Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Thursday, April 23, 2015

04/23 Links Pt1: Happy Independence Day ! ; Obama’s 67 degrees of separation from Israel

From Ian:

‘This is our country, there is no other,’ says teary-eyed Aharish in Arabic

Lucy Aharish, an Israeli-Arab news anchor and actress, was among the 14 torch lighters in the official ceremony kicking off Israel’s celebrations of 67 years of independence on Wednesday night. Almost breaking down at the ceremony, she was the only one of the honorees to give part of her brief address in Arabic.
Aharish, 33, a Muslim Arab whose parents hail from Nazareth but who was educated in Jewish institutions, instantly became a target of far-right criticism when it was announced earlier this month that she had accepted the honor of lighting a torch at the state Independence Day ceremony.
Some left-wing critics said her accepting the honor constituted an agreement to serve as a fig leaf of the government.
Aharish was teary-eyed when she took her turn at the ceremony, saying she was lighting the torch “for all human beings wherever they may be who have not lost hope for peace, and for the children, full of innocence, who live on this Earth.
“For those who were but are no more, who fell victim to baseless hatred by those who have forgotten that we were all born in the image of one God. For Sephardim and Ashkenazim, religious and secular, Arabs and Jews, sons of this motherland that reminds us that we have no other place. For us as Israel, for the honor of mankind, and for the glory of the State of Israel,” she said.
Aharish, the only Arab lighting a torch in the ceremony, also spoke in Arabic, saying: “For our honor as human beings, this is our country and there is no other.”

Arab-Israeli Journalist Lucy Aharish Lighting Torch at Independence Day Ceremony

By Air, Land, and Sea: Aliyah under the British Mandate

Toldot Yisrael presents the dramatic stories of Jews from Germany, Austria, Czechoslovakia, and Iraq who overcame great obstacles in their efforts to reach the Land of Israel. For 2,000 years, Jews around the world dreamed about returning to the Land of Israel. But the rise of antisemitism in the 1930s and 40s made the need to return to Israel far more urgent. Jews fled their homes in Europe and Arab Lands seeking refuge in Palestine but found the British Mandate had all but closed the doors to aliyah, forcing them to find dangerous and illegal methods to immigrate - by air, land, and sea.
This movie is the fifth episode in the "Eyewitness 1948" short film series produced by Toldot Yisrael. It is the centerpiece of an educational pilot program made possible through the generous support of the Jim Joseph Foundation, the Alexander Family, and others.

From 0 to 100 years in Hebrew

We are Maya Cohen and Tom Roes, two filmmakers from the Netherlands who were inspired by a project Jeroen Wolf did in Dutch.
It took us three journeys to Israel to finish this video. The 98 year old lady was the last person in front of our camera. Thanks to all the inhabitants of Tel Aviv and the rest of Israel for helping us!

Google honours Israel Independence Day with a Doodle

Proud to be a Zionist - 5775 edition

I wrote the original essay around 2002 and I have been modifying it since then. Here is this year's edition:

Every year, the State of Israel seems to be up against yet another unsolvable crisis. These have ranged from wars to suicide bombings to terror rockets to facing the prospect of nuclear-armed enemies. This year the number of terror attacks have increased even as the leader of Israel's best friend has been acting in ways that are anything but friendly.

Yet, here she is, 67 years old and more beautiful than she was at birth.

Yes, I am a Zionist and I am proud of it.

I know that Israel has the absolute right to exist in peace and security, just like - and arguably more than - any other country.

I am proud of how the IDF conducts itself during its war on Palestinian terror. There is no other country on the planet, save the US, that would try to minimize civilian casualties in such a situation where innocent Israelis are being threatened, shot at, mortared, rocketed, and murdered in cold blood. At times there are discussions whether the IDF's moral standards are too high and end up being counterproductive - and what other army could one even have that conversation about?

I am also proud that Israel investigates any mistakes that happen on the battlefield and keeps trying to improve its methods to maximize damage to the terrorists while minimizing damage to the people that the enemy is hiding behind. This is not done because of pressure from "human rights" organizations - it is done because it is the right thing to do. Even when everyone knows that the world will accuse it of "war crimes," the IDF retains incredibly high moral standards, which can be easily proven for anyone who wants to investigate the situation impartially. (People willing to do that are, regrettably, few and far between.) It would be so easy for Israelis to say that since the world will accuse them of atrocities anyway, then why bother with holding to such standards - but young Israeli soldiers do, day in and day out. The rare exceptions prove the rule.

I am proud that Israel remains a true democracy, with a free press and vigorous opposition parties, while in a constant war situation.

I am proud of how Israel responds to seemingly intractable problems. In the early days of the intifada there seemed to be no solution - but the IDF found one, managing to bring deadly suicide attacks from 60 in 2002 down to practically none today. The enemy has not stopped trying, and if Israel hadn't acted decisively things would look like Iraq or Afghanistan today. For every "successful" attack (if you can use such a term) there have been many failed attempts, and these are truly miraculous.

There is a right and a wrong in this conflict, and I am proud that Israel is in the right.

Today's battles are completely different. They are battles against Israel's very legitimacy. Jews know something about being singled out, about being judged with double standards. They have been attacked for being too rich and too poor, too successful and too needy, too capitalist and too socialist, too religious and too secular, too insular and too integrated. These same wildly inconsistent attacks are now targeting the Jewish state. Israel will survive and thrive, just as Jews themselves have, despite these attacks.

And the best survival technique is success.

Israel has succeeded and continues to succeed in its many accomplishments in building up a desert wasteland into a thriving and vibrant modern country, with its many scientific achievements, incredible leadership in high-tech and the environment, world class universities and culture. Practically every computer and mobile phone being built today includes technology and innovations from a single small Middle Eastern country. A tiny nation, under constant siege, with almost no natural resources besides breathtaking beauty, has used its brains - and strength - to build a modern success story. In a short period of time Israel made itself into a strong yet open nation that its neighbors can only dream of becoming.

And they are indeed starting to dream. The internal struggles throughout the Arab world are, in many ways, a subconscious cry from Israel's neighbors to be more like the Jewish state. Despite the constant incitement against Israel in their media, ordinary Arabs know that Israel treats its minorities with more respect, and gives them more civil rights, than Arab nations give their own Arab citizens.

There are a few high-profile critics of Israel who incongruously pretend to be "pro-Israel." Unfortunately, I can find very little in their writings that can be remotely described as pro-Israel or Zionist. On the contrary, they seemingly spend all their waking hours criticizing Israel, its army, its government, and its people. If they are truly pro-Israel, I invite them to write their own essays that can show their love of the land and the people. Israel is not above criticism by any means, but if you love Israel you should be able to easily demonstrate that love. I challenge the "pro-Israel" critics to do exactly that.

I am proud that the vast majority of Americans support Israel as I do, and that the rabid haters we see on the Internet and on college campuses are the aberration.

The word "Zionist" is not an epithet - it is a compliment.

DCI-Palestine called terrorists "innocent children"

Yesterday, I showed that Defense for Children International - Palestine had just released a study that included at least one bogus report, about a Gaza boy who claimed that the IDF used him as a human shield to find terror tunnels.

The central theme of DCIP's report says:

Evidence and documentation collected by DCIP found that, on numerous occasions, Israeli forces unlawfully targeted individual civilians and civilian structures resulting in the killing of children.

Carrying out an attack that is not directed at a specific military objective constitutes an indiscriminate attack and amounts to a war crime.

The circumstances of each attack briefly discussed below strongly suggest unlawful conduct by Israeli forces that amount to war crimes.

EoZ researcher Bob Knot spent some time documenting the military objectives of the specific examples DCIP gives.

For example:

Around 1:30 p.m. on July 20, an Israeli warplane fired a missile without warning at the Skafi family home on Nazaz Street. Anas, 17, and his twin brother Saad died in the attack. Another five children sustained injuries in the same attack.

Here are photos of these poor dead children:

And here other "civilians" killed in the airstrike that DCI-Palestine characterizes as a war crime because there was "no specific military objective:"

Abdel Skafi:

Ahmed Skafi, in front of the Hamas flag:

Mujahid al Skafi, in his martyrdom video:

Ali Skafi:

DCI-P only admits that "According to sources interviewed by DCIP, one member of the Skafi was affiliated with the Palestinian armed group Saraya al-Quds, and present in the building at the time of the attack." No - there were six terrorists we know of.

And so does DCIP. Their nine months of "research" were clearly not meant to uncover any truths.

Bob Knot found other examples of flat-out lies and deception in the report.

DCIP claims that the Joudeh family were innocent civilians. But their father Issam, who they quote, is acknowledged by Fatah to be a "fighter" for their brigades.

DCIP considers him a reliable witness to say that there was no military target at his house knowing full well that he was the target himself.

DCIP lists other family homes that were used as bases of operations of known terrorists.

On the right is a photo of the target of the Hayyeh house airstrike, Osama Khalil Hayyeh, son of Hamas leader Khalil Hayyeh:

From this and other previous examples we have given, we know that "Defense for Children International - Palestine" willingly lies to slander israel.

And they get plenty of money from other NGOs - and the EU.

Defense for Children-International is funded by these organizations as of 2012:

Every single one of these organizations and governments is guilty of funding a group whose sole purpose is to use children as an emotional ploy to slander Israel. Every single one of these funding organizations must be held to account for why they are giving money to an anti-Israel propaganda outfit that pretends to be an objective NGO.

If you want to help Israel, today, you will write to every single one of these organizations and demand answers.

In a sane world, organizations like DCI-P should be shamed and defunded. You can help do that.

I invite any journalists who still have the slightest bit of integrity to investigate everything I am saying independently and to publish their findings, no matter what they are.

From Ma'an:

A student list affiliated with Hamas on Wednesday came out on top in the closely-watched student elections at Birzeit University near Ramallah.

A day after thousands turned out for a student debate between Fatah, Hamas, and the leftist parties participating, the Islamic List emerged victorious with 26 seats, while the Fatah-affiliated list trailed with 19.

The leftist Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine list emerged with five, while an alliance of three smaller leftist parties – the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine, the Palestinian People’s Party, and Fida -- took one seat.

The PFLP and DFLP are also terror groups just like Hamas and Fatah.

There aren't exactly any "pro-peace" parties in the areas under PA control.

Voter turnout was reported at 77 percent of all undergraduate students entitled to vote, who numbered around 9,000.

The victory for the Islamic List at the historically staunchly pro-Fatah campus took observers by surprise.

In the absence of regular national elections, university elections are seen as important indicators of public opinion by political commentators in Palestine and Birzeit is considered to be the most important campus in the yearly political contests.

The Hamas victory came after a year in which the Fatah-affiliated list dominated student politics, having earned 23 seats compared to the Hamas list's 20 seats.

In 2007, Birzeit held a photo exhibit celebrating suicide bombers and their Jewish victims.

They held another "art exhibit" celebrating terror in 2012:

The overwhelming support for terror in Arab universities under PA control is one of the more under-reported stories in the media.

04/22 Links Pt2: Yom Haatzmaut 2015: So Many Reasons to Love Israel!

From Ian:

Natan Sharansky passionate about bringing persecuted Jews to a safe haven

One doesn’t have to be very vigilant to realize European Jews are in crisis mode. The tragic May attack at the Jewish Museum in Belgium where four people died; the grisly shooting at the Hyper Cacher market in France in January that claimed an additional four lives; and repeated incidents of beatings, harassment and vandalism of Jewish sites point to one alarming trend: Anti-Semitism is on the rise and EU officials are scrambling to find ways to combat it.
Given everything he has witnessed in his storied career as a politician, statesman and human rights activist, Jewish Agency chairman Natan Sharansky is not panicking when faced with such a grim reality. His observations are measured and his solutions – he hopes – are realistic.
“I believe the biggest challenge is anti-Semitism coming back to all these areas in the free world,” he said during a frank discussion with the editors of The Jerusalem Post earlier this month. “I think, while people know about it and write about it, they underestimate its power.”
Sharansky said current European anti-Semitism stems from two sources. The first is classical anti-Semitism – where the undercurrent of nefarious anti-Jewish sentiment has always had a presence on the continent. The second, and perhaps more worrying, comes from liberals who oppose Israel and its treatment of the Palestinians. As the European protests during the Gaza war last year demonstrated, he said, anti-Israel rhetoric can turn anti-Jewish within the blink of an eye.

NGO Monitor: Promoting the "Naqba Narrative"

In advance of Israeli Independence Day, NGO Monitor has documented a number of Israeli NGOs (non-governmental organizations) that mourn the establishment of the state of Israel as a “Nakba” (“catastrophe” in Arabic) and actively promote a Palestinian “right of return,” which, if implemented, would effectually mean the elimination of Israel as a Jewish state. Such efforts are made possible by the extensive funding provided by foreign governments, mainly European.
These NGOs similarly refer to all Jewish aspects of the state of Israel as inherently racist, thereby denying the Jewish right to self-determination and misrepresenting the robustness of Israeli democracy.
These goals fundamentally contradict the two-state framework backed by the international community, including their European donors.
NGO Monitor's detailed research shows that the following NGOs promote divisive campaigns that fundamentally reject the legitimacy of Israel as a Jewish state:

In France, there’s no hatred for any group equivalent to that of Jew hatred

Seven thousand Jews left France in 2014. France is reaping what she sowed. For many years, pro-Arab French politicians and media willfully misread the normative anti-Semitism of all Arab societies as a by-product of the Middle East conflict. Intent on relativizing what has always been a one-way hatred, French elites demoted Jews from their appropriate status of French nationals, as Ashkenazi Jews have been for more than 200 years, into a “community of immigration,” falsely accusing them of “communautarisme” (disloyalty to French republicanism), and shamelessly mischaracterizing Muslim anti-Semitism as a problem of “the two communities,” both in need of “inter-religious dialogue.”
Post-Second World War anti-Semitism has been a serious problem in France since the 1980s, when it was imported from North Africa, where it was endemic. Yet it was, until a few years ago, actually a government policy, in collaboration with France’s pusillanimous media, to ignore hundreds of acts of anti-Semitism so as not to “throw oil on the fire” of Muslim rage.
Valls’ nuanced reframing tells us France is not prepared to tackle the root cause of its only existential hate crisis. So French Jews can choose: a continuing siege existence in a nation whose fear of its alienated Muslims trumps solidarity with its integrated Jews; or a new home in Israel, under external siege to be sure, but a nation where Jewish lives are privileged over political correctness.
French Jews at least have a choice. The rulers who created the conditions that are forcing the choice don’t. They’re stuck in France. Who will be better off in the end?

Middle East Monitor translates an article from Hamas' Felesteen about the importance of Israel's navy. And the article is surprisingly impartial.

Over the course of the past decade, Israel has gone to great lengths to strengthen and develop its navy, which now rivals the air force in its offensive capabilities using the best military resources available. Israel is now able to confront all of the military threats it may face. The Israeli government's massive investment in naval technology is justified by the fact that the navy is responsible for about 50 per cent of all military operations carried out by the Zionist state; this was reported by the Jerusalem Post on 13 August last year.

The most obvious evidence suggesting of Israel's investment in naval technology is the fact that it now has submarines capable of carrying nuclear missiles. By the end of the decade, it is expected to have the most German-built Dolphin Class submarines in the world. These are regarded as the fourth most effective of their kind. Nowhere else in the world will you find a country with a population of just 8 million people having six such submarines in its arsenal. In addition to investing in strategic submarines, Israel has also doubled its number of naval attack vessels and has the sea-to-air and sea-to-surface rockets, both medium and long range, to go with them.

What has undoubtedly pushed Israel to make such a large investment is the reality of the changes taking place within the Arab world. The Zionist state believes that these could affect its foreign trade as 90 per cent of its imports and exports go by sea freight. Hence the need for the navy to take centre stage.

According to Professor Ephraim Inbar, Director of the Begin-Sadat Centre for Strategic Studies at the University of Bar-Ilan, the fact that Arab and Islamic countries control the world's most important maritime routes make it necessary for Israel to secure its commercial vessels with a strong navy. In a recent study, Inbar warned that militant Islamic groups could target Israeli merchant ships. He emphasised that he has no doubt that the most important strategic role in securing Israeli interests needs to and will be carried out by the navy; it also needs to be able to retaliate in the event that it is the victim of a nuclear attack.

According to Umair Bouhbout, a military commentator for Wala News, Israel believes that the only way it can retaliate in such an event is from its seaborne nuclear capabilities. Moreover, having submarines with nuclear warheads makes it possible for Israel to keep its options open with regards to manoeuvrability and the stationing of submarines close to target countries. Israel also looks upon its navy as the means to combat arms smuggling by Palestinian resistance groups and Lebanon's Hezbollah. The Israel Defence Forces (IDF) have gone so far as to claim that they have prevented several smuggling operations via Sudan, Iran and other states. In addition to all of this, we must not forget that the Israeli navy will play a crucial role in securing the natural gas fields that have been discovered off the coast of Palestine.

Israel fears that a hostile party will attack those fields within its territorial waters and it is for this reason that the government and the IDF are focusing the most energy and financial resources on strengthening the navy, which has a key strategic role.

According to Hebrew-language newspaper Yedioth Ahranoth last August, dozens of Palestinian homes were destroyed during the summer war on Gaza by rockets fired from Israeli warships stationed off the coast of the besieged territory; this confirmed that the navy is not only complementing all other sections of the IDF but is also quite possibly the most favoured and used.

Former Israeli naval commander Rear-Admiral Eli Marom said recently that because the submarines can stay underwater for a long time, they are often used by special units to implement covert operations that are thousands of miles away from Israel. An investigation published by Wala News confirmed that Israel employs submarines in electronic warfare against several parties. There is currently no doubt in Tel Aviv that its navy acts as a major deterrent factor that makes other states think twice before launching any attack against Israel.

Abbas Wins Physics Nobel; Proved 4-Year Term = 11 Years (PreOccupied Territory)

Our weekly column from the humor site PreOccupied Territory.

Check out their Facebook page.

Stockholm, April 22 - The Royal Swedish Academy announced today that it would bestow the Nobel Prize in Physics on Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, to recognize his accomplishments in challenging existing notions of mathematical certainty by showing that a four-year presidential term actually lasts more than twice that duration.

Abbas was elected in January 2005 to a presidency that, according to Palestine National Authority law, lasts four years, after which another election is to be held. However, the president demonstrated that those four years must, in fact, have not elapsed, since he retains his office and title, and shows no indication of arranging for another round of presidential elections. The Academy described this achievement as, "challenging and expanding our understanding, and the boundaries, of number, of units of measure, and of time itself, with the potential to revolutionize every arena of human affairs."

Previously, the concept of "four years" was understood to refer to a finite, measurable period on Earth, with empirically observable characteristics, says Dick Tater, professor of mathematics at the University of Chicago. "But Dr. Abbas has changed all that. We used to think that observable time could only be distorted or redefined when great distances and velocities are involved, something Einstein proved. What Abbas has done is to throw into question all the commonly accepted notions of what 'four years' essentially means, ans in doing so, has opened up a world of possibility."

Potential applications for the discovery, says Tater, include everything from medicine to space travel to economics. "Imagine being able to give a dying cancer patient more time just be using Dr. Abbas's principles," he explained. "If four years really equals more than ten - and it might yet end up equaling considerably more; the window is yet open on that front - then a terminally ill person given four months to live actually has almost a year, and possibly more. Annual government budgets can actually cover at least two-and-a-half years, a prospect with immense potential for savings and public works. Really, the possibilities are endless."

A spokesman for the Palestinian president told reporters Abbas was humbled by the announcement, as well as gratified. "It can be daunting to try to fill the shoes of Yasser Arafat," said Yasser Abed-Rabbo, referring to the iconic Palestinian leader who preceded Abbas. "Arafat won a Nobel Prize for peacemaking, and that is a very tough act to follow. All of Palestine is proud of our president for demonstrating a similar commitment to the rigor and principles of the field in which our successive leaders have now been recognized."

Hints of the mathematical achievement were already apparent to some observers much earlier in Abbas's career. Academy representatives pointed out that his doctoral thesis, examining the Holocaust, involved important efforts to prove that the number six million actually referred to a significantly smaller quantity.

04/22 Links Pt1: Remember the fallen; Independence Day: We have reason to rejoice

From Ian:

Isi Leibler: Independence Day: We have reason to rejoice

Alas, the dream of peace with our neighbors remains just a dream. But we should exult in the realization that we are stronger today than in the past when we overcame far greater challenges and genuinely faced annihilation.
Opinion polls indicate that we rank among the happiest and most contented people in the world.
However, many young Israelis now take Jewish statehood for granted, never having undergone the chilling experience of European Jews in the 1930s as they desperately sought entry visas to countries to avoid the impending Shoah. Nor can they appreciate the devastating impact of living in an anti-Semitic environment where Jews are considered pariahs.
Today, on our 67th anniversary, we should give thanks to the Almighty for enabling us to be the blessed Jewish generation, privileged to live in freedom in our resurrected ancient homeland. We should continually remind ourselves that our success defies rationality and by any benchmark must be deemed miraculous.
Chag Sameach.

Col. Richard Kemp: Killing Americans and their Allies: Iran’s Continuing War against the U.S. and the West

Introduction
It appears that the recent framework agreement between the Islamic Republic of Iran and the P5+1, led by the U.S. Administration, will result in a deal that would allow Iran to become a nuclear-armed state. In this context, it is worth recalling the true nature of the Islamic Republic, in particular its recent track-record of violence against the United States and its allies. Both authors of this study had responsibilities for UK national intelligence assessment and crisis management during the period when this violence reached its peak in Iraq.
Many have forgotten, or perhaps never realized, that Iranian military action, often working through proxies, usually using terrorist tactics, has led to the deaths of well over a thousand American soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan over the last decade and a half. Does it make sense to risk allowing a regime that, since its inception, has been conducting a war against the United States and its allies to become a nuclear power?
Anti-Americanism helped fuel the 1979 Islamic revolution in Iran. A violent anti-American doctrine that challenges any role for America in the Middle East, has been and remains the central focus of Iranian foreign policy. Since the revolution, Iran has waged and continues to wage war against the United States and its allies.

Amb. Prosor reads Israel's National Anthem at the UN Security Council

"Tomorrow, Israel will commemorate Yom Hazikaron and honor the 23,320 individuals who lost their lives to war and terror. We will remember the brave soldiers who died so that we can have our freedom and mourn the thousands of men, women, and children who were robbed of their lives simply because they were Israeli.
War has never been the choice of the State of Israel. Our choice is and always has been the path of peace. But when war and terror are forced upon us, we will not surrender and we will not back down. For nearly 2,000 years, the Jewish people were stateless and powerless in the face of hatred and indifference. Those days are no more.
On Thursday, Israel will celebrate Yom Haatzmaut, our 67th anniversary as a free and independent Jewish state. With great joy and with heads held high, we will celebrate the realization of the words in our national anthem, Hatikvah

How may lies can you find in this IMEMC dispatch?

Extremist Israeli settlers raised the Israeli flag on the walls and over the rooftop of al-Ibrahimi Mosque, also known as the Cave of the Patriarchs, today in Hebron.

The reconstruction committee in Hebron condemned, in a press statement, this measure and considered it a continuation of ongoing Israeli attempts to alter the character of the mosque and annex it to the list of Jewish heritage sites.

According to the PNN, the committee slammed this Israeli measure as a provocative act and an assault against Muslims in general and Palestinians in particular.

It called on all relevant human rights and humanitarian organizations to take the necessary actions to protect the mosque.

Al-Ibrahimi Mosque is located in the old city of Hebron, few hundred meters away from the part of the city illegally occupied by around 400 extremist settlers, who are protected by about 1,500 Israeli soldiers.

Since 1967, al-Ibrahimi Mosque, like all other Muslim holy sites in Palestine, became a target for the Israeli occupying forces and Zionist settlers, reported the Hebron Rehabilitation Committee.

The Mufti of Jerusalem said that "the Ibrahimi Mosque is an Islamic mosque, a place of prayer and worship of Muslims alone."

Of course, Hamas flags flying openly in Judaism's holiest spot are quite fine.

Hamas condemned Israeli flags at the site in 2013:

The Islamic movement expressed in a statement issued on Wednesday its strong rejection of the Israeli provocative move, considering it an attack against the religious and historic stature of this site to millions of Muslims around the world.

The Waqf reacted then with similar hyperbole:

“This is an attack against the religious and historic stature of this site to millions of Muslims around the world,” Tayseer Abu Snaineh, the director of the Wakf (endowment) Department in Hebron, told Saudi Gazette on Thursday, October 3.

He added that the “settlers desecrate this holy mosque and often embarrassed and ridicule Muslims while praying”.

See a pattern?

Muslims have managed to turn outrage into an art, routinely describing the most minor incidents in apocalyptic terms and erasing any real meaning from words. And they do it because it works.

Yesterday I posted about how Amnesty International members voted at their annual general meeting against a resolution calling on Britain to fight antisemitic attacks.

The Coalition Against Anti-Semitism in Europe tweeted to Amnesty-UK asking for comment. Here was their shameful response:

@caasecoalition We condemn all forms of hate crime and discrimination. Unfortunately we can't campaign on everything.
— Amnesty UK (@AmnestyUK) April 21, 2015

Here are the resolutions, outside of internal governance topics, that easily passed in the meeting:

Amnesty International’s stance on Abortion: Pro - Choice
Addressing impunity in Guatemala
Violations of the rights of Colombian activists including trade union leader Huber Ballesteros
The United Kingdom: Rendition and Torture
Asylum detention in the UK -AIUK will undertake research into the wrongful detention of torture and trafficking victims in British detention

2014 resolutions all passed as well, including:

Sex Work - Decriminalisation
Garment workers in Asian countries
Guantanamo
Guatemala
Sri Lanka Human Rights

Their mission statement says:

But, hey, you can't campaign on everything.

You can, however, campaign on everything except antisemitism.

This is a neat inversion on the answer that latent antisemites give for choosing to condemn only Israel for things that every nation does - "You've got to start somewhere. " Just like the Jewish state is always the first, last and only one to be condemned by so many, so is Jew-hatred the first, last and only human rights issue that cannot be tackled because of so many other issues worldwide.

DCI-Palestine puts out their latest bogus report, claim Israel targeted children

"Defense for Children International - Palestine" has released their latest report. This one claims that Israel directly targeted children during last summer's Gaza war.

As we have shown in the past, DCI-Palestine has zero credibility. They elicit "testimonies" from children and then go back and iron out any glaring inconsistencies.

Their mandate is explicitly biased - to "develop its programs and act according to Palestinian children's needs and Palestinian priorities." Yet they claim that their researchers, under a biased mandate, can be objective. Here is the methodology they published for this report:

This report is based on investigations conducted by DCIP’s fieldworkers in the Gaza Strip between July 8, 2014 and January 30, 2015. DCIP fieldworkers visited sites where children had been killed or maimed in attacks to collect sworn affidavits from victims, family members, neighbors, and eyewitnesses in accordance with established UN standards. Lawyers and human rights documentation professionals reviewed testimonies and other documentation for accuracy and assessed any gaps that required further research. Fieldworkers frequently returned to the site of an incident to verify details and collect further evidence.

To ensure reliable testimonies, DCIP’s fieldworkers ask a series of non-leading questions, exercise judgment about the credibility of witnesses, and examine possible influences that may shape a response. Fieldworkers have sought medical evidence to verify details such as the victim’s injuries and cause of death, and collected photographs documenting evidence of international law violations at particular sites. DCIP has also sought expert opinions on certain incidents from military and forensic
specialists.

Their claims of objectivity and non-leading questions are obviously not true. The reason we know this is because this report includes the story of Ahmad Abu Raida, the 16-year old who told DCIP, along with +972 Magazine and the New York Times, that IDF soldiers held him for five days and forced him to search for tunnels and to dig for them, beating him and threatening him sexually. They expect people to believe that IDF soldiers, in the middle of a war zone, would trust a 16 year old son of a Hamas member to enter houses alone and tell them whether he found tunnels or not. They would sit around and use a 16-year old to dig with his hands under the "afternoon sun" to find tunnels.

The story is so obviously fake that only people who hate Israel to begin with can believe it.

The most obvious lie was published, unchallenged, by the NYT:

Ahmed’s father, Jamal Abu Raida, who held a senior position in Gaza’s Tourism Ministry under the Hamas-controlled government, said the family forgot to take photographs documenting any abuse in its happiness over the youth’s return, and disposed of the clothing he was given upon his release.

Bruises last for weeks. DCIP interviewed Abu Raida within weeks of his supposed beatings. If they took photos of his bruises, as they claim they routinely do to corroborate stories, where are these photographs? Why wouldn't a Hamas employee do everything possible to support his accusations to incriminate Israel to NGOs and the media?

Because he knows that the media will believe the lies without any evidence!

Abu Raida's bogus story is featured from pages 55-57 of this new report. It proves that DCIP has no regard for accuracy or truth, as we've shown before when they claimed that children who were actively involved in attacks on IDF soldiers were innocent civilians or when they claimed that hundreds of people, including children, were killed in Jenin in 2002.

NGOs like DCIP manage to keep getting lots of money from European governments and NGOs, with obviously no oversight or accountability.

And so it goes.

Massachusetts Jewish newspaper uses EoZ posters to make fun of BDS

With permission, of course:

04/21 Links Pt2: Memorial Day; Tenenbom: Undercover With the Israeli Left; Latma Ep10

From Ian:

'Meaning of independence is the ability to defend yourself'

At 8 p.m. Tuesday night, a one-minute siren will sound throughout Israel to mark the start of Memorial Day for Fallen Soldiers and Victims of Terrorism. A total of 23,320 Israelis have fallen in battle or been killed in terrorist attacks since 1860, when Jews first moved outside the walls of Jerusalem's Old City.
In the past year, 116 Israeli soldiers were added to the list of the fallen, including 67 who were killed in Operation Protective Edge last summer and 35 disabled IDF veterans.
There are 553 Israeli soldiers whose places of burial are unknown, including most recently Staff Sgt. Oron Shaul, whose body was seized by Hamas last July.
On Tuesday night, the traditional Memorial Day opening ceremony will be held at the Western Wall, with President Reuven Rivlin and IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Gadi Eizenkot in attendance.
On Wednesday, around 1.5 million Israelis are expected to visit military cemeteries across the country, from Kiryat Shmona in the north to Eilat in the south. At 11 a.m. on Wednesday, a two-minute siren will sound throughout the country.

JPost Editorial: Unique remembrance

Of course, the day was set aside to remember and honor those who made the ultimate sacrifice to ensure that the world’s only Jewish state continues to thrive and to comfort those whose loved ones are no longer with us.
But Remembrance Day is also a time of introspection.
Defense of Jewish sovereignty in Israel is a two-pronged challenge. One aspect consists of the physical protection of the Jewish people from its many enemies. Jewish power must be brandished through a strong army that is well-equipped with the most advanced weaponry. Maintaining a technological edge over the nations that inhibit the region is essential to deterrence.
Even mutually assured destruction – that element in the balance of powers that prevented a nuclear Holocaust during the long years of the Cold War – might not deter religious fanatics like the apocalyptic Shi’ite mullahs presently running Iran. But in general, it is safe to assume that as long as Israel’s enemies are cognizant of Israel’s unparalleled military advantage, they will refrain from aggression.
However, keeping a technical advantage over neighboring nations and terrorist organizations is not enough, and is ultimately tied to more fundamental aspects of Israeli society. Israel’s astounding technical innovation cannot be divorced from Israel’s unique character.

Latma: We'll be the Judge, episode 10

Saudi-led airstrikes hit a target near the PLO embassy in Sanaa yesterday, damaging the building.

Tariq Ahmed Hardan of Iraq, of Palestinian ancestry, was killed.

The ambassador, Diab al-Louh, said that the target was a "metal workshop" nearby.

The PLO has moved its operations to the ambassador's home.

Some 700 Palestinian students study in Yemen; 500 of them have left through Oman. There are also some 59 Gazans in Yemen, according to the ambassador.

Al Arabiya (Arabic) notices something interesting.

As we have mentioned before, the Houthi slogan and logo includes the phrase "Damn the Jews."

There are a few hundred Jews left in Yemen. They don't want to move to Israel despite the war.

So they are the direct targets of the Houthis.

Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah has thrown his support behind the Houthis even though their slogan is purely antisemitic.

Officially, the Arab and Muslim world s claim that they have nothing against Jews, only Zionists, and as long as the Jews keep their place as second-class citizens. Yet the remaining Jews of Yemen fit the profile the "good Jew" - poor, wretched, and no threat at all to Muslims. And even so, the Houthis are cursing them.

And by having Hezbollah (and Iran) openly supporting the Houthis, they are openly supporting Jew-hatred!

Now in reality, Al Arabiya is a Sunni newspaper, and Sunnis don't love Jews any more than the Shiites do. it is just funny that the Sunnis are using antisemitism as an insult to Shiites, instead of doing what they normally do.

Which is to accuse their Shiite enemies of being Zionist.