Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Friday, February 07, 2014

Huge Yiddish cultural mural defaced in LA (updated x2)

This is a 60 foot wide mural in Los Angeles put up in 1998 for the Arbeter Ring/Workmen’s Circle Southern California campus, a secular (and socialist) Jewish organization.

Recently, it was defaced:

From The Jewish Journal:

A mural on the south side of the Arbeter Ring/Workmen’s Circle Southern California campus at 1525 S. Robertson Blvd was defaced with graffiti that reads “Free Palestine!!!!”

It was not immediately clear when the graffiti was spray-painted onto the building, as phones at the center were not answered on Thursday morning, Jan. 6 [sic - should be February], the day the Journal learned about the vandalism.

The wall-sized mural itslef – titled, ”A shenere un besere velt,” according to the Mural Conservancy of Los Angeles (a Yiddish phrase meaning, “A more beautiful and better world) – depicts cultural, biblical and historical imagery. The imagery includes a menorah, Israelites wandering in the desert, a young girl waving Israeli and American flags, and more.

Artist Elisio Art Silva completed the mural in 1998, according to the conservancy organization.

Photos obtained by the Journal on Thursday morning by a Pico-Robertson resident who was driving by and spotted the defaced building show the graffiti spaning nearly the entire length of the building, which, according to the conservancy group, measures 60-feet-long and 15-feet-high.

Robert Adler-Peckerar, executive director of the L.A.-based organization Yiddishkayt, which is a frequent collaborator with the national office and local branch of Workmen’s Circle, said the message of the graffiti reflects an ignorance about the mission of the victimized group. He described Workmen's Circle as being historically committed to ideas of “social progress, equality, human rights, civil rights and the general pursuit of human dignity,” which includes promoting a “progressive, peaceful solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict,” he said.

“I feel like this [the graffiti] indicates something much more about thoughtlessness than about an actual commitment to a free Palestine,” Adler-Peckerar said in an interview. “And a tremendous amount of cultural illiteracy [on the vandal(s)’ part].”

The Arbeter Ring/Workmen's Circle has traditionally been a socialist movement, anti-religious but very committed to Jewish/Yiddish culture and what it calls "social justice." It would not be called a Zionist organization.

In its statement, it said:

“It is ironic that the slogan defaced the mural of an organization whose observance of kol nidre, a major Jewish holiday, includes an Arabic American singer leading the hymn, ‘Peace, Shalom, Salaam,’ and that includes the aspirations of the Palestinian people in our other secular Jewish observances,” the statement continues.

“We invite those responsible for the slogan-painting to meet with us to discuss far more effective ways of encouraging progress toward a lasting peace between the Israeli and Palestinian states and their peoples,” said Ruth Judkowitz, Chairmentsh (chair person) of SoCal Arbeter Ring/Workmen’s Circle.

This graffiti shows that to many supposedly "pro-Palestinian" activists, their target isn't Israel but Jews. It isn't "thoughtlessness" - it is hate.

It is a shame that an organization that says it pursues justice cannot recognize a hate crime and instead ascribes it to "cultural illiteracy." Even worse is its painful naivete thinking that more cowtowing can remove hate.

(h/t Doris, Bob K.)

UPDATE: New graffiti artists changed "Free" to another four letter word:

The Workmen's Circle response was that "this new defacement proves 'that there are idiots on both sides.'"

I think there are idiots on three sides here.

(h/t Rebbe Yell)

Fatah insists it never abandoned terror

I've mentioned a number of times that the Fatah platform that is in force today supports the continued use of terror.

I even found an English version:

Struggle emanates from the right of the Palestinian people to resist the occupation‭, ‭to struggle against settlement‭, ‭expulsion‭, ‭displacement and racial discrimination‭; ‭a right guaranteed by international law‭. ‭Our revolutionary struggle was launched by armed struggle against the military usurpation of our land ‭, ‭but it was never confined to it ‭. ‭Its tools and methods were diverse and included peaceful resistance as was practiced by the first Intifada ‭; ‭demonstrations‭,‭ sit-ins‭, ‭civil disobedience‭, ‭confronting settler gangs‭, ‭political‭, media‭, ‭legal‭, ‭and diplomatic struggle including negotiations with the occupation authority‭. ‭Consequently‭, ‭the‭ Palestinian‭ people’s right to practice armed resistance against the military occupation of their land remains a constant right confirmed by international law and international legality‭.‭ However‭, ‭the selection of struggle methods‭, ‭in time and space depends on the capabilities of our people and our Movement‭. ‭

(Disingenuously, it claims that "‭Fatah always rejected targeting civilians anywhere" which is so laughably ridiculous that one can only say that they regard no Israeli Jews as being civilians.)

Even more interesting is that while the platform insists that killing Jews in Israel is a legal right, they mention in their strategy that they want to have closer ties with Israel's "peace camp." Amazingly, no one in the "peace camp" has anything bad to say about their being manipulated by a party that justifies murdering them.

Just in case you don't believe the actual text written and disseminated by Fatah, here's new video from MEMRI reiterating their position:

During a recent visit to Iran, Fatah central committee member Jibril Rajoub said: "The resistance is still a strategic option, and armed resistance is on the table." He said that he wanted all components of Palestinian society "to maintain the state of conflict between Palestine and the occupation." The interview was broadcast by the Iranian Al-Alam TV network on February 3, 2014.

Following is an excerpt:

Jibril Rajoub: Either a Palestinian state will be established – and this is a condition for stability, peace, and security for everyone – or else the Israelis will not enjoy security, while continuing settlement activity.

TV host: Will you take up arms again?

Jibril Rajoub: We have never given up our arms. We have never left the battlefield, and we have never raised a white flag. No one can lecture Fatah or its leadership in this regard.

The resistance is still a strategic option, and armed resistance is on the table. We consider resistance to be a means to an end, not the goal itself. If negotiations fail, we will reexamine things, with our Arab and Islamic allies.

As I've told you, we want to maintain the state of conflict between Palestine and the occupation. This applies to all components of the Palestinian people, because we want all the Palestinians to participate in the resistance. We want the Palestinians within the 1948 borders to demand equality, the Palestinians within the 1967 borders to demand independence and liberty, and the Palestinians in the diaspora to demand the Right of Return. We want our Arab supporters in the region to be able to embrace this resistance, and we want the world to accept our methods.

I believe that by international law, we have the right to conduct any form of resistance, in the occupied lands and against the occupation, in order to put an end to the occupation.

I'm telling you that there will not be any bus bombings, and there must not be bus bombings in Tel Aviv. But we have 400,000 settlers. What are these people doing among us? According to international law, these [settlements] are illegal. These people will not enjoy security, peace, or stability, as long as occupation and Judaization continue.

Fatah remains Fatah, and in keeping with its goals and values, it still considers resistance to be an option.

So bus bombings in most of Jerusalem are OK. And, sometime in the future, they might be OK for Tel Aviv as well, but just not quite now.

Now, who is the leader of Fatah again? Oh, yeah - Mahmoud Abbas. This is his organization, and he has never contradicted these words.

Egyptian media upset over Israeli 2nd graders singing about Passover

Egyptian media on Thursday got hold of a shocking video.

Popular Egyptian site Youm7, as well as other media outlets, say that this is a video of Jewish extremist children who are being taught that they were slaves in Egypt - and that they must return to Egypt.

Here's the offensive video, of the second grade class in the Binyan Olam school, singing songs about and play-acting the Passover story. (It's a pretty bad video. You can skip the first 1:10 of musical introduction to get to the other five minutes of watching kids repeat songs and verses they memorized.)

And here's how Youm7 describes this video:

Jewish extremist Rabbi Eliyahu Yisraeli published a video clip on YouTube of a group of Jewish children, students in one of the Jewish "yeshiva" schools. They do rituals to commemorate the holiday of Passover, where they are celebrating the anniversary of the Exodus from Egypt.

The video clip shows the young children on a trip to a village located on the Sea of Galilee, which was created to serve as a model of what was experienced by the children of Israel in Egypt, since Moses split the sea and took the children of Israel out from Egypt.

The video shows the children reading some passages from the distorted books of the Torah which tell the full stories of the children of Israel, and it used the word "slavery" in a reference to Egypt.

It presents to the children during their studies in the "yeshiva" the extent of the suffering experienced by both the children of Israel during the era of Pharaoh, and the miracles of God known in the Torah as the "ten plagues" in addition to the years of wandering in the Sinai.

Israeli extremist Jewish schools in this video indicate their incitement of hate for Egypt and Egyptians, saying that it was the land of bondage, and the Jews must return to Egypt again because it is a religious duty.

The last phrase, that Jewish children are being taught that they must return to Egypt, is the headline in every version of this article.

Almost certainly that ridiculous interpretation is a result of a couple of stories in Egyptian media last year. One was that a Muslim Brotherhood leader said that (after Israel is replaced with an Arab state) Jews should be allowed to return to Egypt. He was mercilessly attacked for months afterwards, and the idea still rankles Egyptians, worried that the Jews might sue them for the huge amount of land and capital that were stolen from them when they were expelled.

Another crazy but related rumor in late 2012 was that US ambassador Anne Patterson said that DNA evidence showed that Jews owned Egypt, King Tut was Jewish and by the end of 2013 Egypt would be under total control of the Jews.

One other fact that might be making the Egyptians so nervous about Jews taking over Egypt: It says so in the Quran! Chapter 44, verse 28, has been interpreted to say

Thus (it was)! And We made other people inherit them (i.e. We made the Children of Israel to inherit the kingdom of Egypt).

Given that Egyptians are so sensitive to the idea of Jews returning to and taking over Egypt, that fiction is apparently what is fueling so much interest in this video. Egyptians believe that Jews want to rule over their country - and they think that these second graders' songs about the Passover story prove it.

Another terrorist's body being returned on Sunday. Let's talk about one hero he killed.

Ma'an writes:

Israel will return the remains on Sunday of a Palestinian killed by soldiers over a decade ago, an Israeli human right groups said on Thursday.

Israeli rights group Center for the Defense of the Individual (HaMoked), said in a statement that the remains of Ahmad Ayid Faqih from the Hebron area town of Dura, will be returned via the Tarqumiya checkpoint west of Hebron on Sunday evening.

The remains matched DNA samples taken from relatives, HaMoked said.

Faqih was killed on Dec. 27, 2002 after he and Muhammad Mustafa Shahin broke into the Israeli settlement of Otniel south of Hebron and opened fire inside a Yeshiva school. The attack killed two Israeli soldiers and two settlers before Faqih and his companion were shot dead in the ensuing firefight.

At the time Faqih was 20 years old.

The Islamic Jihad movement claimed responsibility for the operation, which came at the height of the Second Intifada, a Palestinian uprising in the 2000s against the decades-long Israeli occupation.

Here is what happened:

On Friday night, 27 December 2002, over 100 students and faculty members of Yeshivat Otniel were getting ready to have dinner in the dining room of the Yeshiva, while in the adjacent kitchen, four yeshiva students on kitchen duty organized the first course of the Sabbath meals. Two of the four students on kitchen duty were IDF soldiers on leave without pay from the army.

Meanwhile, two Palestinian militants of the Islamic Jihad, disguised as Israeli soldiers and equipped with battle vests, M-16 rifles and hand grenades, made their way to the settlement through the valley located between Othniel and the town of Dahariya,[2] and managed to infiltrate into the settlement. The militants cut the rickety fence which was erected around the building of the Yeshiva[2] and afterwards, around 19:45 pm, they snuck into the building through the back door of the kitchen. The students on kitchen duty had just finished preparing the main dishes on serving plates and were about to bring them into the dining room when the militants entered the kitchen and opened fire at them. In the last moments of his life, Staff Sergeant Noam Apter, upon immediately realizing what was happening, managed to lock the sliding door separating the kitchen and the dining room, before he was murdered by the militants. In doing so, Noam prevented the militants from entering the dining room and carrying out a far deadlier attack. Nevertheless, after killing the students on kitchen duty, the militants smashed the window of the sliding door and began shooting through it into the dining room, wounding four yeshiva students, one of them critically.[2] The majority of the students in the dining room managed to hide underneath the tables while some of them, whom were carrying weapons with them, returned fire at the militants.

Noam Apter saved possibly dozens of lives with his quick thinking - and sure knowledge that his locking the door meant that he would be murdered within seconds.

No doubt Faqih will receive a hero's welcome on Sunday, just like last Sunday.

To Israel, a hero is someone who saves lives. To Palestinian Arabs, a hero is someone who murders.

And by the sick calculus of the enlightened Western world, each side's positions are equally valid.

02/06 Links Pt2: Friedman’s Colleagues Call Him an ‘Embarrassment’; Hummus is a laughing matter

From Ian:

In Memoriam: Barry Rubin

In his 64 years, he worked tirelessly to defend and promote both U.S. and Israeli interests. He was also dedicated to the research and commemoration of his ancestry and those who perished in the Holocaust. In 2013, he published Children of Dolhinov, a historical account of the Jews of Dolhinov (today part of Belarus). He wrote, “If we don’t respect those who came before us, and who made our existence possible, how can we expect anyone to respect us?”
In addition to his professional and academic achievements, he was a loving father and husband. He is survived by wife Judith and his two children.

The Woman Who Makes the Jihadis Squirm

Civil lawsuits, it turns out, are not just a great way to help victims find justice and compensation for their misery. They are also an enormously powerful tool in fighting terror. Because they are not initiated by any government, they cannot be stopped through ordinary diplomacy or with back-channel deals. The can be initiated spontaneously, unpredictably—effectively turning the tables on the terrorists, who are used to being the unpredictable ones. Once filed, they are in the hands of an independent judge who follows the law, not the political needs of the moment.
And because civil lawsuits have lower thresholds of proof than do criminal proceedings, and it is therefore usually much easier to prove liability than criminality, civil attorneys can very often succeed where prosecutors fail. For this reason, Western intelligence agencies often happily cooperate with civil cases against terrorists, providing crucial evidence for the plaintiffs—for they are doing the work that government cannot.

Thomas Friedman’s New York Times Colleagues Call Him an ‘Embarrassment’

Jewish New York Times columnist Thomas L. Friedman, often criticized for expressing anti-Israel views, was slammed by his own colleagues in an expose published on Tuesday by the New York Observer. The article came as a Friedman-penned Op-Ed in The Times on Wednesday claimed that a “Third Intifada is underway.”
The Observer said it interviewed some two-dozen current and former NYT staffers about a split between the news team and the editorial pages, run by Andrew Rosenthal, son of former NYT editorial leader AM Rosenthal, who publishes work by Friedman, a three-time Pulitzer Prize winner. The staffers’s concerns, as embodied in The Observer headline, ‘The Tyranny and Lethargy of the Times Editorial Page,’ were that, as one put it, the Op-Eds are “completely reflexively liberal, utterly predictable, usually poorly written and totally ineffectual,” and that the editorial page was frequently trounced by crosstown rival, the Wall Street Journal. Most of The Observer article criticizes Rosenthal’s vision and ability to manage a team that has grown to 14 employees, plus assistants, but staffers reserved plenty of venom for Friedman’s role in destroying The Times editorial page.

Politician claims PM preparing for Jews to take over Greece

From Enet English:

There has been widespread condemnation of claims made by a Syriza politician that the name of the country's new state broadcaster Nerit has Jewish roots and that Prime Minister Antonis Samaras’s recent visit to Thessaloniki Synagogue was an act threatening Greece.

Theodoros Karypidis, who was selected at the weekend as Syriza's candidate for the post of regional governor of Western Macedonia, made the comments in a Facebook post on June 15 that came to light on Wednesday.

In the post, Karypidis claimed that the new station’s acronym is linked to the Hebrew word for candle - Ner - and that candles lit during the Jewish festival of Hanukkah celebrate Jewish victory over ancient Greece.

"Samaras is lighting the candles (Nerit) in the seven branched candelabra of the Jews and lighting Greece on fire after his visit to Thessaloniki Synagogue ... He is organising a new Hanukkah against the Greeks," wrote Karypidis, a journalist who has hosted Golden Dawn figures on his local television show.

In a statement issued on Thursday, the American Jewish Committee said it was is "appalled by the antisemitic statements".

"Vile, outrageous expressions of antisemitism in Greece are coming not only from Golden Dawn on the far right but also, as Theodoros Karypidis's Facebook post illustrates, from the far left," said the AJC's executive director, David Harris.

"Prime Minister Samaras and his government laudably reject these dangerous attacks and recognise the right of the Greek Jews, like all Greek citizens, to live in peace and dignity."

"Whipping up hatred of Jews, for all kinds of alleged conspiracies, is an all-too-familiar and long-time tactic of political extremists with nothing constructive to offer about real-life issues facing their country," said Harris.

"It also reveals once again that, for all their purported differences, far-right and -left politicians can have more in common than they might otherwise admit - the capacity for blind hatred, bigotry and demagoguery." he continued.

It looks like Kaypidis' Facebook post also said that Jewish girls born during Chanukah are named "Nera" and that Chanukah is an anti-Greek holiday.

(h/t Yosef)

Coke invests in SodaStream competitor; will Pepsi buy SODA?

From Business Week:

Coca-Cola (KO) announced on Wednesday that it’s buying a 10 percent stake in Green Mountain Coffee Roasters (GMCR) for $1.25 billion. It’s not a move to get into the coffee business but rather an aggressive push to compete directly with SodaStream (SODA), which sells do-it-yourself carbonation machines as well as the flavor syrups that go with them. Coke will be the first company to feature its brands in Green Mountain’s new Keurig Cold machines, set to debut in 2015.

Keurig Cold will make soda and noncarbonated drinks like juices and teas using pods similar to those in Green Mountain’s Keurig coffee brewers. That means consumers could soon make their own Hi-C or Fuze, not just home-bubbled Diet Coke or Sprite. Compatibility with familiar and valued soft drink brands is clearly going to be the selling point, just as it is with the big coffee brands such as Starbucks (SBUX) and Dunkin’ Donuts (DNKN) available as K-Cup pods.

Israel's Calcalist reports that in the wake of the SodaStream SuperBowl ad, it appears that the soft drink giants are getting very nervous. There were rumors of talks between SodaStream and Pepsi six months ago, and now people are talking about both Pepsi and Dr. Pepper as potential buyers or investors in SodaStream.

The day after the Super Bowl, SodaStream stock went down 2 points, causing much cheering from the Israel haters who were certain that their whining caused the drop.

If the SodaStream ad had bombed as the haters pretended, then Coke wouldn't have to drop one and a quarter billion to get into that market, would it?

Today, SODA is up 4 points, an 11% gain, on the rumors of a new partner for SodaStream.

Sorry, haters.

(h/t Ori)

02/06 Links Pt1: Putin’s Occupation Olympics; Do ‘Syria,’ ‘Iraq’ and ‘Lebanon’ Still Exist?

From Ian:

Eugene Kontorovich: Putin’s Occupation Olympics

The international silence about the deepening occupation of Georgia seems even more like acceptance when contrasted with the diplomatic outrage the U.S. and EU express about what they regard as occupation elsewhere.
For example, the EU has recently taken the position that it would be illegal to do business with Israeli companies that operate in the West Bank. Of course, by this standard any participation in the Sochi Games — from corporate sponsors, to contributions and fees from national Olympic committees — would be forbidden. Making “ending occupation” the centerpiece of U.S.-EU foreign policy while playing the Occupation Olympics magnifies the extent of the West’s Caucasian capitulation.
Four years ago, former U.S. ambassador to NATO Kurt Volker wrote that “attending the 2014 Olympics … would make all of us complicit in cementing in practice Russia’s changing European borders by force, even if we reject those changes in principle.” Now, the cement has set — cement that was itself taken from Georgia.

Isi Leibler: Candidly speaking: Friends of Israel must speak up now

But when a US secretary of state indirectly encourages Europeans and others to pressure Israel with sanctions unless it makes further concessions, friends of Israel must protest publicly or this could develop into a tsunami and we will be abandoned.
Not surprisingly the traditionally outspoken ZOA immediately protested. But it was significant that ADL head Abe Foxman, hardly a hawk, sent Kerry an open letter bitterly criticizing his remarks, which he charged would be construed as “an incentive by Palestinians not to reach an agreement” and “as legitimizing boycott activity.” Israel’s supporters around the world should today unite and speak out.
The government and Diaspora leaders should initiate a Day of Global Solidarity with Israel in which Israelis, Americans and Israel supporters worldwide gather in Jerusalem to express their support for Israel’s commitment to peace, and condemn those seeking to force Israel to compromise on its basic security needs. We must demonstrate that a genuine peace can only be attained when both sides are committed to peace and treated fairly.

Ed Royce: Anti-Israel Incitement Must End

The scene has become a depressingly familiar one: while the United States works to advance peace negotiations in the Middle East, the Palestinian Authority’s state-controlled media and educational systems teach their citizens and, most troubling, children to hate Israel and its Jewish people.
It often seems more like the Palestinian Authority is preparing its people for war instead of preparing them for peace.
The PA’s state-sanctioned media and educational systems systematically deny the existence of a Jewish state, arguing that Israel’s existence is a direct threat to Palestinians; even asserting that the destruction of Israel is justified.

British appeals court rules that selling Ahava products is "perfectly lawful"

In November, 2010:

Pro-Palestinian activists blockaded an Ahava store in London's Covent Garden on Monday, resulting in temporary closure of the store.

Two activists reportedly locked themselves to a cement-filled barrel at the entrance to the property. Police were called to the store, and the two were subsequently arrested on charges of aggravated trespassing, and taken to a central London police station.

They were convicted, and they appealed, on numerous grounds.

All of which have been thoroughly rejected by the UK Supreme Court.

Their 13-page judgment disproves the arguments made by the Israel-haters to support their position. There are four conditions for being guilty of this category of trespass. The four categories are:

i) the defendant must be a trespasser on the land;

ii) there must be a person or persons lawfully on the land (that is to say not themselves trespassing), who are either engaged in or about to engage in some lawful activity;

iii) the defendant must do an act on the land;

iv) which is intended by him to intimidate all or some of the persons on the land out of that activity, or to obstruct or disrupt it.

The haters claims that part 2 doesn't apply to them because selling Ahava products is illegal. They brought a number of specious arguments.

First, they claimed:

i) The company running the shop was guilty of aiding and abetting the transfer by the Israeli authorities of Israeli citizens to a territory (the OPT) under belligerent occupation; the transfer was said to be contrary to article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention of August 1949, and aiding and abetting it to be an act ancillary to a war crime, made a criminal offence in England and Wales by sections 51 and 52 of the International Criminal Court Act 2001.

The court answered:

It is very doubtful that to employ such people could amount to counselling or procuring or aiding or abetting the Government of Israel in any unlawful transfer of population. Such an employer might be taking advantage of such a transfer, but that is not the same as encouraging or assisting it. Even if that company could have been aiding and abetting such transfer, that cannot amount to an offence by the separate retailing company, whatever the corporate links between the two companies. And even if the companies had been the same, such a crime of assistance was not an integral part of the activity carried on at the shop, which was retail selling. On the contrary, it was antecedent to, and remote from, the selling. The selling was perfectly lawful. The defendants, for their own reasons, elected to trespass and to stage a sit-in which was intended to (and did) stop that lawful activity in its tracks. They thereby committed the offence under section 68.

Their other arguments were equally ridiculous and dismissed accordingly; for example that the products were mislabeled as being from "the Dead Sea, Israel," the court noted that even if they were mislabeled that does not make their sale illegal. Similarly, they claimed that since the labeling said Israel, it violated a Cosmetic Products Safety Regulation where the country of origin must be prominently displayed, but the judgment found that this was a consumer safety issue and while "the Regulations are not directed at disputed issues of territoriality" the clear labeling that it came from the Dead Sea was accurate. (Which indicates that the UK legally considers the territories to be disputed, not occupied!)

The conclusion was that

It follows that of the postulated offences all were either not demonstrated to have been committed by the occupants of the shop at the time of the defendants’ trespass or were at most collateral to the core activity of selling rather than integral to that activity. The occupants of the shop were, accordingly, engaged in the lawful activity of retail selling at the time and section 68(2) provided no defence to the defendants.

It is so funny how, in the echo chamber of the haters, they assert that so many things are illegal, and when courts actually rule otherwise they are shocked that all those "experts" in their social media were wrong.

(h/t SFI)

Secretary General of Islamic Jihad Ramadan Abdullah met today with Iran's Foreign Minister, Mohammad-Javad Zarif.

Zarif noted that "enemies" have failed to divert the world's attention from the Palestinian issue. Presumably he means with such unimportant issues like Syria.

He complimented "Islamic resistance in Palestine" (i. e., terrorism) as uniting various Palestinian factions.

Zarif made headlines a couple of days ago with purported statements that the Nazi Holocaust against Jews was "tragically cruel and should not happen again." In a little reported followup, Iranian officials denied these statements.

The Islamic Jihad leader also met with Ali Larjani, chairman of the Parliament of Iran, who said "Fighting the Zionist entity is the only way to fulfill the rights and liberate Palestinian land."

UC Berkeley professor forcing students to tweet against "Islamophobia"

From Tarek Fatah in The Toronto Sun:

Two weeks ago, I received a panicked message from a student enrolled at the University of California, Berkeley.

He wrote: “I’ve been told by one of my professors I will be required, as part of my grade, to start a Twitter account and tweet weekly on Islamophobia. I can’t help but feel this is unethical. This is his agenda not mine.”

The professor conducting this exercise was Hatem Bazian as part of a course titled, “Asian American Studies 132AC: Islamophobia”.

When I asked him to elaborate on his concerns the student wrote: “There are 100 students in the class, all of us forced to create individual Twitter accounts. I’m not wholly clear on what our final project is yet (I find it very interesting that he excludes both the Twitter account requirement AND the final project from his official syllabus), but we have to meet with a group in San Francisco, and our class will be surveying people of color on the impact of some ads put out by (anti-Sharia blogger) Pamela Gellar. Now I’m no Pamela Gellar fan, I think she’s nuts, but I feel ... between the Twitter stuff and the final project he’s basically using us as unpaid labor to work on his agenda.”

I wrote to Prof. Bazian, who co-founded “Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP)” at Berkeley, asking why he was using his students to pursue what appeared to me to be a political exercise meant to propagate a specific message to the Twitterverse.

Bazian replied, without referring to Islamophobia:

“My course is designated as an American culture community engagement scholarship class … Students are asked to send at least one posting per week on something related to the course content, be it from the actual reading or anything they read or came across.”

When I asked him why all the tweets by his students so far are about Islamophobia, he replied:

“The class is titled De-Constructing Islamophobia and the History of Otherness … (Students) are asked to post based on … examining Islamophobia through looking at earlier historical examples.”

The fact remains Prof. Bazian appears to be using his position of authority to make 100 students — mostly non-Muslims — tweet about Muslim victimhood in America, irrespective of how it’s defined or whether it exists.

No student I have seen on Twitter has yet posted a tweet saying Islamophobia is a myth, nor has any student challenged the validity of the term.

Here is a sampling of tweets by Prof. Bazian’s students:

One tweeted: “How difficult it is to be a Muslim woman in America”; Another wrote about “Islamophobia in Canada”; while a third tweeted, “One perspective of Islam is to view it as inferior to the West. Where does this notion of cultural superiority come from?”

Bazian's history should make him ineligible for any academic position whatsoever - even Berkeley - in a sane world.

In May 2002, Bazian was the sole speaker for a two-day event at San Francisco's George Washington High School so inflammatory as to generate formal letters of apology from the school administration to the public. Advertised as a Middle Eastern "cultural assembly," the event featured a rap song by a student comparing Zionists to Nazis as students ran back and forth with Palestinian flags. Student and faculty observers called the supposedly multicultural event "pure pro-Palestinian propaganda."

In October of 2002, at the University of Michigan, at the Palestinian Solidarity Movement's annual conference, Bazian shared a forum with revisionist historian Ilan Pappé and the now-jailed academic and terrorist fundraiser Sami Al-Arian of Florida Atlantic University. At Michigan and elsewhere Bazian consistently denies being an anti-Semite, calling the accusation a ploy of opponents. "(The charge of) anti-Semitism is used as a means of neutralizing the opposition so the mainstream American public will distance itself from the 'extremists.'"

Yet, Steven Emerson, in his book American Jihad, quotes Bazian sermonizing at the American Muslim Alliance conference in May 1999 in Santa Clara, California, promoting the Islamic State of Palestine. Excerpts from the quote read, "'In the Hadith, the Day of Judgment will never happen until you fight the Jews ... and the stones will say, 'Oh Muslim, there is a Jew hiding behind me. Come and kill him!'"

Also:

At an April 10, 2004 anti-war rally in San Francisco, Bazian told the cheering crowd, “we’re sitting here and watching the world pass by, people being bombed, and it’s about time that we have an intifada in this country that change[s] fundamentally the political dynamics in here.” He added: “They’re gonna say, ‘some Palestinian being too radical’ — well, you haven’t seen radicalism yet!”

After a 2002 Students for Justice in Palestine rally at UC Berkeley resulted in the arrest of 79 protesters, Bazian spoke at a follow-up rally protesting the arrests. "If you want to know where the pressure on the university [i.e., to prosecute the demonstrators] is coming from, look at the Jewish names on the school buildings," he said.

Isn't that interesting that a leading expert on "Islamophobia" has an anti-Jewish agenda?

(h/t Ishai)

A Gaza businessman hugs an Israeli colleague - and Arabs freak out

Once in a while private Gaza businessmen meet Israelis . Some of them need to import goods to Gaza; sometimes COGAT arranges for them to attend trade shows or training.

A couple of days ago, at one of these meetings, an apparent Israeli soldier hugged and effusively greeted many of the Arabs from Gaza that he knew.

Arabs could not stand the idea of an Arab hugging an Israeli.

The video spread on Arab social media, "causing great resentment among activists who said this is normalization that should not happen."

Some activists - and journalists - called for the businessmen to be put on trial, and for the Gaza government to make these sorts of meetings illegal.

The PA Ministry of Civil Affairs, which helped organize the meeting, was caught on the defensive. They confirmed the meeting, which was held at the Erez crossing, saying that it was a business meeting to debate the problems of the Gaza Strip and the issues of the blockade of the introduction of construction materials and oil and gas and food, and that this video misrepresents the atmosphere.

Maher Abu Alouf, Director General of the Ministry of Civil Affairs said that these meetings are publicly known but are not friendly nor are they a form of normalization, and he expressed disapproval of the misrepresentations by some activists and the media.

Ali Al-Hayek is the person seen hugging the uniformed Israeli. He is one of Gaza's most prominent representatives of the Palestinian private sector. Hayek claimed that the person he embraced was retired from the army, and that it was strange that the media showed footage of them being civil to each other but did not show footage of the arguments by Palestinians for the introduction of the materials to the Gaza Strip, in full coordination between the private sector and governments in Ramallah and Gaza.

"Normalization" is one of the worst things Arabs can accuse each other of.

Think about that for a while.

UPDATE: The soldier is General Eithan Dangot of COGAT who is retiring, this was a lunch in his honor. (h/t Yenta Press)

02/05 Link Pt2: The Darker Side Of Oxfam; Boycotts Are Driven By Hate; 9 Narrow Miles

From Ian:

The darker side of Oxfam

But lurking behind this carefully-crafted website, and indeed the spokesman’s carefully-worded statement, is a rather different reality.
In truth, Oxfam channels charity funds to political groups which follow deeply partisan agendas, and support the boycott of Israel.
Over the last few years, Oxfam GB and the Dutch branch of the charity, Oxfam Novib, have granted many tens of thousands pounds to Coalition of Women for Peace (CWP).
This group is linked to whoprofits.org, a website that publicly identifies boycott targets, including Israeli banks, utility providers and companies like SodaStream.

Divest This!: A Panic-Driven Response to Omar Barghouti

As the leader of a “movement” that has accomplished next to nothing in close to fifteen years, Omar Barghouti seems to have developed special vision powers (perhaps learned while studying at an Israeli school he insists everyone in the world but he should boycott). These powers allow him to see panic-stricken Israeli supporters on all sides that quiver in perpetual fear of BDS’s explosive growth that always seems to arrive in the form of a damp squib.
Barghouti’s latest New York Times piece (paired with a “rebuttal” by Hirsh Goodman which declares Israel to be guilty, but urges something other than boycotting as a punishment – great diversity of opinion Grey Lady!) demonstrates all the rhetoric ticks that give BDS staying power despite lack of concrete victory (incidental or otherwise).
Thus 16% of the American Studies Association’s membership voting for an academic boycott is a “landslide vote” while the stunning backlash against the boycott from across the academy goes unmentioned. Or perhaps that is just part of the panicked response of Israeli supporters? (Keep in mind that in the heads-I-win-tails-you-lose world of BDS, both the BDSers own activity and the overwhelmingly negative response it generates counts as a victories for them.) (h/t Yenta Press)

Answering Roger’s questions

The other day you posted an open letter to Neil Young and Scarlett Johansson on your Facebook page. This letter was primarily made up of a series of questions regarding the Palestinian employees of SodaStream’s factory in Ma’ale Adumim, addressed to Ms Johansson.
I see that neither Neil Young or Scarlett Johansson has offered you any answers to these questions, so I thought I might have a go.
There are several hundred Palestinians employed at this particular factory, I don’t know each of their particular circumstances, so I have taken my lead from the people interviewed in this recent article, and this video.

Iranian women need written permission from their husbands before traveling abroad

From Al Monitor:

Mahboubeh, a 62-year-old Iranian schoolteacher, was forbidden from traveling outside the country a couple of weeks ago. She has been separated from her husband for three years, after what she describes as over three decades of constant fighting. Since her husband has not agreed to divorce her, he has taken revenge by preventing her from leaving the country, even for a short trip to the United Arab Emirates with a couple of her old friends. Mahboubeh told Al-Monitor she’s fed up with the system that hands over so much authority to men, allowing them to rule women’s lives, even when they are no longer living under the same roof.

Married Iranian women, even if they hold a valid passport, require their husband’s permission to depart the country, regardless of age. For obtaining or renewing a passport, a notarized permit from the spouse is required. Husbands can easily refrain from allowing their wives to obtain or renew their passport.

But this is an improvement over a recently rescinded law that gave the same restrictions on single women.

...Mehdi Davatgari, an Iranian MP and member of the Majles’ National Security and Foreign Policy Committee, told ISNA news agency, "It is an achievement of the Majles that single Iranian women over the age of 18 can obtain a passport with their father or grandfather’s official permission. Thus, contrary to the previous requirement, once a woman has her passport, she is cleared to exit the country, and there is no need for male permission to be obtained for every departure."

According to Davatgari, this measure would save a considerable amount of red tape. However, if the male supervisor feels strongly about the woman’s travel and is against it, predicting “wrong-doing or misconduct,” he could submit a request to the government to prevent her from leaving the country.

Fatemeh Rahbar, head of the Majles' Women and Family Affairs Committee, also gave her two cents on the matter, saying that the number of women who have misbehaved while traveling outside Iranian borders is too small to restrict every woman's travels: "Around 76 women who have traveled outside the country have behaved inappropriately, and therefore are forbidden from departure without an eligible male's notarized permission for each individual trip. Passports are equal to international birth certificates and cannot be denied to women, unless there is hard evidence proving a woman’s misbehavior outside the country, which we obviously take quite seriously.”

Shahla Mirgalou-Bayat, a physician and member of the Majles' Women and Family Affairs Committee, said passing and implementing these regulations are vital to protecting women and ensuring their safety while traveling.

In a recent interview, Mirgalou-Bayat said that since men could easily tend to their sexual needs through concubines and women cannot, it is safer for women to travel only if they must, and only if cleared by their male guardian. Mirgalou-Bayat added, “Women have different desires and needs than men, and implementing further restrictions for women is actually beneficial to women themselves. I approach this fact as a physician, from a physiological standpoint and considering the difference between male and female bodies.”

(h/t Anne)

Fun with imaginary numbers: Israel released almost 12,000 prisoners last 3 years!

Hamas' Al Qassam Brigades translates and publishes some new "statistics" from the PA Ministry of Prisoner Affairs (also at IMEMC):

Head of the Census Department at the Palestinian Ministry of Detainees, Abdul-Nasser Ferwana, said that Israeli occupation is currently holding captive around 4800 Palestinians in seventeen prisons, detention and interrogation centers.

Ferwana said that around 11034 Palestinians, including 2500 children, have been taken prisoner by the Israeli army over the last three years, during ongoing Israeli military invasions and violations in occupied Palestine.

According to B'Tselem, at the end of 2010 there were 5,705 prisoners. At the end of 2013 there were 4,768. If Israel imprisoned "around" 11,034 Palestinian Arabs in the past three years, that means that they have released an astonishing 11,971 prisoners in that time period!

It also means that the Israeli prisons must have especially fast revolving doors.

The lies don't end there, of course:

Ferwana also stated that Israeli occupation continues to deny ailing detainees the right to professional and specialized medical treatment, and said that there are 1500 detainees suffering with various conditions, including cancer, while others completely lost their mobility and various bodily functions.

Wow - 1500 of the 4800 prisoners are seriously ill? Then the mortality rate among prisoners must be super high, right?

As for detainees who died after their arrest, Ferwana stated that 205 detainees died since 1967, the causes of death range between excessive torture during interrogation, the lack of adequate medical treatment, and the excessive use of force.

Um...in 46 years, 205 prisoners died. That's less than five a year. How can it be that over 30% have serious medical conditions, but only 0.1% die every year?

This means (assuming roughly 5000 prisoners on the average since 1967, even though the numbers before 2001 were significantly lower) that the mortality rate among Arabs in Israeli prisons is at least four times better than they are outside of prison.

Dozens of Palestinians died shortly after their release from prison due to health complications resulting from the lack, and in many cases, the absence of medical attention in Israeli prisons, among them are detainees Morad Abu Sakout, Hayel Abu Zeid, Ashraf Abu Threi, Fayez Zeidat and Zakariyya Issa.

They don't die in Israeli prisons, but as soon as they can access professional medical facilities in the territories, then they drop dead?

Ferwana called on media outlets to provide further coverage on the issue of the detainees, their suffering and the ongoing violations, mental and physical abuse they face in Israeli prisons.

I think that is a great idea. The media really should report on these numbers. And they should bring in a statistician to do the analysis to see if they add up or if Ferwana is blowing smoke.