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! |
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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! |
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Walking in the footsteps of Jesus, huge crowds of Christian pilgrims have this month thronged Jerusalem's ancient streets where the Easter story unfolded."It's very emotional, I already cried a little," says Marina, who is visiting from Belgrade and joined the Orthodox Good Friday procession carrying a wooden cross. "It's something you have to feel to be here."Local Christians also stand out as they join the devotions, with Palestinian and Armenian scout groups leading religious processions.But in recent months, Christians living in the occupied East of the city say they have seen increased harassment and violence.
The holy city of Jerusalem lies at the heart of the Christian faith. However, the number of Christians living here has dropped from a quarter of the population a century ago to under 2%. Many have emigrated, escaping the painful daily realities of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and seeking better opportunities elsewhere.
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! |
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In 1949, nine months after the State of Israel was formally recognized by both U.S. President Truman and Soviet Premier Josef Stalin, Britain refused to acknowledge the existence of the first Jewish commonwealth to appear on the earth in 2,000 years. The Labor foreign minister, Ernest Bevin, known for his antipathy to Zionism, refused to consider that a fledgling Jewish state should be of interest when it was opposed by so many countries that seemed to matter more to Britain. In response, the leader of the opposition, Winston Churchill, stood in Parliament and delivered one of his addresses for the ages. He accused Bevin of presentism, of maintaining a stunted historical perspective.Declaring Independence, 75 Years Later
“Whether the right honorable gentleman likes it or not,” Churchill said, “the coming into being of a Jewish state in Palestine is an event in world history to be viewed in the perspective, not of a generation or a century, but in the perspective of a thousand, two thousand or even three thousand years. That is a standard of temporal values or time-values which seems very much out of accord with the perpetual click-clack of our rapidly changing moods and of the age in which we live. This is an event in world history.”
Churchill’s words are worth bearing in mind as we consider the contretemps over judicial reform in Israel as the nation moves toward the 75th anniversary of its inception. In the midst of all of the rancor, it is easy to overlook how remarkable, from a historical perspective, this anniversary actually is. It should be obvious, of course, that Israel’s birth was astounding: that, as Paul Johnson reflected in these pages, while 100 states came into being in the 20th century, only Israel’s birth counts as a miracle. But as we mark 75 years of a modern Jewish state, a study of history reveals another fascinating fact: This might be the most stable 75 years of government that the Jewish people have had in Jerusalem in all of Jewish history.
Can this be? Consider: Several thousand years ago, David first conquered Jerusalem and made it his capital and was soon after temporarily overthrown by his son Absalom. David was forced to flee the city, returning only after he had conquered and defeated his son’s forces. Solomon succeeded his father and ruled in peace and prosperity, whereupon the Israelite monarchy summarily split between kingdoms north and south, which is how the Holy Land remained until its conquest by Assyria and Babylon.
Amid the sturm und Drang surrounding the judicial reform proposals put forward by the new Israeli government, which many have called a “constitutional crisis,” the words of the Jewish state’s former attorney general, Avichai Mandelblit, were especially telling. In decrying the proposed reforms and what would happen if they take effect, Mandelblit said, “What remains of the Declaration of Independence? It will just become a piece of paper we can throw in the trash.” Mandelblit’s reference to Israel’s Declaration of Independence sent me back to the text itself in search of answers. Just as I had remembered from my Zionist upbringing, which included regularly listening to David Ben-Gurion’s famous reading of the Declaration on May 15, 1948, Israel actually has no constitution, despite the fact that the Declaration promises one in the future.John Podhoretz: Who’s Actually Saving Democracy Here?
A fascinating new book by Neil Rogachevsky and Dov Zigler tells the story of the writing of Israel’s Declaration of Independence and offers some insights into why, 75 years after its founding, Israel still has no written constitution. Israel’s Declaration of Independence offers readers a ringside seat. As in any good story, there is a hero, in this case David Ben-Gurion. Rogachevsky and Zigler tell the stirring story of how Israel’s first prime minister wrestled with earlier drafts of the Declaration in the final hours before he declared Israel’s statehood and, mediating among competing Zionist ideologies, put his own indelible imprint on the final document.
The book builds on the work of Yoram Shachar, who discovered the earliest draft of the Declaration, written in late April 1948 by a young government lawyer named Mordechai Beham. Rogachevsky and Zigler carefully trace the development of the Declaration from Beham’s draft through subsequent versions hastily composed by Tzvi Berenson, Herschel Lauterpacht, Moshe Shertok, and finally Ben-Gurion during the frenzied days before the British Mandate ended. Taken as a whole, the various versions offer readers a tour of the diverse and often competing political philosophies that framed the modern Zionist movement.
I said last month in this space that the Netanyahu government had been extraordinarily imprudent in the way it pursued its agenda—trying to ram through changes at lightning speed in a country where domestic policy had been pretty much frozen in place over the previous eight years. I think that opinion was borne out by Netanyahu’s decision to suspend the judicial-reform process and enter into negotiations to calm the roiling political waters.
He did so in large measure out of fear not of the demonstrations but of the effect of the demonstrations on the behavior of the nation’s military and reservists. Here Netanyahu showed a kind of pragmatic and necessary foresight he had lacked at the beginning. Just as he was doing so, Israel found itself challenged perhaps as never before by what appears to be a four-front assault—rockets from Gaza and Lebanon and terrorist attacks from the West Bank, all of it apparently directed by Iran.
The right that wants to disempower certain aspects of the nation’s judiciary and the left that is staging a revolution against Israel’s democracy supposedly in the name of preserving that democracy got wrapped up in their own melodramas over the past six months. And both seemed to have forgotten about the existential threat Israel has faced over the past 75 years from its enemies—and still faces today. Luckily for the nation he leads despite protestors shamefully likening him to Pharaoh on the eve of Passover, Netanyahu hasn’t.
The US and the HolocaustJPost Editorial: Israel must reassess its handling of Holocaust school trips to Poland
America’s vital role in the defeat of Nazi Germany is unquestionable and can be readily appreciated firsthand by touring the Normandy beaches of the June 1944, D-Day landings – as I did in 2019 together with my daughter, an IDF officer.
Steven Spielberg’s epic Saving Private Ryan, which we watched again the night before the voyage from Plymouth to Le Havre, gives cinematic expression to the enormity of the Allied effort and to the immense sacrifice of American blood.
Here too my family has a personal debt. Until his death, my father celebrated April 13, the day in 1945 when the US Army’s 102nd infantry division entered Uetz and liberated him – in his words, “a very lucky day.”
But while America was instrumental in the victory over Germany, it is sometimes forgotten that Washington didn’t declare war on the Nazis – it was Hitler who declared war on the US.
Germany invaded Poland in September 1939; Denmark and Norway in April 1940; Belgium, Holland, Luxembourg, and France in May 1940; Yugoslavia and Greece in April 1941; and the Soviet Union in June 1941. All the while, America remained neutral.
Although president Franklin Roosevelt backed the Brits in the 1940 Battle of Britain, the US was not a combatant, and to Churchill’s great chagrin, London had to pay for Washington’s Lend-Lease support.
American isolationism ended on December 7, 1941, with the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Hypothetically, just as the Soviets fought the Germans without fighting the Japanese, America could have fought the Japanese without fighting the Germans. But any strategic dilemma Washington faced was solved by the December 11, 1941, Nazi declaration of war.
Throughout, America maintained strict restrictions on the admittance of Jewish refugees – the State Department consistently opposed giving any priority to immigrants fleeing racial or religious persecution.
In 1939 alone, close to 300,000 German Jews applied for US visas, creating an 11-year waiting list.
Public opinion bolstered bureaucratic callousness. A 1938 poll showed that 82% of Americans opposed admitting larger numbers of Jewish refugees.
The voyage of the St. Louis was emblematic of the situation. Carrying 937 refugees, the ship sailed from Hamburg for the Western Hemisphere, but was denied entry to Canada, Cuba, and the US. Despite a campaign by Jewish organizations, Washington refused to budge, and the vessel was forced to return to Europe, where many of its ill-fated passengers ended up in the camps.
On April 4, 1944, Auschwitz was first overflown by US reconnaissance aircraft. Over the following months, American bombers conducted a series of operations in proximity to the notorious death camp, including raids upon nearby oil refineries and industrial targets.
In parallel, from May 15 to July 9, 1944, Hungarian Jews were being transported en masse to Auschwitz: 45 cattle cars per train, 4 trains per day, 12,000 Jews in a single day – 424,000 gassed in total.
Reports about the mass murder at Auschwitz had been broadcast by the BBC (June 15, 1944) and published in The New York Times (June 20, 1944). Yet despite the activity of American bombers in the immediate vicinity, no attempt was made to destroy the extermination facilities or the rail lines leading to them.
Surely, this history also deserves a place in our national memory.
Yad Vashem issued a statement stating that the group trips must maintain “complete historical accuracy, including the role of Poles in the persecution, handing in, and murder of Jews during the Holocaust, as well as in acts of rescue... We believe that all educational visits from Israel to Poland in the future will be conducted accordingly.”
There are many educational facilities and sites within Israel that can provide excellent background material and preparation for the trips, addressing the unique relevance to young Israelis.
Care should be taken to ensure that today’s youth realize the true scope and aims of the Nazis: to destroy the entire Jewish people. Most of the Holocaust took place in Europe because it spread from Nazi Germany. The Nazis established many of their concentration camps in Poland, which it had invaded. Nonetheless, the Shoah was not only an attempt to eradicate European Jewry, but world Jewry – Jews wherever they were found. Sephardic Jews were killed in Greece, Libya, Tunisia and elsewhere, and if the Nazis had had their way, millions more Jews would have been murdered. The Holocaust was not an atrocity against Ashkenazi Jews but against Jews, period.
The role of Righteous Gentiles – those brave people, in Poland and elsewhere, who risked their own lives to save Jews – needs to be acknowledged, along with the fact that they were the minority. That is what makes their acts so courageous and commendable. The complicity of locals willing to help destroy Jewish communities and kill Jewish neighbors should not be overlooked.
Finally, the trips must be affordable for all. No student should be denied the chance to travel to see the sites where the Nazi atrocities took place for lack of funds. At the same time, there needs to be a greater effort to prevent the trips from turning into a shallow experience – they should not be considered glorified, fun school trips.
As we approach Yom Hashoah, Holocaust Remembrance Day, we should take the opportunity to reassess how Israel handles Holocaust education and commemoration – not in response to Polish demands, but for Israel’s own sake.
The Democrats appear to think that, as with Israel, they have the right to dictate a particular outcome in Northern Ireland. Despite their pieties about “peace,” that outcome is clearly a united Ireland—an agenda that constitutes a direct attack on the identity and integrity of the United Kingdom.Joe Biden poses for a selfie with alleged IRA member and former Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams - after his advisors scrambled to insist he was NOT anti-British
Early last week, Clinton and Gerry Adams topped the bill at what the Spectator described as a “grand back-slapping affair for Sinn Féin and their unnamed comrades” in New York to celebrate 25 years of the Good Friday Agreement.
The event organizer, Marty Glennon, spelled out that the true purpose of the agreement was “the reunification of Ireland.” After expressing satisfaction at the way the unionists were continuing to lose to the republicans, Clinton added that even so, “we need to finish the job there.”
For his part, after delivering in Belfast some meaningless platitudes about peace, Biden proceeded to insult Britain. After no more than a coffee with Sunak and a brief meeting with local party leaders, Biden departed for two full days in the Irish Republic where he loudly lauded everything and said he felt he was “coming home.” For good measure, he also snubbed the coronation of King Charles III on May 6 by announcing that he would be absent and that his wife would be present instead.
That’s how Biden is treating America’s most significant ally in the west. When it comes to Israel, America’s only true ally in the Middle East, arrogant magical thinking moves closer to outright malevolence.
For the Biden administration continues to ignore the Palestinians’ murderous agenda of exterminating Israel. It continues to fund the Palestinian Authority despite its “pay-for-slay” policy of rewarding terrorists’ families for killing Israelis. It refuses to hold the P.A. to account for inciting violence over fabricated threats to Temple Mount. Instead, it threatens Israel not to take the action that’s needed to protect Israeli lives and Jewish human rights.
It has displayed its disapproval that Benjamin Netanyahu is Israel’s prime minister by failing to invite him to the White House. It has interfered in Israel’s internal row over judicial reform by issuing not-so-veiled threats if Netanyahu doesn’t abandon the policy.
Privileging murderous aggressors over their victims, America continues to interfere in the affairs of other sovereign nations like high-handed colonial administrators.
The outstanding similarity between Northern Ireland and Israel is that the Biden administration is treating its two principal global allies like dirt while continuing to empower the enemies of civilization.
Joe Biden on Thursday posed for a selfie with Gerry Adams, the former leader of Irish nationalist party Sinn Fein, in yet another blow to his advisors scrambling to insist that he is not anti-British.
Adams has spent his life trying to secure a united Ireland, and end British rule in the North. Despite years of rumors, Adams has always denied any membership with the IRA and has refuted any involvement in their terror campaign during the decades of the Troubles.
Biden addressed a joint session of parliament at Leinster House in Dublin, delivering a speech he said was 'to reflect on the enduring strength of the connections between Ireland and the United States, a partnership for the ages.'
Among those listening was Adams, the 74-year-old former Sinn Fein leader, who has known Biden for many years.
Adams, who stood down as Sinn Fein chief in 2018 after 30 years, posted a selfie of the pair together, captioned: 'A President Biden Selfie.'
The selfie does little to help White House aides, who insisted on Wednesday that Biden is 'not anti-British'.
Whenever they occur terrorist attacks are met with global sympathy – except of course when they happen to Jews in Israel. But even for those of us who have become used to the blatant double standards, loaded headlines, and insincere commentary that regularly accompany these tragic events, the raw hate that we saw following the tragic events of last Friday still took us by surprise.Dr. Mordechai Kedar: ‘Death to Israel’: The Iranian plan to attack Israel
The Brutal terrorist attack
The Dee family had moved from London to Israel in 2014, and went to live in Efrat, a town situated in the Etzion bloc between Jerusalem and Hebron. The family held dual citizenship, and the father Leo, had once been the Rabbi at the Radlett synagogue in Hertfordshire.
On Friday, 7 April 2023, during the Pesach break, the family set off for a holiday to Lake Kinneret. They split into separate cars for the journey. As the car carrying the mother, Lucy and two daughters Maia (20) and Rina (15) reached Hamra Junction, it was attacked by Palestinian terrorists. Once the driver had been injured and the car had crashed, the terrorists walked up to the car and shot all three at point blank range. Maia and Rina were killed immediately. The mother, Lucy died three days later in hospital.
The natural response is heartbreak
This was a family torn apart in a brutal killing by Palestinian terrorists. Lucy and her two daughters had their lives stolen from them by hate-filled people who believe that killing Jews is a religious duty. The ideology of the terrorists is the same warped religious ideology that massacred innocent people in Manchester, London, Paris, Nice, Madrid, Brussels, New York, Berlin and 100s of other places around the world. They all had their excuses. The father, and the remaining children will somehow need to pick up the pieces and it is almost impossible for any normal person not to feel heartbreak for those that are left behind.
With the Jews it is different – even from the mainstream
Whenever terrorist attacks such as this occur there is usually a united outpouring of sympathy. Across the globe, landmarks and famous buildings are lit up with the colours of the victim country – as a means of standing in solidarity in their moment of heartbreak.
Charlie Hebdo solidarity
Except of course when it happens to Jews in Israel. At best we see a few meaningless words of condemnation from key political figures, but even these can be wrapped up in talk of ‘violence on both sides’ – thus equating Jews who are defending themselves against terrorism with the death cult of the terrorists.
Newspapers also rush to ‘blame the victim’, with most editors making sure they write the word ‘occupied‘, more often than they inserted humanising details about the innocent civilians that were murdered. Outlets like the Guardian stayed true to form and spent more time bashing Israel than criticising the terrorists.
Imagine for a minute an article about the Manchester Arena bombing focusing on what the UK and US did in Libya, Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan rather than the young concert goers who were massacred at the venue. Salman Ramadan Abedi was an angry terrorist personally caught up in the devastation of Libya, but not a sane newspaper editor in the western world would have tried to rationalise his actions in the way that Palestinian terrorism is always excused. Had one done so, it is doubtful his newspaper would have survived.
The murder of Jews is treated differently. Somehow the media always finds a way to suggest we deserved it. And let us be honest here, the only reason this attack even got the limited attention that it did – is because the victims held a dual British citizenship.
From the point of view of the West, the loss of Israel would not be so terrible, because in any case the Middle East turned its back on the West when Saudi Arabia and its Gulf partners—countries much more important than Israel—decided to turn their backs on the weak Western coalition and join the strong and growing Eastern Alliance that includes Russia, China, Iran, North Korea, Venezuela and more.Ruthie Blum: Is Hamas smelling Israeli weakness?
The Iranian government is very impressed by the continued desire of the Americans in particular and the West in general to appease them, lift the sanctions and accept it as a respected member of the family of nations, while demonstrably ignoring the Iranian race towards the bomb. This Western behavior instills in the hearts of the decision makers in Iran the feeling that no one in the West will do anything on the practical, military level to stop an air and ground attack on Israel such as the one described above.
The U.S. forces deployed in eastern Syria are meant to protect American interests, not Israeli ones, and Iran has already demonstrated several times that it has no problem attacking these American forces with missiles and drones. The American administration knows the negative attitude of the liberal majority of American Jewry towards Israel, particularly in recent months, and therefore is not afraid it will pay too great a public and political price if it allows Israel to deal with the Iranian invasion on its own. Biden will of course declare to the cameras that “Israel has the right to defend itself,” but he will try not to take actual steps.
A coordinated missile and UAV attack is not a theory; Iran has already done this in Saudi Arabia, on Sept. 14, 2019, and this attack caused enormous damage to Saudi Arabia’s oil export capacity, reducing it for many months. This was probably the reason for Saudi Arabia’s avoidance of joining the Abraham Accords and a factor that pushed Saudi Arabia into recently abandoning the understandings it had with Israel and joining the Iranian camp. The United States under Trump’s presidency, and Europe, did nothing against Iran following the attack in 2019, so it is certain that today they will do nothing when Biden is the president.
I don’t know how realistic this scenario of an air and ground attack on Israel is, but even if the chance of it happening in the foreseeable future is only one percent, the State of Israel must act as one united entity, and it is very important that the coalition work with the opposition in order to prepare the country and military for this scenario.
If the Israeli public wants to survive, it must prepare—mentally and physically—for war with the Iranian octopus that has managed to establish its grip on Gaza and the failed countries adjacent to Israel: Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Yemen—all countries that have almost nothing to lose. Qatari money and the jihad media channel Al Jazeera are constantly pouring jet fuel on the fire of hatred for Israel and preparing public opinion in the Middle East and the wider world for the great, final campaign.
Qatari money has also bought Western politicians so that they would not see what Qatar does not want them to see, from the violation of human rights and foreign workers in Qatar to what Qatar’s ally—Iran—is planning to do to Israel.
It’s time to wake up. This dangerous scenario may be realistic.
In a 2004 Israel TV interview on their newly published book about the Second Intifada, co-authors Avi Issacharoff and Amos Harel recounted the purpose of the joint endeavor and what their research uncovered. Expressing amazement at their findings, show host Meni Pe’er (who died a decade later) pointed in particular to their research on suicide bombings.
“Yes,” said Issacharoff. “In The Seventh War: How We Won and Why We Lost the War with the Palestinians, we tried to examine the thinking of Hamas, not merely that of the Palestinian mainstream.”
To do this, the two Israeli correspondents and commentators on Arab and Middle East affairs spoke to senior Hamas officials. Among these was Sheikh Hassan Yousef.
Yousef, a co-founder and spiritual leader of the terrorist organization, spent several stints in Israeli prisons. Today, he is in charge of the group’s West Bank (Judea and Samaria) operations.
According to Issacharoff, Yousef explained that one of Hamas’s goals in its overall pursuit of the Jewish state’s ultimate destruction had been to foment and enhance internecine Israeli strife. Evidence of a schism on which the organization could build, Yousef told the authors, lay in calls on the part of the Israeli Left for a complete withdrawal from Judea, Samaria and the Gaza Strip, and for IDF soldiers and reservists to refuse to serve in those territories.
It was the latter, above all, he said, that buoyed Hamas to keep up its suicide attacks on Israelis. A revelation that has eluded all trying to boycott IDF service to protest judicial reforms
THIS REVELATION, which is just as pertinent now as it was then, must have eluded all those defending current ultimatums by “conscientious objectors” to boycott military duty if the government reforms the judicial system. Furthermore, the argument that such threats aren’t emanating solely from the Left, but are voiced from a cross-section of concerned patriots, is as irrelevant as the claims that Israel is on the verge of becoming a theocratic dictatorship are false.
Ditto for the assertion that the judicial reform process is responsible for Israel’s appearing weak in the eyes of its enemies. In fact, it’s the well-oiled protest movement – commandeered by formerly prominent figures promoting the demonization of the powers-that-be in Jerusalem – that’s been signaling instability.
And Hamas, like its patrons in Iran, is paying close attention to what it perceives, or at least hopes, is Israel’s imminent implosion. The timing of its rocket barrages last weekend from launchers in Gaza and Lebanon, after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu initially fired Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, wasn’t accidental. The terror masters observed with glee as the Israeli “resistance” reacted to this move by shutting down the economy.
They were undoubtedly even more pleased to see Netanyahu resolve the problem by pausing judicial-reform legislation to enable dialogue and compromise with the opposition. Not that Hamas gives a hoot about the balance of power among the three branches of government in a democracy.
Nor does it distinguish between one Jewish defense minister, or political party, and another. Yet it definitely grasps the benefits of a deeply divided “Zionist entity,” which is why the demonstrations spurred it to test Israeli resolve and IDF strength in the face of salvos from different directions.
Issacharoff – who created the hit Netflix series, Fauda, along with its star, Lior Raz – might agree with this assessment if his antipathy for Netanyahu’s ruling coalition weren’t so great. The same applies to Harel, with whom he also wrote the 2008 book, 34 Days: Israel, Hezbollah, and the War in Lebanon.
Is it permissible to conduct sports programs in the mosque, such as popular games, wrestling and...? Taking care of the sanctity of mosques and adhering to the time of prayer?Doing these things is not appropriate for mosques. Yes, if the mosque includes a special base or a place separate from it and the title of the mosque does not apply to it, and the endower did not stipulate a special type of behavior and actions, then there is no objection to holding cultural and sports ceremonies in it while preserving its sanctity.Attachments:The answer of the great tradition references to the question posed is as follows: [1]His Eminence, Grand Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei (may his high shadow extend):The mosque is not a place for sports and physical exercises, so matters that violate the sanctity of the mosque or the condition and direction of the endowment must be avoided.His Eminence, the Grand Ayatollah Al-Sayyid Al-Sistani (May Allah Extend His Shadow):This is not appropriate for mosques.His Eminence, the Grand Ayatollah Sheikh Makarem Al-Shirazi (May Allah Extend His Shadow):It is true that sport is necessary for everyone, especially for the young segment of them, but it is not appropriate for mosques or hussainiyas. You must choose another place for it.His Eminence, the Grand Ayatollah Sheikh Safi Gulbaykani (May Allah Extend His Shadow):It is not permissible to do the things mentioned in mosques.
With regard to making the mosques, outside of the times of the prescribed prayers, a place where children can play in an organised fashion and on a regular basis, that is not permissible; rather it is obviously wrong, because of what it involves of imposing time restrictions on worshippers at that time, and making the mosque unavailable for the purpose for which it was built, and because it also will lead to the mosques not being respected and being exposed to the risk of contamination with dirt and impurities on some occasions, and it will expose some items in the mosque to damage, and expose the Mushafs and Islamic books to harm at the hands of children, because young children usually, if given free rein, do not refrain from spoiling things and damaging them, and doing whatever they please the place in which they play.Shaykh al-Islam Ibn Taymiyah (may Allah have mercy on him) said:The mosque should be protected from things that will damage it [like fireworks,, perhaps?] and disturb the people worshipping in it, even children and raising their voices and making dirty the carpets and so on, especially if it is the time of prayer, because that is one of the gravest of ills.
We cannot find in the narrations of our Imams (peace be upon them) that much of a special or exceptional significance regarding Jerusalem as much as we find in their narrations regarding the Grand Sacred Mosque, the Prophet’s Mosque, the Great Mosque of Kufa or the Holy Shrine of Imam Hussain (peace be upon him). We cannot even find a single narration about the significance of the mosque of Jerusalem reported by al-Sheikh al-Kulayni (with whom may Allah be pleased) in his book al-Kafi in the chapter that includes the most recommended mosques by our Imams’ (peace be upon them). We find, for example, in this chapter narrations that mention the significance of al-Quba Mosque, the Mosque of al-Ahzab, the Mosque of Fadhi’kh, al-Fath Mosque, al-Ghadeer Mosque, the Well of Umm Ibrahim, the Mosque of Sahlah in al-Kufa, the Sacred Mosque and the Prophet’s Mosque. Still, there is not a single mention of the Mosque of Jerusalem.Therefore, we do not acknowledge what the opponents of Ahl al-Bayt (peace be upon them) narrate regarding the mosque of Jerusalem. We consider many of them to be Israeli narrations or transmitted through Ka’b al-Ahbar. One may easily realise this by looking at the narrations of Abu Huraira, as the exaggeration in it regarding the significance of Jerusalem is quite evident.
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! |
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As Israel celebrates its 75th anniversary, it remains the only state in the world that is constantly threatened with extinction by immediate and more remote neighbors. The Jewish state is often chastised when it responds in strength to acts of aggression, remaking the victim into an aggressor, while there is a tolerant international attitude to countless conflicts that involve far harsher and more indiscriminate use of force in response to far lesser threats.Israel, Split and United
Israel has never sought to conquer and destroy the surrounding Arab states even as they sought its destruction. Ironically, it was only after Israel relinquished control of 95% of the West Bank and Gaza's Palestinian population by 1997 that terrorism in these territories spiraled to unprecedented heights. In the two-and-a-half decades preceding the Oslo accords, some 400 Israelis were murdered; since the conclusion of these "peace" agreements, over 1,700 Israelis were murdered, and another 10,000 wounded.
Israel's enemies must be challenged to name a single state that has acted better in similar circumstances. They must also be asked to explain why the Jewish state alone is persistently subjected to such double standards while far more brutal states are given a free reign.
People have forgotten that the Zionist project was beset by serious internal strife from the very start. Uganda vs. Palestine; Socialists vs. Revisionists vs. Agudat Yisrael; Ben-Gurion vs. Jabotinsky; the newly formed IDF attacking the Irgun's Altalena armaments ship; the German reparations riots; Mapai vs. Mapam; Western Ashkenazi elites vs. Eastern/North African Mizrahi immigrants.Israel Isn't Perfect, but It's an Example for the Mideast
The question isn't why Israel has had so much domestic discord, but rather how the country and society have managed to stay together with more than a semblance of unity. The answer: external enemies. There is nothing as useful to putting out flames in the kitchen as a forest fire outside threatening to engulf your entire home. This has been going on for over a hundred years, beginning with the 1921 and 1929 Arab pogrom attacks against Jews.
Circling the wagons when under attack, at least temporarily negating internal discord, is not something unique to Israel. This past week Finland joined NATO. This was close to unthinkable two years ago, until Russia invaded Ukraine. That palpable, external threat unified NATO's nations like it hasn't been since the Cold War.
This is the blind spot of most autocracies like Russia, Hamas, Hizbullah, and Iran. When they see disunion in their enemy, they take it for "the beginning of the end of the Zionist entity," not realizing that disunion does not entail civil war or domestic military dysfunction. Attacks from the outside, despite strife from within, ultimately achieve the opposite of what they seem to be doing at first: strengthening Israel's will to survive and flourish.
While Israel debates policy and holds regular elections, much of the Middle East remains under authoritarian rule that quashes political discourse and silences dissent. As a Lebanese who has lived under the dictatorships of Hizbullah and Bashar al-Assad, I've witnessed how autocrats are freed from accountability for economic disarray, the erosion of human rights, and the destruction of infrastructure.
Any Middle Eastern observer would draw a distinction between the demonstrations in Israel and the protests elsewhere in the region - including in Iran, Iraq and Lebanon. In those countries, public dissent is often described by the authorities as treasonous, claims used to justify harsh repression in the form of lawless imprisonment and execution.
Few countries in the Middle East have a sterling record when dealing with ethnic or racial minorities. Ask the Kurds and Christians in Iraq, Syria, Iran and Turkey, or consider the hostilities between Sunni and Shiite Muslims.
It was not just the Israelis who thought that hasbara—propaganda—was unimportant. When I returned to the United States I tried hard to interest at least two Jewish American organizations to allow me to develop a curriculum for their staff, one that would teach them the language of oppression and liberation. I explained that this was precisely the language that would be used against Israel globally. I offered to do this pro bono. It was 1980-1981 and there was simply no interest.Gil Troy: Australia’s Jews show how to criticize Israel constructively, thoughtfully
In other words, more than 40 years ago, there was little interest in combatting the cognitive war against the Jews both in Israel and among Jewish American organizations.
This rapidly rising antisemitism was both old and new. As I (and others) pointed out in the early 21st century, anti-Zionism was now the reason for Jew-hatred.
A dedicated group in which I participate have been covering the cognitive war against Israel for the last 22-23 years. By 2012, I began calling for an Iron Dome to combat the lethal lies against the Jewish state.
Nothing less will do.
Minister Distel-Atbaryan: You have OldChinaHands and committedcognitive warriors at your disposal. Students who are focused on internet hate. Professors who are focused on academic hate. Intellectual activists, including lawyers, who are focused on Lies in the Street, the media, the governing bodies of the world.
Please consider calling upon us to serve; but, like you, we also need resources that we do not yet have.
‘What’s Bibi thinking?” Unfortunately, too many American Jews ask this question with a triumphalist I-told-you-so tone, oozing with what-do-you-expect-from-those-primitive-Israelis condescension.Bassam Tawil: Why Palestinians Cannot Resume Peace Talks with Israel
Two weeks ago, many Australian Jews asked me the question, heartbrokenly, with surprise, concern and frustration. Most Kanga-Jews are staunch Zionists. Many have long supported Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. They dislike criticizing Israel – but are shocked at how quickly and self-destructively Netanyahu has threatened so many of his economic and diplomatic accomplishments.
Australian Jews, like North American Jews, instinctively understand the need to separate executive, judicial, and legislative powers – while distributing power widely too. As a federation of six states, with two self-governing territories, Australia fragments power, avoiding the hyper-concentration in prime-ministerial hands so many Israelis justifiably fear.
A thoughtful statement
That insight shaped the Zionist Federation of Australia’s (ZFA) thoughtful recent statement defining the community as “deeply Zionist” – but worried. From this “position of unconditional love and connection,” the ZFA expressed “serious concern” that the coalition was pushing its judicial reforms “with undue haste and in the absence of broad-based public support.” The statement wisely supported President Isaac Herzog’s mediation efforts.
Despite this anxiety, looming like one of those perpetual clouds over the Melbourne sky, my week-long pre-Pesach visit to Melbourne and Sydney was inspiring. Australian Jewry is thriving in these two urban strongholds by the Indian Ocean. Even more impressive than their infrastructure – epitomized by their popular, high-quality, Jewish day schools on majestic campuses – is their unapologetically Zionist, deeply Jewish, worldview. So many conversations began with someone mentioning “my brother in Baka,” “my sister in Ra’anana,” “my son – or daughter – serving as a lone soldier.”
It’s a pleasure to visit a community that uses the Z-word comfortably and proudly, and was happy to talk about “Identity Zionism.” Often, when I speak in the US, after I describe how Zionism can inspire alienated young people with our sense of community, history, and destiny – the questions invariably go political – from the Palestinian issue to, now, the judicial reform.
In Australia, while asking about current challenges, many listeners, young and old, happily explored this deeper, more existential approach, which doesn’t just see Israel through today’s black-and-white lens of headlines and headaches. Instead, it invites us to see Israel through a blue-and-white prism of identity and possibility, of achievements and dreams, not just asking what we can do for Israel – but what Israel can do for us.
Once a Palestinian leader makes such a serious (and false) allegation against Jews [such as "violent storming of the al-Aqsa Mosque"], he is telling the Arabs and Muslims that the Jews... should therefore be fought against, not welcomed as peace partners.
If you tell your people (again, falsely) that the Israelis are perpetrating "war crimes," "desecrating mosques" and "stealing land," what will the Palestinians think of you when they see you sitting with an Israeli? They will denounce you as a "traitor" and call for your death.
By describing the Jews as "colonizers," [Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Mohammad] Shtayyeh is seeking to send a message that the Jews have no religious or historical connection to their homeland, Israel.
In the eyes of Shtayyeh and many Palestinians, all Jews living between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea are "colonizers" and "settlers." These Palestinians see no difference between a Jew living in a Jewish community in the West Bank and a Jew living in Tel Aviv or Jerusalem. For them, all Jews are foreigners who have no connection whatsoever to Israel and Jewish holy sites and no right ever to live there. Period.
Palestinian leaders such as Shtayyeh are straightforwardly saying that they see Israel as one big illegal settlement that must be eradicated... [and not] as a place for anyone other than Muslims.
[C]ontrary to the false claim made by Shtayyeh and other Palestinian leaders, the Jews who visit the holy site have never set foot inside the al-Aqsa Mosque.
One of those who have failed to call out the Palestinians for their antisemitism and lies is US Secretary of State Antony Blinken.
"Palestinians and Israelis alike are experiencing growing insecurity, growing fear in their homes, in their communities, in their places of worship," Blinken argued.
If the Palestinians are "experiencing growing insecurity," it is because they are enabling terrorists to operate freely against Israel within their own communities. If the Palestinians want to live in their homes in security and without fear, they could stop terrorists from planning and executing terror attacks against Israel. If the Palestinians want to feel safe in their worship places, they could stop attacking and harassing Jews....
On March 27, 2023, Palestine TV (Palestinian Authority) aired a musical titled “The Journey of a Nation.” The musical was performed in Khan Yunis, Gaza and depicts the “struggle” of the Palestinians since the 1917 Balfour Declaration until the 2004 death of Yasser Arafat. In the musical, dancers dressed in military fatigues and carrying mock rifles sing about fighting the “enemy” with machine guns, RPGs, daggers, rifles, and bombs, everywhere between Gaza and Rosh HaNikra in northern Israel. The men sing: “The blood of the martyrs will light our way.” In another song, children dance, throw stones, and sing: “In Gaza and in the Balata refugee camp, in Jerusalem, and in Ramallah, we rose up in an Intifada.. Our lands will be regained […] only with blood and stones.” The performance was organized by the PLO’s Department of Refugee Affairs.Performers: We have outlined our principles with the Degtyaryov machine gun and the RPG. We have outlined our principles with the Degtyaryov machine gun and the RPG. We tackled death with our bullets and we were not afraid. We executed the attack, and then we went home.You encounter us everywhere between Rafah and Ras Al-Naqoura [Rosh HaNikra]. Our revolution is in every village and every city. You encounter us everywhere between Rafah and Ras Al-Naqoura [Rosh HaNikra]. Our revolution is in every village and every city. The unity between the rebels and the people is our unity. We fight with daggers and guns. All the people are fedayeen. We are accustomed to death and sacrifice. All the people are fedayeen. We are accustomed to death and sacrifice. We are accustomed to death and sacrifice. This is our path, we will never stray off it. For your sake, our revolution, our lives are insignificant.We are the heroes that the enemy will encounter wherever it may be. Stamp your feet, oh our revolution! We are the heroes that the enemy will encounter wherever it may be. Stamp your feet, oh our revolution! Rise with our bullets and our bombs! Oh our revolution, pave the way of our return! The blood of the martyrs will light our way. We stay true to the oath, comrades. The blood of the martyrs will light our way. We stay true to the oath, comrades. The blood of the martyrs will light our way. We will traverse the long distance. The oath of the revolution is that we will not relinquish our weapons.Hey, hey, hey, rise up, rise up, rise up! Hey, hey, hey! In Gaza and in the Balata refugee camp, in Jerusalem, and in Ramallah, we rose up in an Intifada, we shouted 'Allah Akbar!' in the name of Allah. In Gaza and in the Balata refugee camp, in Jerusalem, and in Ramallah, we rose up in an Intifada, we shouted 'Allah Akbar!' in the name of Allah. We are challenging [the enemy] with our free people and with stones. Our young people are rebelling. Our lands will be regained and our shame will be washed away only with blood and stones. Rise up, rise up, rise up, hey, hey hey!
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! |
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Buy EoZ's book, PROTOCOLS: EXPOSING MODERN ANTISEMITISM
If you want real peace, don't insist on a divided Jerusalem, @USAmbIsrael
The Apartheid charge, the Abraham Accords and the "right side of history"
With Palestinians, there is no need to exaggerate: they really support murdering random Jews
Great news for Yom HaShoah! There are no antisemites!