I had read and written about Lebanon's extreme restrictions on Palestinians - banning them from many types of jobs, not allowing them to own land or even expand their houses in the camps. And now businesses that hired Palestinians are being shut down and owners arrested.
If Palestinians in Lebanon want to work and they are being so restricted from working for others, naturally they would think about starting their own businesses, right?
Lebanon's laws make that extraordinarily difficult for them.
For every new business, the (non-citizen) owner must deposit one hundred million Lebanese pounds (about $67,000).
If they manage to pass that high hurdle, and they want to open a mom-and-pop shop, there is another rule: 75% of their employees must be Lebanese.
Which means that the mom and pop must hire six workers they might not need to even open the business!
These are the businesses that Lebanon has been shutting down recently, along with Lebanese owned businesses who hired Palestinians for jobs they are not allowed to have.
Palestinians burned tires at the entrance to their UNRWA camp to protest the crackdown, although why that would be considered anything besides inconveniencing their own people is another question.
Palestinian groups, both Fatah and Hamas, have protested the new laws to the Lebanese government, so far to no avail.
As of this writing, Human Rights Watch and Amnesty Twitter accounts have been silent on this.
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I was among the handful who began seeing some awful parallels between the 1930s and today. Of course, the 21st century is so much worse because the entire world is involved in defaming Israel and the Jews; now, it is not merely one country or one continent—but via the internet, the Big lies are proclaimed 24/7, and in every language on earth.
History never repeats itself in exactly the same way and so I must ask: Are we really living in the 1930s? Jews are being menaced and murdered on the streets of Europe; that’s happened many times before (but not at Muslim hands which is now the case). However, Jews are also fleeing Europe and that’s new. Most Jews refused or could not do so in the 30s.
Jews are being shot down in American synagogues, cemeteries are being vandalized, young Jews are being slandered and shamed on American campuses. Black face-masked and violent brownshirt-style mobs occupy the streets, the academy, and the internet.
Just recently at the Christians United for Israel (CUFI) conference in Washington, D.C., more than one hundred angry pro-Palestine demonstrators tried to violently storm the building. They were prevented from doing so.
But there’s more. Our infra-structure has been so fully penetrated that the Jew- and Israel-hating propaganda keeps cropping up everywhere.
Unfortunately, this year, I regret to say that France sometimes finds it difficult to realize its beautiful values. Beyond the grand declarations, France finds it hard to wage an effective battle against rising antisemitism, in particular its new embodiment as hatred of Israel, which has resulted in the murder of 12 French Jews in recent years.
On the French right, including among lawmakers from President Emmanuel Macron’s party, the hatred of Israel and the United States in general, and of Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in particular, is blatant; I experience it every day. Iran denies the Holocaust, announces its intention to develop nuclear weapons, and openly declares its desire to wipe the State of Israel — where, by the way, some 150,000 French citizens live — off the map. But Europe and France continue to respond passively.
Paris recently named a square in the center of the city after Jerusalem at a dedication ceremony attended by the mayors of both cities. Yet despite the festive atmosphere, France refuses to recognize Israel’s capital and the capital of the Jewish people, talking instead of “occupation” and supporting the city’s division. This is unfortunate because no peace can come from a historic lie.
My concern is no longer just for the Jews, but for France in its entirety. But I have hope, and I want to remain optimistic. France has proved in the past that it knows how to stand on the side of democracy and freedom. That is why I wish France a clear view of reality, and to remain loyal to the lofty ideals that make the French such a special nation.
Even when artists do succumb to BDS pressure, it does not necessarily mean they support BDS’s agenda. Many artists simply do not wish to have their art politicized. Other times, BDS has made the atmosphere so toxic with their threats and intimidation, that artists cancel because they fear BDS attacks on their physical safety or damage to their careers.
Naturally, during times of major conflict such as Operation Protective Edge in 2014, cancellations spike for safety reasons, and artists frequently rebook when things quiet down.
Certainly, however, BDS has racked up some “wins.” In 2018, both New Zealand songstress Lorde, and American singer and songwriter Lana Del Rey, canceled their scheduled concert dates under BDS pressure. By and large, however, cancellations in support of BDS remain rare.
When artists bow to BDS pressure — out of agreement or as a result of bullying and intimidation — they unwittingly become political pawns. Apolitical intentions are eclipsed, hate groups claim victory, and Israeli audiences of all faiths miss out.
To BDS proponents, however, the campaign to destroy Israel is not a zero-sum game where their nominal wins are offset by Israel’s greater wins. For BDS, much like terrorists, the occasional success sustains them and generates much sought-after publicity for their mission.
But as long as artists continue to love their fans and to place their art above politics, music will continue to be heard — and hearts will be lifted — across concert grounds in Israel.
One of the benefits of being an on-campus Israel hater is
that you never have the pay the price for the damage you cause.
Take the case of Williams College, back in the news after
the school settled a complaint by the Department
of Education that it had discriminated against pro-Israel Jewish students
on campus. This complaint did not arise
due to anything the college or its administration had done. Rather, it was the result of irresponsible
(and all too typical) behavior of students.
Earlier this year, a group of Williams students organized a
new pro-Israel group called Williams Initiative for Israel (WiFi). As with any new group on campus, the
organization was required to follow a set of procedures for becoming a
recognized campus club that could receive funding from the elected student
government. Those procedures were
straightforward, and WiFi followed them to the letter. But still they were rejected.
Why? Because
anti-Israel students who dominated the student council decided that their
political positions – i.e., the legitimate opinions they wanted to advocate for
– were inadmissible on campus. So after
a debate in which “Israel-is-always-wrong” proponents not involved with student
government were given the floor to rail against the Jewish state and its
supporters, the council rejected Wifi’s request 13-8.
Breaking with even more rules they were elected to live by
and enforce, the council did all they could to avoid taking personal
responsibility for their votes, not livestreaming the council meeting (which
would otherwise be normal procedure) or including names of speakers on a
transcript. Given the contents of that
transcript, which revealed staggering levels of ignorance and bigotry, one can
understand why some students did not want to take responsibility for what they
had said and done.
That responsibility fell to the grownups on campus,
specifically the president of the college who immediately condemned
the vote and worked out a procedure whereby WiFi would receive official
recognition, despite the student council vote.
Some students protested
the president’s move, but to her credit she held fast to the principles the
school she led was built upon.
This did not prevent a discrimination complaint being lodged
with the Department of Education which took up the case and proceeded to
investigate the charges. It was this investigation that led to the settlement just
announced this week.
Note that it was not the students who had acted in such an
irresponsible and discriminatory way that had to navigate government
investigators in order to avoid the whole situation being referred to the
Department of Justice as a violation of federal law. Rather, it was (once again) someone else who
had to pay the price (in this case, the adults who led the college.)
This is typical BDS behavior: causing mayhem in one
community after another and leaving it to others to clean up the mess. In theory, the student council could have
changed the rules under which they operated in order to allow discrimination
based on political opinion. Such a move
would likely have faced procedural and administrative hurdles, and would have
been widely controversial (and may have failed). But at least it would have represented an act
of honesty on the part of student representatives who decided their real
constituency was the BDS movement.
It is likely no accident that the whole matter was settled
once summer began and the students who demanded the right to shred the rules
they were elected to live by in order to discriminate against fellow students
who did not share their political opinions were safely off campus.
As in many, many other situations where the BDSers ask an
institution to do their dirty work, once consequences rain down on the
institution that has done its bidding, the boycotters have already moved on to
their next target, leaving it to others to deal with the wreckage.
Let’s hope this is a lesson for the next organization considering
inviting the BDS vampire through the front door.
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These remarks do not reflect the official stances of Hamas and its policy, which state that our struggle is only against the Israeli occupation which occupies our land and desecrates our holy places. Again, our struggle is not with Jews elsewhere or with Judaism as a religion. Hamas has condemned and continues to condemn any attacks against the Jews and their worship houses worldwide.
Professor Fathi Hammad, a member of the Political Bureau of the Islamic Resistance Movement Hamas, insists on the policy of the movement to limit its resistance against the Zionist occupation, which is raping the land of Palestine and desecrating its sanctities, which is always expressed by Hamas in its political behavior.
Our resistance to this tyrannical entity will continue in all forms, whether armed or through the peaceful popular struggle represented by the great return marches.
It is jihad, victory or martyrdom.
The thing is that Hamad's speech was a bit more than just the threat to worldwide Jews.
"We say to the Zionist enemy that it has exactly one week – until next Friday. If it does not lift the siege by then, and if it does not implement the understandings [with Hamas]... We have many methods and means up our sleeves, and they are just waiting for the green light to powerfully explode in the face of the enemy, Allah willing. They think that we are rational people. Well, we aren't. The people of Gaza are not rational. For 70 years in Gaza, the Zionist enemy tried to change our genes. [Our genes] have not changed. On the contrary, they have progressed even more, and they are ready to blow up in the face of the enemies, Allah willing. You have one week, oh Zionist enemy! If you do not lift the siege... Well, we will not die standing [idly by]. We will not die of starvation. If we die, it will be while we are killing you and cutting off your heads, Allah willing. [...] "If you don't lift the siege, we will explode in the faces of our enemies, Allah willing. And the explosion won't just be in Gaza – it will also be in the West Bank and abroad, Allah willing. Our brothers abroad are still preparing. They are warming up... They have been warming up for a year and a half... Oh, you seven million Palestinians abroad, enough warming up! There are Jews everywhere! We must attack every Jew on planet Earth – we must slaughter and kill them, with Allah's help. Enough warming up! [...] "And I say to those in the West Bank: How long will you sit in silence? You can buy knives for five shekels! How much is the neck of a Jew worth to us – isn't it worth five shekels, or even less? [...] "By Allah, [the Jews] will be killed by our [explosive] belts, Allah willing! There are new factories for [explosive] belts and they are up and running. Anybody who wants one can wait his turn... you can have one, and you, and you... Go! [...] "May the mediators and the Zionist enemy hear this message! If we die, we die – but we will die with honor, while attacking, and not while retreating! We will die while exploding and cutting the necks and legs of the Jews! We will lacerate them and tear them to pieces, Allah willing."
Hamas and Hamad did not deny that they have people abroad, "preparing," for a year and a half, to attack foreign sites if asked.
They did not deny calling to kill civilian Jews in Israel and the territories with knives.
They did not deny creating explosive belt factories.
People will seize on this statement as if Hamas is suddenly moderate. Pundits are so relieved to be able to forget about Hamas again that they aren't even asking these basic questions.
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With all of this in mind, we can now return to the question of whether international law exists. Surely it does, but not everything that is passed off as international law qualifies as international law. The UN General Assembly has, by the UN’s own Charter, no power to make any binding decisions whatsoever. The Security Council does have real power, but far less than is commonly assumed. In the case of a breach of international peace, it has the power, when acting under Chapter VII of the Charter, to authorize enforcement actions, including economic sanctions and the use of force.
In U.S. constitutional terms, this is essentially an executive function. The Security Council is emphatically not an international legislature: it does not have the power to rewrite international law, let alone to make a special law for a particular country. Nor is it an international court: it cannot make binding determinations about the content of international law. It is free to offer up, as recommendations, its opinions about the content of international law and its application to particular cases. But others, including Israel, remain free to test the validity of these claims. If the principles endorsed by the Security Council in the case of Israel contradict international law as it applies to other countries, they do not become more valid by dint of a vote in the Security Council.
Law, as Friedrich Hayek explained, is a system of general rules promulgated for unknown future cases. As we have seen, the UN’s judgments on Jerusalem do not comport with the general rules. Rather, they are at best fiats, particular decrees directed solely at Israel that are delivered ultra vires (beyond granted powers). In that respect, too, they are neither international nor are they law.
There is no parallel to the international fixation with the non-binding, long since moot, and moribund Resolution 181, and the same can be said for Security Council Resolution 470, cited by Gurfinkiel, that in 1980 denounced Israel’s parliament for a law enshrining Jerusalem as the country’s capital. In numerous other contexts where the UN has expressed an opinion about a desired resolution to a territorial conflict, that opinion is not regarded as a permanent divine dictate once events have rendered it moot.
Indeed, the same year the General Assembly adopted Resolution 181, the Security Council passed a resolution that, rather than merely contemplating an “international city,” actually created one: the “Free Territory of Trieste.” That “permanent” arrangement ended with the unceremonious annexation of the territory by Italy and Yugoslavia. Who today recalls Security Council Resolution 16 for the purpose of questioning Italian or Croatian sovereignty over the defunct Free Territory?
Similarly, Security Council resolutions from 1948 about the partition of Kashmir have been ignored in every respect and inform nobody’s present understanding of India’s borders. Kofi Annan himself, the former UN secretary general, noted that the Security Council’s Kashmir resolutions were not clear mandates and not “self-enforcing.” That much of the world sees a mere General Assembly resolution of the same vintage as binding on Israel (but not on the Palestinians) says a great deal about international politics, but nothing about international law.
By choosing to hold the protests under the banner of the "Three No's," the organizers of the "Great March of Return" have again proven that the weekly demonstrations are not about improving the living conditions of Palestinians or easing restrictions imposed on the Gaza Strip. Instead, the message the organizers are sending to the Palestinians and the rest of the world is: "We don't recognize Israel's right to exist and therefore we will never make negotiate or make peace with it."
Hamas's two other "No's" – no to recognizing Israel and no to making peace with Israel – do not come as a surprise. In fact, Hamas appears to be reminding Palestinians of its true objectives as outlined in its 1988 charter: "There is no solution for the Palestinian question expect through Jihad (holy war). Initiatives, proposals and international conferences are all a waste of time and vain endeavors...[Hamas] believes that the land of Palestine is an Islamic Waqf consecrated for future Muslim generations until Judgement Day. It, or any part of it, should not be squandered."
This is all that Hamas has to offer the Palestinians 12 years after its violent takeover of the Gaza Strip? Sadly, thousands of Palestinians continue to heed Hamas's call for trying to breach the border with Israel every Friday while ignoring that it is their leaders who are mainly responsible for dragging them from one disaster to another.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu interviewed by Brian Bennett and Joseph Hincks
In an interview in Jerusalem on June 25, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said: "Everybody recognizes that under any realistic peace proposal, there are areas in Judea and Samaria that have already become basically part of Israel....It's a fact. Half of Jerusalem is beyond the proverbial green line. The '67 separation [line]. Does anyone believe that we'll tear up half of Jerusalem? Nobody believes that."
"[The Palestinians] were offered just about everything in Camp David in 2000, with President Clinton and then-Prime Minister Barak, and they walked away from that. They walk away each time. They walked away with Olmert. They walked away when President Obama and John Kerry wanted to propose a framework for negotiations....They serially walk away from any negotiations that will present a workable peace."
"The reason we can't get peace is because nobody goes to the heart of the problem, which is the persistent Palestinian refusal to recognize the Jewish state in any borders."
Israel is helping bring more medicines into Gaza, medicines that the PA has been blocking.
This week, Israel plans to return dozens of fishing boats that were confiscated when Gaza fishermen went outside the allowed areas.
Last week, Israel allowed the export of five tons of toys, wood and textiles from Gaza to the West Bank to help the Gaza economy.
And in the West Bank, Israel has piloted a program to allow Palestinian exports to Israel to be much more streamlined, with remote Israeli security checks near the factories of origin and GPS devices on the trucks themselves (to ensure that they do not stop to load bombs or weapons) allowing the trucks to bypass the checkpoints and allowing goods to travel from Ramallah to Tel Aviv in two hours. The pilot factory has quadrupled the number of trucks being sent out and hired 60 more workers.
Israel always tries to ease the effects of its security measures on Palestinians while protecting its own citizens, which is the primary function of a state. It is a difficult job, and one that is unreported by a media that wants stories that can be explained in four words or less - "Israel bad, Palestinians oppressed."
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In an amazing 1970 Life magazine interview with the PFLP's George Habash by Oriana Fallaci, Habash admits explicitly that he is targeting Jews, not Israelis or Zionists.
Here is how he justified airplane hijackings in Europe:
Countries like Germany, Italy, France and Switzerland, with many Jews among their population, allow their territory to be used as a base for the Jews to fight the Arabs. If Italy, for instance, is a base against the Arabs, the Arabs have a right to use Italy as a base against the Jews.
Fallaci, a real reporter, responded back with, "No, Dr. Habash, Italy is not used as a Jewish base, nor is Germany, France or Switzerland. "
Habash later on was even more explicit about the PFLP's targets:
The attacks of the Popular Front are based on quality, not quantity. We believe that to kill a Jew far from the battleground has more of an effect than killing 100 of them in battle; it attracts more attention. And when we set fire to a store in London, those few flames are worth the burning down of two kibbutzim.
In 1991, Jamal Nassar—currently a professor of political science, and dean emeritus, at Cal State-San Bernardino - wrote a book about the PLO where he changed the above quote to "To kill a Zionist far from the battleground has more of an effect than killing 100 of them in battle. "
Steven Lubet, a professor of law at Northwestern University, noticed this discrepancy and wrote to Nassar asking him why he changed the quote. His absurd answer:
I remember specifically discussing this issue with the late Professor Ibrahim Abu-Lughod who was a renowned expert on Palestinian affairs, a member of the Palestine National Council and former Chair of Political Science at Northwestern University. He told me that he posed the same question to Dr. George Habash who responded that everyone knows what he means, that is his use of the word Jews in that context refers to the Zionists who colonized the Palestinian homeland and those zionists (sic) in the Western World who finance and support that colonization. As such, the change of the word in the quotation was grounded in the intent of Dr. Habash. However, you are correct to point out such a change. I should have included an explanation in the reference.
An academic knowingly changed an explicitly antisemitic quote by a terrorist pioneer to make it appear only "anti-Zionist." But he didn't mention in his book that he modified the direct quote, and he lamely says that he should have explained his whitewashing in the book - which he never would have done in reality because it would have only called attention to his fabrication.
In other words, Nassar knew quite well that he was modifying a quote but he felt that it was all for the greater good and that he "knew" that when Habash said he wanted to target Jews in Europe he really was going to research his victims ahead of time to ensure that they support Israel.
His assertion that "everyone knows" Habash was not antisemitic is a lie as well. Even the Electronic Intifada admits in a glowing obituary that Habash bombed a synagogue when he was younger and says he was originally "anti-Jewish" although it claims, without proof, that his attitude towards Jews changed later.
Interestingly, the PFLP protested Fallaci's quote of Habash's antisemitism at the time, claiming that she fabricated it and he really said "Zionists." She responded sarcastically that "the so-called Department of Information ignores the existence of a machine known as a tape recorder” where she recorded the entire interview proving that Habash knew quite well that he was speaking about Jews into a microphone.
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As Daled Amos reported, the radical group IfNotNow has started a strategy of "bird-dogging" Presidential candidates in order to corner them into saying that they support the organization's extreme anti-Israel agenda.
They executed their plan against a number of candidates this weekend. Cory Booker seemed prepared for them and didn't let himself get cornered the way Elizabeth Warren appeared to. This frustrated them far more than it frustrated him:
Yesterday, we asked @CoryBooker “Do you believe the Occupation is a human rights crisis for Palestinians?” He got visibly frustrated.
He admits: “If that's your issue I would understand if you want to support somebody else”
Joe Biden as well seemed prepared for them and steered back to his own talking points rather than let himself be co-opted by their language:
.@JoeBiden just said 'The Occupation is a real problem' and we're happy to hear it: this is a baseline position every 2020 candidate needs to take. But when we asked @JoeBiden if he'd pressure Israel to end the Occupation, he deflected to his record. pic.twitter.com/1AIQ7Ubl3g
Look at the question they asked both candidates, and presumably others: whether they consider the situation in the West Bank to be a "human rights crisis."
The idea that the West Bank is in crisis and, by implication, one of the top human rights concerns for the United States is insane.
I can find no objective survey of human rights issues in the world that mention the "occupation" as being in the top ten or twenty human rights crises worldwide.
Maplecroft has an objective report on human rights worldwide. Although it doesn't publish it publicly, its 2014 report indicates where the worst human rights crises are worldwide:
Other observers give various lists of the worst human rights abusers in the world, and Israel is never on any list that actually tries to compare it with everyone else.
IfNotNow does not want the US to spend its time and resources on helping the worst human rights victims. The only non-Israeli causes it cares about are the ones that it wants to hijack into making people hate Israel.
In short, IfNotNow is an anti-Israel hate group.
Look at this more expansive response by Biden about his vision for Middle East peace - one which is very much in line with the accepted Obama-era principles, with the UN and the EU, that includes pressuring Israel but also giving Palestinians responsibility for peace.
.@JoeBiden just said 'The Occupation is a real problem' and we're happy to hear it: this is a baseline position every 2020 candidate needs to take. But when we asked @JoeBiden if he'd pressure Israel to end the Occupation, he deflected to his record. pic.twitter.com/1AIQ7Ubl3g
The IfNotNow ambusher simply does not want to consider anything but pressuring Israel. The idea that Palestinians must eliminate hate and accept a Jewish state is treated like irrelevant at best, wrong at worst.
Which means that their interest in peace is literally zero.
The entire purpose of the group is anti-Israel, not pro-peace. These videos prove it.
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Omar Shakir of Human Rights Watch pretends to condemn Hamas' Fathi Hamad's Friday statements (that was first reported here) threatening to kill all Jews of the world - but he ends up praising Hamas instead!
Human Rights Watch considers Hamas is a "freedom movement"???
By using those words, HRW shows that it actually likes and supports the international terror group Hamas, and is only upset that one of its more visible members (in the "political wing," no less) said something distasteful.
Notice that Shakir didn't mention the other things Hamad said - that Palestinians have built explosive vest factories that should be distributed now, that Jews in Israel including Judea and Samaria should be blown up and murdered by knives that cost 5 shekels.
He doesn't condemn that because the intended victims are Israeli Jews, and presumably deserve death at the hands of the "freedom movement" he admires so much.
Hamad also said that Palestinians worldwide have been "warming up" to perform terror attacks in the countries that host them.
If you go through Shakir's long social media history, you will never find him describing Israel in any positive terms, let alone praising it the way he characterizes Hamas on the very day that we find out beyond any doubt that Hamas has never left its antisemitic genocidal ways behind.
What little dignity Human Rights Watch has remaining after its history of anti-Israel bias has evaporated by one of its most visible members openly praising the innovators of suicide bombings, bus bombings, anti-tank missiles aimed at school buses, tunnels dug into civilian communities to kidnap women and children, using their own people as human shields, and shooting thousands of rockets at civilians, as a freedom movement.
If HRW wants to continue being viewed as a human rights organization, Shakir should be fired, period. This is absolutely disgusting.
Here's a longer excerpt of Hamad's speech.
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Last week, a very small story was reported in Palestinian Arabic media.
Dr. Kamal al-Sharafi resigned from the presidency of Al-Aqsa University in Gaza.
The interesting part is who he sent his letter of resignation to.
Not to a Board of Directors. Not to the Minister of Education.
No, his resignation was accepted by PA president/PLO chairman/Fatah leader Mahmoud Abbas.
Just more proof that nothing happens in the Palestinian Authority run areas (and Al Aqsa is evidently part of the PA even though it is in Gaza) without Mahmoud Abbas' personal permission.
There was 25 years between the beginning of the quasi-governmental Jewish Agency and the rebirth of Israel, where the new government was up and running immediately.
It has now been 25 years since the Palestinian National Authority has been created - and it still runs like the PLO ran under Arafat, with secret money and no trust, no government, only an autocracy.
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As far as the Palestinian Authority’s official media and education system is concerned, Tel Aviv and Haifa, let alone Jerusalem, are every bit as “occupied” by the Jews as the most remote hilltop settlement in the West Bank.
Left-wing American Jewish activists, as well as most of the mainstream media and liberal politicians like Warren, also ignore the fact that the reason why a Palestinian state in the West Bank doesn’t already exist is because the PA has repeatedly rejected Israeli offers that would have given them one. These refusals centered on the Palestinian leadership’s fear of being branded as traitors for agreeing to any pact that would recognize the legitimacy of a Jewish state within any borders. Doing so would effectively end the century-long war on Zionism in which most Palestinians still refuse to concede defeat.
The same is true for complaints about the checkpoints and the security fence that Palestinians say make their lives miserable. They only exist because of the carnage that the Palestinians unleashed on Israelis during the Second Intifada, in which they answered a peace offer with a terrorist war of attrition.
And while the Palestinians carp that the autonomous rule of the PA over the Arab population of most of the West Bank isn’t the same as independence, their ability to govern themselves in this manner also undermines claims of Israeli oppression.
But the main point about the talk about “occupation” is that while the status quo in the West Bank isn’t ideal for either side, the obstacle to peace remains the Palestinians’ futile clinging to their fantasy of occupying all of Israel.
And though groups like IfNotNow couch their advocacy in the language of human rights, when they oppose the right of Jews to visit Israel until the descendants of the 1948 Arab refugees have a right to “return,” what they’re effectively endorsing is Israel’s elimination. The same is true of their support of an antisemitic BDS movement, which is similarly linked to a war to wipe Israel off the map.
That is why even if we were to give Warren the benefit of the doubt for what she said to these activists, Americans should be wary of being lured into statements opposing “occupation.” Doing so sounds right for any liberal. But what it really does is fuel the intransigence that makes peace impossible, encouraging Palestinians and their allies to continue to pursue the goal of denying the Jews rights to their ancient homeland.
To bolster her anti-Zionism, Erakat appropriated the struggle of Mizrahi Jews — those who hail from the Middle East and North Africa — against what is, in fact, rapidly diminishing discrimination in Israel. She wanted “to cut across the native-settler binary. Instead of it being Palestinians versus Jewish Israelis, why don’t we do it as a racial struggle against .. the racial hierarchy within Israel?” Erakat rejected the terms “Middle Eastern Jews” or “Mizrahim,” claiming they serve “to separate them from the Arab world, so they cannot be both Jewish and Arab.”
As noted by Israeli Mizrahi journalist Hen Mazzig, anti-Israel ideologues like Erakat are imposing an Arab identity upon unwilling Jews. Jewish presence in the Middle East, along with other non-Arab communities such as Aramaic Christians, predates the region’s Arabization following the Islamic conquests in the seventh century. Moreover, Jews suffered greatly under Muslim rule in Arab countries. Such realities make a mockery of Erakat’s “vision for Jewish Israelis in the region” that would be supposedly “better than what Israel has been able to offer.”
Equally absurd were Erakat’s theories about the alleged “relationship between queer theory and Palestinian liberation,” given the mortal dangers to gay individuals in Palestinian society. Invoking intersectionality, she declared that if Palestinians are part of “emancipation on all levels, then we can’t stop at the door of homophobia,” even as she dismissed Israel’s tolerance for homosexuality as “pinkwashing” and “homonationalism.” Nonetheless, she admitted Palestinian society might not be so accepting when she warned that outsiders must let them “define that on their own terms.”
Erakat and her allies in Washington, D.C., and beyond form a leftist/Islamist, red-green coalition centered intellectually in Middle East studies, which in recent decades have abandoned principled scholarship for grievance-based, politicized writing and teaching. Lacking an empirical foundation for their claims, these activists in scholars’ robes invent false narratives that propagandize students and policy makers and willfully blind journalists. Academe’s unwillingness to reform itself leaves the job of countering and defeating these lies to extra-university organizations and concerned stakeholders, including alumni, donors, and legislators. Absent sustained efforts, today’s outrageous claims will become tomorrow’s conventional wisdom.
Pope Francis sent a letter to the Argentine Jewish political umbrella organization DAIA ahead of the 25th anniversary this month of the attack that killed 85 people at the AMIA Jewish center in Buenos Aires.
“Since the first day, my heart has been with the relatives of the victims, Jews or Christians,” wrote the pope, who was born in Argentina as Francisco Bergoglio.
In 2005, Francis was a Jesuit archbishop when he became the first public personality to sign a petition for justice in the AMIA bombing case.
Francis then criticized terrorism in a message to Argentine leaders on the 20th anniversary of the attack.
“Terrorism is lunacy. Terrorism’s only purpose is to kill. It does not build anything, it only destroys … May justice be done!” Francis said in a video message.
This Disney video from 1929, called The Opry House, includes Mickey Mouse performing on stage as both an Arab (with the Muslim star and crescent in the background, 3:30) and a Hasidic Jew (short piece at 4:29) dancing to the old Klezmer-style Mazel Tov tune:
On a quote different note, Teresa on Twitter pointed me to this poignant thread about a Jew who was sent to a Vichy camp before being forced to Auschwitz. He made a cartoon about how the ever optimistic Mickey Mouse would fare in his internment camp in Gurs.
The plot is simple: Mickey is arrested while strolling through Vichy France, and sent to Gurs, where he is detained. His response is bafflement rather than anger.
Yet if Mickey is bemused by the camp, it is likewise unable to get a read on him. In one panel the clerk tries to work out if Mickey is a Jew or a communist - but of course he is neither, unable to be dehumanised because he is already non-human.
At the end of the strip, Mickey decides that whatever Gurs is, it is not for him. And so he erases himself out of the strip altogether. 'And so, because I’m nothing more than a drawing, I rubbed myself out with a stroke of the eraser… and… ta-da…!!!'
(h/t The Jewish Press for The Opry House)
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The Arab world's discrimination against Palestinians continues.
On July 10, Lebanese Labor Minister Kamil Abu Sulaiman launched a campaign to combat "illegal foreign workers" in different parts of Lebanon, including the closure of shops that employ foreign workers illegally and the seizing of companies employing foreign workers without work permits, in order to give priority to local Lebanese workers.
It is meant to be a response to the influx of Syrian refugees into Lebanon who need work, but it disproportionately affects the Palestinians who have lived in Lebanon for decades but are still considered foreign workers who are banned, by law, from many jobs.
Lebanese law prohibits Palestinians from practicing more than 60 professions. In addition, they have to go through extra administrative tasks beyond that in order to obtain work permits.
Palestinian factions protested the government move, saying that they are appreciative to Lebanon's government for opposing the "Deal of the Century" but expressing concern over these new laws that will affect them disproportionately.
According to the 2017 census, the number of Palestinians in Lebanon stands at 174,422 individuals living in 12 camps and 156 communities in different areas of Lebanon. UNRWA says there are over 450,000 "registered Palestine refugees." Which means that conditions in Lebanon are so bad for Palestinians that over 60% of them had no choice but to leave with their families.
Needless to say, Palestinians under "occupation" in the West Bank do not emigrate in such high numbers.
This supposedly friendly Arab country treats Palestinians worse than Israel does by every single metric. Yet the media and supposedly "pro-Palestinian" groups are virtually silent at official Lebanese policy to disenfranchise Palestinians.
Which just proves that the real reason anyone pretends to care about Palestinians is because they hate Israel, not because they give a damn about Palestinian human rights.
Indeed, even the criticisms of Lebanon by Palestinians themselves is muted and attenuated with praise for their supposed - and fictional - support for the Palestinian cause. The only vitriol is for Israel, which seems to care more about their actual human rights than most Arabs do.
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Hamad gave Israel a deadline of one week before Hamas will start a terror spree worldwide targeting Jews.
"If the enemy does not break this siege, and if the understandings are not implemented, we will not allow the Palestinians to enter Gaza," Hamad said in a speech to demonstrators participating in the "return marches" east of Gaza City. "We have a lot of means and methods in our arsenal."
"We are about to explode and the explosion will not be in Gaza, but in the occupied West Bank and abroad as well," Hamad said.
He then said, "We must attack, slaughter and kill every Jew who exists in the world."
Hamas leader Ahmed Yousef sent an open letter to Hamad, saying that his speech was in error.
"My brother, Fathi Hamad (Abu Musab), I understand your anger at the crimes of the occupation against our people, but the language of knives and explosive belts is not the language of politicians, and talk about the killing of Jews is a violation of religious and moral law, and even contrary to what is stated in the Hamas political document."
He is referring to the Hamas manifesto released with much fanfare in 2017 that was more conciliatory to Jews but was falsely reported as a replacement for their charter which indeed calls to kill all Jews.
Yousef's letter continues to say, "O brother, Abu Musab, your hurried enthusiasm [caused you to say things that] will give all pretexts to the occupation to tighten the siege and the practice of further aggression, and will contribute to the abandonment of our people in the Gaza Strip.
Yousef said: "The leadership of Hamas and the head of its political bureau needs to correct the error and explain the situation, because the cost of this speech can be high, and its consequences painful."
Other Palestinians disavowed Hamad's words, saying they do not hate Jews.
Mahmoud al-Zaq, a member of the political bureau of the Palestinian Popular Struggle Front, said "This speech can is harmful, which harms our people and turns us from victim to murderer."
Dr. Hossam al-Dajani, a writer and political analyst who is close to Hamas, called Hamad's call to kill the Jews a "strategic mistake and a coup against the Hamas political document."
He said: "This is a serious mistake that Hamas will pay for and should immediately disavow this speech because its repercussions will be serious, especially if a Jew were killed in any foreign capital, the charge would be justified."
"The language of slaughtering in the media is not successful, especially as it is linked to world public opinion which closely links [Hamas] with terrorism and brings the consequent phobia of Islam."
This pushback is rare, as there are antisemitic articles in Arab media all the time. However they rarely reach the level of explicit calls to genocide, and much (but not all) of the criticism centers more on the ramifications of Hamad's words in world public opinion than the immorality of his call to kill all Jews.
UPDATE: Here's the excerpt (sorry, no translation yet:)
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The problem of Muslim anti-Semitism is much bigger than Ilhan Omar. Condemning her, expelling her from the House Foreign Affairs Committee, or defeating her in 2020 won’t make the problem go away.
Islamists have understood well how to couple Muslim anti-Semitism with the American left’s vague notion of “social justice.” They have succeeded in couching their agenda in the progressive framework of the oppressed versus the oppressor. Identity politics and victimhood culture also provide Islamists with the vocabulary to deflect their critics with accusations of “Islamophobia,” “white privilege” and “insensitivity.” A perfect illustration was the way Ms. Omar and her allies were able to turn a House resolution condemning her anti-Semitism into a garbled “intersectional” rant in which Muslims emerged as the most vulnerable minority in the league table of victimhood.
As for me, I eventually unlearned my hatred of Jews, Zionists and Israel. As an asylum seeker turned student turned politician in Holland, I was exposed to a complex set of circumstances that led me to question my own prejudices. Perhaps I didn’t stay in the Islamist fold long enough for the indoctrination to stick. Perhaps my falling out with my parents and extended family after I left home led me to a wider reappraisal of my youthful beliefs. Perhaps it was my loss of religious faith.
In any event, I am living proof that one can be born a Somali, raised as an anti-Semite, indoctrinated as an anti-Zionist—and still overcome all this to appreciate the unique culture of Judaism and the extraordinary achievement of the state of Israel. If I can make that leap, so perhaps can Ms. Omar. Yet that is not really the issue at stake. For she and I are only two individuals. The real question is what, if anything, can be done to check the advance of the mass movement that is Muslim anti-Semitism. Absent a world-wide Muslim reformation, followed by an Islamic enlightenment, I am not sure I know. (h/t IsaacStorm)
In my view, here is why we should pay more attention to the special case of Islamist anti-Semitism https://t.co/9VbpH817E6
It was a time when the term "suicide attack" was unknown. It was also a time when everyone assumed that a terrorist attack had to be carried out with a bomb, or a gun, or a knife.
Thirty years ago this month, that assumption was shattered when an unarmed Palestinian terrorist turned an Israeli civilian passenger bus into a weapon. On July 6, 1989, a terrorist named Abdel Hadi Ghneim boarded a bus from Tel Aviv, headed for Jerusalem. As the bus passed a steep ravine alongside the highway, Ghneim attacked the driver, seized the steering wheel and turned it sharply so that the bus went hurtling into the ravine below.
Fourteen passengers were killed, and many others were injured.
The attack was deeply shocking to the Israeli public because two aspects of it were so different from what they were used to.
First, it was clear that the terrorist expected to die. He was willing to give his life just so that he could murder Jews. This was different than typical terrorist attacks, where someone would plant a bomb in an Israeli supermarket and then sneak away, or ambush Israeli traffic with sniper fire and then escape before the army or police arrived.
Second, Ghneim had no weapon. He simply took advantage of circumstances that created an opportunity to murder Jews. A security guard checking bags could not have stopped it. A metal detector would not have made a bit of difference. Any Arab terrorist could board any bus without detection and do something similar.
For American friends of Israel, the attack carried an extra measure of pain because the most severely injured passenger was a well known beloved attorney from Philadelphia. For twelve agonizing days, Rita Levine, 39, hovered between life and death, until, on July 18th, she passed away.
As long as some American and Israeli leaders continue to support the “two-state solution” (TSS) and oppose annexation or incorporation of Area C, the Palestinians (and their supporters) will continue to believe that they will win. This is because the Palestinians present themselves not only as a geographic and demographic entity but, more important, as an ideology: Palestinianism.
This is what the late Robert Wistrich explained in one of his last lectures to the World Jewish Congress. Arab Palestinians cannot and will not abandon their raison d’etre, which is the “liberation of Palestine.” This explains why they “always miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity” to resolve the struggle. It is, for them, existential. It’s in the PLO and Hamas charters. It is a fundamental value, and it is the basis of their policy and strategy to defeat and destroy Israel.
The Arabs’ rejection of a Jewish presence in Eretz Yisrael, or Palestine, began over a century ago. They opposed the Balfour Declaration (1917) and attacked Jewish communities during the 1920s and ‘30s. They call Israel’s establishment in 1948 the “Nakba” (catastrophe) and engage in terrorism, or as they call it, “resistance.” The conflict is not about boundaries, civil and humanitarian rights, or statehood. A TSS offers no incentive to change their narrative, or their behavior.
Why offering “bargaining chips” doesn’t work
Despite a history of failures, some suggest that offering the Palestinians more concessions if they agree to recognize and accept Israel’s existence. These include giving away parts of Area C of Judea and Samaria and evacuating Jewish communities; giving away parts of eastern Jerusalem; and facilitating formal, official statehood. Rather than serve as inducements to accept Israel, however, these measures only encourage Arab leaders to reject all offers and demand more. This “land-for-peace” slogan conveys the message that Israel is desperate, vulnerable and uncommitted.
The trap of the TSS is that it is entangled with other issues, including: 1) the “right of return” for descendants of former residents of Palestine currently living in UNRWA-sponsored towns and villages in Syria, Lebanon and Jordan; 2) “the occupation” of land and properties claimed by Arab Palestinians; 3) accusations of “stealing Palestinian land”; 4) compensating Arabs who claim dispossession; 5) demanding boundaries based on the UNGA plan in 1947, or reversing the results of the war in 1948-49; 6) abandoning strategic security areas, such as the Jordan Valley; 7) freeing convicted terrorists from Israeli prisons; 8) allowing “pay-to-slay” cash rewards to terrorists and their families; 9) anti-Israel incitement, including BDS and support for terrorism.
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Tuesday, July 16, 2019
Elder of Ziyon
