Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Tuesday, September 18, 2018

09/18 Links Pt2: Shapiro: Funding for Terror Supporters Supplements Terrorism; Jerusalem police kill terrorist attempting Yom Kippur stabbing attack; Kippur: The forgotten victory

From Ian:

Ben Shapiro: Funding for Terror Supporters Supplements Terrorism

Jabarin’s family has received $3,350 from the Palestinian Authority; if he receives a life sentence, that number will increase to $1.7 million.

No wonder Republicans and the Trump administration have cut off funding to the Palestinian Authority. They should. Cash in the hands of terror supporters merely supplements terrorism rather than undermining it.

That simple truth, though, eludes the international Left.

We’ve been told for decades that American taxpayers ought to sign checks to Palestinian governmental groups in order to minimize violence. Underlying this argument is a simple theory: Terrorism is driven by poverty and despair. Alleviate that poverty and despair, and terrorism ought to disappear quietly. That’s been the prevailing view among left-wing Jewish thinkers for a century; that view has been adopted by the left-wing intelligentsia of the West as well. Simply hand over the cash, and violence will cease. Barack Obama put the idea well in his book Dreams From My Father: “I know, I have seen, the desperation and disorder of the powerless: how it twists the lives of children on the streets of Jakarta or Nairobi . . . how easily they slip into violence and despair.”

But that’s not what drives terrorism. As Jeff Victoroff of the department of neurology and psychiatry at the University of Southern California School of Medicine explained in a comprehensive 2005 Journal of Conflict Resolution study, “Middle Eastern terrorists in the late 1990s and early twenty-first century come from a wider demographic range, including university students, professionals, married men in their late forties, and young women.” A 2001 poll showed that among Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza, support for political violence was higher among professionals than laborers and more common among those with high-school educations than among the illiterate.

Terrorism is driven by ideology. And ideology determines how money is spent. That means that throwing money at the problem of terrorism doesn’t solve the problem — it actually exacerbates it. As former Israeli prime minister Menachem Begin explained regarding the left-wing Jewish Zionist position on regional peace: “Their flight of fancy led them to the delusion that the Arabs would eventually come to terms with us for the sake of their economic progress. What utter nonsense! Ze’ev Jabotinsky [founder of the revisionist Zionist movement] had too much respect for the Arabs to believe they would come to the peace table for the sake of a mess of pottage.”

Signing checks to terrorist regimes simply means funneling cash to terrorists. That’s true of the government of Iran, the Palestinian Authority, Hamas, Hezbollah, or any other terrorist group masquerading as a pseudo-government. No amount of wishing can change the simple fact that terrorism is driven by ideas, not by the pocketbook. But that wishing can turn Westerners into the pocketbook for terrorists.

Jerusalem police kill Palestinian attempting Yom Kippur stabbing attack

A Palestinian attempted to carry out a stabbing attack outside Jerusalem’s Old City on Tuesday evening, and was shot dead by Israeli police, Israeli and Palestinian officials said.

An Israeli police statement reported “an attempted stabbing attack” near Damascus Gate, saying “a police unit at the spot neutralized the suspect,” with the Palestinian Authority’s health ministry saying it was informed of the death of a civilian by gunshots.

According to police the attacker ran at Jewish man and knocked him over onto the ground, he then “continued running toward the police officers while waving a sharp object and trying to harm them.”

The Haaretz website said the man was a 26-year-old from the Qalandiya refugee camp outside Jerusalem, who had been in Israel illegally.

Police did not say if anyone else was harmed in the incident. It occurred just after sunset on Tuesday, as Jews began observing Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish calendar.

“The widespread deployment of police in Jerusalem and their alertness prevented an attack that could have ended with harsh results.,” police said.

09/18 Links Pt1: Phillips: A great and unspeakable evil; Ari Fuld and the Truth About Palestinians; John Kerry Gives the Iranian Theocrats Hope; Hezbollah Ritually Humiliates the UN

From Ian:

Melanie Phillips: A great and unspeakable evil

The kind of people who claim that Israelis living in the disputed territories, such as in the town of Efrat, are “illegal settlers” who have colonised Palestinian land – a lie, since there never was any “Palestinian” land, while law, truth and history entitle the Jews alone to live there. The kind of people who, shamefully and disgustingly, shrug aside the murder of Ari Fuld simply because he lived in Efrat.

His murderer was Khalil Jabarin, a 17 year-old Arab boy. He was but the latest in a string of teenage Arab terrorists who are attacking Israeli Jews. The reason isn’t hard to find: as Palestinian Media Watch observes, they are being incited to hatred and murder of Jews by the Palestinian Authority education system and mass media which tell them that “all Israelis deserve to be killed and that dying while committing a terror attack is ‘the path to excellence and greatness… the great victory’.”

The Arab writer Bassam Tawil links Jabarin’s attack directly to incitement by PA president Mahmoud Abbas who he says has Ari Fuld’s blood on his hands.

“In a speech before the PLO Executive Committee in Ramallah on September 15, Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas repeated the old libel that Israel was planning to establish special Jewish prayer zones inside the Al-Aqsa Mosque.

“…Abbas’s allegation was quickly picked up by several media outlets in the Arab world, the West Bank and Gaza Strip…According to Palestinian terrorist groups, Jabarin decided to murder a Jew in response to Israeli “crimes” against the al Aqsa Mosque in particular and other Islamic holy sites. In other words, the terrorist was influenced by Abbas’s incitement, and this is why he decided to set out on his deadly mission.”

The Palestinian Authority is funded by Britain and other western governments. These governments are therefore indirectly responsible for the incitement to hatred and murder of Jews which is poisoning Arab children’s minds. If Abbas has the blood of murdered Israelis on his hands, Britain and the west have helped dip them in it.

This evening sees the beginning of Yom Kippur when Jews fast to repent and seek forgiveness for their sins. It is a day when, as we pray to be sealed in the book of life, we recall those who were martyred on account of their defence of Judaism. We do so in order to reaffirm, in the face of those who rise in every generation against the Jewish people, the faith that has never wavered despite the savage attempts to destroy us.

To this list of those who were brutally murdered for no other reason than the hatred of Jews by a barbaric world, we will add the name of Ari Fuld. May his memory be for a blessing.

Sohrab Ahmari: Ari Fuld and the Truth About Palestinians

Ari Fuld described himself on Twitter as a marketer and social media consultant “when not defending Israel by exposing the lies and strengthening the truth.” On Sunday, a Palestinian terrorist stabbed Fuld at a shopping mall in Gush Etzion, a settlement south of Jerusalem. The Queens-born father of four died from his wounds, but not before he chased down his assailant and neutralized the threat to other civilians. Fuld thus gave the full measure of devotion to the Jewish people he loved. He was 45.

The episode is a grim reminder of the wisdom and essential justice of the Trump administration’s tough stance on the Palestinians.

Start with the Taylor Force Act. The act, named for another U.S. citizen felled by Palestinian terror, stanched the flow of American taxpayer fund to the Palestinian Authority’s civilian programs. Though it is small consolation to Fuld’s family, Americans can breathe a sigh of relief that they are no longer underwriting the PA slush fund used to pay stipends to the family members of dead, imprisoned, or injured terrorists, like the one who murdered Ari Fuld.

No principle of justice or sound statesmanship requires Washington to spend $200 million—the amount of PA aid funding slashed by the Trump administration last month—on an agency that financially induces the Palestinian people to commit acts of terror. The PA’s terrorism-incentive budget—“pay-to-slay,” as Douglas Feith called it—ranges from $50 million to $350 million annually. Footing even a fraction of that bill is tantamount to the American government subsidizing terrorism against its citizens.

If we don’t pay the Palestinians, the main line of reasoning runs, frustration will lead them to commit still more and bloodier acts of terror. But U.S. assistance to the PA dates to the PA’s founding in the Oslo Accords, and Palestinian terrorists have shed American and Israeli blood through all the years since then. What does it say about Palestinian leaders that they would unleash more terror unless we cross their palms with silver?

Noah Rothman: John Kerry Gives the Iranian Theocrats Hope

It was the blatant subversion of the president’s sole authority to conduct American foreign policy, and the political class received it with fury. It was called “mutinous,” and the conspirators were deemed “traitors” to the Republic. Those who thought “sedition” went too far were still incensed over the breach of protocol and the reckless way in which the president’s mandate was undermined. Yes, times have certainly changed since 2015, when a series of Republican senators signed a letter warning Iran’s theocratic government that the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (aka, the Iran nuclear deal) was built on a foundation of sand.

The outrage that was heaped upon Senate Republicans for freelancing on foreign policy in the final years of Barack Obama’s administration has not been visited upon former Secretary of State John Kerry, though he arguably deserves it. In the publicity tour for his recently published memoir, Kerry confessed to conducting meetings with Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif “three or four times” as a private citizen. When asked by Fox News Channel’s Dana Perino if Kerry had advised his Iranian interlocutor to “wait out” the Trump administration to get a better set of terms from the president’s successor, Kerry did not deny the charge. “I think everybody in the world is sitting around talking about waiting out President Trump,” he said.

Think about that. This is a former secretary of state who all but confirmed that he is actively conducting what the Boston Globe described in May as “shadow diplomacy” designed to preserve not just the Iran deal but all the associated economic relief and security guarantees it provided Tehran. The abrogation of that deal has put new pressure on the Iranians to liberalize domestically, withdraw their support for terrorism, and abandon their provocative weapons development programs—pressures that the deal’s proponents once supported.

“We’ve got Iran on the ropes now,” said former Democratic Sen. Joe Lieberman, “and a meeting between John Kerry and the Iranian foreign minister really sends a message to them that somebody in America who’s important may be trying to revive them and let them wait and be stronger against what the administration is trying to do.” This is absolutely correct because the threat Iran poses to American national security and geopolitical stability is not limited to its nuclear program. The Iranian threat will not be neutralized until it abandons its support for terror and the repression of its people, and that will not end until the Iranian regime is no more.

When people argue about Israel, various words get tossed around. People will talk about "occupation," "disproportionate force" and "apartheid" -- words that have real-world meanings that tend to get lost.

Another word that is increasingly misused is "indigenous."

Here is Ariel Gold of Code Pink, tweeting last month:

Not only does she not apply the word "indigenous" to Jews, but according to her - it is the Arabs who are indigenous to Palestine.

Is she right?

Well, if you ask Saeb Erekat, the chief Palestinian negotiator, he will tell you he is "the proud son of the Canaanites," with a history in Jericho going back some 10,000 years. (hat tip Elder of Ziyon)

Saeb Erekat. Credit British Foreign and Commonwealth Office.
Source: Wikipedia

But let's be serious.

In 1946, the Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry was assembled to examine the political, economic and social conditions in then-Palestine in order to make recommendations on the issue of Jewish immigration and settlement. The committee consulted representatives of both the Arabs and the Jews.

In Chapter VI of their report, the committee presented the Arab side:

Stripped to the bare essentials, the Arab case is based upon the fact that Palestine is a country which the Arabs have occupied for more than a thousand years, and a denial of the Jewish historical claims to Palestine. [emphasis added]

Those were the good old days -- when the Arabs were satisfied just to deny the Jewish ties to the land, without feeling the need to exaggerate their own.

Basically, there are 3 ways that the Arabs could have found their way from Arabia to Judea:

o Invasion, followed by occupation and settling the land
o Conversion of Jews to Islam (which we have already discussed)
o Immigration due to economic problems where they lived and/or economic opportunity in Palestine

But just how many Arabs living in Israel today are descended from the original Arab invaders from the 7th century?

In their article, Whose Palestine? -- a review of Joan Peters book 'From Time Immemorial' -- Erich Isaac and Rael Jean Isaac note:

But not only are the Palestinian Arabs not descendants of Canaanites, it is highly doubtful that more than a very few are even descended from those who settled the country as part of the Arab invasion of the 7th century. For over a thousand years following the Arab conquest, Palestine underwent a series of devastating invasions, followed by massacres of the existing population: Seljuk Turks and Fatimid reconquerors were followed by Crusaders who were followed by waves of Mongol tribes who were followed in turn by Tartars, Mamelukes, Turks, and incessant Bedouin raiders.

They explain further that while various invasions cut down on the number of Arabs descended from those who originally invaded the land, the foreign Arabs who immigrated from abroad during the 18th and 19th centuries, further diluted the original Arab invader population:

o Egyptians arrived in a number of waves, especially from 1832 to 1840.
o  Sudanese successfully pioneered in the swampy marshlands.
o  Tribes of Bedouin came from as far away as Libya to settle on the coastal plain.
o Lebanese Christians resettled abandoned villages in the Galilee
o  Armenians, Syrians, and Turks settled in the coastal towns
o  French expansion in North Africa resulted in waves of refugees immigrating to Palestine
o Many of the followers of the Algerian resistance leader Abd el Kader founded villages in the Galilee
o  Russian expansion into the Caucasus led to the emigration of many of its Muslim peoples (Circassians and Georgians) to Palestine
o  Austrian advance into the Balkans led to the emigration of Bosnian Muslims to Palestine.
o  Turkomans from Russian Central Asia and Kurds also immigrated

By 1931, instead of an Arab population that could trace itself to the 7th century (let alone thousands of years) a census of Palestine listing the birthplaces of the inhabitants of Jerusalem included in addition to Palestine itself: Syria Transjordan, Cyprus, Egypt, Iraq, Yemen, Persia, Turkey, Algeria, Moroco, Trioli, Tunis, Albania, France, Greece, Spain, Great Britain, the USSR, the US, Central and South America and Australia. [See "From Time Immemorial," p.227, quoting Census of Palestine-1931, vol I, Palestine; Part I]

Daniel Pipes quotes from 11the edition of The Encyclopedia Britannica, (1910-1911). The entry on 'Palestine' was written by the Irish archeologist Robert Alexander Stewart Macalister, who also notes that the population of Palestine at the time was anything but homogeneous:

The inhabitants of Palestine are composed of a large number of elements, differing widely in ethnological affinities, language and religion. It may be interesting to mention, as an illustration of their hetereogeneousness, that early in the 20th century a list of no less than 50 languages, spoken in Jerusalem as vernaculars, was there drawn up by a party of men whose various official positions enabled them to possess accurate information on the subject.

Macalister describes the towns:

In each there is primarily a large Arab element...There are very large contingents from the Mediterranean countries, especially Armenia, Greece and Italy, principally engaged in trade. The extraordinary development of Jewish colonization has since 1870 effected a revolution in the balance of population in some parts of the country, notably in Jerusalem.

Pipes summarizes the article:

This overview of Palestine mentions in no less than 20 foreign ethnicities other than the native fellahin (farmers) and the Jews: Assyrian, Persian, Roman, Arabian, Crusader, Nawar, Arabian, Turkic, Armenian, Greek, Italian, Turkoman, Motawila, Kurd, German, Bosnian, Circassian, Sudanese, Algerian, and Samaritan.

In her article Were the Arabs Indigenous to Mandatory Palestine?, Sheree Roth points out the book 'The Rape of Palestine', written by William B. Ziff -- the co-founder of the Ziff-Davis Publishing Company. Published in 1938, Ziff's book notes that the hodgepodge of immigrants in Palestine consisted not only of those fleeing from somewhere or running to Palestine. Sometimes they were imported:

It was always the foreign soldier who was the police power in Palestine. The Tulunides brought in Turks and Negroes. The Fatamids introduced Berbers, Slavs, Greeks, Kurds, and mercenaries of all kinds. The Mamelukes imported legions of Georgians and Circassians. Each monarch for his personal safety relied on great levies of slave warriors. Saladin, hard-pressed by the Crusaders, received one hundred and fifty thousand Persians who were given lands in Galilee and the Sidon district for their services.

Out of this human patch-work of Jews, Arabs, Armenians, Kalmucks, Persians, Crusaders, Tartars, Indians, Ethiopians, Egyptians, Sudanese, Turks, Mongols, Romans, Kharmazians, Greeks, pilgrims, wanderers, ne'er-do-wells and adventurers, invaders, slaves...was formed that hodge-podge of blood and mentality we call today "Levantine."...

Ziff fleshes out the list of immigrants mentioned by Isaac and gives some numbers:

In the fourteenth century, drought caused the immigration into Palestine of eighteen thousand "tents" of Yurate Tartars from the Euphrates. Soon followed twenty thousand Ashiri under Gaza, and four thousand Mongols under Moulai, who occupied the Jordan Valley and settled from Jerusalem south. Kaisaite and Yemenite tribes followed in their trail...

In 1830 the Albanian conqueror Mehemet [Muhammad] Ali colonized Jaffa, Nablus, and Beisan with Egyptian soldiers and their Sudanese allies. Fourteen years later, Lynch estimated the thirteen thousand inhabitants of Jaffa to be composed of eight thousand Turco-Egyptians, four thousand Greeks and Armenians, and one thousand Jews and Maronites. He did not consider that there were any Arabs at all in that city.

One hundred years ago, [Jaffa] had a population of four thousand. Today it holds seventy thousand, overwhelmingly Arab, who are largely descendants of the Egyptians and Ethiopians brought in by the conqueror Ibrahim Pasha [Muhammad Ali's son]. The few thousand Jews who lived here fled during the 1936 riots, abandoning their shops and property.

There are many ways to describe this Arab population -- but indigenous clearly is not one of them.

More importantly, considering the ongoing influx of all those different nationalities and ethnicities, Arab and otherwise, Jewish immigration whether in the 20th century, the 19th century and even earlier is certainly no less valid.

That is even truer considering the indigenous ties Jews have to the land.

According to the UNHCR Resettlement Handbook (2011):

Indigenous groups are descendants of the peoples who inhabited land or territory prior to colonization or the establishment of state borders. They often have strong attachment to their ancestral lands and natural resources, an attribute that can distinguish them from other minority groups. They may also have distinct social. economic and political systems, languages cultures and beliefs. Their right to self-determination has frequently been impeded by subsequent migration of other ethnic groups into the territory where they reside. (p. 201)

There has been a continuous Jewish presence in Palestine. The Jews of Israel today are ultimately descendants of the Jews who lived on the land long before the Arab occupation of Palestine in the 7th century. The strong attachment of Jews to their ancestral lands is well established in terms of their distinct history, culture, sacred places, language and literature. And yes, this right to self-determination was frequently impeded: most recently by the invasion and migration of the Arabs -- and by the Palestinian Arabs today.

In contrast, Palestinian Arab history, culture, sacred places, language and literature are ultimately tied, as is true of all Arabs, to Arabia.

Along those lines, note that in 2007, the United Nations General Assembly passed the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples:

Article 11
1. Indigenous peoples have the right to practise and revitalize their cultural traditions and customs. This includes the right to maintain, protect and develop the
past, present and future manifestations of their cultures, such as archaeological and historical sites, artefacts, designs, ceremonies, technologies and visual and
performing arts and literature.

Article 31
1. Indigenous peoples have the right to maintain, control, protect and develop their cultural heritage, traditional knowledge and traditional cultural expressions, as well as the manifestations of their sciences, technologies and cultures, including human and genetic resources, seeds, medicines, knowledge of the properties of fauna and flora, oral traditions, literatures, designs, sports and traditional games and visual and performing arts. They also have the right to maintain, control, protect and develop their intellectual property over such cultural heritage, traditional knowledge, and traditional cultural expressions.

By all rights, this declaration should apply in full to Israel's indigenous rights.

Instead, we have seen the UN violate its own declaration, for example through UNESCO attempting to usurp the indigenous Jewish ties to Hebron and Jerusalem and the indigenous Jewish connection and right to the Temple Mount.

When the UN decides to get serious about indigenous rights, they should let Israel know.

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.

Honor killing in Gaza - but Western "feminist" critics of Israel remain silent

A Palestinian woman was killed on Tuesday by her father in the southern Gaza Strip town of Khan Younis.

Police spokesman Ayman al-Batniji said that Raeda al-Akhras, 42, was suffocated by her father, Mohammed Salem Al-Akhras, to protect his family's "honor."

There are many such murders of women in the Palestinian controlled areas every year, some explicitly said to be for "honor" and many more where the motivation is not explicitly admitted but invariably the murders are done by male relatives of the victim.

It is hard to imagine a more anti-female crime than honor killings. Yet Western feminists, who are overwhelmingly anti-Israel, will never talk about these crimes.

The notable exception is Phyllis Chesler, the only prominent feminist who is as consistent in her positions about crimes against women in the Middle East as she is about similar crimes in the West. (I read a recent book of hers about this very topic, a collection of articles she has written over the years, and it is amazing how Western media minimizes these crimes even when done in the West by Muslims.)

Why are the other feminists silent?

Apparently, their hate for Israel is so deep that they feel that sacrificing a couple of generations of Palestinian women is a worthwhile trade-off for their unrelenting focus on supposed Israeli crimes.

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 Tamimis confirm that they want Israel destroyed, world still calls them "peace activists"

This tweet from last September from a German journalist says it all:

She's a "peace activist!"

But just in case you are deluded and think that the Tamimis are dreaming of a one state where Jews have equal rights, here comes her aunt Najiah saying that there will be no peace until Palestine takes over all of Israel:

Not that the land will be shared between Arabs and Jews - but it is only Arab land.

That is the "peace" that the world is pushing when it publishes puff pieces on the Tamimis, like this piece by France24 yesterday and another by Financial Times.

By calling any Palestinian who does not directly call for suicide bombings "peaceful," the liberal world press is guilty of racism against Palestinians by giving them such a low bar to clear to be praised. It's like praising a pit bull for not tearing out anyone's throat.

Zionists aren't the ones who are dehumanizing Palestinians; it is the world that expects them to be violent and is pleasantly surprised when some of them pretend not to support bombing pizza shops - even though they still support the people who do.

(h/t Petra)

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.

09/17 Links Pt2: Phillips: Dual loyalty taunt? Israel slandered? So what’s new?; The Palestinian Authority has already sent NIS 12,000 to the family of Ari Fuld's murderer

From Ian:

Melanie Phillips: Dual loyalty taunt? Israel slandered? So what’s new?

Within hours of the Labour party giving its members wriggle room to defame Israel without any pushback, posters appeared on central London bus-shelters slandering Israel as a “a racist endeavour”.

The virus of left-wing antisemitism is out of control. Why is anyone surprised? None of this is new. Jeremy Corbyn may have made the poison more toxic but he didn’t release it. He is rather its most malevolent symptom.

I first experienced this in 1982. Colleagues implied that my real country wasn’t Britain but Israel. At the time, I’d never even been there and never wanted to go. All I’d done was stick up for it against the lies and blood-libels.

For that, I was instantly pigeon-holed as not fully British. During the following years, Jewish defenders of Israel like me were accused of dual loyalty.

So why was anyone surprised when Corbyn suggested that British Jews who supported Israel were a breed apart who couldn’t understand English irony?

Over the past few decades, Israel has been the victim of a campaign of demonisation and delegitimisation of a kind directed at no other country, people or cause.

Every accusation hurled at it is untrue. Displaced the indigenous people of the land: untrue. Acts illegally: untrue. Racist, apartheid, colonialist state: untrue. Disproportionately aggressive: untrue. Contemptuous of the lives of innocent Palestinians: untrue.

To these obscene falsehoods and more from the left, others have shrugged or, worse, nodded along. Even now, it’s not the lies about Israel that are provoking such horror. It’s the stuff about hook-nosed bankers or Jewish conspiracy theories or Jewish fascists.

Shocking and vile indeed. But this loathing of Jews is umbilically connected to loathing of Israel.

NGO Monitor: UN and Government Officials Attend Antisemitic “Artwork” Display in Khan al-Ahmar

On August 2, 2018, a number of UN and European government officials attended an event that included a virulently antisemitic artwork display in the Area C encampment of Khan al-Ahmar.

Attendees included UNICEF-oPt’s Special Representative Genevieve Boutin; UNESCO’s Ramallah Office Senior Program Officer Sonia Ezam; Head of Mission at South Africa’s Representative Office in the State of Palestine Ashraf Suliman; the Representative of Norway to Palestine Hilde Haraldstad; and representatives from the German government’s development agency, the UK, and Italy’s Vento di Terra.

The event was hosted by the PA’s “Colonization and Wall Resistance Commission.”

None of the UN or government officials walked out or expressed their protest about such overt antisemitism.

On September 7, 2018, Makor Rishon published an article exposing the event and its attendees. The article includes the following statement from UNICEF:

“Ms. Boutin visited Khan al-Ahmar many times and expressed her concern about the right to security and equality in education for 170 children aged 6-15 from this village and the environment in which they study. Ms. Boutin was invited to a concert held by children from the village at the invitation of the Minister of Education. However, before entering the concert in the village, Ms. Boutin was asked instead to accompany the inauguration of an art exhibition which she was not aware of before her arrival. Ms. Boutin’s impression was that the art exhibition was shocking and very inappropriate, especially because this exhibition was presented in close proximity to the school, and children should be protected from violence and not exposed to violent representatives or messages that promote hatred and intolerance”.

The failure of the government and UN officials to vigorously and publically condemn this incident stands in sharp contrast to claimed human rights agendas.

Ali al-Amoudi, writing in UAE newspaper Al Ittihad, says that this year's confluence of the New Years of three major religions portends good possibilities for tolerance:

The past few days have witnessed the beginning of a new Hijri year, a new Hebrew year, a new Ethiopian Orthodox year, and in stable communities of followers of the three heavenly religions, touching the splendor and beauty of tolerance and good coexistence.

In our region, for the past forty years, many societies suffer from terrorism, extremism and violence, fueled by sectarian tendencies, since the establishment of the Tehran mullahs, in which they found the greatest support. We witnessed the sectarian epidemic in Iraq, Syria and Lebanon and when they tried to export it to Bahrain, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, their terrorist schemes failed.

Today in brotherly Yemen, people suffer from the horrors of the Houthi militias, a coup d'état of Iran, after it turned on the project of building the new federal state agreed by the Yemenis in their national dialogue...

The Houthi coupists began their alliance with the "mullahs of Tehran" and their stronghold in Sa'ada to systematically expel the Jewish community. They launched a brutal war of extermination against their Sunni compatriots in Marran, rupturing the fabric of hundreds of years of coexistence and tolerance.

The article does not mention the word "Israel," but some Arabs are concerned that this article is a precursor to better relations between the UAE and Israel.

In a report that could be regarded as a prelude to what is to come, especially after the reports that revealed a great rapprochement between Abu Dhabi and Tel Aviv, Al-Ittihad claimed that the Hebrew year that coincided with the new Hijri year is an example of tolerance and coexistence.

Observers confirmed that the report included normalization values with the occupation state when promoting it as a model of coexistence and tolerance. It is far from that, not because it occupies another people or territory, it oppresses the Palestinians, but because Tel Aviv is an entity based on racism and discrimination among Jews themselves Where Ashkenazi Jews are "Westerners" and Sephardic "Oriental" Jews.

The response article goes on to say how racist Israel is, of course. Yet the original article didn't even imply that Israel was tolerant.

Just the idea of saying that Jews should be tolerated is so radioactive in the Arab world that anyone who espouses that tolerance is automatically labeled a Zionist.

Which, incidentally, is proof that Arab anti-Zionism really is antisemitism.

It should be pointed out that in this case, it is entirely possible that the state-controlled UAE media really was trying to soften up its people to the idea of tolerating Israel as well as Jews as allies in its conflict with Iran.

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.

It was a morning like any other here in Israel, the day that Ari was taken from us. A blue, cloudless sky, a cup of coffee, Facebook. The making of lists, the folding of laundry, punching the clock at work. You cannot know when you wake up, the nature of the day, the evil it holds, and the holiness.

Until you know. Until the family Whatsapp pings: “Everyone ok? Pigua tzomet hagush* 2 injured.”

Telling your heart to be still, you think: “My husband.”

You do a head count.

Then you know it’s not your family, and the wondering begins. Who is it?

And it comes to you. You don’t know why and you push it away, the knowledge. But somehow you know. It’s Ari Fuld.

There is no reason to think it. No reason this particular name comes to you. You don’t know why you know, but you do.

(Later a friend tells me she had the same premonition. “I had the same premonition but refused to voice my suspicion. Instead I sent text messages to him that went unanswered and kept watching the 'last seen at 11:02' line, hoping it would change.”)

Maybe I knew because always, the best of us are taken. Because whom else would God take like that, a holy martyr, but the best of the best?

And so it had to be Ari, a voice of truth in a great wilderness of evil. Whom else would evil want to still, squelch, silence, but Ari? Which meant that it was never his broad, strong back that presented itself as a target, but goodness and light, the truth.

After the fact, many spoke of conspiracy, of targeted assassination. But I know in my heart it was not. The Ari I knew would never have left himself open like that for so long. It was meant to be, a cosmic battle.

Now it might seem to some that evil won, because Ari was taken from us in a cruel and horrible way. And they aren’t wrong. A terrible evil was unleashed, a precious gem fitting only for the King’s crown stolen by blood-sullied hands.

But at the moment the awful news filtered down to our nation, a greater force was unleashed, our nation was seized with the knowledge of Ari’s holiness, his purpose, and we were as one!

Those of us who chose to be as one.

A Kfar Etzion family set out a drinks table, knowing that the thousands who walked from all over to say goodbye to Ari, might get thirsty along the way.

And there are many of us.

Ari would tell you, if he were here, that the forces of evil are great in our day, but while our numbers are smaller, our impact is greater, more important. And you can know it with your heart when you see the tidal wave of grief that has swept through our nation. You know it at midnight as an orderly crowd sings quiet songs of faith as one, brought together in a pine-scented space in the land Ari loved, he the Lion of Judah, us now the inheritor of his torch, to light the way of truth, to never give up.

To always love the land and own it, and know deep down that God gave it only to us. To know that we are the stewards of this land and that each and every one of us has a responsibility to know this truth deep in our hearts.

Ari would want us to finally glean the takeaway: The land is ours if we earn it and it is our duty to claim it at every juncture and never weaken, to never give an inch. Not of land and not of ideology.

Because this is important work: the most important work there is. And it’s all about the truth and seeing the truth, fighting for the truth in all its colors and clarity, a sparkling brilliant thing.

Ari taught us that the truth and the land are things to love. And the simple truth is that this beautiful land is ours and always will be. The truth won last night, as Ari found his final resting place where his bones and flesh would nourish the land he loved, and become one with it.

Ari is now part of our land and our truth. And we will carry him with us always as we fight the forces of evil and keep desperate hold of what we are destined to hold and cherish. Ari lit the way for us, made the path so clear, so simple. He fought with knowledge and with truth, and when push came to shove, with his hands and feet and a weapon of cold steel.

We too, must be ready to fight with everything we’ve got. No matter what we’re called to do. No matter what situation or evil ensnarls us, surrounds us, confronts us.

The truth is all that matters. Ari knew that and he knew what he had to do. He was always encouraging others to fight the fight in their own way, with their own special God-given tools.

It was never about him, what he did, who he was. It was all for our nation, our people, our land. A single thread of truth connecting all these strands. That’s who Ari was.

And when we lost him, we gained the knowledge of just how holy he was, and the nature of his work as it had been all along. Last night looking at the thousands who came to say goodbye to Ari, I knew it and felt it: along with the great cloak of sadness that descended on our people, a bright light of faith and holiness shone through. We knew as one what we had lost, a national tragedy, and in our hearts, all of us pledged faithfulness to God and to the way before us.

Ari had been stolen from us, but the impact of his cruel, tragic murder had lit the way, revealing how he’d lived his life and left a hero, a shining star to guide us, always there.

Forever.

Yehi zichro baruch.

*Terror attack at the Gush Etzion Junction

(Video: Calgary United with Israel (CUWI) Edit: Igal Hecht)

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.

09/17 Links Pt1: Glick: Ari Fuld, A Fighter for Israel in Life and Death; Mahmoud Abbas: Fresh American Blood on His Hands; Palestinians admit boy who died in border clash not killed by IDF fire

From Ian:

Mahmoud Abbas: Fresh American Blood on His Hands

In a speech before the PLO Executive Committee in Ramallah on September 15, Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas repeated the old libel that Israel was planning to establish special Jewish prayer zones inside the Al-Aqsa Mosque. Abbas claimed that Israel was seeking to copy the example of the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron, where Jews and Muslims pray in different sections.

Abbas did not say what his lie was based on. He also did [not] provide any evidence of Israel’s ostensible plot against the Al-Aqsa Mosque . . .

Hours after reports were published of Abbas’s allegation, a 17-year-old Palestinian from the town of Yatta in the southern West Bank fatally stabbed Ari Fuld, a 45-year-old Israeli-American citizen and father of four, in a shopping center in Gush Etzion, south of Bethlehem.

According to Palestinian terrorist groups, the terrorist, Khalil Jabarin, decided to murder a Jew in response to Israeli “crimes” against the Al-Aqsa Mosque in particular and Islamic holy sites in general.

In other words, the terrorist was influenced by Abbas’s incitement, and this is why he decided to set out on his deadly mission. There is no doubt that the terrorist saw the reports quoting Abbas’s claim that Israel was planning to allow Jews to pray inside the Al-Aqsa Mosque.

PMW: PA says teenage killer who murdered Israeli was victim

Yesterday, a Palestinian teenager, Khalil Jabarin, stabbed and murdered Israeli Ari Fuld in the parking lot of a supermarket. Before succumbing to his wounds, Fuld, together with another civilian, shot and wounded Jabarin, which led to his capture.

Today, the PA is portraying terrorist murderer Jabarin as a victim of an unprovoked Israeli shooting. The headline in the official PA daily indicated that he had not even attacked anyone:

Headline: "The shooting and wounding of the boy Khalil Jabarin, and his arrest claiming that he killed a settler next to 'Etzion'"

The report continued to insinuate this, stating that Jabarin "stabbed a settler according to the Israeli occupation's version," and even accused Israel of neglecting the injured terrorist, claiming he was "left bleeding on the ground for more than 20 minutes":

"The boy Jabarin was wounded by a number of bullets fired by the occupation's soldiers (sic., by two Israeli civilians, one of whom Jabarin had just stabbed and mortally wounded) next to the '[Gush] Etzion' Junction, and this was after he stabbed a settler according to the Israeli occupation's version. He was left bleeding on the ground for more than 20 minutes, and then was transferred to the hospital. Jabarin is an 11th grade student in a science study track."
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Sept. 17, 2018]

This is a typical example of the PA's modus operandi whenever a terrorist is killed or injured while committing a terror attack. The PA routinely describes Israel's self-defense measures to stop the terrorist as an attack on the Palestinian terrorist who is portrayed as an innocent "victim." Palestinian Media Watch reported extensively on this PA tactic during the terror wave in 2015/16, when the PA and Fatah claimed that the many terrorists committing stabbing attacks were "innocent" victims.

PMW: Cleric on PA TV: Israelis like "rats burrow under the ground" of Al Aqsa

A Palestinian cleric compared Israelis to rats, claiming Israel is excavating under the Al-Aqsa Mosque like "rats burrow under the ground only for evil and destruction." He also stated, in the interview on official Palestinian Authority TV, that due to Israel's digs the mosque has "no foundations now":

Sheikh Raed Da'na from the Religious Source of Authority in Jerusalem: "The blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque has no foundations now... Al-Aqsa is now empty of the rocks and that which supports it, due to the Israeli machine that is excavating under it (sic., Israel does not excavate under the Temple Mount), as rats burrow under the ground only for evil and destruction." [Official PA TV, Topic of the Day, July 23, 2018]

This statement is just one in an endless stream of false accusations by Palestinian leaders that the Al-Aqsa Mosque is "in danger" and that Israel is carrying out a deliberate plan to destroy it. At times, PA leaders have intensified the repetition of this libel in order to ignite fury among Palestinians and urge them to use violence and carry out terror attacks against Israelis. This was the case before and during the terror waves in 2014 and 2015/16 in which dozens of Israelis were murdered and hundreds wounded.

Therefore it is not surprising that Hamas was quick to justify yesterday's murder of Israeli Ari Fuld by a Palestinian teenager with the alleged "danger" to Al-Aqsa. Hamas presented "the heroic operation" as a reaction to Israel's "harming Al-Aqsa":
"While blessing this heroic operation, we emphasize that harming the Al-Aqsa Mosque is a red line, and that this operation is a response to warnings regarding the danger of what the occupation is currently doing, and what it intends to do at the Al-Aqsa Mosque." [Donia Al-Watan, independent Palestinian news agency, Sept. 16, 2018]

For decades, Palestinian leaders have alleged that Israel is destroying the mosque, and it is not the first time Palestinians have referred to Israel as rats or mice eating away at the foundations of the mosque.

I’ve always been curious whether certain words create their own power or simply draw upon the power of that which they describe. The term “Holocaust,” which starts with soft vowels implying vastness and ends with knife-sharp consonants, seems like it would be evocative regardless of what it describes. Yet once this term came into general use to describe the Nazi’s extermination of European Jewry, it drew upon the massiveness of that event, eventually pushing out other terms (some foreign like “Shoah,” some euphemistic such as “Final Solution” – a simple phrase which itself can mean only one thing to today’s ears) to become synonymous with history’s most horrific crime.

Fights over the term simply demonstrate its unique power to move people emotionally. As horrific, vast and mind-numbing as other historic mass murders have been (such as the Armenian genocide, which many see as an historic “warm up” for other 20^th century ethnic exterminations), there is a reason we describe these as the “Armenian Holocaust,” the “Rwandan Holocaust,” etc., rather than describing the Shoah as the “Armenian genocide of the Jews.”

“Apartheid,” meaning “separateness”, resonates as a word, even to those unfamiliar with the Dutch dialect used by South Africa’s white Afrikaans population, implying as it does the English terms “Apart” and “Hate.” And yet the ugliness of the system it describes, a form of mass racial discrimination masquerading under formal legalism, certainly contributes to this term becoming synonymous with bigotry as state policy.

As with the term “Holocaust,” there are legitimate fights over whether the term “Apartheid” belongs to the world, or just to those who experienced the original phenomenon. Anyone looking over the past century will see enough political murder and racism to shake their faith in humanity. But are all murders of any scale a “Holocaust,” and is all institutionalized bigotry a variant on “Apartheid?” Many (but by no means all) Jews and South Africans would argue that by allowing these terms to be used to describe anything remotely smacking of large-scale killing or racism, one is not universalizing them but draining them of any meaning whatsoever.

In the cauldron of debate over the Middle East, arguments over the use or misuse of these terms are particularly acute. While some attempts have been made to describe the Palestinian experience as a new “Holocaust,” this runs into a problem when you realize that, unlike other historic genocides, the Palestinian population has skyrocketed since Israel’s birth (especially in the disputed/occupied territories that are supposed to be serving as stand-ins for Hitler’s concentration camps).

“Apartheid” is by far the more frequent term of abuse hurled at the Jewish state for its alleged “crimes.” Thus the barrier built to stop mass bombing campaigns originating from the West Bank is not a fence, a wall or even “the New Berlin Wall,” but the “Apartheid Wall.” Jimmy Carter’s book “Peace Not Apartheid” has basically been translated to the single phrase: “Jimmy Carter says Israel is an Apartheid State,” (even if the author himself has tried to weasel out of the implication of his chosen title).

Web sites with names like “It Is Apartheid” are dedicated solely to the purpose of making Israel synonymous with Apartheid South Africa (especially in the mind of people too young to remember the original), with BDS itself simply a component of a wider “Apartheid Strategy” whose practitioners believe that by replacing the term “Israel” with “Apartheid Israel” in all of their communication and correspondence they can, over time, turn their preferred version of reality into common wisdom.

But who gets to draw boundaries around where the term “Apartheid” is used, even in debate over the Middle East? Some supporters of Israel have responded to the “Israel Apartheid” slur by charging Israel’s accusers of practicing, supporting or ignoring crimes of “Gender Apartheid,” “Sexual Apartheid” and “Religious Apartheid” within the wider Arab world. And unlike some of the more fanciful charges against the Jewish state, repression of women, homosexuals and religious minorities by Israel’s neighbors is undisputable.

But who gets to decide if they are all variations on “Apartheid?” If enough people started using the phrase “Apartheid Saudi Arabia,” “Apartheid Syria” or “Apartheid Gaza” in their daily communication, does that legitimize an accusation masquerading as a descriptive phrase (a la “Apartheid Israel”)?

This is why the involvement of South Africa and South Africans in this debate is so significant. Absent the ability to characterize the Middle East conflict in Apartheid terms, it becomes a less charged (and, as an aside, potentially more solvable) political dispute. That being the case, is it as clear as BDS advocates would like everyone to believe that South Africans who participated in the fight against the original Apartheid see the Arab-Israel conflict in the same terms as their own struggle?

To be continued…

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.

A new website was launched last week, called Palestine Is Here.

The purpose?

Palestine is Here, a project of Researching the American-Israeli Alliance (RAIA), is a database tracking Israeli military ties to American local government, police departments, corporations, and academic institutions. Using simple search algorithms to help activists expose the connections between American and Israeli state violence in their communities, the database works to support direct grassroots organizing to end US militarized trainings, academic collaborations, and technological exchanges with Israel.

RAIA is a bit more forthcoming about supporting BDS and destroying the Jewish state via "right of return" and its cynical use of "intersectionality" to build an alliance of people who hate Israel:

RAIA is a research initiative launched in 2017 dedicated to exposing the connections between American and Israeli state violence. Our work is grounded in the conviction that the ongoing dispossession and oppression of the Palestinian people undermines the possibility of a viable homeland for both Palestinians and Israelis. Embracing the 2005 Palestinian call for Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) against Israel until Israel ends its Occupation, grants full equality to its Palestinian citizens, and honors the Palestinian right of return, RAIA is committed to conducting research for the movement for justice in Palestine in the United States....RAIA seeks to raise awareness of the close collaboration between the Israeli and American governments to displace, surveil, and control communities of color and other marginalized populations in order to suppress popular resistance.

The head of RAIA is a known and proven anti-Zionist Israeli Eran Efrati, formerly of Breaking the Silence and ICAHD. I revealed him to be an absolute liar a couple of years ago when he claimed, ludicrously, that religious Jews encouraged children to set fires to and urinate on, carpets in the second-holiest place in Judaism while it was packed with worshipers.

The Palestine is Here site is another in a long series of well-organized initiatives meant to turn the very word "Israel" into a viscerally horrifying term. There is nothing wrong with US police attending seminars given by Israelis, which is the "crime" that the site is most concerned with now. As I've pointed out before, each US police department is responsible for its own rules of engagement, and taking a seminar in Israel doesn't make them change their policies.

So far the site has listed over 250 US law enforcement groups that have had some exposure to Israeli teachers.

The funny thing is that when I read their entries, I'm generally quite proud of the things that RAIA wants us to think is abhorrent. For example here is much of the database entry on the Colorado State Patrol, not exactly an organization known for violence against minorities:

The State Patrol of Colorado is among the departments that have sent delegates to Israel. The Colorado State Patrol has sent at least 2 officials to train in Israel. James M. Wolfinbarger served as Chief of the Colorado State Patrol between 2009 and 2013. Scott Hernandez served as Chief of the Colorado State Patrol between 2013 and 2017. Chief James M. Wolfinbarger attended a training in Israel in 2009 with the ADL as a delegate of the NCTS. Chief Scott Hernandez attended an NCTS training in Israel with the ADL in 2015.
Chief Scott Hernandez’s training includes briefings by senior commanders in the Israeli police, military, intelligence and other security units. Chief Wolfinbarger’s training includes meetings with Israeli Brigadier Generals, police commanders and local government leaders, with visits to Israeli army command centers and holy sites. James Wolfinbarger is now in the private security sector, working as a Real-Time Crime Center (RTCC) Solutions Consultant at ŽMotorola Solutions, which supports command centers and fusion centers with technology and predictive policing. According to the ACLU, fusion centers can employ officials from federal, state and local law enforcement and homeland security agencies, as well as other state and local government entities, the federal intelligence community, the military and even private companies, to spy on Americans in virtually complete secrecy.
One of the private companies that transfer technology to police departments is the Israel-based Cellebrite. Cellebrite is a “mobile forensics” firm that manufactures data extraction, transfer and analysis devices for cellular phones and mobile devices for law enforcement, military and intelligence, and corporate customers.
Colorado State Patrol is one of the departments that uses Israeli private-sector technology. Colorado State Patrol spent $26,216 to crack into phones using Israeli tech firm Cellebrite, according to public record requests by Motherboard. California Highway Patrol uses Cellebrite’s technology to bypass phone passwords and security mechanisms to retrieve call logs, text messages, and in some cases even deleted data.
The way information moves in Israel is much more fluid than it is here. They have a remarkable exchange of information between all levels of government and private industry… [T]hat’s something we can build on here.” ~ Chief Wolfinbarger on the advanced collaboration between the Israeli private industry and Israeli government in “counter-terrorism” and how the ADL helped them start thinking about how to apply these techniques in their local police departments.
This trip forges ˜forever relationships… [that] range from friendships to opportunities to discuss and share ideas on what we want to change in our particular work settings. ~ Chief Scott Hernandez

There is nothing that is illegal, immoral or even problematic in the slightest. Law enforcement is allowed to try to read information on the cell phones of suspects. It is allowed to listen to how other law enforcement agencies work.

"Palestine is Here" is a sick attempt to blame Israel to domestic US problems with the aim of ensuring that stupid liberals will link hating Israel, the most liberal state in the Middle East and one that can claim in many ways to be more liberal than many Western European democracies, with all the causes they hold dear.

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.

Abbas angry at the murder of Ari Fuld HY"D? Oh, please.

Times of Israel reports:

ToI’s Adam Rasgon reports that even PA President Mahmoud Abbas was “visibly angry” about the attack, telling a group of former Israeli lawmakers that he condemns violence after bringing up the stabbing at the beginning of a meeting in Ramallah, according to former minister Yossi Beilin, an architect of the Oslo Accords who was at the meeting.

Wonderful! Abbas is supposedly "visibly angry" at a terror attack! Peace is at hand!

Except that nowhere in Arab media is this supposed anger reported.

The official Wafa news agency didn't report on Ari Fuld's murder, but it reported on his shooting his murderer:

Bethlehem, 16-9-2018 (WAFA) - Israeli occupation forces on Sunday beat Khalil Yousef Ali Jabarin, 17, from Yatta village, south of Hebron, on the pretext that he was trying to carry out a stabbing near the Asion junction south of Bethlehem.
Security sources confirmed to our correspondent that the boy Jabarin was wounded and described as moderate.

The Fatah Facebook page showed a photo of Ari Fuld in front of an Israeli flag and an old photo of him in uniform, describing him as a "settler" killed in an "operation," which is as much justification of murdering him as one can find in the Arab world.

Fatah is led by the supposedly "visibly angry" Abbas.

However, the Fatah Facebook page - in trying to show that Fuld was a staunch Zionist and settler who deserved to be murdered - reproduced a video Fuld made in Jerusalem.

This video is as good an obituary as one can find for Ari Fuld. It shows his passion for Israel and for spreading the truth.

Fatah, in a backhanded way, has proven the difference between good and evil.

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.