Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Sunday, November 21, 2010

BDS: Epic FAIL

The worldwide Boycott, Divestiture and Sanctions movement somehow manages to get a lot of headlines about its efforts in making Israel look like a pariah state, convincing people to avoid using her products. Most of those efforts are fictional - for example, last week they claimed that the Netherlands' top pension fund had divested from Israeli companies in its portfolio, a claim that was found to be false, and this is a pattern of lies from the BDS leaders to try to give the appearance of gaining traction.

The best proof comes from the Country Brand Index of 2010, sponsored by FutureBrand and the BBC World News. From their report (not directly online; you can request it here:)

The Country Brand Index is an annual study that examines and ranks country brands, based on FutureBrand’s proprietary research methodology.

The sixth edition of CBI incorporates a global quantitative research study with 3,400 international business and leisure travellers from 13 countries on all five continents, qualified by in-depth expert focus groups that took place in 14 major metropolitan areas around the world. The overall country brand score is calculated using FutureBrand’s Hierarchical Decision Model (HDM), which measures overall country brand performance in the following areas:

AWARENESS:
Do key audiences know that the country exists? How top of mind is it?

FAMILIARITY:
How well do people know the country and what it offers?

ASSOCIATIONS:
What qualities come to mind when people think of the country?
We look at the measured perceptions of five key association dimensions:

• TOURISM
• HERITAGE AND CULTURE
• GOOD FOR BUSINESS
• QUALITY OF LIFE
• VALUE SYSTEM

PREFERENCE:
How highly do audiences esteem the country? Does it resonate?

CONSIDERATION:
Is this one of the countries being thought about for a visit?

DECISION / VISITATION:
To what extent do people follow through and visit the country?

ADVOCACY:
Do visitors recommend the country to family, friends and colleagues?

Israel ranking this year shot up from #41 to #30.

Not only does it rank far higher than every Arab and Muslim country save one (the UAE fell from #23 to #28), but it rose more positions in 2010 than any nation except for Chile, which gained a lot of visibility for the miners' rescue and jumped 19 places on the list.

The BDS movement has nt only been ineffective - it has backfired.

Egypt went down 13 spots (45 to 58), Jordan down eight (67 to 75), Syria down five (82 to 87), and Iran plummeted from 98 to 109, the second worst ranking in the list next to Zimbabwe.

In their words:

Israel (#30 +11) received significant marketing investment for tourist destinations. Israel moves in the right direction in 2010 – particularly in Tourism metrics like Authenticity and History, which align very well with campaigns promoting heritage and culture.

I guess that this means that most people realize that historic Jerusalem is in Israel despite the efforts of one advertising board to pretend otherwise.

(h/t VC Cafe)

A tool of the trade

Palestine Today has another article warning that Israel will kick thousands of Jerusalem Arabs out of their homes. Nothing new there.

But the picture illustrating it is sort of nice. The sort of picture that one can put on a poster to bring to an anti-Israel rally, just to tick the protesters off.

A little research shows that it was taken by AP last December.

Now, how can I know that?

One of the items in my toolbox is this website. It can read the EXIF information from photos, which can reveal lots of interesting information. In this case, it seems that AP puts its captions into the photo itself. I Google the caption and find somewhere that the original photo can be found (and, incidentally, prove that Palestine Today rips off AP without giving it attribution.)

Usually, the viewer is good for finding the original date of a photo. Often the Arabic papers I read will illustrate a story with an older photo and make it appear that it refers to the actual even (like an explosion.) In this case AP modified the photo caption so the date says October, not last December, but the caption says the original date.

More results from the poll of Palestinian Arabs

Here are some more highlights from The Israel Project poll of Palestinian Arabs that should make anyone pause before wanting to grant them a state of their won.

A Palestinian state should be run by Sharia Law. 55%
A Palestinian state should be run by civil law. 35%

The best goal is for a two state solution that keeps two states living side by side. 30%
The real goal should be to start with two states but then move to it all being one Palestinian state. 60%

Israel has a permanent right to exist as a homeland for the Jewish people. 23%
Over time Palestinians must work to get back all the land for a Palestinian state. 66%

In 2000, President Bill Clinton proposed a Palestinian-Israeli peace agreement in which the Palestinians would receive an independent state, which included Gaza and nearly all of the West Bank, using the 1967 green line, exchanging Israeli land for larger settlements. It made East Jerusalem the capital of the Palestinian state, with control over Palestinian quarters of the Old City. Yasir Arafat rejected this offer. In retrospect, do you wish Arafat had accepted this peace agreement - yes or no?
Yes: 24%
No: 71%

Some of the answers, to be sure, seemed to contradict these, as in the abstract they seem to support a two-state solution. But when specific compromises are mentioned, they reject every one.

And they make it crystal clear that a two-state solution is not a final agreement, and that they will try to take over Israel as well, signed agreement or not.

Terrorists win Palestinian Arab popularity contest

The Israel Project commissioned a poll in the West Bank and Gaza last month surveying Palestinian Arab opinions about various topics.

The results are most enlightening.

This post is about one specific question:

Now, I'd like you to rate your feelings toward some people, countries, and organizations, with one hundred meaning a VERY WARM, FAVORABLE feeling; zero meaning a VERY COLD, UNFAVORABLE feeling; and fifty meaning not particularly warm or cold. You can use any number from zero to one hundred, the higher the number the more favorable your feelings are toward that person, country, or organization.

Here are the results, sorted from lowest score (coldest feelings) to the highest (warmest feelings), along with their respective mean scores:


	Israelis	3.3
	Israel	4
	Benjamin Netanyahu	4.4
	American Jews	7.8
	Tony Blair	9.2
	Barack Obama	10.7
	The United States	14.5
	Hillary Clinton	15.2
	A one-state solution	28.7
	Two-state solution with an independent Palestinian state and Israel as a Jewish state	30.2
	Mahmoud Ahmadinejad	40
	Iran	40.4
	Two-state solution	41.3
	Hamas	42.6
	The peace process	42.6
	Ismail Haniyeh	44.1
	Hezbollah	44.6
	Palestinian Authority	54.2
	Salam Fayyad	54.5
	Mahmoud Abbas	57


	Fatah	57.6
	Marwan Bargouti	64.5
	Khalil Ibrahim al-Wazir ("Abu Jihad")	71.2
	Dalal Mughrabi	74.5

By far, the winners of the popularity context (at least that were named) were three terrorists, and the top one could not credibly be called anything but a terrorist (the other two at least had some political activities outside of terrorism.)

And for some reason Barack Obama, the most pro-Palestinian Arab president in history, hasn't seemed to have gained much for his efforts at least in this part of the Arab world. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad trounces him in popularity among the moderate, pragmatic, peace-loving Palestinian Arabs.

More analysis form this poll to come.

(h/t JoeSettler)

Photo of an oppressed West Bank Arab woman

Veet sent me this picture he took at the Rami Levy supermarket in Gush Etzion, in the dreaded territories.

The Arab woman looks so oppressed as she is forced to find bargains while standing next to an evil, colonialist, land-grabbing, imperialist, Jewish settler.

The very idea of Jews and Arabs living together in Judea and Samaria is self-evidently abhorrent. After all, every human rights activist on the planet thinks that this store shouldn't exist, that this woman should not be subjected to shopping with Jews, and segregation - not coexistence - between Jews and Arabs is the very definition of peace.

And it is easy to see why, when pictures like this of melancholy Arabs get published.

Meanwhile, in the parking lot, peace-loving Palestinian Authority spies are taking pictures of the cars at the store with PA license plates, so they can be subjected to, I am sure, proper professional therapy for their harrowing experience at being subjugated and humiliated by Jews.

Latest Latma (11/19/10)

Pretty good one: the dire consequences of not implementing the freeze, a new episode of the Jihad boys, and a NIF moonbat trying to befriend a Palestinian Arab.

Is Dmitry Medvedev Jewish?

When Dmitry Medvedev was first hand-picked to be president of Russia in 2008, there were a number of rumors that he was Jewish.

The rumors are based in part on the fact that his maternal grandfather's first name was Veniamin - similar to the Hebrew Binyamin (Benjamin) - while his family name, Shaposhnikov, is sometimes a Jewish name. But beyond that, accusing an electoral rival of being Jewish is a tactic that nationalist parties have employed in the past, both in Russia and in other former communist countries.

Even though he was baptized at 23, the rumors continued.

NRO translated (badly) a Dutch source from 2009:

A Russian journalist to RIA Novosti asked Russian President Dmitry Medvedev if he has Jewish ancestry?

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev replied that the rumors about his Jewish ancestry are inaccurate. He added that his ancestors are from Adana (Western Armenia in Turkey now) but he was born in Russia. He added in “I want everyone to be clear that I am Armenian, surname of my mother was Naxshikyan what the word Naxshik comes oudarmeens. The surname of my father was Bagratyan. This name is also purely Armenian. I was forced to change name to be head of Russian secret service (KGB) in France to work the cold war times. Since France had large Armenian community should not Arms Irish secret service agent working in France. That I have an Armenian surname changed to Russian. I am 100% Armenian.” Finally the Russian President says he is proud of his Armenian parents and ancestors.

Armenians, who had heard that claim earlier, weren't buying it:

The story has little, if any, credence. Medvedev who was born in 1965, lived and studied in Russia for most of his life. He received his Law Degree in 1987 from Leningrad State University. Three years later, he received his Ph.D. from the same university… and then the Cold War was over. Published biographies of Medvedev do not make any reference to his Armenian ancestry either.

Now, more fuel is being added to the fire.

Victor Shikhman, who is a talented blogger, writes almost as an aside in a recent post:

As a sidenote, Medvedev's [planned] visit [to Israel] is all the more interesting given that he is a Jew, the son of a Jewish mother and the first Jew to become President of Russia, much less enter the Kremlin in any capacity besides the following: doctor, scientist, military hero, foreigner.

I've personally confirmed Medvedev's Jewish identity with former Muscovites, who say that Medvedev's mother regularly attended the main synagogue in Moscow. The subject has not been broached much in Russian media, as Medvedev is Putin's man, and, well, Russian journalists know what's good for them, or they have an accident - there is freedom of choice in Russia. I wonder if anyone's bothered to tell the Arabs.

Ooooh...I will! I will!

It is mind-blowing that the president of one of the most anti-semitic nations in history could be a halachic Jew.

(h/t Silke)

Turkey arrests 25 Palestinian Arabs!

Turkey is such a friend to Palestinian Arabs, trying to help them improve their lives, sending aid ships, and so forth. Right?

Turkish authorities announced they arrested 25 Palestinian immigrants in northwestern Turkey who were trying to sneak into European countries in search of a better life.

The Turkish newspaper Hurriyet today reports that the Turkish security forces managed to arrest these illegal immigrants from Palestine while conducting inspections on the roads leading into the province of Edirne in north-west Turkey.

The paper said the investigation of the illegal immigrants who were detained is still ongoing.

The thousands of illegal immigrants each year pass through Turkey on their way to Greece and other European countries.

Why doesn't Turkey open its doors to all Palestinian Arabs, their fellow Muslims, who want to immigrate?

It seems Turkey's sympathy for the poor, oppressed Palestinian Arabs disappears when it is at Turkey's expense.

I wonder if they were they really from "Palestine" or from Lebanon. If Arabs from under PA rule are so desperate to leave their homeland when they are already living under PA autonomy, that would explode the myth of how Palestinian Arabs prefer unity over their own interests - the myth that has guided official Arab policy towards Palestinian Arabs for decades.