Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Thursday, October 29, 2020

10/29 Links Pt1: US announces citizens born in Jerusalem can now list Israel on their passports; Three dead as woman beheaded in knife attack in Nice, France

From Ian:

US announces citizens born in Jerusalem can now list Israel on their passports

The United States will now allow US citizens born in Jerusalem to list Israel as their country of birth on passports and other consular documents, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced Thursday.

The declaration marked the reversal of a decades-old policy that refrained from identifying the city as part of the Jewish state in an effort by the US to remain neutral on a key final status issue of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Pompeo said in a statement that the policy change would be “effective immediately” and was “consistent” with US President Donald Trump’s 2017 decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and subsequently move the US embassy there from Tel Aviv.

The new policy will allow US citizens to choose between “Jerusalem” or “Israel” as their place of birth; those who refrain from choosing will by default continue to be issued documents with their place of birth listed as “Jerusalem.”

US policy until Thursday allowed American citizens born in Jerusalem to identify only the city as their birthplace in their passports, unless they were born before Israel’s creation in 1948, in which case their country of birth was listed as “Palestine.” The State Department policy was challenged in the Supreme Court but ultimately upheld in 2015.

Consistent with President @realDonaldTrump's policy, I am happy to announce U.S. citizens born in Jerusalem can now elect to list their place of birth as either "Jerusalem" or "Israel" on their passports. We remain committed to lasting peace between Israelis and Palestinians.
— Secretary Pompeo (@SecPompeo) October 29, 2020

NYTs: Could a New U.S. Government Undo Trump's Policy toward the Palestinians?

Allowing the reopening of the Palestine Liberation Organization's diplomatic mission in Washington or restoring much of the aid to projects that directly benefited the Palestinian Authority would require overcoming a number of legal obstacles, some of which might require Congressional approval. And re-establishing the U.S. Consulate in Jerusalem, which until 2019 functioned as the American diplomatic mission to the Palestinians, would require Israel's permission. "These are all possible but they would require heavy political lifting," said Lara Friedman, president of the Foundation for Middle East Peace.

What PA President Abbas may wish for most - that a new U.S. president would prioritize the Palestinian cause, pressure Israel to make concessions, and even move the U.S. Embassy back to Tel Aviv from Jerusalem - seems highly unlikely at best. Former Vice President Joe Biden has made clear he has many higher priorities and has signaled that he does not want to clash with the Israeli government. "The idea that everything will go back to the way it was before is somewhat of a fairy tale," said Mouin Rabbani, an expert on Palestinian politics.

A New Nuclear Deal with Iran?

How then can the United States get around the Iranian regime's adamant opposition to any restrictions on its nuclear or missile ambitions and secure a sound nuclear deal?

Even if the United States secured a new nuclear agreement with Iran, or resuscitated the old one, what makes anyone think that Iran would honor a deal any more than it honored the last ones?

Given the seriousness of these issues and the lack of trust in the mullahs, all provisions must not have "sunset clauses" but be permanent.

Even if these six factors may now make it possible to give "diplomacy a chance," it might be advisable only to try that route if it is reinforced with resolute military force.

The JCPOA it is not only a fraud, it is camouflage for the appeasers of the world to pretend they are doing something about Iran's nuclear ambitions when in fact they are not doing anything but allowing Iran, after a short delay, to have nuclear weapons.... The mullahs will not change on their own. Diplomatic options are poor and unrealistic.

The JCPOA deal not only fails to stop Iran from having a nuclear weapons and the missiles to deliver them, it also hides Western inaction in confronting Iran's missiles, nuclear sites and terrorism.

Sudan op-ed warns that Israel wants to use Sudan to create Greater Israel, "the Jew does not give you bread for free"

Sudanile has had a large number of op-eds about the Sudan-Israel peace agreement, showing a wide variety of views that give an indication of the thinking in different segments of Sudanese society.

I've noted that even the articles that were supportive of the deal were somewhat antisemitic. All the more so this op-ed opposing it by Mahjoub Tawer.

What is the interest of Israel in Sudan, since it has established relations with many African countries and others? Why bother to establish relations with Sudan in particular? Is not it sufficient for all of these countries or is there a secret that only the scholars of the Children of Israel know in their protocols and their old age?

Israel knows perfectly well that its relationship with Sudan enriches it more than the rest of Africa and the Middle East and if it can set its feet in Sudan, the rest does not matter. The reason for that is that it can control the world east and west from the Sudanese lands and reach its goal of building the Greater State of Israel. Israel aspires to the Greater State of Israel from the Nile to the Euphrates.

Sudan is one of the richest countries in the Middle East [in resources] and is distinguished by a strategic location that is not available to anyone else, and if its resources are well utilized, it will be the richest and best in the world, as its lands are among the most fertile ...Add to that the abundance of water that passes through Sudan to Egypt, where the Nile River is the longest river in the world, which secures for Israel its need of water throughout the year in particular, and for the water war in the coming years.

Those who oppose normalization know very well that the Jew does not give you bread for free. Any dollar you take, you know that the Jew received a thousand dollars for it. So let us warn them, we must not be a bridge that Israel crosses over it to achieve its goals.

This is big! It used to be assumed that the map of Greater Israel only extended to the Egyptian border of the Nile.

But it turns out it is much larger - going through Sudan!

Here's my exclusive map of the new, Greater Israel!

If the White Nile is the border it can get even bigger!

We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.

Over the past week, Muslim countries have been vocal in condemning France and specifically its president Emmanuel Macron for defending cartoons that lampoon Mohammed.

The Organization of Islamic Cooperation said that "it will always condemn practices of blasphemy and of insulting Prophets."

Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan condemned "blasphemous cartoons targeting Islam & our Prophet PBUH."

Leaders of Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Jordan, Iran, Chechnya and other Muslim countries also condemned Macron's defense of the Charlie Hebdo cartoons.

Most of them added that, of course, they also condemned the beheading of teacher Samuel Paty for showing those cartoons.

There's a problem there, though. If you call the cartoons "blasphemous" then you are directly encouraging murdering the blasphemers, because most Islamic scholars through the centuries say that the punishment for blasphemy is death. Various hadiths imply that one who kills someone for insulting Mohammed - a lesser crime than blasphemy - is not punished, and that certainly applies to those who kill blasphemers.

In Iran, Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan and Pakistan, the punishment today for blasphemy is death.

Now, a man who repeatedly said "Allahu Akbar" has been arrested for killing three people in a church in Nice, France, with reports of at least on of the victims being beheaded.

There was one other attack on police in France by another man screaming Allahu Akbar, as well as a security guard stabbed outside French embassy in Saudi Arabia.

These attacks and murders are a result of the direct incitement by Muslim leaders who are calling the cartoons blasphemous. Moreover, many of these national leaders - instead of trying to calm down Muslims who might be inspired to attack - instead blamed Westerners pre-emptively, by "warning" them that any terrorism that results is their fault.

Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov said this explicitly to Macron: "You are forcing people into terrorism, pushing people towards it, not leaving them any choice, creating the conditions for the growth of extremism in young people's heads." Kadyrov wrote on Instagram.

Muslim national leaders are responsible for the murders and other attacks today. Their pro-forma condemnations of Paty's beheading were insincere but their anger at the "blasphemy" was not. They are inciting terrorism and blaming the victims by pretending that Muslims cannot be held responsible for their actions.

We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.

Some New York hotels proudly discriminated against Jews in 1877

In 1877, a sensational story played out in the pages of the New York Times.

A Jew named Joseph Seligman and his family were refused lodging at the Grand Union Hotel in Saratoga, upstate New York because they were Jewish, even though they had stayed there previous years. The owner of the hotel, Judge Henry Hilton (not related to the Hilton hotel chain of today), justified this because, he said, his gentile guests objected to being with Jews.

On June 20th, the Times published a number of articles and letters about it. Here is the summary:

Other vacation hotel managers in Long Branch, NJ, agreed with Judge Hilton and said they did not welcome Jews.

New York City hotel owners were generally fine with Jewish customers, many of them complimenting them as guests. A few hotels, however, some flatly refused Jews, giving interesting reasons about how Jews acted. Others bragged that they didn't discriminate against anyone, even Blacks.

The letters section the next day had three letters agreeing that Jews were nasty and no one wants to share a hotel with them. Here are two of them.

We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.

Vic Rosenthal's weekly column

The end of the historic “Arab-Israeli conflict” may be on the horizon, depending on the outcome of the US presidential election.

Oh, It wouldn’t mean that the Palestinian Arabs will soon give up on the idea that they can flood Israel with the descendants of 1948 refugees and reverse the result of the War of Independence. It wouldn’t mean that the antisemitism and misoziony that are rife in our neighbors Egypt, Jordan, and Lebanon, are likely to end in our lifetimes. It wouldn’t mean that Recep Tayyip Erdoğan will stop trying to re-establish the Ottoman Empire, including Jerusalem, or that the revolutionary regime in Iran will stop planning to wipe Israel off the map and establish a Shiite caliphate in the region. ISIS, Hamas, and the Muslim Brotherhood will not be normalizing relations with the Jewish state no matter what. There will be plenty of conflict and terrorism in our region for the foreseeable future.

But the classical Arab-Israeli conflict, as expressed by the Three No’s of 1967 may soon be history. The idea that no Arab nation can accept the existence of the Jewish state – or even mention it by name – until all of the extreme demands of the Palestinian Arabs have been met has already fallen by the wayside. It is becoming obvious to any honest observer that the reason the Palestinian issue has festered for so many years is that the Palestinians, encouraged by the Arab nations and European antisemites, have never entertained any possibility short of total victory. Now Arab support for their intransigence and rejectionism is falling away.

The UAE, Bahrain, and Sudan have already made normalization agreements with Israel. Others are expected to follow. The most important of those would be Saudi Arabia, the leader of the Sunni Muslim world, the custodian of the Holy Mosques, and the source of funds for countless Islamic institutions around the world. There are reliable reports that the Saudi regime, which is increasingly under the control of Crown Prince, Deputy Prime Minister, and Minister of Defense, Mohammed bin Salman (MBS), will normalize relations after the US election – if Donald Trump wins.

It’s hard to imagine that any of this would have happened if not for the change in US policy initiated by the Trump Administration. The recognition of Israeli rights in Jerusalem and sovereignty over the Golan, and the downgrading of relations with the PLO, sent an unmistakable message that America did not support the Palestinian program to replace Israel with an Arab state. Trump’s peace plan, unlike those proposed during the previous administration, is not based on the transformation of the 1949 cease-fire lines into borders, but respects the concept of “secure and recognized boundaries” as expressed in UNSC resolution 242.

In order to truly appreciate the change in policy, compare it to that of the previous administration. Even before his inauguration in January 2009, Barack Obama forced Israel to abandon its campaign to oust Hamas from Gaza, probably the last practical opportunity to do so. In June of that year he visited Cairo and made a speech in which he directly compared the Holocaust to Palestinian “suffer[ing] in pursuit of a homeland” (he didn’t visit Israel until 2013, and then chose not to speak to the Knesset in Jerusalem but rather informally to students). Obama deliberately refrained from helping Iranian dissidents in Iran’s failed Green Revolution. He supported the Muslim Brotherhood in Arab Spring conflicts in Egypt, endangering Israeli-Egyptian relations. He demanded a freeze on all “settlement activity” which was used by the Palestinians as an excuse to refuse to talk. He deliberately humiliated PM Netanyahu when he visited the White House in 2011. He stopped a shipment of missiles to Israel during the 2014 conflict with Hamas in Gaza. At the same time the FAA ordered flights to Israel canceled, in an action that many thought was ordered by the administration.

Obama rammed through the Iran deal over the objections of a majority in Congress, including huge cash payments that the regime used to finance terrorism and Hezbollah’s military buildup. In 2013, his administration leaked information to the press about Israeli attacks against Iranian weapons shipments in Syria, making a wider conflict more likely. Finally, as a lame-duck parting shot at Israel in 2016, he encouraged the introduction of an anti-Israel Security Council resolution, and instructed his ambassador to abstain, ensuring its passage. And there is much more.

One can understand why Arab leaders might have thought that there was no percentage in improving relations with Israel while the US was kicking her to the curb.

Joe Biden was deeply involved in the Obama Administration’s relationship with Israel. You may recall that Biden was “furious” after an Israeli official announced the completion of a step in the process of approval for the construction of apartments in eastern Jerusalem while he was visiting Israel, precipitating a 45-minute angry phone call full of demands from Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to PM Netanyahu.

Biden has said that he would “rejoin the [nuclear deal with Iran] … as a starting point for follow-on negotiations.” He opposes Trump’s “maximum pressure” approach and even blames it for Iranian progress toward nuclear weapons. He is likely to reopen the American consulate in eastern Jerusalem that was the unofficial “US Embassy in Palestine,” and the PLO office in Washington that were closed by Trump. He will restore financial aid to the Palestinian Authority that was cut off by Trump because the PA would not agree to stop payments to convicted terrorists (“pay to slay”). He will probably restore payments to UNRWA, which supports the descendants of 1948 refugees and is closely aligned with Hamas in Gaza. And he will bring back the tired rhetoric of the impossible “two-state solution” based on 1949 lines. It’s doubtful that he would be as hostile to Israel as Barack Obama, but he would undo much of the progress made by Trump.

This explains the statement by MBS that he would not normalize relations with Israel immediately if Biden becomes president. There is plenty of opposition in Saudi Arabia to such a bold step, which could even express itself violently. MBS is willing to take the risk if it will lead to the development of a powerful, US-supported Sunni-Israel bloc which could challenge Iran for regional leadership. Why should he do so if the US returns to the Obama-era policy of appeasement of Iran? And the same applies to other Arab countries that are waiting in the wings.

The development of a Sunni-Israel bloc in the region would be a breakthrough that would fundamentally alter the balance of power, and reduce the need for the US to physically intervene to keep the peace. It might set the stage for greater regional independence, so that outside players like Russia, the US, and Turkey would be less able to use its nations as pawns in their power struggles. It might lead to the Iranian people finally throwing off the corrupt and oppressive regime of the Mullahs. It might even bring a solution to the Palestinian problem somewhat closer. It would not fix all of the region’s problems, but it would be a good start.

But all of this depends on continuing Trump’s sharp turn towards rationality in Middle East policy. And Joe Biden is not the guy to do it, especially since he has already adopted some of the same advisers and former officials of the Obama Administration that were responsible for its destructive policies, including several architects of the Iran deal. Biden’s mental condition is a matter of dispute, but the specter of the enormous power of the US president in the hands of unelected and unaccountable operatives who have demonstrated their hostility to Israel and their approval of Iranian regional hegemony is truly frightening.

We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.

10/28 Links Pt2: Holocaust Denial Not a Violation of Misinformation Policy, Twitter Boss Tells Skeptical Senate Committee; Ruthie Blum: Peter Beinart’s Assault on the Abraham Accords

From Ian:

Holocaust Denial Not a Violation of Misinformation Policy, Twitter Boss Tells Skeptical Senate Committee

Twitter boss Jack Dorsey sowed further confusion over the social media platform’s Holocaust denial policy during an angry grilling at the hands of the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee on Wednesday.

Facing questioning from Republican senators who alleged that Twitter was censoring information from conservative outlets while permitting posts that deny the fact of the Holocaust, Dorsey appeared to backtrack on a statement issued by his company on Oct. 15, when a spokesperson for Twitter had condemned “antisemitism and hateful conduct,” emphasizing, “We also have a robust ‘glorification of violence’ policy in place and take action against content that glorifies or praises historical acts of violence and genocide, including the Holocaust.”

But at Wednesday’s hearing, Dorsey said that Twitter did not “have a policy against misinformation.”

He explained: “We have a policy against misinformation in three categories. That is all we have policy on for misleading information.”

He then added that tweets denying the Holocaust could be removed if they were considered to incite violence.

Dorsey’s answer infuriated Sen. Cory Gardner (R-CO), who countered by invoking Iranian Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s constant use of Twitter to engage in Holocaust denial.

“It’s strange to me that you’ve flagged tweets from the president [of the United States] but haven’t hidden the ayatollah’s tweets on Holocaust denial or calls to wipe Israel off the map,” Gardner said. “Millions of people died and that’s not a violation of Twitter?”

Responded Dorsey: “It’s misleading information, but we don’t have a policy against that type of misleading information.”

This is astonishing: Jack Dorsey says that Holocaust denial is not “misinformation” according to Twitter policy. pic.twitter.com/GhVn3u9ow8
— Alexander Nazaryan (@alexnazaryan) October 28, 2020

Jack Dorsey Defends Allowing Iranian Threats to Eliminate ‘Cancerous’ Jews: ‘Respecting Their Right to Speak’

Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey on Wednesday said his platform allows Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, to fulminate against “cancerous” Jews because he wanted to “respect” his “right to speak.”

“We believe it’s important for everyone to hear from global leaders, and we have policies around world leaders,” Dorsey said in testimony before the Senate Commerce Committee, responding to a question from Chairman Roger Wicker (R-MS) about the messages. “We want to make sure we are respecting their right to speak and to publish what they need. But if there is a violation of our terms of service, we want to label it.”

Wicker interjected to note the messages still appear on Twitter without a label. Dorsey said he found them permissible because Khamenei was threatening citizens of other countries rather than citizens of Iran.

“We did not find those to violate our terms of service, because we considered them saber-rattling, which is part of the speech of world leaders in concert with other countries,” Dorsey said. “Speech against our own people, or our country’s own citizens, we believe is different and can cause more immediate harm.”

Khamenei has used Twitter to write numerous messages that have drawn attention this year. He used the platform in July to promise a “reciprocal blow” to the United States for the January killing of Qasem Soleimani, the leader of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps, and previously referred to Israel’s “Zionist regime” as a “cancerous tumor” that needed to be “eliminated.”

I meant the fact this enormous tool is still tweeting, I'm guessing if I were to post an illustration of the prophet, my account would probably be reported and banned. Should tell you something. pic.twitter.com/c8GT3Co5xA
— Stephen L. Miller (@redsteeze) October 28, 2020

Ruthie Blum: Peter Beinart’s Assault on the Abraham Accords

That Beinart has made a career of blaming Israel for everything from Palestinian Authority (PA) intransigence to Hamas terrorism is not news. Nor is it surprising that many of his admirers in Israel and abroad are miffed that the Abraham Accords exposed the conventional wisdom about Mideast peace-making as folly.

But it takes a special kind of vicious creativity to concoct a universe in which peace, if forged by or with Israel, is evil. Beinart’s main method is to twist facts to fit his false version of reality. One such revision of history includes the idea of widespread Muslim-Arab support for the Palestinians. The latter would be the first to scoff at the notion that they have received much more than lip service from their Arab League “brethren,” particularly of late.

Nevertheless, Beinart concludes his piece by warning against the danger of additional peace deals with the Jewish state.

“In the coming months, Israel may succeed in normalizing relations with additional Arab states,” he writes. “Over the long run, however, its warming relations with oppressive regimes will likely provoke even greater hostility from the broader Arab public. In the past, Arab citizens mostly resented Israel for oppressing Palestinians. In the future, they may also resent it for helping their own governments to oppress them.”

For someone so concerned about oppressive regimes, Beinart is curiously silent about the suffering of Palestinians at the hands of their own corrupt and despotic leaders in Ramallah and Gaza. Indeed, he has nothing to say about the blatant human-rights abuses committed by Palestinian Authority head Mahmoud Abbas and his henchmen against critical journalists, academics, novelists, and even average social-media users.

Nor does he bother wasting ink on the absence of free speech or the persecution of gays that are the norm in the PA. No, if Israel can’t be called out as the culprit, Beinart’s not interested.

He can’t even pause to acknowledge the flurry of preparations being made in the Gulf for Israeli tourists, from kosher-catered airplane food to Jewish-holiday hotel packages. But then, doing so might cast a shadow on The New York Times-approved convictions that pay his bills.

Khaled Abu Toameh won a victory in a small Jerusalem courtroom this week when Ted Belman at last agreed that his defamatory articles, social media posts, and newsletters were factually baseless. Belman is now required to make public apology to Abu Toameh within 14 days. If Belman again defames the award-winning Israeli Arab journalist and distinguished senior Gatestone fellow, he will have to pay 5000 shekels per defamatory item published, in compensation to Khaled.

By way of disclaimer, there was a personal victory here as well, as Belman’s countersuit against Abu Toameh, this author and Bat-Zion Susskind-Sacks was rejected out of hand by the court. The interesting thing about this is that I was approached by the 86-year-old Belman in court on Monday. “Who are you?” Ted asked me. “Are you the enemy?”

He was suing me, but didn’t even know me.

Here we must go back and explain why Ted was suing me. Ted Belman, you see, asserted that Khaled was running a spy ring in Israel for the Jordanian king, and that I was one of his operatives, the other being Bat-Zion Susskind Sacks. Well goodness I’m relieved. An Israeli court has rejected a lawsuit accusing me of working on behalf of His Majesty, King Abdullah of Jordan. Not guilty! Acquitted.

But I digress. The main thing is that all three of us—me, Batzi, and of course, Khaled—are victorious.

So ends this courtroom saga that began in late 2017, when Abu Toameh had finally had enough of the defamatory campaign of words and memes waged against him since at least 2013. Readers of this column will recall my exposé of self-proclaimed “putative prime minister of Jordan” Mudar Zahran (see for instance, HERE, HERE, and HERE). Zahran, banned from entering Israel as a security risk, tried to enlist me in his smear campaign against Khaled Abu Toameh. I refused, but Ted Belman apparently did not.

What followed was an endless campaign of baseless defamation, an ongoing attack that lasted seven full years. Articles were published in numerous publications, all smearing Khaled. The defamation of Khaled was an ongoing theme in newsletters, Belman's personal website, and on Facebook, too. The worst part of this defamation, of course, is that Khaled Abu Toameh is a fine person: the only Israeli Arab journalist I know of who writes the honest truth about Israel and the Middle East.

Khaled is one of the good guys. And everyone on our side knows this. Which is why Khaled Abu Toameh has won plaudits and numerous awards by distinguished bodies. From Wikipedia:

Recognition and awards

· Abu Toameh received the 2014 Daniel Pearl Award. Abu Toameh shared Israel Media Watch's 2010 award for media criticism with the satirical Israeli website Latma.

· On 10 May 2011, Khaled Abu Toameh won the Hudson Institute Award for Courage in Journalism.

· Canada's Toronto Sun columnist Salim Mansur praised Abu Toameh for his courage and knowledge of the politics of the Arab world.

· Abu Toameh is the 2013 recipient of the Emet award given by the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America (CAMERA).

· He was chosen on the Algemeiner Journal's 2013 list of The Top 100 People Positively Influencing Jewish Life.

All during this trying time, while Khaled was being smeared, important people came to the fore to defend the embattled journalist. People like Caroline Glick, Lori Lowenthal Marcus, Ruthie Blum, and Harold Rhode, couldn’t offer enough praise for Khaled. And still, this creep Zahran spread horrible lies about Khaled to all and sundry through anyone he could rope into his web.

Well, all’s well that ends well, and in that small Jerusalem courtroom on October 26, 2020, justice won out with victory on many counts:

1. Ted Belman finally admitted that he has no evidence to support the libelous publications.

2. Ted Belman agreed to publish an apology and retraction, admitting that what he published was factually baseless.

3. Ted's main witness, the Jordanian fraudster Mudar Zahran, who is banned from Israel for security reasons, never got a chance to testify before the court, not even by video.

4. Ted's counterclaim against Khaled Abu Toameh, Varda Meyers Epstein, and Bat-Zion Susskind-Sacks, was rejected.

5. The court ruled that if Ted republishes the same material against Khaled Abu Toameh, he will pay 5000 shekels in compensation per piece.

After three years of refusing to do so, Ted will finally apologize and admit that what he published about Khaled Abu Toameh was factually baseless. Assuming Ted fulfills his promise to the court, he now has 14 days to issue the apology and retraction. This is good because Ted’s own lawyer admitted in court that Belman had no proof to back up any of the nasty things he published about Khaled. It’s icing on the cake that Belman’s counterclaim was rejected. And if he tries to republish the defamatory items, he’s going to get slapped with a fine of 5000 shekels per article. Pretty nifty.

Judge Moriah Cherka, addressing Belman, said that what he did was unethical and against journalistic standards, because Ted never sought Khaled's response before publication. Judge Cherka also noted that Khaled Abu Toameh is a renowned and respected journalist, therefore it is inconceivable that his credibility should be questioned or harmed.

Nadav Haetzni, representative for the plaintiff, Khaled, said, "At long last, this grievous smear campaign against one of Israel's leading journalists is over. This was a campaign aimed at destroying this man's reputation; it caused him great damage and suffering, but in the end, this was a victory and we hope others will learn from it."

“For me,” said Khaled Abu Toameh, “The lawsuit was never about money, but about getting Belman to publicly admit that every bit of what he published about me was factually baseless. I initiated the lawsuit as a matter of principle, to defend ethical standards in journalism, and to serve as a deterrent to others,” said Khaled.

The judge made a point of rebuking Ted Belman in court, for behaving in an unethical manner. Which is as it should be. Journalists, and bloggers like Ted Belman, need to check the facts before they publish, to ascertain the truth, and to seek a response from the person in question, when preparing to publish something that might be defamatory.

Let us hope that this lawsuit will underscore this point for anyone who takes to the blogosphere to randomly and without proof, trash-talk and damage others. This is wrong and should not be countenanced in a country ruled by law. And on Monday, in that small Jerusalem courtroom, a judge did in fact, determine that such baseless defamation would not be countenanced in Israel.

We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.

From Campus Reform:

San Francisco State University Professor Rabab Abdulhadi said in an interview that students who expressed concern and outrage over her decision to host known terrorist hijacker Leila Khaled were part of a “Jewish caucus” and “a Zionist agenda."

“The Zionist movement is quite strong, it has resources, it has networking,” Abdulhadi remarked in a YouTube interview with Steve Zeltzer, “so they pressure- and actually, some of the legislation, not all of them, but some of them, went along with them, led by the Jewish caucus, which is all Zionist agenda, it has a Zionist agenda.”

Abdulhadi claimed the outrage over her invitation to Khaled was manufactured by the “Israel Lobby Industry," and said opposition to her was “catering to donors, catering to the right-wing agenda and catering to Islamophobia.” Abdulhadi doubled down on her comments later on in the video, stating that the university president “only talked to Zionists, only talked to one brand.”

“The university is participating in a very discriminatory, racist, defamatory, smearing campaign by the Zionist bullies and their right-wing, neoliberal and wealthy allies,” Abdulhadi said. She also claimed the talk with Khaled was only canceled because of the university’s desire to retain wealthy Jewish donors, alleging the school's president told donors she would “crush the Palestinians” and “crush AMED studies.”

That last sentence is only the most obvious lie.

The interview, which was posted on September 22 before the Leila Khaled event was dropped by Zoom, shows that Abdulhadi has no concept of truth. She [13:07] accuses SFSU president Lynn Mahoney of publishing a piece in J Weekly that is "Islamophobic" - you can read it yourself and see that all she condemned was terrorism and didn't use the words Islam or Muslim once.

The interviewer Steve Zeltzer directly accused Israel of funding universities through American Jews to further its agenda, comparing it to China and Russia influence campaigns:

When we talk about influence - there's a big campaign, both Democrats and Republicans talking about the influence of China, the influence of Russia, yet it seems when it comes to Israel and Israeli funding of institutions in the United States and campaigns to target professors such as yourself and others who are critical of Israel, there doesn't seem to be a problem with that role of Israel in the United States and operating through Jewish community councils and others it seems like a double standard.

Abdulhadi enthusiastically agrees with this accusation, which goes beyond the dual-loyalty trope of American Jews - the accusation is that Israel is paying American Jews to be loyal to it above the US.

This is today's antisemitism, and the only defense they use (as Abdulhadi does in this video) is the one that Jew-haters have used throughout the centuries: "Some of my best friends are Jewish."

We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.

Arab48 reports that the body of a young man was found near Qusra, south of Nablus - with his hands missing.

Local sources said that he was killed in an explosion of a homemade bomb.

Usually such work accidents happen in Gaza as terror groups work on explosives and rockets. It is unusual for such things to happen in the West Bank.

It could be that he decided to become a lone wolf terrorist, but one has to worry that this was part of a larger terror plot.

(h/t Tomer Ilan)

We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.

10/28 Links Pt1: US to extend bilateral agreements with Israel into Judea and Samaria, Golan; Nikki Haley Recalls Trump’s Jerusalem Decision: ‘If Not Me Then Who? If Not Now Then When?’

From Ian:

US to extend bilateral agreements with Israel into Judea and Samaria, Golan

The United States and Israel will eliminate territorial restrictions for bilateral agreements in a ceremony on Wednesday.

The move will build upon a policy shift made by U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo this past November, in which America no longer recognizes Israeli settlements in Judea and Samaria as illegal under international law.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and U.S. Ambassador to Israel David Friedman are slated to participate in a signing ceremony at Ariel University in Samaria.

The agreement will immediately expand scientific and academic cooperation to include projects within Judea and Samaria, and the Golan Heights—disputed territories under Israeli control. The United States recognized Israel’s full sovereignty over the Golan Heights in March 2019.

Israel captured Judea and Samaria, in addition to the Golan, from Jordan and Syria, respectively, during the defensive Six-Day War in 1967.

Israel formally annexed the Golan Heights in 1981. Judea and Samaria remain disputed territories and were divided into non-contiguous zones (“Area A,” “Area B” and “Area C”) of varying Israeli or Palestinian administrative and security control under the 1993 Oslo Accords

'In the spirit of the #AbrahamAccords, we place great value on academic, cultural, commercial and diplomatic engagement as the best path to peace,' David Friedman, @USAmbIsrael, at signing ceremony of Israel-US scientific research cooperation pic.twitter.com/mE0pmkNjU2
— i24NEWS English (@i24NEWS_EN) October 28, 2020

And to those malevolent boycotters, I have a simple message today: You are wrong and you will fail. You are wrong because you deny what cannot be denied, the millennial connection between the people of Israel and the Land of Israel—it's over three-thousand years old.
— PM of Israel (@IsraeliPM) October 28, 2020

Friedman: US-Israel ‘righting old wrongs’ by extending W. Bank agreements

Extending agreements between the US and Israel to the West Bank, Golan and east Jerusalem bolsters the ties between the countries, US Ambassador to Israel David Friedman said in a ceremony removing the only territorial limitations in agreements between Washington and Jerusalem on Wednesday.

“We are righting an old wrong and strengthening yet again the unbreakable bond between our two countries,” Friedman said at a signing ceremony with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at Ariel University in Samaria.

Netanyahu and Friedman signed new versions of three agreements on research cooperation, which erase a line that says "cooperative projects sponsored by the Foundation may not be conducted in geographic areas which came under the administration of the Government of Israel after June 5, 1967, and may not relate to subjects primarily pertinent to such areas.”

The first agreement, signed in 1972, was the Binational Science Foundation, followed in 1976 the Binational Industrial Research and Development Foundation (BIRD), and then the Binational Agricultural Research and Development Fund (BARD) in 1977. All three had large endowments that provided grants to American and Israeli academics and companies for research and technology.

They also signed a new Science and Technology agreement, meant to increase government-to-government cooperation at the highest levels, which also does not have geographic restrictions.

Friedman said that BIRD, BARD and BSF, as originally written, “were subject to political limitations that did not serve the goals sought to be achieved.”

Trump: Up to 10 countries set for peace with Israel, ‘largely after’ elections

US President Donald Trump said Tuesday that there are up to 10 countries that he expects to soon normalize relations with Israel, but that the developments would largely happen after next week’s presidential elections.

Asked if there were more countries in the Middle East that would follow the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, and Sudan who all recently opened diplomatic relations with Israel, Trump said there were more on the way, without specifying exactly how many or which countries they were.

“We have five, but really have probably nine or ten that are right in the mix, we’re going to have a lot, I think we’ll have all of them eventually,” he told reporters at Andrews Air Force Base before hitting the campaign trail.

“The beauty is there’s peace in the Middle East with no money and no blood,” he continued. “There’s no blood all over the sand. We have five definites and I think we’ll have another five pretty much definites. And all of them, the big ones, the smaller ones.”

Asked if agreements would come before or after the November 3 election, Trump said “largely after.”

"Peace in the middle east with no money and no blood." #Trump https://t.co/tvhusK7gPu
— Arsen Ostrovsky (@Ostrov_A) October 27, 2020

Debate moderators ignored Trump’s ‘greatest achievement’: Bolt

Donald Trump came along and managed to “do the unthinkable” by brokering peace between the Israelis and the Arabs by simply bypassing the Palestinians, according to Sky News host Rowan Dean. President Donald Trump has recently brokered a third historic peace deal this time between Israel and Sudan, after previously negotiating deals between Israel and the UAE, and Bahrain. Mr Dean said bypassing Palestine to broker these deals is the “genius of Donald Trump”. "The Democrats have no solutions for the problems in the world,” he said. “You need people like Donald Trump who just cut through all the sort of red tape and get to the bottom of the nut of the problem and solve it.”

Here is video from the Philadelphia riots last night tweeted by Kitty Shackleford.

Black youths in the middle of the Philadelphia riots see a fewJews wearing kippot. One refers to them as "Amalek," which they do not notice.

The harasser goes on. "Amalek, whatcha all doing down here? Do you live here? You know you aren't all real Jews, right? This ain't your fight!"

One of the Jews responds, "We are showing solidarity."

"We don't need your solidarity!"

Others join in, shouting at the Jews, "Get the fuck out! Get the fuck out of here!" A Jew is shoved as the crowd forces them out. As they leave, one shouts, "Revelation 2:9, Synagogue of Satan!"

Must be white supremacists.

We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.

UAE selling "occupied territory" wine while US ends legal obstacles to dealing with "settlements"

Two giant stories occurred this week regarding the legal status of the disputed territories.

Israel announced on Tuesday the United States is lifting a ban on funding Israeli scientific research conducted in the West Bank and Golan Heights. This follows the announcement a year ago by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo that the US does not consider "settlements" to be a violation of international law.

Up until now, the US was careful not to spend any funds on Israeli projects across the Green Line armistice lines of 1949.

This position is consistent with Donald Trump's "Peace to Prosperity" plan as well as common sense that in any potential two-state solution, Israel would hold on to most of the areas where Israeli citizens (Arabs and Jews) have lived for decades.

As important as that announcement is, perhaps the UAE has gone further.

Starting tomorrow, Israeli wines from the Golan Heights Winery will be sold in Dubai.

They will be imported by the UAE-based African+Eastern, which made the announcement. They sell wines and spirits to the many non-Muslim consumers in the UAE.

The Golan Heights wines are not yet on their webpage.

The people that consider Judea and Samaria to be "occupied" say the same about the Golan Heights, conquered by Israel in 1967.

By allowing imports from the Syrian-claimed region, the UAE is saying that it is considering at least some of the "occupied territories" to be part of Israel - or at least it doesn't object to labeling goods from the Golan Heights as Israeli, which makes the UAE more pro-Israel than some European countries.

None of these announcements should be earth-shattering. The world never made the demands on other disputed or "occupied" territories that is has of Israel. Earlier this month, Turkey announced it will open a tourist site on the ruins of an abandoned Cypriot beach town without a word from Human Rights Watch or Amnesty International about "illegal settlement activities in occupied territories."

But treating Israel like any other nation is, indeed, big news. Hopefully that will not be the case for long.

We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.

A truly weird, antisemitic article in Algeria's major newspaper Echorouk begins with:

As soon as the Jews set foot on the ground [in Algeria], they tried to desecrate and distort its heritage, and on a journey that wandered around the globe, they immigrated to Algeria, dissolving into society, learning its language, and wreaking havoc in it ... We open the archive of history, in search of Jewish profane linguists during their presence in guarded Algeria.

A number of examples are given of phrases that apparently are common in Algerian dialects of Arabic that they say are actually from Jews trying to destroy Algerian culture through language.

One is the word "makalah" which apparently means in colloquial Algerian "something that is not necessary." This article, and apparently many others, claim that the origin of the word is that Jewish traders in the market used to tell the Muslim traders with whom they traded that "ma kan ilah" which means "there is no Allah (in the market)." In other words, the Jews told the Muslim traders that they do not need to swear by Allah's name.

Another example - which may actually be true - is the Algerian word "haylula" which means tumult. They claim that it came from the Hebrew word "hilula," the celebration on the anniversary of the death of a major Jewish rabbinic figure.

They give a couple of examples where Jews apparently referred to Aisha, Mohammed's very young wife, in a derogatory manner - although they are not sure if that is of Shiite origin rather than Jewish.

Another example of "bakbuk," which means "bottle" in Hebrew as well as some Algerian dialects.

Why this is considered a desecration of language is anyone's guess.

(h/t Ibn Boutros)

We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.

10/27 Links Pt2: Zionism is about reviving Jewish sovereignty in our ancestral land; After the Tree of Life tragedy, I went to Shabbat services and never stopped

From Ian:

Zionism is about reviving Jewish sovereignty in our ancestral land

WE ALL AGREE that a crucial part of Zionism is maintaining a clear majority of Jews in the Jewish state; yet CIS [Commanders for Israel’s Security] insists on claiming that any act of applying sovereignty over areas that are inhabited by Jews and don’t include the Palestinian Authority necessarily mean that we must “annex” the Palestinians and endanger our Jewish majority. This is simply not true.

CIS completely ignores that the “Deal of the Century” suggests Israel can apply sovereignty over Jewish communities, have full security responsibility over the whole of the Land of Israel, and that there will still be an option for a Palestinian state to be formed, in a format similar to San Marino, Lesotho or Luxembourg. A demilitarized Palestinian state was also Yitzhak Rabin’s vision when he initiated the Oslo Accords. The original two-state solution was far from what it became later on.

We all aspire to have a Jewish state that will be secured for generations to come. Knowing that we can’t afford a third exile from the land of our forefathers, we understand we can’t afford to lose even one war. However, the plan CIS is aggressively promoting, while falsely claiming that the Jewish majority is in danger, is devastating for Israel’s security.

CIS’s suggestion means that in the long-term, our security should be placed in the hands of the Arabs and international forces. This suggestion is coherent with former president Barack Obama’s plan, which CIS has endorsed since its very foundation. While they talk about “security arrangements,” we know there is no sustainable option other than all aspects of security being solely in the hands of the IDF, along with defensible borders and a strong civil infrastructure. Without Judea and Samaria, Israel simply cannot defend itself from the narrow nine mile-wide coastal plain. This isn’t an ideological opinion; it’s a military fact.

When Zionists came to the Land of Israel in the 19th century, they realized they must acquire three abilities: to establish a Jewish entity in the largest territory possible; to become farmers and grow their livelihood from the land; and to be able to defend themselves without dependence on the good will of the Arabs or the international community. A core value of Zionism is that Israel will never place its citizens’ lives and in someone else’s hands. The Jewish people must be able to defend itself in our homeland and defend every Jewish community around the world when called upon.

In summary, the Zionist movement and the State of Israel have fought from the very beginning against all the odds, and won. Trying to find practical solutions to our complex situation with the Palestinians cannot be done by rejecting our core values and spirit.

‘Zionism Only at Beginning of Its History,’ French Intellectual Bernard-Henri Lévy Says

Leading French intellectual Bernard-Henri Lévy has called for a renewal of the Zionist vision, arguing that the notion that the Jewish national liberation movement had already fulfilled its mission was sorely mistaken.

“Zionism is only at the beginning of its history,” Lévy declared in a virtual address to the 38th World Zionist Congress in Jerusalem last week.

“Israel is such a young nation,” he noted. “And in another way, it is ancient, as old as the history of the world. What we call Zionism today must continue to maintain its spirit as long as we are alive. Let us not say today that Zionism has exhausted its message, that’s completely untrue.”

Lévy also argued that Diaspora Jewish communities had to remain at the core of the Zionist movement’s vision.

“The Diaspora is not some kind of remainder or remnant, cast away by history,” the philosopher said. “On the contrary, it is something that should be integrated quickly into the mainstream of Zionism.”

Lévy continued: “In Diaspora life, Jewish existence, let’s say someone who’s Romanian, Italian, American or French, there is something very noble in the existence of these Jews, something that cannot be reduced to the expectation of going to Jerusalem. I don’t think that existence in the Diaspora, in exile, is somehow less-than.”

Almost half of Americans don't know the meaning of antisemitism - survey

Nearly half of Americans don’t know what the phrase “antisemitism” means.

That’s one takeaway from two surveys published Monday by the American Jewish Committee. The surveys asked Jews and the general American public about antisemitism in the United States.

The Jewish survey found that a large majority of Jews consider antisemitism a problem, and that most see it as a problem on the right and in the Republican Party. Those findings were in line with what the AJC, a nonpartisan advocacy organization, found when it surveyed American Jews last year.

The new surveys found that, in a year when 88% of American Jews say antisemitism remains a problem in the United States, 21% of Americans overall — more than one in five — say they’ve never even heard of the term. An additional 25% of Americans overall have heard the term but are unsure of what it means.

But nearly half of Americans overall say they have seen antagonism against Jews either online or in person during the past five years, suggesting that respondents may be familiar with the reality of anti-Jewish bigotry but unfamiliar with the term “antisemitism.”

New Survey Shows More Than 8 in 10 American Jews Think Antisemitism Is on Rise in US

A new survey shows that more than 8 in 10 American Jews believe antisemitism has risen in the US over the past five years.

The State of Antisemitism in America 2020 survey — conducted by the American Jewish Committee (AJC) — also found that 85% of American Jews viewed the statement, “Israel has no right to exist,” as antisemitic, with 84% feeling the same about the statement, “The US government only supports Israel because of Jewish money.”

Another 76% considered the idea, “American Jews are more loyal to Israel than to America,” as antisemitic.

Furthermore, a combined 80% said the BDS movement was “mostly antisemitic” or had “some antisemitic supporters,” with only 15% saying it was “not antisemitic.”

Asked how much of a problem antisemitism was in the US today, 88% said it was a “very serious problem” or “somewhat of a problem.”

However, 97% said they had not suffered a physical antisemitic attack, 75% said they had not been the target of an antisemitic remark and 77% had not been targeted over their religion on social media.

Of those who were targets of such abuse, however, 76% said they had not reported the incidents.

Occurrences of antisemitism on social media were overwhelmingly clustered on Facebook, at 62%; with Twitter at 33%.

We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.

"Zionist Jews are raised to hate Arabs" says idiot Ma'an editor. His own paper proves the opposite.

We last saw Palestinian newspaper Ma'an editor Nassar Lahham with an antisemitic rant about racist rabbis.

His latest editorial is an astonishing example of lies and psychological projection.

Why does the Israeli public not show interest in the news of Sudanese, Saudi or Gulf normalization?

Because the Zionist movement raised Israeli Jews and most of the world's Jews to hate Arabs, with or without reason. In a strange equation, the Jews love Europe that expelled them and threw them into the sea, and they always demand to travel to it and admire it, even though Europe is the one that burned them in ovens... You see the Israeli entering European airports, meek and humiliated.

As for the Israeli, when he lands in the airports of the capitals of normalization, you see him bullying the Arabs, raising his ideology and boasting. - even though the Arab capitals never hurt the Jews and gave them equal rights and correct citizenship through the ages !!

I follow the news pretty closely and this is the first time I've heard that Israel teaches all Jews to hate Arabs, Israelis aren't interested in normalization, that they act meek and humiliated in European capitals (that IDF flyover of Auschwitz must be an example), that they are humiliating Arabs in Arab airports, and that they had equal rights under Arab rule.

As far as the hating Arabs part, Ma'an has a story that Israel opened a new pedestrian bridge at the Qalqilya Crossing so Palestinian Arabs crossing into Israel don't have to dodge cars on the street and parking lot. Israel is investing 300 million shekels to upgrade all the crossings.

If Israel hated Arabs, why would they care if they had to cross a street to get to the crossing? Why would they spend so much money to improve the Arab experience at the crossings?

Ma'an also reports that Israel allowed Qatari funds to enter Gaza for poor people there. Why would these hateful Jews allow that to happen?

Ma'an also reports that Israel is working with the UAE to find a way to have Israeli Muslims travel to Mecca on Hajj using boats that would travel from Eilat to Jeddah, which would shorten their trip significantly. Why would Israel care about that? What's wrong with keeping them traveling through Jordan and then taking long bus rides to Mecca?

Lahham's own paper proves that Israel doesn't hate Arabs and is willing to help them as much as possible. It is Nasser Lahham who hates Jews, not Jews who hate Arabs.

We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.

10/27 Links Pt1: History will judge UNSC for failing to embrace Abraham Accords, US says; DEBATE: Are the settlements an obstacle to peace? Hen Mazzig and Yishai Fleisher

From Ian:

Israeli Ambassador Gilad Erdan to the U.N. Security Council: The "real obstacle to peace" is "Palestinians' long record of incitement and hate"

"...In the two months since I arrived in New York, I have witnessed a jarring dissonance between what this council chooses to focus on and what is actually happening in the Middle East. During this short period, I witnessed the council ignoring opportunities to promote peace while simultaneously choosing not to act in the face of grave threats...

In a debate titled 'The Situation in the Middle East, Including the Palestinian Question,' one would expect the council to focus on the most important issues facing the Middle East.

However, once a month, for 20 years – over hundreds of debates – members of this council routinely overlook critical issues and focus only on the 'Palestinian Question'.

Today's debate is a perfect example. Shouldn't we be discussing the momentum of peace between four countries in a turbulent region?...

Now everyone can see that the Palestinians incite against any country that seeks peace in the region, even its fellow Arab League members. The fact that the Palestinians attack those who make peace with Israel, demonstrates that, for years, the council has been applying pressure to the wrong side....

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is also, of course, an important issue and should be a part of the debate. Yet, while discussing it every month for the last 20 years, key elements have been neglected. If you are looking for the real obstacle to peace, look at the Palestinian's long record of incitement and hate. PA textbooks incite to violence and promote terrorism and antisemitism. Through its "Pay to Slay" program, the PA rewards terror attacks against Israeli civilians. Maybe part of the answer to the Palestinian question can be found here.

The PA spends hundreds of millions of dollars a year on its 'pay to slay' program. Just think how that money could have been spent this year fighting COVID-19.

History will judge UNSC for failing to embrace Abraham Accords, US says

The United Nations Security Council must embrace the Abraham Accords if it wants peace and stability in the Middle East, both Israeli and US envoys urged the international body on Monday. “This council should embrace the Accords and use them as a catalyst to promote peace and security in the region,” Israel’s Ambassador to the UN Gilad Erdan said. His speech marked the first time he has addressed the UNSC since his arrival in New York to replace former ambassador Danny Danon.

“For decades, many in the international community have fixated on a single solution to the conflict. They vote for the same anti-Israel resolutions, recycle old talking points and ignore issues that are crucial for ending the conflict. They also ignore the fact that this approach has only emboldened Palestinian rejectionism,” Erdan said, during the UNSC monthly meeting on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

US Ambassador to the UN Kelly Craft said, “History will judge how this Council responds to this historic moment – it can either shrink from the challenge or rise to the occasion.”

Both envoys spoke in the aftermath of the historic weekend announcement that the US had brokered an agreement between Sudan and Israel to establish ties, under the auspices of the Trump Administration’s Abraham Accords. It follows Israel’s ratification this month of a peace deal with the United Arab Emirates and its pending ratification of a normalization deal with Bahrain.

Could We Lose the Progress We’ve Made in the Middle East?

The new-look Middle East—Sunni Arabs and Jews against Shiite Iran and its many proxies—is rooted in both of those Obama and Trump policies, but in the region, there are fears worse is to come. The election is weeks away, but Arab leaders are already fretting about what a Biden presidency could mean for them. More than the Biden-Harris campaign promises to “reassess our relationship with the Kingdom, end U.S. support for Saudi Arabia’s war in Yemen, and make sure America does not check its values at the door to sell arms or buy oil,” the greater fear is of the pendulum swinging back to the pre-Trump status quo, and a rebalancing of American policy in the region to favor Iran. As much as anything else, the fear of a renewed American-Iran alliance is driving Sunni Arabs to Israel. Could they be wrong?

Team Biden has made it clear that if Iran comes back into compliance with the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or Iran deal, they will rejoin. But it seems unlikely that anyone from a Biden administration would conduct the aggressive lobbying campaign for Iran that Obama’s hapless Secretary of State John Kerry embraced. Indeed, the more serious risk is not that Biden’s Middle East advisers fall hopelessly in love with the Islamic Republic, as too many of Obama’s negotiators did. It is that they will do nothing in the face of Iranian efforts to dominate the Middle East and that America’s erstwhile allies take their security into their own hands, to dangerous effect.

With an America that ignores both Iranian predations against its own people and turns it back on supporting Washington’s traditional allies among Israel and the Sunnis, the odds are that regional powers will take it upon themselves to protect their interests in the best way they know how. That began with a new alliance with Jerusalem, but where it could end is anyone’s guess. The last time such fears were in the air, the Saudis escalated their conflict with Yemen, and began dabbling in opposition politics and worse in the neighborhood. This time they may well turn to other interested global players—Saudi Arabia is now China’s top oil supplier—for weapons and more.

In short, while a rekindling of the Democratic love affair with Tehran promises rough seas ahead in the Middle East, the larger problem may be that both a Trump second term or a Biden administration will likely wash their hands of the region, feeling that the mission as they defined it has been accomplished.