Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Tuesday, December 29, 2020

Joseph Massad and "The Ugly Palestinian"

In 1958, a hugely popular novel named The Ugly American was published. It described how American foreign diplomats were tone deaf to the countries they were stationed in, with little interest in learning the local culture, and therefore they were regarded as obnoxious, pretentious blowhards.

Joseph Massad has just unwittingly published The Ugly Palestinian.

Writing in Middle East Eye, the Columbia professor complains that Arab regimes have always put their own interests above that of Palestinians:

In contrast with the Arab peoples who have ceaselessly shown solidarity with the Palestinians since Britain issued the Balfour Declaration in 1917, Arab regimes, as I have written in Middle East Eye before, have always put their own national interests first and had established ties and collaborated with Israel since 1948 - in the case of the Hashemite Amir Faisal since 1919.

...King Farouk of Egypt entered the war in 1948 not because he placed Palestinian interests ahead of Egypt’s, but as analysts have shown, on account of his rivalry with the Iraqi monarchy for hegemony over the post-colonial Arab world.

Not only did Nasser not launch a single war against Israel, but also all of Egypt’s subsequent wars were fought to defend Egypt, not the Palestinians. In 1956 and in 1967, Israel invaded Egypt and occupied Sinai.

...Rather than sacrifice their national interests to defend the Palestinians, the Arab regimes have used every opportunity to sell out Palestinian rights to advance their own interests without respite.

Massad's cluelessness equals that of the American diplomats of 1950s Southeast Asia ridiculed in The Ugly American.

Of course every responsible national leader is going to place their own national interests above those of anybody else. That is their primary responsibility!

But Palestinians like Massad have drunk the Kool-Aid of the Arab rhetoric where they have claimed for the past 72 years that they put the Palestinian issue above their own. As he notes, they never have - but Palestinians like Massad act as if they should.

This has resulted in a Palestinian leadership and populace that have been taught that they can rely on others to do the hard work to get them what they want, while they just sit back and wait in relative comfort compared to much of the Arab world. Arab leaders should fight wars for Palestinians, they should exert diplomatic pressure for Palestinians, they should boycott Israel for Palestinians, they should forego the benefits of peace with Israel for Palestinians.

Arabs never cared about Palestinians. They always used them as pawns to help destroy Israel. The cynicism was obvious to all, with Syrian and Lebanese leaders pretending that keeping Palestinians stateless was for their own good, to help pressure Israel for a "return" that will never happen.

Astute Palestinians would have noticed this. They would have realized decades ago that if they want a state, they would have to actually work for it, sweat for it, negotiate for it, compromise with Israel for it - not wait for their Arab brethren to do the work for them.

But Palestinian leaders and apologists like Massad just don't get it. They think that the ICC and the ICJ and the UN and the EU will save them just like they used to think that Arab leaders will go to war for them. Instead of building the institutions of statehood, they outsourced all the hard work to Europeans and NGOs. A glance at Palestinian government websites shows that many of them are empty shells, not updated in years, because they never sowed interest in governing themselves or building a government infrastructure.

The only time the world has seen Palestinians being proactive is with terror attacks.

Arab nations finally got fed up with the Hamas/Fatah split, and doubly so when the PA rejected peace plans in the 2000s and a peace framework from John Kerry during the Obama administration - the one president who was the most friendly to Palestinians and antipathetic to Israel. They threw even that away.

Meanwhile, Israel got stronger - not just militarily but economically. Boycotting a regional superpower made less and less sense for Arabs. Jordan and Egypt needed Israel's natural gas. The UAE and Bahrain want Israel's high tech expertise. The policy of following Palestinian demands of boycotting Israel has been increasingly self-defeating.

Massad is complaining that the Arabs are not prioritizing Palestinian interests above their own. Only someone who is spoiled and out of touch would even dare make such a demand. Worse, Massad is denigrating the huge amounts of monetary and diplomatic aid that Arab nations have given Palestinians over the past 50+ years.

Even Columbia professors can have the emotional intelligence of a child, thinking that the world revolves around them.

Massad is using the old playbook, trying to shame the Arab world into giving Palestinians unlimited, no-strings attached support. He has no idea that the world has changed.

Massad's diatribe will not impress any Arab leader. On the contrary, they will be pushed even further away from sympathizing with Palestinians.

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12/28 Links Pt2: "Intersectionality" includes Palestinian Arabs but not minorities persecuted by Arabs;

From Ian:

"Intersectionality" includes Palestinian Arabs but not minorities persecuted by Arabs

Intersectionality is a lie, as Daniel Greenfield shows, adding ithat "It’s not just a lie in its negative hateful aspects, but in its promise of a utopia once the 'white devils' and their 'white privilege' are out of the way."It ignores Black-Black racism in Africa. It ignores minorities persecuted by Arabs.

"The left claims that it’s fighting for equality. What it’s actually fighting for is a tribal society where the notion of equal rights for all is as alien as it is in Iraq, Rwanda and Afghanistan, where democracy means tribal bloc votes and where the despotism of majority rule invariably ends in terror and death."

Why does intersectionality include Palestinian Arabs but not minorities persecuted by Arabs like Yazidi in Iraq, the Copts in Egypt or the Bantus in Somalia? Why does it ignore Black-Black racism in Africa where dozens of different Black ethnic groups opress and persecute other minority Black ethnic groups? Discussed here are examples of discrimination and ethnic conflict in countries like Lybia, Sudan, Somalia, Nigeria, Rwanda, Ethiopia, Mauritania and Uganda.

In discussing slavery and state racism, our host Biram, president of the IRA (Initiative de Résurgence du mouvement Abolitionniste de France-Mauritanie), emphasised the ‘the ideological and religious foundations of slavery and racism with the state in Mauritania’....Biram returned to the central facts around slavery in Mauritania, notably the practice of guardianship – women and children are left to the cruelty of men and women, heartless masters with neither faith or reason.

"...'Where is the compassion of this community calling itself Muslim? What human values form their identity? What goes on in the heads of those men and women who exercise such cruelty, barbarism and cynicism? The inhumanity of these practices challenges our very confidence in what’s human when humanity is capable of undertaking such acts. An ideological, military and police machinery is consistently mobilised to this effect. There has never been any form of respite for the men, women and children assigned to the deadly status of slaves.'

"'Mauritanian society is deeply slavery-oriented and as such has produced deeply unjust inequalities. Certain techniques involving humiliation, torture and even being put to death are employed in the aim of keeping slaves dependent on their masters through fear, shame and submission.

"Biram explained this in strong terms; the master recognizes no right to a dignified life or free black existence as human beings. As a result, children and women remain without protection or security, being at the mercy of arbitrary, cruel and unbearable Moorish masters who defy contemporary humanity through the use of barbarous and wicked treatment and the denial of the most basic of rights. ... This system is rooted in an enduring ideological base, one which constitutes an untouchable and immutable dogma and which gives rise to a logic of extermination and annihilation of the moral and ethical character of black people.

"...Mauritania as a racist and slave state must be overcome for the purpose of building a fair, free and egalitarian Mauritanian society. This Mauritania will be one in which citizens have the rights of citizenship, rather than one in which black people are reduced to indignity under Moorish oppression..."

Black Lives Matter could make a difference in the lives of people of color if it tried to change the situation in the countries described above instead of rioting in the USA. It might do even more good if it told the Palestinian Arab advocates to fight Arab persecution of minorities and leave democratic Israel out of the equation..

Teacher with Mediterranean and Jewish heritage left bewildered as his trade union insists he's black Jason Wardill, who is a design technology teacher, was surprised to be invited by the National Education Union (NEU) to a meeting of black teachers last year.

A teacher has voiced his bewilderment after his Left-wing trade union insisted he was black.

Jason Wardill, who is a design technology teacher, was surprised to be invited by the National Education Union (NEU) to a meeting of black teachers last year.

Mr Wardill, 42, is of Mediterranean and Jewish heritage and has been trying to stop his union referring incorrectly to his ethnicity ever since – with no success.

He says he feels its actions are 'discriminatory' against other ethnicities and religions.

The NEU – which has been at the forefront of the campaign to keep schools closed during the pandemic – says it treats black as a political term rather than a signifier of African heritage.

Therefore the term includes 'all members who self-identify as black, Asian and any other minority ethnic groups who do not identify themselves as white'.

When Mr Wardill – who now works as an area site manager for an academy trust in Lincolnshire – contacted it to say he was not black, the NEU informed him that since he did not consider himself white, he had to be registered as such.

He told the Daily Mail: 'It made me feel pretty helpless. BAME would be absolutely fine, as it encompasses everything.'

The union has been accused of putting political battles before the interests of pupils, bragging that it had 'made the running in this crisis' when schools across the country were shut and children's education was in tatters.

Mr Wardill said when he registered to join the union and was asked for his ethnicity, he ticked 'mixed other' because it was 'the only option available for me'.

'Jewish was an option in the religion section only, which leads me to believe the NEU doesn't recognise Jewish as a race. They only appear to recognise it as a religion,' he commented.

Cartoon of the Day: Greedy Zionists

Continuing our series of recaptioning cartoons...

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As opposed to my last post of the best EoZ essays of 2020, here is a list of the most popular posts of the year that I wrote:

#12: 77-year old female Jewish professor in Pittsburgh sues after being falsely accused of sexual harassment(!) by BDSers

#11: A brief debunking of the “Blacks are the real Jews” theory

#10: Farrakhan’s hate speech, promoted by Diddy, watched hundreds of thousands of times

#9: Why Bari Weiss had to resign

#8: Rabbi apparently forced out as head of Graduate Theological Union after only four months - because he doesn’t hate Israel

#7: Roger Waters hates Jews and Judaism. Now we have proof.

#6: Black lives matter. But don’t support Black Lives Matter.

#5:The anti-Israel “human rights lawyer” who tried to firebomb an NYPD police car

#4: Brown U professor hates Israel so much she erases Jews from her photos of "Palestine" (UPDATE)

#3: New Biden deputy director, Reema Dodin, once justified Palestinian suicide bombings

#2: Amnesty Finland board member defends Hezbollah and Assad, says Israel is the real terrorist

#1: NBC and Fox host Nick Cannon is a racist, antisemitic nutcase

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12/28 Links Pt1: Understanding the lobby against Israel’s new relations in the Gulf; Moroccan delegation arrives in Israel; IDF: Our subs sail everywhere; Iran: Our response to any attack will be strong

From Ian:

'Abrahamic' instead of 'Judeo-Christian'

Upcoming elections in the Netherlands and Germany in 2021 will test the strength of the radical right, which has a distinct vision of European identity. In contrast to those who view democratic values as essentially secular and universal, and not tied to specific cultural or religious roots, radical right parties typically say these values are anchored by the heritage of European or western civilization. And they claim that this heritage is being threatened by non-European cultures, particularly Islamic culture.

My research into the international political world views of radical right parties reveals their widespread references to the "Judeo-Christian" roots of European values. The manifesto of the Alternative for Germany declares that the party:

"Opposes Islamic practice which is directed against our liberal-democratic constitutional order, our laws, and the Judeo-Christian and humanist foundations of our culture."

Comparable claims can be found from Marine Le Pen in France and Nigel Farage in the UK.

What do these politicians mean by Judeo-Christian? This term's definition is fuzzy at best, and historical analysis shows that it has long been used and abused for political ends.

Though the Jewish roots of Christianity are clear, Jews were pariahs in pre-modern Christian Europe. As Europe gradually left behind the identity of "Christendom" from the 18th century onwards, efforts to make Jews a legitimate part of European society were a political struggle, resisted by religious conservatives and anti-Semites. In 19th-century Europe, Jews were still commonly grouped with Muslims as non-European "Semites" or "Orientals."

It was in mid-20th century America, especially after the Holocaust, that the idea of the west as Judeo-Christian gained wide acceptance. When President Dwight Eisenhower referred to the Judeo-Christian roots of "our form of government," he chose words that embraced different Christian denominations and Jews within a shared civic identity – one which contrasted with anti-Semitic and godless ideologies of fascism and communism.

Seth Frantzman: Understanding the lobby against Israel’s new relations in the Gulf

THE CAMPAIGN against Israel’s relations with the Gulf uses several talking points. Initially, they claimed that the new relationship was somehow aiding “authoritarians.” This talking point was used by people who don’t condemn “authoritarians” in Doha, Tehran or Ankara. This illustrates how much charlatanism is behind the “authoritarians” talking point. Ankara’s regime is the largest jailer of journalists in the world and sentences opposition politicians to decades in prison on mythical “terror” charges. If there is an authoritarian axis in the Middle East it is the Tehran-Ankara axis and its allies.

Another argument against the Israel-Gulf ties is made by those who oppose Saudi Arabia. Of particular interest here is that most of those who make this argument are not people who historically cared that Saudi Arabia was an absolutist monarchy and conservative Kingdom. Their dislike of Riyadh is primarily anger at palace intrigue in which their allies in the Kingdom were pushed out when Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman rose to power.

The arguments against Saudi Arabia don’t stand up to scrutiny because they are ostensibly made by people on “human rights” grounds when those very same voices didn’t speak out about human rights as recently as five years ago. Thus, “human rights” and “authoritarianism” became methods of critique of the new Israel-Gulf ties by those who are silent about authoritarian human rights abuses throughout the region.

The critique of Israel-Gulf ties hangs on several interrelated issues. First, the anti-Israel agenda of the 1960s and 1970s has not gone away. The dispute between the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and the Brotherhood, backed by Turkey and Qatar, is another layer. The Gulf crisis between Saudi Arabia and Qatar in 2017 is part of the issue. In addition, the pro-Iran crowd opposes the peace deals. These voices have ample platforms, from pro-government media in Turkey to Qatar, which mostly serve as English-speaking or Arabic platforms to influence the region and the world.

The emptiness of this critique, which reveals its more complex agenda, hangs on the fact that in no other case in the world are “authoritarian” regimes critiqued for merely having diplomatic relations with other states. For instance, the same voices who have poured cold water on the new peace deals, don’t have an issue with the UAE or Israel having relations with Denmark or China. They just don’t think the UAE and Israel should have relations with each other because they are hostile to both the UAE and Israel and have had to find some reason to excuse that hostility to make it appear legitimate.

The campaign against the peace has had its effect, either by downplaying the importance of the new peace or by sniping at it from various angles. An unprecedented level of new engagement between Israel and the UAE, in particular, has not received the attention it deserves partly because of ingrained biases against both states. Understanding the reasons for this is important because it helps explain some of the challenges that these countries – and their allies – face in the region and globally.

Moroccan delegation arrives in Israel

A Moroccan diplomatic delegation was in Israel on Monday for the first time since normalization between the countries was announced earlier this month.

The delegation, which landed in Israel on Sunday night, plans to work towards reopening the Moroccan liaison office in Tel Aviv, which it has held onto for the past 20 years since Rabat cut official ties. Israel has also retained its closed office in Morocco.

During last week’s visit to Rabat by the Israeli-US delegation led by National Security Advisor Meir Ben-Shabbat and White House Special Adviser Jared Kushner, the countries committed to reopening the offices within two weeks, which would mean next week.

Morocco is also expected to prepare for a high-level delegation to come to Israel at a later, yet to be determined date.

The Moroccan diplomats have meetings scheduled at the Israeli Foreign Ministry, but they do not have any public events or statements on their agenda.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu invited Morocco's King Mohammed VI to visit Israel, in a phone conversation over the weekend.

Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra records Moroccan national anthem

Immediately following the announcement of the Israel-Morocco normalization agreement, the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra (JSO) recorded the National Anthem of Morocco in honor of the historic agreement.

Arranged for the symphony orchestra and choir by Israeli composer and conductor Nizar El-Khater, the rendition of the anthem was performed at the Jerusalem Theater.

The Jerusalem Symphony and the Israeli Kehilot Sharot choir were joined via teleconference by Moroccan singers, a truly unique experience in honor of the normalization deal between the two countries.

3 VOIX De L’espoir (Three Voices of Hope), a Moroccan musical collective helped produce the event.

Today's antisemitism in Arabic media

Algerian site Ech-Chaab has an article on how Jews and Zionists are infiltrating the Arab mind.

Long years ago, the great Egyptian thinker Abd al-Wahhab al-Masiri wrote his encyclopedia on Jews, Judaism and Zionism, and in a section of it he warned against Arab Judaism, saying: “From now on we will find Jews dressed as Muslims, who prays with us in the mosque, but he plays the same role that he a Jewish general is doing it, and accordingly, this phenomenon must be analyzed so that many of us do not turn into Jews without even knowing it. ”
In 1977, Dr. Esmat Saif al-Dawla spoke about "Zionism in the Arab mind," and said, "Zionism and its allies, after they were defeated militarily on the battlefront in October 1973, opened holes in our foreheads and invaded our minds."

Saudi site Al Marsd has an article that praises a Jew, and an angry response. Saud Al-Fawzan describes how he rented an apartment from a Jew when he was in college, and it burned down. The Jew first told him that he was happy he was safe; he then invited him in for coffee and fixed the apartment in ten days while putting him up in a five-star hotel.

In response, Ali Al-Zamil is angry at the story: "What do these people want from the cause of glorifying the morals and exploits of the Jewish man !? ...Why not look at his intentions and what is behind his actions .. What is the point of that! ? It is naive, or even stupid, if these people think that someone will believe that good qualities and good morals are confined only to the Jewish people."

Manadrama has an article on why in Islam, Jews are compared to donkeys: because they are as stupid as donkeys. One must not compare Jews to camels, which are noble creatures.

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The latest poll from the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research shows a large majority of Palestinians want Mahmoud Abbas to go - and be replaced by someone even more extreme.

66% of Palestinians want Abbas to resign as president of the PA while only 30% want him to remain in office.

But when it comes to who they want to replace him, the choices are pretty much all terrorists.

People who support Fatah would like to see Marwan Barghouti as their candidate, and if he would run he would handily beat any Hamas candidate. Even if Barghouti would create a new political party, he would get more votes than Fatah would under Abbas.

Barghouti is in an Israeli prison for murder and terrorism charges.

If there was an election between Abbas and Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, Haniyeh would win 50%-43%. But if Barghouti would run against Haniyeh, Barghouti would handily win, 61%-37%.

Interestingly, Mohammad Dahlan, who Abbas considers his major Fatah rival, has little support within the territories, and only 7% would like to see him replacing Abbas. Current PA prime minister Mohammad Shtayyeh would do much better, and an election between him and Haniyeh is a deadlock.

The split between Gaza and the West Bank continues, with Hamas supported by the majority in Gaza and Fatah preferred in the West Bank, although not overwhelmingly.

The poll also showed that 48% of Palestinians would like to see a return to an "armed intifada," meaning terrorism. Similarly, a plurality of Palestinians think the most effective means of ending the Israeli "occupation" is terror, 39% choosing "armed struggle" over 35% who chose negotiations.

The Palestinian affinity for terrorism and terrorist leaders is something that the Western media tries very hard not to report. But it is there in the surveys, consistently, month after month.

This poll was done in conjunction with German NGO Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung.

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Modern "progressive" antisemites now blaming Israel for high Palestinian diabetes rates

The Lajee Center, an NGO centered in the Aida UNRWA camp, wrote in their December newsletter:

On November 19, 1for3 and Lajee Center presented a webinar on Managing Chronic Disease in Conflict settings, featuring Health for Palestine Director Dr. Bram Wispelwey, Community Health Worker (CHW) Ashghan Awais, Asmaa Rimawi, an advanced medical student and Health for Palestine researcher, and 1for3 Director Nidal Al-Azraq. They presented data from a two-year study that revealed significant improvement in diabetes due to the Community Health Worker program. Palestinians in Aida and Azza Refugee Camps suffer high levels of diabetes and hypertension. Dr. Wispelwey put Palestinians’ declines in health in the context of settler colonialism, presenting on the violence of military occupation and comparing Palestinians’ health to that of Indigenous and Black people harmed by settler colonialism in the United States. Moreover, the Middle East and North Africa region currently has the highest rates of diabetes in the world. While the older generation of Palestinians has lower rates than the rest of the region, middle aged Palestinians have higher rates. Rates for diabetes in the West Bank are twice the global rate and more than twice the rate in Israel.

The video of the seminar shows Dr. Wispelway spending some 16 of his 18 minutes talking about his theories that Israel is responsible for Palestinians having high rates of diabetes, blaming everything from the "Naqba" to "settler colonialism" to tear gas to the Oslo Accords.

What he didn't spend much time on was the fact that the entire Arab world has high rates of diabetes.

Here's a map showing its prevalence in 2019:

The prevalence in the Palestinian territories are roughly what they are in Egypt, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and the UAE. It is a huge problem for the entire region.

Are those countries suffering from "settler colonialism?" Did they have a "naqba?"

Dr. Wispelsky went to Bar Ilan University of the Negev. But whether he is Jewish or not, his section of the seminar was effectively antisemitic, blaming Israel for Palestinian obesity and lack of exercise that lead to diabetes, a problem that is endemic in the entire region and has nothing to do with Israel.

Palestinians grow plenty of fruits and vegetables for domestic consumption; blaming Israel for them eating junk food is yet another example of how the "progressive" Left infantilizes Palestinians and gives them no agency over their own decisions.

The irony is that the seminar showed that a relatively simple and inexpensive community based health program can significantly reduce the prevalence of, and risk of mortality from, diabetes - which destroys the thesis that Israeli actions are responsible to begin with.

But the main takeaway from those who watched the seminar is that Israel is responsible for Palestinians' doing basic things for their own health.

Yes, blaming Israel for Palestinians' own poor health decisions is antisemitic.

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Cartoon of the Day: Little David gets in trouble at school

Continuing our series of recaptioning cartoons...

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Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah claims that he knows about an assassination plot against him.

In a video interview with Al Mayadeen, Nasrallah asserted that "Saudi Arabia has instigated my assassination for a long time and at the very least since the war on Yemen."

He went on, , "Our data is that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman raised the issue of my assassination during his visit to Washington," adding that the Americans "agreed to a Saudi request to assassinate me, that Israel would implement it."

Hey, you can't argue with data! Although I'm not sure why now would be a better time to knock him off than any time over the past 30 years.

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12/27 Links: Moroccan-Israeli peace faces multiple security challenges; Israel, No more Arab-Israeli peace deals if Biden mollifies Iran; UAE collaborating to eliminate UNRWA

From Ian:

Dore Gold: Moroccan-Israeli peace faces multiple security challenges

For much of the modern era, the Arab world has sought ways to provide legitimacy to its political leadership. That led it down the road of highly ideological politics based on promoting unity schemes even with the use of force, experimenting with Arab socialist doctrines, and maintaining at all costs the Arab-Israel conflict.

A few brave leaders were prepared to break with this paradigm and reached peace with Israel, such as president Sadat of Egypt and King Hussein of Jordan. Most recently, King Hamad of Bahrain and Sheikh Zayed of the UAE have joined. Peace with Israel was not a risk-free strategy, and some of these leaders’ enemies were prepared to threaten them with assassination attempts and increased political turmoil. But they persisted nonetheless in the path of peace.

Now King Mohammed VI has bravely moved the Kingdom of Morocco into the circle of states making formal peace with Israel. It is a move that is not without risks for the Moroccans.

The security challenges that they face primarily emanate from the area of the former Spanish colony of the Western Sahara, where an insurgency campaign is being waged by guerrillas from the Polisario Front against the Moroccan security forces, with the support of Algeria. Morocco had valid claims to this disputed territory; many tribes in the area had been historically linked to the Moroccan monarchy.

The stakes in this conflict were considerable. The Polisario, which is also backed by the Iranian regime, seeks to undermine the territorial integrity of Morocco itself.

In 2018, Morocco presented documents to the Iranian government proving that Tehran was now arming and training the Polisario with the help of Hezbollah. The weapons supplied included shoulder-fired anti-aircraft missiles like the SAM-9 and SAM-11. As a result, Morocco cut its diplomatic ties with Iran. It turned out that the Iranians were using their embassy in Algiers as a conduit to the Polisario.

This was part of a pattern that the Iranians were following in Africa, seeking to infiltrate the continent by backing military moves of allies they sought to cultivate.

Brian Hook: No more Arab-Israeli peace deals if Biden mollifies Iran

US President-elect Joe Biden will not be able to pursue Israeli-Arab normalization deals if he softens America’s stance against Tehran, former US special representative for Iran Brian Hook told i24 News.

“If the Biden administration pursue a policy of accommodating Iran and alienating our partners in the region, there will be no more peace agreements that are made,” Hook said.

He spoke less than a week after Israel announced a normalization deal with Morocco, the fourth under the US brokered Abraham Accords. The focus of those deals has been Israeli-Arab peace and expanded regional economic opportunity.

But the deals have also been viewed as the backbone of a new and very public regional alliance between Israel and its Arab neighbors against Iran.

The United Arab Emirates was able to secure an agreement with the US to purchase advanced F-35 fighter jets, concurrent with its peace deal with Israel that was ratified in October. A normalization deal with Bahrain was ratified in November and a deal with Sudan has been agreed on but not ratified.

Israel, UAE collaborating to eliminate UNRWA - report

Israel and the United Arab Emirates are working together to eliminate the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA) without solving the issue of Palestinian refugees, the French newspaper Le Monde has reported.

The report alleged that this has been underway since Israel and the UAE announced normalization between them in August.

According to the report, Emirati officials are considering an action plan intended to gradually eliminate UNRWA, without making this development conditional on a resolution of the refugee problem. This is despite the UAE having been a major source of funding to UNRWA in 2018 and 2019, along with Qatar and Saudi Arabia, to offset US President Donald Trump's halting of funds to the agency, which brought it to the brink of bankruptcy.

"In doing so, Abu Dhabi would be rallying to a long-standing demand from Israel, which insists that the agency is obstructing peace by nurturing refugees in the dream of returning to the lands from which their parents were driven in 1948," a tweet of a portion of the report said.

UNRWA was established 70 years ago to supply aid to Palestinian refugees, and its mandate is renewed every three years.

Last year in November, the UN General Assembly approved the extension of UNRWA’s mandate for three more years, only a week after its commissioner-general Pierre Krahenbuhl resigned over a UN ethics report alleged mismanagement and abuses of authority among senior officials of the agency, after which Israel called for UNRWA’s closure.

There was a dance party over the weekend at the Shrine of Nabi Musa (Prophet Moses) in the West Bank. Muslims believe it is where Moses is buried.

This caused great anger among many Muslims who felt this was a desecration of the site, which was built during the Mamluk period.

Reports claim that the Palestinian Authority gave permission for the party, while the mosque was closed for COVID-19. I'm not sure how tru this is.

Videos showed a group of young men and women dancing and cheering to electronic dance music before a group of Muslim youths attacked them, ended their party and expelled them from the site..

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Nadia Fatah Alawi, Morocco's tourism minister, is the most senior woman in the Moroccan government. She told Yediot Aharonot, "I have heard that all Israelis travel to Dubai since you signed a peace agreement with the United Arab Emirates. Honestly, I am not surprised at all. But there is no doubt that there is a challenge here for me - to put Morocco at the top of the list of destinations Israeli tourists desire, and I accept the challenge."

According to Alawi, even before the normalization agreement between Israel and Morocco, 50,000 Israelis visited Morocco every year. "Most of them came to visit relatives who live here, to visit their ancestors' cemeteries and tombs of the righteous. Now, with an official agreement and direct flights, our ambition is very great - I want and believe we will reach 200,000 Israelis every year."

And she doesn't want to limit it to Israelis whose ancestors lived in Morocco. "I also include Israelis of non-Moroccan descent. Those who do not know our country are going to fall in love with it. I want to offer Israelis several vacations instead of one vacation. When you visit Morocco, you have the opportunity to experience a number of very different styles of tourism. Beyond Jewish cultural and historical cities, I want to offer magical beaches, extensive ecotourism with huge and beautiful deserts, golf clubs, nightlife. We want to make you visit here again and again - not just once."

Until now, Israelis could travel to Morocco in organized groups, through a flight connection in another country. Soon, there will be direct flights, albeit with a small detour to avoid flying over Algerian and Tunisian airspace. Both those nations have bragged that they did not allow the maiden El Al Flight to Morocco to fly over their lands.

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I don't know how to objectively rate my own posts, but one of my readers, Malgorzata Koraszewska, translates some of my essays for Polish site Listy Z Naszego Sadu.

If someone spends the time translating entire articles, that seems to be a good indication that they are notable.

Martin Luther King and Edward Said: Palestinian intellectuals never gave a damn about human rights

Forget "peace." Start optimizing the status quo. That is what Israel and the Palestinians have chosen, anyway.

The @Amnesty employee who insisted Hamas arrest Gazans for videoconferencing with Israelis

Israel-haters who pretend to care about Gaza hurt tens of millions of Arabs

Why is the @ICRC glorifying the matriarch of a terrorist family?

There has been a nakba for 72 years. But it isn’t what Palestinians say it is.

The EU's hypocritical use of "international law" that only applies to Israel

New York Review of Books parrots “Deadly Exchange” lies

Jordan’s absurd denial that they annexed the West Bank

Pro-Israel Democrats and their fundamental misunderstanding of the 20 years since Oslo

How would Palestinians act under Peter Beinart’s “one-state” solution?

EU says it rejects unilateral moves in Area C - while funding unilateral moves in Area C

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These are not by any means my most popular posts of the year. But they generally track to the ones I'm most proud of.

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.

The supposedly racist Israeli authorities will be giving Palestinian prisoners the coronavirus vaccine before most Israeli citizens get inoculated.

The head of the Palestinian Prisoners and Executives Affairs Authority, Major General Qadri Abu Bakr, announced Saturday that the Israel Prison Service has informed the prisoners that they will be vaccinated against COVID-19 during the next few days.

The vaccinations, which will use the Pfizer vaccine, will be voluntary.

This is of course not good enough for the Palestinians. The Palestinian prisoners Authority is demanding that the vaccinations be held under the supervision of international doctors.

This all of course doesn't jibe with the many news stories that came out last week that claimed that Israel was withholding vaccines from Palestinians. If Israel was racist, the prisoners would be the last ones to get the vaccine, if at all.

But when it comes to Israel, truth is apparently optional.

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.