From Ian:
Brendan O'Neill: Anti-Israel academics: the world’s least convincing free-speech warriors
However - and this is a very big however - the conference organisers and their sympathisers in the media, the academy and on Twitter must be the least convincing defenders of academic freedom in living memory. These anti-Israel thinkers and campaigners are currently crying ‘Censorship!’ as loudly as they can, depicting themselves as a persecuted minority silenced by powerful political actors (You Know Who). A professor of law at Southampton, and a co-organiser of the conference, said ‘the controversial nature of the conference is precisely where [the principle of] freedom of speech leads – that’s where the commitment to freedom of speech is tested’. He’s right about that; but he’s wrong if he thinks we’re going to buy the idea that today’s shrill and many opponents of Israel are glorious defenders of free speech or controversial discussion. On the contrary, the anti-Israel lobby is possibly the most censorious mob on British campuses today, practising, week in, week out, the very same censoriousness it now cries about being victimised by.
Whether they are No Platforming Zionist speakers and representatives of the Israeli government, or demanding an academic boycott against any professor or thinker or book that comes from Israel, or agitating for the removal from Britain of Israeli dance troupes or theatre groups or filmmakers - as if they were all diseased with contagious Zionism - anti-Israel campaigners have become dab hands at shutting down debate, at silencing those they (irrationally) hate. Their everyday currency is censorship. In recent months, Israel societies on campus have had to cancel events following loud and censorious disruptions and have even faced demands that they be shut down on the basis that they make their campuses into Unsafe Spaces - which means they hold views that small numbers of student-union bureaucrats consider foul. Indeed, in the Guardian article that sympathises with the silenced Southampton discussants it is casually mentioned that the organisers of the conference have ‘voiced support for an academic boycott [of Israel]’. So these self-styled warriors for academic freedom back the highly illiberal and discriminatory tactic of never exchanging thoughts or ideas with Israeli thinkers and instead banning them from British campuses. You couldn’t make it up.
Edgar Davidson: Southampton University's disgraceful statement on cancelling anti-Israel hatefest
"We are sorry but we have had to cancel this excellent unbiased event due to threats from the Zionists"
Southampton University has cancelled the planned anti-Israel hatefest. That ought to be a cause for a small celebration. However, the statement the University has issued is a disgrace, and probably far more damaging than the planned conference itself would have been. It does not mention any of the multiple arguments explaining why the University should never have supported the event in the first place, but instead justifies the cancellation on the grounds of public safety, implying that the planned protest by those opposed to the event (i.e. 'Zionists') posed too great a risk to University personnel and visitors.
The University is effectively promoting the idea (already prominent in the main stream media and not just among Israel haters) that threats from 'Zionists/Jews' have put a stop to free speech. But it is even worse. Instead of criticising the blatant bias and antisemitism of the organisers of the conference (almost every single one of the scheduled speakers was an advocate of boycotting Israel) , the statement goes out of its way to actually praise them and invert reality:
"The University ... has been impressed by the commitment of the organisers to include a broad spectrum of views, and indicated to the organisers that it will work with them to find a venue suitable for a conference of this nature at a later date."
Joke Street
Other speakers included Maha Mehanna, who called Israel’s actions against Hamas this past summer a “crime against humanity”, while remaining silent about Hamas’ actions that provoked the Israeli response. There was Matt Duss who compared Israel’s blockade against Hamas to segregation. There was (of course) Peter Beinart, who called for Obama to take punitive actions against Israel, such as freezing assets.
To top it all off, there was Marcia Freedman, who basically called for the end of Israel as a Jewish state, saying that Israeli Jews should instead live as a “protected minority” in an Arab-controlled Palestinian state instead. She believes this despite the way non-Arab minorities across the Middle East are treated by Arabs. She believes this despite a study conducted by the ADL finding that 93% of Palestinians harbor anti-semitic views and that all 10 of the most anti-semitic countries are all Arab countries. After she gave her speech, Freedman was applauded, by people who are supposed to support Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state. It is amazing that an organization that claims to be for two states gives a platform for someone who calls for one state. Yet, J Street has declined to allow many other supporters of the two state solution, such as Alan Dershowitz, to speak at their conference.
The mask has finally slipped off. Happy April Fools Day J Street, you aren’t fooling anybody but yourselves!
Lethal anti-Semitism originated on the Left
The Marxist Left has a long and sordid history of anti-Semitism. The core belief was that Jews must cease to be Jews in order to be liberated. That has now been extended to virulent hostility to the Jewish State of Israel
Even before Marx, however, there had been in socialist thinking a powerful strain of anti-Semitism. From the stereotypical Jewish street pedlar to the Rothschild banker, both were seen by socialists as rapacious agents of capitalism. The French socialist Proudhon (whom Marx met) provides a good example of such anti-Semitism.
In his latest book From Ambivalence to Betrayal: The Left, the Jews, and Israel, Robert Wistrich (Professor of European and Jewish history at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem) makes the point: “Socialist thought was tainted from its very origins with the heavy baggage of anti-Jewish stereotypes”.
Perhaps it’s no surprise that early socialists imbibed the wider and deeply ingrained stereotype of the Jew as the money-grubbing outsider.
After all, the emancipation of Europe’s Jews in the nineteenth century was held to mean that Jews should lose much of their Jewish identity. They would no longer be outsiders, and would no longer need to be Jewish.
Ayaan Hirsi Ali: Beware of Michiganistan
Since the massacre at the offices of the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo in January, the U.S. media has understandably devoted attention to the problem of radical Islam in Europe. The fact has been widely reported that thousands of European Union citizens have traveled to Iraq and Syria to join the self-styled Islamic State. Almost as much coverage has been given to stories of French Jews emigrating to Israel. And there have been numerous articles about Michel Houellebecq’s diabolically timed novel Soumission, which imagines France in 2022 with a Muslim president introducing sharia law and being fawned over by the Parisian establishment.
The implication of many of these articles is: “How utterly terrifying. Thank heavens it couldn’t happen here.”
True, there are no American equivalents of the alarmist books about Europe with titles like Eurabia or Londonistan. Apparently it is not quite time to warn about the “United States of Sharia” or “Michiganistan.” But are we underestimating the speed with which this country could develop substantial and influential populations of Islamic extremists? A growing, if still small number of cases like that of Abdi Nur — the 20-year-old student who left south Minneapolis to join IS last year — suggests we may be.
Ryan Bellerose: Another History Lesson
The Arabs think they are tough people. They play at being stoic and believe that they have had a policy of “patience” where they seem to think if they make life hard enough for the Jews, that one day the Jews will just give up and go away. Perhaps they got this idea from how the Jews achieved their independence from the British. The Arabs are famous after all for copying or co-opting Jewish experiences and culture (and some would say history and identity). The Jews basically made occupation so difficult for the British that even though they were one of the greatest empires in the world , they finally just said “screw it, these Jews are crazy, we are outta here.” It didn’t happen easily, but it happened. It just took patience. The Arabs of course saw this and probably think they can do the same thing. They look at the history but they do not understand it. They ignore the context. And in history, CONTEXT is everything.
The simple truth is that the Arabs just cannot understand that not only are the Jews a stiff-necked, stubborn people who managed to resist assimilation even in the Diaspora for over two thousand years, but they have a trait that is common to all indigenous people – an almost inhuman tolerance for hardship when it comes to their ancestral lands. For some it’s religious, which adds yet more strength, but for many it is simply the fact that Israel is their ancestral land and they will never be willing to give it up. You see this in studying Jewish history; the fact that many Jews remained despite incredible hardship under Muslim rule, and you see it in other aspects of Zionism and the way that the Mizrachi Jews were expelled from Arab lands yet became integral parts of Israel and the Jewish nation. Colonisers and imperialists do not share this sort of connection. They may feel connected to the land, but it’s not a deep and abiding connection. It is not something they would die for, so it’s almost impossible to explain it to them in terms they will understand. Indigenous people are used to being marginalized and oppressed, while we do not like it. We aren’t overly impressed by it anymore either.
Trevor Noah, Lena Dunham and Anti-Semitism For Laughs
Don Imus, the famous radio/TV talk show host, was caught making a joke insensitive to Blacks and it nearly finished him off. He was taken off the air, spent years being rehabilitated, and now he’s back, but careful – very careful. Zero tolerance!
Schooled by people like Al Sharpton, Imus learned the limits to humor – and so did every other comedian. Don’t go there is the message.
But for Jews, the jokes keep on coming…tasteless, offensive, hurtful, harmful, doesn’t matter. Fair game to be Jewish and we’re into a trend.
So now it’s Trevor Noah and who is this, you ask? I asked the same question and the answer is that if you thought Jon Stewart was obnoxious when it came to Israel, wait till you meet this creep. Trevor (no Noah this guy) is a 31-year-old South African who is slated to take Stewart’s place on Comedy Central’s The Daily Show.
Comedian Trevor Noah Has a Friend Named Hitler
In a Daily Show podcast earlier this year, Mediaite reported, Noah casually mentioned to one of the show's writers, Dan Amira, that he had a friend named Hitler, interrupting a discussion of how South Africans view America.
Taken aback, Amira asked the comedian: “What do you mean your ‘friend Hitler?’”
“This is not a nickname. We don’t call him, ‘AKA Hitler. His name is Hitler,” Noah explained, before describing his friend as a “very good-looking, young black man, charismatic” with a “great smile.”
“Why on earth would a mother name her child Hitler?” Amira asked him. “What kind of mother would do that?”
“Well, Hitler’s mom did it,” Noah said, adding that he "never questioned" the name until he traveled outside of South Africa and realized the hugely negative connotation the name has.
“In many parts of Africa… people would name their children after great leaders,” Noah said, emphasizing that “great” does not necessarily mean “good,” but rather someone who has “really changed the world.”
“Hitler was so big that he forced white South Africans, who at the time were racist, to ask black South Africans to go to war with them to help fight,” Noah added.
And for blacks, he explained, there is a feeling, “who is it that scares the man who oppresses me? Who’s that dude? Because that’s the guy I want to meet.”
JCPA: The Saudi Military Intervention in Yemen
The conclusion is obvious: The Saudis have little trust in the U.S. administration and suspected that the Obama Administration’s Iranian agenda would lead it to stop the Saudi coalition acting against the Iranian-backed Houthis in Yemen. The Saudis have expressed very clearly on many occasions their opposition to a nuclear Iran and, as noted by Israeli leaders, see the Administration reaching a “bad agreement” with Iran.
The Saudis are exasperated by the Obama Administration’s courtship of Iran — the same Iran that supports their enemies in Lebanon, Syria, Bahrain, Yemen and Iraq, and claims control of four Arab capitals (Beirut, Damascus, Baghdad and Sana’a). Saudi Arabia decided it was time to draw the line between the main two camps fighting over hegemony in the Middle East (the Iran-led axis versus the moderate-Arab camp led by Egypt and Saudi Arabia) and demanded that the U.S. choose sides in the war.
This may explain why the Saudis discussed with the U.S. different options in Yemen but never went into details about their military intentions. It is evident that the Saudis perceived that the U.S. did not approve of such a move after the Americans expressed reservations about such intervention.
This could explain the low-profile U.S. “logistic and intelligence support” given to the operation. As in the “lead-from-behind” 2011 Libyan war strategy, the U.S. chose to stay “under the radar” to avoid openly associating with the operation it had to accept after the fact as a reality. The U.S. administration, taken by surprise, did not react immediately. Only two days later Obama called the Saudi king to express half-hearted U.S. support.
Unidentified Troops Land in Aden After Houthis Seize Center
Dozens of unidentified troops landed by sea in Aden in an apparent last-ditch effort by a Saudi-led coalition to shore up a foothold in the southern Yemeni port city after Shi’ite Houthi fighters seized control of its center on Thursday.
The soldiers arrived in a single vessel a few hours after the Iran-allied Houthis and their supporters swept into the heart of Aden despite an eight-day air campaign led by Riyadh to stem their advances.
The southern port city has been the last major holdout of fighters loyal to the Saudi-backed President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi, who fled Aden a week ago and has watched from Riyadh as the vestiges of his authority have crumbled.
It was not immediately possible to verify the nationality of the troops, but the Saudi-led coalition says it is in control of the waters around Aden. If confirmed as a coalition move, it would be the first reported deployment of ground forces since Saudi Arabia launched the campaign a week ago.
Houthi children vow 'Death to America, death to Israel'
A new video posted by the Middle East Media Research Institute shows a group of Houthi children in Yemen calling for the destruction of America and Israel.
In a report which aired last week on the Houthi-owned Al-Masirah TV network, Houthi children called "Death to America! Curses upon the Jews!"
"We long for martyrdom," one boy told the reporter. "Don't you know that killing is what we are accustomed to, and that martyrdom is a blessing bestowed upon us by Allah?"
Houthi forces pulled back from positions in central Aden after air strikes by the Saudi-led coalition at dawn on Thursday, residents of the southern Yemeni port city said.
They said a unit of Houthi and allied fighters, who had advanced in tanks and armored vehicles through Aden's Khor Maksar district 24 hours earlier, pulled back, although they remained in parts of the neighborhood.
Houthi Children Threaten America on Houthi TV
British MP Galloway Slams Anti-Houthi Campaign on Iran TV: The Saudis Are Treacherous Snakes
British MP George Galloway recently criticized the Saudi-led campaign against the Houthis in Yemen, saying that the Saudis were treacherous snakes, who belly-danced for Netanyahu in the casinos and bordellos of London. Galloway was speaking on his regular program on the Iranian English-language Press TV channel on March 27, 2015.
Mob Rule at Sydney University
The intellectual arrogance of the campus BDS supporters, articulated by Lynch and Riemer, is quite astounding.
No postmodern questioning of objective truth here; not only is the truth “out there” but Lynch and Riemer are in possession of it and are able to distinguish it from lies and deceit. No need to allow people to actually hear the contending cases presented fully and effectively, even in contexts such as the Kemp lecture where they can be challenged. Defend Israel in any respect and you are a warmonger, callously indifferent to the fate of oppressed people. You need to be silenced.
This is a truly sinister development, and one not confined to Australian universities. Jewish students at Sydney University with whom I corresponded report feeling increasingly insecure and fearful on campus. My sense is that increasingly anti-Zionism is a mask for occulted anti-Semitism.
Will the university administration, led by vice-chancellor Michael Spence, act decisively to defend free speech on campus in response to this outrage? Time will tell, but at this stage the portents are not encouraging.
Ali Abunimah #Fail At University of Michigan
Proponents of the hate-spewing, anti-Semitic BDS movement apparently pulled out all the stops at yesterday’s vote at the University of Michigan’s Central Student Government, bringing Electronic Intifada co-founder and Hamas supporter Ali Abunimah to agitate in favor of a divestment resolution. Michigan students, however, saw through Abunimah’s hatred and lies, and rejected the resolution by a vote of 29-15.
Edinburgh University students accused of anti-Semitism over Passover BDS vote
Edinburgh University’s Students Association (EUSA) has been accused of anti-Semitism after it refused to reschedule a debate on boycotting Israel timed for the day before Passover.
The university’s Jewish Society president Emma Dubin registered a strong protest at the last-minute arrangements to hold the debate on Thursday, pointing out that most if not all of the 50 Jewish students belonging to the society would be traveling home to prepare for the festival and thus unable to speak against the BDS resolution.
Having been notified of the forthcoming debate only on Monday, Dubin was told by EUSA that the only way the date could be moved was by agreement with the proposer of the motion, Fatima Osman of the student body’s Black and Ethnic Liberation Group (BME). However, Osman refused and declined a compromise suggestion to hold the debate later this academic term.
Dubin told the Jewish Chronicle that she was not just worried that the BDS motion might pass, “I am worried that this is a framework that makes it impossible for Jewish voices to be heard. It is an anti-Semitic process to not have Jewish students’ voices being heard at this stage.”
Sufyan Ismail of MEND on the 300 year old Israeli lobby
Sufyan Ismail is the CEO of MEND, the Islamist political group. MEND says it “helps to empower and encourage British Muslims within local communities to be more actively involved in British media and politics”.
Bashing Israel and its British supporters again and again is a very important part of its mission.
Mind how MEND does that.
Here you can see the mask slip from Mr Ismail. In a talk last October at a mosque in Bolton, this is how he recounts the vote in Parliament on recognising Palestine as a state:
"The other night in Parliament, for the first time in British history, first time in 300 years of the Israeli lobby’s presence in the United Kingdom, first time in British history they lost a vote in Parliament. Do you know this? And the Muslim community didn’t just beat the Israeli lobby, we battered them by 274 votes to 12."
Tufts Prof Thomas Abowd: Jews Colonial Usurpers in Jerusalem
Israel “has built a whole national mythology out of the City of David” in a “weaponization of myth,” stated Israel-hating Tufts University professor Thomas Abowd on March 17 at Washington, DC’s anti-Israel Jerusalem Fund think tank. Condemnation of “Israeli Colonial Racism” described in a Powerpoint presentation formed his lecture’s central theme, which incongruously presented Jews as colonial usurpers in their own ancestral national homeland before an audience of about twenty.
Abowd presented material from his bizarrely titled book, Colonial Jerusalem: The Spatial Construction of Identity and Difference in a City of Myth, 1948–2012. An opening slide of a map depicting “Jerusalem from 1948-1967” portrayed Israeli Jews as imperialists in a Zion where the “new Israeli state occupied the west side, the Jordanian state the east side.” Although Hebrew-founded Jerusalem is of central importance to Judaism and has had a restored Jewish plurality/majority since the mid-nineteenth century, he rejected calling Jerusalem Israel’s “eternal, immutable capital.” Quoting the late anti-Israel charlatan Edward Said, Abowd dismissed this claim as among “representations that exist outside of history.” Carrying revisionist history to absurd heights, he speculated during audience questioning that the centrality to Judaism of the Western Wall, a remnant of the Jewish temple destroyed in Jerusalem in 70 A.D., is an “invention of relatively recent construction.”
Political correctness may end Virginia State Bar international conferences
We continue to investigate the strange cancellation of a mid-year legal seminar in Israel by the Virginia State Bar (VSB). With the help of Judicial Watch, we have served a FOIA request on VSB, and will pursue the facts no matter how long it takes, including FOIA litigation if there is no alternative.
The cancellation of the Israel trip came after an email was sent by 36 VSB members to the VSB Council on Friday morning, March 27, alleging that the members would be prohibited from attending or face discriminatory interrogation by Israeli border officials on the basis of religion and ethnicity. None of the 36 said that they actually wanted to go on the Israel trip; instead they argued that VSB should boycott Israel because of its border security policies.
George Washington University Students Request More Cameras After Swastika Incident
On Monday, the Student Association Senate at George Washington University (GWU) passed a resolution asking the school to install more cameras on campus after swastikas were placed on hallway walls twice in the last month.
In February, several swastikas were painted on the walls inside a GWU dorm which houses a group of sororities and fraternities.
A few weeks later, another swastika ended up on a bulletin board belonging to a Jewish fraternity. That incident, though, proved to be a hoax.
Regardless, the incidents surprised and dismayed many, prompting the Student Association Senate to act.
Temple Beth Israel’s mates believe Jews responsible for 9/11
It’s great when people from diverse backgrounds come together. Last year, Temple Beth Israel treated their guests to a rich cultural experience when they staged an Interfaith Sacred Concert
The second half of the concert brought “something new to TBI’s sanctuary, the Muslim call to prayer, and a chanting of the 55th Surah of the Koran. With this recitation Abdul Aziz al Mathkour and Brother Waseem Razvi of the Islamic research Education Academy (IREA) revealed many points of commonality between Judaism and Islam in its languages and texts”
Temple Beth invited concertgoers to “participate in this opportunity to get to know and to de-mystify the “Other” in our “Sacred Music “.
If Temple Beth needed further de-mystification of the “Other” they should have hastened to Waseem Razvi’s Australian Islamic Peace Conference at the Melbourne Convention Centre. The Australian reported:
Children, including a five-year-old girl, took to the stage at a controversial Islamic conference that also listed on its program a speech from a Malaysian cleric who believes Muslim terrorists were not responsible for the September 11 attacks on the US.
Keynote speaker Hussain Yee, who … was on the program, has attracted controversy for comments implying Jewish people were behind the 9/11 attacks of 2001.
More enablement of Hamas propaganda from BBC’s ME editor
In addition to the previously discussed written and filmed reports based around Jeremy Bowen’s recent interview with Hamas’ Khaled Masha’al in Doha published on the BBC News website’s Middle East page on April 1st, other filmed reports appeared on BBC television news programmes on that date.
In one report viewers yet again saw Masha’al being given a platform from which to promote the notion that his organisation is different from other Islamist groups operating in the region. Bowen’s failure to challenge the statement “There is no Daesh [ISIS], no IS or Al Qaeda in Palestine. There are some lone wolves but they are isolated. We don’t allow such thoughts in Palestine” should of course be assessed within the context of the fact that a BBC reporter was kidnapped by the Al Qaeda affiliated group Jaish al Islam in Gaza in 2007 and in light of the history of Hamas’ relations with that group and others.
Edgar Davidson: Jeremy Bowen in new BBC interview surprise (satire)
Following Jeremy Bowen's cosy BBC interview with Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal (in which they agreed that Israeli extremism ruled out the possibility of a two state solution) the BBC today released rare footage of Jeremy Bowen's fireside chat with Adolf Hitler in 1944.
In the interview Bowen asked about Mr Hitler's well-known vision of a post-war Germany in which Jews lived safely and prospered in all professions. When Mr Hitler pointed to recent acts of appalling Jewish extremism (such as their defiance during the Warsaw Ghetto destruction) Bowen agreed with Mr Hitler that, despite his best intentions, the Jews had ruled themselves out of playing any useful role in a future Germany.
Report: Anti-Semitic attacks rise significantly in Netherlands
An anti-Semitism watchdog group in the Netherlands said that incidents involving acts against the Jewish community rose 71 percent last year, adding that some police officers were unwilling to intervene in such matters.
The Hague-based Center for Information and Documentation on Israel, or CIDI, recorded 171 incidents in 2014 compared to 100 in 2013, CIDI wrote in a statement sent to the media on Wednesday about the group’s annual report on anti-Semitism.
The report noted a "worrisome phenomenon" amongst police officer's behavior towards the Jewish community, with some preferring to "look the other way" in such cases.
“The filing of a complaint was sometimes discouraged in contrast with the policy that indeed seeks to enhance reporting,” according to the report.
Argentine union leader calls politician ‘little Jew boy’
An Argentine union leader who called a government minister “little Jew boy” defended himself by saying “Everybody calls him this.”
In a radio interview Wednesday, Luis Barrionuevo, who heads the Blue and White CGT union, in discussing a national general strike initiated the previous day by his union, said the Minister of the Economy, Axel Kicillof, that “the little Jew boy gives no answer” to workers’ demands.
Barrionuevo used the term “el Rusito,” or “the little Russian,” to refer to Kicillof — “Russian” is a popular slang term used to refer to Jews in Argentina.
Tech giants take a byte of the Start-up Nation
Major technological companies capitalizing on Israel’s knack for innovation and diverse makeup is nothing new: Intel Israel, for example, was founded in 1974 and now employs more than 7,800 people. The top Intel processors have been developed in Haifa and Yakum for years. Apart from their R&D center, Intel has opened Computational Intelligence Institute, which is helping to realize many of the Ministry of Education’s strategic programs. “Intel Israel was responsible for designing the chip in the first IBM personal computers, the first Pentium chips, and a new architecture that analysts agree saved Intel…” “In the southern Israeli town of Qiryat Gat, Intel built a $3.5 billion plant where Israelis designed chips with transistors so small that thirty million of them can fit on the head of pin.”
Google also boasts 2 R&D centers in Israel. Google first opened its office in Israel in 2006. Live results, person finder application, Google Suggest, Digital Dead Sea Scrolls Project, Google Insights for search, In-page analytics and interactive videos on YouTube were all developed in Israel.
“Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer has called Microsoft “an Israeli company as much as an American company” because of the size and centrality of its Israeli teams.” Steve Ballmer said, “Microsoft employs more workers per capita in Israel than anywhere else on earth.”
Check Point acquires Israeli cyber start-up Lacoon
Check Point, the Israeli cyber-security company that invented the firewall, on Thursday announced that it was acquiring another Israeli cyber-firm, start-up Lacoon. The deal, according to industry sources, is worth some $80 million.
With Lacoon, Check Point hopes to increase its presence in the mobile world. While the company has mobile protection products already, it does not dominate that business the way it does the server business, where corporate networks require the firewalls Check Point is known for.
Laccoon uses a behavior-based model to detect anomalies – behavior that is atypical and indicates that malware and viruses are present – and can immediately shut down a connection to a user whose device is misbehaving. Users whose devices have malware, viruses, trojan horses, and other undesirable features are thus kept off the corporate network, preventing them from spreading their malware to others.
Israel joins China-based fund boycotted by US
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu signed an agreement Tuesday to join the newly formed China-based Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, despite a US snub to the initiative.
Analysts believe geopolitical trends are leading Israel to increasingly pivot east toward Asia, amid growing hostility toward the Jewish state from its principal trading partners in Europe.
A slew of countries in Europe and the Middle East filed petitions to join the fund, including Britain, Germany, France, Italy, Australia, Singapore, Taiwan, Jordan, Kuwait, Oman and Qatar, among others.
PreOccupied Territory: Market Report: Chametz Futures Down (satire)
Commodities traders in Israel have noticed a recent decrease in the price of futures for potentially leavened grain products, a seasonal dip that almost always occurs in the late winter and early spring as holders of the goods tend to sell off their inventories.
Bread, pizza, and cookie futures began falling late last week, followed more modestly by cakes, pies, crackers and pretzels. This week has seen those prices continue their decline, joined by those of brownies, breaded chicken, batter-dipped fish, bechamel sauce, quiche, and various specialty pastries such as rugelach. Investors also rushed to arrange the sale and delivery of their existing stocks of pasta, pancakes, waffles, muffins, breakfast cereals, dumplings, and other flour-based foodstuffs.
Commodities market indexes reported that pita, sliced white bread, baguette, and roll futures began dropping as of last Tuesday, losing 4% of their value from the day before. Each successive day bought a further decrease in price, falling a full 60% as of yesterday to only NIS 11.58 per tonne. The precipitous decline, rather than indicating an industry-wide collapse, represents an annual event that occurs around the same time each year, in the transition of winter to spring, explains Haggai Pesach of Balye-Raeh, a clearinghouse for leavened goods.
Observing Passover as the Last Jew in Pakistan
I am a 27-year-old Jew living in Pakistan.
It's a statement that has elicited shock, warnings, threats and intense curiosity ever since I moved from Morocco to Karachi, the country's largest city in the homeland of my parents.
I understand the questions. I've faced them all myself leading up my decision to make my home here.
That Pakistan isn't friendly toward Jews won't surprise anyone. Anti-Jewish and anti-Israel sentiment is rampant. I'm the only openly Jewish person here that I know. I'm sure there must be others in hiding, passing as Zoroastrian, Muslims and other faiths. They're on my mind as we enter Passover, when we commemorate the ancient Israelites' freedom from slavery in Egypt.
Jewish tribe in India celebrates pre-Passover seder, hoping next year will be in Jerusalem
The Shavei Israel Hebrew Center in Churachanpur, India hosted a pre-Passover "Model Seder" for over 550 members of the Bnei Menashe community Thursday.
One of the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel, the Bnei Menashe are descendants of the tribe of Manasseh who were banished from Israel over 2,700 years ago by the Assyrian empire. Over 3,000 Bnei Menashe have immigrated to Israel through Shavei Israel, with another 7,000 still waiting in India to make Aliya.
“Passover symbolizes the Jewish people’s deliverance, and the Seder embodies the deepest hopes of the Bnei Menashe community, which has been dreaming for so long to make Aliyah,” said Shavei Israel Founder and Chairman Michael Freund.
“In the past two years, we have brought 1,000 Bnei Menashe to Israel,” Freund said. “We hope the remaining 7,000 members of the community still in India will soon experience the same taste of freedom -- next year in Jerusalem!”