Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Monday, March 16, 2015

03/16 Links Pt1: The anti-Israel network behind UN's Gaza investigation; Hillary’s Hezbollah Donor

From Ian:

Gerald Steinberg: Revealed: the anti-Israel network behind UN's Gaza investigation

The UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) is one of many organisations that use moral-sounding language as a façade for the opposite. Its officials and activities are controlled by regimes with abysmal human rights records - including Russia, China, and Middle Eastern dictatorships. It is not surprising that Israel is the main focus of "investigations" and condemnations.
Among its other faults, the UNHRC is very secretive - its reports are characterised by a lack of transparency, often written by unidentified persons with a worrying lack of political impartiality. For years, the secret authors of the 500-page document condemning Israel for "war crimes", published as the Goldstone Investigation in 2009, were hidden. (Judge Richard Goldstone showed little grasp of the content, and later acknowledged that the allegations were baseless.)
Recently, however, Hillel Neuer, the head of UN Watch, published the results of detailed research showing that it was Grietje Baars who assembled the text of the Goldstone report (primarily from questionable NGO claims). Ms Baars, who teaches human rights at City University in London, is a radical Marxist and an important figure in a network that seeks to exploit international law to target Israel.
Like others in this network, Ms Baars is closely linked to powerful anti-Israel NGOs, such as the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights and Swedish development charity Diakonia, helping them in campaigns to prosecute Israeli soldiers and officials.
Diakonia is mainly funded by the Swedish government (about £30m annually), implicating them in this moral corruption. The charity submitted a lengthy "report" to the Goldstone Commission, thereby suggesting that the appointment of Ms Baars gave rise to a conflict of interest.

Khaled Abu Toameh: Israelis prepare to vote; Palestinians prepare to fight

For some Palestinians, the election is not about removing Netanyahu from power. Rather, it is about removing Israel from the face of the earth and replacing it with an Islamist empire.
Kerry's statement about the revival of the peace process shows that he remains oblivious to the reality in the Middle East, particularly with regards to the Palestinians.
Kerry is ignoring the fact that the Palestinians are today divided into two camps; one that wants to destroy Israel through terrorism and jihad and another that is working hard to delegitimize and isolate Israel with the hope of forcing it to its knees.
As Kerry was talking about the revival of the peace process, Hamas announced that it has completed preparations for the next confrontation with Israel.
Abbas will come to the talks with the same demands he and his predecessor have made over the past two decades, namely a full Israeli withdrawal to the pre-1967 lines. And when Israel does not accept all his demands, he will again walk out and demand international intervention to impose a solution on Israel.
Talk about the resumption of the peace process is nothing but a silly joke.

Hillary’s Hezbollah-Friendly Donor

The Bill, Hillary and Chelsea Clinton Foundation accepted millions of dollars from a former deputy prime minister of Lebanon known for defending Hezbollah, according to a Washington Free Beacon analysis.
Issam Fares, a Lebanese billionaire who has established himself in the United States as a prominent philanthropist, has given between $1 and $5 million in donations to the Clintons’ foundation with donations coming as recently as last year, according to a public donor disclosure list on the foundation’s website.
Fares was a part of the pro-Syria government of Prime Minister Omar Karami during his tenure as deputy prime minister between 2000 and 2005.
“It seems the Zionist lobby in the United States and its agents in the region were displeased and worried that certain Lebanese and Arab personalities have a friendly relationship with some senior officials of the new American administration,” Fares was quoted as saying in a 2001 statement after questions were raised about his relationship with incoming U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell.
Fares decried comparisons drawn between the terrorist organization al Qaeda and Hezbollah after the September 11 terror attacks.
“It is a mistake to make a comparison between the [Al Qaeda] network … which Lebanon has condemned, and Hezbollah, which Lebanon considers a resistance party fighting the Israeli occupation,” Fares told Agence France-Presse. “Hezbollah did not carry out any resistance operation against American interests in Lebanon or abroad and did not target civilians in its resistance activities as happened on Sept. 11 at the World Trade Center.”

The third holiest karate demonstration on Earth

Yesterday, on the Temple Mount:

Of course, such a show would never be tolerated in the courtyards of the mosques in Mecca and Medina.

Most of the comments talk about how great it is that these kids are preparing for victory over the Jews.

(h/t Bob Knot)

A Tunisian court banned two planned tourist flights to Amman, Jordan where the travelers planned to visit Jerusalem, Bethlehem and Jericho .

Lawyer Nadia Alorga, on behalf of a group called the "Tunisian Association of Arab Resistance to imperialism and Zionism" known as "Resist," filed a suit to stop the trips, saying that they were a form of "normalization" with Israel.

The Tunisian Constitution under the new "Arab Spring" government does not criminalize "normalization"with Israel, but the lawyer Alorga based on her legal claim on the idea that the constitution provides for the support of the just causes in the world and there is no more just cause than the Palestinian cause.

This is ironic, because the PA leadership is on the record to encourage such visits from Arab and Muslim countries.

This is the first time that the Tunisian judiciary intervened in the political controversy since the rule of former President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali.

Some Tunisian political activists have been claiming that Zionist activity has been penetrating Tunisia using US funds through "suspicious private associations" operating in the framework of "civil society."

National Intelligence Estimate no longer lists Iran, Hezbollah as terror threats

From TOI:

An annual report delivered recently to the US Senate by James Clapper, the director of National Intelligence, removed Iran and Hezbollah from its list of terrorism threats, after years in which they featured in similar reports.

The unclassified version of the Worldwide Threat Assessment of the US Intelligence Communities, dated February 26, 2015 (PDF), noted Iran’s efforts to combat Sunni extremists, including those of the ultra-radical Islamic State group, who were perceived to constitute the preeminent terrorist threat to American interests worldwide.

In describing Iran’s regional role, the report noted the Islamic Republic’s “intentions to dampen sectarianism, build responsive partners, and deescalate tensions with Saudi Arabia,” but cautioned that “Iranian leaders—particularly within the security services—are pursuing policies with negative secondary consequences for regional stability and potentially for Iran.

Here is the evolution of how the NIE regarded Iran as a terror threat in recent years (this is separate from their nuclear program):

2012:

The Threat from Iran

The 2011 plot to assassinate the Saudi Ambassador to the United States shows that some Iranian officials-probably including Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei-have changed their calculus and are now more willing to conduct an attack in the United States in response to real or perceived US actions that threaten the regime. We are also concerned about Iranian plotting against US or allied interests overseas.

Iran’s willingness to sponsor future attacks in the United States or against our interests abroad probably will be shaped by Tehran’s evaluation of the costs it bears for the plot against the Ambassador as well as Iranian leaders’ perceptions of US threats against the regime.

2013:

Iran and Lebanese Hizballah

The failed 2011 plot against the Saudi Ambassador in Washington shows that Iran may be more willing to seize opportunities to attack in the United States in response to perceived offenses against the regime. Iran is also an emerging and increasingly aggressive cyber actor. However, we have not changed our assessment that Iran prefers to avoid direct confrontation with the United States because regime preservation is its top priority.

Hizballah’s overseas terrorist activity has been focused on Israel—an example is the Bulgarian Government’s announcement that Hizballah was responsible for the July 2012 bus bombing at the Burgas airport that killed five Israeli citizens. We continue to assess that the group maintains a strong anti-US agenda but is reluctant to confront the United States directly outside the Middle East.

2014:

Iran and Hizballah

Outside of the Syrian theater, Iran and Lebanese Hizballah continue to directly threaten the interests of US allies. Hizballah has increased its global terrorist activity in recent years to a level that we have not seen since the 1990s.

2015:

(Nothing.)

This is an amazing evolution of thinking. Even as the NIE was noting that Iran and its proxy Hizballah was increasing their global terror activity over the years against US allies, it no longer sees it as a threat against the US itself (despite the 2011 attack on the Saudi ambassador), so it is no longer even worth mentioning.

Also amazing is that the near simultaneous Iranian attacks on three separate Israeli diplomatic missions in 2012 are not mentioned at all, even though the FBI at the time said "Quds Force, Hezbollah and others have shown they both have the capability and the willingness to extend beyond that [Middle East] region of the world and likely here into the homeland itself."

The NIE is not supposed to be politically motivated, but it is hard to escape two conclusions.

One is that as part of the Obama strategy to embrace Iran as a potential ally against Sunni extremism, the idea of Iranian backed terror is inconvenient to mention.

The other is that Iranian terror attacks against Israeli targets and other US allies are irrelevant in determining if Iran is a terror threat to the US itself, a truly shortsighted analysis.

The NIE remains on the fence as to Iran's nuclear designs even as it notes that it is working on building ICBMs that can carry nuclear warheads worldwide:

We continue to assess that Iran’s overarching strategic goals of enhancing its security, prestige, and regional influence have led it to pursue capabilities to meet its civilian goals and give it the ability to build missile-deliverable nuclear weapons, if it chooses to do so. We do not know whether Iran will eventually decide to build nuclear weapons.

We also continue to assess that Iran does not face any insurmountable technical barriers to producing a nuclear weapon, making Iran’s political will the central issue. However, Iranian implementation of the Joint Plan of Action (JPOA) has at least temporarily inhibited further progress in its uranium enrichment and plutonium production capabilities and effectively eliminated Iran’s stockpile of 20 percent enriched uranium. The agreement has also enhanced the transparency of Iran’s nuclear activities, mainly through improved International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) access and earlier warning of any effort to make material for nuclear weapons using its safeguarded facilities.

We judge that Tehran would choose ballistic missiles as its preferred method of delivering nuclear weapons, if it builds them. Iran’s ballistic missiles are inherently capable of delivering WMD, and Tehran already has the largest inventory of ballistic missiles in the Middle East. Iran’s progress on space launch vehicles—along with its desire to deter the United States and its allies—provides Tehran with the means and motivation to develop longer-range missiles, including intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs).

There is no strategic thinking here, and it is frightening that the US makes strategic decisions based on an analysis that appears to be more interested in furthering political interests than soberly assessing true threats.

More on how Arabs treated Jews in 19th century Palestine

From Incidents of Travel in Egypt, Arabia Petræa, and the Holy Land, Volume 2, by John Lloyd Stephens, 1849:

I cannot leave this place, however, without a word or two more. I had spent a long evening with my Jewish friends. The old rabbi talked to me of their prospects and condition, and told me how he had left his country in Europe many years before, and come with his wife and children to lay their bones in the Holy Land. He was now eighty years old; and for thirty years, he said, he had lived with the sword suspended over his head; had been reviled, buffeted, and spit upon; and, though sometimes enjoying a respite from persecution, he never knew at what moment the bloodhounds might not be let loose upon him ; that, since the country had been wrested from the sultan by the Pacha of Egypt, they had been comparatively safe and tranquil; though some idea may be formed of this comparative security from the fact that, during the revolution two years before, when Ibrahim Pacha, after having been pent up several months in Jerusalem, burst out like a roaring lion, the first place upon which his wrath descended was the unhappy Hebron ; and while their guilty brethren were sometimes spared, the unhappy Jews, never offending but always suffering, received the full weight of Arab vengeance. Their houses were ransacked and plundered; their gold and silver, and all things valuable, carried away; and their wives and daughters violated before their eyes by a brutal soldiery.

This is the Hebron massacre of 1834. Unlike 1929, it was not the Jews' neighbors in Hebron who preformed the massacre this time but the Egyptians - even though the Jews had not done anything against them. Some say that the Jews were assured of their safety, which is why they didn't flee the oncoming soldiers as their Muslim neighbors did.

7 Jewish men were murdered and 5 Jewish girls raped before being killed.

The narrative shows that the Jews felt themselves to be on the lowest rung of the social ladder, always in danger from whatever event happens.

Terrorists bless +972 writer for supporting United (Arab) List

At Arabic site Bokra.net, Noam Sheizaf - a writer at +972 Magazine - explains why he will vote for the (Arab) United List in the upcoming Israeli elections.

The Al Qassam Brigades, the "military" wing of Hamas, has been active on Twitter trying to tell Arab Israelis to vote for that same group. (I'm assuming that this is not a fake account; it looks legit but one never knows.)

@AnkeJulieMartin @afagerbakke We had democratic elections. @Ayman_Odeh_TJL, @Ahmad_tibi , @haneenzoabii will help the liberation
— Ezzedeen Al-Qassam (@qassamenglish) March 15, 2015

#AskHamas who do we support in the Zionist election? @Ayman_Odeh_TJL, @haneenzoabii, @Ahmad_tibi and all those who will help the liberation!
— Ezzedeen Al-Qassam (@qassamenglish) March 13, 2015

So the terror group is ecstatic at the Jewish useful idiot who is so far left that he has turned around and supports the choice of the most misogynist, antisemitic Arabs:

@sfrantzman @nsheizaf Allah bless him
— Ezzedeen Al-Qassam (@qassamenglish) March 15, 2015

What do 21st century "progressive" Jews have in common with Muslims who want the world to roll back to the 7th century? Hating Israel!

From Ma'an:

The military wing of Hamas on Saturday said that it had rebuilt a number of military bases near the Israeli border in the Gaza Strip, asserting that it had recovered from Israel's summer offensive and was "not afraid" of confronting the occupation again.

"No sooner has the war come to an end, than the al-Qassam Brigades started a new stage of the conflict in preparation for the battle of liberation," a report on the official website of the Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades said.

The report said that fighters from the group had rebuilt military training sites near the border in the north, east, and west of the Gaza Strip, giving lie to Israeli claims that "Operation Protective Edge" in July-August 2014 had caused the group serious damage.

You will recall that the far-left Gisha NGO recently said that no houses were rebuilt since the war.

The chances that Gisha or HRW or Amnesty will condemn Hamas for prioritizing its military build-up over rebuilding damaged homes is roughly zero.

I love how Hamas claims not to have anything against Jews

One of the funnier parts of the #AskHamas Twitter campaign is how Hamas insists that it has nothing against Jews, only Zionists.

@Robbythecoolcat We protect all people even Jews. We do not discriminate, there're are Jews among us and enjoy all freedom #AskHamas
— Huda Naim (@HudanaimMP) March 13, 2015

. @irish4israel To Hamas, a free Palestinian state will be open to and welcome & give equal rights to all regardless of religion #AskHamas
— Huda Naim (@HudanaimMP) March 13, 2015

.@ZoroastrianFunk Respect for all religions is our strong belief and life long policy.
— Rawhi Mushtaha (@RawhiMushtaha) March 14, 2015

. @AnarchoZionist 1) Hamas and Palestinians have no problem with Jews. We are occupied by zionists. #AskHamas
— Rawhi Mushtaha (@RawhiMushtaha) March 14, 2015

. @AnarchoZionist 2) When Palestinians speak about 'Jews', the context is ALWAYS about those who occupy us and kill us. #AskHamas
— Rawhi Mushtaha (@RawhiMushtaha) March 14, 2015

So let's take a trip down MEMRI (and PMW) lane:

Kids rapping at a Hamas rally:

Hamas TV host:

Hamas preacher:

Hamas TV kiddie show:

Hamas MP al-Astal, referring to Jews:

Top Hamas official Osama Hamdan:

These are only some of the antisemitic statements on Hamas media in just the past year! You can click on the links to see the full context, and it is obvious they are not only talking about "Zionists."

It is also interesting to see Hamas' Western groupies happily retweeting the lies as if Hamas' word is gospel.

03/15 Links: This is no debate but a rally of hate directed at Israel; LATMA Ep6

From Ian:

Douglas Murray: This is no debate but a rally of hate directed at Israel

EARLIER this month we once again saw what hotbeds of extremism and hatred some of our university campuses have become.
The fact that Mohammed Emwazi (aka “Jihadi John”) had been a student at Westminster university could have surprised no one.
Nor could the discovery that on the very night Emwazi was unmasked his university was due to host a radical preacher who preaches the most hardline versions of sharia.
In the same week as a new video revealed commonplace anti-Jewish hatred on Britain’s streets, the Cambridge University Union Society once again chose to debate the motion “Israel is a rogue state”.
The Cambridge Union – the oldest in the country – enjoys debating that motion more than any other. It is a fixture in its termly schedules.
And once again last week the students of Cambridge decided to hold Israel guilty among the nations. Needless to say there is no record of Cambridge students debating whether Pakistan (created in the same year as Israel) is a rogue state. Despite there being far more reasons to do so.
Nor does the Cambridge Union annually denigrate any of Israel’s neighbours in the Middle East. During last week’s Cambridge debate the notorious anti-Israeli activist and discredited academic Norman Finkelstein explained to the students that Israel is worse than North Korea.
The students agreed with him. Next month the University of Southampton will become the latest university to fix its position on this bandwagon of hate.

Edwin Black: Los Angeles Conference Confronts BDS Financing and Tactics

The anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment, and Sanction (BDS) movement is said to have ignited in earnest in 2005. It was propelled by significant funding from the Ford Foundation, which poured millions of dollars into anti-Israel NGOs working in Durban, and later by the New Israel Fund (NIF), which financially backed such pro-boycott groups as the Coalition for Women for Peace.
Experts say the BDS modus operendi wields systematic distortion of international law, history, and general fact about the Israel-Palestinian conflict to rally public support. While BDS advocates claim to seek political and economic justice, their actions are increasingly trailed by anti-Jewish actions such as swastika graffiti at Jewish locations, challenges to Jewish student based on their religion, and a general air of anti-Semitic hostility on campus. Today, the BDS Movement stands merely as the leading edge of growing anti-Semitic agitation and anti-Israel mobilization, attracting pure hate elements to their message.
BDS employs such guerrilla tactics as street actions, student harassment, campus disruption, physical assaults, and duplicitous coalition building in moves eerily resembling a Brownshirt playbook. Disarmed and dismayed by the swelling assault, fragmented attempts by Israeli and American Jewish leadership to counter the movement, mainly by assembling bone-dry fact sheets and lifeless statistical arguments, have proven ineffectual.
Now, a number of Jewish organizations are pooling resources and comparing notes to more cohesively combat BDS. To this end, several hundred individuals will gather March 21-23, 2015 in a Los Angeles hotel at the International anti-BDS Conference convened by the leading pro-Israel group, StandWithUs. The diverse list of speakers include famed attorney Alan Dershowitz, Bassem Eid of the pro-co-existence Palestinian Human Rights Monitoring Group, David Renzer of the Creative Community For Peace, Richard L. Cravatts of the Scholars for Peace in the Middle East, as well as this writer, bringing insights into financial investigations of BDS groups funded by tax-exempt charities.

LATMA: We'll be the Judge, episode 6
The six episode of the Israeli satire program "We'll be the Judge," from the creators of Latma's Tribal Update, Israel Channel 1, March 12, 2015.

For many years I favored a two-state solution to the ongoing Arab-Israel conflict.

Like most people, I assumed that what the Palestinian-Arabs wanted was a state for themselves - where they could have autonomy and fulfill their national aspirations - in peace next to the Jewish State of Israel.

To this day most of the common wisdom still holds that we need to strive for a negotiated settlement with two states for two peoples.

But I have a question for those who continue to push the two-state mantra:

How can we possibly achieve a two-state solution if the Arab side absolutely refuses to come to an agreement?

It should be obvious to any fair-minded observer at this point that if the Palestinian-Arabs wanted a state for themselves in peace next to Israel then they could have had one long before now. It is fashionable, however, within Europe and western academia to despise Israel and to blame the Long Arab War against the Jews, on the Jews.

Within the universities, and among Left politicos, it is swank to blame the Jewish people - via its proxy, the Jewish state - for the violence against us. This being the case, there comes a point where we must take "no" for an answer.

In 1937, the British offered the local Arabs a state for themselves within a partition of mandated Palestine and they refused the offer. This map shows what they refused under the Peel Commission.

They could have had the entirety of mandated Palestine, including Jordan, and left the Jews only a rump state between Tel Aviv and Haifa, but even that was unacceptable for the local Arabs. This is because, for religious reasons, any bit of land, of any size, that was at any time part of Dar al Islam must forever, and always, remain incorporated into the Umma.

Conquered land must always remain conquered.

This is not optional. It is an Islamic religious imperative.

No Muslim gets to say "no" to Sharia. It is Allah, himself, who does all the noing and if there is one thing that the Arab leadership, including the Palestinian-Arab leadership, are particularly expert at, it is the liberal use of the negative proposition.

I have never before read of a people, living under the oppression of another people, who refuse release from that oppression unless, or until, all their demands are met.

It is very odd, actually.

The Arabs turned down Palestinian-Arab autonomy in 1937 and they have not changed their minds since. Other than Tel Aviv and Haifa, they could have had the whole kit-and-kaboodle, but the offer was not good enough, because it did not include everything.

So, they said, "no."

In November of 1947, of course, the entire world offered the local Arabs a state for themselves. The United Nations voted that the Palestinian Mandate would be divided and, thereby, shared between a Jewish State and an Arab State. Yet, again, the Jews said, "yes," and the Arabs said, "no."

That this land, including what is now Jordan, was promised to the Jews under both the Balfour Declaration of 1917 and the San Remo Conference of 1920 was of little concern to the British and of less concern to the nay-saying Arabs.

Then, of course, came 1967 and the famous "three nos" issued by the Arab League at Khartoum As if the original "nos" were not enough, after the Arab defeat at the hands of the IDF in the 6 Day War the losers set the terms for the victors:

No Peace. No Recognition. No negotiation.

The reason that the losers were able to dictate terms to the victors was because the losers had the backing of the larger international community, due to the fact that it needed Arab oil.

Israel, probably, should have taken "no" for an answer then. In fact, on the contrary, it did something entirely unprecedented in the entire annals of human history. During those years, in a formal and diplomatic manner, Israel acknowledged and recognized a people - the so-called "Palestinians" - who emerged as a distinct group toward the end of the twentieth century for the lone, sole purpose of challenging Jewish autonomy historically Jewish land.

This represents what is perhaps the single worst blunder in the history of that country.

It has to be understood that neither the Jewish people, nor the State of Israel, is under any moral or ethical obligation to acknowledge a set of people, who organized themselves as "a people," within living memory, for the express purpose of undermining the movement for Jewish liberation and to appropriate both Jewish land and Jewish heritage.

We have no such obligation, but nonetheless, we did it, anyway.

By the early 1970s, both Israeli and diaspora Jews acknowledged the "Palestinians" and thereby suggested to the rest of the world that we do not necessarily deserve autonomy on Jewish land, because there is a brand-spanking new people in town who are also making claims and we wish to be fair.

And, of course, the "Palestinians" were not merely making claims, they were hijacking jets and blowing people up in the name of Allah, while insisting that the Jews are the "New Nazis"... which much to the astonishment of others actually enamored them to a significant segment of the western Left.

In any case, come the early years of the life of the Frankenstein's Monster known as Oslo, Ehud Barak offered Yassir Arafat the entirety of the Gaza Strip and well over 90 percent of Judea and Samaria (i.e., "West Bank"), with land swaps, and was turned down flat in the year 2000.

This was when Arafat astounded US President, Bill Clinton, by claiming that the Temple of Solomon never even existed in Jerusalem. By all accounts, Clinton was flabbergasted at Arafat's audacity.

Writing in the New York Review of Books in 2001, Jewish American diplomat Dennis Ross reminds us to:

Consider Arafat’s performance at Camp David. It is not just that he had, in the words of President Clinton, “been here fourteen days and said no to everything.” It is that all he did at Camp David was to repeat old mythologies and invent new ones, like, for example, that the Temple was not in Jerusalem but in Nablus. Denying the core of the other side’s faith is not the act of someone preparing himself to end a conflict.

Indeed. And, needless to say, everyone's favorite undertaker, Mahmoud Abbas, turned down a nearly identical offer from Ehud Olmert in 2008.

So, it is NO and NO and NO and NO.

Yet, for some reason, today, western politicians, and much of their constituency, honestly expect the Jewish people to continue to beg and plead with the Arabs to give up their alleged persecution at Jewish hands in favor of freedom and autonomy.

How odd is it, really, that a supposedly persecuted minority needs to be induced to accept its freedom?

What I say is that the Palestinian-Arabs have clearly demonstrated over many decades that they are "all or nothing" kind of people. And, you know what they say. If you're an all-or-nothing kind of a guy, and if you cannot get it all, you know what you get.

You get nothing.

That is my proposal to the Palestinian-Arabs. If they insist upon everything, then they get nothing.

If they will not accept a state, then they will not get a state.

Israel should declare its final borders, remove the IDF to behind those borders, and toss the keys over its shoulder. What those final borders would be, should be entirely up to Israel, according to its security needs. If Israel decides to annex all of Judea and Samaria, so be it.

It will, nonetheless, remain a Jewish state.

What I would propose, under such circumstances, is that Arab non-citizens of Israel in Judea and Samaria be offered a pathway to citizenship. Just as most Jewish Israelis are required to join the IDF for a few years at the age of 18, so non-Israeli resident Arabs would be offered a chance at some form of community service and upon completion of that community service with a good record would be offered the franchise.

The two-state solution, however, is dead and it is the Arabs that killed it.

We cannot force them to accept a two-state solution if this is not what they want.

And, guess what?

It is not what they want.

What they want is Israel gone, thus what they get is nothing.

What we are looking at is the expiration date on the side of the cereal box.

It is the expiration date on "Palestine."

Michael Lumish is a blogger at the Israel Thrives blog as well as a regular contributor/blogger at Times of Israel and Jews Down Under.

Haaretz columnist Rogel Alpher, whom we last saw attacking Elie Wiesel's hair and claiming that only Israeli citizens (and Palestinians, and people like him planning to leave Israel) may voice an opinion on Israel, is now urging Israelis not to bother voting altogether.

On Tuesday, we will be going to the polls and feeling like idiots. None of Israel’s pressing problems will be solved by this election. Even after the formation of the next government, the process of becoming an irreversible binational state will continue, thus depriving us of a normal, moral life.

As the campaign draws to a close, an aggressive push has been waged to encourage people to vote. Endless broadcasts on behalf of government agencies and the commercial television networks have called on Israelis to exercise their right to vote. Voting in these elections has been portrayed as an act that enables Israel’s citizens to influence their current existence and future fate.

An ideological steamroller of a campaign has tarnished the reputation of those who don’t vote: Comrades, these are negative types, a band of really dangerous people. They gripe, but refuse to roll up their sleeves. They are quitting the community, turning their backs on society – wild, rotten weeds that weaken our collective existence. So inform on them. The police will push them into the paddy wagons and you will no longer see them. Don’t get infected by their spiritual atrophy. Stick with us.

It turns out the only real, subversive act involves expressing a lack of confidence in the effectiveness of the election as a process – one that lets the citizens shape the country’s identity and as an instrument for change. The major fear – the only fear of the establishment – is that the public will wake up and understand that the election is just a virtual game, an Israeli version of sci-fi film “The Matrix.”

Is not voting an option? Is it an act of protest that will make a mark? At least it lets us maintain our self-respect. At least then we’ll know that we weren’t puppets on a string, fools unaware of the circumstances of our ridiculous lives. On the other hand, elections have become a ritual, like the Passover seder – something you have to participate in, even if you’re not overjoyed about it, without believing in the blessings, but rather to derive a measure of satisfaction from the tradition. Happy Election Day.

It is highly amusing that Alpher, who has been saying since last August that he plans to emigrate from Israel since he is such a moral person, is complaining about people saying people like him are quitting the community.

To Alpher, voting for Meretz is not an option. Voting for the United Arab List is not an option. Presumably, even they are too right-wing for his enlightened tastes.

Alpher sees the truth while other Israelis are blind. He is enlightened while all else are in the dark. He knows that not voting is a "protest" that can make change far better than voting can. How, exactly, he doesn't say.

Perhaps he wants an Israeli intifada to replace the democratically elected government with his own idea of a moral leadership that can then dismantle the state and become one with the Arab world which will treat the Jews fairly. Who knows what goes through the mind of someone who imagines police arresting people who don't vote? (In 2012, 32% of Israelis didn't vote; a steady deterioration from the above-80% turnouts in the 1950s and 60s The jails must be very, very full.)

It is clear that Alpher is on the fringe of the fringe, a person who lives in a tiny bubble even within the Tel Aviv bubble. He doesn't want to vote because he feels that he is better than everyone else, yet no one was brilliant enough to nominate him.

But to the world community, for whom Ha'aretz represents their idea of how liberal Israelis think, Alpher is mainstream.

Why did AP, B'Tselem and Amnesty ignore this house destroyed by Israel?

Recently, Richard Behar and Gary Weiss wrote a masterly destruction of an AP investigation showing how many mistakes and violations of journalistic ethics could be found in an article.

"The New York-based news agency examined 247 airstrikes on homes—interviewing witnesses, visiting attack sites and compiling a detailed casualty count. Its probe determined that out of 844 dead from those strikes, 508 (or just over 60 percent) were children, women and older men, 'all presumed to be civilians.'"

This is very similar to an Amnesty report on Israeli airstrikes of houses that I addressed here.

The organization that decided to do this type of analysis originally is B'Tselem, which even during the war started compiling lists of houses that had been hit by Israel and their casualties.

There is an additional problem with all of these "investigations" - they consciously exclude airstrikes on homes that the NGOs know were being used to shield fighters.

If you only count houses that used women and children as human shields, yes, it will appear that Israel showed disregard for the lives women and children (which is not by itself proof of violations of international law, as I have shown in my Amnesty piece.)

B'Tselem has the most comprehensive list of family homes hit by Israel published (AP did not expose its full list.) Yet one obvious family house is not listed: the home of the Al Skafi family of Shujaiyya.

I already mentioned that two of the al-Skafis were 17 or 18-year old twins who were proud members of Islamic Jihad.

But most of the other victims of that airstrike were also terrorists.

Abdel Skafi:

Ahmed Skafi, in front of the Hamas flag:

Mujahid al Skafi, in his martyrdom video:

Ali Skafi:

Now, it is true that their 63-year old father Akram was killed along with this jihadist family. Presumably he was not an active militant.

But AP, B'Tselem and Amnesty did not bother to list the al-Skafi family house as one of those that were targeted by Israel, because counting that house - and who knows how many others - would reduce their ratio of civilians to terrorists killed by Israel.

In other words, these organizations cooked the books to make Israel look bad.

It is inconceivable that all three are not aware of the al-Skafi home - it was prominently mentioned in "Humanize Palestine" and other sites that list the dead.

Yet since it was obvious to these organizations that the al-Skafi family home was mostly inhabited by fighters, that house is excluded from these supposedly objective analyses.

How many other such houses filled with jihadists from the same family were excluded?

All of the other criticisms of these reports still apply, of course, Without these organizations knowing what the targets were, they cannot know whether the IDF commanders who ordered the strikes violated the primciples of distinction and proportionality, and any assumptions of those violations based on the proportion of civilians killed are inherently flawed.

But the Al Skafi home proves that the entire purpose of this "research" is not to calculate how effective the IDF was, but rather to cherry-pick the examples that they believe prove their point.

It is lying with statistics, and it is reprehensible.

(h/t Thomas Wictor)

Jordan denies rumor that school maps will show Israel

Israel's Channel 10 was reported to have stated yesterday that Jordan decided to allow the word "Israel" to appear on maps in geography classes at schools. The news was accompanied by analysis by "experts" about how this means that Jordan is trying to show it is moderate to the West, or that it is trying to de-emphasize the Israel-Arab conflict in the face of the threats from ISIS.

The rumor was instantly denounced by Arabic media. Jordan's Ad Dustour called to tear out any mention of Israel from the books and "place them where they belong, in the dustbin of history."

Today, Jordan's education ministry flatly denied the story. The Education Minister said it was completely untrue and that Israel does not appear in any Jordanian school materials at all.

Whew!

It turns out that Jordan's education ministry did do something last year that was almost as controversial.

A school textbook called "Jews Do Not Honor Charters and Covenants" was pulled from school libraries, eliciting protests from Jordan's Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamist groups.

03/14 Links: Col.Kemp responds to Anti-Israel riot; Senate probes Obama funded anti-Netanyahu drive

From Ian:

Letter from Colonel Richard Kemp to Vice Chancellor USYD

On the basis of my observations, as I have mentioned, Associate Professor Lynch and Dr Riemer sought to incite and encourage the student protesters. Can it be right that members of your university staff should indulge in such disgraceful action?
Peaceful and reasonable demonstration, such as handing out leaflets, chanting dissenting views or holding placards with messages of opposition to the views of a speaker, is of course acceptable. Indeed, such a peaceful demonstration was under way outside when I entered the room for my lecture. I was offered and accepted a leaflet, which I read and I briefly engaged in discussion with a protester. However the type of racially‐motivated aggression, intimidation and abuse that occurred at this event is wholly unacceptable. Also unacceptable in any respectable university is the curtailment of an invited and approved speaker’s freedom to speak and engage in legitimate academic discourse such as I experienced at your university.
I urge you to investigate this incident and to take action against the students and staff members who were responsible for the behavior that I have described. If you fail to do so then you will be failing to discourage such action in your university in the future. You will thus be failing in your duty to ensure that your students, visitors and guest speakers may take part in debate within the precincts of the University of Sydney without fear or
concern for their own safety.
I would add that you have a particular responsibility in respect of the racist, anti‐Semitic nature of this protest. As you know anti‐Semitism is a rising phenomenon in the world. Jews in many places live in increasing fear and concern that they will be singled out and discriminated against. Only by taking firm action against anti‐Semitic abuse and hatred whenever and wherever it occurs can this situation be reversed. Sydney University has the opportunity here to set an example to other academic institutions that lack the moral courage to face up to the modern scourge of anti‐Semitism.

Sydney University investigating after associate professor waves money in the face of a Jewish woman at a recent protest on campus

SYDNEY University will investigate an incident in which Associate Professor Jake Lynch was filmed waving a five dollar bill at an elderly Jewish woman enraged by anti-Israel protesters at a lecture.
Dr Lynch — Director of the Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies — claims he was threatening to sue the woman after she kicked him “in the meat and two veg”.
Colonel Richard Kemp, a retired British military officer, was delivering a lecture on the ethics of armed conflict at the university on Wednesday when several students stormed the room and began chanting anti-Israel slogans.
Within minutes of their entry, Associate Professor Lynch began filming the fracas.
He was involved in a confrontation with a woman, believed to be 75 years old, with the two taunting each other.
Mr Lynch then reached into his breast pocket, pulled out a $5 note and began waving it in the woman’s face.
Dr Lynch said his actions were intended to represent a threat to sue the woman.
In a video viewed by The Saturday Telegraph, Dr Lynch can be seen arguing with the woman before she throws out her right arm at him.
Colonel Kemp, who witnessed the incident, said in his opinion the actions of associate professor Lynch suggested an anti-Jewish prejudice.

Source: Senate panel probes whether Obama administration funded effort to oust Netanyahu

A powerful U.S. Senate investigatory committee has launched a bipartisan probe into an American nonprofit’s funding of efforts to oust Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu after the Obama administration’s State Department gave the nonprofit taxpayer-funded grants, a source with knowledge of the panel's activities told FoxNews.com.
The fact that both Democratic and Republican sides of the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations have signed off on the probe could be seen as a rebuke to President Obama, who has had a well-documented adversarial relationship with the Israeli leader.
The development comes as Netanyahu told Israel’s Channel Two television station this week that there were “governments” that wanted to help with the “Just Not Bibi” campaigning -- Bibi being the Israeli leader’s nickname.
It also follows a FoxNews.com report on claims the Obama administration has been meddling in the Israeli election on behalf of groups hostile to Netanyahu. A spokesperson for Sen. Rob Portman, Ohio Republican and chairman of the committee, declined comment, and aides to ranking Democratic Sen. Claire McCaskill, of Missouri, did not immediately return calls.
The Senate subcommittee, which has subpoena power, is the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs’ chief investigative body with jurisdiction over all branches of government operations and compliance with laws.

03/13 Links Pt2: At UCLA, a culture of equating 'Israel' with 'guilty'; Jews attacked in Marseille

From Ian:

At UCLA, a culture of equating 'Israel' with 'guilty'

UCLA is a campus that has allowed Middle East history to be taught by instructors who demonize Israel, and has permitted its Center for Near Eastern Studies to be directed and co-directed by BDS supporters. It is a culture where a student can come to class wearing an "Israel Kills" T-shirt, yet any mention of Muslim symbols is sure to trigger the heaviest gun of political correctness, "Islamophobia!"
It is a culture where pro-coexistence students, especially in the social sciences, prefer to keep silent rather than risk mockery and social estrangement. Most importantly, it is a campus overrun by soft-spoken BDS propagandists who managed to hijack the student government's agenda with repeated proposals for anti-Israel resolutions, the purpose of which is one: to associate the word "Israel" with the word "guilty."
Coming from this culture, it is quite natural for a council member to assume that Rachel Beyda, as a Jew, is likely to have a built-in reluctance to joining the never-ending orgy of Israel indictments. Especially indictments authored by a movement like BDS, which openly denies one of Jews' most deeply held convictions – Israel's right to exist.
I am purposely using the generic term "as a Jew" here, in its most inclusive, people-based sense. I do so because a great many Jews do consider Israel the culmination of their millennia-long history. Likewise, I follow the observations of Hillel's leadership, who repeatedly assures concerned parents and outraged donors of its commitment to the Zionist dream, and to pro-Israel education.
So why all the outrage about the misuse of the inclusive term "Jewish?" Roth's mistake was not that she probed into Beyda's faith as a Jew, but that she implied that Jews can only gain social acceptance and student government credentials by joining the "indict-Israel" circus, as some of their professors have chosen to do.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali Condemns Anti-Semitism, Champions New Film

On Wednesday in Brookline, Massachusetts, women’s rights activist Ayaan Hirsi Ali headlined an event revolving around the rise of anti-Semitism. Her remarks followed the Boston premiere of the Jerusalem U film, Crossing the Line 2: The New Face of Anti-Semitism on Campus, directed by Shoshana Palatnik, who also attended.
Hirsi Ali pulled no punches, offering scathing commentary regarding the anti-Semitism around the world. She offered these statements:
It is appalling that only seventy years from the Holocaust, crowds in Europe chant "Hamas, Hamas, Jews to the gas." It is even more appalling that 10,000 soldiers in Paris are needed to protect Jewish sites. That is the continent that promised never again. The men and women who were in the concentration camps, who are tattooed, some are still here. And it is happening again.
Watching Crossing the Line 2: the New Face of Anti-Semitism on Campus, was like having a bucket of ice water being poured over my head. I saw the film last week. And I watched it again last night. And I couldn't sleep. The more we pretend that this is happening somewhere far away, the more hopeless and helpless we feel. But this is not happening far away. This is happening on American campuses, British campuses, Canadian campuses. The filmmakers who made this film made it because it is important that we listen to this message while it is at a smaller stage.

Jewish teens attacked in southern France

Two Jewish teens in France were robbed and beaten after leaving their Marseille synagogue.
The teens were attacked on Tuesday by two assailants who they described as youth “of African origin,” according to the National Bureau of Vigilance Against Anti-Semitism, or BNVCA.
According to the victims, the assailants said, “Dirty Jews, we will exterminate all of you,” before they were robbed and beaten. The Jewish teens required medical attention.
One of the victims told BNVCA that he recognized the attackers.
The bureau called on police in the southern French city to “do everything possible to identify and question the attackers,” and for the assailants to be severely punished to act as a deterrent to future attacks.