Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Monday, July 22, 2019

07/22 Links Pt2: How to talk about the Holocaust: Analogize rarely, never appropriate; The little known fascination Newton had with the Jewish Temple

From Ian:

How to talk about the Holocaust: Analogize rarely, never appropriate

To talk more effectively about the Holocaust, we need to think better about it, and that starts with the recognition that analogy is at the core of how people understand themselves and the world around them. They see one thing, and it reminds them of something else. They consider similarity and difference. Holding something apart from analogy entirely is a recipe for its irrelevance. Analogical thinking is a Jewish mode of thought, as well. The Maccabees, Queen Esther, the Exodus; all of these travel from antiquity into the present on analogical wings.

However, those who argue that Auschwitz is beyond comparison are correct to warn that analogy is always in danger of sliding into appropriation. Analogy intelligently done is alert to difference as well as similarity and requires the agility to temper the rush to comparison with the sober acknowledgment that there are distinctions that make a difference. Properly executed analogy is attuned not only to slogans and symbols, but to processes and complexity. It is a powerful tool because it is a limited one.

Holocaust appropriation is kidnapping. It is taking another’s pain whole cloth and importing it into a context where it generates more heat than light. It is necessarily shallow, because appropriators are more interested in surfaces than depth and detail. Unlike analogy, which does the hard work of comparison and contrast, appropriation does the easy task of proclaiming sameness. Being ethically sound and intellectually honest demands line drawing, not self-serving erasure. Appropriation picks favorites, obscuring the pain of some to highlight the suffering of others. Its memory is necessarily short and selective. There are those still living who looked “Angel of Death” Josef Mengele in the eye.

The onus must always be on those who invoke the Holocaust to do so justly. There are many kinds of injustice, and the burden of proof lies squarely on those who decide that Jewish suffering is the most apt prism through which to view a current issue. The better part of wisdom likely lies in declining to pursue such analogies, and when they are deployed, wielding them cautiously. Never Again, yes – but not Always and Everywhere. Ocasio-Cortez, use my people’s tragedy to inspire you to pursue justice. But never forget that when you speak, six million are listening.

The Myth of Hebron’s Shuhada Street

Shuhada Street is a half-mile long road in the Palestinian city of Hebron in the West Bank. It was once the thriving market center of the city, frequented by Palestinians and Israelis daily. Today, it is a virtual ghost town, largely shut down by the Israeli military for security reasons. It has become central to the Palestinian narrative and the symbol of an alleged Israeli apartheid employed by the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement against the State of Israel.

Why Shuhada Street was closed, how the commercial center of Hebron has moved less than a mile from the now abandoned Shuhada Street and become a thriving market district seldom if ever visited by outsiders, and a place where Jews (not just Israelis, but Jews from any country) are banned is a story seldom told in full. It represents the true story of “apartheid” in Hebron. I visited the city last week and expose the myth of Shuhada Street for the first time here.

The Jewish connection to Hebron dates back almost 4,000 years to when Abraham, the father of Judaism, came to the Land of Israel and settled in the city. Abraham purchased a plot of land, known as the Cave of the Patriarchs, as a burial plot. The site is considered to be the final resting place of Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebecca, Jacob and Leah, the Patriarchs and Matriarchs of the Jewish religion. It is also said that King David was anointed king in Hebron, and that Hebron was the first capital of Israel until it was moved to Jerusalem.

As a result of this historic significance, Jews have prayed in Hebron since biblical times, and with a few interruptions have lived there continuously. Hebron is considered to be the second holiest city for Jews after Jerusalem.

Hebron has a long and complicated history, having been conquered by many invading peoples, including the Babylonians, Romans, Byzantines, Muslim Arabs, Crusaders, Ottomans, Mamelukes, and the British. Following the creation of the State of Israel in 1948, Hebron was captured and occupied by the Jordanian Arab Legion. During the Jordanian occupation, which lasted for 20 years, until 1967, Jews were not permitted to live in the city, nor to visit or pray at the Jewish holy sites in the city. No one complained of “apartheid.”

The little known fascination Newton had with the Jewish Temple

The manuscript was written between 1675 and 1685, and includes text in Latin, Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek.

Throughout the manuscript we can clearly see several instances in which Newton uses Hebrew script. For example, he analyzes the use of the Hebrew root רצף (rezef) and its modifications רצפה and רצפת (rizpah, rizpat), which can mean "sequence", "floor" or "flooring". The Aramaic words תא חזי (ta hezi) and תא שמע (ta shema) also appear in Hebrew script. These Talmudic phrases mean "come and see" and "come and hear", respectively. All of the Hebrew script appears alongside Latin translations and explanations.

In the left column, near the top of the page, we can see a Hebrew biblical verse, complete with vowel notations: Baruch shem kvod malchuto l’olam va’ed ("Blessed be the name of the glory of His kingdom forever and ever"). According to Midrash, when Moses ascended Mount Sinai to receive the Ten Commandments, he heard the angels speak this verse to God.

Also in the left column of the page, we see commentaries from a Spanish Jesuit on the descriptions of the Temple that appear in the Book of Ezekiel.

To Newton, The Temple held significance for three main reasons. First, Newton saw the Jewish Temple as a model of the universe. He believed that the Temple in Jerusalem, and the courtyard surrounding it, was a model of the heliocentric solar system, with the raised altar (located in the center) representing the sun. Second, Newton's interest in the architecture of the temple was fueled by his belief that the Temple would serve as the "site of revelation" for the apocalypse. In addition, he believed that the Temple would be rebuilt in Jerusalem (with even greater magnificence than the original) at the onset of the Millennial Kingdom - that is, Christ’s reign on earth.

It dawned on me that all of Israel’s friends and defenders have been wasting our time over the last several decades.

Instead of writing thoughtful essays that provide facts and perspectives while making the case for the Jewish state, or organizing talks, educational programs or other campaigns that present arguments in favor of our cause or against our foes, we could all have spent that time doing something much simpler, so simple that it requires almost no thought.

So what could we have been doing, rather than bombarding the world with longwinded explanations based on facts and logic?

The answer is simplicity itself, and so easy to implement. For all it would involve would be to never use the term Palestine or Palestinian without first prefixing it with the string of pejoratives titling this piece.

We would not have to be mindless robots uttering the same phrase over and over again. Certainly whenever we find ourselves in debate, we would make sure the words “racist, sexist, homophobic, reactionary, totalitarian” precede the use of any reference to Palestine, Palestinians, the Palestinian Authority and Hamas (and maybe their friends and allies throughout the Middle East). But we could get creative with the ways we slip those words into the discussion over and over and over again. For instance:

Comparative: Yes, there is a difference between the racist, sexist, homophobic, reactionary, totalitarian, corrupt Palestinian authority and the racist, sexist, homophobic, reactionary, totalitarian, religious fanatics in Hamas. But the two have important things in common: they’re both racist, sexist, homophobic, reactionary totalitarians.

Generous: You are free to support all the racist, sexist, homophobic, reactionary, totalitarian political movements you like, including the racist, sexist, homophobic, reactionary, totalitarian Palestinian movement. Just don’t also demand to be considered progressive, much less tell us you get to decide who is anti-racist and who isn’t.

Voltairian: I will fight to the death for your right to scream your support for the racist, sexist, homophobic, reactionary, totalitarian Palestinian movement, and any other racists, sexists, homophobes, reactionaries and totalitarians you like. That is your right, just as it is my right to point out your choice to give racism, sexism, homophobia, and reactionary totalitarians your full-throated support.

Nostalgic: In my era, progressive politics meant being against racism, sexism, homophobia, reaction and totalitarianism, so forgive me if I choose to cling to those principles and fight against the evils you have decided to embrace.

And on and on (so long as on and on means fusing our five mantras to any mention of Israel’s enemies and their supporters).

Needless to say, actual political discourse, compromise or the search for peace would have to be abandoned if this were our strategy. For the purpose of making the name “Palestinian” synonymous with the worst sins of modernity is to reduce others to objects of disgust and loathing, with no concern over the consequences.

This is, in fact, the strategy Israel’s enemies have embraced for decades with their “Israel = Apartheid” smear, one they unleash in every discussion, regardless of the topic under consideration. So the strategy outlined above is the most straightforward way to fight fire with fire.

Now we would have to be willing to keep this up for not just a few weeks or months, but for years and decades and we would have to put great effort into getting others to follow our lead, or condemn them for their own refusal to fight against racism, sexism, etc. In short, we would have to be just as (if not more) ready and willing to poison politics in order to try to get our rivals to be perceived as utterly beyond the moral pale.

If both sides started playing the same game, victory would go to those who could shout the loudest, ignore critics more thoroughly, and be ready to shut down voices not willing to adhere to our vocabulary (by any means necessary).

Perhaps it is our general wussiness that keeps us on the course of dialog, discussion, argument, persuasion and compromise, rather than jumping into the sewer with those who have made it their life’s work to see the world’s one Jewish state dismantled. Although given the state of Israel and the Jewish world – vulnerable though it might be – versus the hell on earth Israel’s enemies have constructed for themselves, perhaps hanging on to our humanity is a wise strategic, as well as a moral choice.

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The UK Labour Party has published a manifesto on what is and what isn't antisemitic in a very late attempt to stem the PR damage from the hundreds of examples of antisemitism that have been documented from its members, as well as the coverups and excuses for that hatred.

Of course it is too little, too late, but the actual contents are fairly good. It even refers to the IHRA definition of antisemitism.

Here is part of how it deals with Zionism:

[O]pposition to the Israeli government must never use antisemitic ideas, such as attributing its injustices to Jewish identity, demanding that Jews in Britain or elsewhere answer for its conduct, or comparing Israel to the Nazis. Many Jews view calls for Israel to cease to exist as calls for expulsion or genocide. Arguing for one state with rights for all Israelis and Palestinians is not antisemitic, but calling for the removal of Jews from the region is. Anti-Zionism is not in itself antisemitic and some Jews are not Zionists. Labour is a political home for Zionists and anti-Zionists. Neither Zionism nor anti-Zionism is in itself racism.

I want to concentrate on the bolded section.

In theory, it should be possible to have a single state where everyone has equal rights. In that case, it shouldn't be antisemitic to advocate such a solution.

In reality, both the people who advocate a binational state and those who oppose it know the truth: it is merely a stage to ultimately make Jews into second class citizens, as they were in Muslim majority countries for centuries.

It would be very democratic of course - voting that mosques must be higher than synagogues, and that Jews cannot visit their holy sites that Muslims also claim, and soon enough that Jews must wear special clothing - and worse.

I gave lots of other reasons why a binational state is just a smokescreen for putting the Jews in their proper place as dhimmis, subject to attack from their woke Arab attackers, here.

In other words, saying that pushing a binational state is not antisemitic is like saying the Germans who built gas chambers weren't doing anything wrong since they merely made a building.

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07/22 Links Pt1: Israel Is the One Stabilizing Element in the Middle East; Khamenei: Palestinians have ‘precision missiles’ to resist US peace plan; EU Parliament gives platform to PFLP member

From Ian:

Israel Is the One Stabilizing Element in the Middle East

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu interviewed by Boaz Bismuth and Amnon Lord

Asked about how he views the period since he first became prime minister in 1996, Benjamin Netanyahu said, "We discovered that we can leverage the basic characteristics of this people into exceptional strength in economics, defense and security, and diplomacy. We've proved that it is possible to turn Israel from a small country in a corner of the Middle East into a central world power."

"It's obvious that the lack of stability here [in the Middle East] is the result of the struggle between the Dark Ages and modernism - between the tyranny of radical Islam and the forces of freedom. That's the most important battle. That is what is destabilizing everything."

"Standing up to the fundamentalist Islam that wants to take over first the Middle East and then the entire world [is important]. If there's one element that is stabilizing the Middle East and fighting radical Islam here, it's Israel."

"[I told Russian President Vladimir Putin] that I would have to take action in Syria, that I wasn't willing to allow Iran to bring its army to our borders. They [Iran] announce their intention of annihilating us. 'What would you do?' I asked him. I told him that I was sure he would do the same as me."

"The [2015] nuclear deal...wasn't conditional on any change in [Iran's] behavior. The argument was that if Iran received millions as a result of the sanctions being lifted, it would become a moderate state. Today, we can judge....Right now, their policy is to quietly pursue nuclear weapons while also conquering the Middle East with the money that the eased sanctions sent flooding into Iran's coffers."

"You need to increase power, not maintain it. My outlook is built on bolstering our strengths. Without strength, we won't survive. The weak don't survive. A strong people forges alliances. So from the first moment, the main question about Israel's existence was whether we would be able to develop the strengths to not only confront our enemies but also be accepted by the rest of the world. The simple fact is that what makes the world accept you is, first and foremost, your strength."

Kushner says opposition to Iran brings Israel and Arab nations closer together

In recent years, the White House has not concerned itself with the Arab world’s relationship with Israel or with curbing the actions of specific Arab nations regarding topics such as human rights or the funding of terror. But Washington has certainly factored in the collective contempt and desire among Sunni nations to reign in Iran’s mullahs and has used this to its advantage.

“Iran is an existential issue for the Arab states; the Palestinians are not,” said Eugene Kontorovich, professor at George Mason University Antonin Scalia Law School and director of its Center for International Law in the Middle East.

“Sunni Arab states need all the allies they can get against Iran, and Israel is one of them,” Kontorovich said. “Thus, they are no longer interested in a diplomatic solution that might endanger Israel's security.”

“The Trump administration has won vast amounts of goodwill in the (Persian) Gulf by canceling the JCPOA (Iran nuclear deal,) and this is one auxiliary consequence,” Kontorovich said.

It appears Sunni states have two major goals for their own interests: to keep terrorism out of their borders, thus ensuring the survival of the current leadership; and to curb the growing influence of Iran’s Shiite hegemonic agenda.

Peace between the Israelis and Palestinians – leading to a more cohesive, secure and thriving region – would help promote the Sunni states’ goals while cutting off a crucial nucleus of business for Iran’s regime.

Khamenei: Palestinians have ‘precision missiles’ to resist US peace plan

Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei met Monday with a delegation from the Palestinian terror group Hamas and held talks with its deputy chief, Saleh al-Arouri, who is heading the delegation.

Khamenei told the Hamas officials that supporting the Palestinians “is an ideological and religious matter” and strongly condemned the Mideast peace plan pushed by US President Donald Trump’s administration, which he said the Palestinians have “precision missiles” to resist.

“The dangerous conspiracy of the ‘Deal of the Century’ is aimed at destroying the Palestinian identity among the Palestinian public and youth,” an English statement on his website quoted him as saying.

“Confronting the Deal of the Century requires promotional, cultural, and intellectual efforts and the other method is to make the Palestinians feel advancement. Today Palestinians are equipped with precision missiles rather than stones and this means the feeling of advancement,” Khamenei added.

He also said “the return of this holy land [Israel] to the World of Islam is not a strange and unattainable matter” and called Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah’s goal of praying at the Al-Aqsa Mosque on Jerusalem’s Temple Mount “an absolutely practical and achievable aspiration for us.”

Al-Arouri told the Iranian leader that “we believe that based on the divine promise, Qods, and Palestine will be freed from the tyranny of the Zionists,” according to the statement from Khamenei’s office.

Iran and Hamas agree: Peace deal is dangerous!

Hamas officials have been visiting Iran for the past two days, and today they met with the Supreme Leader himself, the Ayatollah Khamenei.

Saleh al-Arouri, deputy head of the Hamas "political bureau" and his accompanying delegation, met with Khamanei and posed for a photo op.

Hamas declared that they fully support Iran in its conflict with America, as one would expect from a terror organization. Arouri said that any attack by the US on Iran will be tantamount to an attack on Hamas. (Which makes the other Hamas statement of having sleeper cells around the world suddenly seem more important than the news media thought.)

In a letter delivered to Khamanei from Ismail Haniyeh, the head of Hamas, he said that the the "deal of the century" is a serious plot is to eliminate Palestinian identity between the Palestinian people and youth, where this main idea must be confronted and not allow the elimination of Palestinian identity for money.

If Palestinian identity is that fragile, then maybe it isn't worth fighting for. Then again, if there was no Israel there would be no Palestinian identity to begin with. It only exists for one reason.

Unfortunately, Hamas and Iran aren't the only parties who are dead set against a US-backed deal to find a way towards peace. They are joined by Mahmoud Abbas, the EU and the Democratic Party.

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Background: A Jewish organization legally bought a hotel in the Old City of Jerusalem right inside Jaffa Gate.

The Guardian takes for granted that this is a huge crime.

Standing on a balcony at the New Imperial Hotel, overlooking Jaffa Gate in Jerusalem’s Old City, 75-year-old Walid Dajani last week declared a one-man war on Jewish settlers.

Because obviously Jews have no right to Jerusalem.

According to Dajani, the settlers – who seek to create a Jewish majority throughout the Old City which, along with East Jerusalem, was annexed by Israel in the Arab-Israeli war of 1967 – are enacting “the rape of Jaffa Gate”.

Because obviously Jews have no right to Jerusalem.

Archbishop Theodosius Attulah, spokesperson for the Greek Orthodox church, criticised the supreme court decision, saying the sale was fraudulent. “The Christian properties have been a target for 70 years, but this is the most dangerous so far. It is aimed at marginalising Palestinian influence and weakening the Christian presence in the Old City. It will not be tolerated.

“Jerusalem is sacred to the three monotheistic religions, the purpose of the move is to transform the city into a place of hatred and struggle,” he said.

Because while the Archbishop might believe that Jerusalem is holy to Jews, they aren't allowed to buy land there. Buying land is a manifestation of hate, calling the buyers "rapists" is apparently Christian love.

The showdown is the culmination of a lengthy court wrangle dating back to a suspect secret sale of Greek Orthodox-owned properties to settlers, authorised by a now deposed Greek Patriarchate.

It is "now deposed" because it legally sold land to Jews!

The Greek Orthodox church, the largest private landowner in Israel and the occupied territories, has often sold property in East Jerusalem to Jewish settlers who deploy dubious means to secure deals.

Since the Arabs are bigots who threaten to kill anyone who sells land to Jews, yes, Jews who want to buy land have to jump through hoops. But to the Guardian, Jews have no rights, so - how dare they work so hard to get around Arab antisemitism

The New Imperial Hotel was sold behind Dajani’s back, despite the fact that he is a protected tenant, and the $1.8m deal for the three properties was signed by a Greek official who has since disappeared.

I am unaware of how a buyer of a property needs permission from the renters. But The Guardian believes this is true - at least when Jews are the buyers.

Dajani fears representatives of the settlers will seek entry to the hotel any day. He has been watching his security cameras and monitoring suspicious activity on hotel booking websites. He says he has learned that hotel “clients” linked to the settler group had taken rooms in the hotel through Booking.com and were already inside the property. He has closed the rooftop restaurant to prevent incursions from adjoining buildings.

Because illegal squatters have more rights than Jews who pay top dollar for the property.

Even so, looking across from the Imperial’s roof to the Dome of the Rock, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, and the city’s other sacred sites, Dajani’s shoulders slumped a little. “We have to do the impossible,” he said. “When I look at the walls opposite, I see them cry, asking: ‘Where are the people who love Jerusalem?

Perhaps they are the ones who risk millions of dollars to buy property there when the Supreme Court often rules against them. Perhaps they are the ones who get chased and stabbed by Arabs in the Old City. Perhaps they are the ones who pray - multiple times a day for Jerusalem to be restored fully to their control - when the entire world believes otherwise.

(h/t Yosef)

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Some recent posters

Some stuff I did on Twitter last week:

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07/21 Links: Shin Bet nabs man who planned to bomb Ashdod hotel; The Munich Massacre: The 1972 Slaughter of Israeli Athletes on German Soil; Ilhan Omar is a troll

From Ian:

Shin Bet nabs man who allegedly planned to bomb Ashdod hotel

The Shin Bet security service said Sunday it had caught an Arab Israeli man who was planning to carry out a terror attack in a hotel in support of the Palestinian terror group Hamas.

Adel Abu Hadayeb, 20, of the southern Bedouin town of Rahat, was indicted Sunday in the Beersheba District Court for allegedly planning to bomb the Leonardo Hotel in Ashdod, which was near where he worked as a gardener.

Abu Hadayeb became a supporter of Hamas after being exposed to online propaganda materials for the group, the indictment reads, and had already attempted to construct a bomb for the attack by the time he was arrested last month.

He also attempted to build a rocket, and had purchased some of the materials needed.
Grenades belonging to Adel Abu Hadayeb, 20, of the southern town of Rahat, who was indicted on July 21, 2019, for allegedly planning a terror attack in Ashdod. (Courtesy Shin Bet)

After his arrest, he led investigators to a stash of five grenades — two stun grenades, one smoke grenade and two tear-gas grenades — as well as a “Carlo” submachine gun he had collected.

In a statement, the Shin Bet said Abu Hadayeb’s alleged radicalization was part of a trend in which Israeli citizens were being “influenced by Hamas propaganda spread on social networks and through Palestinian media.”

Honest Reporting: The Munich Massacre: The 1972 Slaughter of Israeli Athletes on German Soil

Following the 2005 release of Steven Spielberg’s movie, Munich, the attack’s mastermind, Black September leader Mohammad Daoud Oudeh (a.k.a. Abu Daoud) told Sports Illustrated that the attack was financed by Mahmoud Abbas. Daoud died of kidney failure in Damascus in 2010.

Five of the Munich massacre martyrs, Andre Spitzer, Amitzur Shapira, Kehat Shorr, Eliezer Halfin, and Mark Slavin were buried together in Tel Aviv’s Kiryat Shaul Cemetery. Another fallen athlete, dual US-Israeli citizen David Berger, was buried in his hometown of Cleveland, where a sculpture of broken Olympic rings was designated as a national memorial by the National Parks Service.

Widows of the murdered athletes have campaigned for official IOC commemorations at subsequent games such as a minute of silence during the opening ceremony. Olympic officials repeatedly rejected the idea saying such tributes would inject politics into the games. Matters came to a head four days before the 2012 London games — the fortieth anniversary of the Munich massacre — when, during a lightly-attended ceremony honoring the Olympic truce, IOC President Jacques Rogge held a spontaneous minute of silence for the Israelis. The widows denounced Rogge for “trying to do the bare minimum.”
In Memoriam

With the passage of time, the individuality of each of the 11 has faded into a collective group of Munich massacre victims. But for the generation that didn’t grow up with first-hand memories of the shock and horror of the Munich massacre, it’s worth reminding ourselves that Moshe Weinberg, Yossi Romano, Ze’ev Friedman, David Berger, Yakov Springer, Eliezer Halfin, Yossef Gutfreund, Kehat Shorr, Mark Slavin, Andre Spitzer, and Amitzur Shapira were all accomplished athletes who followed their own individual paths to the top of their sports. We can only imagine how they might have impacted the sporting world had they not been cruelly cut down.

Pre-Mossad, IDF – England’s Jewish Brigade fought Nazis, got Jews toward Israel

Before the establishment of the Mossad and the IDF in 1948, a unit of 5,500 Jews known as the Jewish Brigade fought the Nazis as part of the British Army, and carried out underground operations to smuggle Jews across Europe to sail to British-occupied Palestine.

While the activities of Aliyah Bet, the Bericha (Flight) and subsequently the Mossad are well-known, the Jewish Brigade preceded these efforts both in smuggling Jews to Israel – as well as providing food, necessities and preparation for aliyah – under the noses of the British, and in using wildly creative schemes to succeed in those efforts.

Put differently, the movie Exodus about the ship the SS Exodus 1947, which embarked from the port of Sète near Montpellier, France, en route to Palestine, is famous, but the brigade is the story about how Jews were smuggled to the docks to board ships like the Exodus.

The brigade is also distinguished from these other efforts as its establishment was critical in the success of the future IDF. Jewish volunteers in the British Army in general served as a pipeline for an estimated 721 of the IDF’s first 2,180 officers, and the brigade contained a sizable number of those 721.

Graduates of the brigade who took leadership positions in the IDF rose to the highest ranks, with Mordechai Makleff and Haim Laskov both becoming chiefs-of-staff.

This article in The Daily Beast by Robert Silverman is truly remarkable in how much it tries - and fails - to tar the greatest relief pitcher of all time as a bigoted, far-right racist.

Over the past three years, [Rivera's] served at the pleasure of a racist president, taken part in thinly veiled propaganda on behalf of an apartheid government in Israel, and gotten chummy with outright bigots and apocalyptic loons. None of this will be inscribed on his Hall of Fame plaque. It should, even if much of the sports world would very much like to pretend none of it exists.

The article then goes into detail about these accusations, and ends up with nothing more than guilt by association with people whose views the author finds odious, again without proof.

The illustration of Rivera on a yarmulka/pitcher's mound with the Israeli flag is actually perfect for this article - nothing but insinuation, zero facts, and showing how biased the author is.

Let's start off with Silverman's "proof" that Israel is an apartheid state. He links to an article about a document released by a UN commission made up exclusively of 18 Arab states, because whatever Arabs say about Israel must be true. He doesn't mention that the document was not accepted by the UN and the person who wrote it was forced out of her job for making that accusation without clearing it with her UN bosses.

I'm not going into whether Trump is racist (I don't believe he is although he is too willing to use racist dog whistles to help his political aims) but to imply that everyone who does anything for Trump is a racist is something that any decent editor would throw back in the face of the writer.

Look at the doggerel in the article:

Rivera insisted he would retire from baseball in 2003 in order to focus on evangelical work; “Phil. 4:13", referring to Philippians 4:13, was scribbled on his cleats; the year he retired, Rivera’s charitable organization, one very much powered by his faith, was distributing nearly a million dollars annually, according to New York magazine; he recently founded a church in New Rochelle, NY (his wife serves as pastor); when Rivera gave up the game-winning single that cost the Yankees the 2001 World Series, he said it was part of the greater good—God’s plan, even—because doing so prevented a teammate from possibly getting on a plane that crashed; and when it comes to his signature pitch, “He put it in me,” Rivera said. “He put it in me, for me to use it. To bring glory, not to Mariano Rivera, but to the Lord.”

But the vast majority of Evangelical Christians also believe in a particular messianic biblical prophecy: Jews must rule the Holy Land before Christ can return. Whether Rivera ascribes to those beliefs entirely is unclear, but his support for Israel and the Israel Defense Forces is a matter of public record. He has traveled to Israel on multiple occasions, possibly beginning in 2013.

Wow. Silverman has proven that Rivera is a devout Christian and supports Israel. Which is, of course, unforgivable to Silverman.

It gets more absurd:

[A]ccording to the NYBR {New York Board of Rabbis] executive vice president, at one point they were in the Golan Heights. Gesturing toward Lebanon and Syria, which were visible from where they stood,“They could have a much better life and yet they choose not to take that path,” the rabbi claimed Rivera told him. “There’s an ideology that infects their thinking, and they just don’t want to live in peace.”

If Silverman has evidence that Syria and Lebanon want peace with Israel, he should stop writing about baseball and publicize that. He could win a Pulitzer.

While there, Rivera said the IDF trains soldiers to be “a better person, a better citizen, and a better human being,” according to a statement put out by the FIDF. Two-and-a-half months earlier, Israeli soldiers killed at least 60 Palestinian protesters in Gaza and injured thousands more.

Of whom nearly all those killed were Hamas and Islamic Jihad terrorists. But isn't it better just to call them "protesters?"

The entire article has not a single fact to prove its point. All it has is loose linkages of Rivera with people and organizations that Silverman has an obsessive hatred for but who aren't close to what Silverman claims they are.

In the end, Silverman is upset that a successful athlete is pro-Israel and a proud Christian, which proves that the only bigotry in this entire article comes from the author.

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For a purportedly "pro-peace" organization, J-Street has been quite silent on actual progress towards peace between Israel and the Arab world.

Since Israel's Foreign Minister Israel Katz met the foreign minister of Bahrain in public on Friday, J-Street has been silent.

When Katz visited Abu Dhabi and met with at least one senior UAE official, J-Street was silent.

This has been a consistent pattern with J-Street. No matter what the diplomatic achievements of Israel in the Middle East and Africa and with majority Muslim nations worldwide, J-Street cannot find a nice thing to say.

When Netanyahu sat down with foreign ministers from United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, and Bahrain in Warsaw, and even when he flew to Oman to meet the Sultan Qaboos bin Said al Said, J-Street had nothing to say - except a link to a Foreign Policy article complaining about how the Arab world was abandoning the Palestinians.

Benjamin Netanyahu has made more progress for peace between Israel and the Arab world than Rabin, more than Begin, more than Peres, more than any other Israeli leader. Even the peace treaties with Egypt and Jordan never resulted in smiling photo-ops between Arab and Israeli leaders of the type we have seen so many of in recent months.

J-Street claims to be pro-Israel - even though it cannot say a good word about Israel in any tweets or articles.

Its claim to be pro-peace are just as specious.

But it is definitely telling the truth when it says it is pro-Palestinian.

One out of three ain't bad, is it?

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Yousef Alhelou writes for Arab Weekly.

He is evidently a Fatah loyalist, but even so, a Palestinian Arab publicly accusing Hamas of ruining Gaza in English is a little rare:

Many crises that took place recently led Palestinians to question why Hamas has stayed in power but is unable to lift the siege and provide a decent life for the nearly 2 million residents of the tiny costal enclave.

Those who want to work in the governmental sector in Gaza must be a Hamas loyalist or at least supporter. This also applies to international aid assistance from countries such as Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar and Turkey and NGOs.

The priority to receive food aid depends on how well a person is connected to the Islamic movement. Housing projects for those whose homes were destroyed in wars with Israel are also prioritised by level of loyalty to Hamas.

If a person has no connection to Hamas, they must be very patient and fight for rights.

No accountability is carried out. Many young people committed suicide because of poverty and debts. The number of beggars — mainly children — in the streets has reportedly tripled.

Mass migration is taking place from Gaza to settle in Europe, especially among unemployed youth and graduates. Even some of those who are rich and who have a stable life have left looking for a better future and to enjoy their basic rights.

Activists and journalists have left because they were unable to express themselves or report without intimidation.

Leaving Gaza is not easy. The Egypt-controlled Rafah crossing is the main gateway for the Gazans to the outside world. They must exert effort to make sure their name is on the departures list. Connections and sometimes bribes are a must to make it out of the “big prison.”

Coordination must go through both Egyptian authorities and Hamas. Reaching Cairo safely from Rafah via the Sinai Peninsula is another story. The suffering has become part of Gazans’ daily life and Hamas is often accused of contributing to the misery by refusing to concede power, allow elections and reconcile with Fatah. The gap between the two parties is big.

We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.

07/20 Links: Caroline Glick: Israeli Court Tells the Truth About Palestinian Authority and Terror; Teaching High School Students to Demonize Israel

From Ian:

Caroline Glick: Israeli Court Tells the Truth About Palestinian Authority and Terror

From a political perspective, the implications of Drori’s judgment are harder to predict.

Attorney Nitsana Darshan-Leitner heads the Shurat HaDin organization, which is dedicated to seeking legal redress for victims of Palestinian terrorism. She filed several of the lawsuits on behalf of terror victims that led to Drori’s ruling.

Darshan-Leitner was firm regarding the implications of the ruling. In a statement to the Post, she said that the Palestinian terror war was an attempt to achieve political ends that the PLO was unable to extract at the negotiating table with Israel. Specifically, she explained, “The Palestinian cause was genocide against Jews in Israel.”

She added that the court’s ruling proved that the Palestinian terror war “was not a popular uprising, but a planned and deliberate war against the civilian population of Israel.”

It should be noted that little has changed since 2002. The Palestinian Authority continues to incite and indeed solicit terrorism against Israel.

The PA’s “pay to slay” policy remains in force today. PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas prefers to forego both U.S. financial aid and Israeli financial transfers, which last year were conditioned on the PA ending the payments to terrorists.

Abbas insisted that the payments to terrorists must continue because “we actually sent them, so we are committed to them. We have to pay them.”

If the United States and Israel accept the evidence that led to Drori’s decision, the policy implications are clear. The PLO and the PA are terrorist organizations, not political actors. And they should be so designated and treated accordingly.

Melanie Phillips: In Trump vs 'the Squad,' American Jews have picked the wrong target

Hatred of Trump seems to have caused a number of Jews to lose their reason altogether. In The Los Angeles Times this week, Michael Hiltzik wrote: “What’s most striking about current administration practice is how it resembles the pre-Final Solution treatment of Jews in Germany and Nazi-controlled portions of Europe.”

This obscenely false analogy unforgivably trivializes the genocide of the Jews of Europe. Yet one after the other, liberal Jews are abusing the memory of the Holocaust and its victims by claiming that Trump is paving the way for Nazism.

Heaven only knows, Trump has his faults – many of them unattractive, egregious or alarming. But those who so hysterically anathematize him and have falsely made him into a figure of mythic malice, while themselves nodding along to bigotry, violence and seditiousness on their own side, are saying much more about themselves. And none of it is good.

It is the Democrats who are embracing anti-Americanism, anti-white racism, Jew-baiting, witch-hunting, and contempt for the rule of law. It is Trump who is standing up for the defense of America and its values, for legality and due process and for the Jewish people.

By displaying Democratic and liberal partisanship that is shallow to such a horrifying degree, American Jews are disgracing their cultural heritage and destroying their own moral standing.

The First Amendment Shouldn’t Be An Empty Promise To American Jews

The First Amendment’s promise of freedom of religion is an empty one if all Americans, including American Jews, don’t feel safe in their houses of worship or welcome in their communities. With FBI data showing that 58 percent of religiously-motivated hate crimes targeted American Jews in 2017, the Department of Justice (DOJ) has been making an increased effort to support and engage with the Jewish community, including by convening a summit on domestic anti-Semitism this week.

The day-long event included speakers from the Departments of Justice, State, Treasury, and Education, including the secretaries of Treasury and Education. Panels addressed how to combat anti-Semitism while respecting the First Amendment, anti-Semitism on college campuses, the prosecution of hate crimes, and federal efforts to combat anti-Semitism.

In his introductory remarks, Attorney General William Barr compared various forms of anti-Semitism to different forms of cancer, observing that the body politic needs a strong immune system that rejects both anti-Semitism and racial hatred. Speakers throughout the day acknowledged the patient is sick. However, Barr told American Jews that he sees rising anti-Semitism, not only in the widely discussed attacks in Pittsburgh and Poway, but also on the streets of Crown Heights, in desecrated cemeteries, and in zoning decisions intended to exclude growing Jewish communities.

Barr told the audience, those experiences “form the daily background of concerns about safety and security that many Jews feel. I want to assure you that the Department of Justice and [the] whole federal government stands with you and will not tolerate these attacks.”