German teachers’ union urges total boycott of Israel
The teachers union in the city of Oldenburg published an article in its September paper calling for a complete boycott of the Jewish state, sparking criticism from Israel’s embassy, German teachers and pro-Israel activists, as well as the Simon Wiesenthal Center.How Jordan’s ‘sheikh of sheikhs’ negotiated with Zionists, founded a kingdom
It appears to be the first call to boycott Israel or Jews from a German organized labor group since the Holocaust. Critics accuse the union of stoking modern Jew-hatred.
The anti-Israel activist and teacher Christoph Glanz outlined the goals of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions movement in his two-page article in the magazine of the Education and Science Workers’ Union (GEW).
“The GEW is an important institution in Germany. That is why we are surprised and disappointed, that the Oldenburg chapter chose to re-publish the pamphlet of a BDS activist in its magazine,” the embassy told The Jerusalem Post on Thursday.
On April 8, 1933, the “most powerful man” in Transjordan took a trip to the famous King David Hotel in Jerusalem. He was there to negotiate with the Zionist leadership over the sale of huge tracts of land on the east bank of the Jordan River. Among the attendees of the meeting were Chaim Weizmann, soon to be Israel’s first president, Moshe Sharett, who would become Israel’s second prime minister, and Haim Arlosoroff, the top Zionist diplomat at the time and the one who set the meeting up.Fred Maroun: Zionism belongs to Jews
This Jordanian VIP, who worked publicly with the Jewish Agency, was Mithqal Pasha al-Fayiz, the leader of the Beni Sakhr tribal confederacy who, and would, ultimately become the kingmaker of the Hashemite dynasty.
Mithqal’s life is the subject of a new book, “The Shaykh of Shaykhs: Mithqal al-Fayiz and Tribal Leadership in Modern Jordan,” by Israeli researcher Yoav Alon.
Alon, who says he was probably the first Israeli researcher to do fieldwork in the kingdom since the Israeli-Jordanian peace agreement in 1994, interviewed the direct descendants of the great sheikh in order to bring his story to life.
A shrewd diplomat, a daring warrior and wise ruler, Mithqal’s life was full of intrigue — prime material for a Hollywood movie, says Alon. He led raids, acted as a judge for thousands of tribespeople, and had to maneuver through the political swamp of British colonialism, the Zionist project and Arab nationalism while balancing local affairs.
In the end, Mithqal did not sell any land to the Zionists, though he did accept their money. And a few years later during the Arab revolt against the British in Palestine, he became the strongest supporter of Palestinian nationalism, defying Abdullah bin Hussein, whom he had helped put on the throne.
The British, the Zionists and even the Hashemites all sought to exploit Mithqal, who Alon believes commanded the most powerful army in Transjordan at the time. But the sheikh turned out to be a chess grandmaster, working with everybody while bolstering his own coffers and political power.
The Palestinian cause should belong to Palestinians, but sadly it does not, and that is one of the main reasons for its failure. In 1947, the trend was established when the Arab world pushed the Palestinians to reject the UN partition plan and to fight their Jewish neighbors instead of living at peace with them.
This trend has continued since then, with Palestinians being encouraged repeatedly by their “friends” to reject Israeli offers for peace. Today the so-called pro-Palestinian movement, including the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement, is driven largely by non-Palestinians and even non-Arabs, and it is far more anti-Israel than pro-Palestinian.
These foreign parties have no interest in helping the Palestinians build a peaceful state. Their interest lies in satisfying an ideological view of what the Palestinians need, which often is very far from reality. For example, they oppose Israeli businesses in the West Bank, regardless of the consequences to the Palestinians. Five hundred Palestinians lost their jobs as a result of the closing of SodaStream which the BDS movement targeted.
Palestinian human rights activists Bassem Eid wrote, “There is no connection between the tactics and objectives of the BDS movement and the on-the-ground realities of the Middle East. Israelis continue to come to the West Bank to do business, and most Palestinians continue to buy Israeli goods. Indeed, if you ask Palestinians what they want, they’ll tell you they want jobs, secure education, and health”.