Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Monday, February 01, 2021

Cartoon of the Day: It's a niche but a lucrative one

Continuing my series of recaptioning old cartoons...

If Israel opened up clinics to vaccinate Palestinians, we KNOW what would happen. Because it happened in 2014.

In The Guardian, Maya Abu Al-Hayat argues that Israel should vaccinate all Palestinians.

I tweeted a response:

If Israel would set up a free vaccination clinic for Palestinians outside Ramallah as @guardian
insists:

1) The Palestinian Authority would threaten anyone who goes there
2) The clinic would be barraged with rocks
3) The PA would go to the UN to condemn the "illegal settlement" pic.twitter.com/euaSLtHNHI
— Elder of Ziyon 🇮🇱 (@elderofziyon) February 1, 2021

I am not joking.

Here is the Wikipedia entry about the IDF field hospital opened for Gazans during the 2014 Gaza war:

The Israel Defense Forces opened a field hospital at Erez Crossing on July 20, 2014, intending it to be for sick and injured Palestinians from Gaza.

The hospital was opened in response to reports by Gazans and news media that the 2014 Israel–Gaza conflict had caused a dire shortage of medical facilities in Gaza. The decision to set up the hospital was made by the Israeli government following the recommendation of the coordinator of government activities in the Palestinian territories General Yoav Mordechai, and approved by the IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Benny Gantz.

According to Al Jazeera, Israeli soldiers at Erez Crossing attempted to persuade families to take relatives to the field hospital for treatment, rather than making the journey to a Palestinian-run hospital in East Jerusalem. IDF Lt.-Col.Sharon Biton from the office of the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories stated that "some" of the refugees passing through the Erez Crossing "refused to get medical treatments" in the Israeli field hospital. The IDF Spokesman's office asserted that Hamas “prevented Palestinians from entering Israel in order to reach the hospital.” A Gazan who asked that his name not be reported told the Jerusalem Post people are reluctant to use the field hospital out of fear Gazans treated in the IDF hospital will come under suspicion by Hamas, which controlled Gaza at the time.

The hospital had 20 doctors, nurses and technicians, a lab, an X-ray device and a pharmacy. Among the doctors were a pediatrician, an ophthalmologist and a gynecologist.

There was opposition on the Palestinian side to injured civilians receiving treatment in Israel thus the hospital stayed almost empty. Hamas fired ten mortar shells at the hospital.

It would be slightly different in the West Bank, but not much. The clinics would have to be erected in Areas A and B, so the Palestinians would call them illegal settlements. The PA has already forbidden Palestinians from getting medical treatment in Israel. Palestinians would think that Israel is injecting poison or drugs that cause impotence, and the rumors to that effect would run rampant.

This is all obvious because we've seen it happen before. The Guardian is engaging in slander, not reporting.

02/01 Links Pt1: Kushner, Berkowitz, Friedman nominated for Nobel Peace Prize for Israel deals; Muslim-majority Kosovo forges ties with Israel - will open embassy in Jerusalem; The Apartheid state of Lebanon.

From Ian:

Kushner, Berkowitz, Friedman nominated for Nobel Peace Prize for Israel deals

Former White House senior adviser Jared Kushner and his deputy, Avi Berkowitz, as well as former US Ambassador to Israel David Friedman and former Israeli Ambassador to the US Ron Dermer were nominated on Sunday for the Nobel Peace Prize for their role in negotiating four normalization deals between Israel and Arab nations known as the "Abraham Accords."

Nominating the pair of former deputies to then-President Donald Trump was American attorney Alan Dershowitz, who was eligible to do so in his capacity as a professor emeritus of Harvard Law School.

In his nomination letter, Dershowitz wrote that he strongly believes that the singular event that warrants the Nobel Peace Prize for this past year is the Abraham Accords.

"These Accords, which have brought about normalization between Israel and several Sunni Arab nations, fulfill all the criteria for the prize. They hold the promise of an even broader peace in the Middle East between Israel, the Palestinians and other Arab nations. They are a giant step forward in bringing peace and stability to the region, and even to the world," he continued.

Dershowitz added that he wanted to "emphasize the enormous contributions to peace made by Jared Kushner, Avrahm Berkowitz, David Friedman and Ron Dermer," insisting that "these men played especially important roles."

"Kushner and Berkowitz traveled all over the region, meeting with leaders and their associates, advocating for peace and nailing down all the details."

WATCH: Fascinating conversation on the #AbrahamAccords and peace in the Middle East with @omaralbusaidy from the UAE and @FleurHassanN from Israel: https://t.co/4Qkdc4DuhK #PeoplesAbrahamAccords @StandWithUs
— Michael Dickson (@michaeldickson) February 1, 2021

Muslim-majority Kosovo forges ties with Israel; will open embassy in Jerusalem

Israel and Kosovo formally established diplomatic ties on Monday, with the Muslim-majority territory also recognizing Jerusalem as the Jewish state’s capital — putting it at odds with the rest of the Islamic world.

In a ceremony held over Zoom in Jerusalem and Pristina, Foreign Minister Gabi Ashkenazi and his counterpart from Kosovo, Meliza Haradinaj Stublla, signed a joint declaration establishing ties.

Travel restrictions to curb the spread of COVID-19, including the closure of Ben Gurion Airport, made an in-person ceremony impossible. It was the first time Israel established relations with a country virtually.

Ashkenazi said he had approved Kosovo’s “formal request to open an embassy in Jerusalem.”

“The establishment of relations between Israel and Kosovo is an important and moving historical step that reflects the many changes the region has experienced in recent months,” Ashkenazi said.

“Today, Kosovo officially joins the circle of countries that aspire to peace and stability and recognize Israel, and Jerusalem as its capital.”

The foreign ministers signed two cooperation agreements — one to establish their diplomatic relations and the other relating to the activities of Israel’s international development agency Mashav. They will send each other copies via email, each to be signed by their counterpart, according to the Foreign Ministry.

The ceremony was broadcast live on the Foreign Ministry’s Facebook page.

US State Department spokesman Ned Price praised the sides for the “historic day.”

“When our partners are united, the United States is stronger. Deeper international ties help further peace and stability in the Balkans and Middle East,” he said.

#HistoryInTheMaking yet again, as #Israel & #Kosovo formally sign agreement (via Zoom, what else) to establish diplomatic relations! Importantly, Kosovo is a majority Muslim country in Europe, that has also agreed to open its Embassy in Israel's capital, Jerusalem! 🇮🇱🤝🇽🇰 pic.twitter.com/27jcuiAm1h
— Arsen Ostrovsky (@Ostrov_A) February 1, 2021

120 years ago: A Jewish obituary for Queen Victoria

From The Jewish Voice (St. Louis), February 1, 1901:

A BEAUTIFUL TRIBUTE TO QUEEN VICTORIA, FROM A PURELY JEWISH STANDPOINT.

Dr:. SALE, basing his eloquent remarks on the life of QUEEN VICTORIA upon "Favor is deceitful, and beauty is vain ; but a woman that feareth the Lord, she shall be praised" spoke for and from the heart of the Jews, when be said :

"And we, too. as Jews, have cause to mourn this woman among-queens, and this queen among women. It was in the beginning of her reign that the civil disabilities were removed from the Jew, and be was enabled to take his place among the noblest in the land. When she entered London shortly after she became Queen;-she knighted Moses Montefiore, as if to proclaim to the world that all her subjects were alike in her eyes. Her predecessors had been busy extracting money or teeth from the poor Jews of their times. She was busy knighting them and giving them their position as men among men. In what other country but England, under other monarch but Victoria could a Lord Beaconsfield have been a Prime Minister? True, his father, driven from the Portuguese synagogue, had had his children baptized. But Benjamin Disraeli remained, as we know, as all England knew, a Jew even up to the moment of his death. Any one who bas read the testimony of friends' who knew him intimately, who has read his own productions, must know this. And yet this man, of Jewish parentage, of strong inclinations toward his father's race, of decidedly Semitic countenance and manners, rose not only to the position of Prime Minister, but is even acknowledged the favorite among the ministers that Victoria had.

"We may seem to some a little overzealous in ascribing all this to Queen Victoria. She had, it is true, the ability to surround herself with the best men and to obtain from them their best work. Melbourne, Brougham, Cobden, Bright, and a host of others must not be forgotten. But during nearly her whole reign the Queen herself was the guiding spirit of affairs. To see how much we owe to her we have only to imagine what serious obstacles she could have placed in the way of these reforms, had she been herself a little soul. And thus the Jew of England may thank her to-day that he is politically and socially the equal of his fellow-Englishmen. "

YNet reports (Hebrew), "The first shipment of 2,000 vaccines of Moderna's Coronavirus vaccine was transferred to the Palestinian Authority's medical teams through the Beitunia crossing. This is out of the 5,000 vaccines approved by the political echelon in accordance with the recommendations of the Minister of Defense and the Coordinator of Government Operations in the Occupied Territories."

This is not mentioned by the official Palestinian news agency.

Instead, there is a story from Sunday denying the news that Israel was planning to transfer 5000 vaccines to medical teams in the territories.

The Director General of Support Medical Services at the Ministry of Health, Osama al-Najjar, told Anadolu Agency that the ministry or any other Palestinian party “did not receive” any quantities of the Corona vaccine from Israel.
Al-Najjar added, “We have not been informed of the existence of vaccines, and we do not know anything,” indicating that Israel is under international pressure and wants to publish this news to alleviate it.
He said that “international institutions and human rights organizations are pressuring Israel to allow vaccinations to enter the occupied Palestinian territories. "

Someone is lying, and it isn't Israel. The YNet story clearly says that the vaccines were dropped off at the Beitunia crossing, and Israel wouldn't do this without coordination with the Palestinian health authorities.

It appears that the Palestinians, as always, are looking for ways to score public relations points that paint Israel as a heartless, evil entity. Plus their misplaced sense of pride doesn't allow them to admit that they are cooperating with Israel on anything, even though everyone knows they are.

Palestinian prime minister Mahmoud Shtayyeh confirmed that some 50,000 vaccines are due to arrive by the middle of this month, without mentioning that Israel of course approves the shipment.

Meanwhile, Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi and his Tunisian counterpart Othman Al-Jaradi affirmed their countries' support for the establishment of a Palestinian state on the "borders" of June 4, 1967, and they stressed that the Palestinian issue is the most important Arab issue.

Neither of them are offering vaccines to their Palestinian brethren, though.

From the Jerusalem Post:

On Sunday, Palestinian sources said that PA security forces arrested five men in the West Bank on suspicion of being affiliated with Hamas. One of the detainees, Ameed Shehadeh, is a journalist from Nablus. The sources said he was arrested for criticizing the PA in a Facebook post.
Also in Nablus, the PA security forces arrested Qassam Sabbah, who was recently released from Israeli prison and An-Najah University student Hussam Shtayyeh.
In Hebron, the PA’s Preventive Security Service arrested Muhab al-Juneidi one week after his wedding. In the town of Salfit, Abdullah Abdel Fattah was also arrested by the PA security forces.
Last week, the PA security forces arrested Nablus lawyer Awni al-Sharif on charges of “insulting” the Palestinian leadership on social media platforms.
According to the sources, the latest arrests are in the context of the PA’s ongoing crackdown on its political rivals in the West Bank, including those suspected of being affiliated with Hamas.

Democracy!

Meanwhile, on the Gaza side:

Last week, Palestinian officials in Ramallah ... said that three senior Fatah activists – Ahmad Naji, Mustafa al-Shannat and Shukri Abu al-Hosseen – were summoned for interrogation by Hamas’ Internal Security Force.

Democracy!

And, as I reported exclusively on Saturday night, Fatah Revolutionary Council members reportedly threatened to kill anyone who runs for office outside the official Fatah slate. Human rights activists criticized the report, saying it violates Palestinian basic laws.

Democracy!

People are still talking as if the planned Palestinian parliamentary elections will occur in May and the presidential elections in July.

I'd love to see the London bookmakers odds on either of those happening. Personally, I'd say the odds are 10-1 against for the parliamentary elections and 50-1 against for the presidential elections.

Cartoon of the Day: Bigotry is the new anti-racism

Continuing my series....

01/31 Links: NY Post Editorial: A new libel against Israel from Human Rights Watch; What drove Obama into Iran's arms?; Evidence Suggests Iranian Link to Blast Near Israeli Embassy in New Delhi

From Ian:

NYPost Editorial: A new libel against Israel from Human Rights Watch

Israel has led the world in rapidly vaccinating much of its population, so naturally the global left has to find fault: hence the drive to condemn Jerusalem for not taking responsibility for vaccinations in Gaza and the West Bank.

In a series of tweets, Human Rights Watch Executive Director Kenneth Roth accused Israel of racism for this supposed failure; a week later, Palestinian officials decided to join the blame game, announcing that Israel is responsible for vaccinating Palestinians despite past statements to the contrary.

In reality, as UN Watch’s Hillel Neuer notes, the 1995 Oslo II Accord designates responsibility for the health care and vaccinations of its people to the Palestinian Authority.

And while the two countries are supposed to cooperate in terms of handling epidemics, Palestinian Health Ministry officials admitted back in December that they didn’t ask for help in obtaining vaccines from Israel.

Top Palestinian officials routinely go to Israel for major medical care, but PA propaganda discourages it for everyone else, with dark hints that Jewish doctors will offer Arabs only substandard care — if they’re not secretly experimenting on Palestinian patients.

What drove Obama into Iran's arms?

From Obama’s perspective, Iran was the state with which to develop a relationship. The mullahs have the will, aggression and desire to destroy Israel, which they have expressed continuously. However, Iran’s nuclear ambitions posed a PR problem. Therefore, Obama relied on the belief that Iran could not be stopped, and as a result the US and some of its European partners negotiated a deal, which on the surface could be sold to a compliant and ever helpful main stream media, which in turn would sell it to the world’s public. Iran would agree not to develop a nuclear weapon for at least ten years, after which they would be free to do so. This could follow without any international interference. Obama, by then, would have “kicked the can down the road” for a future President to deal with along with the possible fate of Israel.

Whether Iran would comply didn’t really bother anyone, and clauses contained in the agreement limited inspections to civilian sites only whilst excluding military sites -- which is, of course, exactly where nuclear weapons would be developed. This was not only an awful and extremely bad agreement, which appeared to be Obama’s intention, but it has never been ratified by the US Congress. Part of the “deal” was that Obama would transfer huge amounts of cash to the Iranians in the amount of $150 to $170 billion. It remains questionable as to how much of it would find its way into Obama’s pocket. If this was so, a Democrat aligned media would be part of the conspiracy in covering it up.

During the signing and lead up to the JCPOA, I was always struck by the arrogance and cocksureness of Mohammad Javad Zarif so much on display I suspected and speculated that he possibly had Obama and Kerry in his pocket.

This whole scheme essentially threw the USA’s Sunni Arab allies “under the bus” abandoning them with Iran simultaneously threatening them. The great unintended irony, which had not been clearly thought through or even imagined, was that this would encourage the Sunni Arabs to make peace with Israel for their mutual defence as they no longer trusted America. As a result, these states were no longer bound by a ridiculous Palestinian-imposed veto. Their interests and defence obviously took precedence and under a Biden presidency, this situation would be even more relevant, with Obama very likely in the background pulling the Biden strings.

What appealed to Obama and his useless sidekick, John Kerry, was more the potential destruction of Israel, and perhaps to a lesser extent, limiting Iran’s nuclear ambitions. The JCPOA agreement said nothing about the development of missiles, which should have been a logical inclusion. Why something so fundamental was omitted remains a mystery. What should have occurred to them during negotiations was that a nuclear bomb has to be delivered. Iran has an antiquated air force which could not manage such a task. It could of course acquire aircraft from Russia or China. However, the obvious and only alternative was via a ballistic missile. This is precisely what Iran has been developing and testing for years.

Report: Evidence Suggests Iranian Link to Blast Near Israeli Embassy in New Delhi

Indian terrorist group Jaish-ul-Hind has claimed responsibility for the blast that took place near the Israeli embassy in New Delhi on Friday, local media reported.

No one was injured in the explosion, which took place on the 29th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between India and Israel.

According to the India.com news site, the investigation so far has recovered social-media chatter according to which Jaish-ul-Hind operatives boast about carrying out the attack.

The Indian Express reported on a police source as saying that the bomb appeared to have been planted in a flowerpot on the road divider. According to the report, a letter found on the scene, addressed to “Israel Embassy ambassador,” said that the blast was a “trailer,” suggesting that it was a prelude to future attacks against the embassy or other Israeli targets in the country.

The note also refers to “Iranian martyrs” Qassem Soleimani, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Quds Force commander killed in a US drone strike in Iran on Jan. 3, 2020, and Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, head of the Iranian military nuclear program, who was assassinated near Tehran on Nov. 27 in a hit for which Iran has blamed Israel.

New Delhi Blast: 2 Suspects Seen on Security Footage

The tightropes between Qatar, Hamas, the PA, and the Gulf

Qatar has announced that it will provide $30 million a month to Gaza for all of 2021, a total of $360 million in aid.

While the aid is generally earmarked for needy families and fuel for Gaza's power plant, part of it is also for paying Gaza employee salaries - meaning that it helps prop up Hamas.

Israel has been allowing this aid for years, walking a tightrope between helping Hamas and staving off a Gaza economic collapse.

Now that the Gulf states are resuming relations with Qatar, there are more tightropes being navigated.

The Palestinian Authority has been feeling marginalized after Israel forged relations with Gulf Arab states and wants to improve its own relations with Qatar. Mahmoud Abbas visited Qatar in December in a bid for some of those millions to be directed towards the Palestinian Authority.

For its part, Qatar sees itself as a potential broker for peace between Hamas and Fatah and wants to assert its influence that way. Its cooperation with Israel on aid to Gaza also positions it in a unique way to show its importance in the region.

Israel's allowance of Qatari aid to Gaza has not been without strings attached, either. Last summer Israel blocked Qatari aid as long as Gaza groups were launching firebombs via balloons from Gaza. Note that those balloon launches seem to have halted.

There are a lot of moving parts going on, between the Abraham Accords, the thawing of relations between Qatar and its neighbors, the new Biden administration and its desire to return to the JCPOA. The Palestinian issue still grabs headlines but it is not clear at all that anyone really cares about Palestinians besides in how they can profit from anti-Israel rhetoric - which is not nearly as effective as it was a year ago.

The vast majority - over 88% - of residents in the UAE are not citizens.

The UAE is now taking small steps to change that.

Yesterday, the Emirates announced that it will grant citizenship to some foreigners, if they can contribute significantly to UAE's society.

This includes investors, doctors, specialists, inventors, scientists, intellectuals, artists and their families.

There are a number of provisions - the applicants must be prominent and active in their fields, and they can lose citizenship if they breach the conditions.

For the past seven decades, members of the Arab League have generally agreed not to give citizenship to Palestinians - enshrined into law by the 1959 Arab League Decree #1547.

The UAE did allow a number of Palestinians to become citizens by royal decree in its early years after its founding in 1971, but since then it has been nearly impossible to become a citizen of the UAE for anyone.

Will the UAE defy the Arab League and allow Palestinian doctors and scientists to become full citizens?

Time will tell, but expect some prominent Palestinians to apply for citizenship, as they have whenever a loophole opened in Arab immigration laws that allowed them to become citizens.

And expect the Palestinian leadership to oppose anything that gives citizenship rights to Palestinians anywhere.

Palestinian media is reporting that the Director General of Medical Services in the Palestinian ministry of health, Osama al-Najjar, announced Saturday that the ministry will receive mass quantities of three COVID-19 vaccines within days.

Najjar said that the ministry will distribute them in Gaza and the West Bank alike.

The three vaccines are from Pfizer, Sputnik-V and AstraZeneca.

We have already reported Thursday that Israel was providing 1000 Pfizer vaccines to Palestinian health facilities, and that was the third shipment of vaccines from Israel. Israel has cooperated fully with the Palestinian health ministry on fighting COVID-19 since the pandemic started, yet the media and NGOs started a false rumor last month that Israel was not fulfilling its obligations.

Those false accusations continue, most recently from a letter published in The Lancet.

01/30 Links: Natan Sharansky: Remember the People, Not Just the Atrocities; Caroline Glick: Democrats, American Jews and Politically Correct Bigotry

From Ian:

Natan Sharansky: Remember the People, Not Just the Atrocities

On International Holocaust Remembrance Day, everyone around the world — individuals, leaders, communities — gather to reinforce their commitment to honor the memory of the victims of the darkest hour of human history.

But while the world bows its head to commemorate the Holocaust, it often remembers its victims as a unified collective. The very day we commemorate the victims, Jan. 27, marks the liberation of the Auschwitz concentration camp, the ultimate symbol of the Nazi terror. But not all Holocaust victims were sent to concentration camps. Far from it. The time has come to tell the all-encompassing story of the Holocaust.

Behind the monstrous number of “six million victims” stand six million individual life stories. To commemorate the Holocaust means remembering each and every one of those individually. We are committed to telling as many stories as possible, but unfortunately, too many of them remain unknown.

How many life stories will never be known after the massacre in Ukraine’s Babi Yar ravine? Within two days, the Nazis brutally murdered 33,771 Jewish men, women and children. By the end of the war, they murdered 100,000 people, including Ukrainians and gypsies.

The Babi Yar massacre destroyed the Jewish community in Kyiv. The Jews of Riga, Minsk and Vilnius encountered the same tragic fate — murdered in ravines. Some 1.5 million Jews lost their lives that way.

The central chapter of the Nazi’s “final solution” is still largely unknown. As I know from bitter experience, the Soviet regime after World War II did everything possible to erase Jewish identity and the memory of the Holocaust from collective memory.

The Jews who fought back during the Holocaust

Much has been written about what needs to be done during the remaining days of the year to properly commemorate and educate the world about the horrors of the Holocaust, and what “never again” really means. A recent Pew Research poll proves that Americans’ Holocaust education is sorely lacking. For example, only 45 percent of Americans interviewed even knew that 6 million Jews were murdered during the Holocaust. Even fewer knew that Adolf Hitler became chancellor of Germany by a democratic political process.

Surely, what is far less known is how many Jews fought valiantly against the Nazis. But fight they did. Jews fought back alongside resistance groups around Europe, organized uprisings in the ghettos, created partisan units and even fought back in the concentration camps, attempting to bomb a crematorium in Auschwitz. To properly commemorate the Holocaust, these stories must be told as well.

To that end, I commemorate and honor the story of the following Jews who courageously fought back during World War II and the Holocaust. Their stories represent the thousands who fought to the end.
- Mordechai Anielewitz. The leader of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. In April 1943, he led 750 Jewish fighters armed with a handful of pistols, 17 rifles and Molotov cocktails—all smuggled into the ghetto—in a clash with more than 2,000 heavily armed and well-trained German troops. They held off the Germans for 27 days.
- Boris Lekach. This one is personal. My wife’s maternal grandfather. Lekach fought for the Russians against the Nazis. He enlisted at age 16 with doctored papers just so he could fight. He was also well-known to many in the Jewish community in Russia for helping Jews escape during and after the war.
- The Bielski Brothers. Made famous in a number of books and in the 2008 movie “Defiance,” the Bielski brothers—Tuvia, Asael and Zus—fled their city in Belarus after their parents and two other siblings were murdered. The brothers found shelter in the forest, where they created one of the largest and most effective partisan groups during the war, focusing on guerrilla attacks against the Nazis and their collaborators, as well as on preserving Jewish life even in their hideout. In a little more than two years, the Bielski group grew to about 1,200 people.
- Tosia Altman. A young woman who used fake papers to smuggle weapons and information in and out of Poland’s ghettos. She was an active member of the social Zionist youth movement Hashomer Hatzair, active in the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising alongside Anielewitz and the other brave fighters.
- Eta Wrobel. A young woman in her 20s who helped form an all-Jewish partisan unit in the Polish woods. Her unit attacked German troops as they traveled through the area and is credited for saving hundreds of Jews.
- Rudolph Masaryk. On Aug. 2, 1943, at the Treblinka extermination camp, Masaryk and other Jewish prisoners stole 20 grenades, 20 rifles and a few handguns. Together, they attacked the SS guards, while another doused a large part of the camp with gasoline and lit it on fire. Approximately 300 prisoners escaped and 40 Nazi guards were killed during the Treblinka uprising.

Caroline Glick: Democrats, American Jews and Politically Correct Bigotry

In recent weeks, outspoken anti-Israel campaigners and BDS supporters like Representative Ilhan Omar, former CNN commentator Marc Lamont Hill and New York Times columnist Peter Beinart have been pushing for the new administration to reject the IHRA definition and legitimize BDS. They have attacked Jewish Democratic groups like the Democratic Majority for Israel, as well as the vast majority of all American Jewish groups, led by the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations—all of which are urging the Biden administration to maintain the previous administration's policies.

These efforts are being driven both by overtly anti-Israel, nominally Jewish groups like IfNotNow and Jewish Voice for Peace, and by ostensibly "pro-Israel" progressive Jewish groups, including Peace Now, J Street, T'ruah and the New Israel Fund. The AMCHA Initiative report found that since 2019, 44 percent of efforts to discredit the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism were carried out by these and other like-minded Jewish-run groups.

All of these groups are calling for the Biden administration to disavow the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism and its examples of contemporary anti-Semitism as a legal tool for combating anti-Semitism. IfNotNow is running a social media campaign, as well, to lobby the Biden administration to appoint an official special envoy to monitor and combat anti-Semitism who will simply ignore leftist anti-Semitism. As the group put it in a recent Twitter post, "It is important for us to demand that [President Biden] appoint someone to the special envoy to monitor and combat anti-Semitism who'll be committed to fighting neo-Nazis and white nationalists, not Palestinians and students."

It is a peculiar thing to see ostensibly Jewish groups dedicating their efforts to removing legal protections against anti-Jewish discrimination from their fellow Jews. It is a mark of the corruption of the American Jewish far Left that this is what they wish to fight for today. But even more disconcerting is the anti-Semitic disposition of large swaths of the Democratic Party. Democratic activist circles are now dominated by anti-Semitic voices from the Left who denounce Israel and its supporters. The effort by progressive Jewish groups to deny civil rights protection to pro-Israel Jews is indicative of the prevailing winds in the Democratic Party. Progressive Jews believe that to remain relevant in their party, they must fill the role of Jewish fig leaves for their party's anti-Semitic activist base.

This then brings us to the object of their lobbying efforts—President Joe Biden. Wednesday was International Holocaust Remembrance Day. To mark the occasion, Biden released a strong statement decrying anti-Semitism. Arguably more significant, however, is the fact that Trump's executive order on anti-Semitism has been scrubbed from the Biden White House's website.