Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Wednesday, October 10, 2018

Barkan and the Myth of Arab-Jewish Coexistence (Judean Rose)

The Barkan Industrial Zone terror attack was a shooting spree which left two dead, one wounded, two spouses with no partners, and several children who lost a parent. But all the talking heads want to discuss is “the threat to coexistence.” That’s because Barkan, with its 164 factories employing 4,200 Palestinians and 3,000 Israelis was one of those places you show off to foreigners: “See? Arabs and Jews can get along just fine.”

But it’s a false paradigm. The Barkan murders were, in fact, predictable. The larger the number of Arabs you have working side by side with Jews, the more likely it is, statistically, that one of them will decide to go berserk and murder a Jew or two. And that’s exactly what happened.

Arab-Israeli coexistence as a concept, is similar to describing Arab violence against Jews as the Arab-Israeli “conflict.” The prefix “co” suggests that it takes two to tango, that this is about two kids who either will or won’t play nicely in the sandbox. It suggests a sameness of intent and purpose, a moral equivalency. But this is a lie, the fear and the violence is on one side, only.

Israel's dynamic has never been one in which Arabs fear proximity to Jews. Jews are not a threat or a liability in the mixed Arab/Jewish environment. The Jews, rather, are at risk, the Arabs the threat.

Arabs do not fear to walk along Jerusalem's main thoroughfare, Jaffa Road, but Jews do fear to walk on Salah A Din Street in "East" Jerusalem.

Some years ago in Efrat, where I live, a trusted Arab worker, an installer of drywall to whom all were friendly, strapped on a bomb and attempted to self-destruct in our supermarket (by miracle, a Jew intervened with a pistol). This supermarket terrorist never feared spending time with Jews. He felt perfectly safe and comfortable in Efrat, and welcome in any home. But the Arab a Jew knows and loves, may turn out to be a deadly foe.

What happened at the recycling plant in Barkan can unfortunately, on the other hand, happen on any day, at any time, to any Jew who spends time in close proximity to Arabs.

That’s just the way things are. And there is no reason we need pretend otherwise. You can’t change things if you can't see them as they are, and this is indeed, the way it is: it’s Arabs against Jews. Not all Arabs are violent and out to kill Jews, and there may be a small minority of violent Jews who attack Arabs, but these are the exceptions that prove the rule. The danger is one-sided.

Ari Fuld, HY"D

I live in Israel, which means I have intimate knowledge of terror attacks and the way they can affect a community and a country. In the first days after terror strikes, you’re more watchful and you tell your kids to be vigilant, too. Then slowly, you relax back into what passes for normal. In my community, for instance, we are in gradual recovery from what happened to Ari Fuld, HY’D. By now we’ve been to the shopping center, the scene of Ari’s murder, several times. It makes you sad, but life goes on.

This made me wonder what it would be like to go back to a mixed work environment after a terror attack. Wouldn’t you wonder: “Who’s next? How do I know if I can trust my Arab coworkers?”

And the truth is, you can’t trust them. Even if you have years and years of beautiful “coexistence,” all it takes is one evil player one afternoon, and a gun or a knife to turn things on their head.

I looked to speak with someone from Barkan—someone who works there on a daily basis. I wanted to commiserate and ask how they were going to bear it: how they will go back to work, knowing it could happen again at any time. Because I know what it was like to go back to the Gush Etzion shopping center to do my mundane grocery shopping after Ari Fuld was murdered.

But my desire for commiseration was frustrated by Moshe Lev Ran, export manager of Twitoplast, a plastics factory that exports its products to 20 countries worldwide. Lev Ran isn’t angry or despairing. He is “sorry about what happened,” but his commitment to the idea of coexistence remains unshakable, even in the aftermath of the terror attack.

Moshe Lev Ran, at right

Judean Rose: How does it feel to go back to work after what happened?

Moshe Lev Ran: Nothing changed. Our workers at our factory, they’re like our family. We work together as if we’re on our honeymoon all these years, and even such a bump in the road will not change anything between us and the Palestinians.

Judean Rose: But surely you must be upset, nervous after the tragedy?

Moshe Lev Ran: We are very sorry about what happened and we have a lot of sympathy for those who died [sic!!], but as I said, it’s only a bump in a road. We’re back to working normally, the Palestinians are like our friends and they feel very comfortable to work here. (emphasis added)

Of course, I don’t work at the recycling plant. Our factory is only close by. Barkan is a big place with 160 factories. I can’t tell you how the people at the Alon Group, where the attack happened, are feeling.

I know that the owner is in a very bad mood, refusing to speak. The plant is closed for now.

Judean Rose: Has anything changed for you since the attack?

Moshe Lev Ran: The only thing that has changed is increased security. It takes another hour for the Palestinians to cross the checkpoints and arrive at work. We explained. But they are very angry. Because they know that this harms only the Palestinians, and not us. (emphasis added)

Judean Rose: Do some Jewish workers feel resentment: “we give them work and this is how they pay us back?”

Moshe Lev Ran: No, no, no. I don’t know him, don’t know why he took a gun and shot people. I don’t know what happened between him and management. I’m not a psychologist. My duty, my only responsibility, is to keep the good relations we have with the Palestinians. When they come in the morning, they are happy to work. (emphasis added)

Lev Ran isn’t worried or scared or feeling threatened, just as we were not worried about our drywall installer in Efrat. He sees the terrorist as mentally ill, an aberration. Someone who had problems with management. And since Lev Ran is a great manager, he’s never going to have this “problem.”

He’s only disturbed that the Palestinians are angry about having to spend more time going through security checkpoints.

Lev Ran says, “They feel very comfortable to work here.”

Of course they do. They’re not the ones in danger. They’re completely safe. Just as our drywall worker in Efrat, was safe until the day he walked into our supermarket with a bomb.

From my point of view, I wonder why the onerous security checks had to be explained to the Arab workers of Barkan. Is it not self-evident that if one of you attacks your coworkers, the rest of you will now exist under a cloud of suspicion? And if you really valued your jobs, why would you not work to prevent this from ever happening again? Why would you not do everything possible to cooperate with security?

Arab workers at Barkan who are paid by the hour will no doubt lose money by arriving late to work each morning. They choose to be angry about this. Instead, why not accept it as the deterrent measure it is? Is this not a fair price to pay to keep the people who pay you, safe?

The bigger problem at Barkan, perhaps, concerns Jewish workers: how will Jewish Barkan employees protect themselves going forward if their ideas about coexistence remain exactly the same? It's not just about not being able to change things if you can't recognize them for the way they are. There's also a high probability that if you can't see things they way they are, you won't be able to protect yourself from danger.

Fellow EOZ columnist Forest Rain told me about the normalcy bias, which according to Wikipedia, "is a belief people hold when facing a disaster. It causes people to underestimate both the likelihood of a disaster and its possible effects, because people believe that things will always function the way things normally have functioned. This may result in situations where people fail to adequately prepare themselves for disasters, and on a larger scale, the failure of governments to include the populace in its disaster preparations. About 70% of people reportedly display normalcy bias in disasters."

This would appear to describe the situation at Barkan, both before the attack and in its aftermath.

The thing about Arab-Jewish coexistence is that there’s a prerequisite: in order to have coexistence, the Jews must exist. Which is what stepped up security is all about: preventing Arabs from killing more Jews. What we mustn't do is pretend that when security measures function as they should, what we have is coexistence.

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Who can object to a smiling SJP president studying at Hebrew U? (EBoZ)

A guest post from Elder Brother of Ziyon:

___________________________________

Bret Stephens and Bari Weiss, two staunchly pro-Israel editorial writers for the NYT, have penned a rare criticism. “Why Is Israel Scared of This Young American?” pans Israel for barring Lara Alqasem, a past president of Students for Justice in Palestine, from entering the country and attending Hebrew University. Their argument is that Israel, as a liberal democracy, must display tolerance “for opinions we find foolish, dangerous and antithetical to our own.”

Stephens and Weiss do indicate in passing that “Students for Justice in Palestine has received funding and other assistance from a group called American Muslims for Palestine, some of whose leaders have links to groups flagged by the U.S. Department of the Treasury for their ties to the terrorist group Hamas. “ But look at her. How could such a pert, smiling innocent looking student be possibly associated with groups that advocate Israel’s violent destruction?

The extensive ties between SJP and terror groups such as Hamas and PFLP are well-documented (see http://jcpa.org/students-justice-palestine-unmasked/). If she were to be admitted, Alqasem could regularly visit friends and relatives in the West Bank and return to Jerusalem using her American passport and student visa.

What possible danger could someone of Palestinian descent who glorifies martyrdom and advocates for Israel’s destruction pose?

Hebrew University cafeteria bombing - July 31, 2002.

(9 killed, 100 injured)

______________________________________

I just want to add two pictures to this article.

This is one of the victims of the Hebrew University bombings, Marla Bennett. Like Alqasem, she was also a fresh faced young woman studying at university. Unlike Alqasem, there are no NYT op-eds about her.

She was murdered by people that SJP admires.

Here is a celebration of the attack in Gaza with Hamas flags.

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10/10 Links Pt1: UNESCO: Rachel's Tomb and Cave of Patriarchs part of 'Occupied Palestine'; Global News Erroneously Claims Palestinian Terrorist Killed 2 Israeli Soldiers – Not Civilians

From Ian:

UNESCO: Rachel's Tomb and Cave of Patriarchs part of 'Occupied Palestine'

The PX Commission of the Executive Board of UNESCO on Wednesday morning adopted resolutions 28 and 29, titled "Occupied Palestine," which state that the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron and Rachel’s Tomb in Bethlehem are "an integral part of the Occupied Palestinian territory" and condemning the construction of the security fence and "other measures aimed at altering the character, status and demographic composition of the Occupied Palestinian territory."

Both resolutions were sponsored by Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, Oman, Qatar and Sudan, and were approved within minutes at the commission’s meeting, which includes the 59 members of UNESCO’s Executive Committee. Israel is not a member of the Executive Committee.

The resolutions also refer to Israel as "occupier" and condemn "Israeli army violations against Palestinian universities and schools," criticize the construction of the security fence, deplore the destruction of Palestinian schools, including in the village Khan al-Ahmar and regret Israel’s excavation projects in east Jerusalem.

UNESCO's assistant director-general for external relations, Nicolas Kassianides, said at the meeting that the resolutions were adopted following close consultations between the member states, and welcoming "the spirit of constructive dialogue that enabled to reach a consensus."

Kassianides further said the adoption of the resolution by consensus "confirms the positive momentum that started last year, especially on this subject which is very sensitive," hailing in particularly efforts by the Palestinians, Jordan and Israel to reach agreement.

Over the years, UNESCO included both items in the final text adopted annually by the agency’s Executive Committee. But when Audrey Azoulay took office last year as head of UNESCO, a compromise was achieved, with the resolutions adopted as an annex, and not inside the body of the text. This was the case today as well.

Belgium acknowledges Pisgat Ze’ev as part of Jerusalem

After sending the Tenzer family a letter stating that the parents of the family live in “Jerusalem”, while their two children live in “Palestinian territories,” the Belgian consulate in Jerusalem has announced the error was due to a technical malfunction in its computers that has since been amended.

"We would like to inform you that due to a technical error in our computer, the addresses of your children Talia and Gilad were incorrectly registered, and since then the error has been corrected," the second letter the consulate sent read.

The family reside in the Pisgat Ze’ev neighborhood, which is located over the Green Line in eastern Jerusalem that was captured and annexed by Israel during the 1967 Six Day War.

The first letter, which was sent to every Belgian citizen as the Western European country approaches its national elections, was intended to explain to all expats their rights and how to cast their vote.

The family said that all letters addressed to the family from the Belgian consulate have always referred to all its members simply as residents of Jerusalem.

Caroline Glick: Russia Raises the Stakes in Syria with S-300 Missiles

Last week, India signed a deal to purchase Russia’s S-400 surface-to-air missile system. How likely is that deal to come to fruition if the U.S. and Israel expose the failings of the S-300? What about Turkey’s agreement to purchase the S-400?

While these key issues remain unknown, there are low-risk moves the U.S. can take in response to Russia’s adoption of a new, far more aggressive posture towards Israel and the U.S. that could serve to deter Russian adventurism and empower any moderate voices in Moscow that may have been sidelined since Sept. 17.

First, the administration could recognize Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights. The move would empower Israel diplomatically and weaken the diplomatic position of Russia, Iran, and the Assad regime they control.

Second, the U.S. can launch a campaign to withdraw international recognition of the Assad regime.

Iran and Russia both base the legality of their operations in Syria on the fact that the Assad regime asked them to intervene in Syria. But the Assad regime only exists because of their support.

In truth, they are foreign aggressors asserting control over Syria and using a local Syrian proxy to legitimize their aggression. A U.S.-led campaign internationally to withdraw recognition of the Assad regime and remove regime representatives from international forums, including the UN, could weaken the Russian-Iranian political position in significant ways.

Third, the administration could ask Congress for a new, updated authorization for the use of force in Syria. Current authorization is based on the Obama administration’s strategy in Syria. The Obama administration’s strategy was to deploy U.S. forces to fight ISIS and take no action against Iranian or Russian forces in the country.

This paper by Shiri Eisner published in the Journal of Bisexuality in 2012 is truly insane. The abstract is only the beginning:

This text narrates the writer's story as a bisexual activist and, through it, also the story of the bisexual movement in Israel so far. In addition, the text endeavors to highlight the strands of militarism, violence and racism in Israeli culture, with a focus on the Israeli occupation of Palestine and the Palestinian people. This is meant to achieve two things: first, to deconstruct the false separation between the two fields of ‘LGBT rights’ and antiwar activism; and second, to promote the principles of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement, encouraging solidarity with the Palestinian people and nonviolent struggle against the Israeli occupation.

The author admits in the abstract that this is a piece of propaganda. She is using her bisexuality to push BDS, even though "Palestine" has absolutely nothing to do with her bisexuality. But she insists there is a linkage - even though she agrees that this isn't a scholarly paper but a personal account.

Why on Earth did the journal publish this? Is everyone's personal opinions worthy of being published, or only if they fit some sort of trendy opinion?

The beginning of the paper is published in Eisner's blog, and her justification for her personal story being published in a presumably academic journal is bizarre:

This article will consist of a sequence of stories from my personal history as an activist.4 The reason why I chose to tell this story from my own perspective rather than take the more ‘dignified’ stance of an academic researcher is threefold. Firstly, by telling the story from my personal point of view, I denounce a single, unified, master-narrative. ...

Secondly, living in a patriarchal, masculinist world, we all learn to appreciate certain values over others: objectivity over subjectivity, universal over personal, rational over emotional. The values associated with masculinity are socially rewarded with respect, dignity and status, and are attributed more importance (both within and without the academia). On the other hand, the values associated with femininity are perceived as flawed, undignified and often even inappropriate. Indeed, in polite “Western” society, speaking of one’s feelings or personal life is often frowned upon. Of course, these values are also racially charged: the former, masculine ones often linked to whiteness and “Western-ness”, and the latter, feminine ones, to “race” and “third-world-ness”. Thus, it is my intent to undermine and subvert these values through use of a personal narrative and emotional writing. By this I mean to suggest that emotions, subjectivity and personal perspectives are central to our experiences as people and should be respected as crucial to our understandings of the world. I feel that to claim a space, and to incorporate these values in my writing is a political act of feminist and anti-racist subversion.

You see, objectivity is part of the evil patriarchy! Emotions and feelings are just as important to be published in an academic journal.

Some seven billion people are now entitled to be published, without any regard to whether their opinions have any validity, because objectivity is male and therefore racist.

The funny part is that the only people associating women with being emotional and unable to be objective are those who are biased against women. It is a negative stereotype - and one that Eisner celebrates.

Eisner embraces the stereotype of women who cannot think clearly and objectively and denigrates those who do as acting "male."

In an academic journal.

The considers this idiocy to be worthy of publication.

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Fatah is very upset at fuel being sent to Gaza.

Yesterday and today, Qatar sent tanker trucks of fuel to Gaza through Egypt to get the power plant going again and ease the electricity crisis there. Israel and the UN cooperated in order to get this to happen, bypassing the Palestinian Authority which is against any ease in the humanitarian crisis in Gaza that it is largely responsible for.

Fatah issued a statement today saying that this deal was a step towards Gaza becoming a separate political entity run by Hamas, and saying that this was all part of the Trump/Kushner "Deal of the Century".

Apparently, Fatah now believes that Hamas, Israel, Egypt, the UN and Qatar are all colluding to push the still-unannounced deal. (Maybe also Morocco, which is sending 2 tons of medical supplies to Gaza today while the PA restricts medicines.)

The truth, of course, is that while Israel restricts goods to Gaza that can be used to create weapons, there are no other restrictions from Israel and no desire to punish Gazans for the actions of Hamas, despite the lies that the Palestinians (and Western haters of Israel) try to push.

The PA, on the other hand, has been explicitly engaging in collective punishment of Gaza for 18 months, deliberately trying to hurt the people of Gaza in order to get them to pressure Hamas to unify with Fatah.

The amount of articles and public statements from the UN blaming the PA for the Gaza crisis is tiny compared the number of articles falsely accusing Israel of doing what the PA is doing.

The cracks are starting to become more visible. When it is obvious that Israel is working harder to bring fuel to Gaza than the Palestinian leadership, conspiracy theories can no longer work. Arab media is quite well aware of what the PA is doing, but that awareness is only starting to be seen in Western media.

This is not the first attack by Fatah against the UN, by the way. Earlier this week a top Fatah official accused Nikolay Mladenov, the United Nations special coordinator for the Middle East peace process, of working on behalf of the Trump administration.

When they think that the UN is the enemy then you know that the Palestinian Authority is grasping at straws to remain relevant.

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Archaeology be damned! Arabs continue to deny any Jewish connection to the land

Yesterday a dramatic archaeological find was announced:

Archaeologists have uncovered the oldest known instance of the word "Jerusalem" spelled out in full, on an ancient stone carving that was once part of an ancient pottery workshop, the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) and the Israel Museum in Jerusalem, announced today (Oct. 9).

On earlier inscriptions, Jerusalem was spelled "Yerushalem" or "Shalem," rather than "Yerushalayim" (pronounced Yeh-roo-sha-La-yeem), as it is spelled in Hebrew today.

The carving — which was written in Aramaic and says "Hananiah son of Dodalos from Jerusalem" — dates to the first century A.D., making it about 2,000 years old, according to the IAA.

The evidence of a Jewish nation in the area is one of the best documented facts there is, with hundreds of artifacts and many mentions in contemporaneous writings.

But since that fact is inconvenient to Palestinians, they simply deny it.

Last week the Palestinian site Amad had an entire article by Bakr Abu Bakr claiming that the Land of Israel was never in what became known as Palestine.

The article says that "there is no connection between the myths and legends of the Torah - written hundreds of years ago - and the names of cities, villages, valleys and mountains in Palestine."

He says that Israeli archaeologists like Israel Finkelstein and Ze'ev Herzog show that there was no Jewish nation. Of course, they make no such claims - they just say that the Biblical accounts of the nation are not accurate, but they do not deny the existence of the kingdoms of Judah and Israel.

Abu Bakr further pushes the absurd theory that all Biblical events occurred in Yemen, not Israel, quoting several Arab "scientists."

Of course, Abu Bakr also claims that today's Jews have nothing to do with the Jews of history and are Khazars. Besides being debunked by history and genetics, this doesn't explain Jews who lived in Arab lands, but no matter.

The Arab denial of basic history and science is not a small thing. They know that they are not the indigenous people of the land, and Jews are the only people in existence today who can make that claim. The fundamental basis of the people claiming Arabs are indigenous - and building their arguments by comparing them to First Peoples worldwide - is completely opposite the truth, and Zionism is not only not colonialist but is a movement for the indigenous people to reclaim their lands.

This is the message that must be obscured by Arabs and their leftist Western friends at all costs.

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10/09 Links Pt2: UNRWA teaches children to blow themselves up; Archaeologists unearth 2000-year-old Hebrew 'Jerusalem' inscription; Anti-Zionist Conspiracy Theories Seek the Mainstream

From Ian:

'UNRWA teaches children to blow themselves up'

In Jerusalem, Mayor Nir Barkat presented a plan to remove all UNRWA operations from the capital and begin providing full municipal services to the residents of Shuafat, where UNRWA operates schools and clinics without Israeli permission.

The Jerusalem move follows a decision by the US to cut aid to UNRWA because it is an organization that perpetuates the refugee problem instead of acting to solve the issue.

Arutz Sheva spoke to Bassam Eid, a human rights activist who has been studying UNRWA's schools and institutions for years, bringing the paralyzed Palestinian Arab voices that have been struggling for years under UNRWA, Hamas and the Palestinian Authority.

"I have been saying for years that UNRWA has become part of the problem and not part of the solution," said Eid, "For 70 years, UNRWA has been managing the affairs of the Palestinian refugees and has not managed to reduce the problem or resolve the refugee problem within seventy years. "I am interested in continuing to manage the issue of the Palestinian refugees."

"I support Trump's decision to stop UNRWA funds," Bassem Eid said, adding that "65 percent of UNRWA funds go to salaries and the renting of buildings and offices, salaries of $25,000 a month and luxury vehicles. I want to close this organization so that its employees will be unemployed and become refugees themselves."

Eid also criticized the education provided in UNRWA schools. "I worked in several UNRWA schools in the territories and in Jordan, and children aged 9-10 want to be killed and kill Jews and to release their people. "Who taught you that?" I asked. They said that was what they were learning in schools, and I asked teachers at UNRWA schools in Jordan if children were taught to blow themselves up and be killed. They said "of course. How else will they liberate the land from the Israeli occupation? " UNRWA is aware of this, and the international community knows that all UNRWA studies are full of hate and incitement. The international community continues to inject funds because it is against Israel."

Top UNRWA official says he champions both Israel and Palestinian refugees

Just a few years ago, Peter Mulrean was defending Israel in what is arguably one of the most hostile diplomatic environments for the Jewish state.

In 2013, as the US deputy ambassador to the United Nations Humans Rights Council in Geneva, he hailed Jerusalem for its “strong commitment and track record in upholding human rights, political freedoms and civil liberties.”

Today, Mulrean is a senior official at UNRWA, the UN agency dealing with Palestinian refugees, arguably the most hated organization in Israel and one the US government recently called “irredeemably flawed.”

From his office just across from UN headquarters in Manhattan’s Turtle Bay, Mulrean promotes the agency on the world’s largest international stage.

The director of UNRWA’s Representative Office in New York decries the recent budget cuts by the US administration and passionately rejects the often-made argument that the agency perpetuates the Palestinian refugee problem and stands in the way of a realistic solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Human Rights Council Elections Set to Deliver Another Record-High Number of Rights-Abusing Members

The U.N. holds annual “elections” for its Human Rights Council this week and, once again, none of the five regional groups are offering any competition for the vacant seats. Instead all five are putting up “closed slates” of candidates – a practice seen as one of the main reasons rights-abusing regimes are able to secure seats.

Indeed, the absence of competitive slates makes it possible to predict, three days before the U.N. General Assembly holds the exercise in New York, that next year the 47-member HRC will have 14 members – 29.7 percent – that are graded “not free” by the veteran democracy advocacy group, Freedom House.

That’s a record high for “not free” countries on the 13-year-old council, tied only with the 2018 membership.

Failing unexpected last minute developments, the 2019 HRC membership will comprise 23 “free” countries, 10 “partly free,” and 14 “not free.”

The presence on the U.N.’s top human rights body of regimes with poor human rights records was one of the main reasons cited by the Trump administration for its decision to withdraw over the summer, following what it said were unsuccessful attempts to reform it.

Archbishop of Jerusalem Michael Sabah used unusually sharp language in condemning the Palestinian Authority for its role in blocking fuel, medicines and other essentials from Gaza.

He called the PA sanctions imposed on Gaza "an act of brutality and inhumanity."

He said that the role of the PA in starving two million people is "inhumane, unacceptable to religion, man, and political or moral logic, and is considered a national flaw."

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The propagation of socialism in the Democratic party in this upcoming election cycle begs the question of why the millennial generation of voters acquiesces to a leftist political movement, largely comprised of inexperienced and untested candidates for office. The answer regularly doled out is that young people are fed up with the way things have been done, the inhumanity of the political world, and the disconnect between elected officials and constituents, and they demand a change. In 2018, socialists are there for the little guy and for justice—in all regards excepting support for Israel.

Ocasio-Cortez, Tlaib, Omar, and the plethora of other socialist and staunch leftist candidates in the November elections express support for the BDS movement in order to fight some misconstrued oppressive regime in Israel. But for them, support for BDS and lack of support for Israel is inherently contradictory to the values of socialism which they’ve all been elected upon and supposedly continue to preach.

I am far from a socialist ideologue myself, but nonetheless, these candidates have committed themselves to support its founding principles and have failed miserably to do so.

On a pragmatic note, socialists believe in a universal health care system, which Israel has implemented and the United States has not. On this fact alone, American socialists should be citing Israel as a functional society in which universal health care is implemented and is relatively successful—like they do Switzerland and Norway and other states. Whether or not universal healthcare would be beneficial to America is not the question. Rather, the question is why Israel is the exception to socialist support for universal health care rather than a part of the larger rule?

The cornerstones of the socialist movement are freedom and equality and justice for all without implicit biases by metrics of race or other distinguishing factors. Everyone is considered equal, without preconditions.

Such values are exemplified by Israel, where the Arab MK bloc is one of the largest in the Knesset, an Arab justice presides on Israel’s highest court, and millions of citizens who are part of ethnic and religious minorities are just as Israeli as their Jewish counterparts. Israel is undisputedly a liberal democracy with a track record of support of LGBT rights that is second to none.

A political movement which advocates fervently against discrimination of any kind should surely support Israel’s societal values; however, the false narrative peddled that Israel acts in a racist manner towards Palestinians prohibits this.

Just in the past few months, we’ve seen the high-profile socialist candidate from Michigan, Rashida Tlaib, advocate for a unified state of Palestine in place of today’s Israel. We’ve seen Ilhan Omar and Ocasio-Cortez both refer to Israel as “an apartheid regime” and countless other instances of democratic socialist vitriol directed at Israel.

The narrative is without question false, and it’s elementary for anyone observing the situation impartially—unlike the socialist candidates—to take note of Israel’s daily humanitarian contributions to Gaza and Syria in the face of looming terrorist threats, and other evident examples of Israel’s compassion, even towards those who oppose Israel most.

And yet the image of a functional Palestinian state conveyed by socialist and Democratic rhetoric denies realities of Palestinian governance. First and foremost, LGBT rights are not protected in either the West Bank or Gaza. Under the thumb of Hamas, a military commander was executed in 2016 for allegations of gay sex. In the West Bank, dozens of gays have fled to Israel to eschew the regular harassment and discrimination endured under the Palestinian Authority. The treatment of women is no better: until March of 2018, the Palestinian Authority effectively legalized rape by permitting rapists to evade charges should they marry their victims. Women are also unable to request divorce in the absence of special circumstances, where they would forfeit any financial compensation and the dowry.

Realistically, the detestable treatment of the LGBT community and women in the Palestinian territories are extensions of the practices of surrounding Islamic theological states; and should Israel not exist, it’s probable that the already harsh treatment would be further escalated to match that of Iran and Turkey and Jordan and others.

Even still, socialists and select members of prominence in the Democratic party fully embrace the BDS movement to cripple Israel by any means necessary.

“[Palestinians have a right to] resistance by any means, including armed resistance. [Jews] aren’t indigenous just because you say you are….[Jews] are not a people…the UN’s principle of the right to self-determination applies only to colonized people who want to acquire their rights,” said BDS founder Omar Barghouti.

And other notable supporters of BDS have called for far more drastic measures to be taken against the Jews in Israel—namely acts of genocide and cataclysmic warfare in an already unhinged Middle East.

The movement, without question, has a basis in anti-Semitism and makes regular calls to violent action. So for an egalitarian and social-justice-oriented movement like socialism to buy into this hate speech is hypocritical and dangerous. It truly does counteract all of the morals of socialism by allowing for the specific targeting of a global religious minority, the Jews.

All this withstanding, why do socialists continuously promote violence by way of the BDS movement and denounce liberal societies like Israel? And for this question, there is no logical explanation because it is such a fundamentally illogical act. So the real question is, when are socialists going to recognize Israel as a haven of equality and tolerance?

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10/09 Links Pt1: Nikki Haley resigns as US ambassador to UN; How Iran Plans to Take Gaza; End Funding of Palestinian Terror; Fatah blames Israel for yesterday’s murder of 2 Israelis

From Ian:

In surprise move, Nikki Haley resigns as US ambassador to UN

UN Ambassador Nikki Haley is tendering her resignation, marking the latest shake-up in the turbulent Trump administration just weeks before the midterm election.

US President Donald Trump met with Haley at the Oval Office in front of news cameras shortly after reports of her resignation Tuesday, saying the departure had been planned for several months.

Trump said she would leave at the end of the year.

He called Haley a “very special” person, adding that she told him six months ago that she might want to take some time off. Trump said that together, they had “solved a lot of problems.”

Speaking after Trump, Haley said serving as ambassador to the UN has “been an honor of a lifetime.”

She cited pushing back against the anti-Israel bias at the UN as one of the key accomplishments of her tenure. She praised Trump for moving the US embassy in Israel to Jerusalem.

Haley also pointed to her work with Jared Kushner, Trump’s special adviser and son-in-law, on the Trump administration’s Israeli-Palestinian peace plan.

“Looking at what we’ve done on the Middle East peace plan. It is so unbelievably well done,” she said. “Jared is such a hidden genius that no one understands.”

Haley said she had no plans to run for the White House in 2020.

Danon thanks Haley for 'standing up for truth at the UN'

The Israeli mission to the United Nations responded Tuesday to the decision by US Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley to step down from her position, lauding her work in the international body since assuming office in January 2017.

"Thank you, Nikki Haley,” Israeli ambassador to the UN Danny Danon said in a statement Tuesday.

“Thank you for standing with the truth without fear. Thank you for representing the values common to Israel and the United States.”

Danon praised Haley for her efforts in the UN to challenge anti-Israel bias and work to block resolutions targeting the Jewish state.

“Thank you for your support for the State of Israel, which helped lead to a change in Israel's status in the UN. Thank you for your close friendship and common paths. Wherever you are, you will continue to be a true friend of the State of Israel."

I am sad to learn that Ambassador Nikki Haley is resigning. Facing an assembly of dictatorships and their apologists, history will record that she stood up for truth, fairness and human rights, and that she did so with courage, eloquence and grace. I will miss her. pic.twitter.com/fwa6FwNAyk
— Hillel Neuer (@HillelNeuer) October 9, 2018

Khaled Abu Toameh: How Iran Plans to Take Gaza

If anyone was hoping that removing Hamas from power in the Gaza Strip would improve the situation there and boost the chances of peace between Palestinians and Israel, they are in for a big disappointment. Hamas, which violently seized control over the Gaza Strip in the summer of 2007, is not the only terrorist group in the coastal enclave, home to some two million Palestinians.

In addition to Hamas, these are several other Palestinian terrorist groups in the Gaza Strip.

The second-largest group after Hamas is Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), which has thousands of supporters and militiamen. If and when Hamas is ever removed from power, PIJ has the strongest chance of stepping in to fill the vacuum.

You remove Hamas from power, you will most likely end up having to deal with PIJ - not a more moderate group. While Hamas could only be considered "good," in some alternate reality, its replacement would not be any better. Islamist fundamentalism is enshrined in the hearts and minds of tens of thousands of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.

The two Islamist groups -- Hamas and PIJ -- are like two peas in a pod. The two do not recognize Israel's right to exist and continue to call for an armed struggle to "liberate all Palestine," from the Mediterranean Sea to the Jordan River.

Like Hamas, the Iranian-funded PIJ also has an armed wing, called Saraya Al-Quds (Jerusalem Brigades). Founded in 1981 by PIJ leaders Fathi Shaqaqi and Abed Al-Aziz Awda in the Gaza Strip, the Jerusalem Brigades is responsible for hundreds of terrorist attacks against Israel, including suicide bombings. In recent years, the group has also been launching rockets and mortars at Israel.

ArtScroll is not generally considered to be a Zionist publisher.

They are known for their English translations of Jewish classic texts into English.
Their editions of siddurim are used all over.
The ArtScroll edition of the Talmud is indispensable.

But while their love of the people of Israel and the Land of Israel is clear, no one would consider ArtScroll to be in the forefront of Israel hasbara.

So it is striking how their Stone edition of the Chumash handles the verse in Genesis 40:15. After Joseph explains to Pharaoh's butler the meaning of his dream and asks the butler to mention him to Pharaoh, Joseph says:

For indeed I was stolen away out of the land of the Hebrews: and here also have I done nothing that they should put me into the dungeon. [King James Version]

The ArtScroll Chumash explains what "land of the Hebrews" Joseph is referring to and why:

Not only is Joseph a "Hebrew" -- more than that, quoting the Ramban, Joseph comes from a territory, Hebron, where his family and his forefathers have lived for generations and to which Jews were closely associated. Hebron was not recognized by the Canaanites as a separate country, but it was their land where the Hebrews settled and lived.

Maarat HaMachpelah, Cave of the Patriarchs. Public Domain. Source: Wikipedia

And generations later, the Jews will leave Egypt and return to reconquer that land to which they have that connection.

Going a step further, the explanation of the ArtScroll Chumash is echoed by S. D. Goitein in his book Jews and Arabs. Goitein, an ethnographer, historian and Arabist, notes the Jewish presence in Bethel, Hebron and Beersheba and writes:

Israel's sojourn in the desert is described everywhere in the Bible as a short interval between prolonged residence in Egypt and the conquest (or reconquest) of Canaan... (p. 26. Parentheses are Goitein's; emphasis added)

The Jews were not just leaving Egypt to come to a promised land, but returning to a land where they already had roots.

Goitein examines the roots of the Jewish tie to the land and traces the basic migration based on the Book of Genesis. Abraham is described not only as the father of Isaac and Ishmael but also of Midian and others who were sent eastward while Abraham migrated with his family from Mesopotamia to Canaan -- and Hebron. Lot and Esau moved on to farmland to the east and south of Canaan, while Ishmael-tribes traveled into the Arabian Peninsula.

Goitein concludes:

We have, of course, no means whatsoever of determining the historical facts of this population movement. However, no other migrations would be compatible with the tradition preserved in the Bible; and they may well account for the astounding affinities between Israel and the Arabs, which are an indubitable fact.

But Goitein was writing this in 1955.
Today there is support for the unique migration of Jews from Mesopotamia to Canaan.

In their article, The Gene Wars, discussing the genetic basis for comparing Israeli Jews with Palestinian Arabs, Diana Muir Appelbaum and Paul S. Appelbaum note a 2001 study, The Y Chromosome Pool of Jews as Part of the Genetic Landscape of the Middle East, a study that compared together:

o Jews: Ashkenazi, Sephardic, and Kurdish
o Arabs: Palestinian, Syrian, Jordanian, Lebanese, and Bedouin
o Transcaucasians: Muslim Kurds, Armenians, and Turks
o Eastern Europeans: Russians, Byelorussians, and Poles

The Muirs write that the results of the genetic testing not only echoes the movements of the Jews described in the Torah, it also points to Palestinian Arabs as relative newcomers to the land, coming from Arabia:

Although all of the Middle Eastern populations bore some similarities to each other (a fairly robust finding confirmed in other works), “Jews were found to be more closely related to groups in the north of the Fertile Crescent (Kurds, Turks, and Armenians) than to their Arab neighbors.” For some, this will evoke the biblical account of Abraham’s origins in Ur of the Chaldees, and raise the possibility that the story contains echoes of an ancient population movement. Alternatively, Jews, Kurds, Armenians, and Anatolian Turks may all carry the genetic markers of ancient indigenous populations of the Fertile Crescent, while Palestinian Arabs and Bedouin may largely descend from the Arab conquerors, with their distinctive genetic signifiers. All these hypotheses are highly tentative until confirmed or disproved by further genetic data. [emphasis added]

The actual report itself also points out the commonality between Ashkenazic and Sephardic -- and Kurdish -- Jews:

It is believed that the majority of contemporary Jews descended from the ancient Israelites that had lived in the historic land of Israel until ?2000 years ago. Many of the Jewish diaspora communities were separated from each other for hundreds of years. Therefore, some divergence due to genetic drift and/or admixture could be expected. However, although Ashkenazi Jews were found to differ slightly from Sephardic and Kurdish Jews, it is noteworthy that there is, overall, a high degree of genetic affinity among the three Jewish communities. [emphasis added]

Similarly, despite genetic similarities between Jews and Palestinian Arabs, the differences support Goiteins outline of the migration:

In a report published elsewhere, we recently showed that Jews and Palestinian Arabs share a large portion of their Y chromosomes, suggesting a common ancestry (Nebel et al. 2000). Surprisingly, in the present study, Jews were found to be even closer to populations in the northern part of the Middle East than to several Arab populations...These findings are consistent with known cultural links that existed among populations in the Fertile Crescent in early history. [emphasis added]

As for the Palestinian Arabs themselves -- what does the genetic testing indicate?

Palestinian Arabs and Bedouin differed from the other Middle Eastern populations studied here, mainly in specific high-frequency Eu 10 haplotypes not found in the non-Arab groups. These chromosomes might have been introduced through migrations from the Arabian Peninsula during the last two millennia. [emphasis added]

Besides the genetic evidence against the claim that Palestinian Arabs are descended from Canaanites, there is the curious fact that as Erich and Jean Isaac note in "Whose Palestine?":

Ironically, the only surviving “Canaanite” culture is that of the Jews, who everywhere still pray, and in Israel also speak, in a Canaanite language.

(Not to mention the history, culture, literature and religious ties that bind Jews to Israel in the same way that Arab history, culture, literature and religion bind them to Arabia)

As for the Arabs, they are no more indigenous to "Palestine" than they are to the other countries they invaded - as listed by Bernard Lewis in "What Went Wrong" (p.4ff):

o Syria (then under Christendom)
o Egypt (then under Christendom)
o North Africa (then under Christendom)
o Spain
o Portugal
o France
o Sicily
o Sacking Rome
o Russia (under the Tartars)
o Anatolia
o Capturing Constantinople
o Invading the Balkan peninsula
o Reaching Vienna
o And of course Palestine (then under Christendom)

An honest approach to addressing the conflict could start by admitting the long history of Arab colonization.

But at a time that the media cannot even admit in its headlines that Palestinian Arabs are killing Jews -- what are the chances of that happening?

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.

From Haaretz:

The unexpected revelation that Jews have taken over a Palestinian house in Jerusalem's Old City has sparked a flood of theories and accusations in the Palestinian media as to who exactly sold the house to them.

Previously the house, which abuts the Temple Mount, belonged to one of the best known and distinguished Palestinian families in the city, the Joudeh family, which has kinship ties with the aristocratic Husseini family. The head of the family is Adeeb Joudeh al-Husseini al-Ghodayya, a well-known figure in the Old City, who – by virtue of his family heritage – is keeper of the keys to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.

According to reports in the last week, the Joudeh family has wanted to sell the property for some time. About two years ago they agreed to sell it to a man named Fadi al-Salamin, a Palestinian political activist who lives in the United States and is considered to be a crony of Mohammed Dahlan, a bitter rival of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. Salamin is also highly critical of the Palestinian Authority headed by Abbas.

Palestinian sources claim that the PA torpedoed the sale of the house to Salamin, which prompted the Joudeh family to hire a broker named Khaled Atari, who reportedly has ties to senior people in the PA. According to Israel's Land Registry, Atari purchased the house last April – and on the same day, transferred its ownership to a company registered in the Caribbean, named Daho Holdings.

Six months later, Jews moved into the house and it emerged that dwelling had apparently been acquired by the Israeli right-wing nonprofit Ateret Cohanim. A Palestinian source in Jerusalem claims that Atari received $17 million for the house.

The fact that Jews moved into a house that once belonged to a respected Palestinian family, which is located so close to the sometimes-volatile Temple Mount, has now whipped up an uproar in the Palestinian press and social media. Sources close to Dahlan are charging the PA with thwarting the original deal with Fadi al-Salamin to facilitate the sale to Jewish settlers.

Adeeb Joudeh and Atari have both published ads in the Palestinian media rejecting allegations that they knew of or had been involved in the transferral of the house to Jews, but their messages have done little to assuage the Palestinian street.

In the last week the accusations have become shriller and new names of PA people who may have been involved in the debacle were cited, among them Majid Faraj, head of Palestinian intelligence, and Adnan Husseini, governor of Jerusalem on behalf of the PA.

Faraj has been mentioned as a possible successor to Abbas as PA chairman; his association with this affair arose because Atari is considered to be one of the intelligence chief's cronies. As for Husseini, by virtue of his position, he should have given his approval for the transaction. In a tape making the rounds recently, Husseini is heard calling Atari a “reliable person.”

Meanwhile, Sheikh Ikrima Sa’id Sabri, imam of the Temple Mount's Al-Aqsa Mosque, renewed the fatwa forbidding the sale of assets to Jews, and threatening “anyone who furtively transfers an asset to Jews” with excommunication. Upon death, the fatwa elaborates, the body of such an individual “may not be washed, wrapped in a shroud, prayed over or buried in a Muslim cemetery,” according to the 0202 East Jerusalem news website.

To give an idea of the reactions, Archbishop of Jerusalem Michael Sabah called the sale of a single building to Jews a "moral and national disaster."

The idea that Jews cannot buy houses in their own capital, in their holiest city, next to their holiest site, is not outrageous or antisemitic or even strange to the world.

The Joudeh family is yet another prominent Palestinian Muslim family who ar not indigenous. They come from the Hashemites and were in Mecca in Mohammed's time.

The Jews that bought the house for an exorbitant price are more indigenous to the area than the Arab colonizers they bought it from.

(I have yet to find a single Palestinian Muslim family who did not come to Palestine after the time of Mohammed. There are some Christian families who trace back to Roman times, but there seems to be a fair chance that they are Jewish converts from after the fall of Jerusalem.)

This story, of Arabs selling houses to Jews but trying to hide that fact, has been told many times over the past 90 years.

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.

Recently it was reported that outgoing mayor of Jerusalem Nir Barkat intended to take over UNRWA camp and facilities in the city and replace them with licensed schools and medical centers.

While the idea is wonderful, it appears that this is legally problematic.

Ma'an Arabic reports that a Jerusalem municipality official was stopped from entering an UNRWA health facility in the Old City on Monday.

The official Arabic spokesman of UNRWA, Sami Masha'sa, said on Monday that UNRWA would not allow Israel to violate its immunity and privileges.

Masha'sa said this was based on the immunity and privileges enjoyed by UNRWA as an international institution.

He may be right.

Convention on the Privileges and Immunities of the United Nations (1946) and the Convention on the Privileges and Immunities of the Specialized Agencies (1947) both say that "The premises of the United Nations (of the specialized agencies) shall be inviolable. The property and assets of the United Nations, wherever located and by whomsoever held, shall be immune from search, requisition, confiscation, expropriation and any other form of interference, whether by executive, administrative, judicial or legislative action."

Moreover, Israel has a specific agreement with UNRWA written in 1967 "to ensure the protection and security of the personnel, installations and property of UNRWA."

Unfortunately, it looks like Israel would need to get UNRWA to agree to transition its facilities to the municipality. And that will never happen, because UNRWA wants to increase Palestinian dependence on the agency, not wean them off as was originally intended.

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.

10/08 Links Pt2: Why All the Outrage over Israel's Nation-State Law?; Qatari Foundation Influences Anti-Israel Propaganda in US Schools; ‘Vogue’ Can’t Glamorize Palestinian Terror

From Ian:

Moshe Koppel and Eugene Kontorovich: Why All the Outrage over Israel's Nation-State Law?

VI. A Seminal Moment

Basic Law: Nation-State gives constitutional force to the fundamental principles of Zionism. It does so without imposing duties on or denying rights to any individuals. It is consistent with similar provisions found in other Western nation-states. The need for anchoring these principles in a basic law has grown ever more urgent as Israel’s Supreme Court has slowly but surely endeavored to erode Israel’s Jewish character, an endeavor abetted in part by the absence of just such a basic law.

The need for this law is made further manifest by the continuing opposition to the very idea of a Jewish nation-state. We have in mind not those advocates of national self-determination for everyone on earth—first and foremost the Palestinians—with the single exception of the Jews; bigotry of this order deserves no response. Rather, we have in mind those, in Israel and in the diaspora, who call themselves Zionists, and for whom the content of this law would have been entirely consensual less than a generation ago, but who now find themselves bothered by it for reasons they appear to have trouble articulating—hence the frenetic and sometimes self-contradictory striking out at one thing after another.

Indeed, many of the very same members of the Knesset who co-sponsored a more robust version of this bill in 2011 suddenly claim to be horrified by its weaker version. One such co-sponsor, MK Hamed Amar, is now petitioning the Supreme Court to strike the new law down. One could get the impression that those not engaged in cynical political opportunism have been swept up in the tides of elite anti-nationalist sentiment and now simply find this law “too Jewish” for their taste.

Basic Law: Nation-State was written, promoted, and passed by those who remain firm in their commitment to a Jewish nation-state and to individual freedom. We believe their resolve will not go unrewarded. A decade or two from now, when the political dust has settled, the passage of Basic Law: Nation-State will be regarded as a seminal moment in Israel’s maturation both as the national home of the Jewish people and as a beacon of liberty.

NYTs: A New Wave of Democrats Tests the Party’s Blanket Support for Israel

One Democratic House candidate has pledged that she will vote against bills that include aid to Israel, denouncing what she saw as the “injustice” of Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians. Another wrote that “Israel has hypnotized the world” with its “evil doings.”

Still another helped write a scathing book on relations between the United States and Israel, while Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a progressive political star expected to win a House seat in New York, condemned the “occupation of Palestine.”

A cluster of activist Democrats — most of them young, most of them cruising toward House seats this fall — has dared to breach what has been an almost inviolable orthodoxy in both political parties, strong support for Israel, raising the specter of a crack in the Democratic Party that Republicans could use to attract Jewish supporters.

Surging support for the Palestinian cause has already strained relations between liberal parties and Jewish voters in Europe. In Britain, the Labour Party’s leader, Jeremy Corbyn, has been accused of anti-Semitism for a pro-Palestinian stand that has veered into statements that many see as outright bigotry. Across the United States, movements to force colleges and universities to boycott, divest investments from and place sanctions on Israel have divided some progressive students from their Jewish peers.

Now some Democrats are testing the boundaries of what has been the politically acceptable position on Israel in the mainstream parties. They include Ilhan Omar, a Somali-American Muslim running for an open House seat in Minneapolis; Rashida Tlaib, a Palestinian-American Muslim running in Detroit; Ms. Ocasio-Cortez, running in a heavily Democratic district in the Bronx and Queens; and Leslie Cockburn, co-author of “Dangerous Liaison: The Inside Story of the U.S.-Israeli Covert Relationship,” who is running in a Republican-leaning district in Virginia. None of them would comment for this article.

Is the New Israel Fund Violating US Non-Profit Policy?

The New Israel Fund (NIF) openly backs groups that have endorsed the boycott of Israel and it has long engaged in a wide variety of activities which we consider to be most harmful to the State of Israel. But the organization — a US-based non-profit which funds a number of different initiatives — may now have crossed another line by openly supporting political campaigning, which is in clear violation of the US tax code for charitable organizations.

As such, we have recently filed a complaint with the IRS demanding that the NIF’s tax-exempt status be revoked (we have yet to receive a response).

Shatil, the Israel-based “operative arm” of the NIF has embarked on a project it calls “Free Cities.” Local iterations of the project include “Free Ramat Hasharon,” “Free Givatayim,” and “Free Petach Tikvah.”

The goal of “Free Cities” is to unite a number of groups and organizations to fight against “religionization.” The New Israel Fund’s logo is prominently displayed on Shatil’s website and Shatil, in turn, hosts the “Free Cities” website on its domain. The coordinator for the project is listed as a member of staff on Shatil’s website and the administrators of the “Free Cities” Facebook group also both work for Shatil.

Hence, there can be no question of the New Israel Fund’s ties to the political activity.

Here are some of the details:
“Successes” listed by the organization’s “Free Ramat Hasharon” group include the passing of legislation to allow businesses to remain open on Shabbat. The group also announced it was running for municipal elections.
The group’s “Free Givatayim” branch similarly announced on its Facebook page that it’s running for the municipal elections.
Their “Free Petach Tikvah” branch openly supports Rami Greenberg for mayor of the city.

One of the great frustrations when dealing with BDS propagandists is the difficulty getting them (or anyone else) to acknowledge the yawning chasm between their zeal to fight for “Justice for Palestine” when said Palestinians come under Israeli jurisdiction and their complete indifference to the suffering of those same Palestinians (or anyone else) at the hands of non-Israelis.

“Syria is that way!” taunted the Israeli Prime Minister a few years back when a crop of Flotillists tried to break the quarantine of Gaza with their pretend load of “humanitarian aid,” summing up the question many of us ask regarding why those who storm the streets the second the Jews shoot back can’t bring themselves to even run a pancake-breakfast fundraiser for the hundreds of thousands dead in Syria’s civil war – especially since that number includes more Palestinian casualties than were generated in 60+ years of war with Israel.

As always, if you confront a BDSer with this seeming inconsistency/hypocrisy, they will simply ignore you in favor of continuing to spew their own propaganda messaging, regardless of what you have to say. But if they get backed into a corner, one of their most frequently used counter-moves is to attack their opponent for practicing “whataboutism” (also pronounced “whadaboudism” – preferably with a Sylvester Stalone accent).

Unlike “Pinkwashing” – a fake phenomenon the Israeli haters baked up in order to have something else to talk about whenever the gap between gay rights in Israel vs. the Arab world is pointed out – whataboutism is an actual argument, which means there is a surface logic to the BDSers using it to defend their own glaring inconsistency with regard to human rights concerns.

The term describes a fallacy which assumes if you support one cause then you are being inconsistent (or even hypocritical or neglectful) by not applying the reasoning behind that support to all similar (especially similar but far worse) cases with equal or greater verve. As an example, claiming that someone fighting for civil rights of African Americans is a hypocrite if they don’t put even more energy into fighting for black lives in Sudan’s Civil War is a clear example of “whataboutism.”

The reason this is a fallacy is that it assumes everyone is obliged to be perfectly consistent regarding what they choose to care about, and that not applying their energies based on the rank order of need translates to indifference to that suffering. But here on earth, we all make choices that prioritize some goods vs. others. If you support your local Boy Scout troop or help create a community farm, are you a good citizen or an uncaring monster for not putting that energy into “worthier” causes such as rescuing orphan boys in far-off civil wars or feeding the starving (vs. well-fed locavores)? And if you claim to fight for general principles like “human rights,” there is always someone worse off than the particular group you have chosen to be the recipient of your support.

This is why there is a certain logic for a supporter of Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions directed at Israel to claim that someone asking them why they don’t BDS China or Sudan might be practicing whataboutism since, in those instances, China and Sudan are distinct issues (even if they all fall into the general category of human rights abuse cases).

The reason I described this as “surface logic” earlier is that the crude: “You can’t fight for Palestine if you don’t also fight for Tibet” argument is not really what critics are saying when they ask for consistency with regard to places like Gaza, Syria or elsewhere in the Middle East. For human rights abuses in those places are not peripheral to the Arab-Israeli conflict, but central to it.

Take Gaza where Hamas came to power by killing off their Fatah rivals, stay in power through terror directed at their own population, and trigger repeated wars with Israel after securing their own safety in tunnels built below hospitals, schools and mosques while forcing the civilian population to stay above ground to serve as cannon fodder for the propaganda component of their ongoing war effort. Given this, pointing out the BDSers indifference to Palestinian suffering in Gaza is not peripheral but central to the question of whether they really stand for human rights at all (vs. shielding their militancy behind a human-rights vocabulary).

Syria is another example where asking why such “human rights supporters” don’t seems to give a damn about the hundreds of thousands of people killed there since the start of the Syrian Civil War is central vs. tangential to any discussion of the Arab-Israeli conflict. For Syria is and has always been a key player in that conflict, having participated in conventional wars, terror wars, and proxy wars against the Jewish state, not to mention participating in nearly a century of economic warfare (Damascus was HQ for the Arab League’s boycott office for decades, for example). So highlighting that this progenitor for the BDS movement is currently killing more Palestinians than Israel ever has is not a distraction but a perfectly valid question that the BDSers simply would prefer to not have to answer.

In fact, one could make the case that the entire Arab war against Israel represents whataboutism on an industrial scale never before seen in human history. For – as is playing out today in a Middle East aflame – the problems of the region have always been about the dysfunctional government, fanatical politics and instability that characterizes virtually every nation in the Middle East save Israel, embodied in states which are by any measure the world’s worst human rights abusers.

But bring any of this up and you’re sure to be met with a photo of a dead Gaza child (or, just as likely, a photo of a dead Syrian being laundered as a Palestinian) or loud demands that we talk about the latest bathroom addition to an apartment in Gilo – anything but the human rights catastrophe that characterizes those nations that have been at the forefront – and are thus the de facto partners – of the propaganda war current traveling under the name of BDS.

Going further, the transformation of the United Nations and virtually every organization and entity created for fight for human rights across the planet into weapons directed at the Jewish state is meant to ensure that whataboutism never needs to be invoked by Israel’s foes since a refusal to look at the vast crimes of Israel’s enemies is now hard wired into the system.

Back in the 1980s, someone toted up million+ people killed in the Middle East since 1948 who died in wars and other violent acts that had zero to do with Israel’s existence or continuation. And it would not surprise me if contemporary calculations brought that number well above the two-million mark. Which leaves us at the question anyone genuinely interested in human rights should be asking: whataboutthem?

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