees", in suburbs or villages called "camps", are inaccurately told that Tel Aviv and Haifa had belonged to them and should be returned to them, and where the myth of an impossible "right of return" continues to hold new generations of Palestinians hostage and inciting hatred of Israel and Jews.
As Said Aburish, one of Yasser Arafat's biographers and a former adviser to Saddam Hussein, told this author:
"In order to conserve UNRWA rations, Palestinians had become accustomed to bury their dead at night, so that no one died in the camps except when it was possible to accuse Israel of it. As a result, the refugee figures have always been distorted, with the passive complicity of UNRWA, as its annual budget depends on the number of souls for which they are responsible."

Lawsuit Targets American Muslims for Palestine

A national anti-Israel group and several of its activists are "alter egos and/or successors" of a Hamas-support network that was found liable for an American teen's death in a 1996 terrorist attack, litigation filed in Chicago federal court Friday claims.
After Stanley and Joyce Boim won $156 million in damages, defendants including the Islamic Association for Palestine (IAP) and the American Muslim Society (AMS) shut down and claimed to be unable to pay. It was a ruse, the Boims' attorneys claim, as many of the same people opened up American Muslims for Palestine (AMP) at a nearby address.
A subsequent criminal prosecution found that other defendants in the original lawsuit, like the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development (HLF) and the United Association for Studies and Research, were part of a Muslim Brotherhood-created Hamas-support network in the United States called the Palestine Committee.
The IAP used to hold annual conventions. The year after it shut down, AMP held its first national meeting, offering the same "audience, content, management, speakers, and ... message" as the IAP gatherings, the complaint said.
Today, AMP and its financial arm, Americans for Justice in Palestine Educational Foundation, continue the work done by the defunct groups in the original Boim suit, the complaint said. AMP donors and officers "are substantially identical to the management and donors of their alter egos and predecessors, HLF, IAP and AMS."

IsraellyCool: Terror Supporters JVP and AMP Stung By Flyers Accusing Them Of Being Terror Supporters

The following flyers have been placed all over New York City.
Including the homes of Rebecca Vilkomerson, Executive Director, Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP), and Hatem Bazian, Chairman of American Muslims for Palestine (AMP), leading to this attack by Vilkomerson, JVP and AMP.
Note how they characterize the flyers as “Islamophobic” because they “attempt to link Islam with terrorism” – even though nothing in the flyers actually suggests this.
Instead, let’s look at the accusations in the flyer to see if they are founded.
American Muslims for Palestine (AMP)
According to the ADL – which incidentally comes out hard against “Islamophobia” – AMP is not only affiliated with terrorists, but is also antisemitic.

Are Biblical scholars that ignorant? Or is it only Haaretz?

From Haaretz:

Can We Eat Bacon Now? Leviticus Was Written for Priests, Not You, Say Scholars

The Book of Leviticus, the third book in the Old Testament, is considered something of an anomaly by some scholars.

The rest of the Old Testament books are concerned with the history of the Jewish people and their belief. But Leviticus concerns itself with ritual, legal, and moral practices. It lays down the laws by which the Jewish people are supposed to live.

But, was it truly meant for the laity? Should all Jews have to adhere to its tenets, as is commonly assumed? Some Biblical scholars argue that the Book of Leviticus was not originally meant to apply to the general public: its laws were meant for the priests of the Temple.

Dr. Robert Gnuse, professor in the Religious Studies Department at Loyola University, says that historically, the rules on food and clothing found in the Book of Leviticus were meant exclusively for priests, just like the laws in the Hindu Code of Manu Smriti for Brahmin priests.

That is, until the period of the Babylonian captivity. Someone from the priestly class in Babylon found a way to encourage the Jewish people living in exile to take on these laws in order to keep them together as a community, Gnuse theorizes. This is also the view Mary Douglas took in her earlier works.

First of all, the text of Leviticus makes it clear which rules are for all Israelites and which only for priests.

Some sections start with variants of And the LORD called unto Moses, and spoke unto him out of the tent of meeting, saying, Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them:

Others start with And the LORD spoke unto Moses, saying: Command Aaron and his sons, saying:

It is pretty clear which sections were meant for priests and which were meant for everyone.

Beyond that, the laws of Kosher are also in Deuteronomy, where the entire book was clearly meant for the entire nation. (A little of the kosher laws are in Exodus, too, and at least one mentioned in Genesis.)

So how much is this are idiotic Biblical scholars and how much Haaretz twisting their words for the story?

I want to stress that I have respect for some non-Jewish Biblical scholars. Like George Bush. No, not that one, but a relative who wrote books about the Bible in the 19th century. Here is the first page of his commentary on Leviticus 11, the chapter that speaks about kosher laws:

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05/12 Links Pt2: The People vs. Haaretz; Comedy Central promotes Anti-Israel Linda Sarsour on ‘The President Show’

From Ian:

The People vs. Haaretz

Haaretz is an Israeli newspaper. Admired by many foreigners and few Israelis, loathed by many, mostly Israelis. Read by few, denounced by many, it is a highly ideological, high-quality paper. It has a history of excellence. It has a history of independence. It has a history of counting Israel’s mistakes and misbehavior. It has a history of getting on Israel’s nerves.
Still, it is just a newspaper. The story of the people vs. Haaretz — that is, of a great number of Israelis’ growing dislike for the paper — is worth telling only because it tells us something about Israel itself: that the country’s far left is evolving from a political position into a mental state and that the right-wing majority has not yet evolved into being a mature, self-confident public.
Consider an incident from mid-April. Haaretz published an op-ed by one of its columnists. It made a less-than-convincing argument that religious Zionist Israelis are more dangerous to Israel than Hezbollah terrorists. And yet, the response was overwhelming. The prime minister, defense minister, education minister and justice minister all denounced the article and the newspaper. The president condemned the article, too. The leader of the centrist party Yesh Atid called the op-ed “anti-Semitic.” Leaders of the left-of-center Labor Party called it hateful. The country was almost unified in condemnation.
Of course, not completely unified. On the far left, a few voices supported the article and the newspaper. Some argued that the article was substantively valid. Others argued that whether the article was substantive or not, the onslaught on Haaretz is a cynical ploy to shake another pillar of the left — maybe its most visible remaining pillar. (h/t Elder of Lobby)

Comedy Central Gives Anti-Israel Linda Sarsour Spot on ‘The President Show’

Sarsour has in the past stated that Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a victim of genital mutilation as a child, doesn't deserve to be a woman and should have her vagina taken away.
After asking Sarsour about the meaning of "intersectionality," Atamanuik turned back to Muslim issues for a joke about how the political right uses "Islam as a way to criticize female treatment in Muslim countries" even though they are "trying to kill women here by having a health care bill that basically takes out people."
"Don't you think that there's a problem that extends beyond political party or ideology in displaying Muslims as somehow rudimentary, or violent, or other, in a way that extends to commentary from the left, talking about Muslims needing to take responsibility for terrorist attacks, or on the right, using Islam as a way to criticize female treatment in Muslim countries when we actually are trying to kill women here by having a health care bill that basically takes out people," asked Atamanuik during the comedy show.
Sarsour said that she refuses to take responsibility for terrorist attacks, arguing that while they are "outrageous and horrible," it is not her responsibility.
"It's not my responsibility [as a Muslim]," Sarsour said. "Those people didn’t call me up and ask my permission for doing something horrific. I want to condemn it as a human being, as an American just like everybody else."
Sarsour appeared at an event last month with Rasmea Odeh, a convicted terrorist responsible for the death of two young students in Israel, and said she was "honored to be on the stage with Rasmea."

White House: Trump to push Palestinian ‘self-determination’ on Mideast trip

US President Donald Trump will work toward a “just and lasting peace” between Israel and the Palestinians, including the Palestinian aspiration of “self-determination” on his upcoming trip to the region, the White House said Friday.
US National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster told reporters during the daily press briefing that Trump will meet again with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, where the president will “express his desire for dignity and self-determination for the Palestinians.”
McMaster also said that Trump’s meetings with Israeli leaders would look to cement stronger ties between the two allies.
“With President (Reuven) Rivlin and Prime Minister (Benjamin) Netanyahu, he will reaffirm America’s unshakable bond to the Jewish state,” he said.

One of the more prominent (alleged) hunger strikers is Karim Younis, 59, a terrorist who murdered Avraham Bromberg in 1980. He was originally sentenced in 1983 to life in prison but Shimon Peres commuted the sentence to 40 years.

He is one of a handful of Palestinians prisoners who have been there since before Oslo.

Today, Arab media is reporting that Younis is getting weaker from the hunger strike. But they are adding a detail that Younis is the longest serving prisoner in the world.

Of course, this is a lie. The 34 years he served so far are not even in the ballpark of the longest serving prisoners in the world, several of whom have been in prison over 60 years. Francis Clifford Smith has been in prison for nearly 67 years, almost double Younis' stint.

For some reason, Palestinians always want to be known as the record-breakers. From "the only people under military occupation in the world" to the "largest refugee population in the world" they lie, exaggerate and make things up just to stay in the spotlight - a spotlight that they had for decades and whose bulb is inexorably burning out.

(h/t Ibn Boutros)

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05/12 Links Pt1: Glick: The PLO’s most powerful lobbyists; Has The Red Cross Visited Israeli Prisoners in Gaza?

From Ian:

Caroline Glick: The PLO’s most powerful lobbyists

In choosing to treat anti-Israel groups like Breaking the Silence and B’Tselem with kid gloves, the General Staff is inserting itself directly into Israeli politics.
Likewise, when IDF generals lobby Congress to maintain US funding of the PA , and when “military sources” express their opposition to Trump’s plan to move the US Embassy to Jerusalem, they are behaving as political activists.
This returns us to Netanyahu and his frustration at Trump’s sudden embrace of the PLO , which places the most pro-Israel president in history on a collision course with Israel.
Netanyahu is right to be angry. But his rage at Lauder is misdirected. The real culprit is the General Staff.
Since no prime minister can dispute the holy grail of “security concerns,” Lauder got blamed.
This situation is insufferable. Our generals cannot continue to receive a pass for their political activism.
When they lobby for the PLO and against moving the US Embassy to Jerusalem they cross the line into gross insubordination. When they protect Breaking the Silence and B’Tselem rather than their soldiers, they commit a grave dereliction of duty.

Sheri Oz: Question. How Many Times Has The Red Cross Visited Israeli Prisoners in Gaza?

Tell me, Mr Barghouti – how do your prison conditions compare with those of Gilad Shalit who was abducted and held by Hamas in Gaza for five years? How do they compare with the conditions Hamas offers to current Israeli prisoners: Abera Mengistu, Israeli of Ethiopian origin being held in Gaza since September 2014, Hisham al-Syed, Israeli Bedouin held since April 2015, and Juma Ibrahim Abu Anima, Israeli Bedouin who has been held since July last year?
The Israeli Prison Service (IPS) has agreed to let the International Red Cross visit you today (Thursday) in lieu of the pre-scheduled meeting with your lawyer that was cancelled since you called on security prisoners to join you in a hunger strike and you were consequently put into solitary. The reports note that you have not seen anyone from the Red Cross since before the hunger strike. That means that you HAVE seen Red Cross staff before that – and we have no idea how many times these visits have taken place but apparently the IRC visits security prisoners in Israel on a regular basis.
Out of curiousity, I wanted to know how many times the IRC has visited with Abera Mengistu so I called Uri Perednik, Parliamentary Aide to MK Avraham Neguise (pronounced Negosa), who serves as chair of the Caucus for the Return of Avraham (Abera) Mengistu. Perednik told me that the IRC has visited Mengistu a total of zero times. Furthermore, while the Israeli government and Hamas insist that Mengistu is alive, there have been no signs of life presented in fact, according to Perednik.

PM: All embassies, especially the US, should be in Jerusalem

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that all foreign embassies in Israel should be located in Jerusalem, chief among them the American embassy.
Speaking at a Likud event on Thursday, Netanyahu said Jerusalem is the “eternal capital of the Israeli people and it is fitting that all embassies, especially that of our friend the United States, be moved the Jerusalem.”
The remark came less than two weeks ahead of the expected visit of US President Donald Trump, who during his presidential campaign last year, promised to move the American embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, a potential move he has distanced himself from since his election in November.
Israel considers Jerusalem its undivided capital while the Palestinians want East Jerusalem, including the Old City, as the capital of a future state. The international community has never recognized Israel’s annexation of East Jerusalem after Israel captured it in 1967.
Most foreign embassies in Israel are in Tel Aviv, with some nations also maintaining consulate-generals in Jerusalem.

Egypt is hardly a paradigm of human rights, but human rights NGOs ignore some of the remarkable things that have been done under the current Egyptian leadership.

From Al Ahram:

A Cairo misdemeanor court has set 24 June to start the trial of a prominent Islamic cleric and television presenter on charges of contempt of religion, after he described Christians as non-believers on an episode of his television show.

The lawsuit filed against Salem Abdel-Geliel by lawyer Naguib Gibrail initially charged that Abdel-Geliel’s comments displayed contempt of religion, threatened national unity, disrupted public peace and incited the killing of Christians.

Abdel-Geliel, a former deputy minister for proselytisation at the Ministry of Religious Endowments, has presented a daily religious programme, Muslims Ask, on Mehwar satellite channel since early 2016.

Hassan Rateb, the head of Mehwar, said on Wednesday that the cleric’s contract with the station would be cancelled. The channel also apologised to all “Christian brothers” in an official statement.

Abdel-Geliel, who is been known for his mainstream religious views, described Christians as "unbelievers" and their beliefs as "corrupted" during his explanation of a Quranic verse on an episode of his programme earlier this week.

He said later in a statement that the description “unbeliever” was applied to Christians in the Quran in a specific context, but he apologised if he had offended Christians’ feelings.

He also stressed that describing Christians as such doesn’t carry any sort of incitement to violence against Christians or followers of any other religion, as such violence is forbidden in Islam.

Abdel-Geliel also said that he fully understood the channel's decision to end his contract.

Egypt's Ministry of Endowments had said that Abdel-Geliel would be banned from giving sermons at ministry-affiliated mosques until he issued an apology.

Defendants charged with contempt of religion are normally Christians, or others holding minority religious views, charged with insulting Islam.

But this is not the first time in recent years that an Islamic religious figure has been tried on charges of contempt of Christianity.

Controversial preacher Abu Islam, who burnt a copy of the Bible in front of the American embassy in Cairo during Salafi protests in September 2012, was sentenced in June 2013 to 11 years in jail and a EGP3,000 fine over the incident after he was found guilty of insulting Christianity.

The sentence was reduced to three years following a series of appeals.

Even Abdel Geliel's reaction is remarkable. His words were fairly mild and also pretty accurate. There is much worse incitement all over the Arab world as can be seen from five minutes at MEMRI. Furthermore, he isn't some firebrand preacher or crazy jihadist. He is popular and represents mainstream Islam.

Egypt does seem to be taking anti-Christian attitudes seriously. Perhaps it is too little, too late, but this is very welcome.

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