I've reported about the strange scene of Israeli, including Jewish, police protecting delegations of Gulf Arabs from angry Palestinians at the Temple Mount - which is doubly ironic because to Jews, any Muslims who visit the area are desecrating it.
We have lived to see Arabs enter Al-Aqsa Mosque under Israeli protection. It is shameful.
Is there any real difference between an Arab delegation visiting Al-Aqsa Mosque under Israeli protection and hordes of extremist Israeli settlers whose incursions and practice of Talmudic rituals there take place under the protection of the same security forces? The crime of these Arabs is arguably greater.
The storming by Israeli extremists under the guns of the Israeli occupation does not whitewash the image of the occupation in the eyes of the world, nor does it give it legitimate sovereignty over the Noble Sanctuary of Al-Aqsa. The Arabs’ visit does, however, whitewash the image of the military occupation and is “evidence” that all Muslims can go to Al-Aqsa Mosque. It also shows the world the false image of Israel providing protection for religious sites and allowing religious freedom.
Left unsaid is that the Waqf has already said that they would ban Gulf Arabs from visiting Al Aqsa, which proves the exact point that it really is Israel that is safeguarding full access to the Temple Mount, blocking only those who would try to stop others from visiting.
The only reason any Arabs need Israeli protection to visit the site is to save their lives from the hateful Palestinians who would lynch them if they could.
In fact, an Emirati tweeted the video I published yesterday of Palestinians harassing Gulf visitors to the site with the caption, "Thank God that Jerusalem is in the hands of the State of Israel."
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Last summer, Israel announced a massive "Silicon Wadi" project in the Arab Jerusalem neighborhood of Wadi al-Joz, converting an industrial park that is now mostly garages into a high tech area specifically meant to provide quality, high-paying jobs for the Arabs of Jerusalem. It is meant to add 250,000 square meters for tech, 50,000 for tourism and 50,000 for commercial space, intended to add 10,000 jobs.
Naturally, the Palestinian leaders complained, saying that it was an excuse extend Israeli sovereignty over all of Jerusalem. They complained about the loss of the existing garage jobs and about Jews taking all the new jobs.
Now there is an interesting possible wrinkle in the plan. According to some reports, Fleur Hassan-Nahoum, deputy mayor of Jerusalem, specifically recruited UAE companies to invest in Silicon Wadi - in order to invest in the Palestinian Arabs of Jerusalem as well as a tech hub. UAE companies in the tech center would naturally recruit Arabic-speaking Jerusalemites for their ventures.
Here would be a direct way that the UAE could invest both in Israeli tech and in the future of Arabs in Jerusalem.
The question is, will the Jerusalem Arabs welcome Silicon Wadi if fellow Arabs invest in it? This would somewhat blunt their fears of Jews taking the new jobs.
This may be a way to find out if Palestinian Arabs are as opposed to Israeli peace with the Gulf as their leaders are.
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The battle of ideas against Islamism will, of necessity, be a long one and if he hopes to succeed Macron must ensure that French civil society and philanthropic foundations are fully engaged in this effort. He should disband subversive Islamist organisations that lay the ideological groundwork for violence, while calling on his fellow European leaders to do the same. It’s amazing how many of them, even now, prefer to avoid the topic.
He might also strengthen immigration laws to ensure that French civic values are taken into account in admission decisions. Those admitted to the Republic from abroad should be told to embrace the French notion of social cohesion, which means they cannot embrace separatism or Islamism, or belong to organisations that do.
Existing laws should be used more too. Not so long ago, an Algerian woman who refused to shake hands with male officials at a French naturalisation ceremony was denied citizenship as a result. Islamists can, in this way, be served notice that France is not their natural home.
French law allows the government to reject naturalisation requests on grounds of ‘lack of assimilation, other than linguistic’. So in the spirit of this law, Macron should start to repatriate asylum-seekers who engage in violence or the incitement of violence — particularly against women.
In foreign policy, he could tackle the ideological extremism that is disseminated by the governments of Qatar and Turkey — among others — through their support of Islamists, Islamist foundations and communitarianism in Europe (including France). He could take a much stronger stand against the Iranian regime — bilaterally as well as at the EU level — for its hostile activities on European soil, its vicious cruelty towards its own population and its efforts to export revolutionary Islamism throughout the Middle East. This would also mean further strengthening France’s ties to Israel, the UAE and Egypt and demanding that Saudi Arabia stop funding Wahhabi extremists abroad.
Other Arabs said that Muslims have only themselves to blame for the "crisis" in their religion. They are referring to the use of Islam, by many Muslims, to carry out terrorist attacks and other atrocities against Muslims and non-Muslims.
The message these Arabs and Muslims are sending is: We created the crisis in our religion by allowing terrorists and extremists to use Islam as a pretext for their crimes.
The views expressed by these Arabs and Muslims are reminiscent of those by Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Sisi. In 2014, he called for a "religious revolution" in Islam and appealed to leading Muslim groups to "confront the misleading ideologies harming Islam and Muslims worldwide."
"The fact is that the biggest conspirators against Islam are the Muslims themselves, specifically those who reproduce the discourse of closed-mindedness and hatred. In this context, there is no difference between those who create, finance or carry out terrorism and those who are silent about it or justify it." — Mohammad Maghouti, Moroccan writer, Hespress, October 13, 2020.
"[W]e have to call on France to place the Muslim Brotherhood and Hezbollah on the list of terrorist organizations." — Nervana Mahmoud, prominent Egyptian commentator and blogger, Al Hurrah, October 11, 2020.
"The crisis that Islam is suffering from was made by Muslims with their own hands when they allowed a handful of them to adopt violence as a language for dialogue with the other. Macron was right in everything he said. His message should be considered a wake-up call. Muslims have greatly offended Islam when they showed it to be a religion that incites violence and spreads chaos in stable societies that received them as refugees and provided them with protection. Muslims made a mistake when they used their religion as a justification for attacking others. This does not give us the right to condemn others and accuse them of being hostile to Islam. Islam is in crisis because it has been distorted, mutilated, and destroyed from within. We should have said thank you to Macron rather than curse him." — Farouk Yousef, Egyptian writer, Middle East Online, October 13, 2020.
This expression ”two-state solution” is so deeply entrenched in the West that it will require an enormous effort to spread doubt about it. That is not because the message isn’t simple. Why would one upgrade the criminal Palestinian entity—the leaders of which glorify genocide and reward the murder of civilians, and which is permeated with a death cult—into a state?
Israel’s battle against the UN’s abuse of the phrase ”Palestinian refugees” has been fought only in a lukewarm way. There is a general definition of “refugee”: “someone who is unable or unwilling to return to their country of origin owing to a well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group, or political opinion.”
Specifically for the Palestinians, the UN expanded this definition to include descendants of refugees. This has undermined the meaning of the word and multiplied resulting problems. Almost no Palestinian “refugees” are true refugees according to the original definition. They did not flee from Israel, though their surviving parents, grandparents, or great-grandparents may have done so and are genuine refugees. Yet not a single international journalist points this out or uses the expression “UN fake refugees” for them.
Another abuse of language is to call Israelis “colonists.” That word was exclusively used for people who went to lands usually thousands of kilometers from their homeland. The 1967 partition lines that separated Israel from the Palestinian territories were armistice lines, yet they are frequently and mistakenly called ”borders.”
There are also many examples of the abuse of language in the antisemitism discourse. The French government often used to speak about “tension between communities.” It suggested that two communities, the Muslim and the Jewish, were aggressive toward each other. The reality was one-sided aggression and hatred toward the Jewish community originating in parts of the Muslim community.
The Palestinians will probably wait to see if Biden is elected president of the US and whether he will tear up the Trump plan. Should this occur, it may well be that the Palestinians will then decide to try to arrange a peace conference to deal with concrete issues such as final borders, the status of the Temple Mount, the demilitarization of a Palestinian state, and so on. It is unlikely to address a crucial issue: how the Palestinians intend to rid themselves of the cult of genocide and death that permeates their society.
This issue should be prominently put on the international agenda by Israel. Otherwise, if a Palestinian state is established it will be the upgrading of a criminal entity into a criminal nation-state.
The anti-Israel NGO Adalah issued a condemnation of Israel for not providing enough computers for Arab students to learn from home.
150,000 Arab students in Israel lacking computers, electricity, or internet access are unable to connect to online remote-learning solutions and cannot secure their basic right to education.
Adalah – The Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel has sent a series of letters to Israeli education and communications authorities demanding they provide computers and internet access so that some 150,000 Palestinian Arab schoolchildren stuck at home due to COVID-19 are able to connect to online remote learning systems together with their peers.
What is left unsaid is that haredi children have the exact same issues, so this is not an Arab problem but a problem of not enough resources.
Number of computers allocated by Israel’s Education Ministry
Nazareth
5,000
1,868
Umm al-Fahem
4,000
1,835
Qalansawe
1,961
704
Chances are the Education Ministry is calculating the number of computers per household, not student, which is the most efficient way to spread around a limited number of devices.
The absurd part comes later in the Adalah report:
In addition, another 50,000 Bedouin schoolchildren living in unrecognized villages in the Naqab (Negev) region also lack computers as well as basic infrastructure such as electricity and internet access.
As we've seen, Bedouin have built hundreds of illegal villages, willy nilly, all over the Negev, without coordination with Israel. Israel has set up towns for them to move into with full infrastructure but most of them refuse to abandon their makeshift homes that they are using to stake a claim to state land.
Now Adalah is demanding that Israel provide electricity, plumbing and Internet to hundreds of illegal sites, some of them with only one family!
If they cared about education, they would ask that the Arabs move into the free housing Israel is offering where the kids can have the necessary infrastructure. Instead, they are using COVID-19 as an excuse to demand that Israel legalize their illegal communities.
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Palestinian Muslims are proud to share videos of them insulting their fellow Muslims at Al Aqsa when they happen to come from Gulf countries.
In this case, the Palestinian is saying, "Get out you dog, you trash, bye-bye" and other insults.
If Palestinians want to see their popularity continue to plummet among other Arabs, they are executing their plan perfectly.
(h/t Ibn Boutros)
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The 65 year-old Palestinian chief negotiator, Saeeb Erekat, is deteriorating so badly from Covid-19 that he has been rushed from his home in the “West Bank” to a hospital in Israel. It is Hadassah hospital in Jerusalem.
That fact is presumably deeply unpalatable to Erekat’s comrades in the Palestine Liberation Organisation. In a statement on Sunday, the PLO said:
Following his contraction of Covid-19, and due to the chronic health problems he faces in the respiratory system, Dr Erekat's condition now requires medical attention in a hospital. He is currently being transferred to a hospital in Tel Aviv.
The Times of Israel reported that the PLO couldn’t even bring itself to say he was being admitted to hospital in Israel, but said he was being transferred to a hospital in the 1948 areas.
The BBC reported for most of today that Erekat has been admitted to hospital in Tel Aviv, Israel with Covid-19.
In fact, as the Jerusalem Post, Times of Israel and jns.org correctly reported, he had been admitted to Hadassah hospital in Jerusalem, Israel. The BBC finally updated its website report this evening to identify the Israeli hospital as Hadassah.
There he will receive the finest care by Israeli doctors in the attempt to save his life. Those doctors will be both Israeli Jews and Israeli Arabs. He will be nursed by a staff consisting of Israeli Jews and Israeli Arabs. He will be treated alongside patients who are both Israeli Jews and Israeli Arabs, and he will be dealt with, as they all are, according to the priority dictated by his clinical needs.
It does not take much imagination to envision a scenario in which a U.S. withdrawal from the MFO results in the collapse of the organization. The United States provides the largest portion of force protection capability for the MFO, and most of the other nations contribute troops to the MFO based on their relationship with Washington. If Washington were to pull the U.S. military contingent from the MFO, many other troop-contributing nations would worry for the safety of their forces. Some nations would also no longer see any serious benefit in retaining troops there in terms of their relationship with the United States.
It would hardly be surprising to see Beijing or Moscow step into the vacuum created by an American departure, seeking to work with Cairo to establish a new civil or military presence in the Sinai. Ironically, in such a scenario, an American effort to reduce a modest military commitment in the Sinai to compete more effectively with China and Russia elsewhere would give Beijing and Moscow an opportunity to establish a coveted strategic outpost vital to energy, economic, and military security at the intersection of Africa, Asia, and Europe.
Thankfully, key leaders in Congress appreciate the bigger picture. In an extraordinary bipartisan broadside, the Democrat and Republican leaders of the House and Senate Foreign Relations, Armed Services, and Appropriations Committees sent a letter to Secretary Esper and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo regarding the MFO on May 13. The members of Congress warned that a withdrawal of the U.S. contingent from MFO would represent a “grave mistake” that could “ultimately make it more difficult to implement the NDS.”
The Pentagon is right to review U.S. military posture in every combatant command to ensure an optimal military posture that fully aligns ends and means. In the Middle East, an objective review would demonstrate that ending the modest U.S. military contribution to the MFO would endanger key NDS objectives and represent a short-sighted and self-inflicted wound to American national security interests.
Intelligence information could also help make the case that Iran fits the Shields Act’s criteria for listing as a “foreign state that … knowingly and materially supports, orders, controls, directs, or otherwise engages in” human-shields use by Hezbollah. It may well be possible to make such a case, as Iran has reportedly been sending PGM parts to Hezbollah for assembly at locations such as the Janah, Laylaki, and Chouaifet sites.69 In addition, Israel has said that Rammal was “manufacturing precision-guided missiles in cooperation with Iranian forces,” and that “as part of his role, he visited Iran a number of times.”70
Apart from the legal requirements of the Shields Act, there are strong policy reasons to hold Hezbollah accountable for human-shields use. Hezbollah’s use of human shields puts civilians in danger of explosives accidents, such as those that decimated the Port of Beirut in August71 and detonated a Hezbollah arms depot in the Lebanese village of Ain Qana a few weeks later.72
In addition, a formal U.S. government determination that Hezbollah is engaging in a war crime through the use of human shields could strengthen the argument for the European Union to designate Hezbollah as a terrorist group.73 This argument is made more compelling by recently publicized discoveries that Hezbollah has been storing large quantities of ammonium nitrate, a bomb-making ingredient, in various European countries.74
Imposing Shields Act sanctions on Hezbollah in response to its clear recent violations would also be an important first step toward countering human-shields use against the U.S. and allied militaries by groups such as the Islamic State and the Taliban. In his 2019 request to NATO member countries, General Scaparrotti, in his capacity as NATO supreme allied commander Europe, said, “[I]t is essential that further measures be taken at the national level to maximise enforcement of the international legal prohibition of the use of human shields.” Scaparrotti specifically urged “imposition of sanctions” and “spotlighting of violations.” In light of the frequency and effectiveness of human-shields use against NATO forces, Scaparrotti said that such national measures “would decidedly become a major and substantial contribution” to NATO operations.
Imposing sanctions on Hezbollah for using human shields would set a strong U.S. example for its NATO partners of taking action on these requests from the NATO supreme allied commander Europe. It would also hopefully pave the way for the U.S. government’s collection and deployment of sufficient evidence to impose Shields Act sanctions on the Islamic State and Taliban for their human-shields uses since the date of enactment (December 21, 2018).
It has been nearly two years since the Shields Act became law. Despite considerable prior evidence of human-shields use by terrorist groups, the Trump administration has yet to impose any sanctions under the law. It is time for the U.S. government to use the Shields Act to hold terrorists and their material supporters publicly accountable for the war crime of using human shields.
“The Israel tech sector is super advanced, so obtaining some of that
knowhow—the sharing of studies, research and development—will help expand and
improve the UAE’s talent pool. Education for the UAE tech sector will be
massive. The post-grad learning opportunities are substantial.”
But while Israel is an acknowledged leader in global technology, it's not as
if Israel is late to the game.
Yehoshafat Harkabi wrote a doctoral thesis a month before the outbreak of the
1967 Six Day War. It was later published and then appeared in English as
Arab Attitudes To Israel. In a chapter on Israel, he has a
section on Favourable and Ambivalent References.
In the introduction to his book, Harkabi writes:
The Arab attitude to Israel is, of course, affected by the vicissitudes of
time and war can certainly change public attitudes and make descriptions of
previous situations out of date. It seems, however, that my description of
the attitude is still valid. [p. xv; all quotes are from the English
edition]
Let's see if Harkabi is right.
He writes that the many pejorative Arab statements he quotes in his
book are not the whole story. Instead, there were statements made in the Arab
world that praised Israel and presented it as a model to be imitated.
In 1955, no less than Nasser himself recommended in a speech in Gaza:
All I ask of you is to persevere, and unite, and act, and be patient, and
take an example and a lesson. [emphasis added; p. 337]
A lesson in what?
Harkabi sums it up that in the Arab praises of Israel,
major prominence is given to her efficiency and modernity,
her achievements in technology and science, her thorough planning
instead of improvisation. Israel stands for dynamic enterprise and
achievement. [emphasis added]
Of course, these compliments are not for the sake of praising Israel, but
rather to point out attributes that the Arabs should imitate -- especially the
Palestinian Arabs. Harkabi refers to Arnold Hottinger's book,
The Arabs: Their History, Culture and Place in the Modern World where
he writes of the Palestinian Arabs that they view Israel's victory in 1948 as
being because of her modernity, an ideal to be imitated.
This recognition of Israeli accomplishments in science and technology even led
to arguments among the Arabs themselves.
In 1962, The Syrian prime minister, Nazim al-Qudsi spoke to students and noted
the high percentage of engineers and physicians in Israel -- and emphasized
the need for Syria and other Arab countries to follow suit. For that, he was
severely criticized by Cairo Radio and the Egyptian press.
A Damascus Radio commentator snapped back:
Qudsi drew the attention of the Arab nation to the truth: Israel our enemy
is not--as Nasserist propaganda describes her--weak and unstable in her
social structure; she is a State with various possibilities and human
potential. By revealing this truth, Qudsi is stimulating the Arabs to
comprehensive action and progress in all fields. [p. 337]
Aref al-Aref, a journalist, historian and former mayor of East Jerusalem,
wrote in his book The Disaster about how Jews study and delve into
matters. Similarly, Walid Qamhawi -- who later led the Palestinian National
Fund -- praises Israel numerous times in his book
Disaster and Reconstruction. [p. 338]
So, no, Israel did not just suddenly appear on the world stage as a modern
leader in technology.
And it's not as if the Arab world is only now recognizing that fact and
wanting to emulate it -- the same attitude of admiration for Israeli
technological prowess existed back then too.
So why is it only now that countries in the Arab world, including those who
already have covert relations with Israel, willing to step forward to sign
agreements -- and even normalize relations -- with Israel?
One reason, of course, is the threat of Iran
But another reason is how the Middle East has changed.
Dr. Kedar notes how radical leaders such as Abdul Nasser of Egypt, Hafez
Al-Assad of Syria, Saddam Hussein of Iraq and Muammar Gaddafi of Libya once
dominated the Middle East, under the aegis of the then Soviet Union and wanted
to unite the Arab world.
In such a situation, more-traditional Arab countries such as Saudi Arabia, the
UAE, Kuwait and Oman felt under threat from these radical leaders who
considered those countries as counter-revolutionaries because they stuck with
the old traditions and did not actively partake in their attacks on Israel.
But now, over the past 10 years, things have changed.
The Arab countries that once were in the forefront, no longer are.
o Syria is suffering from a bloodbath
o Iraq is dysfunctional o Libya is a
swamp of problems o Egypt has its own problems with the
Nile, rapid population growth and unemployment
Under such conditions, the dream of Arab nationalism has been a failure.
And Israel is not the enemy anymore.
Egypt made peace, albeit a cold one, with Israel.
Likewise, Jordan has a 'cold' peace with Israel.
Between Egypt and Jordan on the one hand, and these dysfunctional states on
the other, Saudi Arabia and the other traditional countries feel free to
pursue their own interests -- and those interests include living in peace,
developing their countries and preparing the day when their oil runs out.
That means working with those countries that are leading the way in
progress. And that means working with Israel.
That segment begins at 22:54 below automatically.
That is quite a change.
But this is not to say that the road to real peace is certain and secure.
It is not.
Dr. Kedar points out that during the 1990's, both Qatar and Tunisia had good
relations with Israel to the extent that Israel opened commercial offices in
those countries flying the Israeli flag. Those were not embassies, but they
were still official.
Both countries canceled their agreements with Israel following the outbreak of
the second intifada.
An agreement can be breached.
It remains to be seen whether the Abraham Accords will meet expectations.
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I saw this cartoon by the antisemitic Carlos Latuff published in August with the caption "#Israel is pounding #Gaza day after day. Are you seeing this on the mainstream media?"
Since it shows a Palestinian mother and her dead child, I wondered - when was the last Gaza fatality from Israeli action?
It was February 24th, when the IDF killed an Islamic Jihad terrorist who was setting roadside bombs outside the Gaza fence.
Not one Gazan has been killed since then by Israel. Plenty have died in "work accidents" but none from Israeli fire.
Nearly eight months without a fatality.
Now, that's something that the mainstream media is ignoring. Let alone the "pro-Palestinian" community that routinely claims that Gazans are being killed daily.
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A German intelligence report from July 10, 2020 revealed Iranian intelligence activities inside Germany, which were involved in spying against synagogues and other targets. The report referred to the Islamic Center in Hamburg which is considered “the most important center for Iran in Germany.” The center has established a national network of contacts within many mosques and Shiite societies and exercises of great influence over them. The report added that Iran "is trying to link the Shiites of different nationalities to itself, and to spread the basic social, political and religious values of the Iranian state in Europe."
The percentage of Muslims in Germany is about 4.7 million and Shiites represent about 7%, or over 300,000. An estimated thousand members of Hezbollah are in ermany.
The Islamic League (Islamische Gemeinschaft der Schiitischen Gemeinden Deutschlands, or IGS) represents the most prominent organization accused of being an expansionist arm of Iran in Germany.
The Islamic Center of Hamburg (IZH) is another prominent arm of the Iranian regime in Germany, according to a report reported by the Office for the Protection of the Constitution in August 2020, which referred to IZH as a tool of the mullahs working side by side with the Tehran embassy, and its officials are known as the Supreme Leader's envoys to Berlin. The center is suspected of involvement in financing and cooperating with Hezbollah.
Other apparent fronts for Iran are the Center for Islamic Culture Frankfurt, the Counseling Association of Berlin (Markaz-Al-Qaem Al-Irshad), and the Al Hassanein Center of Berlin (Markaz Al-Hassanein Berlin), associated with Hezbollah.
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The National Council of Resistance of Iran announced that they have proof that Iran was violating the terms of the JCPOA even before President Trump withdrew the US from that agreement.
In a press conference on Friday, the group announced that Iran's Organization of Defensive Innovation and Research (Sazman-e Pazhouheshhaye Novin-e Defa’i), known by its Persian acronym SPND, started building a secret nuclear site near Tehran in 2012 and started moving personnel into it in 2017.
The new site is built in an existing area already under control of the Defense Ministry where missiles are being built.
The NCRI also announced that a second site that they had revealed in June 2019 was destroyed by the IRGC shortly thereafter, and only after a year of sanitizing the site did they allow the IAEA to inspect it this past August.
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One of the main achievements of the Abraham Accords—which normalized diplomatic relations between Israel and the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain—is their very name. After losing hope of defeating Israel on the battlefield, Israel’s enemies focused on creating an anti-Israel narrative. Their ambition was to erase all of Zionism’s intellectual foundations—distort history, negate the legitimacy of the Bible and paint Israel as an evil state, certainly not as a state seeking to promote progress and good in the region.
One of the primary avenues of this narrative-based attack is “occupation”—a buzzword that the State of Israel has been most identified with by international organizations and media outlets across the globe. This nefarious term, “Israeli occupation,” implies all that Israel’s enemies wish to convey: that Israel is a colony of the “white man” in the heart of the Middle East, a European foothold, a foreign entity seizing Arab lands and violating the human rights of the natives, the original people of the land: Palestinian Arabs.
How does one fight this? How do we express the Jewish people’s deeply-rooted connection to this land, which is the backbone of the State of Israel, and undo the image of the heartless occupier? The answer to this question lies in this new treaty, and is predicated upon a single word: “Abraham.”
US Vice President Mike Pence visited Israel in January 2018 and spoke to the Knesset. In that speech, he elucidated the importance of Abraham: “Nearly 4,000 years ago, a man left his home in Ur of the Chaldeans to travel here, to Israel. He ruled no empire, he wore no crown, he commanded no armies, he performed no miracles, delivered no prophecies, yet to him was promised ‘descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky.’
“Today, Jews, Christians and Muslims—more than half the population of the Earth, and nearly all the people of the Middle East—claim Abraham as their forefather in faith,” he said.
It’s evident, then, that the phrase “Abraham Accords” denotes that the treaty was forged by the descendants of Abraham’s children—Arabs and Jews—and thus redefines Jewish presence in the region as ancient and therefore legitimate. This runs exactly counter to the “occupation” narrative. It also appears the UAE has adopted the figure of Abraham as a unifying element in the region. In Abu Dhabi, construction has already begun on a magnificent inter-faith complex named the Abrahamic Family House, which will consist of three main buildings—a mosque, church and synagogue—for the purpose of invoking peace and coexistence among the three Abrahamic faiths: Christianity, Islam and Judaism.
More Arab and Muslim countries are likely to make peace if US President Donald Trump is reelected, Secretary of the Treasury Steven Mnuchin said on a flight to Bahrain with a US-Israeli delegation on Sunday.
“We are very hopeful there will be other announcements,” he said. “Our expectation is, obviously, that President Trump wins and this continues… There is a lot more in the works.”
Asked if a Trump loss would stop the momentum of Arab states establishing ties with Israel, he said: “I surely hope not.”
The Abraham Accords between Israel, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain are “the most extraordinary outcome in the last 25 years,” Mnuchin said.
“I think 10 years from now when we look back at this, this will be as significant – if not more significant than both the Egyptian treaty and the Jordanian treaty [with Israel] – in how it has changed the whole region economically in particular, but also from a security standpoint and a cultural standpoint,” he said.
The opportunities for trade between Israel, the UAE and Bahrain are enormous, Mnuchin said.
A joint US-Israeli delegation arrived in Bahrain Sunday afternoon to sign a series of bilateral agreements between Jerusalem and Manama, including a so-called Joint Communiqué that will formally establish diplomatic relations between the two countries.
El Al Flight 973 — a nod to Bahrain’s country code — landed in Manama after taking off from Ben Gurion Airport in the first-ever nonstop passenger flight from Israel to the Gulf kingdom.
Bahraini Foreign Minister Abdullatif bin Rashid Al-Zayani welcomed the joint US-Israeli delegation at the airport.
During a ceremony held on the tarmac, Israel’s National Security Adviser Meir Ben-Shabbat said in Arabic that Israel “extends its hands for genuine peace with the Bahraini people.”
“Together we will change the reality in the region for the benefit of our nations. God willing, we will host you in Israel soon,” he said.
Switching to Hebrew, Ben-Shabbat noted that the Knesset approved the Israel-UAE peace treaty three days ago. He said the current delegation, like a previous one to the United Arab Emirates, flew nonstop from Tel Aviv, and added that he hoped the route would become a regular route in the near future. He thanked Bahrain’s King Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa for making peace.
“In a certain sense, this visit today closes a circle for Bahrain’s role in bringing peace,” Ben-Shabbat said, presumably referring to last year’s Peace to Prosperity conference in Manama.
Wafa and a whole bunch of other Arab sources report:
Settlers cut, today, Saturday, about 30 olive trees from Qaryut lands, south of Nablus.
The official in charge of the settlement file in the northern West Bank, Ghassan Douglas, told "Wafa" that settlers cut down about 30 olive trees in the town's lands, owned by Bilal Mahmoud Raja.
This is not an exaggeration. It is his job, and he has been quoted in major media outlets who cannot believe that he is a professional liar.
In this case, as in virtually all the articles he is quoted in, there is no photographic evidence of the crime he is accusing Jews of doing.
Every article I saw about this absurd accusation, that the religious Jews of communities near Nablus would chop down trees on Shabbat, shows "archival footage" rather than any actual photos of the destroyed trees.
Even though every adult nowadays is walking around with a high resolution camera in their pocket, there are no photos.
That's truly amazing!
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But the Palestinian Authority has been reducing the number of permits of sick Palestinians to go to Israeli hospitals in recent years.
In 2017, it drastically reduced the number of Gazans given permission to travel to Israel for medical treatment.
Earlier this year, in order to fulfil a promise by Mahmoud Abbas to end all coordination with Israel, the Palestinian Authority stopped all transfers of patients to Israel - resulting in some deaths. Israeli NGOs scrambled to try to allow the most sick patients to come to Israel for treatment, while Palestinian NGOs angrily said that they would not try to help save Palestinian lives - the principle of non-cooperation was far more important than mere human life.
Well, that only applies to expendable Palestinians. But not the VIPs.
Apparently, the PLO rules of Palestinian honor only extend to allowing normal Palestinians to die for the cause, but not highly placed PLO officials.
A government that actively works against the interests of its own people does not deserve to exist to begin with. But when it distinguishes between the masses of its people it doesn't care about and its own top officials, it shows that it doesn't even adhere to its own stated principles to justify treating its citizens like dirt.
Palestinians deserve better leaders than this.
We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.
On Friday, a jihadist in France beheaded a teacher, Samuel Paty, who showed his class the Mohammed cartoons that caused controversy (and murder) when published a few years back.
In Tunisia, a member of Parliament, Rached Khiari, wrote a post on Facebook seemingly agreeing with the murder.
He wrote, "Offending the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him, is the greatest crime, and whoever performs it bears the consequences whether they are a state, group or individual."
Immediately, Khiari attracted critics - and supporters.
The spokesperson for the Tunis court of first instance, Mohsen Dali, announced that the prosecutor has launched an investigation into the post, saying that the post is comparable to a terrorist act, in accordance with the Tunisian anti-terrorist law, since it constitutes a justification for terrorism.
On the other hand, other prominent people and media came to Khiari's defense. Islamist media said that the critics were all trying to make themselves look good to the French.
Professor and lawyer Hanan Al-Khumairi denounced the media campaign against Khiari and supported his statements, claiming that they did not glorify the killing.
Khiari doubled down in Facebook, writing that "I may give up immunity and parliament, but I will not give up on my condemnation of the crime of offending the Messenger of Allah Muhammad peace and blessings be upon him. Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah more important and greater than glory, parliament, politics and the whole world."
We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.
If Trump wins an historic level of support among American Jews, it will be a testament to the wisdom of an unprecedented percentage of American Jews. For American Jewry this year's presidential election is without question the most critical one ever.
Over the past four years, anti-Semitism has become an undeniable, and central characteristic of the Democrat Party to which the vast majority of American Jews have pledged their loyalty for the better part of the past hundred years while anti-Semitism in the Republican Party has dropped to historic lows.
Democrat anti-Semitism has seemingly appeared out of the blue but in truth, the party has been on a largely one-lane road to radicalization for the past fifty years. It's just that the path turned into a highway over the past four years with the rise of open anti-Semites like Rashida Tlaib, Linda Sarsour, Andre Carson, Keith Ellison and Ilhan Omert to commanding positions in the party.
Anti-Semitism runs through Democrat politics, policies and behavior across a spectrum of issues. In foreign policy, hating Israel has become the most passionate position of the progressive grassroots.
Biden announced early on that if elected, he will restore the US's commitment to the Iran nuclear deal he forged with Barack Obama. That means that a Biden administration will cancel the economic sanctions on Iran, ensuring the survival of the regime. It means a Biden administration will enable the cessation of the UN arms embargo enabling Iran to purchase whatever advanced weapons systems it wants. It also means a regime pledged to annihilate the largest Jewish community in the world – Israel – will have an open path to a nuclear arsenal.
Biden has agreed to restore the Palestinians to center stage. This isn't a pro-peace position. After all, the Abraham accords are the result of Trump marginalizing the Palestinians. The purpose of a Palestinian-centric policy is it is to delegitimize Israel, justify a US foreign policy that is hostile to Israel and domestic policy that is hostile to Israel's supporters in America.
Then there is anti-Semitism itself. The good news is that like Trump, Biden can be expected to take on white supremacists. The bad news is that in stark contrast to Trump, Biden can be expected to turn a blind eye to the growing anti-Semitism in his own political camp.
‘Cynical Theories – how universities made everything about race, gender, and identity and why this harms everybody.’
By Helen Pluckrose and James Lindsay
The word cynical, in the title of the book, is deliberate; the authors assert that many of the ideas informing the theories are pessimistic, rejecting objective truth and modernity. Radical skepticism about modernity is a defining feature. There is a sense of hopelessness and a preoccupation with the superficial. The authors deem these key features ‘reactionary’. (The theories are also often characterised by obscurity of language. *)
The authors suggest that universities , and academia, are sites in which the theories are mainly located, and are significant generators of activism and intolerance. Scholarship and rigorous research are tainted by the cynical theories, open debate is stifled. This has affected a wide range of studies including STEM subjects. And ‘what happens in universities doesn’t stay in the universities’.
The book comprises 10 chapters dealing with interrelated topics such as CRT and Intersectionality, Postcolonial theory, Feminism and Gender studies, and explores what I call the heavy stuff originating in the 1960s – Foucault, Lyotard, Derrida, etc – whilst later chapters consider ways in which the theories have shaped the debate in subjects such as Queer theory and Fat studies.
Of particular interest are two chapters on Social Justice scholarship, thought, and action. Whilst a concern for justice in society is necessary, social class – previously considered an important topic – is rarely considered by the theory. Instead it ‘seeks to apply deconstructive methods and postmodern principles to the task of creating social change’. Theory and activism are based on the assumption that racism and bigotry are everywhere, consequently there is a preoccupation with, and elevation of, victimhood. There is no room for criticism: disagreement is interpreted as a sign of intellectual and moral failure. There is ‘little time for universal principles and individual intellectual diversity’. (h/t L King)
New York’s scapegoated Haredi communities appear to be the last Americans capable of maintaining a sane balance between science and faith
Like, say, the idea of science. If you believe in it—truly, deeply, and unequivocally—you understand that science isn’t a faith-based system. It cares little for politics or virtues. It’s a blissfully agnostic methodology that makes guesses, compares them with available evidence, and amends, alters, or rejects them based on results. So, if you’re being true to science, say, here’s how you should be thinking about public gatherings: Are they unsafe? Then they’re as unsafe for the proponents of Black Lives just as they are for the Satmars. Are they safe under some conditions? Then let us be clear about precisely what these conditions are.
Take, for example, Gov. Cuomo’s decree that no more than 10 people are allowed in a house of worship at any given time. If you possess even a modicum of common sense, you realize that this idea is, at its core, profoundly anti-scientific, as it has nothing to say about the size of the house of worship in question. Ten people in a small one-room shtiebel is a real risk; 10 people in a grand synagogue built to seat thousands is a real farce. A governor serious about science and public safety rather than about seizing power would’ve understood that and acted accordingly, offering guidelines that were sensible and measured and concrete. The only ones pointing out this travesty are the Haredim.
It’s of little surprise, then, that the main flag on view during the Haredi protests last week was the Gadsden flag. Don’t Tread on Me, that quintessentially American cri de coeur, is, these days, primarily the domain of the Haredi community. Everywhere else in the Jewish world, the slogans recited are the confused and exhausted and meaningless truisms of nice liberals who can’t or don’t care to explain the staggering contradictions, violations, hypocrisies, and usurpations committed with their tacit support.
Flatten the curve, wear a mask, close the shuls—all were accepted without too much attention to detail or rationale and without asking what, in effect, we’re risking when we sign away so many of our freedoms to officials who seem to have nothing but the vaguest grasp on science and democracy alike. There’s nothing less Jewish, or less American, than that. The Haredim understand that by succumbing to the tyranny of illogic, the sort that restricts attendance regardless of the size of the venue or deems one form of gathering acceptable but not another, all will be lost. To surrender thusly would be a total disruption of their Jewish and American way of life. Their critics, sadly, prefer instead to worship at a very different altar, sanctifying their leftist bona fides and reverence to leaders from the correct political party rather than asking hard but obvious questions. What we see in Brooklyn these days, then, is nothing less than a religious war, in which the Haredim, in a delicious twist of fate, have actual science on their side. Here’s hoping they prevail.
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Tuesday, October 20, 2020
Elder of Ziyon
