From Ian:
Time to Reconsider U.S. Support of UNRWA
The Palestinian Authority (PA), which was created by the Oslo peace process, has turned its back on negotiations with Israel and sought to pressure and delegitimize the Jewish state through the United Nations. Palestinian efforts to secure a one-sided Security Council resolution calling for an Israeli withdrawal to the borders that existed before the 1967 Arab–Israeli War are opposed by the United States, which correctly sees them as incompatible and harmful to negotiating a peace accord.
The Obama Administration should not only block efforts to bypass direct Israeli–Palestinian negotiations, the only genuine path to peace, but also seek to prevent the United Nations from being exploited to advance these efforts. One egregious example is the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), whose facilities were used by Hamas in 2014 to house missiles—Hamas has launched thousands of rockets against Israeli civilians—and tunnels that were used to launch strikes into Israeli territory.
UNRWA has existed for more than 60 years as a temporary initiative to address the needs of Palestinian refugees from the 1948 Israeli–Arab conflict and to facilitate their resettlement and/or repatriation. It has evolved into a permanent institution providing services to multiple generations of Palestinian “refugees,” of whom a large majority live outside refugee camps, enjoy citizenship in other countries, or reside in the Palestinian-governed West Bank and Gaza Strip.
The reality is that UNRWA obstructs its original mission of resolving the Palestinian refugee problem. Worse, by encouraging the Palestinian fixation on their “right to return” to Israel, UNRWA impedes negotiations for a permanent peace agreement. The U.S. should withhold its contributions until UNRWA implements critical reforms. The medium-term U.S. goal should be to eliminate the organization and shift responsibility for actual Palestinian refugees to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).
Schabas keeps demonizing Israel, despite ethics violations
When Canadian law professor William Schabas was exposed as having omitted a blatant conflict of interest in applying for a UN position, he abruptly resigned as head of the latest commission investigating Israeli “war crimes.” However, he did not slink away quietly in embarrassment, or apologize and ask for forgiveness.
Instead, as a political warrior, his strategy has been to counterattack and spin the discussion in a way that his image is changed from attacker to victim. Schabas is an intense ideologue, dedicated to radical causes in which hostility toward Israel is at the top of the agenda. For many years, he has used his status as a professor of international law to advance this form of warfare, including serving as a PLO adviser. (This was the “minor point” he omitted in a UN application form.) His appointment as head of a high-profile UN investigation was a major achievement, and his removal a greater defeat.
To divert attention from his ethical violations, Schabas’ primary response is to dress himself in the clothes of the victim of an Israeli-led conspiracy. In a sympathetic article published in the New York Times, he complained of being targeted in “a stream of vulgar and violent emails and several death threats.”
Schabas has also tried to use his Canadian link to present his spin. In an interview last month with The CJN, he made the Pinocchio-like claim that there was “no evidence I’m biased against Israel.” But the article provided plenty of evidence. For example, the interviewer (reporter Paul Lungen) asked about a 2011 public declaration that Netanyahu “should be in the dock of an international court.” Schabas awkwardly sidestepped the specifics, instead presenting a convoluted attempt to redefine bias.
Michael Lumish: The Big Lie and "Palestinian" Jew-Rammin' Fun
"Five people were injured Friday morning in a car-ramming terror attack near a Jerusalem Light Rail station in the north of the city. Four of the wounded were young border policewomen, in their twenties, and the fifth was a civilian bicycle rider in his fifties
A Palestinian man in a private vehicle hit the five as they stood on a sidewalk. He was identified as Mohammad Salima, 21, from east Jerusalem’s Ras al-Amud. After the car attack, he then emerged from the vehicle with a butcher’s knife and attempted to stab passersby, but was swiftly shot and incapacitated by a Border Policeman and a Light Rail security guard at the scene."
We need to remember that our alleged allies on the Left literally believe that "Palestinians" have every right to murder Jews, or attempt to murder Jews, because of the so-called "Occupation of Palestinian Territories."
They would rarely put it in such blunt terms, of course. Instead, with a shrug of the shoulders, they wave away any Arab responsibility for attempts to murder Jews by portraying those attempts as perfectly reasonable responses to Israeli Jewish bad behavior.
Of course, the only way that they can get away with this is through ignoring thirteen hundred years of Jewish (and Christian) persecution under the heel of Islamic-Arab imperial aggression and the fact that it is not an Israeli-Palestinian conflict, because the Arabs involved include pretty much every Arab government on the planet, to greater and lesser degrees.
It is, in fact, a Koranically-based ongoing Arab war against the Jews.
Obama Appoints Man He Fired for Hamas Contacts as Middle East Coordinator
Let’s go back to 2008 when candidate Obama was trying to convince people that he wasn’t anti-American and anti-Israel. The problem was that he was surrounded by people who were both. So a few had to go under the bus. Like Robert Malley.
The Times of London reports that Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., has fired one of his foreign policy advisers — Robert Malley of the International Crisis Group — for meeting with the Palestinian group Hamas, which the U.S. State Department classifies as a terrorist organization.
“He was one of literally hundreds of informal, outside advisors,” Obama spokesman Bill Burton told ABC News, confirming the Times account.
Hundreds. Informal. Outside.
Then Robert Malley, who was meeting with Hamas on behalf of George Soros’ International Crisis Group, became one of the few formal inside advisers.
In February of last year, he became a senior director of the National Security Council. Now the sky is the limit. (h/t Yenta Press)
Hate speaker condemned
ISLAMIST group Hizb ut-Tahrir has been condemned by communal leaders after a video emerged last month of a hate rally it conducted in the Sydney suburb of Lakemba last year.
During the gatheirng, which was held on July 25 at the height of Operation Protective Edge in Gaza, Hizb ut-Tahrir spiritual leader Ismail al-Wahwah accused Jews everywhere of corruption and called Jews “a hidden evil”.
“The entire world suffers from the children of Israel … Who will set the world free from the children of Israel so that the world will be able to say that it has rid itself of that hidden evil?” he asked.
“This mission will be accomplished by none but you, O Muslims … The ember of jihad against the Jews will continue to burn.
“Judgment day will not come until the Muslims fight the Jews … Tomorrow you Jews will see what will become of you – an eye for an eye, blood for blood, destruction for destruction.”
Hizb ut-Tahrir spokesman Uthman Badar subsequently tried to explain that in the context of the “brutal Israeli aggression on Gaza” the comments were “entirely appropriate.”
Bibi Was Ready for Peace, Abbas Wasn’t
When the Middle East peace talks collapsed last spring, the Obama administration made no secret of its willingness to blame Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu for the failure of Secretary of State John Kerry’s initiative. According to both Kerry and President Obama, it was Netanyahu’s actions on settlements and refusal to accommodate the Palestinians that undermined the effort. Even for those not privy to inside information this made no sense and it was even contradicted by the testimony of Tzipi Livni, one of Netanyahu’s main rivals for power. But now a new document has surfaced detailing just how far Netanyahu was willing to go to make peace. But don’t expect this to change the minds of an administration that has, from its first moments in 2009, sought to distance the U.S. from the Jewish state. But it does provide even more evidence for those who are capable of being persuaded by facts that it remains the Palestinian refusal to make peace on even the most favorable terms that prevents the end of the conflict. That means the talk about a new U.S. initiative in the waning months of the Obama presidency is doomed no matter how much pressure is placed on the Israelis.
For those who care to remember what actually happened in the spring of 2014, the facts aren’t in much dispute. After several months of Palestinian stonewalling in the peace talks, Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas blew them up by signing a unity deal with Hamas. He then compounded that folly by ignoring his obligations under the Oslo Accords and heading to the United Nations in a vain attempt to gain recognition for Palestinian independence at the world body. That Obama and Kerry chose to ignore these actions and instead blame it all on Netanyahu was a clear measure of their disdain for the prime minister and his country.
But even Livni, who despises Netanyahu and is working to defeat him in the Knesset Elections this month told the New York Times last year that it was the Palestinians who derailed any chance of peace by stonewalling the talks at crucial moments. Given that the same PA turned down offers of peace and independence in almost all the West Bank, Gaza and a share of Jerusalem in 2000, 2001 and 2008, this is a hardly a surprise. The political culture of the Palestinians makes it impossible for Abbas to recognize the legitimacy of a Jewish state no matter where its borders would be drawn.
Netanyahu aide denies PM okayed return to '67 lines in talks with Palestinians
An aide to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu denied on Friday a report in an Israeli tabloid which claimed that the premier had agreed in principle to an Israeli withdrawal to the 1967 lines.
“The prime minister never agreed to a return to the ’67 lines, a partition of Jerusalem, and recognition of the right of return,” the aide said. “His position on these issues remains unchanged.”
According to the popular circulation daily Yediot Aharonot, Netanyahu considered an agreement with the Palestinians that would have uprooted West Bank settlements and recognized Palestinian claims in Jerusalem.
The document was the result of secret talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority during Netanyahu’s previous term, from 2009-2013, the daily reported.
In the document considered by Netanyahu’s envoy, Yitzhak Molcho, and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’s confidant Hussein Agha, Israel would agree to negotiate a peace deal on the basis of the 1967 borders, with land swaps and terms that would allow Israelis living in the West Bank to choose whether to remain under Palestinian rule.
Steinitz: 'Concessions Document' is Suitable for Purim
Intelligence Minister Yuval Steinitz, a close associate of Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, insisted on Friday that a report in Yedioth Aharonoth, outlining supposed land concessions offered to the Palestinian Authority by Netanyahu, was false.
According to the report, in secret talks with the PA, Netanyahu's representative presented a document offering a bevy of concessions, including a return to the 1949 Armistice lines with land swaps on a meter for meter basis, certain recognition of PA aspirations for Jerusalem, a PA hold in the Jordan Valley, a possibility for "Palestinian refugee" return on an individual basis, the evacuation of Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria, and leaving some Jewish residents under PA rule.
The document in question, Steinitz claimed in an interview with Channel 2 News, is an American proposal “that presents what we do not agree with.”
"Despite agreeing in principle to the two-state formula, we say unequivocally that in the situation in the Middle East today, any withdrawal from Judea and Samaria or Jerusalem is not a recipe for peace, but rather a recipe for disaster," he said.
"The way this document was presented is suitable for Purim - we never agreed to anything in the document, and Attorney Molcho (Netanyahu's representative in the talks) did not agree either," Steinitz continued.
UN Chief Calls on Israel to Resume Transfer of Taxes to PA
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Friday expressed concern after the Palestine Liberation Organization's (PLO) central council decided to end security cooperation with Israel in response to Israel’s decision to withhold the Palestinian Authority’s (PA) tax revenues.
Ban, however, had criticism for Israel and called on the Jewish state to resume the transfer of taxes, which are being held back from the PA in retaliation for its moves to join the International Criminal Court (ICC).
"The Secretary-General repeats his call on Israel to resume the transfer of tax revenues legally due to the Palestinian Authority as per the Paris Protocol," UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said, according to the Xinhua news agency.
While urging both parties to "exercise utmost restraint" and "reverse their unhelpful cycle of actions and counter-actions," Ban stressed that in the absence of effective international engagement, the situation may "further unravel," according to Dujarric.
BBC News website invents ‘1967 ceasefire lines’ in Jerusalem
With regard to the location of the attack, in addition to describing it as having taken place “on the seam of East and West Jerusalem”, the article adds:
“Israel has occupied East Jerusalem since the 1967 Middle East war and annexed it in a move not recognised internationally.
It regards the whole of Jerusalem as its “eternal and indivisible” capital, while the Palestinians want East Jerusalem as the capital of a future Palestinian state.”
Included in the article is a BBC-produced map of the location of the attack in which the 1949 Armistice Lines are inaccurately – and absurdly, given the above text – represented as the “1967 ceasefire line”.
One might have thought that the BBC’s incessant promotion of “East Jerusalem” would at least ensure geographical and historical accuracy.
'An Israeli leader must be able to stand up and tell the truth'
After speaking at Congress and facing off with U.S. President Barack Obama, 11 days before facing an election at home, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu tells Israel Hayom that "a prime minister in Israel must be able to stand up even to our closest ally and tell the truth. Otherwise, history will not be kind to us."
Netanyahu stresses that the speech he gave to a joint session of Congress this week was "well worth the cost of confrontation" with the American president, adding that "what are we expected to do with such a fateful issue? Put our heads down? Go back 80 years to a time when Jews were forced to cower before the nobility? Ignore a threat of annihilation? Not demand action? Stop interrupting? I refuse to accept that!" (h/t Josh Korn)
Kerry: ‘Up to Iran’ to show its nuclear program peaceful
US Secretary of State John Kerry said Saturday that it was up to Iran to prove it has a peaceful nuclear program, following talks with his French counterpart in Paris.
“It is frankly up to Iran that wants this program, that asserts that it has a peaceful program… to show the world that it is exactly what they say,” said Kerry following a meeting with his French counterpart Laurent Fabius.
French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius noted “progress” in talks with Iran, but said differences remained.
“There is progress in certain areas but there are also divergences that must be remedied, so there is still work to do,” said Fabius at the joint press conference with Kerry.
Kerry arrived in Paris on Saturday to brief European officials on the status of nuclear negotiations with Iran.
20 Times Obama Adminisration Said No Deal Was Better Than a Bad Deal
Pro-Iran NIAC Found Liable to Pay Judgment for Disobeying “Multiple Court Orders”
A judge slapped sanctions amounting to nearly $200,000 on the National Iranian American Council (NIAC), a controversial group that advocates for stronger ties between the United States and Iran, finding that in the process of suing blogger Hassan Diaoleslam, a critic of the group, it had “‘flouted multiple court orders’ and improperly delayed its delivery of documents to Daioleslam during the discovery portion of the lawsuit and even withheld certain documents,” Business Insider reported Thursday.
NIAC had sued Daioleslam in 2008 for defamation, after Daioleslam claimed that the organization functioned as a lobby group for the interests of the Iranian government, which if true would place the organization in violation of the Foreign Agents Registration Act. In 2012,the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia found that NIAC founder and president Trita Parsi’s work was “not inconsistent with the idea that he was first and foremost an advocate for the regime.” According to the court’s decision, Daioleslam’s claims thus could not be considered defamatory.
White House Tweets Attack on Bibi Using Noted Plagiarist
The White House used an article written by a known plagiarist to attack the credibility of the leader of America’s closest ally in the Middle East.
Even though the president insisted the U.S. and Israel were strong, the White House National Security tweeted “Interesting take from @FareedZakaria on why PM Netanyahu’s predictions on #Iran have been wrong for 25 years,” and included a link to the article.
In a stunningly political and petty move, the White House essentially accused Prime Minister Netanyahu of fear mongering for more than two decades.
The White House’s use of Zakaria raises red flags. CNN and Time magazine suspended the embattled pundit and editor for plagiarism on a gun control article he wrote in 2012. He was accused, again, of plagiarism in August 2014. Afterwards, Our Bad Media delivered a crushing report detailing 26 examples of Zakaria continuously plagiarizing in dozens of episodes of his CNN show by ripping off other sources.
Beyond credibility as a journalist, it was foolish for the White House to use Zakarie because he has been a puppet of the Obama administration since Obama came into the national fold in 2007.
Zakaria has long been an outspoken Obama backer. In 2008, in an interview with Playboy magazine, Zakaria even went so far as to say Obama is never wrong about anything.
Prominent pro-Israel senator may be charged with corruption
A top pro-Israel Democrat in the US Senate, Sen. Robert Menendez (D-NJ), may be charged with corruption following allegations he used his office to advance the business interests of a Democratic donor in exchange for gifts.
Menendez defiantly said Friday he has always been honest in office even as a person familiar with the matter said he’s expected to face criminal charges soon.
“Let me be very clear, I have always conducted myself appropriately and in accordance with the law,” Menendez, a New Jersey Democrat, said at a press conference in his home state. “Every action that I and my office have taken for the last 23 years that I have been privileged to be in the United States Congress has been based on pursuing the best policies for the people of New Jersey and this entire country.”
CNN first reported Friday that the Justice Department was set to bring corruption charges against the lawmaker centering on his relationship with Dr. Salomon Melgen, a Florida ophthalmologist as well as a friend and donor to the lawmaker’s campaigns. (h/t Jewess)
Jews Dress Up as Arabs to Enter Temple Mount
A group of Temple Mount activists were spotted dressed up as Arabs on Friday in order to be able to enter the compound.
The Jewish activists did not do this in the spirit of Purim, which was celebrated in the capital on Friday. They did it in order to get around a ban on Jewish prayer which was imposed by the police.
Despite a court ruling earlier this week which said that police “must make sure that Jews are able to pray on the Temple Mount”, officers have been restricting Jewish prayer at the compound since Wednesday, telling worshippers that the restrictions are in accordance with a decision by the political leadership following pressure from Jordan.
On Friday, Jews who wanted to visit the Temple Mount were told by officers that on Fridays the Temple Mount must be free of Jews regularly, even on Purim.
The worshippers who were forced to dress up as Arabs said, "It is inconceivable that we cannot be on the Temple Mount on a day like today.”
Purim Attack: Shin Bet interrogates family of east Jerusalem terrorist
The east Jerusalem terrorist who rammed his car into a crowd of Border Policewomen on Shimon Hatzadik Street in the capital on Friday has been identified by authorities as Mohammed Mahmoud Abdel Razek Salaima.
Salaima is a 22-year-old resident of the Palestinian neighborhood of Ras al-Amud.
The Israel Security Agency (Shin Bet) detained Salaima’s father and siblings, who are now being questioned in a Jerusalem police station. It remains unclear whether Salaima is affiliated with any particular Palestinian faction.
What is known is that Salaima has a criminal record. He is now hospitalized in critical condition at a Jerusalem hospital after he was shot by a police officer at the scene of the attack.
An initial investigation revealed that Salaima drove his car in the direction of Zax Junction in downtown Jerusalem. Soon afterwards, he drove his vehicle onto the sidewalk and ran over five pedestrians, four of them security officers.
Palestinians: Gaza fisherman shot dead by Israeli navy
Israeli naval forces shot a Palestinian fisherman dead Saturday off the coast of Gaza, a Palestinian health official said.
Tawfiq Abu Riala, 32, was killed and two other Gaza fishermen were arrested, said Ashraf al-Kidra, a Gaza health ministry spokesman.
The Israeli military said its forces identified a number of vessels that had “deviated from the designated fishing zone” and ordered them to halt their progress. When the vessels did not comply, the forces opened fire at their engines to stop them, the military said.
It was not clear how the fisherman ended up in the line of fire.
Egypt to open Rafah border crossing with Gaza
Egypt will reopen its Rafah border crossing with Gaza for two days from Monday, for the fourth time since it was closed after a suicide bombing, security officials said.
The terminal was shut after the bombing in the Sinai Peninsula in October killed 30 soldiers, and has since been reopened three times.
The only access point to the Gaza Strip not controlled by Israel will reopen on Monday and Tuesday to allow Palestinians stranded on both sides to cross.
Palestinians who travel through Rafah are mostly students heading to universities in Egypt or beyond, and those seeking medical treatment.
October’s attack also led to a state of emergency and curfew being imposed in some parts of North Sinai where security forces are battling an Islamist insurgency.
Egypt kills at least 25 militants in Sinai, officials say
At least 25 Islamist militants were killed in air strikes in northern Sinai over the past several days, senior security officials said Friday.
Security sources cited by Reuters said 10 militants from Ansar Beit Al-Maqdis, which pledged allegiance to the Islamic State and renamed itself “Sinai Province”, were killed Friday in Egyptian air raids on a home in Sheikh Zuweid in northern Sinai, near the Gaza Strip. This followed similar air strikes on Thursday in the town which killed 15 terrorists from the group, according to the sources.
Egypt is in the throes of fighting an Islamist insurrection in the Sinai that has claimed the lives of hundreds of police officials and soldiers since the ouster of Islamist president Mohammed Morsi in the summer of 2013.
Nicholas Kristof’s quasi-Apartheid imagery
In a New York Times Sunday review feature, “The Two Israels,” Kristof not only presented a one-sided assessment of the situation of the Negev Bedouin community but unintentionally used apartheid imagery. Not only does its title suggest an apartheid situation but he characterized the recognized Bedouin towns as “Indian reservations;” the US equivalent of South African black townships.
This image would be rejected by Hura mayor Mohammed Alnabari. Under his administration, Hura gained call center jobs, initiated the Women’s Catering Enterprise that produces meals for Bedouin schools, developed a joint project with a nearby kibbutz to produce high value-added produce, and begun a project with the Jewish National Fund to raise mixed heads of sheep and goats for organic meat and dairy products. And the government has provided substantial subsidies to firms that hire Bedouin workers in the new industrial park in Rahat and through other employment initiatives.
Kristof could have consulted the OECD. It approved Israeli membership on the basis of substantial improvements in employment initiatives, infrastructure – roads, transportation networks, sewage facilities – and a dramatic improvement in Bedouin schooling that increased substantially student test scores. Specifically, in 2000, the share of Jewish and Arab children in preschool programs was 85% and 49%, respectively. Dan Ben-David reported that while the share of Jewish children was virtually the same in 2010, the share of Arab children increased to 71%. In 2007/8 35% of Arab but only 19% of Jewish classrooms had more than 35 students. As a result of additional funding, by 2010/11 only 15% of Arab classrooms compared to 11% of Jewish classrooms suffered overcrowding; and it was 10% for Bedouin schools. Together with other initiatives during this time period, the Myers-JDC-Brookdale Institute reported that the scores on the GEM standardized exams for Arab fifth graders increased by more than 40% for Bedouin Negev students.
New book probes the growing impact of BDS on academia
As more student governments take up votes to divest from Israel, the BDS movement’s roots in American academia are probed in a newly published essay compilation, “The Case Against Academic Boycotts of Israel.”
The 32-essay collection takes particular aim at the American Studies Association, which voted to boycott Israeli academic institutions at the end of 2013. Published by MLA Members for Scholars’ Rights, the book explores many facets of the Boycott Divest Sanction (BDS) movement against Israel, which is modeled on strategies used against apartheid in South Africa.
“The BDS movement is more harmful to the academy than it is to Israel,” said Donna Robinson Divine, a professor of Mideast studies at Smith College. Located in western Massachusetts’ Pioneer Valley, Smith has been a long-time hotbed of anti-Israel activity.
In February, Divine addressed a group of Northeastern University professors convened by the campus Hillel, in part to talk about the book. Her essay, “The Boycott Debate at Smith,” chronicled how some professors turned their classrooms into “a battleground” to push BDS, according to Divine.
“You can teach the Mideast conflict without taking sides,” Divine told attendees. “The problem is that we’re fighting an establishment now,” she said, referencing media outlets that print war crimes allegations against Israel before investigating them.
Arab-Israeli Diplomat Calls Boycotts a Continuation of Wars Against Israel
George Deek, Israel’s former Deputy Ambassador to Norway, spoke to the Stanford Political Journal, an undergraduate publication of Stanford University, in an interview published Monday, about the anti-Israel boycott movement and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Deek, an Israel-Arab Christian, characterized the anti-Israel boycott movement “as a continuation of the [Arab-Israeli wars] in 1948, 1967, and 1973,” and an effort to “put Israel in a moral crisis.” He was asked to explain “the biggest lies or omissions you see made when people criticize Israel.” His response:
The BDS campaign is not about criticizing Israel. It’s about demonizing and dehumanizing it. For example, you would hear a lot of comparisons between Israel and the Apartheid regime: Israel as a colonialist state; Israel stealing and grabbing land.
Now, there are a lot of politics on the ground that are important to discuss — the issue of borders, the issue of settlements, the issue of refugees in Jerusalem. These are all important topics. Many critics of Israel are interested in finding a solution, not intensifying the problem. They want to find a solution where both Jews and Arabs can live without fear in that region. Meanwhile, the aim of the BDS campaign is to put Israel in a moral crisis. And we have to make sure that people don’t get convinced by a nice slogan and a nice campaign based on a groundless agenda.
People ask me: How do you differentiate between a legitimate criticism of Israel and the kind that is less legitimate, less constructive? I would say the test is the famous “three D” test. The first D is dehumanization; trying to portray Israel as something not human, as something that is sons of apes and pigs, people who are half-demons who are trying to take over the world. The second D is demonization: people who are trying to demonize Israel with claims like, “Israel is controlling world media.” The third D is delegitimization, where people question the right of the Jewish people for self-determination, which is exactly the same right they are asking for the Palestinian people. If you hear people doing any one of those three, you should be very careful when you address that issue.
Edgar Davidson: Update on the tax-payer funded antisemitic hatefest at Southampton University
Update on the tax-payer funded antisemitic hatefest at Southampton University
The University of Southampton is funding a three-day event in April devoted to searching for ways to use international law to deny the world’s only Jewish state the right to exist. A friend of mine has written to the Vice Chancellor of the University (see correspondence below, which is very interesting). The latest update is that the programme for the event is now available and it is even worse than anybody could have imagined. There are 58 speakers and, contrary to what Southampton University said in response to my friend, every single one is an anti-Israel activist.
The irrelevance of being MIRIAM
Miriam lambasts Israel for imagined atrocities, ignoring countries which commit real atrocities. You’d think, as a lesbian, she would use her celebrity status to raise awareness of the terrible abuse of women and gays throughout the Middle East. Yet she is silent at the plight of real victims, exposing the anti-Israel agenda behind her vacuous pro-Palestinian stance.
She was pilloried in Jacobson’s novel, ‘The Finkler Question’: Finkler declared on a popular BBC programme that, “as a Jew,” he was “ashamed,” that is to say, ashamed of Israel…. As a reward, he was invited to join a group of “well-known theatrical and academic Jews” who offer to rename themselves “in honour of his courage in speaking out-Ashamed Jews.”
Jacobson took another swipe at Miriam; featuring a play called ‘Sons of Abraham’, which got a standing ovation for its equation of “Gaza” with Auschwitz, mirroring Caryl Churchill’s play, ‘Seven Jewish Children-A Play for Gaza’, starring Miriam, who denied that a play featuring the blood libel of Jews deliberately killing Arab babies could possibly be antisemitic!
Miriam’s stance has made her the darling of the chardonnay socialists.
The Spineless Kingdom of Sweden
I’m angry. Steaming. Infuriated. Crazy mad. It’s going downhill so fast. The merciless avalanche is growing bigger and stronger, and dragging everyone down with it. Downhill and into the depths of the abyss of fear. This small group has so much power. They have Sweden under a tight grip and the spirit of “Je Suis Charlie” is nowhere to be found. One whisper, one breath and everyone fall on their knees.
Don’t say one good word about Israel. Don’t you dare! If you do, you will hear battle cries from the voices of “Palestinagrupperna”: a small, extreme, active and very loud pro-Palestinian organisation. They will intimidate you, terrorise you, and lecture you about THEIR truth: that the evil Jews stole the ancient land of Palestine from the ancient people the Palestinians, and occupied the Palestinian eternal capital called Jerusalem. Then they will silence you. Quick, easy, like a silent blitzkrieg.
The examples are many and it’s disgusting to watch how spineless Sweden is. No honor. No integrity. Not wanting to take sides, but still do. Just like World War 2. Sweden officially stayed neutral, but still let the Germans and their trains filled with iron go through the north of the country. Iron that helped the Nazi war machine to get stronger. “We are neutral! We are not injecting the drugs but JUST supplying the needles!”
The Swedish company Oatly has stopped buying Vitamin D from their Israeli supplier after pressure from this extremist group. Still they continue to buy products from countries like China, Vietnam, Indonesia and Ethiopia – countries who definitely don’t have a good track record when it comes to human rights.
The Swedish TV 4 has decided to permanently remove an episode of a popular cooking show featuring celebrity chef Tina Nordström, where she travels around Israel. Why? Because she innocently says “Jerusalem is the heart of Israel”.
Arrested ISIS-supporting American says he planned to kill Obama, bomb Israeli embassy
An Ohio man claiming sympathy with Islamic State militants and charged with plotting to attack the US Capitol said in a television interview that he would have shot President Barack Obama in the head.
Christopher Cornell, 20, told Cincinnati's FOX 19 WXIX TV that if he had not been arrested by FBI agents in January, he would have carried out an alleged plot to plant pipe bombs on the Capitol and at the Israeli Embassy.
"What would I have done? I would have took my gun, I would have put it to Obama's head and I would have pulled the trigger," Cornell, of Cincinnati, said in a telephone interview from the Boone County, Kentucky, jail aired on Friday.
"Then I would have released more bullets on the Senate and the House of Representative members, and I would have attacked the Israeli Embassy and various other buildings full of kafir (a Muslim term for infidel) who want to wage war against us Muslims and shed our blood. That's what would happen," he said.
Widespread outrage after IS bulldozes ancient Iraq city
Condemnation poured in Friday of the Islamic State group’s bulldozing of the ancient city of Nimrud, the jihadists’ latest attack on Iraqi cultural treasures that the UN termed a “war crime.”
After rampaging through Mosul’s museum with sledgehammers and torching its library last month, IS “bulldozed” the nearby ruins of Nimrud Thursday, the tourism and antiquities ministry said.
The devastation comes with the jihadists the target of an Iraqi government offensive.
The US military said Friday Iraqi government forces and allied tribal militia have retaken the town of Al-Baghdadi, from where jihadists had threatened to attack an airbase housing American troops.
Iran blinds acid attacker in ‘eye for an eye’ punishment
Under Sharia law in Iran, retribution for crimes against persons is allowed, but clemency is encouraged. Victims and their families have the final say in such matters and punishments can be stopped.
The man in question was not identified but, according to the report, medics gouged out his left eye at Rajai-Shahr prison in the city of Karaj, northwest of the capital Tehran.
The man was found guilty of throwing acid in the face of another man five years ago in the city of Qom. He was sentenced to have both his eyes removed, serve a prison sentence of 10 years and pay a fine.
On Tuesday, his victim decided to postpone the loss of his right eye by six months. He will be allowed to plead to keep his remaining eye, according to the report.
The punishment was roundly condemned by NGOs and human rights activists.
Are you an Anti-Semite or Just Anti-Israel? Finally, the Difference Revealed
I don’t get it. A majority of the world has hated the Jewish people since creation and/or the Big Bang. Ancient (and modern) Egyptians, Babylonians, Greeks, Romans, crusading Christians, non-crusading Christians, Muslims, Spanish Inquisitors, French, German, and Portuguese expellers, Torah Burning Frenchmen, European Progromers, British Massacres, Italian Ghettos, Nazis, Arabs, the KKK, the Congressional Black Caucus, Walt Disney, Henry Ford, Roger Waters. If it’s beginning to sound like a Billy Joel song, there is a reason. The list is never-ending.
Each of those Anti-Semites believed in their cause. The Jews aren’t a mere annoyance. They are the cause of everything wrong about the world. In the old days, you could also count on some mitigating hatred of black, gays, gypsies, the physically or mentally challenged, and any random minority who could be readily labeled as an enemy. Not anymore. As liberalism and political correctness have drastically reduced the list of targets, it’s much harder to find a good scapegoat for the problems of the world.
In some circles, it is even considered taboo to outwardly hate the Jews. So, what is a closet anti-Semite to do? Blame everything on Israel and explain that you don’t have a problem with the Jewish People – – just the policies of the Israeli Government. Some of my best friends are Jews.
But, because the three categories are so similar and often indistinguishable, I have developed a quick test to help you decide whether you are: (1) Anti-Semitic; (2) Anti-Israel, or (3) Just an idiot.
George Galloway slams cancellation of Gilad Atzmon show as a ‘book burning’
Pro-Palestine MP George Galloway has berated the decision to cancel the concert of an anti-Zionist Jewish Israeli as comparable to a “book burning.”
Controversial Israeli artist Gilad Atzmon had a concert in Manchester cancelled, after the venue ‘bowed to ultra Zionist’ pressure, he claimed.
In an open letter to the Royal Northern College of Music (RNCM), North West Friends of Israel (NWFI) called for the event on Thursday 5 March to be pulled.
The letter slammed Atzmon for his ‘criticisms of Zionism, Jewish identity and Judaism’ and his ‘views on Holocaust denial and Jewish history’, claiming it has led to “allegations of anti-Semitism and racism”. (h/t Yenta Press)
'Circumcised trolls' row: Protest after Jewish jazzman has Nottingham concert cancelled
[January 20, 2015] A JAZZ musician and political blogger who referred to some Jews as “circumcised trolls” had his gig cancelled after 13 people signed a letter of complaint.
Israeli Gilad Atzmon is currently touring the UK with his band Gilad Atzmon & The Orient Ensemble. His tour, named The Whistle Blower, was supposed to play at the Bonington Theatre in Arnold on Thursday, January 15.
Gedling Borough Council – which manages the High Street theatre – received the
letter from local residents and later found comments made by Atzmon
including “it is always Jewish bad behaviour that brings disaster on the Jews” and “Nuremberg was a fake tribunal, Israel deserves a real one”.
Israeli Company’s Chipset Could Extend Battery Life for Devices Using 4G Networks
Israeli company Altair Semiconductor says that it has developed the capability for small electric devices to connect better to fourth generation (4G) mobile networks. The new technology could impact such devices as electricity meters or security alarms.
Currently the batteries of devices that use 4G networks, which are known as LTE, tend to run out quickly. According to Altair, a new chipset the company has designed makes sure that data flows with as much as 10 time less power and half the cost of using current LTE technology.
“We’re talking about repositioning LTE to serve down to the level of street light sensors, smart home gateways, vehicle telematics,” Eran Eshed, co-founder and vice president of marketing, told Reuters.
Galilee structure may be Jesus’s boyhood home
A hillside house dating back to the early first century CE in northern Israel may have been the Nazareth home where Jesus was raised, according to researchers.
The stone and mortar house, first identified in the 1880s, is likely to have been the home in which Mary and Joseph brought up their son, claims Dr. Ken Dark, a British 1st century and Christian archaeology specialist, who has been researching the ruins since 2006, the Daily Mail reported Wednesday.
Cut into a limestone hillside, the house contains a series of rooms and a stairway. A part of the original chalk floor, as well as a doorway, have survived.
While it is impossible to say for certain, there is “no good reason” not to believe it was Jesus’ home, Dark wrote in the latest issue of the Biblical Archaeological Review.
Madonna Set to Drop $20 Million on Customized Luxury Tel Aviv Penthouse
Pop superstar Madonna is finalizing details in the purchase of a customized, two-story condo in Tel Aviv that will cost her $20 million, celebrity gossip site TMZ reported on Friday, citing sources close to the deal.
The pop singer’s 12,000 sq. ft. new home, the purchase of which is nearly two years in the making, is perched on the top of a 42-story skyscraper in Tel Aviv that was designed by famous Getty architect Richard Meier. Madonna’s condo includes a gym, lavish living room and rooftop pool, TMZ noted.
The Material Girl will have some famous neighbors including Scott Disick, who recently purchased a Tel Aviv condo, and Ashton Kutcher and Mila Kunis, who are rumored to be looking for a home in the popular city. Madonna is no stranger to Tel Aviv and the city was was the first stop on her 2012 MDNA world tour.
Madonna was raised Roman Catholic but has been a follower of the Jewish mystical teachings of Kabbalah for nearly two decades. The 56-year-old is a staunch supporter of Israel and has performed numerous times in the Jewish state, defying the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement.
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