Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Sunday, October 16, 2016

FrontPage Mag Says "Hello" to San Francisco State University (Michael Lumish)

David Horowitz's FrontPage Magazine has a piece entitled, San Francisco State: A Haven for Supporters of Terrorists.

Whatever anyone might say about Horowitz he definitely does not pull punches. I always think of the guy as a general marshalling his troops and setting them forth to ideological warfare. But I feel reasonably certain that he, himself, would agree with that assessment.

The editors at FrontPage tell us:

Last night, the David Horowitz Freedom Center brought its Stop the Jew Hatred on Campus poster campaign to San Francisco State University, a campus that is notorious for its glorification of anti-Israel terrorism and anti-Semitism...

The posters are part of a larger Freedom Center campaign titled Stop the Jew Hatred on Campus which seeks to confront the agents of campus anti-Semitism and expose the financial and organizational relationship between the terror group Hamas and Hamas support groups such as Students for Justice in Palestine. As part of the campaign, the Freedom Center has placed posters on several campuses including San Diego State University, the University of California-Irvine and the University of California-Los Angeles. The campaign also recently released a report on the “Top Ten Schools Supporting Terrorists” which may be found on the campaign website, www.StoptheJewHatredonCampus.org. San Francisco State University is among the campuses listed in the Top Ten report.

I do not know what effect this kind of "guerrilla politics" will have on the way people think about either the rise of Political Islam or the Arab-Israel conflict, although it may get a few people talking on that campus... either that or they will ignore the whole thing entirely.

One or the other.

My guess is that many Jewish students at SFSU will roll their eyes and turn away. Some will want to keep their head down out of fear for their social standing. Others will feel a degree of relief in recognizing that at least some people genuinely are pro-Israel and pro-Jewish, even if it does come from the much berated American right-wing. And maybe there will even be a few other Jewish students inspired to stand up and organize on behalf of their own people.

We shall see.

I feel a strong connection to this story in part because I am an alumnus. It is also because the university put up a mural of Edward Said, one of the most prominent anti-Semites working in academia in the United States during the twentieth-century.

There should be two caveats in discussing SFSU anti-Semitism, however..

The first is that Jewish parents who send their kids to that university should know that if their kids keep their heads down they'll be just fine. When I was there at the end of the 1990s, I honestly did not care that much about Israel and I had a terrific university experience at SFSU.

Of course, there was the day where I witnessed a bunch of black students holding up a poster with an American flag wherein the stars were replaced by 50 little Stars of David. That was a sort-of "wake up call" but all it elicited from me was a strongly worded letter to the editor. As I recall, the letter was not so much about condemning the poster itself, as it was about its potential for alienating Jewish students from left-leaning coalitions.

The second caveat is that this is obviously not a distinct SFSU problem. Sure, SFSU is prominent among American universities in its advancement of hatred toward the Jewish State of Israel - and thus inevitably toward Jews, in general - but it is hardly alone.

The current ongoing kerfuffle around SFSU is primarily about the rise of an anti-Israel / anti-Jewish political culture on that campus nurtured by, among others, Professor Rabab Abdulhadi, faculty advisor to the General Union of Palestine Students (GUPS) and Associate Professor of "Race and Resistance Studies."

The development of these interrelated stories was organic. I wrote about it. Dusty at Pro-Israel Bay Bloggers wrote about it. And, most significantly, both Cinnamon Stillwell (West Coast Representative for the Middle East Forum's Campus Watch) and Tammi Benjamin (AMCHA Initiative founder and UC Santa Cruz instructor) covered the stories, as well.

Most recently even Daniel Pipes of the Middle East Studies Forum has written about SFSU anti-Semitism, so the broader story appears to have legs.

For me it started with the guy below, Mohammad G. Hammad, former president of GUPS, holding his trusty blade back in 2013.

If you are reading this it is fairly likely that this face may look familiar. Mr. Hammad posted the photo above on his Tumblr page with this message:

I seriously can not get over how much I love this blade. It is the sharpest thing I own and cuts through everything like butter and just holding it makes me want to stab an Israeli soldier…

That was the moment that I got hooked on the story, mainly out of well-founded concern that the university - while expelling an advocate for outright murder in Mr. Hammad - nonetheless continues to support GUPS even as members of GUPS call for Intifada which is nothing less than a call for the genocide of the Jews in the Middle East.

This is what must be understood by university administrators around the country. When students cry out for Intifada they are crying out specifically for Jewish blood and university administrators from around the country (and Europe, and Australia) need to account for why they are just dandy with student calls for genocide.

Someone like Jerusalem mayor, Nir Barkat, must have an amazingly strong stomach to endure hate-filled students screaming in his face for his own murder as we saw last spring when he was invited by the local Hillel to speak on campus.

The man got ambushed.

Then, of course, we have Abdhuladi's attempt to normalize anti-Jewish hatred on university campuses though her successful efforts to partner SFSU with that "greenhouse" for Jihadis, An-Najah University in Nablus.

And finally - for the moment - there was the Edward Said mural festivities that featured GUPS members, and others, holding aloft signs calling for the murder of "colonizers." I do not know about you, but when Arab or Muslim students from organizations like GUPS - or, say, the Muslim Student Association, or, say, Students for Justice in Palestine - hold aloft signs calling for the killing of "colonizers" my guess is that they are not referring to the Polish. On the contrary, I get the sneaking feeling that they may be discussing my friends and relatives in places like Haifa, Tel Aviv, and Jerusalem.

In any case, stay tuned because as long as the President of San Francisco State University can say, as President Wong did not so long ago, that "GUPS is the very purpose of this great university" then Jewish people associated with that campus, if they care about Israel and their fellow Jews, have a fight on their hands whether they like it or not.

My first recommendation is to encourage Jewish SFSU donors to divert their generous offers to AMCHA or Campus Watch, rather than to an openly anti-Semitic university.

My next recommendation is to keep a close eye on the writings and investigations of:

Tammi Rossman-Benjamin.

Cinnamon Stillwell.

Pro-Israel Bay Bloggers.

And, indeed, I will have my say, as well.

I don't think that any of us are much in the mood to allow this virulent hatred of Israel and Jews - based on lies, misinformation, and propaganda - to continue without response.

What we need, however, is for the mainstream press to pick up the larger story of the camouflaging of campus anti-Semitism under a veil of anti-Zionism and drive it home to the peoples of North America, Europe, and Australia.

That and a little Krav Maga for your kids might be good.

Michael Lumish is a blogger at the Israel Thrives blog as well as a regular contributor/blogger at Times of Israel and Jews Down Under.

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PA art classes brainwashing kids to hate Israel and Jews

The Fatah Facebook page published a series of cartoons drawn by Palestinian Arab children.

Palestinian Media Watch reports that the cartoons are being labeled "innocent drawings" that "express the feelings of children of #Palestine,"

In fact, these cartoons show that the teachers have been indoctrinating the children to hate Israel.

A few years ago, there was a traveling exhibit of what was purportedly Palestinian children's art, which was a combination of art drawn by adults in a primitive style to mimic children's art and actual children's drawings that mimicked already existing cartoons and motifs that the teachers gave them. Anti-Israel groups used this fake art exhibit to great effect.

So Fatah is doing the same.

While the drawings in this exhibit do seem to be actually drawn by children for the most part, and most are even signed, the motifs and symbolism are astonishingly sophisticated for children.

Notice anything missing?

Some themes are so pervasive that it is impossible to believe that the teachers didn't encourage them:

This example shows that this "art" is meant to be eventually shown to Western audience, like the previous exhibit:

More examples of children's "art" that were clearly prompted by the antisemitic teachers and modeled after existing adult-drawn cartoons:

Similar to:

And:

A direct copy of:

This set of pictures doesn't prove that Palestinian children are innocently and spontaneously drawing anti-Israel and antisemitic cartoons. It proves that they are being brainwashed to hate.

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Does the UNESCO resolution really nullify Jewish ties to Temple Mount? Yes, it does.

Electronic Intifada and idiot blogger Richard Silverstein both claim that the UNESCO resolution passed last week actually does not deny any Jewish connection to the Temple Mount.

They mention (correctly) that the resolution affrims "the importance of the Old City of Jerusalem and its Walls for the three monotheistic religions," which presumably includes Judaism.

However, in regard to the Temple Mount itself, the resolution says the "Al-Aqṣa Mosque/Al-Ḥaram Al-Sharif, as reflected in the historic status quo, [is] a Muslim holy site of worship."

Silverstein (who refers to the site as "the Haram" exclusively and falsely claims "When I was last in Israel in 1980, I visited the Haram and it was a peaceful place of worship for all who visited, including Jews)* argues that the resolution "simply doesn’t address the issue" of Jewish ties to the Temple Mount.

Ah, but it does - by omission.

Because the resolution refers to two other "Palestinian" holy sites, the Ma'arat HaMachpelah and Kever Rochel. And in both of those cases, while it mentions their Arabic titles first, it does identify them as the "Tomb of the Patriarchs" and "Rachel's Tomb." And it specifically says that both of those sites "are of religious significance for Judaism, Christianity and Islam."

Clearly, the authors of the resolution are not denying the Jewish ties to those holy sites, even if they minimize those ties.

Given that, the lack of mentioning any Jewish (or Christian) connection to the Temple Mount, and the refusal to use any other name but the Muslim names for the site, are clearly deliberate and an attempt to frame the site as exclusively Muslim and having nothing to do with Judaism.

Meanwhile, a Palestinian cartoonist correctly reacts to the UNESCO resolution as evidence that the Palestinian narrative has completely taken over UNESCO:

Hard to argue with that.

(h/t Yenta)

UPDATE: I am told that Jews actually did pray on the Temple Mount before the 1990s without anyone caring (see comments.)

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Is Obama planning anti-Israel moves before leaving office?

The Zionist Organization of America sometimes sends me op-eds for inclusion in the blog. This one from last week is worth reading:

After Elections, Will Obama Betray Israel At UN?

By Morton A. Klein

Wikileaks recently exposed an email written by former White House official Stuart Eisenstadt that discussed the Obama administration’s deteriorating relationship with Israel and warned that: “There is a distinct possibility that the Administration may seek a new UN Security Council Resolution embodying the two-state, with [pre-] 1967 lines and agreed land swaps, and some vague statements about Jerusalem.”

Is President Barack Obama intending to abandon the decades of bipartisan U.S. policy of vetoing anti-Israel U.N. Security Council resolutions? Specifically, is Obama preparing to permit the UN Security Council to pass a resolution supporting or recognizing a Palestinian Arab state, and declaring Jewish communities built within it to be illegal?

The signs that this is indeed the case are numerous. President Obama is laying the groundwork to rationalize, and make palatable and understandable that he may take unprecedented unilateral actions against Israel. Consider:

• On October 5, 2016, Obama’s State Department “strongly condemned” Israel for approving plans to build 98 apartment units within the existingJewish community of Shiloh in Samaria, for Jews who will be forcibly evicted from their homes in Amona. The existing Jewish community in Shilo which was established in 1979 and has 3,500 existing residents. The State Department falsely claimed that Israel was approving a “significant new West Bank Settlement,” and that this undermined a two-state solution, and “called into question Israel’s commitment to achieving a negotiated peace.”

• The State Department’s October 5 condemnation also stated: “with regard to the UN Security Council and any action at the UN, our position hasn’t changed. We’re always concerned, frankly, about one-sided resolutions or other actions that could be taken within the UN, and we’re always going to oppose those kinds of resolutions that we believe delegitimize … Israel and undermine its security. But we’re going to carefully consider our future engagement, if and when we reach that point, and determine how to most effectively pursue and advance the objective that we all at least claim to share, which is that of achieving a negotiated two-state solution.” [emphasis added].

Despite being prefaced with a line about the U.S. position being unchanged, the State Department’s “reconsideration” statement, on top of the unusually harsh language of condemnation for a mere announcement of program of residential construction in an existing Jewish community, is more than a hint as to the course President Obama may take.

• Shockingly, the same day, the Obama administration questioned whether Israel is a “friend.” White House spokesman Josh Ernest reiterated the State Department’s unfounded criticism of Israel, wrongly stating on October 5 that “we did receive public assurances from Israel that contradict this announcement, I guess when we’re talking about how good friends treat one another, that’s a source of serious concern as well.”

• The media promptly provided further evidence of Obama’s intentions to overturn longstanding U.S. policy. On the day of the administration’s statements (October 5, 2016), the same “echo chamber” method that Obama aide Ben Rhodes boasted of using to promote the Iran deal – namely, using the media to promote the administration’s agenda – was in full swing. A New York Times article that day quoted former Obama Administration peace negotiator, Martin Indyk, saying: “At a certain point … the Administration may well decide that there needs to be consequences for what it now sees as an effort to close off the two-state solution.”

• And on October 6, 2016, a New York Times editorial entitled “At the Boiling Point With Israel,” parroted the State Department’s false accusations against Israel, and called for Mr. Obama to “lead the Security Council to put its authority behind a resolution to support a two-state solution.”

• During his September 30, 2016 speech eulogizing Shimon Peres, Obama falsely implied that Israel is “enslaving” Palestinian Arabs. Obama quoted the leftwing Peres as saying, “The Jewish people weren’t born to rule another people” and “we are against slaves and masters.” Obama also called Israeli’s founding “flawed.”

• Later the same day, after the White House official transcript of Obama’s eulogy listed “Jerusalem, Israel” as the speech’s and burial’s location, the White House crossed out “Israel.”

• On September 9, 2016, Obama’s State Department wrongly criticized Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu’s valid and accurate explanation that the Palestinian Arab leadership’s repeated demand for a state with “no Jews” constituted “ethnic cleansing.”

In sum, there are good reasons to believe that the ground is being prepared for a major change of US policy, and major U.S. betrayal of Israel at the UN, perhaps after the November elections.

Obama’s refusal to veto a potential UN Resolution unilaterally establishing or laying out borders or other parameters for a Palestinian Arab State would sabotage any chance of Israel/Palestinian negotiations and peace.

As President Lyndon Johnson wisely said: “We are not the ones to say where other nations should draw lines between them that will assure each the greatest security. . . . [L]ines must be agreed to by the neighbors involved.”

The U.S. Congress can and should play a decisive role here: it can pass legislation mandating a cut-off of U.S. funding for the UN and/or the Palestinian Authority if the Obama administration permits a Palestinian state resolution to pass in the Security Council. This could stop a devastating UN resolution, which will endanger the only tiny Jewish State in the world and its eight million inhabitants.

Morton A. Klein is the President of the Zionist Organization of America.

This fits in very well with this article from October 7 by Eli Lake at Bloomberg:

When Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was re-elected last year, the White House threatened to reconsider long-standing U.S. policy to veto U.N. Security Council resolutions on Israel's presence in the West Bank. At issue was a last-minute interview in which Netanyahu said there would be no Palestinian state as long as he was prime minister. He took back that statement after the election. Nonetheless, the White House directed policymakers to draw up a set of options for how Obama could "preserve the two-state solution," according to one U.S. official privy to the process.

...[W]ith a little more than three months left of his presidency, Israeli officials privately say they worry Obama intends to try to level the playing field between the Palestinians and Israelis before he leaves office. The threat of a last-minute speech, executive order, or U.N. action has stirred some of Israel's friends in Washington. Last month, for example, 88 senators signed a letter to Obama urging him to restate "long-standing U.S. policy" to veto one-sided anti-Israel resolutions at the U.N.

So far, though, Obama has not sanctioned Israel for settlements, preferring instead to censure. This is where the options from 2015 could come into play. U.S. officials who have been briefed on them tell me they run from the substantive to the symbolic.

On the milder end would be a speech Obama would deliver outlining his parameters for a two-state solution. This approach is similar to a speech Bill Clinton gave at the end of his presidency that laid out such parameters. In Obama's case, the speech could disclose the concessions Netanyahu and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas were willing to make in negotiations that fell apart in 2014.

The options also include tougher measures such as support for a new U.N. Security Council resolution that would supersede U.N. Security Council resolution 242, which was drafted in 1967. That calls on Israel to withdraw from the territory it won in the Six Day War, but calls on that territory to be returned to Israel's neighbors, not an independent Palestinian state.

Other policy options include changes to the U.S. tax code to target U.S. charities that support West Bank settlements today. Last month, J Street, the self-anointed "political home for pro-Israel, pro-peace Americans," began a new campaign to get the Internal Revenue Service to withdraw the tax-exempt status for charities that "entrench or expand Israeli settlement activity" in the West Bank.

Another option in the 2015 policy memo would have the U.S. recognize a Palestinian state or upgrade its diplomatic presence.

And the Weekly Standard agreed, saying the building new houses at Shilo was simply a pretext for the White House to blame Israel for forcing its hand:

The latest controversy revolves around construction that the Israelis say is within the already existing Israeli neighborhood Shilo, but that the administration says constitutes a new settlement. Congressional officials who spoke to TWS said that the administration's condemnation is a pretext for eroding relations with Israel and potentially for setting up a broader diplomatic offensive.

"They're launching this weird, aggressive campaign that simply will have no positive outcome," a senior congressional source told TWS. "It's not an accident that all of this has been going on as Congress goes into recess [and] as attention is diverted by the election."

The source said that while the administration has engaged in similar behavior against Israel in the past, this case appeared "far more coordinated and aggressive."

"The president is in the market for a legacy," the source continued. "I'm very concerned that he's going to do something that he considers to be dramatic, just to get his name on the process."

Another congressional source told TWS that President Obama has been "waiting for an opening" to condemn Israel.

"200 housing units in an existing community that did not expand the boundaries at all? That's not something that should even make the news in Israel, let alone the U.S."

The source suggested that the administration had also coordinated with media outlets this past week to release material criticizing Israel.

"The fact that they seem so prepared for this, the fact that it comes at the exact same time as this crap from the New York Times and Vox," the source continued. "I [think] they were waiting for something."

A senior political official at a nonpartisan national Jewish organization told TWS that the White House seems to be setting up the Israelis to take the blame for a fabricated crisis, which could then be used to justify diplomatic action against Israel.

"It's no secret that the Obama administration is angling to do something against the Israelis after the election, when it will face no political pressure," said the source. "That's exactly why lawmakers from both parties have been penning letters and resolutions calling for the President not to throw our Israeli allies under the bus at the United Nations or target them domestically."

"The administration wants to be able to say the Israelis forced them to act, which is why they've launched these efforts to blame Tel Aviv for tensions."

Indeed, on Friday the US criticized Israel during a special UN session on "illegal settlements":

Israeli policies in the West Bank and in East Jerusalem, and particularly continued settlement construction were severely criticized in a special UN Security Council session on Friday.
The meeting, titled "Illegal Israeli Settlements: Obstacles to Peace and the Two-State Solution," did not involve a vote. It was held at the behest of member states Egypt, Venezuela, Malaysia, Senegal and Angola, with a push from the Palestinians. The initators made use of the Arria Formula clause, allowing them to call for debates on subjects of specific interest to them. Attendance is not mandatory.
skip - WATCH LIVE FROM UN
The U.S. representative to the session said that the U.S. is "deeply concerned and strongly opposes settlements which are corrosive to peace." He said that Israeli activities in the West Bank, primarily settlement construction, "creates a one state reality on the ground."

It seems quite possible that the groundwork is being laid for a post-election surprise.

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10/15 Links: An archaeology lesson for UNESCO; America’s Hot Proxy War with Iran

From Ian:

The Little Jewish Village That Makes Obama Boil

Halfway to the sky sits a tiny village of little white houses that has attracted the ire of the White House.
The village of Amona with its small white houses and red roofs could easily be mistaken for some lost Italian village or a dusty California town. But the White House would not have “boiled in anger”, as one anonymous official claimed, over the doings of some Italian village.
There’s only one place on earth that makes Obama’s blood boil. It isn’t Iran or North Korea. It’s Israel.
Amona’s small scattering of houses have a fraction of the square footage of the White House. The 40 families living there in defiance of Islamic terrorists and left-wing lawfarers would hardly be noticeable if they all crowded into the White House foyer. And yet they’ve been condemned by the State Department in more virulent tones than most Muslim dictators.
What is it about this handful of Jews caught between heaven and earth that outrages so many?
That may be the great question of history. It will not be solved among the sheep pens and orchards, the little white houses of Amona and their inhabitants, who despite the rage of the big White House, continue to go to work each day, to raise their children and to worship in the way of their ancestors.

Think 'Shiloh'. Think 'Settler'. Think 'Horn'.

No, that headline is not a lede about me blowing a shofar here in Shiloh, Israel.

UN Watch: Historical revisionism: UNESCO adopts PLO’s Islamist resolution denying Jewish, Christian ties to Jerusalem

UN Watch condemned UNESCO’s “historical revisionism” after the agency’s 8-member Executive Board adopted an inflammatory and one-sided Palestinian-drafted resolution, submitted by the Islamic states, which erases Jewish and Christian ties to Jerusalem and casts doubt on the connection between Judaism and the ancient city’s Temple Mount and Western Wall. The vote was 24 in favor (including Iran and Sudan), 6 against (including USA, UK, Germany, Netherlands), 26 abstaining, and 2 absent.
At the same time, UN Watch said the inflammatory text’s failure to obtain a majority was a moral victory. The amount of countries abstaining increased by seven from the 17 who supported a similar text in April, with France, India, Argentina, Spain, Sweden, Sri Lanka, Guinea and Togo shifting their votes from yes to abstain.
The resolution was drafted by the Palestinians but officially submitted by Sudan’s genocidal regime together with human rights abusers Algeria, Egypt, Lebanon, Morocco, Oman, and Qatar.
Notable features of the text:

The resolution “decries,” “condemns,” “deplores” and “deprecates” a long list of alleged Israeli infringements of Palestinian rights. The text calls Israel “the Occupying Power.”

The text omits any mention of the hundreds of violent Palestinian attacks against Jews in Jerusalem, organized Palestinian attempts to terrorize Jews visiting Jewish holy sites in the city, or incitement to such attacks by the Palestinian Authority and Hamas

10/14 Links Pt2: Melanie Phillips: America’s nightmare choice; Alleged UN-Hamas double-agent charged

From Ian:

Mark Regev: Remember Cable Street, when the labour movement and Zionists were allies

This week we commemorate 80 years since the famous battle of Cable Street, in which the labour Zionist youth movement I grew up in, Habonim, stood shoulder to shoulder with anti-fascists and leftwing demonstrators to prevent the British Union of Fascists from marching into the Jewish East End.
As the labour movement celebrates this milestone in the struggle against fascism and antisemitism, it is also faced with an inquiry into bigotry closer to home: the Chakrabarti report.
Among other findings, Chakrabarti correctly identified “Zio” as a term of racist antisemitic abuse. Yet the word that the insult is derived from – Zionism, a belief in the right of the Jewish people to self-determination – is an ideology that has enjoyed a long and proud history of support from the British labour movement.
The year before the battle of Cable Street, the future Labour prime minister Clement Attlee noted that Labour party conferences would “never falter” in their “active and sympathetic co-operation” with the Zionists. According to Attlee, Nazism and fascism demanded that this support was “all the more necessary”.
In the same year, the future president of the World Trade Union Conference, George Isaacs, called upon the Trades Union Congress to extend its blessing and help to the Jewish people in building, “a new Jerusalem in Palestine”.

Melanie Phillips: America’s nightmare choice

So let’s sum up what voters disgusted by Trump will be electing if they vote for Hillary: a corrupt, untruthful hard-leftist who disdains the US Constitution, whose record includes endangering American security and who has declared her intention to remake American society in the image of the oppressive and illiberal leftist causes she espouses.
People think that, compared to Trump, Hillary is at least a safe pair of hands. If that were so, the choice would indeed be easy. But she is not safe at all.
Let no one be under any illusions. The choice is between a candidate who is a dangerously unpredictable loose cannon and a candidate who is a predictable danger to both America and the world.
The issue in this election is not which candidate has the better claim to be an admirable human being or indeed a fine president. The issue, unfortunately, is which of the two presents the greatest danger to America and, by extension, to Israel and the rest of the free world.
Either way, America’s fate hangs in the balance. We can only look on aghast.

Honest Reporting: “This Is Palestine” – Where All Palestinians Are Innocent Victims

An article in the Irish Independent promotes a photo exhibition by Riverdance founder John McColgan, called “This is Palestine.” The photos were taken in Gaza and the West Bank, yet the article claims the photographer traveled to the region to “document the lives of Israelis and Palestinians affected by the ongoing conflict.”
In fact, judging by what the article says, the only Israelis McColgan met with were activists who campaign against the “occupation.” They are hardly going to give him a balanced view of what it’s like for Israelis living under the daily threat of Palestinian terror attacks.
In the world of the Irish Independent and McColgan’s exhibition, every Palestinian is a victim of Israeli oppression. There are no Palestinians who harm other Palestinians, and there are no Palestinians who harm Israelis. It is the usual, one-sided, simplistic narrative that the media generally favor, where Israelis = oppressors and Palestinians = victims.
These are some of the Palestinians he photographed – along with some facts that he and the Irish Independent left out that may have been inconvenient to the narrative, but would have added some much needed context:

From Middle East Monitor (MEMO), the anti-Israel propaganda "newsletter" that employs Ben White:

Israeli archaeologist denies Jewish ties to Al-Aqsa Mosque

An Israeli archaeological expert has asserted that there is no relation between the Western Wall of the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound and an ancient Jewish temple, Al Jazeera reported today.

This will likely serve to undermine Israeli excavations of the site.

Meir Ben-Dov, an Israeli archaeological expert who is author of many books about Jerusalem and the Temple Mount, further asserted that the Wailing Wall, the Jewish name for the Western Wall, has no sacred significance in the Jewish faith.

As far as I can tell, this is complete fiction.

No one claims that the Kotel is the Western Wall of the Temple; it is part of the retaining wall of the Temple Mount. (Ben Dov wrote an entire book about the Kotel.)

Here is a 1986 article about the Temple Mount and its magnificence from Ben Dov.

I did find a different relevant reference to Ben Dov:

Dr. Shmuel Berkovitz, a scholar of the holy places in the Land of Israel, found that until the eleventh century, Muslim scholars disagreed as to the location of the tethering of Muhammad’s steed and pointed to different places on Al-Haram al-Sharif.(12) Some said the place of Muhammad’s entry to Haram and the tethering of Al-Buraq was the Eastern Wall. Others said it was the Southern Wall, but no one at all looked to the Western Wall as the place where Al-Buraq was tethered. In the seventeenth century, it was common to identify a spot close to the southwestern corner of the mount as the site of the tethering. The archeologist Meir Ben-Dov believes that the Muslim traditions identifying the place as the Western Wall began at the end of the nineteenth century,(13) just when the wall was gradually becoming a symbol of the renewed Jewish settlement in the Land of Israel.(14)

If the Muslims are now asserting that Ben Dov is an authority, then the claim of the Kotel a being "Al Buraq" where Mohammed supposedly tethered his magical flying steed is completely false - according to their own expert!

This is the kind of "journalism" that Israel haters rely on for their "facts."

As far as evidence that the Temple Mount is where the Temple was, the Temple Mount Sifting Project released a great list of archaeological evidence. (h/t Yoel)

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10/14 Links Pt1: Glick: Israel must go on offensive at UN; The Bible - Revised by Unesco

From Ian:

Caroline Glick: Israel must go on offensive at UN

Over the past eight years of the Obama Administration, US condemnations of Israeli construction beyond the 1949 armistice lines, including in Jerusalem, have become steadily more obsessive.
This has been part of an unambiguous policy to delegitimize Israel in America. Until Obama entered the White House in 2009, there was a clear difference between the attitudes of Europe and the attitude of the United States towards us. Under Obama we have witnessed the Europeanization of American attitudes towards the State of Israel.
So far, Obama's efforts have only been successful in the Democratic Party. Party activists have worked hand in hand with anti-Israel movements, most notably the BDS movement. In addition, several Democratic lawmakers have shown their willingness to abandon Israel, and that number is growing. Although they are still the minority in the party, Senator Tim Kaine, Democratic Candidate for President Hillary Clinton's running mate, was the first senator to announce that he would boycott Prime Minister Netanyahu's speech to Congress about the Iran nuclear deal. He is also one of the lawmakers closest to Obama.
When Israel goes to confront the hostility, it should operate on two levels simultaneously. First, Israel must continue and increase its Hasbara to the American public. Netanyahu's Facebook video protesting the international support for the Palestinian demand for the ethnic cleansing of Jews from Judea and Samaria is a good start. But we need to have even stronger messages protesting the moves by the US and the international community against us and to justify the "settlements."
At the same time, Israel must act vigorously with the members of the UN Security Council, adopting a carrot-and-stick approach to oppose anti-Israel measures at the UN.
For a generation Israel's governments have rejected the idea that we can succeed if we resist the UN. It is time that we abandon this defeatist attitude and work diligently to broker deals with member states to reduce the room for Obama and Clinton, if she is elected, to maneuver against us in the Security Council.

When Jesus stormed the al-Aqsa mosque

October 13, 2016, was a momentous day in world history: the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) voted to rewrite millennia of Jewish history by denying the Jewish connection to Jerusalem’s Temple Mount, which is Judaism’s holiest site. As far as UNESCO is concerned, the site where once the Jewish temples stood – and where the Christian Bible situates important events in the life of Jesus – should rightly be known as the Muslim “Holy Site Al-Aqsa Mosque/Al-Haram Al-Sharif.”
The UNESCO resolution also renames what Jews call the Kotel, i.e., the Western Wall (of the Temple Mount) and the area in front of it, as Al-Buraq Plaza, while using scare quotes when mentioning the common English term “Western Wall Plaza.” Well, what are a few millennia of documented Jewish history compared with a Muslim legend about al-Buraq, “a tall, white beast, bigger than the donkey but smaller than the mule” with “long ears” and “two wings on his thighs”? Muslims believe that one night, this creature took their prophet Muhammad “to the farthest Mosque” – which of course couldn’t possibly have been located in Jerusalem during Muhammad’s lifetime (supposedly 570 – 632 CE). In reality, the Muslim claim to Jerusalem was simply established by force when Muslim troops conquered the city 636-637.
Perhaps the best reaction to the preposterous UNESCO resolution would be the kind of ridicule Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs offered on Twitter when they posted a few tweets and a short video with Bible texts “corrected” to conform to today’s UNESCO resolution. Given that UNESCO strongly condemns “the continuous storming of Al-Aqsa Mosque/Al-Haram Al-Sharif” by what they call “Israeli right-wing extremists and uniformed forces” – i.e. Jews (and other non-Muslims) visiting the Temple Mount and the security forces necessary to protect them from violent Muslims – it’s perhaps particularly urgent to revise the famous story of Jesus chasing merchants from the Temple’s court yards and to understand that UNESCO would firmly denounce Jesus for his inexcusable “storming of Al-Aqsa Mosque/Al-Haram Al-Sharif.”

The Bible - Revised by Unesco

Today UNESCO adopted a resolution denying the Jewish and Christian connection to Jerusalem.
Trying to imagine which Bible UNESCO has been reading...

UN Condemns Prague Golem As Violation Of Pillagers' Rights (PreOccupied Territory)

Our weekly column from the humor site PreOccupied Territory.

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Geneva, October 13 - The United Nations Human Rights Council held a session today on the Prague Jewish community's use of a golem to defend against massacres by the non-Jewish populace, and voted to condemn the use of such measures as illegally impinging on the rights of those non-Jews to perform the massacres, rapes, and destruction their leaders had exhorted them to perform.

The council voted unanimously on the measure after hearing testimony from local church officials and would-be marauders whose intentions were thwarted by the hulking, powerful presence of the golem. The Sudanese delegate, in particular, argued for stronger language in the resolution that originally proposed by Saudi Arabia, which had merely "denounced" Prague's Jews.

"After dutifully and enthusiastically acting according to the admonitions of clergy and local gentry, the citizens of Bohemia have been repeatedly frustrated in their efforts to intimidate, oppress, and otherwise abuse the Jews of Prague and its environs," read the resolution. "The inability of the devoted Bohemian non-Jews to inflict the sought-after damage on the Jewish community directly results from the presence of a so-called golem, created by the leader of the Jews of Prague to keep those non-Jews from carrying out their leaders' policies. This council finds such short-circuiting of the will of the masses deplorable, and condemns them."

The statement further called on the Jewish community to cease its use of the golem at once. "Measures to prevent the masses from massacring Jews are the exclusive province of local sovereign authorities, not some rabbi," read a later section of the resolution, referring to Rabbi Judah Loewe, who is alleged to have created the creature using Jewish mysticism. "The golem must be withdrawn and destroyed at once, on penalty of referral of this case to the Security Council for consideration of sanctions and other punitive actions."

Representatives of the local clergy expressed satisfaction. "That'll show those Jews," boasted Thaddeus, the Bishop of Prague. "I shouldn't have to frame anyone for the murder of a Christian child and blame it on Jewish ritual murder just to generate enough hostility to incite a massacre - it should be much easier, but the Jews, especially that rabbi, have been making my life difficult from day one. This out to show them their place."

A member of Prague's Jewish council voiced bewilderment at the decision, noting that no mention of a golem of Prague is found in any literature until nearly five hundred years after it was supposed to exist.

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The Arabic Facebook group "Mahmoud Abbas does not represent me" now has over a million "Likes." It gains another 5000 members every week.

The page uses photos of Yasir Arafat in its header.

The group has revealed a number of cases of corruption by Abbas and his cronies.

But the main criticism of Abbas is that he is not militant enough for the Palestinian Arabs.

While it is impossible to know how many of the million actually live in the territories, this is yet more evidence that Abbas has little support among his own people.

An article with the same name, "Abbas Does Not Represent Me," was written in the wake of his attending Shimon Peres' funeral. None of the commenters disagreed with the author's contention that Abbas is little more than an Israeli lackey.

(h/t Georgia)

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At The Hill, a remarkable op-ed from Salman Al-Ansari, Founder and President of the DC-based Saudi American Public Relation Affairs Committee (SAPRAC). Here is the bulk of the article:

How Israel can contribute to Saudi's vision 2030

The topic of establishing a relationship between Saudi Arabia and Israel raises many theories, assumptions, and emotionally charged arguments. Some of these arguments have merit, while others amount to nothing more than poorly formulated conjecture. These strongly held positions are especially interesting because they are put forward despite the current lack of an existing relationship between the two countries.

However, the prevailing political discourse might not only indicate that it is in the interest of both countries to form a collaborative alliance, but in the interest of the greater Middle East and their global allies as well.

In fact, there are some opinions suggesting that having a common enemy in Iran will help accelerate any sort of rapprochement between two of the Middle East’s most powerful nations. While that could be partially true, a more solid foundation for establishing deep-rooted ties between the two countries could manifest in the context of a mutually beneficial economic partnership.

[I]t is common knowledge that Saudi Arabia and Israel have committed to rational and balanced foreign policies over the past 70 years, never seeking any provocative or hostile actions against each other. It’s also important to note that there are hundreds of Jews hailing from many corners of the world who are currently working in Saudi Arabia, contributing to its financial, infrastructure, and energy projects.

As a matter of fact, Saudi Arabia is going through its biggest economic transition in its history, of which Israel is the most capable of contributing to. The architect of this transition, Deputy Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman, is also viewed by political observers as a pragmatic and progressive personality, with all indicators showing that he is prepared and willing to develop real, enduring ties with Israel. With the goals of this transition outlined in a recently announced “National Transformation Plan,” one of its most important strategies focuses on diversifying income sources and mining for more natural resources.

The latter represents a rare, golden opportunity for Israel to participate in and help bolster the Saudi economy. After all, Israel has a reputation as one of the most sophisticated and technologically advanced countries in the field of mining, with a robust, globally recognized diamond industry. Keeping in mind that Saudi Arabia is the largest country in the world without any source of flowing water, Israel is also a world leader in the water engineering industry, which makes it extraordinarily qualified to help Saudi Arabia with its ambitious desalination plans, which are a crucial part of the Deputy Crown Prince’s blueprint for Saudi’s economic reform, “Vision 2030.”

Of course, such an economic partnership cannot be established without addressing security concerns, as the trust factor between the two Middle Eastern countries still needs positive reinforcement. However, most of these concerns are mutual, as both countries are facing constant threats from extremist groups that are directly supported by the totalitarian government of Iran, which is classified internationally as a global sponsor of terrorism, providing a safe haven for most of the world’s most dangerous and well-known terrorist organizations.

Any form of normalization between the two countries is also an Arabic and Muslim normalization towards Israel, which will undoubtedly promote security and weaken extremism in the region. ...

Impeding collaboration in any way would inevitably stifle an historic opportunity for both countries to grow, develop and solidify the mutual goal of not only ensuring the success of this vital relationship, but bringing the Middle East into a new era of unprecedented peace and prosperity.

SAPRAC is Saudi Arabia's version of AIPAC, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee. It was launched earlier this year.

While SAPRAC is ostensibly independent and receives no official funding from Saudi Arabia, it would never deviate its messaging from what the Saudi government desires. Most of Al-Ansari's Twitter feed is dedicated to pushing the Saudi agenda, whether it is to fight the JASTA bill or to defend Saudi actions in Yemen.

In other words, there is no way that Saudi Arabia doesn't approve and support this message of cooperation with Israel.

Israel has to tread carefully; Saudi Arabia has had historic ties to international terrorism as well as to funding Palestinian terrorism, although it seems unlikely that the level of support to either is what it used to be.

Saudi Arabia's human rights record is terrible. Although that doesn't seem to be a problem for any other state, Israel would be expected by its so-called "friends" to have a much higher standard than the US or European nations which happily cooperate with the kingdom.

Saudi Arabia only explicitly allowed Jewish workers to enter the country in 2014.

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Interesting choice of detail on UNESCO's interactive maps

Sprinkled throughout UNESCO's website are interactive maps where you can zoom in to various parts of the world.

Obviously Israel is a small country and it cannot be easily seen or labeled on a map of all of Asia, Africa and Europe:

But the Gaza Strip is labeled even on this map.

Zooming in, we see:

Cyprus and Lebanon, both smaller than Israel, make the cut in this view. Jordan and Syria don't. Gaza remains named.

Next level in:

Every country in the region is labeled, and two non-countries: "Palestine" and the Gaza Strip are labeled as well. Only one country, Israel is missing. (actually, Saudi Arabia loses its name which was visible in an in-between map I did not reproduce. That looks like a bug.)

You need to zoom in one more level to see Israel:

Also interesting is when you zoom in all the way, it labels the Green Line accurately as "armistice demarcation lines" - and even shows the no-man's land between Jordanian-occupied territory and Israel from 1949-1967. It doesn't mention the year of the armistice.

The no-man's land means that this is a map of Israel and its pre-1967 boundary with Jordan. But the labels show that section as being between Israel and something called "Palestine" implying that Palestine was a state before 1967.

All of these decisions of what to show are clearly not made by a computer. (Note how the "Gaza Strip" label disappears and it becomes part of "Palestine" at larger zooms. A computer wouldn't do that.)

A human decided what labels would be visible at which levels and what text would show up at certain points. And Israel was considered so distasteful that it would not appear until there was no choice.

It isn't paranoia when they are really out to get you.

(h/t Simon)

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10/13 Links Pt2: Bob Dylan wins Nobel Prize for Literature; YouTube Blacklists Dennis Prager

From Ian:

Bob Dylan wins Nobel Prize for Literature

Bob Dylan has won the Nobel Prize for Literature "for having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition," the Swedish Academy said on Thursday in awarding the 8 million Swedish crown ($927,740) prize.
Literature was the last of this year's Nobel prizes to be awarded. The prize is named after dynamite inventor Alfred Nobel and has been awarded since 1901 for achievements in science, literature and peace in accordance with his will.
Born Robert Allen Zimmerman and raised Jewish in Wisconsin, Dylan has maintained Israel ties throughout his life. He visited the country several times in the late 1960s and 1970s and even took steps toward joining a kibbutz. He played three shows in Israel in 1987, 1993 and 2011. The Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement pressed him to cancel his most recent performance — to no avail.
Even more recently, Israelis can thank Dylan for the 2014 Rolling Stones concert in Tel Aviv, the band’s first visit to the country. According to Stones guitarist Ronnie Wood, Dylan gave them the idea.

YouTube Blacklists Dennis Prager

Another Progressive machine decides to limit free speech by denying easy access to the educational videos of Prager University: YouTube.
I guess we shouldn’t be surprised. YouTube has decided that 21 Prager University videos need to be placed on “restricted mode,” a category meant for inappropriate and objectionable adult and sexual content. The videos all run only five minutes or less.
Dennis Prager filed a formal complain to try to stop this censorship (which YouTube insists is not censorship), but Prager finally felt he had no option but to go public.
The YouTube video series, known as Prager University, has enjoyed wide success and for good reason. In each video, a noted academic, media personality, or other well known person, addresses a particular issue in a practical and straightforward way, usually in five minutes or less.
There is nothing controversial about the videos, certainly nothing that requires an age rating for viewing so it’s very strange that YouTube would restrict them in any way.
Included in the list are:
Why Don’t Feminists Fight for Muslim Women?
What ISIS Wants
Why Are There Still Palestinian Refugees?
Islamic Terror: What Muslim Americans Can Do
Did Bush Lie About Iraq?
Israel: The World’s Most Moral Army
Radical Islam: The Most Dangerous Ideology
Why Do People Become Islamic Extremists?
Israel’s Legal Founding
Pakistan: Can Sharia and Freedom Coexist?

IsraellyCool: Know Your History: Farid Kassab, First Arab To Use Term “Palestinian”, Praised Zionists

A series where I bring to you news from the newspaper archives and historical documents to debunk common misconceptions about the Middle East conflict.
I am currently reading a great book – Semites & Anti-Semites by Bernard Lewis.
At one point in the book, when discussing antisemitism in the late Ottoman period, Lewis mentions an antisemitic piece by an antisemitic Maronite Christian called Negib Azoury. Azoury is described as “one of the first to see in Zionism a serious threat to the emergent Arab nation.”
Two important phenomena, of the same nature but opposed, which have still not drawn anyone’s attention, are emerging at this moment in Asiatic Turkey. They are the awakening of the Arab nation, and the latent effort of the Jews to reconstitute on a very large-scale the ancient kingdom of Israel. Both these movements are destined to fight continually until one of them wins. The fate of the entire world will depend on the final result between these two peoples representing two contrary principles”
Note how despite being an antisemite and anti-Zionist, Azoury is acknowledging an ancient kingdom of Israel. He does not write “supposed” or “mythical.”
But even more interesting, in my mind, is Farid Kassab, a Greek Orthodox Arab from Beirut, who responded to Azoury’s piece with a pamphlet that supported the Ottoman Empire and Jewish settlement in Palestine while rejecting Azoury’s idea of an Arab nation.