The BDS movement is based on a single uber-myth – that economic and political pressure forced apartheid South Africa to fall. And if it can bring down South Africa, it can bring down Israel as well.Melanie Phillips: 'Jesus Was a Palestinian': The Return of Christian Anti-Semitism
It’s a myth, however, because it’s simply not true.
According to research conducted by Ivo Welch, boycotts, divestments, and sanctions had virtually no impact on South Africa. “Individual divestments, either as economic or symbolic pressure, have never succeeded in getting companies or countries to change,” he wrote in the New York Times.
Referring to an initiative at Stanford University to force the administration to divest from coal-mining companies, Welch pointed out that the South Africa model cannot serve as an example for success.
These malevolent concepts, spreading from Palestinian Christians to churches in the West, are rooted in an audacious strategy adopted by the Palestinian Authority to deny Israel’s right to exist by changing Jewish history to suit its own end. Part of this strategy involves denying that Jesus was a Jew from Judea and turning him into a Palestinian who preached Islam.The UNRWA "Peace Ambassador" Who Sings For Terror
Clearly, this is a tall order: Rome didn’t change the name of Judea to Palestine until 136 C.E., and Islam first surfaced in the seventh century C.E. Nevertheless, the Palestinian leadership repeatedly claims that Jesus was a Palestinian.
In his Christmas message last year, the Palestinian Authority president, Mahmoud Abbas, described Jesus as a “Palestinian messenger.” In the same month, the PA’s chief negotiator, Saeb Erekat, who had described Jesus as “Palestine’s first martyr,” said that Jesus was “the first Palestinian after the Canaanite Palestinians.”
Mohammed Assaf, the 24 year old UNRWA resident who won the Arab Idol song competition, has become an overnight and worldwide sensation.
His victory song was entitled “Raise Your Keffiyah”, a PLO anthem and a favorite of Yasser Arafat (before whom he had performed ), and included such incendiary lyrics as “Most precious homeland, O Palestine, how dear it is, oh Arabs...when we were united the stone was very strong...the full moon rises on martyr (sic) may he rest his soul...”
The song has reverberated with UNRWA and the UN, as the former appointed Assaf their first ever “Regional Youth Ambassador for Palestine Refugees” and “Goodwill Ambassador For Peace”. PA President and Fatah leader Mahmoud Abbas called upon Palestinian Arabs to support Assaf in his bid to win the Arab Idol contest and welcomed him as a hero after his victory, hosting him at PA headquarters in Ramallah and designating him an “honorary ambassador”.
Tuesday, June 03, 2014
Elder of ZiyonWalid Muhammad Ali: It is imperative that we uncover the truth about the Zionist movement's role in the crime [of the Holocaust], which was perpetrated against the Jews, as well as against the Gypsies and many other European minorities.
Interviewer: Are you referring to the doubts over the extent of what occurred?
Walid Muhammad Ali: Indeed, this is a matter of research, yet it is considered taboo in the West, because, obviously, the figures are inflated. On principle, we condemn the killing of even a single person, let alone the killing of thousands or millions. But we must expose the way that the Zionist movement has extorted the entire world, particularly the German people, and at the Palestinian people's expense.
[…]
The Nazis perpetrated the Holocaust in collaboration with the Zionist movement.
[…]
Under their agreement, the Zionist movement was meant to help the Nazis to shatter the European and international embargo against them, and in return, the Zionist movement would help expel all the Jews from Germany. The Zionist movement helped run the Nazi camps, and helped guard the convoys of Jews, who were sent to the concentration camps and to the prisons, where the Holocaust took place. In exchange for the Zionist movement's help in breaking the economic embargo the Nazi movement would help the Zionist movement transfer the Jewish funds and Jewish youth to Palestine.
Tuesday, June 03, 2014Elder of Ziyon
For nearly a century, Palestinian leaders have missed no opportunity to impede the development of Palestinian civil society and the attainment of Palestinian statehood. Had Hajj Amin Husseini chosen to lead his constituents to peace and reconciliation with their Jewish neighbors, the Palestinians would have had their independent state over a substantial part of mandate Palestine by 1948, if not a decade earlier, and would have been spared the traumatic experience of dispersal and exile. Had Arafat set the PLO from the start on the path to peace and reconciliation instead of turning it into one of the most murderous and corrupt terrorist organizations in modern times, a Palestinian state could have been established in the late 1960s or the early 1970s; in 1979, as a corollary to the Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty; by May 1999, as part of the Oslo process; or at the very latest, with the Camp David summit of July 2000. Had Abbas abandoned his predecessors' rejectionist path, a Palestinian state could have been established after the Annapolis summit of November 2007, or during President Obama's first term after Benjamin Netanyahu broke with the longstanding Likud precept by publicly accepting in June 2009 the two-state solution and agreeing to the establishment of a Palestinian state.12 ways the US administration has failed its ally Israel
But then, the attainment of statehood would have shattered Palestinian leaders' pan-Arab and Islamist delusions, not to mention the kleptocratic paradise established on the backs of their long suffering subjects. It would have transformed the Palestinians in one fell swoop from the world's ultimate victim into an ordinary (and most likely failing) nation-state thus terminating decades of unprecedented international indulgence. It would have also driven the final nail in the PLO's false pretense to be "the sole representative of the Palestinian people" (already dealt a devastating blow by Hamas's 2006 electoral rout) and would have forced any governing authority to abide, for the first time in Palestinian history, by the principles of accountability and transparency. Small wonder, therefore, that whenever confronted with an international or Israeli offer of statehood, Palestinian leaders would never take "yes" for an answer. (h/t Bob Knot)
What was saddest about Washington’s insistence on accepting Abbas’s paper-thin veneer over his government’s new nature — his “technocrat” ministers were all approved by Hamas — is that it represents only the Obama administration’s latest abrogation of leadership, logic and leverage at Israel’s expense. Rather than rushing to embrace a Palestinian government in which an unreformed Hamas is a central component, what was to stop the US conditioning its acceptance on a reform of Hamas? What was to stop Washington saying that it would be happy to work with Abbas’s new government, the moment its Hamas backers recognized Israel, accepted previous agreements and renounced terrorism? Not a particularly high bar. What was to stop the US making such a demand, one of tremendous importance to its ally Israel? Only its incomprehensible reluctance to do.Khaled Abu Toameh: Fatah Leaders: Abbas Is A Dictator
Unfortunately, however, such lapses and failures are not the exception when it comes to the US-Israel alliance of late. This administration has worked closely with Israel in ensuring the Jewish state maintains its vital military advantage in this treacherous neighborhood, partnering Israel in offensive and defensive initiatives, notably including missile defense. It has stood by Israel at diplomatic moments of truth. It has broadly demonstrated its friendship, as would be expected given America’s interest in promoting the well-being of the region’s sole, stable, dependable democracy. But the dash to recognize the Fatah-Hamas government was one more in a series of aberrations — words and deeds that would have been far better left unsaid or undone, misconceived strategies, minor betrayals.
The unprecedented verbal attacks on Abbas reflect the deepening crisis in Fatah. Dahlan and the five senior Fatah officials who were expelled by Abbas enjoy widespread support among Palestinians, particularly in the Gaza Strip. And it is obvious that Dahlan and his loyalists do not intend this time to let Abbas get away with his controversial decision.
The renewed tensions in Fatah came as Abbas announced that he has instructed the new unity government to prepare for long overdue presidential and parliamentary elections. He said he is hoping that the elections will be held within six months and that he wants Hamas to participate in the vote, as was the situation in January 2006.
In the wake of the infighting in Fatah, Hamas's chances of winning the elections, when and if they are held, do not seem to be bad at all. In 2006, Fatah lost the parliamentary election due to internal squabbling and tensions, as well as financial and administrative corruption. Eight years later, Fatah appears to be suffering from the same problems and is likely to be defeated once again at the ballot box.
Tuesday, June 03, 2014Elder of ZiyonThe Palestinian Authority has been under pressure from international donors following Palestinian Media Watch's exposure of the PA's policy of rewarding terrorists with salaries. These salaries amounted to a total of $103 million in 2013 and will reach at least $130 million in 2014. Members of US Congress have recently suggested deducting the amount paid in salaries from US funding to the PA. Similarly, Norway and Britainhave been demanding clarifications and changes to their funding of the PA, and the Dutch Parliament passed a motion that its government must do something to stop the salaries.
In order to avoid this international pressure, the PA is planning a ploy to maintain the salaries but transfer responsibility for payments from the PA to the PLO. PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas is also the head of the PLO and he will continue to be directly responsible for the payments to the prisoners. (See below)
The PA expects that this ploy will work. The PA daily Al-Ayyam reported that "well-informed sources" stated that "turning the Ministry of Prisoners' Affairs into an authority subordinate to the PLO" "would be a change of name and nothing more, which would in no way affect the roles and duties that the Ministry [of Prisoners' Affairs] fulfilled." [Al-Ayyam, June 1, 2014] Accordingly, US and European donor money will continue to flow to the PA, the PA will pass the money to the PLO, and the PLO will pay the salaries of the terrorists.Palestinian sources specified that this move was in response to US and EU pressure not to pay salaries to terrorists with their donor money.
"The new situation would make possible the provision of new resources to support prisoners' issues, without allowing forces of the US Congress or some European parliaments to attempt to blackmail the PA or to take steps against it.' Furthermore, these sources predicted that prisoners "would not feel any change," but rather improvement of their situation would be the case, as the PA would be able "to act towards meeting their demands and defending their rights more efficiently and flexibly."[Al-Ayyam, June 1, 2014]
PMW reported last week on what the PA daily calls "forces of the US Congress," who are against paying salaries to terrorists. During the testimony by Assistant Secretary of State, Ambassador Anne W. Patterson at a congressional Subcommittee Hearing, Congressman Weber asked:
"If the PA is paying for terrorists in prison, we ought to also be willing to hit them with some economic sanctions of that sort?"
Assistant Secretary Patterson answered:
"Frankly, I know that they're going to try and phase that out and we should give them an opportunity to do so." [House Committee on Foreign Affairs' website, April 29, 2014]
At the time, PMW wrote that the PA had never indicated that they would cut back payments to terrorists, and that in fact the payments were increasing in 2014. There had been no evidence of what Assistant Secretary Patterson referred to as the PA "phasing out" their salary payments to terrorists. It may be that this PA ploy - to keep the benefits and salaries at the same level but bypass Congressional pressure by moving it to the PLO - is what the PA presented to Patterson as a "phasing out" of the salary program.Official PA sources confirmed that the purpose is to avoid pressure from donor countries who don't want to fund terrorists, and they stressed that the change is only cosmetic. PA Deputy Minister of Prisoners' Affairs Ziyad Abu Ein explained on PA TV that the massive funding of prisoners has been increased by PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas and that the money for prisoners under the PLO will also be administered by Abbas:
"Who else has elevated the cause of the Palestinian prisoners other than President Mahmoud Abbas? All the laws, the tenfold increase of the budget of the Ministry of Prisoners' [Affairs] - [all this] was done during the tenure of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and according to the wishes of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas...
If we go back to the source, which is the PLO, which will take care of the [prisoner] issue... we eliminate the international pressure and the attempts to tamper with this issue, so sensitive and holy to our Palestinian people. The [Palestinian] leadership wants to keep this holy issue away from the influence of the donor countries, the interference of the donor countries, and the occasional negative influence of the donor countries, by giving it [the prisoner issue] its holiness and assigning it to the leadership of the struggle of our Palestinian people. Who is the leadership of the struggle of our Palestinian people? The PLO... All the authority, all the laws, the budget, the officials and staff will be a part of the Prisoners and Released Prisoners' Authority, which will belong to the PLO, to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and to the Executive Committee of the PLO."
[Official PA TV, June 1, 2014]
Tuesday, June 03, 2014Elder of Ziyon
The Temple Mount became Jewish again, at least for one day, on Tuesday. Temple organizations reported that about 400 Jews had ascended to the Mount in the morning hours, and that police allowed them in without undue delays.Muslim and Arab websites are seething, from the most secular to the religious.
Most of the gates to the Mount were closed, and Muslim worshippers, who often harass Jews on the Mount, are not being allowed in. This is happening because police and the Israel Security Agency (ISA, or Shin Bet) have received intelligence about “malicious intentions” and Islamist incitement calling on Arabs to riot and prevent the Jews from entering.
Only a few elderly Musims could be seen on the Mount, reported Temple activists.
The Temple Mount will be open to Jews on Shavuot in the morning hours of Wednesday, from 7:30 to 11:00 a.m., and again from 1:30 to 2:30 p.m.
Shavuot is one of the three annual pilgrimage festivals on which the Israelites were commanded to come to Jerusalem to celebrate, in Temple times. The others two pilgrimage holidays are Pesach and Sukkot.
Pesach on the Temple Mount was a mirror image of Tuesday's calm. Likud MK and Knesset Deputy Speaker Moshe Feiglin recently called on Prime Minister Netanyahu to investigate riots by Muslim extremists on the Temple Mount, and to take action to put an end to intimidation and violence against Jews on Judaism's holiest site.
Tuesday, June 03, 2014Elder of ZiyonAt first glance, you may not notice what's painted on the side of Biggie's gas station and convenience store at the corner of E.55th and Cedar.
Amongst other religious and political commentary, is one image that's so disturbing, so grotesque, we have to blur it out in order to post it or use it on TV.
The picture shows a priest engaged in a sexual act with a baby. There's writing on top that says, "Talmudic priests in Church. Sex with minors permitted." It's an image that Biggie's owner Abe Auiad told us - flat out - he stands behind.
"That's a circumcision," says Abe Ayad.
The owner is trying to say that this is actually an image of a priest doing a circumcision on a baby. The problem is that the wording up above says, "sex with minors permitted."
The owner of Biggie’s, Brahim “Abe” Ayad, a forty-something Palestinian-American who lives in North Olmsted, once explained to Douglas Guth of the Cleveland Jewish News that the murals represent his “protest against ‘evil-doing Zionists’ who, among other offenses, he claims, took away his Palestinian father’s land to make way for the state of Israel.” Ayad further explained that “[t]he shocking imagery on his walls are his way ‘of fighting fire with fire,’ and that ‘[i]f they want to insult me, they should know how it feels to be insulted.’”
If you believe AIPAC, it’s an incredibly effective organization. If you believe its enemies, AIPAC runs America and parts of Canada. It’s not an accusation that AIPAC denies too hard. Mall Santas don’t deny that they have flying reindeer waiting for them on the roof. AIPAC is a fat man in a rented red suit and fake beard trying to pretend that it can do anything. But AIPAC would have better luck making reindeer fly than countering the dominant power of the anti-Israel left and the Saudi lobby in Washington D.C.Israel Thrives: Defining pro-Israel
And that’s because it doesn’t even try.
When the Democratic Party’s platform deleted the usual mention of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, removed a call to boycott Hamas and opposition to the “Right of Return” vocal protests came from Jewish organizations.
AIPAC was not one of them.
Before long, the primaries will begin for the campaign to succeed Barack Obama. One of the issues in the upcoming campaign will be who is good for Israel. This assessment might seem simple, but that would be deceiving. The reality is that no viable candidate will claim to be anything but pro-Israel. With everyone vying to claim the pro-Israel mantle, how should we determine who would support Israel when it counts and who would bail out?‘Open Hillel’ Only Promotes Anti-Semitism
One part of this assessment would be a review of Obama's record. For all the legitimate gripes we have about Obama's record on Israel, it is important to note that on any matter of providing military equipment or assistance, Obama has never let Israel down. Is this an attempt to exonerate Obama from the positions he has taken on Israel? No. Rather, this is an effort to bring in all the facts that a view of Obama's record on Israel needs to explain.
What Obama's military assistance to Israel shows is that when the Arabs wage conventional warfare or terror against Israel, Obama has Israel's back. We do not have to ask questions. However, those methods of attempting to destroy Israel are yesterday's war, corresponding to the Arabs' primary modus operandi from 1948-1973 and 1973-roughly 1995. Today's war, which started as far back as the 1960's but became more significant only recently, is the Arab effort to delegitimize Israel and thus gain international support to destroy Israel or at least to change the battlespace enough that they would be able to succeed in destroying Israel on their own through the previous two means. Obama's shortcomings come in his support, or lack thereof, for Israel in today's war.
In other words, criticism of Israel is welcome at Hillel as long as that criticism does not call for the destruction of the Jewish state, hold Israel to an impossible double standard, or call for the boycott of the only Jewish state.
Therefore, by default, all ‘Open Hillel’ supports is the inclusion of these dangerous anti-Semitic messages at the Jewish student center. Again, this is true because Hillel already allows all other voices.
Delegitimizing and demonizing the Jewish state, as well as holding it to a double standard (which BDS does on a regular basis), is considered anti-Semitic even by John Kerry’s State Department.
Monday, June 02, 2014Elder of Ziyon
Three days before the scheduled opening reception, The Mattress Factory abruptly canceled Sites of Passage: Borders, Walls & Citizenship, a show meant as a cultural exchange between artists from Israel, Palestine and the U.S.More details here:
According to the museum, the exhibit was canceled because the three Palestinian artists — Bashar Alhroub, Manal Mahamid and Mohammed Mussalam — withdrew their participation.
A statement on the museum's website also read, "The Mattress Factory and guest curator Tavia La Follette would like to make a public apology to all Palestinians everywhere for the misunderstanding of this exhibition."
But the circumstances surrounding the cancellation — and the precise nature of the "misunderstanding" — remain unclear.
...
Possible clues about reasons for the cancellation might be found in additional verbiage on the Filmmakers web page about the exhibit. It read: "Correction: An exhibition description concerning 'Borders, Walls, and Citizenship' was prematurely posted without the agreement or prior knowledge of the artists involved. … All participating artists, and those that withdrew are against racism, against occupation, and in support of self-determination for Palestinians and all people. This show was never intended to be about normalization."
"Normalization" is a controversial topic in Israeli-Palestinian relations; the word refers to the idea that the two states can relate to each other like any two other states. Rejection of that concept has helped fuel activist groups including the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel. On its website, the group defines normalization in this context as "the participation in any project, initiative or activity, in Palestine or internationally, that aims (implicitly or explicitly) to bring together Palestinians (and/or Arabs) and Israelis (people or institutions) without placing as its goal resistance to and exposure of the Israeli occupation and all forms of discrimination and oppression against the Palestinian people."
The Mattress Factory's April press release for the show didn't use the term "normalization." However, it did say, "The artists have been working collaboratively as part of a yearlong exchange that has allowed them to manipulate and respond to each other's work in ways that may be impossible to mimic in real life due to the physical boundaries of the countries of conflict they reside in."
The Israeli artists had pulled out of the show one day earlier in order to protect the Palestinians who had been threatened and accused on an Arabic-language Facebook page of “normalizing relations with Israel,” according to Tavia La Follette, the independent curator of the exhibit. La Follette is the founder and director of ArtUp, and an artist-in-residence at Carnegie Mellon University’s CREATE Lab.OK, so the Palestinian artists were threatened because they were working together with Israeli artists on an art project. Horrors!
The trigger for the threats, said La Follete, was the use of the words “collaboration” and “dialogue” within the exhibition’s announcements on the websites of the Mattress Factory and Filmmakers Galleries. But those words were never approved by La Follette or the artists in the exhibition, she said.
“There’s language that was put up on the websites that are words used in the land of art all the time,” she said. “In the art world, ‘collaboration’ and ‘dialogue’ are used all the time. But ‘collaboration’ means something completely different politically. That’s where the problem started.”
But La Follette, who had invited the artists to create works together and individually in response to issues and experiences surrounding the words “borders,” “walls” and “citizenship,” said the shows were “not about normalization and were never about normalization.”
“But we knew the artists would be getting flack at some time because people would be making judgments on what we’re doing,” she acknowledged.
After the Palestinian artists were accused on Facebook of normalizing relations with Israel, all three Israeli artists — Emmanuel Witzthum, Dror Yaron and Itamar Jobani — withdrew from the exhibition to allow the Palestinians to remain in the show, said La Follette, adding that what was supposed to be a celebratory party at her home last weekend, “turned into Camp David.”
“The Palestinian artists said, ‘We can’t be in this show,’ so the Israelis withdrew,” she explained. “The whole idea behind the project was to move it beyond political rhetoric. But we need to protect the Palestinian artists. It shows the integrity of the Israeli artists that they pulled out of the show.”
One of the Palestinian artists, Mohammed Musallam, in a Facebook post written in Arabic blamed the city’s “Jewish lobby” for the cancellation of the show.
“It became clear to us that what we considered victory, eliminating Israelis from the exhibit, will be harshly used by the media against Palestinian artists, creating accusations against them and fictional accounts,” he wrote. “Because of these developments in the situation and concerned that the exhibit will continue with its Israeli and American participants, and feed additional lies and stories from the Zionist media in this state, we asked the museum’s management not only that we withdraw, which was easy, but strongly demanded the abolition of the entire exhibit, with the understanding that we are willing for future collaborations without any Israeli participation.”
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| Musallam with La Follette before he ruined her year |
Monday, June 02, 2014Elder of Ziyon
Buy EoZ's book, PROTOCOLS: EXPOSING MODERN ANTISEMITISM
