Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Monday, December 31, 2018

12/31 Links Pt2: The good side of 2018; David Collier: 2018 and Antisemitism, a year in review; The Intellectual Dishonesty of 'I’m Just Criticizing Israel'

From Ian:

JPost Editorial: The good side of 2018

Newspapers tend to be in the business of bad news far more than good news. “If it bleeds, it leads” is a well-known adage. The downside is we often forget how good things are. Between rockets from Gaza, terrorist attacks, corruption, murder and whatever else makes headlines most days, there are plenty of great events happening in Israel and the world each day. Here is some news from 2018 to remind us all to see the glass as half-full, as the secular year comes to a close.

Netta Barzilai became an international name and a national hero, after she and her chicken sounds brought Israel to its fourth Eurovision victory, the first in 20 years, bringing Israelis to the streets to celebrate and sing “I’m Not Your Toy.”

Netta was part of another major good news story in 2018: the first-ever official visit to Israel by a member of the British royal family, Prince William. This year, a prince and Superman – OK, actor Dean Cain, who played Superman on TV – visited Israel.

Beyond visiting royalty, this was a banner year for Israel’s foreign relations. Our ties expanded throughout the Middle East, with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visiting Oman and other ministers jetsetting around the Persian Gulf. By Netanyahu’s count, 300 senior foreign dignitaries – presidents, prime ministers, foreign ministers, senators and leading parliamentarians – visited Israel this year.

Israeli disaster-relief experts helped people around the world. Israelis provided aid in California, Puerto Rico and Guatemala, where Sara Netanyahu was personally invited by the president’s wife to dedicate the efforts. In Thailand, emergency mobile communication technology developed by Israeli company Maxtech Networks played a key role in rescuing the youth soccer team trapped in a flooded cave, whose survival and rescue captured the world’s attention.

The US recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and moved its embassy. We didn’t need them to tell us. It’s our eternal capital and has been that way for millennia, but it’s nice to get recognition. And US Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley championed Israel repeatedly in that den of wolves.

David Collier: 2018 and Antisemitism, a year in review

To look back on antisemitism in 2018, I have split the year into calendar months, with each example representing a different element of the global battlefield.

I remember the end of 2017 as being part of a lonely battle. In November I recorded that there were 176 anti-Israel events taking place in the UK in a single month. By year-end we were just a handful shouting about the Labour Party and Jeremy Corbyn, but few seemed to be listening. I didn’t realise back then, how much things were about to change.

January 2018 – Alison Chabloz
2018 Alison Chabloz2018 began just as 2017 ended, with me sitting amongst neo-Nazis and far-left antisemites. On January 10 2018 I was in court, for the early stages of the Alison Chabloz trial. Chabloz is a far-right Jew-baiter, a woman who composes songs that ridicule and deny the Holocaust. To add that extra dose of ‘spiteful’, Chabloz sets the lyrics to classic Jewish folk tunes.

Her journey to the court-room was a long one and this case highlights the difficulty of actually bringing even the most odious haters to justice.

Sitting amongst neo-Nazis in the gallery, people who cheered to songs about the Holocaust, was a very lonely place to be. Yet by the end of 2018, I was almost never alone. One of the greatest changes that occurred in 2018, was the ‘waking up’ of the Jewish community (along with their friends).

In May, Chabloz was found guilty. She was sentenced in June.

The Intellectual Dishonesty of 'I’m Just Criticizing Israel'

The playbook exploited by Marc Lamont Hill and countless other anti-Israel activists ranging from Linda Sarsour to Jimmy Carter, to former Pink Floyd front man, Roger Waters, is the following:

Step 1: Fabricate a non-existent Israeli law or policy, that, if real, would constitute a colossal human rights violation. Don’t be afraid to be dramatic. Ethnic cleansing has a real ring to it. And always remember to be as vague as possible. Use broad terms and generalizations, making your claims harder to challenge on specific grounds.

Step 2: Next, feign outrage about the existence of this newly concocted law, and justify any acts of terrorism against Israel under the guise of “resistance” against this law you just invented.

Step 3: If anyone points out that what you’re saying lacks any smidgeon of truth, simply reply, “I am just criticizing the Israeli government! Are you a fascist? Am I not allowed to criticize Israeli government policies?”

It goes without saying that criticism of Israel’s government is as kosher as criticism of any country’s government. The only catch is the criticism hinges on the issue under scrutiny being real. It requires specific criticism, aimed at an existing law or practice. Conversely, what borders on bigotry is blithely fabricating non-existent laws or practices — like, Israel’s perpetration of ethnic cleansing — and using them to undermine Israel’s existence. Self-avowed “critics” of Israel who are derided as addled anti-Semites exclusively focus their ire on laws they themselves imagine into existence. Not for the betterment of the Palestinian Arabs, but for the belittling of Israel.

Daily Freier losing ground to hot new satire site called “The Forward” (satire)

With 2018 drawing to a close, the Daily Freier reviewed its web traffic numbers and discovered that it has been consistently losing market share to a hot new competitor in the “Goofy Jewish Satire” niche market that calls itself “The Forward”. This wacky blog has popped up out of nowhere it appears, and is consistently putting out material that is funnier and more nuts than anything the Daily Freier has managed to produce. So did the Daily Freier just give up? Heck No! We put together a focus group! Yes, the Daily Freier gathered a focus group of Jews: Young and Old. Gay, Straight, and the Israeli guy who you think is Gay but ends up trying to hook up with your girlfriend. Reform, Conservative, Conservadox, Dati, Haredi, and Masorti. Americans, Canuckians, and…. Well you get the point. And if you think this comes cheap, then you haven’t purchased bagels and coffee recently, thank you very much. So anyhoo, we put a bunch of Jews in a room with copies of the Forward downloaded onto Kindles and stealthily recorded their reactions. Like that movie with Sigourney Weaver and the Gorillas. Except the Daily Freier was Sigourney Weaver. Let’s call it “Hebrews in the Mist“. So where were we? Oh yeah, the Focus Group. They LOVED the Forward! But don’t take our word for it, check out some of their reactions below!

“Hey, check this one out!” exclaimed “Married North Jersey Dentist” to the other people sitting at his table. “No, You Can’t Be A Feminist And A Zionist“, by Mariam Barghouti! You know, this might be the funniest thing produced by a Barghouti since Marwan invented the “Hunger Strike with Designated Snack Breaks” last year!“

“OK OK you need to see this!” giggled “Canadian-Israeli Woman” as she took a break from showing everyone pictures of her dogs. “It’s called ‘Lay Off Linda Sarsour’. I know! Linda! The woman who said that there is nothing creepier than Zionism! And accused Jews of secretly controlling America. Yes! her! So anyways, the article says that Jews only criticize Linda because they’re racists! Amazing! ……What’s that you say? It would be funnier if they also threw in some random stuff about Trump? Well say no more. They did that too!”

Know How to Answer #4 - "Israel expelled 700,000 Arabs in 1948"

Nearly six years ago I gave a lecture at Yeshiva University on how to answer anti-Israel arguments. Since the lecture was over an hour and twenty minutes, I decided to break it up into 20 sections, one each to answer one popular anti-Israel argument.

Here's part 4.

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12/31 Links Pt1: Palestinian-American sentenced to life in prison by PA for selling properties to Jews; srael, U.S. slated to leave UNESCO today to protest anti-Israel bias

From Ian:

Ten New York Times Journalists Accuse Israel of ‘Possibly a War Crime’

The Times article concludes by claiming that Najjar “has become a symbol, perhaps not of what either side had hoped, but of a hopeless, endless conflict and the lives it wastes.”

That’s a dodge, because the gist of the rest of the piece is that it’s not the “conflict” that killed her, but an Israeli sniper, in what was “possibly a war crime.” And now, thanks to the work of at least ten Times journalists and whatever editors decided to set them loose on this story and to give it prominent play, her life isn’t a “waste,” but rather has become a valuable propaganda tool for the Palestinian Arabs, who can now use her death to depict Israel to the Times audience as reckless murderers, and Israelis as war criminals, or at least “possibly” war criminals.

None of this is to say that the Israeli troops defending the border with Gaza performed perfectly, or that there isn’t room for journalism that can help Israel do a better job at it going forward. No human is perfect. US police and American troops accidentally kill people, too, and Palestinian Arab terrorists intentionally kill people. For whatever reason, though, the Times has decided that this Gaza death is worth the time of ten journalists and three pages of the Sunday newspaper, while the death of an Israeli American, Ari Fuld, wasn’t deemed fit to print by the Times at all.

If one were to take a Timesian approach, one would write it with a question headline: “Times Pays More Attention To a Palestinian Death Than to an Israeli American One. Was It an Accident?” And then one would weasel around the issue: “the Times journalism appears to have been careless at best, and possibly a blood libel.” But I’ll reject that approach and be more direct and forthright. The New York Times “investigation,” for all its dignified trappings, is just the same old Israel-bashing you can get for free on any extreme right or extreme left Internet site or social media feed. Save yourself the time and the money and the heartburn and skip it.

After damning report, IDF says it is probing killing of Gazan medic in June

The Israeli military on Sunday responded to a New York Times report that questioned its use of live fire in an incident along the Gaza border on June 1, in which a Palestinian medic, 21, was killed when a soldier fired into a crowd of protesters.

The IDF said the army’s internal investigations body is “probing to clarify the reasons behind the death of Razan al-Najjar. The results of the investigation will be sent to the military advocate general upon their completion.”

For its investigation, The Times analyzed over 1,000 photographs and videos of the incident, interviewed over 30 eyewitnesses, spoke to Israeli and Palestinian officials and ballistics experts, and worked with the Israeli-run company Forensic Architecture to build a 3D rendering of the shooting, which also integrated drone and cellphone footage.

“The bullet that killed her, The Times found, was fired by an Israeli sniper into a crowd that included white-coated medics in plain view. A detailed reconstruction, stitched together from hundreds of crowd-sourced videos and photographs, shows that neither the medics nor anyone around them posed any apparent threat of violence to Israeli personnel,” it said.

“Though Israel later admitted her killing was unintentional, the shooting appears to have been reckless at best, and possibly a war crime, for which no one has yet been punished,” the report added.

According to The Times, the bullet that killed Najjar also injured two other medics.

Too Big to Fail? How UNRWA Fails the Palestinians — and the World

To the consternation of many, the US government will no longer provide $350 million a year to the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), and the Trump administration says that it may cut more money for Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Some analysts and pundits claim that this decision will cause more hardship and violence in Gaza and the West Bank, and plunge other areas of the Middle East into unrest. This is unlikely to occur.

The prophets of UNRWA’s impending doom underestimate its political usefulness. UNRWA, which was founded in 1949, is simply too valuable a political asset to fail. Its existence guarantees that Palestinian refugees and the contested right of return remain a generational and prioritized political fixture in international fora. Consequently, Arab and other states use the demise of the Palestinians to generate political capital by lambasting Israel for its subjugation of the Palestinians, and for instigating a “humanitarian disaster” in the Gaza Strip.

These states have a vested political interest in UNRWA, and there are already early indications that the EU, Ireland, Jordan, and Germany will pledge further support to make up for the current budgetary pitfall.

Much of UNRWA’s and its backers’ achievement in generating this political capital derives from their strategic interest to maintain the Palestinian right of return, and the Palestinian refugee, on the international political agenda. Former Commissioner-General to UNRWA Karen Abu-Zayed has stated that “Palestine refugees are the focus of the Agency’s thinking, planning and activities. Promoting their interests as individuals with rights and entitlements under international law and ensuring their well-being and long-term human development are the engines that will continue to drive all aspects of UNRWA’s activities.”

What is surprising is how UNRWA has ingeniously manipulated commonly accepted international humanitarian law and the 1951 UNHCR Convention definitions of a refugee. Why? Because by changing the definition of a Palestinian refugee, they have ensured that the Palestinian refugee issue can never be solved. This has turned UNRWA’s original temporary relief mandate into a quasi-governmental and permanent political fixture in the West Bank and Gaza.

More trouble in the Gaza paradise as Hamas arrests hundreds of Fatah members

According to Palestinian media, some 500 members of Fatah were arrested in Gaza over the past day.

Apparently, Hamas doesn't want to see a major celebration of the 54th anniversary of Fatah's first terror attack, on January 1, 1965.

But why should arrests of hundreds of Palestinians be newsworthy? When Israel can't be blamed, it is just another Monday.

Here is the official Fatah video celebrating the anniversary. It isn't exactly peaceful.

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One of the themes of this site is that Palestinian leaders aren't interested in building a state, but in destroying one.

One of the biggest proofs for this can be seen in the annual statistics of the Palestinian Authority presented today.

42% of all "Palestinians who live in the State of Palestine" - their words - are "refugees."

If they are Palestinians and live in the "State of Palestine" then how can they be considered "refugees?"

That's over 2 million people who live in their own country but are counted, by the UN as well, as being "refugees." And they get free medical services and housing and schooling, paid for by the world, even though they should be treated exactly as any other Palestinian Arab under the PA.

Because they don't want to live in "Palestine" but to move to Israel where they can make it another Arab state.

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IfNotNow's fabulous self-own

If Not Now tweeted this graphic:

So the original name for the areas is meant to erase the history of the one that came thousands of years afterwards.

Beyond the stupidity of that assertion, the West Bank is a Jordanian name, not a Palestinian name. (The term was not consistently capitalized until after the Six Day War.)

Even the UN referred to Judea and Samaria when talking about the area, e.g., the UN partition plan of 1947 saying "The boundary of the hill country of Samaria and Judea starts on the Jordan River at the Wadi Malih south-east of Beisan..."

The format of this infographic indicates that IfNotNow has an entire series of them that they were planning to tweet daily. But the derision they have received for this one may make them bury the rest of them. Too bad! Debunking them is one of my new favorite hobbies.

I'm still hoping against hope that they say that the name you should use is Al Quds instead of Jerusalem.

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Did you miss the angry protests on the Kuwaiti citizenship law decision?

From Arab Times Online:

KUWAIT CITY, Dec 27: The parliamentary Interior and Defense Committee on Thursday rejected the proposal to grant Kuwaiti citizenship to non-Muslims in accordance with Article Two of the Constitution which stipulates: “The religion of the State is Islam and Islamic law shall be the main source of legislation.”

The Legal and Legislative Affairs Committee previously approved the proposal on grounds that the Nationality Law contravenes Article 29 of the Constitution stating, “People are equal in human dignity, public rights and obligations before the law.

There shall be no differentiation between them due to race, origin, language or religion.” The committee then referred the proposal to its interior and defense counterpart.

Interior and Defense Committee Chairman MP Askar Al-Enizi confirmed that Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Interior Lieutenant General Sheikh Khaled Al-Jarrah attended the meeting, during which he voiced the government’s rejection of the proposal on the same grounds while noting that this situation is similar to what happened in the 1981 National Assembly.

I must have missed all the angry op-eds and embassy protests over the past few days about this racist law from outraged Westerners who care deeply about injustice in the world.

(h/t Andrew)

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Know How to Answer #3: "Zionists always intended to ethnically cleanse Arabs"

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12/30 Links: After massive investigation, NY Times concludes Israel did not intentionally shoot Gaza medic; Hamas at 31: As Committed as Ever to Israel’s Destruction

From Ian:

Ruthie Blum: Ill-Boding News for Israel’s Enemies

Netanyahu’s and Norkin’s words were not only directed at the new group of fighter pilots tasked with keeping Iran and its terrorist proxy, Hezbollah, from attempting to annihilate the Jewish state. The joint message was also aimed at Tehran, Damascus, Beirut, and Moscow.

The verbal warning was as clear as Tuesday night’s military one: that Trump’s exit from the region does not signal the onset of Israeli defeatism. If anything, it bodes even more ill for Israel’s enemies.

One indication that those enemies are getting the picture is Syria’s response to the airstrikes. This took the form of a letter of lament to the United Nations, stating that “Israel’s continuous aggressive policy is possible due to the unlimited and consistent support of the American administration.”

Ironically, the Syrian Foreign Ministry lodged this complaint on Wednesday, just around the time that Trump was paying a surprise visit to US troops in Iraq. There he explained why he will be withdrawing all American soldiers from Syria and half from Afghanistan, yet leaving those stationed in Iraq where they are. He intimated that having a US presence in Iraq would serve as a bulwark against Iran, while also enabling a swift ground re-entry into Syria, if necessary, or airstrikes from the very base where he was addressing the troops.

Coming as it did on the heels of Israeli military actions, Trump’s statement was the only encouraging communication about the Middle East to emerge from the White House in the past week. That the administration in Washington did not issue a statement about Tuesday night’s IAF raid indicates tacit American approval, if not outright coordination.

JPost Editorial: How will Trump's address in Iraq effect Israel?

This dovetails with Trump’s Iraq visit. The US President could have made this part of a larger trip, going to Baghdad and Erbil to meet essential Iraqi leaders, and then to Turkey, the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Israel to show that the US may be leaving Syria, but the US is not leaving the Middle East. Instead this visit was a US-only visit. It took place in Iraq, but at a US airbase. Therefore it was designed for a domestic American audience, but the Middle East paid close attention to Trump’s words.

Trump said ISIS was mostly defeated, and that the US would remain in Iraq to prevent a resurgence. “We are putting America first for the first time in a long time,” Trump said, arguing that the US would no longer be suckers, paying for foreign wars. He said the Syria conflict demands a political solution, and that Saudi Arabia and Turkey might be part of that. He argued that the US would withdraw in an orderly manner from Syria “while maintaining US presence in Iraq to prevent ISIS resurgence and protect US interests, and also to always watch very closely over any reformation of ISIS and also to watch over Iran. We’ll be watching,” Trump said.

The comments about Iran are part of a larger US policy that began with Trump’s decision to quit the Iran nuclear deal and continued with sanctions applied this fall, particularly in November. However Iran appears to be on a charm offensive in the region. Its president was recently in Turkey, and it is working with Ankara and Moscow to form a constitution committee for Syria. It also attended the Doha Forum. In each instance, Iran seeks to show that it is an influential country, and it pairs its visits with jibes at Israel. Recent comments by Turkey’s president against Israel, even comparing Israeli actions against the Palestinians to the Holocaust, paired with Iran’s comments and Russia’s criticism, show that Israel may be in for rough sailing ahead. Israel has improved some relations in the Gulf but Turkey and Iran are two of the most important and powerful countries and economies in the region. The warmth their leaders show is a threat to Israel, as is Iran’s presence in Syria and its growing influence in Iraq. Confabs like the Doha Forum also isolate Israel as Jerusalem has no presence at them, even as Qatar still claims to play a positive role in the peace process.

Now is the time to have a serious conversation with the US about its Middle East strategy. Trump wants to put America first. The US is increasing its defense budget which is good for Israel because of defense connections between Israel and the US. But a reduced US presence in the region is not helpful in the long term.

Hamas at 31: As Committed as Ever to Israel’s Destruction

Making no effort to disguise its ultimate goal of establishing a Palestinian state on Israel’s ruins in the entirety of what was once Mandatory Palestine, or its categorical rejection of the idea of Jewish statehood, Hamas draws comfort from the deafening aloofness of the international community to its genocidal vision and activities.

Thus, for example, the glaring failure of the UN to condemn Hamas’ countless war crimes over the years — be they firing missiles and rockets at Israeli civilian population centers, or straightforward terror attacks — has reinforced the organization’s belief that its terrorist actions are considered legitimate by the international community and carried out according to the “rules of the game.”

Hamas is keenly aware that the schism between the West Bank and the Gaza Strip complicates its ability to pursue its strategic goals, and Haniyeh’s statement criticizes Fatah for undermining the attainment of national reconciliation that will enable Palestinians to resist the “Zionist occupation.” In Hamas’ view, Zionist machinations against the Palestinians continue apace, including “the Judaization of Jerusalem and the West Bank, the killing of hundreds of Palestinians, the wounding of thousands, and the incarceration of still other thousands.” By way of countering this “aggression,” the statement boasts, Hamas has carried out numerous “acts of resistance,” including “dozens of shooting operations as well as hundreds of stabbing, car ramming, and Molotov cocktail attacks that killed and wounded the enemy. This is how we continue the resistance.”

Haniyeh concludes his statement by reiterating the main precepts of Hamas’ vision, notably the establishment of a Palestinian state with all of Jerusalem as its capital, the continuation of “armed resistance” against Israel, and the rejection of the Jewish right to statehood. On its 31st anniversary, Hamas thus remains as committed as ever to its genocidal worldview: “Jihad is jihad. Either we triumph or die as martyrs.”

Tourism in Israel smashes records

Times of Israel reports:

Israel welcomed some four million tourists over the course of 2018, breaking a new record, the Tourism Ministry reported this week.

This year saw an increase in tourist arrivals of 13 percent compared to 2017, and 38% compared to 2016, while tourism revenue exceeded NIS 24 billion ($6.3 billion), according to the ministry.

I found the statistics from previous years and the rise in tourism is stunning:

You can see the impact that BDS has had on tourism!

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Philip Weiss of Mondoweiss writes an essay about the joys of celebrating Christmas with his Christian wife, and how proud he is of the IfNotNow members who disrupt Birthright tours, and then:

Over the years, some Christians have said to me, Stop thinking that you’re Jewish, it’s neurotic. But I’ve not been able to do that, or anyway I never tried. I don’t like the entitlement and the Israel lobby, but I believe in tribe, and at some level I clearly love my group and thank it for cultivating traits I cherish, reading and intellectual detachment. A good number of my closest friends are Jewish, and I am taking Hebrew for the first time in 50 years, so as to study what the supremacists say in Israel.

My Judaism is anti-Zionism. That’s the spiritual challenge that has propelled me and this site. My social/political identity is Jewish; and my Jewish chore is clear. Being Jewish means helping to free my group and the world of the historic trauma that generated religious nationalism and all its evils.

Needless to say, there is nothing Jewish about Phil Weiss.

His entire spiritual and religious existence is centered on hating Israel. So much so that when he finally decides to learn Hebrew it is not to connect to the rich Hebrew literature that has been the backbone of Western civilization - but to attack Jews.

He is a believer - but his belief system is not Judaism. Philip Weiss' religion, loosely defined, is hate. It is the opposition to Jewish nationalism, Jewish self determination and Jewish pride.

It is laughable that he claims to have intellectual detachment. When every single article he writes is a crazed attack on Israel - which is no worse than any other country, and better than most, especially given the circumstances of being in a state of war for 70 years - you can be sure that there is no intellectual honesty nor detachment from Weiss. His own words, calling his anti-Israel crusade "spiritual," contradicts his smug pretense of intellectualism.

It is almost pitiful that Weiss feels that he must call his bizarre, perverted belief system his "Judaism." He is not willing to throw away his Jewish identity just yet. Maybe he clings to his pretense of Jewishness in order to give moral authority to his anti-Israel screeds, or he really has a "pintele yid" that nags him about his obsession with destroying the Jewish state.

Let me absolve him of that nagging.

Phil, there is nothing Jewish about you besides for perhaps your nose. There is no Jewish philosophy you can point to over two thousand years that remotely resembles what you absurdly call your "Judaism." Your own worldview is based on the negative - negating religious Jewishness, negating Israel, negating Jewish heritage. It is enshrining hate. There is nothing positive you bring to the table. The things you claim to love about Judaism are plentiful among Christians, atheists and others.

Don't pretend to be Jewish any more. Accepting the truth that you are a vicious hater will set you free to attack Jews and Israel with all your spiritual might.

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From The Forward:

Manny’s, a new business in San Francisco’s Mission District, is part cafe, part bookstore, part political event hall. Owner Manny Yekutiel, a 29-year-old rising star in the world of liberal political organizing, calls it a “civic social gathering space.”

It’s hosted incoming House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, San Francisco Mayor London Breed, activists with Black Lives Matter — and on the sidewalk outside, protesters upset because Yekutiel is a “Zionist gentrifer.”

“Zionists out of the Mission!” one marcher yelled on Wednesday, Dec. 26, as about 20 members of the Lucy Parsons Project and allied groups gathered outside Manny’s.

The self-described “radical black queer direction action group,” named for an early 20th century Latina anarcho-communist labor organizer, has protested at Manny’s every Wednesday this month, and says it will continue protesting every Wednesday until Manny’s is “shut down.” The Project only has about 300 Twitter followers, but among the protest’s supporters is a local rapper, Equipto, with 14,500 followers.

This reporter tweeted at the Lucy Parsons Project on Thursday asking for an interview and was promptly blocked. (The group tweeted on Dec. 21, “We Proudly Block all Zionists.”)

None of the events at Manny’s have concerned the Middle East. Instead, the protesters are targeting Yekutiel for his personal support for the existence of the Jewish state.

The Lucy Parsons Project claims that Yekutiel is furthering gentrification in their neighborhood and criticized him for posting things like “Happy 70th Birthday Israel!” and “I am so proud of Israel and its people” on his personal Facebook page. They also wrote that he is “pinkwashing and blackfacing his gentrification and Zionism” by bringing in minority and LGBT guest speakers. (Yekutiel is also gay.)

Yekutiel is renting his space from the Mission Housing Development Corporation, a local not-for-profit affordable housing development company that owns the 28-unit family apartment building that the ground-floor commercial space is attached to. “100% of [Manny’s] rent goes back into the building, and pays for residential and community services,” Mission Housing executive director Sam Moss told the Forward.

The 5,000 residents across the Mission Housing system also get to go to Manny’s events for free and get discounts on food. Moss said the neighborhood is safer now that Manny’s has replaced the failing restaurant that used to occupy the space.

The protesters have claimed that “no one in the poor/working class brown community asked him to open this gentrifier space.” But according to Moss, that’s not true. More than a dozen neighborhood community leaders came to him gushing about Yekutiel before Moss met him for the first time, he said.

Here is the first tweet from the Lucy Parsons Project laying out their reasons for protesting Manny's:

Today our group had an action against Manny's a Zionist pro-gentrification pro-tech and worst of all "pro-dialogue" liberal hell-space at 3092 16th. st Read our attached statement and join us in boycotting Manny and driving that gentrifying tool out of SF!!!!✊🏿✊🏿✊🏿 pic.twitter.com/sS22wwtAIv
— LucyParsonsProject (@LucyParsonsProj) November 16, 2018

There have been other more recent tweets about "gentrifier Zionists" and "Zionist gentrifiers:"

Come out Tonight and every week Wed. at 6:30pm to help our comrades at Black and Brown run this gentrifier Zionist Manny (Emmanuel Yekutiel) the fuck out of San Francisco!!!✊🏾✊🏾✊🏾 https://t.co/LH13imCgpv
— LucyParsonsProject (@LucyParsonsProj) December 13, 2018

The emphasis on "Zionist gentrifiers" shows that this isn't about Zionism or gentrification - but about Manny being a Jew. (Other tweets call Manny's a "settler outpost" in San Francisco.)

The Lucy Parsons Project also consistently refers to white people as "mayonnaise."

While prominent liberals are embracing Manny's and ignoring the protests, one wonders if they will call out the protesters for what they are: black racists and antisemites.

Or are they too afraid to do that given that the only bigots here happen to be gay and black, and it is too frightening to attack those who win on "oppression" points?

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12/29 Links: The elephants of antisemitism in the European room; Why do prominent black anti-Semites get a pass?; IDF strikes Hamas post following rocket fire

From Ian:

Melanie Phillips: The elephants of antisemitism in the European room

These progressives overwhelmingly link antisemitism to attitudes they consider to be “right-wing”, anti-Muslim or anti-immigrant. Accordingly, their chief European bogeyman is Hungary’s prime minister Viktor Orban. He is widely deemed to be antisemitic, largely because of his campaign against the Hungarian Jewish financier and proponent of open borders, George Soros, and Islamophobic because of his policy of keeping Muslims out of Hungary.

Yet the countries where the survey’s respondents said antisemitism had increased “a little” or “a lot” were the United Kingdom, Germany, Italy and Sweden (increases of 24, 21, 14 and 11 percentage points respectively over the past six years). By contrast, in Hungary the share of respondents actually decreased (by 21 percentage points).

In Germany, Sweden and the United Kingdom, the share of respondents who said they had considered leaving the country due to antisemitism increased by 19, 17 and 11 percentage points respectively. In Hungary, the share went down by eight percentage points.

More than 70 per cent of respondents in France, Belgium, Germany and the Netherlands considered expressions of hostility to Jews in the street and other public spaces a “very big” or “fairly big” problem; but fewer than half of Jews in Poland, Hungary and Denmark expressed such concern.

These three countries have all taken harsh measures to restrict Muslim immigration and activity. Coincidence?

The resurgence of antisemitism in the west is a symptom that it is in existential trouble. The evidence of just how much trouble it is in is that so many in the west fail correctly to diagnose it.

At a time when anti-Semitism is on the rise, why do prominent black anti-Semites get a pass?

If anything, you’d think that black Americans might choose to walk a mile in Jews’ shoes. The two ethnicities, after all, share a common bond of persecution.

Yet, as conservative commentator Larry Elder, himself a black man, pointed out in 2002, a survey commissioned by the Anti-Defamation League “found blacks three to four times more likely than non-blacks to be anti-Semitic.” He continued:

Black Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney, D-Ga., urges America to rethink its support of Israel. Reverend Jesse Jackson, who once called Jews “Hymie” and New York City “Hymie-town,” now demands that George Bush ensure the safety of Palestinian Authority leader Yasser Arafat.
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Trending: The first liberal vulture circles, slams Ruth Bader Ginsburg for not resigning before now

The Nation of Islam’s Louis Farrakhan recently likened the “plight” of black Americans to that of the Palestinians, noting blacks “were in the same position.” Farrakhan also exaggerates the Jewish role in slavery, and once called Hitler a “great man” and Judaism a “gutter religion.”

This was before anyone had heard of Barack Obama, a student of critical race theory whose admitted mentor was a devoutly anti-Semitic preacher. None of this of course prevented him from being sworn in as the nation’s forty-fourth president.

All of which leads back to the title question of this post, which arose for me following the recent publication in the the New York Times’s Sunday Book Review of an interview with Pulitzer Prize-winning author Alice Walker.

Douglas Murray: UK Welcomes Extremists, Bans Critics of Extremists

In November, it was reported that the Pakistani Christian mother of five, Asia Bibi, was unlikely to be offered asylum by the British government due to concerns about "community" relations in the UK. What this means is that the UK government was worried that Muslims of Pakistani origin in Britain may object to the presence in the UK of a Christian woman who has spent most of the last decade on death row in Pakistan, before being officially declared innocent of a trumped-up charge of "blasphemy".

One person who has had no trouble being in London is Dr Ataollah Mohajerani, Iran's former Minister of Culture and Islamic Guidance. Mohajerani is best known for his book-length defence of the Ayatollah Khomeini's fatwa against the British novelist Salman Rushdie.

This week we learned that the UK government has allowed in a man called Brahim Belkaid, a 41-year old of German origin, believed to have inspired up to 140 people to join al-Qaeda and ISIS. His Facebook messages have included messages with bullets and a sword on them saying, "Jihad: the Only Solution".

It is almost as though the UK government has decided that while extremist clerics can only rarely be banned, critics of such clerics can be banned with ease. The problem is that the trend for taking a laxer view of extremists than of their critics keeps on happening.

Jordanians upset their prime minister DIDN'T step on an Israeli flag

Arutz-7 reports:

Israel's Foreign Ministry lodged a protest after Jordan's Information Minister and Government Spokeswoman Jumana Ghunaimat was seen stepping on an Israeli flag.

Ghunaimat had trampled on the Israeli flag during a visit to Amman's trade union headquarters, where a Jordanian government meeting was held.

The trade union headquarters in Jordan stuck an Israeli flag at the entrance to its offices, inviting passersby to step on it on their way inside, a deep insult in the Arab world.

Prime Minister Omar al-Razaz entered the road through a side entrance, thus avoiding the Israeli flag.

More than one minister, as well as the mayor of Amman, deliberately stepped on the Israeli flag painted on the floor.

Al-Razaz's decision to avoid stepping on the Israeli flag has angered Jordanians. Here he is going in through the side door.

Members of the trade union and Jordanian media were upset at their leaders that allowed Al-Razaz to enter through the side door, wanting them to force him to publicly renounce Jordan's ties with Israel.

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12/28 Links Pt2: What if the Six-Day War never took place?; What Bret Stephens Missed About Trump and Israel; Pallywood Rears Its Ugly Head Again

From Ian:

Dr. Martin Sherman: Palestine: What if the Six-Day War never took place?

If the “West Bank” was part of the “Hashemite Kingdom” up to 1967, how did it suddenly become the Palestinian Arabs’ long-yearned-for homeland which, up until then, they were submissively willing to cede to an alien potentate?

Not since the time of Dr. Goebels [Head of the Nazi Propaganda Machine] has there ever been a case in which continual repetition of a lie has born such great fruits...Of all the Palestinian lies, there is no lie greater or more crushing than that which calls for the establishment of a separate Palestinian Arab state in the 'West Bank'... - From “Palestinian Lies” in Ha’aretz, 30-7-76, by former far-Left Meretz Education Minister, Prof. Amnon Rubinstein.

As the new elections approach, the “Palestinian problem” is once again likely to dominate much of the inter-(and intra-) party debate. In many ways this debate is entirely superfluous. After all, a simple mental experiment will suffice to strip away the veil of mendacity shrouding the Palestinian Arab grievances against Israel.

Imagine for a moment…

To demonstrate this, imagine for a moment that the 1967 Six Day War, in which several Arab armies marshalled their forces with the undisguised intention to annihilate Israel, never took place. Imagine that Israel had not been compelled to launch a preemptive strike in self-defense to thwart the Arabs’ openly proclaimed aim of total genocide that resulted in it taking over Judea-Samaria (a.k.a. the “West Bank”)—which the Palestinian Arabs now contend is their long-yearned for homeland.

Then ask yourself: If that war had not occurred, where would “Palestine” be?

What Bret Stephens Missed About Trump and Israel

Trump, Stephens complains, “shows no interest in pushing Russia out of Syria. He has neither articulated nor pursued any coherent strategy for pushing Iran out of Syria. He has all but invited Turkey to interfere in Syria. He has done nothing to prevent Iran from continuing to arm Hezbollah. He shows no regard for the Kurds. His fatuous response to Saudi Arabia’s murder of Jamal Khashoggi is that we’re getting a lot of money from the Saudis.”

Then Stephens asks, “Is any of this good for Israel?” And answers, “if you think that the ultimate long-term threat to Israel is the resurgence of isolationism in the U.S. and a return to the geopolitics of every nation for itself, the answer is more emphatically no.”

Stephens could be right that Trump’s limited pullback, if not full retreat, from the liberal internationalism or “Democratic realism” of some prior administration could be bad for Israel. But there’s a counterargument that Stephens doesn’t mention, let alone rebut, and that is worth considering.

That counterargument is two-pronged.

First, one of the original, profound, and inspiring ideas of Zionism had to do with Jewish self-reliance. The Jewish state would defend itself with its own foreign policy and armed forces, rather than existing at the mercy of, or under the protection of, some foreign colonial power. This is better for the Jews, in part because no matter how closely allied or powerful some foreign country, even America, may seem, in the end those powers have other interests that rank higher than the survival of the Jews. Better for Israel to realize that and act accordingly than to operate under some illusion — a delusion, really — of an American security umbrella. Those of us who have opposed the idea, raised from time to time, of American troops on the Golan Heights or in the Jordan Valley should be similarly skeptical of deploying American troops in Syria for the sake of Israel’s security.

Caroline Glick: Why should Israelis vote if their vote is meaningless?

If, as widely anticipated, Netanyahu and the Likud win in April, he will need to form a coalition with several smaller parties. Although Likud’s natural coalition partners in the right-wing and religious parties have stated that they will join a coalition with Likud even if Netanyahu is indicted, those parties together are polling fewer than 61 mandates out of a total of 120.

If this remains the case after the elections, then to form a government, Netanyahu will need to bring in populist or left-leaning parties. And the leaders of populist parties and center-left parties have signaled or stated outright that they will not join a coalition with Netanyahu if he is indicted.

In other words, by dangling the Netanyahu probes over the heads of politicians like a sword of Damocles, Mandelblit is effectively threatening to nullify the results of the elections if the public doesn’t vote as he and his fellow attorneys wish.

And so we return to the European ambassador’s dim assessment of the European parliament. It works out that European voters agree with him. Since 1999, voter turnout has never reached 50% and it has dwindled from election to election. A mere 42% of voters showed up in 2014.

The Europeans are right. Why vote if your vote is meaningless?

In April, Israelis will choose which party to vote for based on any number of considerations. But in the end, only one central question will be decided on April 9.

Do we want for our votes to matter, or are we prepared to have all aspects of governance dictated to us by unelected bureaucrats governed by unelected lawyers?

Peter Lerner: Election season brings out the anti-Israel trolls

This week the Knesset convened and decided to disperse. It was a decision based on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s understanding that his government would be a lame duck and the looming societal and security challenges requires to restart the system and regain faith in government.

Since the announcement, anti-Israel supporters have come out and claimed that as Israel once again heads for elections, millions of Palestinians ruled by it cannot vote.

This is a claim that is false.

It is a frequent talking point by the supporters of BDS and is raised by anti-Israel online activists as they dub Israel a masquerading democracy. This is a simplistic, populist way of framing the reality on the ground and it is used mostly by those who desire a one-state solution.

Looking carefully at the narrative they are trying to envisage it is important to realize the facts on the ground contradict their own premise. The claim of “occupation,” is not enough to discount the actual Palestinian institutions, functions and representatives, even though their internal Palestinian legitimacy is undoubtedly disputed. Those activists love to ignore the achievements and foundations already laid down for the future Palestinian state.

The Palestinians, as a result of the Oslo Accords, have a self-rule system. They have a Palestinian Legislative Council with 132 elected officials. The legislative council is the Palestinian equivalent to the Knesset. The PLC was established as a provisional parliament with the responsibility of enacting legislations, and oversight over the executive authority. This is the body the Palestinians of the West Bank and Gaza are supposed to vote for, not for the Knesset. The last election took place in 2006, with Hamas winning the election that caused the violent rift between the leadership, peoples and territories, which remains unbridgeable until today.

In the PLC they receive foreign lawmakers and the Palestinian Legislative Council is a member, observer, or partner in different international parliamentary organizations such as the Inter-Parliamentary Union, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe and many others. These platforms serve as staging grounds to bash Israel by the Palestinian representatives.