Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Saturday, November 09, 2019

11/09 Links: Education? Not on BDS’s Watch!; Fmr Jordanian Health Minister Dr. Zaid Hamzeh: We Arabs Supported Hitler During WWII Because He Hated The Jews; UNESCO book program puts antisemitic material on display

From Ian:

The Palestinian Solidarity Committee at Harvard University, a student organization that favors the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel, has set its sights on Israel Trek.

Harvard’s Hillel sponsors Israel Trek, a student-led, student-organized spring break trip to Israel and the West Bank. Past participants speak of how the trip challenged their preconceived notions about Israel and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. One writes of his visit to Ramallah, where, at Fatah headquarters, his group heard “from a number of high-ranking [PLO] officials who discussed with us their views on the conflict, the state of affairs in Palestinian communities, and the prospects for peace going forward.” They had already met “members of the Knesset, a former Supreme Court justice, a prominent investigative journalist, and the spokesman for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.”

As this witness saw it, “our organizers truly strove to provide the broadest range of perspectives that they could” so that students could form their own judgments. Not that the student leaders weren’t Zionists. They evidently calculated that Israel’s reputation would benefit from the exchange of ideas.

Students who attend Israel Trek don’t necessarily emerge allies of Israel. Two participants wrote of their experience that they “had even more questions than we had before departing,” about, among other things, what a democracy is. On the question, “are you pro-Israel or pro-Palestine,” the students demur because they now think it “fails to acknowledge the deep nuances that complicate a conflict involving real people, each with their own experiences, politics, and pain.”

Those of us who are pro-Israel may find this a little too wishy-washy. We may find the students’ views of Fatah’s objectives naïve. But we can hardly, if we are also in favor of liberal education, object to a trip that dissolves a student’s sense of “Manichaean clarity.” Even a student who had done his best to understand the Israeli-Palestinian conflict by discussing it with friends and consuming news and opinion found this education no substitute for first-hand experience. He had, it turned out, “relied too heavily on external, and often biased outlets, both in favor and against Israel.”

MEMRI: Former Jordanian Health Minister Dr. Zaid Hamzeh: We Arabs Supported Hitler During WWII Because He Hated The Jews

Former Jordanian Health Minister Dr. Zaid Hamzeh said in an October 9, 2019 interview on A One TV (Jordan) that nations oftentimes only progress after having suffered for centuries and that future Arab generations must suffer before progressing. In addition, he said that he had supported Adolf Hitler during World War II like other Arabs, and recalled that in fourth grade his school had participated in demonstrations and chanted "Long live Abu Ali," which he said had been a reference to Hitler. Dr. Hamzeh said that the Arabs supported Hitler because he hated the Jews, although he added the Arabs have a general tendency to admire dictators.

"Was That Really The Reason, Or Was It Because We Arabs, By Nature... Love Dictators"

Interviewer: "Was that really the reason, or was it because we Arabs, by nature – and I don't have time to give a historical review... We love dictators."

Zaid Hamzeh: "No."
Interviewer: "Really?"
Zaid Hamzeh: "Nobody loves dictators, except for people who have been led astray, and I don't want to use..."
Interviewer: "We love people who kill and slaughter. We consider this to be a sign of manliness."
Zaid Hamzeh: "Unfortunately, many people do, but we shouldn't generalize."
Interviewer: "Right, not everybody..."
Zaid Hamzeh: "But with regard to dictators, you are right. We laud the dictator and wish he would come back. We want him to come riding in on a white horse and to liberate the land, while the people here are in a slumber or watching from the sideline."

UNESCO book program puts antisemitic material on display

The Protocols of the Elders of Zion and Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf were among the books featured at a book fair in Sharjah, UAE sponsored by The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). The Simon Wiesenthal Centre exposed the book fair on Thursday and the Centre’s Director for International Relations, Dr. Shimon Samuels, wrote a letter to UNESCO Director-General, Audrey Azoulay, condemning the book fair.

“Sadly, the name of UNESCO is abused as appearing to be complicit in validating for young Arab readers, the bigoted stereotypes of Jews - as expounded by Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran. This is particularly damning at a time of reconciliation between Gulf States and Israel, now facing common enemies,” Samuels wrote in a letter to Azoulay.

In the letter, Samuels added, “the organizers are known to carefully vet all titles on display for Islamophobia, but leave Jew-hatred in pride of place!”

Sharjah was declared UNESCO’s 2019 “World Book Capital of the Year,” as part of an initiative that was launched in 1996 “that seeks to encourage and promote publishing activities at the local and global levels by nominating for a one-year period the best city program aimed at promoting books,” according to the Sharjah World Book Capital website.

In July 2019, UNESCO published a blog post entitled “Addressing contemporary antisemitism: A global issue?”, in which the organization acknowledges that “antisemitism did not begin or end with the Holocaust.” It also stated that “antisemitic bigotry” was “no longer restricted to extremist circles,” in the modern world.

11/08 Links Pt2: Ian Austin is a “hero of the Jewish community” as he declares “Labour is poisoned with anti-Jewish racism”; Kristallnacht without Jews; Nikki Haley accepts prestigious Theodor Herzl award

From Ian:

Ian Austin is a “hero of the Jewish community” as he declares “Labour is poisoned with anti-Jewish racism” and announces he will not seek re-election

The former Labour MP Ian Austin, who resigned from the Party over antisemitism, has given a series of powerful interviews this morning condemning antisemitism in the Labour Party and announcing that he will not be seeking re-election.

Speaking on Sky News, Mr Austin, who is an honorary patron of Campaign Against Antisemitism, was asked if his decision to leave the Labour Party and stand down as an MP was “personal”. In response, he explained: “I joined the Labour Party as a teenager in Dudley. I was a councillor there in my twenties, I worked for the Party and for the Labour Government in my thirties, and I became an MP and a Government minister in my forties, so this has been my life. This has been my life.

“I can’t really believe it’s come to this,” he said, “but I’ve got to be honest with people: I think that Jeremy Corbyn is unfit to lead the Labour Party. I think he’s certainly unfit to lead the country.”

Asserting that only two individuals can be Prime Minister the day after the election, Mr Austin remarkably declared: “I’ve sadly come to the conclusion that it can’t be Jeremy Corbyn,” and endorsed the Conservative Party Leader instead.

Visibly emotional, Mr Austin pointed out that he “could just disappear off back to Dudley, never say a word, keep quiet — but I think people in politics have got to stand up and tell the truth and you’ve got to do what you think is right, however difficult it is.”

In support of his decision, Mr Austin asserted that Mr Corbyn and Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer, John McDonnell, have spent their careers in politics “working with, defending, supporting all types of extremists, including antisemites,” and backing genocidal antisemitic terrorist groups such as Hamas and Hizballah, whom Mr Corbyn has described as “friends”.

Mr Austin insisted that he has “thought about this long and hard,” and said: “But most shameful of all…you know under his [Mr Corbyn’s} leadership a political party with a proud record – a long history – fighting for equality, fighting racism, has become poisoned with anti-Jewish racism and it is a complete and utter disgrace, a complete disgrace.”

Just devastating! The heroic @IanAustin1965 on Sky News:

"@jeremycorbyn isn't fit to lead the @UKLabour. He isn't fit to lead the country. At every opportunity, he backs our country's enemies. I don't think he loves this country. I don't think he's a patriot." pic.twitter.com/SgjMY9zbKq
— Arsen Ostrovsky (@Ostrov_A) November 7, 2019

This is not true. It is a complete lie.
I was appointed an unpaid trade envoy in July, along with 27 other MPs and peers from different parties, including Labour, to promote UK trade and exports
John should withdraw this lie and apologise. https://t.co/HP8GLJTCJD
— Ian Austin (@IanAustin1965) November 7, 2019

BBC Panorama investigation into Labour antisemitism shortlisted for British Journalism Award, as is maker John Ware

BBC Panorama is a finalist in the British Journalism Awards in the category of ‘Investigation’ for its programme titled “Is Labour Anti-Semitic?”, which explored antisemitism in the Labour Party.

The episode’s creators, John Ware, Leo Telling, Neil Grant and Rachel Jupp, have also been shortlisted in the ‘Politics Journalism’ category.

The programme, which was televised in July, showed former Labour Party employees speaking out publicly to reveal Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn’s personal meddling in disciplinary cases relating to antisemitism. The programme explained how senior Labour Party staffers, some of whom Campaign Against Antisemitism has known for years, used to run Labour’s disciplinary process independently, but soon after Mr Corbyn’s election as Party leader found themselves contending with his most senior aides, who were brazen in their efforts to subvert due process.

During the programme Labour’s press team made claims that the staffers featured had political axes to grind and lacked credibility, and it is understood that they and Mr Ware have now commenced libel proceedings against the Labour Party. The libel cases are being brought by Mark Lewis, a highly esteemed media lawyer who is also an honorary patron of Campaign Against Antisemitism.

11/08 Links Pt1: IAEA Confirms that Iran Lied about Its Nuclear Program; The Palestinian Authority's missing billions; White House was right about UNRWA corruption

From Ian:

US rejects Jordan's opposition to deport wanted terrorist

The United States has rejected a claim by Jordan over its refusal to deport wanted Palestinian-Jordanian Hamas terrorist Ahlam Tamimi, as a Jordanian court ruled in 2017 that Amman’s extradition treaty with Washington is invalid, despite the U.S. State Department saying the opposite in a report published this week.

The report could lead to increased pressure by the White House on Jordan to extradite Tamimi to the United States, who helped organize the well-known suicide-bombing at a Sbarro pizzeria on Aug. 9, 2001, which killed 15 people, including two Americans, and injured about 130 others.

Tamimi, who planned the attack, has shown no remorse, saying she has “no regrets.”

She had been awarded $51,836 until she was released from prison, as part of a 2011 prisoner exchange that included Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit’s release from Hamas captivity, when she then escaped to Jordan.

Tamimi is on America’s “Most Wanted Terrorist” list, but the United States has been unable to secure her extradition as a 1995 extradition agreement was not ratified by Jordan’s government.

The UN’s Michael Lynk listed Manal Tamimi, Ahed’s mom, as a “human rights defender” but he was forced to delete her name after folks reminded him she supports murder of Jews she calls “vampire Zionists.” pic.twitter.com/Hkg0oRWGKx
— Hillel Neuer (@HillelNeuer) November 7, 2019

Israel's Daily Reality: The Story of Aluma

When Aluma Mekaitan Guertzenstein tells me she’s married and pregnant, I burst into tears of joy.

I’ve been asked to update the stories of terrorism survivors, those I met in the years 2000 and 2005 when the horror of bus bombings, restaurant bombings and disco bombings aimed at young people was our daily reality in Israel. Thousands of Israelis were killed and maimed. Jerusalem, our real and symbolic capital, was the target of much of the terrorism. I’ve run into Aluma a few times over the years. Once she’d just gotten her driver’s license and was going to see which cars she could drive. I was glad she’d gone on with her life.

Who can forget November 21, 2002? Aluma got up early, her mind full of numbers. A 17-year-old schoolgirl, she was determined to score high on the morning’s math test, as she boarded Egged bus No. 20 in Kiryat Menahem, a working-class neighborhood of Jerusalem where her family lived. Aluma hugged close her heavy school backpack packed with books and notebooks. Others were waiting at her stop on Mexico Street.

Among them was Na’el Abu Hilail, 23. He’d been driven into Jerusalem from El-Khader, south of Bethlehem, to this bus, deliberately chosen because by 7:15 a.m. it was always crowded with children going to school and office workers going to their jobs downtown. In his backpack were no books, but 5 kilograms of explosives packed with shrapnel. Standing near the driver where passengers lined up to pay, he pulled the switch. The windows were blown out of the bus. The roof was ripped off. The blast wave rolled through the enclosed space, tearing the junctures where air and tissue meet: ear, lung and the gut. Metal fragments flew through the bus. Passengers were thrown from their seats. Fifty passengers were seriously and critically injured. Eleven persons, four of them kids on their way to school, were murdered.

At first the count of dead was 12. But then a paramedic named Raphael, like the angel of healing, made a last check through the bus and saw a schoolgirl’s eyelids flicker.

Friday Night Dinner with Palestinian Rockets

Each week, my cousins Dina and Yair host students in their home from Sapir College in the Israeli city of Sderot. This week, the guests included students and my wife, myself, and our baby son. My wife and I had finally put our 1-year-old to sleep and were sipping soup when, suddenly, a sharp, oddly calm, almost robotic announcement came over loudspeakers. "Tzeva Adom - Code Red." We know we have 15 seconds to run to a bomb shelter as a rocket speeds towards us. This is not a test.

I run into our bedroom and scoop the sleeping baby out of his crib. Like a football player running downfield, I hold him under one arm and guide people down the hallway to the shelter with my other. We dive into the shelter and slam shut the heavy vault door just as the first blasts shake the walls and rattle the roof. Our sleepy 1-year-old claps his hands and screams, "Boom, boom."

Ten minutes later, we leave the shelter to sit around the table once again and pretend that things are normal. After a second barrage of rockets half an hour later, we decide to leave our son in the bomb shelter overnight with the other kids. At least we won't need to wake them up if more rockets are fired at us - as indeed they were at 2 a.m.

Today 3/11 A traveller bordering the Gaza Strip saw his children playing with a book, suspecting it was a booby trap called the police. The sappers found half a kilogram of TNT explosives and spray balls to increase the injuryhttps://t.co/4qku4GGntq pic.twitter.com/sfKd36QmN4
— (((Donny)))🇮🇱🇺🇸 (@mlirh) November 3, 2019

Arutz-7 reports:

One of heavy metal’s biggest bands will be returning to Israel next year, for its first show in the Jewish state in 25 years.

On Thursday, the band Iron Maiden confirmed that it will be appearing in Tel Aviv next year for its first show in Israel in a quarter of a century.

Iron Maiden is slated to perform at Tel Aviv’s Bloomfield Stadium on May 30th, with Israeli heavy metal band Orphaned Land opening the show.

While many Israeli fans rejoiced, some Orthodox Jewish fans in Israel urged the band to reconsider the timing of the concert, which begins Saturday evening before the end of the Sabbath and a day after the Shavuot holiday.

A petition launched by Orthodox fans has called on the show’s promoters to push off the date of the concert.

“For the greater good of G-d and the Jewish people, please choose a day to play here that doesn't fall out on one of the forbidden times.”

Other fans took to the ‘Bring Iron Maiden to Israel’ group to organize a group Shabbat at a hotel in Tel Aviv near the venue, allowing religious fans to make it to the show after the end of the Sabbath (8:23 p.m.).

Aviva Fort, who previously covered the Israeli metal scene with ‘Metal Israel’, told Arutz Sheva concert promoters fail to realize that a growing number of rock and metal fans in Israel are religiously observant, assuming that the fan base is exclusively secular.

“The foreign-born religious population is only growing. Concert promoters and the rest of Israeli society need to deal with reality: Shabbat-observant people that move to Israel or study here don’t necessarily fall into the strict boxes delineated by Israeli society. Shutting out an entire sales market by not taking our needs into account is just not a smart financial move.”

The problem is compounded by the fact that the Friday before the concert is Shavuot, so any religious fan would have to be in a hotel for two days - and most religious Jews would want to be with their families on the holiday rather than in a Tel Aviv hotel.

Some people might think it is strange that religious Jews would be fans of heavy metal, but there are plenty of Jews who take Jewish law seriously and who also fully participate in secular society, including listening to the same music everyone else listens to.

The petition has little chance of making an impact; the band's full tour dates are published. However, there is a five day gap between the May 30 show in Tel Aviv and their next concert in Finland. If enough "frum" metalheads convince the promoters and band that there is money to be made by adding a second show, then, just maybe, they can pull it off. They just need to convince 30,000 Israelis to come to a second Sunday night show!

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.

Ahlam al-Tamimi is the proud Hamas terrorist who was integral to the 2001 bombing of the Sbarro restaurant in Jerusalem, killing 15 including 7 children and a pregnant woman.

Tamimi was one of the 1,207 prisoners released in the deal to free Gilad Shalit and she has lived freely in Jordan since then, publicly proud about her role in murdering Jewish children.

Malki Roth, 15, was one of the two American victims of the Sbarro massacre, and since then her parents Arnold and Frimet have been working tirelessly to see justice done to her murderer.

In 2013, the US Justice Department brought charges against Tamimi under US laws, but the charges were not unsealed until 2017.

“Al-Tamimi is an unrepentant terrorist who admitted to her role in a deadly terrorist bombing that injured and killed numerous innocent victims,” Acting Assistant Attorney General for National Security Mary McCord said at the time. “The charges unsealed today serve as a reminder that when terrorists target Americans anywhere in the world, we will never forget – and we will continue to seek to ensure that they are held accountable.”

Last year, for the first time, the US State Department annual Country Report on Terrorism mentioned al-Tamimi:

A U.S. criminal complaint was unsealed in March charging Ahlam Aref Ahmad Al-Tamimi, a Jordanian national in her mid-30s, with conspiring to use a weapon of mass destruction against U.S. nationals outside the United States resulting in death. The charge is related to her participation in an August 9, 2001, suicide bomb attack at a restaurant in Jerusalem that killed 15 people, including two U.S. nationals. Four other U.S. nationals were among the approximately 122 others injured in the attack. Also unsealed was a warrant for Al-Tamimi’s arrest and an affidavit in support of the criminal complaint and arrest warrant. Jordan’s courts have ruled that their constitution forbids the extradition of Jordanian nationals.

The newly released Country Report on Terrorism 2018 includes a significant addition to the virtually identical text:

In 2018, Jordan continued to cite a court ruling that its constitution forbids the extradition of Jordanian nationals. The United States regards the extradition treaty as valid.

Those nine words hint that the current administration, unlike previous ones, might actually pressure Jordan publicly to extradite Tamimi to the US.

The Jordanian ruling that Jordanian nationals cannot be extradited is contradicted by Jordan's own actions in extraditing a Jordanian national for his role in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing in 1995.

Here is the text of the extradition treaty between the US and Jordan.

Jordan's position that Tamimi cannot be extradited under their constitution is an extreme insult. Here is what the Jordanian constitution says:

Article 21
(i) Political refugees shall not be extradited on account of their political beliefs or for their defence of liberty.
(ii) Extradition of ordinary criminals shall be regulated by international agreements and laws.

Meaning that Jordanian justice system does not view a murderer of children as a criminal or terrorist, but rather as an innocent person being persecuted for her political beliefs.

Far more information is available at the This Ongoing War website maintained by the parents of Malki Roth.

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.

Dahir Zidani, the owner of the Al Reda restaurant that has been in the news for not allowing patrons to speak Hebrew to his staff, is probably a bigot - but he is definitely a jerk.

He was interviewed by QudsN where he said that part of the reason that he bans Hebrew from being spoken is to push Arabic as a language of choice for Arabs like his workers, but the major reason is that Israelis are "barbaric:"

There is another issue, one that Israelis may understand better than others, because they know themselves, that they are insolent and messy, they are loud and boastful, they enter the restaurant arrogantly and in a condescending way, and we found that this way we could restrain them. The moment we speak to them in English, they become different people, they lower their voices, they speak politely, they behave nicer and they are more civilized, not as much as we would like them to be, but less barbaric than they were beforehand.

He also makes it cler that he doesn't consider himself an Israeli:

Can an Israeli impose his conditions and mood on a restaurant in France or in Africa or ask them to bill the account in Hebrew ?! of course not. So I submit the invoice in Arabic, and if someone wants to explain the details of the invoice, I am of course ready, but I provide it in Arabic.

The striking thing about the interview though is that Zidani has a vision for the relationship between a restaurant owner and the customers that is not exactly how most businesses are run:

This place is open to all people, but it is my place. Another point of view is who should determine the conditions of hospitality, is it the guest or the host ?! Or is this guest expecting that he can impose his conditions elsewhere as he tries to do with us ?! Or is this a reflection of the balance of power ?!

"The customer is always right" is not this guy's slogan. This is very clear when he or his manager respond to criticism on TripAdvisor:

The place seems to be strict about rules. We left with uncomfortable feeling that they had something against us and we got no reasonable explanation why we couldn't get our order. Try sodfeh or tashreen in the neighborhood. Time was midnight, place half empty , 4 of us, sat further away from smokers. Apparently our table was only for 3 people. Ordered drinks only. Waiter retuned explained take only for 3. We said we want to be close to window and further from smokers. 10 minutes another waiter came that the table can't hold food for 4, we explained we ordered only drinks. 10 minutes later same waiter came back and explained no way you stay on this take , we left wasting half an hour and perplexed about the true reason why we couldn't get our order.

Dear Mr Zipzib
you don't like smoke and smokers , you entered a smoker's place , !!!
you decided and insisted to take a table we did not give you !!! without respecting our rules and consideration !!!!
you can insist also not to understand why we did not and could not serve you under your conditions !
still I hope you can understand this : A table should not look comfortable only for client , it should be comfortable also for the next tables , it should be comfortable for the waiter to serve and it should be safe , safe , safe for clients !!!!
we would have explain that to you if you did move to the available alternative tables !
you exempted your self from thinking or worrying about these considerations , we cannot and we don't want to take this exemption to ourselves !!! we simply still have some respect to ourselves and to our place !!
hope you will reconsider you review !!!!??

The manager of this establishment was the rudest, most offensive and angry person I have come across in any so called restaurant.
If it had been my choice I would have immediately left.
The group I was part of were made to feel unwelcome, unruly (!) and unwanted.
The manager, or whoever was representing this business , was contemptuous and positively abusive in my honest opinion and showed our group not even the most basic respect never mind any remote shred of 'hospitality' whatsoever.
To list :initially a refusal to acknowledge the booking denying it existed
Negative attitude towards size of our group
Refusal to take orders instead offering 'shared plates' that did not take much account of vegetarian or vegan needs
Slamming down menus in front of us
Telling us to split into smaller tables because we were too loud..!!
Refusing to turn music down
Keeping people waiting interminally for drinks and food
Just plain nasty
There was obviously some deep seated resentment towards us that I could only guess at.
This person looked unclean,disheveled;
The place itself was dark, extremely dusty and practically empty apart from single men and one very young inappropriately dressed girl.
How I deeply deeply resented giving even one shekel of hard earned money to this company.
NO STARS
AVOID AVOID AVOID

DAZEI, General Manager at Alreda, responded to this review
This review ( second of the same grope ) does not deserve any kind of respond !!
I am so sorry I agreed to feed them , and I am most happy they and their friends promise to avoid my place !!!

The restaurant has no problem putting a Hebrew sign on its front. It is a warning that it is protected by a security system.

Apparently he considers thieves to be Hebrew speakers.

(ht Ibn Boutros)

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.

11/07 Links Pt2: Israel can't allow those who call for its destruction to remain; Jewish Chronicle urges Brits not to vote Corbyn; Stanford Activists Compare Ben Shapiro To An Insect

From Ian:

The Problem with Anti-Zionism

Anti-Zionism is a flourishing politics today on many university campuses and on parts of the left, and the standard response from many Jewish organisations and from most of the Jews I know is to call it the newest version of antisemitism. But anti-Zionism is a subject in itself. I take “Zionism” to mean a belief in the rightful existence of a Jewish state, nothing more. Anti-Zionism denies the rightfulness.

Most versions of anti-Zionism first appeared among the Jews. The first, and probably the oldest, takes Zionism to be a Jewish heresy. According to Orthodox doctrine, the return of the Jews to Zion and the establishment of a state will be the work of the Messiah in the days to come. Until then, Jews are required to accept their exile, defer to gentile rulers, and wait for divine deliverance. Political action is a usurpation of God’s prerogative.

“Waiting for the Messiah” has a left-wing version, which might be called “waiting for the revolution.” Jews (and other minorities) were often told that all their problems would be solved, and could only be solved, by the triumph of the proletariat. Many Jews took this to be an expression of hostility, a refusal to recognise the urgencies of their situation. But I don’t see antisemitism here, only ideological rigidity and moral insensitivity.

The second Jewish version of anti-Zionism was first proclaimed by the founders of Reform Judaism in nineteenth-century Germany. There is no Jewish people, they insisted, only a community of faith – men and women of the Mosaic persuasion. Jews could be good Germans (or good citizens of any state) since they were not a nation like the other nations and did not aspire to a state of their own. Zionism was perceived as a threat to these good Germans, since it suggested that they had an allegiance elsewhere.

Many leftists have adopted this denial of Jewish peoplehood, and then they go on to claim that a Jewish state must be a religious state, something like a Catholic or Lutheran or Muslim state – political formations that no leftist could support. But Reform Jews adopted this position knowing that most of their fellow Jews didn’t share it. They weren’t all looking for a homeland in the land of Israel, but even the Bundists, who hoped for autonomy in the Tsarist empire, were Jewish nationalists.

The early Reform Jews wanted to change the course and character of Jewish history; they weren’t ignorant of that history. Leftists who argue against Jewish peoplehood are, mostly, ignorant.

Ben-Dror Yemini: Israel can't allow those who call for its destruction to remain

From the moment Omar Shakir stepped on Israeli soil, he had the same modus operandi he always did and even traveled to Bahrain to promote a FIFA ban on Israel. Bahrain denied him entrance to the country.

Last year, following the decision to cancel Shakir's visa, 15 human rights organizations, Including Israeli NGOs B'tselem and Breaking the Silence, called for the decision to be reversed.

"This decision only serves to partner Israel with a list of shady countries whose governments want to control the opinions, thoughts and actions of human beings, instead of protecting their right to free speech," the groups said.

Well, let's see: Canada banned former British MP and vehement Israel-hater George Galloway; France banned Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, considered by Sunni Muslims to be a prominent intellectual; Britain banned American anti-gay protester Fred Phelps and his daughter, Shirley Phelps-Roper from entering the country, as well as Michael Savage, a far-right conservative radio host; the U.S. denied entry to Filipina human rights activist Liza Maza who intended to attend a conference on American activity in her country; and recently, both the U.S. and Britain banned the entrance of Omar Barghouti, the co-founder of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement and Omar Shakir's ideological twin.

It's safe to assume that anti-Israeli elements will resume their usual drivel about damage to free speech, which is curious given that Shakir himself is an advocate of harming free speech.

In 2015, Shakir signed a petition calling for a ban on Muslims who dared accept the invitation of the Hartman Institute (on Jerusalem-based center for pluralistic Jewish thought and education) for an educational tour of Israel.

Every country has the right to deny entry to agitators, and there's no country in the world that would allow a person who denies its right to exist enter its borders. This is true of Israel as well.

In front-page editorial, Jewish Chronicle urges Brits not to vote Corbyn

In a front-page editorial, the British Jewish Chronicle implored UK citizens not to vote for Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn in the upcoming December 12 election, citing his long record of comments against Israel and failure to stamp out anti-Semitism within his opposition party.

“To all our fellow British citizens. This front page is addressed not to our usual readers — but to those who would not normally read the Jewish Chronicle. In other words, to non-Jews,” it read.

In its call for British nationals to take Jewish concerns into account on election day, the editorial cited a March poll showing that 87 percent of British Jews believe Corbyn to be anti-Semitic.

“There is racism on all sides of politics and it must be called out wherever it is found. History has forced our community to be able to spot extremism as it emerges — and Jeremy Corbyn’s election as Labour leader in 2015 is one such example,” it said, citing Corbyn’s past affiliation with members of Hamas and Hezbollah, his presence at a ceremony that honored the Palestinian terrorists behind the 1972 Munich Olympic massacre, his reaction to anti-Semitic statements by members of his party, and his 2018 comment that “Zionists” do not grasp “English irony.”

Boston University wants to hire a lying, hateful "academic" because she is married to a faculty member! (update)

A letter by Karen Hurvitz, an attorney who taught law at Boston University Law School, to BU president Richard Brown about BU's imminent hiring of a fake academic who literally makes things up and publishes them, is a bombshell.

In these times of rising anti-Semitism, I have just learned that Boston University is considering appointing Sarah Ihmoud, a terrible anti-Semite to a tenure track position in its sociology department. I understand that letters of concern and alarm submitted to the president, provost, and others have been met with a “none of your business” type of response, together with assurances that the process is being handled “based on peer evaluation of a candidate’s scholarly and professional achievements within the appropriate discipline and according to established disciplinary criteria… consistent with our established criteria and processes.”  The quote is from a form letter being sent out by President Brown.

In point of fact, I have learned from colleagues on the law school faculty, where I taught in the BU Defenders Program, that nothing about this potential hire is being handled in accordance with established criteria and processes. The hire is being considered as an accommodation to a recent law faculty hire — Ihmoud is his wife. The position was not advertised, and there was no applicant pool, as required by BU’s established — and written — practices and processes.

What is worse is that her “scholarly” achievements are works based on viciously defamatory and easily refuted assertions about Israel. For instance, she writes in In the Absence of Justice, a report she co-authored with Shaloub-Kevorkian, another rabid anti-Semite who claims that Israelis sell Palestinian body parts, do medical experiments and test weapons on Palestinian children — see http://www.israelnationalnews.com/Articles/Article.aspx/23511, that

Existing studies on gendered aspects of military occupation in East Jerusalem reveal that even in times of death, women are stripped of dignity and security, and their safe burial is jeopardized by the militarized regime (Shalhoub-Kevorkian 2013). Women are prevented from safely reaching health professionals and finding a safe place to give birth, and face humiliation in Israeli hospitals during treatment, operations, giving birth, miscarriages and more (ibid.). Gendered violence was also apparent when examining the effects of surveillance over women, mainly in relation to the immense security devices and cameras in and around homes, schools and streets (Shalhoub-Kevorkian, 2015). Sexual and psychological abuse and harassment of women at checkpoints, by Israeli soldiers was also another factor affecting women. harassment by Israeli soldiers, including being made to undress when crossing checkpoints, was found to have increased women’s sense of loss of their bodily integrity and added to their humiliation and oppression (ibid., p. 63).

In the Absence of Justice, Embodiment and the Politics of Militarized Dismemberment in Occupied East Jerusalem, Ihmoud and Shaloub Kevorkian, 2016

What should be apparent to anyone — not just a sociology professor — is that she and her co-author are citing themselves! Not only is this echo-chamber readily apparent, the “research” on which it relies is unverifiable because it is based  on interviews with Palestinian women whom the researchers refuse to name, citing vague security concerns (and adding to the idea that no one is safe from Israelis).  In fact, as the article at the website I provide above points out, these assertions are false. Her other articles  contain similar outrageous propaganda.

Boston University has strict policies on academic integrity. Boston University is actually holding a workshop on Academic Honesty today! Take a look:

This interactive workshop explores the importance of academic integrity in higher education, and addresses the following important questions: What is academic integrity? Why is academic integrity important? What are some of the values associated with academic integrity? Why is integrity important in the realm of higher education? How does the concept of academic integrity transition into environments outside of higher education?

1:00pm on Thursday, November 7th, 2019
2:00pm
100 Bay State Road, Room 545A
https://www.eventbrite.com/e/academic-integrity-workshop-tickets-72084706297

Boston University is also a member of the International Center for Academic Integrity
https://academicintegrity.org/about/our-member-institutions-2/

But all these standards and workshops mean nothing if Boston University is considering hiring Sarah Ihmoud. If Boston University expects its students to have academic integrity, it must demand the  same of its faculty. If Boston University wants to have good standing in the  community of  scholars, it must enforce rules of scholarly integrity. Please don’t make this shameful hire.

Sincerely,
Karen Hurvitz

This is now a major scandal. The email that the BU president is sending out to people complaining about Ihmoud now looks even more like a cover-up for shoddy hiring standards and nepotism. Here it is:

I have received your email expressing your concern about Dr. Sarah Ihmoud, who is being considered for a faculty position in Boston University’s Department of Sociology.

I am disappointed that what should be (for a long list of sound reasons) a judicious and confidential process has been turned into a public controversy that produces a variety of harmful side effects. In this case, as in all cases involving review and assessment of candidates for faculty positions, our evaluation and hiring process is based on peer evaluation of a candidate’s scholarly and professional achievements within the appropriate discipline and according to established disciplinary criteria.

I acknowledge your disapproval of some of Dr. Ihmoud’s rhetoric and positions she has advocated. But it is the University’s obligation to both recognize the authority of the faculty, relevant deans, and academic leaders to make an informed decision, and to respect any decision that is made consistent with our established criteria and processes.

UPDATE: The sociology department rejected Ihmoud, the women's studies department is still considering her.

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.

Jews are still fleeing Arab countries - 20% of Moroccan Jews moved to Israel in 8 years

The official Israel in Arabic Twitter site had this information and chart (text translated):

The Population and Immigration Authority published the list of Arab countries that have experienced the most immigration of Jews to Israel in the last 8 years. During this period, 432 Jews emigrated from Morocco to Israel. Here are the full data.

In 2012, Morocco had around 2,250 Jews. If 432 emigrated since then to Israel, that is over 19% of the entire Jewish population - and that is only to Israel.

That's pretty astonishing. Morocco is the best Arab country for Jews and the Jews are fleeing even from there.

Tunisia had an estimated 1500 Jews in 2013, to lose 160 is over 10%.

Yemen's 119 emigrants is the bulk of the community, there are reportedly 50 Jews left who refuse to leave.

The other nations mentioned are Algeria, which has practically no Jews, seeing 2 emigrants to Israel. One person each from Libya, Lebanon, Qatar and Bahrain, all of which have token or no appreciable Jewish populations.

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.

Iron Dome Intercepting Rockets Silences Legitimate Criticism Of Israel (PreOccupied Territory)

Our weekly column from the humor site PreOccupied Territory.

Check out their Facebook page.

Iron Dome Intercepting Rockets Silences Legitimate Criticism Of Israel

by Every Single Antisemite Masquerading as Just an Anti-Zionist as if There's a Meaningful Distinction

London, New York, Washington, wherever, November 7 - We see it everywhere: people who raise genuine, sincere criticisms of Israeli policy by calling for the total ostracism and dissolution of the world's only Jewish state, branded as antisemitic for sharing their views. The world must not tolerate such an overreaction to criticism, which is why, among many other measures, the international community must work to deprive Israel of its missile defense and other defensive systems that specifically target the legitimate criticisms of Israeli policy.

An activist cannot raise even a single suggestion that perhaps the Jews should remain non-sovereign, stateless, and at the mercy of peoples and ideologies responsible for millennia of persecution, without some stooge of the Jewish-controlled media labeling him antisemitic. It has reached the point that even prominent figures in American government, the so-called land of the free and home of the brave, cannot indulge in semi-plausible Jew-baiting and get a free pass - not even by playing the Islamophobia card. The only way to restore the freedom to call or work for the annihilation of Jewish sovereignty in the ancestral Jewish homeland without suffering the indignity of being called a bigot or worse is to dismantle the mechanisms by which such potent criticism is neutralized. Iron Dome must go.

The same applies to the various other organs of Israel's missile defense, such as the Arrow and David's Sling programs, as well as Trophy and Patriot systems, but let us not restrict our efforts to ensure legitimate criticism of Israel to only those elements of the dynamic. We must dismantle the entire security and defense apparatus of the State of Israel, an apparatus that has done nothing over the last seven-plus decades but frustrate the attempts of critics to criticize: bombings, shootings, stabbings, vehicular assaults, missile attacks, hijackings, gassing attempts, and numerous other cogent statements of criticism. Remove the IDF and its related organs, and we remove the suppression of legitimate criticism of Israel.

But we cannot accomplish all that at once; the gradual restoration of total freedom to criticize Israel must start somewhere, as the formulation among anti-Zionists always goes, and the initial focal point must be the most noticeable barrier between the criticism and Israel - its missile and rocket interception systems. Once we meet success in that endeavor, we can move on to the dismantling of other restrictions on legitimate criticism of Israel, until we reach that glorious day when everyone will be free to criticize Israel in any manner whatsoever from the River to the Sea.

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.

11/07 Links Pt1: Ron Prosor: For UNRWA, the party is over; Shin Bet: We thwarted over 450 terror attacks in the past year; Apartheid on Temple Mount: Police Block Jews from Using Drinking Fountains

From Ian:

Ron Prosor: For UNRWA, the party is over

When I heard that United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East Commissioner Pierre Krahenbuhl resigned, I was shocked. After all, the UN does not have the best track record when it comes to investigating corruption allegations against its own agencies, let alone when it comes to the UNRWA, which until recently had airtight immunity from criticism.

For 70 years, UNRWA has been something of a separate entity in the UN, one dedicated solely to the issue of Palestinian "refugees," alongside the agency that handles all other refugees – the UNHCR. But unlike the former UNRWA never even tried to solve the refugee problem and seemed dedicated to perpetuating it.

Case in point: When UNRWA was founded in 1949, there were around 700,000 Palestinian refugees in the world. Today, their number stands at 5.7 million.

But UNRWA's data must always be taken with a grain of salt, as they tend to artificially inflate. A census that took place in Lebanon in 2017 found that 300,000 people included in the agency's data simply do not exist and that the true number of Palestinian refugees in Lebanon was 66% smaller than stated on its reports.

At the same time, the budgets appropriated to UNRWA put the UN's actual refugee agency to shame.

Not only is UNRWA's budget per-refugee four times greater than that of any other refugee, it employs 30,000 people. The UNRCR, which deals with 70 million refugees, employs only 10,000 people.

But it seems that UNRWA's party is coming to an end.

Head of Shin Bet: We thwarted over 450 terror attacks in the past year

Head of Shin Bet Nadav Argaman claimed on Thursday that the Shin Bet thwarted over 450 terror attacks in the past year. Argaman spoke at the Unmanned Systems Conference, UVID 2019, initiated by Israel Defense.

"We are an agency with excellent people, the best technology and synergy within the agency and with Israeli security authorities, which allows us to have an edge on very challenging enemies," Argaman said. "All that allowed us to thwart over 450 terror attacks in the past year and try to provide the citizens of Israel with safe and peaceful daily life without knowing what happens behind the scene."

Meanwhile, the IDF mapped on Thursday the house of Kassem Shabli, one of the terrorists who carried out an attack near the West Bank town of Dolev in August, in which 17-year-old Rina Shnerb was murdered.

The mapping was done in order to prepare for the demolition of the house in Kfar Kobar on Wednesday night.

Kassem a-Karim Ragah Shabli, 25, a member of the PFLP, has been arrested in the past for involvement in terrorist activities. Kassem provided the explosives that were used in the IED as well as assisted in assembling it, and took part in the killing of Shnerb.

Two other terrorists were arrested for involvement in the attack.

PMW: Why is Martyrdom-death “unique in Palestine”?

Death as a "Martyr" for Allah and for "Palestine" - during terror attacks and other violent confrontations with Israel - has been promoted as an ideal by the Palestinian Authority for years, as documented by Palestinian Media Watch.

The elevated status "Martyrs" enjoy in the PA was recently stressed by a host on official PA TV, who bragged that "Martyrdom in Palestine is unique," because a Martyr's funeral is considered "a wedding." A mother of a "Martyr" present in the TV studio expressed her opinion that death as a Martyr is "an honor":
Official PA TV host: "Praise Allah, I want to say that this Martyrdom always is-"

Mother of a "Martyr": "An honor."

Official PA TV host: "Exactly! Martyrdom in Palestine is unique. We are the only ones who celebrate the news of a Martyr's wedding." [Official PA TV, Palestine This Morning, Aug. 27, 2019]

A Martyr's funeral is considered a wedding to the 72 Virgins in Paradise in Islam.

These expressions of support for dying as a "Martyr" come as no surprise. PMW has documented numerous mothers and fathers who have expressed joy when their terrorist children died as "Martyrs." This is what the PA has taught them and what is expected of them. The following are examples of mothers praising their dead children's Martyrdom, collected in one video (additional texts below):

"I hold my head high. The honor is mine. I have a son who is a Martyr." [Official PA TV, Sept. 24, 2002]

"[My son] told me: 'In this entire world, I can't think of anyone to marry... I want to marry the Dark-Eyed (i.e., Virgins of Paradise).' I said: 'If these are his thoughts, I wish him Martyrdom.'" [Official PA TV, Jan. 21, 2003]

"I ask Allah to give him the reward of a Martyr... I greet all the people who came today to accompany my son at his wedding (i.e., to the Virgins of Paradise). My son is a sacrifice for the homeland, for Palestine, for Islam, and a sacrifice for all of Palestine." [Official PA TV, Feb. 17, 2018]

Why is Martyrdom-death “unique in Palestine”? According to a host on official Palestinian Authority TV, it's because "we are the only ones who celebrate the news of a Martyr's wedding."

More here: https://t.co/BKV5uBJ79l pic.twitter.com/4odxeHKhx7
— Pal Media Watch (@palwatch) November 7, 2019

PMW has documented numerous Palestinian parents who have expressed joy when their terrorist children died as "Martyrs." This is what the PA has taught them and what is expected of them. Here are examples of mothers praising their dead children's Martyrdom: pic.twitter.com/HzPMQmJ2bf
— Pal Media Watch (@palwatch) November 7, 2019

Omar Shakir even boycotted MUSLIMS who don't support BDS

Omar Shakir worked for Human Rights Watch in 2014, then left and joined again in 2016.

In between, he signed a petition supporting the boycott of Muslims - Muslims who care about Palestinians and who care about their own communities.

The crime that these Muslims committed? They showed an interest in learning about the Zionist point of view and attended a workshop in Israel called the Muslim Leadership Initiative.

In reality, what panicked BDSers about the MLI is that it showed that intelligent, caring Muslims could speak to Israelis and learn their perspective as a way to help bring peace. BDS is against any sort of "normalization" because it wants Israeli Jews to be demonized, not treated with respect.

These Muslims who want peace rejected BDS, so BDS called on all Muslims to boycott them - not to let them speak in schools and mosques.

We pledge to not give a platform to any MLI participant to speak about their experiences at our community centers, places of worship, and campuses and call on a complete boycott of MLI.

Everyone who signed this petition is against peace. They are against dialogue. They are against treating Israeli Jews or Zionists as human beings.

Omar Shakir signed the petition.

HRW claims that Shakir is an objective researcher. Yet they hired him knowing that he was not only a supporter of BDS but he hates Muslims who don't share his opinion about it.

HRW knowingly hires people with a rabid hate for Israel - and deliberately chooses to use these same haters to "research" Israel.

This isn't human rights. This is pure hate. And HRW is part of it.

(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.