Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Wednesday, January 20, 2021

01/20 Links Pt1: As Trump exits, the full Mossad story on normalization into focus; Melanie Phillips: On Iran, it's groundhog day all over again; The many reasons Biden should not enrich Iran's rulers

From Ian:

EXCLUSIVE: As Trump exits, the full Mossad story on normalization into focus

As the administration of president Donald Trump exits stage left, it’s time to take stock of the four normalization deals that Israel has already signed.

But there is a crucial piece of the story that has not been emphasized.

Contrary to conventional wisdom, although the July-to-December 2020 wave of deals provided the historic photos, the turning point moments were back in 2017 and 2019, The Jerusalem Post has learned. Also, though, it has not yet signed an agreement itself, the key party was always Saudi Arabia.

Much of the de-emphasis of these points has to do with Mossad chief Yossi Cohen – whose acts were mostly shrouded in mystery until a major speech in July 2019 – who was leading the Israeli push by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

There have been multiple narratives about who really got the ball rolling between Israel, the US and the UAE, and about when was the critical turning point.

Of course, part of the complex answer is that each country in the Israel, UAE, US triad played its part.

Also, each of the countries that came afterward made its own contributions which helped form the order of who would be “in” during the Trump era and who would play “wait and see.”

But to properly understand what happened in 2020, Israeli intelligence sources would say that it is imperative to understand the behind-the-scenes role of Cohen and the Saudis and what happened in September-November 2017, and in July 2019.

Trump officials: Mauritania, Indonesia were next to normalize, but time ran out

The Trump administration was closing in on agreements with Mauritania and Indonesia to be the next Muslim countries to normalize relations with Israel, but ran out of time before the Republican president’s term ended, two US officials told The Times of Israel this week.

An agreement with Mauritania was the closest to being reached, with US officials believing they were mere weeks away from finalizing a deal. The northwest African country was identified by the Trump peace team led by senior White House adviser Jared Kushner and special envoy Avi Berkowitz as a likely candidate to follow the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Sudan and Morocco in normalizing with the Jewish state, given that it once had relations with Israel.

Mauritania became just the third member of the Arab League to establish full diplomatic relations with Israel in 1999, but severed ties 10 years later against the backdrop of the 2008-2009 Gaza war.

After the UAE agreed to normalize ties with Israel in August, Mauritania’s Foreign Ministry issued a statement offering tepid support for the deal, saying it trusted Abu Dhabi’s “wisdom and good judgment” in signing the accord.

Mauritania also has close ties with Morocco, which similarly established relations with Israel in the 1990s only to break them off several years later. The Trump peace team was encouraging Rabat to push its neighbor and ally to forge ties with the Jewish state.

The next most likely candidate to join the so-called Abraham Accords was Indonesia, the US officials said, claiming that a deal could have been inked if Trump had another month or two in office.

Melanie Phillips: On Iran, it's groundhog day all over again

When anxiety first surfaced that in Joe Biden the US would once again be led by a president who would be soft on Iran, some others attempted a positive gloss. Don’t worry, they said; in light of Iran’s appalling aggression over the past four years and the fact that the regime was now far weaker than it had been, Biden would be exceptionally stupid to cosy up to Tehran and re-empower this lethal threat to the Middle East and the west.

But with the Biden era about to begin, those fears have become even stronger. For the signals are all pointing towards the Democratic party’s cultural default of empowering evil people both at home and abroad and abandoning or actively trashing their victims. And against stiff competition from the world’s tyrants (China, North Korea, Russia), the Iranian regime is arguably the most dangerous.

In 2015, it was given a tremendous boost by the nuclear deal, brokered by US President Barack Obama and supported by (to their eternal shame) the UK, France, Germany and others. The fiction was that the deal would stop Iran from developing the nuclear weapons with which they had pledged to erase Israel and attack the west, because the agreement would bring the regime in from the diplomatic cold and thus transform it into a regular government.

The opposite happened. The deal funnelled billions of dollars into the regime, enabling it to increase its dominance of the region, repress its own people still further and continue its sponsorship of international terrorism. Far from stopping the Iranian bomb, the terms of the deal meant that at best it would only delay the Iranian nuclear weapons programme by a few years, and only assuming that the regime would not continue to cheat and lie.

It was actually a deal to facilitate the Iranian bomb and fund the regime’s genocidal and fanatical aggression abroad and tyrannical repression at home. It made Neville Chamberlain’s Munich agreement with Hitler look by comparison like an act of principled statesmanship.

Times of Israel reports:

The Trump administration was closing in on agreements with Mauritania and Indonesia to be the next Muslim countries to normalize relations with Israel, but ran out of time before the Republican president’s term ended, two US officials told The Times of Israel this week.

An agreement with Mauritania was the closest to being reached, with US officials believing they were mere weeks away from finalizing a deal. The northwest African country was identified by the Trump peace team led by senior White House adviser Jared Kushner and special envoy Avi Berkowitz as a likely candidate to follow the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Sudan and Morocco in normalizing with the Jewish state, given that it once had relations with Israel.

The next most likely candidate to join the so-called Abraham Accords was Indonesia, the US officials said, claiming that a deal could have been inked if Trump had another month or two in office.

With a population of over 270 million, Indonesia is the world’s largest Muslim country. That gave it “extra symbolic importance,” to the Trump administration, which maintained that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict need not be a hindrance to peace between the Jewish state and the Muslim and Arab worlds, a US official explained.

We have been told for years that Jared Kushner and Avi Berkowitz were neophytes with no diplomatic experience who cannot be expected to accomplish anything. Yet they managed to broker peace deals between Israel and four Arab states.

So certainly the new, seasoned diplomats in the Biden administration will find it trivial to finish the work done with Mauritania and Indonesia and get them to recognize Israel.

We will see if the experienced dinosaurs of Oslo can learn something from the nobodies who did more for peace than any previous administration. Or if they will go back to business as usual.

Jewish Voice for Peace writes on their Facebook page:

“Most Jews, including an estimated half-million Israelis, continue to choose to live in diaspora. Yet there is no name for the ideology that backs up the political choice to do so” — or at least there wasn’t, until Melanie Kaye/Kantrowitz coined the term “diasporism.”
Kaye/Kantrowitz’s “diasporism” challenges two key Zionist assumptions: “first, that living in diaspora is an unfortunate lapse, unchosen and without value;” and “second, that true home and safety are to be found in the nation state.”
Instead of conceiving of the Jewish diaspora as “a problem to be solved by indoctrinating the next generation about their REAL home,” the ideology of “diasporism” celebrates our multi-rootedness and our ethnic and cultural diversity. It affirms our “right to be, and to fight for justice, wherever we are,” opening up opportunities to join with other diasporic peoples who oppose reactionary nationalism and “see borders as lines to cross.”
For Kaye/Kantrowitz, if there is a problem with Jewish life in the US, it’s not our estrangement from Israel, but “the narrowly prescribed options… for expressing and nurturing Jewish identity,” i.e. Zionism, antisemitism, and the Holocaust. If you’re looking for a diasporic home to express and nurture a Jewish identity beyond these options, JVP might be a great community for you!

You can see the appeal to the idea of "Diasporism" to anti-Zionists like JVP. It justifies their loathing for Jewish Zionists and Israel. It attempts to create a divide between the Jewish people and the Land of Israel. It is an attempt to normalize their hate.

While I cannot speak to the original thinking of Melanie Kaye/Kantrowitz, as I have not read her book on the subject, JVP's formulation of "diasporism" is not a philosophy. It is a justification for the unjustifiable disguised as philosophy.

After all, Zionism doesn't preclude Jews living outside Israel. It doesn't say that Jews shouldn't work within their own communities for equality for all, or to fight against antisemitism. In fact, Israel gives resources to help Jewish communities worldwide.

The only real difference between Zionism and "diasporism" is that Zionism seeks unity among all Jews - the half of Jews who live in Israel and the half who do not - while diasporism seeks division between the two groups.

There is one simple way to show that diasporism is not a true liberal philosophy and is just hate hiding behind noble sounding words.

If diasporism is the ideal for Jews, then it must be the ideal for all groups who are outside the lands of their ancestors. If the ideal for Jews is to integrate into the nations they live in, then shouldn't Palestinians have that same right?

Where are the Leftist Jews who are agitating for Palestinians to have the right to live as equal citizens in Arab countries? Certainly most Palestinians themselves want that. The few times that Egypt and Lebanon allowed some to become citizens, Palestinians eagerly took advantage of the offer. But the standard Leftist opinion is that the Palestinians must remain outsiders in the lands in which they were born until they are allowed to "return," and that "return" is a human right that is more essential than equality.

Does anyone (outside Palestinians themselves) actually advocate "diasporism" for Palestinians?

Similarly, where were these "diasporists" when Jews were being expelled from Egypt and Syria and, even last year, Yemen? Does it only apply to Jews who are already comfortable in liberal western countries and not to Jews who actually have been under attack as Jews?

If the idea of disaporism isn't universal - if it applies only to Jews and only in the West - then it isn't a moral philosophy. It is nothing but an excuse for hate and division.

Steffi Hentschke, in German newspaper Die Zeit asks whether Israel is even a democracy. Its subhead asks that question explicitly.

Then we read the article.

Israel is making a name for itself these days because of its successful COVID-19 vaccination campaign. Three weeks after the first vaccination, around 1.8 million citizens - around 20 percent of the population - have been vaccinated. But this success cannot hide the fact that, 72 years after the founding of the state, Israel is in its deepest domestic political crisis. For the fourth time in two years , parliamentary elections are due at the end of March . In a recent study, 19 Western democracies were compared; nowhere else have there been so many elections since 1996 as in Israel.

You get that? Israel cannot be a democracy because it has too many elections.

Many in the country have long since doubted whether Israel is still a democracy at all . Thousands of citizens have been taking to the streets for months, criticizing the erosion of democratic structures. The focus is on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu , who has ruled the country for 14 years.

Israel cannot be a democracy because the people can protest the Prime Minister every week without worrying about being arrested.

This makes him the longest-serving head of government in Israel's history - and the first incumbent to stand trial for criminal offenses, corruption, breach of trust and bribery.

Israel cannot be a democracy because its elected leaders aren't above the law and can be prosecuted like any other citizen.

Israel has no constitution. After the founding of the state, they could not agree on it, especially the first Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion was against and declared that as long as the majority of the Jewish people still lived in the diaspora, no stable constitution could be passed. Instead, basic rights with constitutional status were drawn up, which to this day form the foundation of the rule of law. These basic laws include the right to freedom of the press, the protection of minorities and the independence of the judiciary.

Israel cannot be a democracy because it has basic laws that include freedoms that no other non-democracies have.

The Supreme Court in Jerusalem takes care of compliance , a massive building made of sandstone with panoramic windows. Men in black robes hurry through the bright hallways, only the creaking of the soles of their shoes on the polished marble floors can be heard.

Israel cannot be a democracy because it has a judicial system that enforces freedom and democracy.

Do you see a pattern here? The very things that makes Israel a free country and a democracy are used to claim the opposite.

The article was also skewered in MENA-Watch.

(h/t someone on Twitter, sorry, didn't save it)

01/19 Links Pt2: MLK Proves Palestinian Intellectuals Never Cared About Human Rights; Tlaib Calls Israel a ‘Racist State,’ Spreads False Claims on Vaccinating Palestinians

From Ian:

Elder of Ziyon: Martin Luther King Proves Palestinian Intellectuals Never Cared About Human Rights

Historian and scholar Martin Kramer writes:
Not a year goes by without an attempt by someone to associate the name of Martin Luther King, Jr. with the Palestinian cause. It’s particularly striking because while he lived, no one had much doubt about where he stood. Here, for example, is the late Edward Said, foremost Palestinian thinker of his day, in a 1993 interview:

With the emergence of the civil rights movement in the middle ’60s – and particularly in ’66-’67 – I was very soon turned off by Martin Luther King, who revealed himself to be a tremendous Zionist, and who always used to speak very warmly in support of Israel, particularly in ’67, after the war.

Kramer goes on to show how King was an unabashed Zionist even though today the anti-Israel crowd tries to steal his legacy.

The Edward Said quote is fascinating, though. It seems to indicate that all of the good King did – all of the progress he made towards equal rights for all people – is worthless to Said because of this one position. Never mind that King’s position of support for Israel is entirely in line with his support for equal rights for all; after all, King saw the justice of having a Jewish state which in fact allowed Jews to be considered equals with other peoples in the world. But to Said, all of MLK’s legacy seems to be worthless because of his Zionism.

Further reading into Said’s writings show that this is in fact consistent. He addresses King briefly again in his memoirs, where he says:
Eleanor Roosevelt revolted me in her avid support for the Jewish state; despite her much-vaunted, even advertised, humanity I could never forgive her for her inability to spare the tiniest bit of it for our refugees. The same was true later for Martin Luther King, whom I had genuinely admired but was also unable to fathom (or forgive) for the warmth of his passion for Israel’s victory during the 1967 war. (141)

Said didn’t just disagree with these icons of human rights. He was revolted by them if they also were sympathetic to Jews and Jewish aspirations to self-determination.

Dr. King’s Clarion Call for Soviet Jewish Freedom Remembered on MLK Day

A 1966 speech by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. urging justice for the persecuted Jewish communities in the USSR has been reissued to mark the annual US holiday honoring the civil rights leader, who was tragically murdered in 1968.

The speech by Dr. King was delivered to the American Jewish Conference on Soviet Jewry on what was billed as a “nationwide telephone hook-up” on Dec. 11, 1966.

On Monday, the National Coalition Supporting Eurasian Jewry (NCSEJ) — a US NGO supporting Jewish communities in the former Soviet Union — distributed the speech online in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King Day.

Opening his remarks with a famous John Donne quotation — “No man is an island entire of himself” — King said that these words affirmed “the interdependence and interrelatedness of mankind … particularly when we think of the plight of three million Jews in the Soviet Union.”

“Jewish communal rights are deprived by the Soviet government of elementary needs to sustain even a modest level of existence and growth,” King said.

King noted that while “Jews in Russia may not be physically murdered as they were in Nazi Germany, they are facing every day a kind of spiritual and cultural genocide.”

He argued that African-Americans could “well understand and sympathize with” the plight of Soviet Jews.

The naked pleading for domestic surveillance + censorship is breathtaking. The man manages to keep a straight face while drawing direct comparisons to 9/11.

How could this end badly? One timely example: America’s domestic surveillance apparatus was once directed at ppl like MLK. https://t.co/p59ZMGxIRC
— Kmele (@kmele) January 18, 2021

Anti-Semitic propaganda is not news

Accusing democratic Israel of committing "apartheid" against its Arab community, which enjoys full equality under the law and has been seeing an unprecedented rise in the number of working women (up 5%) and students in universities (up from 10% to 18%), while being highly represented among the country's doctors (17%) and pharmacists (47%), is patently absurd.

Finally, CNN echoes the outrageous position that Israel's identity as the homeland of the Jewish people, guaranteeing a Jewish majority and encouraging the "ingathering of exiles," should be considered racism. This reflects an attempt to apply globalist and racialist theories to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, fundamentally considering the world as an ethnic struggle between "oppressors" and "oppressed," and rejecting the very concept of religious and national identity – yet only when it comes to Jews.

B'Tselem attempts here to fawn on world progressive movements, creating an artificial parallel to the common trope of "white supremacy," by considering the Jewish affinity to Israel a form of "Jewish superiority."

The recent example of this "fashion" on social media to refer to "Jewish privilege" as a parallel to "white privilege" proves how anti-Semitic sentiments traditionally and still apply to these groups' credo. This is not only an insult to the historic yearning of Jews worldwide, but also to Israel's recognition and endorsement by the international community – in the 1920 San Remo Conference, in the 1947 Partition Plan, preceding Israel's foundation a year later, and on countless other occasions.

It is regretful that CNN has chosen to cooperate with the attempt to subvert Israel's very existence. Far from covering news, it cherishes distortions.

Israel is not an identity-free immigration hub; it has always been intrinsically bonded with Judaism as an inseparable part of Jewish existence while preserving equality under the law of all of its citizens, as is stated in its Declaration of Independence.

Cartoon of the Day: Genetic Jewish supremacy

Continuing my series of recaptioning single-panel cartoons...

From UN Watch (via email):

GENEVA, January 18, 2021 — Country speakers taking the floor today at the UN Human Rights Council showered praise on Lebanon during a mandatory human rights review that all UN member states undergo every five years. (See quotes below).

While the UN procedure known as Universal Periodic Review (UPR) is meant to scrutinize governments and thereby strengthen the basic rights and freedoms of their citizens, according to a UN Watch count, 89 out of 105 countries that spoke today at the UNHRC—85 percent—praised Lebanon for its human rights achievements.

This includes 54 countries that glowingly praised the corrupt Lebanese authorities for their human rights record, and another 35 that expressed some praise for the country's alleged achievements.

"It is shameful that only a very small minority of 16 countries used their allotted 1 minute of speaking time to apply scrutiny to Lebanon's human rights record," said Hillel Neuer, executive director of UN Watch, an independent non-governmental human rights organization in Geneva.

"The vast majority—85 percent of the countries that spoke—turned a blind eye to Lebanon's torture by security forces, restrictions on freedoms of speech and press, high-level and widespread official corruption, criminalization of LGBTI status, and the government's ties to Hezbollah, a terrorist group that helped slaughter tens of thousands of people in Syria," said Neuer. "All of this was ignored."

Below is a selection of the praise expressed by 85% of the UNHRC delegates:

Bahrain: "We commend the tireless efforts by Lebanon in all fields of human rights."

China: "China appreciates Lebanon’s adoption of the National Strategy for the Prevention of Violent Extremism to combat terrorism and extremism, and protect people’s safety and human rights."

Egypt: "We commend the progress achieved in the field of human rights despite economic and social difficulties, particularly in the light of COVID-19."

India: "We commend the progress made by Lebanon since its second Universal Periodic Review, particularly its accession to the International Convention for the Suppression of the Financing of Terrorism, and the adoption of the National Strategy for Gender Equality."

Iran: "Lebanon is fighting the pandemic despite all of the challenges, and this is commendable."

Iraq: "We commend the measures taken on the legislative and political front to improve the human rights situation and welcome their efforts against extremism and terrorism."

Jordan: "We hail Lebanon’s commitment to achieve and promote human rights and fundamental freedoms."

Kuwait: "Lebanon is a pioneering state in the field of human rights."

Pakistan: "Despite grappling with financial, political and security challenges, coupled with huge refugees’ influx, we appreciate Lebanon’s commitment to comply with its international human rights obligations."

Palestine: "We have taken note of the efforts taken by the government [of Lebanon] to promote human rights, and we urge Lebanon to continue its efforts to develop practical mechanisms for the promotion of human rights."

Remember, Lebanon has laws specifically excluding Palestinians from holding many kinds of jobs - and stopping many businesses from hiring them.

Lebanon does not naturalize Palestinians so they do not have access to health care from the state.

Lebanon has laws specifically banning Palestinians from owning property. They are not allowed to expand their dwellings in overcrowded, tiny "refugee" camps, some of which are built like prisons complete with watchtowers.

If there is any apartheid against Palestinians in the world today, it is happening in Lebanon.

And the UN Human Rights Council praises Lebanon's human rights record.

01/19 Links Pt1: State Department Cuts Ties With Islamic Charity Over Anti-Semitism; Wendy Sherman and the art of failing upward; Seven questions for Tony Blinken

From Ian:

State Department Cuts Ties With Islamic Charity Over Anti-Semitism

The State Department has cut ties with Islamic Relief Worldwide, an international charity that the United States accuses of spreading anti-Semitism. The public accusations represent a wholesale shift in how the United States approaches a global charity that was, until recently, an official partner of the American government and raked in hundreds of thousands in taxpayer dollars.

The State Department is "conducting a full review of the organization and U.S. government funding" due to the "anti-Semitism exhibited repeatedly by IRW’s leadership," Ellie Cohanim, the deputy special envoy to monitor and combat anti-Semitism, told the Washington Free Beacon.

IRW boasts a budget of more than $100 million annually and has a registered nonprofit arm in the United States. The State Department’s public reproach of the charity means that it will no longer enjoy the legitimacy that comes with a close relationship with the American government or be able to cash in from this stamp of approval.

Anti-Semitism watchdogs have been sounding the alarm on IRW for years. IRW was an official State Department partner in the Obama administration and, for a time, in the Trump administration, despite evidence the group’s senior leadership engaged in persistent anti-Semitism, including social media posts from the organization's senior leaders praising Hamas leaders and calling Jews the "grandchildren of monkeys and pigs." Israel has designated IRW as a supporter of terrorism. The outgoing administration’s decision to publicly chastise the charity sets down a marker for the Biden White House as it assesses U.S. humanitarian priorities abroad. The next administration could restore ties with IRW, though it is unlikely given the current State Department’s rare elevation of anti-Semitism claims against the organization.

"Now that the State Department has issued this warning about the anti-Semitic Islamic Relief, it would be a very worrying step back if the incoming Biden administration, like Trump, rejected European concerns and started to fund this dangerous charitable franchise once more," said Sam Westrop, a Middle East researcher and director of Islamist Watch who has documented IRW’s promotion of anti-Semitic conspiracy theories.

Westrop described the Trump administration’s last-minute move as a severe blow for IRW, speculating the group stands to lose millions in funding from Western governments, the United Nations, and the European Union—all of which have contributed at least $100 million to the charity in the past decade.

Australian Government Probes UNRWA After Watchdog Report Reveals Antisemitic Educational Materials

The Australian Department of Foreign Trade and Affairs (DFAT) will investigate antisemitic and inflammatory educational materials used by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), after a report by an Israel-based watchdog organization, The Australian reported Monday.

“UNRWA has a fundamental obligation to remain unbiased and impartial while it delivers its humanitarian mandate,” a department spokesperson told the paper. “DFAT has reiterated to UNRWA the importance it places on non-discrimination, equality and neutrality in the education programs that UNRWA supports.”

Last week, the organization IMPACT-se, which monitors school curricula, released a report on racism, falsehoods, and incitements to violence in materials used by UNRWA.

Australia spent $8.39 million on UNWRA funding in 2020, the 19th-biggest contribution to the $921 million in total funds pledged to the organization. Last year the country reduced its aid allotted to the agency, following a similar move by the US in 2018.

“Instead of nurturing young Palestinians with the knowledge that they will need to lead satisfying and productive lives as citizens in a future Palestinian state, UNRWA is feeding their hearts and minds with the poison of racism and violent extremism,” said Peter Wertheim, CEO of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry, to the Australian daily on Monday. “It is time for Australia to look for new, more constructive partners through which to channel its assistance.”

Our recent report represents the first-ever audit of educational materials produced by @UNRWA. Sadly, what we found was a bevy of problematic content, all antithetical to the UN's vision, values and goals. Read the full report here:https://t.co/mXjRjieR5A pic.twitter.com/oWPW5nb3em
— IMPACT-SE (@IMPACT_SE) January 18, 2021

JPost Editorial: Gallant is right

The security fence and checkpoints on West Bank roads are not designed to perpetuate a regime where there is one superior and one inferior people, but rather to protect Israel from real-life terrorism. Anyone remotely acquainted with the Israeli-Arab conflict of the last century understands this.

Hagai El-Ad, executive director of the human rights organization B’Tselem, doesn’t understand this – and in a dramatic announcement last week, his organization declared Israel an apartheid state.

“The territory between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea is governed by a single regime that works to maintain Jewish supremacy,” the organization stated. “In recent years, the Israeli regime has grown increasingly explicit regarding its Jewish supremacist ideology.”

It is because of this view that Israelis largely yawn at B’Tselem’s pronouncements, believing them to be so far from the truth as to be irrelevant.

The Jerusalem Post, unlike the Hebrew media, was one of only a few media outlets in Israel – all of them English – that reported on B’Tselem’s outlandish declaration, believing that the public should know what this group, trumpeted abroad as Israel’s “leading human rights organization,” is saying.

We do not believe, however, that B’Tselem should be given a blank check to peddle this pernicious lie in the country’s schools. Therefore, we support Education Minister Yoav Gallant’s directive to keep groups calling Israel an apartheid state out of the schools, a decision breached Monday when El-Ad delivered a Zoom talk to Haifa’s Hebrew Reali School.

El-Ad has both a right to his viewpoint and to articulate it. The state must by no means prevent him from expressing his opinion, but it need not provide him a platform. Gallant is not saying that El-Ad can’t express his opinion, only that state-funded schools don’t need to give him a bullhorn and an audience.

While some may say this is undemocratic, we contend it is just good common sense.

Would there be a Palestinian state if Israel lost in 1948?

I tweeted this fictional map on Monday, and it received a lot of attention.

If Israel had lost the 1948 war, there wouldn't be a Palestinian state in its place. The Arab countries would have divided up the area of British Mandate Palestine.

While it is an interesting exercise to guess who would have captured what part of Palestine...

...that isn't the point of the exercise.

If the Arabs had won, the area would have been picked apart by the Arab armies and there is zero chance they would have created a Palestinian state.

The tiny Palestinian national movement of 1948 would have also been stillborn, because Palestinian nationalism has from the start been a reaction to Zionism, not an organic movement of its own. Without Zionism, there was little to no desire for a Palestinian state.

Witness how little interest there was in a Palestinian state from 1949-1967, and how the 1964 PLO charter excluded areas under Egyptian, Jordanian and Syrian control from its desired boundaries for a state - they coincided with what Jews controlled, no more and no less.

Can anyone seriously argue that there would have been a "Palestine" after 1948 if the Jews lost?

The US embassy in Jerusalem issued this press release yesterday:

The United States Embassy in Jerusalem, together with the United States Commission for the Preservation of America’s Heritage Abroad, have recognized the City of David as a testament to America’s Judeo-Christian heritage and founding principles. The archeological discoveries at the City of David bring Biblical Jerusalem back to life and reaffirm the prophetic messages of freedom, justice and peace that inspired America’s founders.

U.S. Ambassador to Israel, David Friedman, and Chairman of the Commission for the Preservation of America’s Heritage Abroad, Paul Packer, recently attended a special ceremony dedicating a plaque to honor the City of David in recognition of the seminal role it plays in connecting its visitors to the origins of the values that helped shape America..

In response, the Palestinian ministry of foreign affairs plans to sue Ambassador Friedman, who is leaving his post this week.

Foreign Affairs and Expatriates undertakes to legally pursue the settler, Ambassador Friedman

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Expatriates condemns in the strongest terms the announcement of the American ambassador to the settler occupation state David Friedman regarding his recognition of the settlement project called the City of David, in the middle of occupied Jerusalem, two days before the end of his duties as ambassador to the United States of America, and considers it illegal and invalid. It expresses Friedman's desires and his dark ideology which he is trying to affix not only to the United States of America, but also to the American constitution and principles and employ them in favor of the narrative of the occupation in Jerusalem, saying in a statement issued by the American embassy: "The City of David" is "a testament to the Judeo-Christian heritage and the founding principles of America."

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Expatriates will take it upon itself to follow up this issue with legal experts and the concerned authorities to discuss the possibility of holding the settler Friedman accountable before international and specialized courts.

I guess they didn't think they can sue the United States so they want to go after Friedman. Not that they can point to any international laws broken by him by presenting a plaque.

The plaque itself says:

The City of David brings Biblical Jerusalem to life at the very place where the kings and prophets of the Bible walked. It is the site where internationally acclaimed archeological discoveries have been unearthed, including the Pool of Siloam, the Pilgrimage Road, the Gihon Spring and Hezekiah’s Tunnel.

As the prophet Isaiah said, “Out of Zion shall go forth the law and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.” The spiritual bedrock of our values as a nation comes from Jerusalem. It is upon these ideals that the American Republic was founded, and the unbreakable bond between the United States and Israel was formed.

The City of David serves as a proud reminder of the glorious heritage of the United States of America.

“I REJOICED WITH THOSE WHO SAID TO ME, ‘LET US GO TO THE HOUSE OF THE LORD.’ OUR FEET ARE STANDING IN YOUR GATES, JERUSALEM.”

— PSALM 122:1 – 2

B'Tselem's absurd, contradictory arguments that Israel is an apartheid state

(Based on a Monday Twitter thread)

The lies of @btselem are so egregious.

Here are some screenshots from their position paper that pretends to prove that Israel is an apartheid state. Their arguments are not only weak – they are self-contradictory.

Jews cannot travel to Area A. Or Area B. Or Gaza. And severe limitations on the Temple Mount. So by B'Tselem's definition, Jews are the ones under apartheid.

In fact, the only people who can freely travel to all areas of the West Bank and Israel are Arabs in Jerusalem, who have far more freedom of movement than Jews do.

If nations giving preference to their own national group over others is apartheid, then most European countries are apartheid. Every Arab country is apartheid. Armenia, Ireland, Japan – all these nations have preferential immigration policies for people who share the ethnicity of the majority of the nation.

Worse, though, is that B'Tselem ignores why Israel has a Law of Return. it must be nice to think that 2000 years of antisemitism has disappeared, and that Nazi Germany’s Jew-hatred isn't worth remembering anymore, but the Jewish people are a nation and they have been pushed out of many countries over history.

B’Tselem, instead of acknowledging antisemitism, is hell-bent on perpetuating it.

If even B'Tselem admits that Israeli Jews and Arabs have the same freedom of movement - in fact, Israeli Arabs have MORE - then where is the apartheid and "Jewish supremacy"?

Answer: Even B’Tselem knows this is a sham. .

So Israeli Arabs have full political rights. Doesn’t that completely destroy the entire “apartheid” argument?

There is some racism in Israel. Just like in the rest of the world. If that is apartheid, then the word loses all meaning.

B'Tselem knows this. Their entire argument is hand-waving, and nothing that relates to real apartheid. They want to demonize Israel, not fight for human rights, because they can raise more funds from modern antisemites than anyone else. And when antisemites pay your salary, over the years you tend to agree with them.

One more reminder of the hypocrisy of @Amnesty, B'Tselem and Physicians for Human Rights - Israel as first Russian vaccines due to reach Palestinian territories (update)

Ma'an quotes Israel's Kan News as saying that the Palestinian Authority will bring five thousand Russian Sputnik COVID-19 vaccines into the territories tomorrow.

Palestinian Authority official Hussein al-Sheikh is visiting Russia now and he will return tomorrow with the vaccine via Jordan, after he obtained approval from Israel to bring the vaccine into the territories. The PA has already approved the Sputnik vaccine for use under emergency regulations.

Israel is allowing the Russian vaccine - but B'Tselem, Amnesty, Physicians for Human Rights-Israel, Gisha and other NGOs are against this happening.

They do not want the Sputnik vaccine - which only require storage at -20C - ostensibly because they don't think Palestinians should have a vaccine that Israel hasn't approved for Israeli citizens.

The Russian vaccine, although not as well tested as others, is approved for use in a number of countries.

These supposed human rights organizations don't seem to care about human lives when they can choose to use vaccines as a public relations weapon against Israel.

UPDATE: It looks like the vaccines won't arrive until Friday, they will come through Israel, and the next batch of 100,000 is due in February.

01/18 Links Pt2: David Collier: Academia – the epicentre of global antisemitism; Martin Luther King Jr.’s legacy alive in Israel

From Ian:

David Collier: Academia – the epicentre of global antisemitism

The epicentre of global antisemitic activity is – astonishingly – academia. Anti-Zionist, antisemitic academics beget more anti-Zionist, antisemitic academics, all scratching each other’s backs and agreeing with each other.

It is almost impossible to follow a research path on the subject of Israel unless you have spent several years mentored by an Islamist, a Marxist or someone who claims Palestinian heritage. If you show potential as a professional anti-Israel propagandist, or agree to research an area that they choose for your study – your fees may all be covered. Once holding your PhD, you join a club whose members praise each other’s books, sign off each other’s grants – and block access to anything and anyone that does not fit the anti-Israel profile. As a group you actively seek to silence dissent. Hey – you even get to co-sign letters to the Guardian. It is a self-protecting global factory that churns out activists who hold PhDs and who all hate Israel. This isn’t academia, it is taxpayer-funded, Islamist-sponsored, antisemitic, propaganda. This propaganda is the central pillar upon which western antisemitic, anti-Zionism is supported.

In opposition to this, we must stop spending our time putting out fires and begin to address why these fires keep starting and where the fuel for them is all coming from.

Jews on campus – a type of ‘dhimmitude’
Jewish people today on campus can be tolerated, protected or abused. At no point are they treated as equals. The best they can hope for is protection and tolerance in a hostile environment. It is reminiscent of dhimmitude under Islamic rule. On the campus the prevailing wisdom is that their beliefs in Jewish identity are fundamentally wrong.

The Woke doctrine of ‘systemic racism’ holds that Jews are ’white’ and that they are guilty of establishing the ‘settler colonial’ state of Israel. Post-colonial, post-modernist, Marxist thought dominates the universities in which they are ‘permitted’ to study, and they will be tolerated provided that they ‘behave’. In these halls Zionism is a dirty word which is equated with racism.

Jewish students can wave their flags in secret rooms but must not do it where it can provoke. They are offered the protection of being allowed to be wrong within a superior system of thought – or in other words they are second class students. If they are abused, it is far less serious than an offence against someone from the Muslim, BAME or LGBTQ communities. If an academic is responsible for the abuse (see Bristol, Leeds, Warwick) it is the academic who will be protected and the complaining Jewish student who will be victimised – even if the student can prove abuse. Academics fiercely resist the protection for Jewish students that the government is trying to implement. Jewish students that bow down before their masters will be given special favours and status. The best analogy I can find is Dhimmitude.

It has got so bad that there are some universities which are virtually Judenfrei. Why would an openly pro-Israel Jewish student want to go to a University where they will be vilified by other students and victimised by lecturers? What an indictment of the failure to deal with the problem that Jewish students choose a University not by the course content or the quality of teaching – but by the extent of antisemitism that they will encounter.

Guardian anti-Israel editorial evokes antisemitism

On Sunday, the Guardian (via their sister site, the Observer) published an article on a King’s College/YouGov poll – commissioned by Campaign Against Antisemitism – on the attitudes of British Jews, which found that “90% believe that media bias against Israel fuels persecution of Jews in Britain”.

On that same day, the Guardian published an official editorial on the recent B’Tselem report they’ve been promoting which not only accused Israel of apartheid, but characterised it as a “Jewish supremacist” state. Though their coverage up until today uncritically quoted B’Tselem’s “Jewish supremacism” charge, and included an op-ed by the NGO’s director which used that term, this editorial used that term in their own editorial voice:
Israel has a problem of historic discrimination. But under Benjamin Netanyahu’s government there has been the enactment of the nation state law that constitutionally enshrines Jewish supremacy and a plan to formally annex parts of the West Bank.

First, let’s be clear. This has nothing whatsoever to do with Israel’s prime minister, or even the nation state law. Though we’ve refuted Guardian charges that the law enshrines discrimination, our concern is with their editors’ use of a term which suggests the state is intrinsically racist, and which has a clear antisemitic history.

We contacted Community Security Trust (CST), who provided us with the following statement about the use of the term by the Guardian and B’Tselem:
“The meaning and impact of language can vary considerably depending on who is using it, the audience that is hearing or reading it, and the context in which it lands. For this reason, whatever B’Tselem’s intended meaning in Israel regarding the phrase “Jewish supremacy”, they ought to have been cognisant that this phrase has a long-standing antisemitic usage outside Israel, and journalists in the UK, writing for primarily non-Jewish audiences, should be even more mindful of the danger of such wording.”

The danger British Jews feel about such wording, per the CAA poll which the Guardian reported on, is that it demonises not only Israeli specifically, and Zionism more broadly in a manner that’s arguably antisemitic per the IHRA definition, but vilifies Jews qua Jews – insofar as most are (correctly) identified as Zionists.

We’ve complained to the Guardian, and asked that they remove that antisemitic term from their editorial.

Martin Luther King Jr.’s legacy alive in Israel

On Monday, the US marks Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday with a national holiday. Celebrated this year on January 18, the event comes less than two weeks after historic violence on Capitol Hill, the symbol of American democracy.

King was only 39 years old in 1968 when an assassin’s bullet ended his life in Memphis, Tennessee, but his legacy as a proponent of nonviolent conflict resolution lives on.

This year, though, a different spirit – one directly affected by the attack on the home of the US legislative bodies – adds a variant to King’s heritage.

“I have also been thinking a lot this past week about Rev. Martin Luther King’s famous ‘I Have a Dream’ speech in Washington, DC, at the [National] Mall, in front of hundreds of thousands of Americans in August 1963, in which he envisioned freedom for all Americans and called for an end to racism,” Rabbi Ron Kronish, the founding director of the Interreligious Coordinating Council in Israel, told The Media Line.

“How relevant this is today when racism is once again tearing America apart, as we witnessed so dramatically during the insurrection incited by US President Donald Trump last week on January 6, at the same place, in America’s capital city,” stated Kronish.

What are the ramifications of these events for Israel and the Middle East?

As we honor the incomparable #MartinLutherKing, the great champion of human rights & civil liberties for all, a reminder that #MLK was also a staunch Zionist & supporter of the State of #Israel!

Watch the 📺 this #MLKDay: pic.twitter.com/TfRUYBFgdV
— Arsen Ostrovsky (@Ostrov_A) January 18, 2021

Cartoon of the Day: More apartheid

Continuing my series of recaptioning cartoons...

This is actually not far off from what a UN official said in 2014:

Over the weekend, a custom-tailored-for-Facebook story started making the rounds, claiming that Navi Pillay, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, was blasting Israel for refusing to share the Iron Dome missile defense system with Hamas. It was just the kind of hilariously delicious absurdity that could be expected of the same organization that will soon welcome Chad—where slavery is still a rollicking tradition—into its Security Council, but the ever zealous guardians of Israel’s minor infractions and little else soon declared that Pillay was being slandered: she never called on Israel to share its defensive bounties, but rather criticized the United States for helping to fund the advanced system and noted that “no such protection has been provided to Gazans against the shelling.”

Infantilizing Palestinians

One of the implications about the sustained campaign to make Israel responsible for vaccinating Palestinians is that Palestinians do not have the ability to make their own medical decisions.

Even though they have insisted from the start that they can take care of their own people, even though they have undertaken their own negotiations with pharmaceutical companies and decided which vaccines they want, even though they have a fairly mature medical infrastructure in the West Bank, the critics of Israel are saying that the Palestinians are helpless children who cannot be trusted to safeguard their own lives as the wise Western NGOs are.

Isn't that bigoted?

Sometimes, though, the West treating Palestinians like children encourages them to act like children.

The EU issued this statement when the Palestinian Authority announced elections this May:

On Friday, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas enacted a decree-law on holding legislative, presidential and National Council elections in the coming months starting with legislative elections on 22 May.

This is a welcome development as participative, representative and accountable democratic institutions are key for Palestinian self-determination and state-building.

The EU has in the past years consistently supported and funded the work of the Central Elections Commission in order to prepare for holding free, fair and inclusive elections for all Palestinians.

Palestinians haven't had elections for 15 years. Since then, the EU has been funding support of nonexistent elections.

The EU even built the Central Elections Commission headquarters, spending €5 million on it.

Has this EU encouragement and funding made the Palestinians any more democratic? (Odds are that the scheduled election will never takes place.)

Or is the EU patronizingly telling the Palestinians, "Let us grown-ups explain to you what democracy is. Here, we'll give you a building and send consultants and election monitors and give lectures so you will know."

Can anyone imagine outside governments "helping" Israel in its first elections?

Eight months after independence, Israel took a census, prepared a thousand polling places, registered voters and held the elections. All without outside help. Most of this during a war.

If Palestinians want democracy, they can do it without help. If they want vaccines, they can get them without help. If they choose terror or if they choose peace, it will be their decision.

The people who are telling them that they cannot make their own decisions are interfering with their autonomy - not "occupation."

(h/t Irene)

01/18 Links Pt1: Trump's Middle East solution will sink into oblivion; City of David recognized as 'testament' to US Judeo-Christian heritage

From Ian:

David Singer: Trump's Middle East solution will sink into oblivion

Trump’s Peace Plan was rejected by PLO Chairman Mahmoud Abbas on 5 February 2020:
“They told me Trump wants to send me the deal of the century to read, I said I would not,” Abbas told the meeting of Arab League foreign ministers.

“Trump asked that I speak to him over the phone, so I said ‘no’, and that he wants to send me a letter, so I refused to receive it.”

On 9 February 2020 - US Ambassador to Israel – David Friedman – affirmed:
“The process [preparing a detailed map – ed] will not last very long, but we want to go through a process… We’re going to go through a mapping process to convert a map which is drawn of more than a million to one into something which really shows on the ground how the territory will be put together.

"It’s not unduly difficult, but it’s also not simple, because there are a lot of judgment calls. We don’t want to do this piecemeal …

"We want to do it once, holistically, in totality, and get it done right. We just want to get it done right. That’s not too much to ask. And that was the president’s message when he spoke about it the first time.”

On 15 February 2020 - the three US members of a joint US-Israel committee to join Israel’s three nominees in translating Trump’s conceptual plans into two defined territorial entities were announced (Mapping Committee).

Eleven months later the Mapping Committee’s map remains under tight wraps. No reasons have been given for the Committee’s failure to publish.

Failing to release the Mapping Committee’s detailed map before 20 January setting out defined borders to facilitate future Israel-PLO negotiations – should they ever be resumed - will see Trump’s two-state solution sink into political oblivion.

President Trump’s opportunity to finally end the 100 years-old unresolved Jewish-Arab conflict will then become just a footnote in history – joining the failed attempts of his Presidential predecessors.

Commentary Magazine Podcast: Trump’s Gift to Biden

Hosted by Abe Greenwald, Christine Rosen, John Podhoretz, Noah Rothman Bret Stephens, newly minted COMMENTARY contributing editor, joins the podcast today to discuss his blockbuster article, “Memo to President Biden: Please Don’t Mess Up the Abraham Accords.

”

US Special Envoy Aryeh Lightstone @lightstonea to #i24NEWS on Arab-Israeli normalization and the new Middle East:

'Peace does not belong to Republicans or Democrats, it is not an issue for Jews, Christians or Muslims, it is an issue for mankind.' pic.twitter.com/Kiw8GX9I2q
— i24NEWS English (@i24NEWS_EN) January 17, 2021

Col. Richard Kemp on 30th Anniversary of 1991 Gulf War

Survey of British antisemitism: Extreme antisemitism is down, subtle antisemitism is on the rise

The Antisemitism Barometer 2020, which was commissioned by the UK-based Campaign Against Antisemitism (CAA), was just released.

Some of the specific responses to the questions look absolutely frightening.

While those who agreed with the antisemitic statement that Jews have too much power in the media went down from the 2019 survey from 14% to 11%, those who disagree went down more - from a majority of 54% to a minority of 42%. That is a very bad trend.

A similar pattern is seen on this question of Jews chasing money:

The number of explicit antisemites went down, but the number who oppose the antisemitic statement went down even further - from 54% to 41%, a huge drop in one year.

Another example where the extremist antisemites are decreasing but the moderate antisemites are increasing:

The number who are comfortable around Zionists plummeted from an already-low 41% to 31%.

And again, when asked if Israel has the right to defend itself from those who want to destroy it - a question that would be so obviously true for every other nation on Earth, but for Israel, the British are worse than ambivalent:

Those who agree went down from 58% to only 50%.

Here's a question where a classic antisemitic trope is re-phrased as an anti-Zionist one:

Only 30% disagree that Zionists control the media - in the land of The Guardian and the BBC.

Perhaps the most shocking result is this one, where only 20% of Britons disagree that Israel treats Palestinians as Nazis treated Jews - an absolutely antisemitic statement:

They must have gotten this impression from the Zionist-controlled media.

In a year where antisemitism was a big topic in the UK with the Labour antisemitism scandal, it seems that fewer people are willing to express explicitly antisemitic feelings - but the number of people willing to openly counter antisemitic is plunging..

This does not bode well for British Jewry.

Dafna Meir H"YD

Dafna Meir worked as a nurse in the neurosurgery department of Soroka Medical Center in Beesheba. She was also a pre-marital counselor for brides. Dr. Ahmed Nasser, who worked alongside her at the hospital, described her as his "best friend" in the department, always helpful, encouraging everyone, treating all alike, whether Jewish or Arab. Dafna had been studying Arabic, telling Dr. Nasser that "we are neighbors and should speak the same language."

She had four children and two foster children. "She was a happy woman, joyful, optimistic, driven, responsible, loving," related a neighbor.

On January 17, 2016, Dafna was painting the front door to her home. Her eldest daughter, Renana, heard her scream. She ran to her aid, only to see a Palestinian terrorist stab her mother repeatedly. Dafna tried to fight off assailant, protecting the three children who were at home at the time. Renana screamed for help, and the terrorist fled.

Dafna was pronounced dead at the scene.

Her murderer was a 15 year old boy named Morad Bader Abdullah Adais who was caught the next day.

It is now five years later - and Morad Adais is very happy. Because his salary for being a murderer is doubling today.

According to the Palestinian Authority's sliding salary structure for terrorists and murderers, today Adais goes from being paid 2000 shekels a month to 4000.

The average Palestinian worker gets paid about 2500 shekels a month, which means that the now 20-year old Morad Adais makes significantly more money than Palestinians who have to work for a living, who have to pay for their own housing and food.

The Palestinian leaders say that these payments for terrorists are a sacred part of their budget.

To Palestinians, Morad Adais is a hero who deserves every penny of his lifetime award for repeatedly stabbing a mother who was guilty of the crime of being a Jew.

(h/t Maurice Hirsch)

Human Rights Watch belatedly jumped on the bandwagon claiming Israel is responsible for vaccinating Palestinians who are not under Israeli control.

As one might expect, HRW twists international law:

The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, which Israel ratified in 1991 and the State of Palestine acceded to in 2014, requires states to take steps necessary for the “prevention, treatment and control of epidemic, endemic, occupational and other diseases.”

That sure sounds like the Palestinians have the primary responsibility, doesn't it? But HRW adds:

The United Nations body responsible for monitoring this treaty has confirmed that Israel is obliged to respect this treaty in the occupied territory, and to protect the right to health and other rights of the population there.

What does this document say? This is the part HRW doesn't want you to read:

The Committee reminds the State party that it has positive and negative obligations with regard to the Occupied Palestinian Territory, depending on its level of control and the transfer of authority, that it should not raise any obstacle to the exercise of such rights in those fields where competence has been transferred to the Palestinian authorities and that any measures taken by the State party should ensure that the legislative and policy measures relating to the occupied territories taken by the State party as the occupying Power do not result in any permanent alteration in the political or legal status of the territories or have irreparable consequences for the people living there.

It says explicitly that in areas where the Palestinians have control, Israel cannot interfere with their governance without permission.

That means that Israel must not interfere with Palestinian vaccination plans - unless the Palestinian Authority asks.

Which is entirely consistent with the Geneva Conventions, with the Oslo Accords, and entirely inconsistent with what HRW is claiming!

HRW may have one point: it may be true that Israel is responsible for vaccinating the non-Israeli Palestinians in Area C, even though many of them are illegal squatters. Yet even then, it disgustingly accuses Israel of racism:

“Nothing can justify today’s reality in parts of the West Bank, where people on one side of the street are receiving vaccines, while those on the other do not, based on whether they’re Jewish or Palestinian,” said Omar Shakir, Israel and Palestine director at Human Rights Watch. “Everyone in the same territory should have equitable access to the vaccine, regardless of their ethnicity.”

This is slander. Israel is not distinguishing between Jews and Arabs. There are thousands of Arabs who live across the Green Line who get full access to Israeli services, including vaccinations.

Israel is distinguishing between citizens and non-citizens. Which is something every country on Earth does. If a nation doesn't take care of its own citizens ahead of others, it is failing in its most basic function.

The only people who really do distinguish between Jews and non-Jews are the critics of Israel like BDS and Human Rights Watch. Because, you see, they don't consider the Israeli Arabs who live across the Green Line to be "settlers."

Only Jews can be illegal settlers.

When Israel builds houses for Arabs in Jerusalem across the Green Line, Human Rights Watch is silent - even though Israeli Arabs will move there. They only complain when Jews move into those projects or neighborhoods.

When Israeli Arabs own businesses over the Green Line, their business names are not places on any "blacklists" of "illegal settler businesses." Only Jewish-owned ones are called illegal.

So when HRW accuses Israel of treating Jews better than Arabs, they are projecting their own bigotry onto Israel. Because they are the ones who say that Jews should be treated differently from non-Jews.

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