Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Monday, March 13, 2023

Moroccan government rebukes opposition party for attacking its policy on Israel

Last week, Morocco's Islamist Justice and Development Party accused the Moroccan government of defending Israel in international forums:

Morocco's Foreign Minister Nasser Bourita has been slammed for allegedly "defending the Zionist entity" during meetings with African and European officials.

The Justice and Development Party (PJD) denounced Bourita's remarks during a meeting with the European Commissioner for Neighbourhood and Enlargement Oliver Varhelyi last week, in which he talked about tripartite regional cooperation and the "opportunities that it grants for development between Morocco, the European Commission and Israel."

The government issued a rare rebuke where it both expressed its support for Palestinian positions as well as defended its relations with Israel while accusing the PJD of playing politics:

The General Secretariat of the Justice and Development Party (PJD) recently issued a statement containing irresponsible excessive views and dangerous approximations concerning the relations between the Kingdom of Morocco and the State of Israel, against the background of the latest developments in the occupied Palestinian territories.

In this regard, the Office of His Majesty the King stresses the following:

Firstly: Morocco's position regarding the Palestinian question is irreversible. It constitutes one of the priorities of the foreign policy of His Majesty the King, the Commander of the Faithful and Chairman of the Al-Quds Committee, who places this issue on a par with the question of the Kingdom's territorial integrity. For Morocco, this is a constant, principled position, which should not be open to political posturing and narrow electoral campaigns.

Secondly: The Kingdom's foreign policy is a prerogative of His Majesty the King, may God assist him, as per the Constitution - a foreign policy which His Majesty implements in light of the immutable values and best interests of the nation, chief among which is the question of territorial integrity.

Thirdly: The Kingdom's international relations cannot be the subject of blackmail by anyone or for any consideration whatsoever, particularly in the current complex global context. The instrumentalization of the Kingdom's foreign policy in a domestic partisan agenda thus constitutes a dangerous, unacceptable precedent.

Fourthly: The resumption of relations between Morocco and Israel took place in circumstances and in a context which everyone knows. It is governed by the communiqué of the Office of His Majesty the King dated December 10, 2020, and the communiqué issued on the same day following the telephone conversation between His Majesty and the Palestinian President, as well as the Tripartite Declaration of December 22, 2020, signed in His Majesty's presence.

The nation's driving forces, political parties, as well as some prominent figures, and certain associations engaged in the Palestinian question, were at the time informed of that decision, for which they expressed their support and commitment.

Arabic media are interpreting this statement according to their own political positions, some emphasizing the Moroccan commitment to Palestinian positions and others highlighting the Moroccan government attacking an Islamist party.

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To China, Israel must be marginalized

There has been a great deal of analysis about the Chinese-brokered improvement of relations between Saudi Arabia and Iran.

As AP notes,

The agreement was seen as a major diplomatic triumph for China, coming as Gulf Arab states perceive the United States as winding down its involvement in the Middle East.

“I think it is a sign that China is increasingly confident in taking a more assertive role in the Middle East,” said Muhammad Zulfikar Rakhmat, an Indonesian academic affiliated with the Washington-based Middle East Institute.

China’s economic interests increasingly draw it into conflicts far from its shores. It’s by far the biggest customer for Middle Eastern energy exports, while the U.S. has reduced its need for imports as the country shifts toward energy independence.

Chinese officials have long argued that Beijing should play a more active role in the region, said June Teufel Dreyer, a political scientist at the University of Miami specializing in Chinese politics.

Meanwhile, U.S.-Saudi frictions have created “a vacuum that Beijing was happy to step into,” Dreyer said.

Absurdly, the Chinese Foreign Ministry published a statement claiming that Beijing “pursues no selfish interest whatsoever..”

Clearly, this is all about Chinese interests - in sidelining the US as a power broker in the Middle East, in extending its own power and influence - solidifying its status as a superpower.

Where does Israel fit in this Chinese calculus? Apparently, as an obstacle.

On Saturday, PA dictator Mahmoud Abbas hosted a delegation headed by the Chinese special envoy for the Middle East, Zhai Jun.

The President referred to the historical relations between China and Palestine, and the Palestinian leadership's keenness to strengthen and develop them for the benefit of the two friendly countries, appreciating the support provided by China to the Palestinian people and their just cause in all fields, stressing that Palestine will remain supportive of China in international forums despite all pressures .

In turn, the Chinese special envoy affirmed the firm and principled Chinese position in support of the Palestinian people and their just cause, and that China, whether during its presence in the UN Security Council or in all forums in which it is present, will remain supportive of the Palestinian people's right to freedom and independence..

As far as I can tell, Zhai Jun is not visiting Israel. He last visited a year ago and briefly said that while China and Israel do not agree about Iran, China "understands" Israel's concerns.

Both China and Israel seek to expand their influence in the region, and in that sense they are rivals - and China is the 900 pound panda.

In 2021, Zhai Jun published a manifesto of sorts describing China's goals for the Middle East: "China and Middle Eastern Countries: Towards a Brighter Shared Future." Israel is barely mentioned., only named in the 2,800 word article as an afterthought: "China has by far established 14 strategic partnerships with regional countries and the League of Arab States, and an innovative comprehensive partnership with Israel, adding strong vitality to the friendship and cooperation between the two sides."

Even when the document discusses the moribund peace process, it manages to avoid mentioning Israel by name:

In 2002, the Chinese government appointed its first Special Envoy for the Middle East. Over the past 18 years, five successive special envoys have made more than one hundred trips to the Middle East to promote peace talks and worked tirelessly for resolving the question of Palestine and other issues in the region. China’s Special Envoy for Syria and Ambassador for China-Arab States Cooperation Forum (CASCF) Affairs, two roles created later, have also conducted shuttle diplomacy and contributed their wisdom to resolve relevant hotspot issues. This is another example of how China upholds justice and assumes responsibility as a major country. Such efforts have been widely applauded and supported by the parties concerned.

China sees an opportunity to exploit the US incompetence in the region under the Obama and Biden administrations and it is exploiting it. Israel is at best a distraction and at worst an enemy in Chinese ambitions to dominate the region economically and diplomatically.

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75 years ago: Arabs bomb the Jewish Agency using a US Consulate car, killing 13

75 years ago, on March 11, 1948, a huge explosion shook Jerusalem as a car bomb detonated outside the Jewish Agency.

13 Jews were killed, including the head of the Agency, Leib Jaffe, 71, who had attended the First Zionist Congress in Basel in 1898.

A Christian Arab employee of the US Consulate took the car, with the US flag, into the compound and the Jewish Agency guards trusted him.

Arab snipers shot at rescue workers from across an Arab cemetery nearby.

A couple of days later, the Arab Higher Committee published a "Black Paper" listing the imagined crimes of the Jewish Agency and named major Zionist leaders as targets, comparing them to the Nazis.

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BDS leader Omar Barghouti admits BDS targets Jews, not "Zionists"

Last week, a bunch of "anti-Zionists" got together for a webcast that next to nobody watched about the dangers of "normalization" with Israel.

One of the speakers was Omar Barghouti, who claims to be the founder of the BDS movement. He explains here what, exactly, BDS opposes when it says it opposes normalization with Israel, giving two conditions before anyone can meet with the "Israeli side." Paraphrasing, the Israeli side must oppose Israel's existence as a Jewish state, and the meeting itself must be an anti-Israel meeting.

Then at the very end of his description, Barghouti says, "Again, 'Israeli side' means Jewish Israelis or Jewish Israeli institutions as the case may be."

Meaning, that it is not "normalization" to meet with Israeli Arabs or Israeli Christians even if they are Zionist. The "crime" of normalization applies only to meeting Jews.

Yes, BDS is antisemitic. But we knew that already.

Here is the video, with as much context as I could put in:

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03/12 Links: Who are the winners and losers in Iran-Saudi ties?; The ignorance of Gary Lineker; Nablus governor, PA security chiefs offer condolences to family of Huwara terrorist

From Ian:

Saudi deal with Iran worries Israel, shakes up Middle East

In Israel, bitterly divided and gripped by mass protests over plans by Netanyahu's far-right government to overhaul the judiciary, politicians seized on the rapprochement between the kingdom and Israel's archenemy as an opportunity to criticize Netanyahu, accusing him of focusing on his personal agenda at the expense of Israel's international relations.

Yair Lapid, the former prime minister and head of Israel's opposition, denounced the agreement between Riyadh and Tehran as "a full and dangerous failure of the Israeli government's foreign policy."

"This is what happens when you deal with legal madness all day instead of doing the job with Iran and strengthening relations with the US," he wrote on Twitter. Even Yuli Edelstein from Netanyahu's Likud party blamed Israel's "power struggles and head-butting" for distracting the country from its more pressing threats.

Another opposition lawmaker, Gideon Saar, mocked Netanyahu's goal of formal ties with the kingdom. "Netanyahu promised peace with Saudi Arabia," he wrote on social media. "In the end (Saudi Arabia) did it … with Iran."

Netanyahu, on an official visit to Italy, declined a request for comment and issued no statement on the matter. But quotes to Israeli media by an anonymous senior official in the delegation sought to put blame on the previous government that ruled for a year and a half before Netanyahu returned to office. "It happened because of the impression that Israel and the US were weak," said the senior official.

Despite the fallout for Netanyahu's reputation, experts doubted a detente would harm Israel. Saudi Arabia and Iran will remain regional rivals, even if they open embassies in each other's capitals, said Guzansky. And like the UAE, Saudi Arabia could deepen relations with Israel even while maintaining a transactional relationship with Iran.

"The low-key arrangement that the Saudis have with Israel will continue," said Umar Karim, an expert on Saudi politics at the University of Birmingham, noting that the Israeli occupation of the West Bank remained more of a barrier to Saudi recognition than differences over Iran. "The Saudi leadership is engaging in more than one way to secure its national security."

Seth Frantzman: Who are the winners and losers in Iran-Saudi ties?

China has clearly sought to expand its relationships in the region, and the decision by Iran and Saudi Arabia to work with China on normalization with each other is part of China becoming a diplomatic broker in the region.

Though this is a win for China, it was also a natural country to host this final step. Iran and Saudi Arabia already held talks in Baghdad about reconciliation, talks that began in 2021 and continued off-and-on with some stalls in 2022. Overall, the trajectory was clear.

Saudi Arabia had also reconciled with Qatar early in 2021, and it was rumored to be considering closer ties with Israel, a slow process that began back in 2015. The train was on the tracks for Saudi-Iran ties, all it needed was a bit of a push – which China gave

Does Israel lose out?
The potential for better Israel-Saudi ties have been a constant issue of speculation. Days before the Saudi-Iran deal was announced, there were reports in the Wall Street Journal and New York Times about Riyadh seeking security pledges from Washington as part of some kind of upgrade of ties with Israel.

Clearly, Saudi Arabia has been working on multiple policy tracks: China, Russia, the US and potentially Israel, all part of Riyadh’s new positioning of a more complex independent policy.

It’s unlikely that Iran ties will necessarily impact Israel negatively. Saudi Arabia has interests in Yemen and Lebanon, as well as in Syria and Iraq. In many ways, Saudi Arabia’s interests dovetail with Israel’s in terms of stability and not wanting Iran’s militias or proxies running these countries.

The Gulf in general is moving to reconcile with Syria, which can reduce chaos in the region. The era of war that defined the period after the Arab Spring, and the era of conflict that began decades ago with the rise of extremists, appears to be coming to some kind of a close.

The shifts in the Gulf are important for this to happen. Extremist groups have, one-by-one, been ejected by most Gulf states, except in Qatar. There is less funding for these groups; al-Qaeda and ISIS have been mostly defeated.

Stability and state-to-state relations are part of the new era. This is underpinned by big country politics and also deals that Israel has played a role in such as the Negev Summit, I2U2 and the Abraham Accords. Iran-Saudi ties can be viewed as part of that larger process of diplomacy.

As such, Israel might not lose out. Saudi Arabia can now articulate its concerns to Iran through diplomacy, rather than being at loggerheads. Countries tend to listen more than they have a way to speak and engage with one another, rather than portraying each other as enemies. New ties could reduce the Iranian threats.

IAF fighter jets, refuelers hold air drill with US forces, thought to focus on Iran

Israeli fighter jets and refueler aircraft on Sunday began a two-week air drill with the US Air Force at an airbase in Nevada, a joint activity thought to be focused on Iran, with officials saying the exercises would include long-range flights and simulate strikes in unfamiliar enemy territory.

The seven F-35I fighter jets and two Boeing 707 refueling planes of the Israeli Air Force had been arriving at Nellis Air Force Base since Wednesday, ahead of the drill, known as Red Flag 23-2.

In a statement Sunday, the Israel Defense Forces said the exercises would include a “strategic strike in the depth,” an apparent reference to a potential strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities.

Additionally, the air drills would simulate “achieving aerial superiority in the region, joint aerial strikes, area defense, interception of enemy aircraft, low-altitude flights and striking in an unfamiliar area with an abundance of anti-aircraft defenses.”

During the drill, the IAF refueler planes were to refuel American fighter jets, and Israeli fighter jets were to refuel from an American Boeing KC-46, of which Israel has ordered four and is expected to receive the first in 2025.

For Israel, the KC-46 aircraft are seen as necessary to conduct potential major strikes against targets in Iran, some 2,000 kilometers (1,200 miles) from Israel and far outside the normal flight range of Israeli jets.

Hmmm pic.twitter.com/C2FAtmRwQA
— Mike (@Doranimated) March 11, 2023

Lebanese freaking out that maritime agreement appears to be legal recognition of Israel

From Arab News:

There was controversy in Lebanon on Friday after a document on the demarcation of maritime borders appeared to suggest the country had recognized the neighboring state of Israel.

Talks have been ongoing between the two nations for some time amidst a backdrop of broader political tensions, with a state of war technically existing between them.

Possibilities of a thaw in relations have also been hindered by the influence of strongly anti-Israel factions in Lebanese politics, especially the Iran-affiliated Hezbollah.

The document in question, recorded as No. 71836 and published on the UN’s official website, said that “the secretary–general of the United Nations hereby certifies that the following international agreement has been registered with the secretariat in accordance with article 102 of the charter of the United Nations … constituting a maritime agreement between the state of Israel and the Lebanese Republic (with the letters, Oct. 18, 2020) Jerusalem, Oct. 27, 2020 and Baabda Oct. 27, 2022.”

One activist told Arab News on condition of anonymity: “The UN document is undeniably clear; Lebanon recognized the state of Israel, and Hezbollah’s role has become limited to protecting the common borders.”

Here is the UN document that is upsetting them so much:

At the time, Lebanon took pains to say that this is not recognition:

A letter approving the deal was first signed by Lebanese President Michel Aoun in Beirut and then by Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid in Jerusalem.

Lapid claimed that Lebanon's signing of the deal amounted to a de-facto recognition of Israel.

In a palace statement after he signed the agreement, Aoun said the deal would have "no political dimensions or impacts that contradict Lebanon's foreign policy."

"The agreement... will take the form of two exchanges of letters, one between Lebanon and the United States, and one between Israel and the United States," said Stephane Dujarric, spokesman for the UN Secretary General.

Lebanon, which has fought a series of wars with Israel, said it would not allow its delegation to be in the same room as the Israeli side, and the two parties would not even sign the same piece of paper.

Rafic Chelala, a spokesman for the Lebanese presidency, confirmed that the Lebanese delegation "will not... meet the Israeli delegation".

This latter article seems to contradict itself - was it one letter signed by both Israel and Lebanon in separate places, or as it two letters between each of them and the US?

I cannot find official copies of the letters from last October to see if both signatures are on the same page. Based on this Times of Israel article with the text of the letters, it does not appear that Lebanon recognized Israel in any way. But I cannot claim to know much about international treaty law.

Either way, it is fun to see the freak-out.

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As he did last year, Adin Haykin is documenting every single Palestinian killed by Israeli forces in the West Bank this year, and explaining the circumstances.

I put his current thread on a Twitter Thread Reader post.

Out of 80 killed this year, I count six who were uninvolved civilians. (I'm counting a father who was shot while trying to stop his son's arrest as a civilian.)

That means that 92.5% of those killed were actively part of hostilities, or members of armed groups. And that includes every single minor who was killed this year.

It is also entirely possible that some of the civilians listed were killed by Palestinian fire, which as we've seen has been quite wild.

A far as I can tell, never in the history of urban fighting has the percentage of innocent civilians killed been this low.

In contrast, over 50% of those killed in Operation Banner in Northern Ireland by the British Army were uninvolved civilians.

Western troops in Iraq, Afghanistan and Syria have never achieved anything close to this record.

The mainstream media emphasizes the uninvolved, as they should. But they do not contextualize their deaths with these facts that the IDF is far exceeding what is considered acceptable by any other army in history, especially when it often operates in an extremely challenging environment when there stone throwers and firebombs coming from attackers on all sides.

If any other army went under the same microscope that the IDF does, they would look horrible by comparison.

For example, the New York Times reported in 2021 about an attack by US forces five years earlier that no one knew about:

Shortly before 3 a.m. on July 19, 2016, American Special Operations forces bombed what they believed were three ISIS “staging areas” on the outskirts of Tokhar, a riverside hamlet in northern Syria. They reported 85 fighters killed. In fact, they hit houses far from the front line, where farmers, their families and other local people sought nighttime sanctuary from bombing and gunfire. More than 120 villagers were killed.

Do you remember reading about this incident, or the dozens of others that were uncovered in that story using Pentagon records? No, the story disappeared from the news media radar in no time.

Now, imagine the tsunami of coverage from multiple news outlets, the UN resolutions and condemnations from every nation on the planet, that would result if Israel killed 120 civilians in an air strike and claimed it was a successful strike on dozens of fighters.

That is not just a double standard. That is treating Israel as uniquely evil and ignoring far, far worse things done by "the good guys."

And that is the entire point. Israel's critics do not want you to know this context when they accuse Israel of war crimes. They do not want you to see how Israel compares to other armies. They never make 3D models of US bombing of wedding parties.

There is only one possible explanation for putting Israel under an electron microscope for doing an amazing job targeting terrorists while virtually ignoring the horrible mistakes that every other professional western army does. It isn't "concern over taxpayer dollars" or "humanitarian concerns" or any of the dozens of other excuses used to justify this obsession with how Israel fights terror. None of the Western armies who wantonly bombed dozens of innocents had to worry about an immediate threat of someone slipping through a porous border and attacking their own citizens who live only a few kilometers away.

The only explanation is antisemitism.

Maybe not the explicit, neo-Nazi kind, but this crazed obsession with finding everything wrong with Israel defending itself from real, imminent threats while ignoring everyday Palestinian terror cannot be logically explained any other way except to say that a Jewish state is assumed to be automatically criminal the way Jews have lived under that assumption for thousands of years.

The truly remarkable thing is that the IDF, like the Jews throughout history, don't respond by saying that they might as well act the way they are being accused of acting. Instead, they continue to improve their methods and work towards a 100% record of only killing those who are actively trying to kill them first. (In attacks on Iranian targets in Syria, they are very close to that 100%.)

The IDF is truly the most moral army in the world. It isn't even close.

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This frame appears to show a muzzle flash, but the WaPo can't see it.

The Washington Post has an article that they believe damns IDF troops - and they are so excited about it they took away the paywall so everyone can see their computer-modeled 3D analysis.

They did indeed document a war crime, but not the one they are pretending to have uncovered.

Israeli security forces in an armored vehicle fired repeatedly into a group of civilians sheltering between a mosque and a clinic after a Feb. 22 raid in the occupied West Bank city of Nablus, killing two people, including a teenager, and wounding three others, according to witnesses and a visual reconstruction of the event by The Washington Post.

For all the fancy 3-D modeling and hundreds of photos they claim to have used, the newspaper relies completely on one video, taken from above, showing a man with his arm extended with what appears to be a gun, and then running for cover. It is in the third part of this video:

The newspaper tries to claim that there is no evidence that the gunshot one can hear was from that gun, and even says, " The videos reviewed by The Post do not clearly show whether the man had a gun or fired, and none of the witnesses interviewed by The Post said they saw a gunman fire at the Israelis." Yet there appears to be a muzzle flash at the very beginning of the video (see photo above.) It is ignored by the Post.

They consult two experts about the two bangs heard, who say wildly different things: one says that they are not gunshots at all, and the other says they are gunshots but come from the Israelis, without saying how he could make such a distinction.

If two experts cannot even agree if a sound is gunfire or not, then what value do they add? The answer is that the WaPo can claim that they consulted audio experts when coming up with their foregone conclusion, even when they don't agree on anything!

When you look at the video of the man who appeared to be pointing a weapon then running to where the civilians are trying to avoid gunfire, it is obvious that he is holding something heavy like a gun. If his hands were empty he would not be running with his arms close together in front of him; his arms would be pumping at his sides the way normal people run.

Moreover, the civilians are running away before the IDF vehicle is shooting anything. (Look at the ones in the sunken plaza.) It appears they are running away from previous Palestinian gunshots, not Israeli.

The nature of open source forensics is that they are necessarily incomplete. We have no idea if there are any gunmen in the building behind the civilians, or on surrounding roofs, or across the street that may have shot the victims. The IDF did certainly fire in this video; we can see that some shots hit the pillar. But even if the IDF did shoot at the gunman and accidentally hit the victims, it is not a war crime. It is a split-second decision based on the information the soldiers had - they were being shot at, the gunman went for cover behind a stone pillar, and they were responding to the likelihood that the gunman would resume shooting at them as they passed the pillar. It is unclear that the soldiers even saw the civilians on the top of the stairs before the gunman ran to cover behind the pillar.

The entire life and death decision needed to be evaluated and made in fractions of a second.

Under the laws of armed conflict, while the existence of civilians is one factor to be weighed in such a decision, it is not the only factor. Troops are allowed and expected to defend themselves. A known gunman who runs for cover behind a pillar and who is about to be in line of sight is certainly a legitimate military target.

In peacetime, police are held to this higher standard of doing everything possible to avoid accidentally hitting civilians even if it means the gunman gets away. For armed conflicts, the laws are different. But the Washington Post doesn't say that - their entire article is geared towards the idea that the IDF had no right to target an armed man who was hiding among civilians. (And they know quite well that the civilians were not the intended targets.)

Isn't it interesting that the Post spent weeks and used four reporters with several experts consulted, and yet didn't even ask an international law expert whether Israel violated the laws of armed conflict?

And that brings up the other omission in the Washington Post's coverage: the armed man ran for shelter among civilians, making them into human shields. I mean this literally - he placed himself behind civilian bodies knowing that he was a target, possibly even shoving one person aside. And that really is a war crime!

Apparently, the reporters know quite well that the IDF didn't violate any laws. And that the Palestinian gunman did. And they don't want their readers to know that.

Remarkably, whenever the news media spends lots of time and money putting together elaborate 3D models of something involving Israel, it is always to say Israel is guilty. They try to replace honest investigations with razzle dazzle. And they are nearly always wrong.

When you put it all together, this article, like the others, is not meant to illuminate the truth, but to obfuscate it.

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

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03/11 Links: Wiesenthal Center urges UN's Guterres to denounce Iraq's law banning peace with Israel; US professors speak at terrorist's conference

From Ian:

The next Intifada is about to begin

I’ve argued elsewhere that the entire Palestinian predicament is the outcome of three very different Arab-Israeli wars which began in 1947, 1967, and 2000. It’s not an intuitive historical argument to make, as these three wars have so little in common. The first began as an Arab-Jewish civil war fought village by village, which then expanded into a multi-state war across four borders lasting a year and a half. The second was a rapid but conventional military conflict fought in less than a week. And the third was a low-intensity armed conflict characterised by frequent terrorist attacks and counterinsurgency operations by an occupying army which took about five years to peter out.

All three were preceded by a wave of righteous ecstasy on the Arab side. All three ended in a disastrous defeat for the Arab side that irreversibly worsened the political and economic situation of the Palestinians. And all three defeats were followed by the collective erasure of any memory of the excitement before the conflict. They instead became stories of distilled victimisation, almost ensuring a repeat performance a generation later.

Why does this keep happening? It’s not that Palestinians are uniquely irrational; nor are the Palestinians the only nation birthed by the collapse of an old imperial order. The Irish, Bulgarians, Greeks, Turks, Armenians, Poles, Ukrainians and many others formed modern states on a mix of historical claims and very modern myth-making throughout the 20th century, frequently in conditions of war and displacement, and always with unanswered territorial claims. Some of these were the basis for lingering resentments and conflicts for generations.

Yet none except for the Palestinians rejected statehood when it was on offer because it didn’t include all their territorial claims. And this includes the Israelis who accepted the UN partition plan on roughly half of what was left of the original British Mandate. Zionists accepted a state that didn’t even include Jerusalem, the focal point of Jewish longing for two millennia and already then, as for a century before, home to a Jewish majority. This is the difference between a movement for national liberation and a movement for the elimination of another nation. In the former, even a very difficult compromise can be understood as an achievement (however partial or internally controversial). In the latter, a compromise that leaves this unwanted presence is still an unacceptable defeat.

The Arab war against Zionism has been a central organising political fact of Arab politics for over a century. This self-destructive passion hit its peak in the mid-20th century, dragged numerous Arab states into repeated military catastrophes and saw nearly every Jewish community in the Arab world completely erased, some after a continuous presence of more than 2,000 years. Anti-Zionism serves the same totemic function for broad circles of activists and intellectuals in the West too. Accepting that Israel is not a state whose policies may merit severe critique, but one whose existence is a crime, is now the price of entry to the community of the good.

This is how the “Arab-Israeli” conflict morphs into the “Israeli-Palestinian” conflict, which then morphs into just “the occupation” and now increasingly “apartheid”. The first transition denied the scope of the conflict and effaced the reality of a tiny Jewish minority being marked for destruction by the Arab world as a whole. The second denied that there was a conflict at all, and rendered the entire situation as an extended outcome of an Israeli sin. The third eliminates even the possibility that such a sin can be expiated; it instead holds Israel’s existence as inherently evil. Between these two external forces, and with all the internal dysfunction of Palestinian politics, it is nearly impossible to expect the Palestinians to do what every other national liberation movement has done: seek political freedom and build a society from there. After three catastrophes in three generations, there is not even a hint of an alternative.

Three destructive and unnecessary wars put the Palestinians in the lamentable place they now inhabit. It’s impossible to know what the fourth will look like, but it’s unlikely it will resemble that or any of the previous three. The current violence has not sparked that war yet, but unless something dramatic changes in the political trajectories of both parties, something eventually will. And when it does, Israelis will pay a heavy and avoidable price — and the Palestinians an even larger one.

Daniel Greenfield: An Anti-Israel Op-Ed Accidentally Exposes the Bias Machine

Nadav Ziv fails to disclose that this was a response to the murder of two young men who were stuck in traffic in Hawara followed by celebrations in the Muslim village. One of a series of murders and assaults.

I’ll let Shmuel Sackett, an activist who lives in the area, tell the rest of the story. “1,600 Jewish families live in Har Bracha, Yitzhar, Itamar and Elon Moreh and their only way home, from the main Tapuach junction, is via this town. Every day, yes! – every single day – at least 20 Jewish cars get stoned while driving through Hawara. I highly doubt that this has ever happened to Rabbi Hauer… It’s important to note that “stoning cars” is not what you think. None of the violent Jew haters are throwing pebbles. They are throwing bricks and dropping cinder blocks from rooftops.”

Imagine a young mother with 3 children in her car, driving home from the supermarket. As she is driving, a brick comes crashing through her windshield. The shock of what happened is enough to give her a heart attack! The children start screaming, there is broken glass everywhere, but she cannot stop for help… because she’s in the middle of Hawara with a mob just waiting to finish the job.

This is not an exaggeration. This happens every day and the murder of Hillel and Yagel Yaniv was something that Hawara residents live for. After the brutal murder, candies and sweets were handed out, cake was distributed, and people were singing.

I’m going to be writing about Hawara elsewhere. Ziv’s ugly and dishonest op-ed is interesting for a whole other reason.

A LinkedIn with that name reveals that he appears to be an employee of 90 West: a strategic communications firm that are “committed to working with mission-driven organizations and individuals whose work aligns with the issues we believe are central to creating a more just, equitable, and sustainable future.”

What’s Ziv’s job at 90 West?

“I research and write op-eds with a focus on climate change, diversity, and taxes; conduct research on the clean energy transition with a focus on grid reliability and offshore wind; and help clients crystallize their research into coherent and engaging prose.”

Founded by an associate of former MA Governor Deval Patrick, the firm is currently tied to Squad member Rep. Ayanna Pressley. One of its missions is “assisting U.S. companies and organizations seeking to engage in Israel.”

The Los Angeles Times op-ed failed to disclose any of that. Instead, it just states that, “Nadav Ziv is a writer whose work includes essays about Judaism, antisemitism and Israel” While a chain of associations isn’t solid evidence, the failure to disclose that Ziv writes op-eds for a leftist strategic comms firm with a focus on Israel is a serious red flag.

Was the vile op-ed written for a 90 West client and planted in the LA Times to make it appear organic? If so which one? I’ve reached out to both Ziv and LA Times editorial page editors to get a response, but I suspect that there won’t be one.

Anti-Israel basis is systemic, but it’s also fed by a network of not only activist groups, but comms operations, many of which are disguised to appear Jewish or even pro-Israel, because that makes them more plausible. These operations are invisible to most people unless you do some digging. And when you do, what turns up is highly revealing. There are organic participants in an anti-Israel movement, but much of it is planted, bought and paid for with the complicity of the media which chooses not to reveal the machine behind the bias.

Jonathan Tobin: The ADL’s woke war on the right won’t stop antisemitism

Sometimes, the most important questions are the ones that aren’t asked about the issues that generate the most concern. That’s certainly true with respect to the widespread and justified concern about a rising tide of antisemitism that has spread across the globe to the United States. There, the question that isn’t being asked is whether the information we’re being fed by the Anti-Defamation League is illuminating the problem or actually doing more to confuse and distort the discussion about its core mission of fighting Jew-hatred.

Though the partisan tilt of the organization under its current CEO and national director Jonathan Greenblatt has been amply documented, it is still treated by the mainstream corporate media, as well as most of the Jewish community, as the authoritative voice on the subject. So when the group issues a report on the issue, as it did this week with a study on “White Supremacist Propaganda,” the world pays attention. The thrust of that document was the claim that the number of “white supremacist events” rose to an all-time high in 2022. That was treated as fodder for alarmist headlines that stoked the fears of Jews that the United States is in danger of being overrun by neo-Nazis.

But like many of the ADL’s reports in recent years, when reading beneath the headlines, the details don’t quite justify the fear-mongering that drives the group’s successful fundraising efforts. The key data point is that the group counted 170 “events” of white supremacist propaganda in 2022 as opposed to 108 in 2021. By “events,” they don’t reference actual attacks on Jews but rather the distribution of antisemitic fliers and stickers or posters or banners displayed publicly.

Any instance of far-right hate is one too many. Moreover, the memory of the murderous attacks on synagogues in Pittsburgh in 2018 and in Poway in 2019 is deeply embedded in the consciousness of Jews who have now sadly grown accustomed to the sight of armed guards at their places of worship. Anyone who has witnessed any of these “events” is entitled to be angry and concerned.

Yet while vigilance is necessary, the idea that even 170 such instances in a nation of 336 million people constitute a genuine surge of neo-Nazi hate cannot be taken seriously. The voices of far-right extremists are amplified by the Internet, and digital technology has also enabled them to communicate and organize in ways that were impossible a generation ago.

Yet the evidence doesn’t back up the idea that this is the principal threat to Jewish security. That was illustrated by what happened on Feb. 25.

Although many American Jews feared the worst when the news spread last month of a network of neo-Nazi groups planning a “National Day of Hate,” what happened was much like the “events” that the ADL puts forward as proof of a surge of far-right activity. The much-ballyhooed alarmism fell flat when that Saturday proved to be something of a virtual stunt with little, if any, neo-Nazi activity observed. This showed that although they get a lot of PR and attention from the ADL and the liberal media, their numbers remain tiny, and they have no political support for their efforts.

That is, of course, not the case with the intersectional left; it promotes a different brand of antisemitism that doesn’t seem to generate the same kind of threat among American Jewry. The demonization of Israel and its Jewish supporters, who are branded as the beneficiaries of “white privilege” and the oppressors of Palestinian “people of color,” is widespread and routinely published in mainstream publications like The New York Times and broadcast outlets like MSBC, and, as CAMERA pointed out this week, in overseas outlets like France24.

03/10 Links Pt2: Eugene Kontorovich: Our Think Tank Sparked Mass Protests in Israel. We Proudly Stand By Our Ideas; Ruthie Blum: Nakba Day and diversity at the Hebrew University

From Ian:

Victor Rosenthal: Playing chicken with the Jewish state

That one thing is Netanyahu. More specifically, the left’s hatred of him. As a result of this, what should have been a matter of discussion and compromise has become a conflict between the country’s two major blocs.

This is what lies behind the well-financed campaign against judicial reform. This campaign is dishonest and hysterical. If the reforms pass, opponents say, the justice system will be destroyed and Israel will become a fascist dictatorship. The economy will be wrecked, capital and tech workers will flee, the army will not fight and Israel will become a theocratic state soon to be overrun by her enemies.

This is nonsense. Even if the reforms are enacted in full, the situation would be no different than it was prior to the 1980s. If a compromise version of the reform were to pass, democracy in Israel would be enhanced, not damaged.

None of the reform bills have passed more than the first of three readings, so there is plenty of time to negotiate and compromise, and the government is willing to do so. The opposition, however, refuses to talk unless the process is frozen. The coalition believes that if the process is frozen, it will never be thawed, and insists that there can be negotiations during the normal legislative process.

In the meantime, opponents are ramping up their disruptions to the point that there are real fears of serious violence. The opposition sees blood in the water—Netanyahu’s—and can’t face the prospect of losing their veto power over the actions of any right-wing government. They have decided to keep their foot on the gas in the game of chicken until Netanyahu and his coalition blink.

What should happen is for the grownups in the opposition to work out a compromise with the government that will restore judicial balance without harming either side or the nation. This is perfectly possible.

What might happen is that the left has unleashed forces that cannot be controlled. In that case, the game of chicken could end in a fiery head-on collision.

Eugene Kontorovich: Our Think Tank Sparked Mass Protests in Israel. We Proudly Stand By Our Ideas.

If you subscribe to mainstream American newspapers—or if you read Matti Friedman’s piece the other day in these pages—perhaps you’ve heard that Israeli democracy is in grave danger because of the government’s proposed judicial reforms. The two of us are well situated to address those concerns: our think tank drafted some of the policy papers that have informed the current government.

In other words, those marching in the streets of Tel Aviv are protesting many of our ideas.

They are ideas we stand by proudly—and that we suspect will resonate with reasonable people capable of looking past the noise.

Here is the current reality in Israel: the Jewish state is a thriving democracy, but its Supreme Court is a law unto itself. Its unchecked power began in the early 1990s, when the Court’s president, Aharon Barak, announced that even in the absence of a constitution, the Court could invalidate legislation and block government actions with which it disagreed.

Barak’s so-called “constitutional revolution”—that’s what Barak himself dubbed it—also had the effect of creating an ideologically homogeneous court. Unlike the situation in almost every democratic country in the world, in Israel, sitting Supreme Court justices and representatives of the Bar Association—who have strong personal incentives to vote with the justices, and almost always do so in practice—constitute a majority of the committee that selects new judges on all courts. This has resulted in a self-perpetuating clique, drawn largely from the country’s political left and social elite, that has final say over almost every policy decision in the country.

There were other changes, too—and none of them were voted on by the people or the Knesset.

Barak retroactively declared Israel’s Basic Laws to be a functional constitution and began striking down laws on that basis. (Israel has no formal constitution.) The Court also gave itself the power to veto government actions that satisfied all legal criteria, but that the Court simply regarded as “unreasonable.” It also declared that the attorney general is not merely the government’s legal advisor; he is its boss, in the sense that any directive issued by the attorney general is legally binding on the government. Just imagine in the United States if the attorney general—and not the president—got the last word on government policy on every issue from the death penalty to gay rights.

This is the current situation in Israel. For decades, the majority of citizens have had their voices—and the outcome of their votes—silenced by a growing tyranny of unelected officials and technocrats.

The proposed reforms currently under consideration in Israel’s Knesset are designed to remedy the situation by instituting some basic checks and balances on the Court—checks and balances that are the norm in other Western democracies.

Iddo Netanyahu: Judicial reform won't make Israel dictatorship - PM's brother to 'Post'

The members of “Team Amnon,” who served in Sayeret Matkal when my late brother Yoni commanded it and who performed with distinction and bravery in the raid on Entebbe, recently wrote an open letter to Bibi and me. Initially, I did not intend to write a response. Why bother? To yet again, spend my time correcting distortions about my family and me, even if now it was coming from a few of Yoni’s subordinates?

What persuaded me to reply was one sentence that struck me in their letter. It bothered me greatly and still does. We will get to it later.

The team members write that I called the protesters (and by extension, them as well, since it turns out they participated in the protests) “people whose minds were misled.” True, since in my opinion, those who sincerely believe that the proposed judicial reform will turn Israel into a “dictatorship” have indeed allowed themselves to be misled. Had “Team Amnon” bothered to read the explanations provided by the reform initiators and then to think about them in depth, they would know that the reform will certainly not bring about the destruction of democracy, but is intended to do the exact opposite: enhance and strengthen it.

This in fact is also the opinion of quite a few opposition leaders, who in the past spoke emphatically against the current legal system and in support of the reform, only to now furiously lash out against it. They themselves, of course, do not believe for a moment their own slogans about “the end of democracy” and “dictatorship”; they do, indeed, knowingly and intentionally mislead others.

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!

03/10 Links Pt1: 3 wounded, including 1 critically, in central Tel Aviv terror shooting; Iran, Saudi Arabia to resume relations after years of tension

From Ian:

3 wounded, including 1 critically, in central Tel Aviv terror shooting

Three people were shot and wounded in a terrorist shooting near a cafe in central Tel Aviv on Thursday night, police and medics said.

Police said the Palestinian attacker opened fire at people outside the cafe on the corner of Dizengoff Street and Ben Gurion Street, an area typically bustling on Thursday night. He then fled the scene while shooting at other people in the area, before being shot dead in a shootout with police officers a short time later.

One victim was listed in critical but stable condition after undergoing surgery and was still fighting for his life, said doctors at Ichilov Medical Center, where the injured were taken. The other two were listed in serious and moderate condition, the Magen David Adom ambulance service said.

The hospital said the critically wounded victim was stabilized and was to undergo surgery along with the other man who was seriously hurt. Another two victims were brought to the hospital to be treated for anxiety.

Police said they were treating the shooting as a terror attack.

In graphic footage from the moment of the attack, a man in a black jacket can be seen walking briskly behind a group of three men before pulling out a pistol and opening fire at them from point-blank range. He can then be seen trying to flee as panicked cafe patrons take cover.

Tel Aviv terror victim in life-threatening condition, another undergoes neurosurgery

Two people severely injured in a terrorist shooting in Tel Aviv Thursday evening remained in very grave condition the following morning, doctors said.

Three friends in their 30s were injured on Thursday night when a Palestinian attacker opened fire at people outside a cafe on the corner of Dizengoff Street and Ben Gurion Street. He then fled the scene while shooting at other people in the area, before he was killed in a shootout with police officers a short time later.

Or Asher, 32, was hospitalized in critical condition at the emergency care ward at Ichilov Hospital, according to a Friday statement. A second man, Rotem Mansano, 34, was also in serious condition and being treated in the emergency neurosurgery ward, doctors said.

Both victims were sedated and breathing through a respirator.

The third victim, Michael Osdon, 36, who suffered light to moderate wounds, was hospitalized in the plastic surgery ward.

Dr. Or Goren of Ichilov told Kan public radio that Asher was wounded in the neck. According to the doctor, Mansano and Osdon’s conditions were not life-threatening.

Tel Aviv terror attack victim: We're here to stay and keep fighting

Michael Osdon, who was moderately injured on Thursday in the Tel Aviv terror attack and was taken to Ichilov Medical Center where his two friends are fighting for his lives, said that he and his two close friends were on their way to a wedding when the terrorist ran up to them and opened fire.

"Yesterday at 8:40 p.m., were went to Dizengoff from north to south on our way to a close friend's wedding, and just as we were getting to the junction, one of my friends who was to my left was hit with a bullet from behind," he said. "After that, the terrorist moved to my side and shot me from behind. I moved my head, and my cheek was hit instead of my head. He shot another bullet at my third friend."

Osdon said that after his friends fell on the road, he tried to run for help, but the terrorist kept chasing him.

"Unfortunately, my two friends are in a condition that they need to be prayed for very hard."

"He shot another bullet at me, but he missed," said Osdon. "I continued to the ice cream parlor and asked them to call an ambulance, and the incident kept going for another minute and half until security forces showed up. They took us to the hospital, and unfortunately, my two friends are in a condition that they need to be prayed for very hard."

Was the wedding disrupted by the attack?
Osdon may not have reached his friend's wedding, but he said the event happened despite the terror attack. "I'm very happy it did," he said. "We have to continue with our lives, and we cannot stop and give someone the understanding that we don't intend on staying and keep fighting.

Osdon concluded with another appeal for people to pray for his friends' recoveries.

The terrorist, a 23-year-old Palestinian affiliated with Hamas, was shot and killed by Israel Police officers shortly after the shooting.

Today's Muslim antisemitism sounds a lot like Christian antisemitism in England in the 1750s

In the mid 18th century, British lawmakers were debating whether to allow Jews to become full citizens of the country. Jews had been returning to Britain starting in the mid-1600s after being expelled in 1290, but they were not allowed to be citizens.

As Parliament debated the short-lived Jewish Naturalisation Act of 1753 (repealed in 1754), a Christian Jew-hater with the nom de plume "Christianus" wrote to the Newcastle Weekly Courant about all the reasons that Jews should not become citizens of England.

His arguments mirror the antisemitic arguments of Muslims, today.

Muslims claim that Jews break their agreements. Christians in England claimed that Jewish law allows Jews to break all oaths.

Muslims claim that the Talmud is a bigoted work that ensures Jewish supremacism. Christians in England claimed the same.

Muslims claim that Jews are descendants of apes and pigs. The Christians called the Jew "wolves" who would destroy the Christian flock from within.

Muslims claim that Jews kill prophets. Of course Christians in the 18th century believed that Jews killed Jesus.(The letter writer is aghast that "the Murderers of Christ are to be incorporated into the Body of Christians!")

Here is only an excerpt of the letter:

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!

Today, 2-year old Hadar Noga Lavi was laid to rest less than a week after being critically wounded in a head-on collision as her mother was returning her from a medical appointment.

Her mother, Idit Lavi of Shiloh, is convinced that her daughter was the victim of a suicide terror attack.

The mother said that Hadar had hurt her back and she took her to Shaarei Tzedek hospital in Jerusalem on Saturday night. She was returning, driving on Route 60 in Samaria, when she saw a car approaching her in the wrong lane. She swerved to the opposite lane, he followed her, and she zig-zagged back to the right lane and he again followed her and crashed into her car head-on.

While Idit Lavi is certain that it was an intentional attack, Israeli police and the Binyamin council are treating this as a simple car accident, complaining about the road conditions that contributed to the crash and about wild Arab drivers on that road.

Arabic media reports from the time do seem to indicate that it was a multi-vehicle accident. Three Arabs were killed and others injured in other cars.

Perhaps the Palestinian driver, with two other young men in the car, was playing "chicken."

But since Hadar's death today, Arab media prefer the narrative that this was a terror operation, calling Hadar a "female settler." Palestinians would rather than their own heroically die by trying to kill a young mother and small daughter than think that they died in an accident.

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!