Friday, September 30, 2022
- Friday, September 30, 2022
- Elder of Ziyon
- Friday, September 30, 2022
- Elder of Ziyon
- 1941, antisemitism, blame Jews, conspiracy theories, Electronic Intifada, IfNotNow, Jews have always been Zionist, justifying antisemitism, Wisconsin Jewish Chronicle
- Friday, September 30, 2022
- Elder of Ziyon
- Marvel Universe, Sabra, spoof, Tariq Raouf, The Scarlet Scarab
Thursday, September 29, 2022
Combatting anti-Semitism must include emancipating Zionism
Knowing the real-world harm that excludes Zionists from equal access and participation—in university book clubs, in support groups for victims of sexual harassment, in class, etc.—is an unacceptable reality. The mutation of anti-Semitism enabled by the appropriation and weaponization of foundational principles to demonize, delegitimize and apply double standards to Israel (the “three D’s”) finds multi-dimensional, escalating expressions. In a blurred-boundary reality, they manifest on digital platforms and on the streets, peddling and echoing modern renditions of ancient toxic anti-Semitic tropes as defined in the IHRA definition that includes, as it must, the three D’s, if it is to fulfil it role to comprehensively identify and combat anti-Semitism.The tragedy of Jews who can’t stand with Israel
The “trigger” for the creation of the IHRA definition, a non-legally binding resource, was the 2001 Durban Conference “Against” Racism, the pretext for what became an anti-Semitic hate fest, a milestone in the systematic appropriation of human rights to advance and conflate Israel with apartheid South Africa. A mutation of the 1975 “Zionism is racism” U.N. resolution, revoked decades later, it is part of the recognition that where conventional warfare failed, a war for hearts and minds, implementing a systematic strategy, can gain traction. Appropriating Zionism, a 140-year-old progressive national liberation movement built on a millennia-old identity integral to the character, heritage and ancestry of Jews worldwide, most of whom identify as Zionists, has rendered their identity synonymous with the gravest of human crimes, enabling to “legitimately” include it in the list of “isms,” excluding and denying Zionists from equal access, rights or participation in digital and real spaces.
In order to ensure equal access to opportunity, safety and protection from harm for all, including those who identify as Zionist and regard it as an integral part of their identities, it must be added to existing, detailed lists of “protected characteristics” in the social media platforms’ hate policies. Transparency of the policies and their application is critical, as transparency is an antidote to growing distrust that threatens the fabric of societies, ensuring safety and protection from harm is extended to all, equally and consistently. Selective application or any appearance of double standards not only fails to protect one category, but undermines the entire infrastructure created to protect all categories.
The case study of the toxic mutation of anti-Semitism enabled by systematic appropriation, weaponization and selective application of foundational principles, institutions and mechanisms of international law and human rights, expose and shed light on processes that undermine and collapse the foundations of democracies. It can serve to enhance vital understanding of the processes that enable and empower terror regimes and organizations committed to the destruction of democracies that identify and utilize their strengths as weaknesses. In a digital reality, the IHRA working definition of anti-Semitism is a critical resource, informing and enabling to identify and combat its current, mutated form, and empowering to predict, prepare and prevent real world violence and harm. As a first critical step needed to address rising real-world harm and compromised safety of Jews, for most of whom Zionism is an integral part of their identity, as well as non-Jews who identify as Zionists—it is imperative to add “Zionist” to the list of protected characteristics in existing hate speech policies, affording Zionists the very same treatment as any and every other protected characteristic.
I thought back to the Cold War and it occurred to me that people under 40 probably don’t remember the Berlin Wall. While the Wall stood, there were fools, many teaching in universities—and some still doing so—who lauded the virtues of communism. The communism that was so wonderful a wall had to be built to keep people from escaping it. It was hard to find anyone tunneling under the wall to get into East Germany.A White House summit tackles right-wing extremism with talk of security, hugs — and Christian forgiveness
I realized that this is analogous to Israel. For all its faults, there is no mass exodus from the Jewish state. On the contrary, people are clamoring to get in. If you believe the student rabbis, the U.N. Human Rights Council and other detractors, Israel is the worst country in the world. Yet thousands of Ukrainians fleeing war and Russian domination are seeking Israeli citizenship. If Israel is exactly like Afrikaner South Africa, please tell me why so many people are flocking to live under such a system.
Ah yes, the detractors say, but it’s only the privileged white Jews who feel that way. This ignores the hundreds of thousands of non-white Jews who came to Israel fleeing persecution in Muslim countries. Having experienced life in those societies, these Jews reject American liberal suggestions that they should be happy to live under the rule of Palestinian Muslims. They do not dismiss the threat posed by a nuclear Iran and Islamist terrorism in general.
But, of course, those who can’t stand with Israel claim that it’s Palestinians who are treated like black South Africans. But they’re not.
When Israel built its security fence, it was meant to keep terrorists out, not keep its people in—unlike the Berlin Wall. And in which direction did Palestinians choose to go? Did they want to be on the side controlled by the Palestinian Authority? No. Most of them wanted to be on the Israeli side of the barrier.
A declining number of Israeli Arabs support a two-state solution, and few would move to a Palestinian state if it were established. Whenever peace negotiators have suggested incorporating the “Arab triangle” in the Galilee—where most Israeli Arabs live—into “Palestine,” the residents have ferociously objected. Polls have found that most Israeli Arabs are proud to be Israelis. When asked how they identify themselves, only 7% said “Palestinian,” a majority said “Arab-Israeli” and an even larger percentage said they feel like a “real Israeli.” According to a Palestinian poll, 93% of Palestinian Arabs in Jerusalem prefer to remain under Israeli rule.
Can you imagine blacks in Afrikaner South Africa expressing such views?
What does all this say about Jews who can’t stand with Israel? Who have less regard for the Jewish state than Palestinians and Israeli Arabs?
I stand with Israel. You should too.
Katz said she was unsettled by a session called “Healing the Soul of the Nation.” It featured a number of survivors of racist and homophobic attacks who forgave their attackers. It was especially jarring before the Days of Awe between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, whose major theme is personal and communal accountability, not learning to forgive others.
“There was definitely a theme that forgiveness is good, and that the act of forgiving can help someone move through their journey. And I think people who have experienced trauma don’t owe their perpetrator anything,” Katz said in an interview during a break.
“We’re not obligated to forgive people who cause us harm,” she said. “It’s on the person who causes harm, to do the work and to be accountable.”
At least four of the six people speaking in the session on “healing” dwelled on forgiving their attackers and even advocating for them once they were captured.
“We have to do a better job of listening to pain and that includes the pain of those who are exhibiting or even perpetuating hate and violence,” said the moderator, Lisa Ling.
Joseph Borgen, the only Jewish participant on the panel, subverted the narrative of unsolicited forgiveness. Borgen, who wears a kippah and was beaten by pro-Palestinian activists in New York during the May 2021 Israel-Gaza conflict, said accountability was paramount.
One of his assailants, Borgen told the room, “was released the next day on minimum bail when he said he would do it again to another individual just like me, and it’s just unfathomable for me that someone in this situation can just be let out.”
Borgen’s presence was significant for another reason: He was one of the few victims who was not targeted by the extreme right. The session in which he appeared immediately followed two sessions focused on the extreme right, including one featuring Bill Braniff, the director of the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism. Braniff, a University of Maryland professor, said the focus should properly be on the far right because that was where the overwhelming number of attacks originated.
Ling introduced every speaker except for Borgen with details of why the person was attacked. Turning to Borgen, she said, “Joseph, you are also a survivor of an antisemitic hate attack that happened just last year in New York,” without elaborating that his attackers were pro-Palestinian protesters, as CNN itself has reported. She asked Borgen to explain how his attack made him more sensitive to attacks on Asians.
- Thursday, September 29, 2022
- Elder of Ziyon
- 2014, analysis, Daled Amos, hamas, Ismail Haniyeh, Operation Protective Edge, Russia, Sword of Jerusalem, Vladimir Putin, wrong side of history
By Daled Amos
Just two weeks ago, I wrote about the bond between Russia and Israel, the result of their shared experiences with terrorist attacks against their civilians and because of the large number of Russians living in Israel.
Now it turns out that on September 10, a delegation of Hamas terrorist leaders -- led by leader Ismail Haniyeh -- visited Moscow at the invitation of the Russian government. As a matter of policy, Russia does not see Hamas as a terrorist organization and hosted it back in 2020 and Grigory Karasin, chair of the Federation Council's Foreign Affairs Committee, has described Haniyeh as "one of the most moderate and prudent leaders of Hamas."
In 2017, the Russian ambassador to Israel -- Alexander Shein -- explained in an interview why Russia does not recognize either Hezbollah or Hamas to be terrorist organizations:
We do not consider these organizations to be terrorist. True, they are radical organizations, which sometimes adhere to extremist political views...Russian law - the Supreme Court, following an appeal by the prosecution - defines terrorist organizations as such when they intentionally conduct acts of terror in Russian territory, or against Russian interests abroad - installations, embassies, offices, or citizens. [emphasis added]
Apparently, it escaped Shein's notice that the large number of Russians with dual citizenship living in Israel would qualify as "Russian interests" according to his own definition.
Israel and Russia restored full relations between the 2 countries in 1991, 24 years after Russia broke off relations following the Six Day War. During that time, the US displaced the then-Soviet Union as the major power broker in the region. Since the renewal of relations, Russia has not been silent when Israel was targeted by Hamas.
In 2014, Russia came out in support of Operation Protective Edge, Israel's response to Hamas targeting Israeli civilians with its rockets:
“I am closely tracking what is happening in Israel,” Russian President Vladimir Putin remarked in a meeting on Wednesday with a delegation of Chief Rabbis and representatives of the Rabbinical Center of Europe.
...“I support Israel’s battle that is intended to keep its citizens protected,” he [Putin] said about the Israel Defense Forces’ operation to restore quiet to the region and stop Hamas terrorism.
“I also heard about the shocking murder of the three teenagers,” Putin added about the kidnapping and murder of Naftali Fraenkel, Eyal Yifrach and Gilad Shaar, three Yeshiva students in Israel. “This is an unconscionable act and I ask that you bring my condolences to the families.”
Despite the condemnation, Russia has not dumped Hamas as a "friend," instead keeping all ties open, much in the same way that China maintains relations simultaneously with both Israel and Iran.
But what is the point of Russia's personally inviting the Hamas leaders for a visit?
JNS hosted a discussion of the possible reasons for the invitation.
One suggestion was that this was Putin's way of dispelling the current image of Russia as an isolated pariah:
Russian President Vladimir Putin has no one who wants to play with him. So he’s happy to invite anyone. And, not surprisingly, it’s going be someone with whom no one wants to play either.
But that can hardly be the whole answer, since hosting Hamas is hardly a way for a leader to establish his legitimacy and demonstrate that he is in demand.
Another, possibly additional, motivation for the invitation could be a rebuke of Israel. Back in May, Hamas was invited to Russia, shortly after then-Foreign Minister Lapid accused Russia of war crimes in Ukraine. But if so, it was not clear what Israel did this time to provoke the invitation this time around.
A third possibility, suggested by Jonathan Schanzer of Federation for Defense of Democracies, is that the invitation is part of a growing alliance that Russia is building:
It appears that Putin is building an axis of like-minded governments and entities, Schanzer said. “It really does look like he is working to create a new revisionist axis that already includes the Iranians, includes China potentially, and includes North Korea.”
“The question is whether this is an effort to legitimize and recruit Hamas to be part of that broader coalition. Or is this for show, or something else entirely?”
For its part, Hamas thinks there is a shift taking place among the world powers, and it wants to get in on the ground floor. At a conference this past June in Gaza entitled Palestinian Sovereignty, the Strategic Variables and Future Paths, Haniyeh spoke about 4 variables towards a new strategic vision:
o The "success" of the Sword of Jerusalem campaign during the fighting of May of last year
o America's withdrawal from the area, a sign of its declining power and influence
o The Russia-Ukraine war, which supposedly is actually between Russia and the West
o The Abraham Accords, specifically the military and security alliances with Arab countries
The key variable, according to Haniyeh, is the 3rd one -- the war in the Ukraine:
"This is the broadest and most significant war in the struggle between the world's camps since the end of WWII." Stressing that "after this war the world will no longer be the same," he added: "It will undoubtedly become a multipolar world, and the currently prevailing unipolar era in international and global policy will end. This will certainly be a very important change, and it will impact both our Arab and Islamic region and our [Palestinian] cause and our struggle with the occupation."
Haniyeh is very keen on this up-and-coming multipolar world:
"Haniyeh stated that the Zionist narrative is no longer current, that Israel's status is not what it once was, and that there are important variables to be based on, including openness to large and influential countries such as China and Russia as well as Islamic Iran and all the countries that are confronting the Israel-U.S. policy in the region... [emphasis added]
Haniyeh's speech seems to dovetail nicely with the suggestion that this new multipolar world is something that Russia itself may be pursuing.
But if Haniyeh was expecting a confirmation of his goals against Israel during his visit to Russia, he was disappointed. The statements issued separately by the Russians and Hamas were very different.
Russia's statement emphasized the need to settle the conflict on the basis of a generally recognized legal framework, but Hamas emphasized that all negotiations with Israel have failed and that "resistance" was the only realistic option remaining:
According to the official statement of the Russian foreign ministry, the talks between the ministry officials and the Hamas delegation focused on "the developments in the Middle East, with emphasis on Palestinian affairs. The Russian side stressed the importance of quickly restoring the Palestinian national unity on the basis of the PLO's political program, as well as the need to settle the Palestinian-Israeli conflict on the basis of generally-recognized legal framework, which is rooted in the relevant resolutions of the UN Security Council and General Assembly and the Arab peace initiative."
...The Hamas statement, on the other hand, emphasized that the delegation had informed the Russian officials of "the Israeli violations" against the Palestinian people and had stressed the Palestinians' right to "resist the occupation by every possible means, until liberation and return [are achieved]."...The statement said further that Hamas "is working to strengthen its ties with its Islamic and Arab surroundings and with influential international elements that support our people," and added: "The hegemonial status of the U.S. in the world order has harmed the Palestinian cause, and we believe that the shift to a multipolar world order based on just principles will benefit our people and our cause."
Publicly, at least, there seemed to be very little to indicate that Russia considered Hamas to be an asset -- let alone a valued ally. Hamas may very well see the value of a "multipolar world," but that does not mean it will get to sit at the same table with these other countries.
But if that means that this whole exercise of hosting Hamas was intended as a rebuke and warning to Israel, it doesn't appear to have had the desired effect.
Just this week, Israel had its own rebuke for Russia in response to its attempt to annex parts of Ukraine
Israel's Foreign Ministry stated on Tuesday that Israel "recognizes the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine," as Russia holds its fifth and last day of referendums as a prelude to it annexing four Ukrainian regions.
Israel "Will not accept the results of the referendum in the Eastern districts of Ukraine," the Israeli statement said, in a rare rebuke of Moscow.
Considering the sensitive agreement between Israel and Russia regarding Israeli flights into Syria in response to Iranian threats, the statement was somewhat unexpected -- especially since it preceded any official statement by Russia and the statement itself was apparently not the result of US pressure.
Israel seems to see Russia hosting Hamas as a rebuke -- nothing more.
As for Haniyeh, he may be jumping the gun when he compares the Russia-Ukraine war favorably to WWII as an opportunity for Hamas to reap the benefits of a new world order. He seems to have forgotten about the other world war, WWI.
That was when the Ottoman Empire also saw a new world order in the making -- and joined against the allied powers.
Buy the EoZ book, PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism today at Amazon! Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424. Read all about it here! |
|
- Thursday, September 29, 2022
- Elder of Ziyon
- humor, Preoccupied
Our weekly column from the humor site PreOccupied Territory.
Check out their Facebook page.
New York, September 29 - A business owner with a bias against employing Haredim also accuses Haredim of living off welfare at the expense of the taxpayer instead of getting jobs, associates of the entrepreneur reported today.
Joseph Corell, 40, of Brooklyn's Midwood neighborhood, has on more than one occasion refused to hire any Jew who adheres to the dress code of the "ultra-orthodox" community, sources indicate, while blaming the same group for miring the next generation in poverty by not working or pursuing education outside traditional Jewish content.
"Parasites," Corell was heard to mutter after rereading a New York Times article on the alleged academic underperformance of certain Hasidic schools. Corell has turned down six Hasidic and "yeshivish" orthodox jobseekers at his air conditioning repair business in the last four years, despite the advertised position requiting no prior training, education, or professional experience, instead waiting until other candidates applied.
The phenomenon recurred this week, a subordinate reported, when the boss faked his absence from the office after a yeshiva alumnus entered to apply for an assistant technician position. Ten minutes after the Haredi Jew departed, Corell reemerged from the kitchenette where he had been hiding and greeted another applicant with no high school diploma or equivalency exam, whom he hired immediately.
"I don't care if you don't have a degree," he stated. "At least you're not a lazy good-for-nothing welfare queen who wants the state to pay for your kids' religious indoctrination. Why won't those people just get a job?"
Subordinates note that in each case of refusing to hire the religious Jew, Corell had a plausible pretext: feigning unawareness of the applicant; "losing" the candidate's contact information; pretending a different applicant came earlier; or making excuses about passing a drug test first, which, while required by city and state regulations, Corell never demands of other applicants, while in the meantime waiting for other candidates to apply and take the job.
Casual conversations with the business owner also featured assumptions on his part that unprovoked assaults on visibly-Jewish residents of the city over the last several years, many of which have been captured on video, must have involved the victims inviting the attacks somehow, despite the footage showing no such impetus. "I try to give people the benefit of the doubt and not jump to conclusions about them just based on what I see, because you can't always trust your eyes," he explained.
Buy the EoZ book, PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism today at Amazon! Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424. Read all about it here! |
|
- Thursday, September 29, 2022
- Ian
- "Al-Aqsa is in danger!" lie, Al-Aqsa Mosque, Caroline Glick, Eugene Kontorovich, King Abdullah, Linkdump
The Women Burning Their Hijabs Want the Iranian Regime to Fall. Does Joe Biden?
Khamenei’s deal-denying obstinacy ought to be viewed as a liberating opportunity by the Biden administration. Why should we allow Khamenei and his regime a guaranteed pathway to bomb-grade uranium and long-range ballistic missiles and let them extort us? Unrestricted oil and gas sales, a bonanza of foreign investment, and big, legal purchases of Russian conventional weaponry will significantly abet Iranian expansionism . . . unless we believe just down the road that the Supreme Leader and his like-minded friends will give way to more reasonable people?Caroline Glick: How Benny Gantz killed Israeli-Palestinian peace
Obama’s nuclear deal never really made sense unless one believed the regime would evolve into something much less malign. But the theocracy has crushed every internal effort at even the most minimal political reform, and, as Masha Amini’s death makes clear, the regime that inspired The Handmaid’s Tale is still very much that regime.
Democrats, who’ve been pushing apologias since Bill Clinton apologized to Iran in an effort to jump-start better relations, have a chance to get more realistic about the nature of the Islamic Republic. Khamenei’s decision to tell Washington to pound sand may finally allow Democrats, who’ve been addicted to arms control with the theocracy, to regain a certain moral clarity about the most aggressive, antisemitic, revisionist state in the Middle East.
Many Republicans should also thank the cleric, who is the most impressive post-World War II dictator in the region. Those who’ve wanted to believe that a “good deal” and better Iranian behavior was possible if Washington just ramped up sanctions enough to coerce the mullahs into moderation are now obliged to ask themselves whether they are willing to argue for military strikes, which could lead to a war in the Persian Gulf. Whatever the timeline was for sanctions working—always just over the horizon—it certainly no longer matches the timeline for Iran to test a nuke.
If most Republicans, too, turn out to be Iran doves, then they can at least try to develop a bipartisan approach to the Islamic Republic that involves, at a minimum, continuing economic pressure. Sanctions won’t stop the mullahs’ nuclear drive, but they can weaken the clerical regime internally and deny it hard currency for its foreign adventures. Americans, Europeans, Turks, Sunni and Shiite Arabs, and, most emphatically, the Israelis would be a lot better off if Washington forestalled the Iranian bomb.
But if Americans no longer have the self-confidence to engage in such military action, if they just don’t believe U.S. hegemony in the Middle East is worth the price, then they can still default to something less delusional and destructive than paying an endlessly lying enemy to forsake the cornerstone of its hegemonic ambitions. We should take a cue from the protestors in the streets: a regime that so easily kills women isn’t one the United States can do business with.
American and European “realists” have never been so wrong. It is the nature of the regime that counts.
In 2014, Egypt, the UAE and Saudi Arabia acted as Israel’s unofficial allies in Operation Protective Edge against Hamas in Gaza. Among other things, they blocked the Obama administration from coercing Israel into accepting Hamas’ ceasefire terms.Abbas Asked Why There Is No Palestinian State. The Answers Were in His UN Speech
Their opposition to the Palestinians and support for Israel only grew during Trump’s presidency. Many people who spoke with the Egyptians, the Emiratis, Saudis and Bahrainis during this period understood that they were no longer willing to stand with the Palestinians and were willing to reach a pragmatic resolution of sovereignty in Judea and Samaria that respected Israel’s rights and interests as well as those of the Palestinians.
But blinded by ideology, and guided no doubt by Gantz’s political interest in humiliating Netanyahu ahead of the third round of elections, Eshel and Gantz ignored all of this. They insisted that nothing had changed in the Arab world since 2002, when the Saudi king gave a fake peace offer to New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman demanding that Israel surrender to the PLO’s maximalist demands as a condition for Arab-Israeli peace.
While Kushner seems to reject Eshel’s version of events in his recently published memoir, in a way, the veracity of Eshel’s story is less important than the fact that he takes so much pride in his version of events that he chose to share it with the Israeli public. Eshel clearly never considered that he may have been mistaken, and as a result of his own ideological blindness and political interests, he had destroyed Israel’s chance of permanently securing its national and strategic interests in Judea and Samaria.
Eshel’s blindness is a testament to the most glaring and dangerous characteristics of the left, both in Israel and throughout the Western world today. For leftists from Tel Aviv to Washington to Paris, the world is a static place where the 1960s anti-colonialist slogans that blamed all the troubles of the developing world on the West and the Jewish state are truths etched in stone—a progressive Ten Commandments. And the tablets will never be broken. Anyone who rejects these slogans, or permits reality to seep into their policymaking at any level are enemies far worse than the likes of the PLO or the Iranian regime or any terror group or regime that bases their claim to legitimacy on anti-colonialist precepts. On the other hand, unelected elites who live and die by these precepts are “objective professionals,” who protect our societies from riff raff that actually take into consideration facts, events, statements and political forces that stand these anti-Western principles on their heads.
From the progressives’ collective slobberfest over Islamic terrorists from Ramallah to Tehran, to their political and legal wars against anyone who disagrees with them, all over the West, our ability to make informed decisions, whether as voters or policymakers, is under assault. Elites who insist that their catechisms to the anti-colonialist gods are the beginning and end of all legitimate policymaking are damning us to policies that cause our nations to fail perpetually.
The Trump peace plan, including the sovereignty plan, was the first pragmatic blueprint for Israeli-Palestinian peace ever presented, because unlike all of its predecessors it was not based entirely on anti-Israel mythology. Eshel and Gantz didn’t just kill the sovereignty plan when they scared Kushner with their myths. They killed the entire concept that reality should form the basis of Israel’s policies towards the Palestinians.
In his memoir and in subsequent interviews, former ambassador Friedman has said that whatever one thinks of the Trump peace plan, it was an opportunity for Israel to begin having a serious discussion about what it wants to do with Judea and Samaria. Obviously, so long as Israel’s left controls the discourse and blocks reality from entering the discussion, no such discussion will be possible.
PA President Mahmoud Abbas asked the UN General Assembly on Friday why the Palestinians do not yet have a state. I found the answers to Abbas' questions were in his speech as well.
He claimed to genuinely want peace with Israel, but made clear that he rejects Israel's very legitimacy. He described Israel as a colonizing power for 75 years - that is, since its historic rebirth in 1948. He airbrushed Judaism out of his "eternal" Jerusalem, in which there are only Muslim and Christian holy sites.
There was no mention that Israel dismantled its settlements and withdrew all its soldiers from Gaza in 2005. No hint that Hamas took over, and has provoked conflict with Israel ever since with indiscriminate rocket attacks on Israel, teaching Israel that relinquishing adjacent territory merely empowers the forces that seek our destruction.
Abbas devoted some of his speech to Nasser Abu Hamid, whom he described as a heroic martyr who was now dying in jail of cancer, failing to note that Abu Hamid is serving multiple life terms for the murders of seven Israelis and the attempted murders of 12 more. Abbas championed the killers of Israelis - to whom his Palestinian Authority insists on paying salaries, thus nurturing the next generations of murderers.
Abbas ignored the "one condition" Prime Minister Yair Lapid set on Thursday for the implementation of a two-state solution: "That a future Palestinian state will be a peaceful one. That it will not become another terror base from which to threaten the well-being and the very existence of Israel."
Lapid offered Abbas a one-sentence formula for Palestinian independence: "Put down your weapons, and there will be peace."
- Thursday, September 29, 2022
- Elder of Ziyon
- Abu Mazen, Benny Gantz, High Holidays, Isaac Herzog, Khaled Sadiq, Magdi Hamayel, Mahmoud Abbas
Politicians believe that the congratulations of PA President Mahmoud Abbas to the leaders of the Israeli occupation on "Jewish holidays and occasions" reflect the extent of the state of political weakness that the PA has reached in front of Israel, and proves that "its president tweets outside the flock."Member of the Future Electoral List, Hatem Shaheen, considered that the PA President's congratulations to Gantz and Herzog show the state of disregard and humiliation of the rights that the authority has reached, at a time when the occupation is escalating its violations in the occupied territories. Shaheen explained to Felesteen that such a position constitutes an affront to our people and our capabilities, and is completely rejected, because of what our people suffer from Israeli crimes. "Abbas's congratulations to the leaders of the occupation express a state of weakness, lack of self-esteem and confidence, and a lack of belief that we are able to extract our rights in the future, and it represents begging."Writer and political analyst Khaled Sadiq said: "Abbas' contact with Gantz and Herzog comes within the framework of the relationship with the occupation, which he is trying to strengthen with the aim of returning to the negotiating table." He cautioned that "this congratulations encourages the occupation and its leaders to commit more violations and crimes against our people and realize its ambitions, so that the authority appears to be a partner in the tragedies and crimes that the occupation causes against our people, and attempts to change the reality in Jerusalem and the Al-Aqsa Mosque."However, Abbas knows that Israel has nothing to offer the authority. Sadiq continued: "The positions of Abbas and the PA do not reflect the will of the Palestinian people, but rather reflect the positions of the personality of the PA president, to maintain his presence at the head of the PA, to please Israel and to return to the path of settlement and achieve personal gains."The researcher and writer Magdi Hamayel stressed that the congratulation on Jewish occasions reflects the state of contradiction in the head of the Palestinian Authority. While he calls at the United Nations to protect the Palestinian people from the violations of the occupation, he contacts his leaders to congratulate them on the arrival of a new Hebrew year. He pointed out that the state of anger among the Palestinian people is supposed to be accompanied by the anger of the presidency and the authority, and to take a political position commensurate with the sacrifices it is making against the occupation, and the president of the authority must be in harmony with the position of the Palestinian street and the revolution in Jenin. Hamayel stressed that "Abbas is still gasping for the leaders of the occupation and the mirage of the settlement project," and this will not make him gain anything, as the occupation wants to control all of Palestine.
- Thursday, September 29, 2022
- Elder of Ziyon
- antisemitic, apartheid lies, Comix, far left, far right, gender equality, hamas, Hezbollah, Hypocrisy, Islamic Jihad, jew hatred, Judith Butler, Khaled Abu Toameh, leftists, Rashida Tlaib, The Lion's Den
Rashida Tlaib, the Lion's Den, and the ubiquity of Jew-hate across political boundaries (plus comic)
If Hamas is part of the global Left, and an Israel where there are equal rights for Arabs and women and gays is cast as part of the bigoted far-Right, then the terms have lost all meaning.
This is the first organized armed group that consists of gunmen belonging to a number of Palestinian factions – including Fatah, Hamas, IJ and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.
- Thursday, September 29, 2022
- Elder of Ziyon
- antisemitism, Arab antisemitism, Arab History of Zionism, conspiracy theories, Dr. Najeeb Qaddoumi, PalArab lies, revisionist history
Religious reformer Martin Luther says their Talmud and their rabbis teach them that murder is not considered a sin if the murderer is a Jew and the murdered is a non-Jew, but it is considered a sin only if the Jew kills his Jewish brother.The Jews still cling to this belief and follow the example of their parents and teach their children to do so, and this is what the Israeli curricula that they are trying to impose on Arab schools, especially in Jerusalem, imply.As they sow in the minds of their children hatred for the Palestinian, the Arab and the Muslim... By forgery and fabrication they try to erase the ideas of the Palestinian students who are steadfast on their land with their families and poison the facts and distort their ideas and distance them from their heritage and their ancient past.
It is worth noting that Zionism has tried hard to acquit the Jews of the blood of Christ, peace be upon him, and despite the fact that the United Nations issued an important resolution in 1975 AD saying that Zionism is a form of racism and racial discrimination. But the American and Zionist political pressures and campaigns of extortion and skepticism enabled Zionism and Israel, with the support of the United States of America and Britain, to issue a resolution acquitting the Jews of the blood of Christ, peace be upon him, issued by Pope Paul VI in 1965 AD, and a decision by the United Nations in 1991 AD to cancel its decision to condemn Zionism.
Wednesday, September 28, 2022
The first Jew to escape Auschwitz helped save 200,000 lives — but few know his name
On April 7, 1944, a nineteen-year-old named Walter Rosenberg and a twenty-five-year-old from the same town in Slovakia named Fred Wetzler became the first Jews to escape from Auschwitz. The two made their way through the Polish countryside and into their native country, where Rosenberg—taking the name Rudolf Vrba as cover—tried to get the story of what he saw to his fellow Jews, and to the world at large. Robert Philpot, reviewing a new biography of this forgotten hero, writes:
As soon as they crossed the border, Wetzler made contact with Slovakia’s Jewish council, the only communal organization the regime still allowed to function. The men were then subjected to a grueling 48-hour interview and cross-examination, both to establish their credibility and to record their story.
From their interviews, Oskar Krasnansky, one of the council’s most senior members, compiled a 32-page, single-spaced report, complete with professional drawings based on Vrba’s and Wetzler’s testimonies. The . . . report methodically detailed the horrors of Auschwitz and, crucially, the fictions deployed by the Nazis from the moment the cattle-truck doors were slammed on departure to that at which the gas-chamber doors were locked.
Reactions to the report in London and Washington also revealed that, despite the horrors it contained, old prejudices remained unshaken. The U.S. Army magazine, Yank, for instance, declined to use material from it in a feature on Nazi war crimes, requesting instead “a less Jewish account.” Meanwhile, in the UK Foreign Office, civil servants bemoaned the “usual Jewish exaggeration” and the amount of time expended on “these wailing Jews.”
But, alongside these responses, there was also a swirl of disbelief surrounding the report’s revelations: one which affected not only the Allies but even some Jews themselves. It was perhaps best captured by the words of the French-Jewish philosopher Raymond Aron: “I knew, but I didn’t believe it. And because I didn’t believe it, I didn’t know.”
‘The God-Damnedest Thing’: The Antisemitic Plot to Thwart U.S. Aid to Europe’s Jews and the Man Who Exposed It
On June 19, 1939, over lunch at the White House, Treasury Secretary Henry Morgenthau, Jr. attempted something he was loath to do: He prodded his best friend. “A year has passed,” he told Franklin D. Roosevelt, “and we have not got anywhere on this Jewish refugee thing. What are we going to do about it?”A Nazi Collaborator in the Family
No other member of the Roosevelt cabinet enjoyed a relationship as intimate with the president; the two had a standing date for a private lunch on Mondays. Across Washington, Morgenthau and his wife Elinor were known as the couple closest to the Roosevelts: Since the early 1920s, they had worked together, socialized together and, long before the New Deal, made common cause. (“From one of two of kind,” FDR had once inscribed a photograph to Elinor.) Morgenthau rarely dared to risk his most treasured friendship. But the saga of the St. Louis, the ship carrying nearly a thousand Jewish refugees that had reached Florida only to be turned back to Europe, haunted him. The tragedy, coming just days before his lunch at the White House, laid bare the grim truths of the crisis unfolding on the continent.
The only son of the New York real estate baron — Henry Morgenthau, Sr., who’d become America’s most vocal anti-Zionist — Henry Jr. was reared as a devout assimilationist. He’d never even attended a Passover Seder. But the desperate news from Europe had stirred something, brought a change that those few who were close to him would later call an “awakening.”
The war in Europe would test Morgenthau in ways unlike any other member of the Roosevelt administration. In “those terrible eighteen months,” as he would later call the period after the summer of 1942, when he first learned that “the Nazis were planning to exterminate all the Jews of Europe,” Morgenthau would find himself surrounded by threats: an anti-immigrant old guard at the State Department, “America First” isolationists on Capitol Hill and enraged Zionist leaders desperate for the attention of the White House. He would face the greatest test of his 12-year tenure in Washington, risking all that he held most dear: not only his friendship with FDR, but the trust of his best men at Treasury and even the faith of his own family. In the end, Morgenthau would rely on his moral compass — “Franklin’s conscience,” Eleanor Roosevelt liked to call him — to affirm his belief in America as a sanctuary for the persecuted, and press his best friend to act, before it was too late, to save the remaining Jews of Europe. Now, as the nation finds itself once more bitterly divided over its obligations to the world’s refugees, the story of Morgenthau’s crusade serves as a poignant reminder of what can happen when government officials stand up to the misdeeds of their own administration.
Dutch filmmaker Eline Jongsma was enjoying dinner with her father when he suddenly confessed a family secret: His paternal grandfather was a known Nazi collaborator during WWII.
“There wasn’t even ever hints of this being part of my family’s history so it wasn’t a moment of ‘Oh, I see, I figured it out.’ It was a total shock,” Jongsma told Tablet in a Zoom interview from the Netherlands. “I think the reason my father told me then was his father died very recently.”
A decade later, her story sometimes voices itself in metaphor, like falling scraps of aging archival documents resembling cascading fingernail clippings—imagery that embodies a poignant turning point in her groundbreaking documentary, His Name Is My Name. Rather than bury the culpability of her great-grandfather, Jongsma, 42, mines it in the film—in a sequence of three-minute videos living on Instagram, @hisnamemyname.
With Kel O’Neill, 43, her American-born creative partner and husband, Jongsma expertly explores long discarded fragments of her complex history, generational trauma, and hope. Since its July release, the project has been gaining recognition, with 30,000 views and climbing, and installations at Kamp Westerbork, the Dutch memorial at the site where more than 100,000 Jews, Roma, and Sinti people were deported to Nazi extermination camps in Central and Eastern Europe. As a child, Jongsma and her family gathered wild mushrooms there. In addition to beingfeatured in a mural with images and a QR code at Westerbork’s The Memory of Camp Westerbork exhibition, the documentary’s 10 self-contained installments appear on YouTube.
“There was [this] idea, maybe if artists can make something about this ‘perpetrator perspective’ as they call it, we can educate the youth a little more,” Jongsma said. “We were asked to submit an idea and at first, we were not quite sure what to do with this.”
Jongsma explains a complication of visual storytelling is that the filming itself lends itself to glorifying a subject, “which of course was very problematic,” she said. “So it took us a while to think about how to approach this.”
As the heavily researched episodes explain, Jongsma shares her surname with her great-grandfather: convicted war criminal Gekke Gerrit, or “Crazy Gerrit,” a notorious Nazi-aligned mayor of the small Dutch town of Krommenie, north of Amsterdam. Known for his penchant for violence, Gerrit Jongsma sent at least one Jewish family, Esther and Benjamin Drilsma, to be murdered at Auschwitz. He subsequently hunted down their hidden 6-year-old daughter Fien (Adolphine), whom he doomed to death in Sobibor. He may not even be the only perpetrator among Jongsma’s ancestors.
- Wednesday, September 28, 2022
- Varda Meyers Epstein (Judean Rose)
- Ahlam Tamimi, Jordan, Judean Rose, Malki Roth, Opinion, Varda
Malki Roth is perhaps a name you’re sick of hearing, a stale
story, an old story, the story of the Jewish girl who got blown up while eating
pizza a LONG time ago. Even as you feel perhaps a pinch of guilt at your
indifference, you say to yourself that it’s Israel’s fault in the first place that
the woman who helped murder 15-year-old Malki is free. Which also makes the subject of Malki Roth a
subject that some people just don’t want to touch.
Which, with Yom Kippur coming up, is a shame. Justice for
Malki Roth should be—needs to be—a national, Jewish cause. No one should have
to work hard to get the world to care about this. Instead, it’s like pulling
teeth.
I have written about Malki Roth and interviewed her father
Arnold several times. Each time a column comes out, the number of viewers
progressively dwindles. It is as if the Jewish world collectively says, “It was
cool to read about this the first time around, but nu?? Write about something
else, already.”
Two weeks ago I wrote something new about Malki Roth, or so I thought. I had
been struck by the way the State Department focused on the Abu Akleh thing
while completely ignoring the Roth
family’s letter to President Biden, requesting a meeting with him during
his visit to Israel. Both Abu Akleh and Malki Roth were American citizens, but
only one of them was a Jew.
It was, I thought, a new perspective on the subject of Malki
Roth. Something to share around, to help raise awareness of the issue. Yet when
I sent the link to a colleague, he responded, “please [sic] don't send me these
news items since I know about it.”
Note that this is a man who contacted me out of the blue a
few months ago. I knew his work and it was impressive. I was flattered. He had,
he said, read a certain piece of mine, and liked it. Did I consider sending it
to this or that publication? Also, his daughter is a musician who lives on a
settlement. I would like her, did I want her number? Could I share his piece?
I did what I could to promote his piece, and he continued to
send me his stuff, so I began to send him mine.
Perhaps I was wrong to send him my work without seeking his consent. But this
happens to be how it’s done. It’s called “networking.”
After that last email, I would have just written him off as
a jerk. But it was a piece about Malki Roth, an important cause for me—as it should
be for him! Even if he doesn’t have
time to read it, it’s something to share with others to help raise awareness of
a major Jewish cause. Instead, what bothered him was unwanted email/spam, though
he’d only recently asked for my help, which I had
freely given.
I have concluded that the issue began when he saw the name “Malki
Roth” in the subject line. To him this is old stuff. It’s diplomatically touchy:
Why should we expect Jordan to extradite a terrorist who killed Israeli Jews,
when Israel itself released her to her freedom? And why should anyone expect
the United States to do more to seek justice for a Jewish Israeli—even one with
dual US citizenship—than Israel itself?
There’s some logic to this. Also, it is possible that Israel doesn’t want Jordan to extradite the Sbarro terrorist Ahlam Tamimi--the beast who helped to murder Malki Roth We can’t know what goes on behind closed doors. I asked
Arnold Roth about this. Who is correct in this matter? Should the US stay out
of it? Should Jordan be left alone? Is Israel getting in the way of justice?
Arnold was matter of fact. “Legally, there’s no case for
Jordan. Tamimi is charged under US law for a crime that involved the deliberate
and exceptionally cold-blooded killing of children. It was the children that
drew her to Sbarro.
“But what about politics?" asks Roth.
“Jordan is a young kingdom, ruled by a family with dynastic
ambitions but whose roots are in what we today call Saudi Arabia," explains Roth. "The vast
majority of Jordan’s population is made up of people who call themselves
Palestinians. And there’s said to be a consensus that even if he wanted to,
King Abdullah would endanger his kingdom and perhaps his life if he were to
hand over this heroic figure, the killer of “Zionist rapists,” (an expression
often used in Jordan’s media in connection with victims of the Sbarro massacre)
to the Americans. So we all ought to understand that this is something that he,
Abdullah, just can’t be expected to do,” says Roth, with sarcasm.
“There’s a lot that’s wrong with that way of looking at
this. But," says Roth, "it gets worse."
“Israel is quietly said to be interested in avoiding any
steps that would put King Abdullah’s rule and the stability of his kingdom at
risk. And to have said this to the Americans."
So, okay. We get it. Israel doesn’t want the US to press the extradition issue. But
that doesn’t make it okay for Jordan or the United
States to turn a blind eye to a child murderer on the loose. Also: Israel will do
what Israel will do, but the Jewish people? We can be as loud as we want in seeking justice for a 15 year old girl whose blood cries out from the ground!
The same was true of the Jonathan Pollard issue. Some said it was Israel that didn't want him freed. They said he took money, he was no saint. But in the end we were loud enough, and they let Pollard go. We, as a people, fought for him and won. And now we must fight for Malki Roth who is no longer here to plead her case.
People need to hear this story. They need to know how nations have colluded to protect Tamimi, an evil being who openly delights in having helped to spill the blood of Jewish children. Her aim was to kill Jews, and specifically Jewish children, which makes this most decidedly a national problem.
What we need to do is get loud and make Malki Roth a household name. No matter what anyone says there is no reason we shouldn't press for the extradition of Ahlam Tamimi and no good reason not to adopt justice for Malki Roth as a national Jewish cause.
#JusticeforMalkiRoth
Buy the EoZ book, PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism today at Amazon! Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424. Read all about it here! |
|
- Wednesday, September 28, 2022
- Elder of Ziyon
- Abd al-Rahman Hazem, Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, Facebook, family values, Fatah, glorifying terror, Hypocrisy, Muhammad Abu Na’asa, Muhammed Alownah, supporting terror, Terrorism