Wednesday, March 16, 2016

  • Wednesday, March 16, 2016
  • Elder of Ziyon
Islamic Jihad today issued a video threatening to escalate military actions against the IDF.

It shows a long-distance view of an Israeli army jeep, implying that they could pick off soldiers any time they want.

The tagline reads, in Hebrew, "To show you the shadow of horror."




The numbers that seem to indicate that the jeep is being followed by a sophisticated targeting mechanism were added afterwards, which is clear because earlier in the video the same jeep is made to look as if it is being watched through binoculars.

Islamic Jihad spends a lot of money on what it calls its "media war," which includes not only these propaganda videos but also the running of newspapers and TV stations like Palestine Today, which Israel raided last week.


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Tuesday, March 15, 2016

  • Tuesday, March 15, 2016
  • Elder of Ziyon


Here is a somewhat antisemitic but witty joke/poem, from "Fun for the Million, Or, The Laughing Philosopher: Consisting of Several Thousand of the Best Jokes, Witticisms, Puns, Epigrams, Humorous Stories, and Witty Compositions, in the English Language, Intended as Fun for the Million"from 1835.



This one from the same book is better:

VICE VERSA
A Frenchman once asked what difference there was between M. de Rothschild, the loan broker, and Herod.

“It is,” he was told, “that Herod was the King of the Jews, and Rothschild the Jew of the Kings.” -



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From Ian:

The Middle East Is Unraveling—and Obama Offers Words
What is most jarring is Obama’s tendency to distort the views of his detractors to the point of dissembling by reframing their original positions. He perfected this formula on critics of his maddening approach to Syria, including senior members of his administration, by belittling their proposals for establishing no-fly zones, or protected safe havens in Syria, as “half-baked” ideas or “mumbo-jumbo” proposals. Obama told Goldberg that his critics say, “You called for Assad to go, but you didn’t force him to go. You did not invade.” But Mr. President, who asked you to invade Syria? Could you please name one serious critic who said so? Obama speaks expansively and derisively about the “Washington playbook” and what he describes as the foreign-policy establishment’s “credibility” fetish; the playbook, according to Obama, tends to prescribe militarized responses to different crises in order to maintain America’s credibility. But credibility, particularly for a great power, is the coin of the realm. And it need not be purchased by force every time.
Obama boasts that he is “very proud” of the moment, on August 30, 2013, when he retreated from his threat to punish the Assad regime militarily following its mass murder of more than 1,400 innocent Syrian civilians, many of them children, with chemical weapons. He may view that date as his day of liberation from promises he made to help people who have been at the receiving end of weapons of mass destruction. But for millions of Syrians, August 30, 2013 is a day that shall live in infamy.
Elliott Abrams: The U.N. Sinks Further into the Anti-Israeli Muck
It may seem hard to believe that the United Nations can hold any new surprises when it comes to unprincipled attacks on Israel, but never despair: There is always farther to fall.
For more than 20 years, the U.N. Human Rights Council has had a dedicated “Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967.” (Needless to say, there’s no U.N. Special Rapporteur for the condition of Tibetans or Cubans; only Palestinians.) Now, the incumbent Israel-Hater-in-Chief is leaving and his replacement must be chosen.
This being the U.N., what kind of candidate will they choose? Be careful, now: The position’s entire purpose is to condemn Israel, so it’s important to disqualify anyone who might examine the evidence in an unbiased search for truth. Heaven forfend. Much better to choose someone whose anti-Israel bias is absolute.
And this being the U.N., that’s what they’re doing.
Jennifer Rubin: Former apartheid state can attest that Israel is not one

A new report billed as the “the first empirical study of its kind providing objective confirmation of student reports of widespread antisemitism, as well as evidence that the primary agents of antisemitic activity are anti-Zionist students and faculty boycotters and that Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) is the strongest predictor of anti-Jewish hostility on campus” confirms a number of disturbing trends, including a strong correlation between anti-Zionist student groups such as Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) and anti-Semitism; between the presence of faculty who have expressed public support for an academic boycott of Israel and anti-Semitism; and between BDS activity and anti-Semitic activity.
With regard to BDS activity:
“56% of schools with evidence of BDS activity had one or more incidents that targeted Jewish students for harm, whereas of the schools with no evidence of BDS activity, only 23% had incidents targeting Jewish students. In fact, schools with more incidents of BDS activity tended to have more incidents that targeted Jewish students for harm.
95% of schools with BDS activity had one or more incidents of anti-Semitic expression, whereas of the schools with no evidence of BDS activity, only 33% had anti-Semitic expression. Schools with more incidents of BDS activity tended to have more incidents of anti-Semitic expression.”
Ironically, in the real world, the post-apartheid government of South Africa wants closer relations with Israel on trade, water and technology. Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs Director General Dr. Dore Gold is in South Africa to do just that. A readout of the meeting between Gold and his counterpart states: “The discussions focused on the relations between the two countries and the sides agreed on improving cooperation between the two countries.

  • Tuesday, March 15, 2016
  • Elder of Ziyon
Not me, as this classic post of mine shows.

Another example is Nesher Beer, from the Palestine Brewery, Bat Yam. Proudly brewed and bottled in Palestine!


They also brewed Gold Star beer that were proudly sold to British troops.


In fact, everyone was rightly encouraged to buy lots of Palestine products in response to the boycott of Palestinian goods called by Arabs who would never call themselves Palestinian  in 1936.




(h/t Joel B)

UPDATE: Other products:




(h/t Elder of Lobby)


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In September 1893 at least two British newspapers (the Yorkshire Evening Post and the Aberdeen Journal), having noted that on 20 August Switzerland had passed a law banning shechita, commented identically: “The situation is full of irony. That the Societies for the Protection of Animals should claim to take Jews to task for the manner in which they prepare their food would be amusing if it were not so serious a matter. It was a Jew, Lewis Gompertz, who practically founded the movement in Europe for the prevention of cruelty to animals!”

In 1944, at London’s celebrated Brook Street Gallery, an exhibition on the theme “What the Jews have done for civilisation” was opened by the humanitarian peer and former politician Lord Sankey. Reported one of the country’s most prominent and respected provincial newspapers, the Yorkshire Post (22 February 1944): “It is lined from floor to ceiling with nearly 900 miniature portraits of Jews past and present, eminent in science, medicine, philosophy, art, music, literature and many other fields. Their names are legion … Animal lovers may note the name of Lewis Gompertz, who founded the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.”

On 6 May 1949 the Leamington Spa Courier carried a letter from the then chairman of the Shechita Committee of the Board of Deputies of British Jews, Elsley Zeitlyn, objecting to the paper’s statement “We hesitate to charge the sons of Israel with deliberate barbarity. Religious conviction dating from Old Testament times, is the basis of the practices they employ.”

In defence of shechita, Zeitlyn cited the support for it of 400 eminent non-Jewish authorities, and quoted London University physiologist Professor (Sir) Charles Lovatt Evans: “I should be happy to think my own end was likely to be as swift and painless as the end of those cattle killed in the Jewish way undoubtedly is.” Zeitlyn also gave examples of the obligation Judaism places on its adherents to treat animals with consideration and decency: ‘For many centuries Jewish teaching has inculcated the utmost concern for the exercise of kindness to animals. It is regarded as the mark of a righteous man, and finds expression in the laws governing the daily life of the Jew. It was the Jew who first taught “Thou shalt not muzzle the ox when he treadeth out the corn”, “Thou shalt not yoke an ox and an ass together.” Indeed, until the end of the 19th century cruelty to animals was nowhere illegal except under Jewish law. It is ironical to recollect that the RSPCA itself was founded by, amongst others, a Jew, Lewis Gompertz …’

If you think that the famous, controversial, Australian-born moral philosopher Professor Peter Singer, who authored Animal Liberation in 1975, is the Jewish pioneer of animal rights, think again.
On 1 May 1830 the following appeared in the correspondence columns of an English provincial newspaper, the Bucks Gazette:
“…. Let those who are satisfied that they commit no active cruelty, see whether they partake in a dish produced by unnecessary or excessive torture, eat lobsters, &c, which have been boiled alive … or eels skinned alive, or whether they countenance butchers who skin sheep or cut open and singe pigs before life is extinct, or run a hook through the nose and tail of calves. Let them go still farther – descend into their cellars and see whether they have any cats which are starving; whether any arsenic has been laid to poison, with excruciating torture, the unfortunate rats created there or any steel traps to mutilate them; and let them ask themselves if they had their own deaths to chuse [sic], if they think they could not find one more mild. Let them say whether they ever sit at ease in their carriages and unconcernedly hear the lash unmercifully applied on horses, – and here again we recommend the test of pain to be taken from their own bodies …. [A]nd farther be it known, that the link between man and brute is as strong as many others of nature’s chain, the ape and monkey being evidently man’s next of kin; while if report speak true, an offspring has arisen between them, half monkey and half man. Has, then, such offspring been granted only half a soul?”
Seems remarkably modern, doesn’t it, well ahead of its time?
The writer was Lewis Gompertz, born about 1783, the youngest of the large brood (including five sons) of a London couple, Solomon Barent Gompertz and his second wife Leah (née Cohen). Solomon Gompertz was a wealthy diamond merchant of Dutch Ashkenazi background and Leah was Dutch-born. The family was active within the Hambro Synagogue. In 1771, though, Solomon had the name of his newborn son Barent (his principal heir) recorded in the baptismal register of the church of St Olave, in the City of London, without, it seems, actually having him christened. The relevant entry reads thus: “Barent, the son of Solomon and Lea [sic] Gompertz, was born in the parish April 13 1771 which is here noted at the request of his father, as it may be of service to him hereafter, tho’ a Jew, to know his parish.”
Whether the same was done for Lewis and other siblings I do not know, but on 12 December 1809 Lewis married a non-Jewish wife, Ann Hollaman, at St Leonard’s Church, Shoreditch, and set up home in Kennington, a London district south of the Thames. Lewis believed strongly in the equality of women and like John Stuart Mill deplored their subjugation. The childless marriage proved a happy one. His brother Benjamin, who in 1810 at the Hambro Synagogue married Sir Moses Montefiore’s daughter Abigail, was a gifted mathematician, and Lewis was similarly accomplished. He had a gift for mechanical engineering, and over the ensuing years devised a number of inventions, many of them intended to alleviate the suffering of animals, or to abolish the use of animals as beasts of burden altogether, for instance in the invention of a type of velocipede in 1821.
In fact, the welfare of animals was his consuming passion. What he must have inculcated of the Jewish teaching on kindness to animals morphed into vegetarianism, even veganism. He abstained from eggs and meat, would not ride in carriages out of sympathy for the horses that pulled them, and avoided leather products. Resolutely opposed for killing animals for their flesh or by-products, he did concede that animals who had died of natural causes might be consumed or otherwise used. His essential attitudes are contained in his book, Moral Inquiries on the Situation of Man and of Brutes (1824), as outlined by himself in a letter to the Morning Advertiser (12 February 1830):
“That man possesses no other right over dumb animals than that of the strong over the weak, not even … to use them for his food and labour, much less to sacrifice for sport. That the chief mental superiority of man over other animals consists in his greater power of communication, and that, individually, or divested of this advantage, he is, at least in many principal respects, inferior to some brutes. That with regard to prior and future states, man and brutes seem precisely similar. That in each of them consciousness may be suspended by death for an indefinite times, but never destroyed, the possibility of re-animation always remaining. That life can never exist by sport alone, but it must be suspended after death until a new body be formed, and that then all recollection of this life will cease….”

Yes, in many ways incomprehensible stuff. Imagine how that must have been received by the average reader, especially in an era when badger-, bear-, bull- and otter-baiting, as well as cock-fighting, dog-fighting and of course fox-hunting were tolerated pastimes!

The Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SPCA; the prefix Royal came later, thanks to the patronage of Queen Victoria) was founded in 1824 by such good and compassionate men as the parliamentarian Richard Martin and clergyman Reverend Arthur Broome. Gompertz was on its committee from the start, becoming its manager in 1826 and its hon. secretary in 1828. He also acted as de facto treasurer and out of his own pocket (he had private means) rescued it from financial difficulties. His zeal for its work is exemplified by the prosecution he brought in 1828 against a man called Turner, whom he had seen in his own neighbourhood, Kennington, beating “in a very scandalous manner” a heavily-laden donkey (“ass” in the Times report) about the head and shoulders with “a long thick stick, more resembling a bludgeon than the proper instrument for quickening its pace” and for no discernible reason than the “gratification” of doing so. And also in his prosecution in 1830 of a butcher for transporting calves in a cart with their heads hanging over the sides resulting in serious injury to many and even death. The magistrate dismissed the case on the grounds that the butcher had no alternative means of conveying the livestock and had not been deliberately cruel, but the upshot was that, with the magistrate’s encouragement, Gompertz devised a more satisfactory means of transport for such animals.

His noble endeavours ensured that in 1832 he was awarded a silver medal by the SPCA, but in 1833, following its merger with the rival Association for the Promotion of Rational Humanity to the Animal
Creation (whose journal had accused Gompertz of anti-Christian and Pythagorean views), he was, being a Jew, effectively marginalised when the resultant new committee declared itself founded on Christian principles. He consequently resigned, and with the support of a number of sympathisers including subscribers, founding patrons, and the neo-Pythagorean Thomas Forster MB, FRAS, FLS – whose Philozia; or Moral Reflections on the actual condition of the Animal Kingdom (published 1839) would be dedicated to Gompertz – he founded the Animals' Friend Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. It carried on the work of prosecuting animal abusers and of distributing tracts that the revamped original organisation had suspended.

Three press items during 1836 illustrate the Animals’ Friend’s Society’s effectiveness, for, aided by his wife Ann as “Honorary Inspector”, Gompertz applied himself it its work with all the energy and enthusiasm that had characterised his involvement with the SPCA (which for a time his organisation eclipsed as a result):

Bell’s Weekly Messenger (30 October 1836) “The Animals’ Friend Society. The Hon. Secretary [Gompertz] and officers of this necessary society, last week called John Haines, a drover, to be fined 13 s[hillings] by the Court of Aldermen, and John Lambert’s drover 5s 6d by Mr Trail, for having ill-treated their cattle.”

Morning Advertiser (2 November 1836) “The Animals’ Friend Society has recently met with the most flattering testimonials of gratitude from the respectable inhabitants of Birmingham, Bilston, Sedgeley, Darlastan and other places, for the great good it has effected towards the suppression of bull-baiting in those districts; no less than forty-eight bull-baiters having been severely punished by the society last year [bull- and bear-baiting were outlawed in 1835], and this society being again engaged in directing its energies and means in the same laudable work, and having also, we understand, this year repeated its efforts towards abolishing the barbarous Stamford bull-running. We also learn that Lewis Gompertz, Esq. (its Hon. Secretary), has reason to believe that its previous interference will present that sport from again taking place. We hope our humane readers will bear in their minds the great expenses of these operations, and aid the society to continue its efforts.”

ell’s Weekly Messenger (13 November 1836) “Proceedings of the Animals’ Friend Society at West Bromwich and London. Last Sunday having been the day appointed for the commencement of the wake of bull-baiting, a bull which had been baited every year for the last 10 years, was got ready by a fellow called John Hancox, to be again baited (and on that sacred day). But upon his having discovered that the society was watching him, he concealed the bull in his own pantry, when his wife, on her having entered the pantry the next morning, little suspecting such a visitor, was terribly alarmed, and let the bull escape. Hancox then having been severely admonished by the Rev. Dr Spry, became truly penitent, and no baiting is now expected to take place. The agents next having notice that a badger was being baited, went to the spot and rescued it; after which they proceeded with nine constables to stop some dog fights, and took two offenders into custody, one of which was unfortunately rescued by the mob.”

To quote an advertisement for its organ, The Animal’s Friend (in Bell’s Weekly Messenger, 17 June 1838): “The Animal’s Friend No. VI just published for the Animal’s Friend Society (not the Society usually called the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals), 60 pages octavo and a copper plate, price 6d, containing its Sixth Report with its Prosecutions, 280 by this Society during the last six years, for Cruelty to Dumb Animals. Also, much miscellaneous matter connected with the subject, in which the crimes of Field Sports and vivisections perpetrated by the Rich; and Bull-baiting and other enormities by the poor are alike impartially exposed. Lewis Gompertz, Hon. Sec., Oval Kennington.”

Gompertz’s wife Ann died in April 1847. He felt her loss keenly. His own health was in decline and to make matters worse the Animal’s Friend Society had been experiencing difficulties. In 1843, for instance, three disaffected members spread a false report that it had disbanded, and kept its takings for themselves. In 1849 Gompertz appeared as a witness in a court case, a spiteful reporter describing him as “a miserably dressed decrepid [sic; archaic; i.e. decrepit] old Jew’. He died at his Kennington home on 2 December 1861 and was buried beside his wife in the local churchyard. Described in his Last Will and Testament as “Lewis Gompertz, gentleman” (and in the 1861 Census as a “fundholder”) he left around £14,000 (the equivalent of £1.5 million today). Had he flaunted his wealth, we can imagine what that spiteful reporter would have written.


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From Ian:

Settlements Equal Security
One of the most intriguing findings in the sweeping Pew survey of Israel released last week was a sharp rise in the proportion of Israeli Jews who said settlements are beneficial to Israeli security. As recently as 2013, the survey noted, a plurality of Israeli Jews (35 percent) accepted the global consensus that settlements harm Israel’s security. But in the new poll, an even larger plurality deemed settlements beneficial to Israel’s security – 42 percent, up from 31 percent in 2013. Only 30 percent deemed settlements detrimental, while 25 percent said they make no difference to Israeli security. This shift in public opinion reflects both a growing conviction that Israel’s security requires the Israel Defense Forces to remain in at least part of the West Bank, and a growing recognition that settlements are the anchor keeping the IDF from leaving.
Three significant events occurred between the earlier poll, conducted in March-April 2013, and the latest one, conducted from October 2014 to May 2015: the Gaza war of summer 2014, the virtual collapse of UN peacekeeping forces on the Golan Heights, and the failed Israeli-Palestinian talks led by Secretary of State John Kerry. All had a major impact on how Israelis understood their own security.
The war solidified an Israeli consensus that the unilateral pullout from Gaza was disastrous, with even opposition leader Isaac Herzog admitting that “from a security perspective, the disengagement was a mistake.” There were two reasons for this. First, despite two previous wars with Hamas since the 2005 disengagement, Israeli casualties in both were low enough that on balance, the pullout seemed to have saved soldiers’ lives. This time, military casualties were so high (66 soldiers killed) that, as I explained in detail here, keeping the IDF in Gaza would actually have cost fewer lives than leaving did. Second, while Hamas had bombarded Israel with thousands of rockets and mortars ever since the pullout, it had previously mainly targeted the south. During the 2014 war, sustained rocket fire for the first time hit the center of the country, where most Israelis live.
MEMRI: Incitement To Terrorism By Palestinian Civil Society Organizations That Receive Foreign Funding
Some Palestinian civil society organizations operating in the West Bank that receive funding from Western countries, institutions, and foundations are openly expressing support for terrorism. They express this support with ceremonies exalting terrorists, with public displays of support for attacks and their perpetrators, by lionizing terrorists, and by posting inciting content on social media.
The following are several examples of such organizations:
The Palestinian Bar Association Awards Honorary Attorney's Certificate To Muhammad Al-Halabi, Who Killed Two In Jerusalem; Encourages Participation In Stabbers' Funerals
The Palestinian Bar Association is the official body for Palestinian attorneys in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.[1] It receives regular funding from the EU, and has received aid from the EU Police Coordinating Office for Palestinian Police Support (EUPOL COPPS), the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), and UN Women.[2] It also maintains cooperation ties with the International Legal Foundation (ILF).[3]
On October 10, 2015, the bar association announced that it would be posthumously awarding an honorary attorney's certificate to Muhannad Al-Halabi, who was killed after stabbing two people to death in the Old City of Jerusalem on October 3, 2015 and wounding a woman and a two-year-old baby.
Increasing Signs that Hamas, Not Frustration, Is Behind the New Intifada
The latest wave of terror in Israel may not be conducted by “lone wolves,” as is commonly believed, but guided by the hidden hand of Hamas, a leader terror researcher has reported.
Shaul Bartal of the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies wrote that obscuring the genesis and motivations of such attacks is a common Hamas tactic. The Iran-backed terror organization is “aware of the many advantages and the protection that deception and obscuration provides its operatives, their families and the organization’s institutions,” he wrote. “The Sunni organization uses the concept of concealment (‘taqiyyah’) which is more common in Shiite Islam, in order to make political and propaganda gains, mostly in order to change its image as a terror organization and present itself to the world as a legitimate organization.”
While Bartal acknowledged that “lone wolf” terrorists carry out their attacks “without any proven connection or direct order from the organization they belong to,” he found connections to Hamas in many cases.

  • Tuesday, March 15, 2016
  • Elder of Ziyon
In an interview with France 24, Hamas political leader Khaled Meshal justified murdering Jews as self-defense:
Asked whether Hamas supported the killing of Israeli civilians, [Meshal] replied: "It is wrong to frame the problem this way, because Hamas, the Palestinian movements and the Palestinian people are just defending themselves. It’s a defensive war, we are defending our sons, our children, our wives, our places of worship, our land."
In other words, yes, he does support the murder of Israeli civilians, but doesn't like to use that terminology to Western media. (France 24 of course didn't follow up, asking how stabbing random Jews, Arabs and tourists can be considered defensive. Reporters really are absurdly deferential to terrorists tht they manage to interview.)

In Arabic, however, the message is clear.

The Hamas-aligned Al Resalah news site has an article today praising the murder of Jews with this photo:


The article says that the attacks are against "the occupation and the settlers," and we've seen in the past that Hamas considers every Israeli Jew to be a "settler." It also brags about the murder of American Taylor Force in Jaffa, calling him an "Israeli."

The article also says that the murders are meant "to address the crimes of the occupation against humans and trees and stones in the occupied Palestinian territories." Meaning that according to moderate Hamas, stones have more rights than Jews.



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  • Tuesday, March 15, 2016
  • Elder of Ziyon
From the AMCHA Initiative (edited):
After numerous independent surveys have suggested alarming rates of anti-Semitic activity on college and university campuses across the country, AMCHA Initiative, today released the first empirical study of its kind demonstrating that anti-Zionist activities, including BDS, anti-Israel student groups and faculty who endorse an academic boycott of Israel, are at the heart of the rise in campus anti-Semitism.

Major findings include:
  1. Campus anti-Semitism is highly prevalent in public and private schools with significant Jewish undergraduate populations, irrespective of school size.
  2. Strong correlation between anti-Zionist student groups such as Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) and anti-Semitism.
  3. Strong correlation between the presence of faculty who have expressed public support for an academic boycott of Israel and anti-Semitism.
  4. BDS activity strongly correlates with anti-Semitic activity.
  5. Presence of SJP, faculty boycotters and BDS strong predictors of anti-Semitism.
  6. Anti-Zionism permeates and is inseparable from contemporary campus anti-Semitism.

AMCHA has been leading a coalition of more than 40 groups that is calling on university leadership to acknowledge a distinction between scholarly debate and criticism of Israel’s policies and anti-Zionism – i.e. calls for the destruction of Israel — which is anti-Semitic and breeds additional anti-Semitism. Pope Francis, President Obama, British Prime Minister Cameron, French Prime Minister Valls, former Secretary of State Clinton and the majority of presidential candidates have all stated that denying Israel’s right to exist is anti-Semitism.

A Trinity College and Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law study revealed that 54% of surveyed students experienced or witnessed anti-Semitism during the first six months of the 2013-2014 academic year. A survey by Brandeis University in the Spring of 2015 found that three-quarters of North American Jewish college student respondents had been exposed to anti-Semitic rhetoric. Both surveys found that anti-Israel expression, particularly expression related to BDS campaigns, was a major factor in anti-Jewish hostility. A 2015 survey conducted by AMCHA Initiative of Jewish students at the University of California found that 70% had experienced or witnessed anti-Semitism.
Here are the worst universities according to the study:



Last night I had a wide ranging conversation with Tammi Rossman-Benjamin of AMCHA about this survey and what can be done to help the rights of Jewish students to have an education free from hate.






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  • Tuesday, March 15, 2016
  • Elder of Ziyon
Brazen: The EU flag flies above an unauthorised building erected for Palestinians in Area C of the West Bank (Daily Mail caption)

It's about time someone noticed this.

From The Daily Mail:

The EU is claiming diplomatic immunity after using taxpayers' money to build unauthorised settlements and roads on Israeli parts of the West Bank, MailOnline can reveal.

An Israeli NGO launched legal action after photographing EU flags flying above buildings on land placed under Israeli jurisdiction by the Oslo Accords, to which the EU is a signatory. EU bureaucrats are avoiding court by citing diplomatic rules.

The buildings, which are given to Palestinians, are intended to 'pave the way' for more land to be brought under Palestinian control, according to official EU papers. Many are bulldozed by Israel only for the EU to repeatedly rebuild them, generating more costs for the taxpayer.

Leaked documents obtained by MailOnline show that the EU – which receives £350million per week from Britain – is using diplomatic rules to place officials above the law, foiling attempts to hold bureaucrats accountable.

MPs have expressed outrage that the EU is using aid money to 'meddle' in a foreign territorial dispute, and branded its actions 'dodgy'.
'It is deeply concerning that the EU falls back on diplomatic immunity after breaking planning regulations,' Jacob Rees-Mogg MP told MailOnline. 'The UK Government would take a very dim view of a friendly state doing that to us.

'Diplomatic immunity is there to protect envoys from unjust treatment, not to protect the high-handed behaviour of arrogant bureaucracies.'

He added: 'The EU maintains that it is based on fundamental principles of rule of law and support for democracy. But when this clashes with its bureaucratic bungling, neither rule of law nor democracy seem important.'

The projects come at a cost of tens of millions of Euros in aid money, a proportion of which comes from the British taxpayer. Construction is also funded by international charities, including Oxfam.

EU flags are mounted on the buildings, leading them to become known locally as the 'EU settlements'.

'The EU should comply with the law. It should not be meddling in the Middle East, then hiding behind some dodgy use of diplomatic immunity,' Andrew Percy MP told MailOnline.

'This is a gross waste of taxpayers' money. It's another example of money given to the EU over which Parliament has no real oversight.

'The British electorate is contributing to this but we are completely unaware of how it's being spent. We don't know who is spending this, and we can't vote them out.'

He added: 'No wonder the EU think they're above the law. They are untouchable.'

Mr Percy also expressed serious concerns that the EU is 'undermining the Oslo Accords' and 'damaging attempts at peace' in the Middle East. 'Not only is it a waste of taxpayers' money, it is morally questionable,' he said.

This month, the EU approved a further £193million of aid to the Palestinian Authority.

Professor Eugene Kontorovich, an international lawyer from the Northwestern University School of Law in Chicago, said: ‘There’s no question, the EU is openly in violation of international law.'

But an EU spokeswoman argued that the construction was legal 'in accordance with the humanitarian imperative', and said the EU believed that Area C would be 'part of any viable future Palestinian state'.

She would not say whether or not the EU's actions breached the Oslo Accords.
So the EU is justifying violating the fundamental basis of the Oslo Accords - which are legal instruments - by saying that their own idea of a "humanitarian imperative" is more important.

But what humanitarian imperative is it to move people into buildings that are going to be demolished within months?

The answer is that the EU wants video of Israel demolishing illegal structures to be shown. They want the UN to issue reports counting how many structures were destroyed and how many people who had other places to live only shortly beforehand are now "homeless." Especially children. They make great video.

In other words, the EU's "humanitarian imperative" is to demonize Israel, not to help Palestinians.

And as this article shows, they literally hold themselves above the law. A systematic and illegal campaign to violate written agreements, vilify Israel and pre-judge the outcome of negotiations is protected as "diplomatic immunity."

No wonder the Palestinians don't want to negotiate with Israel. The EU already is supporting their claims with its willingness to spend hundreds of millions of Euros without any concessions towards peace on their part.

The EU could work together with Israel to improve the existing Arab villages in Area C. It can lobby Israel to loosen up zoning laws to help the existing Arab population in those areas build easier. But to swoop in, violate international law by illegal building and then claim that they are untouchable is immoral, illegal and arrogant.


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Monday, March 14, 2016

  • Monday, March 14, 2016
  • Elder of Ziyon
From Fun for all, a novel collection of jokes and jests for all readers, 1880:
"Did you know," said the cunning Yankee to a Jew, "that they hang Jews and donkeys together in Poland?"

"Indeed! then it is well that you and I are not there," retorted the Jew.





From Ian:

Col Kemp: The West’s fight against terrorism is anemic
Arguing for the authorization of airstrikes on Syria in the British House of Commons recently, British Shadow Foreign Secretary Hilary Benn — a life-long campaigner against war — noted succinctly that we know this about Islamic State: They are fascists, and we have to defeat them.
Experience makes plain that when terrorist movements control territory where they can organize and train, the threat increases exponentially. The United States, the United Kingdom and our coalition partners must intensify our anemic action to destroy the Islamic State.
Coalition airstrikes alone will not defeat the Islamic State, nor end Syria’s brutal civil war. Ground forces will be necessary to take back and hold territory in urban centers in Syria and Iraq. We cannot predict the ultimate makeup of such forces. But we can be certain that they will face an unconventional enemy that will act with utmost brutality and pay no heed to the rules of warfare.
This is the fundamental challenge our democracies face.
We are confronted by ruthless Islamist death cults that pervert the rules of war to achieve victory and have no respect for basic humanity.
The Slipperiest Slope of Them All
President Obama came into office promising to turn the page on a chapter of American history defined by two wars in the greater Middle East. His consistency in delivering on that promise is admirable, as is the focus with which he has learned from and sought to avoid his predecessor’s mistakes regarding the use of American force abroad.
Ironically, however, Obama’s fixation on closing one chapter led him to decisions that opened a new one that reads very similarly. This new war on ISIS—Obama’s war—which began in August 2014, can be traced to two errors of judgment. Jeffrey Goldberg’s article on “The Obama Doctrine” reveals that these errors were driven by the president's determination to keep his promises to the American people and to avoid the mistakes of the past.
The first mistake was Obama’s retreat from Iraq—the withdrawal not just of U.S. forces, but even more so of diplomatic energy and leverage, which, successfully deployed, might have mitigated the collapse of the Iraqi political experiment and thus blunted the rise of ISIS. After Iraq held its (pre-American withdrawal) elections in 2010, the Obama administration took a hands-off approach to Iraqi domestic politics, and it failed to replace the American military presence with a robust set of civilian, economic, and other partnerships to sustain American influence. In 2011, my last of about two years working on Middle East policy in Obama’s State Department, we were planning for sharp cuts in civilian programs for Iraq alongside the military drawdown—and over the next two years, U.S. economic aid to Iraq dropped nearly 50 percent. The administration had ample warning about the damage Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki’s sectarian and power-hungry behavior was having on Iraqi security and stability. But the president and Vice President Biden, who managed the Iraq portfolio on Obama’s behalf, chose to do very little to constrain Maliki as he began to unravel the tentative political bargains between Sunnis, Shiites, and Kurds within federal Iraq.
Americans don't always know everything
The root of the problem for many American administrations, including the current one, is the American tendency to assess the Middle East through the prism of American concepts, as if the people living in the region are American citizens who adhere to an American logic, worldview and political culture. It turns out, however, that protestors in the streets of Arab cities are not necessarily social activists; Islamic movements don't exactly champion equality and human rights; and local tyrants, like Bashar Assad and the spiritual leader of Iran, neither resemble American political adversaries on the campaign trail nor common street thugs acting violently on the streets of American cities.
It comes as no surprise that an administration that views the crime-filled streets of Chicago and violence in the Middle East through the same lenses has sought to appease the region's thugs through restraint and patience, not to mention weakness, and has responded in similar fashion to the world's current mafioso-of-the-moment, Vladimir Putin. In actuality, however, Obama has not secured the goodwill of his adversaries and enemies in the region. Quite the opposite -- from the moment they smelled weakness they rose up in a manner of defiance they had never before dreamed possible. At the same time, the Americans squandered the trust of their allies, who felt abandoned and under threat.
Obama's approach to the Middle East has included two crucial aspects that together had far-reaching and disastrous consequences, not only for America's status in the region but for its inhabitants. On the one hand, Obama naively sees the Middle East through rose-tinted glasses, befitting his belief that the region and its people seek modernity and democracy, and that the basis for tensions between them and the U.S. is America's belligerent behavior, highlighted by George W. Bush's invasion of Iraq. On the other hand, Obama's approach also comes with the cynicism of a cold and calculating businessman trying to cut his losses by selling depreciating stock. In other words, when the reality of the region blew up in his face, he chose to disengage from it while leaving Washington's friends and allies to fend for themselves.
One cannot deny that a policy of inaction can be beneficial on occasion and can prevent volatile situations from escalating. But the result of Obama's policies -- or lack thereof to be more precise -- is that on his watch the Middle East has not only become far less stable but is now a more dangerous place where far more lives have been lost to war than at any time during Bush's presidency, when American soldiers were sent to fight in the region.
If Obama would have listened to Israel, he could have learned from its firsthand experiences -- that while you can disengage from Gaza and Lebanon, those places will not disengage from you and will continue chasing you to your doorstep.

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