Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Thursday, June 18, 2015

Mahmoud Abbas and the Potemkin NGO

This story from 2012 received very little attention in Western media, although independent Palestinian media has been all over it again lately:

The Palestinian Authority has plans to use an international human rights organization as a front for intelligence gathering and discrediting Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, according to documents leaked to a number of Palestinian news websites over the weekend.

The documents also appeared on the PA’s official news agency Wafa, but were quickly removed under the pretext that they are “fabrications.”

The agency claimed that hackers infiltrated its website and posted the documents.

Earlier, the agency announced that the PA has decided to establish a commission of inquiry to look into the documents out of fear that the case could embarrass the Palestinian leadership in Ramallah. Later, however, the agency removed the report, again claiming that it had been planted on its website by hackers.

There was no way to verify the authenticity of the leaked documents.

According to the documents, the PA’s General Intelligence Service in the West Bank is planning to use the Global Network for Rights and Development as a front for espionage activities.

GNRD was established in Geneva in 2008 with the aim of enhancing and supporting human rights and development by adopting new, creative strategies and policies to achieve lasting change.

The documents are said to be part of a “classified report” prepared by the PA’s General Department of Palestinian External Security.

The plan envisages using GNRD as a front for the establishment of an “effective and credible international human rights group that would be based in Geneva and whose goal would be to defend Palestinian causes” and collect information.

The cost of the project is estimated at hundreds of millions of dollars.

The report points out the important role of NGOs’ in shaping public opinion and affecting decision-making worldwide.

“These NGOs have a green card to enter any place in the world and operate freely under various pretexts,” the report said. “But we in Palestine are lacking many elements of power.”

The report claimed that many Western countries, including France, Britain and the US, have been using human rights organizations as a “striking arm” to affect policies around the world and remove governments from power. The report referred specifically to Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch and claims that they are funded and backed by Britain and the US, respectively.

The report recommended that the PA set up a similar “striking arm” that would operate out of Geneva and have representation in at least 50 countries. It said that the main mission would be to gather intelligence with the help of Western nationals.

The Global Network for Rights and Development is already a fake human rights organization. Brian Whitaker at Al-Bab has an impressive series of articles exposing them.

GNRD has connections with the United Arab Emirates and portrays the UAE's human rights policies in an undeservedly favourable light.

Its founder and president, Loai Deeb, previously set up a fake university in Norway which closed under threats of legal action from the Norwegian authorities.

Deeb also uses hundreds of fake Twitter accounts to promote himself and his activities.

GNRD's "High Commissioner for Europe" is a discredited Belgian politician with a conviction for electoral malpractice.

Last Friday, however, new questions arose about the activities of Deeb's strange human rights organisation. It emerged that GNRD was at the centre of a money-laundering investigation launched by the Norwegian authorities and that Deeb had been arrested. The amount of money involved is said to be $13 million.

Stavanger university has now decided that GNRD does not "meet the requirements" for partnership and has cancelled the agreement.

Universities were not the only institutions fooled by GNRD. Others include the United Nations, the European Parliament and the African Union. Even before the money-laundering case (which has yet to be tested in court) there were plenty of reasons to stay well clear of Deeb and GNRD.

In the seven years since it was founded, GNRD has made a particular point of trying to associate itself with other organisations and institutions. Sometimes there were formal agreements and a signing ceremony which was photographed for GNRD's website. Developing these ties helped to build an air of credibility.

Many of its ties, though, were much less formal but GNRD exaggerated their importance. It spent a lot of time "participating" in activities organised by other groups – which often required nothing more than attending a conference or meeting and posting a report of it on the GNRD website. Again, this helped to build credibility by association and, through the website posts, created an impression of GNRD as a busy, active organisation even when it wasn't actually doing very much.

GNRD's website carries the logos of 27 "collaborators and sponsors" (scroll down to the bottom of this page). They look impressive but the names are difficult to read – which is perhaps just as well because two of them are businesses owned by Loai Deeb. They also include two hotel companies and a travel agent (presumably used by GNRD) and several NGOs in Latin America which GNRD staff have reported meeting on their travels. Almun (the Arab League Model United Nations) is included too – apparently because GNRD attended one of its events in Cairo last year.

This "human rights NGO" is a scam - a scam that has fooled the EU, the UN and many NGOs.

The founder, Loai Deeb, is a Palestinian who now lives in Norway.

The idea that Abbas could have wanted to effectively rent out this fake organization, run by a Palestinian, which had already collaborated with known human rights NGOs and governments, is plausible indeed. It seems far-fetched that such an elaborate plan could have been fabricated by Abbas' enemies, but the idea that Abbas would want to use a human rights organization that can travel the world without scrutiny as an espionage operation - as well as another venue to bash Israel - is not too implausible.

UPDATE: I misread the date of the JPost article; it was 2012, not this year.

(h/t Ibn Boutros)

Harvard International Review has published an article by Iran's foreign minister, Javad Zarif, entitled "The Imperative of a Comprehensive Strategy to Fight Violent Extremism."

The article itself is not worth fisking. It is essentially an Iranian polemic against much of Sunni Islam, regarding it as "takfirism" and not true Islam.

He gives an eight point strategy to fight "violent extremism" that just so happens to align with the Iranian strategy of global dominance. For example:

Religious leaders from around the world should be at the forefront of efforts to denounce the false precepts of violent extremism and unequivocally reject sectarianism and attacks against religious and ethnic minorities. In this context, the recent message of Ayatollah Khamenei to European and North American Youth is a serious endeavor to initiate such enlightened cultural and ideological discourse.

Or this way of blaming Israel for "violent extremism:"

The continued occupation of Palestine and the plight of the Palestinian people and their tragic predicament have been another effective recruitment tool for extremist groups like Da’esh, which require attention and action.

Or this interesting piece:

It should contain measures to counter Islamophobia, which conflates violent extremists and true Muslims, thus playing right into the hands of Da’esh and similar Takfiri groups and directly lending credence to the extremists’ messaging. While we should rightly condemn racism and anti-Semitism, and we indeed do, we should at the same time condemn and criminalize Islamophobia and blatant disregard for the values, beliefs and sanctities of Muslims.

Antisemites and racists should get a scolding. Islamophobes must get jailed. (And, if they are guilty of blasphemy, executed.)

Finally, we see the hypocrisy in its purest form:

Iranians of all ages and affiliation, particularly the youth, have been consistent in rejecting and fighting violent extremism from the Taliban and Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan to AQAP, Da’esh and others similar forces in Yemen, Iraq and Syria.

Just two weeks ago, an admitted Hezbollah terrorist was discovered with bomb-making materials in Cyprus, almost certainly targeting Jews.

A similar plot was foiled also in Cyprus in 2012. The terrorist told police, "I was just collecting information about the Jews. This is what my organization is doing, everywhere in the world."

Hezbollah (or at least its "military wing") is recognized by most of the West as a terrorist organization. And Hezbollah is loyal only to Iran's Supreme Leader, the one who is supposedly in the forefront against terror. Hezbollah's manifesto says

"Hizbullah considers Iran as a central state in the Muslim world...Since the declaration of the victory of the Islamic Revolution under the leadership of Wali Al Faqih Imam Khomeini (May Allah honour his soul), and since the replacement of the “Israeli” embassy with a Palestinian one, this support has been ongoing in the different shapes and forms until our day under the leadership of Imam Khamenei (may he live long)."

Do I have to list the many Hezbollah terror attacks? The father of the coach of the world champion Golden State Warriors was murdered by the "Islamic Jihad Organization" in Lebanon - which is just another name Hezbollah uses.

It isn't only Hezbollah. the Iranian Quds Force has been implicated in many terror attacks worldwide.

The director of the National Counterterrorism Center declared in 2012 that “Iran remains the foremost state-sponsor of terrorism in the world. "

And Shiite terrorism as practiced by Iran is no less fundamentalist or radical in its adherence to Islam than ISIS is:

Iran is a constitutional, Islamic theocracy. Its official religion is the doctrine of the Twelver Jaafari School. Iran's law against blasphemy derives from Sharia. Blasphemers are usually charged with "spreading corruption on earth", or mofsed-e-filarz, which can also be applied to criminal or political crimes. The law against blasphemy complements laws against criticizing the Islamic regime, insulting Islam, and publishing materials that deviate from Islamic standards. The regime uses these laws to persecute religious minorities such as the Sunni, Bahai, Sufi, and Christians and to persecute dissidents and journalists. Persecuted individuals are subject to surveillance by the "religious police," harassment, prolonged detention, mistreatment, torture, and execution. The courts have acquitted vigilantes who killed in the belief that their victims were engaged in un-Islamic activities.

Harvard should be ashamed for publishing such a self-serving, hypocritical piece of garbage without context or rebuttal.

(h/t EBoZ)

06/17 Links Pt2: Pierre Rehov - Beyond Deception Strategy; Evil spirit of BDS growing stronger in US

From Ian:

Pierre Rehov - Beyond Deception Strategy

Beyond its deception strategy, BDS has one goal : the destruction of Israel and, on the long run, the extermination of Jews. Among BDS supporters, deceived losers, neo-Nazis, Islamists, terrorists. This organization must be stopped. It always begins with the Jews, and then, you are next !

Ben-Dror Yemini: Evil spirit of BDS growing stronger in US

The BDS deniers say it's a marginal matter. There is no cause for concern. These are small groups with no influence. But the anti-Semitic incident at UCLA is repeating itself in the leading US media. This time we're already talking about a presidential candidate. The mud thrown at Beyda has reached Sanders. In both cases it’s not their views, it's just the fact that they are Jewish.
We can present, once again, surveys showing that the sympathy towards Israel is at its peak in the American public opinion. But that's an illusion. Because there is a crawling process of change taking place in the centers of power and knowledge. The evil spirit of BDS is already controlling some of the lecturer and student organizations. Among young people, Jews and non-Jews, the support for Israel is dropping.
The regular choir will continue arguing that it's all because of the occupation. Claims can be made against the Israeli policy. Some claims are true. But understanding or justifying the evil spirit of BDS under the excuse of "the occupation" is sort of like justifying racism against black people by claiming that there are violent black people.
So the evil spirit of BDS is racism which is also infiltrating the press. And no, it's not in the margins. It's growing stronger.

Suspect in 1982 Paris attack arrested by Jordan, released on bail

Jordan said Wednesday that the suspected mastermind of an attack on a Paris Jewish restaurant in 1982 that killed six people and wounded 22 had been arrested but was out on bail and banned from leaving the country.
Official sources said Zuhair Mohamad Hassan Khalid al-Abassi, who goes by the nom de guerre “Amjad Atta”, was “arrested on June 1 under an international arrest warrant. A court imposed a travel ban pending a decision on whether he will be extradited,” an official source told AFP, speaking on condition of anonymity.
A source in the security services said the 62-year-old suspect was released on bail.
Amjad Atta was one of three men for whom France issued an international arrest warrant earlier this year.
Overall, between three and five men are thought to have taken part in the attack, which was blamed on the Abu Nidal Organization, a Palestinian terrorist group.
The other two main suspects in the 1982 attack have been named as Mahmoud Khader Abed Adra, alias “Hicham Harb,” who lives in Ramallah in the West Bank, and Walid Abdulrahman Abu Zayed, alias “Souhail Othman,” a resident of Norway. (h/t Alexi)

Abbas reportedly bans PalArabs from traveling to Israel for Ramadan

Times of Israel reports:

For the first time in at least a decade, the IDF will let Palestinian buses bring West Bank worshipers into Israel during the month of Ramadan, which begins Wednesday, a senior officer said.

Speaking to journalists on Tuesday, Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories Maj. Gen. Yoav Mordechai announced a series of measures aimed at easing movement for Palestinians during the Muslim holy month.

In recent years, tens of thousands of Palestinians have been granted permits to enter Israel for prayer and vacation during the month-long holiday, a trend which was scaled back last year after the kidnapping of three Israeli teenagers by Hamas during Ramadan.

Palestinian buses are usually stopped at Israeli checkpoints and not allowed to enter Israel proper. Permit-carrying Palestinians entering Israel typically need to board Israeli buses or taxis to reach their destination.

Mordechai said that Palestinian men over the age of 40 will be allowed to enter the Temple Mount this year without need for an Israeli permit. Women of all ages will also be permitted entry. The IDF will allow Palestinians to enter Israel freely for family visits, setting an initial quota of 100,000 believed to be the capacity of checkpoints to process the entering civilians.

Six hundred Palestinians will also be allowed to leave the country through Ben Gurion International Airport; they are usually required to travel abroad through Amman, Jordan.

But Mahmoud Abbas knows this this is just another example of Israel's Ramadan-washing. And he will not allow his people to have any part of it!

Palestine Press Agency reports that, according to multiple sources, president Mahmoud Abbas issued a decree banning the delivery or receipt of requests for the issuance of permits to enter Israel.

A spokesman complained that Israel was only allowing men to visit the Al Aqsa Mosque if they were over 40. Without any trace of irony, he added, "The right of freedom of worship is guaranteed by international law, and Israel must adhere to it. We will not allow buses from the Palestinian Authority to go to areas of Jerusalem as Israel wants."

We may want to remember that quote about freedom of worship the next time we read about "storming" of Al Aqsa by Jews who want to pray there.

Khalil Rizk, Head of the Chamber of Commerce in Ramallah, said that local merchants have been demanding from Abbas for two days to stop the permits within the Green Line, because Palestinians were spending money in Israel instead of locally, hurting merchants who prefer a captive audience.

If this is true, Mahmoud Abbas has yet again decided that his anti-Israel political objectives are more important than the human rights of the people he supposedly leads.

I think what made Abbas decide on this move was the fact that AFP was reporting the story of Israel loosening restrictions as positive. The idea that mainstream media praises Israel is too much for the man of peace to stomach.

Local BDS Group Votes To Boycott Israeli BDS Supporters (PreOccupied Territoory)

Our weekly column from the humor site PreOccupied Territory.

Check out their Facebook page.

Aberdeen, Ireland, June 17 - Students at the University of Aberdeen who seek to isolate Israel voted this week, for the sake of consistency, to sever all ties with Israeli groups who also want to isolate Israel.

The University of Aberdeen Student Union held a session to debate and vote on the boycott proposal, which specifically calls for Israeli BDS activists to be included in the list of people and institutions to be avoided in the effort to aid the Palestinian cause by weakening Israel and undermining the country's legitimacy.

If adopted by the university, the new policy would address a glaring inconsistency in the behavior of the BDS movement. Whereas BDS calls for a blanket boycott of Israeli groups, people, and institutions, including academics and artists sympathetic to the Palestinian cause, no international BDS supporters have applied the same rigorous interpretation of BDS to Israeli BDS activists, despite their being flagrantly Israeli. A boycott of Israelit BDS supporters by their counterparts abroad would remove this glaring demonstration of potential hypocrisy.

University of Aberdeen officials were quick to note that the vote does not bind the administration, which maintains robust ties with Israeli BDS activists. "The vote, as a welcome democratic expression of student opinion, is important, but the students' positions are not the only factor we must consider in formulating academic policy," explained University Provost Goahead McMyday. "Also, it is much easier to make idealized pronouncements than to implement them, however laudable their goals."

Other student groups are expected to follow suit when the next academic year begins in September. Organizers of campus groups promoting BDS in the US say they are especially keen to hold a vote on the issue as soon as possible.

"The students at Aberdeen put their finger on a thorny question that affects all of us," said Jewish Voice for Peace chapter president Albiya Fass-Schist of Northwestern University. "We can't honestly claim to be applying our principles faithfully if we draw some arbitrarily line between Israelis who think like us and all other Israelis," she explained. "Being Israeli by definition makes a person an oppressor, or at least an enabler of oppression, and it's disingenuous to say that that Israeliness, that culpability, is somehow negated by advocating BDS."

Israeli activists expressed shock, confusion, and anger, but ultimately, said Tel Aviv University student and BDS proponent Omar Barghouti, the move is probably healthier in the long run for all involved. "This measure will help everyone be more honest about their intentions. I do feel sorry for the Israelis who thought they'd be able to gain some legitimacy in the world's eyes by betraying their country, but they'll get over it. There's always some other outlet for self-hate."

"Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go hang my new diploma on the wall," he added.

06/17 Links Pt1: UNRWA Chief: Hamas Hid Weapons in Facilities; Oren: US-Israel ties ‘in tatters’

From Ian:

UNRWA Chief Admits Hamas Hid Weapons in Facilities

Pierre Krahenbuhl, Commissioner-General of UNRWA, the UN body tasked with aiding "Palestinian refugees," admitted on Wednesday that Hamas terrorists hid weapons at UNRWA facilities during their terror war against Israel last summer.
"We were the ones who found the weapons caches in our facilities during inspections," Krahenbuhl told Yedioth Aharonoth in an interview. "The reason that the whole world knew about it is that we told them."
Krahenbuhl's reference is to at least three separate occasions in which rockets were found at UNRWA facilities. After the first finding of rockets at an UNRWA school, UNRWA workers reportedly called Hamas to come remove them.
Likewise, a booby-trapped UNRWA clinic was detonated, killing three IDF soldiers. Aside from the massive amounts of explosives hidden in the walls of the clinic, it was revealed that it stood on top of dozens of terror tunnels, showing how UNRWA is closely embedded with Hamas.
The UNRWA head continued, saying, "we knew the revelation would lead to harsh responses against us in Israel, but try to imagine what would happen if we weren't the ones who published it. The act of publishing proves we aren't ready to allow it and show restraint."

David Horovitz: Blaming Obama, ex-envoy Oren says aspects of US-Israel ties ‘in tatters’

He said the root of Israel’s problems with Obama lies in three aspects of the president’s abiding worldview: Obama’s “unprecedented support for the Palestinians,” the goal of “reconciling with what Obama calls the Muslim world,” and Obama’s “outreach, reconciling with Iran. From the get-go. You see that right from the beginning. He comes into office going after Iran.”
But the administration is also problematic, Oren added, because it “jettisoned the two core principles of the alliance, which were ‘no surprises’ and ‘no daylight.’ Obama said it: I’m putting daylight. And proceeds to put daylight, public daylight. And then surprises. I was told that with previous administrations,” said Oren, “we were always given advance copies of major policy speeches. The Cairo speech (that Obama delivered in 2009) was twice as long as the First Inaugural Address. It touched on issues that were vital to our security. We never had any preview.”
Given the deterioration in ties, and especially given Obama’s policy on Iran, Oren concluded in the interview that “we’re on our own,” facing what he termed “a broad spectrum of monumental threats all at the same time.” He said this conclusion was inescapable after Obama failed to act against Syria, and that it was at this point that “everyone” in Israel realized that Obama was not serious about his military option on Iran.
Still, Oren tried to put a brave gloss on Israel’s lonely position: “To me that’s a refreshing Zionist moment. We realize we’re on our own,” said Oren. “It’s a different topic, but I have a thing about this regional peace conference with the moderate Arab states that everyone keeps talking about here, certain parties. To me it’s running away from what I believe is an Israeli Zionist responsibility: taking our fate into our own hands. Waiting for the Saudis to somehow bring redemption? I don’t think it’s going to happen.”
Oren concludes the book by urging that bilateral ties be repaired, and says American and Israeli leaders “must restore those three ‘no’s’ — no surprises, no daylight, no public altercations — in their relations.”
Asked toward the end of the interview whether things would be better under a Hillary Clinton presidency, Oren said that Netanyahu had “a rapport” with her, and that “she understands certain things about Israel… She gets it.” Clinton and Republican candidate Jeb Bush both made major campaign speeches this week in which they promised US-Israel ties would improve if they were elected president next year.

From Clooney to Clinton: 20 revelations from Michael Oren’s new book

1. Netanyahu’s take on the Hebrew press: Criticized on all sides in the Israeli media for his 2009 speech at Bar Ilan University in support of a two-state solution, Netanyahu tells Oren, half in jest, “If I walked on the Sea of Galilee, the Israeli papers would write, ‘Bibi can’t swim.'”
3. Kissinger’s bleak assessment of Obama’s approach to the Middle East: Meeting with Henry Kissinger early in his term, Oren finds the ex-secretary of state gloomy over the president’s eagerness to reconcile with Iran. Surely, says Oren, the White House realizes that an “Iran with nuclear capabilities means the end of American hegemony in the Middle East?” Retorts Kissinger: “And what makes you think anybody in the White House still cares about American hegemony in the Middle East?”
4. Oren stunned by Obama’s attitude to the United States: Reading the president’s memoir “Dreams From My Father,” the ambassador says he scoured the book in vain “for some expression of reverence, even respect, for the country its author would someday lead” but finds none. Instead, in Oren’s reading, “the book criticizes Americans for their capitalism and consumer culture, for despoiling their environment and maintaining antiquated power structures.” He notes that Obama accused Americans traveling abroad of exhibiting “ignorance and arrogance” — the very same shortcomings, notes Oren dryly, that the president’s critics assigned to him.
7. Abbas’s no-peace stare: At the suggestion of veteran US official Dennis Ross, Vice President Biden, visiting Israel in 2010, asked Mahmoud Abbas, when he called on the Palestinian Authority president in Ramallah, to “look him in the eye and promise that he could make peace with Israel. Abbas refused.”
8. Closed Gates: Former US defense secretary Robert Gates had “a visceral dislike” of Netanyahu, writes Oren. He’d known Netanyahu since the prime minister was deputy FM, and back then thought him superficial, glib, arrogant and outlandishly ambitious. As an adviser to George H.W. Bush, Gates had gone so far as to recommend that the young Netanyahu be banned from the White House.

Hamas whines over its impotence in the "unity government"

Maan reports:

An attendee of the 15th Fatah Revolutionary Council conference led by President Mahmoud Abbas told Ma'an Tuesday that the council will form an entirely new unity cabinet rather than pursuing efforts to reform the existing government.

Abbas announced that the government would resign within the next 24 hours, several senior Fatah officials attending the conference told AFP, with the new government formation expected to be carried out in a matter of several days.

The announcement comes as Palestinian leadership in the West Bank and Gaza Strip have struggled to maintain a unity government pieced together in June 2014.

Hamas is upset:

Hamas rejected any unilateral dissolution of the Palestinian unity government on Wednesday, hours before Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah was expected to meet President Mahmoud Abbas to present his government’s resignation and discuss the formation of a new government.

The rejection comes as senior Fatah officials reported Tuesday night that Abbas announced during a Fatah council meeting that the government would be dissolved and entirely reformed.

"Hamas rejects any one-sided change in the government without the agreement of all parties," Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri told AFP.

"No one told us anything about any decision to change and no one consulted with us about any change in the unity government. Fatah acted on its own in all regards."

Governmental sources told Ma'an that Hamdallah is expected to be assigned to the task of forming a new government that would potentially include the Hamas movement and other PLO factions.

Spokesperson of the national consensus government Ihab Bseiso meanwhile denied reports by Israeli media that forming a new government would not include representatives of Hamas.

Only a few years ago Hamas was the one calling the shots - its Gaza leader flying all over the world acting as heads of state, seemingly unlimited funding from Iran, absolute support from Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood leaders.

Now Iran has limited its support for Hamas because it wouldn't support Assad in Syria. Egypt treats Hamas as an enemy and Gaza as enemy territory. Hamas is working to prevent rocket attacks on Israel because it cannot afford another war. And instead of defining the agenda of the "unity government" as it did in earlier failed attempts, now it is sidelined and complaining over how no one asks its opinion.

The worst thing you can do to Arabs is not to defeat them but to humiliate them, and being ignored is the ultimate humiliation.

JPost reports:

The police must increase its presence around the the Mount of Olives Cemetery in east Jerusalem, where Jewish visitors are often attacked, MKs and activists said at a Knesset Interior Committee meeting Monday.

Police Kedem District commander Chief Superintendent Chaim Shmueli recommended that a fence be built around the cemetery with gates leading to the graves.

The meeting’s attendees pointed to continued problems of vandalism and rock-throwing, saying that the police is not doing enough.

“Either give [private] security guards more authority or increase the protection,” on the mount, MK Yoav Ben-Tsur said. “It cannot be that in the State of Israel our sovereignty is abandoned.”

MK Yisrael Eichler (United Torah Judaism) said the violence on the Mount of Olives is an attack on Israeli sovereignty in Jerusalem and the entire Land of Israel.

MK Abdullah Abu Marouf (Joint List) spoke out against vandalizing graves, calling it “not accepted by anyone in the world; a basic concept in human values.”

The Joint List MK also said the Waqf should have been invited to the meeting.

Why should the Waqf be invited to a meeting about the world's oldest and most venerated Jewish cemetery?

Because, like every single other Jewish heritage site that predates Islam, Muslims claim it as their own.

Al-Haj Mustafa Abu Zahra, "head of the Islamic graves," responded to this story by saying that the Mount of Olives is really an ancient Islamic cemetery known as "Ras al-Amud." It belongs to the Islamic Waqf, he claims. Adding to the absurdity, Abu Zahra added that a hundred years ago, the benevolent Muslims loaned it to Jews - and now they want it back.

The Jews moved the bones of hundreds or thousands of Muslims from the cemetery, and added thousands of its own fake graves to expand their land grab according to this Islamic leader.

Abu Zahra further said how ironic it was that Jews are concerned over these graves when they are destroying ancient Muslim cemeteries to build the Museum of Tolerance. (He didn't mention my discovery that the Supreme Muslim Council had decided in 1945 to build an office park directly on top of the Mamilla cemetery they are referring to. Or that the Mufti of Jerusalem dumped sewage from his hotel into the same cemetery. Or that it is Muslims, not Jews, who have planted fake graves - and been caught doing so.)

The article adds that Jews visiting the graves of their ancestors are the ones who are harassing the peaceful Arab residents of the area.

No lie is too fantastic for Muslims when they are trying to delegitimize Israel and Judaism.

(h/t Ibn Boutros)

Assuming that this Mondoweiss account of a program at the 92nd St Y is accurate:

At the end of the discussion, [Peter] Beinart challenged the hall filled with 500 mostly older folks (and surely almost all Jews, and paying $40 a head) to include anti-Zionists at the table:

“And the last thing I’ll say and this is the most challenging I think maybe for most people, including for me: Our tent, our Jewish community, our proverbial Seder table, is going to have to include the Jewish kids who are not Zionists, including the Jewish kids who are involved in the BDS movement. Because Jewish kids are overrepresented in the BDS movement. You may find that frightening beyond belief, you may find it terrifying. And I understand why you do, but it’s true.”

Beinart then related an anecdote of a campus meeting of Students for Justice for Palestine where most of the group was Jewish, and continued:

“Every generation hears the voice of Sinai anew. This generation– one way it is hearing it makes us radically uncomfortable. We cannot afford to tell them that they are not welcome in Jewish spaces, because then we alienate them not only from Israel but from being Jews as well. We need to welcome them in, we need to argue with them, we need to challenge them, we need to be challenged by them. We may be entering– I take no pleasure in this, I find it a terrifying reality– We are entering, An era in which there is no longer going to be a Zionist consensus in the U.S. Especially if Israel continues on its current path. We will have to remain a Jewish community in that environment and we will have to be welcoming even to those people on the far left or the far right whose views we find deeply, deeply upsetting.”

Saying that those who are dedicated to destroying the Jewish state are listening to the word of God is beyond obscene..Beinart has lost what little credibility he may have had.

Beyond that, as usual, Beinart is wrong. He claims that by excluding these anti-Israel voices from the Jewish community, we are alienating them from Judaism. He has it exactly backwards - the vast, vast majority of Jews who support BDS are those who have already been estranged from Judaism, and they cynically use their accident of birth to legitimize a fundamentally anti-Jewish position.

Yes, Judaism is Zionist. You cannot meaningfully say "Next Year in Jerusalem" at the "proverbial seder table" while saying that Jews don't have rights to their capital city.

The seder happens to be a perfect way to illustrate how wrong Beinart is. Here is a part of something called "No time to Celebrate - Jews Remember the Nakba Passover Haggadah Supplement, 5768 / 2008":

Yes, they have changed "Next year in Jerusalem" to refer to those who want to see Jerusalem to be ethnically cleansed of Jews. Yeah, let's include them in the "big tent."

These people don't care about Judaism except for how to use it as a weapon. Their claim to Judaism, by doing things like hijacking the idea of a Passover seder, is like Hamas pretending to love human rights - a cynical ploy to fool others, but not a true statement of belief. Their "Judaism" - which is really taking concepts like "social justice" and calling it Judaism - is purely political, and their intent in being taken seriously by the Jewish establishment is to destroy Jewish (and mainstream Zionist) institutions from within.

Not to say that there isn't a problem with young people.. Beinart exaggerates it - there is far more pro-Israel sentiment among college students than he pretends - but there is a problem, and the problem is that too many people don't raise their kids to feel like they are part of the Jewish people.

The sad fact is that most American Jews know little about Judaism and Israel. The issue needs to be addressed early on, with dynamic education programs that start when the kids are young, with camps and trips and accurate education about Judaism and Zionism.

If the older people listening to Beinart are concerned about their grandkids, they should be putting their money into education for pre-teens and teens as well as into programs that counter the anti-Israel lies on college campuses.

The Haggadah - the real one, that is - has explicit instructions on how to deal with "the wicked son." We are not told to love him and listen respectfully to his views. On the contrary, we are told to recognize his true intention to weaken us and to publicly shame him for his efforts to hurt his people under the pretense of simply asking innocent questions., Judaism - real Judaism, that is - does not say to have a "big tent" to accept all viewpoints as having equal validity. It tells usto recognize evil and to fight it.

Jews who support BDS certainly are analogous to the wicked son. And Peter Beinart, by praising those who want to pervert Judaism in order to destroy Israel, may very well have crossed the line to that category as well.

06/16 Links Pt2: The Bigotry of Our Time; Kay Wilson's revenge

From Ian:

Douglas Murray: The Bigotry of Our Time

The letters page of The Guardian in the UK is regularly filled with letters, jointly signed by "correct-thinking" people who hope that in so doing, they will give themselves both a little puff of publicity and simultaneously signal their loyalty to all modern virtues
Their opinions on Israeli counter-terrorism strategy may be those of a group of teachers, the unemployed and two extreme-left filmmakers, but it is Israel they are against, so of course the letter is of note. So much so, that it received an accompanying news story in the print edition of the paper. This gave a further quote from Ken Loach, who said: "The boycott campaign specifically says this is not a campaign against individual film-makers, it is a call for a boycott when the state of Israel invests money or is promoting the event. I'd be the last person to want to censor an individual voice."
One doubts, in fact, that Loach would be the last. He is always among the first. The letter -- and the surrounding furore -- is simply the latest in a series of attempts to make Israeli and indeed Jewish culture "forbidden." In London, we have had Israeli orchestras, theatre companies and even string quartets howled down by mobs during performances, and Israeli-performed shows cancelled because the venues hosting them just do not want the bother. Last year, the Tricycle Theatre in London refused to proceed with a festival of "Jewish" culture because a tiny proportion of the festival's funding was coming from the Israeli embassy in London.
The campaign is obviously organized. The same names crop up again and again. Little, if any, rigour is paid to whether the signatories of such letters even do what they say do, or have opinions worthy of any note. Beneath the barely-built veneer of "professionals objecting to something in their own profession," is just the same tiny number of anti-Israel and anti-Jewish obsessives. A sprinkling of "as a Jew" Jews, like Margolyes, help, of course. But the aim is clear. These people, step by step, want to make every expression of Israeli and Jewish cultural life subject to their idea of how a nation under constant threat of terrorist bombardment should behave. They denounce Israel as a militaristic society and then attempt to outlaw every non-militaristic cultural and artistic expression from that society.
It is the bigotry of our time. And if unchecked, it will lead in the same direction as it historically has done. Thankfully, although few people have seen the films of those self-important Guardian letter signatories, we have all seen this larger, historical film -- and it is not one that decent people would like to see repeated.

Fascist Demonstrators to Burn Talmud at London Rally in Jewish Neighborhood

The extreme right-wing organizers of a Saturday protest in a predominantly Jewish London neighborhood plan to burn Israeli flags and even a copy of the Jewish Oral Law, or Talmud, the UK’s Jewish Chronicle reported on Tuesday.
Right-wing activist Joshua Bonehill-Paine called on demonstrators through his website to bring Israeli flags to the July 4 demonstration in the mostly Orthodox Jewish neighborhood of Golders Green to “dismember … by hand,” which apparently sidesteps the legal complications of burning national flags.
“This will be a show of solidarity by English people who recognize that Israel is a corrupt state which is responsible for horrific war crimes,” wrote Bonehill-Paine.
Additionally, the activist said there would be a private meeting held before the demonstration in which copies of the Talmud could be burned “in recognition of its racist Anti-White [sic] teachings.” (h/t Alexi)

5/28/2015: Police Chief Asks UK Jews for Help to Stop Anti-Semitic Rally

A British police chief has requested London's Jewish community to provide proof an extremist rally being planned for July 4 in Golders Green will be anti-Semitic, so authorities can shut it down.
According to a Jewish Chronicle report, Barnet borough commander Adrian Usher claimed that if there was evidence the rally is “motivated by antisemitism, then that is clearly against the law and we will take robust action.”

Kay Wilson's revenge

A ferocious attack by terror-minded Palestinian Arabs on a pair of defenseless women hiking in the hills near Jerusalem on December 18, 2010 is the prelude to an extraordinary recent talk recorded on video as a TEDx event.
Speaking to an audience in Beer Sheva on the campus of Ben Gurion University of the Negev on May 13, 2015, Kay Wilson passionately and articulately walks her audience through the before, the during and the after of being murdered - and surviving. She shares what it means to witness her friend and companion butchered right beside her, and to identify the killers - who must have thought they had gotten away with their barbarism - and watch them convicted.
There are societies all over the world where a person who undergoes what she did becomes twisted, vicious and bent on revenge. Even if her own website [Let My People Giggle] had been given a different name, it would be clear that hatefulness is not what Kay embodies.
But in a way, standing up in front of audiences, as she now does, and projecting a message of optimism and humanity is an act of revenge.

Rockets being shot from/to civilian areas in Ukraine doesn't seem to bother anyone

Hmmm....

Donetsk (Ukraine) (AFP) - Several hundred Ukrainians in the country's war-torn east demanded Monday that pro-Russian insurgents remove scores of rocket launchers from crowded city neighbourhoods and stop provoking government fire on their homes.

Districts around Donetsk and Lugansk -- capital of a neighbouring separatist region -- have witnessed the return of intense fighting that has claimed more than 50 lives this month.

That upsurge followed more than three months of relative calm that came in the wake of a truce agreement brokered in the Belarussian capital Minsk with the direct involvement of the leaders of Germany and France.

Donetsk residents from a neighbourhood near the airport that insurgents managed to seize after months of some of the war's heaviest clashes in January, accused the insurgents of using them as human shields.

"You are hiding behind our backs," some residents chanted. Others simply shouted "Shame!"

"It has been impossible to live in these conditions for the past year," said a young woman who wanted to be identified only as Lena for fear of retribution from the insurgents.

"We have hardly been able to leave our basements for the past two weeks," said fellow demonstrator Irina. "They have left us to our fates."

The event received no mention on the Donetsk insurgents' official news site. They have previously described videos showing rockets being launched from children's playgrounds and apartment courtyards as fake.

It seems clear that rockets are being shot from civilian areas - and the government is shooting back.

Because there isn't much choice in dealing with terrorists who use civilians as human shields.

Reports even say that the point of shooting the Grad rockets is to draw fire so they can blame civilian casualties on the government.

Isn't it interesting that this is receiving so little coverage?

(h/t Jeff K)

"When you educate people to boycott only Israel, when you tell them that all Israelis are responsible for human-rights abuses, when you mobilise a global campaign to say that Israel is uniquely racist, and when this campaign becomes central to progressive politics globally, you are, whether you know it or not, incubating anti-Semitic ways of thinking. When ears are closed to concern about anti-Semitism on the basis that such concern is a marker of secret support for Israeli human rights abuses, then you know there is a problem."

So observed London academic and left-leaning Zionist Dr David Hirsh on his well-known website (http://www.engageonline.org.uk) in 2011, in an article entitled “No such thing as a victimless boycott”.

Australians Associate Professor Philip Mendes and Dr Nick Dyrenfurth, both of Monash University and both with a number of books to their credit, are cast in similar mould to Dr Hirsh. They are on the mainstream left of the political spectrum – Philip Mendes is, incidentally, the undisputed, much-published authority on the Jewish Left in Australia and has told its story warts and all, while Nick Dyrenfurth has written about the Australian Labor Party (ALP), for which he once worked as an adviser and speechwriter. Manifestly not uncritical of Israeli government policy, they are firmly committed to Israel’s right to exist within just and secure borders, and under no illusions regarding the sinister nature and aims of the BDS movement. Their new book, Boycotting Israel is Wrong: The progressive path to peace between Palestinians and Israelis (NewSouth Publishing, Sydney, 2015) is the first book written by political “progressives” that unequivocally condemns the excrescence that is the BDS weapon while at the same time offering a prescription for a solution to a seemingly intractable conflict.

Last Thursday, at its Melbourne launch introduced by Michael Borowick, assistant secretary to the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU), around 100 people including the indefatigably pro-Israel ALP federal MP Michael Danby and yours truly, heard ALP federal MP and Shadow Justice Minister David Feeney speak enthusiastically in favour of the book and its thesis. Pointing out that being anti-Israel is fast becoming the litmus test of being a loyal political leftist, and observing that the experience of partition was not unique to former mandate Palestine, he blamed the Palestinian leaders’ persistent rejection of solutions offered by Israel for the Palestinians’ plight, and queried why so many on the Green Left movement and in the left-wing factions of the ALP demonise the Middle East region’s sole democracy, Israel, when what should concern progressives is the oppression of and atrocities against women and minorities that characterises so much of the Middle East. Denouncing the antisemitism of the BDS movement, he also denounced the current trend for unilateral recognition of a hitherto non-existent Palestinian State: likening such recognition to a cul-de-sac that is no thoroughfare to peace. Such a peace, entailing a two-state solution, can only be achieved through negotiation and compromise (including the division of Jerusalem), Feeney argued, adding that while it is true that Palestinian nationalism is a comparatively late phenomenon, it should not be dismissed as invalid on those grounds, for not all modern states – Pakistan for instance – are rooted in an ages-long sense of nationhood. It is vital, he concluded, for the mainstream left, based on such considerations, to present the case for Israel and not allow support for Israel to be misrepresented exclusively as a feature of the political right.

Since Feeney’s speech essentially reflected the sentiments of the book, Philip Mendes decided to dispense with the speech he intended to give – which he had given at the Sydney launch the previous day – and spoke relatively briefly.

‘Why would anybody write a book about the BDS movement?” Mendes had said earlier. “For me personally, it’s all been a bit of a political catharsis. For much of the 1980s and indeed 1990s, I was part of a tiny minority of a few dozen Australian Jews – barely a minyan – who favoured recognizing Palestinian national rights alongside the State of Israel via a two-state solution.

But even in those days, there were anti-Zionist fundamentalists on the far Left who demanded absolute justice for Palestinians even if this meant Israelis were denied any national rights….

By any reasonable judgement, the month of March 2002 had been a particularly horrific episode in the long-standing Israeli-Palestinian conflict. During that awful period, there were eight separate suicide attacks by Palestinian Islamic terrorists on Israeli civilians resulting in the deaths of no less than 63 people and many hundreds injured. The final straw was the attack on the Passover Seder in Netanya’s Park Hotel which killed 30 people and injured 140. This attack provoked the Israeli invasion of the leading West Bank cities known as Operation Defensive Shield in an attempt to destroy the terror networks, and stop the carnage.

Yet it was precisely at this point that the international campaign for a boycott of Israel commenced. Two UK academics Steven and Hilary Rose proposed a boycott of all Israeli academics and academic institutions. Their initiative was copied in May 2002 by two Australian academics John Docker and Ghassan Hage. Their boycott petition, which was signed by 90 Australian academics, was based on the binary opposites of good and bad nations stereotyping the Israelis as evil oppressors, and the Palestinians as defenceless and innocent victims.

Even putting aside the question of whether this petition may have been interpreted as supporting the Palestinian perpetrators of suicide bombings rather than the Israeli victims, the philosophical intent was obvious. The Australian BDS movement did not endorse the national and human rights of both Israelis and Palestinians, and did not seek to promote Israeli-Palestinian peace and reconciliation via a two-state solution. Rather, its concern was the end of Israel as a Jewish state.

As we note in our book ... the BDS movement’s extremist agenda has not changed since 2002. The major local manifestations include:

The Max Brenner chocolate shop protests led by angry far Left extremists from the Socialist Alternative group who urge the restoration of Palestine from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea which means the elimination of the State of Israel;
The Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies at the University of Sydney whose Director Jake Lynch ironically boycotted the visiting Israeli peace academic Dan Avnon. Lynch has publicly argued that Jewish financial pressure was responsible for the ALP switching leaders from Kevin Rudd to Julia Gillard in June 2010.
The NSW Branch of the Australian Greens which voted in December 2010 “to boycott Israeli goods, trading and military arrangements, and sporting, cultural and academic events as a contribution to the struggle to end Israel’s occupation and colonization of Palestinian territory, the siege of Gaza and imprisonment of 1.5 million people and Israel’s institution of a system of apartheid”, later resulting in the embarrassing Marrickville Council BDS saga during the 2011 state election.
The Victorian Trades Hall Council which hosted a BDS Conference in October 2010 with the American BDS activist Anna Baltzer, who favours the abolition of the State of Israel, as the key-note speaker.
The Sydney University Staff for a BDS who construct Israelis as monolithically evil oppressors whilst its powerful supporters around the world allegedly bully and threaten any who challenge its hegemony.

The common theme here is that the BDS movement is not concerned with ending the Israeli Occupation of the West Bank, or challenging specific Israeli policies towards the Palestinians. Rather the sole aim is to paint Israel as an allegedly racist and colonialist state which has no right to exist, and to transform Israel into an international pariah similar to South Africa under the former apartheid regime.

In doing so, the movement also demonises any pro-Israel Jews elsewhere, whatever their varied views on conflict, as the political enemy, and openly use the language of bigotry and xenophobia to hit their target. This has been particularly apparent during the recent and continuing debate over Jake Lynch’s role in the aggressive disruption of Colonel Richard Kemp’s talk at Sydney University. Lynch’s supporters have constructed the debate as an apocalyptic battle between allegedly brave supporters of justice for the Palestinians versus powerful Jewish pro-Israel lobby groups.

For example, Professor Stuart Rees, Lynch’s predecessor at CPACS and founder of the Sydney Peace Foundation, has accused pro-Israel groups of engaging in intimidation, verbal battering, venom, hate mail and death threats. He refers to the alleged “financial and political power” of these groups, and yet oddly denies any link between anti-Semitism and the extremist BDS movement. He should also note that Palestinian BDS activists have actually been physically breaking up Israeli-Palestinian peace conferences in Jerusalem and elsewhere.

Nick Riemer and David Brophy from the Sydney University Staff for a BDS group raise the furphy of a powerful pro-Israel lobby allegedly threatening the jobs of University Staff involved in pro-Palestine activism, but provide no names or evidence as to which groups or individuals are involved in what they call a “witchhunt”. Their argument suggests a bizarre misrepresentation of the combative interest group politics associated with the Israel-Palestine conflict. Hardliners from both sides (what we have identified as the Greater Palestine and Greater Israel groups) tend to use shrill and aggressive bullying tactics in promoting their beliefs, and seeking to discredit those with whom they disagree. Everything that we have heard from a wide range of academic colleagues at the University of Sydney would suggest that the Sydney Staff for BDS group are active sinners as much as being sinned against in this regard.

And finally back to Jake Lynch who laughably claims that he is neither antisemitic nor even anti-Israel despite supporting the global BDS agenda for the elimination of Israel and the ethnic cleansing of its Jewish population.

But Lynch is confident that he can call on five self-denying Australian Jews to support his argument, all of whom happen to also be supporters of the extremist BDS movement.

So he prioritizes the views of this tiny minority against the will and rights of the great majority of the other 120,000 Australian Jews who detest his views. Obviously when they taught the most basic community development principle at Sydney University – start where the community is – Lynch was absent from class.

To conclude, the BDS movement has clearly become a major source of intolerance in Australian society as has also been the case in the UK and USA.’

Needless to say, not all of Elder’s readers will agree with the authors’ solution to the conflict, as outlined in the book’s final chapter. But they will surely applaud the main tenets of this highly cogent work, with its helpful appendices, its copious notes, and its long and impressive bibliography.

Not the least appealing aspect of the book is the fact that, as seen in their long rant against it on the ABC’s “The Drum” website, two of the mainstays of the Australian BDS movement, Riemer and Brophy – both mentioned in Mendes’s address quoted above – are raging about it in an article (http://www.abc.net.au/religion/articles/2015/05/08/4232595.htm) entitled “Right to Boycott”. Enjoy!

06/16 Links Pt1: Instead of investigating IDF, UN should probe itself; UNRWA is Counterproductive

From Ian:

UN-believable:Israeli Organizations Working Against Israel at the UN

Im Tirtzu’s latest report reveals how three Israeli organizations, which have consultant status at the Economic-Social Council of the United Nations (ECOSOC), have been acting against the State of Israel and promoting the delegitimization of Israel in the international community. The groups have also been calling for an inquiry into IDF actions in Gaza.
Because the status conferred upon the organizations is a very prestigious one, as far as non-governmental organizations go, they are able to advise UN institutions on human rights, and can influence formulation of positions and resolutions adopted by the various UN bodies.
The groups – Adalah, Itijah, and the Israeli Committee against House Demolitions – use their access to UN organizations to accuse Israel and the IDF of war crimes, violations of international law related to combat and human rights, torture of Palestinians, and other crimes.
Im Tirtzu said that all three organizations have enjoyed funding from the New Israel Fund (NIF), among other sources, and Adalah receives money from the NIF to this day.

UNRWA in the Gaza Strip is Counterproductive

It must have come as a great shock to the so-called international community that in June 2015 the so-called refugees, the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip protested that the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) was giving resources they deserved to other Palestinians.
The Gaza Palestinians demanded of UNRWA that it not cut the funds allocated to them, nor transfer those resources to the Palestinians who remained in the Yarmouk refugee camp in south Damascus, despite the fact 150,000 had fled the camp because of the Syrian War They also demanded that the international community, implicitly the U.S. and the EU, provide extra funding for their needs.
Perhaps because of this protest, Robert Turner, Director of UNRWA in Gaza, without reason or explanation, announced his intention to leave his position in mid July 2015. He has held that position since May 2012. His resignation might have been a cause of regret if he had not continued to refer, inaccurately, to the Gaza Strip as “Occupied Palestinian Territory.” He seems unaware that since 2007 it has been ruled by the terrorist group Hamas. He has always been a true naïve believer in the self-serving fallacious Palestinian Narrative of Victimhood.
Sometimes people in power do speak truth, or part of it, to the rest of us. On June 2, 2015, commemorating more than 65 years since UNRWA was established, the United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon remarked that it was “never meant to exist for this long.” Ban regards it as a political failure.

UN Watch: "Why is the U.N. Rewarding the Perpetrators?" — Hillel Neuer blasts election of Iran & Saudi Arabia

Arab media over the past day have reported a bizarre story claiming that former French President Nicolas Sarkozy, speaking in Israel, said that the Jewish state should be exclusively for Jews and the Palestinian state exclusively for Arabs.

The story is wholly fictional. In fact, Sarkozy said in 2011 that the idea of a "Jewish state" is "silly."

But while researching it I found something that Sarkozy said last week in Israel at the Herzliya conference that explains the mindframe that causes Arabs to make up stories like that.

Sarkozy said that humanity owes a debt to the Jewish people for their persecution over the centuries, which culminated in the Holocaust. “The silence of the nations while the crimes were committed is a blemish on the conscience of humanity, he said. “We all failed and have a debt toward the Jewish people, and it continues to exist.” He said that the “only way to do something about it” is to always ensure the security of the Jewish people.

“Mankind has not yet understood that the fate of the Jews is always the forerunner of what will happen to others,” he said. “Fighting for the security of Jews and Israel is fighting for all those who make a difference in the world, and this is my profound conviction.'’

Sarkozy mentioned that there exist schools in France where teachers cannot teach about the Holocaust.

“It’s true there are schools in France where you cannot teach the Holocaust,” he said. But he insisted that France ‘’is not an anti-Semitic country.’’

Without saying this explicitly, Sarkozy is saying that French schools in Muslim neighborhoods - seemingly state schools where the curriculum is set nationally - refuse to teach an important part of 20th century history because they are antisemitic.

It is the same antisemitism that causes Muslims and Arabs to make up stories that Israel is planning to ethnically cleanse Israel of Arabs.