Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Wednesday, February 21, 2024

The people of Gaza have spoken and they blame Hamas (Judean Rose)

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

The whole world blames Israel for the loss of life and devastation in Gaza. But the people of Gaza are having none of it. The president of Brazil, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, went so far as to compare Israel’s actions in Gaza to those of Nazi leader Adolf Hitler against the Jews and the president of Colombia, President Gustavo Petro, agreed with him. And still, the Gazan people know better. They know who bears the fault for laying waste to Gaza, and it's not Israel. The body responsible for destroying Gaza is Hamas.

But try telling that to the Zionist- Jew-hating, Israel-hating world, and they’ll only double down. UN Relief Chief Martin Griffiths, for example, said that he did not consider Hamas to be a terrorist group. In spite of the clamor from regular Gazans.

Martin Griffiths, @UNReliefChief, denies Hamas is a terrorist organization. No wonder he is abusing his power to save Hamas' skin after the deadliest terror attack since 9/11 instead of demanding its surrender. pic.twitter.com/0FIA3fmtDU
— Eylon Levy (@EylonALevy) February 15, 2024

Michelle O’Neill, the recently elected First Minister of Northern Ireland, also does not care what the people of Gaza think, going so far as to claim that Hamas will come to be regarded as the future partner for peace in the Middle East! The people of Gaza, however, vehemently disagree with this naïve assessment, and now that Hamas is on the way to extinction, have begun to lose their fear of speaking out. They know that Israel not to blame for their suffering, and they’re pointing their collective finger at the real culprit, Hamas.

The IDF, for example, posted a video compilation of Gazans speaking out against Hamas on December 15. One of the most striking moments in this video occurs during a news reporter’s interview of a Gazan man: “And if I told you that Hamas ruined Gaza? What would you respond?”

“Obviously. It’s obvious,” said the interview subject, “The reason of this destruction is Hamas.”

Here’s another IDF clip of a Gazan blaming Hamas for the war.

Hamas’ oppression has started to collapse. Gazan civilians are speaking out against Hamas— watch this: pic.twitter.com/zICKDtakR9
— Israel Defense Forces (@IDF) November 7, 2023

The Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center on December 13, published bulleted lists of Gazans criticizing Hamas in the media and on social networks. Some excerpts:

Criticism of Hamas in the media

·        The Palestinian Authority’s Wafa TV interviewed residents and evacuees from Khan Yunis who left the city for the Rafah area. One of them angrily claimed that they had been forced to evacuate Rafah to a place where there was no water, food or showers. He wondered why “they” [Hamas] were doing it to them. “Hamas, protect the people!” he said. Another resident who was riding in a horse-drawn cart, shouted “May Allah disgrace the honor of Hamas and al-Sinwar” (Wafa YouTube channel, December 6, 2023).

·        Radio Alam, which broadcasts from Hebron, aired an interview with residents of the Gaza Strip who criticized Hamas and its leadership. One of the interviewees cursed Yahya al-Sinwar and claimed, “You destroyed us.” He said, “the Palestinian civilians speak without fear because they now know that death is everywhere, the leaders of Hamas must pay attention to the Gazans to protect what is left of the Gazan people and end the useless war.” He spoke of the civilians’ difficulties after they moved from Khan Yunis to Rafah, and emphasized that the Hamas leadership did not care. Another interviewee appealed to Yahya al-Sinwar in distress, saying there was no food or water and the number of evacuees was increasing, while there are 20,000 people in one school. He called for help for the children and expressed fear of epidemics spreading among the citizens (Assaf Mustafa’s X account, December 6, 2023).
Hamas rats hide in tunnels while Gazan civilians suffer (Issa Alris X account, November 23, 2023)

·        Al-Hadath TV, an Arab channel, played a recording of a Palestinian evacuee, which was originally broadcast on the local radio, who claimed Hamas had destroyed them and that everything happened because of al-Sinwar. He said they had gone from Gaza City to Khan Yunis and from there to Rafah. He said Hamas stole humanitarian aid meant for the Palestinian public, adding that the Hamas leadership, including al-Sinwar and Muhammad Deif, were underground and did not care about what was happening [to the Gazans above ground]. He also appealed to al-Sinwar to release the hostages (al-Hadath TV, December 6, 2023).

·        Ahmed Rifat Muheisen, an evacuee, was interviewed by QudsN channel TV, a Palestinian TV channel, from the tent camp of the evacuees in western Rafah, and complained that at night it rained on them. He complained there was no [central] entity in the Gaza Strip, not even a governmental entity [i.e., the Hamas administration] taking care of them. No one, he said, gave them answers about their situation (QudsN X account, December 6, 2023).

·        The American satellite Alhurra network broadcast a video of a Palestinian sheltering in al-Aqsa hospital in Deir al-Balah, after members of her family were injured in an IDF attack. She shouts [at Hamas] to end the war in Gaza, stating that enough is enough, they do not want more destruction or a prisoner exchange deal (Alhurra TV X account, December 4, 2023).

A Palestinian woman calls for the end of the war in Gaza (Alhurra TV X account, December 4, 2023)

Criticism of Hamas on social networks

·        Kareem Jodha (4,300 followers) posted a quote from senior Hamas terrorist Osama Hamdan, which read, “Gaza was and will continue to be a cemetery for invaders and occupiers.” Jodha replied, “True, it was, but people like you turned it into a cemetery for its residents and genocide” (Kareem Jouda’s Facebook page, December 4, 2023).

·        Ghattas (1,012 followers) wrote, “When the war is futile and the defeats taste like massacres, retreat is courage, admitting defeat is chivalry, and the one who preserves the blood, honor and livelihood of the innocent is the winner. That is of course part of the morality of “the knights,” however, insane al-Sinwar and the other leaders of the tunnels and the Hamas Muslim Brothers who live in fancy hotels are not among them” (@Moraqeb2020 X account, December 4, 2023). He attached a photo of Yahya al-Sinwar.

·        Ghattas also retweeted a tweet by a Saudi journalist, who wrote, “With all the destruction and killing, where are Yahya al-Sinwar, Mashaal and Haniyeh, where is their offer of protection for their people? Maybe they enjoy the torture and bloodshed, as is the custom of the Muslim Brotherhood? Where is the wisdom of the leader and his compassion for his people? The world will not stand with you, because on October 7 you foolishly gave your enemy the chance to go down in history. So be brave and take action to stop the killing of your children and women Are the lives of some Israelis you bargain for more valuable than the lives of your own civilians?” After that he added, “Hamas is not only an armed movement, but a movement of seats [of power], rule and money. History has taught us that the Muslim Brotherhood does not leave the seat of power unless they and those who rule them are [forcibly removed], and Gaza will be no exception” (@Moraqeb2020’s X account, December 4, 2023).

·        Naama Hassan (7,431 followers) wrote that “Displacement and death will not stop unless the war stopped. The war in Gaza has to stop. The lives of the people of Gaza are more important than all your negotiations and demands. Share our demands, we have the right to choose life” (Naama Hassan’s Facebook page, December 2, 2023).

·        Amjad Abu Kush (6,387 followers) wrote, I hope that in a future prisoner exchange deal we will not see another dog being carried by an Israeli captive. It will hurt our hearts that he and the dogs that protect him are safe underground, while their people are being destroyed now. #Open_the_shelters, #Open_the_tunels, and #lead us to al-Sinwar, take our children somewhere safe, as the released hostage was told” (Abu Kush’ Facebook page, December 1, 2023). He added that whoever wants to create a flood must first build a ship to save his people, and not a submarine to save himself (Amjad Abu Kush’s Facebook page, December 5, 2023).

·        Marwan Abu Sharia wrote: “Protect us! If Hamas sees itself as the ruler, it must protect the homes of the displaced from thieves. The dogs stole from us” (@elthwrah X account, November 27, 2023).

·        Hani al-Hassan posted a video of a man wearing a yellow vest putting a tray of food in front of a child and then walking away with the tray in his hand. Alhassan wrote that Hamas members are seen in a shelter for the displaced, photographing a child they offer a meal to and then take it from him even though he reaches out to take it (@Hanialhasn1999 X account, November 27, 2023).

Hamas operatives beat civilians in the Shejaiya neighborhood and steal their food (IDF spokesperson in Arabic, Dec 9, 2023)

A Wall Street Journal piece from December 21 cites a survey from a Ramallah-based think tank, the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research, which found that one in five Gazans blames Hamas for their suffering as a result of the war. The article quotes a 56-year-old Gaza businessman, “People are dying every minute. Hamas is the one that dragged us into this terrible vortex.”

A hairdresser from Gaza City, now taking refuge in Rafah was also quoted, “Damn Hamas. If I see Ismail Haniyeh, I will hit him with my slippers,” she said. In the Arab world, throwing shoes at a person is a serious insult.

The use of civilians as human shields, has not helped to endear Hamas to the people of Gaza. On February 12, for example, Gaza-based journalist Jehad Saftawi said that Hamas had sacrificed his family members and neighbors as cannon fodder in its war against Israel.

"Hamas terrorists used my family and hundreds of our neighbors as human shields. Hamas continues to hold the people of Gaza captive," Saftawi wrote on X. "There should be no reconstruction of my family's home while a stockpile of weapons lies underneath.

"Goals rather than causes are what is behind Hamas's masterminds' wars. The case for removing Hamas is not to fuel escalation but to prevent it, which is why they should never be allowed to retake control of Gaza.”

The journalist also said that this was the first time in over 10 years that he felt “able to speak about this publicly,” adding that it’s "a cry for realignment for our Palestinian society as well as an appeal to the international community."

Saftawi further related that while his family home was being built, there were masked men who built a tunnel below. "In the years since my family or their neighbors heard sounds or movements from time to time. They wondered sometimes if there really were tunnels, if they were active. My family was too afraid to speak about this with anyone, so it was our secret. It felt shameful even though we knew we were deeply opposed to whatever Hamas had done on the other side of that cement slab."

Just after October 7, Saftawi and his family evacuated to southern Gaza, and his home and neighborhood are now reduced to rubble. "I may never know if the house was destroyed by Israeli strikes or fighting between Hamas and Israel. But the result is the same. Our home, and far too many in our community, were flattened alongside priceless history and memories.

"This is the legacy of Hamas. They began destroying my family home in 2013 when they built tunnels beneath it. They continued to threaten our safety for a decade—we always knew we might have to vacate at a moment’s notice. We always feared violence. Gazans deserve a true Palestinian government, which supports its citizens’ interests, not terrorists carrying out their own plans. Hamas is not fighting Israel. They’re destroying Gaza," concluded Saftawi.

The Gazan voices crying out against Hamas injustice grow louder by the day. Only yesterday, on the night of February 20, residents from Jabaliya in northern Gaza, and from Rafah in the south, took to the streets in protest against the leaders of Hamas, in particular calling out the head of Hamas in Gaza, Yahya Sinwar, and Hamas political bureau chief Ismail Haniyeh, who is living in the lap of luxury in Qatar. The people of Gaza protested against these Hamas leaders first and foremost for stealing the humanitarian aid meant for them, "We need food, we need flour, Sinwar and Haniyeh, stay away from us, you thieves.”

The Gazan protesters were also heard to condemn Hamas’ representative in Lebanon, Osama Hamdan, "Hamdan, leave Lebanon; the people are the victims. With spirit and blood, we will redeem you, Gaza."

Rafah now has demonstrations against Hamas pic.twitter.com/FnDqsLwoNZ
— Ph.Gritti (@Philipp27960841) February 20, 2024

شيعة .. شيعة
حرامية .. بدنا اكل وبدنا طحين
يا سنوار يا هنية حلوا عن شعبنا يا حرامية

هتافات شعبنا الآن في شمال غزة وعناصر حركة حماس تطلق النار تجاه المتظاهرين وسط جباليا https://t.co/RNLJpeXYxX pic.twitter.com/n91PIuY0VY
— Mohammed Emad 𓂆 (@moh_re21) February 20, 2024

Even as the voices of the people of Gaza swell to ear-piercing decibels, the academics in their ivory towers continue to stick their fingers in the ears. They want to put the onus on Israel and the ~~Zionists~~ Jews for the leveling of Gaza. This is because like Hamas, these antisemites are two-legged beasts with black hearts of stone.

Someday the people of Gaza will curse not only Hamas, but these Jew-haters too, for misleading the world and pointing it in the wrong direction as so many Gazans lost their homes and died.

Not because of the Jews. But because of Hamas. Something the world would rather not know.

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!

A recent survey of Muslims in France point to some very disturbing findings.

17% of French Muslims admit that they hate Jews. 39% say they have a bad, or very bad, opinion of Judaism.

45% of French Muslims say they want the total destruction of Israel. An equivalent number of French Muslims define the massacre rape, torture, beheadings and burning alive of Jews by Hamas terrorists in Israel on October 7, 2023, as an "act of resistance".

19% of French Muslims say they have sympathy for Hamas.

49% of French Muslims want Catholics to convert to Islam, and that 36% percent want churches to be transformed into mosques.

37% of Muslims express sympathy for the Muslim Brotherhood; 57% among the young and 54% among the most religious.

42% of French Muslims respect Islamic Sharia law above respect for the laws of the French republic. Among young Muslim adults below 25, the percentage rises to 57%.

23% want a total or partial application of sharia in France: 35% among 18-25 year olds and 48% among the most religious.

Jews in the US have a crystal ball of what life will be like for them in America in the next decade or two. It's called "Europe." All the hate we are starting to see now in the US was normalized in western Europe years ago.

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!

02/21 Links Pt1: Hamas’s ‘sadistic sex crimes’ on October 7 revealed; The West is about to hand victory to Hamas; Melanie Phillips: The Duke of Gaza

From Ian:

Hamas’s ‘sadistic sex crimes’ on October 7 revealed in new report

The systematic nature of the “sadistic sex crimes” committed during the Hamas-led invasion of Israel on Oct. 7 has been revealed for the first time, in a report published by the Association of Rape Crisis Centers in Israel.

Furthermore, the document has been translated into English and sent to decision-makers in the United Nations to leave “no room for denial or disregard.”

The report, authored by Dr. Carmit Keller-Halamish and Nega Berger, analyses public and confidential testimonies about the sexual violence, eyewitness accounts and interviews with victims and first responders.

“The terrorist organization Hamas has chosen to injure the State of Israel with two clear strategies—taking civilians captive, and sadistic sex crimes,” said Orit Soliciano, CEO of the Association of Rape Crisis Centers.

“It is no longer possible to remain silent—we expect the international organizations to take a clear position, it is impossible to stand on the sidelines. Standing on the other side will be remembered as a historic stain on all those who chose to remain silent and deny the sexual crimes committed by Hamas,” Soliciano added.

The first official report on the sexual element of the atrocities highlights the systematic and deliberate manner in which the sexual violence took place. Over a thousand people were murdered, thousands more wounded and 253 kidnapped during the Hamas-led attack.

According to the report, sexual violence took place everywhere the terrorists invaded, including at the Supernova music festival, kibbutzim, cities, towns and IDF bases. The hostages in Gaza continue to be victimised.

Examples of the sexual crimes committed include violent acts of rape, with weapons pointed at the victims, in some cases aimed at wounded women. Many mass rapes occurred. Often, the rapes were intentionally committed in front of husbands, partners and family members to maximize the pain and helplessness felt and increase the terror.

Hamas terrorists carried out a hunting expedition to catch young men and women who attempted to escape the carnage at the music festival, dragging them by the hair screaming. The sexual violence targeted men, women and girls and included binding their bodies, mutilating genitals and the bodies of both males and females with knives and in some cases inserting weapons inside the genitals.

In most cases, the victims were executed either during the rape or after.

'Many victims' bodies found mutilated and bound, some discovered deliberately booby-trapped'

The report presents several testimonies from massacre survivors who witnessed incidents of gang rape, where women were passed between terrorists who beat, injured, and ultimately murdered them.

Testimonies from first responders and corpse-handling personnel in southern kibbutzim and communities indicate that many homes showed signs of rapes committed close to the time of murder, with a significant number of these incidents occurring in the presence or vicinity of family members.

“Many cases involve heinous attacks on women and girls, including a case of hiding a knife in a genital organ,” the report reads. “Additional information was received by the ARCCI but cannot be disclosed due to privacy concerns.”

The report includes several testimonies, among them that of Noam Mark, a member of the alert squad at Kibbutz Re'im, who found the bodies of three young women from the nova rave in one of the kibbutz homes. The bodies were found naked, with clear signs of severe sexual violence.

According to the report, these violations also occurred at IDF bases. Bodies of female soldiers that arrived at Camp Shura for forensic identification bore unmistakable signs of sexual violence.

“Information regarding sexual assaults in captivity has been published following the testimonies of those who returned from captivity. These testimonies include various cases, including those of captives who are still alive.”

The report indicates that sexual crimes were systematically and deliberately committed during and after the October 7 terror attack, characterized by multiple assailants, assaults in front of family members, executions and accompanied by unique sadistic practices.

"The brutal practices used on October 7, such as genital mutilation of girls, women, and men, shooting, and weapon insertion, were designed to destroy and inflict sadistic terror,” the report authors stated.

According to the authors, the manner in which the assaults were carried out and the actions that accompanied them were intended to maximize the impact on the victims and their communities, which were unable to prevent the attacks.

“As the scars in our hearts refuse to heal, and the souls of our sisters and brothers cry out to us from the depths of the earth, a significant portion of those we considered partners responded in silence and denial of these horrors. We call on you to raise your voices and not allow the cries of these victims to fade away,” they say.

This report, the first official study since October 7, aggregates testimonies and provides conclusions, demonstrating that the incidents were not anomalies or isolated occurrences but rather part of a deliberate and systematic strategy of extremely cruel sexual abuse, establishing an initial evidentiary basis for the widespread perpetration of sexual crimes. "The report, submitted to decision-makers at the UN, leaves no room for denial or disregard,” said Orit Sulitzeanu, CEO of the Association of Rape Crisis Centers in Israel.

“The terrorist organization Hamas chose to harm Israel strategically in two clear ways – kidnapping citizens and committing sadistic sexual crimes. Silence is no longer an option. We expect international organizations to take a clear stance; we cannot stand on the sidelines. Silence will be remembered as a historical stain on those who chose to remain silent and deny the sexual crimes committed by Hamas.”

Families were reportedly coerced by Hamas to witness the rapes of victims on October 7th

Orit Sulitzeanu, Executive Director, The Association of Rape Crisis Centers in Israel, and Miriam Schler, Executive Director, The Tel Aviv Crisis Center for Sexual Assault discuss

Hamas reportedly forced families to witness rapes of October 7 victims

Miriam Schler, executive director of the Tel Aviv Crisis Center for Sexual Assault, breaks down the harrowing report that describes terrorists forcing Israelis to watch as they raped and killed their family members and neighbors.

UNRWA death statistics over the past two months strongly indicate that Hamas casualty figures are lies

A month ago, we looked at a Lancet article that used statistics from the first month of the October 7 war to shore up the idea that the Hamas ministry of health statistics were accurate.

Briefly, they compared the number of UNRWA deaths per thousand employees (about 7.5) with the number of total Gaza deaths per thousand residents according to the MoH (about 5) during the first month of the war. Based on that, they decided that the Ministry of Health statistics were largely accurate.

I pointed out the methodological flaws. As I noted,

It makes an assumption that everyone in Gaza has an equal chance of being killed, meaning that Israel is killing people randomly and indiscriminately. This is not only a false assumption, but an antisemitic one.

Indeed, one reason UNRWA workers could have been killed at a higher rate is because none of them are children - and more than half of them are males of fighting age. About two thirds of the first 101 killed were men, a higher percentage than the percentage of male employees at UNRWA (about 54% across UNRWA, not sure about Gaza itself.) Chances are that at least some of the UNRWA casualties were also legal combatants, either actively participating or acting as "spotters" or other support.

In other words, one would expect a much higher percentage of UNRWA employees, especially males, to be killed than the general population if you don't accept the antisemitic assumption that Israel is killing indiscriminately.

Which means that if UNRWA death figures are to be statistically meaningful, we must assume that they represent a higher death-per-thousand rate than the general population.

However, since that first month, the rate of UNRWA workers killed has dropped dramatically - far more than the drop in deaths published by the Hamas authorities.

If the Lancet felt that UNRWA's figures support the MoH figures in the first month, then why have they diverged so dramatically since then? Doesn't that indicate that the MoH figures have become increasingly unreliable?

If the UNRWA deaths can be used as a sample of total Gaza deaths, which the Lancet peer-reviewed claimed, that would mean that the true number of deaths over the past month in Gaza is about 1,100, not the 5,095 the MoH claimed.

I don't think the UNRWA numbers are a proper proxy for calculating deaths either way. My theory is that the Gaza health ministry statistics on total casualties (not women and children) were roughly accurate for the first month or so, but as communications broke down in Gaza they (and the Hamas media office) just started making things up. There is simply no infrastructure in Gaza to provide anything close to accurate casualty statistics but Hamas relies on these numbers being reported daily to pressure Israel to cease fire. Since the world believes them, so why not continue to lie?

A group of supposed experts are projecting the number of Gaza deaths if there is a ceasefire orif Israel presses into Rafah. Their entire analysis is based on accepting the casualty figures from Hamas as being 100% accurate. And while they don't say exactly how they use the UNRWA figures, they seem to be accepting the Lancet methodology in their report: " We estimated the proportion and number of unreported (e.g. those killed that may be under rubble and have not been reported) traumatic injury deaths by comparing the ratio of mortality among United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) staff (for whom 100% detection was assumed) to that among the general population, including uncertainty ranges, to estimate a confidence interval."

One of the authors of this report was also a co-author of the Lancet report.

At any rate, even if you completely trust The Lancet methodology of using UNRWA casualties as an accurate sample of Gaza total death rates, you have to admit that their evidence supporting Hamas casualty figures has been thoroughly debunked. Science depends on consistency, and the data from the past two months contradict the Lancet's conclusion from one mere month.

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!

Nasser Medical Center lights appear to be turned off for Western media reports

I reported that the Hamas Health Ministry claimed on Sunday that electricity had been cut off at the Nasser Medical Center in Khan Younis for three days (since February 16) - yet I found a Sky News Arabia report from February 18 showing the lights and medical equipment were still on.

Then the World Health Organization posted a video apparently taken the same day showing the lights off.

Maybe the electricity was cut between the two scenes?

If that was the case, then why are the lights on in Al Ghad TV on February 20?

Today there were more scenes of the hospital with the lights off in patient rooms, and teams of doctors relying on flashlights, from CNN and Euronews.

This seems strange - because even the WHO admits that there is a backup generator in service in the hospital. (It was provided by the same Israeli soldiers who are portrayed as the evil invaders. ) Why would there be no electricity where it is needed most?

More importantly, why would the hallway lights be prioritized over the lights where the doctors are treating patients?

Perhaps it depends on the audience and the message that they want to tell. To the Western audiences of WHO, CNN and Euronews, footage of doctors treating patients with small handheld lights is dramatic. For reports by Arabic sources, they want to see scenes of overcrowding, chaos and injured people being rushed through the hallways, which look a lot better when the lights are on.

I'm not saying that things are wonderful at the hospital. I'm saying that you can assume that everything you see out of Gaza is being staged and choreographed to send a specific message to manipulate you.

That's entertainment.

That's Pallywood.

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!

Hamas shooting rockets in civilian clothing

We've discussed why we believe that the number of Hamas terrorists killed is far higher than the 6,000 that Reuters quoted a Hamas official in Qatar as admitting.

If we take Hamas at its word, though, their claims of civilians killed are impossible.

Hamas claims that 70% of those killed in the war are women and children, which would mean about 20,000 of the 29,000 they claim were killed. This is roughly the proportion of women and children in the total population of Gaza.

Hamas' overarching narrative has been that Israel killed indiscriminately.

If we take them at their word, that leaves 9,000 adult males killed by Israel.

Roughly two thirds of Gaza adult males, about 370,000, are fighting age - under 40. So if we assume Israel is killing adult males indiscriminately as well, we could expect 2/3 of the adult males killed were of military age.

That means about 6,000 military age males would have been killed - the same number of terrorists the Hamas official is admitting.

But only about 10% of Gaza's adult males of military age are members of armed groups. These numbers seem to indicate that 100% of the males of fighting age who have been killed were members of Hamas, and zero innocent adult males were killed - while at the same time all other demographic groups are killed indiscriminately.

Israel is perfectly efficient at picking out Hamas members among young males and terrible at distinguishing them from women and children.

Needless to say, this is statistically impossible.

Hamas has been exaggerating the number of civilians killed by orders of magnitude. And no one in the media is bothering to do even a cursory examination of the statistics Hamas is putting out.

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!

02/20 Links Pt2: The woke wing of Hamas; Australia has succumbed to anti-Semitism; The Don Quixote Delusion; Harvard Probes Anti-Semitic Cartoon Shared By Faculty

From Ian:

Brendan O'Neil: The woke wing of Hamas

Can we call them hate marches now? On Saturday in London there was yet another gathering of frothing Israelophobes. Another noisy assembly of bourgeois leftists and radical Islamists. Another long trudge through the city by that unholiest gang of Waitrose shoppers and jihad fanboys, of plummy liberals and the people who’ll be giving them a hundred lashes if the Islamic Revolution ever sweeps Britain. And this time the mask was well and truly off. This was no ‘pro-Palestine’ march – it was a viscerally anti-Israel march that frequently crossed the line into something even darker. Into the darkest hatred of them all.

There was the usual anti-Semitism. The kind we’ve seen at every anti-Israel demo since Hamas’s pogrom of 7 October. ‘I thought Hitler was dead’, said one placard, next to an image of the Star of David. The Jews are the new Nazis, you see. They are such a wicked people that they now gleefully visit on Palestinians the kind of horrors once visited on them. ‘Wanted for mass murder’, said another, with an image of Benjamin Netanyahu next to Hitler. One turbo-smug hippyish couple, complete with culturally appropriated keffiyeh scarves, held up a placard featuring a photo of Israeli spokesman Eylon Levy and the words: ‘The Goebbels of Gaza.’

This is rank Holocaust inversion. Anti-Israel hotheads seem to derive a sick thrill from comparing Jews to Nazis. If you hate Mr Levy so much that you feel the need to take a day off from perusing the kale aisle at Whole Foods to defame him on the streets of London, then why not just call him a ‘liar’ or a ‘propagandist’? Because that wouldn’t achieve the true aim of these vile marches, which is not merely to criticise people like Mr Levy but to hurt Jews. To taunt Jews. To rub salt in their historic wounds. The public branding of Levy as ‘the Goebbels of Gaza’ is hard proof of the racial animus behind these fake anti-war gatherings.

Holocaust inversion is so widespread now, it’s such a key motif of fashionable Israelophobia, that there is a danger we’ll come to view it as merely irritating. As the ravings of witless youths who don’t know their history, who don’t know that there’s no comparison whatsoever between the bloody war in Gaza that Hamas started and the Nazis’ meticulously planned effort to exterminate every Jew on Earth. But that would be wrong. For this is more than hyperbole. It’s a nauseating inversion of truth designed to trivialise the crimes of the Nazis while criminalising the actions of Israel. As that great warrior against anti-Semitism, Deborah Lipstadt, says of Holocaust inversion, it ‘elevates by a factor of a zillion any wrongdoings Israel might have done, and lessens by a factor of a zillion what the Germans did’.

We must never become inured to Holocaust inversion. That the streets and social media are overrun by activists screaming ‘Nazis!’ at Israel should horrify us all. Projecting the crimes of Nazism on to the Jews is surely the highest – or lowest – form of anti-Semitism. It is a flagrant effort by the activist class to denude the Jews of their historic experience of suffering and reimagine them as the reincarnation of their own evil persecutors. That people are happy to march in London with placards showing the swastika enmeshed with the Star of David is testament to how unabashed this racist project of the moral demotion of the Jews has become.

Nick Cater: Australia has succumbed to anti-Semitism

Albanese has shown a reluctance to call out the rise in anti-Semitism without tempering his words with moral equivalence. When asked about the chants at the Opera House protest, Albanese said: ‘Anti-Semitism has no place in this country, nor does Islamophobia, nor does any form of racism.’ But there was no ‘Islamophobia’ on display at that demo, or at any other.

This blurring of lines denies the peculiar evil to which Jews have been subjected recently. The Executive Council of Australian Jewry reports an eight-fold increase in anti-Semitic incidents since 7 October. The council recorded 662 incidents in October and November, compared with 79 in the same period in 2022.

Earlier this month, almost four months after the Opera House protests, NSW police reported on their review of video recordings from the night. There had been no arrests. No one had been charged under Victoria’s usually restrictive racial-vilification laws, which criminalise ‘any public act that threatens or incites violence towards a person or group of persons based on their race, religious belief or affiliation’.

The police had, however, bought in an independent voice expert to listen to the chanting. They confirmed that the recorded audio was genuine and had not been doctored. However, it had supposedly been miscaptioned in social-media videos. The expert claimed, ‘with overwhelming certainty’, that the crowd had not been chanting ‘Gas the Jews’, but ‘Where’s the Jews?’.

The suggestion is utterly implausible. Yet even if the voice expert is correct, it is hard to see how a chant of ‘Where’s the Jews?’ is much less threatening than ‘Gas the Jews’. That this mob chanted ‘fuck the Jews’ is not in dispute.

The attempt to excuse those hateful words suggests that Australians are not yet ready to confront the hatred in their midst. Australia’s Jews have been totally abandoned.

The rise of barbaric progressivism

Progressives share more with radical Islam than hatred of Jews, however. For example, both movements have an essentially messianic worldview. Islam has its final day of judgment and the progressives their blessed society. The two groups are also obsessed with the same alleged evils, such as imperialism, American foreign policy, and Western civilization in general. The alliance further plays to progressives’ obsession with race, as they have convinced themselves that all Muslims are “people of color” (they aren’t) and therefore oppressed by “white people” (they aren’t). Despite the Muslim world’s considerable trade in black African slaves, which continues to this day in various forms, progressives have decided that radical Islam is simply pursuing the shared task of overturning the global racial hierarchy and defeating “white supremacism.” That the Islamic radicals seek to replace it with Muslim supremacism does not perturb the progressives, as they likely consider it just revenge for centuries of depredation.

Most important of all, however, is that most of today’s progressives and all radical Muslims are against freedom. In the case of radical Islam, this is obvious, as they make no pretense of valuing freedom, and the movements and regimes they have built are, without exception, brutally oppressive, violent, terroristic, and totalitarian. In the case of progressives, the issue is less clear-cut, as they publicly proclaim that they value freedom, particularly for oppressed groups. But if we examine progressive actions rather than rhetoric, a different picture emerges.

It is notable, for example, that the institutions ruled by American progressives, particularly academia, are by and large the least free institutions in American society. They place a great deal of value on ideological conformity and almost none on fundamental liberties like free speech and assembly. Basic legal rights do not exist in the academic disciplinary system. Those who wish to avoid being fired or expelled for alleged transgressions must often submit to humiliating Maoist-style reeducation and struggle sessions during which they are forced to confess and repent their sins in a wretched public spectacle. As a result, progressive rule suffocates independent thought and silences criticism, thus destroying two of freedom’s greatest benefits. Similar circumstances prevail in those areas of corporate culture, the arts, the media, and even sports that are dominated or ruled by progressives.

Taken together, the above seems to indicate the emergence of a kind of barbaric progressivism. A progressivism that, while it advocates progress in certain areas, is also quite comfortable with supporting some of the most barbaric ideas imaginable, such as antisemitism, totalitarianism, religious fanaticism, theocracy, patriarchy, racism, anti-democratic politics, terrorism, rule by a designated minority, suppression of heretical ideas, and opposition to human freedom itself.

The question, then, is what Americans who have no desire to live under this kind of progressivism should do. Certainly, there are political and legal measures that could be taken, but the most important form of resistance must come from within the movement itself. Many good people in the progressive movement sincerely believe in its principles and do not want to see it collapse into barbarism. They need not exit the movement. Instead, they should stay and fight for a better progressivism, one that is at least vaguely worthy of the name. There are signs that this difficult and unhappy resistance is already underway. Whether or not it can succeed confronts the rest of us with one of the more ominous questions of our present moment.

Every day Arab antisemitism gets worse. In Arabic, they don't even try to pretend they are only against "Zionists."

One of today's examples comes from Shahid Al-Aan, a Saudi news site that claims it is "Providing objective and highly credible news from the heart of events." But the article is also in Yemen media.

Dr. Awad Ahmed Al-Alqami comes up with a novel argument that the Holocaust is a myth. He doesn't bring any evidence - he just says that since Jews are liars, of course it must be a myth.

Since I grew up and my awareness began to blossom, I was passionate about reading, as I used to read everything I could get my hands on. One day, I read several pages from a book whose name I no longer remember now - as forgetfulness has become dominant in memory in this era - although nothing I read has left my memory, especially... These allegations depict what the Jews were subjected to; Of abuse, torture, and burning at the hands of Hitler.

I did not sympathize with them; Because I knew for sure that the story was doubtful; Because since the Jews lied to their father Jacob and harmed their brother Joseph, their lives have been based on lies, falsehood, and blackmail, in addition to the fact that they were known for killing the prophets and conspiring against the pious.

Based on the above, I kept wondering to myself: Is it possible for the brave German leader, Hitler, to do to the Jews everything that the Zionist Western media is promoting, and that writers and scholars in the Western lying empires are promoting? Then I go back and ask myself, why is this not a form of the Jews’ plots, lies, and conspiracies that they were born with, and then passed down throughout history to blackmail Germany and those who allied with it in World War II? I remained in this state, attracted by doubts and filled with suspicions, until October 7, 2023 AD, when Netanyahu and other members of his notorious government said: The Palestinian resistance had beheaded Jewish children and newborns by the hundreds in the settlements surrounding Gaza, and the sun had not set on that day until it became clear. The falsity and lies of these allegations, even though the administration of the great lying empire in Washington had agreed with the Netanyahu government and confirmed the veracity of these Zionist fabrications and lies without hesitation or scrutiny of these irresponsible nonsense.

The Zionists and their masters in the White House did not stop there, but rather continued to spread lies day and night without any scruples of religion or modesty of conscience... And their latest lies and impoliteness are that they launch tons of bombs and lava fires on the Yemenis under the claims of self-defense. He is defending himself; The Yemenis who are in their land, or the Zionist invaders who came from the Crusader West and traveled thousands of miles until they reached Yemen?

I think that you, my dear reader, after this brief presentation, share my opinion, and you believe me when I say that Hitler’s Holocaust of the Jews is nothing but a Zionist lie to blackmail Germany for many decades, and may continue for centuries. Those who forged, fabricated, lied, and stole in the land of Palestine, desecrated its sanctities, and also demolished homes on the heads of their inhabitants. And they burned it, and killed every living person they could get their hands on, without distinguishing between the resistor and the defenseless old man, the woman, and the child. They never hesitated to falsely invent a holocaust, and call out an injustice by slander!!!

Al-Alqami is a dean for an Aden community college.

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1890 painting of Kotel, discovered in a California synagogue storage, sells for $3.4 million

Jewish News reported in the end of January:

A hyper-realistic 19th-century painting of worshippers at the Western Wall that spent many forgotten years in a synagogue’s storage room is headed to auction at Sotheby’s New York on Thursday.

The Western Wall, created circa 1890 by German artist and illustrator Gustav Bauernfeind, is expected to fetch an estimated $2 to $3 million.

In his day, 1848-1904, Bauernfeind, who had some Jewish ancestry, was a well-known ‘Orientalist’ painter who stood out for his realism and focus on architecture. This particular piece was donated to a synagogue in Southern California in the mid-1980s by the family of Theodore Cummings, a former US ambassador to Austria and confidante to President Ronald Reagan. However, about 10 years ago, during renovations on the synagogue, the painting was placed into storage — where it remained until the executive director of the congregation discovered the piece last summer.

The Western Wall depicts, in remarkably realistic fashion, a diverse set of worshippers huddled together at the base of the Kotel. Some Jews wear the fur hats known as shtreimels, while others wear fezzes and still others wear black hats and kippot. Nearly all of the men are wrapped in prayer shawls, while women are shown in the rear of the scene, their hair and bodies wrapped in colorful scarves and shawls.

The painting is four feet high by three feet wide.

Detail:

It fetched a higher price than anticipated, $3,448,000.

(h/t Michelle)

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02/20 Links Pt1: Hamas Apologists Have Destroyed International Law; US resolution for Gaza ceasefire ‘as soon as practicable’; Hamas' Secret Financial Empire

From Ian:

Seth Mandel: Hamas Apologists Have Destroyed International Law

Buried in a long and detailed briefing by Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant were a couple of important descriptions of Hamas activity that, via repetition, have lost their ability to command headlines.

An IDF operation at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis uncovered the following:
Vehicles used by Hamas terrorists during the October 7 slaughter;
Vehicles of October 7 victims stolen by Hamas;
Hamas terrorists involved in October 7;
Hamas members dressed as medical staff;
Weapons and explosives;
Medicine intended and marked for hostages but withheld from them.

The military released a video of the medications, which clearly showed the names of the hostages they were intended for and, for some, a clear picture of the hostage next to the name. The medicine was sent through European intermediaries and then to Egypt, crossing into Gaza at Rafah. Some of the intended recipients are still being held by Hamas—in need of the medication that Hamas kept for itself.

Coincidentally, that’s what happens to humanitarian aid intended for Gazans, too. Actual civilians—not Hamasniks in scrubs—get shot at by their terrorist overlords for trying to claim some of the humanitarian aid that should be theirs entirely.

But for that to be considered newsworthy, the world would have to be capable of making such a distinction. Instead, everyone who reports the Gaza death toll fed to them by Hamas has made a clear choice to erase the line between soldier and civilian. So it’s no surprise that Hamas terrorists dressed up as hospital personnel raise no alarms among the same coterie of Western media and “human rights” groups.

To Hamas, there’s no such thing as a civilian. To the world, there’s no such thing as Hamas.

Amb. Alan Baker: Unilateral Recognition of a Palestinian State Will Undermine the Oslo Accords

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken has reportedly requested that the State Department present policy options for possible U.S. recognition of a Palestinian state. It is inconceivable that responsible international leaders are either overlooking or deliberately ignoring the basic principles of international law and practice requiring resolution of the Middle East dispute through negotiation, rather than by unilateral, third-party imposition.

The principle of a negotiated outcome for resolving the dispute figures in the still valid 1993-1995 Oslo Accords, in which Israel and the PLO Palestinian leadership, with the support and encouragement of the leaders of the international community, reciprocally obligated themselves to negotiate the permanent status of the disputed areas.

In the Israeli-Palestinian Interim Agreement on the West Bank and Gaza signed in Washington on September 28, 1995 (known as Oslo II), the parties agreed specifically that "Neither side shall initiate or take any step that will change the status of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip pending the outcome of the permanent status negotiations."

Any unilaterally imposed recognition of a Palestinian state by the international community would be tantamount to undermining the Oslo Accords, to which the U.S., the EU, Russia, Norway, Jordan, and Egypt are signatories.

Not only would it contravene their solemn commitments as signatories, but it would, in effect, be unilaterally prejudging the outcome of the negotiations on the permanent status of the territory. As such, it would constitute an attempt to unilaterally change the status of the West Bank and Gaza in contravention of the Accords.

This would afford Israel the prerogative to consider the Accords as no longer valid, and to take whatever unilateral actions it may judge appropriate in order to protect its national and security interests.

Jonathan S. Tobin: What Americans Don't Get about Israelis Fighting for Their Lives

The war in Gaza between Israel and Hamas is between a democratic nation fighting for its existence against an Islamist movement whose goal is the destruction of Israel and the Jewish people. Yet many outside of Israel are increasingly speaking of ending the war as soon as possible. This means that Hamas survives - and gets away with mass murder. It means the Palestinians are rewarded with an independent state. Somehow, that makes sense in Washington. But not in Israel.

The overwhelming majority of Israelis see it very differently. The battle with Hamas isn't one about Israelis ruthlessly harming Palestinians. The hotels in Israel are full, but not with tourists. They're packed with hundreds of thousands of Israelis - families with small children and elderly people - who were forced to flee their homes near Gaza and near Lebanon due to rocket and missile fire from Hamas and Hizbullah. They have been omitted in the breathless coverage of Palestinian suffering.

The Israelis who were called back into the military and willingly risked their lives fighting in Gaza, though eager to resume their regular lives, are just as ready to return to the battlefield because they know the job of destroying a deadly threat to their country isn't finished. Few Israelis are prepared to halt the war until all of the perpetrators of the Oct. 7 massacres are stripped of the ability to repeat their crimes.

Morale among Israeli soldiers is high and stretches across all the cultural, political, and religious debates. They don't want to kill Palestinians and also grieve the loss of so many of their comrades - casualties made more likely because of the strict rules of engagement to lower the number of civilians killed, that prevent the Israel Defense Forces from fully utilizing the firepower at their disposal.

Israeli soldiers know that they are defending their homes and families. It's the civic faith in the justice of their cause that resonates throughout Israeli society and pervades the thinking of those who have sent their loved ones to battle. It is also felt by the grieving families of those who didn't come home. Israel is a nation united by both anguish and determination.

Israelis understand that their opponents are not in far-off lands like in America's wars in recent decades. The horrors of Oct. 7 were not a one-off act. Israel has suffered many terrorist attacks in which large numbers of civilians were killed by Islamist murderers, but Oct. 7 was the worst of them all. What made it resonate throughout Israeli society was the certain knowledge that it was intended as a trailer for what Hamas - and the majority of the Palestinian population that supported and still supports those actions - intends to do to the rest of Israel.

The Nuremberg Trials Didn't Justify All Resistance: Lessons For Pro-Hamas Protesters (Daled Amos)

There is an ongoing claim justifying the murder of unarmed Israeli civilians.

This claim has gained even more support following the Hamas massacre on October 7th, when Palestinian terrorists murdered 1,200 Israelis and took hundreds hostage.

Just one day after the attack, pro-Palestinian protesters came out to defend the atrocities:

The protesters carried signs that called for an end to U.S. aid to Israel and argued that "Resistance is justified when people are occupied."

Arab countries, like Iraq, also supported the massacre:

[T]he operations carried out by the Palestinian people today are a natural result of the systematic oppression they have been subjected to for many years at the hands of the Zionist occupation authority, which has never adhered to international and UN resolutions.

First of all, the claim that Gaza is occupied is debatable at best. The legal precedent in international law is that occupation requires boots on the ground -- an actual, physical presence in the territory that allows the "occupying" force to exercise control and authority to the exclusion of local government authority. That is clearly not the case in Gaza, where Hamas is in control.

According to the European Court of Human Rights, this is the definition of occupation.

It is also how the Nuremberg trials defined occupation, after World War II in the Hostage Case, addressing the issues involving the Nazi invasions of Greece, Yugoslavia, and Norway:

Whether an invasion has developed into an occupation is a question of fact. The term invasion implies a military operation while an occupation indicates the exercise of governmental authority to the exclusion of the established government. This presupposes the destruction of organized resistance and the establishment of an administration to preserve law and order. To the extent that the occupant's control is maintained and that of the civil government eliminated, the area will be said to be occupied. [p. 1243]

Defendants during the Hostages Trial in Nuremberg

Because the issue is one of actual authority and control, the European Court of Human Rights makes a point that applies particularly to Gaza:

According to widespread expert opinion physical presence of foreign troops is a sine qua non requirement of occupation, that is, occupation is not conceivable without “boots on the ground”, therefore forces exercising naval or air control through a naval or air blockade do not suffice.

But the Hostage case is especially instructive because it does more than define occupation per se. It also addresses the responsibilities of those who are occupied.

One would expect that the application of international humanitarian law to the occupied population should be straightforward and the distinction between them and the occupying force should be black and white.

But that is not the way the court saw it:

But it does not follow that every act by the German occupation forces against person or property is a crime or that any and every act undertaken by the population of the occupied country against the German occupation forces thereby became legitimate defense. [p. 1247]

In other words, the actions of the occupying force -- even of the Nazis in WWII -- are not automatically illegal just because they are done during an occupation. Similarly, not everything that the occupied citizens do in response to the occupation is legal under international law. And it makes no difference whether the occupation is legal or not:

At the outset, we desire to point out that international law makes no distinction between a lawful and an unlawful occupant in dealing with the respective duties of occupant and population in occupied territory. There is no reciprocal connection between the manner of the military occupation of territory and the rights and duties of the occupant and population to each other after the relationship has in fact been established. Whether the invasion was lawful or criminal is not an important factor in the consideration of this subject. [p. 1247]

What are the obligations of the occupied population?

In his book, The International Law of Belligerent Occupation, Yoram Dinstein writes:

There is a widespread conviction that the civilian population in an occupied territory has a right to forcibly resist the Occupying Power. This is a misconception that must be dispelled. In reality, LOIAC [Law of International Armed Conflict] allows civilians 'neither to violently resist occupation of their territory by the enemy, nor to try to liberate that territory by violent means'. As a Netherlands Special Court pronounced in the 1948 Christiansen trial:
the civilian population, if it considers itself justified in committing acts of resistance, must know that, in general, counter-measures within the limits set by international law may be taken against them with impunity. [emphasis added; p. 94]

The bolded text that Dinstein quotes comes from "How Does Law Protect in War?", Volume 1: Outline of International Humanitarian Law, published by the International Red Cross:

From the point of view of IHL [International Humanitarian Law], civilians in occupied territories deserve and need particularly detailed protecting rules. Living on their own territory, they come into contact with the enemy independently of their will, merely because of the armed conflict in which the enemy obtains territorial control over the place where they live. The civilians have no obligation towards the occupying power other than the obligation inherent in their civilian status, i.e., not to participate in hostilities. Because of that obligation, IHL allows them neither to violently resist occupation of their territory by the enemy nor to try to liberate that territory by violent means. (Part 1, Chapter 8:IV)

On the question of resistance, the court addressed whether the partisans who took up arms against the Nazis qualified as lawful belligerents -- and found that in many cases they did not:

The evidence shows that the bands were sometimes designated as units common to military organization. They, however, had no common uniform, They generally wore civilian clothes although parts of German, Italian, and Serbian uniforms were used to the extent they could be obtained. The Soviet star was generally worn as insignia. The evidence will not sustain a finding that it was such that it could be seen at a distance. Neither did they carry their arms openly except when it was to their advantage to do so...It is evident also that a few partisan bands met the requirements of lawful belligerency. The bands, however, with which we are dealing in this case were not shown by satisfactory evidence to have met the requirements. This means, of course, that captured members of these unlawful groups were not entitled to be treated [by the occupation] as prisoners of war. No crime can be properly charged against the defendants [Nazi generals] for the killing of such captured members of the resistance forces, they being francs-tireurs [a guerrilla fighter or sniper]. [p. 1244]

The court here is dealing with cases of armed groups that fought against the occupation army -- and still found these groups who failed to identify themselves properly to have acted contrary to international humanitarian law.

The Geneva Convention was modified to reflect the findings of the Hostage Case:

Following the Hostages Trial the Geneva Convention was amended to extend protections to captured partisan fighters as legitimate prisoners of war. The convention required of such partisans that they have an established chain of command, carry their weapons openly, and have a distinctive and readily visible symbol of their unit. They also must carry out military activities in accordance with the conventions of warfare, rather than covert assassinations, bombings, and other criminal acts.

It is not hard to imagine what the judges would have said about partisans who attacked unarmed civilians.

Nor should it be hard to see the Hamas massacre for what it is -- and what it is not. Yet around the world, the streets are overflowing with people drawn to emotionally charged chants and self-serving fabrications of international law.

Even in the current war in Gaza, in Hamas' own videos of fighting, they are not wearing uniforms and are violating the Geneva Conventions.

Contrary to what these "protestors" would have you believe, they have no interest in the law.

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I've spent years reading various antisemitic accusations by Muslims in Arabic media. The things blamed on Jews are extensive and wide-ranging. I've mentioned them in this site literally hundreds of times.

I just looked at Martin Luther's infamous 1543 work ,"On the Jews and Their Lies." The style and substance of Luther's crazed polemic resembles today's Arab antisemitism in many ways.

Some examples:

They are the real liars and bloodhounds, who have not only perverted and falsified the entire Scriptures from beginning to end and without ceasing with their interpretations. And all of the anxious sighing, longing and hope of their hearts is directed to the time when some day they would like to deal with us heathen as they dealt with the heathen in Persia at the time of Esther. … O how they love that book Esther, which so nicely agrees with their bloodthirsty, revengeful and murderous desire and hope! The sun never did shine on a more bloodthirsty and revengeful people as they who imagine to be the people of God who desire to and think they must murder and crush the heathen.

They are condemned because they have God’s Commandment and do not keep it, but act against it without ceasing. …

Be on your guard against the Jews and know that where they have their schools there is nothing but the Devil’s nest in which self-praise, vanity, lies, blasphemy, disgracing God and man, are practiced in the bitterest and most poisonous way as the Devils do themselves.

Even now they cannot give up their insane raving boast that they are the chosen people of God, after they have been dispersed and rejected for 1500 years! Still they hope to get back there because of their own merits. There is no promise for that on which they could lean for comfort, except what they smear into the Scriptures according to their own imagination …

Their breath stinks for the gold and silver of the heathen, since no people under the sun always have been, still are, and always will remain more avaricious than they (the Jews) as can be noticed in their cursed usury.

Since childhood they have devoured such poisonous hatred against the Goyim from their parents and Rabbis, and still devour such without ceasing, that according to Psalm 109, it has gone over into their flesh and blood, bone and marrow, and has become their life and being.

Therefore know, my dear Christian, that next to the Devil you have no more bitter, more poisonous, more vehement an enemy than a real Jew who earnestly desires to be a Jew. ...In history, therefore, they are often accused of poisoning wells, stealing children and mutilating them; as in Trent, Weiszensee, etc. Of course, they deny this. Be it so or not, however, I know full well that the full, ready will is not lacking with them if they could only transform it into deeds, in secret or openly. Know this for a certainty and act accordingly!

Should they at times do something good, however, know full well that it is not done out of love for you, nor for your good. In order to have space to live among us they must of necessity do something. But their heart is and remains as I have said.

A person who does not know the Devil, might wonder why they are so at enmity with the Christians above all others; for which they have no reason, since we only do good to them. They live among us in our homes, under our protection, use land and highways, market and streets. Princes and government sit by, snore and have their mugs (mouth) open, let the Jews take from their purse and chest, steal and rob whatever they will. That is, they permit themselves and their subjects to be abused and sucked dry and reduced to beggars with their own money, through the usury of the Jews. For the Jews, as foreigners, certainly should have nothing; and what they have certainly must be ours. They do not work, do not earn anything from us, neither do we donate or give it to them. Yet they have our money and goods and are lords in our land where they are in exile.

Do not their Talmud and Rabbis write that it is no sin to kill if a Jew kills a heathen, but it is sin if he kills a brother in Israel! It is no sin if he does not keep his oath to a heathen. Therefore, to steal and rob (as they do with their usury) from a heathen, is a divine service.

Now behold what a nice, thick, fat lie it is when they complain about being captives among us. Jerusalem was destroyed more than 1400 years ago and during that time we Christians have been tortured and persecuted by the Jews in all the world. For nearly 300 years (as stated above) we might well complain that during that time they captured and killed the Christians, which is the clear truth. On top of that, we do not know to this day which Devil brought them into our country. We did not fetch them from Jerusalem!

On top of all that, no one is holding them now. Land and highways are open to them; they may move to their country whenever they care to do so! We would like to add a present in order to get rid of them. They are a heavy burden to us in our country, like a plague, pestilence, and nothing but misfortune.

Whenever you see or think about a Jew, say to yourself as follows: Behold, the mouth which I see there has every Saturday cursed, execrated, and spit upon my dear Lord, Jesus Christ who has redeemed me with His precious blood; and also prayed and cursed before God that I, my wife and children, and all Christians should be stabbed and perish in the most miserable manner—would like to do so himself if he could that he might come into possession of our goods.

Those Jews professing to be surgeons or doctors deprive the Christians who make use of their medicaments, of health and prosperity, for such Jewish doctors believe they find especial favour with their God if they torment and furtively kill Christians.

The similarities with how Muslims write about Jews today are uncanny. Claiming that Jews had all the rights they needed in diaspora and are ungrateful; that Jews are oppressing non-Jews, the blood libel, projection that Jews teach hate in these very treatises filled with bile.

Although Muslims always showed disdain for Jews, their hate did not have this kind of intellectual underpinning for antisemitism until they were exposed to Christian missionaries and the schools they built in the Levant in the 19th century. There are a number of articles on Christian influence on building Arab nationalism and spreading other Western concepts, but the Christians of the time were virulently and doctrinally antisemitic, and it seems highly likely that their antisemitic ideas gave an pseudo-intellectual rigor to the Muslims who already disliked Jews.

Being given justification for one's pre-existing hate is a very seductive idea. It is the only explanation for the enthusiasm, huge turnouts and party atmosphere seen in the current anti-Israel protests.

Today, the cross-pollination of antisemitism is coming from all directions - from the Arabs to the Western world, from Russia and Iran and the neo-Nazis. The previous paradigms of pretending that they were only "anti-Zionist" and only against the "occupation" and that they found terrorism abhorrent have been supplanted; the support for antisemitism and even terrorist attacks are now explicit and justified after the fact. The Internet allows ideas from the Soviet Union to easily travel to the far-Right, from the anti-religious Marxists to the devoutly religious Muslims. Arguments no longer take centuries to morph from being used by one type of antisemite to another - it now takes hours.

Luther's short book ended up with a series of actions he recommended all right-thinking Christians should take to counter the pernicious Jews. These included

To burn down Jewish synagogues and schools and warn people against them
To refuse to let Jews own houses among Christians
To burn and censor Jewish religious writings
To forbid rabbis from preaching
To offer no protection to Jews on highways
For all Jews' silver and gold to be removed, put aside for safekeeping, and given back only to Jews who truly convert

Then as now, intellectual antisemitism leads to actions. We are seeing arson and other attacks on Jewish establishments. we are seeing Jews excluded from public spaces, we are seeing attempts to ban any pro-Israel events, we are being told that terrorism is a human right and Jews do not have a similar right to defend themselves. Like Luther, terrorist-supporting media are convinced of the righteousness of their demands. While the progressive protesters are claim they are against violence, their Arab co-protesters have no problem with attacking Jews and the progressives are justifying rather than denouncing their violent cadres.

Maybe we aren't yet at 1939, but it sure sounds a lot like 1543.

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