Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Friday, September 09, 2016

New paper indicates that settlement activity is not a violation of Geneva Conventions

Professor Eugene Kontorovich has just published an incredibly-well researched paper that looks at the legality of settlement activity in occupied territories from a completely new angle.

The paper takes an exhaustive look at every known example of belligerent occupation in modern times, and finds that for any occupation of more than a few years, settlement activity is a part of the occupation. Kontorovich summarizes his paper this way:

First, the migration of people into occupied territory is a near-ubiquitous feature of extended belligerent occupations. Second, no occupying power has ever taken any measures to discourage or prevent such settlement activity, nor has any occupying power ever expressed opinio juris suggesting that it is bound to do so. Third, and perhaps most strikingly, in none of these situations have the international community or international organizations described the migration of persons into the occupied territory as a violation of Art. 49(6). Even in the rare cases in which such policies have met with international criticism, it has not been in legal terms. This suggests that the level of direct state involvement in “transfer” required to constitute an Art. 49(6) violation may be significantly greater than previously thought. Finally, neither international political bodies nor the new governments of previously occupied territories have ever embraced the removal of illegally transferred civilian settlers as an appropriate remedy.

He looks at examples of settlement activity in East Timor, Western Sahara, Northern Cyprus, Syria/Lebanon, Vietnam/Cambodia, Armenia/Azerbaijan, Russia/Georgia, Russia/Crimea, and the Baltic states.

For example,

Under Russian occupation, Abkhaz authorities have embarked on an explicit settlement enterprise, designed specifically to bolster the proportion of ethnic Abkhazians in territory, at the expense of Georgians, and thus cement the split from Georgia.316 Such an enterprise faces inherent challenges, as the entire Caucuses region experiences net population outflow due to economic conditions.

The occupation authorities have established an official government entity, the State Committee on Repatriation, which encourages ethnic Abkhaz from the diaspora to move to the occupied territory. It actively recruits such individuals, and organizes their flights and transportation. The authorities also provide them with free housing, subsidies, and other assistance. Significant sums are invested in construction for the settlers.

This is not anomalous.

Yet Kontorovich is not establishing merely that Israel is subject to double standards. That part is obvious, but it doesn't prove that Israel isn't violating international law.

His argument is far deeper. The nearly complete absence of any criticism of these actions by the international community - even when the same international community is listing other violations of international law by the belligerent side in these conflicts - means that outside of Israel, none of these activities are considered a violation of the Geneva Conventions' prohibition of "transfer." The bar to violate Geneva is much higher, and appears to be the forced transfer of a population, not the passive or active encouragement of such population movements. (I don't think Kontorovich says this last point explicitly, but in light of his findings, I believe that this is accurate.)

Moreover, the lack of international response to these activities in itself implies that they are legal. Kontorovich quotes a major figure in international law, Malcolm Shaw:

Generally, where states are seen to acquiesce in the behavior of other states without protesting against them, the assumption must be made that such behavior is accepted as legitimate…This means actual protests are called for to the break the legitimizing process [when a new rule is being established by affirmative conduct].

Kontorovich expands on this:

In the situations studied in this Article, the failure to raise legal objections is consistent and general, and extends to international organizations and groups (the U.N.UN Human Rights Commission, the ICRC, and humanitarian NGOs like HRW), whose work it is to systematically point out violations of these norms.

Numerous other circumstances give added weigh to this silence.402 For one, the situations here are not ones that escaped international political condemnation and legal scrutiny. In most of these contexts, the international community has condemned the underlying occupation or aggression, and in most if not all cases, it has criticized the occupying power for violations of IHL and human rights norms. Thus the UN, the EU Parliament, PACE, and other bodies have been asked to denounce these activities as illegal, and have refused.

Such omission speaks loudly. Indeed, in various contexts (e.g. Cyprus, Georgia) the occupying power has been criticized by the international community for the transfer out of protected people (Art. 49(1)), but nothing was said about Art. 49(6). Finally, when some of the settlement activities were criticized by the international community (Vietnam, Armenia), they were not branded illegal. In these cases, we are not dealing with pure silence, but rather with the kind of silence that suggests the underlying conduct is either legal or not clearly illegal.

Crucially, the paper shows that in none of these other cases of occupation are the settlers demanded to be removed as part of any peace plan. That is wholly unique to Israel. (I personally believe that such a forced removal would be a clear violation of international law, as the main parts of article 49 of the Geneva Conventions explicitly deal with the violation of human rights accompanied by the forced removal of populations against their will.)

Kontorovich also makes this devastating point:

Doubtless some will attempt to dismiss the findings of this Article by saying the treatment of settlers in these other contexts was merely politics, rather than law. To be sure, geopolitics is always a presence in international law. That is why scholars must study an issue across all possible geopolitical contexts. Consistency of treatment across different geopolitical contexts suggests a legal rather than a political explanation. Moreover, the situations discussed here are not marked by an international fear of condemning the occupying power – they often are condemned, just not for illegal settlement activity.

Once one admits possible political explanations for how Art. 49(6) is applied, one would have to consider the possibility that maybe it is the exceptional treatment afforded to the Israeli case that is the political one. To put it differently, the point of looking at the broadest set of data is to help exclude alternative hypotheses like “politics.” With a data set of one, one cannot determine whether observed reactions are political or not. Expanding the sample to eight other cases raises a sharp question: what is more likely to be political – the international community’s consistent treatment of settlements across eight vastly different geopolitical situations – or its anomalous treatment of the single notoriously politicized and emotional case of Israel?

It isn't just double standards. It is that the international community has created an artificial international law to apply only to Israel, even though that law simply doesn't exist in other contexts. Not that it exists and is ignored - it doesn't exist. When legal critics give their laundry lists of violations of international law by belligerent occupiers, they simply do not consider settlement activity to be illegal.

This is an extraordinarily important paper that not only reveals much about international law, but also about how much of what people call international law in context of Israel is simply a lie.

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An Israeli leftist slams Brian Eno for his BDS stance

The Guardian reported:

The composer and producer Brian Eno has denied permission for one of Israel’s most critically acclaimed dance companies to continue using his music for a series of performances in Italy after he discovered that the Israeli embassy was sponsoring the event.

Eno, 68, who started his career with Roxy Music but has latterly become known for his ambient music compositions, said he had not been aware his music was being used in a piece by the Batsheva dance company.

Eno, a prominent supporter of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign aimed at Israel’s occupation of the Palestinian territories, wrote to the dance company last month to deny them permission to use his music.

The Batsheva Dance Company posted this response:

"I am willing to give my own house for peace," says Ohad Naharin, who says that Eno's actions are "useless" towards bringing peace.

(h/t Yigal)

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09/08 Links Pt2: Anti-Semitism, Brought to You by the UN; ‘BDS doesn’t want a better Israel — it wants no Israel’

From Ian:

NGO Monitor: World Vision Finances in Jerusalem, the West Bank, and Gaza

On August 4, 2016, the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) announced that Mohammed El-Halabi, manager of the Gaza operations of the international humanitarian non-governmental organization (NGO) World Vision, funneled 60% of the World Vision Gaza budget to the terrorist group Hamas. The Israeli indictment and media reported that these funds were used in the construction of Hamas tunnels, military installations, and other terrorist activities.
World Vision International (WVI) disputes these allegations, arguing that the budget for Gaza operations was smaller than the amount of funds the Shin Bet states were diverted. In a press release, WVI claimed that, “World Vision’s cumulative operating budget in Gaza for the past ten years was approximately $22.5 million, which makes the alleged amount of up to $50 million being diverted hard to reconcile.”
NGO Monitor research demonstrates the obstacles to independent verification of World Vision’s financial claims regarding operations in Gaza. World Vision operates an official Jerusalem-West Bank-Gaza office (JWB). In addition, according to the Israeli Registrar of Non-Profits, there is an Israeli World Vision entity, with offices in Jerusalem. The relationship between the entity registered in Israel and the JWG office is entirely unclear.

Anne Bayefsky: Anti-Semitism, Brought to You by the United Nations

The U.N. gives a platform to many NGOs that actively encourage violence against Jews and the destruction of Israel.
The United Nations was founded as a global pact among states, but over the decades in the name of transparency and to further the aim of globalization, it has opened its doors to more than 6,150 non-governmental organizations (NGOs). While governments wring their hands over incitement to terror and dangerous uses of social media, they ignore the alarming focal point within arms’ reach: the United Nations. An examination of U.N. NGOs reveals that the U.N. has handed a global megaphone to groups spreading hatred and inciting terror from the world stage. In short, the so-called representatives of “civil society” aren’t so civil after all.
In theory, the U.N. has processes for accreditation that share a common requirement: respect for the purposes and principles of the organization. In order to qualify for accreditation, NGOs must operate in conformity with, or promote, the U.N Charter. They must affirm “faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person, in the equal rights of men and women and of nations large and small.”
In practice, NGOs have been welcomed into the world of international diplomacy and have gained access to international media platforms while they are simultaneously betraying the core U.N mission by advocating terror and intolerance.
Most striking for an organization founded on the ashes of the Holocaust, the U.N. has accredited NGOs that play a central role in promoting modern anti-Semitism and encouraging the destruction of the Jewish state.

How the UN Pitched the Media on Antisemitism Event: Don't Worry, Israel-bashing is OK

According to a UN summary provided to news media of a conference on antisemitism held at the UN on September 7, 2016, antisemitism is bad, but condemning Israel is fine. The summary was published on UNifeed, a UN website which provides videos and information about UN events to broadcast news providers. In the words of the UNifeed summary:
"UN / GLOBAL ANTISEMITISM (2:38)
At a high level forum on Global anti-Semitism, General Assembly President Mogens Lykketoft said the UN has 'an enormous responsibility to go up against all expressions of prejudice and incitement,' but noted that 'it's not anti-Semitic to call for an end of the occupation and oppression of the people of Palestine and to demand an end to illegal settlements on occupied Palestinian land.' UNIFEED-UNTV"

Vic Rosenthal's Weekly Column

On Monday morning, an underground parking lot being constructed in Tel Aviv collapsed into itself, killing at least three workers and injuring some 20-odd others. As I write (Wednesday) there are still several workers unaccounted for, probably buried underneath piles of concrete and steel.

Since the collapse, literally hundreds of rescuers – Homefront Command soldiers, firefighters, MDA and Hatzalah workers, special rescue teams with dogs and high-tech equipment to seek weak signals from mobile phones, and others have been working nonstop to try to get to the remaining trapped workers. Some have been pulled out of the rubble, but as time passes it becomes less likely that they will come out alive. Rescue workers say they will not stop until everyone is accounted for. The Prime Minister and the IDF Chief of Staff have visited the scene.

Most construction workers in Israel are Arabs – Israeli citizens or from the territories – or foreign workers. One still missing is Mohammad Dawabshe, a member of the extended family from Duma in Samaria that was a victim of a murderous arson that has been controversially blamed on Jewish extremists.

So what can we say about this?

I don’t mind saying that Israelis care about human life, including non-Jewish human life. You might not believe this if you get your knowledge about us from the subversive, lying Ha’aretz newspaper or the biased foreign press, but they do.

We went to Haiti, to Turkey, to Nepal and to other scenes of natural disasters in order to save lives, which we did, even though Ha’aretz will say that we were just trying to hide the fact that we are committing ‘genocide’ against the Palestinians. We have been systematically providing care for Syrians wounded in the civil war that is taking place next door. Sick Gazans are able to come to Israel for treatment (the obstacles in their way are primarily placed by Hamas, despite what is written in Ha’aretz). Even relatives of Hamas and PLO leaders are treated in hospitals in Israel.

Our army really does try to avoid hurting non-combatants when we defend ourselves against murderous attacks. International military experts say so, despite the flood of propaganda from anti-Israel sources.

Every day Amira Hass writes in Ha’aretz that Israeli security forces and ‘settlers’ practice deliberate cruelty against Arabs. But every day Amira Hass puts on her one-way glasses, the ones that block Arab terrorism and Jew hatred, and magnify accusations against Israel. This is how a conflict looks when you see only one side. And the more ‘information’ that you get that comes through filters like Hass, the more you become incapable of seeing things differently.

Although the PLO and Hamas are obsessed with death, there are Arabs that care about life too. An example of a real-life situation here was the murder of Rabbi Miki Mark in June. The car in which he was travelling with his wife and several of his children was riddled with bullets by Hamas terrorists. Rabbi Mark was killed, his wife seriously wounded and two children also injured. But the first car that stopped to help was occupied by an Arab man and his doctor wife, who got them out of the car and provided first aid. It becomes still more complicated when you note that these Arabs protected them from other passers-by who were not so benign, and that one of the rescuers lost his job because of the incident. Because he saved the lives of Jews.

But to return to the construction site, isn’t it the case that safety rules and practices in the construction industry are outrageously lax, and many workers are killed every year in avoidable accidents? And isn’t this because the workers are non-Jews and we don’t care about them?

The answer to these questions are ‘yes’ and ‘no’. Construction in the US is much safer. More money and time is invested in worker safety. But the lack of attention to safety in Israel does not only affect non-Jewish workers. As I found in my years working on two kibbutzim and in my army service, there are cultural attitudes that express themselves as carelessness, attitudes that are shared to a great extent by both Jews and Arabs. My wife says it’s a Middle Eastern macho thing: we don’t need no stinkin’ hard hats, ear plugs, or dust masks.

In this incident, as in the collapse of the “Versailles” wedding hall 15 years ago when 23 lost their lives and 380 were injured, it’s obvious that there was negligence, and heads will probably roll. There has already been one person placed under house arrest by the police in connection with this incident.

As always, after a particularly bad accident or terror attack everyone says “well, now things will have to be different.” But most of the time they go back to being more or less the way they were. The Versailles disaster was much worse and changes were made, but apparently the procedures for ensuring that sound design and construction practices are followed still need improvement.

It’s hard to change deeply embedded cultural attitudes, and the Israeli attitude is to distrust rules and regulations and improvise as the situation demands. As I have been told countless times in this country, “don’t worry, it will be OK.”

But not everything can be flown by the seat of your pants or fixed in the field with duct tape. The air force learned this a long time ago, and the army learned it from the Second Lebanon War. Maybe it’s time the construction industry learned it too.

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09/08 Links Pt1: Abbas was KGB Agent in Syria in 1980s; Palestinian court postpones local elections

From Ian:

PMW: Murderer of 6 is Fatah’s candidate for Hebron City Council

In the approaching Palestinian local municipal elections, Fatah has chosen a special candidate to run for election to Hebron’s City Council: a convicted murderer.
On Facebook, Fatah praised its candidate Tayseer Abu Sneineh and took pride in his participation in the murder of 6 Israelis in 1980:
Posted text: "The number 2 candidate on the Fatah Movement list in the Hebron City Council elections - hero of the Daboya operation (i.e., Beit Hadassah terror attack, 6 murdered) Tayseer Abu Sneineh - one of the heroes of the Daboya operation on May 2, 1980.”
Tayseer Abu Sneineh was one of four Palestinian terrorists who attacked a group of Israelis on May 2, 1980, in Hebron, near Beit Hadassah - the only building in Hebron in which Jews lived at the time. They murdered 6 Israeli young men and wounded 20. All four terrorists were sentenced to life in prison, but were released in various prisoner exchange deals in the 1980s.
Fatah’s post announcing Abu Sneineh’s candidacy went on to describe the terror attack as “one of the most important battles and acts of bravery of the Fatah Movement” and “one of the most courageous self-sacrifice operations.” Fatah furthermore praised the killers as “heroes” and men “of delicate emotions”:
“Four young people met on one of the cold days of March 1980 in a cave in the Hebron hills... on that very day the four were unknown...
After a few months, the four carried out one of the most courageous self-sacrifice operations in the occupied areas, if not the most courageous, and it is the attack against the Jewish settlers in Hebron...
The four heroes were not murderers, who feel a sense of enjoyment and satisfaction from the sight of blood, but rather [men] of delicate emotions, who the extremist Zionist occupiers denied the rights of their Palestinian people, and they did not find any other means besides weapons in order to restore them [the rights]...”
[Official Fatah Facebook page, Aug. 27, 2016]
Abu Sneineh is not the only murderer who is being considered a respectable figure in Palestinian politics.

Analysis: Abbas, the KGB and the world of Middle East espionage

The revelation that the Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas, also known as 'Abu Mazen,’ was a KGB agent, should not surprise historians and researchers of the PLO movement and the methods of the Soviet Union.
Since its creation in 1959, the Fatah group, and later the PLO, were influenced, penetrated and supported by various Arab intelligence communities, the KGB and its satellite security services in the communist bloc. More than ideological bonding it was a marriage of convenience.
The PLO needed financial support, military training and weapons. The Soviet Union, entangled in the Cold War with the West, wanted to increase its influence in the Middle East. The Soviet Union and its client states in Eastern Europe supported “progressive” movements and groups around the globe, including those who were involved in terror and violence.
While the Soviet Union tried to keep its hands “clean,” it instructed the security services of its client states to do the dirty work. The East German Stasi, and also the Hungarian and the Bulgarian agencies, trained PLO officers, gave them weapons, documents and hosted notorious terrorists such as Abu Nidal, Carlos and Wadi Haddad. The Black September terrorists who killed the 11 Israeli athletes at the 1972 Munich Olympics traveled via East Berlin.
Yasser Arafat himself was photographed by “Securității” the Romanian security service in an intimate position in his hotel room in the company of his body guards while visiting Bucharest. (h/t Yenta Press)

JCPA: Israel’s Rights in the Territories under International Law
Amb. Alan Baker: International Law Expert: Israel Is Not an “Occupier”

I just joined Patreon, a crowdfunding site that allows you to give money every month for those who create content that you love (videos, blogs, art, games...) Patrons get rewards based on their level of giving.

Some sites are getting tens thousands of dollars a month. I see one idiotic anti-Israel blogger manages to get $1200 a month!

If you are a fan of EoZ, you know that I work hard to bring you news that you wont see elsewhere. I also want to give more to the columnists and others who contribute to the blog.

More than that, I would love to do this full-time and build EoZ (or an offshoot, probably with a different name) into an entire organization that goes way beyond the blog to actual newsletters to distribute to pro-Israel churches and synagogues, lesson plans to help teach students about the issues before they go to college, more formalized review of textbooks for anti-Israel bias, and many more initiatives. Some of the ideas I have are listed on my Patreon page.

Why should you become a patron? Well, let me show you:

Become a patron of EoZ and help us defend Israel with facts.

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Palestinian textbook teaches how to pray

I reported on Monday that Palestinians were complaining that their new textbooks, released with much fanfare late last month, included many mistakes on maps and implied that Ramallah was the capital of "Palestine."

The Palestinian Education Ministry responded by claiming that Israel created these textbooks and somehow infiltrated them into Palestinian schools!

The Palestinian ministry of education Wednesday condemned the issuing of fake Palestinian history school books that contained false information on Palestine.

The ministry said in a statement that Israel issued school books that resembled official Palestinian school books, but included false information such as Jerusalem being the capital of Israel, adding that the move was an attempt to distort the Palestinian national identity.

However, it was unclear if there was a specific Israeli company that was behind the publishing of the books.

The ministry warned against using the Israeli-issued copies of the Palestinian school books, while calling on all schools in Jerusalem, teachers, parents, and students to be aware of the falsified school books.

So those nefarious Jews spent hundreds of hours and tens of thousands of dollars to create fake Palestinian textbooks!

What makes this even more interesting is that the minister of education, Tharwat Zaid, originally blamed the mistakes on editing and printing errors, and said that the same thing happens in other countries, and that it would be corrected. But as the complaints piled up, he apparently decided that saying that Israel was behind the problem is a better response.

The ministry of education did teach an important lesson to its students: when faced with a major embarrassing mistake, blame the Jews.

The new curriculum is not only being criticized for its allegedly Zionist content, but also because it is misogynist:

Women are depicted in first- and second-grade Islamic Education textbooks as witches and sorceresses -- and this is really catching flak.

One image features a witch under the Quran verse that reads: "I seek refuge with Allah from Satan, the accursed." Another image of a witch is accompanied by a verse from the Quran that refers to the "evil of malignant witchcraft."

Critics say that associating women with witchcraft is extremely disrespectful and offensive towards Palestinian women.

"Children in grades 1 and 2 are being taught that women are witches or hags," they protested. "The lesson they are being taught is that the first half of society is Muslim, while the second half is infidel."

It is unclear whether this is being blamed on Israel as well.

It is also worth emphasizing that the Palestinian Arab curriculum mandates "Islamic education" in public schools, and UNRWA teaches Islam in its schools when it uses this curriculum, violating its own UN standards by hiring Islamic studies teachers and teaching Islam.

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In Nazareth Illit, three Muslim women beat a Christian woman in their building because her son serves in the Border Police.

The Muslims, who are sisters, have also abused the Christian in other ways. They poured acid on the boy's uniform while it was hanging outside, emptied trash by the door of their apartment and cursed the mother repeatedly.

Two weeks ago the mother filed a complaint with the police after the three sisters entered her house and started beating her.

The lawyer for the Christian woman, Eyal Peltak, says that other Christians who decide to serve their country have also suffered from abuse from their Muslim neighbors. There have been inquiries and recommendations made but nothing has been done.

In 2014, there were some 300 Christians in the IDF, 1500 Christians in the police and over 100 in the Border Police. Increasing numbers of Christians have been choosing to serve even though they are not obligated to under the law. Christian and Muslim Israelis who join the police or military are subjected to intense pressure and insults from many of their Muslim neighbors as well as from Palestinian Arabs who regard them as traitors.

(h/t Yoel)

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Israeli police reward rioters by forbidding Jewish prayer in Muslim Quarter

Arutz-7 reports:

A ban on Jewish prayer on the Temple Mount has been extended to the Muslim Quarter of the Old City, police officials say, justifying the series of recent arrests of Jews praying outside of entrances to the Temple Mount.

After a number of arrests of Jews praying outside of the gates of the Temple Mount, police justified the arrests during a court hearing on Monday, claiming that the ban on Jewish prayer is not limited to the Temple Mount, but extends to the areas around the entrances to the holy site and even to the Muslim Quarter as a whole.

Police representatives Safi Sarahan and Roei Avrahami explained the ban in court, following questioning by an attorney from the Honenu organization representing several girls arrested for praying in the vicinity of the Temple Mount.

The officers revealed that prayer by Jews anywhere near the Temple Mount or even in the Muslim Quarter was considered “disturbing the peace”, except where coordinated with the police in advance.

“Prayer is permissible anywhere in the Jewish Quarter, but the moment you come without permission and pray in the Muslim Quarter, that causes a public disturbance. Inside the Muslim Quarters and the entrances it is forbidden to pray.”

When pressed by the Honenu attorney to cite the law which prohibited Jewish prayer in the Muslim Quarter, the police represents said the matter was within the discretion of the police, under their general responsibility for “keeping the peace”.

NRG broke the story, and followed up,. Agriculture Minister Uri Ariel said it is a discriminatory policy by the police. "If a Jew prays, it can anger the Muslims, then they will breach the public peace, that makes a riot, they run wild, so Jews are not allowed to pray. Everything is upside down. After all, somewhere in Tel Aviv, if a Muslim wants to pray, he has no problem, he takes the prayer mat in the middle of Tel Aviv, the middle of Safed, the middle of each location in Israel - there is no one to bother him about it. We respected him. Would one of us dare to raise a hand against him?! To mock him ?! No, he is respected."

Effectively, Muslims are being rewarded for antisemitism and rioting. By the police in the Jewish state. The police are agreeing with the Muslims that prayers are "provocative" and violence in response to those so-called provocations are fine.

Will Jews need special permission to pray at the Kotel HaKatan, or the Ohel Yitzchak synagogue, both of which are in the Muslim quarter?

All Muslims have to do to rid the quarter of Jews is to start riots, and the police will do what the Muslims want accomplished.

Amnesty and HRW have a dilemma. Do they support the Jews who want to exercise their human right of freedom of worship, or do they support the Israeli police? I think that these brave "human rights" workers will stay out of this issue because they can't support either side.

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09/07 Links Pt2: Elder of Ziyon interviewed at Jewish Press; Mamet on movies

From Ian:

Fighting Israel’s Battle Online An Interview with Influential Blogger: ‘Elder of Ziyon’

On March 1, “Elder of Ziyon” – the anonymous author behind www.ElderofZiyon.blogspot.com – posted a map from a McGraw Hill college textbook purporting to show “Palestinian loss of land 1946 to 2000.” Considering that Jews were often called “Palestinians” before 1948, and that Palestinian Arabs – as a “nation” – never owned any territory until Israel carved out autonomous regions for them in 1993, the map was highly misleading.
Elder of Ziyon demanded that McGraw Hill “be held accountable for pushing such propaganda in college classrooms” and called on his readers to e-mail the publisher. Remarkably, within a week, McGraw Hill had removed the book from circulation and promised to destroy all remaining copies.
It is victories like these, and many smaller ones, that motivate Elder of Ziyon – the name is “meant to be ironic,” he says – to continue blogging daily, as he has for over 12 years.
The Jewish Press: Why do you blog under an alias?
Elder of Ziyon: I’m not worried about death threats or anything like that. The main reason is professional. I work in a high-tech industry and it doesn’t help my career potential to use my real name. For any future jobs, people would see my name and think I’m not doing any work – that I blog all day.

Mamet on movies

David Mamet does not answer questions directly.
A linear Q&A would be too boring for the actor, director and playwright, who enjoys and revels in the art of storytelling.
Ask him a question about casting, and he launches into a joke about St. Peter at the pearly gates. Ask him the best way to direct a movie and he explains that the art of film is essentially a long con game with the audience, where deception is key.
But ask him about the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement, and he’s surprisingly frank. “It’s an obscenity. The BDS movement is an absolute obscenity,” the Pulitzer prize winning writer and director lamented in a discussion at the Jerusalem Ma’aleh school of television, film and arts last week.
“It’s just another example of anti-Semitism, and in America it’s been accepted. The Jewish contribution is great and vast, but nobody likes us. Young kids would ask ‘why?’ and I’d say, ‘you don’t have to answer that.
That’s not your problem,’” he said bluntly.
Mamet lays the majority of the blame for the movement’s popularity on liberal Reform Jews in the US who he says have lost sight of the religion and focus too much on mitzvot or good deeds.
“The BDS movement is an outgrowth of a pseudo- religious consciousness. A liberal, Western Jewish consciousness divorced from religion,” he explained.

Amb. Danny Danon: Taking the Fight Against Anti-Semitism to the United Nations

For all of its good intentions, the United Nations is an institution full of contradictions.
The organization’s founding charter in 1945 stated it would hope to “achieve international co-operation in solving international problems of an economic, social, cultural, or humanitarian character and in promoting and encouraging respect for human rights and for fundamental freedoms for all without distinction as to race, sex, language, or religion.”
Yet all too often, the UN has been manipulated by dictators and despots who place little importance on these values.
At a special gathering Wednesday, “The High Level Forum on Global anti-Semitism,” Israel, the United States, Canada and the nations of the European Union will come to together and work toward a true fulfillment of the UN’s vision. Some of the world’s leading academics, diplomats and experts from the private sector will conduct an honest assessment of the current damage inflicted on humanity by anti-Semitism and plan concrete steps the international community can take to minimize, and eventually eliminate, this particular form of hate.
The United Nations wasn’t founded in a vacuum. It was established after the horrors of World War II and the terrible tragedy of the Holocaust. Despite the raison d’etre for its existence, until 2005 the United Nations didn’t officially mark a Holocaust remembrance day, nor did it seek to educate its member-states about it.
The institution hasn’t been immune to anti-Semitism. All too often Israel has been singled out, boycotted and treated differently for no reason other than it is the world’s only Jewish state. Israel has been accused of being modern-day Nazis by some at the UN, and at its depth of hypocrisy, the world’s nations passed a resolution in the General Assembly in 1975 equating the national movement of the Jewish people, Zionism, with racism.

While Netanyahu is protested in the Netherlands, a Hamas leader freely accesses Parliament

There was an uproar earlier today when Prime Minister Netanyahu visited the parliament in the Netherlands and one of the MPs refused to shake his hand.

Many people protested Netanyahu's visit because, you know, he is just so immoral.

One of the protesters is Amin Abu Rashid, who put this video on his Facebook page specifically to protest Netanyahu's visit:

Rashid is a major Hamas figure in the Netherlands.

And as this video shows, he has full access to the parliament, with no protests.

1. Zo makkelijk loopt kopstuk #Hamas parlement in en uit.
2. Cie BuZa ontvangt commandant Supermarkt Inspectieteams. pic.twitter.com/7Hcwycbv5r
— Prof. D.A.H. Vintik (@Prof_DAH_Vintik) September 7, 2016

He posts antisemitic cartoons.

Yet he can walk into the parliament without anyone batting an eye.

The Dutch are in serious trouble.

(h/t Mark)

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BBC Looking For More Negative Angle On Israel's Treatment Of Wounded Syrians (PreOccupied Territory)

Our weekly column from the humor site PreOccupied Territory.

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Safed, September 7 - The British Broadcasting Corporation is holding off on production of a segment on injured Syrian civilians receiving medical treatment in Israeli hospitals until a sufficiently dark portrayal of the policy can be worked into the broadcast.

Thousands of Syrians have been spirited across the Syrian frontier with the Golan Heights to institutions such as Rambam Hospital in Haifa and Sieff Hospital here in Safed, in clandestine coordination between the Israeli military and various Syrian groups fighting the Assad regime. Pro-Assad media and institutions refer in blanket terms to the patients in Israel as terrorists, but BBC editors are looking for an angle that preserves the wounded Syrians' innocent humanity while highlighting Israel's cynical exploitation of the situation.

"It has to be just credible enough - we do have some journalistic standards," explained Ann T. Semitt of the Jerusalem bureau. "It doesn't fly anymore with much of our audience to explicitly parrot the propaganda of a genocidal dictator such as Assad, so we have to find a different approach to smearing Israel in an article about something good Israel is otherwise doing. "

Semitt said the bureau and BBC headquarters in London had held extensive discussions of options for framing the Israeli medical treatment in negative terms, but had yet to hit on a compelling formula. "We couldn't find a convincing way to shoehorn mention of Palestinian suffering into the clip without it seeming contrived, and the best we've come up with so far is overstating the plight of Druze residents of the Golan Heights, and emphasizing that Israel's annexation of the area has never been internationally recognized. But that doesn't spark the emotion the way, for example, charges of organ-harvesting might. We're still basically at the drawing-board stage."

Other possible angles included a focus on mishaps that may have taken place during the course of the treatment, or the not-so-veiled implication that the Syrian patients were brought to Israel against their will. However, specifics on the Syrian cases were difficult to obtain, and it soon became clear that every Syrian patient was brought at his or her own request, or that of family. Semitt, however, expressed confidence that the BBC would soon arrive at the right anti-Israel formulation, at which point the video segment could be produced.

"We always get there in the end," she promised. "As some historical figure once said, 'If you will it, it is no dream.'"

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09/07 Links Pt1: Posthumous medal for IDF soldier who fought stabbers ‘barehanded’; Hamas TV Glorifies Murder Of Rabbi

From Ian:

Amb. Alan Baker: Israel’s Rights in the Territories under International Law

Israel Is Not an “Occupier”
International law defines “occupation” as one power occupying the lands of a foreign sovereign. In Israel’s case, Israel is not occupying any foreign sovereign’s land; Israel entered the area known as the West Bank in 1967 and took over the authority to administer the land from Jordan, which was never considered to be a sovereign in the area.
“Palestinian Territories” Is Not a Legal Term
The international community’s constant referral to the “Palestinian territories” is a complete fallacy and has absolutely no legal or political basis. There has never been a Palestinian state, as such, and therefore the territories never belonged to any Palestinian entity. There’s no international agreement, there’s no contract, there’s no treaty, and there’s no binding international resolution that determines that the territories belong to the Palestinians.
In actual fact, even the Palestinians themselves, in the Oslo agreement that they signed with Israel, acknowledge the fact that the ultimate permanent status of the territory is to be determined by negotiations. Therefore, even the Palestinians accept the fact that this is not Palestinian territory, its disputed territory whose status is yet to be settled.
The Settlements Are Not Illegitimate
There’s one other point, the issue of settlements is a negotiating issue. The Palestinians have agreed with the Israelis that the issue of settlements is one of the issues on the permanent status negotiating table. Therefore, anybody who comes along and claims that Israel’s settlements are illegitimate – whether it’s the EU, whether it’s individual governments, whether it is the secretary of state of the United States, who said so specifically, or the spokesman of the State Department – they’re prejudging a negotiating issue, which is clearly incompatible with any negotiating principle.
There’s No Such Thing as 1967 Borders
There’s no such thing as 1967 borders. A border is a line between two sovereign entities. In 1967, there was a ceasefire line that had existed since the 1948-1949 war between the Arab states and Israel and after Israel declared its independence. The Jordanians insisted on inserting in the Armistice Agreement of 1949 a provision which says that the armistice demarcation line is not the final border. Final borders can only be determined in peace negotiations between the parties. So “1967 borders” is a non-existent term and anybody using this term – again, including the U.S. administration and the EU – are simply being misled.

Elliott Abrams: Obama: See No Evil, See No Enemies

What has been the American response? What has the White House decided? To do nothing, and to tell the Navy to bob and weave and duck. The administration remains committed to its nuclear deal above all, and is willing to allow these dangerous and humiliating maneuvers against the Navy without reply. It is engaged in covering up Iran’s violations of the nuclear deal, denying them, and allowing secret exemptions. Meanwhile Iran increases its presence and activity in Iraq and Syria and uses the nuclear deal to build its economy.
It would be easy to show the Cuban regime, and the Cuban people, that we care more about freedom than Jet Blue; all that was required was a visit to Guillermo Farinas. Still, the administration won’t do it, refusing to undermine its message that Cuba is changing and is our new friend. It is not so easy to show the world that we are not cowed by Iran and that our Navy will not be abused by the Iranian Navy; that will actually require sinking an Iranian vessel. But here again, the administration will not undermine its message that the nuclear deal will bring peace and moderation.
So it will be up to our next president to distinguish between friends and enemies. If he or she wants to send the world a message that the Obama era is over and America is back, visits to Cuban dissidents like Farinas and one sinking of an Iranian ship that is illegally and dangerously harassing a U.S. Navy vessel would be the best and likely the cheapest ways to do so.

Will Obama roll the dice on the Middle East one more time?

Barack Obama took office in 2009 with two big personal priorities in foreign policy: the limitation of nuclear weapons and the cause of Palestinian statehood. This summer the president has been weighing a flurry of possible last-minute actions to cement his legacy on nukes, including a U.N. resolution that would ban testing. That raises an obvious question: Will Obama also launch an 11th-hour Mideast gambit?
The possibility has been debated in and outside the White House ever since Secretary of State John F. Kerry’s quixotic effort to broker an Israeli-Palestinian deal collapsed in 2014. All along, the assumption has been that Obama might wait to act until after the presidential election, so as to avoid creating problems for Hillary Clinton. There’s plenty of precedent: Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton and George W. Bush all bid for a Middle East legacy during their final months.
Not surprisingly, the prospect of an Obama initiative — which could take the form of a speech, or at its most ambitious, a U.N. resolution — is producing “high anxiety in the Netanyahu world,” as one former administration official puts it. That would be Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu, the Israeli leader who has haunted and taunted Obama since he took office — and absorbed in return more White House animus and abuse than any other U.S. ally. In the end, Obama’s final decisions on the Middle East may be driven by another drama: the Barack and Bibi endgame.

Professor Radwan Amr, who is the director of manuscripts department at the Al Aqsa mosque, says that a group of "settler" held a formal wedding ceremony on the Temple Mount, guarded by police and special forces.

This story was reported as fact by the official Wafa News Agency of the Palestinian Authority.

Needless to say, the screaming "worshipers" at the site didn't manage to take any photos or video of this event.

Jewish visitors who were peacefully visiting the site were reported to be creating an "extremely tense atmosphere" with their "provocative incursions."

Since Wafa reported it, other Palestinian media followed suit.

Which means that Mondoweiss and Electronic Intifada may not be far behind.

It's funny, because they won't report the very obvious lies and accusations in Palestinian media, because it would make them look bad when they are debunked, but they happily report any accusations that they feel are true.

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B'Tselem Won't Call Hamas a Terrorist Organization (Judean Rose)

Varda Meyers Epstein's weekly column:

It's hard to understand why someone like Sarit Michaeli, the spokesperson for B'Tselem, the so-called human rights organization, continues to live in Israel, considering the fact that she sees Israel as an "occupier" of its Arab minority. I mean, if she thinks she's guilty of a crime, why doesn't she leave?

At the same time, it's even more difficult to understand why anyone gives her a platform to spew her nonsense. Still, Alan Mendoza of JTV acquitted himself well in his interview of Michaeli.

He at least tried to pin her down, to make her admit that, for instance, Hamas, the ruling power in Gaza, is a terrorist organization. He asks her once, twice, three times. But that comes later.

The interview begins with an overview of B'Tselem history and how the org has morphed from being all about the "occupation," all the time, to sometimes noticing that the other side isn't exactly playing fair. You know how it goes: gotta look balanced or no one takes you seriously. Especially since you got caught giving out cameras to people in Hebron to take that little film clip of Elor Azaria in which you MUTED THE SOUND.

Soon enough, thank God, Mendoza cuts off her blather:

Alan Mendoza: Okay, so the original goal was informational, and to bring to light human rights abuses. What's the goal today?

Sarit Michaeli: So I think over the years, the situation has changed on the ground and I think our understanding as well of the inflation of our role in the broader picture is also evolved.

(Take a deep breath. Not really, but this is going to be long.)

Sarit Michaeli: If in the past, it seemed like information is enough in order to spur Israelis on to action, to get them to oppose the Israeli occupation—which we do as the pure problem of human rights violations of Palestinians living under it—now of course we're much more nuanced I think in our understanding and we know that this isn't simply going to change purely by providing this information, but information and research is still, for the basic building block of our work but on top of that we do a lot of advocacy with Israel, with the international community, with the Israeli public, talking about the reality on the ground, talking about what it means, you know, we're actually only just a week following the 49th anniversary of the occupation, actually half a century, entering a 50th year of the occupation, and one of the key things for us is trying to explain the reality on the ground all Palestinians living under the occupation today. . .

(Someone, anyone, please write the McWhirter brothers. Surely that's a sentence worthy of a Guinness record?)

Alan Mendoza: I get you want to explain what's happening on the ground. Where do you want that to go to? What's your end point in this?

Sarit Michaeli: I mean, for us I think the key issue is that the Israeli occupation needs to end. B'Tselem doesn't say. . .

Alan Mendoza: Is that a two-state solution or a one-state solution?

Sarit Michaeli: B'Tselem doesn't provide a blueprint as to how to end the conflict. It's far beyond the limits of our mandate. Our mandate is to look at the current situation and to you know, influence Israelis and Palestinians to reach a decision on how to end the conflict between them and how to resolve it, you know, in whatever way that of course, appears to work for both sides, but also to force it to benchmarks, to human rights benchmarks.

Alan Mendoza: I understand that. You speak of human rights benchmarks. Of course it's important those are kept to. What about benchmarks on the Palestinian side? It doesn't appear you have any interest in Palestinian rights and we know, we've had many reports from Palestinian human rights activists about what happens under the Palestinian Authority. Torture, murder, things like that. Where's your comment on that?

Ooh. SNAP.

Sarit Michaeli: Well absolutely, so our website of course includes critique, not just theoretical critiques, but also information and data on the most egregious human rights violations under the Palestinian Authority but also under the Hamas regime in Gaza. We certainly view human rights as a universal issue and of course it would be completely absurd not to relate to these kinds of violations. What we try to also do is we work out what we would be effective in doing, so when it comes to the recent, for example, execution in Gaza by Hamas, to torture and various forms of denial of freedom of speech by the PA, of course we've made very clear statements about this. We've also made statements and we denounce in very categorical terms Palestinian attacks against Israeli civilians are not just a violation of the rights of the Palestinians by other Palestinians, but also a violation of Israelis by Palestinians.

Say what?

Sarit Michaeli: However, as it is really an Israeli organization, the bulk of our research and our work and our effort goes at self-criticism so looking at our own government, our own army. . .

Here it comes. The big question. First time:

Alan Mendoza: Let's look at one issue. Is Hamas a terrorist organization?

Sarit Michaeli: Hamas engages in clear terrorist acts when it bombs Israeli civilians. We have denounced these actions clearly, I mean if you're referring to the attempt by a former Israeli Member of Knesset to basically smear B'Tselem's director, in order to place us in a position, to present a false image, as if B'Tselem is somehow, in any way, in support of attacks against civilians, it's simply incorrect and it is simply, basically a form of political attack against us then what can we do. . .

Second time:

Alan Mendoza: Are you prepared to call Hamas a terrorist organization? That's what I'm asking you.

Third time:

Alan Mendoza: Are you prepared to call Hamas a terrorist organization?

Sarit Michaeli: As I said, we denounce the terrorist acts perpetrated by Hamas military. We have stated that again and again. Again what you're referring to is a clear attempt by Israeli politicians, to try and present us as if we are terrorists . . .

Alan Mendoza: It's a very simple question. . .

Sarit Michaeli: . . . and of course this is simply unacceptable. . .

Alan Mendoza: . . . and you're not answering it.

Sarit Mendoza: I answered it.

Alan Mendoza: Well, it seems that you believe that Hamas is not a terrorist organization. . .

Sarit Mendoza: We have said that Hamas attacks Israelis, attacks Israeli civilians, and it bombs Israeli civilians. We've denounced these acts, clearly.

Alan Mendoza: It's a terrorist organization part of the time.

Sarit Michaeli: I've answered your question.

Actually, no. You haven't.

Sarit Michaeli: You're trying to basically present our, you know, our attitude and approach to this issue based on the framing of you know, presented by an Israeli extremist right-wing Member of Knesset when he was a radio reporter. This is the backdrop to what we're talking about. I think this notion of somehow like smearing us as like terrorist sympathizers, it's just simply unacceptable. B'Tselem has a very clear record of condemning this type of violence.

Alan Mendoza: I'm afraid that's all we've got time for. Thank you for joining us.

So as a mother of 12 kids, what this reminded me of most is the theory that you never call a child "bad." Rather, you say his actions are bad. "Jimmy, it is a bad thing to bite Susie" but never , "Jimmy, you are a bad boy for biting Susie."

In other words, B'Tselem views Hamas as an unruly child to be tamed with psychobabble. Michaeli won't characterize Hamas as a terrorist organization. She has no compunction, on the other hand, about characterizing Israel as an "occupier."

Just another example of the soft bigotry of low expectations, brought to you by B'Tselem.

(h/t Natan Epstein)

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