Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Tuesday, February 14, 2023

Yasir Arafat Museum has a new exhibit on Jewish settlements

Today, the Yasir Arafat Museum opened up a new exhibition.

What part of Palestinian history is it about?

Silly. It is about how terrible Jews are.

Dignitaries, including the Palestinian prime minister Muhammad Shtayyeh, crowded the space to see maps and text on the walls showing how Jews are taking over what they consider Palestinian land.

Shtayyeh commented after his tour, "What we saw today in this exhibition is an exceptional effort in documenting settlement crimes and colonial crimes since the occupation of the Palestinian territories in 1967. Settlement is a tool to destroy the two-state solution, and the colonialists have been defeated throughout history. This is the only case in the world in which the settler-colonial conflict with the indigenous people remains. "

Shtayyeh thanked the management of the Yasser Arafat Foundation for this "exceptional, distinguished and great effort in preserving, presenting and documenting the crimes of Israeli colonialism and occupation."

He called for "Palestine to remain in the heart of every Palestinian, in the heart of every Arab, and in the heart of every free and honorable person in this world."

Shtayyeh also called on the United States and the European Union to put pressure on Israel to stop plans to build new settlement units in the West Bank.

One demand I have not hear before: Shtayyeh called on the US and Europe to revoke citizenship from Jewish settlers who have two passports.

Buy the EoZ book, PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism today at Amazon!

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02/14 Links Pt1: Palestinian School Backed By US Gov Celebrated Terrorist Who Murdered 7 At Synagogue; UN official says Israel to blame for Palestinians murdering Jews

From Ian:

Biden and Israel, So far no good

Throughout his senate career, Joe Biden ignored the easiest pro-Israel actions, nonbinding pro-Israel resolutions. Some of the resolutions called Bubba Clinton to press Syria to free the Jews locked in the county, supporting Israel’s efforts to make peace. He refused to sign the talent/Nelson Letter Urging Pres. Bush #43 to press Palestinian Arab leadership to bar terrorist groups from participating in Palestinian Legislative Elections. The letter had 73 co-signers then- Sen. Biden did not sign this letter.

As he neared becoming Vice President, Joe Biden got even worse. Two months before he was elected to be Barack Obama’s number two, syndicated radio host Hugh Hewitt reported:

Democratic vice-presidential candidate Joe Biden was quoted Monday as telling senior Israeli officials behind closed doors that the Jewish state will have to reconcile itself to a nuclear Iran. (…)

“Israel will have to reconcile itself with the nuclearization of Iran,” Israell Army Radio quoted Biden as telling the unnamed officials. “It’s doubtful if the economic sanctions will be effective, and I am against opening an additional military and diplomatic front.

Ed Morrissey, Managing Editor of Hot Air, discussed Hewitt’s report and news about Biden’s comments in Ha’aretz, Jerusalem Post, and elsewhere.

In 2021 Joe Biden was inaugurated and became the fourteenth American President since the rebirth of Israel in 1948. The easiest way to describe President Biden’s relationship with Israel after two years is, “so far, no good.”

He began his Presidency by selecting Israeli haters and/or Iran apologists to join his team. Some of them have left the administration, but that happens In every administration.

Examples of that problematic staff included:
Avril Haines,Director of National Intelligence (DNi) Ms. Haines’ appointment was endorsed by the anti-Israel group J-Street. She signed their letter to the DNC berating them for being “silent on the rights of Palestinians and on Israeli actions that undermine those rights.’

John Kerry- Climate Czar. Kerry believed Israel couldn’t make peace with any Arab state until peace was made with the Palestinian Authority. Kerry lied to the American people about the details of the JCPOA Iran nuclear deal to make it look better. In 2018 Kerry told a representative of Palestinian Authority’s President Abbas to ignore Trump’s demands because he’ll be out of office within a year.

Karine Jean Pierre- initially Deputy Press Secretary. Wrote an op-ed in Newsweek urging Democrats not to attend the 2020 AIPAC convention. She slandered Israel when the IDF was defending Israeli citizens against Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) terrorists who set off explosives at Israel’s border fence, trying to allow 30,000 Hamas-led Arabs to invade Israel and commit more violence.

Robert Malley– Special Envoy To Iran. Not often do I lay the sins of the father on the son, but in this case, it is part of the story. Robert Malley’s dad was an Israel hater and friend of Yasser Arafat. Perhaps this was why Malley was the ONLY American who was part of President Clinton’s peace negotiating team to blame Israel for Arafat walking out of the talk. The others involved, including the former President, Bubba, said Yasser Arafat walked away from a “sweetheart” deal. Malley served under three different Presidents. Between his White House jobs, Malley publicly trashed Israel and promoted the terrorist group Hamas as an essential peace partner.

There are many others, but I don’t have enough bandwidth.

One of the most positive events in Israel’s seventy-five-year history was the Abraham Accords. Announced September 13, 2020, the accords were Israel’s first peace with Arab nations in 24 years. Along with ending a state of war between Israel and the participating nations, they included agreements of economic cooperation. Thus, demonstrating the economic benefits of peace with Israel’s multi-faceted solid economy. Over four months, the UAE, Bahrain, Morocco, and Sudan made peace with the Jewish state. At the end of the Trump administration, the foggy bottom (State Dept) scuttlebutt was other countries, including Saudi Arabia, would soon hop on the peace train.

After his inauguration, Biden refused to continue the momentum that began with the accords. Instead, President Biden returned to the old unsuccessful strategy of no peace with other Arab nations until there is peace with the Palestinian Authority (which refuses to negotiate) and “land for peace” instead of “peace for peace.” The President and his foreign policy team are not fans of the Abraham Accords. Therefore, it has no chance of expanding to other countries during his term.

Palestinian School Backed By US Gov Celebrated Terrorist Who Murdered 7 At Synagogue

A Palestinian school backed by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) held a ceremony celebrating the deaths of seven Israelis killed at a Jerusalem synagogue in January, according to the school’s Facebook post.

Omariya Secondary School for Girls in Qalqilya, Palestine, was established in 2009 via funding from USAID, according to the school’s Facebook profile, and has a “computer center,” “fashion design studio,” “scientific laboratory” and 29 teachers. The school held a ceremony on Jan. 30 commemorating the “hero Khairy Alqum” who killed seven Israelis in a terror attack on Jan. 27, according to a Facebook post. (RELATED: US Charity Linked To Palestinian Terrorism Received Thousands In Taxpayer COVID-19 Funding)

“A distinguished view of the students of the Cultural Club, a stand in solidarity with our people in Jenin camp, and a lamentation for our martyrs and hero Khairy Alqum,” the post read, according to a Facebook translation.

In pictures taken of the event, the students and teachers could be seen outside the school with a USAID placard on one of the school walls, according to the post.

USAID sponsored initiatives at the school under the Local Government and Structural program (LGI), according to a USAID report from 2013 to 2014, and sponsored more initiatives from 2014 to 2015 under the “Let’s Change It” project. The school participated in the Female Role Models Initiative that aimed to promote “leadership skills, and worked on projects promoting women’s leadership and potential in their communities,” according to the report.

USAID did not respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s multiple requests for comment.

Al-Qaeda video shows former leader urging Muslims ‘to target interests of Israel’

Al-Sahab, the media arm of Al-Qaeda Central Command, published an eight-minute video on Sunday showing a speech by the organization’s assassinated leader, Ayman Al-Zawahiri, who was killed in a U.S. drone hit in Kabul on July 31, 2022.

According to a report by MEMRI’s Jihad and Terrorism Threat Monitor, shared first with JNS, the video titled “How to Support the Palestinian Cause” is subtitled in English, and Al-Sahab published transcripts of Al-Zawahiri’s speech in Arabic and English.

Zawahiri urged Muslims to rise up and help Palestinian Muslims “by targeting the interests of Israel and [of] the powers that support Israel everywhere.”

Addressing Palestinian Muslims, Al-Zawahiri urges them to defend their homeland “until your last breath.”

The video was posted during a Palestinian terror wave against Israelis.

The video begins with a series of short clips of Israel’s Minister of National Security Itamar Ben-Gvir in Jerusalem and on the Temple Mount plaza, juxtaposed with older footage of senior Israeli officials meeting with Arab leaders, including Palestinians and leaders of countries that are Israel’s allies, such as the U.S. and Turkey.

Arafat got the ball rolling.

In a 1997 online article on Azure, Yoram Hazony describes a 1996 festival staged by Arafat's Ministry of Culture, in honor of Ba'al:

Arab youths dressed in robes bearing ancient Canaanite figures brandished torches as they danced about the town square, packed with officials of the PLO’s administration and security services...On the stone stage in the middle of the square, a dramatic passion was acted out, with the Ba’al, god of the heavens and fertility in the pantheon of the ancient Canaanites, heroically struggling against Mut, god of the underworld...the narrator took the opportunity to pour praise on the loyal Palestinian-Canaanite nations, the Amorites, Girgashites, Jebusites and Perizzites, which had fought at his side in the battle against the Hebrew invaders from across the Jordan.

And Arafat kept the ball rolling. On March 30, 2000, Arafat declared during a 'Land Day' speech:

Our forefathers, the Canaanites and Jebusites, built the cities and planted the land; they built the monumental city of Bir Salim [Jerusalem]…

The previous year, his advisor and minister for Jerusalem affairs, Faisal Husseini, said in an interview with New York Times Magazine:

I am a Palestinian. I am a descendant of the Jebusites, the ones who came before King David. This [Jerusalem] was one of the most important Jebusite cities in the area…. Yes, it’s true. We are the descendants of Jebusites.

Similar claims by Abbas and Saeb Erekat are not new.

The Middle East Forum finds efforts of this falsification in 1978 in the Palestinian encyclopedia (Al-Mawsu'at Al-Filastinniya),

which declared, "The Palestinians [to be] the descendants of the Jebusites, who are of Arab origin," and described Jerusalem as "an Arab city because its first builders were the Canaanite Jebusites, whose descendants are the Palestinians."The entry continued, "Ever since the destruction of the Temple, the link with Jews and Christians has been severed. Muslims alone have a right to the Temple."

No Palestinian claim is too absurd to be made -- after all, who in the West ever calls them out on such things. Here is Dr. Hayel Sanduqa on PA TV, on June 2, 2011, claiming that a famous Psalm was actually first said by a Crusader:

[The Israelis] have acted to change Jerusalem's character. Even the expression (Psalm 137:5) “If I forget thee, oh Jerusalem, may my right hand forget its skill. May my tongue cling to the roof of my mouth.” This statement said by the Frankish (Crusader) ruler of Acre shortly before he left – was borrowed by the Zionist movement, which falsified it in the name of Zionism.

Is the problem really that the West is unwilling to call out the Palestinian Arabs on their falsification of history, or is the problem really much bigger -- is the West actually complicit in this falsification?

UNESCO

Erasing Jewish history seems to be a UNESCO specialty.

In 2011, Elder of Ziyon pointed out how UNESCO identified the Rambam (Maimonides) as Maimouna Ibn Moussa, effectively claiming that the revered Jewish philosopher, legal scholar and leader of the Jewish community during the 12th century was a Muslim.

Other attempts by UNESCO to erase Jewish ties to their land just up to 2011 alone include:

o  November 7, 1974: voted “to withhold assistance from Israel in the fields of education, science and culture because of Israel’s persistent alteration of the historic features of Jerusalem.”
o  November 20, 1974: voted to exclude Israel from its European regional group -- until 1978, after the US withheld $40 million in payments from the organization in protest.
o  1989: claimed “Israel’s occupation of Jerusalem” was destroying the holy city by “acts of interference, destruction and transformation”
o  1990: attacked the “irreversible” changes to Jerusalem's architectural heritage resulting from Israeli “occupation”
o  1993: then-UNESCO director-general Frederico Mayor boycotted an international conference on science in Jerusalem
o  1995: When the UN celebrated its 50th anniversary, UNESCO refused to mention the Shoah in its World War II resolution
o  1996: organized a symposium on Jerusalem at the body’s Paris headquarters without inviting any Jewish or Israeli groups
o  1998: a delegation visiting Jerusalem refused to meet with Israeli officials.
o  2001: UNESCO promoted the “Cairo Declaration Document for Jerusalem Antiquities Preservation,” accusing Israel of destroying Islamic antiquities on the Temple Mount and in Jerusalem’s Old City
o  2002: During the Second Intifada, condemned Israel for “the destruction and damage caused to the cultural heritage in the Palestinian territories” as “a crime against the common cultural heritage of humanity.”
o  2009: designated Jerusalem as a “capital of Arab culture”
o  2010: declared Rachel’s Tomb and Hebron’s Cave of the Patriarchs as “Muslim mosques.”
o  2011: called on Israel to stop all archaeological works in the Old City of Jerusalem

In the past, UNESCO also has also called for “financial sanctions against Israel” and passed hundreds of resolutions criticizing Israel’s activities in Judea and Samaria

According to the UN Watch Database:

Between 2009 and 2021, UNESCO adopted 82 resolutions against Israel; 9 on Crimea; 4 on Iraq; 2 on Syria; and none on Iran, Sudan, North Korea, or any other country in the world...UNESCO repeatedly denies the ancient Jewish heritage and culture of the holy cities Jerusalem and Hebron – which it has declared a World Heritage site of “Palestine.”

The Supreme Muslim Council in 1925

But when it comes to denying Israel's right to Jerusalem and its Jewish history, everyone wants to get in on the act -- which is ironic, considering how in 1925, the Supreme Muslim Council published A Brief Guide to Al-Haram Al-Sharif, which in addition to permitting non-Muslims to visit, explicitly recognizes the history of Solomon's Temple as being "beyond dispute" as the location where the Dome of the Rock and the Al Aqsa Mosque stand today -- and quotes from the Book of Samuel to make its point. The guide goes on to mention in passing that in 637 Caliph Omar "occupied Jerusalem."

The Mosque of Omar, 16 miles southwest of Jerusalem, has an inscription dating back to the 9th or 10th century CE that refers to the Dome of the Rock as “the rock of the Bayt al-Maqdis” -- literally "the rock of The Holy Temple."

Things have changed.

The BBC

Things have changed in the media as well. CAMERA UK has pointed out that while at one point the BBC recognized the Jewish historical ties by referring to The Temple Mount...

...in 2014, after the PLO warned international reporters not to use the term Temple Mount, the media obliged and perpetuates the Palestinian Arab narrative, the BBC among them. Last month, when Itamar Ben-Gvir visited the Temple Mount, the BBC reported:

The hilltop site is the most sacred place in Judaism and the third holiest in Islam. It is known to Jews as the Temple Mount, site of two Biblical temples, and to Muslims as Haram al-Sharif, the site of Muhammad's ascent to Heaven. The entire compound is considered to be al-Aqsa Mosque by Muslims. [emphasis added]

The BBC includes a graphic that helpfully emphasizes the point:

By perpetuating this distortion, the BBC is aiding the Palestinian Arabs who undercut Jewish rights and Jewish history by increasing the number of mosques on the Temple Mount from 1 to 5 while deliberately destroying archaeological evidence of the ancient Jewish ties to the area.

Helping the Palestinian cause is the EU.

The EU

Back in December, a document came to light describing the EU's plan to help the Palestinians by undercutting the Oslo Accords and help Palestinian Arabs gain a foothold in Area C of Judea and Samaria.

The six-page document calls for mapping the territory in order to prove Palestinian rights to the land and monitoring Israeli archaeological activity, as ancient Jewish ties reinforce Israeli claims.

The document also recommends strengthening Palestinian infrastructure in Area C and supporting Palestinians with legal aid.

The article quotes Shlomo Ne’eman, head of the Gush Etzion Council and the Yesha Council who decries how "the allies of the State of Israel, the European governments, are actively working to change the borders of our country." This is just taking the attempt to arbitrarily refer to Tel Aviv as the capital of Israel and taking it to a whole new level.

Meanwhile, Wikipedia is doing its share to falsify history.

Wikipedia

An article on Wikipedia on Iran–Jordan relations, traces those relations back for "most of Jordanian history" -- in this case back to the Persians:

The article on Jordan itself tells you that "the oldest known evidence of hominid habitation in Jordan dates back at least 200,000 years."

You have to check out the Wikipedia article on Iraq-Jordan relations to get the straightforward history starting in the 20th century:

And now the Biden Administration has decided to play along with the Palestinian Arabs.

The Biden Administration

According to a press release from the Manhattan DA's office:

Manhattan District Attorney Alvin L. Bragg, Jr., today announced the repatriation of an ivory cosmetic spoon dating back to approximately 800-700 B.C.E to the Palestinian Authority, marking the first time a cultural object has been returned to the Palestinian people from the United States...

“We are proud to join our law enforcement and government partners in this moment. It is impossible to put a value on the cultural and historical significance of looted antiquities and I thank our talented team of attorneys and investigators who are continuing their incredible work of returning these objects to where they rightfully belong,” said District Attorney Bragg. [emphasisd added]

Rightfully belong?

As Johanna Markind pointed out at Legal Insurrection:

American law calls for repatriation of certain artifacts to Indian tribes, if “the requesting Indian tribe or Native Hawaiian organization can show that the object was owned or controlled by the Indian tribe or Native Hawaiian organization.” That is, the Smithsonian would return a qualified Cheyenne artifact to the Cheyenne tribe. It would not return a Cheyenne artifact to, say, the Pawnee.

According to the law, then, the artifact should have been returned to Israel. But that would have been a problem. After all, the spoon was originally looted from Hebron, so returning it to Israel would amount to admitting the Jewish ties to that area.

So instead, we are treated to an onslaught of government officials publically supporting the Palestinian Arabs in fabricating an imaginary history:

o  Ivan J. Arvelo, a special agent in charge of US Homeland Security Investigations in New York, described the transfer of the spoon to the PA as a "historic repatriation”
o  George Noll, head of the US Office of Palestinian Affairs, described the spoon as “an example of Palestinian cultural patrimony.”
o  DHS official, Jeff Brannigan, claimed that, “This repatriation is representative of HSI’s commitment to ensuring the storied heritages of peoples around the world through the preservation and protection of cultural artifacts.”

The Biden Administration is pushing a falsified history -- much as Biden himself famously falsified his own history during the 1988 presidential campaign when he claimed:

o  He graduated from Syracuse University’s law school in the top half of his class.
o  He received 3 undergraduate degrees.
o  He attended law school on a full academic scholarship

But this time, the media is unlikely to call him out on this fake history.

Buy the EoZ book, PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism today at Amazon!

Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424.

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Another child mujahid, and more silence from @UNICEF and other NGOs about Palestinians recruiting children

The Palestinian Amad news site shows this photo of another "child" killed by Israeli forces as they engaged in a battle upon entering the Al-Faraa camp to arrest terrorists that the Palestinian Authority refuses to.

Hmmm. 17-year old Mahmoud al-Aidi seems to be carrying something. A laptop bag, perhaps?

Not quite.

In this case, the IDF says that al-Aidi approached them with an explosive device.

In related "child martyr" news, 14-year old Qusai Radwan Waked, who was killed Sunday, appears to have been linked to Islamic Jihad, and was referred to as a "mujahid" in the Jenin Qassam Telegram channel while wearing the PIJ headband and showing the "tawhid" hand gesture popularized by ISIS and now used by Palestinian jihadists.

The martyr, the mujahid cub, Qusai Wakada, son of the town of Al-Arqa in Jenin, who was martyred yesterday while confronting the invading occupation forces in Jenin..

Palestinian militias are recruiting children and encouraging them to attack Israeli soldiers, knowing that their deaths are worth far more in public relations value than their military skills.

And yet NGOs that supposedly care about the welfare of children have been completely silent - because that dilutes from the false narrative of Israeli forces wantonly shooting children, which is also worth far more to them in fundraising value.

Buy the EoZ book, PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism today at Amazon!

Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424.

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UN accuses Israel a brand new crime - "domicide" - because Israel must be the worst violator of EVERY crime!

The UN's antisemitic Special Rapporteur for Attacking Israel, Francesca Albanese, tweeted this:

The systematic demolition of Palestinian homes, erection of illegal Israeli settlements & systematic denial of building permits for Palestinians amounts to “domicide”. This is nothing but Israel’s attempt to curtail Palestinians’ self-determination & threaten their very existence.

She links to a report from the viciously anti-Israel Human Rights Council which says:

The international community must take action to stop systematic and deliberate housing demolition and sealing, arbitrary displacement and forced evictions of Palestinian people in the occupied West Bank, UN experts* said today.

In the month of January 2023 alone, Israeli authorities reportedly demolished 132 Palestinian structures across 38 communities in the occupied West Bank, including 34 residential and 15 donor-funded structures. This figure represents a 135 percent increase, compared to the same period in 2022, and includes five punitive demolitions.

“The systematic demolition of Palestinian homes, erection of illegal Israeli settlements and systematic denial of building permits for Palestinians in the occupied West Bank amounts to “domicide”.

Here's the interesting part. The word "domicide" was coined last year by Balakrishnan Rajagopal, UN Special Rapporteur on the right to adequate housing.

In his report he defined the term this way:

“The attacking, bombing and shelling of civilian targets, the razing of entire cities and villages – displacing millions into homelessness – have continued unabated despite the development of modern human rights and humanitarian law,” the UN expert said.
While international law outlaws all forms of arbitrary housing destruction, deportation, displacement and forced eviction, the Special Rapporteur noted an alarming continuity of gross violations of the right to adequate housing in times of conflict.
In a path-breaking report, Rajagopal urged States to recognise “domicide” - the systematic or widespread violation of the right to adequate housing – as an international crime of its own standing.

Rajagopal created the term to describe a much bigger issue than just destroying houses here and there. He's discussing the systematic destruction of entire cities and making thousands of people homeless just to hurt people:

“How many more Aleppos, Saanas and Mariupols must we endure? We must not allow those responsible for such egregious crimes to remain in positions of power. They must face international justice,” Rajagopal said.

This scene in Aleppo is what he means by domicide:

In the 17 or so years I've been reading Palestinian media, I have not once seen an article about a homeless Palestinian in the West Bank.

Those who are building illegal houses in Area C already have houses in Palestinian administered areas. They aren't homeless! They are building these illegal, dangerous shacks in order to grab land from Israel - with European support. It is a purely political move. But they have a place to sleep at night even after Israel demolishes their homes. No one is living in a tent or in a car that I have seen.

This is not at all what Balakrishnan Rajagopal had in mind when he created the term.

Once the UN describes a new crime, the modern antisemites must hijack the term to apply it to Israel, of course, and pretend that Israel's demolishing illegally built houses - which is an obligation under the laws of occupation! - is the worst possible example of this crime.

And, let's face it, saying that Israel is guilty of "domicide" sounds so much more dramatic than "enforcing zoning laws."

By hijacking the issue, the UN's "experts" and Albanese have now cheapened the actual crimes of Syria, Yemen and Russia. Because antisemites insist that Jews are the worst people on Earth.

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!

02/13 Links Pt2: Three thousand five hundred days of thwarted US justice; Turkey thanks Israeli rescue teams for 'solidarity' in earthquake aid

From Ian:

Three thousand five hundred days of thwarted US justice

Jordan's refusal to extradite Ahlam Tamimi to the United States, despite her being responsible for the horrific 2001 bombing of a Jerusalem pizzeria that killed 15 people, including two Americans (one of them our daughter Malka Chana Roth), is a clear breach of the 1995 extradition treaty signed between the two countries.

The US Department of Justice brought charges against Tamimi in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia on July 15, 2013. That's 3,500 days ago as of today.

At the US government's request, those charges were promptly sealed by the court once they were signed off.

They then remained secret - even from the families of the victims of the atrocity, which includes us - for the next four years.

The eventual unsealing came on March 14, 2017, in a media announcement that featured tough language by determined American law enforcement officials.

Astonishngly, just six days later, a Jordanian court handed down a decision declaring the 1995 Jordan/US extradition treaty invalid. As Aljazeera reported, the decision meant Tamimi's extradition to face charges in Washington for her role in the Sbarro bombing was permanently blocked under Jordanian law. It was a contentious finding and one plainly contradicted by facts that we ourselves later discovered by suing the United States government in 2012 under the Freedom of Information Act.

The basis on which Jordan's Court of Cassation - the kingdom's most senior appellate court - relied is not an inherent flaw in the treaty but a flaw created by the Jordanian government itself. It relates to the ratification of the treaty, an essential step in the treaty-making process for both sides.

The United States says the treaty was ratified by Jordan. Even if that's wrong (and the evidence shows it's plainly not), Jordan has had more than a quarter century to fix it - to ratify in accordance with whatever legal requirements its judges say have to be observed. The fix could be done this afternoon. Or tomorrow.

Given the importance of the US-Jordan relationship and the grave nature of the crime for which Tamimi is charged, the US Congress ought to take action to press Jordan so that the fugitive is brought to American justice. In fact, it should have done this years ago but did not.

For its part, Jordan has failed to take any steps to rectify this situation, despite the obvious harm it causes to the victims and their families. The United States has repeatedly called on Jordan to fulfill its obligations under the treaty. But Jordan continues to flout its obligations with impunity right up until today.

Eyes On Islam: An Interview with Middle East Scholar Daniel Pipes

Daniel Pipes is an acclaimed authority in the realm of Middle East scholarship. With a Ph.D. from Harvard University, Pipes taught at universities around the country and served as an official in the U.S. Departments of State and Defense. The author of 16 books, his biweekly column is published in The Washington Times and other publications.

Pipes is perhaps most recognized for founding and operating the prestigious Middle East Forum. The MEF is an independent non-profit organization dedicated to promoting American interests in the Middle East. It includes Campus Watch, which exposes biases in Middle East Studies in American universities, and The Legal Project, which protects against predatory lawsuits filed by Islamists as well as combating free-speech restrictions.

I spoke with Dr. Pipes about the topics he specializes in: the role of Islam in public life, the Arab-Israeli conflict, and U.S. foreign policy. His views confirm his reputation as a fearless and sometimes controversial figure with the courage to express uncomfortable truths.

The peace agreements demonstrated that the Palestinian issue was not the problem. You have advocated for what you call the Israel Victory Project relating to Israel’s relationship with the Palestinian Arabs. Can you describe what it is and what kind of support it has garnered both within Israel and without?
Our efforts in the U.S. Congress were fairly effective. In 2017-2018, we had a caucus of, at its peak, 35 members in the House. We have since abandoned that and focused on Israel, the Knesset, and many other institutions. We are finding that there is a broad sympathy for the idea, which is a quite radical idea. Many people have spoken about the need to impress on the Palestinian Arabs that Israel is there and its government can’t be defeated. Israel Victory takes it a step further and says that not only do the Palestinian Arabs have to understand that Israel won’t be defeated, but the Palestinian Arabs need to be defeated. That’s going further than anyone else does.

How would you define defeat?
Very simply — defeat is imposing your will on your enemy. Whatever that might be. In this case, it would be accepting that Israel is there and permanent. My research suggests that through the past century about 20% of Palestinians have accepted that. Arabs played a very important role, especially in the pre-independence period, when they sold land, intelligence, and arms and provided all sorts of assistance to Jews. The rest are in denial, and the goal has to be to increase that [20%] to 40-60%.

How do you do that?
That is the challenge. First you have to make it your goal, which the Israeli government has not. Take Gaza. The current goal there is just to keep things quiet. My argument is that the Israeli security establishment — the IDF, intelligence services, police, and other services — just want quiet. They want no rockets or missiles coming out of Gaza and that’s acceptable to them. I’m saying it’s not. My argument is that there are three dangers: One is violence, be they missiles or knife attacks or anything else.

The second is, once again, the U.S. and European governments queuing up to have a peace process, which I call the war process and which is counterproductive. The third and, perhaps, most important, is the virulent hostility towards Israel around the world — on the left, among Muslims, from the far right, among various assorted dictators, and among certain Christian elements. No country has such hostility towards it [like] Israel has. So far that hasn’t had that much impact. Israel is flourishing, and so Israelis tend to shrug it off. I’m saying don’t be so cavalier.

How Art Museums Distort Jewish Culture, and Downplay Anti-Semitism

In recent years, art museums have grown increasing concerned with a variety of questions that might be characterized as “woke.” Are the works of artists of different races and ethnicities displayed in galleries? Are black as well as white subjects represented in paintings? Museums have taken such steps in response as making sure to mention the role of the Netherlands in the trans-Atlantic slave trade in an exhibit on 17th-century Dutch paintings. Yet, observes Menachem Wecker, none of these sensitivities seem to apply to Jews. Thus works by Philip Guston are censored or guarded by trigger warnings, while no mention is made of the fact that Guston was Jewish, or that he might have been responding to anti-Semitism with his work.

Wecker produces numerous examples of museums downplaying anti-Semitic portrayals of Jews in artworks, while often failing to identify such artists as Chaim Soutine as Jews—even when Jewish themes figure prominently in their art. Nor do Catholics fare much better, with anti-Catholic pieces like the now-notorious 1987 Piss Christ receiving ample contextualization intended to downplay controversy, whereas “when there’s no controversy, museums insert controversy.”

A couple of memes on double standards

These have been doing OK on Twitter.

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!

Traditional antisemitic attitudes getting mainstreamed

The latest AJC report on antisemitism in America has an interesting datapoint.

There were a number of questions asked of both Jews and the general American public about antisemitism, and for most of them, the responses were very similar. For example:

Amazingly, a higher percentage of the American public (90%) feels that the statement "ISrael has no right to exist" is antisemitic than Jews! (87%)

Where they diverge is concerning, though.

34% of the American public is not familiar with classic antisemitic tropes, and therefore they don't see the problem with a statement like "Jews control the media."

The next question is even more concerning - both about the general American response and the Jewish response:

58% of Americans and even 41% of Jews don't see comparing Covid mandates to the Holocaust as antisemitic - somehow, apparently, conflating mandatory wearing of the yellow star, as bad as that is, with gas chambers.

A lot of people are very uneducated.And the ignorance that results can help bring about the next wave of antisemitism.

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02/13 Links Pt1: Europe's Proxy War against Israel; When Terrorism Pays in Cash; Ukraine should back Israel for fighting Iran-backed Palestinian terror

From Ian:

By Maintaining Palestinians' Permanent Refugee Status, the UN Has Perpetuated Violence

Despite the work being done to promote peaceful solutions in the Middle East through the Abraham Accords, the UN appears to insist on keeping Israel's very existence in question and ensuring Palestinians remain as permanent refugees. The UN established the only permanent refugee organization in the world, the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA).

Millions of refugees poured out of Syria during the civil war, but no dedicated UN agency was founded for them. There are no international campaigns or significant Syrian refugee movements on university campuses calling for their return, because most have acclimatized to their new homes - as refugees generally do. Of all the refugees past and present, the Palestinians are the only ones who have their own permanent exhibit near the UN General Assembly.

After the Arab world went to war against the newly founded State of Israel in 1948, instead of absorbing the refugees into their host countries, UNRWA deliberately kept them in refugee camps. From a human rights point of view, that is completely unfair to the millions of children who have had their futures stolen from them by the UN and their host countries which refuse them citizenship.

Before 1948, the area was ruled by the British for a short time and by the Ottomans for 400 years before that. There was never a state of Palestine. This generation of Palestinians wants to lay claim to Jerusalem, but the holy city was never Palestinian. The way back to peace is for the UN and its agencies like UNRWA to stop deceiving the Palestinian people by suggesting that Israel is a temporary political entity. It's not going anywhere.

Europe's Proxy War against Israel

What is even more painful and humiliating for the Palestinians, is that EU officials who regularly visit the Gaza Strip intentionally ignore the suffering of the Palestinians living under Hamas.

On February 2, fifteen EU Heads of Mission visited the Gaza Strip without saying a single word about any of the victims of Hamas's crimes and human rights violations.

Notably, the EU did not state that it is Hamas, whose wealthy leaders live comfortable lives in Qatar, Turkey and other countries, that is mainly responsible for the bad "humanitarian situation" in the Gaza Strip.

Instead of working to strengthen the economy after it violently seized the Gaza Strip in 2007, Hamas has since been investing the millions of dollars it receives in building tunnels, and manufacturing and smuggling weapons to attack Israel.

Hamas, in addition to its disproportionately large military budget, also diverts aid money from Europe and the US to fund its military ventures.

When Hamas threatens that Israel will "pay the price," the Iranian-backed group is actually saying it will continue to murder Jews for daring to enforce the law against those who violate the law.

The EU show of solidarity with the residents of Khan al-Ahmar not only emboldens Hamas, it also incentivizes Palestinians to pursue their illegal attempts to seize territory that, in the Oslo Accords, they had agreed did not belong to them, as well as to continue launching terrorist attacks against Israel.

Recently, a confidential document composed by the EU mission in east Jerusalem revealed that Brussels is actively working with the Palestinians to take over all of Area C by building scores of other illegal "facts on the ground." By doing so, the EU has disqualified itself from playing the role of an honest broker in any future peace process between the Palestinians and Israel.

What right does any European official have to tell Israel that it is not permitted to enforce the law against illegal squatters? Would any European official tolerate it if, for example, an Israeli government official told the authorities in Paris or Madrid that they are not entitled to take action against those who break the law in their cities?

The actions of the EU finally expose its deep hostility toward Israel in Europe's proxy war against the Jewish state, as well as its undisguised bias in favor of the Palestinians.

By obsessing about Israel and ignoring the crimes of Hamas in the Gaza Strip, the EU is doing a massive disservice to the two million Palestinians living there. The EU's actions always seem more about hating Israel than helping the Palestinians.

If the Europeans truly cared at all about the Palestinians, they would raise the roof about the crimes committed by Hamas against the residents of the Gaza Strip. And they would be calling out their cohorts in the Palestinian Authority for abusive governance, corruption, embezzlement of public funds, and especially the Palestinian crackdown on human rights activists and journalists, who are trying to tell the EU, the international community and the so-called human rights groups about the brutal conditions under which their leaders keep forcing them to live.

When Terrorism Pays in Cash

Murder can be an all-too profitable endeavor for Palestinian terrorists. Despite pretensions to being a normal governmental organization, the Palestinian Authority doles out hundreds of millions of dollars to terrorists and their families. As Israel stares down another wave of terrorist violence, we cannot lose sight of the factors that fuel this escalation. The PA's continued incentives to commit heinous crimes should not be ignored.

Ramallah keeps its prisoners and "martyrs" highly satisfied. The PA grants an allowance of as much as $3,500 a month to those held in Israel's prisons for having murdered Jews. The allocation becomes a lifetime entitlement if the prison sentence runs more than five years. The PA celebrates the work of its "martyrs" by paying an allowance of around $500 a month to the family of a deceased terrorist. This comes on top of an initial lump-sum payment of $1,700. These are eye-popping amounts on the West Bank, where the annual GDP per capita sits at around $3,000. Terrorism can be a more lucrative profession than being a doctor or the head of a small business!

Notwithstanding the criticism the "pay-for-slay" program has drawn—and regular Palestinian promises of reform—the PA continues to cut hefty checks to those responsible for the most recent massacres of Jews. Khairi Alqam, who last week shot seven dead at a Jerusalem synagogue before he was neutralized, has secured his passage to heaven and his family's ascent into the Palestinian upper class. He carried out his attack on International Holocaust Remembrance Day and took the lives of several children. The adolescent who opened fire on two random passersby the next day near Jerusalem's City of David was taken alive—he will draw a monthly salary for the duration of his prison term. Those payments can add up: just ask Karim and Maher Younes, the murderers of Avraham Bromberg. The cousins, who were recently released, have received $1.2 million since the beginning of their incarceration in 1983. Surely, they will live out their golden years in great comfort.

The PA's subsidies for terror are a moral outrage, spurring further violence and rewarding fanatics. The PA has attempted to defend the indefensible, claiming that Hamas would step in to provide the funds were the PA to ever turn off the tap. But this excuse is weak tea; funding murder is always wrong, no matter the reason. Nothing could do more to showcase the PA's moral degeneracy and inaptitude as a partner for peace.

"Israeli prisons are training schools for resistance"

Earlier this year, Israel transferred some 70 prisoners to a new prison where they were isolated from each other, causing bitter complaints by Palestinian "prisoner rights" groups.

We may now have a reason why.

Earlier this month, Israel released Ahmed Abu Jazar after he finished a 19 year prison sentence. He is a member of Islamic Jihad, which is celebrating his release.

And the terror group notes that his arrest was not only on the charge of being a member, but also for participating in multiple terror attacks. His original sentence was extended when he tried to smuggle mobile phones into the prison.

In an interview with the Al Quds Brigades site, Abu Jazar says that Israeli prisons are training schools for terror: He said "the heroic prisoners were able to transform their detention centers into militant and revolutionary schools that contribute to raising the pace of their belonging and devotion to their people and their national cause, despite the deprivation, harassment and attacks they are subjected to."

Electronic Intifada had a fawning article about him when his sentence was extended in September, pretending that he was arrested for no legitimate reason and implying that he was practically a child. It also noted that he received a master's degree while in the inhumane Israeli prisons.

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Dashcam footage of car ramming attack on Friday

Muhammad Shehada is one of the most vocal defenders of Palestinian terror under the pretense of "human rights." He is the Chief of Communication for the Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor and is a columnist for the Forward, also having written for Haaretz, Vice and Newsweek.

He angrily denounced anyone who claimed that the car ramming attack on Friday that killed three, including two children, and critically injured others (including their father), saying that there was no evidence that the attack was deliberate.

Somehow, it is a sheer coincidence that Palestinians happen to lose control of cars near crowds of Jews. And equally strange that they celebrate those accidents and canonize the poor people who all have faulty brakes due to the "occupation."