Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Thursday, January 25, 2024

01/25 Links Pt1: The Meaning of Gaza's Tunnels: Spare Us the Outrage, Qatar; American Troops Know: Iran Is Already at War with Us; Idan Amedi released from hospital

From Ian:

Bret Stephens: The Meaning of Gaza's Tunnels

Ever since Israel withdrew its soldiers and civilians from Gaza in 2005, critics have accused it of blockading the territory - turning it into an "open-air prison." The charge was always preposterous. Gaza shares a border with Egypt. Gazans were often treated in Israeli hospitals for cancer and other life-threatening conditions. Israel provided Gaza with much of its electricity and other critical goods even after Hamas came to power in 2007.

Gaza's vast underground tunnel network has turned the territory into a gigantic military fortress. How much did it cost to build these tunnels? How much concrete, steel and electricity did it divert from civilian needs? How many millions of hours of labor were given to the effort? Hamas stole from foreign donors, subtracted billions of dollars over several years from Gaza's gross domestic product, and diverted labor from productive to destructive ends, all to feed its war machine.

Hamas could have averted this tragedy if it had turned Gaza into an enclave for peace rather than terror, if it had not started four previous rounds of war against Israel, if it had honored the cease-fire that held on Oct. 6. It could have eased it by releasing all of its hostages. It could end it now by surrendering its leaders and sending its fighters into exile. Till then, Hamas bears the blame for every death in this war.

UN Agency in Gaza Alleged To Have ‘Blood on Its Hands’ in Aftermath of October 7 Massacre of Israelis

Worse, he adds, in the early stages of the war, the IDF brass approached Unrwa officials, asking for help in removing civilians from areas where the army planned to wage battle, and usher them to proposed safe zones. The organization made a decision “at the highest levels” to refuse, as Hamas objected to losing human shields.

“Had Unrwa agreed to the IDF plan, the lives of many civilians could have been spared,” Mr. Conricus says. “Not only did they refuse to cooperate, they actively prevented the creation of safe zones. They have blood on their hands.”

Yet Secretary-General Guterres is adamant that the agency will have a role in Gaza after the war. “Unrwa plays a critical role in supporting many Palestinians on education, on healthcare and other services, and it plays a stabilizing role in the region,” Mr. Dujarric told the Sun, adding that Mr. Guterres “continues to believe that.”

Nevertheless, “Unrwa has taken the decision to commission an independent review, to look at all the allegations regarding Unrwa and its activities in Gaza,” its commissioner general, Philippe Lazzarini, told Australia’s foreign minister, Penny Wang, last week.

After UN Watch published the trove of evidence of unethical conduct, Australia demanded an investigation. Under pressure from America’s former UN ambassador, Nikki Haley, America denied funds to Unrwa. President Biden renewed America’s status as the agency’s top donor, contributing nearly $1 billion to its coffers since 2021.

“Our constituents are horrified that their taxpayer dollars may have, through Unrwa failures, supported Hamas terrorists,” the House Foreign Affairs Committee chairman, Michael McCaul, wrote last week, inviting Mr. Lazzarini to testify.

Mr. Lazzarini takes these allegations “very seriously,” the UN spokesman, Mr. Dujarric, says, adding that Unrwa takes “disciplinary action when needed and when things are proven.” As yet, though, Mr. Lazzarini has indicated only that he would investigate “smears” against his agency, Mr. Neuer tells the Sun.

Seth Mandel: Spare Us the Outrage, Qatar

The Qatari statement is idiotic. If Netanyahu had said this publicly, one could argue that it would be a breach of diplomatic politesse. Ill-advised, at the very least. But if Netanyahu is explaining in private why the usual objections about Qatar shouldn’t disqualify them from the diplomatic process, then the reaction is thin-skinned bush-league whining.

Fact is, Qatar funds and enables Hamas. It hosts Hamas leadership. And as Jonathan Schanzer wrote here last month, “In their efforts to steer the Gaza conflict toward a permanent ceasefire, the Qataris have actively tried to help save Hamas from destruction, which is Israel’s stated war aim.”

Qatar is a major reason that Hamas has the capabilities it possesses to pull off barbaric invasions like its Oct. 7 rampage, which resulted in the hostage standoff that it is supposedly helping to solve. I’m glad they’ve played some productive role in all this, but it is the role of an arsonist putting out the flames in a few of the rooms of the building it set ablaze. The suggestion that they’re doing the world a favor is risible.

In fact, Qatar has been far less useful than it should have been throughout the hostage crisis. Israel has had to turn to the Egyptians time and again when Qatar’s gold-plated incompetence gets put on display. That ineptitude is one reason Israel is in Gaza collecting the bodies of its citizens. Qatar is very good at ensuring the money keeps flowing to its clients but not very good at predicting what, exactly, its clients are preparing to do with that largesse.

Benjamin Netanyahu didn’t say any of this, of course. Publicly, he said nothing unkind, and privately, he offered mild criticism but no objections to Qatar’s role in the hostage negotiations. Qatar should put a Band-Aid on its wounded ego and go back to helping to fix a fraction of the problems it has caused the free world.

A great catch by UN Watch's Hillel Neuer.

Last week, UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric was asked a question in a press conference:

Q: Given the UN's big role in Gaza, UNRWA, has there ever been any indication to the UN that tunnels are being built under the city?

UN: Not to us. I mean... it seems to me that all this infrastructure was built in a highly secretive way. I mean, I see it just as an observer... To think that the UN had any understanding of what was… any information about those operations, I think, is... No is clearly the answer to that.

This is even though the UN has admitted in previous years that tunnels were found underneath their own schools.

In fact, former UNRWA Gaza director Matthias Schmale admitted that it is a "safe assumption" there were extensive tunnels under Gaza, in a 2021 interview:

One of our schools...less than half a kilometer from our compound, you can see it from our compounds very close, the [Israeli] military bombed, put two missiles into the courtyard of that school.

They destroyed a tunnel going underneath that school. And again, with precision. They struck exactly at one end of the tunnel and the other end of the tunnel. So they closed it off, basically. Very clear. They knew exactly what they were hitting.

Many people told me through my four years, there's tunnels everywhere and it's a safe assumption.

Whether there are tunnels under our main compound, I cannot say, you know, that's speculative at this point. But yes, why would they hit so close if there is not something there?

And it isn't as if there were no news articles about the tunnels, especially during the 2014 war.

This is the same interview that got Schmale fired from his UNRWA job, because he said that Israeli airstrikes were accurate, and Gazans protested that he said out loud something that contradicts Hamas' narrative.

(Corrected, I originally thought they were the same person. H/t Hillel Neuer.)

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

Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424.

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More evidence that the Palestinians literally make up casualty statistics

The Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics is keeping its own tally of deaths in Gaza that they claim comes from the Gaza ministry of health and the UN.

As of today, they are claiming that there have been 25,700 total deaths, of which 12,345 have been children and 7500 women.

That would mean that 77% of those killed were women and children, far higher than the 70% that Hamas claims.

Here's the problem: the Hamas health ministry has not issued any statistics on the number of women and children killed for over a month. The last time they did, on December 11, they claimed an already absurd 70% were women and children.

And here is irrefutable proof that these numbers ar ecompletely made up.

As of December 11, Hamas claimed that there were 5,153 women and 7,729 children killed out of a total of 18,205 deaths.

As of January 16, the PCBS - claiming to be using figures from the same source - said that there were 12,345 children and 7,100 women killed out of 24,100.

That means that during those 36 days, there were 5,895 new total "martyrs" - but 6,563 additional women and children killed.

Yes, they are claiming that there were 668 more women and children killed than there were total deaths. Truly miraculous!

Not only that, as of January 16, the PCBS claims that some 81% of all deaths were women and children, which is far higher than the total percentage of women and children in Gaza (I estimate it is 73%.) Any terrorists killed are just accidental, apparently.

It's all made up.

The Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics brags how professional and accurate it is. But these numbers are completely fictional (isn't the number of children being 12345 a little odd?)

If they really are getting these numbers from the Hamas authorities, then Hamas is obviously lying. If Hamas hasn't updated its women and children numbers since December as the UN says, then the PCBS is obviously lying.

In truth, both are. As we've shown, Hamas statistics sometimes also counted more women and children than total deaths. We see here that the "professional" PCBS happily posts numbers that simply don't add up.

And the world media apparently doesn't have a single employee with a spreadsheet that can notice that the Palestinian authorities are proven to be liars.

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!

The IDF released three samples of memos written from Gaza's Al Qassam Brigades to Dr. Muhammad Hamdan, Head of the Directorate of Education and Teaching in Gaza, asking teachers to be excused from work because of military training ahead of October 7.

First memo:

Date: September 10 2023

Subject: Lenient Work Schedule

With regard to the matter mentioned above, we ask of you to provide the brother Nur-Aldin Naim Mahmoud Siam, who works at the Aljanan high school (as a math teacher), with a flexible work schedule, as the nature of his position with us requires constant follow-ups.

Second:

Subject: Granting Release

With regard to the matter mentioned above, we ask of you to release the brother Moataz Abed-Alrazk Muhammad Alfara, who works at the education administration in west Khan Yunis, as we need him for military training on the date 28/09/2023. This date is not flexible.

Third:

Subject: Granting Release
With regard to the matter mentioned above, we ask of you to release the brother Hani Saeed Saleem Salah, who works at the education administration in west Khan Yunis, as we need him for military training on the 28/09/2023. This date is not flexible.

So we know that Gaza teachers, journalists and even doctors are also Hamas members. But how many articles that blame Israel for targeting specific people mention this quite important fact?

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!

01/24 Links Pt2: This War Is Different; Shylock at the U.N.; UN Agency Floats Funding For Orgs That ‘Diverted’ Aid To Hamas; Hollywood stars join new campaign against Jew-hatred

From Ian:

Seth Mandel: This War Is Different

Normally this set of conditions, in which only one side is subjected to any real pressure because the other side’s leaders cannot be made to value life, would whittle down governmental resistance until it reached its breaking point and agreed, like a game of musical chairs, to the best available deal on the table when the music stopped. Indeed, it is no longer just Netanyahu in the crosshairs of public opinion: The most recent polling shows a majority of Israelis are dissatisfied with the war council’s handling of the conflict. There is almost no conceivable development in which the cabinet’s numbers would improve.

In a normal conflict, then, this would be the moment the government would begin to collapse, and the war’s days would be numbered because the public’s will was nearly sapped.

But this isn’t a normal conflict. And what’s more, the families of the remaining hostages know it.

One exchange in a recent meeting between Netanyahu and the hostage families, included in the Times of Israel report, caught my attention: “Netanyahu was reportedly asked during the meeting why Israel could not simply agree to end the war in order to secure the release of the remaining hostages and then restart the fighting once the abductees have been returned.”

In other words, the hostage families—sleep-deprived, tortured by psychic pain—know the fighting must go on and Hamas must be defeated. They are desperate, as would be any human in their situation, for some way to bend reality enough to end their suffering. But they will not relinquish that sense of reality, even in this state. Just lie to the Americans.

Netanyahu then proceeded to explain to the Israelis gathered that, no, we cannot deceive the Americans. Israel would have to give its word and keep its word.

And that is part of what makes the weight on Israel’s shoulders so heavy. There is no pretending to end this war, because this war is different.

Shylock at the U.N.

It seems obvious that neither diplomat would ever have thought of urging restraint upon Islamic nationalists, or an understanding of a broader context to Palestinians, who are implicitly granted a freedom of action that comes from being outside of a Judeo-Christian cultural imaginary (though often enrolled in a different one—I’m looking at you Caliban.). Indeed, one searches in vain for similar calls by European and U.N. leaders for anger management to Assad in Syria or Erdogan in Turkey. But, in the case of Israel, a Jewish demand for justice (or retribution) in the here and now is an inevitable, and perhaps even pleasurable, occasion for hardened diplomats to open up the possibility of an ultimate or final justice that will transcend justice, in the process of which the Jew will be inducted into the ways of mercy.

A similar dynamic can be seen at play in President Biden’s account of a recent conversation with Prime Minister Netanyahu:
It was pointed out to me — I’m being very blunt with you all — it was pointed out to me , by Bibi, that ‘Well, you carpet-bombed Germany. You dropped the atom bomb. A lot of civilians died,’ I said, ‘Yeah, that’s why all these institutions were set up after World War Two to see to it that it didn’t happen again — it didn’t happen again. Don’t make the same mistakes we made at 9/11. There was no reason why we had to be in a war in Afghanistan at 9/11. There was no reason why we had to do some of the things we did.

In Biden’s gaff- prone way, he admits that these institutions of international law set up after World War II and intended to prevent massive civilian casualties were ignored again and again by the United States, most recently during the Afghanistan war, thereby contradicting his statement that “It didn’t happen again.” He’s also implicitly urging Netanyahu to set a better example than the United States has. The quality of mercy is not strained and becomes the throned monarch better than his crown.

In the way that, according to James Shapiro, The Merchant is not about Jews but rather a projection onto Jews of another people’s anxieties, so is the ongoing drama of Israel-Palestine. Biden turns a dialogue about Israeli national security and how that country should respond to terrorism – not being a global terrorism expert, I personally don’t know! - into a stream-of-consciousness soliloquy full of belated and uneasy American guilt and doubt about its own response to terrorism and insurgency, in parts of the world that are certainly much farther away from U.S. borders than Gaza is from Israel’s.

The Biden-Netanyahu conversation also shows the first tendency of Shylockism running headlong into the second. That is, Jews claiming the right to be as bad as gentiles, because they can imagine no other recourse. We don’t know if Bibi said exactly what Biden said he did: Biden may have been hearing Israel’s leader through the same distorting field that is audible in the rest of his account. Yet much of the historical rhetoric of Zionism as well as the State of Israel’s own messaging amounts to a kind of “honesty in vice” that attempts to justify actions seen as excessive through appeals to a tarnished self-image of “Western Civilization” from which Jews were historically excluded and “Western nations” no longer want to defend.

What remains exceptional about Jews and the Jewish state is a wish to exit a state in which Jews must be exceptional, either exceptionally good or exceptionally bad. But this desire to be like others is also an old wish that runs through the heart of modern Jewish experience, going at least as far back to the time of Shylock and Rodrigo Lopes, and is inextricable from the searing prejudices that provoked it, at times becoming their obverse.

In a remarkable interpretation of The Merchant of Venice that turns on the question of what it meant to be a human being and a man in 16th century Europe, the critic Marc Shell suggests that much of Shylock’s behavior is “out of character for a Jew.” Specifically, Shell notes Shylock’s contract with Antonio as being inherently goyish. As he writes, “The apparent commensurability between persons and purses which this enactment reveals turns out to be more typical of Christian law, which allows human beings to be purchased for money, than Jewish “justice” and practice, which disallow it.”

Shylock is not afraid to say or do in broad daylight—transact with human flesh—what the Venetian nobles are themselves ashamed of. Shylock’s mention of slavery is the first time slaves appear in the play, although one might wonder what cargo Antonio is indeed trading to and from Mexico and the Indies. The play’s response to this is to invoke something beyond the law: Portia’s merciless mercy dressed up in judicial robes. It is through the invocation of mercy that Shylock inherently lacks that the crimes of the nobles of Venice are made to disappear from view. Without Jewish guilt, there can be no Christian innocence. I don’t like it.

NGO Monitor: Concerns about NGOs listed in UN OCHA-oPt’s “Flash Appeal” on “Hostilities in Gaza and Israel”

On October 12, 2023, UN OCHA-oPt launched the “OPT Flash Appeal,” seeking $294 million “to address the most urgent needs of 1,260,000 people in the Gaza Strip (Gaza) and the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, for three months.” On November 3, the target amount was raised to $1.2 billion.

The money will go to “13 UN Agencies, 29 International Non-Governmental Organizations (INGOs), and 38 National NGOs (NNGOs).” UNRWA was the only one of the 80 to be named in the October 12 document as an intended recipient. However, NGO Monitor researchers note that in January 2023, OCHA-oPt published a list of 78 partners that were projected to work within its “Humanitarian Response Plan” (HRP) in 2023. By cross-referencing grants listed in OCHA’s Financial Tracking Service database, NGO Monitor was able to identify, with a high level of confidence, the other two partners. (See Appendix 1.)

As of January 24, 2023, $697 million had been received as part of the Flash Appeal – by 9 UN Agencies, 22 international NGOs, and the International Committee of the Red Cross. (See Appendix 4), and an additional $250 million had been pledged.

NGO Monitor raises the following concerns regarding this appeal:
Many of these same UN agencies and NGOs were responsible for the hundreds of millions of dollars in humanitarian aid that Hamas systematically diverted for terror purposes – including for rockets and tunnels. Some of the recipients actively lobbied the US and European governments to significantly relax vetting standards meant to prevent this theft of aid. It would be irresponsible to continue funding these groups in the absence of significant changes in oversight and prevention.
At least two of the NGO partners have been sanctioned after working with terror groups:
In 2016, Mohammad El-Halabi, World Vision’s manager of operations in Gaza, was arrested by Israeli authorities, accused of diverting approximately $50 million (60% of the World Vision’s Gaza budget) to Hamas for tunnels and to fund other terrorist activity. In June 2022, the Be’er Sheva District Court convicted El-Halabi of taking “an active and significant part in the activities of Hamas and assisted Hamas over the years in a variety of ways, including transferring monies and equipment that he knew would be used to fund terrorism and assisting terrorists…marking exit points for tunnel openings on the Israeli side of the Erez Crossing…”
In January 2023, the Jerusalem District Court approved a request from the Israeli Registrar of Non-Profits to disband the World Vision’s Israel branch, due to concerns of terror financing and financial mismanagement.
According to the US Department of Justice, Norwegian People’s Aid (NPA) provided “material support” to Iran, Hamas, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), and the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP).
During the current fighting, as with the past 16 years of Hamas control, the terror group has exploited humanitarian arrangements. There is no evidence to support a conclusion that the UN agencies and NGOs have will and security capabilities to prevent further large-scale abuse by Hamas and other brutal terror actors in Gaza.
A number of recipients are listed as “International NGOs (Confidential)” and “National NGOs (Confidential)” (emphasis added). The lack of transparency and the possibility that the grantees are problematic actors are concerning.

UN Agency Floats Funding For Orgs That ‘Diverted’ Aid To Hamas And Worked With ‘Terror Groups,’ Report Says

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in the occupied Palestinian territory (UN OCHA-oPt) coordinates humanitarian action within Gaza and the West Bank, and is currently requesting a $1.2 billion total appeal for roughly 80 partners, which includes non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and sister agencies at the UN, to deliver aid to the region. In some cases, aid handled by UN OCHA-oPt’s partner NGOs has ended up being “diverted” to Hamas for “terror purposes,” according to a report from NGO Monitor obtained by the DCNF.

“Many of these same UN agencies and NGOs were responsible for the hundreds of millions of dollars in humanitarian aid that Hamas systematically diverted for terror purposes – including for rockets and tunnels,” according to the NGO Monitor report. Some of these partners lobbied the U.S. and Europe to loosen regulations and standards surrounding the delivery of aid, thereby making it directly easier for it to be stolen.

“There is no evidence to support a conclusion that the UN agencies and NGOs have will and security capabilities to prevent further large-scale abuse by Hamas and other brutal terror actors in Gaza,” the NGO Monitor report reads. “The lack of transparency and the possibility that the grantees are problematic actors are concerning.”

“At least two of the NGO partners” were previously sanctioned for ties to terrorism; World Vision’s location in Israel was approved for disbandment by an Israeli court in 2023 over terrorism financing, one year after the organization’s Gaza manager, Mohammad El-Halabi, was convicted for his “active and significant part in the activities of Hamas,” according to the report. The second, Norwegian People’s Aid, reached a settlement in 2018 after being civilly accused of providing “material support” to Iran, Hamas and other Islamic terror organizations, according to the Department of Justice.

Disclaimer: the views expressed here are solely those of the author, weekly Judean Rose columnist Varda Meyers Epstein.

Antisemitism is personal. Like snowflakes—no wokeness intended—no two Jews experience antisemitism the same way. Even the same Jew will experience antisemitism differently when there are multiple incidents or when exposure to antisemitism is ongoing.

Social media antisemitism is probably the safest kind of antisemitism, because the antisemite hides behind a keyboard. An ugly comment, it must be acknowledged, is not the same as being beaten by gangs. Still, there is always the possibility that the online antisemite will doxx you, or use what you write to identify you to people who could do you real harm IRL (in real life).

The comments themselves range from brainless to so ugly that you gasp out loud from the shock of it. One particular antisemitic barb will make you giggle for its stupidity, while another will make you tremble, and your eyes well up with tears. Sometimes you feel a wry sense of the familiar. This is what it is. This is our lived experience, to be hated for false reasons or for no reasons at all.

Sometimes the hurt is compounded by the attitude of the people at the top. People like Mark Zuckerberg who has made his community standards such that horrific antisemitic comments and memes are left up, while our innocent pro-Israel memes and comments are removed when reported by Arabs and their supporters.

A pattern has developed wherein I report the offensive, antisemitic post and Facebook says no, it doesn’t violate its community standards. I then appeal where they allow it, and they say no again, and the vile antisemitic post stays up.

Here are some antisemitic comments and memes that I have reported over the past several weeks. Facebook has refused to take action:

In my personal experience of social media however, the worst offender in allowing antisemitic comments and online calls for genocide, is Quora. It’s all anti-Israel, antisemitic lies and propaganda posed as questions. Sure, you can report antisemitic questions and comments and they’ll be collapsed or deleted, but repeat offenders are never banned. I think about leaving or even muting Quora all the time, but I stay, mostly to encourage those still interested in learning the truth about the Jewish people and Israel.

Here’s a selection of 26 antisemitic Quora questions that have accumulated over the past 12 days and are awaiting my attention—for me to either reply or pass:

1. With the utmost respect intended, how is it possible for so many average Israelis on sites as this to defend their state's ongoing assault on Gaza, when even such mainstream " Western " sources like Oxfam attest to its singular level of brutality?

2. Why did Hamas commit terrorism against Israel which can annihilate itself entirely?

3. Does Satan support Israel victory over the people of Palestine?

4. Has Trump asked Netanyahu to cause maximum embarrassment for Biden, with Israel's assault on Gaza, by completely ignoring Biden's pleas for restraint?

5. Would there have been more outcry against Israel's actions if any major Fortune 100 companies had been headquartered in Gaza?

6. Would people who oppose Yemen's blockade of Israel-linked ships also have opposed the partisans who blew up Nazi train lines?

7. Why is Palestine more pro-American and trustworthy than Israel?

8. Are Israelis going to give the stolen land back to the Palestinians and stop their thieving ways?

9. Why doesn't Israel just give back the land it won and pretend the war never happened and we get a 2 state solution?

10. Why are Israelis basically flat out admitting to genocidal intent by calling approximately 1.15 million minors (including children) terrorists and "the enemy" when asked why Israel was withholding water, food and medicine from them if not genocide?

11. It’s only a matter of time until our generation is elected to office, and the rogue terrorist state of Israel will cease to exist, but what can we do in the meantime to stop Israel's bloodbath?

12. What is the reasoning behind Israel refusing to embed journalists to show the world Hamas is still aggressive and leaving the world to only see civilian suffering? [untrue]

13. It was just last year that Israel was funding Hamas millions of dollars in cash and weapons. What happened that made Hamas attack the people that support them?

14. Do you think Israel will rebuild Gaza for the Palestinians, or do you think they will just steal the land?

15. Why does Africa love Hamas so much, should Israel start a war with them?

16. Why do the Zionists in the social media persistently seek to dehumanize the Palestinians, despite having themselves been subjected to similar dehumanization tactics by Hitler that led to genocide against them?

17. Why does America seem unable to influence or control Israel, while other countries supporting Palestine exert more control over the situation?

18. Is Israel’s attack on Gaza legitimate?

19. Why am I seeing so many Israeli propaganda posts in my feed?

20. Polls show Israel has completely lost younger Americans with 74% or more disapproving of how it has handled the Hamas-Israel war. Has Netanyahu and his right wing government permanently damaged the US - Israel relationship or can it come back? [false]

21. Why was the USA disturbed by the disruption of navigation in the Red Sea and not disturbed by genocidal crimes committed by Israel in Gaza, but rather supported it in that?

22. Is the only way of stopping Israel's slaughter of Palestinian civilians in Gaza for ten [sic] USA to withdraw all support from Israel? If so, isn't it morally incumbent on them to do so?

23. Why is Western media calling the Palestinian genocide a war, and censoring people in support of Palestine?

24. Is Israel using artificial intelligence to deny humanity and wage war?

25. Is someone who supports both Israel in Gaza and Russia in Ukraine a pawn of the Likud?

26. Is it true that the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7th was relatively hilarious?

That last query was actually older, from early December 2023. I leave it in my inbox as a future reminder of a time when the world was once again overrun by masses of people rejoicing at Jewish suffering while too many watched on, indifferent. Atrocities are never hilarious. Good people know this. Yet Quora, as powerful as it is, with its 400 million active monthly users, leaves this question up on its website where it has sat now for seven weeks. Is Quora’s indifference to antisemitism evidence of malfeasance? Is Mark Zuckerberg’s refusal to ban evil antisemitic memes and comments, evidence of his malfeasance?

Which leads to another question: Are antisemitic evil, hate, and depravity still real if they exist only in the virtual halls of Quora and Facebook? The answer depends on your personal experience of antisemitism. One Jew will laugh off an antisemitic comment, or block it from their consciousness, while others may feel hurt or anger. But no matter how a Jew experiences antisemitism, some damage is done, even if the “damage” consists of absorbing the bitter lesson that not all, or even most people are good.

It’s a lesson that Jews have been forced to learn and relearn over millennia, a lesson that perhaps even Anne Frank was forced to learn in the end. We’ll never know, because Anne Frank was murdered before she could tell us, because she was a Jew.

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!

ITV has a distressing video showing a man in Gaza, with a white flag, being shot and killed.

Nowhere in the video do we see any IDF soldiers.

Yet everyone reporting on this story, somehow, "knows" that Ramzi Abu Sahloul was killed by an "IDF sniper."

Not one news outlet asks a basic question: who gains more from a man being shot with a group holding a white flag? Israel or Hamas?

Add to that question: We know that Hamas' entire military strategy is based on using Gaza civilians as human shields. And their political strategy is based on pressuring Israel to stop fighting using world pressure, partially based on a spiraling death count that Hamas wholly controls.

Every Gaza civilian who is killed makes the IDF's job harder.

Any sniper who could take that shot could also clearly see the cameraman who was interviewing the victim shortly beforenahd, as well as the white flag.

Why on Earth would any IDF sniper do such a thing that would do nothing but hurt the war effort?

And, why on Earth would Hamas not want to kill a civilian in front of Western cameras? Does anyone think at this point that Hamas cares about the lives of Palestinians, when they have never lifted a finger to protect a single one, and on the contrary, they have done everything they can to endanger them?

There is zero evidence from this video of who shot Abu Sahloul. Hamas has huge incentive, and the IDF has huge disincentive, to kill him.

Michael Elgort adds:

1. Israeli army is right now about 6-7 kilometers away from the Al Mawasi humanitarian safe zone (see the recent map from January 21 below), the ground forces of IDF are not in Al Mawasi or anywhere near. There is no existing sniper rifle that can cover that long range (mostly they are good for along shot between 1000-1500 meters, rarely slightly farther)

2. We can hear automatic gun fire in the video, not a single shot fire that sniper rifle produces, which implies we hear a machine gun fire (like M-16 or Kalashnikov) and effective range for those are between 500 to 550 meters for M-16 and 350 meters for Kalashnikov.
3. The clip is edited between the time we hear gunshots and we see the body - it misses several seconds of the footage and these are important seconds, because during these seconds the person was hit with a bullet
4. We do not see on the video any armed person, we do not have a clear visual on the body either, the angle does not allow us to see where he was hit and from which direction, what we see is that he is covered with a white piece of cloth and dragged to a nearby area behind the fence

It is unconscionable that the media reports this story as if it knows how Abu Sahloul was killed. They don't. And all the circumstantial evidence we have points away from the IDF and towards Gaza armed groups.

Assuming that Abu Sahloul must have been killed by Israel is not journalism.

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!

01/24 Links Pt1: Israel is still winning the political war; Cut funding to organizations that are empowering Hamas; ICJ to rule on Friday

From Ian:

Israel is still winning the political war

On the other side, in UN venues highly suited for empty words, Russia and China both ceremonially declared their support for the Palestinians. Yet Moscow has continued to co-operate smoothly with Israel’s air force as it operates over Syria to attack Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, while not one Chinese partner has withdrawn from any joint venture in Israel. Nor did the rising calls to reduce the bombardment of Gaza, led by Belgium of all countries and eventually backed by the White House, have any actual consequence — Israel’s bombing was reduced in any case by the diminishing supply of worthwhile targets.

Likewise, not one of the Arab countries with whom Israel has diplomatic relations has interrupted them in any way, while relations with Egypt have blossomed into a veritable security partnership over Gaza and Sinai. Even more important are the statements of Saudi Arabia’s Foreign Minister, who has made it clear that normalising ties with Israel will not long be delayed once the fighting ends. Even though intelligence exchanges and multiple technology joint-venture negotiations have been underway for some years without any need for official relations, such assurances cannot be overestimated: they are, after all, definitive evidence that Hamas’s assault on October 7 has failed.

The purpose of that deliberately horrific attack was precisely to stop any alliance between the Saudis and Israelis. That was certainly the goal of Iran, which has every reason to dread the fusion of Israel’s technology with Saudi Arabia’s financial resources: Tehran rightly fears this would entail some form of military co-operation, which in turn might bring Israeli air power within a short distance of its Iranian targets.

For now, though, Saudi Arabia’s declared goals are more prosaic. Just like the world’s venture capitalists, the Saudis believe that joint investments in Israeli tech will be profitable. But far more important is Israel’s proximity, which can greatly facilitate the training of Saudi engineers, technicians and skilled workers — thus achieving progress towards the central aim of putting Saudis to work and ending its reliance on expatriate labour. For Israel, it scarcely matters that the Saudis want a quiet Gaza ruled by reliably corruptible Palestinians, just as in the West Bank, before they start investing their billions; after all, the Israelis themselves obviously need some sort of political arrangement to retreat from Gaza without more rockets being launched the day after.

Israel’s diplomatic success is not just due to its changed economics however: its high-tech military equipment has arguably been more influential. It is the reason, for instance, why India has emerged as a steadfast ally, as it relies on Israeli tactical missiles for both its air and naval forces, along with much else. It is also the reason why the Pentagon does not begrudge military aid to Israel — it benefits from a constant backflow of valuable technology, including famous helmet-mounted display at the core of the F-35 fighters that now equip the Air Force, Navy and Marines.

Bonnie Glick and Richard Goldberg: Cut funding to organizations that are empowering Hamas

As Congress mulls its next moves on big federal spending bills, members of both political parties are refusing to confront an elephant in the room: Billions of taxpayer dollars are being sent to international organizations enabling Hamas terrorism.

With 34 Americans already murdered by Hamas and six more still held hostage in Gaza, it’s time for Washington to withhold contributions to agencies that actively subsidize, enable or defend the evil the world witnessed on Oct. 7.

The U.S. sends billions of dollars to the United Nations every year and hundreds of millions more to the International Committee of the Red Cross. Are we getting our money’s worth? Hamas certainly is.

Take the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) for starters. This organization runs schools in the West Bank and Gaza that explicitly teach kids to hate Jews and of course Israel. Many of its staff members are members of terrorist groups such as Hamas. Its facilities are used by Hamas to launch attacks and build terror tunnels. Employees stand accused of celebrating Oct. 7 and even holding some of Hamas’s Israeli hostages in their homes.

UNRWA does not submit the names of its staff, contractors or beneficiaries to the U.S. for counterterrorism vetting. And so, despite funding UNRWA with over $1 billion under the Biden administration, there is no accountability in terms of who has access to that money.

These aren’t shocking revelations — they go back many years. This is what led the Trump administration to cut off all funding to UNRWA in 2018. The Biden administration, however, subsequently reopened the spigot. And with roughly 40 percent of UNRWA’s budget focused on Gaza, that’s $400 million of U.S. funding to an organization that employs Hamas members and whose employees are credibly believed to have participated in its crimes against humanity.

Absent an outright prohibition in an appropriations law, Congress may greenlight hundreds of millions more this year, both in the regular budget and the president’s requested emergency supplemental.

The same goes for the International Committee of the Red Cross, to which the U.S. will send another $600-700 million this year as if on autopilot. This, while the Red Cross refuses to pressure Hamas to allow medical visits to the hostages it kidnapped, and after an apparent cover-up of Hamas’s use of hospitals as both terror base camps and holding centers for hostages.

Which countries are actually helping Gaza and not just bolstering extremists?

Israeli news has repeatedly covered stories of aid entering Gaza only to be stolen by Hamas or looted by desperate Palestinian civilians. While these incidents are likely rampant, one of the better-known reports of this was from mid-December when Kan released footage of alleged armed individuals stealing UAE-donated aid on the streets of Gaza. In reality, the men seen atop the truck in that footage are not Hamas or criminal gangs but local Palestinians hired by the United Arab Emirates to ensure that their aid is delivered safely to those who need it most.

Numerous countries are playing a role in Gaza, but not all may be as well coordinated or as altruistic.

Qatar, for example, recently brokered a deal to deliver medicine to Israeli hostages held by Hamas in Gaza. While playing a central role in the delivery of aid, as well as in negotiating for the release of Israeli captives seems praiseworthy, the reality is that the Qatari government has long been known as the terror group’s most important patron and the gracious host of Hamas’ most senior leaders.

Playing all sides in the conflict
Qatar is playing all sides, gaining points for negotiating on behalf of Israel with the very murderous group they lavishly domicile, while the civilians in Gaza suffer from the results of Hamas’s actions.

The UAE, on the other hand, is working daily to improve the humanitarian situation in close coordination with the Israeli and other regional governments.

Along with countries such as Bahrain, Jordan, and Egypt, the UAE maintains strong open ties with Israel, but Bahrain is its only ally in so singularly and consistently denouncing extremism.

The UAE is providing unconditional humanitarian aid to Gaza, without any of the political brinkmanship of some other actors. Since the start of the war, it has sent over 140 airlifts to Gaza; set up six desalination stations; and delivered over 200 trucks of aid along with quietly opening a 150-bed field hospital which has so far treated around 1,700 patients. It has also transferred hundreds more patients to Abu Dhabi for further care.

NYC public school principal seems to be recommending her teachers attend an event claiming Israeli "genocide" in Gaza

I received this letter, apparently written by the principal of a New York City high school, from multiple sources. She is recommending that her teachers attend an event by "Educators for Palestine" to share anti-Israel curricula.

Sharing this resource.

On February 3rd from 10AM-12PM Educators for Palestine will be hosting a virtual "curriculum share" geared to K-12 classroom teachers. In the first part of this session, teachers will have the opportunity to hear from a panel of organizers and legal experts on how to combat censorship as we strive to create classrooms that foster justice, understanding, and healing.

In the second part of this session, teachers will have the opportunity to present and share original lessons and materials they have developed on topics such as Palestinian history, the history of Israeli occupation, and the ongoing genocide in Gaza—every teacher who attends the curriculum share will leave with a collection of lessons they can use with their students.

Our hope is that by creating space to share resources and build meaningful connections, that we can empower each other to serve as changemakers within our individual schools. We especially want to highlight the incredible work educators are doing right now to combat hate, misinformation, and misunderstanding during this critical time. If you are an educator who has developed a lesson around Palestinian history, the history of Israeli occupation, the ongoing genocide in Gaza, or a related topic, and you'd like to present it to other teachers on February 3rd, please fill in ! Generous humans who donate lessons will be contacted by event organizers to answer questions and provide further details.
Anyone interested in attending should please RSVP HERE. We hope to see you on February 3rd, NYC Educators for Palestine, Working Group on Education & Curriculum Development

With Appreciation,
Your Partner in Education and Proud Principal,
Terri Grey

The February 3 event is real.

It seems that a New York City public school principal is encouraging her teachers to attend a session where they will receive curricula for their classrooms that spread antisemitic conspiracy theories that Israel intends to destroy all Palestinians.

"Educators for Palestine" seem to be associated with The Progressive Classroom Project, as well as with the Democratic Socialists of America BDS and Palestine Solidarity Working Group.

They held a small demonstration last week outside the United Federation of Teachers offices in Manhattan, mindlessly repeating anti-Israel chants.

Principal Terri Grey herself is part of the Solidarity Caucus of the United Federation of Teachers.

While her school is an academy school and is not required to use the official New York public school curriculum, schools chancellor David Banks warned teachers about violating Education Department rules on political speech. He wrote an email in November to school staff urging educators to keep their personal political beliefs out of the classroom.

Encouraging teachers to attend a curriculum development program that is explicitly anti-Israel and antisemitic appears to violate that directive.

The seminar, and similar ones in recent years, also shows how far behind pro-Israel organizations are in reaching out to teachers. No one seems to be doing anything even close to this in influencing K-12 classrooms to tell the truth about Israel. Outside of Holocaust education, what is the Jewish community doing to promote schools teaching Jewish history, Jewish culture, the Jewish influence on world religions, the affinity the founding fathers had for Jewish history, the influence of Jews in medicine, science, law - and the centrality of Israel to Jewish belief and thought?

(h/t Mathew)

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!

Independent Arabia is a London-based newspaper that is jointly owned by the Independent (UK) and Media Arabia which is apparently Saudi-based. It calls itself the "Arabic version of the British newspaper 'The Independent'" but it has many stories that are not in The Independent itself.

Yesterday, it published a story by Lebanese journalist Sawsan Mhanna, "Jewish pressure groups and their influence on global decision-making." It uses the visit by Elon Musk to Auschwitz as a springboard to describe how Jews have immense influence on global affairs.

The article heavily relies on a study by the Arab Gulf Center for Studies and Research, "The hidden Jewish empire and the plan to control the world." Its choice of photos indicate how professional it is.

The study itself, which is the third most popular article on the CSR Gulf site, is laughably bad, twisting news articles to say things they don't say. For example, it says that "more than 17 thousand young Jews in 2016 were able to enter the millionaires’ club and achieve great wealth" when the article they link to doesn't say that at all: it discusses not people becoming rich but how the rich are moving from large cities to elsewhere, and it peripherally mentions wealthy Jews who fled an increasingly antisemitic Europe for Israel.

The CSR Gulf insists that it is not a conspiracy theory, and then says things like:

All this economic influence that the Jews enjoy around the world makes their power extend, openly and secretly, to the centers of the global economy, through their planned arm represented by the Zionist group, which attracts all those who sympathize with Israel, whether influential Jews or Christians, or from other religions. It is more like Masonic or Templar organizations [than a religious group.]

CSR Gulf is a Kuwaiti based think tank whose president is unapologetically pro-Iran. He gave a speech in Tehran last month supporting Hamas and the entire Iranian "axis of resistance" against world Zionists.

After extensively quoting the CSR Gulf "study" (including the paragraph above,) Mhanna then goes to another source, the Egyptian sociologist Abdel-Wahab Al-Mesiri who wrote the “Encyclopedia of Jews, Judaism and Zionism,” who says that the Jewish lobby controls America both through legal and illegal means, including through blackmailing and bribing government officials.

Needless to say, both the CSR study and the article assume that Jews all collude together, that Jews all have their own unique agenda at odds with that of their host countries, and all Jews agree on how to spend their wealth.

Independent Arabia uses the same logo as the Independent UK, and as mentioned is part owned by it. Which means that the "mainstream" British media is helping to spread classic antisemitic conspiracy theories.

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!