Over the past year, Saudi Arabia has been arresting dozens of Palestinians and Jordanians. They all seem to be connected to Hamas or the Muslim Brotherhood.
Among those arrested was former Hamas representative in Saudi Arabia Mohammed Saleh Al-Khudari, 81, and his son.
The reason for the arrests seems to be that Hamas tilted towards Iran in accepting funding and the Saudis look at any allies of Iran as implacable enemies.
Last September, after trying to negotiate behind the scenes, Hamas came out with a public statement against the Saudis for the arrests. Now Hamas is publicly protesting, saying that the arrests are political (which seems likely) and their only crimes is supporting jihad (which is also likely.)
On Sunday, the trial of the al-Khaduris began, and it appears that they will return to court the beginning of May.
This infighting is not being widely reported in the West.
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I found a play about the Purim story, written in rhyme, from 1889, by a Rabbi H. M. Bien. All I can find about him is that he lived in Vicksburg, Mississippi.
Queen Vashti's part is surprisingly feminist and modern.
Here she as as she enters after being summoned by the King to show off her body.
Vashti (Enters weeping, r. h.)-
And this to me? the queen! unprecedented shame!
I will resent the outrage !-or Vashti's not my name!
I, who brought up retired-strict Oriental fashion,
Now be made sacrifice to his unbounded passion,
For hollow pride and power. I? show myself? indeed ! (stamps her feet)
I will not go—no never-nor his vile bidding heed !
(Muses, walking to and fro—more composed.)
These men will always play our masters, and be they low or be they high,
Will rule and lord it over woman, at least they will imperious try.
Weak-minded, pliant and obedient, our sex most always does submit;
Aye! it were different had they only a little more of pride and wit.
For we by nature fair and lovely, the nobler part of human kind,
To men superlatively better, in soul and body, heart and mind;
We bear the burden of existence, serve from the cradle to the grave.
Yet could be free if we would never permit ourselves to be the slave.
I'd willingly become a beggar or instantly would rather die,
To be example to my sisters, while I my lord's command defy.
True! he has given me these baubles, a royal diadem and crown.
Like pretty puppets men adorn us, with gaudy gems and costly gown;
And then degrade us as their creatures. Now let one learn what woman can
If once aroused ; that she is stronger than most despotic, selfish man.
I know the time is near approaching when females will their rights assert.
The more advanced will be determined to act harmonious in concert.
They will no longer then permit it, that man shall rule the world alone;
And will no longer be the servants of kitchen, feasting-hall or throne.
We too can traffic. plead and labor, can sculpture, sing and play and paint;
Strong-minded women will hereafter take Vashti for their patron saint.
Ahasuerus, he will rage and bluster, that I his bidding disobey !
I scorn his wrath-defy his anger; the consequence be what it may.
In fact, Vashti is the heroine of this play! After the king banishes her she disguises herself as Hatach, the king's servant, and pushes the narrative to her will without anyone realizing it.
At the end, Vashti says:
Vashti as Hatach , the Scribe ( To king and queen .) —
I'll write this in my annals of Esther's reign and thine !
We'll call it the “ M 'gillah ; ” forever it shall shine
To rulers and to princes a plea for tolerance ! (Advances to front of stage )
And to the house of Israel a great inheritance !
And unto me (muses and sighs) I own it, the time for woman's right,
Among these barbarous Asians, it is not yet in sight.
But I have learned it lately , that ’mongst some Northern nation
In a far distant country has a new civilization
Arisen in its mighty power, and women there elated ,
Already to their hearts' content the men have well berated .
I hear they there are doctors, and learned in law and lore .
One does command a ship , and some preach where they God adore.
The men tend quite submissively to duties of the houses :
They mind the babes, they cook and wash as well as their good
spouses.
The government will shortly too by woman's rule grow free !
They will fill all the offices ! That is the land for me!
The cause of Vashti lives triumphant, when I shall be no more,
Farewell, home of my birth ! I'll go to that far distant shore,
And though my fate to history be lost fore'er and aye
Our sex will build me monuments ! I'm off, my friends ! good -bye !
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In the Megillah, we will that in the face of the antisemitic threat of Haman, Esther and the Jews found an unlikely ally in King Achashverosh, who originally supported Haman in his plan to kill the Jews.
Apparent enemies of Jews can become allies, or at least find common cause.
It is a recurring theme in Jewish history.
And it is what Theodore Herzl believed.
In his book, Zionism: The Concise History, Alex Ryvchin notes that while Herzl became keenly aware of the strength of antisemitism, he felt that there were antisemites who could be allies and help provide a homeland for the Jews. He turned to antisemites such as Germany's Kaiser Wilhelm and Russia's Foreign Minister Vladimir Lambsdorff. Herzl calculated that such men were so eager to rid their countries of the Jews that they would support the establishment of a Jewish state and thereby rid their respective countries of the Jews they did not want. Some of these leaders did see a benefit in supporting political Zionism for just that reason.
This was the realpolitik that guided Herzl in seeking alliances with apparent enemies, in the interests of reaching his goal. Eventually, Herzl realized that such leaders could not be counted upon to act in good faith and were in fact fundamentally opposed, if not outright hostile to Jewish rights.
For this reason, Herzl shifted his search for allies to Great Britain.
However, Netanyahu has gone one step further than Herzl, and has arguably succeeded where Herzl did not.
While the growing ties between Israel and some of the Arab countries in the Middle East is in the news, Netanyahu has also developed key alliances with Hungary, Poland, the Czech Republic, and Slovakia -- the Visegrad Group.
But not without controversy.
Netanyahu has been making overtures to Eastern Europe, to countries that during WWII were not only accessories to the Nazis, but in some cases actively helped the Nazis kill Jews and even went so far as to kill Jews on their own initiative.
The issue is more than past history. Even today there are accusations of antisemitism against leaders such as the Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban. He has been accused of antisemitism for his attacks against George Soros and his right-wing government has been accused of rehabilitating wartime figures as anti-communist icons and minimizing their complicity in deporting and killing Jews.
He is a far-right leader of a country whose Jewish citizens say they face less harassment than Jews in any other part of Europe. Mr. Orban and his party, Fidesz, have used anti-Semitic tropes to promote his vision of Hungarian nationalism, and have been accused of trying to understate Hungarian complicity in the Holocaust — even as he has bankrolled many Jewish institutions and causes.
Meanwhile, Poland is still trying to play down its role during the Holocaust.
Whatever else these four countries gain by allying themselves with Israel, they get what might arguably be called a "kosher seal" that deflects claims that they are antisemitic.
In return, Netanyahu has gained a way of blunting, to a degree, the attacks by the European Union against Israel.
o In 2017, when the UN General Assembly voted overwhelmingly to reject the US recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital, Hungary abstained.
o Hungary joined the Czech Republic and Romania in blocking a European Union statement that criticized the US Israeli embassy moving to Jerusalem.
o In November 2019, the EU failed to get all 28 member states behind a joint statement condemning the US decision to no longer consider Israeli settlements as illegal. It was blocked by Hungary, which meant that instead of a joint statement, the EU was reduced to a statement by then-EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini
o In January, the EU again failed to get a consensus, when it tried to unanimously condemn Trump's peace plan
o Hungary and the Czech Republic are also among the countries that will file an amicus brief with the ICC in response to ICC chief prosecutor Fatou Bensouda's statement in December that there was enough evidence to investigate alleged war crimes by Israel.
And then there is Bernie Sanders, cynically creating alliances with antisemites -- who are not merely critical of Israel, but also demonize it, accuse it of being supremacist and accuse those who support it of having dual loyalty.
This is a different kind of 'realpolitik'.
Like Herzl, Sanders is not out to change his allies such as Sarsour, Tlaib, Omar or any of the other antisemites that he has gone out of his way to ally himself with. But while Herzl's goal was to channel the influence of powerful antisemites to establish a Jewish state to save the Jewish people, Sanders accepts the endorsements of these people while they continue to attack and demonize Israel. There is nothing about such associates that in any way helps Jews in general or Israel in particular.
We never hear Sanders publicly challenge what they say.
On the contrary, Sarsour, for example, is a surrogate whom Sanders has chosen to actually represent him and speak on his behalf.
At least Herzl realized that people like the Kaiser could not be relied upon to act in good faith. Sanders shows no interest in what his "allies" say against Israel, so long as they strengthen his 'progressive' creds.
In the process, Sanders -- a self-proclaimed 'proud Jew' -- acts as a shield for these people, for their attacks against Israel and against those who stand up for it.
While one can argue that Netanyahu provides a shield for leaders who engage in antisemitic themes, it is undeniable that those same leaders have been instrumental in frustrating a number of the EU's attempts to attack and isolate Israel.
Sanders, on the other hand, is distant from his fellow Jews.
o When he praised the Soviet Union, but never stood up for the persecuted Soviet Jews o He has never attended pro-Israel rallies o He has never attended an AIPAC conference - this last time trying to justify his absence by attacking AIPAC as racist
Whatever one may criticize about Biden's gaffes, it appears that Bernie Sanders -- in distancing himself from both his 'Jewishness' and his fellow Jews -- is also becoming increasingly difficult to watch.
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Salon published a piece originally in Undark that describes the difficult life of a leading Gazan astrophysicist - without mentioning that he identifies as a Hamas member and his brother was a major Hamas terrorist.
The article says:
[A]strophysicist Suleiman Baraka's life's work — along with that of his students and mentees — illustrates the promise and challenges of astronomy in Gaza.
Baraka studies space plasma, the electrically-charged soup of ions and electrons that constitutes the vast majority of space. And he creates kinetic models that simulate how these charged particles in solar wind interact with the magnetosphere of the Earth. He holds a part-time appointment at the National Institute of Aerospace in Virginia, and he also has a teaching position in Gaza, at al-Aqsa University. Colleagues around the world have praised his efforts to bring astronomy to Gaza.
Baraka graduated in 1987 from al-Quds University in East Jerusalem with an undergraduate thesis on the formation of black holes and an offer to study astrophysics at the Australian National University in Canberra. ....
He never made it to Australia, though this isn't unusual. Scientists in Gaza are "essentially isolated," says Robert Williams, an astronomer and former president of the International Astronomical Union. In 2010, Williams attempted to enter the Gaza Strip to attend an astronomy event, but was denied entry. And even within the West Bank — the Palestinian territory not under blockade by Israel — it is difficult for scientists to travel from one place to another, due to checkpoints and travel restrictions.
Really? Any examples of how Western scientists were stymied in traveling through the West Bank? No, just a commonly accepted "fact."
In 2008, almost four decades after first seeing Neil Armstrong walk on the moon, Baraka started his fellowship as a post-doctoral researcher for the National Institute of Aerospace — the closest a foreigner can ever get to working with NASA.
But three months into that appointment, a rocket tore into his house in Gaza, destroying his father's books and critically injuring his 11-year old son, Ibrahim. The boy was transported to an Egyptian hospital, where doctors tended to shrapnel wounds in the left side of his brain. Baraka says he flew from Virginia to Egypt and sat by his son's bed for four days until his son's body was sent back to Gaza in a coffin.
Why might Israel have targeted this house?
Probably because Salon doesn't mention that the Baraka family is Hamas.
Suleiman himself had been arrested twice by Israel. He told the reporter that one arrest was for helping foreign journalists report on the region, and one for secretly teaching Palestinian students. That was accepted as truth in the article.
Recently, Suleiman gave a speech at a Palestinian TED event and received loud applause from the Gazan audience as he recounted his life-story in the Arab world. .... "But in the end, like my brother Nour, I belong to the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades," he said.
Yes, a Palestinian who has reached the heights of fame for his scientific work also identifies as a member of Hamas' "military wing" that is responsible for the deaths of thousands, and no one wants to mention that.
(h/t Tomer Ilan)
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Ethiopia announced on Friday its rejection to the Arab League’s Wednesday resolution that showed solidarity with Egypt in protecting its historical rights to the Nile River water and refused any unilateral measures that might be taken by Addis Ababa regarding the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) on the Blue Nile.
Tensions between Cairo and Addis Ababa have been escalating recently after Ethiopia missed the last US-sponsored ministerial meeting with Egypt and Sudan in Washington to conclude a deal over the rules of filling and operating the GERD.
Egypt accused Ethiopia of not attending the last round of talks in Washington “to deliberately hinder negotiations.”
Ethiopia has justified its absence that it needs more time to consider the matter, and that it would commence filling the dam’s reservoir in parallel with its construction.
While Ethiopia, an upstream country, puts a huge development strategy based on GERD, Egypt is concerned it might affect its 55.5bn cubic meter annual share of Nile water, if the filling of the dam’s reservoir was executed in less than 7-year period which would cause low flooding seasons.
Afterwards, the war of words heated up some more. On Saturday evening the Egyptian Foreign Ministry issued a heated statement that said, in part, "Ethiopia’s posture and position during these negotiations, which has been criticized by the Arab League, evinces its intent to exercise hydro-hegemony and to anoint itself as the unchallenged and sole beneficiary over the Nile. This is especially apparent in its insistence on filling the GERD unilaterally in July 2020 without reaching an agreement with downstream states, and while holding negotiations on the GERD hostage to domestic political considerations. This constitutes a material breach of the DoP and demonstrates, beyond any doubt, Ethiopia’s bad faith and its lack of political will to reach a fair and balanced agreement on the GERD."
This is the sort of thing wars break out over, although analysts are minimizing that possibility. Still, you cannot minimize the importance of the Nile to Egypt's culture as well as its economy. This crosses from an economic or food issue into an honor issue, and as such anything can happen.
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The graphic that they chose is from a 1985 poster by a terror group, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.
Here are some other posters for International Women's Day by the PFLP and other Palestinian groups over the years that JVP supports:
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This exclusive account demonstrates that SOAS has been the venue for a hate-infested political group set up explicitly to attack mainstream British Jewry. The official minutes from this group’s meetings demonstrate-
- That it was set up by academic(s) at SOAS. The university hosts the group’s strategy meetings
- Calls itself Jewish even though it is driven by non-Jewish antisemites
- The Islamic Human Rights Commission (IHRC) – the radical Islamist group behind the pro-Hezbollah Al Quds demonstrations -gives them directives to act against the Jewish community
- A volunteer from Interpal and the Campaign Manager for the PSC have also been part of the ‘Jewish’ steering group
- At its first public outing -two of the three official attendees were non-Jews who share antisemitic conspiracy theories
- They do not have a connection to a single Rabbi and struggled to find somebody who could fill the role
- They prepared a ‘lecture series’ to tour on UK campuses which will create hostility towards Jewish people in the UK and destabilise the Jewish community
There is no justification for SOAS continually being permitted to get away with so much flagrant antisemitic activity. It isn’t just about the poor Jewish students who study there – SOAS is incubating groups that align with Hezbollah, Iran, Islamist movements – and that are created with the purpose of helping to tear the world of British Jewry apart. And if you complain – they will shield antisemitic political activity as being under the umbrella of ‘academic freedom’. How toxic is that!
Though they claim to stand for inclusion and universality, progressives these days are managing to denounce more groups than they include. Anyone who does not share their politics is, at best, persona non grata; at worst, they are downright demonized. Progressives condemn hate, unless it’s toward an individual or group they’ve deemed worthy of hating. The most glaring and pernicious example today is the obsessive delegitimization of Israel, the very embodiment of Jewish people hood.
The first prong of attack is the Left’s gross mischaracterization of Jews as predominantly “white,” and therefore powerful, in contrast to Muslims, who are perceived as “brown,” and therefore oppressed. In fact, global Jewry is dominantly brown-skinned, and millions of Muslims are actually white. But it is a small lie to tell for the sake of one’s sacred political theory.
Such a fallacious mode of thinking about group oppression begs the question: Who gets to determine the “universal” hierarchy of victimhood? Muslims may be an oppressed group in China, but in the Arab world, Muslims are doing the oppressing. Palestinians may be a persecuted minority in Lebanon, but in Gaza and the West Bank, their leadership is persecuting Christians and practicing gender apartheid against women.
The anti-Israel activist group IfNotNow has gone so far as to blame an Israeli victim of a terrorist attack for his own murder, decrying the teenager’s participation in a government they deem a colonialist regime. At the same time, they never disclose that the very term “Palestine” was an imperialist invention of the Roman Empire.
What we know so far:
1. Ken Roth solicited gift from Saudi billionaire promising NOT to defend #LGBT rights
2. HRW had reported on this donor's enslavement of workers
3. Roth's HRW had $223 million net assets & didn't need the money
After CBS' Mike Wallace died Sunday, it is illuminating to see this combative 1958 interview he held with Abba Eban.
Wallace pressed Eban about Israel's "aggression" in 1948 and demanded how Israel could justify holding onto the 1949 armistice lines!
Many people today believe that those 1949 armistice lines were considered "international borders." They were nothing of the sort, and this interview shows where Israel was reminded over and over again at the time that those armistice lines were temporary and fragile.
It is also instructive to see how Israel's critics were saying then that Israel could not possibly survive economically, mirroring arguments that were made before Israel was born and those made years after this interview. Israel is still here, those critics are not. (Eban's sarcasm saying he is touched by the critics' concern is hilarious.)
Wallace also echoes the Walt and Mearsheimer argument that US friendship towards Israel was at too high a cost compared to what it could lose from the Arab world, showing again that the constant kerfuffles created by Israel's critics are hardly original.
Finally, Wallace quotes a Jewish anti-Zionist, reform rabbi Elmer Berger, echoing the charges made today ("Israel-Firsters") that Israel demands loyalty from world Jewry at the expense of their own countries. It seems that even then Jewish critics of Israel gained much fame and fortune for their opinions among certain crowds - and yet they and their hate are soon forgotten, to be replaced by newer editions of the same old arguments. (Berger praised the Soviet Union's treatment of its Jews and supported the Arab side of the 1967 war.)
Eban does very well in this interview. Wallace comes across as being hostile towards Israel's very existence.
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The Palestinian National Council issued a statement "recalling the role and contributions of Palestinian women to the Palestinian national struggle for liberation from occupation."
In a statement issued by its president, Salim Al-Zanoun, on the occasion of International Women's Day, the National Council "saluted the Palestinian women in the homeland and diaspora, especially the wives, mothers, sisters, and daughters of the martyrs, the prisoners, and the wounded, who were patient and endured, and who bore great responsibility after the loss of the breadwinner."
They also showed appreciation for "the steadfastness of the struggling female prisoners in the Israeli occupation prisons."
"At a time when the world celebrates women and their accomplishments in various aspects of life, Palestinian women still live in suffering, injustice, occupation, arrest and deprivation of their rights, and still feel the pain of losing a husband, son and brother, whether he is a martyr or a detainee," the statement said.
To the Palestinian leadership, women's jobs are to support their terrorist husbands and sons, except for the exceptional ones who perform terror attacks themselves. Otherwise, Palestinian women are not expected to be strong, independent women - not professors or doctors or programmers or politicians or peacemakers. They are defined by old men to be supporters of terror against Israel, and to be used as propaganda to play the part of passive victims of Israel's existence. To them, Palestinian women have no aspirations to go beyond that. Not a word about battling inequality, about women's rights, about the theme of helping women in the workplace.
Palestinian leaders show through their International Women's Day statement that Palestinian nationalism is defined by opposition to Israel rather than building a state and that women have no use except for being assistants for this goal of erasing Israel.
Palestinian leaders issued a fundamentally misogynist statement for International Women's Day. Yet feminist leaders won't call them out on it - because they have embraced the falsehood that Palestinians are nothing but victims to show solidarity with, rather than a culture that relegates women to bit roles, a culture that should be fought by everyone who cares about human rights.
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The first paragraph of an article in Algeria's Shourouk News:
World Zionism is a reality - a real force present in its actions, plans, effects, propaganda, intentions and goals .. It organizes groups of people who are known since ancient times in history, and in all books of law, for their ruthlessness and cruelty ... rebellion and disobedience ... they did not know in their history anything like loyalty or devotion to obedience to those who take charge of their affairs .. even their prophets .... and in all the societies in which they lived there appeared their isolation and partisanship .. and their uniqueness in residing in private places and neighborhoods .. and their specialty was blackmailing the nation's money, with greed and exploitation .. They seek the help of their fifth columns, who manage their affairs for them in every country and in every field .. and work - secretly from behind the curtain - nurtured by the fanaticism of the hatre for the whole world.
Either Zionists have been around since the time of the Prophets, or they are talking about Jews.
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Years passed, and, responding to Trump’s plan at a January 28, 2020 press conference in Ramallah, Abbas exposed the deeper layer of the PLO’s beliefs, saying: “Dear brothers, I consider this deal as the culmination of the Balfour declaration… The ‘Deal of the Century’ is based on the Balfour Declaration, which was created by America and Britain. Some may find this strange. America? Yes, America! And Britain. It was America that formulated [the Balfour Declaration], in agreement with Britain, and it was America that incorporated it into the Covenant of the League of Nations… America founded the Balfour Declaration, and it has now begun to implement it.”
Indeed, according to Article 20 of the 1964 Palestinian Covenant, “The Balfour Declaration, the Mandate for Palestine, and everything that has been based upon them, are deemed null and void.” And so, even 22 years after the ceremony in which the covenant was “abolished,” the PLO continues to consider the Balfour Declaration a source of continuous injustice that has been done to the Palestinians. It is in this spirit that in his article marking the centenary of the declaration titled “The Burden of Lord Balfour” (The Cairo Reviews of Global Affairs, November 17, 2017) Abbas wrote: “Lord Arthur Balfour was a British foreign secretary who decided to change the identity and fate of Palestine, a land that he did not own, by promising it to the Zionist movement, and dramatically altering the history of the Palestinian people... The Balfour Declaration of 1917 symbolizes the international role in the Palestinian catastrophe and exodus, the Nakba of 1948.”
In that article Abbas also proposed a solution to the refugee issue: “We also reiterate that, in order to end claims with Israel, there must be a just solution for the seven million Palestinian refugees based on the choice of every refugee,” i.e., his choice between returning to his family’s original home in Israel and accepting financial compensation.
The meaning of this permanent demand is that the PLO is not authorized to represent the will of each individual refugee, and hence the PLO is unable to agree with the Israeli government on any quota of refugees that would be allowed to settle in Israel. Hence, the PLO is unable to include in any agreement the vital component of “mutual end of claims.” This barrier is in addition to the PLO’s ongoing claim to the entire territory of Israel, a demand on which organization still educate its youth.
The new American “Peace to Prosperity” plan implicitly anticipates that, within the next four years, the PLO leadership will return to the negotiation table. In order to avoid future mistakes, we must abandon the erroneous theory that “the PLO is the solution.” We must not close our eyes to the simple fact that, for the PLO, the core issue is the hundred-year-old “injustice” embedded in the very existence of Jewish sovereignty in any part of Palestine. This gap cannot be bridged, and no plan that any Israeli government can accept can also satisfy the PLO. Therefore, a peace treaty with the PLO cannot and will not be signed.
Ze’ev B. Begin is a researcher in MEMRI, The Middle East Media Research Institute.
Pew Research nodded toward this issue last year, while studying European attitudes 30 years after the Berlin Wall’s fall. Jews were not the poll’s focus, but it’s striking that Jews were rated favorably by their fellow countrymen in “the Netherlands (92%), Sweden (92%), the UK (90%) and France (89%).”
Seventy-four years after the Holocaust’s end, Pew also learned that only 12 percent of Germans in former East Germany and 5 percent in former West Germany viewed Jews unfavorably. Eighty-six percent of Germans told Pew they had favorable opinions of Jews in 2019, compared to 53 percent in 1991.
Unfortunately, other surveys don’t echo these upbeat numbers. Asked about this, a Pew Research spokesman, who pointed to some questions posed by Pew’s “international religion survey team” in 2017, emailed, “Neither survey set out to measure antisemitism. In fact, we are very careful NOT to make any claims that our questions are actually measuring antisemitism.”
So, stipulating that Pew’s surveys do not expressly study antisemitism, lack the qualitative data Pew’s spokesman considers necessary, and include few questions, let’s look at the 2017 data, because Pew remains a reputable source. That year, surveyors asked Europeans in 15 countries whether they would accept a Jew as family or a neighbor, whether Jews “pursue their own interests” rather than their home country’s, and whether Jews “overstate how much they have suffered.”
I’d submit that the number of Europeans opposed to Jewish relatives is irrelevant here. While it reflects a form of prejudice and is upsetting to any people involved, it doesn’t threaten Jews’ ability to live freely or safely.
By contrast, not wanting Jewish neighbors is housing discrimination and affects every Jewish citizen. So when 12 percent of Italians, along with 10 percent of Irish and Portuguese respondents say they wouldn’t “be willing to accept Jews as” neighbors, that matters.
When 36 percent of Portuguese respondents, along with 32 percent of Spaniards, 31 percent of Italians, and 28 percent of Belgians agree that “Jews always pursue their own interests and not the interest of the country they live in,” that’s concerning.
And when 36 percent of Italians, 33 percent of Portuguese, 30 percent of Spanish, and 28 percent of Belgian respondents tell Pew pollsters they agree that “Jews always overstate how much they have suffered,” that’s a red flag. Neighbors who believe you’re exaggerating about historical suffering are unlikely to empathize over your contemporary concerns.
Anti-Jewish incidents in Italy climbed sharply in 2019, the latest report from the country’s main antisemitism monitor revealed on Friday.
Data gathered by the Milan-based “Osservatorio Antisemitismo” (Antisemitism Observatory) showed that there were 251 incidents of hatred targeting Jews last year, compared with 197 such incidents in 2018.
About 30,000 Jews live in Italy, concentrated in a handful of major cities.
The majority of the 2019 incidents — 173 — involved antisemitic posts online that were reported to the Observatory. In other categories, there were 31 incidents of verbal abuse, 23 instances of antisemitic graffiti and two violent assaults, one involving a woman in Rome who was slapped and spat upon by her assailant, and the other a man in the northern town of Prunetto who was punched and insulted with anti-Jewish epithets.
Stefano Gatti — the editor of the Observatory’s report — told the Italian Jewish news outlet Bet Magazine Mosaico that part of the reason for the increase was a greater willingness among victims to report attacks.
Equally, Gatti emphasized that the available data was likely an “underestimate” of the scale of the problem, “because they only include explicit complaints and not cases that are unknown or unreported.”
Asked to explain the broader context around the rise of antisemitism in Italy, Gatti pointed to the visibility of anti-Zionist propaganda demonizing the State of Israel and the related popularity of conspiracy theories centered upon Jews.
Two of the incidents recorded by the Observatory in 2019 — the cancellation of a concert in Sardinia by the Israeli musician Eyal Lerner and a public campaign for the boycott of Israeli goods — were characterized as antisemitism promoted by Italian supporters of the effort to subject the Jewish state to boycotts, divestment and sanctions.
“In the pro-Palestinian rhetoric, the themes, myths and symbols of anti-Judaism re-emerge,” Gatti commented. “Deicide, the blood libel, exclusivism, hatred for the rest of humanity: Anti-Zionist propaganda is hybridized with anti-Jewish myths.”
Palestinian Authority prime minister Dr. Muhammad Shtayeh too a tour on Saturday evening of a number of shops. He said, "The people's morale is high and there is no shortage of food supplies. Our people are great in giving and in a spirit of solidarity in crises."
At least one of the stores he visited had a product with Hebrew prominently displayed at checkout (see at left in photo.)
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A top surrogate for Sen. Bernie Sanders's (I., Vt.) presidential campaign claimed Zionism is a "racist" ideology and even criticized Barack Obama for saying otherwise.
Phillip Agnew, a self-proclaimed militant, was published by Ebony magazine in 2015 arguing that Zionism "is a racist, exploitative, and exclusionary ideology."
"There is no direct line from Zionism to the Black Freedom struggle," Agnew wrote. "No rhetorical imagination-acrobatics can conjure one, and no amount of intimidation can chart one. It is a racist, exploitative, and exclusionary ideology."
Agnew, who also goes by Umi Selah, criticized then-president Obama for comparing the right of Jews to "have a homeland and to feel safe and free of discrimination" to African Americans having equal protection under the law. He called it a "lie" and a "figment of our well-manicured imagination."
The Sanders campaign and Agnew did not respond to requests for comment.
Agnew's viewpoint is out of line with even the United Nations, which has a history of heaping scorn on the Jewish state. The international body voted overwhelmingly in 1991 to revoke a statement it previously passed, saying, "Zionism is a form of racism and racial discrimination."
"The official count found 111 nations in favor of repealing the statement and 25 nations, mostly Islamic and hard-line Communists, voting against," the New York Times reported at the time. "Thirteen nations abstained. Seventeen other countries, including Egypt, which recognizes Israel, and Kuwait and China, did not take part in the voting."
Agnew is the cofounder of Dream Defenders, a group that promotes the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement, which advocates an economic boycott of Israel and its people.
There are a lot of people who are relieved that Michael Bloomberg has dropped out of the Democratic primary race, and not all of them are named Biden.
The withdrawal of the former mayor of New York City gives a boost to former Vice President Joe Biden. Bloomberg's jumping on the Biden bandwagon removes the last competition for more moderate Democratic primary voters and lessens the chances that Sen. Bernie Sanders will become the Democratic nominee. That's a relief for both centrists who fear the Vermont Socialist can't beat President Donald Trump, as well as supporters of Israel who have been rightly outraged by Sanders's slanderous attacks on AIPAC and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
But Bloomberg's exit from the presidential contest also brings a sigh of relief to those who feared that his wild spending was providing ammunition to anti-Semites.
The idea that Jews buy political influence to pursue secret agendas has been a trope of anti-Semites dating back to the publication of the fake Protocols of the Elders of Zion at the start of the 20th century. It's been revived in various forms, including by some anti-Semitic supporters of Sanders, such as Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), who claimed that supporters of Israel were purchasing Congress in her now-famous quip: "It's all about the Benjamins."
Indeed, the fact that Bloomberg and two other billionaires with Jewish ties, George Soros and Tom Steyer (who has a Jewish father and who also recently ended a futile presidential bid) have been the largest donors to Democratic candidates and liberal political causes in recent years has created an unhealthy dialogue about campaign finance and anti-Semitism. The slightest hint of criticism of the trio – who have invested large sums promoting liberal politicians and policies – has been seized upon as evidence of Jew-baiting.
From Iran, to Syria to the Palestinians, if a Democrat wins the US presidency, especially Bernie Sanders, Israel will need to make major policy adjustments, former deputy National Security Council head Chuck Freilich told The Jerusalem Post.
Under Sanders, “I would advise for everyone to pray,” he said, adding that confronting a nuclear Iran with Sanders in the White House “is a horror.”
But Freilich, who advocates many moderate national security ideas, said Sanders in some ways is a symptom of issues that have festered much longer.
If in November a Democrat wins the presidency, “whether [Joe] Biden or Sanders, there is a critical role of repairing to be done,” he said.
“I don’t think the people of Israel are fully aware of the collapse of support – the absolute free fall in support for Israel especially among younger people in the Democratic party – and in the Jewish community, which votes in the high 70% range for Democrats,” Freilich said.
“There is pent up fury with decades of frustration over the policy regarding Palestinians in the West Bank,” which was exacerbated by the direct confrontation between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the Obama administration over Iran and by Netanyahu’s cozying up to the Trump administration, he said.
“There are also tectonic changes in American demographics, which have nothing to do with Israel,”Freilich said. “The fastest-growing groups are Latinos and the religiously unidentified. Latinos are not interested in Israel,” and if people who are more religious tend to support Israel, people who are less tend not to.
Here are a couple Arab political cartoons in Hamas media against Mahmoud Abbas, showing opinions one normally doesn't see in Western media.
The road-sign points towards "Palestinian rights" and Abbas is depending on the UN to give him those rights, symbolized by a dead horse. Abbas is sitting on a carriage marked "negotiations". The wild horse that is tied is marked as "resistance."
Abbas is seen sniffing cocaine that spells "security coordination" (with the IDF), while holding a sign saying "glory to our martyrs and freedom for our prisoners".
Cocaine is at least as prohibited in Islam as alcohol, so this is especially vicious.
(Al Jazeera.net is not the same as the famous Al Jazeera from Qatar.)
(h/t Ibn Boutros)
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Elder of Ziyon
Among those arrested was former Hamas representative in Saudi Arabia Mohammed Saleh Al-Khudari, 81, and his son.
