Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Thursday, April 02, 2015

04/02 Links Pt2: Anti-Israel academics: the world’s least convincing free-speech warriors;

From Ian:

Brendan O'Neill: Anti-Israel academics: the world’s least convincing free-speech warriors

However - and this is a very big however - the conference organisers and their sympathisers in the media, the academy and on Twitter must be the least convincing defenders of academic freedom in living memory. These anti-Israel thinkers and campaigners are currently crying ‘Censorship!’ as loudly as they can, depicting themselves as a persecuted minority silenced by powerful political actors (You Know Who). A professor of law at Southampton, and a co-organiser of the conference, said ‘the controversial nature of the conference is precisely where [the principle of] freedom of speech leads – that’s where the commitment to freedom of speech is tested’. He’s right about that; but he’s wrong if he thinks we’re going to buy the idea that today’s shrill and many opponents of Israel are glorious defenders of free speech or controversial discussion. On the contrary, the anti-Israel lobby is possibly the most censorious mob on British campuses today, practising, week in, week out, the very same censoriousness it now cries about being victimised by.
Whether they are No Platforming Zionist speakers and representatives of the Israeli government, or demanding an academic boycott against any professor or thinker or book that comes from Israel, or agitating for the removal from Britain of Israeli dance troupes or theatre groups or filmmakers - as if they were all diseased with contagious Zionism - anti-Israel campaigners have become dab hands at shutting down debate, at silencing those they (irrationally) hate. Their everyday currency is censorship. In recent months, Israel societies on campus have had to cancel events following loud and censorious disruptions and have even faced demands that they be shut down on the basis that they make their campuses into Unsafe Spaces - which means they hold views that small numbers of student-union bureaucrats consider foul. Indeed, in the Guardian article that sympathises with the silenced Southampton discussants it is casually mentioned that the organisers of the conference have ‘voiced support for an academic boycott [of Israel]’. So these self-styled warriors for academic freedom back the highly illiberal and discriminatory tactic of never exchanging thoughts or ideas with Israeli thinkers and instead banning them from British campuses. You couldn’t make it up.

Edgar Davidson: Southampton University's disgraceful statement on cancelling anti-Israel hatefest

"We are sorry but we have had to cancel this excellent unbiased event due to threats from the Zionists"
Southampton University has cancelled the planned anti-Israel hatefest. That ought to be a cause for a small celebration. However, the statement the University has issued is a disgrace, and probably far more damaging than the planned conference itself would have been. It does not mention any of the multiple arguments explaining why the University should never have supported the event in the first place, but instead justifies the cancellation on the grounds of public safety, implying that the planned protest by those opposed to the event (i.e. 'Zionists') posed too great a risk to University personnel and visitors.
The University is effectively promoting the idea (already prominent in the main stream media and not just among Israel haters) that threats from 'Zionists/Jews' have put a stop to free speech. But it is even worse. Instead of criticising the blatant bias and antisemitism of the organisers of the conference (almost every single one of the scheduled speakers was an advocate of boycotting Israel) , the statement goes out of its way to actually praise them and invert reality:
"The University ... has been impressed by the commitment of the organisers to include a broad spectrum of views, and indicated to the organisers that it will work with them to find a venue suitable for a conference of this nature at a later date."

Joke Street

Other speakers included Maha Mehanna, who called Israel’s actions against Hamas this past summer a “crime against humanity”, while remaining silent about Hamas’ actions that provoked the Israeli response. There was Matt Duss who compared Israel’s blockade against Hamas to segregation. There was (of course) Peter Beinart, who called for Obama to take punitive actions against Israel, such as freezing assets.
To top it all off, there was Marcia Freedman, who basically called for the end of Israel as a Jewish state, saying that Israeli Jews should instead live as a “protected minority” in an Arab-controlled Palestinian state instead. She believes this despite the way non-Arab minorities across the Middle East are treated by Arabs. She believes this despite a study conducted by the ADL finding that 93% of Palestinians harbor anti-semitic views and that all 10 of the most anti-semitic countries are all Arab countries. After she gave her speech, Freedman was applauded, by people who are supposed to support Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state. It is amazing that an organization that claims to be for two states gives a platform for someone who calls for one state. Yet, J Street has declined to allow many other supporters of the two state solution, such as Alan Dershowitz, to speak at their conference.
The mask has finally slipped off. Happy April Fools Day J Street, you aren’t fooling anybody but yourselves!

A few days ago Hamas police broke into a gathering of Fatah activists in the Jabalya camp in the northern Gaza Strip meant to memorialize the six Fatah members killed in the first intifada. The Hamas gunmen beat the participants and arrested a number of them while firing their weapons in the air.

Yesterday, Hamas prevented another Fatah gathering in Rafah to commemorate the death of ten more of its own terrorists. Fatah had planned to hold a concert and show a documentary on the lives of their "martyrs" and informed the Hamas leadership ahead of time.

Meanwhile in Fatahland, the PA security forces have arrested five Hamas students at the Palestine Polytechnic University in Hebron over the past two days. They have also arrested two former prisoner in Israeli jails associated with Hamas, one in Jenin and one in Ramallah, in recent days.

Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri emphasized yesterday that Mahmoud Abbas' presidency is constitutionally over according to Palestinian law.

Vic Rosenthal's weekly column:

Get up, stand up, stand up for your right
Get up, stand up, don’t give up the fight
Get up, stand up. Life is your right
So we can’t give up the fight
Stand up for your right, Lord, Lord
Get up, stand up. Keep on struggling on
Don’t give up the fight — Bob Marley, “Get up, stand up”

I am sure the planners in Israel’s Defense Ministry have given priority 1 to the nuclear threat from Iran. As the ridiculous ‘negotiations’ with Iran pass yet another meaningless ‘deadline’ and Western negotiators, led by the foolish John Kerry, make concession after concession, it must be 100% clear to the folks in the kiriya that if Iran is to be stopped, Israel will have to stop her.

The Iranian question is no longer a political and diplomatic one; it is now a military one. The generals will decide how to do what must be done, and the politicians will decide when is the best time to do it. We can only hope they do their jobs competently. Ordinary Israelis will start cleaning the junk out of our bomb shelters again.

So now I want to turn to the other, somewhat lesser, threat that Israel faces today — also brought to us by courtesy of our ‘friend’ in the White House — which is the diplomatic offensive for the UN Security Council to impose a ‘solution’ in the form of a Palestinian state in Judea and Samaria. Obama, feckless in his second term and armed with the convenient lie that it is Israel’s fault (the multiple Arab rejections of partition proposals notwithstanding) that there isn’t ‘peace’, will likely withhold the US veto of such a resolution.

What happens if a resolution calling for Israeli withdrawal from the territories passes? Most resolutions are only advisory, unless one is passed under Chap. VII of the UN charter, which can be invoked if the UNSC determines that there is a “threat to peace” or “act of aggression.” In that case economic or even military sanctions can be applied if the target doesn’t comply. A precedent could be the sanctions adopted against the Ian Smith regime in Rhodesia in 1966. Of course even an advisory resolution can be used as a reason for a nation or group of nations to independently sanction another nation.

Israel finds itself in this position for several reasons, but it can’t help that over the years we haven’t made our own case for the legitimacy of our control of the territories. Much of the time we have accepted the narrative of our enemies that we are ‘occupiers’ of ‘Arab land’. If this were true, then it only would make sense that we ought to return the land to its ‘owners’ in return for adequate security guarantees.
But in fact it is not true. The Palestine Mandate as finally ratified by the League of Nations in 1922, granted the Jewish people the right of ‘close settlement’ on the land from the Mediterranean to the Jordan. In 1948, Jews were ethnically cleansed from the eastern part of the former Mandate, in a war crime committed by the Jordanian army.

For the 19 years until 1967, a racist occupation was maintained by Jordan. Jews were forbidden to set foot in the so-called ‘West Bank’, including Jewish holy places in eastern Jerusalem, synagogues were made into stables and cemeteries into latrines. It is absurd to say that this illegal act somehow transformed Judea and Samaria into ‘Arab land’ that we now ‘occupy’. As Naftali Bennett has said, you can’t be an occupier in your own land.

But didn’t Israel ethnically cleanse the western part of the former Mandate? Actually, no. With a few exceptions, generally in response to hostile actions by Arab populations, the Arabs who left fled because they feared the coming war or because they expected that the Jews would massacre them in revenge for what they had been doing to Jews since 1920. The Arabs that stayed put and did not engage in hostilities are still here.

Arabs in Palestine began the hostilities of our War of Independence, the Arab nations intervened in support of them, and the Jews prevailed. There certainly were injustices, but there is no comparison to what would have happened to Jews if the Arabs had won. Starting wars and losing them has consequences.

A whole industry of Israeli ‘revisionist’ historians and journalists has arisen to tell the story from the Arab point of view. Some are simply anti-state propagandists like Ilan Pappé, while others, like Ari Shavit, are Zionists obsessed by pathological feelings of guilt for being on the winning side. Their faults range from deliberate and wholesale invention of Jewish crimes to an exaggerated propensity to believe hostile sources uncritically.

The facts are known and documented by historians like Ephraim Karsh. There is no reason for Israel to adopt the Arab narrative. For example, the concept of ‘pre-67 lines and land swaps’ assumes that all of Judea/Samaria belongs to the Arabs. Therefore, the argument goes, if Israel is allowed to keep settlements over the Green Line then it must transfer an equal amount of land from this side of it to the Arabs. But the only claim that the Arabs have on this land is the illegal Jordanian occupation! And the Green Line, the boundary that is given so much significance, is just the 1949 armistice line — which the agreements made at the time specifically state is not a border and does not have any political significance.

Israel does not owe the ‘Palestinians’, led by the violent Jew-haters of Hamas and the PLO, anything. They have no a priori right to the land over the Green Line, nor do the descendents of Arab refugees have a ‘right of return’ to the Israel that their grandparents left.

It could be that nevertheless it is desirable for Israel to facilitate some kind of demilitarized Palestinian state in some part of the territories. But the starting point for negotiations must be the legitimate right of the Jewish people to the land of Israel, and not the nonexistent ‘occupation’.

The deck may be stacked against us in the international arena. But we certainly won’t get our rights if we don’t stand up for them.

04/02 Links Pt1: Glick: Annex Judea and Samaria Now; Poll: 73.5% of palestinians support intifada

From Ian:

Colonel Richard Kemp Defends Israel’s Military Response

Former commander of British forces in Afghanistan, Colonel Richard Kemp, explains the concept of proportionality in war and how the term is being misused to criticize Israel.
A common criticism made against Israel is that during last year’s war against Hamas in a battle known as Operation Protective Edge, the Israeli military used “disproportionate response.”. During the war, Hamas fired thousands of rockets at civilian targets mainly in Israel. Despite their best efforts to kill and maim innocent civilians, Israeli casualties were minimal. In response, and in accordance with international law, Israel fired at military targets in Gaza, killing a large number of terrorists. It is important to note that Israel took extraordinary measures to protect innocent lives in Gaza by dropping leaflets, phoning residents and sending warnings to civilians before attacking a Hamas target.
Hamas committed a double war crime: they fired from behind innocent Palestinian civilians while firing indiscriminately at innocent Israeli civilians. By doing so, they were directly responsible for the deaths of innocent Gazan and Israeli civilians. Because of Hamas’ war crimes, numerous innocent Palestinians were killed. Many human rights activists and governments pointed to the number of killed on each side and came to the mistaken and wrongful conclusion that the higher number of deaths on the Palestinian side meant Israel was using disproportionate force in Gaza. In fact, this is not true at all. And according to Colonel Kemp, this is not how one measures disproportionate response.

Colonel Richard Kemp debunks "Disproportional Response"

Caroline Glick: Annex Judea and Samaria Now

Journalist and writer Caroline Glick, author of the book "The Israeli Solution: A One-State Plan for Peace in the Middle East", says Israel should annex Judea and Samaria now, in response to President Barack Obama’s statements that the United States will “re-evaluate” its support for Israel at the United Nations.
Seeing as Obama is planning to change American policy and “force Israel into completely indefensible borders”, Glick told Arutz Sheva, “the time has come for Israel to come out with an alternative policy, and the alternative policy that we have to put out is applying Israeli law and sovereignty to Judea and Samaria”.
“The question couldn’t be more urgent,” said Glick, whose book deals with this very issue and of which a Hebrew edition was recently published.
“The government has got to put forward a new policy regarding the Palestinians,” she continued. “The two states failed, we all know it, [and] we can’t resurrect it because it wasn’t we that made it fail.”
“The world doesn’t like us now,” Glick pointed out when asked about the world’s reaction if Israel does indeed annex Judea and Samaria. “We’re in a situation now where all the things they said will happen to us if we do X, Y, or Z are happening to us now when we’re saying, ‘No, no, no, we’ll support the establishment of a Palestinian state in Israel’s heartland.”

Caroline Glick: Annex Judea and Samaria Now - in Wake of US Policy

An-Najah Poll: 73.5%:18.4% Palestinians support armed intifada, 46.2% of Gazans want to emigrate

Submit a petition to the UN to recognize a Palestinian state on the 1967
borders.
Yes 72.2 No 22.1 DK 5.2
Start nonviolent and unarmed popular resistance
Yes 38.8 No 54.3 DK 6.9
Call for a one-state solution – a state for both Israelis and Palestinians
Yes 56.6 No 35.8 DK 7.6
Dissolve the PA.
Yes 22.7 No 71.0 DK 6.3
Recourse to the International Criminal Court
Yes 32.2 No 59.3 DK 8.5
Start a new armed intifada (uprising) and confrontations with the Israelis.
Yes 73.5 No 18.4 DK 8.2 (h/t Bob Knot)

Last month, as well as for the two previous months, the Palestinian Authority was only able to pay 60% of normal salaries to its workers because of its precarious financial situation.

Yet today, the PA announced that the families of "martyrs" will receive their full stipends this month, just as they did last month. The decision was made by the minister of finance, Shukri Bishara.

At the same time, the EU and the Netherlands announced that they are giving some $34.2 million (€31.6 million) to the Palestinian Authority for payment of its civil servants’ March salaries and pensions. It is unclear whether those funds are being channeled to the families of "martyrs" directly, although of course they allow the PA to have latitude to spend more on their terrorist heroes.

It is estimated that some 6% of the PA budget is allocated to paying salaries and stipends to terrorists (both in Israeli jails and after they are released) as well as to their families.

On March 31, Jordan's Ministry of Culture honored film director Mohammad Azizieh, who was behind the antisemitic miniseries "Khaybar" that was shown throughout the Arab world in Ramadan of 2013.

During the ceremony, the ministry screened a new Khaybar movie that Azizeh edited from the mini-series. The description on their website leaves no doubt that the subject of the movie is the "treachery of the Jews from the beginning of the Islamic Dawah."

Newspaper Arab al-Yawm expanded on this, describing the film as being about "Jewish hostility against all that is Arab, and how they would stand against the Islamic Dawa, and the ethics of the Jews in their dealings, conspiratorial and filled with hatred, betrayal and breaking agreements."

Minister of Culture Dr. Lana Mamkegh praised Azizieh as a Jordanian cultural treasure.

Jordan's Culture Ministry also has a paper by a University of Petra professor claiming to prove that the Jewish Temples were a myth.

(h/t Shawarma News)

Ha'aretz keeps publishing idiotic op-eds. This one by By Salman Masalha does a spectacular job of misunderstanding Mizrahi Jews.

There was an uproar over remarks made by Prof. Amir Hetsroni against those who voted for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud, including Hetsroni’s suggestion that it would not have been so awful if Moroccan Jews had been “left to rot” in North Africa rather than coming to Israel. But if we translate his statement into the more nuanced official language of the Prime Minister’s Residence in Jerusalem, it sounds very familiar.

“We are Europeans. We are refined [and] don’t eat as much as you Moroccans do.” This comment was reportedly directed by First Lady Sara Netanyahu at one particular Moroccan, Meni Naftali, former chief caretaker of the Prime Minister’s Residence, who is suing the Netanyahus. Nevertheless, a lot of Meni Naftalis showed their support for the First Family by going to the polls on Election Day to fill the ballot boxes with Likud ballots.

Masalha, writing for Haaretz, is convinced of course that the Likud is more racist against Mizrahi Jews than the Left, and cannot understand why they tend to vote right wing. It never occurs to him that his premise might be wrong. (Or that the Prime Minister's wife isn't a Likud official.)

One should remember that Zionism is a white European national movement. This Ashkenazi Zionism, which established the country in an ongoing confrontation with the Arab world, created a serious emotional crisis for Jews from Arab countries. The more the Arab-Israeli conflict intensified, so did the complexity of the situation faced by Jews from Arab lands.

The people with the political, economic, social and cultural clout have no problem declaring proudly, “We are Europeans. We are refined, not like you Moroccans.” On the other hand, what are Jews whose entire existence is Arab supposed to do? In the intensifying national confrontation between European Zionism and the Arab world, Jews from Arab countries were pushed aside. They therefore began referring to themselves as Mizrahim (literally “Easterners”) among other things. Anything to escape the term “Arab,” which connotes national enmity. A few years ago such emotional pressures pushed a Jewish Likud Knesset member at the time, Carmel Shama, to ask the Interior Ministry to add “Hacohen” to the end of his name because he was sick of people always thinking that he was Druze, in other words, Arab.

Notice how Masalha is himself bigoted against Mizrahi Jews. He assumes that they are conflicted about their identity while European Jews have pride in their not being from the backwards Middle East (that they risked their lives to move to.).

This last anecdote is a fantasy that Masalha published five years ago in Haaretz as well. There is no evidence that Shama-Hacohen was embarrassed by his last name; many Ashkenazic Jews also change their names in Israel from German or Polish surnames to Hebrew ones. If "proud, refined" Europeans and Americans change their names just like the Jews from Arab countries that Masalha considers emotionally disturbed, then that sort of blows apart Masalha's theory.

The flight from Arabism, even the wearing of Eastern European shtetl clothing (as one sees in Shas) will not lead Mizrahim, meaning Arabs of the Jewish faith, anywhere. Netanyahu and the white right wing in general will continue to fan hatred towards Arabs. This hate will ensure the continued flight of Arab Jews from their Arabness and the right’s continued manipulation of Jews who are estranged from it.

The only Ethiopian Knesset member at this time is a Likud member. Likud also has a Druze member. Silvan Shalom, #6 on the list this time, was born in Tunisia.

So much for the "white right wing."

As a result, it is only when the descendants of Jewish Arabs proudly and confidently proclaim to the refined, arrogant European Israelis that they are Arab, and proud of it, that perhaps there will be an end to their tribulations. This could also constitute a first step on the road to a historic reconciliation with the Palestinians.

I asked the blogger at Point of No Return to comment, since she is far better qualified than I am to respond to this:

It's a puzzle. Mizrahim ('Jews of the East') get insulted by Mrs Netanyahu. (Or was it that foul-mouthed professor with the long hair, Hetzroni, who wished they could have rotted in Morocco?)

Yet, like victims of long-term abuse, they come back to vote for Mrs Netanyahu's husband.

Masalha performs logical acrobatics to conclude that Jews from the East are denatured from their 'Arab' identity. So desperate are they to be loved by their 'European superiors' that they imitate them and vote for parties that take a hard line against Arabs.

How does Salman Masalha explain this curious phenomenon?

Well, let me provide an explanation.

The confrontation with the Arab world did not create a serious emotional crisis for Israel's Mizrahim. Despite the arrogance of some members of Israel's elite, they have, with the exception of a few fringe communists, always been able to see the unvarnished truth.

The truth is that Israelis surrounded by enemies, some with serious psychopathic tendencies. Were Israel to show weakness, as advocated by Herzog's Zionist Union, Hamas, Hezbollah, the jihadists of Al Qaeda, Al-Nusra and Da'esh, would make mincemeat of Israel's Jews. To say nothing of the Iranian nuclear threat. And so they vote for parties that will stand firm against Israel's enemies.

What Masalha and his ilk cannot, or will not, acknowledge is the Arab and Muslim antisemitism that drove the Mizrahim to the Jewish state in the first place. Mizrahim view today's threats with a sense of perspective and history that even many Ashkenazim do not have.

Mizrahim know full well that had they stayed in Iraq, Libya or even Morocco, they would have been at best marginalised, worse, oppressed, at worst massacred.

They fled not Arabness, but Arabism and Islamism.

Zionism has never been the sole preserve of white Europeans. Mizrahim prayed 'next year in Jerusalem' along with the rest.Through the centuries, Eretz Yisrael has always attracted a steady inflow of Sephardim and Mizrahim.

As for being proud Arabs, perhaps the Tunisian writer Albert Memmi puts it best:

"We would have liked to be Arab Jews. If we abandoned the idea, it is because over the centuries the Moslem Arabs systematically prevented its realization by their contempt and cruelty. It is now too late for us to become Arab Jews."

Jordan sends warm message to Iran as it accepts millions from US

Two stories in Ammon News, posted an hour apart:

Jordan has received USD 75 million worth of grant, part of pledged USD 184 million, from the United States, Jordanian Ministry of Planning said on Tuesday,KUNA reported.

The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) has transferred the grant to the Jordanian State Treasury, as part of the regular American financial support for the 2014 Jordanian State budget.

Amman received a previous installment amounting to USD 127 million in the end of last year, according to a deal signed with the American agency in September.

Washington allocated USD 633.20 million worth of aid for Jordan last year. The assistance includes USD 436 million in the form of regular grants in addition to USD 197.20 million for funding vital projects, executed by the American agency, and government ministries.

And:

His Majesty King Abdullah II has sent a cables to Supreme Leader of of Islamic Republic of Iran Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and President of Islamic Republic of Iran Hassan Rohani, congratulating their on the anniversary of the establishment of the Islamic Republic of Iran.

Yes, I know that Jordan and Iran maintain diplomatic relations and the congratulations on national anniversaries is almost automatic, but the juxtaposition was interesting. Especially since I couldn't find stories about any other nations congratulating Iran yesterday.

In February, however, there were a number of countries that congratulated Iran on the anniversary of its revolution, including Jordan, India, and Venezuela.

04/01 Links Pt2: America’s Academies for Jihad; Son of Hamas: ‘Islam Is a Very Dark Theory’

From Ian:

From a walled compound in Sana'a, one of Yemen's last Jews confides his fears

In June 2012, Yahya Zandani’s father, Aharon, was stabbed to death at the main market in Sana’a. His body was brought to Israel for burial. Nevertheless, Yahya returned to Yemen, where his wife’s father and three brothers still live.
Today, the family are among Yemen’s last 60 Jews — 40 of whom are huddled in a gated government compound in the heart of what is now the rebel-controlled capital, Sana’a.
Speaking by phone to The Times of Israel on Tuesday, Zandani, 31, said that despite their avowedly anti-Semitic credo, the Houthi rebels who captured Sana’a last September and have moved south to the port city of Aden, are not threatening the Jews, at least not yet. But he confided deep fears of what may lie in store.
Zandani was speaking from a compound known as the touristic city — where deposed president Ali Abdullah Saleh relocated the community in 2008 after it was driven out of the northern province of Saada by the Houthis. Arab diplomats from Iraq and Egypt have also moved into the compound in recent days, after their embassies were bombed out.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali: America’s Academies for Jihad

A radical imam threatened me with death—and was later hired to preach in U.S. prisons. I was surprised, but I shouldn’t have been.
Less than a year after I moved to the United States in 2006, I was asked to speak at the University of Pittsburgh. Among those who objected to my appearance was a local imam, Fouad El Bayly, of the Johnstown Islamic Center. Mr. Bayly was born in Egypt but has lived in the U.S. since 1976. In his own words, I had “been identified as one who has defamed the faith.” As he explained at the time: “If you come into the faith, you must abide by the laws, and when you decide to defame it deliberately, the sentence is death.”
After a local newspaper reported Mr. Bayly’s comments, he was forced to resign from the Islamic Center. That was the last I would hear of him—or so I thought.
Imagine my surprise when I learned recently that the man who threatened me with death for apostasy is being paid by the U.S. Justice Department to teach Islam in American jails.

‘Islam Is a Very Dark Theory’: How the Son of a Founding Member of Hamas Rejected Extremism and Converted to Christianity

Mosab Hassan Yousef, the bestselling author of “Son of Hamas: A Gripping Account of Terror, Betrayal, Political Intrigue, and Unthinkable Choices,” appeared on The Glenn Beck Program Monday to discuss how he rejected radical Islam and converted to Christianity.
“I was brought up in a state of delusion, believing the Islamic theory that once we control the globe and build an Islamic State we can bring humanity, justice and happiness and solve the human condition,” Yousef said. “Islam is a very dark theory and we need to face this reality.”
The son of one of the founding members of Hamas, Yousef worked as a spy for the Israeli intelligence service after beginning to question the ideology he had been raised with. On Monday, he reiterated his belief that “Islam is the religion of war.”
“Islam is at war with everything that is not Muslim,” he said. “Islam has been in a war against the west and its foundations for the last 1,400 years. This is a fact. The Islamic phenomena that we see in ISIS, Hamas, Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad, Boko Haram, Al Qaeda, Taliban — this is not just a new phenomenon. It has been out there for the last 1,400 years. And I think this is the time for humanity to have the courage to say no to the Islamic theory.”

Marijuana farm discovered near Hebron

We don't hear enough stories about Palestinian Arab entrepreneurship.

Palestinian Authority police seized more than 10,000 marijuana plants covering a 3 dunum area south of Hebron on Monday.

The plants filled ten greenhouses. The owner of the greenhouses was arrested.

(This is not an April Fool's post.)

UN To Investigate 10 Plagues As Possible Crimes Against Humanity (PreOccupied Territory)

Our weekly column from the humor site PreOccupied Territory.

Check out their Facebook page.

Geneva, April 1 - The United Nations Human Rights Council has appointed a commission to collect and analyze evidence that the ten plagues wrought against Egypt violated international law, and may constitute crimes against humanity.

Egypt submitted a request last month to the Council alleging that the release of the Israelite nation was secured under duress, and that the Israelite god had perpetrated mass atrocities in the process. As part of the negotiating strategy with the Pharaoh of the time, the Hebrew god YHWH repeatedly struck the nation with various calamities, disrupting life, agriculture, commerce, diet, and causing an unknown number of deaths and injuries. The request asked the Council to investigate, noting that although the events took place nearly 2,500 years ago, there is no statute of limitations on such crimes.

Specifically, the commission's mandate includes a series of ten events in the year leading up to the Israelite exodus, with the addition of a mass murder allegation charging that on the way out, YHWH disproportionately smote the entire cavalry corps of the Egyptian military. The commission will also explore the evidence of two accessories to the crimes identified as Moses and Aaron, brothers who may have participated in some or all of the alleged atrocities.

Investigators will have to sort through varying accounts of the events, but the broad outline of the narrative has been broadly accepted for some time. After encountering Egyptian resistance to his demands, YHWH dispatched Israelite brothers Moses and Aaron to threaten the Pharaoh over possession of at least 600,000 Hebrew slaves that the god wanted to acquire for himself. YHWH allegedly transformed the Nile to blood, then caused a massive frog infestation; according to some reports, vicious and venomous other reptiles also descended upon the land. The first two came with a threat, but then YHWH brought lice with no warning.

The pattern repeated when Moses threatened and brought wild beasts, animal pestilence, but initiated boils with no warning - though some reports claim swarms of gnats instead of beasts; and again, when he threatened hail and locust swarms, but caused thick darkness even in daytime with no advance warning. Finally, YHWH allegedly resorted to actual killing, when he smote all of Egypt's firstborn males.

The commission will attempt to depose Egyptians claiming to be eyewitnesses or victims, then build a coherent case for or against recommending that the International Criminal Court open a formal criminal investigation. However, several important hurdles may impede its work, chief among them an apparent paucity of survivors to interview, leaving only documentary evidence of disputed veracity. Such problems have not hampered other UNHRC commissions in the Middle East, since they often amount to a technicality in the foregone conclusion envisioned by the report authors, but if a bona fide criminal case by the ICC is the goal, and not mere political posturing, then rules of evidence may eliminate the vast majority of universally accepted credible sources.

The Council has already appointed Canadian professor William Schabas to head the commission, citing his experience with similar inquiries.

04/01 Links Pt1: Prosor: The U.N.’s War on Israel; Palestinian Authority incites religious hatred

From Ian:

Ron Prosor: The U.N.’s War on Israel

The United Nations is celebrating its 70th anniversary this year. It was intended to be a temple of peace, but this once great global body has been overrun by the repressive regimes that violate human rights and undermine international security.
In 1949, when the United Nations admitted Israel as a member state, it had 58 member countries and about half had a democratic orientation. Today, the landscape of the organization has changed drastically. From 51 member states at its founding in 1945, the institution has grown to 193 members — fewer than half of which are democracies.
The very nations that deny democratic rights to their people abuse the United Nations’ democratic forums to advance their interests. The largest of these groups comprises members from the 120-member-strong bloc known as the Non-Aligned Movement. Since 2012, the bloc has been chaired by Iran, which has used its position to bolster its allies and marginalize Israel.
In March, the United Nations closed the annual meeting of its Commission on the Status of Women by publishing a report that effectively singled out just one country for condemnation: Israel. The commission apparently had nothing to say about the Sudanese girls who are subjected to female genital mutilation. It also had nothing to say about the Iranian women who have been punished for crimes of “adultery” by stoning. These oversights may have something to do with the fact that both Iran and Sudan sit on the 45-member commission.

PMW: Palestinian Authority incites religious hatred

The Palestinian Authority continues to incite religious hatred, spreading the libel that Israel is in the process of destroying the Al-Aqsa Mosque.
The text on the above image is supposed to instill fear and hatred in Palestinians that the Al-Aqsa Mosque is in danger, threatened by Israel:
"What are you waiting for?
Are you waiting for them to destroy this? (Visual of the Al-Aqsa Mosque -Ed.)
In order to build this?" (Visual of the Temple -Ed.)
[Al-Asima, Feb. 25, 2015]
The charge that the Mosque will be destroyed unless Palestinians take active steps to prevent it, was published alongside an article in Al-Asima, a bi-weekly distributed with the official PA daily, which repeated the libel that Israel seeks to destroy the Mosque in order to build the third Temple in its place:
"It is no secret that the 'Israeli' aspiration since the occupation of East Jerusalem in the war of 1967 has been to first divide the Al-Aqsa Mosque and perhaps even to destroy it, in order to build, eventually, their alleged Temple."
[Al-Asima, distributed with official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Feb. 25, 2015]
These PA libels that incite fear and hatred of Israelis are widely believed by Palestinians. A poll conducted four months ago found that 56% of Palestinians believe that "Israel intends to destroy the Al-Aqsa Mosque" and 86% of Palestinians believe that "Al-Haram Al-Sharif (i.e., the Temple Mount) is in grave danger."

Hamas Chief Haniyeh Calls for Palestinian Unity for West Bank Intifada

Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh called on Palestinian factions, including the Palestinian Authority, to unite and wage war on Israel with an intifada and armed resistance in the West Bank, Israel’s NRG reported on Tuesday.
Haniyeh also addressed the results of Israel’s elections earlier this month, saying that the “re-election of Netanyahu and the reinforcement of the Likud Party have revealed the true face of the occupation.” He then stressed the need to move on to a real strategy of Palestinian unity against the “occupation.”
Mohammad Al-Hindi, a member of Palestinian Islamic Jihad’s political bureau also commented on the Israeli elections, claiming that they showed there was really no difference between Israel’s political parties. “We have been in negotiation for 20 years, and have been led astray after the minor political differences [between Israel's political parties.] Israel continuously announces that it is building new settlements, and says very clearly that there is no reason for negotiation, yet the Palestinian Authority continues to shout ‘two states!’ Netanyahu said that there will not be two states, and we are crying and begging the world.”
Al-Hindi said there was no point in waiting for a change in the world’s opinion. “How does the Authority intend to resume negotiations with Netanyahu, when he declares that Jerusalem is the capital of Israel only?”

The reason J-Street will never condemn Marcia Freedman

Over the past several days I have shown that, to applause at the J-Street Conference, former Ratz MK Marcia Freedman called for the end of the concept of a Jewish state and instead for a "Jewish homeland" within some sort of (presumably Arab) political entity in Palestine, with Jews as a "protected minority."

I noted that no one from J-Street condemned or even distanced themselves from her comments, and wondered why an organization that pretends that it is so concerned about a two-state solution would not say a word against its own speaker advocating a one-state solution with no Jewish state.

It turns out that if you parse J-Street's official position, it is not a whole lot different from Marcia Freedman's.

J-Street's home page does not call for a Jewish state. Like Freedman, it calls for a Jewish "homeland."

Their six principles also don't say anything about Israel being a Jewish state.

1. We support the people and the state of Israel and their right to live in security and peace and to defend themselves against those who would harm them.

2. The future of Israel depends on achieving a two-state resolution of the conflict with the Palestinian people.

3. The resolution of the conflict requires serious and sustained US leadership.

4. Israel's supporters have not only the right but the obligation to speak out when we think the policies or actions of the Israeli government are hurting Israel's and the Jewish people's long-term interests.

5. Vibrant and respectful debate about Israel benefits the American Jewish community and Israel.

6. It is both possible and necessary to engage in a warm relationship with Israel and to remain true to the values we hold most dear as Jews and as Americans--and on which Israel was founded.

There is very little here that contradict's Freedman's solution. If one of the "two states" is not recognized as the Jewish state, then J-Street's core principles does not preclude the "right of return" - Israel could become a Muslim majority state alongside "Palestine" as a prelude to Freedman's ultimate goal.

To be sure, they will sometimes sprinkle in phrases like "Jewish and democratic state" in their articles, even when they are dead-set against requiring that Israel be recognized as the Jewish state by its "peace partner." In a final agreement, they say, it would be nice if there was mutual recognition of the rights of the Jewish people to a state along with the rights of the "Palestinian people" to a state - but nothing about recognizing Israel as that state.

It is clear that J-Street's philosophy is far to the left of most American Jews, but they will downplay their true position in order to raise funding for their jihad against Israel's elected leadership.

Members of their college arm, J-Street U, have recognized that as they are frustrated that the J-Street conference was tilted more towards public relations and pretending to represent the Jewish community than towards the "progressive" values they hold dear. Stanford J-Street U members were upset that the Palestinian flag was not on stage at any of the J-Street Conference events, and they were nt happy that J-Street told them to not support divestment from Israel - a position that would be consistent with J-Street's position of pressuring Israel from without, but one that would alienate its core of clueless liberal Jews who don't parse J-Street's positions beyond the "two-state" rhetoric.

There isn't much daylight between J-Street's real positions and that of Marcia Freedman. And there is a lot of daylight between J-Street's real positions and what the majority of the American Jewish community desires. J-Street knows that it needs to lie and obfuscate its positions to the Jewish community in its attempts to divide it - and to raise money from it.

That is J-Street in a nutshell.

Passover Hagaddah Conclusion “Next Year in Jerusalem” Deemed Unhelpful by Obama Administration

March 31, 2015 | 11:60PM
by SHANA HABBAB

WASHINGTON (AP) — The White House Administration has registered "deep disappointment" in the refusal of the Israeli Prime Minster Benjamin Netanyahu to tone down "hostile and aggressive language" of the Passover religious service.

An unidentified Israeli official has confirmed that President Obama delivered a harshly worded message to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu which included a strong request that the upcoming Passover holiday not include the familiar refrain of “next year in Jerusalem”, citing the passage as provocative and unhelpful for future peace discussions.

White House sources also confirmed the story. "To have millions of Jews referring to Jerusalem as part of their heritage is an affront to the Palestinians, not to mention a slap in the face to President Obama himself who has worked tirelessly for peace despite Israeli intransigence on requests like this one."

The Administration suggested replacing it with “next year in Haifa” or “next year in peace”, reportedly Mr. Obama's choice. The final wording would best be decided in negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority according to the White House source. If the two sides cannot agree on the specific wording, the United Nations General Assembly would be tasked with choosing the most appropriate conclusion to the Passover service.

In a related story, the British Advertising Standards Authority has mandated that the British Library remove the pages of the illuminated Haggadahs in their collections that have the offending phrase "Next Year in Jerusalem," saying that those pages give the impression that Jerusalem has something to do with the Jewish state.

I hate that I have to say this, but yes, this is a joke.

(somewhat modified from an original piece by Andrew Bloom)