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Israeli planners may soon have to understand that the efficacy or credibility of their country’s nuclear deterrence posture could vary inversely with enemy views of Israeli nuclear destructiveness. However ironic or counter-intuitive, enemy perceptions of a too-large or too-destructive Israeli nuclear deterrent force, or of an Israeli force that is not sufficiently invulnerable to first-strike attacks, could undermine this deterrence posture.
Also critical, of course, is that Israel’s current and prospective adversaries see the Jewish state’s nuclear retaliatory forces as “penetration capable” — meaning they are capable of penetrating any Arab or Iranian aggressor’s active defenses. Naturally, a new state of Palestine would be non-nuclear itself, but it could still present a new “nuclear danger” to Israel by its impact upon the more generally regional “correlation of forces.” Thereby, Palestine could represent an indirect but nonetheless markedly serious nuclear threat to Israel.
There is still more to be done. Israel should continue to strengthen its active defenses, but Jerusalem must also do everything possible to improve each critical and interpenetrating component of its nuanced deterrence posture. The Israeli task may also require more incrementally explicit disclosures of nuclear targeting doctrine, and, accordingly, a steadily expanding role for cyber-defense and cyber-war. And even before undertaking such delicately important refinements, Israel will need to more systematically differentiate between adversaries that are presumably rational, irrational, or “mad.”
Overall, the success of Israel’s national deterrence strategies will be contingent upon an informed prior awareness of enemy preference and of specific enemy hierarchies of preferences. Altogether new and open-minded attention will need to be focused on the seeming emergence of a “Cold War II” between Russia and the United States. This time around, the relationship between Jerusalem and Moscow could prove helpful rather than adversarial. For Jerusalem, it may even be reasonable to explore whether this once hostile relationship could turn out to be more strategically gainful for Israel than its traditionally historic ties to the United States. At this transitional moment in geostrategic time, when Donald Trump’s often incoherent alignments could multiply or escalate, virtually anything is possible.
In any event, it is essential that Israeli planners approach all prospective enemy threats as potentially interactive or even synergistic. If a formalized state of Palestine does not readily find itself in the same ideological orbit as Iran — now an increasingly plausible conclusion in view of still-accelerating Shiite-Sunni fissions in the Middle East — the net threat to Israel could become more perilous than the mere additive result of its pertinent area enemies. All things considered, in approaching the possible simultaneity of Iranian nuclear weapons and Palestinian statehood, Jerusalem must consistently bear in mind that the adversarial “whole” could prove palpably greater than the calculable sum of its belligerent “parts.”
For 2019, there could be no more important security consideration.
Thank God, it's over. When 2018 ended, Israel's withdrawal from the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization took effect. Don't feel bad. Under existing conditions, there was no reason to keep our place at the table with the gang of hypocritical liars that every few months rewrote another chapter of the history of the land of Israel and the Jewish people, and coopted it for the Palestinians. Rather than thrilling at the glorious cultural, religious, historic, and archaeological legacy of the Jewish people in the land of Israel, the organization chose time and again to adopt "fake history" and give its seal of approval to more fabrications from the Palestinian pack of lies.Maybe UNESCO Will ‘Learn a Lesson’ From US and Israeli Withdrawals, Ex-Envoy Says
UNESCO questioned Jewish ties to the Temple Mount and the Western Wall. It treated us as if we were occupiers in our own capital, even though Jerusalem in all its holiness was never a capital – in terms of either politics or conscience – for any Arab or Muslim ruling entity. Even the Jordanians, who together with the Palestinians prompted UNESCO to pass resolutions hostile to Israel – never used Jerusalem as their capital in the years in which they occupied the city. They desecrated the places that are holy to Jews, and in violation of agreements we signed with them, even denied us access to those places. Back then, the Jordanians and the Palestinians – before they invented themselves as a "people" – cited the Temple Mount as the location of Solomon's Temple on their maps and in their writings. Today, they boldly deny ever doing so and UNESCO is helping them by partly adopting their denial.
But UNESCO has more than Jerusalem in its sights. Rachel's Tomb, which UNESCO decided to call, as the Palestinians term it, Bilal Ibn Rabah mosque, was never traditionally called that. Ibn Rabah, of Ethiopian descent, was one of the first muezzins who served the Prophet Muhammad. He was killed in Syria and buried in Aleppo or Damascus. Only when the Palestinian Authority realized it had failed to capture the site from Israel during the Second Intifada did they link Ibn Rabah to "Kubat Rachel," the Arabic name for the site that had been used for generations. In the case of Rachel's Tomb, UNESCO supported an attempt to take over people's minds in place of a physical occupation of the site which failed.
“Maybe they will learn a lesson,” a former Israeli ambassador to UNESCO told The Algemeiner on Tuesday as the Jewish state officially left the global cultural institution.
David Kornbluth — who served as Israel’s UNESCO envoy from 2005-2009 — said the country was pulling out of the body now largely because the US had scheduled to leave by the end of 2018.
“It’s completely in coordination with the United States,” he noted. “This is part of the reason also why it’s being done. Politically, it didn’t seem that we could stay in it if the United States is going, on our behalf as it were. Part of the reason they’re going is because of Israel.”
Israel and the US stayed in UNESCO for so long, he stated, “because they believed that once you leave these organizations, it’s much more difficult for Israel to get back in than the United States to get back in,” but the worsening situation had finally forced their hand.
“It was bad then,” Kornbluth said of his tenure. “It’s really nasty being attacked all the time, but was more manageable. But things got worse and worse, it just goes on and on and on, and politically it becomes just a bit disgusting.”
Asked whether the withdrawals will force UNESCO to change its attitude toward Israel, Kornbluth responded, “Hard to tell. The Israel-bashing thing has been going on forever, but the United States is staunchly with Israel and it’s quite true for many many decades already that Israel relies on the United States in UNESCO for the air it breathes. So I can’t tell if it will have a positive effect. It will have some effect. Since the United States and Israel came out two years ago with the intention to withdraw, UNESCO has moderated itself a bit towards Israel, but not sufficiently.”
This is the reason the Israeli Defense Forces @IDF IS the most moral army in the world: not because it fights with flowers (it doesn't), not because Jews have a unique moral DNA (no people does), but because the IDF is forced to carry out its missions under unparalleled scrutiny: https://t.co/fo2kH2mH5t
— Dr. Einat Wilf (@EWilf) January 1, 2019
Across Europe, anti-immigration parties with ties to far-right movements have stepped up efforts to recruit supporters in the continent’s small Jewish community, often drawing on perceptions in that community about anti-Semitism among Muslims.Based on the recent release of the EU survey on the increase in Jew-hatred and hate crime in the EU, this 'perception' has a very strong and very dangerous basis in reality. The fact that much of this antisemitism comes from the Muslim immigrant community makes Jews natural allies of the far-right.
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Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban meets with Netanyahu. Screenshot from YouTube video |
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Italian Interior Minister Matteo Salvini. Screenshot from YouTube Video |
Every birthright trip includes a heavy dose of right wing propaganda.
My trip leader was a settler who told us all Arabs were terrorists and threatened to throw me off the trip for my "Arab beliefs." American Jews were hazed by Israeli soldiers who pushed pins into their chests.
On my trip, one of our evening activities was a simulation of a checkpoint, in which we had to pretend to be IDF soldiers denying entry to pleading Palestinian women.
Even if they told us their children were sick, we were to deny everyone entry. It was horrifying.
David Sebs @dsebsAnd:
I went on a trip in 2012 and this couldn't be further from the truth.
If anything our guide was extremely sympathetic to the Palestinians... Even organizing Ultimate Frisbee tournaments with those on the other side of the 'wall'.
Gritty 2020🔥 @maxberger
It totally depends on your trip leader. They are discouraged from talking about the conflict, but some bend the rules.
David Sebs @dsebs
I mean you mentioned 'every Birthright trip' and then conceded that it 'depends on your trip leader.'
You understand the hypocrisy in that right?
I'm not even trolling, but it c'mon....
Melissa WeissBerger backtracks big time:
@melissaeweiss
I don’t often call people liars, but I went on Birthright as a student. Dozens of my friends have staffed and guided trips. Hundreds of my friends and colleagues have been participants over the years. Not a single one has had the experience Max describes. Not a single one.
Gritty 2020🔥 @maxbergerThe "larger point," apparently, that Birthright is still right wing propaganda even if his own supposed case was an outlier. And if that really happened, there would be lots of people talking about it.I
Replying to @melissaeweiss
I don't think this was the least bit typical! Lots of stuff happened on my trip that wasn't according to protocol. But the larger point still holds.
The report presents a number of news articles that incite incitement and racism against the Palestinians.
According to journalists Asaf Jibur and Yishai Friedman, Israeli Arab terrorists, who were recently released from prison, were received like kings in Ramallah in the presence of senior officials of the Palestinian Authority. Among those who received a certificate of appreciation, during a ceremony held a few weeks ago, were Samir Sarsawi and Mahmoud Jabarin, who were accompanied by a convoy of long cars, horses, applause and encouragement from the public, and a ceremony at the grave of Yasser Arafat.
Sarsawi was charged with throwing hand grenades at civilians on the Noordo Street in Haifa in 1998, and was imprisoned on charges of placing explosives in order to kill, manufacture weapons or explosive materials, and membership in illegal organizations. Jabarin was accused of killing an Arab collaborator. The wife of the terrorist, Walid Daqqa, also participated in the ceremony.
The concert was broadcast live and live on Palestine TV channel, within the program "Giants of Patience", which follows the families of "terrorists".
When Labour’s shadow foreign secretary Emily Thornberry spoke last week at the annual Limmud Jewish cultural festival in Birmingham, she declared in relation to the accusation that the Labour party leader Jeremy Corbyn was an antisemite:
“I don’t believe there is a racist or antisemitic bone in his body”. And she claimed that Corbyn had been unable to deal properly with the issue of Labour antisemitism because he had been so emotionally affected by being accused of it himself.
Cue derision and jeers. Which was only to be expected.
After all, Corbyn has not only personally endorsed numerous enemies of the existence of the State of Israel, Judaism and the Jewish people. He has not only failed adequately to tackle the blizzard of anti-Israel and anti-Jewish utterances by party members under his leadership.
He has himself endorsed unambiguously antisemitic tropes, such as the wall mural depicting grotesquely caricatured Jewish financiers making money literally on the backs of the enslaved poor (which he claims to have supported only on freedom of expression grounds and not to have noticed what the mural actually contained); and he also implied that British Zionist Jews were somehow alien to their own country by being unable to appreciate “English irony”.
So Thornberry’s protestations were ludicrous and clearly untrue and amounted merely to cynical dissembling, no?
Well actually, no. I think she was speaking honestly. And that’s even worse.
For I believe that Corbyn really is upset at the accusations against him – because he really does believe he is simply incapable of antisemitism (which he equates, shallowly, with racism, thus demonstrating he doesn’t even understand that antisemitism is not just a prejudice nor even just a form of bigotry but is a unique and ultimately murderous deformation of rationality and psychology).
And he’s not alone in that belief. Virtually all on the left believe they too are incapable of antisemitism because that is exclusively to be found on the right. Why so?
Please join me here as I discuss with Avi Abelow of Israel Unwired some major events of the past few days in our crazy world.
We consider the implications of President Trump’s decision to withdraw US troops from Syria, the ramifications of which are more complex than might be imagined from the shallow mainstream media accounts. You can also read my take on what really matters about America’s approach to Syria and Iran here.
We also talk about the recent EU survey of perceptions by Jewish communities in Britain and Europe of the incidence of antisemitism in their countries. The survey found rising alarm, especially in Britain, but once again this needs to be unpicked to discover findings which the mainstream media have not seen fit to explore, including a refusal to face realities by the Jewish communities themselves.
most observers today would agree that, at a minimum, the fundamental features of a democracy include government based on majority rule and the consent of the governed; the existence of free and fair elections; the protection of minority rights; and respect for basic human rights. Democracy presupposes equality before the law, due process and political pluralism.Looking at how the report evaluates those countries reminds us of the bias of the West when it comes to the Middle East in general, and these states in particular.
Elections have substantial irregularities that often prevent them from being both free and fair. Government pressure on opposition parties and candidates may be common. Serious weaknesses are more prevalent than in flawed democracies—in political culture, functioning of government and political participation. Corruption tends to be widespread and the rule of law is weak. Civil society is weak. Typically, there is harassment of and pressure on journalists, and the judiciary is not independent.But in the West Bank, they don't have "election irregularities" -- they don't have elections at all!
In these states, state political pluralism is absent or heavily circumscribed. Many countries in this category are outright dictatorships. Some formal institutions of democracy may exist, but these have little substance. Elections, if they do occur, are not free and fair. There is disregard for abuses and infringements of civil liberties. Media are typically state-owned or controlled by groups connected to the ruling regime. There is repression of criticism of the government and pervasive censorship. There is no independent judiciary.And in the category of "Political Participation," "Palestine" comes in with a score of 7.78, tied for second place with Tunisia behind Israel. Add to that how the Palestinian score of 7.78 in Political Participation ties with Canada and exceeds the US score of 7.22 and it appears clear that different standards apply to different areas of the world -- the soft bigotry of low expectations.
The Economist Intelligence Unit’s index is based on the view that measures of democracy which reflect the state of political freedoms and civil liberties are not thick enough. They do not encompass sufficiently, or, in some cases, at all, the features that determine how substantive democracy is. Freedom is an essential component of democracy, but not, in itself, sufficient. In existing measures, the elements of political participation and functioning of government are taken into account only in a marginal and formal way.Yet the report claims that "the condition of holding free and fair competitive
an improvement in Iran’s score in 2017, which saw it climb four places to 150th globally as a result of consistently high voter turnout in recent elections.But according to the American Enterprise Institute, the reason for the large turnout may have nothing at all to do with political participation:
One correspondent explained that the government also stamps birth certificates at polling stations when the presidential ballot is collected. Those stamps are necessary for university admission, bank loans, or state employment. What reportedly happens is that many voters outside the capital and major cities pick up the presidential ballot in order to qualify for such benefits. The state counts the ballot, and the “voter” spoils the presidential ballot since their interest is local only and they do not wish to legitimize the broader regime.At a time when the media, traditional as well as social, is understood to have its own biases and agenda, their reports and articles require a critical eye, now more than ever.
Issam Aqel, a Palestinian-American with Israeli residency, has been detained, arrested and tortured.PMW: The PA’s Apartheid land laws
You may be surprised that you’ve never heard of Aqel. It’s usual for the plight of the Palestinians to make big news. But the ugly truth is, they only make big news when they’ve been hurt by Israel.
And Aqel was tortured by the Palestinian Authority.
This Palestinian Was Tortured. But No One Cares Because It Wasn’t By Israel. by the Forward
Aqel responded to a PA summons to appear in Ramallah where he was called in to “sign paperwork.” But once he appeared, Aqel wasn’t allowed to leave. According to people who have been in touch with him, he was tortured.
Hi crime? Selling land to Jews.
A few weeks ago, the Palestinian Authority’s security forces announced that it had “foiled” the sale of roughly 741 acres to Jews throughout the West Bank and East Jerusalem. In a statement posted on Facebook, the PA said that in a large-scale operation, 44 Palestinians were arrested for attempting to sell property to Jews.
The use of torture is not unusual in the PA. Another man who I will call Ali to protect his identity testified about it before the Knesset. He said he was taken from his family. He was kept in a cage for weeks at a time. His captors threw hot and cold water, threw garbage and rotten food on top of him. They forced him to sit on broken bottles and hung him upside down for days on end.
Ali is one of 52 so-called “collaborators” who were arrested and tortured in the 1990s and early 2000s. In the PA, collaborating with Israeli security forces is illegal, despite the fact that the Oslo accords call for security collaboration between the Authority and Israel. Over the years, many men and women have been accused of being “collaborators” and tortured and killed for their crimes.
“They punished me for saving lives,” Ali told the Knesset, “for preventing terror attacks.”
The 52 “collaborators” were freed by the IDF during Operation Defensive Shield, an Israeli military operation which tackled the suicide-bomber infrastructure in 2002.
An American-Palestinian, Isaam Akel, was convicted of selling land in East Jerusalem to Jews and sentenced to life imprisonment with hard labor by a Palestinian court:
"In accordance with the instructions of clause 2/274 of the [PA] criminal procedures law, the [PA] Grand Criminal Court, which convened in Ramallah, convicted the accused I.A. on the charges attributed to him - an attempt to cut off part of the Palestinian territories and annex them to a foreign state [as described in] Penal Code Number 16 of 1960. Relying on the conviction and in accordance with the instructions of clause 2 of Decision with Legislative Force Number 20 of 2014, the court sentenced him to life with hard labor.
The lawsuit was submitted to the court on Dec. 23, 2018, and the verdict was given approximately a week later."
[WAFA, official PA news agency, Dec. 31, 2018]
The basis for the PA's prosecution of Palestinians for selling land to Jews is article 114 of the Jordanian Criminal Code (1960), which the PA later adopted. The original Jordanian provision stated that a person who attempts to sever any part of the Jordanian territory in order to annex it to a foreign state will be subject to at least five years of hard labor.
In 2014, PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas passed an amendment to the law - Government Decision with Legislative Effect (No. 20), 2014 - in which he raised the maximum sentence to life imprisonment with hard labor.
The prosecution of Palestinians for selling land to Jews is not new and enjoys overwhelming Palestinian support.
In October, Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah faction stated:
"The Fatah Movement emphasized that the sale of properties and lands to the occupation or their illegal transfer to dubious sources constitutes high treason against the religion, the homeland, and the people, and that 'whoever does this decrees upon himself shame and disgrace in this world and in the world to come.'"
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Oct. 14, 2018]
This position is also reflective of the general opinion of the Palestinians. In a recent study, 87.8% of those surveyed said they would call Palestinians who sell land to Jews "traitors" while 9.1% would call them "corrupt/despicable/non-patriotic." [Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research, Dec. 18, 2018]
The fact is that malice toward Israel and Jews is also something that appears regularly in Jordanian media and civil discourse. As the US State Department’s 2017 annual report on international religious freedom noted concerning Jordan, “Editorial cartoons, articles, and postings on social media continued to present negative images of Jews and to conflate anti-Israel sentiment with antisemitic sentiment. The government continued not to take action with regard to antisemitic material appearing in the media, despite laws that prohibit such material.”
HENCE, EVEN though Jordan has formally been at peace with the Jewish state for more than two decades, it appears that our neighbor to the east is shamelessly fomenting antisemitic and anti-Zionist sentiment with little regard for the potentially dire consequences.
This cannot be allowed to continue. With all due respect for Jordan’s so-called “moderating” role in the region, the regime’s actions appear to be anything from moderate and threaten to add fuel to an already combustible situation.
Fortunately, both Israel and the US have leverage with Amman. Washington provided Jordan with $1.3 billion in aid in 2017, and the Jewish state provides the parched kingdom with 50 million cubic meters of desperately needed water annually.
So both in terms of the pocketbook and the pipes, Jordan is reliant on American and Israeli largesse to keep its autocratic rulers afloat. Now more than ever would be a good time to employ these tools to pressure the Jordanian regime to start acting more like a friend, and less like a foe.
Otherwise, there is little reason to continue pouring liquids and liquidity into a country that tramples on its commitments, both literally and figuratively.
Some say that after the Oslo Accords, armed struggle abandoned. However, particularly after the Oslo Accords, the Palestinian resistance, led by Fatah, was set free. In the years of the Intifada, between the years 2000 and 2005, it was set free in a way that was unprecedented in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. The fiercest battles between Fatah and Israel took place after the Oslo Accords, not before them. I am referring to the years 2000-2005. This means that that negotiations that ended in failure in Camp David brought about armed resistance by Fatah with a ferocity that had not been seen before the Oslo Accords.(h/t Yoel)
Dear AliceReally? Professor Peled-Elhanan, who has previously published lies about Israeli textbooks supposedly being "racist," is another academic fraud if she thinks that Talmud is only taught among the haredim.
I read your poem and the criticism of it and I must react.
The people who torture and kill Palestinian have never studied the Talmud. It is not studied in Israeli state schools. And no one can read it on their own. The ones who study it are the ultra-orthodox Jews such as the pro-Palestinian Neturei Karta in NY.
Peled-Elhanan, as an academic, should have researched the Talmud a bit herself before giving Walker an out by saying her quotes might be true. She could have done a great service by informing Walker that she was repeating lies in her poem.
The quotes (whether true or false) are surely partial and do not characterize this 12 volume work (thousand pages in every volume) whose writing ended thousands of years ago.
The Talmud is not a prescriptive book. It is an endless interpretation of the Torah, always adapting the Torah to present times so that people can live by it. Ethiopian Jews never studied it and lived by the Torah as is.Walker responds with a newer poem where she repeatedly refers to "Zionist Nazis" as not representing all Jews, but those "Zionist Nazis" are pretty evil. An excerpt:
In these volumes you read discussion and polemics between different sages about every tiny aspect of human life. And the discussions are brought as they happened, more or less because it was all discussed orally.
But the main thing is that each such discussion ends with: “and so they disagreed” and people would choose the interpretation they wanted. Every argument that is brought is immediately countered by an opposite argument and the discussion that ensued. It is always open ended.
In my time we learned a bit of it and I loved it, because it is Logic, like reading Plato. Today schools don’t teach it anymore.
So in order to know what is in the Talmud – which none of the non-orthodox Israelis or Jews know – you have to read at least a whole chapter, pros and cons etc.
One of the most discussed subjects in the Talmud as in the Torah is the treatment of foreigners, workers, slaves etc. Extremely human and enlightening.
I don’t want you to be trapped in superficial propaganda of ignorant people. And again: the reason for the ruthlessness and violence towards Palestinians is not to be found in ancient writings but in Modern ones. It is Modernity and European Enlightenment that brought slavery, colonialism, Fascism and Totalitarianism, national movements such as Zionism and the way to treat people as superfluous. Auschwitz was not prescribed in any ancient scripture, neither is Israeli colonialism.
Much love
Nurit
–
Prof. Nurit Peled-Elhanan
Zionist Nazis are not the Jews I know; terrorists who would and do kill anyone and anything to get what they want: Control over everyone.(When you take out the random line breaks that make this drivel "poetry" the hate is much clearer.)
I will never be divided from my friends, no matter how bad Zionist Nazis are making Jews look.She can distinguish between good and evil Nazi Jews, but sadly, many others (on her side!) cannot. Which means that when Jews are shot dead for being Jews, from Pittsburgh to Paris to "Palestine," you can give the murderers the benefit of the doubt because they really hate Zionism and Zionists are to blame for making all Jews look bad.
As someone ignorant (yes, this is true) of what is in the ancient texts in their totality, I am, millions of us are, still wounded by the parts that have been inherited by word of mouth, over generations, and millennia, and are recognized as active in human behavior today. I don’t see how we will ever have peace without examining the deep past, and letting go of those parts that mean endless contention and war and suffering.Walker's response is that the evil Talmud is in the DNA of all Jews and her extensive exposure of it using neo-Nazi YouTube videos helps excise the poison from the Jewish DNA.
Newspapers tend to be in the business of bad news far more than good news. “If it bleeds, it leads” is a well-known adage. The downside is we often forget how good things are. Between rockets from Gaza, terrorist attacks, corruption, murder and whatever else makes headlines most days, there are plenty of great events happening in Israel and the world each day. Here is some news from 2018 to remind us all to see the glass as half-full, as the secular year comes to a close.
Netta Barzilai became an international name and a national hero, after she and her chicken sounds brought Israel to its fourth Eurovision victory, the first in 20 years, bringing Israelis to the streets to celebrate and sing “I’m Not Your Toy.”
Netta was part of another major good news story in 2018: the first-ever official visit to Israel by a member of the British royal family, Prince William. This year, a prince and Superman – OK, actor Dean Cain, who played Superman on TV – visited Israel.
Beyond visiting royalty, this was a banner year for Israel’s foreign relations. Our ties expanded throughout the Middle East, with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visiting Oman and other ministers jetsetting around the Persian Gulf. By Netanyahu’s count, 300 senior foreign dignitaries – presidents, prime ministers, foreign ministers, senators and leading parliamentarians – visited Israel this year.
Israeli disaster-relief experts helped people around the world. Israelis provided aid in California, Puerto Rico and Guatemala, where Sara Netanyahu was personally invited by the president’s wife to dedicate the efforts. In Thailand, emergency mobile communication technology developed by Israeli company Maxtech Networks played a key role in rescuing the youth soccer team trapped in a flooded cave, whose survival and rescue captured the world’s attention.
The US recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and moved its embassy. We didn’t need them to tell us. It’s our eternal capital and has been that way for millennia, but it’s nice to get recognition. And US Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley championed Israel repeatedly in that den of wolves.
To look back on antisemitism in 2018, I have split the year into calendar months, with each example representing a different element of the global battlefield.The Intellectual Dishonesty of 'I’m Just Criticizing Israel'
I remember the end of 2017 as being part of a lonely battle. In November I recorded that there were 176 anti-Israel events taking place in the UK in a single month. By year-end we were just a handful shouting about the Labour Party and Jeremy Corbyn, but few seemed to be listening. I didn’t realise back then, how much things were about to change.
January 2018 – Alison Chabloz
2018 Alison Chabloz2018 began just as 2017 ended, with me sitting amongst neo-Nazis and far-left antisemites. On January 10 2018 I was in court, for the early stages of the Alison Chabloz trial. Chabloz is a far-right Jew-baiter, a woman who composes songs that ridicule and deny the Holocaust. To add that extra dose of ‘spiteful’, Chabloz sets the lyrics to classic Jewish folk tunes.
Her journey to the court-room was a long one and this case highlights the difficulty of actually bringing even the most odious haters to justice.
Sitting amongst neo-Nazis in the gallery, people who cheered to songs about the Holocaust, was a very lonely place to be. Yet by the end of 2018, I was almost never alone. One of the greatest changes that occurred in 2018, was the ‘waking up’ of the Jewish community (along with their friends).
In May, Chabloz was found guilty. She was sentenced in June.
The playbook exploited by Marc Lamont Hill and countless other anti-Israel activists ranging from Linda Sarsour to Jimmy Carter, to former Pink Floyd front man, Roger Waters, is the following:Daily Freier losing ground to hot new satire site called “The Forward” (satire)
Step 1: Fabricate a non-existent Israeli law or policy, that, if real, would constitute a colossal human rights violation. Don’t be afraid to be dramatic. Ethnic cleansing has a real ring to it. And always remember to be as vague as possible. Use broad terms and generalizations, making your claims harder to challenge on specific grounds.
Step 2: Next, feign outrage about the existence of this newly concocted law, and justify any acts of terrorism against Israel under the guise of “resistance” against this law you just invented.
Step 3: If anyone points out that what you’re saying lacks any smidgeon of truth, simply reply, “I am just criticizing the Israeli government! Are you a fascist? Am I not allowed to criticize Israeli government policies?”
It goes without saying that criticism of Israel’s government is as kosher as criticism of any country’s government. The only catch is the criticism hinges on the issue under scrutiny being real. It requires specific criticism, aimed at an existing law or practice. Conversely, what borders on bigotry is blithely fabricating non-existent laws or practices — like, Israel’s perpetration of ethnic cleansing — and using them to undermine Israel’s existence. Self-avowed “critics” of Israel who are derided as addled anti-Semites exclusively focus their ire on laws they themselves imagine into existence. Not for the betterment of the Palestinian Arabs, but for the belittling of Israel.
With 2018 drawing to a close, the Daily Freier reviewed its web traffic numbers and discovered that it has been consistently losing market share to a hot new competitor in the “Goofy Jewish Satire” niche market that calls itself “The Forward”. This wacky blog has popped up out of nowhere it appears, and is consistently putting out material that is funnier and more nuts than anything the Daily Freier has managed to produce. So did the Daily Freier just give up? Heck No! We put together a focus group! Yes, the Daily Freier gathered a focus group of Jews: Young and Old. Gay, Straight, and the Israeli guy who you think is Gay but ends up trying to hook up with your girlfriend. Reform, Conservative, Conservadox, Dati, Haredi, and Masorti. Americans, Canuckians, and…. Well you get the point. And if you think this comes cheap, then you haven’t purchased bagels and coffee recently, thank you very much. So anyhoo, we put a bunch of Jews in a room with copies of the Forward downloaded onto Kindles and stealthily recorded their reactions. Like that movie with Sigourney Weaver and the Gorillas. Except the Daily Freier was Sigourney Weaver. Let’s call it “Hebrews in the Mist“. So where were we? Oh yeah, the Focus Group. They LOVED the Forward! But don’t take our word for it, check out some of their reactions below!
“Hey, check this one out!” exclaimed “Married North Jersey Dentist” to the other people sitting at his table. “No, You Can’t Be A Feminist And A Zionist“, by Mariam Barghouti! You know, this might be the funniest thing produced by a Barghouti since Marwan invented the “Hunger Strike with Designated Snack Breaks” last year!“
“OK OK you need to see this!” giggled “Canadian-Israeli Woman” as she took a break from showing everyone pictures of her dogs. “It’s called ‘Lay Off Linda Sarsour’. I know! Linda! The woman who said that there is nothing creepier than Zionism! And accused Jews of secretly controlling America. Yes! her! So anyways, the article says that Jews only criticize Linda because they’re racists! Amazing! ……What’s that you say? It would be funnier if they also threw in some random stuff about Trump? Well say no more. They did that too!”
Buy EoZ's book, PROTOCOLS: EXPOSING MODERN ANTISEMITISM
If you want real peace, don't insist on a divided Jerusalem, @USAmbIsrael
The Apartheid charge, the Abraham Accords and the "right side of history"
With Palestinians, there is no need to exaggerate: they really support murdering random Jews
Great news for Yom HaShoah! There are no antisemites!