Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Thursday, August 24, 2017

A non-solution to a non-crisis of racism in Israel (Vic Rosenthal)

If you are an Israeli, do you feel smug that the neurotic politics of political correctness and victimology that lately are so prevalent in the USA are rare in Israel? Are you pleased to think that most Israelis are not obsessed with race the way Americans are?

If so, you will be sorry to hear that the folks that hijacked the Women of Wall and other internal Israeli controversies in order to depict Israel as undemocratic or worse have decided to bring the socio-political pathology of the US to our country.

The Israel Religious Action Center (IRAC), created and primarily funded by the American Union for Reform Judaism (URJ) has proudly announced the establishment of a “Racism Crisis Center” in Israel.

Did you know there was a crisis of racism here? I didn’t, and in fact it seems to me that racially-based conflict is much lower here than in the US and many other places.

You may be shocked by that statement. Isn’t Israel the conflict capital of the world? Yes and no.

Yes, the Palestinian Arabs led by Hamas and Fatah want to kill us and take our land. But this is ideologically and religiously-based racism on the Arab side. it’s remarkable how well Jewish Israelis get along with the Arabs that they come into contact with who do not espouse this ideology.

Of course there are exceptions. And one can say that given the violent expressions of hatred by the Palestinian Arabs, it is surprising that there aren’t more. There are issues of resource allocation to Arab municipalities, but there are also reasons for this having to do with their own municipal governance. In some areas – higher education, for example – Arab citizens arguably get preferential treatment. And of course Muslims are not required to do military service (they are permitted to volunteer). How many countries in the world can maintain a population that is 20% Muslim without violent civil conflict? Probably only Israel.

And yes, it is true that the police have behaved improperly toward Ethiopian immigrants. But unlike the persistent black underclass in the US, the Ethiopian Jews – who were brought to Israel to save them from famine and persecution rather than as slaves – have been undergoing the usual processes of acculturation of immigrants, and each generation is economically better off and has members in higher and higher status positions. Discrimination against them because of skin color exists to some extent, but is getting rarer every day. There is not and never has been anything that remotely resembles the discrimination against blacks in either the North or South of the US.

Other immigrants, like Mizrachim and Russians, have had and in some cases are still having problems integrating into the society. But these are normal immigrant problems which will be solved by the passage of time, not examples of endemic racism. These groups are well-represented in the Knesset and government, and more and more getting their share of the economic and social status pie.

Nevertheless, the director of IRAC, Anat Hoffman, thinks there is a crisis that needs to solved – by the introduction to Israel of the hierarchy of victimization that has so greatly increased the divisions in American society. In an email to supporters, she writes,

The Racism Crisis Center is modeled after the Southern Poverty Law Center, based in Montgomery, Alabama. Like the SPLC, IRAC will use litigation to protect the rights of minorities in Israel by elevating the voices of victims of racism and discrimination.

The Racism Crisis Center will provide support in cases of discrimination, hate speech, and hate crimes against minority populations, and collect data on the growing phenomenon of racism in Israel. The center provides support to victims of all backgrounds: Arab, Ethiopian Jews, Russian Jews, Mizrahi Jews, asylum seekers and migrant workers, and provides services in Hebrew, Arabic, Russian, Amharic and English.

Perhaps Hoffman is not aware of the criticism that has been leveled against the SPLC for its bias – it seems to see “hate groups” only on the right – its inflation of the number of “hate groups,” its use of lawsuits for intimidation of impecunious opponents, or for its shameless pursuit of cash. Or perhaps she is aware, and she sees all of these things as worth emulating.

One wonders if she will create a list of “hate groups” like that of the SPLC, and if it will include Hamas, Fatah, the Islamic Movement, and similar organizations? Will it list MK Haneen Zouabi as an extremist? Ayman Odeh?

The website of the “crisis center” provides an emergency hotline telephone number and an online form for reporting “hate crimes” and other incidents of racism. In addition to making it possible for someone to blacken the reputation of any individual or group instantaneously, it will provide a rich source for incidents that can be used by IRAC to impress its overseas donors, to produce “documentation” of its charge that Israel is being inundated by a “tide of bigotry” (Hoffman’s phrase), and maybe even – as is the case with the SPLC in the US – to be used to shut down right-wing voices. Will the Israeli branch of PayPal close the accounts of right-wing groups like Im Tirtzu as happened to the Jihad Watch website in the US?

Israel’s social problems can’t be solved by trying to fit them into a conceptual scheme that was developed in a different society in a different environment with totally different problems – and which failed miserably there, arguably making social divisions and conflicts worse. Non-Americans often look at the US with wonderment, unable to understand the obsession with race, the accusations of racism flying in all directions, the “litigizing” of every imaginable dispute, “intersectionality” and the creation of a hierarchy of victimization, and the excesses of political correctness. And this is precisely what Anat Hoffman and her bosses at the URJ want to introduce to Israel!

The URJ’s interests are not necessarily aligned with those of the Jewish state. It has consistently sided with the Left on the issue of the “peace process,” in spite of a total lack of understanding of the security situation here. It is closely associated with the Democratic Party in the US, and indeed couldn’t even bring itself to oppose Obama’s Iran deal. Many Reform rabbis are members of J Street, the phony “pro-Israel” organization that is supported by George Soros and even elements associated with Iran, Saudi Arabia and Turkey. The head of the URJ, Rabbi Rick Jacobs, was a member of J Street’s Rabbinic Cabinet and a board member of the New Israel Fund before taking over the URJ. These are not the people we need to help save Israel from herself, either in our dealings with the Palestinians or our own social issues.

Despite her American education and connections, Anat Hoffman was born in Israel and lived most of her life here, so she should know better. But apparently she is being paid not to.

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

08/24 Links Pt1: PA spends more on terrorists' stipends than on welfare benefits; The peace process farce

From Ian:

PA spends more on terrorists' stipends than on welfare benefits, report finds

The payments made by the Palestinian Authority to jailed terrorists and to terrorists' families are much higher than the welfare payments it provides to Palestinians in need, a new report by the Middle East Media Research Institute revealed Wednesday.
The Palestinian Authority spends millions of dollars annually on these stipends, which in 2016 amounted to 1.15 billion shekels ($319 million) -- 7% of the PA's total budget for salaries and about 20% of the foreign aid it received.
The Palestinian Authority's extensive support for prisoners and terrorists' families prompted the United States to halt the transfer of $221 million to Ramallah earlier this year. The Palestinians claimed that the so-called "martyr" payments -- monthly stipends paid to terrorists and terrorists' families -- were equal to the welfare benefits provided to needy families, arguing that in both cases, the family had lost its primary breadwinner.
But according to the MEMRI report, stipends to prisoners and terrorists' families, appearing in the PA 2017 budget book under a section titled "The Plan for Protection and Care for the Prisoners and Their Families and Support and Training for Released Prisoners," are defined as a "monthly salary" while the welfare payments are only made once every three months (quarterly). A review of the figures showed that the terrorist stipends are sometimes 20 times higher than the welfare benefits provided to needy families.

Isi Leibler: The peace process farce

Unless the U.S. is willing to confront Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, the latest peace mission headed by presidential adviser Jared Kushner and negotiator Jason ‎Greenblatt may well prove highly counterproductive, causing more harm than good.
As he approaches the end of his reign, Abbas is determined to shape his legacy into that of an embattled ‎‎"freedom fighter" whose objective was the restoration of Arab hegemony from the Jordan River ‎to the Mediterranean Sea. ‎
Until now, he has ignored U.S. President Donald Trump's requests and demands. Incitement reached a record ‎high as he whipped up religious hysteria on the false assertion that Jews were desecrating ‎Al-Aqsa mosque, triggering riots and encouraging terrorism. Meanwhile, Palestinian children are being brainwashed into ‎regarding Jews as subhuman in propaganda replicated from Nazi sources.‎
The PA and its leaders continue honoring mass murderers by dedicating mosques, city squares, and ‎schools in their names. ‎
Despite American demands, Abbas has vowed that he will never close the Palestine National ‎Fund, which provides massive financial awards to imprisoned terrorists and to families of deceased terrorists. Incarcerated murderers receive monthly payments of 11,000 shekels (more than ‎‎$3,000), with a grant of $25,000 upon release from jail. This year, the fund has ‎distributed $345 million -- a sum equivalent to half the foreign aid received by the PA. Thus, the U.S. ‎and Europe have indirectly been incentivizing Palestinians to murder Israelis. ‎

PMW: Special Report: FIFA Must Correct Its Double Standard

FIFA moves quickly and forcefully to punish all acts of discrimination and racism throughout world football, yet it ignores Palestinian football's institutionalized discrimination, glorification of terror and terror promotion.
This special report contrasts FIFA's inaction on PMW's complaint against the Palestinian Football Association's serious violations of fundamental FIFA statutes with FIFA's swift and forceful punishments, even for relatively minor violations, by other teams or their fans.
Click here to read as a PDF
In April 2017, Palestinian Media Watch (PMW) submitted a complaint to both the Disciplinary Committee and the Ethics Committee of FIFA against the Palestinian Football Association (PFA) and its president Jibril Rajoub. The full complaint documents the repeated violations by the PFA and Rajoub, which include explicit encouragement of terror, glorifying terrorist murderers of civilians, sponsoring sporting events named after killers, referring to Jews as "satans" and "Zionist sons of bitches," and much more.
PMW's complaint documented that the PFA is in violation of at least Articles 3 and 4 of the FIFA Statutes and Articles 53 and 58 of the FIFA Disciplinary Code, and the potential punishments include "suspension or expulsion," and a minimum fine of 30,000 Swiss Francs. Although PMW received notification that our complaint was received and was being reviewed, and despite a number of follow-up inquiries, until today, PMW has not been invited to give testimony and no disciplinary action has been taken against the PFA or Jibril Rajoub.

My grandmother was alone in the house. Not really alone, her two small babies were there and the accountant that would be useless in a fight was there too. Her husband (first husband, not my grandfather) Haim Natanzon was away guarding the territory they had been assigned to protect. She didn’t know how far away he was. She did know that he had taken their only horse and the only gun they had.

It was before the re-establishment of the State of Israel, when the land was called Palestine. My grandmother and her husband belonged to an organization called the “Shomer”, the Watchman, founded in 1909. The organization was responsible for guarding Jewish settlements, freeing Jewish communities from dependence on foreign consulates and Arab watchmen for their security. My grandmother had been given a house to live in on a piece of land bought by the Jewish National Fund (near Netanya). Their task was to guard the land, to be present and ensure that Bedouin did not come and settle on the land intended for Jewish settlement.

That day was the test.

Alone, she saw to her horror, a Bedouin tribe, moving on to the land. What was she supposed to do?! If she hid in the house, by the time her husband came back, it would be too late. The Bedouin would claim that the land had been empty and they had the right to be there. Or they would claim that they had always been there. If she confronted them, with no weapon and two babies in the house, they could very easily kill her and take the land anyway.

Not on her watch.

She told the accountant to watch the babies, grabbed a box of matches and stormed out of the house.

They paused in shock to see a woman, alone, with fire in her eyes, fly at them. Standing in their midst, she held up the matches and announced: “This is MY land. If you don’t leave NOW, I will burn down your tents.”

Not wanting to lose all of their worldly possessions, they began folding up the encampment. Why didn’t they just kill her? They could have but they did not. They believed her. The land was not empty. It had been claimed by a Jew. It was very clear who belonged and who did not.

As a conciliatory gesture, my grandmother gave them permission to settle on the land bordering hers. Access to water was from her territory and could be done with her consent.

Since that moment they lived side by side, in peace. No violence was necessary, a steadfast Jewish presence was enough.

Today we are approaching the 70^th Independence Day of the State of Israel. We have our own government, clear laws, police, military and courts of law. Israel is a high-tech superpower and, in many ways, a military superpower and yet, we are facing some of the same issues that the Jewish community faced pre-re-establishment.

The politically correct call it “agricultural crime”. Israel’s farmers, especially herders, ranchers are under attack. Marauders steal their equipment and their animals. They sometimes demand “protection money” and when it is not paid farmers find themselves beaten, livestock slaughtered, their barns and fields burned.

The police and court system are incapable or unwilling to put an end to these problems. They are unwilling to admit that these crimes are really agricultural terrorism. Often the damage goes beyond stealing for financial gain, it is to instill fear, to break the will of the farmers, to make them leave. The victims are Jews and the perpetrators Arabs, Israeli citizens - Arabs living in villages near the farmers in Israel’s north, in the south Bedouin.

When Jewish farmers abandon their land because they can no longer keep up the fight for it, the land does not remain empty. The perpetrators move in and claim the land as their own.

The goal is to remove Jews from the land.

Obviously, this is illegal but the State does not have the tools or willpower to deal with the problem.

When Haim Zilberman told his family that they were bankrupt and had to give up the family holding his son Yoel decided that he would not let this happen.

At first Yoel thought he could do it on his own. He knew that the Shomer had guarded and protected the land for the Jewish communities before the State had been re-established. It had been done before, it could be done again.

It quickly became clear that he could not do it alone – but he didn’t have to. Friends and neighbors began showing up, volunteering to help. They announced with their presence: “I am my brother’s keeper. When my brother needs me, I will be there!”

That is how the Shomer Hachadash, the New Shomer, was born.

When the government is not capable of fixing problems, the people of Israel are. This is the spirit of Israel, what founded the country and made her great. This is what Zionism looks like – individuals, banded together, to protect their brothers and sisters, to hold and defend the land that is theirs. This is a love story between a people and their land, a land and her people.

In any love story, it is necessary to be present. To live and breathe together, to touch and be one. This is true of Israel and her people as well.

The Shomer Hachadash began as a way to defend individual farmers and ranchers. It is swiftly becoming a movement for the return to our roots. Israelis feel called to volunteer to help guard farmers and ranchers. Young Israelis feel drawn to the leadership programs the New Shomer has developed.

There is something about touching the land, working the land, sweating and teaching others what they can achieve if they too remember their land, that awakens the heart of our people.

And this is just the beginning.

This is a love story, between a people and their land, between a land and her people. As long as we declare: “I am my brother’s keeper!” NOTHING has the power to rip us apart.

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

Last month, President Trump praised Lebanese prime minister Saad Hariri and Lebanon as a partner in the war on terror. Improbably, he claimed that Lebanon was also fighting against Hezbollah.

Now, Hariri has made his positions clear when he was visited by Iran's Deputy Foreign Minister for Arab and African Affairs Hossein Jaberi Ansari in Beirut.

Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri says the Israeli regime and terrorism are the two dangers currently threatening Lebanon and the entire Middle East.

“Two dangers, namely the Zionist regime of Israel and terrorism, are threatening Lebanon and the region,” Hariri said in a Tuesday meeting with Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister for Arab and African Affairs Hossein Jaberi Ansari in Beirut.
He also conveyed his greetings to Iranian President Hassan Rouhani as well as First Vice-President Es’haq Jahangiri and Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif and expressed the hope that the two countries would further boost mutual ties.
Jaberi Ansari, for his part, echoed Hariri’s remarks concerning the two dangers (Israel and terrorism), and noted, “These two threats can serve as common ground for promotion of Iran-Lebanon ties as well as regional cooperation.”

Hariri's positions are identical to Iran's. There is really no substantive difference between the two countries any more - Lebanon is Western Iran, just with more of a nightlife.

It is actually surprising that with the Arab world turning its back on Qatar for its ties to Iran, we have not seen a similar action against Lebanon which has been effectively an Iranian satellite for years.

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

The Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) issued this statement this week:

Muslims are marking the 48th anniversary of the sad burning of the holy mosque of Al-Aqsa, the first Qibla (prayer direction) of Muslims and the third holiest site in Islam, amid mounting extremist settles’ violations and assault, condoned by the Israeli occupation forces, against the Al-Aqsa.

Muslim media is claiming, as usual, that Israeli "occupation forces" were responsible for the fire set by a deranged Christian.

The policy of judaization and ethnic cleansing practiced by the Israeli occupying power in the city of Al-Quds, against its population and sanctities, is such that it constitutes a breach of the Muslim Ummah’s indelible religious rights and heritage. More than a source of provocation to the feelings of Muslims, an offense to the freedom of worship and a desecration of the sacred places of Islam, these policies and practices are a downright affront to the international law and the relevant international legitimacy resolutions.

Isn't it cute when Muslims invoke international law to protect freedom of worship that they deny everyone else who doesn't submit as second-class citizens?

The OIC's respect for other religions is so huge that they cannot bring themselves to capitalize "judaization."

On this sad occasion, the Organization of Islamic Cooperation reaffirms the central religious and spiritual character of Al-Quds and the place of importance the holy Mosque of Al-Aqsa holds amongst the Muslim community worldwide, stressing that the integrity and sanctity of this city’s holy places can only be maintained if peace and security are established throughout the entire region.

It's equally cute when people who support terrorism against Jews and infidels talk about their vision of peace throughout the region.

The OIC holds Israel, the occupying power, fully responsible for the safety of all the holy places falling under its unjust occupation, pointing out that the international covenants and agreements, particularly the Fourth Geneva Convention, prohibit aggression by the occupying power on houses of worship and provide that free access to these places should be ensured. These international instruments also prevent the occupying power to take such measures as may alter the geographic and demographic status of historical and holy places.

The Fourth Geneva Conventions are very clear that the "occupying power" can do essentially anything necessary to ensure security. Security concerns are of paramount concern. Read them.

... The OIC also calls for a cessation of the ongoing Israeli violations and judaization plans, especially Israel’s attempts to harm the Islamic and Christian holy places in Al-Quds, on top of which is the holy Al-Aqsa Mosque.

And by "harm" they mean "allowing Jews to quietly and respectfully visit."

This statement shows how Muslims have adopted the language of human rights to urge the exact opposite. But most Western observers are too frightened to point this out since, if you accuse Muslim leaders of being anything less than liberal, they might threaten to kill you.

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

08/23 Links Pt2: Phillips: The Canaan falsehood; BBC claims Israel ‘carved out of Palestinian land’; What’s the Matter With Chicago?

From Ian:

Melanie Phillips: The Canaan falsehood

In the “Palestinians’” attempt to rewrite history and claim falsely that they and not the Jews are the indigenous people of the land of Israel, they have taken to claiming they have descended from the Canaanites. Since the Canaanites preceded the ancient Jews’ conquest of the land, that would make the Palestinians the rightful inheritors.
Problem with this claim is that it is utterly ridiculous from all points of view. First off, it means the Palestinians aren’t Arabs. Which they are, by their own lights. Arabs, though, came from Arabia and most certainly were not around in the Biblical land of Israel.
Second, there’s not a shred of evidence that the “Palestinians” were descended from the Canaanites. Nor is there any evidence they descended from any other unified people or tribe, for the simple reason they did not. The immediate forefathers of today’s “Palestinians” either considered themselves southern Syrians or just part of the Arab nation; many others immigrated to pre-Israel Palestine in the first half of the last century from a variety of non-Arab countries. And of course, since the invading Romans tried to erase the Jews’ claim to the land by giving Judea/Israel the meaningless name Palestina, there was never any such people as “the Palestinians”.
The whole Canaanite heritage claim is merely another lie being propagated in order to rewrite the Jews out of their own history and conceal the fact that the Jews are the ONLY people for whom the land of Israel was ever their national kingdom. As Pinchas Inbari says in his JCPA paper Who Are the Palestinians:
“When one looks into what the Palestinians say about themselves, how each family describes its lineage, there is no trace of a ‘Canaanite’ ancestry. Most of the families find their origins in Arab tribes, some of them with Kurdish or Egyptian background, and there are even – by word of mouth – widespread stories of Jewish or Samaritan ancestry. Although one might have expected some effort to adduce a Philistine ancestry, there is almost no such phenomenon.

Evelyn Gordon: A New Book Tries, and Fails, to Understand the West Bank’s Jews

In City on a Hilltop, Sara Yael Hirschhorn seeks to explain Israel’s settler movement, rejecting the common misconception that its members are fanatics uniformly motivated by religious zeal and ferocious nationalism. Nonetheless, writes Evelyn Gordon, Hirschhorn fails to look past her own political assumptions:
[R]eaders emerge from [the book] with no clear understanding of what drives the settlement movement. This isn’t surprising, since Hirschhorn admits in her conclusion that she herself has no such understanding: “After discussions with dozens of Jewish-American immigrants in the occupied territories, I still struggled to understand how they saw themselves and their role within the Israeli settlement enterprise.”
Consequently, she’s produced an entire book about settlers that virtually ignores the twin beliefs at the heart of their enterprise: Israel has a right to be in the territories, whether based on religious and historical ties, international law, or both, and Israel has a need to be there, whether for religious and historical reasons, security ones, or both.
This glaring omission seems to stem largely from her inability to take such beliefs seriously. In one noteworthy example, she writes, “While their religio-historical claims to the Gush Etzion area are highly contentious, many settler activists over the past 50 years have asserted Biblical ties to the region.” But what exactly is contentious about that assertion? No serious person would deny that many significant events in the Bible took place in what is now called the West Bank. . . . One could argue that this doesn’t justify Jews living there today, but if you can’t acknowledge that this area is Judaism’s religious and historical heartland, and that many Jews consequently believe that giving it up would tear the heart out of the Jewish state, you can’t understand a major driver of the settlement movement.

What’s the Matter With Chicago?

Chicago has long been home to one of America’s largest and most thriving Jewish communities, a vibrant and nurturing setting that gave the nation everyone from Saul Bellow to Julius Rosenwald, the founder of Sears.
For the city’s thriving progressive and LGBT Jewish community, Chicago has as much been that cherished home as it has a sheltered harbor offering the freedom to proudly express spirituality right alongside an individual’s political, sexual, or gender identity. Reform synagogues have seen a continual membership growth, which even includes a migration of Conservative Jews.
Yet, over the past 18 months, the city has made headlines for a series of ugly snubs targeting Jewish organizations and individuals, leading many—the city’s Jews first and foremost—to wonder just what’s going on.
The first sign of trouble came on January 22, 2016, at the National LGBTQ Taskforce’s Creating Change Conference. Held at the downtown Chicago Hilton, the event, bringing together gay rights activists of all stripes, included a Shabbat service and reception, held by the Jewish LGBT advocacy organization A Wider Bridge (AWB). To its participants’ shock, the quiet reception turned into a riot both in the corridor outside and in the meeting room when two anti-Zionist activists stormed the stage and chanted slogans like “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free,” denying Israel’s right to exist.

If you were a parent contemplating where to send your child in Israel after high school for a solid Jewish experience, would you send your child to Achvat Amim? The name sounds good, from the little Hebrew you might remember—sounds like the name of a Jewish congregation, a temple. But even if you can’t quite remember what the words mean, the website tells you: Solidarity of the Nations.

Intrigued, you look around the Achvat Amim website and see that one of Achvat Amim’s partners is Masa. Now that’s a name you’ve heard. You go to Google and you find Masa’s about page which states:

“Masa Israel, a public-service organization founded by the Prime Minister’s Office of the Government of Israel, together with The Jewish Agency for Israel, is the leading organization in the long term Israel experience space, and it sets the industry standard.”

Well, you think to yourself, if the Israeli government co-founded Achvat Amim, it must be a good, hearty, Zionist program. You’re pretty much sold, just right on the basis of that. Because you know that everything comes down to money, and you’re pretty sure this means Achvat Amim is receiving funds from the Israeli government. What better endorsement could there be, right?

Hashomer Hatzair

You might not even bother to look into the other Achvat Amim partners, whose names you’ve never heard of. Because once you see it’s got Israeli funding, you’re just not worried enough to dig further. That means you wouldn’t find out, for instance, that the group receives funding from the Marxist socialist Hashomer Hatzair movement with which Achvat Amim founder, Daniel Roth, is associated. Hashomer Hatzair receives funding from, for instance, the Friedrich Ebert Stiftung, affiliated with the Social DemocraticParty (Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands - SPD). This foundation, according to a report by NGO Monitor, “cooperates closely with local partner organizations to jointly develop projects in the spirit of democracy, gender equality and peaceful co-existence.”

Which is why in December 2011, the director of FES’ Jerusalem office, Michael Broning, co-wrote an article with Ghassan Khatib, director of the Ramallah-based Palestinian Government Media Center, entitled, “What about Israeli Rejection,” a rebuttal to an op-ed by two Israeli government oficials: “The Problem is Palestinian Rejectionism.” The rebuttal argued there is no Arab rejection of peace and that Israel is the intransigent party standing in the way of peace. Certainly a problematic position for a foundation funded by the German government, if you see what I mean.

Rabbis for Human Rights

And since you’re not looking further into Achvat Amim’s credentials, you also wouldn’t bother looking into Rabbis for Human Rights, which receives oodles of funding from all the wrong places, including the George Soros-funded New Israel Fund. RHR, while some of us are fighting for Jewish rights in Israel, fights for Arab rights, always at the expense of Jewish rights, and sees the Arabs as supreme. While numerous examples of this ethos exist, here’s one that is particularly vile, culled from an NGO Monitor report:

“Following the March 2011 Itamar massacre, RHR condemned the murders saying, ‘They were of course a violation of the most basic human right, the right to life,’ but quickly went on to demand that the defense office fulfill its ‘obligation to protect Palestinians.’ The Hebrew website contained a one-sentence condemnation followed by four paragraphs detailing the need to defend Palestinians from ‘settler attacks.’”

Hand in Hand: Center for Jewish Arab Education

Another one of Achvat Amim’s partners is Hand in Hand. NGO Monitor mentions this organization in regard to a past lack of transparency over US funding for Israeli and Arab NGO’s. Hand in Hand schools, attended by Jewish and Arab children, received $1.08m from the US government for the 2012-2015 period, using the money to hold such annual events as “Nakba Day” which translates to “Disaster Day” and is celebrated by Arabs the day after Israel's Independence Day (which means they're mourning Israel's independence/existence/that we whupped their butts). NGO Monitor’s report states that “a flyer for a May 14, 2014 event at the Hand in Hand school in Jerusalem, ‘Families Talk about the Nakba,’ features the USAID logo.”

Now imagine little Israeli children being indoctrinated with this sort of false and ugly narrative about their own people. This is an organization partnering with Achvat Amim. Are your older children contemplating this five-month program more or less susceptible to this smear on their own kind, their own nation?

Givat Haviva

Givat Haviva is another partner of Achvat Amim that received hefty US government funding for a two-year joint project Keshev called “Communicating Peace.” NGO Monitor speaks of a USAID-funded Keshev report accusing the Israeli media of, “ignoring the wider context of the story and Israel’s responsibility for the continuation of the conflict.” In a different USAID-sponsored report on the “Free Gaza Flotilla’s” confrontation with the Israeli Navy, Keshev alleged that “the message that the activists tried to present against the policy of blockade [of Gaza]…remained outside the public discourse in Israel.”

Before we delve further into Achvat Amim, it should be noted that Masa has withdrawn funding from Achvat Amim. Of course, you’d never know this from looking at the Achvat Amim website.

If you were a parent wanting to send your child on a trip to Israel, you might still think it a perfectly viable option, based on what appears to be Masa’s imprimatur.

Why did the Jewish Agency/Masa/the Israeli government decide to withdraw funding from Achvat Amim? Because Israel’s Channel 2 did a huge exposé of the program’s illegal activities, which include, oh, entering a closed Israeli military zone and clashing with IDF soldiers. The closed military zone was the site of an illegal Arab outpost that left-wing orgs keep helping the Arabs rebuild and which the IDF keeps dismantling. Like four times. It’s called Sumud.

You can see the whole story of Achvat Amim and the kids fighting with Israeli soldiers here:

Channel 2’s source for the story was Ad Kan, an organization working hard to spread the truth about Israel.

Now losing Masa funding would have to be a big blow to Achvat Amim, since this lost revenue represents $3000 per participant. I wrote to Daniel Roth, director of Achvat Amim to ask him how the withdrawal of funding will affect his program:

Hi Daniel,

I'm writing a piece about Achvat Amim. Can you explain the reason the Israeli government withdrew its funding from your program? How will this affect your program going forward?

What is the cost per participant? Why should a parent send his/her child to your program over others?

I see on your Facebook page a mission statement: Solidarity of Nations - Achvat Amim is a 5 month volunteer experience in Jerusalem that directly engages with the reality of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, based on the core value of self-determination for all peoples.

Question: where, in the opinion of Achvat Amim, are Jews within their rights to have self-determination, meaning in which territory?

Best,

Varda Epstein

In response, I received an out of office email telling me he’d be in on Monday (Nov 21^st). Google told me that Nov 21^st was a Monday in 2016.

I sent a private message to the Facebook page and was told that Daniel would respond to me by email. Which he did, with the text of the lie-filled statement put out by Hashomer Hatzair which I had already seen:

Statement from Hashomer Hatzair on the Solidarity of Nations - Achvat Amim program Participants of the Solidarity of Nations - Achvat Amim program who took part in activities which have been portrayed in a misleading manner, did so independently, during time which was not part of the organized program.

It is important to emphasize that none of them took part in any illegal activity, or any instance of civil disobedience or non-compliance with authorities. Any attempt to assert otherwise is simply incorrect and defamatory.

The safety and security of our participants is our top priority and we take that very seriously.

In light of this situation, we are in active conversation and full cooperation with all of the relevant bodies.

The Achvat Amim program makes a large contribution to Israeli society – the program includes five months of meaningful volunteer work and successfully connects diaspora Jews to Israel.

Why is this statement a lie? Because the Achvat Amim kids entered a closed military zone, which is definitely illegal, and impeded the ability of Israeli soldiers to perform their duties, also illegal. There's footage, documentation, so the statement is silly. Furthermore, the statement didn’t really answer my questions, for instance, how the loss of Masa funding will impact Achvat Amim. Which is what I told him.

He wrote:

Hi Varda,

At this time that statement is all we are putting out.

Thanks sincerely,

Daniel

Meantime, there was something nagging at me, something awfully familiar about the Achvat Amim clash with IDF soldiers in the South Hebron Hills. A quick search confirmed suspicions that the site of the clash was the same as the site of Rabbi David Basior’s confrontation with the IDF, an event my friend Mike Behar had written up HERE. Michael had been incensed that a man serving as the rabbi of the Kadima Reconstructionist Community in Seattle had attacked Israeli soldiers. What kind of rabbi is that? What kind of Jew??

I thought I spotted Basior wearing a white watch cap at around 2:05 in the Channel 2 footage of the clash in Sumud with IDF soldiers. It didn’t surprise me that he might be involved with Achvat Amim. I sent him a private message to confirm, but I already know him: if he doesn’t like a question, he won’t answer it. I know because I initiated a discussion with him after reading Mike’s piece about him.

Basior had come to Israel not only to beat up on Jewish soldiers, but also to protest the treatment of Arabs who were striking for better jail conditions. It’s difficult to wrap one’s mind about a rabbi making all that effort to defend the jail conditions of Arab terrorists. These are men who murdered innocent Jews in the most callous ways possible. How could he want to help them?

What’s WRONG with him?

So I thought I’d see what would happen if I wrote him something sensible that included actual facts about the treatment of these prisoners and what kind of people they are. I wrote:

“I'm told you're a reasonable man. These are not political prisoners. They're terrorists. Their conditions are not terrible: http://www.palwatch.org/main.aspx?fi=157&doc_id=20545”

Basior responded (May 22):

“Hi Varda. I have different information than you and do believe that prisoners demanding humane treatment while in prison is a reasonable request no matter their crimes. And, I do not argue that they are innocent nor should be released. I have not read a list...I am simply commenting, especially while I happened to be in the West Bank at this very moment, how powerful and important the prisoner strike is to millions of Palestinian people who resist everyday occupation. I am glad I have a reputation of being reasonable. Like every Jew, I deplore violence, think it is sometimes called for, and wish for the safety and peacefulness of my people and all those living among us. I do believe ending the occupation is key toward that goal. Happy to talk more and wish you a great day.”

I thought, “Great! I’m going to draw him out and reason with him. Show him the facts.”

I wrote:

“It would be a reasonable request if their conditions were unreasonable. But their conditions are good.

“Certainly better than in any Arab country.

“Did you go to the link I supplied above?

“After we address the prison conditions, I would like to address the issue of occupation with you.”

But he never responded. Did he watch the clip at the link I sent him, showing the glam conditions of Arabs in Israeli prisons? I will never know, I suppose. If he did, what could he have said to that? “I was wrong—I repent”?

Trick photography??? (Those sneaky Israelis, doctoring Arab media.)

And anyway: how can a rabbi see his own people as “occupying” Israel?? Has he not read the bible? How did he manage to receive ordination??

But I digress. I’m supposed to be writing about Achvat Amim. But somehow, if you write about one of these vile organizations that are attempting to wipe out the State of Israel through Jew-washed antisemitism, you end up finding the tentacles of all of the others crawling all over it.

So gross.

Here’s the thing: there’s a reason I wrote this piece. I didn’t come to it on my own. I wrote it because people kept asking me to do so. People like Forest Rain, who has a wonderful column at Elder of Ziyon but doesn’t do this sort of writing. She was appalled that parents might send their kids to Achvat Amim thinking it harmless Jewish fun with a soupçon of social justice thrown in for good measure. She wanted me to get the message out, in English, to American parents who might open their wallets to send young Britney or Ben to Israel, not having a clue that Achvat Amim is a subversive organization that eats its own.

So, if you know any Jewish parents out there with kids of a certain age, please send this along to them. Better yet, tweet and share it on Facebook. We need to get the word out. For the sake of our children.

And the sake of our people.

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

Study: Your Advocacy Is Fine; Others' Advocacy Is 'Special Interest Groups'

Our weekly column from the humor site PreOccupied Territory.

Check out their Facebook page.

Jerusalem, August 22 - New research has given a scientific basis to a venerable assumption in politics, according to which your efforts to further your political goals through contacts and discussions with elected officials are perfectly legitimate, whereas your political adversaries, or other advocates of causes for which you feel no affinity, can be dismissed as "special interest groups."

The study, detailed in the upcoming issue of the journal of the Society Of Letters In Politics, Sociology, Ideology, and Scientific Modalities (SOLIPSISM), examined the nature and effects of when you convey your wishes and goals to political officials versus when people who do not share your goals do so, and concluded that the data support a qualitative distinction between the two phenomena: when you engage in such activity, it represents democratic accountability to the electorate, whereas when others perform functionally identical activities, they represent special interest groups who exploit or harm democratic systems for their own narrow ends.

"It is uncanny," wrote lead author Dr. Sol Arbiter, "how closely our findings match previously untested assumptions. In most cases, researchers expect longtime conventional wisdom, widely-held beliefs, and what we call 'common knowledge' not to stand up to scientific scrutiny, but what we found actually bolsters everyday thinking. It came to us as a quite a surprise."

Arbiter observed that the distinction between your political efforts and those of parties not allied with you obtains no matter what field of endeavor the researchers examined. "There was no statistically significant difference among religious, economic, criminal, legal, commercial, or other issues," he noted. "If you are lobbying - and of course it could never be called lobbying if YOU do it, since that smacks of manipulation and exploitation of the system - for tax breaks for your demographic, that constitutes a fulfillment of the democratic vision of the country's founders. But if someone from another demographic - say, you're secular and they're religious, for example - and they lobby for much the same thing on behalf of their constituency, that constitutes a subversion of the will of the majority and a danger to democracy. This holds true across the spectrum of government activity and regulation."

As a follow-up study, Dr. Arbiter hopes to test the assumption that your level of religious or ideological commitment is just right, whereas those who hold more strongly to the faith or ideology are extremists, and those whose commitment is looser than yours are lacking.

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

08/23 Links Pt1: EU ambassador: 'Israel has much to learn from us in war on terror'; The Medias Lies By Omission

From Ian:

Khaled Abu Toameh: Palestinians: Taking Journalists Hostage

Palestinian journalists have once again fallen victim to the continuing power struggle between the Palestinian Authority (PA), which has jurisdiction over parts of the West Bank, and Hamas, the Islamist movement that is in control of the entire Gaza Strip.
Neither the PA nor Hamas is any champion of human rights, especially freedom of the media. The two parties regularly crack down on their critics, including journalists who do not toe the line or dare to report on issues that are deemed as reflecting negatively on the PA or Hamas.
The past few weeks have been particularly tough for Palestinian journalists. In this period, several journalists found themselves behind bars in PA and Hamas prisons, while others were summoned for interrogation and had to spend hours in interrogation rooms facing and detention centers.
To make matters even worse, a new Cyber Crime Law passed by the PA paves the way for legal measures against Facebook and Twitter users who post critical or unflattering comments about President Abbas and his senior officials. Critics say the law is a grave assault on freedom of expression and it will be used as a tool in the hands of Abbas and his henchmen to silence their critics or throw them into prison. In addition, the PA has blocked more than 20 news websites that are affiliated with Hamas and Mohammed Dahlan, an ousted Fatah leader who has long openly challenged Abbas.
The PA-Hamas war is hardly a secret. The two entities use every available method to bring each other down. Abbas's PA has not hesitated to take extreme measures against the two million Palestinians living in the Gaza Strip. These measures include depriving the Gaza Strip of medical supplies, electricity and fuel, as well as forcing thousands of PA civil servants into early retirement and cutting off salaries to thousands of others.
Hamas's retaliatory capacity towards the PA for these punitive steps is limited -- by Israel. Fortunately for Abbas and the PA, Israel is sitting in the middle between the West Bank and the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip.

Chloe Valdary: Why I Refuse to Avoid White People

In the days since the white supremacists marched into Charlottesville, Va., my Twitter feed has lit up with advice from black pundits, activists and even friends:
“It’s time to stop talking about racism with white people.”
“Whiteness is always protected, even at its worst.”
“Non-racist white people simply don’t exist.”
Lines like these advise black Americans like me to respond to racism largely by avoiding white people. The assumption is that they are racist, even evil, unless they explicitly state and repeatedly prove otherwise.
I found myself thinking about this advice as I walked down Franklin Avenue in Brooklyn this past weekend. I noticed a white person walking her dog. Another listening to his music. And a third having dinner with her friends.
Do all of these people harbor a thinly veiled hatred for me, I wondered? Is there a secret white conspiracy scheming against me? How do I escape all this toxic whiteness I keep hearing about?
I didn’t grow up asking such questions. I was raised in a community in New Orleans where my parents taught me that the beauty of our people’s historical struggle for freedom and equality was that it ultimately spoke to the oneness of all human beings. Sounds of Blackness’s “Africa to America”; Stevie Wonder’s “Songs in the Key of Life”: These were the albums I was raised on. These are what taught me to develop an identity that was secure in itself and which did not require prejudging others.
Though I never heard the words “white privilege” until I got to college, I encountered racism. A college anthropology professor assumed I shouldn’t be held to the same standard as my white peers. I’ve been called a “house slave” for standing up against anti-Semitism. I’ve been called the N-word.
But by and large the violent hatred on display in Virginia couldn’t be further from my personal experiences with white people. Every school I attended in New Orleans was either predominately black or multicultural. So I grew up around black kids and white kids and Hispanic kids and Jewish kids and Muslim kids and Asian kids. I was and still am able to navigate diverse cultural spaces with ease as a black woman — not because I assume that these people aren’t prejudiced toward me, but because if they are, I was raised not to respond in kind.

Netanyahu to Putin: Iran’s Growing Military Presence in Syria Threatens Israel, Middle East and Entire World

At a sit-down in Sochi with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned of a growing risk to international security posed by Iran.
“Iran is increasing its efforts to establish its military foothold in Syria,” Netanyahu said at the meeting, his sixth with the Russian leader in the past two years. “That is dangerous for Israel, the Middle East and, I believe, the whole world. Iran is already in advanced stages of taking over Iraq and Yemen, and in effect it also controls Lebanon.”
The Israeli prime minister continued, “We are all defeating ISIS in a concerted international effort, and that is welcome. What is not welcome is Iran moving in everywhere ISIS moves out. We do not forget for one minute that Iran continues to threaten Israel’s destruction every day; it is arming terrorist organizations and is itself instigating terrorism; and it is developing intercontinental missiles with the goal of arming them with nuclear warheads.”
“For all these reasons, Israel continues to oppose Iran’s entrenchment in Syria, Netanyahu concluded. “We will defend ourselves in any way against this threat and any threat.”

From Mehr News:

TEHRAN, Aug. 23 (MNA) – Iranian Presidential Office’s Committee of Support for the Islamic Revolution of Palestine issued a statement on Tuesday marking the 48th anniversary of arson attack on al-Aqsa Mosque.

“Forty-eight years ago, on August 21, al-Aqsa Mosque, the first Qibla of Muslims and the third holiest shrine in the Islamic world, was set on the fire of anger and historic humiliation of Zionists by an extremist Zionist and many valuable Islamic antiques of the place were destroyed,” reads the opening of a communique released on Tuesday by the Iranian Presidential Office’s Committee of Support for the Islamic Revolution of Palestine, “Since then on, the Zionists’ and extremist Jews’ aggressions and on and off attacks have targeted the first Qibla of Muslims, however, no cry of support for the place is heard.”

“Since 1969 till now, numerous military attacks have been staged against al-Aqsa Mosque by the Zionist regime,” asserted another line of the document, “setting on fire, blocking the entrance gates, hindering the prayers ceremonies of Muslims, holding Jewish rituals at the site, breaking the lock of the main door of the holy place, and so many aggressions are among the desecrating behaviors against the respect of the divine place.”

“The Zionists have used different excuses under the heading of digging operation, conducting destruction operations, and widening or deepening the buildings in the environs of the city, have always sought to impose a Judaized identity upon the holy shrine so far as they have managed so far to divide the Abrahamic venue and convert a big share of the place to synagogue,” underlines the communiqué.

Hey, if Iran already thinks there is a synagogue there, then there is no downside to building one!

(Of course, they are referring to the Western Wall, showing how tolerant these Iranians are of Jews.)

“What is clear is that the Zionist regime has always been seeking to erase the image of al-Aqsa Mosque from the mind of the public and that is why whenever local or international media refer to al-Aqsa Mosque, photos of the Dome of the Rock are shown to obfuscate the recognition of the mosque from the dome and reach their goal,” asserts the document.

As I noted last month, about half of the Google Image searches for "Al Aqsa Mosque" show the Dome of the rock. I didn't realize that the Zionists had so thoroughly infiltrated the Arabic speaking world!

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