A large number of activists have held a demonstration in the US city of Los Angeles to protest against Israel and Hillary Clinton, the Democratic presidential nominee.
The pro-Palestinian demonstrators marched on Monday night near the Beverly Hills home of Zionist billionaire Haim Saban, who was hosting a big a fundraising event for Clinton.
The protest rally was organized by the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions Movement (or BDS Movement), which seeks to end the Israeli occupation and colonization of Palestinian lands.
...Zionist billionaires like Saban, Sorores [sic] and Sheldon Adelson have vowed to punish those who boycott Israel.
Soros a Zionist? Well, Iranian media isn't the first to think so.
The Palestinian BDS National Committee (BNC), the largest coalition in Palestinian civil society that is leading the global Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement for Palestinian rights, called today for a boycott of the Soros Fund Management and the Open Society Foundations due to the recently announced[1] -- first-quarter 2014 -- investment by Soros in SodaStream stock and increased investment in Teva Pharmaceuticals, both Israeli companies that are deeply involved in violations of international law.
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One of the many misconceptions about Lebanon in the West is that it is liberal with respect to women's rights.
It is a classic example of how being liberal in comparison with the very low bar set in most of the Arab world is mistaken for being truly liberal.
A Pew study in 2014 showed both how liberal Lebanon is in comparison with its Arab neighbors - and how conservative it is in comparison with the West - with this simple question:
49% of Lebanese felt that women should be able to dress however they want, and 51% felt they should cover at least most of their hair.
This is hardly "liberal."
Similarly, in Lebanon there is a law that a rapist can go free if he marries his victim. This causes conservative families to often pressure their daughters to marry their rapists in order to avoid social stigma.
Yes, in Lebanon, we don’t have it all that bad. We can drive, dress as we like, study what we wish and have successful and fulfilling careers. But these norms should not be hailed as some kind of liberal victory, but rather, as minimal requirements for a state that at least tries to manage itself democratically. These so-called modern practices did nothing to help Roula Yaacoub when she was brutally murdered, allegedly by a husband who beat her regularly, and who remains a free man.
It frankly doesn’t mean much that women can dress provocatively and order a drink when their husbands can also legally rape them. Nor should we feel empowered by our right to date freely (within our religions, of course) when any woman who has lost her virginity is treated as damaged goods, or worse.
A new article in Now Lebanon points out that things are even worse - men can murder their wives for "honor" reasons without worrying too much about any consequences:
Lebanon has truly become (or has always been) a dangerous place for women. In recent years, Lebanon’s media began covering cases of women murdered by their spouses, and the frequency of the occurrence of violence against women revealed a pattern associated with deeply rooted patriarchal sentiments. And if being murdered by the person you vowed to share your life with isn’t tragic enough, in most cases, the judicial system did not deliver justice for the victims. The Lebanese public never knew the depth of the problem our society faces with unpunished domestic violence and the long-standing tradition of honor killings – which was, until recently, permissible by law. The following is a recap of some of the cases that made us aware of the injustices against women in our country and that also sparked public outrage over the judicial system’s handling of violence against women.
...Manal Assi was brutally murdered by her husband. After Manal confronted her husband about his marriage to another woman, he began to beat her with everything in sight – including kitchen utensils, cleaning equipment, tables and chairs. The doctor’s report mentioned serious injuries in almost every part of Manal’s body, and her husband confessed to calling her mother and having her watch her daughter being beaten to death. On July 16, the husband was given a “light sentence” of 5 years in prison for his crime. According to the sentence, Manal had “cheated” on her husband which made him angry and forced him to brutally kill her. The honor killing – which has been illegal in Lebanon since 2011 – was being revived in a completely shameful decision that ignored the violence Manal had endured for years at the hands of her husband. Tuesday is the deadline for the court to consider appealing the decision and KAFA is organizing a protest Tuesday morning to pressure the court.
Around Lebanon, many other women share a similar story. Crystal Abou Shakra was poisoned to death by her ex-husband, who she had divorced due to his acts of violence towards her. Again, her ex-husband was not indicted due to “lack of evidence.” Roqaya Monzer was shot at point blank by her husband when she asked for divorce due to his violent behavior. Zahraa Al-Qabout also faced a similar fate. This past week, a new victim was added to the list. Maymouna Abou Alaylah was murdered by her husband who reportedly used the glass that forms the base of the hookah to strike her on the head and then stabbing her repeatedly with a knife. These are just some of the cases that have been reported and the frightening reality is that many more cases are undisclosed.
The real battle here is that the killers of the women mentioned above are not paying for their crimes. The only way for this madness to stop is for justice to be served. These men knew beforehand that will not suffer the consequences of their actions in a country like Lebanon, which embraces patriarchy and suffers massively from corruption in its institutions. This unique and unfortunate alliance between corruption and sexism is why Lebanon is a dangerous place for women.
This is the best place to be a woman in the Arab world.
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As of this writing, he received over 1700 comments from Arabic speakers around the world.
While many of the comments were the usual hate, with commenters cursing him and all Israelis, a surprising number of the comments were warm and sincere birthday greetings from Arabs.
Many of the positive comments came from Iraqis, causing much consternation in jihadist media and Egyptian sites calling it "shocking" and worried that Iraq is losing its anti-Israel mojo.
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I think that everyone who cares about Israel believes strongly that the mainstream media does not cover Israel accurately. We accept it as a given that almost all coverage represents an anti-Israel media bias that stems from either anti-Semitism, a liberal world view that sees the country in a negative light, or simply journalists who are ignorant of the complicated nuances of events here.
But Israel’s critics claim the media is biased in favor of Israel. Review some of the writing on sites like Electronic Intifada, and you would get a very different view.
Who’s right? Are we just taking our emotional attachment to Israel and making assumptions that anyone who does not see the country the same way must be biased? Is the truth somewhere in between the opinions of those who are pro and those who are critical of Israel? I believe there are specific, objective criteria that can be used to show clearly that much of the mainstream media not only reflects an anti-Israel media bias, but is factually inaccurate.
But to effectively evaluate media coverage of Israel, we need to put our emotions, politics, and backgrounds aside. Otherwise it becomes just one of many political debates that journalists can effectively ignore.
The political platform recently published by the Movement for Black Lives repeats the demonizing rhetoric of the infamous antisemitic NGO Forum of the 2001 Durban Conference, which launched the BDS movement. The platform labels Israel as an “apartheid state”, accuses the country of committing “genocide” against Palestinians, calls for an end to military aid, and endorses the anti-Israel BDS movement, including opposition to the “expanding number of Anti-BDS bills being passed in states around the country.” In response, a number of mainstream Jewish organizations issued condemnations, including the American Jewish Committee, the Anti-Defamation League and the Reform movement’s Religious Action Center.
In the initial text, the Black Lives platform listed Nadia Ben-Youssef, who represents the Israel-based Adalah organization in the US, as an “author and contributor.” The BLM platform also included a reference to Israeli laws that allegedly “sanction discrimination against the Palestinian people,” based on the tendentious “database of discriminatory laws” published by Adalah. This publication refers to Zionism in a pejorative manner, and makes no distinction between laws that were actually passed by the Israeli Knesset and legislative proposals that went nowhere. Furthermore, laws promoting Zionism and the historic Jewish connection to Israel are labeled as discriminatory, including the use of Jewish symbols and the Hebrew calendar.
Adalah’s participation in the BLM project was not particularly surprising, as the NGO has often been involved in political campaigns that promote the Palestinian narrative and seek to isolate Israel through the use of labels such as “racist”, “apartheid” and “anti-democratic”. The reference to Adalah in the BLM platform was reported by the Jewish Telegraphic Agency (JTA) and other media frameworks, and noted by NGO Monitor.
New housing built by Israel for Gazans in Sheikh Radwan
neighborhood, 1977
We've spoken about this before, but here is a 1977 LA Times article that shows how much UNRWA (and the PLO) were against Israel moving Arabs into decent housing.
There was, of course, a postscript.
The UN condemned Israel for improving the lives of hundreds of Palestinians and for trying to get them out of these crime-ridden, crowded camps.
The General Assembly, 1. Calls once more upon Israel: (a) To take effective steps immediately for the return of the refugees concerned to the camps from which they were removed in the Gaza Strip and to provide adequate shelters for their accommodation; (b) To desist from further removal of refugees and destruction of their shelters;
This article shows that UNRWA was more concerned over losing control of the lives of Palestinian Arabs than they were about improving their lives.
As it remains today.
The upshot is that Israel did everything it could to improve the lives of Palestinian Arabs, to make them self-sufficient and productive.
The Arab world, most NGOs, and the UN have done the opposite.
(h/t Ahron Shapiro)
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Words are used to explain reality but
they can also be used to shape reality, to create it. Sometimes exchanging a
single word for another can change the picture entirely.
Personally I don't believe there is
any neutrality on the issue of Israel. There are people who are uninvolved and
not particularly aware of the facts (in addition to those involved despite
having no knowledge of the facts). The point is, there are facts - historical,
cultural and religious, well documented facts. These can be disputed (and they
often are) but not in arguments based on actual facts.
The people who wish to destroy Israel
are hyper-aware of the power words have in creating reality and are consciously
using well-chosen terminology to delegitimize Israel. Words are carefully
chosen and used over and over as a mantra, a marketing slogan, until the
general public begins to accept the words as accurate labels with historical,
factual value.
Americans my age were told over and
over: "Milk. It does a body good." We heard it so many times, most
people believe that milk is healthy, never considering that this message,
designed by people wanting to sell milk, may not actually be true.
The words chosen in regard to Israel
are specifically intended to disconnect Jews from our homeland, to diminish our
history to the point where it can be completely disregarded.
And it is working.
Worse than that – people who love and
support Israel are taking part in this, reinforcing and legitimizing it by
participating in the narrative of the enemy.
Let's be very clear:
When you use the terminology of the enemy you empowering the enemy.
If you are using these terms you are strengthening
and providing justification to those that hate Israel. You, who love Israel,
agree with their concepts, accept their terminology and by extension, are
helping to create a reality where their terms must be accepted.
1)West Bank
West Bank seems like an innocuous
term however it is its seeming innocence that makes it so deadly. "West
Bank" is a term that takes the Jordan River as a reference point i.e. the
west bank of the Jordan River.
The territory that is subtly being
appropriated is Judea and Samaria, the heartland of Israel. This is the
territory in which most of the bible took place. Shilo, the first capital of
Israel is in the center of this territory. The Tabernacle was in Shilo for 369
years, before it was brought to Jerusalem.
Shilo can be found easily by
following the directions contained in the Book of Judges (21:19). North of Bet
El, east of the road heading from Bet El to Shechem (which the Arabs call
Nablus), and south of Levona. The connection between this land and the Nation
of Israel is very well documented.
The territory became disputed when it
was conquered and occupied by the invading Jordanian army in 1948. When Israel
was attacked in the 1967 Six Day War and had the temerity to actually win,
regaining her ancient heartland and freeing Jerusalem it became popular to
attempt to delegitimize this through terminology.
In reality calling Judea and Samaria
the West Bank, as if this land is part of Jordan, is no better than saying
"the occupied territories." Can one really "occupy" their
own home?
The war that the Arabs lost with
soldiers and tanks is now being fought with words.
2)Wailing Wall
This commonly used, highly offensive term is an
ancient form of delegitimizing Jewish history by diminishing Jewish anguish at
the loss of the ancient Jewish Temple, destroyed by the Romans in 70 CE.
This is the term of non-Jews who occupied
Israel, ridiculing the pain of the Jews who stood weeping at the Kotel, the
Western Wall, which is the only wall left standing of the ancient Temple in the
heart of Jerusalem.
During the period ofChristian
Roman ruleover Jerusalem (ca.
324–638), Jews were completely barred from Jerusalem except to attendTisha be-Av, the day of national
mourning for the first and second Temples, and on this day the Jews would weep
at the holy site. The term "Wailing Wall" was thus almost exclusively
used by Christians, and was revived in the period of non-Jewish control between
the establishment ofBritish Rulein 1920 and theSix-Day Warin 1967.
This derogatory term mocks the pain of the Jewish people, as
in "there go those Jews, weeping again."
Damn straight. We have much to mourn and weeping is a
reasonable reaction to deep, painful loss. Would you mock a child whose mother
was murdered in front of him? Would you ridicule the child who always
remembered and mourned the loss of his mother? The Temple was the heart of the
Nation of Israel, the center of the Jewish religion and culture. The Jewish
people have not forgotten this and standing next to the Kotel, the Western Wall
of the Temple that once stood on the Temple Mount in the heart of Jerusalem is
a poor substitute for what is supposed to be there, for what was once there.
Kotel is the word used in Hebrew
which simply means "Wall". The choice of this term is indicative of
the importance of the structure in the Jewish mind – this one remaining wall is
so significant that it is not necessary to detail which wall is being mentioned,
it is THE Wall. It is not the Wall itself that is holy, it was the Temple and
what stood at its center that was holy. 2000 years, exile and many terrible
experiences along the way, have not been enough to make the Jewish people
forget the importance of the Temple. The Wall has grown in significance because
it is all that remains of the Temple, because of that it is precious.
"Western Wall" is a factual
description of the Wall. The Kotel is the western wall of the Temple and it is
perfectly reasonable to describe it as such. The "Wailing Wall" is an
offensive term, used to belittle and diminish the Jewish people and our
connection to Israel and Jerusalem. If that is not your goal, don't use that
term.
3)Palestine
The most effective media stunt in the
history of the world, Palestine is a term used for one goal: to wipe Israel off
the map.
Palestine is a name given to the Land
of Israel for the sole purpose of disconnecting the Jewish people from Judea,
from Israel, from Zion. This was done in the 2nd century CE, when
the Romans crushed the revolt of Shimon Bar
Kokhba (132 CE), and gained control of Jerusalem and Judea which
was renamed Palaestina in an attempt to minimize Jewish
identification with the land of Israel. After World War I, the name
“Palestine” was applied to the territory that was placed under British
Mandate; this area included not only present-day Israel but also
present-day Jordan. Leading up to Israel’s independence in 1948,
it was common for the international press to label Jews, not Arabs, living in
the mandate as Palestinians.
Words give meaning and form to
reality, thus names are of vast importance. It is obvious that Jews belong in
Judea, but who belongs in Palestine?
Palestine is and always was, a
politically motivated name. It is a name that is meant to denigrate and destroy
the Jewish connection to her homeland. Arab “Palestinians” are a nationality
invented to facilitate and justify cleansing Jews from Israel.
If you will – calling Israel,
“Palestine” is the original hate speech.
Before the Final Solution was
formulated, Hitler wanted to send the Jews "home to Palestine." At
the time there was no question regarding where the Jews belong. Now Jews in
Israel are being told to "go home" to Europe. We are being told that
we are occupiers of a land called Palestine, that we have usurped a people
called the Palestinians.
This insidious lie has taken root
within the world culture to the point where many nations around the world have
recognized the existence of a Palestinian people and even declared there to be
a country called Palestine. The fact that this is a modern day invention meant
to REPLACE Israel is completely ignored.
The historical facts are
indisputable. There have been Arabs in the region for centuries. There are
Israeli Arabs, Jordanian Arabs, Syrian, Lebanese and Egyptian Arabs. There are
Arabs in Gaza and Arabs in Judea and Samaria. There are Muslim Arabs and
Christian Arabs.
(There used to be Jews in all the
same areas, before it became necessary for Jews to flee Arab ruled lands.)
There never was a Palestinian people.
This modern day invention based on the geographical territory Palaestina was
created for the sole purpose of undermining Israel.
And it is working.
The Palestinian myth has taken root
in the political arena, leading many to assume that with the right leadership,
a country called Palestine can live peacefully next to Israel. The Two State
Solution places Palestine instead of Judea and Samaria, the heartland of
Israel, the territory that is or historical and religious connection to this
land. The assumption that this is a reasonable or even feasible solution
ignores the Arabs in Jaffa, Akko and Haifa that consider themselves
"Palestinians." It is Arabs throughout Israel who are dreaming of a
new land instead of Israel.
When a place called Palestine
replaces Judea, it will be possible for "Palestinians" to replace the
Jews.
The Arabs that never accepted the
existence of the Jewish State, who lost all the wars they waged against Israel
and the Jewish people are winning the war of ideas. They are winning because
people like you and me are adopting their terminology and accepting the
concepts and reality being constructed by those words.
Words matter. Choose wisely.
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As far as Israel is concerned, Soros-backed groups work to delegitimize every aspect of Israeli society as racist and illegitimate. The Palestinians are focal point of his attacks. He uses them to claim that Israel is a racist state. Soros funds moderate leftist groups, radical leftist groups, Israeli Arab groups and Palestinian groups. In various, complementary ways, these groups tell their target audiences that Israel has no right to defend itself or enforce its laws toward its non-Jewish citizens. In the US, Soros backed groups from BLM to J Street work to make it socially and politically acceptable to oppose Israel.
The thrust of Soros’s efforts from Ferguson to Berlin to Jerusalem is to induce mayhem and chaos as local authorities, paralyzed by his supported groups, are unable to secure their societies or even argue coherently that they deserve security.
In many ways, Donald Trump’s campaign is a direct response not to Clinton, but to Soros himself. By calling for the erection of a border wall, supporting Britain’s exit from the EU, supporting Israel, supporting a temporary ban on Muslim immigration and supporting the police against BLM, Trump acts as a direct foil to Soros’s multi-billion dollar efforts.
The DCLeaks exposed the immensity of the Soros-funded Left’s campaign against the foundations of liberal democracies. The “direct democracy” movements that Soros support are nothing less than calls for mob rule. The peoples of the West need to recognize the common foundations of all Soros’s actions. They need to realize as well that the only response to these premeditated campaigns of subversion is for the people of the West to stand up for their national rights and their individual right to security. They must stand with the national institutions that guarantee that security, in accordance with the rule of the law, and uphold and defend their national values and traditions.
The Syria Campaign, an advocacy group, has put together a meticulous report arguing that the United Nations has hopelessly compromised itself by agreeing to the Syrian regime’s terms and filtering money and aid through the Syrian government. The Executive Summary minces no words: By choosing to prioritize cooperation with the Syrian government at all costs, the UN has enabled the distribution of billions of dollars of international aid to be directed by one side in the conflict. This has contributed to the deaths of thousands of civilians, either through starvation, malnutrition-related illness, or a lack of access to medical aid. It has also led to the accusation that this misshapen UN aid operation is affecting – perhaps prolonging – the course of the conflict itself.
Alas, this is absolutely true. The real tragedy is that the UN’s decisions and compromises were eminently foreseeable. After all, Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon is simply following the precedent established by his predecessors Kofi Annan and Boutros Boutros Ghali, and their dealings with Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, alas, with the same exact results.
A Tunisian singer has been receiving withering insults after a photo of him with an IDF officer from the COGAT unit has spread through social media.
Saber al-Rebai, a famous Tunisian singer, posed for this photo after he crossed over the Allenby Bridge from Jordan to the West Bank to perform in a concert in Rawabi. The IDF's COGAT unit coordinates such crossings.
Rebai was forced to go on TV to explain what happened and to insist that he is against normalization with Israel, and in fact he supports the Palestinians wholeheartedly.
He said on his Facebook page that as he crossed over from Jordan, a person in a uniform he didn't recognize introduced himself in Arabic as "Hadi" and said he was responsible for keeping him away from Israelis.
Yes, Rebai is really claiming that.
He then released a flurry of photos and videos showing him with Mahmoud Abbas and wearing a keffiyeh during the concert to show how much he loved Palestinians.
He concluded his Facebook message by saying that "to visit the prisoner doesn't mean normalization with the jailer."
It is interesting to contrast the unrelenting hostility that the Arab world has to the very idea of appearing friendly with any Israeli to the COGAT logo itself:
In the zero-sum mentality of the Arabs, if Israel wants to be friendly than friendship itself becomes a source of intense shame.
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Throughout Judea and Samaria, Israel places signs warning Jews not to travel down certain roads because it is dangerous:
A few years ago, some Israeli leftists from a group called "We do not obey" decided that these signs were racist because they depict Palestinians as dangerous terrorists. So they covered some of these signs telling Israeli civilians that they are welcome to visit the friendly Palestinian population:
“We got really good reactions from Palestinians wherever we went, and people told us they feel like the original signs portray them as would-be murderers to be careful of,” Rivka Sum, one of the activists in the group, told +972. “One person said that every day when he comes home from work and drives by that sign, he is immediately depressed by the thought that Israelis reading it might think of him as a blood-thirsty cannibal or something.”
In a Haaretz column (Hebrew) author, translator and one of the founders of the group, Ilana Hammerman, stated that putting up the signs was also for the benefit of Israeli drivers. “Fewer and fewer are those Israelis today who dare to acquaint themselves with this reality, with which their state’s fate is intertwined,” she writes. “We want people to know that these roads lead to the residences of human beings … to know that really it is the roads of military (enforced) segregation that lead to doom.” In their official statement the group added: “This is our way to express our protest against this method of threats and intimidation. The signposts that are supposedly for our ‘security’ violate the surrounding environment and their only purpose is to scare and to cause conflict between Jews and Arabs.”
Last night, a group of religious Hasidic Jews - not particularly known for their Zionism - attempted to test the theory espoused by "We do not obey." They violated Israeli law to visit Joseph's Tomb in Nablus.
An IDF force was rushed to Joseph's Tomb in Shechem yesterday, after an Israeli bus that entered the area of the Tomb without advance coordination was violently attacked by rioting Arabs.
The Arabs threw rocks at the bus, containing 60 Jews of the Breslov hassidic sect, as IDF forces quickly evacuated passengers from the scene.
A number of the passengers were injured from the rock-throwing and were treated at the scene. 32 of the Israelis were detained for investigation after they were successfully extricated from the scene. It is being checked whether the bus entered the premises with Palestinian license plates.
An Israeli medic on the scene noted that a 17-year-old Israeli youth was evacuated to Schneider Hospital with head injuries. His condition is defined as "light."
An IDF spokesman said, following the incident, "the IDF emphasizes that civilian entrance into 'Area A' [so-called 'Palestinian areas' of Judea and Samaria] is dangerous and constitutes a transgression of law."
Police also condemned the incident: "We see the incident tonight as very severe, uncoordinated entry [into the Tomb complex] without security is dangerous for both civilians and security forces coming to rescue them. Entry in to Area A without permission is a criminal offense."
This incident shows, yet again, that the Palestinians aren't protesting the presence of Israeli security forces, as they like to portray themselves. They attacked a bus-full of Jews for no other reason than because they are Jewish.
They weren't greeted with coffee and snacks, as anti-Israel Westerners love to pretend is the norm when they visit Palestinians.
They were greeted with rocks and rioting and threats to their lives.
The "We Do Not Obey" theory was tested. Everyone can see the results.
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Mahmoud Abbas said the Palestinian people are instrumental in the defense of Jerusalem and the holy sites, adding that the Al-Aqsa mosque is a red line - we will not allow daily attacks and violations by the occupation forces and settlers.
It appears as if he is saying that it is permitted to use any means to block any Jews from visiting the Temple Mount.
Funny - he said the same thing last year, two weeks before his people's murder spree started.
I guess it is only a matter of time before he invokes "filthy feet" again.
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Tablet Magazine ran a few great takedowns of Black Lives Matter's platform as it concerns Israel. Unfortunately, they were followed by an article by Daniel May, a past Director of JStreet U, essentially saying that Israel's occupation policy is responsible for BLM's platform. While nearly every paragraph of May's deserves criticism, in particular his parroting of Haaretz's lies, I'd like to focus on his original sin. In the final paragraph, May writes: Palestine will never advance so long as Jews deny the cost of Zionism. The Jewish nation’s independence was won only through the dispossession of another nation.
Everything in the case against "the Occupation" stems from the accusation the Jewish sovereignty was won by dispossessing another nation. From the dispossession narrative comes the "right to resist" which justifies Palestinian terror and, with such actions being justified, delegitimizes Israel's countermeasures. Hence we see the one-sided description from JStreet and their ilk. To understand dispossession as it pertains to the "Palestinians," consider a counterfactual from American history. Suppose that when the Pilgrims came to Massachusetts (for simplicity, I will be using present-day names for places), the population of Indian tribes native to Massachusetts was small. However, just before then, a handful of tribes from Quebec had started migrating to Massachusetts and accelerated during the Pilgrims' lifetimes. Subsequently, the Pilgrims' descendants stopped the inflow from Quebec and imposed population controls on the Indian population in Massachusetts, affecting the Quebec tribes because they were the larger presence. Would such an action constitute dispossession for the Quebec tribes? Such is the case with the Palestinians.
Last week Aditya Chakrabortty interviewed Israeli, or to be more accurate Israeli and Palestinian, conductor Daniel Barenboim for the Classical music section of the Guardian. In his article headlined “Daniel Barenboim on ageing, mistakes and why Israel and Iran are twin brothers” Chakrabortty included political views which would have been more at home in an opinion piece than the Classical music section.
Barenboim conducts the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra, a mix of Israeli and Arab musicians, which played at the London Proms last week prompting a 5 star review by the Guardian’s Andrew Clements. The review was delightfully free of politics.
Barenboim’s interview with Chakrabortty goes into how and why the Orchestra came together in the first place, the perfectionist that Barenboim is, how hard he works his musicians and questions whether the Orchestra is actually achieving anything positive. Then the interview enters its gratuitous political mode. After describing the insults Barenboim received after playing Wagner, the Nazis’ favourite composer, in Israel Chakrabortty writes
“For his part, the musician has called the Israeli occupation of Gaza and the West Bank “immoral” and backed a boycott of the Israeli government.”
Australia - All. up Halabi says he diverted 60 per cent of World Vision’s Gaza budget to Hamas for six years. Costello is waiting to see the evidence, which is fair enough. But if it’s true, a latterday Philistine exploited World Vision’s tunnel vision and rendered it as blind as Samson, ‘eyeless in Gaza’.”
But worse for World Vision is yet to come. The U.S. Government gifts World Vision $200 million per annum. Can you imagine what American congressional committees will do when they require or subpoena World Vision to give public testimony on whether U.S. Taxpayers money has been misspent on subsidising Hamas to build extensive concrete tunnels into Israel? Professor Steinberg concludes in his Wall Street Journal article “World Vision’s failures in Gaza highlight the problems of a multibillion dollar NGO industry that remains largely unregulated and unexamined. With so much money involved, including private and public funds, and given the stakes in environments of terrorism and guerrilla warfare, the need for transparency, accountability and detailed guidelines is clear. If the officials who run organizations such as World Vision aren’t willing to take the lead, then the governments that contract out their aid budgets must act.” The Wall Street Journal, 11 August 2016
I hope, against hope, but I doubt that these revelations will lift the mote from Tim Costello and World Vision’s eye about good and evil in the Middle East.
No-one wants to stop aid to those who need it, but the blindness to terrorists diverting aid for their evil purpose will give government and individual donors to those charities good reason to insist on a genuine accounting of every dollar and shekel they claim to have spent on the welfare of the people of Gaza and the West Bank. Until that happens, World Vision, and others who are eyeless in Gaza, will be rightly shunned by responsible Western governments and even happy idealistic optimists who support them in favour of more responsible and accountable charitable and foreign aid causes.
During my visit to Israel, I had the opportunity to ask Ambassador Alan Baker, an expert on international law, if he could summarize his position on the legality of Israel's presence in Judea and Samaria.
We've noted most of the arguments before but it is nice to have them confirmed.
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In response to EoZ’s criticism
of the pronounced anti-Israel bias reflected in Macmillan’s World Regional
Geography textbook, the prestigious publisher has
declared its willingness to take the “comments very seriously” and to
inform the authors, Lydia Mihelic Pulsipher and Alex Pulsipher. This is
certainly welcome news; however, I’m afraid that there are some very
fundamental problems in the textbook’s treatment of Israel and Palestine as one
of the “worrisome geopolitical situations” in the Middle East.
In fairness, it should be noted that it is of course very
difficult to treat a long-running conflict that has been attracting so much
attention and media coverage for decades in just a few pages. But it is
noteworthy that the advertisement
for the book emphasizes:
“Alone among books for the regional
geography course, Pulsipher and Pulsipher’s World Regional Geography humanizes
geographical issues, showing how larger geographical forces affect the lives of
individuals and communities around the globe.”
In the case of the section on Israel and Palestine, the
authors obviously decided to “humanize” the Palestinians, who are depicted
right at the outset as the victims of Israel:
“Israel’s excellent technical and educational
infrastructure, its diverse and prospering economy, and the large aid
contributions (public and private) it receives from the United States and
elsewhere, have made it one of the region’s wealthiest, most technologically
advanced and militarily powerful countries.
The Palestinian people, by
contrast, are severely impoverished and undereducated after years of conflict,
inadequate government and meager living […] often in refugee camps. Through a
series of events over the past 60 years, Palestinians have lost most of the
lands on which they used to live.”
So we have Israel, which receives “large aid contributions …
from the United States and elsewhere”, and the Palestinians, who – due to “a
series of events over the past 60 years” – are reduced to eking out a “meager
living … often in refugee camps.”
Given that Israel and Palestine are presented as one of the
“worrisome geopolitical situations” in the Middle East, there is plainly no
reason whatsoever not to mention that the Palestinians have the political
support of the Arab League and the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC);
notably, the latter boasts of being “the second largest inter-governmental
organization after the United Nations.” You just have to read through the first
paragraph of the OIC’s “History”
on its own website to find out that it was established “as a result of criminal
arson of Al-Aqsa Mosque in occupied Jerusalem.” And you just have to read an
article from yesterday
to find out that up to this very day, Palestinians “recycle” the lie that a “radical
Jew” set fire to Al-Aqsa Mosque in 1969. And it isn’t hard to find out that
this lie is being widely promoted
all over the Muslim world.
Which brings us to claims like: “the conflict between Jews
and Palestinian Arabs” has always been – and continues to be – “less about
religion than control of land, settlements and access to water;” or like: the “second intifada … was primarily fueled
by the expansion of Israeli settlements.” These claims are presented as facts,
but one could literally fill a book (if not several volumes) with material
documenting that in the Arab and Muslim world, the conflict with Israel has
always been seen primarily as a religious conflict. It would actually be very
important for a textbook that tries to explain “worrisome geopolitical
situations” in the Middle East to acknowledge religion as a factor that has
fueled the Arab/Muslim-Israeli conflict. That’s why, soon after taking power in
Iran, Khomeini declared “Quds
Day,” which is meant “to proclaim the international solidarity of Muslims
in support of the legitimate rights of the Muslim people of Palestine.” And
incidentally, that’s why the “second intifada,” which was supposedly “primarily
fueled by the expansion of Israeli settlements,” is also known as the “Al-Aqsa Intifada.” And
that’s also why Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas declared
just last fall that Jews “have no right to desecrate the [Al-Aqsa] mosque with their
dirty feet” – by which he meant to say that Jews should not be allowed to visit
the Temple Mount.
Overlooking the political backing Palestinians have from the
Arab League and the OIC also means overlooking the vast disadvantage Israel has
in the UN, where, as Ben Cohen has explained
so well, “a whole network of anti-Israel institutions and funding streams”
created in the wake of the infamous resolution equating Zionism with racism has
remained in place after the resolution was repealed in 1991; this institutional
network continues to fuel anti-Israel initiatives and policies around the
world. Why emphasize “large aid contributions” Israel “receives from the United
States and elsewhere” while completely ignoring the considerable aid and
leverage Palestinians enjoy due to the influence of the Arab League and the
OIC?
And some related questions, particularly since the material
refers to a video [154] with the title “60 Years After Israel’s Founding,
Palestinians Are Still Refugees”: Why emphasize the Palestinian refugees
created by the Arab and Muslim wars in response to Israel’s establishment while
ignoring that the Arab states also proceeded to drive out the ancient Jewish
communities all over the Middle East? Are there any explanations that there are
Palestinian “refugee” camps in Palestinian-ruled Gaza and areas of the West
Bank because Palestinian “refugees” are unique in the world since their
“refugee” status is inheritable, and that they have a special UN organization
that takes care of them and makes sure that they receive
“the highest per capita [humanitarian] assistance in the world”?
And some more questions, given the repeated suggestions that
Israel’s founding was a “nakba”, i.e. catastrophe for the Palestinians: what
about the fact that (as I’ve explained previously)
in late 1948, a group of Palestinian
leaders officially asked for the incorporation of the West Bank into the
Jordanian kingdom, and that Jordan annexed the area in April 1950? The annexation also meant that the
people living in the West Bank — as the area was then named by Jordan
— became Jordanian citizens. Anis F. Kassim, an international law
expert and practicing lawyer in Jordan, explained in an interview published in February 2011 by the Electronic
Intifada: “on 20 December 1949, the Jordanian council of ministries amended
the 1928 citizenship law such that all Palestinians who took refuge in Jordan
or who remained in the western areas controlled by Jordan at the time of the
law’s entry into force, became full Jordanian citizens for all legal purposes.
The law did not discriminate between Palestinian refugees displaced from the
areas that Israel occupied in 1948 and those of the area that the Jordanian
authorities renamed the West Bank in 1950.”
It was only in
July 1988 that Jordan ceded its claims to the West Bank in favor of the PLO –
using the opportunity to deprive West Bank residents of their Jordanian
citizenship. As Kassim put it: “more than 1.5 million Palestinians went to bed
on 31 July 1988 as Jordanian citizens, and woke up on 1 August 1988 as
stateless persons.” (For the effects of Jordanian rule vs. Israeli rule of the
area, see this excellent article from 2002 by Ephraim Karsh).
Given that from
1948 until 1967, West Bank Palestinians were apparently quite content to live
in Jordan as Jordanian citizens, where exactly is “Palestine”? Specifically,
what “Palestine” do Pulsipher & Pulsipher have in mind when they define
“Zionists” as “those who have worked, and continue to work, to create a Jewish
homeland in Palestine”? In the context of their overall presentation, this
definition quite obviously suggests that there was a “Palestine” rightfully
belonging to Palestinians that was – and continues to be – usurped by
“Zionists.” It is also noteworthy in this context that Pulsipher &
Pulsipher refer elsewhere to “the space
in the eastern Mediterranean that Jews had shared in ancient times with
Palestinians and other Arab groups.” I guess it depends on what you call
“ancient times,” but for Jews, “ancient times” were most definitely long before
there were any “Arab groups”, let alone any “Palestinians” in this particular “space
in the eastern Mediterranean.” And incidentally, back then, this “space in the
eastern Mediterranean” wasn’t called Palestine, even though Pulsipher &
Pulsipher emphasize at one point that “the word Palestine” has “roots
far back in history.” All in all, I cannot help but see this as a fairly
transparent and completely unscholarly attempt to suggest some ancient
Palestinian history while downplaying the real ancient Jewish history of the
area.
Last but perhaps
not least, a book on geography should arguably also provide a correct image of
the actual extent of Israel’s settlements. However, Pulsipher & Pulsipher
are content to parrot popular claims about the ever-growing settlements, even though facts are not hard to come
by: as veteran Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat acknowledged grudgingly in an
interview five years ago, “despite Israel’s continual policy
of ‘occupation and settlement building,’ an aerial photograph provided by
European sources shows that settlements have been built on approximately 1.1%
of the West Bank.” Similarly, published estimates by settlement watchdog groups
like Peace Now and B’tselem indicate that the settlements are taking up between
1.4-1.7 percent of the West Bank. Not all that much to show for more than four
decades of relentless land grabbing andincessant settlement expansion.
Incidentally, in
the same interview, Erekat also acknowledged “that former Israeli Prime
Minister Ehud Olmert had offered a final peace settlement that would include
territorial concession equivalent to the entire West Bank, the return of
thousands of Palestinian refugees […], and the division of Jerusalem.” Yet,
Palestinian President Abbas told the Washington Post’s Jackson Diehl in
an interview about Olmert’s offer: “The gaps were wide.” Once
again: so much for the idea that the conflict is primarily about “control of
land, settlements and access to water” – particularly given that access to
water is becoming less relevant in view of Israel’s advances in desalination programs.
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As the Palestinian Authority prepares for municipal elections in October, the rift between Fatah and the official PA security forces is growing in Samaria towns. Nablus and Tulkarem have seen real battles in which both official PA security operatives and Fatah members have been killed.
In Nablus the tension has risen to even higher levels after the Al-Aghbar family of the Nablus casbah issued condemnations of the Palestinian security forces for, they claim, having “executed” their son, Khaled Abd al-Nasser, while he was a detainee in their hands after his release from an Israeli prison,. According to the Nablus Facebook pages, the city’s main thoroughfares are strewn with fires.
Fatah Opposition to the PA
The question that arises, of course, is if the elections do take place, who in Nablus will vote for the pro-Ramallah candidates – if there are any? Who can stop the lists of candidates from Hamas and the pro-Iranian organizations, such as the Popular Front? In Hebron, the clans are considering whether to draw up lists that are loyal to the city and the district, and not to Ramallah.
Fatah elements have expressed bewilderment as to why, given these gloomy prospects, PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas, who is also the supposed head of Fatah, is insisting on holding the elections.
I’ve been reading Ha’aretz lately and listening to some of our left-of-center politicians, and it seems like they are living in an entirely different world than I am.
The usual piece starts off with an attack on Binyamin Netanyahu, each one trying to find a new angle. Ari Shavit tells us that he’s dishonest, he’s obsessed with his father, he hates Arabs, he will destroy the country, he is little by little crushing democracy, and on and on. Avraham Burg claims that Israel is becoming a dictatorship and refers to Iran and the Hamas terror tunnels as “some … Netanyahu phobia.” Phobia!
Former PM Ehud Barak claims that Netanyahu has made serious errors recently that have made Israel vulnerable to a “central security threat.” But he won’t say what, exactly, so we are waiting for it to leak. This from the guy that opened the door to the Second Intifada, and who allowed Druze IDF soldier Madhat Yusuf to bleed to death because he didn’t want to anger the Palestinians. Most of these writers and politicians admit that Israel is doing well economically and that Bibi has made some serious diplomatic gains, with Turkey, the Sunni Arab states, several African nations, India, even China to some extent. They have to admit that there have been few wars during his years as PM, and they’ve been limited in extent. He has kept us from getting entangled in Syria, seems to have reached a modus vivendi with the Russians, and avoided the big one with Iran/Hezbollah. They blame him for our bad relationship with the US. They might as well blame him for climate change too, but anyone with eyes can see that the Obama Administration – correctly viewing our PM as the main obstacle to realizing their goal of reversing the outcome of the 1967 war – has it in for him and for us as a result. That’s why they blame him for the PLO/PA’s refusal to even sit down to negotiate and why they tried to intervene in our last election.
Avigdor Lieberman, Israel’s recently appointed defense minister, has a reputation as a hawkish right-wing nationalist. To those who know him solely by this reputation, it might be surprising to learn that his first major initiative regarding the West Bank has been to expand the access of Palestinians living in Areas A and B (under, respectively, complete and partial Palestinian Authority control) to economic opportunities in Area C, which remains under direct Israeli control. David Makovsky writes: The eleven projects [the defense ministry announced last week], ranging from a medical facility to residences, will be carried out in locations adjacent to Areas A and B. While the projects may only occur in a limited geographic space in Area C, they certainly create an interesting precedent. . . . This week’s move suggests that Lieberman, obviously with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s support, will back an emphasis by the Israel Defense Forces on taking stabilizing economic steps during a period of diplomatic stasis. In particular, the IDF has resisted pressure from the most right-wing forces within the Israeli government to reduce sharply [the number of] work permits granted to Palestinians in response to the wave of stabbings that began last October. IDF officials generally believe that any such overreaction will only worsen the situation, and they feel vindicated by the dissipation of the stabbings. . . .
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Wednesday, August 24, 2016
Elder of Ziyon
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