Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Saturday, February 17, 2024

02/17 Links: Michael Oren: The Core Conflict and the Jews; Phyllis Chesler: Silence of the Feminist Lambs: Not a Word on Hamas Horrors

From Ian:

Phyllis Chesler: Silence of the Feminist Lambs: Not a Word on Hamas Horrors

In 2005, I published a book titled The Death of Feminism. At the time, I was focused on how Western feminists had become obsessed more with the alleged “occupation” of a country that has never existed — Palestine — than with the real occupation of women’s bodies in Gaza and on the West Bank, who were being forced into hijab, niqab, and child and arranged marriages, or who were being honor killed by their families for minor or imagined infractions. This form of femicide is primarily a Muslim-on-Muslim crime both in the West and in Muslim countries but, to a lesser extent, also takes place among Hindus in India, and, less frequently, among Sikhs. Honor killing is likely a tribal custom that religious leaders have failed to abolish, I wrote, one in which women also collaborate.

Both Stalinized and Palestinianized feminists and rabid Islamists denounced me as an “Islamophobe” for prioritizing the rights of women of color over and above the rights of the men (and women) of color who were terrorizing and even killing them. I was also condemned as a “Zionist” for questioning the sacredness of Palestinian victimhood.

Thus, I may have been among a handful of people not surprised by the feminist silence on Hamas’ Oct. 7 pogrom-on-steroids. It does not ease my sorrow that so many others, including the worldwide media and professoriate, human rights groups, and the United Nations, are also actively engaging in Oct. 7 denialism, as well as in relentless and vicious blood libels against the Jewish state, every single day.

By the late afternoon of Oct. 7, I was a cognitive warrior on fire. Between Oct. 11 and Jan. 25, I had published 24 articles on the subject and been interviewed about it 10 times.

Most second-wave feminists have died, suffered strokes, or are struggling with either dementia or cancer. Many are disabled. They are no longer “dancing in the streets.” But some of my long-time allies still attend conferences, march, sign petitions, write articles, and speak out.

These are the feminist allies who did not respond to the articles that I sent them about their shameful, even unbearable, silence. Perhaps they felt that Israel deserved whatever it got but were too embarrassed to say that to me. Instead, they said nothing.

Only one such feminist ally responded by sending me articles by Masha Gessen and Judith Butler. She suggested that reading their ideas about the moral superiority of vulnerable Jewish Diaspora life and the advantages of dissolving the Jewish state would “open my mind to the truth.” She also sent me an article that blamed Benjamin Netanyahu — and only Netanyahu — for the failure of a “two state solution — the only fair solution.”

I immediately sent her my critique of Butler and Gessen; I sent her Bassem Eid’s fact-based piece in Newsweek. Eid summarizes the long history of Arab rejection of the offers for a Palestinian state, first proffered by the British, then by the UN, and, finally, by Israel at least six times. Thus far, she has not responded.

Another long-time feminist (a friend, not merely an ally) is adamant that Israel is “committing genocide” and is an “apartheid, colonial, occupying state.” I told her that we cannot discuss Israel ever again. But now our conversations are thinned, brittle. There is no way we can discuss Oct. 7 without endangering our suddenly fragile friendship.

Why are my views so different? Here’s one reason.

Most Western pro-Palestinian feminists have never lived in a Muslim country or moved in Muslim circles, as I have — and still do. When I was young and oh-so-foolish, I traveled to Kabul with my Westernized Afghan husband, whom I had met at college. Once we landed, an airport official smoothly, officiously, removed my American passport; I never saw it again. I found myself trapped in the 10th century with no way back to the future.

The sickness of anti-Semitism

It’s often been said that a society that allows anti-Semitism to flourish is in a particularly deep kind of trouble. That a society that fails to keep anti-Semitism in its box not only fails to stand by its Jewish citizens, but also risks becoming consumed and deranged by it. That anti-Semitism’s toxic cocktail of hatred and conspiracism can all too easily lead a reasoned, tolerant society to sicken. If so, Britain looks very sick indeed.

This week, a report by the Community Security Trust (CST) laid out in stark, blood-curdling detail the hatred we’ve seen exploding all around us since 7 October. Anti-Semitic incidents are at their highest for 40 years, the highest since the CST began logging them, surging by 150 per cent in 2023. This includes a 96 per cent rise in anti-Semitic assaults. The most ever recorded.

British Jews have had bricks, eggs and bottles thrown at them. They’ve been punched, kicked and spat on. They’ve been threatened with metal bars, knives and fake firearms. In one incident, ‘pro-Palestine’ protesters kicked a Jewish man on his way home from a Sabbath service in London. They then threatened to beat him up and shouted: ‘We are going to rape your mother, you dirty Jew.’ I’m sure this was all just an unconventional icebreaker, before they made the case for a ceasefire and a two-state solution.

We are seeing Jew hatred at its most visceral. According to the CST, the incidents were at their peak not when the IDF rolled into Gaza, or when this awful war – that Hamas started – began to claim civilian Palestinian life. No, they peaked just a few days after 7 October, just after Hamas had killed and raped its way through southern Israel, long before Israel’s full military campaign had begun. As the CST puts it, the initial surge in anti-Semitic abuse, graffiti and violence represented a grotesque carnival of ‘celebration’ – celebration, that is, of the murder and maiming and defilement of Jews.

It would be sickening enough if Israel’s just war in Gaza was leading scumbags in Britain to menace Jews on protests, or to daub ‘SS IDF’ on the wall of a synagogue, as happened in Sussex. To hold British Jews responsible for the actions – real or imagined, justifiable or unjustifiable – of the Israeli state is the essence of the new anti-Semitism. But we can surely now drop the pretence that the undiluted anti-Jewish racism we’ve seen on our streets in recent months was just mindless, misplaced anger with Benjamin Netanyahu.

Anyone who has been paying attention knows this has been brewing for longer than many would like to admit. Even before the awful events of 7 October, British Jews constituted 0.5 per cent of the British population and around a quarter of the victims of the religiously motivated hate crimes. Jewish pensioners being suckerpunched in north London or Jewish cemeteries being desecrated were grimly regular occurrences that rarely – shamefully – made it beyond local-news websites.

But it really feels like it’s open season now. It’s in the air. Jews – or at least the ones who are pro-Israel, which happens to be the vast majority of them – are fair game. You can even ‘hound’ them out of a comedy show, if they take against a performer pulling out a Palestinian flag at the end of his ‘non-verbal immersive comedy show’, as happened at the Soho Theatre last week. I still don’t know what’s worse, that performer Paul Currie was reportedly so upset with an Israeli audience member that he broke character and blared ‘leave my fucking show now’, or that his audience immediately joined in, chanting ‘Free Palestine’ until the pesky Jew left.

'The end of the Jews': Herzog reveals Hamas textbook seized from Gaza

At the Munich Security Conference on Saturday, Israeli President Isaac Herzog revealed a book titled "The End of the Jews", which was found in a residential home in Gaza and written by one of the founders of the terrorist organization Hamas.

The book, which has been described as a "blueprint for the annihilation of the Jewish people", was discovered in the Al-Furqan neighborhood in the Gaza Strip, and was showcased during a conversation with senior commentator David Ignatius on the stage of the Security Conference.

The author of the book is Mahmoud az-Zahar, one of the founders of Hamas and former foreign minister of the Palestinian Authority, once again proving the antisemitic ideology of the Hamas terrorist organization, whose core is the hatred of Jews and a call for their annihilation; a call that was translated into the monstrous October 7 terror attack.

The book was discovered and seized by security forces, and it describes the allegedly justified hatred of Jews throughout history. For example, it notes that while the family of nations and its leaders defined the Nazis, who acted to annihilate the Jewish people, as having committed crimes against humanity, the Nazis are in fact an important and worthy role model for many around the world.

The chapters of the book focus on hatred of the Jewish people and justify the persecution and murder of Jews throughout history; among them are chapters titled "The World's Burning Hatred of Jews" and "Reasons to Expel the Jews".

"This book was written by Dr. Mahmoud az-Zahar, a well-known political figure of Hamas and one of its founders," Herzog said at the conference. "This book mainly says that there is no need to recognize that there are Jews, that there is a Jewish people, but mainly it glorifies the Holocaust, what the Nazis did, and calls on nations to follow in their footsteps. Now we are in Munich. On the outskirts of Munich, there is the Dachau concentration camp, where tens of thousands of Jews were massacred. And that's the problem, we need to form a coalition of all the moderate forces in the world, fighting this ideology."

02/16 Links Pt2: Dara Horn: Why the Most Educated People in America Fall for Anti-Semitic Lies; Melanie Phillips: Never again; Bari Weiss with Natan Sharansky

From Ian:

Dara Horn: Why the Most Educated People in America Fall for Anti-Semitic Lies

The mountain of proof at Harvard revealed a reality in which Jewish students’ access to their own university (classes, teachers, libraries, dining halls, public spaces, shared student experiences) was directly compromised. Compromised, that is, unless they agreed—or at least agreed to pretend, as many Jewish students who are neither religious nor Israeli now silently do—that there was nothing wrong with wallpapering America’s premier university with demonization of Jews. Coercing that silent agreement was the goal, and it was achieved not through arguments or evidence, but through the most laughably idiotic heckler’s veto: screaming at, chasing away, freezing out, or spitting on anyone who dared disagree with supporting the most successful Jew-killers since the Nazis. This left the great minds of Harvard debating the finer points of free speech for hecklers, instead of wondering why their campus was populated by hecklers. The question of why Harvard’s hecklers were heckling in favor of Hamas’s barbarism was too disturbing to consider, and so public discussions ignored it completely.

This heckling was not unrelated to the education that Harvard itself provided. Classes existed at Harvard, it turned out, that were premised on anti-Semitic lies. A course at the school of public health called “The Settler Colonial Determinants of Health” looked at case studies from South Africa, the United States, and Israel; its premise—not a topic of discussion, but the premise on which the course was built—was that Israel is a settler-colonialist state. (A Jewish student who wrote to the professor questioning what they saw as the ideological slant of the readings was told that it was “insulting” to suggest that the course had an agenda.) The “Palestine Program for Health and Human Rights” proudly announced that it “utilizes a decolonial framework in program development, leadership, and engagement”—meaning, one might reasonably assume, the “decolonizing” of Israel through the removal of its 7 million Jews. (The program is a partnership between Harvard and Birzeit University, a Palestinian institution where an Israeli journalist was expelled from an event in 2014 just because she was Israeli and Jewish.)

An astonishing number of pop-up lectures, panels, and events at Harvard both before and after October 7 were centered on the suffering of Palestinians in Gaza—a worthy topic addressed with almost no mention of Hamas, even though Hamas has ruled Gaza for 17 years. Nor was there much mention of the fact that Hamas was founded in connection with the global Muslim Brotherhood, or of its comically wealthy sponsors in the Persian Gulf. Students had many opportunities to learn about Palestinian suffering from oppression by evil Jews, but far fewer opportunities to learn, for instance, about Hamas’s success in co-opting foreign aid and crushing dissent, or the intifada that students hoped to globalize. Outside of their engagements at Harvard, some guest speakers publicly endorsed extreme anti-Semitic lies, including the straight-up blood libel that Israelis are harvesting Palestinians’ organs or that the Israeli military uses Palestinian children for weapons testing. One could hardly blame students for repeating their educators’ claims.

Out of respect for Gay’s request that our committee’s discussions with administrators remain private, I won’t share here anything that we talked about in our many meetings. But I will say that one thing we did not discuss was Gay’s congressional testimony on this topic, for which she and other administrators never asked for the advisory committee’s advice. Instead, they consulted lawyers, a choice that backfired on national television.

The horror that the hearing laid bare was something far worse than a viral gaffe. Harvard was already being investigated by the Department of Education for allegations of violating Jewish students’ civil rights under Title VI, and perhaps the president was advised against admitting any institutional failure. (In January, a group of students sued Harvard, describing the university as a “bastion of rampant anti-Jewish hatred and harassment.”) Still, the only morally tenable position would have been to admit failure, to reveal that the problem was not all in Jews’ heads; that there truly was an anti-Semitic environment at these incubators of American leadership; that these universities, along with far too many other pockets of the country, had reverted, slowly and then all at once, into what they had been a century earlier: safe spaces for high-minded Jew hatred—not in spite of their aspiration that education should lead to a better world, but because of it.

Melanie Phillips: Never again

I made a pilgrimage this week to the the area of the south-western Negev that was devastated by the Hamas pogrom on October 7.

It was a lot to take in and process. Here are some of the things I saw and heard which particularly spoke to me.

The eerie silence of Kibbutz Kfar Aza, whose once idyllic aspect is still visible through its shrubs and spacious landscaping despite the wrecked and deserted houses.

Outside his house sits Shachar, the only kibbutz resident who is still there.

They came from five directions, he says; between 300 and 600 terrorists. There were only 11 members of the kibbutz civil defence; they were prepared for only two, three terrorists, maximum. Seven of the 11 were murdered.

When the attack started, he said, he got a knife, told his wife Ayalet to get under the bed and stood guard at the door for 30 hours. The terrorists didn’t try to get in.

Why not? He shrugs. The house stands alone: others are connected in pairs. They seemed to be killing people in one of each pair of houses and leaving the other one alone, he says. They thought no-one was inside here, he says. And they were in a hurry. They didn’t think they would have time to kill so many. The terrorists expected the army to come at any minute.

Why did he come back to his house just a few weeks after the massacre, to live here alone, in the silence, in this place of death? He spreads his hands. It’s my home, he says simply. And I hoped that if I came back, others would follow. Not yet.

Further into Kfar Aza, the scene is very different. This is not tranquil. This is a place of the utmost horror. These houses are laid out in neat rows with neighbours facing each other across the pathway. In two of these double rows, the inhabitants of every single house were murdered or kidnapped. Not one house was spared.

Every house is wrecked. Outside each one are pictures of the murdered or the kidnapped who had lived there. Most are taped off. Every house has symbols painted on the outside by those who came to retrieve the remains of the slaughtered. A circle with a dot, we are told, means a body or body parts were inside.

New Documentary Aims to Arm Jewish Students with Facts about Israel’s History to Combat Surge in Campus Antisemitism

Since Hamas attacked Israel on October 7 and Israel launched its retaliatory military operation in Gaza, college campuses have been aflame with an anti-Zionism that, more often than not, veers into antisemitism.

One recent college graduate, alongside her former professor, has created a documentary series aimed at educating people past the flashy signs and catchy slogans one might see and hear at an anti-Israel rally, toward a full understanding of what Zionism and anti-Zionism really mean. That series, “Zionism and Anti-Zionism: The History of Two Opposing Ideas” by Zoé Tara Zeigherman, had its Washington, D.C., premiere Thursday night.

The series, a five-episode look at the varieties of both its titular subjects, covers Jewish history and the development of Zionism, the intra-Jewish debates that occurred before Israel’s founding in 1948, and various strains of anti-Zionism from post-1948 Arab opposition to Israel to Soviet propaganda.

Zeigherman, alongside her former Georgetown University professor (and former member of Israel’s Knesset) Einat Wilf, began formulating the idea for the series in 2022, well before anti-Zionism and antisemitism shot to the fore of public debate following the October 7 Hamas attack. Zeigherman thinks the problem was always there, but now that college campuses are under a microscope, the documentary series is even more relevant.

“I think that what a lot of Jews have experienced since October 7 is kind of waking up to this feeling that something is seriously wrong; seeing protests on October 8, they’ve been feeling that something is mobilizing against Jews, and they don’t really understand what’s happening.” Zeigherman told National Review. “I had that feeling in the Black Lives Matter protest era when antisemitism was erupting online and I couldn’t understand where it was coming from.”

“If it can just help one young Jew the way Einat’s course helped me, that’s enough,” she told NR. “But I would really like to see it be part of something bigger, where Jews aren’t afraid to be Jews anymore — where we stand taller and prouder and go on offense as opposed to constantly defending ourselves and apologizing.”

Zeigherman initially came up with the idea for the series during her time as a Beren Summer Fellow with the Tikvah Fund, a nonprofit organization that promotes Jewish leaders and ideas, in 2022. While a fellow, she worked with individuals both inside and outside the Tikvah Fund to determine how to bring her vision to life.

Liron and Rakefet Eldor

By Forest Rain

He stood by the door, slightly bent over as if recovering from a punch to the gut and yet he had a smile on his face, warm words, and a hug for friends and family.

I’ve been to many Shiva houses. This is the first time I’ve seen a grief-stricken father greet those who came to pay their respects in this way.

For those unfamiliar with the Jewish mourning tradition of Sitting Shiva, this is a structured way for the bereaved family to express their grief and the community to support the family. Immediately following the funeral, for seven days (shiva means seven in Hebrew), the immediate family resides (usually) in the home of the deceased. Extended family, friends, and members of the community come without invitation to offer condolences, share memories of the deceased, and provide emotional support. The endless stream of people provides a stabilizing distraction for the mourners, helping to pass the initial shock of bereavement. Mourners are not supposed to cook or serve food, so it is customary for guests to bring food, making sure the bereaved family doesn’t have to think about themselves or their guests.

People differ in their adherence to the Jewish traditional guidelines for the Shiva. Secular Jews do not necessarily conduct the proscribed prayers, wear a kippah (yarmulke), or stick to the guidelines regarding clothes, etc. Tradition dictates that the mourners sit on low chairs or even pillows on the floor, indicating their grief and differentiating them from everyone else.

Mourners often remain sitting on their low chairs while the people around them come and go, replaced by new visitors. Sometimes the bereaved move around to visit with the different people who came to comfort them.

Liron Eldor is the first father I’ve seen greeting visitors by the door with a smile and a hug.

Liron’s son, Sergeant First Class Adi Eldor was killed in Gaza. He was just 21 years old.

We don’t know the Eldor family personally, but they live in Haifa and their son’s life journey is very similar to that of our son – same school, both were in the Scouts and they were in the same elite army unit. Israel is a nation of people who are family who haven’t met yet so, it isn’t uncommon for people to pay condolences to families they don’t personally know. What is the difference between their son and ours?

The Eldor family is the cream of Haifa society. Well-to-do, sophisticated, intelligent, and kind people. Liron and Rakefet, Adi’s mother, are both young, attractive, and charismatic. Their beautiful home was overflowing with friends, family, and an enormous amount of food.

After we introduced ourselves to Liron I asked him the question I usually ask bereaved parents: “Tell me something about Adi so that I can remember him, although I didn’t know him.”

(It’s rather horrifying that we meet so many bereaved parents that I have an arsenal of questions to ask)

Liron smiled and told me: “You know the saying; In death, they command us to live?”

“Yes, of course” I nodded.

“In death, Adi commands us to smile. He always had smiles for everyone. There are good things and negative things to see in people. Adi always knew how to see the good and he used that to bring people together. That’s Adi.”

Then he told us about donations of food the family planned to give with an image of Adi smiling, to spread warmth and smiles to other people.

Liron’s choice of how he greeted the people who came to comfort him wasn’t random. It was a simple yet powerful way to honor his son’s legacy. Brokenhearted but still standing, he had smiles to share.

Wow.

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

Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424.

Read all about it here!

02/16 Links Pt1: Netanyahu: Palestinian state recognition ‘huge reward’ to terror; 30 UNRWA employees participated in Oct. 7 massacre

From Ian:

Douglas Murray: Shameful Biden tries to reward Hamas terror with a Palestinian state

On October 8th — as terrorists were still running wild across the south of Israel — Blinken told CBS “We think the best way to resolve [the Israeli-Palestinian conflict] remains a two-state solution.”

By clicking above you agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.

A month later he could be found claiming that a two-state solution was “the only way to end a cycle of violence.”

By the time he was in Davos in January Blinken was telling the New York Times that creating a Palestinian state would solve all the problems of the region, including (bizarrely) regional instability caused by Iran.

By the end of January Blinken was reported to have ordered the State Department to review options for American recognition of a Palestinian State.

In recent weeks Blinken has been sending out his British counterpart — Lord Cameron — to bang on about the creation of a Palestinian state. He was doing it in Washington this week. Cameron is clearly acting as Blinken’s warm-up act.

Blinken recently boasted that he was in Ramallah with Mahmoud Abbas “to reiterate US support for reforming the PA and establishing an independent Palestinian state.”

But such a policy is an embarrassment.

As Israeli politicians of left, right and center have told me in recent months, even if you believe that the Palestinians should be given another state, now is not the time to discuss it.

To push for a two-state solution now is to say to the Palestinians “You carried out a horrific terror attack on October 7th, and as a reward you will be given another state.”

I wonder how many more terror attacks will come about by incentivizing terror in this way?

But the other reason why it is so wicked is that since 2005 we know what a Palestinian state in the West Bank would look like. It would not just be one more failed Arab state.

It would be another Palestinian terror state. One which had views over the entirety of Israel and where the rockets could this time easily hit Tel Aviv, Haifa and Ben Gurion airport.

So long as the Palestinians celebrate terror, encourage terror and pay for terror they should not have another state.

Two-states? It’s not a solution. It’s part of the problem.

Michael Oren: The US charge of ‘indiscriminate bombing’ is over the top

Another country, struck by the type and immensity of the atrocities committed against Israel on Oct. 7, would likely have responded with vastly greater force and inflicted far greater numbers of civilian casualties. But Israel is a Jewish state in the moral manner in which we defend ourselves. Even when the enemy is using its own population as a human shield, Israel must do its utmost to reduce the damage to civilians. This is not only a strategic interest but also a moral imperative.

The IDF takes unprecedented measures to warn civilians of impending actions and to evacuate them from combat zones. It's why Israel has maintained the lowest combatant-to-civilian casualty rate in modern warfare - as Hamas' own statistics show. How, then, can the Biden administration accuse Israel of "indiscriminately bombing" Gaza and of reacting "over the top" to the events of Oct. 7?

President Biden and his staff continue to uphold Israel's right to self-defense, to supply us with vital forms of ammunition, and to resist mounting calls for a permanent ceasefire. Yet, the accusations they level at Israel do far more than insult our soldiers. They fundamentally endanger our security.

By asserting that Israel is violating international humanitarian law, our American ally is bolstering those who accuse us of committing war crimes and perpetrating genocide. The next time Israel faces these charges in an international court, statements by the U.S. president and the secretary of state will be Exhibit A for the prosecution. That evidence, moreover, would be demonstrably false. Israel's efforts to reduce civilian casualties, often at the expense of our own soldiers' safety, are well-documented.

Outrage at the civilian casualties must be directed at those who cynically engineer them. Hamas' goal is to brand Israel as a war criminal. That is precisely the objective served by accusations of "over the top" reactions and indiscriminate bombing.

‘We’ll Be Seen as Losers if We Don’t Complete the Job:’ Israeli Historian Benny Morris Addresses the War Against Hamas

With the US maintaining its role as the leading outside power in the region, talk of a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has been revived, causing tensions between Netanyahu and US President Joe Biden’s Administration. Morris believes that a Palestinian state alongside Israel is theoretically the correct solution, but he doesn’t see a “roadmap” — the phrase much used by successive US administrations in their peacemaking efforts — for getting there.

“The problem is that the occupation is immoral and bad,” he said. “It was forced upon us, but we didn’t do enough to get out of it.” Meanwhile, in the wake of the Hamas atrocities, Israelis have become hardened. “The Israeli public is staunch in its desire to destroy Hamas and pay them back for what happened,” he said. “It’s not just a matter of revenge, it’s understanding that without that, Israel will appear weak.”

As Morris explains it, the dilemma for Israel revolves around how to withdraw from the West Bank without turning it into a Hamas stronghold. Israel has been able to weather two decades of rocket and missile attacks from Gaza, but similar salvos from Ramallah, which is just a short drive from Tel Aviv, would amount to an “existential threat,” Morris said. “In the West Bank, there is no way of assuring the benign nature of a Palestinian state,” he said. “They want all of Palestine. That’s the essence of the problem.” Additionally, Morris has little faith in international guarantees, citing Hezbollah’s refusal to move its armed forces north of Lebanon’s Litani River, as part of a broader disarmament process envisioned by UN Security Council Resolution 1701 of Aug. 2006, as an example of the difficulty of implementing compromises that are not enforced.

“The sense among Israelis is that, along with the rapes of Oct. 7, Israel itself was raped,” Morris said. “The world didn’t seem to care about that, and there was an instant rise in antisemitic abuse and anti-Israel rhetoric even before the military response.” The political context is also changing, he observed. “The further away the western world gets from the Holocaust, particularly the younger generations, the less they know and care about World War II,” he said. At the same time, “Islam contains a large antisemitic element” that stems from the bombastic accounts in the Qur’an of the battles in the seventh century between the Jewish tribes of Hijaz and the prophet Muhammad and his followers. “There’s this inherent anti-Jewish element that’s been reinforced by Israel’s existence in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries,” Morris said. “Israel is an innovation in that sense — a Jewish state projecting power at the Muslims. That was not the situation for 1400 years since the rise of Islam.”

Seth Mandel: The Rafah Hostage Rescue Was a Game-Changer

It’s impossible to say for sure how much has been changed by Israel’s dramatic hostage rescue in Rafah. But it’s clearly altered the conflict.

The fact that Israel wasn’t bluffing about going into Rafah, and the revelation to the world that the IDF had legitimate reasons to do so, convinced the other players in this conflict that the Israelis meant what they said and to prepare accordingly.

Hence we have a rather important story about the adjustments Egypt’s government is making for the possible influx of Gaza evacuees: An eight-square-mile walled camp is under rapid construction in the Sinai Peninsula, the Egyptian desert region that borders Gaza.

The history here is important. Rafah was divided between Egypt and the Ottoman Empire, briefly reunited after the Six-Day War, and then divided again when Israel pulled out of the Sinai. It became, and remains, the only border crossing between Palestinian-controlled territory and Egyptian-controlled territory.

Given the history, the last thing Egypt wanted to do was accept a large number of Palestinian refugees fleeing Gaza, and the last place they wanted to do it was Rafah, despite the fact that it would obviously save lives.

Egypt’s sensitivity toward an IDF operation in Rafah is twofold. One, tunnels running underneath have long plagued Egypt’s anti-smuggling efforts. (Though those efforts have gotten feebler over the years.) Two, Egypt does not want to take responsibility for any part of Gaza nor any Gazans. As Israel’s experience shows, that is a difficult entanglement to disengage from. Perhaps all the more so because of Rafah’s identity as a divided city.

The latter point has been a running theme of the broader Arab-Israeli conflict since 1967. Egypt does not want Gaza. Israel does not want Gaza (it went so far as to leave Gaza unilaterally, without a single guarantee about what the Strip would be used for thereafter). Hamas does not want Gaza—not in the traditional sense. Hamas does not want to govern the people of Gaza. It put all the Strip’s resources into building a second Gaza underground that is inaccessible to most Gazans, and it does not want statehood. There is nothing that Hamas wants, in fact, that is in any way beneficial to the Palestinians unless those Palestinians are members of Hamas (or UNRWA, the UN refugee agency that is essentially Hamas’s very own Learning Annex). Hamas is a terrorist army that is controlled and funded by non-Palestinian entities.

UN Relief Chief Martin Griffiths told said on Wednesday that he did not consider Hamas to be a terrorist group.

A Sky News interviewer asked him about the difficulty of eliminating Hamas, and Griffiths responded “Hamas is not a terrorist group for us, as you know, it is a political movement."

There was an uproar at a UN representative saying Hamas was not a terrorist group, so Griffiths pretended to clarify, tweeting, "Just to clarify: Hamas is not on the list of groups designated as terrorist organizations by the United Nations Security Council."

That hardly exonerates him, since he didn't only exclude Hamas as a terrorist group, but he also said it was a "political movement."

But it is worth examining the UN Security Council list of designated terrorist groups, because it is not meant to be a list of terrorist groups worldwide.

The list started as a list of groups to be sanctioned under United Nations Security Council Resolution 1267 which was specifically against Al Qaeda and later expanded to the Taliban and ISIS. The name of the the list is the "ISIL (Da'esh) & Al-Qaida Sanctions List."

The UN Security Council does not claim to have a list of designated terror organizations. It has a list of terror organizations associated with ISIS and Al Qaeda, nothing more. (There is also a separate list of entities and people under sanctions for various reasons, but it is not referred to as a terrorist list.)

So Griffiths is being knowingly deceptive about even this.

Of course, the UN would never designate Hamas or Islamic Jihad as terrorist organizations, because the Arab bloc and other non-aligned nations would oppose it. So using the UN as a yardstick to determine whether Hamas is a terror group is absurd. Hamas and Islamic Jihad are designated terror groups by the EU, US, UK and others.

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

Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424.

Read all about it here!

1,300 Gaza rockets have landed in Gaza since October, and other rocket statistics that no one is reporting

Since October 7, Hamas and Islamic Jihad have launched over 10,000 rockets towards Israel.

About 1,300 of them fell in Gaza.

I'm no expert, but that seems like a lot. Especially in "one of the most densely populated areas on Earth."

Outside the Al Ahli hospital incident, when have reporters even mentioned this? How many have investigated "airstrikes" on civilian areas and noted that they look more like Hamas rockets than Israeli airstrikes?

I have reported that it is likely that a terror rocket hit the Al Awda Hospital in November, an incident where three doctors died. The damage in the hospital is far more consistent with a rocket than with an airstrike. But every other report assumed it was Israel.

Because no one mentions the 1,300 Hamas rockets exploding in Gaza itself.

There are some other statistics of rocket fire that the media cannot be bothered to report (source: INSS).

Here is a graph of Code Red alerts in Israel over time since October 8.

It appears that military action can reduce rocket attacks! Who knew?

Jerusalem, which Hamas pretends to be protecting, has had 48 rocket alerts. Tel Aviv, 163.

Ashkelon has had the most rocket alerts of any town - 576.

Over 2,000 rockets have been fired at Israel from the north mostly from Lebanon.

This map lists the number of attacks on each community from the north.

Nearly 218,000 Israelis have been forced to leave their homes because of the threat of rocket attacks. 62,000 are from the northern communities, the rest from the Gaza area.

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!

HOW TO ACCUSE ISRAEL OF THE WORST HUMAN RIGHTS ABUSES

A Handy Guide

Time tested by "human rights" groups!

1. Determine which specific crime against humanity you want to accuse Israel of. It is important to have a good libel in mind before you start to gather evidence. This is how the professionals do it.

2. Start to gather evidence. It is not strictly important that the evidence fits the legal definition of the crime; you can declare it does without fear of contradiction. Your audience is looking to affirm and confirm their antisemitism, not to seek truth.

3. (VERY IMPORTANT): While you are gathering evidence, you may find counter-evidence that disproves your accusation. Ignore this counter-evidence at all costs. Even (and especially!) if you need to twist your evidence to make this work.

4. Many accusations of war crimes, like apartheid and genocide, requires you to be able to read the minds of Israeli leaders and Zionists. When they say they want to "eradicate Hamas," for example, we all know that they mean "eradicate Palestinians." We know this because they are Jews, and Zionist Jews are slippery liars so you cannot trust what they say - only what your psychic abilities tell you they really mean. This predetermined assumption of guilt is a major part of building the case that they are indeed guilty.

5. Write a very long, heavily footnoted report. When you present 300 pages that show only one side of the story, no one will even think to spend the time checking all those footnotes. The more footnotes, the more people will think this is a serious work of scholarship and not a one-sided hack job that is desired.

6. Some stubborn Zionists will still insist on checking the footnotes out to prove that you are lying, or taking facts or quotes out of context, or making things up. Do not link or refer to primary sources. Link only to media articles that already twisted the primary sources to damn Israel (The Nation, Time, Washington Post), and treat them as if they are the real source.

7. Liberally quote other reports of human rights groups who have already used these methods to "prove" their own slanders against Israel. When a major human rights group accuses Israel of something like apartheid or genocide or settler colonialism, that makes it a fact that you no longer need to prove again.

8. Treat every Palestinian claim as absolute truth, and quietly discard them when proven to be false. Treat every Israeli claim as already disproven hasbara. In this case, references to Electronic Intifada, Max Blumenthal and Mondoweiss are exceptionally valuable., since they can do the lying for you.

9. If you must refer to Palestinian war crimes to appear balanced, give a passing mention to "rockets." Never mention incitement, rape, murder, antisemitism, misogyny, wife beating, gay bashing or anything else.

10. When forced to debate Zionists and they mention Palestinian war crimes and extremism, blame Israel. Palestinians have no agency or choice in how they act. When Israelis are killed, it is their own fault, and no one else's.

11. Avoid context. Never look at the entire picture. Never compare Israeli actions with those of any other country. Look at Israel with a microscope and don't compare with what other nations do in wartime. (The only exception is if you find a creative way to say Israel is the world's worst at something, like the "most destructive war in the 21st century in an area less than 400 km2 with a Z in its name.")

12. Build on the work of those who came before you. Find obscure concepts like "domicide" and popularize them by applying them to Israel only. If you get lucky enough to apply a new human rights abuse to Israel, repeat it over and over. Make sure that if anyone does an Internet search for the term, Israel fills up the first page of the results.

13. Even though you spend all your time and effort attacking Jews, strenuously deny you are antisemitic. Claim to be merely a "critic" of Israel, a nation you fervently want to see destroyed. Accuse those who say you are antisemitic of being the real bigots if you identify as a woman, a person of color or a Jew yourself.

14. Finally, learn to lie. Find photos on the Internet from sub-Saharan Africa and claim they are Gazans. Use AI to generate photos of thousands of dead children. Refer to nonexistent Talmud sources or fictional quotes by Ben Gurion. Make up new international laws. Pretend UN General Assembly resolutions are legally meaningful. As long as you speak confidently, people who already hate Jews will believe you no matter what you say. You will be surprised how many people are eager to hear new ways to blame all the world's problems on Israel and Jews.

These are all time tested, repeatable methods that have worked well over history against Jews and now against Israel.

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

Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424.

Read all about it here!

02/15 Links Pt2: The antisemitism crisis is out of control; Australia’s Descent Into Jew-Baiting Chaos; Tlaib Votes ‘Present’ on Condemnation of Hamas’ Sexual Violence

From Ian:

Melanie Phillips: The antisemitism crisis is out of control

The Labour leader either loses the support of the Muslims or the Jews. But he can’t afford to lose either, the first on grounds of electoral math and the second on grounds of the party’s foundational claim to moral decency.

The Conservative government is also in a mess over this problem. It has expressed horror at the rise in British antisemitism and called it “utterly deplorable.” Ministers cannot begin to address it, however, unless they call out not just support for Hamas but support for the Palestinian cause itself.

They have not done so. Instead, the accepted line is that Hamas is bad but the Palestinian cause is fine.

Worse still, Foreign Secretary Lord Cameron, like his counterpart in the United States, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, has repeatedly demanded the establishment of a Palestinian state after the end of the war in Gaza.

Not only would this pose an insupportable danger to Israel from Palestinian Arabs no less committed than Hamas to the genocide of the Jews, but through such rhetoric, Cameron and Blinken are tacitly endorsing the antisemitism being inescapably promoted through the Palestinian cause.

In America, under the pressure of the presidential election later this year, the Biden administration is desperately trying to pacify the Democrats’ interrelated pro-Palestinian and Muslim constituencies.

It is doing so through an increasingly harsh attitude towards embattled Israel, with Blinken ramping up demands amounting to surrender to Hamas and the State Department sanctioning four Jewish “settlers” while defaming all Jewish residents of the disputed territories of Judea and Samaria.

Last week, a delegation of senior officials was dispatched to the key Democratic stronghold of Dearborn, Mich., to grovel to the Muslim community there. The principal deputy national security director, Jon Finer, actually apologized for the White House statement marking 100 days after Oct. 7, which focused on the tragic plight of the hostages and the brutality of Hamas, and expressed contrition for “missteps” in America’s support for Israel.

In both Britain and America, the Muslim vote is increasingly distorting politics. The consequences are potentially devastating.

The UNRWA Obstacle

This current problem is the result of the original sin, the original problem. As UNRWA became entrenched, its mission was no longer to settle the refugees and their sons, grandsons, great-grandsons, great-great-grandsons, but rather to keep their dream of “going home” alive. That is, to keep a sinister and disruptive vision for the Palestinians, one in which Israel somehow ceases to exist as the millions of supposed exiled Palestinians go back to places that were resettled decades ago by other people.

Such a vision should not come as great surprise, because UNRWA is an international organization by name and funding only. It gets its allocations from a naïve, or baleful, world, it draws its legitimacy from being an agent of the international community. But in fact, it is a Palestinian organization funded by outsiders. Other than a few foreigners in managerial positions, almost all UNRWA employees are Palestinians. In Gaza, they are Gazans, and, in most cases, supporters of Hamas. They get their salaries from you — Americans, or Canadians, or Norwegians — and they work for Yahya Sinwar, a coldblooded killer and a master of violence. They work for him in two ways: as perpetrators of terrorism, or perpetrators of hate.

Note this: When UNRWA takes care of schools and medicine in Gaza, all expenses are paid by you. It’s not because there’s no money in Gaza to fund these activities; it is because Hamas takes that money and uses it for other purposes, such as arming itself, digging tunnels, firing rockets. UNRWA is an agency whose work gets Hamas off the hook of having to provide for the population of Gaza. Hamas is engaged in violence, while UNRWA keeps the people of Gaza fed, clothed and schooled. That’s a convenient arrangement for all parties involved. Hamas has free hands to do what it wants to do, UNRWA has a mission that keeps it viable. All this is well known and documented. You can read all about it in the above-mentioned book. There’s no news – except for the fact that we were suddenly made to realize that UNRWA is not a nuisance, it is a threat that must be dealt with. It is a threat that should be eliminated along with Hamas rule. There are less corrupt and less political aid agencies that can replace UNRWA, such as USAID, the World Food Program, and other groups that already have functioning operations in certain Palestinian areas.

The most eager supporters of this decision – to eliminate UNRWA – ought to be those who want to someday see a cure for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The cure will not come when the world funds an organization whose main activity is to keep a wound open, to preach the gospel of victimhood, to educate the next generation of people with no dream other than the destruction of other people’s homes and country. That this organization is also swarmed with terrorist supportive employees is not a bug, but a feature. You can’t run an army by staffing it with pacificists, you can’t run a school by staffing it with illiterates, you can’t run an orchestra by staffing it with only deaf persons – and you can’t run an UNRWA believing that its workers will be a peace-loving, solution-seeking, peace-promoting bunch.

So, as they say, don’t let a crisis go to waste. Winning the war and keeping UNRWA would be a wasteful thing to do.

Why the UN Hates this Man

The United Nations, I think it’s safe to say, has moved beyond parody to farce.

Created in the wake of the Holocaust with the primary goal of preventing future world wars and genocides, its number one target of condemnation since 1967 has been the only Jewish state.

Russia and China are permanent members of the Security Council, tasked with “the maintenance of international peace and security.” Current members of the Human Rights Council include China, Qatar, Cuba, and Sudan. The Commission on the Status of Women finally unloaded Iran, but still includes Afghanistan, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and China.

Since 2015, the General Assembly has condemned Israel 140 times; the total against all other countries combined: 65.

Still, the U.N.’s treatment of Israel remains its most barbaric affectation. In 1975, the U.N. declared that Zionism is racism. Since 2006, more than half of all condemnatory resolutions in the Human Rights Council have targeted Israel. Since 2015, the General Assembly has condemned Israel 140 times; the total against all other countries combined: 65. Israel has been made to face the International Criminal Court, because in the morally corrupt human rights industry, Israel’s self-defense amounts to a war crime.

And then there’s UNRWA, whose tight alliance with Hamas no doubt makes ISIS jealous.

Much of the above came to light when in 2004 a Canadian named Hillel Neuer became executive director of UN Watch, a human rights NGO in Geneva, Switzerland. Under his leadership, UN Watch has become the leading force against what he calls the “U.N.’s pathological discrimination and delegitimization of Israel.” He regularly calls out countries and their leaders on human rights abuses, which is what the U.N. would be doing if its mission hadn’t become politicized.

None of this makes him very popular at the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva. “When I walk into the room at the U.N., if looks could kill, I’d be dead by a thousand blows,” Neuer told the Jerusalem Post.

On Feb. 7, a bipartisan group of 12 U.S. legislators sent a letter to U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken urging him to demand that U.N. Secretary General António Guterres and the head of UNRWA, Philippe Lazzarini, resign over the revelation that a dozen members of UNRWA staff were involved in the Oct. 7th massacre: seven staffers infiltrated Israel; five helped to kidnap Israelis and provide ammunition. In addition, the IDF found that Hamas stored weapons in UNRWA buildings; used UNRWA resources for terrorist activities; and built tunnels under UNRWA facilities. And a recent Wall Street Journal report estimates that roughly 10% of UNRWA employees — 1,200 — are linked to Hamas.

Who initiated this call for their resignations? Hillel Neuer.

I was lucky to grab some time with @HillelNeuer of @UNWatch to get some insight on the United Nations & the most criminal scandal of our time: the participation of @UNRWA staff in rape, murder & kidnapping - paid for by our taxes

How could this happen?

We discuss#replaceUNRWA pic.twitter.com/V3uaEp1apz
— leekern (@leekern13) February 15, 2024

Egypt building a real open-air prison for Gazans in the Sinai, just in case

The NGO Sinai for Human Rights wrote on X:

Egypt to create a gated high-security area in the reception of Palestinian refugees from Gaza

The Sinai Foundation obtained information through a relevant source that indicates that the construction work currently taking place in eastern Sinai, is intended to create a high-security gated and isolated area near the borders with Gaza strip, in preparation for the reception of Palestinian refugees in the case of the mass exodus of the citizens of Gaza Strip.

The foundation interviewed two local contractors who said that local construction companies had been commissioned this construction work by Ibrahim Al-Arjani - A close businessman to the authorities - Abnaa Sinai For Construction & Building, who had been directly assigned the commission through the Egyptian Armed Forces Engineering Authority. The construction work is intended to build a gated area, surrounded by 7-meter-high walls. After the removal of the rubble of the houses of the indigenous people of Rafah, who were displaced forcibly and their houses demolished during the war against terrorism against ISIS. The area is expected to be levelled and ready in no more than 10 days. They said this information is being circulated in closed circuits to avoid publication, noting that the work is being done under the supervision of the Egyptian Armed Forces Engineering Authority under heavy security presence.

Here's a photo of the construction from their website. (Google autotranslated text.)

And here is a map showing the area being prepared depicted in white. It borders both Gaza and Israel.

That area is empty now.

I don't know if this is being built under pressure from the West, or if it is a "Plan B" in case desperate Gazans somehow manage to breach the existing wall.

Either way, it will be hard for Egypt to claim that it loves Palestinians when it is building a prison with 23-foot high walls.

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!

Madrassa Instructor Caught Pleasuring Himself To Pics Of IDF Troops In Diapers (PreOccupied Territory)

Our weekly column from the humor site PreOccupied Territory.

Check out their Facebook page.

Jerusalem, February 15 - Scandal rocked a renowned Islamic seminary this week upon the discovery that a beloved instructor there habitually pleasures himself to images of Israeli soldiers who had humorously donned a shipment of absorbent disposable briefs that reached them by accident, sources within the seminary disclosed today.

Two members of that staff, who spoke on condition of anonymity, at the Mutaharish Aitfal Madrassa in Jerusalem's Moslem Quarter of the Old City, told reporters that a senior lecturer, whom they declined to name, was caught twice in the last two months masturbating to photographs of the IDF soldiers. The first time, the sources reported, the incident was dismissed as a one-time aberration or moment of weakness, but following the second time, which, according to information from someone within the madrassa administration, involved the presence of minors, and resulted in the instructor's suspension, at least temporarily.

As Israel began mobilizing and preparing for its current operations in the Gaza Strip, following an October 7 invasion of southern Israel by Hamas that killed 1200 Israelis and involved mass rape and brutality as well as the abduction of Israelis as hostages, Israelis, as well as supporters abroad, contributed tons of supplies, gifts, treats, and equipment to the standing and reserve troops. One such shipment reached a group of soldiers who discovered that a mix-up had caused them to receive not helmets, body armor, snacks, socks, underwear, children's letters, or gift cards, but adult diapers.

The unit in question decided to don the diapers and pose for a photo, which went viral among two separate audiences online: people who appreciated the humor in making light of an awkward situation, and anti-Israel users who enjoy depicting as helpless babies the soldiers who have by now destroyed two thirds of Hamas's fighting capacity in the Gaza Strip - killing, capturing, or incapacitating about 20,000 fighters - for a loss of only several hundred IDF soldiers.

The madrassa instructor's behavior has challenged the institution's administration and the surrounding community, which both take a hard pro-Palestinian stance. "The parents found out and are furious," acknowledged one of the sources. "Less so because of the minors being exposed to the masturbation - they were just the kids of staff, and nobody cares about them - and more because of the shame of this paragon, this mentor, getting aroused by... that stuff."

"I mean, if it were actual kids, or goats, no one would mind."

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

Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424.

Read all about it here!

02/15 Links Pt1: US, Arabs ‘rushing’ plan to establish Palestinian state; Israeli FM slams UN for calling Hamas ‘political movement’

From Ian:

US, Arabs ‘rushing’ plan to establish Palestinian state

The Biden administration is preparing to make a major push for Palestinian statehood if a Gaza ceasefire agreement being negotiated in Cairo this week takes effect.

According to The Washington Post, the United States and its Arab partners are “rushing” to finalize the plan to establish a Palestinian state—a plan that could be announced in the next few weeks with hopes that a deal to release the remaining 134 hostages held by Hamas terrorists in Gaza in exchange for a six-week pause in fighting takes effect before Ramadan, which begins on March 10, give or take a day.

Negotiations in Cairo on a hostage-for-ceasefire deal have been extended until Friday. However, only lower-level officials are participating after Tuesday’s initial summit, which included high-ranking representatives from Egypt, Israel, Qatar and the United States.

There is an urgency to reach an agreement because Jerusalem is readying for a major offensive in Rafah, the last Hamas stronghold in the Gaza Strip. While Israel is working on an evacuation plan for the 1.5 million civilians sheltered in the city ahead of the battle, fears are mounting in Western capitals about the toll the fighting could take on the noncombatant population.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday dismissed reports of progress in the Cairo talks, with his office issuing a statement saying that Jerusalem did not receive any new proposal from Hamas on releasing the hostages and that the premier “insists that Israel will not give in to Hamas’s delusional demands.”

Jerusalem’s goals in the war, which have not changed, are to destroy Hamas in Gaza, free the hostages and ensure that the territory never threatens Israel again. Hamas initiated the war on Oct. 7 when thousands of terrorists broke across the border, murdering 1,200 men, women and children, wounding thousands more and kidnapping 253 people.

Netanyahu emphasized the importance of the Gaza military campaign on Wednesday evening and reiterated Jerusalem’s position on the Cairo talks.

“This week we freed two of our hostages in a brilliant military operation. As of now we have freed 112 of our hostages in a combination of strong military pressure and tough negotiations.This is also the key to freeing more of our hostages: Strong military pressure and very tough negotiations,” the prime minister said.

“Indeed, I insist that Hamas drop its delusional demands. When they do so, we will be able to move forward,” he continued.

In addition to the United States, the participants planning the pathway to a Palestinian state are Egypt, Jordan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and the Palestinians. Notably, Israel is not involved in these discussions, according to the Post.

WaPo: U.S., Arab Nations Plan for Postwar Gaza, Palestinian State

The Biden administration and a group of Arab partners are rushing to complete a detailed, comprehensive plan for long-term peace between Israel and Palestinians, including a firm timeline for the establishment of a Palestinian state, that could be announced in the coming weeks. The planning participants include Egypt, Jordan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Palestinian representatives, in addition to the U.S.

The elephant in the planning room is Israel, and whether its government will acquiesce to much of what is being discussed: the withdrawal of many, if not all, Israeli communities in the West Bank; a Palestinian capital in eastern Jerusalem; the reconstruction of Gaza; and security and governance arrangements for a combined West Bank and Gaza. The hope is that Israel would also be offered specific security guarantees and normalization with Saudi Arabia and other Arab states.

U.S. officials said the menu of actions under consideration include early U.S. recognition of a Palestinian state - even as elements of political reform, security guarantees for both Israel and the Palestinians, normalization and reconstruction are being implemented.

"I'd be stunned if they extended de jure or de facto recognition to the state of Palestine" as an early part of a day-after plan, said Aaron David Miller, a former State Department adviser and coordinator on Arab-Israeli negotiations. He questioned whether the current leadership of either Israel or the Palestinians was capable of or interested in "any transformative solution." "They don't have the leaders in place to pull the wagon."

Americans "think they can come here and play with us like building Lego," said Tawfiq Al-Tirawi, a member of the Central Committee of Fatah, the largest faction in the PLO, which forms the basis of the Palestinian Authority. "If we want to renew our leadership, that's purely our decision." One Arab official said Hamas should be included in the talks, if not in the future government, "to ensure they're on board with this."

Palestinian Authority Security Forces Behind Dozens of Recent Attacks on Israelis, Watchdog Finds

Officially, the Palestinian Authority works with Israel to crack down on terror groups in the West Bank. But off-duty PA security forces have carried out dozens of attacks on Israelis, according to a watchdog group.

An investigation by Palestinian Media Watch, the nonprofit watchdog based in Jerusalem, documented at least 55 attacks by PA security forces against Israeli soldiers or civilians since 2020, including four in the past month alone. In each case, the PA or its ruling Fatah party has eulogized the attacker as one of their own "soldiers."

The findings reveal the extent to which the PA, the internationally recognized Palestinian government in Ramallah, encourages and rewards terrorism against Israel—even in its own ranks. For Israel, such activity proves the folly of the Biden administration’s demand that a "revitalized" PA be allowed to govern Gaza following Israel’s war against Hamas, the rival Palestinian faction that rules the territory.

Itamar Marcus, the director of Palestinian Media Watch, on Monday sent a copy of the report, "Terrorists in Uniform: A study of PA Security Forces involvement in terror," to Secretary of State Antony Blinken.

"The American suggestion to empower these terror forces to rule Gaza after Israel has destroyed the terror infrastructure is inconceivable," Marcus told the Washington Free Beacon. "The PA and its security forces are a fundamental part of the problem; it is absurd to believe they can be part of the solution."

Going further than the Israeli government, Marcus called on the Biden administration to reverse its reinstatement of $45 million a year in funding to the PA security services. He noted that the United States last month froze donations to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency following revelations that staff took part in the Oct. 7 attack.

"This is far worse than UNRWA, where at least the leadership claimed they didn't know," Marcus said. "The PA is saying, ‘We know, and we're happy about it. And that's what makes us heroic.’"

Waiting for War With Hezbollah

United Nations Security Council Resolution 1701 was adopted on Aug. 11, 2006, to end a one-month war sparked by a surprise Hezbollah attack on IDF forces along the border that caused the death and abduction of two soldiers, Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev. Using the obsequious language of international diplomacy that fails to mention Hezbollah by name, the resolution “calls for” the establishment between the Blue Line and the Litani River of an area “free of any armed personnel, assets and weapons other than those of the Government of Lebanon and of UNIFIL.” But Hezbollah never withdrew its forces, and the U.N. Security Council has never enforced its 2006 resolution, the implementation of which was dependent on coordination with the Lebanese authorities, who answer to Hezbollah. The UNIFIL soldiers “do absolutely nothing,” said Reuveni.

Most Israeli villages in the north were evacuated after Oct. 7 and its 80,000 residents have not yet returned. Many homes have been damaged and destroyed by mortars and missiles.

Since Oct. 7, a reported 20 civilians have been killed on the Lebanese side, as well as nearly 200 Hezbollah fighters. In Israel, nine soldiers and 10 civilians have been killed by Hezbollah fire.

President Biden has been pursuing a diplomatic effort to ensure Israel does not launch an operation in Lebanon after Gaza. He has sent Special Presidential Coordinator for Global Infrastructure and Energy Security Amos Hochstein to try and broker a deal that will ostensibly move Hezbollah a few kilometers back from the border—far short of what UNSCR 1701 calls for—in return for IDF demobilization on the border, followed by land border negotiations that would pressure Israel to concede border areas claimed by Hezbollah and Lebanon. In 2022, Hochstein had strong-armed the Israelis to accept a lopsided maritime border deal with Lebanon, working hand in glove with Hezbollah and its cut-outs in the Lebanese government.

Reuveni says that based on history and the reality in Lebanon, “I don’t see any reason why any Israeli would trust negotiations or a diplomatic solution.” In December, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant promised the mayors of the northern communities that their residents would not go home until Hezbollah was driven north of the Litani River. “If they want to go north of the Litani River, let them go,” Reuveni said dismissively. But he is not holding his breath.

On Jan. 31, after 119 days of service, Reuveni was furloughed. He climbed back into his car and drove home. He was told he must report back to duty in May.

“I need to process everything that happened,” he wrote to me a few days after getting home. “It still feels like some kind of dream. And now being back is very mentally hard. Everything is confused and I need to put things in order.”

There are some Marxists who fight antisemitism from within

One of the most salient features of modern antisemitism is its utter lack of consistency. It applies standards to Israel that are never applied to Israel's enemies; it demands of Jews things it doesn't demand from anyone else. When the hypocrisy is pointed out, the response is "whataboutism" or the critic is attacked as "Zionist" which ends the discussion right there.

The best way to discredit any form of antisemitism is to argue from within the same ideological framework as the antisemites themselves.

The most devastating and complete takedown I have yet seen of conspiracist and antisemitic former British academic David Miller comes from an unusual source: the

Marxist Workers World Liberty site.

Miller’s claims of a Zionist/Israeli conspiracy to take over the world are 24-carat 21st-century antisemitism: His claims are a revamped version of the world Jewish conspiracy promoted by the “Protocols of the Elders of Zion” and the Nazis.

Although Miller talks of Zionists rather than Jews, the actors in his imaginary conspiracy are all Jewish: the Jewish national state, Jewish organisations, and Jewish individuals.

Miller endows them with the attributes of Jews in more traditional antisemitic conspiracy theories. They “penetrate” power structures, they run campaigns of “subversion”, they are unpatriotic cosmopolitans, they take orders from a foreign power, they bring down political leaders, they “dictate” the outcome of elections, they are all-powerful, and they use bogus allegations of antisemitism to silence their opponents.

The site cannot be regarded as Zionist, but it does appear to be consistent in its worldview, and as such it brings up viewpoints that are simply never heard in most places.

At the onset of the current war, the site published a backgrounder on Zionism and the history of the conflict that succinctly demolishes most anti-Israel arguments from a progressive, Marxist perspective:

Socialists must side with the oppressed against their oppressors. In general, we side with the Palestinian Arabs against Israeli oppression. However, to side with an oppressed people should not mean that we adopt all the views of every group within it, or even of its majority. Those views may be one-sided or even chauvinist.

...The Jewish state is no longer a scheme for the future. It is a fact over 75 years old. Most Israelis live there because they were born there. The meaning of “Zionism” is not so clear. Usually it is taken to mean any sort of sympathy or identification with Israel, however critical — in other words, the reflex response of most Jews worldwide.

Then “Zionism” is denounced as something akin to racism. This is ideological terrorism, used to prevent any consideration of the issues that does not start with root-and-branch condemnation of Israel.

The “absolute anti-Zionist” demand that “Zionism” should be undone — i.e. that the Israeli Jewish state should cease to exist, and that the Jewish nation should instead dissolve into an Arab state — is not necessarily racist, but it is inescapably antisemitic. It implies hostility to the Israeli Jews, and hostility to that big majority of Jews worldwide, the “Zionists”, who instinctively identify with Israel.

The voices of the sane Left have been shouted down by the antisemitic Left. But they exist.

No Pasaran Media is a publishing house featuring "Left Wing authors in the fight against Left antisemitism, racism and conspiracy theories." The blurb for its latest book is a breath of fresh air from the Left:

Outcast is an explanation of how Jewish people’s experiences of racism have been cast out of the anti-racist imagination, as the very possibility of recognising anti-Jewish racism has been displaced by the commonplace leftist belief that when Jewish people cry ‘antisemitism!’, their surreptitious intent is to cover up the real racism propagated by Israel against the Palestinians.

How this has happened lies both in an academic framework for the study of racism that confines racism to a colonial phenomenon of ‘white over black’ domination, and in the antisemitic idea of ‘the Jewish question’: that something must be done about the harm which Jews pose to humanity. Outcast shows that when both are translated into an understanding of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, Zionism and all associated Jews become the representation of racism incarnate demanding the unprecedented wipe out of Israel.

Camila Bassi says “Outcast is the product of my search for the reasons why sections of the Left are so singularly obsessed by Israel and are disposed to cast out those who identify as Jewish as unworthy of solidarity. This book elucidates how Jews have been banished as victims of racism by their demotion as the Left’s racist pariahs, while offering a more comprehensive and inclusive approach to the study of racism and to emancipatory politics”

Too much of the discussion of Israel devolves into a Right vs. Left argument. This turns Israel into a political and ideological football, with actual debate suppressed.

The fact is that Israel upholds the best ideals of both sides and rejects the extremism and bigotry that is sadly seen on both sides as well. Antisemitism poisons the debate and it must be identified, uprooted and shamed.

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!