Monday, June 24, 2019

I am pleased that the amazing tweeter American Zionism agreed to write an occasional article for EoZ.

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Arab/Muslim Immigration to the Holy Land

Part 1 - Bosnia, Algeria, Morocco, and Egypt


We know a lot about Jewish immigration to the Holy Land because the Ottomans and then the British did such a good job at keeping Jews out that it became global news. But what about Arab/Muslim immigration to the Holy Land during the same period. The usual narrative you will read online is that the Jews arrived in the late 19th & early 20th century, but that the “Palestinians” had been there since the beginning of time. Is that true?

If you have ever spent time on social media talking about Israel, you may have come across this quote from Robert Kennedy

“The Jews point with pride to the fact that over 500,000 Arabs, in the 12 years between 1932-1944, came into Palestine to take advantage of living conditions existing in no other Arab state …”

Kennedy, a young, recent college graduate and wise beyond his years, made the remark after a trip to the Holy Land in March of 1948 -  after the UN partition of Mandatory Palestine and on the precipice of the Israeli War of Independence, which began in May. The quote appeared in the Boston Post, in a series of articles about his experiences on the trip. Kennedy was a supporter of the nascient state of Israel and of the Jewish people and it is what eventually lead to his assassination in 1968.

I’ve often thought about that quote. I’ve even referred to it on social media. But, I haven’t seen much in the way of  support for that statement. Did Arabs really immigrate to Palestine to take advantage of the improved living conditions thanks to the Zionists enterprises? Did they immigrate to Palestine at all? Could I find any proof of Arab/Muslim immigration to the Holy Land in the 19th or early 20th centuries?  I began studying historic documents to see if Jews were the only people that immigrated to the land of Israel or if they were joined by Arabs. As conditions in the Holy Land improved, Arabs/Muslims did indeed come from around the Mediteranean, other parts of the Levant, Egypt, and even from Europe at the same time as the Jews. They immigrated, built colonies, and eventually became a component of the people that would go on to call themselves Palestinians. Here are some of those stories. This article is part one of what I discovered.

A Bosniak Muslim Colony in Caesarea

Murray's Handbooks for Travellers were among the oldest and most respected travel guides in Europe. Their guides were well researched and revised as needed. Their first guide on Syria and Palestine appeared in 1858. In the 1903 edition, they report that a colony of Bosniak Muslims settled in the ancient seaside city of Caesarea in 1883 (page 202). Later it states that the Bosniak colonists were engaging in building operations (Page 205).

  It certainly doesn’t sound like they were planning on going anywhere. They were building a society. One question remains from the passage. Murray’s guide mentions that the colony was ravaged by malaria and that it might become extinct. Did it become extinct because of malaria?


If you have ever taken a tour in Europe or looked for a tour from Europe, chances are you’ve dealt with Thomas Cook. One of the most well known travel agencies in the world, dating back nearly 200 years, Thomas Cook is a name that people trust. They also happened to produce travel guides in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. In 1907, four years after the Murray guide, they published Cook's Tourists' Handbook to Palestine and Syria. In the section under Ceasarea, they also mention that Bosnian immigrants lived in Caesarea and “have houses among the ruins” of the ancient city ( page 169).



Baedeker is known around the world for their travel guides. They are so ubiquitous with international travel that the name Baedeker came to mean “guidebook” in the dictionary. In the 1912 edition of Baedeker’s Handbook for Travellers Palestine and Syria, on the section about Caesarea, they mention that “Bosnians have been settled here since 1884 and can supply rough nightquarters in case of need.” (page 237) This was nine years after Murray mentioned them and five years after Cook.




Not only were they still in Caesarea, but they were the only group mentioned that supplied sleeping arrangements in the city. Obviously, the Bosnian colony did not become extinct and most likely grew, eventually to be absorbed into the community that would go on to call themselves Palestinians.

Colonies from North Africa

The Maghrebins of Jerusalem

In the 1876 edition of Baedeker’s Handbook for Travellers Palestine and Syria, regarding the population of the city of Jerusalem, it states “Among the Muslim Arabs is also included a colony of Africans (Moghrebins).” (page 162) The Maghrebs are Muslim of North Africa, mostly Morocco, Tunisia, and Algeria, and are either Arabs or Berbers. They were previously referred to as Moors by Europeans. In the 1894 edition of Baedeker, eighteen years later, it repeats the same statement about the Maghreb colony and mentions that out of 40,000 residents of Jerusalem, 7560 are Muslims including that community. 




The 1907 edition of  Cook's Tourists' Handbook to Palestine and Syria it lists the population of Jerusalem at 50,000 with 12,000 Muslims and among them “a colony of African’s from Morocco”. (page 65)




The 1912 edition of Baedeker’s also mentions North African Maghrebins located near the Western Wall in Jerusalem, only this time they’ve graduated from a colony to residents of the city.




If the colony existed at minimum 36 years and the members were absorbed into the population at large, there is a good probability that they eventually became part of the future Palestinian people.


The Algerians of Palestine

Emir Abdelkader was an amazing man. He was an Algerian religious and military leader who staged a rebellion against the French occupation of Algeria in the mid 1800s. He eventually failed and was forced to flee with his supporters to Turkey and then eventually settled in Damascus, Syria where he lived out the rest of his days. In the 1907 edition of Cook's Tourists' Handbook to Palestine and Syria on Page 286, it mentions that part of the population of Safed in northern Galilee, one of the four holy cities of Judaism in Israel, contains a large number of Muslims, including Algerians who followed Abdelkader into exile after the failed rebellion. This episode is interesting for two reasons. The first is that we have written proof that there were North Africans who had a community in Safed. The second, is that since Abdelkader went from Algeria to Turkey to Syria, it would logically follow that those that settled in Safed came over from Syria. We know from history books and other travel journals that the Ottoman occupiers of the Holy Land restricted the number of Jews who could immigrate and live in the Holy Land, while the same restriction did not apply to other populations and the border was open to them. This entry supports that claim.




The 1907 Cook handbook lists two other Algerian colonies in the Galilee. The first was the village of Kafr Sabt, which is described as an “Algerian colony” (page 274). Kaft Sabt is often noted as a Palestinian village on the Internet, but in 1907 it was cleary a strictly Algerian colony.



The third reference to Algerians in the 1907 Cook guide can be found on page 287 and mentions an Algerian settlement near the village of Ain ez Zeitun.




So far the only references to Algerians immigrants is in the 1907 Cook guidebook. Are there any other references? In the 1912 edition of  Baedeker’s Handbook for Travellers Palestine and Syria, it references the village of Kafr Sabt as being “a village inhabited by Algerian peasants” (page 251) corroborating the account in the Cook guidebook.





That is at least three separate Algerian colonies in the Galilee that came from at least two different areas in the Middle East (North Africa and Syria) and were established in the late 19th century at the same time as Jews were settling in the area. We can draw some conclusions. The first being that the Algerian communities did not return to Algeria. There is no record to suggest it. They undoubtedly  became part of the Palestinian people. They were not a group of people who originated in the Holy Land and whose ancestors had lived there for thousands of years, but recent North African immigrants. The second is if it’s true that there were Arab/Muslim colonies established by Algerians at the same time Jews were establishing colonies, then if you call Jews “colonists” you have to also call the Palestinians colonists, since part of the Palestinian collective was composed of recent immigrants that estabilised colonies and settlements. As we will see, these weren’t the only Arab/Muslim colonies.

Gaza’s Egyptian Character and  the Galilee’s Egyptian Colony

In 2012, Hamas’ Minister of the Interior and National Security, Fathi Hammad, speaking from the Gaza Strip, declared on video that “half the Palestinians are Egyptians and the other Half are Saudis”. Was he just trying to get money from the Egyptian government when he said it, or did some Palestiians actually immigrate from Egypt? Gaza is on the border of Egypt’s Sinai peninsula and the connection between Egypt and Gaza goes back a thousand years or more, including the Egyptian Mamluk occupation of Gaza in the 14th century and Modern Egypt’s occupation of Gaza between 1948 and 1967. Gaza has served as a major stop in the trade route between Syria and Egypt, so it would make sense that over the long history of the two, Egyptians would have settled in Gaza. But do we have any historical proof to back it up?

In the 1894 edition of Baedeker’s Handbook for Travellers Palestine and Syria (page 156),  it gives a description of Gaza as having a “semi-Egyptian character”, that the veil of the Muslim women “closely resembles the Egyptian”, and that the bazaar too “has an Egyptian appearance.”



All three of those descriptions allude to the area being inhabited by people who came over from Egypt. The 1906 edition of Baedekers repeats the description of Gaza as having a semi-Egyptian character.

In the 1822 travel journal Travels Along The Mediterranean Vol.2 by Robert Richardson, a Scottish physician and travel writer, he writes that the southern half of Gaza below the town of Deir al Balah (Dair), including Khan Yunis (Hanoonis), pays tribute not to the Pasha of Acre or Jerusalem, but to the Pasha of Egypt (pages 195-196). Not only does it seem like Gaza was a distinctly Egyptian area in feel, but part of it may have actually been part of Ottoman Egypt.




That’s all fine, but it could be argued that the Gazan’s adopted the looks and customs of the Egyptian traders and that who they paid tribute to doesn’t reflect who they were. Even if they were Egyptians, who is to say they didn’t come over during the Mamluk conquest 500 years prior and remain? Is there any proof that Egyptians came as immigrants during the time Zionists were cultivating the land? In fact there is, and they didn’t only settle in Gaza.

In the 1903 edition of Murray's Handbooks for Travellers it states that Ibrahim Pasha established a colony of Egyptian peasants in the year 1840 in the ancient city of Bethshan now called Beisan (page 213). It even states that the village is almost exclusively made up of the Egyptian colony. What is interesting about this account is the location of Beisan. It is not located in Gaza or even along the coast. Beisan is in the Jordan Valley in the North close to the Jordanian border. 




The Odd Case of the Al-Simalni Tribe

The most fascinating story of immigration from Egypt might be the story of the Al-Simalni Bedouin tribe in the Galilee. In 1924 the Mukhtar of the tribe announced that they were secretly Jews and wanted to officially convert to Judaism. The British were skeptical and determined that it was probably not true and mostly likely motivated by economics. Whether or not they went through with the conversion is unknown at this time. What is known and more important in the context of this article is the background of the Al-Simalni.

On August 30, 1924, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency (JTA) ran a story about the Al-Simalni tribe, including an interview with their Mukhtar Shiekh Mustapha. When asked why they wanted to convert to Judaism, he explained that the founder of the tribe, Simlon was of Jewish origin and came to Palestine from Egypt 80 years ago. He married a woman from Transjordan (Jordan) and had six children. The tribe emerged from that union. What is not clear is whether he came from Egypt with other Bedouins or he came alone.



What is clear however is that it was a Bedouin tribe in the Holy Land that was not there since “the time of Abraham” as is often sensationalized in books and articles about the history of the region, but one that came from Egypt and Jordan in the mid 19th century! It’s always possible that they were descendants of a Jew. That we will never know. What we do know is they were Arab Muslims who came from Egypt and Jordan and became part of what is know known as the Palestinians.

The story of the Al-Simalni also appeared in the August 31, 1924 edition of the Louisville Courier-Journal.

This by no means is an exhaustive list of Arab/Muslim immigration to the Holy Land during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. These are just a few examples of Arabs/Muslims that settled in the Holy Land at the same time as Jews and who became part of the people we now know as Palestinians. These were not people who had lived on the land from the beginning of time or biblical time that converted to Islam as so many claim. These were immigrants who established colonies and built communities just like the Jews, whether for economic reasons to take advantage of the advances and technologies brought by the Zionists or for other reasons. You probably didn’t know about this wave of Arab/Muslim immigration because while Jewish immigration was restricted, Arab/Muslim immigration was not, so it wasn’t  noteworthy and rarely reported. Not all is as it seems in the news and social media. It is important to search deeper.


In Part 2, we will discuss more settlements of Arabs/Muslims in the land of Israel from the Middle East, including World War I refugees and unauthorized immigration. 

@americanzionism



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  • Monday, June 24, 2019
  • Elder of Ziyon
Alkawnnews.com is the 13th most popular site of any type in Jordan.

An article published there by writer Abdul Hamid Al-Hamshari spins a fanciful conspiracy theory around the Bahrain conference that involved Jews, Freemasons and the Protocols of the Elders of Zion.
The purpose of this workshop is to market the Jewish state and to impose it as an essential component of the new Middle East, which is being promoted and marketed by the United States, which takes the approach of Ferdinand and Isabella as a way to destroy the Arab-Islamic presence in the Middle East.

Of course, the Jewish state will be the actual leader of the Arab communities in the Eastern Mediterranean and North Africa. In other words, the implementation of what Jehovah's Witnesses promoted in 1887 would be the Jewish state in Palestine, the basic building block of a global civil government that rules the world by the Old Testament.

This workshop enabled the Jews in the hands of the Arab and Muslim Masons to take over the entire Middle East and conduct its affairs according to the Basel Conference in Switzerland in 1897, where the evil will spread to all the Arabs in the hands of the Freemasons who follow the implementation of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion.  The settlement of the occupied Palestinian territories and the Golan Heights, the end of UNRWA and the annexation of the occupied Syrian Golan to the occupation entity is in preparation for the liquidation of the Palestinian cause all culminates in the Bahrain workshop.

For the last two decades of the last century and the first decade of the current century the goal is to get rid of everything that was believed to be a stumbling block in the implementation of the Jewish state that Zionism seeks. They destroyed Iraq and Libya and Yemen and others, on the same path to describe the atmosphere of Jewish tampering in the region with the support of American Masons.

This workshop is based on Masonry to serve Zionism and global imperialism and to destroy values ​​and morals in the Arab countries, especially from the cradle of the message of Islam to the Arabian Peninsula and to the end of the world. The Arab and Muslim builders are the ones who have the responsibility of promoting the Zionist presence and the ownership of Palestine to the Jews by legislative status. Abdul Hameed al-Othmani was isolated for refusing to allow the Jews to settle in Palestine and then he was destroyed by the Ottomans, the Ottoman state whose tolerance for the embrace of the Spanish Jews had put the snake in its hole that ended its existence.
Nah, nothing antisemitic about that.

This workshop is not aimed at the economic revival of Palestine or the countries of the Middle East. These countries have enough economic resources if there is good intentions and honesty with self to lead the entire world economically and politically and impose their will on it, but their self-destructive tendencies leadthe Arab region to fall and subjugation and humiliation.
This paragraph is hilarious. It shows that the reason the author hates being under the thumb of his imagined Jewish overlords is because he wants the Arabs to be the ones who control the world!






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  • Monday, June 24, 2019
  • Elder of Ziyon


We have seen this weekend, and will continue to see this week, a Palestinian leadership refusing to accept a detailed economic package that everyone can agree would help their people tremendously.

Let us make explicit what the reporting only hints at.

When Abbas says "no" to $50 billion in economic aid that would build an infrastructure, create universities, empower women and provide tens of thousands of jobs, he is saying that he wants more. He demands a state, half of Jerusalem, the "right of return," Israel releasing thousands of prisoners including the most heinous terrorists, 100% of the territory on the Jordanian and Egyptian sides of the 1949 armistice lines, and more.

If he doesn't get that, there is an "or else." An "or else" that no one talks about, because when it is defined, it shows that Mahmoud Abbas and his Fatah leaders are monsters. The idea is too terrible for tender Western sensitivities so it gets papered over.

What are the "or elses"?

The first and most popular "or else" has been said over the years in a passive way. It states that if Palestinians don't get what they demand, then the region will always be in turmoil. The threat goes that unless Palestinian leaders get the state that they demand, without compromise, they will continue to use terrorism against Israeli civilians. They will continue to shoot rockets at Israeli communities. They will start an uprising. (In times past, they would also threaten to inflame the "Arab street" to destabilize lots of Arab regimes, but I'm not sure anyone believes that anymore.)

In short, the first and foremost "or else" is a permanent return to terror. Within that threat is the hint of a wider threat, that Muslim extremist groups like ISIS and Al Qaeda will become strengthened, that the terrorist spree of the 1970s will return, that there will be more 9/11s.

It is a mafia-style threat of "give me what I want or I will make life miserable for you."

That is bad enough, and it already exposes Abbas and his team as despicable. But more recently there is another "or else," another threat which reveals the Palestinian leadership to be absolute monsters.

The "or else" is that if Abbas doesn't receive aid in the format that he demands, he will allow his own people to wither and die. He refuses to send his people to Israeli hospitals that can save their lives. He refuses to accept USAID aid. He refuses to accept tax revenue from Israel where some 6% is deducted for the amount he pays terrorists and their families.

And he refuses to even consider aid that could bring his people out of the limbo they have been placed in. Money that could give them dignity and a future.

In this insidious "or else," Abbas is telling the West that he doesn't give a damn about his own people, but he knows that the hated Israelis and Americans do care about all human life.

He is saying to do what he wants, or else he will let his own people die.

That is not just bargaining. That is callous and despicable. It is the exact opposite of leadership. It is disgusting.

Yet no one is calling him out on this.






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Sunday, June 23, 2019

  • Sunday, June 23, 2019
  • Elder of Ziyon
Continuing my series of re-captioning single panel cartoons....






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From Ian:

Ben-Dror Yemini: Kushner is repeating the same mistake
John Kerry, who served as US Secretary of State under former US President Barack Obama, claimed more than once that poverty leads to terror. We'll give the poor economic prosperity, he thought, and the level of terror will drop. If anyone thought that the Trump administration had changed direction - the "deal of the century" proves that nothing has changed.

The economic workshop, to be held this week in Bahrain, is proof. We'll give the "Palestinians" economic prosperity, says Jared Kushner, who leads the Trump administration's peace deal staff, and the level of enmity will drop.

Both Kerry and Kushner, along with many others, should know that this is an illusion. The poor in Africa do not choose terror. There are millions of poor people in Nigeria. They don't choose terror. And among the "Palestinians" as well, those who choose violence are not necessarily poor.

The city of Shechem (Nablus) has enjoyed relative prosperity in recent years, thanks to the buying power of Israeli Arabs. Has it changed anything for Zakaria Zubeidi? After all, in recent years he has enjoyed status and is well-to-do financially. But he went back to terror. Because the brainwashing and incitement are a lot stronger than the options of money and prosperity. All the mass terror attacks in the US were carried out by successful, middle-class Muslim youth. Did any of that prevent them from choosing terror? (h/t IsaacStorm)
David Singer: Trump should not pour $6.5 billion into Gaza and 'West Bank'
President Trump should not allow the euphoria that swept the world following the 27 November 2007 Annapolis Conference to infect the Manama Conference being jointly hosted by himself and Bahrain on 25-26 June.

Yet his just released 40 page document “Peace to Prosperity” threatens to do just this – offering US$6.5 billion in Grant and Equity Funding and Concessional Funding to carry out a variety of programs in Judea and Samarai (aka 'West Bank') and Gaza including:
- Starting Equity-Matching and Lending Facilities
- Border Crossing Points Upgrade
- Power Plant Upgrades
- Tourism Lending Facility and Site Rehabilitation
- New Palestinian University

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice’s closing remarks at Annapolis were brimming with hope:

“The conference began with the joint announcement by Prime Minister Olmert and President Abbas that they will begin negotiations to establish a Palestinian state and to achieve Israeli-Palestinian peace with the goal of concluding an agreement by the end of the year 2008”

Under their Joint Understanding Olmert and Abbas committed:
“...to immediately implement their respective obligations under the Performance-Based Road Map to a Permanent Two-State Solution to the Israel-Palestinian Conflict, issued by the Quartet on 30 April 2003 (hereinafter, "the Roadmap") and agree to form an American, Palestinian and Israeli mechanism, led by the United States, to follow up on the implementation of the Roadmap”

Palestinian Authority: U.S. economic plan is a new Balfour Declaration
Palestinian officials on Sunday stepped up their attacks on the economic portion of the US administration’s Middle East peace plan, calling it “Balfour Declaration No. 2” – referencing the 1917 public statement by the British government announcing support for the establishment of a “national home for the Jewish people” in Palestine.

Meanwhile, Palestinian factions called for launching three days of protests in the West Bank and Gaza Strip against the US-led Bahrain economic conference, which is expected to be launched in Manama on Tuesday. The factions and Palestinian officials in Ramallah expressed disappointment over Jordan’s and Egypt’s decision to participate in the conference despite Palestinian calls to boycotting it.

“Day after day, the reality of the American intentions and attitudes against the Palestinian people and their rights are exposed,” the PA Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

Referring to the unveiling of the economic plan by the White House on Saturday, the ministry said it was US President Donald Trump’s “ominous declaration, or Balfour Declaration No. 2.”

The PA ministry accused the US administration of denying the existence of the Palestinian people and dealing with them as a “group of people.”

It said that the US economic plan, called “Peace to Prosperity,” was an extension of the US administration’s political bias in favor of Israel. “This plan does not mention the economy of the Palestinian state and its components, but is trying to whitewash the occupation and settlements,” the ministry added.
Tensions Rise Over US-Led Bahrain Peace Workshop
GUESTS: IDF LT. COL. (RES) Alon Eviatar – Palestinian Affairs Expert, FMR. COGAT Advisor and Dr. Mustafa Barghouti – Leader of Palestinian National Initiative discuss the Israeli Palestinian tensions amid the upcoming Bahrain US-lef Bahrain conference.


  • Sunday, June 23, 2019
  • Elder of Ziyon
Continuing on with the UN's large permanent exhibit on the UN and the Palestinian question, we see this timeline:


The 1948 entry is wrong. Palestinian Arabs started attacking Jews way before May 1948 - they started within hours of the partition plan vote in 1947. They killed scores of civilians before Zionist forces started defending themselves.

But the astonishing thing about this history is what is missing. Even though it is a history of the UN involvement in the issue, it doesn't mention the UN accepting Israel as a state in 1949. The 1956 war is ignored completely, as are the fedayeen attacks on Israel from its inception through 1967. The threats of Arab nations against Israel - ignored. The actual 1967 and 1973 wars are essentially ignored. The formation of Fatah and PLO and other terror groups - ignored. Black September - ignored. Palestinian airline hijackings in the 1960s and 1970s - ignored.

The latter is especially important because there was at least one UN Security Council resolution demanding the hijackers release the passengers of one of those hijackings. The UN cannot claim that his history is only of its direct involvement with Palestinians and the other information is not relevant - because a UNSC resolution is a big deal yet it is ignored in this history, because the point isn't to inform visitors of Palestinian history in the UN but to whitewash it.





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  • Sunday, June 23, 2019
  • Elder of Ziyon
When anti-Israel voices speak of the first Intifada to Westerners nowadays, it is invariably described as a grassroots, popular movement, largely nonviolent.

The Nation says "Palestine’s First Intifada Is Still a Model for Grassroots Resistance." Ma'an has, in English, a "factbook" about the intifada where Israel is portrayed as killing non-violent protesters who are simply trying to demonstrate.

In Arabic, things are a little different.

Yesterday, the mother of a "martyr" from the first Intifada died. Fatah honored her on behalf of her son, Ibrahim Jalamneh.

Here are a couple of photos of Jalamneh.




Jalamneh was a member of a group of assassins from Jenin named the Black Panthers. This site mentions a few attacks including a shooting attack on a civilian bus.

Jalamneh and others were killed in a fierce firefight in Jenin in 1992 that also killed an Israeli soldier.

This is the part of the first intifada that Palestinians don't want Westerners to remember.



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  • Sunday, June 23, 2019
  • Elder of Ziyon


Mahmoud Abbas again said Saturday that he is not interested in the Bahrain economic workshop, saying that there can be no economic progress without a diplomatic solution fo rpeace.

The position is, frankly, ludicrous.

After looking at the vision document for the Bahrain economic workshop, I see very little that anyone could object to.

Israel is barely mentioned except as a neighboring country with which Gaza and the West Bank could trade.

There are thirteen "breakout" program ideas, including:

Startup Equity-Matching and Lending FacilitiesFINANCING:
$100 million in grant equity funding
$300 million in concessional financing
PROJECT OVERVIEW:This project will support the creation of equity-matching and lending facilities focused on Palestinian startups and emerging technology companies. The equity-matching component will encourage venture capital and private equity firms to invest in Palestinian startups. 
“Power Gaza” Power Plant UpgradeLOCATION:
Gaza
FINANCING:
Up to $590 million in grants and concessional financing
PROJECT OVERVIEW: Stage One of this project will provide up to $90 million in grant funding to support the conversion of the Gaza Power Plant from diesel fuel to natural gas and connect it to a natural gas supply. This will increase electricity supply in Gaza by approximately 70 megawatts (MW) and significantly reduce the cost of electricity for Palestinians. In Stage Two, an additional investment of $500
million will expand the production capacity of the Gaza Power Plant by an additional 400 MW
Regional TourismLOCATION:
West Bank and Gaza, Egypt,Jordan, Lebanon
FINANCING:
Up to $1.5 billion in concessional financing
Up to $500 million in grants
PROJECT OVERVIEW: With its culture, natural beauty, and historical and religious sites, the region has extraordinary tourism potential. This project will support private-sector domestic businesses and public-private partnerships to develop tourism sites and infrastructure in West Bank and Gaza, Egypt, Jordan, and Lebanon. 
New Palestinian UniversityFINANCING:
Up to $500 million in grants
PROJECT OVERVIEW: To prepare Palestinian students to join the workforce of the 21st century, this project envisions the construction and development of a new flagship liberal arts and sciences university in the West Bank and Gaza. The project will incorporate input from Palestinian academic leaders to construct facilities that use the latest technology to deliver the highest-quality education. 
Career Counseling and Job PlacementFINANCING: Up to $30 million in grants
PROJECT OVERVIEW: Peace to Prosperity envisions women within the West Bank and Gaza receiving the financing, market opportunities, and workforce training to succeed as entrepreneurs and private business owners. As a part of promoting the adoption of a comprehensive strategy to advance economic opportunities for women, this project will support the development of a central institution to facilitate career counseling and job-placement services for women and young Palestinians throughout the West Bank and Gaza. 

Abbas is saying that there can be no university, no tourism initiatives, no job programs for Palestinian women, no fixing the Gaza power plant - until Israel gives in to his blackmail.

Who exactly is suffering in the meanwhile? Of course, only Palestinian Arabs. There is precisely zero relationship between most of these initiatives and progress in moribund peace talks.

Abbas doesn't want the world to realize that he could have worked himself to help his people in the years since he has been in office, because he could have gotten Arab and EU money to do these exact things if he wanted.

Allowing the US and Arab countries to work on these things shows how poor a leader Abbas has been, and it highlights how easily he throws his own people under the bus to achieve his own selfish political aims.






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Saturday, June 22, 2019

From Ian:

UK rabbi to House of Lords: Rise in antisemitism today similar to Holocaust-era
The UK’s House of Lords debated the subject of antisemitism in the country’s politics, with Britain’s former Chief Rabbi Jonathan Sacks describing the rise of antisemitism in Europe today being similar to that of Holocaust-era Europe.

Sacks expressed his shock that when he visited Poland, he found that the Warsaw Ghetto was located in the city center.

“Try to imagine 400,000 Hindus or Sikhs imprisoned within ghetto walls in the middle of London,” Sacks said on Thursday. “Imagine people passing those walls every day, knowing that behind them, thousands were dying or being sent to their deaths, and no one said a word. How did it happen?

“It happened because, in the 19th century – in the heart of emancipated Europe – antisemitism, once dismissed as a primitive prejudice of the Middle Ages, was reborn,” Sacks continued.


Sacks mentioned the different politicians during the Holocaust who allowed that same medieval antisemitism to prevail. “That is where we are today,” he emphasized. “Within living memory of the Holocaust, antisemitism has returned exactly as it did in the 19th century, just when people had begun to feel that they had finally vanquished the hatreds of the past.

“Today, there is hardly a country in the world, certainly not a single country in Europe, where Jews feel safe,” Sacks declared. “It is hard to emphasize how serious this is, not just for Jews but for our shared humanity.”
In First Jewish refugees from the MENA debated in UK Parliament
For the first time, the issue of Jewish refugees from the Middle East and North Africa was debated in the UK Parliament on 19 June 2019. The hour-long debate in Westminster Hall, secured by MP Theresa Villiers, obtained unanimous approval by all parliamentarians present for Jewish refugees from the MENA to be ‘considered’ by the House. You can read the full HANSARD transcript here.

Participating in the debate were Dr Andrew Murrison, the junior minister in charge of the Middle East at the Foreign Office and Opposition spokeman Fabian Hamilton, nine back-bench members of Parliament from both the main parties (no Liberal Democrat MPS attended), as well as representatives of the Northern Irish DUP and the Scottish Nationalists.

However, in reply to questions from MPs Zac Goldsmith and Matthew Offord, junior minister for the Middle East Dr Andrew Murrison refused to commit the UK government to following the lead of the US Congress and the Canadian Parliament: both had passed a resolution calling for explicit recognition for Jewish refugees. Dr Murrison referred to Security UN Resolution 242 as the template for considering the rights of both refugee populations ‘in the round’. He did not comment on the imbalance in UN resolutions, 172 of which dealt with Palestinian refugees, not one on Jewish refugees.

The minister (pictured above) mentioned ‘examples of countries that have done relatively well in a dismal scene’. “I cite Morocco, Tunisia and Jordan*….as countries where there has been a more benign attitude towards Jewish refugees,” he said.”This must not obscure the general awfulness,” he acknowledged.

Introducing the topic, Ms Villiers said that the 856,000 Jews ethnically cleansed from pre-Islamic communities in Arab countries were the key to understanding the Middle East conflict. She agreed with MPs Andrew Percy (who had relatives of a persecuted Yemenite family in his constituency) and Stephen Crabbe that awareness of the issue was key to debunking the ‘false narrative’ that Israel was a creation of the West and that no Jews had ever lived in the Middle East. She pointed out that a disproportionate amount of airtime was devoted to the Palestinian refugees. Despite the early hardships, the integration of MENA Jews into Israel had been a ‘huge success”, with Mizrahi Jews today a valued part of the fabric of Israeli society as well as in the West.
European Commission holds first-ever working group on antisemitism
As Europe grapples with a rising tide of antisemitism, the European Commission held its first-ever “working group” on the matter Thursday.

The meeting, which convened almost 100 representatives of Jewish communities, EU Member States and international organizations, spent a full day discussing security, including risk assessments, building trust and physical protections, EU staffer Johannes Börmann tweeted.

“The Commission is acting together with Member States to counter the rise of Antisemitism, to fight holocaust denial and to guarantee that Jews have the full support of the authorities to keep them safe,” EU Justice commissioner Věra Jourová said in a statement before the session. “The Working Group will help Member States coordinate their actions and fight Antisemitism efficiently together.”

The EU was presented with its first action plan to combat antisemitism in February, when the European Jewish Congress (EJC) called on EU Member States to adopt in full the IHRA Working Definition on Antisemitism.

Friday, June 21, 2019

From Ian:

Melanie Phillips: A week of Jew- and Israel-baiting in Londonistan
As I said in the Intelligence Squared debate, however, they cannot be separated. Anti-Zionism has weaponized antisemitism. The unique characteristics of antisemitism are replicated in anti-Zionism because anti-Zionism is the modern mutation of antisemitism.

Antisemitism is an obsessional hatred based entirely on lies; it accuses the Jews of crimes of which they are not only innocent but the victims; it holds them to standards expected of no one else; it depicts them as a global conspiracy of unique malice and power.

Anti-Zionism has exactly the same characteristics. It singles out the Jewish people alone as having no right to their own ancient homeland and, based on the big lie that the Jews stole the land, writes the Jews uniquely out of their own history.

The associated Israel-bashing demonizes, dehumanizes and delegitimizes Israel in order to bring about its destruction. It does this through a narrative of lies.

SOME OF these falsehoods were duly trotted out by our opponents in the debate: the Israeli anti-Zionist academic at Exeter University, Ilan Pappe, and the Al Jazeera journalist Mehdi Hasan.

Hasan proved himself to be an unscrupulous demagogue, rousing his Israel-bashing audience to wild support through the brazen tactic of reversing what I had just said. Repeatedly and hysterically, he claimed I was calling all anti-Zionists antisemites.

But this was the very opposite of what I had said. Many who subscribe to anti-Zionism, I said, were not antisemites. Plenty are; but many others subscribe to Israel-bashing lies without realizing they are lies.

They truly believe the lie that the “Palestinians” were the original inhabitants of the land, that Israel is a serial human rights abuser and all the rest of the calumnies. They believe them because they are the default position of the intelligentsia pumped out by the media, most importantly by the BBC, with virtually no public challenge.

Of course, none of this was to any avail. Demagoguery and falsehoods won that debate hands down.

Einat and I had been under no illusions and had known exactly what to expect. Nevertheless, it is lowering to be in the presence of evil. And whipping up an audience with falsehoods in the service of an agenda of hatred and bigotry is evil.

That audience contained a significant number of Muslims. Yet the huge problem of Muslim antisemitism in Britain and Europe is virtually never mentioned in a conspiracy of silence.

Ami Horowitz Goes 'Inside The Muslim Brotherhood'
Filmmaker and independent journalist Ami Horowitz’s new documentary provides viewers a glimpse "inside the Muslim Brotherhood," the "largest global Islamic organization in the world," which has branches in dozens of countries and which the Trump administration is considering formally designating a terrorist organization. In a series of interviews, Horowitz asks influential members of the group, including the U.S. and Turkey, to explain their ideology and approach to promoting their ultimate goal: “the creation of a global caliphate.”

"While the branches of the Brotherhood are geographically and politically diverse, their ideological goals remain constant and they seem to share a secretive but somewhat cohesive political structure with clearly definable goals," says Horowitz.

Samuel Tadros, from Johns Hopkins’ School of Advanced International Studies, explains that all of the groups under the "umbrella" of the Brotherhood share a "common ideology," the promotion of an exclusively Muslim culture and the establishment of "an Islamic state that dominates the whole world."

The first interview Horowitz features takes place in Instanbul, Turkey, where he speaks with influential Muslim Brotherhood leader Ashraf Abdel Ghaffar. Asked if all of the Muslim Brotherhood branches "share the same ideology," Gaffar responds, "Of course. All of us share an underlying ideology which comes from Islam. You have this ideology, you have this group to fulfill the condition of this ideology, which is in Algeria, or in Chad, or in Berlin, in Malaysia or Finlandia, in America and Russia and Mozambique and South Africa and everywhere. It is the best for everyone!"

The Brotherhood has "aggressively tried to expand their global influence by sending an unknown amount of proxies around the world with the goal of sowing disorder and to radicalize the Islamic populace in order to achieve their stated goal of global dominance," says Horowitz. "They have people on the ground in all major European countries that are actively trying to subvert the political system."


'Dangerous' Muslim Brotherhood fatwa app in Apple Store's top 100 downloads
A “dangerous hate” app linked to the Muslim Brotherhood has been in the top 100 downloads in the Apple store in a third of European countries since its launch, despite international calls for it to be banned.

The Euro Fatwa app, which was launched in April, was created by the European Council for Fatwa and Research, a Dublin private foundation set up by Yusuf Al Qaradawi, spiritual leader of the Muslim Brotherhood.

Touted as a guide to help Muslims adhere to Islam, critics including Germany’s security service, say the app is a radicalisation tool.

It contains an introduction by Al Qaradawi, now 93, in which he makes derogatory references to Jews while speaking about historic fatwas.

It also claims European laws do not have to be obeyed if they contradict Islamic rules.

Al Qaradawi, who lives in Qatar, is banned from the US, UK and France for his extremist views.

On learning of the app’s content, Google banned it within hours.

“While we can’t comment on individual apps, we’ll take swift action against any that break our policies once we’ve been made aware of them, including those that contain hate speech,” the company said.

But a month after The National informed Apple that the app contains hate speech, it is still accessible from the App Store.

  • Friday, June 21, 2019
  • Elder of Ziyon
Here are my most popular tweets of the week that I didn't talk much about on the blog.

AOC:








John Cusack:







Other topics:









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From Ian:

Evelyn Gordon: Once Again, the PA Shows It Doesn't Care about Having a Viable State
The Palestinians' refusal to attend a U.S.-sponsored "economic workshop" in Bahrain has been widely treated as a reasonable response to the unlikelihood that President Trump's peace plan will satisfy their demands. But in fact, it's merely further proof that the Palestinian leadership doesn't actually want a state - or at least not a viable one - because even if Palestinian statehood isn't imminent, economic development now would increase the viability of any future state.

This understanding is precisely what guided Israel's leadership in the pre-state years, although the pre-state Jewish community was bitterly at odds with the ruling British. Nevertheless, the pre-state leadership welcomed and cooperated with British efforts to develop the country, knowing that this would benefit the Jewish state once it finally arose.

The declared aim of the Bahrain conference is merely to drum up investment in the Palestinian economy, primarily from Arab states and the private sector. Thus, if the PA actually wanted to lay the groundwork for a viable state, what it ought to be doing is attending the conference and discussing these proposals.

The most astounding part is that the rest of the world, despite insisting that it wants a "viable Palestinian state," openly condones the PA's refusal to go to Bahrain. Instead, the rest of the world should be telling the PA that it ought to seize any chance for economic development because without such development, there's no chance of any future Palestinian state actually being viable.
Another Approach to the Palestinian Question
The PA should not overlook realities. Regardless of who is at fault, the Palestinian people are split between the West Bank and Gaza. Representatives from 32 states attended the ceremonies of the transfer of the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem. More than half a million Israelis live in the West Bank.

The PA cannot ignore all of this. Its withdrawal from the arena by boycotting diplomacy will not make unpleasantness go away and will not improve the Palestinian position.

The tide of change made important international players that had long supported the Palestinians - such as India, China and Russia - maintain close relations with Israel.

Whatever progress the Palestinians experienced was achieved through direct negotiations with the Israelis.

Certainly, it is possible to undermine the forthcoming U.S. initiative through opposition and boycott. However, the consequence is the perpetuation of the status quo, which works to strengthen the hand of Arab extremists such as Hamas who use "the cause" as a means to bring the Arab temple crashing down on the Arab state and the heads of all the Arabs in it.

The alternative is to draw inspiration from President Anwar Al-Sadat, who saw the matter as a problem between us and Israel, rather than between us and the U.S.

By Daled Amos


Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez certainly isn't the only one jumping at the chance to make absurd comparisons to the Holocaust:


But then again, this is not the first time Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has done this.

Last November, she compared the migrant caravan crossing the border from Mexico with Jewish refugees that the United States turned away before World War II:
“Asking to be considered a refugee & applying for status isn’t a crime,” Ocasio Cortez said Sunday on Twitter after US border agents repelled Central American migrants with tear gas. “It wasn’t for Jewish families fleeing Germany. It wasn’t for targeted families fleeing Rwanda. It wasn’t for communities fleeing war-torn Syria. And it isn’t for those fleeing violence in Central America.”
And just 2 months ago in April, AOC used a Holocaust reference in defense of Ilhan Omar:
[AOC] also shared an image of the words of "First they came...," the famous poem by German theologian Martin Niemöller that was inspired by the tragedies of the Holocaust. (The words are mounted on a wall at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington.)

The poem reads:

“First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a socialist.

"Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a trade unionist.

"Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Jew.

"Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.”

Ocasio-Cortez's tweet sparked major backlash, with critics accusing her of trivializing the Holocaust and slamming her for doing so in defense of Omar, who has repeatedly fought off claims of anti-Semitism.
And now AOC is at it again.



She is trying to create this equivalency in people's minds in order to score political points.

And with the competition between Democrats for the presidential nomination heating up, the comparison may be catching on, as Beto O'Rourke has made the comparison back in April ("2020 Democratic presidential candidate Beto O'Rourke compares Trump's immigration rhetoric to Nazi Germany")

Republicans have criticized AOC's manipulation of the Holocaust, all along the way -- as have some Jewish organizations.

But this time around -- the third time was not the charm.
Many people defended Cortez and attacked those who criticized her.

But some of her defenders were more cautious. Democratic Rep. Henry Cuellar tried to apply Pelosi's defense of Omar in defending AOC -- she just uses words differently.




Bernie Sanders, who could use her support as Elizabeth Warren closes the gap in the polls, nevertheless distanced himself from the comment:
Jewish 2020 presidential hopeful Bernie Sanders, Ocasio-Cortez’s fellow progressive, distanced himself from her reference to concentration camps in a CNN interview Tuesday evening. “I didn’t use that terminology,” noted Sanders, subsequently repeating twice in the interview that he had “not used that word.”
But others who you'd expect to defend Cortez, were more willing to criticize:

NBC's Chuck Todd criticized not only Ocasia-Cortez -- he lambasted the Democratic Party as a whole:



NBC's Joe Scarborough agreed:

Democratic campaign consultant Doug Schoen came out even more strongly:

Not surprisingly, the Wiesenthal Center and Yad VaShem to come out with criticism of what Cortez said -- after all, that is to be expected.

What was not expected is that Poland, which has its own problems with the Holocaust and Poland's place in it, got into the act too:

You couldn't get a larger public discussion of the Holocaust if you tried.

Bottom line, at a time that ignorance of the Holocaust is growing among millenials, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez not only proves the point -- she is unintentionally helping to draw attention to the problem.

Thank you?





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