Monday, February 04, 2019
Elder of Ziyon
Sunday, February 03, 2019Elder of Ziyon
His Majesty the late King Hussein made a strategic decision when he decided to sign the Wadi Araba Peace Treaty due to far-reaching strategic considerations and out of consciousness of the country's long-term national interests, despite all the pitfalls and dangers associated with it. King Hussein must have felt that on balance, entering into a peace treaty with Israel would serve Jordan's national interests more than maintaining the status quo. Yet, some quarter of a century later, many Jordanians have yet to get used to the implications of that peace treaty, and cling to the notion that anti-normalisation with the Zionist state serves Jordan's interests more.He feels that a line needs to be drawn between what Jordan must do to legally uphold the peace treaty and what it must do to avoid any warming of relations between the two countries:
The anti-normalists are failing to distinguish between normalisation of relations with Israel, which is basic, legally necessary and binding under the peace treaty on one hand, and elevating bilateral relations with Israel to warmer levels on the other, which is not legally binding.I wonder what Palestinian "overtures for peace" he is referring to.
Jordanians at large do not differ on the need to cool off relations with Israel for as long as it continues its current path of defiance of everything sensible to the Palestinian's overtures for peace. But when it comes to “normalisation” per se, it would be difficult to reconcile such a stance with the letter and spirit of the peace treaty. This growing stance is clouding the national thinking and judgments on many regional projects.
The government is called upon to speak out more coherently on this dividing subject, with a view to providing guidance to the public on what is right and what is wrong when it comes to the bilateral relations between Jordan and Israel.
As of January 31st, the US administration ceased all its aid to the Palestinian Authority. In response, Saeb Erekat, the Palestinian Chief Negotiator, said:Pierre Rehov: Pay for slay
“Hundreds of Palestinians will be losing their jobs as a result of the U.S. decision to terminate all USAID projects in Palestine. An additional step in a series of punitive and unethical measures, carried out by the Trump Administration, against the people of Palestine to pressure its leadership to compromise on our inalienable right to self-determination.”
[Website of the State of Palestine PLO Negotiations Affairs Department, Feb. 2, 2019]
Upon closer examination, it becomes clear that Erekat, on behalf of the PA, is once again distorting a very simple fact.
In reality, it is not the US that has made any such decision. Rather, it is the Palestinian Authority, headed by Mahmoud Abbas, which has positively decided to reject all of the considerable US aid to the Palestinians. It has done so by actively choosing to continue its ”Pay for Slay“ policy, whereby the PA squanders hundreds of millions of dollars annually to incentivize and reward terrorism and terrorists including convicted murderers and the families of dead terrorists (so-called “Martyrs.”)
American veteran Taylor Force was murdered by a Palestinian terrorist while touring Israel. When the US understood that the PA pays the family of the murderer of Taylor a monthly allowance, it passed the Taylor Force Act (TFA, passed March 2018). According to the provisions of TFA, most of the US aid to the PA became contingent on the PA abolishing its ”Pay for Slay” policy.
Instead of heeding the call of the US administration, the PA made a positive decision to waive the US aid and continue its ”Pay for Slay“ policy, with Abbas declaring that the PA prioritizes rewarding terrorist prisoners rather than taking care of the rest of the Palestinian population:
There are more than 100 links between the internationally-designated terrorist organizations Hamas and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) with NGOs promoting the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement, some of which receive funding from European states and philanthropic funds, a new report by the Strategic Affairs Ministry has found.
More than 30 members of Hamas and PFLP hold senior positions in BDS-promoting NGOs, the vast majority of whom have been in prison for terrorism-related crimes, including murder, and maintain active ties with the terrorist groups.
Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan said the research “reveals the true nature and goals of the BDS movement and its connection to terrorism and antisemitism.”
“When people talk about the goals of the BDS movement, they don’t bother to read official statements from its leaders,” Erdan lamented. “If you do, it becomes clear that the goals of its leaders are the same as those of the leaders of Palestinian terror organizations. BDS rejects Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state within any borders. They want to see Israel wiped off the map.”
“Promoting boycotts is [just] a different means to achieve this goal,” he added.
One such example is Laila Khaled, a PFLP member infamous for hijacking two civilian planes in 1969 and 1973, who was found to have planned terrorist attacks in Jerusalem as recently as 2011, and called for “armed struggle” against Israel last year. She continues to actively fundraise for BDS organizations in Europe and South Africa.
Another example is Rani Sourani, director of the Palestinian Center for Human Rights and also a PFLP operative. His organization releases weekly reports calling to boycott Israel and received $1.5 million of European funding in 2014-2017. Sourani and Iyad al-Alamo, director of the Palestinian Center for Human Rights’ legal department, provided legal aid and advice to Hamas as recently as 2017. (h/t Elder of Lobby)
Sunday, February 03, 2019Elder of Ziyon
Sunday, February 03, 2019Elder of Ziyon |
| The print edition that was censored |
A Detroit-area historical group is protesting a mayor’s decision to stop it from sending out the latest issue of its publication, which delves into Ford Motor Co. founder Henry Ford’s anti-Semitism.The mayor is censoring a history journal???
Officials with the Dearborn Historical Commission say the latest edition of The Dearborn Historian, a city-financed quarterly journal, should be sent to its roughly 200 subscribers and that Mayor Jack O’Reilly should reverse his decision to cut ties with longtime Detroit journalist Bill McGraw, who wrote the Ford piece.
The story, which can be read online, highlights Ford’s writings and views on Jews and explores how they still influence modern neo-Nazi groups. The cover of the halted edition noted that Ford bought a publication called the Dearborn Independent 100 years ago and “used it to attack Jews.” It added, “the hate he unleashed flourishes in the Internet age.”
O’Reilly said in a statement that he thought the publication and dredging up “hateful messages” from a century ago “could become a distraction from our continuing messages of inclusion and respect.”
Dearborn now has one of largest communities of Arabs outside of the Middle East.He is catering to his Arab voter, who (he believes) would be upset at an article about antisemitism.
Under Ford, the Independent became notorious for its unprecedented attacks on Jews. But Ford’s anti-Semitism traveled far beyond the Dearborn borders. Showing the marketing expertise that had catapulted Ford Motor into one of the world’s most famous brands, Henry Ford’s lieutenants vastly widened the reach of his attacks by packaging the paper’s anti-Semitic content into four books. Experts say “The International Jew,” distributed across Europe and North America during the rise of fascism in the 1920s and ‘30s, influenced some of the future rulers of Nazi Germany.
In 1931, two years before he became the German chancellor, Adolf Hitler gave an interview to a Detroit News reporter in his Munich office, which featured a large portrait of Ford over the desk of the future führer. The reporter asked about the photo.
“I regard Henry Ford as my inspiration,” Hitler told the News.
Sunday, February 03, 2019Elder of Ziyon
• During the WWL 2019 reporting period, at least one female convert has been confined to the family home for some time. Several forced marriages of female converts to Muslim men were reported and a number of converts had to relocate within the country, due to pressure from family and society.
Generally speaking, Christians are affected by Islamic oppression throughout the Palestinian Territories, although there is noticeably more pressure in Gaza than in the West Bank, because of the presence of active radical Islamic movements. Islamic militants more radical than Hamas have been active in Gaza, and are also present in the West Bank. These include Islamic State group (IS) cells - either active or "sleeping". Despite the fact that these groups do not have any major power yet, their influence cannot be dismissed. In addition, there is a continuing influence and enforcement of age-old norms and values.
In the Palestinian Territories it is very much mixed with Islam and especially affects converts from Islam. As in the rest of the Middle East, religion is connected to family identity. Therefore, leaving Islam is interpreted as betraying one’s family. In general, families put strong social pressure on converts to make them return to Islam, leave the region or to be silent about their new faith. In many cases, converts are alienated from their families as a result of their faith.
Dictatorial Paranoia is connected to plain greed and the safeguarding of the interests of a small group. Nepotism is widespread within the clan-based society and people with connections to those in power are most of the time well-off. Christians have traditionally been involved with Fatah and the nationalist movement. Most Christians support the factions in their struggle against the Israeli authorities and face no difficulties. Nevertheless, without elections for many years, the democratic legitimacy of the government is low. Both parties within the Palestinian Authority, Fatah and Hamas, try to maintain power with all means necessary. Freedom of expression and therefore the freedom of religion is limited; if church leaders criticize the Palestinian Authorities or their Islamic rule, it can have negative consequences, especially in Gaza. Christians also face the pressure of Israeli government control; for example, church leaders in Jerusalem have to operate carefully in order not to lose privileges such as easy access to obtaining visas and permits.
And don’t forget the little matter of such falsehoods blatantly violating the Oslo Accords. Those accords obligate the PA to refrain from “hostile propaganda” against Israel. Accusing Israel of murdering the PA most beloved leader surely qualifies as “hostile.” So why does the PA keep violating the accords? What happened to all those promises that it can be trusted to honor the agreements that it signs?
Also in the past few days, a rally was held in Tulkarm — under Abbas’s official auspices — to honor convicted Palestinian murderer Maher Younes, while the Bethlehem branch of Fatah (the ruling party, chaired by Abbas) posted photos on its Facebook page glorifying teenage terrorist Ahmed Sanagrah.
Wait, that doesn’t make any sense, either. The proponents of creating a Palestinian state keep telling us that it’s safe to create such a state because the PA is against terrorism. They say Hamas is the bad one, while the PA is moderate. So if the PA is against terrorism, why do its leader and ruling party keep glorifying, sheltering, and paying terrorists?
By the way, when Abbas spoke at the United Nations earlier this month, he proclaimed the PA’s “commitment to international law and legitimacy and to a peaceful solution.”
And that makes perfect sense. Abbas is truly bilingual. When he speaks to Western audiences, he uses all the right words that they want to hear. He sounds peaceful, reasonable, and moderate. But when he speaks to his own people, he literally speaks another language: the language of hatred and violence. It’s the kind of language that gets innocent people killed.
There was a time, not so long ago, when it was almost impossible to find out what was being said by Palestinian Arab leaders in their own media. Every once in a while, something would leak out. But by and large, the world news media did an effective job of keeping Americans in the dark about what Arafat, Abbas, and the others were saying.
That’s all changed thanks to Palestinian Media Watch (PMW), which exposed the above-cited outrages and so many others. By exposing the PA leaders’ true words, PMW has affected US and European policy towards the PA and in some cases has led directly to reductions of Western aid to the PA. Palestinian Media Watch is a uniquely worthwhile organization, and it deserves to receive a level of support from Jewish federations comparable to what is given to various other Israel-based agencies that do good work. Now that would make a lot of sense.
LIKEWISE, THE Alawites were promised a fair amount of autonomy in their own area around Latakia, between Lebanon and Turkey. A nominally Shi’ite sect that most Muslims, including regular Shi’ites, regarded as heretical, the Alawites were eager to associate with the new non-Muslim rulers. They provided the French with excellent and disciplined native levies, which later turned into elite forces.
The Druze issue was more awkward. Another offshoot of Shi’ite Islam that had developed into a fully separate religion, the Druze community was a major power both in the mountainous areas south of Damascus – the Jabal Druze – and in several parts of Lebanon. While the French provided the Jabal Druze with a state of its own, they subordinated the Lebanese Druze to the Christians. That major departure from their global scheme and major mistake was soon met by a bitter all-Druze insurgency and more unrest in other parts of the country. It took two years, and a very discerning general, Edouard Andrea, to quell it in 1927. Finally, de Caix’s map was cosmetically redrawn. The states of Damascus, Aleppo and Jabal Druze were merged into a single Syrian Federal State. However, Lebanon and the Alawite State were maintained as separate entities.
Wrested from Vichy France by the British and the Free French in 1941, Syria was granted independence as a single state in 1945, with the exception of Lebanon, which was confirmed as a separate independent state. It did not mean, however, that the ethnic, religious and geographic tensions or rivalries that appalled de Caix vanished instantly. On the contrary, they were exacerbated by an enormous demographic growth – from five million in the 1950s to about 10 million in the 1970s to about 20 million today. Democracy quickly gave way to military regimes, a succession of coups and even a brief incorporation into Gamal Nasser’s United Arab Republic. Finally, the Alawites took over.
Ironically, the pro-French Latakia sectarians had converted to militant nationalism and then Ba’athism in the 1940s, and their military power had allowed them to assert an ever-increasing role in the country’s politics in the 1950s and 1960s. In 1970, Hafez Assad, an air force general and a leader of the Ba’athist Syrian branch, emerged as the sole ruler. The Assad regime, under Hafez Assad from 1970 to 2000, and then under his son Bashar, was outwardly pan-Arabist, but relied in fact on carefully calculated sectarian alliances.
In a nutshell, the Alawites coopted all non-Sunni or non-Arab minorities in order to check the Sunnis. The system was cemented by socialism – in effect, family and sectarian patronage – and a close alliance with the USSR. Once the Soviet Empire fell that started to unravel. The civil war that started in 2011 brought back to the surface a geopolitical Atlantis: de Caix’s map, with only one major difference, the assertiveness of Trans-Euphrates Syria.
The post-Soviet Russians have been back in Syria since 2015. While they see the preservation of their Alawite ally as a priority, they are realistic enough to commend federalization as a long-term solution. This is all the more so since they know they are bound to compete with their Iranian allies and their Turkish allies-in-the-making. The Americans and the Europeans should not, at that point, leave it to the Russians alone. Nor should the Israelis. (h/t Elder of Lobby)
Britain’s far right has never been so politically weak, fractured or disorganized. The British National Party – whose leader, Nick Griffin, once warned against the “unholy alliance of leftists, capitalists and Zionist supremacists” which had conspired “with the deliberate aim of breeding us out of existence in our own homelands” – is now a spent force.
A decade after winning nearly a million votes and seats in the European Parliament and London Assembly, the far right is now “almost extinct,” in the words of the anti-extremist organization Hope Not Hate.
“Organizationally,” Hope Not Hate suggested in its annual report last year, “the movement is weaker than it has been for 25 years. Membership of far-right groups is down to an estimated 600-700 people.”
But counting votes or membership rolls, its opponents fear, fails to capture the nature of the threat it poses.
That threat has seen growing warnings by the police of the danger of far-right terrorism. Last year, Mark Rowley, then the UK’s most senior counter-terrorism officer, warned that the “right-wing terrorist threat is more significant and more challenging than perhaps public debate gives it credit for.”
Over the previous two years, he suggested, far-right activity had evolved from unpleasant protests and hate crimes committed by isolated individuals. “Right-wing terrorism wasn’t previously organized here,” he claimed.
Thus while much media and political discussion on anti-Semitism over the past three years has focused on the opposition Labour party and its leader, Jeremy Corbyn, that attention has somewhat disguised the danger posed by the far right — a danger which the country’s current political instability and divisive debate over its planned departure from the European Union appears to be fueling.
Saturday, February 02, 2019Elder of Ziyon
A new shopping center in the Atarot Industrial Zone, between Ramallah and Jerusalem, has Palestinians grappling with how to respond to it. Atarot Mall, built by the Israeli supermarket magnate Rami Levy on the western side of the separation wall, is promising high-quality goods at low prices and jobs for Jews, Muslims and Christians. Many, however, see the mall as a threat to Palestinian-owned shops in East Jerusalem and have called for Palestinian merchants and consumers to boycott it.So of course...
The shopping center, inaugurated Jan. 11, is part of a chain that also has branches in Israeli settlements on the West Bank and in Jerusalem. What differentiates the Atarot branch is its location on Route 60, the highway that separates the northern and southern parts of the West Bank and is used by Palestinians as well as Israeli settlers. Also of note is that Palestinian merchants from Jerusalem have purchased or rented space in the mall, which will have a reported 50 stores.
The shopping center embodies Levy’s policy of promoting economic coexistence and normalization between Jews and Arabs. He has pursued these policies through Rami Levy Hashikma Marketing, Israel's third largest supermarket chain, which hires Muslim, Christian, and Jewish workers and caters to both the Arab and Jewish communities.
In an article and video posted Nov. 20, 2017, to the website for Coordination of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT), Levy said, “In Judea and Samaria we have four branches. … I think that coexistence needs to come from here. To show that it is possible to live together, to work together, and serve each other in a fair and moral way.”
Levy, who invested 200 million shekels ($54 million) in the new shopping center, which took two years to build, told COGAT that 65% of the merchants will be Jews and 35% Palestinians. “We treat everyone here equally,” he said. “Everyone wants to make this center a success.”
Various Palestinian parties have called for boycotting the mall. In a Jan. 8 statement, Fatah asserted, “Buying and renting shops or shopping there is a betrayal of the homeland.”We've seen this before. Rami Levy supermarkets have similarly been blasted by the Palestinian Authority - and Arabs shop there anyway, despite threats.
Rita Abu Ghosh, media coordinator of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign, told Al-Monitor, “The BDS movement considers anyone taking part in the mall to be working with the occupation and must be boycotted.”Once again, BDS and Palestinian "leaders" are acting to hurt Arab owned businesses and Arab consumers.
She said that BDS in cooperation with the National Labor Authority, a Jerusalem-based NGO comprised of political, national and religious figures, had succeeded in dissuading prominent merchants from Jerusalem not to open stores in the mall. One of them owns a large electronics company that was supposed to occupy an entire floor, and another owns a mobile phone business.
Abu Ghosh remarked that BDS also contacted several owners of small shops, such as those selling bread, shoes or clothes, but the majority refused to withdraw from the mall because of the potential benefits, such as expected high demand for their goods, or for fear of having to pay hefty fines should they withdraw from their lease agreement.
Book Review: ANTISEMITISM Here and Now By Deborah E. LipstadtStephen Pollard: I truly thought that anti-Semitism was over… I was wrong
Another guise is anti-Zionism, which pretends that one can malign Israel as a uniquely diabolical and illegitimate state, guilty of Nazi-like atrocities, and still be acquitted of anti-Semitism. The leading Western voice for this view is the British Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn, who has repeatedly joined hands with virulent anti-Semites who share his pro-Palestinian, anticapitalist views — all the while insisting that he opposes racism. Lipstadt makes short work of that defense.
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“Is Jeremy Corbyn an anti-Semite?” she asks.
“My response would be that that’s the wrong question. The right questions to ask are: Has he facilitated and amplified expressions of anti-Semitism? Has he been consistently reluctant to acknowledge expressions of anti-Semitism unless they come from white supremacists and neo-Nazis? Will his actions facilitate the institutionalization of anti-Semitism among other progressives? Sadly, my answer to all of this is an unequivocal yes. Like Trump, Corbyn has emboldened and enabled anti-Semites, but from the other end of the political spectrum.”
This analysis — that the resurgence of anti-Semitism owes as much to its political enablers who aren’t openly bigoted as it does to its ideological practitioners who are — is the most valuable contribution the book makes to our discussion of modern-day Jew hatred. Still, Lipstadt misses something important by insisting that anti-Semitism “has never made sense and never will.”
Not quite. However irrational, cynical or stupid anti-Semites may be, most Jews nonetheless can be said to stand for certain ideas and attitudes. A particular concept of morality. A reverence for law founded on the idea of truth. A penchant for asking nettlesome questions. Skepticism toward would-be saviors. A liberal passion for freedom.
Anti-Semites tend to have the opposite set of views, for reasons that may be repugnant but are perfectly rational. The fundamental truth about anti-Semitism isn’t that it’s necessarily crazy. It’s that it’s inevitably brutish.
The conclusion to be drawn is that the enemies of the Jews, whether in Tehran or Virginia, will always be the enemies of liberalism — which is why the fight against anti-Semitism must also be a fight for liberalism. Lipstadt gets this, of course, even if she arrives at the point by a different set of stairs. Fair enough. She has written a book that combines erudition, clarity, accessibility and passion at a moment when they could not be needed more.
That is one reason why Holocaust Memorial Day is so important - because as the survivors pass on, we need to retain a collective memory of what happened on European soil so recently.Singling Out the Jewish State
But there is a deeper issue. Were those older generations, in those countries, uniquely capable of such evil? As a Jew, I grew up almost entirely unaware of anti-Semitism. It was indeed just history to me. My grandmas told me stories of pogroms in Poland and Lithuania. One kept a suitcase packed and stored in a cupboard "because you never know when we might have to leave". I thought she was living in the past, that the Holocaust had somehow forced an end to anti-Semitism.
But I was wrong.
It was arrogance for me to assume that my generation, alone in history, was cured of that virus. Anti-Semitism is not called "the oldest hatred" for nothing. And slowly, I started to see it - and to experience it. A comment about being a "Jew boy", not really British; a snide remark that we Jews stuck together and really ran the country. But I didn't think too much about it. Half a dozen stupid remarks in 40 years is hardly a torrent.
That was then.
This, though, is now - when I have to block 2,000 people because otherwise my Twitter feed would be an even greater cesspit of anti-Semitism than it is. When people openly tell me that I should be in the gas chambers and that my children will not live to adulthood because Hitler's work will be finished; when I am told I am running a Jewish paedophile ring; when I am said to be a paid agent of Israel, a foreign agent in a foreign land.
Yes, it's just words. But the people who send such words are real. And my office has to have guards due to the threats.
Most of those who choose to attack me as a Jew on social media have one thing in common: they describe themselves as supporters of Jeremy Corbyn.
If Mr Corbyn had taken real action, had attacked them with vigour and with purpose, things might be different. But he has not. Ever. He has chosen not to. Is it any wonder I am scared of what may come, if he ever takes power?
There are 43 countries with official state religions, and another 40 that give one religion preferential treatment over other faiths. Of the former group, 27 countries enshrine Islam as their state faith, and 13 do the same for Christianity—including nine countries in Europe. Rep. Ilhan Omar (D., Minn.) does not seem to have a problem with any of them; one would be hard-pressed to recall a single word of criticism. But she does have a problem—a big one—with the world's only Jewish state—a tiny country, home to just under nine million people—recognizing itself as, well, the Jewish state. Why the double standard? Maybe it's not the obvious.
Omar's most recent public criticism of Israel came during an interview on Yahoo News' "Through Her Eyes" on Tuesday. After Omar lamented how the United States strongly supports Israel and has a policy that "makes" Jerusalem "superior" to the Palestinians, whatever that means, host Zainab Salbi pressed her to provide specifics. Omar pointed to Israel's Jewish nation-state law, which was passed last year and affirms that Israel is the "nation-state of the Jewish people, in which it fulfills its natural, religious, and historic right to self-determination."
"When I see Israel institute a law that recognizes it as a Jewish state and does not recognize the other religions that are living in it, and we still uphold it as a democracy in the Middle East, I almost chuckle," Omar said. "If we see that in any other society, we would criticize it. We would call it out. We do that to Iran. We do that to any other place that sort of upholds its religion."
Perhaps Omar can provide examples of her colleagues in Congress "calling out" Christian countries in Europe for affirming the prominence of Christianity or, more controversially, doing the same for Muslim countries in Africa and the Middle East—such as her native Somalia—that define Islam as their state religion. Has she ever questioned whether Denmark is still a democracy because its constitution recognizes the Lutheran church as the state religion? Has she ever called out Jordan for establishing Islam as the religion of the state? It's not even worth going into Omar's asinine attempt to compare Israel, a true democracy, to Iran, an Islamist theocracy that abuses minorities.
In her interview, Omar went on to say, in a wonderful show of irony, that she is "aggravated" by "those contradictions," apparently blind to her own double standard. She does not seem to understand, or knows but will not acknowledge, that Israel's nation-state law, which is similar to constitutional provisions in several European countries, neither creates individual privileges for any Israeli citizens nor infringes on the individual rights of any citizens. Moreover, Israel has never even officially proclaimed Judaism as the state religion. Palestinian Basic Law, meanwhile, states that "Islam is the official religion in Palestine" and that "the principles of Islamic Shari'a shall be the main source of legislation."
So we are left with a question: why single out Israel?
Friday, February 01, 2019Elder of Ziyon
Friday, February 01, 2019Ian
"pro-Palestinian", BDS, Benny Morris, Brazil, David Singer, Hezbollah, iran, Ireland, Linkdump, Martin Sherman, Melanie Phillips, opinion poll, Saeb Erekat, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Terrorists in SuitsProtests by the Palestinians in Lebanon are unlikely to draw any attention from the international community, including so-called pro-Palestinian groups that are active especially on university campuses in the US and Canada, among other places.David Singer: Trump Should Reaffirm Core Bush-Congress Commitments to Israel
The real "pro-Palestinian" groups are those who are willing to raise their voices against the mistreatment of Palestinians at the hands of their Arab brothers. The real "pro-Palestinian" groups are those who are prepared to defend the rights of women and gays living under Hamas in the Gaza Strip. The real "pro-Palestinian" groups are those that are prepared to advocate for democracy and free speech for Palestinians living under the repressive regimes of the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank and Hamas in the Gaza Strip. The real "pro-Palestinian" groups are those who are prepared to condemn Lebanon for its racist and discriminatory measures against Palestinians, living and dead.
Hiding at a university campus and spewing hatred against Israel does not make one "pro-Palestinian." Rather, it makes one just an Israel-hater. Will the "pro-Palestinian" groups listen to the urgent messages coming from the people in Lebanon they claim to represent?
The upcoming Israeli elections will give Israelis the chance to vote on the future direction Israel’s new government should take in resolving the future of Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) and Gaza (“disputed territories”) – the last remaining 5 per cent of the territory of the Mandate for Palestine where sovereignty still remains unallocated between Arabs and Jews.
The choices offered to Israeli voters should be explicitly spelt out by the political parties contesting the elections. The newly-elected government’s stated policy should be implemented. This basic premise of democracy has been undermined in America as Trump’s election commitment to build his promised border wall remains unfulfilled because of Congress’s opposition.
Trump should not similarly attempt to thwart the mandate of Israel’s next government.
Trump should shelve his long-overdue ultimate deal indefinitely – due to the changed circumstances that have demonstrably arisen since his well-intentioned thought bubble in November 2016.
Instead – Trump should:
- Pledge his Government’s full support for Israel’s next duly elected Government
- Reaffirm the core commitments made by President Bush to Israel’s Prime Minister Ariel Sharon in Bush’s letter dated 14 April 2004 – endorsed overwhelmingly by the Congress by 502 votes to 12 (“Bush/Congress Commitments”).
Those core American commitments – made to procure Israel’s unilateral withdrawal from Gaza – included:
- Opposing any peace plan other than the 2003 Bush Roadmap
- Being strongly committed to Israel’s security and well-being as a Jewish state.
- Not supporting any right of return by Palestinian refugees to Israel
- Regarding as unrealistic a full and complete withdrawal from the disputed territories.
Congress could endorse this Trump initiative – reinforcing continuing bipartisan support for Israel.
Peace will remain elusive – but Trump will have saved himself from drowning in a cesspool that has swallowed previous American presidents who believed they had the answer to ending this unresolved 100 years old conflict.
As readers will recall, I have, for years, been urging the initiation of a largescale initiative for the incentivized emigration of the Arab population in Judea-Samaria and Gaza, as the only viable policy option that can facilitate (albeit not ensure) the continued survival of Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people—as it is, demonstrably, the only policy option that allows Israel to adequately contend with the geographic and demographic imperatives required for such survival.
This week, I encountered strident—albeit somewhat doleful, and certainly unintended—support for my thesis from a rather unexpected source—the well-known historian, Benny Morris.
Morris: Coming full circle?
Once a member of the so-called New Historians, a radical, left-wing group of academics, who challenged the traditional Zionist view of the inception of Israel—particularly the displacement of hundreds of thousands of Arabs due to the fighting during the 1948 War of Independence—Morris has come to adopt a far more understanding view of the alternatives facing the then-nascent Jewish state—and its resultant actions.
Indeed, in many respects Morris has come “full circle”—at least in terms of prevailing public perceptions of his political positions. Once denounced as an anti-Zionist, considered too radical for employment in the Israeli academe, and who was imprisoned, rather than serve as an army reservist in the “occupied territories”, he now not only defends, but endorses, the coercive displacement of Arabs—indeed, even lamenting that it was not sufficiently implemented.
In this regard, he has chided Ben Gurion for being overly reticent: In a 2004 interview with Haaretz’s Ari Shavit, he declared provocatively: "If he was already engaged in expulsion, maybe he should have done a complete job…my feeling is that this place would be quieter and know less suffering if the matter had been resolved once and for all.”
Morris speculates: “If Ben-Gurion had carried out a large expulsion --the whole Land of Israel, as far as the Jordan River. It may yet turn out that this was his fatal mistake. If he had carried out a full expulsion - rather than a partial one - he would have stabilized the State of Israel for generations."
Friday, February 01, 2019Elder of Ziyon
Friday, February 01, 2019Elder of Ziyon
Friday, February 01, 2019Elder of ZiyonArab antisemitism, Arab culture, Cairo International Book Fair, conspiracy theories, Dar al-Kitab al-Arabi, Hitler, jew hatred, Muslim antisemitism, PEZ, The Protocols
The same holds true for Linda Sarsour, co-chair of the Women’s March. Sarsour is a supporter of the anti-Semitic boycott against Israel. In 2012, she tweeted, “nothing is creepier than Zionism,” and has publicly defended radical Jew-hater Louis Farrakhan. She has stated that support of Israel cannot coincide with feminism. Yet she, too, sent out a Holocaust Remembrance missive — this one curiously missing any mention of the Jews. “May the memories of those who perished inspire us to love and protect one another. May we never forget history so that we may never repeat it,” she tweeted. “May they rest in an eternal peace knowing that we will fight for each other no matter the consequences.”Amnesty: Israel using antisemitism to whitewash its war crimes
Again, a message just vague enough with which to virtue-signal — all without ever having to acknowledge the real-life anti-Semitism in which Sarsour herself has engaged.
Her tweet is a convenient way of omitting the actual message of the Holocaust: first, that Jews must never again be dehumanized and murdered for political purposes; second, that anti-Semitism is not merely a subset of bigotry, but its own poisonous brand; and third, that mass murder is possible when purportedly civilized people forget the first two lessons. And yet, thanks to a deliberate campaign to obfuscate those first two lessons, enemies of the Jewish people can hijack Holocaust Remembrance Day to use as a political club.
One time, the Lubavitcher Rebbe was asked if the Holocaust could ever happen again. “Morgen in der fruh,” he answered. “Tomorrow morning.”
In a world in which Iran routinely threatens Israel’s Jews with annihilation, in which the Palestinian Authority and Hamas unite to teach their children about the eventual hope of a Judenrein Palestine, in which Jews across Europe live under the possibility of the knife, the Holocaust must be remembered. Obscuring it with platitudinous statements uttered by anti-Semites isn’t just disgusting, it’s dangerous.
Israeli ministers have accused Amnesty International of antisemitism to divert public attention away from the government’s “war crimes” against Palestinians in the West Bank, the group said on Wednesday.An amnesty for Paliwood
It hit back at the right-wing reaction to its report on Israel’s tourism industry over the pre-1967 lines called “Destination: Occupation,” which it published on Tuesday.
The report called on the four major digital booking sites – Airbnb, Booking.com, Expedia and TripAdvisor – to boycott hotels, rentals and tourism sites over the pre-1967 lines. This includes Jewish sites in Jerusalem’s Old City, with its Western Wall and the Temple Mount, which are the holiest sites in Judaism.
Strategic Affairs Minister Gilad Erdan tweeted Tuesday that Amnesty has become a leader in the antisemitic #BDS campaign and that its report was an “outrageous attempt to distort facts, deny Jewish heritage & delegitimize Israel.”
Emotions are particularly on the issue among Israeli politicians in light of the anticipated publication this winter of a blacklist of companies doing business with Israel over the pre-1967 lines, which the office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights is expected to publish later this month.
Emotions are particularly high on the issue among Israeli politicians, in light of the anticipated publication this winter of a blacklist of companies doing business with Israel over the pre-1967 lines, which the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights is expected to publish later this month.
The next day Amnesty said that ministers, such as Erdan, are trying to “silence reports of Israel’s war crimes in the occupied Palestinian territories.”
To use the charge of antisemitism in the context of the report is “blatant incitement based on lies, deceptions and distortions that are easy to refute and are intended to divert the discussion from the subject at hand, which is, war crimes and human rights violations against Palestinians in the occupied territories,” Amnesty stated.
What grounds are there to believe this is the fakest of fake news?
Although not stated explicitly by Amnesty International we are supposed to believe the boy in the photograph is bravely putting his body at risk to stop a home demolition.
Check out the bulldozer driver in the enlarged image. Does he look like an IDF driver? IDF uniform is olive-green. This driver appears to be wearing a shirt with a distinct blue stripe. If he was demolishing a building in Palestinian territory wouldn’t he for his own safety be wearing his helmet?
Check out the bulldozer. It is clearly not an IDF bulldozer. It is completely unarmoured and painted bright yellow not grey or khaki.
So maybe it is a civilian bulldozer? Is the boy in danger or not?
With photography distance relationships can be quite deceptive. Long lenses compress distance. Either way it looks as if he is nowhere near the path of the bulldozer. He has been placed there by the photographer for a good angle. Or did you think it was his idea to find a chair and a flag?
Buy EoZ's book, PROTOCOLS: EXPOSING MODERN ANTISEMITISM
