Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Tuesday, March 12, 2019

Cartoon of the Day: Boycott

Continuing my re-captioning of single-panel cartoons....

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Continuing a series that started here and continued here, I hope by now that readers appreciate the difficulties Israeli and its defenders face if we decided to “fight fire with fire” by mirroring enemy tactics. But presuming our only choices are to ape our foes or sit back and take a beating represents a failure of imagination, born from a failure to think through our choices from a strategic perspective.

Fortunately, we already have the most important starting point needed to approach our problems strategically: a well-understood goal we are heading towards. In the case of Israel and her friends, that goal can be summed up as seeing the Jewish state free, safe and strong.

Seeing the Israeli and Jewish condition normalized, so that we are treated with the same respect automatically given every other nation and people, is also a worthy goal, albeit a more difficult one to achieve given how much that would involve changing human hearts. That said, people tend to treat those they are impressed by better than those they consider weak or inferior. So focusing on a free, safe and strong Israel might have positive knock on effects regarding wider normalization goals.

With a free, safe and strong Israel as our North Star, we need to think of the most effective ways of achieving this end. Maintaining strong, bi-partisan support for Israel in the US has been a strategy American Jews have pursued successfully for decades. Indeed, one of the reasons AIPAC is so ferociously demonized by Israel’s enemies is those enemy’s correct perception of how successful the organization has been in staying on and accomplishing its mission.

The passage of dozens of resolutions at the state and national level condemning BDS is another instance where our side has played to its strengths, which includes broad support among legislators who understand the popularity of Israel among the public at large. If you consider the years and years of effort the BDSers have put into unsuccessful attempts to get even one small municipality to officially condemn the Jewish state, the fact that half the nation’s legislatures have instead condemned the boycotters is testament to what we can accomplish without having to develop the fanaticism and pathologies of our foes.

Continuing to be able to succeed with such audacious tactics will involve maintaining bi-partisan support for Israel within the US, which today means fighting with all our might the continued attempted takeover of the Left end of the political spectrum by the forces of BDS. This work will be thankless, and painful, and will require us to put aside our own partisanship in order to achieve a higher good. But from a strategic perspective, better to have both sides mostly in our camp (including the one we never vote for), rather than see Israel become a wholly owned issue of one party, a party that – as history shows – will not always be in power.

These are all illustrations of what US Jews and non-Jewish supporters can and should do domestically. Abroad, the situation is bleaker with anti-Semitic politicians close to power in parts of Europe, and the war against the Jewish state continuing in international political and NGO forums. Without minimizing such challenges, success only comes to those who show up, rather than give up. Remember that a few years ago, the Third World (including most of Africa) seemed similarly lost to the enemy until outreach (i.e., “showing up”) by Israeli diplomats opened doors that were previously closed.

On the Israel front, a nation that can send a vessel to the moon is likely to retain its technological and economic edge over those whose greatest achievement is to replace kites with balloons as the most effective way to burn neighboring farmland. Because military adventures outside the nation’s borders have never been an Israeli political priority, Israelis can focus their technological, economic and military superiority on the task of defending fixed borders, a much easier strategic challenge than conquest outside those borders.

If you compare where Israel was in 1948 vs. where it is today and contrast that with how neighboring enemies have done during this same period, one can see how maintaining siege walls both succeeded in keeping foes at bay, while forcing those foes to live with the consequences of their choice to prioritize Israel’s destruction over the creation of healthy stable societies. In fact, the greatest blunder in Israeli political history – the Oslo Accords – failed specifically because it traded those consequences for rewards that the Palestinians squandered years ago, condemning their people to live lives far worse than the ones they had when under the dreaded “Occupation.”

The greatest risk to our side achieving our ends (vs. our enemies achieving theirs), outside of an Iranian atom bomb, is a failure of will. If young Israelis start losing confidence in the virtue of their cause to the point where they stop making sacrifices in the form of military service, that’s a game changer. Similarly, if active support for Israel in the US loses out to a combination of hostility and indifference, that could threaten both the Jewish state and the American diaspora.

If faith in one’s cause was generated solely by libeling one’s enemies, those who have attacked Israel militarily over the years would have done much more advancing than retreating. So next week, in the final segment in this series, I’ll talk about what a campaign might look like that leverages all that is right with the Jewish state without making our side come off as wusses.

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03/12 Links Pt1: The Fogel family massacre eight years on; New Palestinian Authority PM, Praised Mastermind Of Munich Olympics Terror Attack, Palestinian History 'Will Continue To Be Written In Red Ink'

From Ian:

Edgar Davidson: The Fogel family massacre eight years on

Eight years ago today Arab terrorists murdered five members of the Fogel family in their home in Itamar, killing the parents, Ehud and Ruth, and three of their children, Yoav, aged 11, Elad, aged 4, and baby Hadas just 3 months. The killers cut off the baby's head. My blog posting from that day appears below.

Few people know about the massacre and even less know about the depraved terrorists who committed it. The massacre was ignored by the entire main stream media outside Israel, except for a couple of ludicrous reports claiming that it might not have been a terrorist attack, with even nonsense like it could have been a 'disgruntled Thai worker'. But the terrorists Hakim and Amjad Awad (who are cousins) were eventually found and convicted. They told the court they were proud to have committed the attack, which was carefully planned. From the day Hakim Awad was arrested the PA rewarded him with a monthly salary of $3,000 a month, four times the average Palestinian civil servant’s salary. Official PA TV invited his mother and aunt to talk on the PA TV program dedicated to honoring and sending greetings to imprisoned terrorists. They referred to Awad and his accomplices as “heroes” and Hakim Awad himself was called “the hero, the legend.” The PA TV host added: “We, for our part, also convey our greetings to them.”

It is also worth noting the depraved reactions of leftists in Israel to the massacre

Udi Fogel (age 36)
Ruth Fogel (age 35)
Yoav (age 11)
Elad (age 4)
Hadas (3 months)#OnThisDay 7 years ago, the #Fogel family was brutally massacred by two Palestinian terrorists in Itamar, #Israel, as they slept in their home.

May their beautiful memories always be blessed! 🕯️ pic.twitter.com/hmVTS90SRT
— Arsen Ostrovsky (@Ostrov_A) March 11, 2019

New Palestinian Authority PM, In 2010 Interview From The MEMRI Archives, Praised Mastermind Of Munich Olympics Terror Attack, Adding That He Believes Palestinian History 'Will Continue To Be Written In Red Ink'

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud 'Abbas recently appointed his longtime advisor Muhammad Ishtayeh to the position of prime minister of the Palestinian Authority. In 2010, MEMRI TV released a clip of Ishtayeh's interview on July 9 of that year with Hizbullah's Al-Manar TV; in that interview, Ishtayeh said of Abu Daoud, the mastermind of the 1972 Munich Olympics massacre, that "the martyr Abu Daoud continues the convoy of martyrs who fell for the sake of Palestine. We all follow this path."

"The Martyr Abu Daoud Continues The Convoy Of Martyrs Who Fell For The Sake Of Palestine – We All Follow This Path"

Muhammad Ishtayeh: "The martyr Abu Daoud continues the convoy of martyrs who fell for the sake of Palestine. We all follow this path. As for the claim that history can be rewritten in a different way – I think it is unjust to say that Palestinian history can be written in a different ink."

"The Ink In Which Palestinian History Has Been Written Is Red, And I Believe That It Will Continue To Be Written In Red Ink"

"The ink in which the Palestinian history has been written is red, and I believe that it will continue to be written in red ink. In addition, the martyr Abu Daoud was officially eulogized by the Fatah movement and the Palestinian establishment." (h/t Elder of Lobby)

Qatar's 'Spiritual Leader' Prompts World Cup Fears Over Calls For New Holocaust

The spiritual leader of Qatar’s royal family has called for a Muslim holocaust against Jews, prompting concern about the security of Israelis, Jews, Americans and other “non-believers” during the 2022 World Cup in Doha, Qatar.

Yusuf al Qaradawi, in a Jan. 30, 2009 speech that aired on Qatar’s state-owned Al-Jazeera TV network, said, “Throughout history, Allah has imposed upon the [Jews] people who would punish them for their corruption. The last punishment was carried out by Hitler.”

Qatar’s spiritual leader then went on to praise Hitler saying, “By means of all the things he did to them – even though they exaggerated this issue – he managed to put them in their place.” Following this, he called for an Islamic holocaust against the Jews. “This was divine punishment for them. Allah willing, the next time will be at the hand of the believers.” (RELATED: Al Jazeera Readers Celebrate Orlando Terror Attack)

Two days earlier, Al Jazeera TV aired another speech, in which the radical cleric volunteered personally to “shoot” the Jews and end his life as a martyr for his main cause, which is the annihilation of the Jewish people.

“To conclude my speech, I’d like to say that the only thing I hope for is that as my life approaches its end, Allah will give me an opportunity to go to the land of jihad and resistance, even if in a wheelchair,” Qaradawi said. “I will shoot Allah’s enemies—the Jews—and they will throw a bomb at me, and thus, I will seal my life with martyrdom. Praise be to Allah, Lord of the Worlds. Allah’s mercy and blessings upon you.”

Another "scholarly" book has just been published that claims that the land of Israel mentioned in the Bible is nowhere near "Palestine" - but was in Yemen.

Iraqi Arab scholar Dr. Fadel al-Rubaie says that he intensively researched this for 25 years, and found corresponding geographic features and place names in Yemen to places mentioned in the Torah. He concludes that the idea that the kingdoms of Judah and Israel were in Israel is an Orientalist reading of the Bible.

Jerusalem is really "Beit Bos" near Sanaa. Jericho isn't in Jericho. Hebron is not Hebron. Acre is really Yemen's "Ak." Bethlehem is not Bethlehem, Jaffa isn't Jaffa, Beit El isn't Beit El.

Nebuchadnezzar conquered Yemen, not Judah. Jerusalem didn't even exist when Nebuchadnezzar was alive, we are told - it was built 700 years later.

There's more! Judaism is an Arab religion. The children of Israel are the Yemeni Arab tribe of Hamir. Hebrew is an Arab language and has nothing to do with modern Hebrew.

The article goes on to urge the Palestinians to adopt this narrative in order to strengthen their own claim to the land. Which is, of course, the entire point of fabricating this history.

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Omar, Trump and Breaking Taboos on "Palestine"

I came across this billboard in Jerusalem advertising luxury apartments to the employees of the potentially 200 countries that might move their embassies to Jerusalem:

Although the ad is somewhat tongue in cheek, it isn't completely a joke.

Trump's moving the US embassy to Jerusalem wasn't the entire story. Its major effect was breaking the taboo on anyone even thinking about recognizing Jerusalem as Israel's capital. Once the taboo was broken, a trickle of countries have followed in either recognizing Jerusalem as Israel's capital (Australia, Brazil) or going all the way in planning embassy moves (Guatemala, Honduras.)

Something that was unthinkable and taboo to discuss has become something that people can take seriously.

There are taboos on the other side, although the analogy isn't great. Ilhan Omar's bringing up AIPAC has given an excuse for the critics of Israel to mainstream an antisemitic meme of Jewish control. The New York Times wrote a bizarre article featuring someone who was framed as a major AIPAC official but in fact has not been associated with the group for years. The person was quoted as implying that AIPAC would ensure that the new crop of progressive members of Congress will not be re-elected.

Journalists, overwhelmingly liberal, are much more likely to jump on breaking a taboo that fits their thinking - which is that AIPAC twists the democratic process to push the US to be more pro-Israel than it might be otherwise. While there is no problem with breaking taboos, but one must be honest - and very few of the "Is AIPAC too influential" stories in the past month have been accurately pointing out how there are many far more influential lobbies spending far more money than the pro-Israel lobby.

However, there are plenty of taboos around the Israel/Palestinian conflict that are way overdue to be broken:

Palestinian nationalism is a relatively new phenomenon.
There is essentially no history of Palestiniann culture distinguished from Arab culture.
Palestinian nationalism is centered around not building a state but destroying one.
Palestinians overwhelmingly look at "two states" as a stage towards destroying Israel.
There is no historical or legal reason that a Palestinian state must have Jerusalem as its capital.
International law has been twisted specifically to target Israel.
Anti-Zionism is simply a new version of antisemitism.

These are the taboo facts that the media won't touch. But if the stars can align, they can be broken one by one. The truth is on Israel's side; it is a shame that too few journalists and politicians are willing to say the simple truth.

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Last June, a Norwegian rapper named Kaveh performed at the Haugen Food Festival at St. Hanshaugen in Oslo.

On stage, he asked if there were any of his fellow Muslims, and when the audience responded with some applause he wished them "Eid Mubarak."

He then asked if there were any Christians, and received some applause.

Then he asked if there were any Jews and there was no response. After waiting a beat, he said, "Fuck Jews."

In front of all the families with children enjoying a food festival.

He followed up with words to the effect that we are all God's children anyway, implying that even Jews are sort of human.

When this was reported to the police, they investigated and decided that "Fuck Jews" was not a racist statement. "The way it was said, it falls within the freedom of speech of artists and performing artists to make provocative and satirical statements or the like," said the police report.

Then, in January, State Attorney Trude Antonsen agreed with the police's assessment. In her decision to close the case, she wrote that the statement is highly derogatory, offensive and false, but that it is not affected by the criminal code.

That decision was appealed.

Last week, Attorney General Tor Aksel Busch rejected the appeal on the grounds that "fuck Jews" can be understood as criticism of Israel.

"It seems to be targeting Jews, but it can also be said to be targeting the state of Israel and showing dissatisfaction with its policies," the Attorney General wrote in his decision.

Needless to say, there was not even the hint of anything about Israel in what Kaveh said. He wrote an apology on Facebook shortly after the incident, and wrote, "

The statement I made was in a context related to one of my most controversial songs "Shamener."
Before the song I used the opportunity to first congratulate my fellow believers for the end of Ramadan.
Having received feedback from both Muslims and Christians on my question as to whether any of them were present, there was no response to the same question of Jews. In this vacuum, I followed up with a statement that has now been taken out of context. This was meant as irony and I then followed up with "No matter, here we are all God's children anyway."
Taken out of context, this appears to be wrong. I'm not a racist and I'm not a Jew hater.
My goal was to mark that we were people from different cultures and religions that were good together, in the same place at the same time.

This apology rings hollow because a week before the show he tweeted, "How did the Drake get on the front page at GQ be the best dressed man in the world? ASAP ROCKY has 28 times better style. Fucking Jews are so corrupt." (The tweet was removed since then.)

There is nothing at all about Israel in Kaveh's remarks. It is clearly nothing but Jew-hatred. Yet the Attorney General chose to defend antisemitic remarks by invoking the "he's just anti-Zionist" defense.

The Attorney General was also aware of Kaveh's apology, and mentioned it as a mitigating factor in his decision, showing that he was quite aware of the context and that Israel had nothing to do with it.

An attorney for pro-Israel organization MIFF, Jan Benjamin Rødner, is upset.

"It appears that the Attorney General created the connection between Jew and Israel entirely on their own initiative, without any form of support in what was uttered. They found the ambiguity themselves. This creates the impression that this is not anti-Semitism, but only legitimate criticism of the Israeli state's policy," said Rødner.

"It is a frightening sign of the times that the Attorney General has chosen to find an inherent ambiguity of this kind," he added.

The lawyer believes it would have been much better if the Attorney General wrote that "Fuck Jews" is not sufficiently serious to be affected by the anti-racist law paragraph §185.

"With the argument he has chosen, he legitimizes the use of such expressions as synonymous with "Fuck Israel". Thus, the stage is set for the spread of the term "Fuck Jews" and correspondingly for the resurgence of disdain and hatred against Jews. Not to say that "Fuck Israel" is fine, but then it is in any case formulated with a glimpse of political expression."

In other words, now pretty much any attack on Jews in Norway can be justified as being merely political, and not racist.

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Cartoon of the Day: Tolerance

Continuing my re-captioning of single-panel cartoons....

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03/11 Links Pt2: Seth Mandel: No one loses a debate over anti-Semitism. Except Jews; Ross Douthat: Is Anti-Semitism Exceptional? The inevitable decline of left-wing philo-Semitism.

From Ian:

Seth Mandel: No one loses a debate over anti-Semitism. Except Jews.

Here’s the thing, though: None of this is going to hurt anyone involved, politically.

The Democratic Party’s behavior last week was unconscionable. Freshman Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (N.Y.) led the rebellion against Pelosi’s symbolic denunciation of anti-Semitism, calling the idea of a reprimand “hurtful.” Four presidential candidates — Bernie Sanders, Kamala D. Harris, Elizabeth Warren and Kirsten Gillibrand — made it clear they feared Ocasio-Cortez, not the speaker. Sanders said umbrage at Omar’s comments was an attempt at “stifling” debate. Harris took it a step further and said those offended were putting Omar in danger.

It’ll cost the party nothing.

Please stop with the predictions that the Jewish vote in 2020 is suddenly up for grabs. Democrats may have thrown Jews who were offended by Omar under the bus, but they’ll file provisional ballots while looking up at the rear axle if they have to. And Republicans who think they don’t play a role in that are fooling themselves. “We finally censured Steve King after he won his ninth term” isn’t the bumper sticker of a party that’s done everything in its power to reach Jewish voters — especially when it’s still led by a president who infamously equivocated on racist, anti-Semitic marchers in Charlottesville.

The irony is the vote Thursday proves just how wrong Omar and anyone else who sees shadowy powers directing Washington really are. Far from controlling the conversation, Jews are powerless to stop it.

Anti-Semitism is not a partisan issue, no matter how it might have looked last week. Anti-Semitism is a virus. It mutates and adapts to survive and thrive under whatever conditions currently prevail.

The defense many Democrats made of Omar’s statements is that they weren’t anti-Semitic, they were targeting Israel and its allies in Washington. But anti-Semitism often hides behind “anti-Zionism.” As Izabella Tabarovsky, who grew up in the Soviet Union, wrote in the Forward about one such case, “It was under the banner of anti-Zionism that Soviet anti-Semitism blossomed.” From the outside, the Soviet campaign against Zionism may have looked like criticism of an external-facing ideology, but to those living under the Soviet thumb, the truth was plain: “We were targets of anti-Semitic insults in the streets. Our educational and professional opportunities were diminished. When I was deciding what college I wanted to apply to to study foreign languages, I learned that my top two schools were off limits to me: They prepared students for careers in foreign service, and these were closed to the untrustworthy Jews.”

Ross Douthat: Is Anti-Semitism Exceptional? The inevitable decline of left-wing philo-Semitism.

Finally, a great deal of the new anti-Semitism — from the recent wave of hate crimes in New York City to the anti-Jewish violence befouling Europe — would still be coming from minority and immigrant communities that are seen as essential to left-of-center and especially radical-left politics going forward, making them more difficult than right-wing anti-Semitism for the left to full-throatedly condemn.

Of course right-wing anti-Semites haven’t gone away either — which is part of why anti-anti-Omar Democrats can tell themselves that by downgrading Jewish exceptionalism, trading a specific philo-Semitism for a general politics of all-bigotry-is-bad, they are asking liberal Jews to make a sacrifice that’s essential for the greater good of defeating the greater enemy, which is still the reactionary right.

Whether this argument works depends in part on what the post-Trump right ultimately becomes — whether there’s a way to marry nationalism and philo-Semitism, perhaps wooing Jewish voters rightward, or whether any form of right-wing populism inevitably brings anti-Semitism roaring back.

But it also depends on whether the assumptions of Omar’s left-wing defenders are justified — whether anti-Semitism can be contained if it’s treated as one form of bigotry among many, or whether the perverse resilience of Jew-hatred is such that cultures choose between philo-Semitism and anti-Semitism, with only a swift downward slope lying in between.

Reviews of Friedman's 'Spies of No Country'

'Spies of No Country' proves the point that Israel's early Arabic-speaking spies had no country to call their own own - except Israel, writes Lily Meyer for NPR:

For half a decade, Friedman has been working hard, and publicly, to dispel easy narratives about Israel. He rose to attention — and controversy — through a pair of essays about media bias in coverage of Israel, and has remained on the beat ever since. His perspective is unusual: Israeli by choice, he clarifies his own bias in every piece but he writes to complicate, not to defend. In his third book, Spies of No Country: Secret Lives at the Birth of Israel, Friedman rejects the narrative of Israel as a country filled with Europeans and their descendants, motivated by memories and guilt like my grandfather's. And he does it through a spy story.

Spies of No Country focuses on a fledgling Israeli intelligence unit called the Arab Section, and on four of its spies. The Arab Section emerged at the tail end of British colonialism, at a moment when the Palestine was filling with Jews. The British had made hazy promises, but none clear enough to prevent the war that ensued. The Jews in Palestine formed an army, which in turn formed the Arab Section, a fledgling espionage operation easiest to understand as a version of the Soviets' Directorate S. Where the USSR trained Russians to live in America, though, the Arab Section did something much murkier. It trained Middle Eastern Jews to embed themselves in the very countries they were from.

Friedman builds his story around four such Jews: Gamliel Cohen, Havakuk Cohen, Isaac Shoshan, and Yakuba Cohen. (None of the Cohens were related.) All four were native Arabic speakers. Yakuba grew up in Palestine, Havakuk in Yemen, and Gamliel and Isaac in Syria. In present-day Israeli parlance, they were Mizrahi. In the parlance of the Arab Section, they were not spies but mista'arvim, a word Friedman often uses in its full English translation: Ones Who Become Like Arabs. But it's hard to parse what made them like Arabs. "They were native to the Arab world," Friedman writes, "as native as Arabs. If the key to belonging to the Arabic nation was the Arabic language, as the Arab nationalists claimed, they were inside. So were they really...pretending to be Arabs, or were they pretending to be people who weren't Arabs pretending to be Arabs?"

Previous Palestinian government wasted millions on new cars despite "austerity"

QudsNews reports that the "Coalition for Integrity and Accountability," known as AMAL, released a report saying that the Palestinian Authority government of Rami Hamdallah that recently resigned purchased 5000 new vehicles, claiming that maintenance of old vehicles was too expensive.

Also, one of the government's ministers who was not named changed the furniture of his office not too long after a previous changes, at a cost of 300 thousand shekels.

Even though the Palestinian government announced austerity measures in 2015, it did not actually implement any austerity procedures. The operating budget rose during the years of "austerity" 2016-2018 from 6 billion to 7 billion shekels.

While the government officials spent lavishly on their own needs, employees were forced to retire early, according to this report.

AMAL seems to be independent.

Hamdallah was widely regarded as a moderate figure, untainted by corruption.

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Last weekend we celebrated International Women’s Day.

In Israel feminist discourse is probably similar to that of other western countries, with our own unique twist. Our media is full of panels, consisting almost entirely of women, discussing the gender wage gap, the necessity of empowering women in the fields of technology and science and the male domination of the culture through the military and generals.

It is interesting to note how few realize just how deeply female empowerment is tied to the history, culture and current reality of the Nation of Israel.

From biblical times, throughout our history and today, women have shaped the fate of our nation - and even been the single instrument in preserving our very existence.

Without Miriam’s defiance of Pharaoh’s decree, we would not have had Moses. She dedicated much of her life to ensuring his and is thought to have been instrumental in helping lead the People of Israel out of slavery, through the desert to freedom.

Queen Esther prevented what could have been the first Jewish Holocaust. She stood alone, endangering her own life to speak for the Jewish People, with the understanding that not to speak, is to speak. Purim is a holiday that celebrates the happy result of her courage. Because of her, we exist today.

Devorah, the prophetess my grandmother was named after, was a venerated female leader and a judge who helped raise an army and lead the Nation of Israel to victory. It was Yael, another woman, who finalized the task killing the enemy general Sisera. And Devorah wasn’t the only prophetess, she is one of seven women prophetesses whose prophecies are recorded in the Bible.

Ruth’s choice led to the birth of King David.

It was a Yehudit, the sister of Judah Maccabee, who spurred her brothers on to revolt against the Greek oppression, to preserve the sanctity of Jewish women and return sovereignty to the people.

And like the women of ancient Israel, modern women also had key roles in the re-establishment of the Jewish State.

Ze’ev Jabotinsky was an adamant feminist who said:

“I hold the woman’s place over that of men in every fundamental aspect of public and private life. Except for brute labor which demands physical prowess, there is no position or profession that I would not prefer handing to a woman over a man.”

The Zionist movement is full of strong women who worked alongside men for the same goal – Sarah Aaronson the heroine of the NILI spy organization (who my mother was named after), like many other women in her milieu, learned to ride horses and shoot, like the men. Tziporah Zaid, the wife of Alexander Zaid, founder of Hashomer, did the same.

Henrietta Szold is one of the most famous female Zionist leaders, known for creating Hadassah. Golda Meir was the fourth woman in the world to be a Prime Minister, long before America ever dreamt of a female President.

Today Israel is full of women entrepreneurs, women who head their own corporations, manage banks, win Nobel prizes in science and are at every level of government.

With all this female accomplishment, the one role that no man can do is valued above all other achievements – motherhood. In Israel, no woman says “I’m just a mom.” In our society the position of mom outranks all others, including those whose decisions determine life and death for the People of Israel. In what other country in the world does the media respond to a new Chief of Staff being nominated by calling his mom?

Our soldiers are crucial for our survival but is important to remember that it is Miriam Peretz, not her sons, who we uphold as an example to inspire the nation and teach what heart means.

In Israel, women who have skills and determination can achieve whatever they desire. We are blessed with freedom the women of our neighboring countries can only dream about. Our history provides inspiration, today’s achievements are awe inspiring.

Israeli society expects everyone to be the best they can possibly be. One of the largest divisions in Israel’s Rafael Advanced Defense Systems is headed by a woman because, as she put it: “Rafael promotes people based on their skills, period.”

This, I believe is the true lesson of Women’s Day. Girls and boys can both learn from strong, female role models, just as we learn from strong male role models. There is no competition between the genders – the success of one, depends on the other. Both are necessary, each has unique capabilities and it is together that we WIN.

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03/11 Links Pt1: The Failure of Palestinian Nationalism; Bennett to Buttu: 'What Did You Bring to the World Beyond Suicide Terrorists?'; Glick: Germany’s Love Affair with Iran About More than Greed

From Ian:

The Failure of Palestinian Nationalism

At last month’s American-backed Middle East summit in Warsaw, the Palestinian issue remained conspicuously absent as Arab leaders appeared side-by-side with Benjamin Netanyahu. Alex Joffe explains why, after a century of agitation, Palestinian nationalism has hit a dead end:

On the one hand, [Palestinian nationalism] relies on romantic visions of an imaginary past, the myth of ancestors sitting beneath their lemon trees. These and other supposedly timeless essences are at odds with the hardscrabble reality of pre-modern Palestine, which was controlled by the Ottoman empire, dominated by its leading families, and beset by endemic poverty and disease. As in all national visions, these unhappy memories are mostly edited out.

On the other hand, Palestinian nationalism is [itself] resolutely negative, in that it relies on the existential evils of “settler-colonialist” Zionism and ever-perfidious Jews. Consider the essential symbols of Palestine: a fighter holding a rifle and a map that erases Israel completely. It is a nationalism—and thus an identity—based in large part on negation of [another nation], preferably through violence. [These symbols] also imply that Palestinian identity exists only through struggle. . . .

In terms of creating an actual state, the Palestinian problem is one that is also endemic to Arab and Islamic states. Because the state is fundamentally an extension or tool of the ruling tribe, sect, or ideology, the state’s security institutions are exceptionally strong but its social institutions are weak, both by default and by design. In Palestinian society, the proliferation of security organizations maps onto tribal and clan groups. But, as in many Arab and Islamic states, health, education, and welfare services are either neglected or (just as often) funded by external sources. . . . For the Palestinians, it is foreign aid, nongovernmental organizations, and the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA).

Joffe concludes that until Palestinian leaders reject their traditional tools of “threats, shaming, and blackmail” and accept that Israel isn’t going anywhere—both of which he deems unlikely in the foreseeable future—the failure will continue.

Amb. Alan Baker: The UN Human Rights Council Report on Israel’s Response to the Gaza Border Riots

Where the UN Human Rights Council is concerned, there can be no such thing as an "independent" commission of inquiry. The outcome of the commission's inquiry was determined in advance by its mandating resolution, which condemned in its first paragraph "the disproportionate and indiscriminate use of force by the Israeli occupying forces against Palestinian civilians...in the context of peaceful protests."

The commission uses the term "Occupied Palestinian Territory" in the title of the report, which wrongfully assumes and determines that the territory is Palestinian, despite the fact that its status remains in dispute pending a negotiated settlement between Israel and the PLO pursuant to the 1993-1995 Oslo Accords.

Even more absurd is the fact that the commission's report determined that the Gaza Strip is part of the territories occupied by Israel, even though Israel withdrew from Gaza in 2005 and the report acknowledges that the Gaza Strip is governed by "de facto authorities in Gaza."

To accept that the protests are "non-violent" and "fully peaceful" shows a lack of awareness of the extent of the violence of the demonstrations and public statements by senior Hamas operatives and demonstration organizers inciting violence, assaulting the separation fence, infiltrating into Israeli territory, and seeking to kill Israelis.

MEMRI quotes Emad 'Aql, of Gaza, who tweeted: "[The Israeli town of] Sderot is only 700 meters east of [the Palestinian town of] Beit Hanoun in northern Gaza....[The town] can be reached in two minutes on motorcycles or in 5-8 minutes at a brisk run." He urged: "Murder, slaughter, burn and never show them any mercy."

An extensive professional analysis of the identities of those Palestinians killed during the protests found that 80% were terrorist operatives or affiliated with terrorist organizations, mostly from Hamas. This demonstrates that the marches were not "popular" events but rather a Hamas strategic move accompanied by preplanned violence.

JPost Editorial: Break the loop

This cycle has repeated itself so many times, it’s like we are stuck in a loop that no one knows how to break.

In theory, with 29 days to an election, we should be hearing creative ideas of how to change the paradigm, bust the loop open and end these weekly attacks – for the good of the residents of the Gaza envelope and all of Israel. It would also be good for Gazans to not have weekly demonstrations with senseless violence, considering that the border protests have yet to change their dire reality.

This is a constant drain on Israeli security and resources, putting our civilians and soldiers in danger. Our leaders – and those who would like to be – should be telling us how they plan to deal with it.

The Blue and White Party– whose leader, former IDF chief of staff Benny Gantz, is a candidate for prime minister – does have ideas about how to proceed, which have been laid out in its platform, though in vague terms. For example: “a strong response to any provocation and use of violence against our territory,” while working with regional partners to give Gazans a better life and erode their support for Hamas.

The Likud still does not have a platform, so we don’t know what Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu suggests, or even if he thinks there needs to be a change. When his government didn’t respond to the hundreds of rockets in November, his explanation was that there are greater security challenges, which ended up being the operation to destroy Hezbollah tunnels in the South.

What is his explanation for the past few months? How does he plan to go forward? These are important issues for Israelis to have answers to before they head to the polls on April 9. In fact, smaller parties on the Right, like Yisrael Beytenu and the New Right, have repeatedly attacked him on this point in their election campaigns.

With neither Netanyahu nor Gantz submitting themselves to interviews by journalists, it’s hard to get a clear view on where they stand, even if Blue and White has made more headway towards addressing the point.

Whoever ends up being prime minister after the upcoming election will have a lot on his plate and many issues to address, from US President Donald Trump’s peace plan to the growing deficit. But putting an end to our weekly national déjà vu should be at the top of his list.

Palestinian municipalities routinely poison stray dogs, killing them painfully

I missed this story from Media Line:

Palestinian and international activists along with concerned citizens are accusing municipalities in the West Bank of using poisoned meat to kill hundreds of stray and feral dogs, causing them immense suffering in the process.

Diana Babish, founder of the Animal and Environment Association in Bethlehem, confirmed to The Media Line that the city governments of Beit Sahour, Beit Jallah and Ramallah are eradicating the dogs using poisoned meat distributed around streets and fields where the animals are known to frequent.

Occasionally municipal workers shoot the dogs instead to reduce their suffering, she explained. “Still, the poisoning method is painful and the dogs suffer for hours before they die. While some dogs are dangerous, most are not.”

Stories like this show the projection of those who claim that Israel does good things to supposedly whitewash its true evil practices.

The real whitewashing is that Palestinian supporters only talk about supposed Israeli crimes to keep the spotlight off of the horrible things that happen every day under Palestinian rule.

Which ironically means that not only dogs but citizens under PA rule suffer, as any press about how they are living under a corrupt and uncaring government must be suppressed and all energies into fighting Israel.

(h/t Irene)

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