Wednesday, August 14, 2024

The Imam and Me: Tim Walz and his Love Affair with the Imam Asad Zaman (Judean Rose)


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

Tim Walz just can’t seem to get enough of the imam Asad Zaman of the Muslim American Society of Minnesota (MAS Minnesota). We should examine why Walz is a fan of the cleric of an arm of the Muslim Brotherhood. Does the man who may become vice president of America share the philosophy and goals of the Muslim Brotherhood? Or is the association of Walz with the imam—an avowed, Hitler-loving, Hamas-loving antisemite who wants to eradicate the Jews—completely innocent?

To give the devil his due, Walz may be using his relationship with Asad Zaman only to curry favor with his Muslim constituency. But it’s awfully difficult to overlook the implications of the more than $100,000 Walz has contributed to MAS Minnesota. Walz must want something for that cash payout, unless of course, he deeply admires Zaman’s worldview.

It was Gabe Kaminsky, investigative reporter at the Washington Examiner who brought the affiliation between Tim Walz and Asad Zaman, to light:

Democratic vice presidential nominee Tim Walz, on at least five occasions as governor of Minnesota, hosted a Muslim cleric who celebrated Hamas‘s Oct. 7 attack last year on Israel and promoted a film popular among Neo-Nazis that glorifies Adolf Hitler, the Washington Examiner found.

The imam, Asad Zaman of the Muslim American Society of Minnesota, joined other Muslim leaders in May 2023 for a meeting about mosque security with Walz’s gubernatorial office in Minnesota. Zaman also spoke at a May 2020 event to call for peaceful protests with the governor during the riots in Minnesota sparked after George Floyd’s death. In April 2019, the cleric delivered an invocation before Walz’s state address — just months after Zaman called for an end to a government shutdown at a press conference with Walz in January 2019.

Zaman, moreover, attended a May 2019 event that Walz hosted for Ramadan, social media posts show.

 

 

More from the Washington Examiner about the worldview of Walz’s friend, the cleric Zaman (emphasis added):

Zaman, who is from Bangladesh, said on Oct. 7 of last year that he “stands in solidarity with Palestinians against Israeli attacks.” That day, which saw 1,200 Israelis murdered by Hamas terrorists, he also shared an image of a Palestinian flag on Facebook in response to a post by Yusuf Abdi Abdulle, director of the Islamic Association of North America, declaring that “Palestine has the right to defend itself.” The Biden-Harris administration, Abdulle wrote in the post, was “on the wrong side of history” in “supporting the extremist Zionist regime and its illegal settlements.” 


Asad Zaman’s loyalty to “Palestinians” should be translated as “loyalty to Hamas,” since he once shared a Hamas press release. The occasion? The 2016 hanging of Motiur Rahman Nizami, a Bangladeshi Islamic leader, after he was convicted of genocide, rape and torture.


One of Asad Zaman’s favorite things, of course, is Hitler. Zaman even shared a link to the website of the pro-Hitler film, The Greatest Story Never Told.

Here is a text from the website of this 6-hour documentary on Hitler:

Since the mid-20th century, the world has only ever heard one side of an incredible story. The story of a boy from an ordinary family whose ambition it was to become an artist, but who instead became a drifter.

His destiny however was not to drift into the awaiting oblivion, but to rise to the greatest heights of power, eventually to become one of the most influential men who ever lived.

Now for the first time, here is a documented account of a story many believe to be…

The Greatest Story NEVER Told!

Learn the untold story about the most reviled man in history. Adolf Hitler, The Greatest Story Never Told is a 6-hour Documentary by TruthWillOut Films.

This ground-breaking documentary chronicles the rise of Germany from defeat in World War I, to communist attempts to take over Germany; hyperinflation during the Weimar Republic, widespread unemployment and misery, and Adolf Hitler’s rise to power.

It also reveals a personal side of Adolf Hitler: who he was, his family background, his artwork and struggles in Vienna and what motivated him to come to power.

There’s so much hidden history to recount; FDR Pearl Harbor conspiracy, Soviet brutality, betrayal and treachery on all sides. Do we really know the true cost of war? Do we really possess all the facts?

Watch this series and uncover the real root causes of World War II. Do your own research and decide what you choose to believe. Think differently.



The Washington Examiner explains that the 2013 movie is popular among antisemites, citing an Anti-Defamation League spokesperson. “Imam Zaman has a troubling history of playing into classic anti-Jewish themes and justifying violence against Israel.

“He also has justified violence against Israel, including from terror groups. Given his hurtful remarks post-Oct. 7, and absent any recognition of the pain he has caused the Jewish community, we urge all public officials and leaders to avoid meeting with him in the future. Those who have met with Imam Zaman should clarify that they don’t agree with his toxic views about Jews and the Jewish state.”

After a terror attack, it is always meaningful to see who rushes to support the Jewish State; and all the more so after the slaughter of October 7. On that black day, Rep. Katie Porter (D-CA) was quick to offer sympathy and support to Israel and the Israeli people. At the other end of the scale was Asad Zaman, who asked Porter if she were willing to “reaffirm the right of Palestinians to defend themselves.”

Beyond Porter, there is Minnesota Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party Chairman Ken Martin, who wrote on social media that he was “beyond heartbroken” to hear about Israeli acquaintances “brutally killed or kidnapped” on Oct. 7. Of course, Zaman was there to respond with the threat that his group would be shunned by the Muslim community, that it “cannot be joined at the hip to apartheid Israel and still hope to court the Muslim vote.”

The Zaman way is to twist the truth, equating Hamas terror to Israel defending itself. Because this is how they roll at the Muslim Brotherhood offshoot known as the Muslim American Society of Minnesota. On October 7, MAS Minnesota issued a statement that it “reaffirms its unwavering support for the Palestinian people in their struggle against the Israeli occupation.” We don’t wonder that MAS Minnesota expresses its support for Hamas, a fellow branch of the Muslim Brotherhood; but why has the Walz administration forked over more than $100,000 in funding to MAS Minnesota?

Sam Westrop, a terrorism researcher and analyst at the Middle East Forum think tank, told the Washington Examiner that Walz’s ties with Zaman suggests that the Harris-Walz cabinet will be filled with anti-Israel extremists.

“It is astounding that with all the available public reporting and information about the iniquities of Imam Asad Zaman and MAS Minnesota that Gov. Walz has repeatedly given public platforms and taxpayer money to this extremist,” said Westrop.

“Across the country, Islamists hungry for government support will surely welcome Walz as vice president.”

Note that the Muslim American Society has been described by federal prosecutors as being “founded as the overt arm of the Muslim Brotherhood in the United States.” In the United Arab Emirates, the Muslim Brotherhood was designated as a terrorist group in 2014. There was a brouhaha in 2019 when a video surfaced online of children at an event held by MAS Philadelphia calling to murder Jews.

“We will chop off their heads, and we will liberate the sorrowful and exalted Al-Aqsa Mosque,” recite two young girls, reading from a prepared text.


 How does Tim Walz describe his pal, the pro-Hitler movie fan Asad Zaman? Walz calls Zaman a “master teacher” who offers Walz lessons whenever they spend time together.

“I would like to first of all say thank you to imam,” Walz said at the MAS Minnesota 2018 event, standing next to now Lieutenant Governor of the Gopher State, Peggy Flanagan:

“I am a teacher, so when I see a master teacher, I know it. Over the time we’ve spent together, one of the things I’ve had the privilege of is seeing the things in life through the eye of a master teacher, to try and get the understanding. It was imam talking [saying that] ‘in those times is where we find who we are, in those times is where we really see.’

“That brings me to the second lesson that imam taught me,” said Walz, going on to accuse Congress of feeding on “fear more than hope” and “division.”


Ben Shapiro spoke with Gabe Kaminsky after his exposé of Walz’s friendship with Zaman. During the interview, Kaminsky said that MAS Minnesota had been deemed a Muslim Brotherhood offshoot as far back as 2008, in a terrorism financing case.

“But this individual, Asad Zaman, has a controversial history on social media, on his Facebook page. He has, in one case, promoted a pro-Hitler movie, a movie that glorifies Adolf Hitler. On Oct. 7, when 1,200 Israelis were slaughtered in the Jewish state, his immediate response was to say that Palestinians had a right to resist, a right to defend themselves. And this individual has promoted other conspiracy theories on his social media history.”

Fox News also asked for clarification from the Harris campaign regarding Walz’s links to the imam. The Harris-Walz campaign responded to Chicago-based correspondent Mike Tobin by lying, telling him that "Gov. Walz does not have a relationship with [Zaman],” though Walz has hosted Asad Zaman on numerous occasions.

The campaign also said that Walz "strongly condemns Hamas terrorism.”

Fox's Tobin expressed his concerns:

We start to see more appearances with Zaman and Gov. Walz in 2019, January, April and May. At one point, Zaman delivers an invocation to the state of the state address.

He appeared with Gov. Walz in May of 2020, calling for calm in the George Floyd riots, and again in 2023 following a string of vandalism at mosques.

Sam Westrop of The Middle East Forum says Gov. Walz has been willfully ignorant of Zaman’s radicalism because he relies on the Arab or Muslim voting bloc and cannot do anything that would make him appear Islamophobic.

Westrop said, “This is a serious problem. Under a Walz-Harris ticket, given Walz's ability to embrace really just the worst kind of radicals within the Muslim community, one can only imagine this will be replicated at the White House level. Walz clearly doesn't want to know about the extremists he embraces.”

Even the Dem-friendly CNN wants to know what’s up with Walz and the imam. They got the same response from the Harris campaign’s Lauren Hitt, who told CNN that Walz and Zaman do not have a “personal relationship.”

“The Governor and he do not have a personal relationship.”

Is Hitt getting around what is now known by all, by qualifying the nature of the Walz Zaman relationship? It’s not “personal.” Does Hitt mean they’re not gay, they’re only friends?

Hitt, still sticking to the script, blah-blah-blahed the same thing she’d said to everyone else who’d inquired. “Governor Walz strongly condemns Hamas terrorism,” said Hitt to CNN.

Zaman separately told CNN that he does not have a “personal relationship” with Walz. Pressed by CNN about his antisemitic social media posts, he said that sometimes he shares links “without fully looking at them.” 

“People, myself included, will sometimes pass along social media items without fully looking at them. I support organizations, leaders and efforts to bring greater justice, equality and wellbeing to all people whether Muslim or Jewish, Christian or Hindu, believer or atheist. Desiring harm to people is against my faith and my personal convictions,” said the imam to CNN.

Asad Zaman isn’t the only terrorist with whom Tim Walz has fraternized. There’s also Hatem Bazian, an antisemitic academic. Bazian has been an ever-abundant and dependable source of antisemitic propaganda in the wake of October 7. Naturally, this is someone Walz wants to cultivate. In fact, Walz cozied up to Bazian the Jew-hater for a photo opp in 2019, at a Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) event. The views of CAIR and Bazain were transparent even then. 

CAIR, much like MAS, was labeled by federal prosecutors an unindicted co-conspirator of Hamas in a terror finance case from 2008. In 2017, Bazian was compelled to apologize for posting an antisemitic meme depicting a Jewish man with the caption, "Mom look! I is chosen! I can now kill, rape, smuggle organs & steal the land of Palestinians Yay #Ashke-Nazi."

Walz posed for photos with this man, Hatem Bazian. What does this say about Walz? By now we know. He likes hanging out with known antisemites. And giving them money.

Meanwhile, you won’t get any kind of admission from the Harris campaign about the vice presidential candidate and his close associations with terrorists. When questioned, all they do is lie. Matt Brooks, CEO of the Republican Jewish Coalition was blunt not only about Walz’s relationship with Asad Zaman, but how the Harris campaign responds when confronted with the evidence:

It is an outrage to the American Jewish community that Tim Walz would champion Hitler-promoting cleric Asad Zaman of the Muslim American Society of Minnesota. On Oct. 7, 2023, as Israel was suffering the worst massacre of Jews since the Holocaust, Mr. Zaman disgustingly asserted that he ‘stands in solidarity with Palestinians against Israeli attacks.’ Appallingly, under Tim Walz, Minnesota has awarded over $100,000 in funding to Zaman’s Israel-hating organization.”

At a time of spiking antisemitism here at home and as Israel faces an existential war for survival, it is essential for the American Jewish community to have confidence in our leaders—and it is clear that we cannot trust Kamala Harris and Tim Walz. Their priorities are not our priorities, and the American people will reject their radicalism and extremism in November.

Beyond the stolen valor issue and more, the American public has begun to notice Tampon Tim's affinity for terrorists. Florida Senator Rick Scott spoke out about Walz hosting a Hamas-affiliated terrorist who celebrated October 7 on some five occasions, saying that Harris/Walz is the “pro Hamas ticket.”

Rep. Anthony D’Esposito (R-N.Y.) meanwhile questioned the response of the Harris team: “Why did Tim Walz lie about his obviously friendly relationship with a Minnesota Muslim cleric who promoted Hamas and Hitler?

“Weird—and disqualifying.”

Many are the accusers who call Donald Trump “Orange Hitler” with no proof. There’s just a call that goes out to the echo chamber, and the media and its audiences, fall in. Meantime, in Walz we have a potential VP who has the very bad habit of legit hanging out with genuine Hitler fans. Donald Trump told Elon Musk that any Jew who votes for Harris should have his head examined; and in truth, an examination of the facts about Walz and his Muslim cronies can lead to only one conclusion: Walz is a terrorist sympathizer.

If you vote for Harris, you’re voting for Walz.

And if you vote for Walz, you’re voting for Jews to die. 

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

Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424. 

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  • Wednesday, August 14, 2024
  • Elder of Ziyon

“Again you will plant vineyards on the hills of Samaria” - A tour of Tura Winery (Forest Rain)

By Forest Rain

“Again you will plant vineyards on the hills of Samaria”

Many of the hills of Samaria are barren and empty – except for those touched by Jews who came back and are renewing the love story with our ancestral homeland.

When Vered and Erez Ben Saadon got married in 1997, they chose to live in the village of Bracha, located on Mount Gerizim in Samaria, where the biblical blessing was given to the tribes of Israel.

Vered and Erez had a dream to farm the land. The newlyweds invested the money they received as a wedding gift to buy the first 20 square kilometers of land where they planted vineyards. Today the Ben Saadon family owns 560 square kilometers of vineyards.

For 2000 years the land lay empty. Now it looks like this. The green is just part of their vineyards.



“You shall yet plant vineyards on the mountains of Samaria.
Those who plant them, they will enjoy the fruit” (Jeremiah 31:5).

At first, the couple sold their grapes to other wineries. When they fully understood how special their grapes are, they decided to open their own winery  - Tura, a world-class, award-winning estate winery that has become a place of pilgrimage for Israeli and foreign wine connoisseurs.

It took courage and vision to open Tura Winery in Rechalim, a small community located just 15 minutes drive from Ariel University, 40 minutes from Rosh Haayin. Rechelim was another Zionist vision realized – named after two Jewish women named Rachel murdered by Arab terrorists and our ancient matriarch, Rachel. For life taken, in honor of the life given, a new community established. The first pioneering family to live in Rechalim lived in a tent for nearly eight months, but soon after, multiple families joined them, permanent homes were built, and Rechalim grew into a community in the full sense of the word.

Some of the original tents were incorporated into the structure of Tura Winery. 



The Ben Saadon’s unique personalities are woven into the success of Tura. Erez oversees the wine-making process at all stages, from growing the grapes to marketing. Vered hosts visitors to the winery where shares her extraordinary story and knowledge about Samaria. She has become an unofficial “spokesperson for Samaria” which is why on Israel’s 75th Independence Day Vered was chosen to represent the farmers, the residents of Samaria, and Israeli Wine and light a torch at the torch lighting ceremony on Mount Herzl in their honor.

Vered was born in Holland and as a young girl immigrated to Israel with her parents and sister. Vered’s father was Jewish but her mother was not. Having relatives who survived the Holocaust as well as relatives who aided the perpetrators of the Holocaust led Vered’s mother to decide that she wanted to stand firmly on the side of the Jews. Israel’s chief rabbi Shlomo Goren conducted their conversion ceremony.

Vered says that the Jew hate we see in Europe today is the same hate that created the horror of the Holocaust. It was never really gone. For years she has been warning visiting Europeans that the hate will destroy them. In the past, they showed little understanding of what she was saying. Perhaps now, they will see what she meant. She worries about Israel too but sees more hope for us. We have our soldiers and, if we choose wisely, we may merit miracles. We will need both.     

The slogan of Tura Winery is “Patience & Inspiration”. It reflects the art and love infused in the process of making their wines. It’s appropriate for the story of Israel too.

*******************

The Tura Winery Visitors Center can accommodate up to 55 people.
There is an entrance fee and it is by appointment only. To arrange a visit, please call: 02-650-8882

For more information about Tura Wine please visit: https://www.turawinery.com/

 

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!
 

 

  • Wednesday, August 14, 2024
  • Elder of Ziyon

Not one Palestinian terrorist group is listed in the UN Security Council list of sanctioned groups



The UN Security Council publishes a list of individuals and organizations who are subject to sanctions.

There are many hundreds of people, and nearly 200 entities, on the list. 

None of the organizations listed are Palestinian terror groups.

Hams isn't on the list. Islamic Jihad isn't on the list. Neither are the PFLP, PFLP-GC, DFLP, PRC, Al Aqsa Brigades, or any other Palestinian terror grop. 

Of the individuals listed, there are none who are members of those groups. There are a coupld of Palestinians but they are listed for membership in ISIL or other sanctioned groups, not for being part of a Palestinian terror group.

No Yahya Sinwar. No Monammed Deif. No Ziyad al-Nakhalah.

Even after the terror sprees of the 1990s and 2000s, the bus bombings, the suicide bomb belts, the shootings, the stabbings, the car rammings, the massacres and rapes and kidnappings of October 7 - not one Palestinian terror group is listed. 

This tells you all you need to know about the United Nations. 


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!
 

 

  • Wednesday, August 14, 2024
  • Elder of Ziyon

Message to the head of @UNRWA for the anniversary of the Geneva Conventions




UNRWA head Philippe Lazzarini posted on Monday:

75 years ago today, the Geneva Conventions were put in place to protect civilians in times of wars. 
They are the universal “Rules of War” meant to limit the devastating impact of wars & conflicts on humanity. 
The one set of rules we “all agree on”, but do we? 

In the past 10 months, these rules have been blatantly broken day in, day out in #Gaza by the Israeli Forces as well as the Palestinian armed groups including Hamas. 

More concerning, Member States- party to the Geneva Conventions- have failed in their responsibilities to respect the conventions and ensure that parties to the conflict respect them under all circumstances.

Our shared values enshrined in the Conventions are at stake as is our shared humanity.
It is time to re-instate those values + re-commit to the Conventions. They are the compass of international humanitarian law.

The basics still apply: 

- Civilians, women, children, detainees must be protected. 

- Schools, hospitals, people’s homes, humanitarian + UN staff, facilities & operations must be protected. 
This is libelous.


Dear @UNLazzarini:

I've read the Geneva Conventions.  Israel is not violating any of them.

The average @IDF  soldier (and, indeed Western soldier) knows them better than you do. 

Israel has layers of international law experts at every stage of battle. it makes all its military decisions in full accordance with international law. 

Israel strictly adheres to the principle of distinction. It strictly adheres to the principle of proportionality. If you actually read the Conventions and how they have been interpreted in every other conflict, you would know that. 

The Geneva Conventions do not mandate suicide, whether personal or national. They allow soldiers to do what it takes to protect their lives and the lives of their fellow fighters and civilians. 

The high casualty rate in Gaza is due to one reason and one reason only: Hamas has made dead Gazans (real or imagined) part of its strategy. And you are playing your part by using these deaths that result from Hamas using innocents as human shields into trying to pressure Israel into allowing a terror group - one that coincidentally @UNRWA  cooperates with - to continue to murder Jews in the future.

About half of those killed in this war have been terrorists. For urban warfare, especially a war where the enemy is hiding tens of meters underground and always emerges wearing civilian clothing, this is unprecedentedly high. It should be praised. Indeed, western militaries are learning a great deal from Israel how to wage war morally in their own future battles. Every military expert who visits Israel and discusses the war with IDF brass and lawyers comes away impressed, and more than one is a little frightened that their own militaries will be expected to adhere to Israel's sky-high standards in the future, which - in their words - often go beyond what international law requires. 

You are pretending to be objective by comparing Israel's actions, with its extensive legal framework and moral underpinnings, with a group that celebrates murdering Jewish civilians. 

That is not objecivity: that is antisemitism.
This is without even going into UNRWA's own culpability for terrorism. I'm just addressing his claims that Israel is violating Geneva, a manifest lie. The only way it is true is if you make the assumption a priori that Israel intends to hurt civilians - and that is an antisemtic assumption. 


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!
 

 

  • Wednesday, August 14, 2024
  • Elder of Ziyon

UNRWA meets with designated terrorist group Islamic Jihad



Palestine Today reported Tuesday, "Bassam Mowad, the head of political relations for the Islamic Jihad Movement in the North [Lebanon], accompanied by Hajj Abu Ali Siddiq, met this morning with the [UNRWA] director of services in the Beddawi camp, Mr. Abu Adel Ahmed. During the meeting, they discussed the latest developments in the service situation of UNRWA in the camp."

Among the topics discussed was how to set up a cash for work program for young people that is funded by Germany.

Apparently, UNRWA has no problem partnering with a terrorist group and discussing with them how to spend money.

Mowad no doubt is considered a political, not a military, leader. But Islamic Jihad doesn't make those distinctions itself.  Mowad himself praised the October 7 massacre in a recent speech celebrating the "martyrdom" of three Islamic Jihad terrorists.



To be sure, the camps have quasi-governmental "popular committees" that do some of the trappings of local governance, and UNRWA probably needs to have some interaction with them (anbd they, in turn, pressure UNRWA to bend to their will.) These committees are made up of representatives of lots of terror groups like Hamas, Fatah, the PFLP and Islamic Jihad. But to meet with Islamic Jihad alone cannot be justified as being part of normal UNRWA interfaces with the logal government. 

The "military wing" of Islamic Jihad is just as much part of the Beddawi camp as the "political wing." On October 7, the Islamic Jihad Al Quds Brigades handed out candy to residents of the camp.


This is who UNRWA partners with. 



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!
 

 

  • Wednesday, August 14, 2024
  • Elder of Ziyon

Federal court issues injunction against UCLA on discriminating against Jews - and makes clear that Zionism is part of Judaism



A Los Angeles federal district court today ordered the University of California, Los Angeles, to stop allowing and assisting antisemitic agitators to ban Jews from large parts of UCLA’s campus.  

In Frankel v. Regents of the University of California, Becket and co-counsel Clement & Murphy PLLC filed a lawsuit against UCLA after it helped a group of activists as they set up encampments where they harassed Jewish students and stopped them from accessing classes, the library, and other critical parts of campus. UCLA reinforced these zones—both by providing metal barriers and by sending away Jewish students—while taking no effective action to ensure safe passage for Jewish students. In response, UCLA disavowed any obligation to protect its Jewish students, and claimed that Jewish students have nothing to fear when classes begin again in the fall. 
The ruling leaves no doubt as to the antisemitic nature of what UCLA allowed, and even helped, anti-Zionist groups to do. The ruling is a withering criticism of the school (emphasis in original):

In the year 2024, in the United States of America, in the State of California, in the City of Los Angeles, Jewish students were excluded from portions of the UCLA campus because they refused to denounce their faith. This fact is so unimaginable and so abhorrent to our constitutional guarantee of religious freedom that it bears repeating, Jewish students were excluded from portions of the UCLA campus because they refused to denounce their faith. UCLA does not dispute this. Instead, UCLA claims that it has no responsibility to protect the religious freedom of its Jewish students because the exclusion was engineered by third-party protesters. But under constitutional principles, UCLA may not allow services to some students when UCLA knows that other students are excluded on religious grounds, regardless of who engineered the exclusion. 
The judge clearly sees attachment to Israel as being part snd parcel of Judaism, and forcing students to deny that connection as being antisemitic. 

Note that "UCLA does not dispute this" - that the encampments excluded Jews because Zionism is part and parcel of their Judaism. 

What the sydents went through was antisemitic. Students were asked "Are you a Zionist?" and physcially blocked from entering areas of campus if they didn't denounce Zionism, or if they wore any jewelry or signs of being Jewish.

The examples given in the ruling reinforce this (emphasis mine):
Plaintiffs are three Jewish students who assert they have a religious obligation to support the Jewish state of Israel.  Prior to the protests, Plaintiff Frankel often made use of Royce Quad.  After protesters erected the encampment, Plaintiff Frankel stopped using the Royce Quad because he believed that he could not traverse the encampment without disavowing Israel.  He also saw protesters attempt to erect an encampment at the UCLA School of Law’s Shapiro courtyard on June 10, 2024. Similarly, Plaintiff Ghayoum was unable to access Powell Library because he understood that traversing the encampment, which blocked entrance to the library, carried a risk of violence. He also canceled plans to meet a friend at Ackerman Union after four protesters stopped him while he walked toward Janss Steps and repeatedly asked him if he had a wristband. Plaintiff Ghayoum also could not study at Powell Library because protesters from the encampment blocked his access to the library. And Plaintiff Shemuelian also decided not to traverse Royce Quad because of her knowledge that she would have to disavow her religious beliefs to do so. The encampment led UCLA to effectively make certain of its programs, activities, and campus areas available to other students when UCLA knew that some Jewish students, including Plaintiffs, were excluded based of their genuinely held religious beliefs.
The injunction prohibits UCLA from discriminating against Jewish students, and makes clear:
For purposes of this order, all references to the exclusion of Jewish students shall include exclusion of Jewish students based on religious beliefs concerning the Jewish state of Israel.

(h/t Andrew)

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!
 

 

Tuesday, August 13, 2024

Turkish media is even more antisemitic than Arab media

I've been looking at Turkey's news media lately, and it often makes even the worst Arab antisemitism look tame.

You know how Arab newspapers say "Extremist Jews stormed Al Aqsa MOsque" when Jews visit the Temple Mount? Well, in Turkey today, the consistent headline was "Fanatic Jews raid Al Aqsa mosque."



Note the subhead refers to the Israeli flag as "Israeli rags."

One newspaper helpfully added, "It was emphasized that there was concern that fanatic Jews might raid the mosques in Al-Aqsa."

In other news, the Turkish conspiracy theory that there are still a significant number of secret Jews who were followers of Shabatai Zvi in the 17th century pretendingto be Muslims, and these "Sabbateans" are fighting in Israel's army when they are not pretending to be upstanding Turkish citizens:

For the Zionists, integration into Ottoman society was the mainstay of the struggle to establish a Jewish state. The Zionists’ inclinations towards assimilation were perceived as a strategic maneuver, while assimilation within the borders of another country was a humiliating situation for them. The underlying interest of the Zionists in the Ottoman Empire was to settle and dominate the Palestinian territories. For this purpose, they were willing to fall into all kinds of pits of ignobility, let alone assimilate and integrate.

Today, the Sabbateans continue to be in the elite segment of Turkish society and skim the cream of the crop as first-class citizens. Although some may not consider this group, who appear to be Muslims but have not surrendered to the values ​​of Islam, to be Jews, they are friends of the Jews. It is an undeniable fact that this group of murderers, who have dual citizenship, volunteered for Israeli military service and were involved in the crime of genocide by massacring Muslims in Palestine. 
The destruction of the usurper gang that burns and destroys the lands of Muslims is near, God willing!
Finally, I mentioned one newspaper column where the writer denied the Holocaust. Another columnist took that column as fact and added more details, claiming Sephardic Jews were the ones who sent Ashkenaz Jews to the concentration camps while the "pure-blood" Sephardim were then allowed to move to Israel. 

The Arab world used to be this bad but they were shamed when organizations like MEMRI exposed the antisemitism so they started to preted to be only anti-Zionist" for the most part. It looks like Turkey never got the memo. 

Or they can't be 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!
 

 

  • Tuesday, August 13, 2024
  • Elder of Ziyon

No one cares that Ukraine is now occupying Russia, and other cases of double standards for Israel




It's funny how unimportant international law becomes when the world loves the supposed violator.

Thousands of Ukrainian soldiers smashed through the Russian border a week ago in a surprise attack, and they now occupy 28 settlements and between 500 and 1,000 square kilometers of Russian land.

That is far larger than all of Gaza.

Not only that, but some 200,000 Russians had to be evacuated and are now displaced from their homes.

I have no idea why Ukraine decided to do this. Its President said it was a matter of security because Russia had launched attacks from that region. 

Where are the journalists, human rights advocates and world leaders expressing concern over an aggressive attack, taking of territory and and hundreds of thousands of displaced people? Isn't attacking another nation an act of aggression? 

Well, Ukraine is in a defensive war. Just like Israel was in 1967.

Ukraine is trying to dissuade further Russian attacks. Just as Israel is today.

Ukraine is not targeting civilians. Neither is Israel, although Russia isn't so immoral as to hide its troops underneath civilians to use them as human shields. It has some concern for its own citizzens, after all. 

Analogies are rarely perfect and people can point to differences. But how come those differences always seem to go against Israel's position?

The fact is that people, and nations, and the media, and human rights NGOs, act how they act for their own often selfish or other subjective reasons, and then come up with justifications like "international law" after the fact. The excuses justify the actions after the fact but they are rarely the reasons for the actions or statements. 

This is something that the Palestinians know far better than Israelis. They know that the world wants to hate Jews, just as the West wants to hate Russia. They make up excuses so the antisemites can point to reasons for their hate, but the hate precedes the excuses. 

The Palestinians also know that people love to join the crowd, ansd when they get enough antisemites to go into the streets, plenty of others want to be on the "right side of history."

Jews, possibly due to centuries of Talmudic law study, still think that logic and arguments win the day. They know their positions and facts are right, and think that the world would believe them if they would just listen and look at the evidence. 

It doesn't work that way. And I say this as someone who spends hours a day making ironclad, logical and often irrefutable arguments to prove Israel's case.

The double standards for Jews are all over the place. One of the submissions to the International Criminal Court about its decision to seek an arrest warrant against Israel's leader detailed one of them:

Some have questioned OTP’s motives in seeking issuance of the arrest warrants. Moreover, on the day that the Prosecutor announced his application for arrest warrants, a State Department spokesman questioned OTP’s professionalism as well: “The Prosecutor’s staff was supposed to land in Israel today to coordinate the visit, and instead, Israel was informed that the Prosecutor’s staff didn’t get on their flight around the same time that the Prosecutor himself went on television to announce these charges. These circumstances call into question the legitimacy and credibility of this investigation.” To cite but one comparison : In 2004, OTP commenced its preliminary examination of war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in Colombia. OTP engaged with Colombian authorities for years and finally, in 2021, Prosecutor Khan closed the matter on complementarity grounds, on the basis that Colombian authorities “could not be characterised as being inactive, nor unwilling or unable to genuinely investigate and prosecute relevant Rome Statute crimes.” 

Or, as another submission points out, Israel has a comprehensive and widely respected multi-tiered legal system, and "It is difficult to reconcile an allegation that a manifestly unlawful policy (in contravention to Israel's clear legal obligations and publicly stated positions) could be instituted at the highest political echelon and implemented throughout the civilian and military authorities, with the system of legal advice described above."

 Yet the ICC did it anyway, and it can come up with lots of justifications for why Israel is treated differently from every other nation. And so do other parties that made their own submissions supporting the lie that Netanyahu is a war criminal, Palestine is a real country and Israel's extensive and independent legal system is not adequate to handle cases of crimes against humanity.

Jews think that the world has fundamentally changed when Jews exited the ghettoes and managed to become successful in business and politics. And it did - but not as much as we would like. The prejudices still exist, a little under the surface. The startling language of the ancient kinot we said today mirrors the massacres of last year a little too closely. 

But the world made up their minds before any evidence even existed, they just need a little bit of staged or out-of-context video or statements by "officials" to fully buy what they wanted to believe to begin with. 



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!
 

 

  • Tuesday, August 13, 2024
  • Elder of Ziyon

08/13 Links: Hamas says it killed a hostage, Hamas document reveals paraglider terror plan, Israel pivots to build more of its armaments

Ian will be unavailable for another couple of days. I'll try to muddle through.



Vice President Kamala Harris has named Ilan Goldenberg, who spearheaded the Biden administration’s sanctions against Israel, as its new liaison to the Jewish community Monday.

Michael Doran documented in Tablet magazine on Sunday how Goldenberg, a left-wing Israeli-born peace negotiator, helped lead an unprecedented effort by the Biden administration to hunt and target Israelis for sanctions — in the middle of a war against Hamas terrorists.

One Israeli male hostage was killed by his guard and two women captives were seriously wounded in two separate incidents in Gaza, the spokesperson for Hamas' armed al-Qassam Brigades, Abu Ubaida, said on Monday.
Abu Ubaida blamed the incident on what he described as Israeli "massacres" against Palestinians.

The Hamas terrorist movement’s use of paragliders as part of its mass murder of nearly 1,200 people, including over 30 Americans, in southern Israel on Oct. 7 was laid out in a methodical plan that Fox News Digital can disclose for the first time.

A Hamas military plan obtained by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) in the Gaza Strip reveals the great lengths the Iranian regime-backed terrorist organization Hamas went to deceive the world about its use of the aerial sports device. 

The Hamas document, originally in Arabic and translated into English and reviewed by Fox News Digital, shows how the terror group was looking to exploit its wider use. "The sport should be developed so that the paragliders become motorized. Areas where the sport can be exploited from a military aspect: Landing behind enemy lines, as part of a silent infiltration across the border using paragliders," it read. 
The fact that Sinwar was elected shows that Hamas's political and military branches are the same. It also demonstrates that when it comes to Islamist terrorist organizations, there is no difference between a political and military leader. By electing Sinwar as its "political" leader, Hamas itself is stating that it does not distinguish between a politician and terrorist.

Has anyone ever considered referring to Osama bin Laden and Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the heads of Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State (ISIS), as the "political leaders" of their respective organizations?

In addition to Haniyeh, Hamas's "political bureau" consists of several figures such as Khalil al-Hayya, Khaled Mashaal, Musa Abu Marzouk, Ghazi Hamad, and Taher a-Nunu who have long been advocating the armed struggle against Israel and glorifying acts of terrorism against Israelis.

 Now that UN admits employee involvement in Oct. 7, it’s time to end UNRWA

On Monday, the UN’s internal oversight arm released a report that found nine employees of the UN Relief and Works Agency, or UNRWA, took part in terrorist activities on Oct. 7 and in its aftermath.

That admission is awful enough — but the greater scandal is that investigators ignored evidence indicating that hundreds or even thousands of UNRWA employees are Hamas operatives.

The purpose of this charade is to protect UNRWA’s funding, but Congress should not be fooled.

Rather, it should permanently ban UNRWA from receiving US taxpayer dollars and impose terrorism sanctions to cut off the agency’s remaining sources of income.

Iran: The Next Nuclear Weapons State? 

An astonishing U.S. intelligence report just revealed a grim truth: The Islamic Republic of Iran may be conducting nuclear weapons activities — yet Washington is doing nothing about it.

The Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) recently provided an overdue report to Congress, omitting from the unclassified version a key phrase ODNI has used in annual threat assessments since 2019: “Iran is not currently undertaking the key nuclear weapons-development activities necessary to produce a testable nuclear device.” In other words: The U.S. intelligence community can no longer assert Tehran is not working on nuclear weapons. Iran has “undertaken activities that better position it to produce a nuclear device, if it chooses to do so,” the intelligence report concluded.

In recent years, Iran has expanded its political, military, and economic foothold in Latin America in an effort to utilize to its advantage the political changes in the region, especially the rise to power of left-wing parties. Without the coordinated activity of the United States and its allies in Latin America, the spread of Iranian influence in the continent could reach levels that would threaten Israel’s fundamental interests in the region.

Amid US tensions, Israel pivots to self-reliance on homegrown arms

 Israel Hayom has learned of a decision to develop and manufacture heavy bombs for the Israeli Air Force domestically, including one-ton bombs akin to the American MK-84, whose delivery has been stalled for months by direct White House order.

The Defense Ministry is also broadening the domestic production of additional armaments, including tank ammunition (which is globally scarce) and 155mm shells. The ministry recently announced substantial procurement deals, including a 1.5 billion shekel ($400,000) contract with Elbit for ammunition acquisition and the establishment of a new specialized factory in Israel's south. Defense Ministry director general, Major General (Res) Eyal Zamir, described this as "a large-scale strategic move designed to ensure the IDF's war machine continues to advance. We are investing and will continue to invest tens of billions in building infrastructure and capabilities, expanding production lines, establishing new lines, and purchasing inventories to solidify production independence."


There are two stories here. The first, no less troubling for being obvious, is that trying to prevent clinicians who support the existence of Israel—or are Jewish, or have Jewish-sounding names—from treating patients constitutes a grave breach of professional ethics. Interfering with the work of colleagues for political reasons is unconscionable. 

But the blacklist is also part of a larger drama unfolding within the world of psychotherapy as more and more clinicians insist that psychotherapy is, foremost, a political rather than a clinical enterprise. It is a trend that I, a psychiatrist, find alarming. 

Unfortunately, instead of fighting back, the major professional organizations are embracing this malignant philosophy. The American Psychological Association has committed itself to “decolonial” psychology. The National Association of Social Workers states that “antiracism and other facets of diversity, equity, and inclusion must be a focal point for everyone within social work.” The American Counseling Association emphasizes “the dynamics of power, privilege, and oppression that influence the counseling relationship.” Training programs for new therapists have injected these tenets into their curricula. 
At the beginning of February, Lahav Shapira was beaten up in front of a bar by an anti-Israel fellow student. Shapira then filed a lawsuit against the Free University in the Berlin Administrative Court . According to the lawsuit, the university had "not taken adequate measures to prevent or structurally eliminate anti-Semitic discrimination against the plaintiff or other Jewish students. Instead, an environment of insecurity was allowed to develop."

What this environment looks like in reality can be guessed from the messages from the history students. Due to the threat situation, Shapira was temporarily accompanied to the university by a bodyguard. One student wrote that Shapira was "acting up". Another student replied: "He should be quiet, wallah that he is allowed to go to the university is disgusting." When confusion arose because the group was writing about two different Jewish students, one chat member commented: "There are several of them too...", another added, "too many" - apparently referring to Jews.

Shapira, who is studying to be a teacher, will surely "only be a teacher for their Jewish private schools," one person speculated. "Chosen people, chosen school," mocked a student. One member asked, referring to anti-Semitic conspiracy theories: "Why is the brother studying, they're all rich anyway?" Another chat member wrote: "They flow into various positions in society so they can exercise power."


Many on the Western left, including the LGBT left, have become enamored with Critical Social Justice, which provides a warped lens through which they perceive all of humanity as oppressors versus oppressed classes. Armed with this simplistic, binary worldview, leftists gravitate toward perceived liberation movements for other so-called oppressed groups. This narrow prism, however, obscures the universalist ideology of Islamism espoused by groups like Hamas, which, under a facade of anti-imperialist rhetoric, harbors a brutal dogma that is antithetical to the liberties and rights championed by LGBT activists. No amount of screaming about “pinkwashing” can drown out the irony of folks who believe in LGBT liberation cheerleading ideological movements from which they would flee as refugees.

The aftermath of the 1979 Islamic Revolution in Iran is a harrowing tale of leftists being tortured and executed en masse by the very Islamic regime they supported for the sake of their anti-imperialist goals. Many Iranians who aligned with leftist organizations supported the revolution only to find themselves persecuted by Islamists they helped put in power.

Immediately following the revolution, the new regime led by Ayatollah Khomeini began systematically oppressing LGBT people and publicly executing them by the thousands. These atrocities were justified as a means to "eliminate corruption" and prevent the "contamination" of society. Between 4,000 to 6,000 gay, lesbian, and bi people have been executed since the 1979 Islamic Revolution​​. Iran’s legal system, rooted in Islamic law, criminalizes consensual sexual relations between same-sex individuals, with penalties ranging from lashes to death. Iranian law does not distinguish between consensual and non-consensual same-sex intercourse, allowing authorities to prosecute both perpetrators and victims of sexual assault​.

For the third time ever, an MLB game featured a Jewish pitcher, catcher and batter at the same moment 

Regardless of who stood in the batter’s box, Jewish pitcher Max Lazar’s first career strikeout would have been a big deal.

But as it was, that moment in Saturday night’s game between the Philadelphia Phillies and Arizona Diamondbacks was significant for connoisseurs of Jewish baseball history as well.

The batter Lazar struck out in the bottom of the eighth inning, Diamondbacks outfielder Joc Pederson, is also Jewish. So is the player who gloved the pitch, Phillies catcher Garrett Stubbs.

That meant that Pederson’s at-bat became a rare trifecta in which the pitcher, catcher and batter were all Jewish. According to the Jewish Baseball Museum, Lazar’s strikeout of Pederson was only the third instance of a Jewish pitcher-catcher-batter combination in the more than 100-year history of MLB. It was also only the eighth-ever occurrence of a Jewish pitcher-catcher battery.
Hamas has been holding over 100 innocent people hostage, including eight American citizens, for more than ten months. They, and their families, endure daily, constant agony.

At Boston City Hall Plaza from Sunday, August 18, to Tuesday, August 20, there will be a walk-through tunnel simulation that will provide powerful insight into the experience of the hostages, and give patrons the opportunity to unite across political divides in the call for their freedom.

The simulation is built into a shipping container and includes audio recordings from body cameras worn by Hamas terrorists on October 7.

 






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!
 

 

Monday, August 12, 2024

  • Monday, August 12, 2024
  • Elder of Ziyon

A collection of new kinot written to commemorate October 7

Kinot are the heartbreaking prayers that Jews say on Tisha B'Av, to commenorate not only the tragedy of the burning of the Temples but all the major attacks that Jews have endured throughout the centuries. 

Most of us born after the Holocaust never imagined that new kinot would need to be composed for anything that happened in our lifetimes. 

Some kinot appear to be exaggerated, meant to cause the reader to mourn. Yet those events that seemed impossible in the 1930s became true again in the 1940, and those that seemed to be part of history last year became current events on Simchat Torah. 

There is no exaggerstion needed when talking about how Jews have been treated.

Some of the kinot describe, in gruesome yet poetic detail, specific events to individuals and small details of the larger tragedies, which make them more personal and more awful. And that is what happened on October 7. 

Tzohar issued a booklet that describes how old kinot are seen through a new lens. Here's one small but giant story:

Just a few hours after the war broke out, the police and IDF announced the opening of a forensics identification center for the dead at the Shura military base. Teams of police officers, ZAKA volunteers, IDF personnel, doctors and forensic technicians, worked tirelessly for months until they identified all the victims: 
“A bone. A tooth. A sliver of skull. They came in bags, endless bags, mixed with ash, coins, bullets and shrapnel. Like imperfect tapestries, some held the remains of different people. The bags were numbered, catalogued and scanned. DNA was extracted. The science was precise, but it was hard to know what happened, how a person was killed.” 
One bag, which held clues to the final seconds of life, unnerved and intrigued Dr. Chen Kugel, head of the National Center of Forensic Medicine. Since October 7th, his staff has been working on identifying the remains of some of the 1,200 people killed by Hamas militants. He has been trying to understand not only the causes of death but also the underlying hate. Both, he said, often lie beyond one’s imagination. He pointed to a computer screen. 
“This is a piece of something that looks like charcoal,” he said. “But then you see it through a CT scan, and you see two spines, one of an adult and one of someone younger, maybe 10 or 12 years old. And two sets of ribs. You can see they are roped around with this metal wire. These were people who were hugging one another and burned while they were tied together. It might be a parent and a child.” 
Tzohar published a new kina, beautfully translated into English as well:


Rabbi Moshe Hauer of the Orthodox Union modified an existing kina to refer to the event of October 7:




Rabbi Yosef Zvi Rimon, president of the World Mizrachi Movement, also penned his own kinah with Biblical allusions.





Two other kinot, one from a survivor of the massacre and another from a daughter of a survivor, are worth reading. They do not end with the traditional lines of comfort that traditional kinot do. 






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

Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424. 

Read all about it here!
 

 

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