YNet interviewed Jacques De Maio, the head of the International Committee of the Red Cross delegation to Israel and the Palestinian Authority.
Israel gives us—unlike the security establishments in many other countries, including Western ones—quick access to senior officials in the IDF, the Prison Service, and other security services. We have useful, productive and professional dialogue with them. We clarified with them the issue of shooting assailants who carry out terror attacks and we reached an unequivocal conclusion that there is no IDF order to shoot suspects to kill, as political officials tried to convince us. The rules of engagement haven't changed, and have actually been made stricter. It is true that individual soldiers have made the wrong decision at times and that there are many instances of outrageous behavior at border crossings—at times in complete violation of orders. We do not hesitate to report that to the IDF and we usually get a professional response. That is why we rejected the accusation, and there were immediately those who claimed we were covering up war crimes committed by the IDF, and that we were serving the Zionists.
The Red Cress was very familiar with the regime in South Africa during Apartheid, and we respond to anyone who makes the argument that Israel is an apartheid state: No, there is no apartheid here. There isn't a regime here that is based on the superiority of one race over another; there is no disenfranchisement of basic human rights based on so-called racial inferiority. What does exist here is a bloody national conflict, the most prominent and tragic feature being that it is decades long, and there is occupation. Not apartheid.
De Maio plays a little fast and loose with this part of the interview:
The most complicated thing is to maintain the Red Cross's fundamental principle: neutrality, not taking a position in a situation where each side believes its position is the most moral and just and demands us, the Red Cross, to affiliate ourselves to it and condemn the other. I am constantly asked how we could treat both the aggressors and those who are defending themselves—terrorists and those who fight against terrorism—with the same level of leniency. And I answer: We offer help to people as human beings who need our help. Almost all of our work is done quietly, without publicity, often in secrecy, and our only goal is to protect people's natural rights. Not to deal with politics. Battling politics and political manipulation takes too much time and resources from us.
Unfortunately, the ICRC's position that Gaza is still legally occupied is nonsensical and the only reason they hold that position is political.
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Yesterday, Caterpillar announced much better results than expected and its stock price rose by nearly 8%.
I half-jokingly tweeted that a smart investor would look carefully at any company that the anti-Israel idiots want to boycott, because it might make a great investment.
So I decided to test my theory.
Here are all of the publicly traded companies I could find listed on the BDSList.org site, and their stock prices from a year ago and today, with the percentage gain or loss. (Some are only listed on the Tel Aviv Exchange.)
Company
4/27/2016
4/25/2017
% Gain/Loss
Afcon
114.7
165.8
45%
Bank HaPoalim
26.25
31.35
19%
Bank Leumi
13.76
17.25
25%
Caterpillar
78.68
104.42
33%
Elbit
100.21
119.19
19%
Hewlett Packard
12.76
18.61
46%
Motorola Solutions
76.04
85.39
12%
Sodastream
13.9
55.34
298%
Teva
56.23
30.76
-45%
AVERAGE
50%
If you would have invested equal amounts in all these companies a year ago, you would have made an astounding 50% profit. (The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 16% in that time period. The top funds rated by Kiplinger for the past year made about 30%.)
It is every investor's dream to beat the market. Thanks to BDS, now we can! (And Sodastream, the one company BDS hates the most, has done unbelievably well!)
By the way, this "BDS Fund" also way outperformed the Israel-specific funds I checked out for the past twelve months, so the BDS method of stock picking is truly amazing.
If anyone wants to hire me as manager of their EoZ BDS Mutual Fund, let me know!
(I probably need to add the disclaimer that Past Performance Is Not An Indicator Of Future Results)
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On Sunday (24/4/17), the Jerusalem Municipality deposited for public review a special plan (no. 470484) for the confiscation of 1,300 square meters in the Jewish cemetery in the Mount of Olives, adjacent to the Ras El-Amud mosque. The plan, initiated by the Jerusalem Development Authority (JDA), is meant to allow the confiscation of parcel no. 10 in bloc no. 29991 for public use, in order to allow the construction of a visitor center. The area of the plan is a highly sensitive one, located at the heart of the historical basin of Jerusalem, 300 meters from the Old City and the Temple Mount/Al-Haram A-Sharif, and next to the mosque of the Ras El-Amud neighborhood.
Dragged by settler organizations, the Israeli government is willing to go out of its way to approve this sensitive plan through a highly unusual procedure. In the current political context, to establish a visitor center next to a mosque and 300 meters away from Temple Mount/Al-Haram A-Sharif is to play with fire. A visitor center in this sensitive area could have far reaching implications on the future of the two state solution and the possibility for a compromise in Jerusalem.
Peace Now admits that the site is inside the area of the ancient cemetery. No Arab land is being taken.
It shows a picture of the area, on the southwest side of the cemetery.
In an effort to anticipate Muslim rage, Peace Now helpfully says that it is next to a mosque and 300 meters (three football fields) from the Temple Mount, which makes it "sensitive" - by this definition, along with a good chunk of Jerusalem.
The idea of Israel building a visitor center in the site of the most important Jewish graveyard in the world, not to mention a hugely important Christian site, is simply anathema to Peace Now, who believes that Jews have no rights to their ancient capital and the thousands of Jewish graves should be under Muslim control, just as they were from 1949-1967, when Jordan used gravestones for walls of latrines and road construction.
Area of the planned center, facing the Ras al Amud mosque, Jewish graves immediately to the left
View from the road below the previous picture
Moreover, a visitor center in that area would help protect the graves from being desecrated by Muslims, as they are often being today. It would also provide a safer way for Jews to visit the site, which is often dangerous today.
If the unthinkable happens and Israel gives up this hugely important historic Jewish area, the visitor center would remain to be used by the new administrators, so building it doesn't affect the prospects of peace one bit anyway!
But Peace Now doesn't care about safety, or convenience, or Jewish heritage or ancient Jewish graves. It mentions how sensitive this site is to Muslims - when it is not - and doesn't bother to mention the benefits of continuing to develop Jerusalem for everyone.
In short, by Peace Now mentioning how "close" this is to the "Haram A-Sharif" it shows that the supposedly Jewish organization is trying to stir up Muslim anger at Israel, not to minimize it. It also shows how little this "human rights' organization cares about the rights of any humans who are not Arab.
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Thank you very much. Thank you. Friends, members of Congress, ambassadors, veterans, and, most especially, to the survivors here with us today, it’s an honor to join you on this very, very solemn occasion. I am deeply moved to stand before those who survived history’s darkest hour. Your cherished presence transforms this place into a sacred gathering.
Thank you, Tom Bernstein, Alan Holt, Sara Bloomfield, and everyone at the Holocaust Memorial Council and Museum for your vital work and tireless contributions.
We are privileged to be joined by Israel’s Ambassador to the United States, friend of mine — he’s done a great job and said some wonderful words — Ron Dermer. The State of Israel is an eternal monument to the undying strength of the Jewish people. The fervent dream that burned in the hearts of the oppressed is now filled with the breath of life, and the Star of David waves atop a great nation arisen from the desert.
To those in the audience who have served America in uniform, our country eternally thanks you. We are proud and grateful to be joined today by veterans of the Second World War who liberated survivors from the camps. Your sacrifice helped save freedom for the world — for the entire world.
Sadly, this year marks the first Day of Remembrance since the passing of Elie Wiesel, a great person, a great man. His absence leaves an empty space in our hearts, but his spirit fills this room. It is the kind of gentle spirit of an angel who lived through hell, and whose courage still lights the path from darkness. Though Elie’s story is well known by so many people, it’s always worth repeating. He suffered the unthinkable horrors of the Holocaust. His mother and sister perished in Auschwitz. He watched his father slowly dying before his own young eyes in Buchenwald. He lived through an endless nightmare of murder and death, and he inscribed on our collective conscience the duty we have to remember that long, dark night so as never to again repeat it.
The survivors in this hall, through their testimony, fulfill the righteous duty to never forget, and engrave into the world’s memory the Nazi genocide of the Jewish people. You witnessed evil, and what you saw is beyond description, beyond any description. Many of you lost your entire family, everything and everyone you loved, gone. You saw mothers and children led to mass slaughter. You saw the starvation and the torture. You saw the organized attempt at the extermination of an entire people — and great people, I must add. You survived the ghettos, the concentration camps and the death camps. And you persevered to tell your stories. You tell of these living nightmares because, despite your great pain, you believe in Elie’s famous plea, that “For the dead and the living, we must bear witness.”
That is why we are here today — to remember and to bear witness. To make sure that humanity never, ever forgets.
The Nazis massacred six million Jews. Two out of every three Jews in Europe were murdered in the genocide. Millions more innocent people were imprisoned and executed by the Nazis without mercy, without even a sign of mercy.
Yet, even today, there are those who want to forget the past. Worse still, there are even those filled with such hate, total hate, that they want to erase the Holocaust from history. Those who deny the Holocaust are an accomplice to this horrible evil. And we’ll never be silent — we just won’t — we will never, ever be silent in the face of evil again.
‘Denying the Holocaust is only one of many forms of dangerous anti-Semitism that continues all around the world’
Denying the Holocaust is only one of many forms of dangerous anti-Semitism that continues all around the world. We’ve seen anti-Semitism on university campuses, in the public square, and in threats against Jewish citizens. Even worse, it’s been on display in the most sinister manner when terrorists attack Jewish communities, or when aggressors threaten Israel with total and complete destruction.
This is my pledge to you: We will confront anti-Semitism. We will stamp out prejudice. We will condemn hatred. We will bear witness. And we will act. As President of the United States, I will always stand with the Jewish people — and I will always stand with our great friend and partner, the State of Israel.
So today, we remember the 6 million Jewish men, women and children whose lives and dreams were stolen from this Earth.
We remember the millions of other innocent victims the Nazis so brutally targeted and so brutally killed. We remember the survivors who bore more than we can imagine. We remember the hatred and evil that sought to extinguish human life, dignity, and freedom.
But we also remember the light that shone through the darkness. We remember sisters and brothers who gave everything to those they loved — survivors like Steven Springfield, who, in the long death march, carried his brother on his back. As he said, “I just couldn’t give in.”
We remember the brave souls who banded together to save the lives of their neighbors — even at the risk of their own life. And we remember those first hopeful moments of liberation, when at long last the American soldiers arrived in camps and cities throughout occupied Europe, waving the same beautiful flags before us today, speaking those three glorious words: “You are free.”
It is this love of freedom, this embrace of human dignity, this call to courage in the face of evil that the survivors here today have helped to write onto our hearts. The Jewish people have endured oppression, persecution, and those who have sought and planned their destruction. Yet, through the suffering, they have persevered. They have thrived. And they have enlightened the world. We stand in awe of the unbreakable spirit of the Jewish people.
I want to close with a story enshrined in the Museum that captures the moment of liberation in the final days of the war.
It is the story of Gerda Klein, a young Jewish woman from Poland. Some of you know her. Gerda’s family was murdered by the Nazis. She spent three years imprisoned in labor camps, and the last four months of the war on a terrible death march. She assumed it was over. At the end, on the eve of her 21st birthday, her hair had lost all of its color, and she weighed a mere 68 pounds. Yet she had the will to live another day. It was tough.
Gerda later recalled the moment she realized that her long-awaited deliverance had arrived. She saw a car coming towards her. Many cars had driven up before, but this one was different. On its hood, in place of that wretched swastika, was a bright, beautiful, gleaming white star. Two American soldiers got out. One walked up to her. The first thing Gerda said was what she had been trained to say: “We are Jewish, you know.” “We are Jewish.” And then he said, “So am I.” It was a beautiful moment after so much darkness, after so much evil.
As Gerda took this solider to see the other prisoners, the American did something she had long forgotten to even expect — he opened the door for her. In Gerda’s words, “that was the moment of restoration of humanity, of humanness, of dignity, and of freedom.”
But the story does not end there. Because, as some of you know, that young American soldier who liberated her and who showed her such decency would soon become her husband. A year later, they were married. In her words, “He opened not only the door for me, but the door to my life and to my future.”
Gerda has since spent her life telling the world of what she witnessed. She, like those survivors who are among us today, has dedicated her life to shining a light of hope through the dark of night.
Your courage strengthens us. Your voices inspire us. And your stories remind us that we must never, ever shrink away from telling the truth about evil in our time. Evil is always seeking to wage war against the innocent and to destroy all that is good and beautiful about our common humanity. But evil can only thrive in darkness. And what you have brought us today is so much more powerful than evil. You have brought us hope — hope that love will conquer hatred, that right will defeat wrong, and that peace will rise from the ashes of war.
Each survivor here today is a beacon of light, and it only takes one light to illuminate even the darkest space. Just like it takes only one truth to crush a thousand lies and one hero to change the course of history. We know that in the end, good will triumph over evil, and that as long as we refuse to close our eyes or to silence our voices, we know that justice will ultimately prevail.
So today we mourn. We remember. We pray. And we pledge: Never again.
Thank you. God bless you, and God bless America. Thank you very much. Thank you.
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Jews, too, sometimes prefer to forget. On the left, there is a nefarious tactic of trying to portray the Jewish people as more sinning than sinned against. For those in the anti-Zionist realm, the Holocaust is an ugly snag in the narrative of an Israeli Goliath targeting a Palestinian David. But sometimes there is a desire to forget even within the staunchly pro-Israel camp. It can be tempting, in celebrating Israel’s military might, its flourishing democracy, its miraculous existence, to forget that we were not always so strong. But we cannot let that pride come at the expense of remembering who we are, which necessarily includes remembering what we as a people have endured.
And we won’t. Jewish liturgy and tradition are peppered with the language of memory. We are commanded to remember the Sabbath. We sing about the repercussions of forgetting Jerusalem. Many blessings and prayers conclude with the exhortation that what we are doing is l’zecher yitziat Mitzraim—in memory of our exodus from Egypt. And every year, in commemorating that exodus during Passover, we contemplate our obligation to see ourselves as if we, personally, had been taken out of Egypt; we sing of how in each generation, a new enemy rises up who seeks our destruction; and we commit ourselves to telling the story to our children and our children’s children.
We are a people who understands the immeasurable power of a story told well, so we will not forget. We must ensure that the world does not either.
One of the most patriotic families in Israel lives just a few kilometers from the Gaza Strip. The father—a former Gazan—wears a medallion with the map of Israel and a Star of David around his neck, two of his sons are IDF soldiers who are willing ‘to die for the State of Israel,’ and they all feel a strong connection to Judaism. Years after being smuggled into Israel following the father’s secret collaboration with the Shin Bet, they declare: ‘We have no other country.’
N., a Muslim Arab resident of Gaza, traveled to Israel last summer to see her three grandchildren, two of whom are IDF soldiers. She hadn’t seen them for six years.
When she arrived in Israel, N. knew that she was ill and that her days were numbered. A female IDF soldier escorted her from the Erez Crossing to the entrance to her son’s home, in one of the Jewish communities near Gaza.
“I opened the door for her and gave her a hug,” her son, D., recalls. “She saw the children. I said to her, ‘Mother, look, my sons are in the army. My sons are soldiers.’ We hadn’t seen each other for years. I looked at her. She was happy. She asked me to take care of them, to make sure that nothing happened to them. Before we parted, she hugged my two soldiers in her arms and said to them: ‘Inshallah, I hope we will soon get to see this uniform in Gaza. When will Israel come back there? We have no life.’”
“Grandmother kissed us incessantly,” says Y., a sergeant in the IDF. “She stroked our hair and kept saying, ‘May God protect you.’”
N. stayed with her family for a month. Shortly after returning to Gaza, she passed away. “I feel so relieved,” says D., “knowing that my mother was pleased with us when she died.”
‘Metro’ tells the story of Yahya Mahamed, who said his eyes were opened to the truth about Israel. Now calling himself ‘Zionist Muslim,’ he is working at StandWithUs to help others
Sometimes we are privileged to meet rare and inspiring people, people whose life experiences are so different from our own that hearing about them provides us with a new understanding of the human spirit, a new way to see things, and a new way to think.
Yahya Mahamed is one such person. Tall, dark and slim, the first thing one notices about him is his smile.
It’s sincere and disarming and immediately evokes the feeling that a friend has been found. As his story unfolds, it becomes clear that behind those dimples is a young man of courage, humor, intelligence and a tremendous heart.
Metro sat with Mahamed at the Jerusalem office of StandWithUs, an NGO dedicated to educating people around the world about Israel. This is his story.
“I grew up in Umm el-Fahm, the third-largest Arab city in Israel. It’s a very problematic place. The Islamic Movement runs the municipality. This means they have power over everything: schools, services, who gets hired... and they are very anti-Israel. ISIS logos and swastikas are common,” he says.
The thing is, he met her in February right before the final of Arab Idol, held in Beirut, where she is a judge.
People are talking about Abbas' seeming obsession with Ahlam, and not in a complimentary way.
King Leer
Palestinian Arabs on social media are complaining about how Abbas is interested in meeting Ahlam while the prisoners are suffering on their hunger strike.
One said that this was an insult to the Palestinian people.
Because of the criticism, the official PA media have not been showing these photos or reporting on his meetings with the singer.
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While I take a back seat to no one in expressing glee when
some SJP/JVP-sponsored student government divestment vote goes down in flames
(not to mention burning with rage when such votes go the BDSholes’ way –
especially when they cheat),
it might be time to stop tracking success or failure of the BDS “movement” (or
Israel’s standing among the young) based on what a handful of Student Senators
say or do.
Claims that student government votes carry actual political
weight can only be supported if at least one of the following conditions is
true:
( 1)That there exists a
plausible chance that such a vote will be taken seriously by those who actually
make decisions regarding where a college or university invests its money (i.e.,
the school’s adult leadership and institutional investment managers), leading
to the possibility of actual divestment; and/or
( 2)That such votes represent
genuine anti-Israel sentiments among the wider student body that student
government is supposed to represent
Regarding condition (1), given that college Presidents,
Boards of Trustees and investment managers have been saying “No!” to BDS calls
since the start of the Millennium, it’s pretty safe to say that the number of
schools actually considering divestment from Israel continues to stand at
zero.
In fact, during a BDS era that stretches back close to two
decades, college and universities have been falling all over one another to
build or strengthen partnerships with their Israeli counterparts (many of them
investing – rather than divesting – millions into these relationships).
And keep in mind that during this same era, schools have joined divestment projects –
targeting Sudan and Iran – for their genuine human rights abuses vs. the
fictional ones ginned up by BDS activists against Israel. So it’s not that colleges and universities
are loath to use their investment portfolios to make political statements. Rather, their loud condemnation of student
calls for BDS – often within
hours of those calls being made – represents their rejection of the
political snake oil the boycotters continue to peddle.
Regarding condition (2), as recent history has shown, school
administrators are loath to show disrespect for student opinion, especially if
that opinion can plausibly be said to represent the actual will of the majority
of the student body (or at least a large minority). So the fact that those same administrators
are ready to tell Student Senates to shove their BDS resolutions where the sun
doesn’t shine (or something to that effect) means they know what the boycotters
also know: that student governments pass divestment votes in spite of the fact that those votes do not represent wider
student opinion.
Much has been made of recent last-minute divestment votes
announced or taken during the Jewish holidays.
Beyond the underhanded nature of sneaking such votes in while political
enemies are celebrating religious holidays, this sort of behavior also
represents an admission by cynical BDS activists that they could never win a
fair fight for the simple reason that student opinion is not on their side.
If it were, you’d see student pols running on BDS platforms,
informing voters that this would be their top priority if elected. Instead, you only see pro-divestment votes
being cast by ignorant Senators brow beaten by the boycotters throughout
grueling all-nighters, or stealth BDSers who run for office with the sole
purpose of passing divestment measures (who then leave office if they get – or
don’t get – their way on this one issue).
In fact, on one of the few occasions when Israel has played a role in a
campus election, the result was a rout
for divestment supporters.
So if pandering administrators and normally indifferent students
are all comfortable telling the boycotters to take a hike, why should any of us
be still getting bent out of shape when a gaggle of Students for Justice in
Palestine types manage to squeak through a “victory” by getting an impotent
divestment resolution passed that is guaranteed to be ignored?
Even if you believe (as I do) that BDS campaigns are just
the means to inject a steady drip of anti-Israel venom into the minds of
impressionable students, we can fight against that campaign more effectively if
we don’t treat such votes as stunning victories, harrowing near misses, or
terrible blows. Rather, we should see
them for what they are: the boobie prize the boycotters are forced to content
themselves with in an era when boycotts are nowhere to be seen, investment in
the Jewish state continues to skyrocket, and the only sanctions being enacted
are by dozens of state legislatures and the US government to condemn the aptly
named BDS “movement.”
We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.
As'ad Zo'rob is a Palestinian murderer. In 2002, he shot and killed his Israeli employer who was giving him a ride in his car. Zo'rob is serving a life sentence for the murder. Official Palestinian Authority TV called him "heroic" and decided to join the family's birthday celebrations in his honor. At the party earlier this month, the PA TV host referred to the murderer as "the heroic prisoner" and a source of "pride" for "all of Palestine":
Official PA TV reporter: "Dear viewers, we are transmitting to you from the home of heroic prisoner As'ad Zo'rob..." Brother of murderer: "He is a hero, and is everything to us. He has made us proud." Official PA TV reporter: "Of course, this prisoner is a [source of] pride for your family and all of Palestine."
[Official PA TV, I Call You, April 3, 2017]
Palestinian Media Watch has documented the participation of PA TV at a similar birthday party for terrorist Abbas Al-Sayid who is serving 35 life sentences for planning two suicide bombings, one in 2002 at a Passover celebration, killing 30 Israelis, and another in 2001, killing 5 and wounding 100.
PA TV weekly program Giants of Endurance This example of PA TV presenting a murderer of an Israeli as heroic is no exception. PMW has documented that all Palestinian terrorist prisoners and all terrorist so-called "Martyrs" are considered "heroes" by the Palestinian Authority and its leadership. It is therefore not surprising that official PA TV has a special weekly program dedicated to honoring terrorist prisoners called Giants of Endurance. PA TV honors these "heroes" by having their relatives as guests in the studio or visiting them in their homes, inviting them to speak about their imprisoned terrorist relative and sending him/her greetings.
PA TV honors murderer on his birthday, visits family of “heroic prisoner”
In these tricky – not to say dark – times there is one place to which we can always turn for light relief: Geneva. The city itself may be unamusing. But it does play host to the world’s most hilarious organisation – the body which calls itself ‘the UN Human Rights Council’ (UNHRC).
A few days ago, the Council voted to appoint members for the 2018-2022 term of its ‘Commission on the Status of Women’, a UN agency ‘exclusively dedicated to the promotion of gender equality and the empowerment of women.’ Among those appointed to the Commission was that notable supporter of gender equality – Saudi Arabia. Best of all is that – as the excellent UN Watch points out here – at least five EU member states must have voted to put Saudi Arabia on the Commission.
There was a time when moves like these garnered some outrage, or at least comment. So far this one appears not to have done so. Which might be because everyone has too many other things on their minds. Or that everybody thinks Saudi Arabia has been making such leaps and bounds in the realm of gender equality that it can teach the rest of us a thing or two. Or that nobody thinks that the UN Human Rights Council, its ‘Commission on the Status of Women’ or any of its other expensive initiatives matter one jot and know that the whole thing is barmy. Personally I think that the last of these possibilities is the most likely. But if everybody realises that the UNHRC is the last place in the world where you would go for anything other than a dark laugh, what is the point of countries like ours contributing to it either through financial contributions or sending representatives? Surely we can come up with a better use for the cash? If not, why not just pile it up and burn it? At least that would be a harmless use of everyone’s time and money. Unlike the UNHRC, which is exceptionally costly and consistently harmful.
Why would the UN appoint Saudi Arabia as a defender of women’s rights, a country where a woman cannot even open a bank account without her husband’s permission and received the right to vote and run for office in municipal elections just two years ago? It should not come as too much of a surprise. After all, this is the same UN whose Human Rights Council enforces Agenda Item 7, which dictates that Israel’s purported human rights violations must be raised and discussed every single time the UNHRC convenes. More UNHRC condemnations are made against Israel than against all other countries in the world combined.
Nikki Haley, the US ambassador to the UN, has pledged to change what she calls the “culture” of the international body. She has already done much to combat the knee-jerk criticism directed against Israel that characterizes so much of UN discourse. Perhaps her next order of business will be to help ensure that countries like Saudi Arabia are singled out for their human rights violations. It would be fitting if Haley’s strong female leadership became the driving force for a campaign within the UN to condemn Saudi Arabia for the suppression of half of its population.
The UN once was and might again be a force for good in the world. The potential is boundless for an institution that brings together all the nations of the world. Wars can be prevented; blatant human rights abuses can be stopped; the damage resulting from famine and natural disaster can be ameliorated. All this and more can be achieved through dialogue and cooperation. However, before any of this can happen, the UN must have a minimum level of self-respect that prevents it from appointing Saudi Arabia to a council responsible for safeguarding the rights of women.
In September 2009, the UN came out with the Goldstone Report on Operation Cast Lead -- a report that condemned Israel and minimized Hamas responsibility. The Goldstone Report was so filled with inaccuracies, that 2 years after it came out, Goldstone apologized for the report's conclusion that Israel had intentionally targeted civilians.
The top 250 words in the Goldstone report's conclusions and recommendations section, in graphical format using Wordle. The size of the words indicates how often they were used. The reference to the terrorist group Hamas can be found on the right, in a red square. Credit: Elder of Ziyon
In 2014, William Schabas was selected by the UN to head a similar investigation into Israel's Operation Protective Edge. After various issues of Schabas' bias were revealed, he finally recused himself.
These made big headlines at the time.
The UN anti-Israel bias continues to show up. Sometimes it makes some headlines, sometimes not.
But though the UN bias is persistent, we sometimes forget the extent to which the UN supports anti-Israel terrorism.
The institutional bias and refusal of the UN to deal with it permeates its relationship with Israel, and goes way beyond the bias Israel regularly faces in the UN, the UN Assembly, UN Security Council and UN Human Rights Council.
UNRWA is known for its partisanship. This of course is to be expected. Since the UNRWA's existence is completely dependent on a Palestinian refugee crisis, it is not surprising that it has accomplished so little to actually resolve the problem. What is not mentioned is that UNRWA's bias against Israel is an inescapable result of that dependence on the Palestinian Arabs.
UNRWA, for its part, has played down the fact that there is a UNRWA-Hamas connection. Peter Hansen, UNRWA's commissioner-general in 2004 played down the fact that Hamas had infiltrated UNRWA:
Oh, I am sure that there are Hamas members on the UNRWA payroll and I don't see that as a crime. Hamas as a political organization does not mean that every member is a militant and we do not do political vetting and exclude people from one persuasion as against another.
UNRWA has been caught three times during Operation Protective Edge storing Hamas rockets. Roughly ten percent of all Hamas rockets fired indiscriminately at Israeli civilians have fallen short, causing damage in Palestinian civilian areas in Gaza.
UNRWA confirmed that Hamas fired into the Beit Hanoun area in northern Gaza where, on July 24, 2014, an UNRWA school was hit. An estimated 17 children and UN personnel were killed, and 200 others wounded.
UNRWA has publicly admitted to handing rockets stored in its facilities over to the “local authorities” in Gaza, i.e., Hamas.
UNRWA has publicly admitted to hiring Hamas (and Islamic Jihad) terrorists as teachers at its schools, thereby providing direct access for Hamas to recruit Palestinian children.
UNRWA schools have reportedly been used as launching pads for mortar attacks against Israeli civilians.
A senior UN official, John Ging, confirmed that Hamas terrorists “are firing their rockets into Israel from the vicinity of UN facilities and residential areas,” thereby putting UNRWA staff and students in harm’s way and using civilians in Gaza as human shields.
UNRWA has permitted Hamas to use its schools as grounds for the recruitment and training of child soldiers and suicide bombers, and for the operation of militant summer camps for children.
UNRWA has openly taught Palestinian children from a curriculum that incites violence, encourages suicide-homicide bombings, espouses the concepts of martyrdom and jihad, and calls for the destruction of Israel.
An UNRWA health clinic that housed a Hamas terror tunnel entry shaft was built with explosives in its walls. The booby-trapped UNRWA clinic was then detonated on July 30, 2014, killing three IDF soldiers. The soldiers were working inside the UNRWA clinic to examine its structural integrity before sealing the Hamas tunnel under the building. Additionally, Hamas officials have reportedly admitted that, as of December 2011, at least 160 children had been killed in the tunnels. (Update: The booby-trapped building was reported to be an UNRWA clinic, but other reports have stated that the building was a former International Committee of the Red Cross clinic.)
The incompetence, neglicence and the outright complicity of UNIFIL with the Hezbollah terrorist group is of even greater concern.
In 2000, during a Hezbollah cross-border raid the terrorists captured three IDF soldiers; Benny Avraham, Adi Avitan and Omar Sawaid, who were patrolling the security fence along the border with Lebanon. A timeline of the events make clear that the UN in general -- and UNIFIL in particular -- not only bungled the opportunity to rescue the IDF soldiers, but the UN and UNIFIL deliberately lied to Israel and attempted to stonewall their investigation:
October 7, 2000: Hizbollah kidnapping
Seven hours after the kidnapping, UNIFIL officers find Hizbullah's getaway cars. They find and catalogue 53 items in the cars, including fake UN flags, stickers and UNIFIL license plates. The amount of blood in the vehicles indicates that the occupants "may have been badly injured and may succumb to their injuries."-- but Athmanathan's assessment is not communicated to senior UN or Israeli officials.
October 8, 2001: An Indian UNIFIL officer films the vehicles' recovery, during which armed Hizbullah terrorists detain the convoy and demand the vehicles at gun-point. The UNIFIL Force Commander turns the vehicle over to Hizbullah "to avoid confrontation and because they were not United Nations property."
July 6, 2001: UN finally admits to having the tape, but won't turn it over because they must remain neutral.
Kofi Anan calls for an internal investigation following indications that UNIFIL had hidden the existence of the tape from Israel and senior UN officials for months and the UN "did not deliberately mislead the Israeli government."
July 15, 2001: A third video clip that "purports to show still photographs of Hizbullah fighters during the abduction itself" is shown on Lebanese TV.
General Athmanathan informed Mr. Guéhenno that, on 11 July, UNIFIL had learned of the existence of another videotape (hereafter referred to the Shebaa tape). This videotape, which did not indicate any time or date, nor the identity of the person filming, showed the shelling of IDF posts on 7 October, three to four kilometres from the abduction site, as well as activity in a UNIFIL shelter. The footage on this videotape is of the bombardment of Israeli positions along the Blue Line, and shows smoke that could be of the burning Israeli jeep. It appeared to be filmed from several locations, including from in or near a United Nations observation post and shelter.
The video was not of the kidnapping itself.
July 30, 2001: US Congress adopts resolution 411-4 for UN to release video
August 2, 2001: The UN releases the results of its investigation. Read report here.
UN admits "serious errors of judgment were made, in particular, by those who failed to convey information to the Israelis, which would have been helpful in an assessment of the condition of the three abducted soldiers." But:
Rather than giving the tape directly to Israel, though, the UN decided place sharp restrictions on when and how Israel could view the tape, allowing Israeli officials to view the tape only three times, at neutral sites in Geneva and Austria. The UN also refused to turn over the aforementioned items, which were bloodstained personal belongings of the IDF soldiers and UN officials fervently denied the existence of a third tape, a tape that many Israeli officials claim may have offered the most direct and useful information.
Israel Ambassador to the UN Yehuda Lancry announced that Israel had accepted the UN's offer to view an edited version of the video [of the recovery], in which the faces of Hizbullah terrorists who may have been involved in the kidnapping are obscured.
Only heavily edited versions were eventually turned over to Israel, indicating a cover-up was still operating in the matter, probably to protect UNIFIL personnel who were involved or who were negligent in their duties. An Indian member of UNIFIL gave an interview to an Israeli newspaper in which he said that four Indian members of UNIFIL helped Hezbollah carry out the abduction.
November 1, 2001: Israeli army rabbi Israel Weiss pronounces the soldiers dead.
Their remains have yet to be recovered.
Among the conclusions of the internal investigation:
The videotape of 8 October was the catalyst for this investigation. There is nothing in the Indian Battalion videotape that justified its release to any party on elementary considerations of humanity. The investigation team uncovered the existence of another tape that, despite the fact that it was taped on 7 October, and the fact that it was filmed in a nearby location, also contains no information that bears on the well-being of the soldiers. The Force Commander's initial assessment and subsequent assessments by other senior officials has not varied: neither the tape nor the photographs contain any information that relates to the well-being of the soldiers. The investigation team concludes that at no time was videotape or other photographic material relevant to the condition of the soldiers withheld.
In 2006, Hezbollah again kidnapped Israeli soldiers. It led to the second Israel-Lebanon war, brought to an end with UN Resolution 2701. When Israel agreed in 2008 to release terrorist Samir Kuntar in exchange for the remains of the 2 murdered soldiers, UNIFIL was there - saluting the coffins of Lebanese and Palestinian terrorists:
UN Resolution 2701 was supposed to ensure that Hezbollah would not be able to arm Southern Lebanon and establish missiles and rockets there.
In 2006, David Kopel wrote about United Nations an Accomplice in Hezbollah Kidnapping for The Volokh Conspiracy blog. In an update, he addressed the question of whether the United Nations, base on UNIFIL's failure to prevent the kidnapping and murder of the 3 IDF soldiers and the UN's deliberate attempt to stonewall Israel's investigation.
He wrote:
Anti-semitism. I don't think that anti-semitism is the root of the UN's problem with Israel. It's true, as some commentators have pointed out, that the UN is functionally anti-semitic; that is, the UN constantly condemns Israel far more often and more vehemently than it condemns other countries which (even if you believe the worst about Israel) violate human rights much more severely than Israel does. The Eye on the UN website provides copious documentation of the UN's functional anti-semitism.
Nevertheless, I think the UN's pervasive anti-Israelism, although anti-Semitic in practice, is not primarily motivated by hatred of Jews.
...Although UNRWA was captured [by anti-Israel interests] very shortly after it was born, the broader UN assault on Israel didn't get going until the 1960s; the assault peaked in the 1970s, and later receded slightly from its 1970s apex. The anti-Israel assault of the 1970s was merely one element in a successful Soviet strategy of aligning the new UN members, most of them former colonies of Europe, and most of them dictatorships, into an anti-Western bloc. Israel, having the misfortune of being located in the middle of a sea of dictatorships, was a natural target of this UN super-majority; but the same would have been true if Romastan were a pro-western democracy.
Today, the Islamic bloc at the UN continues to find local political advantage in anti-Israelism (as it would with anti-Romastanism), while the rest of the Third World finds it advantageous to go along. I don't think that the dictatorship of China, for example, cares one way or the other about Jews or Israel; but the Chinese dictatorship correctly discerns that voting with the Islamic bloc against Israel is a cost-free way to curry favor with Islamic states, and win their support on issues relevant to China.
Regarding Kofi Annan, and most of the rest of the UN's leading executives, I would say that, functionally, they are vicious anti-Semites, but that, in their hearts, they are not particularly prejudiced against Jews per se. Rather, their actions are explainable under the principles of organizational behavior. Annan is a career UN employee (the first one to become Secretary-General), and he has risen through the organization by shrewdly placating whoever needs to be placated. His anti-Israel actions are simply the result of his astute calculation of the balance of forces at the UN. If he could gain more power at the United Nations by denouncing Fiji or by defending Israel, he would do so.
So there is no anti-semitic conspiracy at the UN, in the sense of a conspiracy directed by people who are deeply motivated by hatred of Jews. Rather, the UN's criminal complicity in the kidnapping of Israelis, like the rest of the UN's anti-Israelism, is explainable as the logical result of a wide variety of UN actors behaving according to their self-interest.
Perhaps Kopel is right.
It may matter very little, since the functional difference appears to be minimal.
Whether we are talking about the UN, or UNRWA and UNIFIL -- the fact remains that UNRWA and UNIFIL constitute a real danger to Israel, and the failure of the UN to resolve the problems shows that the UN itself is a danger to Israel as well.
But there are just so many instances that we can tend to forget just how bad the UN is.
We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.
Al Arab, a UK-based pan-Arab newspaper, has an unusual article by UAE writer Salem Hamid, that compares how the Arab world has made mistake after mistake when dealing with the Jews and Zionists.
In 1930 Shakib Arslan published his famous book "Why Muslims Delayed Progress," a question that still echoes today. After successive generations and decades, and the question remains waiting for the answer, as the Arab reality remains stalled even after the departure of Western colonialism.
It is clear that there is a psychological background of confusion and hesitation planted in the recesses of the Arab consciousness. We must boldly ask: Why is the pan-Arabism falling behind?
Consider what happened in the judo competition for the Olympic Games in 2016 in Brazil, when the Israeli Judoka Or Sasson defeated his rival Egyptian Islam Shihabi in the first round match.
The Egyptian player refused to shake hands with the Israeli player. The astonished audience witnessed this act and people all over denounced the Egyptian. This leads to the question: Why are we Arabs deliberately distorting our image in front of the world in normal situations?
Are the responses of our actions in the eyes of the West immoral? ...
We must remember that after the announcement of the plight of Palestine in 1948 the Arab countries expelled their Jews to Palestine. The number reached approximately 900,000 Arab Jews, and thus the Arabs gave with this move, consciously or unconsciously, a gift to the emerging Jewish state, because of their hatred of the Jews and the failure to consider them as normal citizens in their countries of origin.
The Arabs were unable to separate the Jewish religion and Zionism as a political movement, resulting in the failure of tolerance and coexistence with the Jews as a community. The passage of time has led this Arab act against Arab Jews to a disastrous result. The Arabs lost the elite of their fellow citizens of the owners of money, influence, arts, industrial diversity and culture. Then they entered into costly wars and incalculable losses against Israel. The Arab mentality continued weaving conspiracy theories to their people, and the permanent search for a scapegoat to justify their defeats.
In the final analysis the "racist" Jewish state represented by the Israeli entity gained different colors of citizens in the area of land that the Arabs lost, but these Arab Jews themselves became citizens, as well as Jews who came from Russia and the West. [NB: I put "racist" in quotes because that is how I interpreted the intent, but it was not in scare quotes in the original - EoZ]
For more than two thousand years Jews lived in Arab countries such as Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, Yemen, Syria, Lebanon and Iraq, as well as in Muslim countries such as Turkey and Iran, and today they make up more than half of Israel's population.
Given the number of Jews at the present time who remained in the Arab home countries we can note the vast difference between the past and present. Now, in contrast, we find that the Palestinians are the largest refugee group in the world, and generously supported. After the 1948 war, 700,000 fled from their towns and villages, and we know that some of them did not emigrate because of the war, but they were asked [by Arab leaders] to leave, and they thought it would be temporary, and they would return to their areas after the end of the conflict with the Israeli entity.
The Syrian Prime Minister in 1948-1949, Khalid al Azm, wrote in his memoirs of the Arab role in persuading the Palestinians to leave from their areas. The Arabs did not realize the gravity of this error that created the Palestinian refugee crisis to date, prompting the United Nations to form UNRWA in 1949, the largest United Nations agency ever created to deal with only one group of refugees.
Our problem in the Arab world is a cultural problem of anti-diversity and lack of acceptance of others who are different. English historian Paul Johnson notes a precursor to the social and political deterioration of the Arabs after the expulsion of their fellow Jewish citizens, when Spain expelled its Jewish citizens in 1492, leaving a significant impact on Spain, as this led to the deterioration of Spain and its colonies in financial science, finance and financial loans.
In czarist Russia, many anti-Semitic laws led to the weakening of the entire Russian government and its corruption in the end, which also led to a mass exodus of the Jews, and therefore the intellectual and human capital loss.
As for Germany, it was possible that the United States would have been the runner-up in the nuclear bomb arms race if Adolf Hitler did not expel Jewish scholars such as Albert Einstein and Edward Teller, and others who emigrated to the United States and invented the American nuclear bomb.
If the Arabs had noted the mistakes that other nations made they could have learned the lessons of such folly of expelling Arab Jews who might have been supportive to help the Arab regimes in the face of Israel if they only had the concept of citizenship, coexistence and tolerance.
There are those who are still confused between Zionist racism and Judaism as a religion. Arab anti-Semitism is not the result of chance and did not start since the rape of Zionism of the land of Palestine in 1948, it is a historic reality and still present in the literature of Islamic heritage, which is essentially the jurisprudence and interpretations of human beings of the previous centuries, the interpretations which were suitable for their time, which was less open, more wary and fanatical. But it seems that the hatred against the Jews will remain constant as long as these heritage books continue to incite since the first stages of education for children, when we teach them that "those who have evoked your anger" are the Jews, and that "those who have gone astray" are Christians! (Quran 1:7)
Thinkers and critics point out that school curricula throughout the Arab countries need radical changes to erase phrases that incite hatred, and the trend towards the formulation of approach works to promote tolerance and acceptance of others' language, and to move away from fanaticism and sectarianism. Hatred and hostility is a highly infectious disease that greatly affects everyone, whether they are ordinary or intellectuals.
But the case of deterioration of the Arab thought go beyond the principle of citizenship and the values of coexistence to the basic level of how poor is our university education, which educates generations and controls the future behavior. In view of the ranking order of universities around the world we do not find an Arab university's name in the list.
At the level of scientific research, we find that the Arabs are very much lagging behind the rest of the world, and if we compare the patent numbers, for example, between Egypt and Israel, on the grounds that Egypt is the largest Arab country in terms of population, the Patent Office in the United States announced in 2015 it gave 3804 patents to Israel compared to 30 patents from Egypt.
It is natural to say that states should learn from their neighbors, even if they are have a historical legacy of enmity, and should overcome the stereotype in the form of an Israeli soldier terrorizing the Palestinians.
We must also ask ourselves why there is not yet a Palestinian state? If Israel allowed Palestinians to have a state of their own, would there be peace in the Middle East? What is the Arab share in the failure to reach the day of the declaration of the birth of a state for the Palestinians?
It seems that many opportunities were lost so far from our hands, after the disintegration of the Ottoman Empire after World War I, Britain seized most of the Middle East countries, including the region that makes up historic Palestine, which is now ruled by Israel.
After 17 years, specifically in 1936 during the Arab Revolt against the British and against the Jews, the British formed the "Peel Commission" task force to study what they called the uprising. The Committee concluded that the cause of violence is that the Palestinians and the Jews want to rule the same land, the answer that was reached by the Peel Commission was to establish two independent states, and one for Jews and other Arabs.
But even this British two-state solution faced difficulties and controversy and did not lead to any practical benefit to the Palestinian cause.
The solution to establish two states was strongly opposed by the Arabs, whom the British offered 80 percent of the disputed lands, compared to 20 percent for the Jews, and despite the small size of the Jewish state the Jews accepted this offer, while the Arabs refused.
And it continued the process of biting off the Palestinian land that has become a dream of establishing a Palestinian state within what is known as 1967 far-fetched in the light of the spread of Israeli settlements.
The result is that the Palestinian issue in the Arab consciousness has become merely talk, but the Palestinians themselves have contributed to this situation.
We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.
This entire article at The Guardian is amazing, not least because it is written as if the opinions expressed are perfectly normal for a university that specializes in teaching about the Middle East.
Students and academics at Soas University of London have said a visit by the Israeli ambassador Mark Regev this week could lead to serious tension and substantial distress on the campus.
Regev has been invited by two student societies to speak about the Middle East and prospects for peace on Thursday, but his visit has been criticised as provocative by other staff and students who are planning a protest.
More than 150 academics from Soas and other UK universities, plus 40 student societies at the university, have written to the Soas director Valerie Amos urging her to intervene to stop the meeting on Thursday at which Regev is due to speak.
A letter signed by more than 100 Soas staff says: “We fear that if this provocative event proceeds as planned, it will cause substantial distress and harm to many of our students and staff who are, have been or will be affected by the actions of what a recent UN report refers to as the Israeli ‘apartheid regime’.
“The event could further cause serious tension on campus and result in a charged atmosphere that will be detrimental to the wellbeing of all faculty, staff and students.”
This is not a spoof. This is not satire. This is seriously what supposed academics are claiming will be the outcome of an Israeli representative speaking on campus, a single Zionist speech among the hundreds of anti-Zionist talks, activities, lectures and boycotts that infest SOAS every year.
The students’ union challenged the university authorities over the staging of the event, raising concerns about possible safety and security risks posed by the ambassador’s visit and “the inability of students and staff – in particular Palestinian students – to participate openly in the debate, because of possible repercussions on their ability to enter Israel/Palestine”.
Apparently Israel is completely unaware of the anti-Israel activities they do the other 364 days of the year, but they will have Mossad operatives taking names on the day of the Regev speech just looking for excuses to ban Palestinians from coming home.
Prof Jonathan Rosenhead, one of the organisers of the academics’ protest letter to Lady Amos, said: “Holding this meeting at Soas, where staff and students have voted overwhelmingly in support of boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel, and in support of Palestinian rights, seems like a deliberate provocation.”
Calling for the destruction of Israel isn't a provocation. Holding a speech defending it is.
A statement posted on Facebook by the Soas students’ union said: “We stand with the Soas community in expressing our concern at Mark Regev’s presence on campus, and in rejecting the idea that our spaces of learning should serve as avenues for officials to put forward state propaganda.”
But perhaps the most outrageous comment about this speech came from Yair Wallach, the chair of the Centre for Jewish Studies at SOAS, who said “We see little value in the talk itself. This is the view of myself and other colleagues at the Centre for Jewish Studies. Therefore we suggest that the JSoc and the SOAS UN society reconsider the event.”
That is how thoroughly anti-Israel SOAS is. Even its "Jewish studies" leaders are against the idea of even hearing an Israeli representative speak.
Snowflakes.
Here is a list of speeches, available on podcast, hosted by the SOAS Student Union over the past couple of years that are considered to have more value than a speech by a representative of Israel. "Twerking as an act of resistance" sounds like it is hugely valuable.
The last time a representative from Israel visited SOAS in 2005, someone pulled a fire alarm at the outset of the speech, delaying it for an hour.
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Wednesday, April 26, 2017
Elder of Ziyon
