Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Monday, June 01, 2020

06/01 Links Pt1: Sovereignty over the Jordan Valley Is Key to Israel's Security; Iran Attempted to Raise Chlorine in Israel’s Water Supply to Dangerous Levels

From Ian:

Sovereignty over the Jordan Valley Is Key to Israel's Security

In order to thrive, and not just survive, Israel must have a minimally defensible eastern border, located in the Jordan Valley, and it must retain control of the eastern mountain ridge.

Yitzhak Rabin, architect of the Oslo Accords, included full Israeli security control over Jewish cities in Judea and Samaria/the West Bank, and full freedom of maneuver for Israelis along the main roads of the area, within those parameters.

The Trump peace plan, with its endorsement of Israeli sovereignty over the Jordan Valley, accurately reflects the Rabin parameters. It also calls for a two-state solution and a demilitarized Palestinian state, with Israeli security control over the entire area between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea.

The U.S. peace plan was coordinated with Sunni states and Israel. That coordination is the result of the Sunni view that an alliance with Israel is an existential imperative in their fight against Iran - something that is of far greater significance to them than the Palestinian-Arab cause.

Jordan, despite its rhetoric, is unlikely to cancel its peace treaty with Israel. It is Israel and the U.S. that stabilize Jordan, not the other way around. There is no Jordanian interest in having a Palestinian military presence on their western border.

The Palestinian public in Judea and Samaria, for its part, has demonstrated that it is primarily interested in its economic wellbeing. The Palestinian-Arab street has shown little appetite to return to the days of the Second Intifada.

David Singer: Trump Needs to Revise his Vision for Judea and Samaria

President Trump’s deal of the century envisioning the creation of a second Arab state in former Palestine – in addition to Jordan – is in tatters following its absolute rejection by the PLO – requiring its urgent revision by the president.

Trump has vainly struggled to keep the statehood possibility alive despite PLO President Mahmoud Abbas having consigned it to the dustbin of history on the day of its publication – 28 January 2020 -but the PLO has refused to play ball.

Being a beggar does not fit Trump’s persona. He is allowing Israel to apply sovereignty in 30% of Judea and Samaria in July – with allocation of the remaining 70% requiring another Arab interlocutor to negotiate with Israel.Trump’s vision was always a mirage – offering the PLO less than 100% of Judea and Samaria it had been demanding since 1967– supported by the international community since the 1980 Venice Declaration.

Trump had predicated his vision without even defining who comprised the “Palestinians”. In addition his plan had incorrectly asserted:
1. “Palestinians have aspirations that have not been realized, including self-determination”.

All West Bank Arabs became Jordanian nationals in 1954 until their nationality was revoked by Jordan in 1988.

2. “The State of Israel has also exchanged sizeable territories for the sake of peace, as it did when it withdrew from the Sinai Peninsula in exchange for peace with the Arab Republic of Egypt.”

Israel’s unilateral withdrawal from Gaza in 2005 didn’t rate a mention.

3.“One reason for the intractability of this problem is the conflation of two separate conflicts: a territorial, security and refugee dispute between Israel and the Palestinians and a religious dispute between Israel and the Muslim world regarding control over places of religious significance. ”

There is only one conflict – between Jews and Arabs - fuelled by the Arab League’s refusal to recognise the State of Israel since its establishment in 1948.

The religious dispute was resolved under the 1994 Israel-Jordan Peace Treaty granting Jordan control over places of Islamic religious significance in Jerusalem.

Jonathan Tobin: Whatever happened to the Emergency Committee for Israel?

Ten years ago, it came in with a bang, but this spring, it disbanded without even a whimper.

The Emergency Committee for Israel came into existence in 2010 in response to President Barack Obama's increasingly aggressive criticism of Israel and his attempt to pressure it to make concessions to the Palestinians. In the following years, as Obama's push for appeasement of Iran culminated in a disastrously weak nuclear deal, the ECI depicted the administration's policies as not just wrongheaded or counterproductive, but an "emergency" that decent Americans should mobilize to oppose.

Democrats blasted the group for what they claimed was an attempt to turn Israel into a partisan wedge issue. Yet by helping to frame the debate about Obama's push for more "daylight" between the United States and Israel, and a rapprochement with Iran, the ECI played a not insignificant role in generating dissent about such dangerous folly and electing members of the House and Senate who disagreed with the administration.

Once Obama got his way on the Iran nuclear deal, the ECI went silent. Earlier this spring, it formally disbanded. But it's prime mover, former Weekly Standard publisher William Kristol has moved on to a different cause, albeit one that puzzles many of those who agreed with him about Obama's attitude towards Israel.

After leading the effort to brand Obama a threat to Israel's existence, Kristol has, along with some other celebrity pundits like The Atlantic's David Frum and The Washington Post's Jennifer Rubin, who were cheerleaders for the ECI, become the voice of the #NeverTrump movement. He leads a new organization whose purpose is to convince Republicans to support presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden. But unlike the ECI, which was often torched by the mainstream media, his new effort is gaining the same kind of sympathetic coverage in The New York Times that the left-wing lobby J Street – ECI's principal antagonist during its most active period – usually receives.

She’s wearing a Palestinian keffiyeh. She’s holding a Molotov cocktail. And she’s ready to firebomb – a NYPD police car.

From the New York Daily News:

One of the two Brooklyn lawyers accused trying to torch an NYPD cruiser in Brooklyn used a Bud Light bottle stuffed with a rag as a Molotov cocktail, according to a photo obtained Sunday by the Daily News.

Urooj Rahman, 31, was snapped in a picture holding a black and white striped scarf close to her face with one hand and the potentially fiery bottle with another as she prepared to toss it out of the passenger-side window of a van.

Rahman and Colinford Mattis, 32, a corporate lawyer and member of Community Board 5 in East New York, were charged with the attempted attack Saturday night on an empty police cruiser parked outside the 88th Precinct station house in Fort Greene.

Rahman hurled the bottle, which was filled with gasoline, into the cruiser. But the Bud Light Molotov cocktail failed to ignite, law enforcement sources said.

Cops gave chase and stopped Mattis’ van nearby on Willoughby St. They found the makings of another Molotov cocktail in the back seat along with a gasoline container, authorities say.

But Urooj Rahman is not just a lawyer. She’s a human rights lawyer.

And she’s not just wearing a keffiyeh for fashion. She’s an anti-Israel activist. She spent a summer interning for an anti-Israel NGO and she wrote an article for Fordham’s human rights newsletter accusing Israel of “apartheid.”

As we have seen countless times, anti-Israel activism and support for terror is often hidden under a veneer of “human rights.” And here we see not only support for terror, but domestic terror itself by a “human rights lawyer.”

This “human rights lawyer” likes to wear a ski cap with a skull and crossbones.

In a final twist of irony, Rahman’s last name means “compassionate” in Arabic.

Will any real human rights groups condemn Rahman? More to the point – are there any real human rights groups in existence?

Is there the slightest hint of embarrassment from the far Left about a person squarely in their camp who was building firebombs to hurl in New York City?

(h/t kweansmom)

Social media is filled with images and videos of violence during the riots in response to George Floyds murder by Minneapolis cops – violence by the rioters and violence by the police. One egregious example of the latter is this video of New York City police cars purposefully ramming protesters who were throwing objects at them.

Wtf!!! #BlacklivesMaters #brooklynprotest pic.twitter.com/S1oet8JC0x
— Pierre G. (@pgarapon) May 31, 2020

When the murder of Floyd occurred, many anti-Israel activists and organizations were quick to tie his death to Israel, either by explicitly saying that US cops were trained in Israel to kill protesters or by claiming that they were somehow influenced by Israeli techniques of violence against Palestinians.

The claims are of course absurd. While many police departments do send representatives to Israel to learn anti-riot techniques, they are the ones responsible for their police officer training and rules of engagement, and the cops themselves are responsible for their actions. Blaming Jews for the brutality of some US cops is simply a modern form of antisemitism.

However, there is an irony there. If the US police departments had actually gone through an extensive and formal training of riot control techniques as their Israeli counterparts have, there would be far fewer injuries of protesters today than we have been seeing.

Back in 2013, B’Tselem issued a report trying to damn the IDF’s riot control techniques. The report itself highlighted how much the IDF tries to minimize civilian injuries and death.

There are two main categories of controls that the IDF uses to minimize civilian injuries during violent riots.

The first one is to try to use weapons that cannot or are unlikely to injure or kill protesters – tear gas, foul smelling “skunk water,” stun grenades, foam bullets.

Far more important, however, are the instructions and training that go along with these weapons. IDF soldiers are given very specific rules as to when each kind of riot countermeasure can be used. Practically the entire B’Tselem report is accusing the IDF of not following its own rules – many of which the NGO only guess at based on secondary sources.

For example, here is part of the section in the report on stun grenades:

Stun grenades are a diversionary device whose explosion emits a bright light and a thunderous noise. The grenades are designed to cause fear and panic, distracting individuals and allowing security forces to gain control of crowds. According to Israel Police procedure, “This device should be used for handling disturbances of the peace which endanger the police force and/or public safety and which do not enable direct contact with the demonstrators without injury to police officers. This device is designed to achieve the dispersal of demonstrators and gaining control of them.” …When used according to the regulations, stun grenades should not cause bodily harm, nor do they have any side effects. However, under certain circumstances, the noise resulting from the explosion may damage the eardrum; therefore, users are instructed to wear hearing protective equipment. In addition, the grenades’ explosion mechanism generates an extremely hot flash of fire, and the very impact of a heavy metal object hurled at a person can result in bodily injury. Therefore, police safety instructions stipulate that the grenade must be aimed at a safe distance of 30 meters from the person throwing and 5 meters from the target, and in any case, the grenade must not be thrown into a crowd. Moreover, over the years, Israeli soldiers who have taken part in dispersing demonstrations have informed B’Tselem that they were instructed to roll stun grenades on the ground, not throw them at people.

The detailed, six page IDF response emphasizes the importance it places on proper training and documentation of when and where to use its non-lethal crowd control and dispersal tools, and only mentions the actual methods peripherally:

The rules and procedures for when to engage with live fire are clearly worded and also encompass the wide array of possible security situations IDF soldiers may find themselves in. These rules clearly establish for soldiers how to respond to life threatening situations as well as riots and other disruptions of public order. Additionally, the instructions regarding proper usage of crowd dispersal equipment are also clearly worded, organized and detailed. As updated instructions are passed from the headquarter-level to the field, they are adapted for the soldiers in the field, and "responses to specific situations" are included so as to ensure that the soldiers understand what is permitted with regards to the use of force and the use of the riot control measures.

It is important to note that the emphasis that the IDF places on the proper procedure for live-fire and proper usage of crowd dispersal equipment significantly reduces the potential for casualties. The IDF emphatically denies the claim that IDF soldiers racially discriminate when engaging in crowd dispersion in Judea and Samaria or in any other location. The decision regarding which specific crowd dispersal equipment to use is based purely on security and operational considerations, not on economic or any other type of consideration.

In order to deal with violent and illegal riots or other disruptions of public order, the IDF utilizes a selection of different equipment to disperse crowds as well as prevent causalities of any kind. The IDF invests a great deal in order to acquire as well as develop effective crowd dispersal equipment that will not harm the rioters; a good example being "Ha'Boesh" or the "skunk" canister. These measures are taken in order to avoid having to employ alternative measures.

Police and soldiers are human and sometimes, in the heat of being attacked, make mistakes. The way to minimize these mistakes is to engage in training and to have specific written rules and drills on how to deal with every situation. What we are seeing in the examples of police overreaction being shown in social media is that some cops simply are not adequately trained, and (certainly in the case of the police ramming mentioned earlier) they don’t even seem to be properly equipped with proper crowd control tools and methods to begin with.

If US police were trained by the IDF the way IDF soldiers are, there would be far fewer such incidents. The “Deadly Exchange” libel is the exact opposite of the truth – if the anti-Israel Left actually cared about protecting protesters, they would want US police to act the way their Israeli counterparts do and to increase training with the IDF, which unfortunately has a great deal of experience with violent riots.

Furthermore, as Haviv Rettig Gur notes, the training programs that do exist today emphasize how to avoid situations that can bring riots in the first place: “sharing best practices in community engagement, nonviolent policing, intelligence.” It is the polar opposite of what is being described by the Israel-haters.

Of course, the socialist Left agenda has nothing to do with avoiding riots or injuries and everything to do with vilifying the police and romanticizing the violent rioters – just as they demonize the IDF and defend terrorism against Jews in Israel.

Jordan still worried about being forced to become Palestine

A cartoon in Jordan’s Al Ghad shows that even today, Jordan is worried that it will be forced to become the Palestinian state, as some right-wing Israelis have suggested over the decades.

The caption says “Annexation of the West Bank” and the Jewish crocodile is thinking that Jordan is the “alternative homeland” for Palestinians.

Of course, Palestinians are widely regarded to be the majority in Jordan and if anyone who pretends to be pro-democracy would insist that the model be applied to Jordan, then Jordan would indeed become the Palestinian state. Jordanians are understandably dead-set against the idea because they remember the last time Palestinians tried to take over the Kingdom in 1970 and the Palestinian who assassinated King Abdullah I in 1953.

Notice that the artist has the Jewish crocodile eating all of Israel, implying that none of it belongs to Israel even today.

Despite the outreach to Israel, Saudis are still antisemitic

Even though the news has been full of stories about how the Gulf countries have been putting out signals of friendliness towards Israel and Jews, antisemitism is still quite a part of life.

The official Saudi news agency Okaz has an article attacking Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. The two main charges against him are that he is friendly to Israel – and he is supposedly Jewish:

• Who is Recep Tayyip Erdogan?
• According to the book “Sons of Moses” by Turkish writer Ergün Poyraz, Erdogan is of Jewish origin. This author Y. Küçük confirmed in a television interview with “Oda TV,” that Erdogan's lineage comes from the Jews, and that 3 of the most important pillars of his government are Khazars.

Erdogan’s enemies have been claiming this for years – see one example below - but if someone calls you “Jewish” to insult you, you can be sure that they are antisemitic.

05/31 Links: Who owns the Land of Israel?; Melanie Phillips: EU second thoughts over hostility to Israel?; Between Minneapolis and Jerusalem;

From Ian:

Pastor John Hagee: Who owns the Land of Israel?

I am inspired to send this message to the 8.2 million-plus members of Christians United for Israel by the fact that months ago president trump met with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Washington to present the administration's peace proposal. I was there!

It was a masterful proposal that gave the Palestinians the opportunity of a better life through a 50 billion dollar investment package. It was an effort that required years of work by the brilliant and talented inner circle of the president.

It was made clear at the Washington meeting that this historic peace plan could go into effect within days. If the Palestinians immediately reject the plan, the US Will be prepared to accept the enactment of Israel's sovereignty over parts of the West Bank within 48 hours.

It was made clear that this historic plan could go into effect within days. However, days have become weeks, weeks have become months.

To be clear, the Palestinians have never owned Judea or Samaria. That Israel will meet with a Palestinian leadership that still supports terrorists and incites violence against the Jewish people is a commentary on Israel's willingness to make every effort to advance peace with their neighbors, not a commentary on the Palestinians being deserving of yet another chance at the negotiating table.

Our role is to heed the commandment that we "pray for the peace of Jerusalem!" And that time is now!

Melanie Phillips: EU second thoughts over hostility to Israel?

Has the European Union reached a tipping point over Israel? Or to be more precise, is the Europeans’ bluff finally to be called over Israel’s proposal to extend its sovereignty over parts of Judea and Samaria?

The E.U. has been mulling over punitive measures against Israel if it goes ahead with what its western critics call “annexation of the occupied territories of the West Bank.”

A number of member states, headed by France along with Spain, Italy, the Netherlands, Ireland, Sweden, Denmark, Poland, Belgium and Luxembourg are calling for a hard line.

Measures being considered include supporting any U.N. moves against “annexation”; public support of proceedings against Israel currently underway in the International Criminal Court at The Hague; and increasing the boycott of settlements in various ways, along with increased financial support for the Palestinians.

The E.U. and Britain maintain that Israel is illegally occupying the disputed territories, and that its settlements there amount to a transfer of population into those lands in contravention of the Geneva Convention.

This is a serious misreading of international law. Israel is not “occupying” these territories. In law, occupation can only occur if the land belongs to a sovereign power, which was never the case here; and a state can also hold onto land which continues to be used for belligerent purposes against it.

It is also a gross misreading of the Geneva Convention, as the Israelis living in these territories were not transferred but moved there entirely of their own volition.

Between Minneapolis and Jerusalem

The killing of Eyad al-Hallaq in Jerusalem was unsettling, as was the horrific images of George Floyd in Minneapolis gasping for air.

Both of them civilians, both killed by police. Their tragic and outrageous deaths are part of a long history of violence.

But the similarities end there, and after observing the path social media took this weekend, maybe it needs to be said clearly: The attempt to draw parallels between Jerusalem and Minneapolis are manipulative, and in many ways irresponsible.

Joint Arab List MK Aida Touma-Sliman implored "whoever is shocked by the murder in the US, to look closely – a whole nation is choking under occupation without being able to breathe."

Leading pundits worked hard to frame the shooting of al-Hallaq as an example of systemic racism in Israel, and many even blamed the public security minister by proxy.

Others expertly determined that it was "murder", and a few self-branding mavens were quick to use the hashtag #ArabLivesMatter, the local version of #BlackLivesMatter.

That's not only self-righteous populism but a manipulative way to use conscience. The shooting in Jerusalem, as horrible as it was, did not take place on racial background, but in the context of a nationalist conflict, which unfortunately creates terror. Just this week there were those who told us an intifada was the natural and desired result of all the talk about extending sovereignty. That is the reason for police presence in Jerusalem, and that is the background for the tension.

A Sudanese writer is claiming that a Saudi development initiative is actually an excuse for Israeli expansionism in the Persian Gulf.

The Saudi initiative is called “NEOM:”

NEOM is a bold and audacious dream. It is a vision of what a New Future might look like (in fact, NEOM means, “new future”). It’s an attempt to do something that’s never been done before and it comes at a time when the world needs fresh thinking and new solutions. NEOM is being built on the Red Sea in northwest Saudi Arabia as a living laboratory – a place where entrepreneurship and innovation will chart the course for this New Future. NEOM will be a destination, a home for people who dream big and want to be part of building a new model for sustainable living, working and prospering.

NEOM will include towns and cities, ports and enterprise zones, research centers, sports and entertainment venues, and tourist destinations. It will be the home and workplace for more than a million citizens from around the world.

The future has a new home

NEOM is the vision of His Royal Highness Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman and is a centerpiece of Saudi Arabia’s 2030 Vision plan to grow and diversify the Saudi economy and position the country to play a leading role in global development. While NEOM is being driven and initially funded by Saudi Arabia, it is an international project that will be led, populated and funded by people from all over the world.

In Gulf365, however, writer Shihab Muhammad knows better:

This article aims to explain two facts: they revealed that the Saudi NEOM project announced by Saudi Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman is not a tourism or development investment project, but rather a revival of the biblical Kingdom of Noam, and to be the capital of the Kingdom of Israel. This is expected after rebuilding the alleged temple on the ruins of Al-Aqsa, with the approval and support of the Al Saud, in implementation of the Zionist Masonic plan…

The city of Neom is mentioned in the context of the deal of the century, which is being established in the region located on the border between Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Palestine and Jordan, this name “Neom” does not mean as they say future and development, but it is a biblical word, and this name was mentioned in the Torah and means “Noam”, which is the name of a Jewish kingdom “ממלכת נוים”, which will be revived in that area of northern Saudi Arabia and Egypt, southern Palestine and Jordan.

…The NEOM project, which will be built on 26 thousand square kilometers, will be responsible for serving the Peres project, and will be based on energy, water and modern technologies, and the Israeli flag will be raised over the two islands of Tiran and Sanafir, Saudi Arabia, for their presence within the project, the government of the temple guards, meaning that the Zionist-Masonic project…

Another issue being covered up is that Egypt has leased 400 km to Saudi Arabia, regions that are filled with ancient monuments and will be handled by Jewish archaeologists, and they declare falsely that they have found Jewish antiquities, perhaps to make up for their failure to find even a shard of pottery indicating their ancient presence in Jerusalem in particular, and we have seen how Moshe Dayan, who occupied the West Bank, Sinai and the Golan in 1967, was burying some pottery and metal pieces, to say later that they found Jewish relics indicating them, and they did so in Lebanon in 1982.

Needless to say, there has never been a Biblical Kingdom of Noam, which the article helpfully transliterates into Hebrew as “Noim” to make it look legitimate.

This is definitely one of the more entertaining conspiracy theories I’ve come across.

A 21 year old girl was beaten to death by her father in what was probably another “honor killing.”

“M.G.” of Al Azawaida in central Gaza arrived at the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir Al-Balah on Thursday evening in very serious condition, beaten and bruised. She succumbed after midnight.

According to the Al-Mezan Center for Human Rights, the cause of death is a result of severe beatings in the head and parts of the body. PCHR says that there were also signs of strangulation around her neck.

PCHR notes that “Palestine” has signed international agreements to protect women legally but has not implemented them, as we have noted previously. In fact, the Palestinian Authority and Hamas have a laundry list of laws that explicitly discriminate against women, and Hamas never repealed laws that mitigate penalties against “honor crimes.”

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From Xinhua:

Palestine on Saturday said it supports China's right to impose the full sovereignty over all its territories including Hong Kong, and maintain its territorial integrity.

"We reiterate our support to the friendly People's Republic of China's right to maintain its sovereignty, against any foreign intervention into its internal affairs and the attempts to destabilize it," the Palestinian presidency said in a statement published by the official Palestinian News and Info Agency.

Palestine values China's efforts in fighting COVID-19, said the statement, highlighting China's aid to other countries including Palestine in combating the pandemic and building a global health community for all.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas also appreciated the unwavering Chinese support to the people of Palestine to achieve independence and freedom, and said Palestine is keen on enhancing its relations with China to the benefit of the two peoples.

There is not a dictatorship or autocratic state that the Palestinian leadership does not support.

And of course, the leftists who pretend that they support the people against their oppressive governments will be silent on this.

05/30 Links: Twitter censors Trump for glorifying violence, lets Iran threaten Israel; Qatar’s Al Jazeera Network Broadcasts Islamist Cleric’s Appeal to ‘Kill Jews’

From Ian:

Seth Frantzman: Twitter censors Trump for glorifying violence, lets Iran threaten Israel

Twitter on Thursday flagged a tweet by US President Donald Trump for “glorifying violence,” disabling re-tweets and comments. In the Tweet Trump had written that “when the looting starts, the shooting starts.” Yet Tweets by Iranian leader Ayatollah Khamenei calling for arming Palestinians, destroying Israel and “Jihad” remained without similar Twitter flags. The company provided no explanation for what defines “glorifying violence” and does not provide a way to report tweets specifically for this issue.

The tweet that Twitter flagged included references to “thugs” and the clashes in Minneapolis after a police officer was caught on video putting his knee on the neck of an African-American man. The man died and days of protests and increasing clashes, including burning of buildings, has resulted. Twitter flagged the tweet and provided a link to “learn more” which explained that due to “public interest” it had allowed the tweet to remain on twitter. This added to lack of clarity over how Twitter makes decisions to flag certain tweets and why it has not singled out tweets by authoritarian regimes, such as Iran, which often glorify violence.

In recent weeks as Iran’s regime sought to commemorate Quds Day it has called Israel a “virus” and “cancerous” and called for Palestinians to “liberate” the country. It has said they should be armed and that Iran supports Palestinian “fighters.” Khamenei tweeted on May 22 that “one cannot communicate with a savage enemy except by force.” A subsequent tweet urged “Jihad” against Israel, “everyone must help the Palestinian fighters.” He writes that “the struggle to free Palestine is Jihad in the way of God, Victory in a struggle has been guaranteed because a person, even if killed, will receive ‘one of the two excellent things.’” This is a reference to religious rewards for being killed fighting. He also wrote that the “Zionist regime is a deadly cancerous growth” and that it must be “uprooted and destroyed.”

Calling for a country to be uprooted, destroyed and calling it “cancerous” and urging armed fighters to be killed fighting it were not labelled as “glorifying violence” by Twitter. Instead, Khamenei’s incitement can be retweeted at will. This leads to questions about what standard Twitter uses and how it makes decisions. None of these details are provided transparently by the company. There is no way to report tweets specifically for this issue or find out what guidelines the platform uses to decide.

Qatar’s Al Jazeera Network Broadcasts Islamist Cleric’s Appeal to ‘Kill Jews’

The Qatar-owned satellite network Al Jazeera broadcast a crudely antisemitic interview with a leading Muslim cleric who called for the violent conquest of the State of Israel.

“Victory will not come on a golden platter. Victory is achieved through the blood of martyrs and over the skulls of the enemies. Victory is achieved by sacrificing money, life, and all that is precious,” Dr. Abduljabbar Saeed — head of the Quran and Sunnah Department in Qatar University’s Shari’a Faculty — declared on Al Jazeera on May 16, in a clip translated by the Washington, DC-based think tank Middle East Media and Research Institute (MEMRI).

“We will not accept the [Israeli] occupation’s existence on a single centimeter of [Palestine] under any circumstances,” Saeed said.

The cleric went on to quote a hadith (saying) of the Prophet Muhammad frequently cited by Islamists in support of their eternal enmity toward Jews: “The Prophet Muhammad said: ‘Judgement Day will not come until the Muslims fight the Jews and kill them.’ This is a promise made by Allah and His Messenger. [The Prophet said:] ‘The Muslims will kill [the Jews], until the rocks and the trees say: ‘Oh Servant of Allah, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him.'”

Qatar launched an ill-fated outreach to influential American Jews in 2017 as it sought to change its negative image in the Jewish community worldwide. Despite the initial fanfare, the effort petered out the following year.

Phyllis Chesler on the Fight against Honor Killings

Phyllis Chesler, a Shillman-Ginsburg Fellow at the Middle East Forum, emerita professor of psychology and women's studies, and the author of eighteen books, spoke to participants in a May 18 Middle East Forum webinar (video) about the barbaric practice of honor killing and how to combat it.

Honor killing is the "cold blooded murder of girls and women by their families of origin." In a "shame and honor tribal culture, ... a girl's virginity and reproductive capacity, her fertility, are owned by her family, literally. Not by the girl herself. She represents their honor," Chesler explained. "If a girl is seen as damaged goods, her family will then be responsible ... no one will marry their other children or deal with them economically. They'll be shunned." The only way the family can "cleanse themselves of this shame [is] with blood – her blood."

The list of offenses that can trigger an honor killing is long, including engaging in sex outside of marriage, refusing an arranged marriage, marrying outside of one's religious sect or cast, having infidel friends, and becoming too Westernized. Since the aim is to recapture family honor, not punishment, it matters little whether the accusations are true. In rare cases where honor killers are prosecuted, according to Chesler, "they claim that they're only acting in self-defense, that communal norms drove them to it."

Unlike domestic violence against women in Western countries, where the perpetrators are almost exclusively men, usually acting alone and spontaneously, "honor killings are carefully planned conspiracies." Typically there is a "designated hands-on killer" acting in collaboration with other relatives, including "mothers, sisters, and aunts." The involvement of female relatives is common, according to Chesler, as
women have internalized the same patriarchal and tribal beliefs that men have and, in addition, they're responsible for keeping their daughters in line. They will pay a heavy price if their daughters dishonor the family. So very often ... mothers will lure their daughters home saying, 'It's okay, he'll forgive you, we'll work it out.' And then she dies.

Honor killing is "not based in any particular religion," said Chesler, noting that in India, the country where honor killing is by far the most prevalent, it is practiced by both Muslims and Hindus. However, Chesler's research has shown that Hindus "only do this in India ... Those who immigrate to the West don't do this." Honor killings in Europe and the United States are "mainly a Muslim-on-Muslim phenomenon."

Chag sameach!

Tonight is the holiday of Shavuot, so I will be off on Friday.

Have a wonderful Yom Tov!

05/28 Links Pt2: Questioning the Legitimacy of Israel's Existence Is Anti-Semitic; The Guardian Ignores Intifada’s Role in Ending Two-State Solution Hopes

From Ian:

Questioning the Legitimacy of Israel's Existence Is Anti-Semitic

Does the U.S. have a right to exist? Is the U.S. military a terrorist organization? Most Americans would reject these questions as unreasonable and unfair. Yet the Stanford community widely accepts these questions as justified when "U.S." is replaced with "Israel."

As an Israeli-American student, I'm constantly asked to defend my nationality. Mentioning Israel, or even Hebrew, on campus immediately eliminates any of the social norms that empower us to respectfully engage in conversation. But questioning the legitimacy of Israel's very existence is anti-Semitic. Jews have a right to self-determination and national aspirations, just like all other people.

Jewish nationalism stems from the constant marginalization and forced migration Jews have faced. I am a Zionist because my grandfather deserved a safe home after he was forced to flee Iraq in 1936, because my grandmother needed security after escaping Nazi-controlled Austria, and because my other grandmother has the right to continue her ninth-generation lineage of living in Jerusalem.

The increasingly common belief that Zionism fundamentally denies Palestinians humanity or a homeland is both inaccurate and anti-Semitic. If the slander or abhorrent language were directed toward any other nationality, it would never be tolerated. Denying me, an Israeli citizen, protection from harassment and ignorance at Stanford is a tremendous oversight on the part of a community that prides itself on diversity, tolerance and open scholarly discourse.

Honest Reporting: The Guardian Ignores Intifada’s Role in Ending Two-State Solution Hopes

When it comes to media bias against Israel, often enough the problem isn’t simply in the content, but what is not in the content.

Take for example a puff piece published in the Guardian on 25 May, entitled “What else happened as coronavirus swept the globe.” The article, written by Michael Safi, brings together a variety of big stories from the last few months and attempts to repackage them so as to provide the Guardian with fresh content.

The final main item, entitled “The end of the two-state solution?” frames the impending partial annexation of areas in Samaria and in Judea, as the death knell for hopes of a peace resulting from a Palestinian state arising in coexistence alongside Israel.

The Guardian’s writers have every right to their perspective – but theirs is not the only one. One held by many Israelis, and the driving force behind the current Israeli administration’s moves to annex these lands, is that the two-state solution is already long dead.
What Really Killed A Two-State Solution?

The peace process of the 1990s initially generated huge optimism in parts of Israeli society and much of the West, especially when it resulted in Yitzhak Rabin and Yasser Arafat ceremoniously signing the Oslo Accords on 13 September 1993.

However, it’s often noted that the heady days of the mid-90s, when the hope that Israelis and Palestinians could finally move forward and make peace was pervasive, gave way to the shock and horror of the early 2000s, when wave after bloody wave of Palestinian terror left millions in Israel in utter despair.

Simplification that may be, but it neatly encapsulates the feeling in Israel after seemingly making so much headway in the pursuit of peace, only to be violently rebuffed. The prospect of a two-state solution for Israelis and Palestinians, once so tangible, faded into the ether and came to be treated by many as a dangerous, alluring mirage.

Without Communist China, Would Palestinian Terrorism Have Become Such a Menace?

Brief history: communists under Mao Zedong consolidate control of China by 1952. The surviving nationalists retreat to Taiwan and set up shop there as a separate country. At the same time, China was fighting on the side of communist North Korea against the United States/United Nations.

Israel recognized the People’s Republic in 1950; China did not reciprocate until 1992. In 1964, China was tilting heavily in favor of the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO).

Tilting is too weak a description. Communist China was the PLO’s greatest supporter outside the Middle East, according to captured files Haaretz’s Shaina Oppenheimer wrote about last August.

A few paragraphs out of Oppenheimer’s long and fascinating story drive the point home of how pivotal communist China was to the PLO and to fomenting chaos around the world.
(Historian Lillian Craig) Harris suggested that the aid provided was an overlooked point in history in which China — unlike other “half-hearted” nations such as the Soviet Union — consistently advised the Palestinians and truly invested in their revolutionary cause.

And
In the late ’60s, the attention given by the Chinese to the Palestinian struggle was the most significant of any nation other than neighboring Arab states.

As relations with the PLO were cemented, Beijing also began cultivating national liberation movements as part of a local, strategic front against imperialism, aiming to revolutionize both China and neighboring countries. Communist parties influenced by Chairman Mao Zedong began to emerge in Malaysia, Vietnam, India and, most notably, the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia.

Vietnam…the Khmer Rouge… The Khmer Rouge alone killed an estimated 2 million Cambodians in the 1960s and 1970s, making China responsible for murders by the millions beyond the estimated 65 million of its own people Mao’s communists murdered during the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution. Add North Korea into that too. China enables that regime.

Why did China support the Palestinians?
In March 1965, Mao famously told a PLO delegation: “Imperialism is afraid of China and of the Arabs. Israel and Formosa [Taiwan] are bases of imperialism in Asia. You are the front gate of the great continent, and we are the rear. They created Israel for you, and Formosa for us. … The West does not like us, and we must understand this fact. The Arab battle against the West is the battle against Israel. So boycott Europe and America, O Arabs!”
(h/t jzaik)