David Hirsh’s must-see video, Whitewashed: Antisemitism in the Labour Party (which you can view below) starts with a truly shocking clip of Jeremy Corbyn speaking. Having referred to the profoundly anti-Jewish, murderous terrorist organisations Hezbollah and Hamas as his “friends”, he says (of either or both): “The idea that an organisation that is dedicated towards the good of the Palestinian people and bringing about long term peace and social justice, and political justice, in the whole region should be labelled a terrorist organisation by the British government is a big, big historical mistake”.
Hirsh’s film not only highlights examples of the antisemitism in the Labour party, but observes the appalling way in which Jews who draw attention to this are dismissed as “lying for Israel”. It states what so many on the left deny: that while in theory it is possible to be anti-Zionist but not anti-Jew, in practice the distinction is meaningless.
As one speaker observes, the Labour Party cannot call itself an anti-racist party if it denies the existence of left-wing antisemitism. Through interviews with Jewish people whose evidence to Baroness Chakrabarti’s vacuous “inquiry” into the issue was ignored, it shows how a report that was supposed to point to solutions to anti-Jewish attitudes in the party ended up as just another manifestation of the problem.

On Friday, The Daily Wire spoke with former Democratic vice presidential candidate and former Connecticut Senator Joseph Lieberman about the rising tide of anti-Semitism on the Left. Acknowledging the political divisions within the Democratic party itself following a contentious primary election battle between the centrist wing of the party, represented by Hillary Clinton, and the left-wing of the party, represented by Bernie Sanders, Lieberman suggested that the anti-Semitism on the Left is inherently intertwined with controversies surrounding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
“There are areas where there is a rising opposition [to Israel] but it’s not based on reality,” said Lieberman following a panel discussion in Paris about Iran’s expansionist policies.
But to Lieberman, this anti-Israel sentiment remains confined to the political fringes.
“I think America remains, by every public opinion poll I’ve seen, very pro-Israel,” he said.
When asked directly about the Bernie Sanders movement, and its disturbingly anti-Israel sentiments, Lieberman said he was hopeful about the future of the Democratic party’s relationship with Israel, however, it was impossible to deny that “an element” within the party had moved away from the American political establishment’s traditional bipartisan support for the Jewish State.
“I’m concerned about that,” said the former vice presidential candidate. “When I became active in politics the Democratic party [during the Kennedy era]” was very supportive of Israel.
But things have changed, noted Lieberman.

But what was Netanyahu’s alternative? If the American Jewish community flies off the handle and declares war against the government, threatening to blackball the elected leaders of the Jewish state when they adopt measures that while impolite have little substantive effect on their positions, then why should Israel take their views into account? If everything that the government does is terrible, then dialogue is reduced to recrimination. Sitting with progressive Jewish leaders from America means being subjected to a lecture about how terrible Israel is by people who do not live here and are not interested in having a serious discussion about what is actually on the table.
The fact that they are not interested in having that sort of discussion, and that they have no interest in making Israel their home, is demonstrated by their indifference to the real implications of the draft conversion law. Leaders truly invested in the future of both their communities and of their communities’ ties with Israel would be appalled by the retention of monopoly control over conversions by rabbinic authorities who refuse to recognize the difference between children of intermarriage and non-Jews with no relation to Judaism and the Jewish people.
They would insist that religious-Zionist rabbis be reinstated in the state rabbinate, and work avidly to ensure that conversions once approved cannot be overturned.
The real problem here is that while everyone involved speaks of the need for Jewish unity, no one involved in the conversation seems to be motivated to work toward that goal.
Jewish unity isn’t achieved by mutual recrimination.
And it isn’t achieved by one-upmanship. It is achieved through compromise based on mutual respect and love for fellow Jews. Absent that, nothing good will come from negotiations or laws or agreements. Absent that, nothing good will come at all.

Russia has not engaged in soul-searching about its dark past, Knesset speaker and former refusenik Yuli Edelstein said Thursday, expressing concern over local admiration for the murderous Soviet-era dictator Josef Stalin.
During Edelstein’s three-day official visit to Moscow this week — marking 30 years since his release from Siberian labor camps for the crime of teaching Hebrew — there was no explicit acknowledgment in his high-level meetings of his past personal suffering, he said.
There were, however, some private conversations, including at a courthouse, where local officials expressed sympathy and admiration for his experiences, and a historic speech he delivered in the Russian parliament that provided powerful closure. Ultimately, he said, he didn’t need an apology, and felt he had “won.”
“I don’t think there is soul-searching here. This is one of the problems, because — and this is something that must be said — the ideology of that period is still considered legitimate in this country.” That, Edelstein continued, is exemplified by the active communist political party, and the fact that “recently, you hear voices talking about the need to recognize Stalin as a great leader.”
Wrapping up his trip, Edelstein spoke three days after the annual Levada independent poll showed that Stalin, who is considered the architect of millions of deaths, remains the most popular figure among Russians, ahead of President Vladimir Putin.

Islamic Christian Council member and former Gaza Latin Church head Manuel Musallam blamed churches in Judea and Samaria for helping the "Israeli occupation."
In an interview with Hamas newspaper Palestin, Musallem said that there is a large number of unsupervised churches in the Palestinian Authority, and that there is no information on why they were founded.
Before the establishment of the State of Israel, European countries and the Greek and Russian Orthodox churches, as well as other Christian denominations, purchased land in many parts of the country.
After Arutz Sheva exposed a deal in which the Greek Orthodox Church signed 140 year leases basically selling large portions of its land in the Jerusalem neighborhoods of Talbieh and Rehavia to the "Nayot" company owned by the Ben David family, Musallam said that selling even one grain of the Church's dirt given to the "Israeli occupation" is "a severe betrayal of the Palestinian nation and of all the Christians in Palestine." (h/t Elder of Lobby)

A pro-Palestine event due to be held in London will go ahead, despite government threats to ban it over alleged links to terror group Hamas.
The Palestine Expo is expected to draw around 10,000 people to the Queen Elizabeth II Centre (QEII) in London, on the weekend of 8 and 9 July.
Earlier in the week, Communities Secretary Sajid Javid wrote a letter to organisers, Friends of Al Aqsa, to express concerns over their links to terror groups.
He is quoted in the Guardian as citing “concerns that your organisation and those connected with it have expressed public support for a proscribed organisation, namely Hamas, and that you have supported events at which Hamas and Hizballah – also proscribed – have been praised”.
Speaking to Jewish News on Tuesday, Department for Communities and Local Government spokesman said: “We have worked with the QEII Centre to carry out checks following concerns raised about the Palestine Expo 2017. Following these checks, we have agreed the event can take place as planned.”
The event is billed as “the biggest social, cultural and entertainment event on Palestine to ever take place in Europe”, and will feature speakers including anti-Zionist Israeli-born speakers Ilan Pappe and Miko Peled, journalists Ben White and Peter Oborne, and controversial former National Union of Students president Malia Bouattia.

‘Will you, Mr. Mayor, look after the interests of the Jewish population of London and write to the home secretary to ask for the clarification of the rules on what is a banned organization?” That is the very simple request that I made of London’s mayor, Sadiq Khan, at our meeting last week.
When terrorist flags are being flown openly in your city and antisemitic slogans are being shouted from street corners – as they were during the recent al-Quds Day march in London – any mayor worth his salt should want to do something about it. Whilst freedom of speech is precious, nobody should have to feel intimidated walking around their own city, or put up with racist abuse being hurled at particular groups.
The problem here is that British law is unclear about whether the Hezbollah flag is legal or not – due to a bizarre distinction between the “military” and “political” wings of this terrorist group. Therefore, police were unable to arrest people who openly displayed what is generally agreed to be a terrorist flag.
So I asked our mayor to do something very straightforward, which was to take this up with the government so that this issue can be clarified. This would be helpful to the police – of which the mayor is in charge – in doing their job to protect Londoners and keep public order. And the protection of Londoners is an important part of the mayor’s job description.

The Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center for Holocaust Studies (FSWC) has filed a hate speech complaint with the Toronto police against a speaker at this year’s Al-Quds Day rally at Queen’s Park.
In his speech at the June 24 event, Maulana Syed Mohammad Zaki Baqri of the Council of Islamic Guidance and the Al Mahdi Centre said, in English and Arabic, that, “Israel, Zionism, should and must know … it is the law that whoever oppresses, he has to be eliminated. One day or the other,” the FSWC alleges in its complaint.
The organization has provided police with a video of the statements.
In a letter to Ontario Attorney General Yasir Naqvi, the FSWC alleges that Baqri’s speech violates Sections 318 and 319 of the Criminal Code, “Advocating Genocide and Public Incitement of Hatred.”
Violations of both sections can lead to imprisonment, the FSWC pointed out in a press release.
“Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center is disheartened by the vilification of Jewish Canadians and Israel on Toronto’s streets,” the group’s statement said.
The annual Al-Quds Day march and rally in Toronto made its way from Queen’s Park to the American consulate. Members of the Jewish Defense League (JDL) organized a counter-protest directly across from the consulate.

The leadership of pro-Israel student groups in Illinois and Ohio both called Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) a “hate group” after two chapters of the notorious organization supported the expulsion of LGBTQ Zionists from a Chicago pride march last weekend.
Elan Karoll, president of the University of Illinois-Urbana Champaign’s (UIUC) IlliniPAC, and Sophia Witt, who recently stepped down as president of Students Supporting Israel (SSI) at Ohio’s Kent State University, spoke with The Algemeiner on Thursday after the SJP groups at their respective colleges applauded the Dyke March’s ejection of two Jewish women who came to the event holding pride flags with Stars of David on them. March organizers said the symbol made Palestinians feel “threatened.”
A couple of hours after IlliniPAC issued a statement on Facebook condemning the Dyke March organizers’ decision, SJP UIUC wrote on social media, “IlliniPAC cannot claim to respect the rights of all races, religions, nationalities, sexualities, and genders while supporting an occupation that systematically targets people of an entire ethnicity by denying them their lands, safety, and dignity.”
SJP UIUC also insisted that it was “committed to the liberation of all oppressed people.” It later added that “groups with an agenda have falsely accused [march organizers] of being motivated by antisemitism.”
Karoll said that SJP’s endorsement of the Dyke March has erased any doubt of the anti-Israel group’s true motives.

The Chicago Dyke March’s decision to boot three women carrying Jewish pride flags from their event last weekend was “deeply ignorant” and “ridiculous,” Michael Lucas, a gay pornographic film actor and director, told Breitbart Jerusalem in an interview.
Lucas is founder and CEO of Lucas Entertainment, New York’s largest gay adult film company and one of the biggest gay porn production companies in the world.
He compared the Dyke March’s actions to anti-Semitic policies carried out by Nazi Germany.
“One of the first things the Nazis did was claim that Jews were a threat, and exclude them from participating in public events and gatherings,” Lucas stated. “Eventually they required Jews to wear the Star of David on their clothing, the ultimate symbol of the persecution of the Jews.”
“And now these women say the Star of David is a ‘trigger,’ is threatening to them? These are deeply ignorant people who are turning history on its head.”
Lucas criticized the lack of significant response on the matter from major LGBT organizations. “What happened in Chicago was despicable, and it certainly does not represent the thinking of all LGBT people, who should be outraged by this hateful moment. All gay organizations talk about diversity and inclusion, so where are the condemnations now from those groups?”

The third Mediterranean Biennale in the northern Arab town of Sakhnin opened Thursday evening, but missing were several works whose creators asked to have them removed from the exhibition because it is taking place in Israel.
The exhibition, which is also being shown in the nearby Arab and Jewish towns of Misgav, Arrabeh and Deir Hanna until December 15, features works by 60 artists from 25 countries, including some who hail from Arab nations that have no diplomatic relations with Israel, such as Kuwait, Morocco, Algeria and Lebanon.
The artists who asked to have their works removed are of Algerian, Moroccan and Lebanese descent, though they currently reside in France and England. Some said they hadn’t been informed that their pieces were to be shown in Israel.
According to a spokesperson for the Mediterranean Biennale, the works in question are part of the collection of the FRAC Museum in Marseilles, which has been working with the Biennale for the past year and a half.
In adherence with the standard operating protocol, the museum forwarded the Biennale’s loan request to its art committee, which agreed to lend the works from the collection. The Biennale was required to pay a standard fee for the loan.
But the artists didn’t learn their works would be appearing in Israel until earlier this week, and several said they wouldn’t cooperate with an Israeli institution due to their support of the Palestinian cause.

The BBC has come under fire for publishing a news article on Wednesday stating that “The Holocaust is a sensitive topic for many Muslims because Jewish survivors settled in British-mandate Palestine, on land which later became the State of Israel.”
The British Campaign Against Antisemitism (CAA), a volunteer-led charity dedicated to exposing and countering anti-Semitism through education and law-enforcement, demanded on its website that the BBC “immediately and unequivocally apologise” for the line.
“The Holocaust is indeed a sensitive topic for many reasons, not least because six million Jews were systematically massacred. It should not be a sensitive topic to Muslims, or anybody else, because of the foundation of the State of Israel,” CAA stated. “Zionism, the movement to create the modern State of Israel began decades before the Holocaust, and had the country existed at the time of the Holocaust, millions of innocent Jewish civilians may have lived.”
CAA claimed that the line published by the BBC was anti-Semitic in nature: “For the BBC to lend credence to the notion that it is legitimate to be ‘sensitive’ about the Holocaust because of the existence of the State of Israel invokes antisemitic notions that the existence of the State of Israel is in some way racist, and it is offensive to tar ‘many Muslims’ in this way.”
The line appeared in a BBC News article about German Muslim schoolgirls who went to visit concentration camps in Poland and suffered racist abuse from locals. The BBC has since removed the controversial statement.

The program closes with Bowen opining that Hamas — the terror organization whose activities and abuses he has downplayed throughout the whole report — should be party to negotiations.
Until matters change in Gaza there will be more wars between Hamas and Israel. Change means a new attempt at peace with the participation and consent of all sides. Right now, there is no chance of that happening.
Perhaps one of the more disturbing points emerging from this series of programs by the BBC’s Middle East editor is the fact that the passage of time has done nothing to alter Bowen’s opinions and analysis.
Having publicly claimed that he did not come across human shields in the few days that he was in Gaza in the summer of 2014, three years later Bowen cannot accommodate the ample evidence that shows otherwise. Having promoted his own pseudo-legal interpretations of the Law of Armed Combat in his 2014 reporting from Gaza, he is incapable of subsequently adjusting that view in line with the facts.
That, of course, is what happens when the agenda takes precedence over the actual story.

It is almost impossible that a historian would miss this controversy (even after a quick Google search), and no responsible historian would omit it from an article, but Bytwerk did. After the controversy broke, National Vanguard, a neo-Nazi publication came to Wall’s defense, as did Veterans Today, another racist publication affiliated with Veterans News Now. (No links.)
What makes Bytwerk’s omission even more astounding is that he is an expert on Nazi propaganda and is the curator of Calvin College’s online archive of German Propaganda. Veterans News Now, where Wall served as associate editor, traffics in many of the antisemitic tropes that the Nazis used and would be familiar to Professor Bytwerk.
Did Randall Bytwerk not know about the controversy surrounding James M. Wall’s affiliation with Veterans News Now and his unwholesome enmity toward Israel and its supporters which manifested itself as his career progressed and came into full bloom in his retirement?
How could he miss it?
In any event, CAMERA supporters can be glad because Wikipedia can be edited by its readers. It may take some effort, but the information about James M. Wall’s transformation from a respected mainline Protestant journalist into a purveyor of hate can be inserted into the Wikipedia article by anyone with a computer and a modem.
It is a sad subject, but the fact is, James M. Wall tarnished his legacy all by himself and no encyclopedia article about his life can legitimately ignore the issue.

Similar conclusions were reached by additional parties including the US, Turkey and the UK as well as Human Rights Watch – an NGO usually considered by the BBC to be an impeccable source.
Is it possible that the BBC is not aware of those reports and hence is still describing the attack as “suspected” and amplifying Assad’s propaganda on the topic? That possibility is ruled out by the fact that included in the related reading at the bottom of this article is a link to a BBC report from April 26th titled “Syria chemical ‘attack’: What we know” that informs readers of the results of the investigations carried out by the OPCW, Turkey and France.
And yet despite that, visitors to the BBC News website still find plenty of content relating to that story which is presented using language and punctuation which suggests to audiences that there is reason to doubt whether an attack took place, what type of weapon was used and who carried it out.
This is of course far from the only case of false balance in BBC reporting that obstructs audience understanding of a story. The BBC News website, for example, still carries a report amplifying inaccurate Hamas claims concerning a 2014 incident in the Shati refugee camp in Gaza despite the fact that the circumstances have been repeatedly clarified over the last three years. The practice of promoting false balance clearly hampers the BBC’s purpose of providing the public with accurate and impartial reporting that enables understanding of global issues.

German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier denounced growing antisemitism in his country on Wednesday, German newspaper Augsburger Allgemeine reported.
Speaking at the 100th anniversary of the Augsburg synagogue, the president noted that while most Germans stand against antisemitism, a growing trend of anti-Jewish hatred is being spread on social media, in part due to some Muslim immigrant groups.
"Social media often propagates the spread of hate messages and antisemitic provocation," he said, noting the trend is growing across Europe.
Despite this, however, Steinmeier noted that, in comparison to France, Germany's Jews are staying put, rather than immigrating to Israel. He affirmed his hope that Germany "can once again be the home of which the Jews were robbed."

German lawmakers are poised to pass a bill designed to enforce the country’s existing limits on free speech — including the long-standing ban on Holocaust denial — in social networks. Critics including tech giants and human rights campaigners say the legislation could have drastic consequences for free speech online.
The proposed measure would fine social networking sites up to 50 million euros ($56 million) if they fail to swiftly remove illegal content, including defamatory “fake news.”
It’s scheduled for a vote in parliament Friday, the last session before summer recess and September’s national election, and is widely expected to pass.
The U.N.’s independent expert on freedom of speech, David Kaye, warned the German government earlier this month that the criteria for removing material were “vague and ambiguous,” adding that the prospect of hefty fines could prompt social media companies such as Facebook and Twitter to delete questionable content without waiting for a court to rule it’s unlawful.

Police in Russia-annexed Crimea are investigating the desecration of a mass grave of Holocaust victims near the city of Simferopol.
The investigation opened Tuesday following the unauthorized exhumations performed last week at the site of a firing trench where Nazis and their collaborators killed hundreds of Jews, the Russian TASS news agency reported. Russia annexed the territory from Ukraine in 2014.
“A local resident saw at night strangers digging and immediately informed us,” Anatoly Gendin, head of the Association of Jewish Organizations and Communities of Crimea, told the news agency. His organization also complained to police about the dig, which he said was likely the work of robbers looking for precious items.
The incident, the second case of its kind in five years in Crimea, came amid preparations for enclosing known burial sites with concrete.
“There is a preliminary decision of the Crimea State Committee and Jewish community organizations on setting up concrete enclosures and establish there a surveillance system,” Grigory Ioffe, a deputy speaker of the parliament of Crimea, one of Russia’s semi-autonomous regions, told TASS.
The Germans captured Simferopol in November 1941 when it had approximately 12,000 Jews, including many Krymchaks — a nearly extinct ethnic group of Jews of Turkmen descent who had lived in Crimea for many centuries before the Holocaust.

“This is the first step on a long path,” Archbishop of Palermo Corrado Lorefice said Thursday upon receiving the Raoul Wallenberg Medal for having transferred to the Jewish community a churchowned facility built atop the ruins of the Great Synagogue of Palermo.
Addressing the audience at a celebratory event at his residence, Lorefice was moved to tears as a he delivered a heartfelt speech.
“This is the first step on long path that we are called to together, to reach God on the day when all the people will be together in paradise,” he said.
He described the medal as “a sign of friendship that warms my heart, and warms the heart of all the Christians of Palermo, and particularly this archdiocese.”

Students, professors and alumni of the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology now have a new way to finance their cutting-edge projects: a $200 million venture capital fund focused on creating companies out of the research conducted at the Haifa-based university.
The new fund is a joint venture between the Technion Research & Development Foundation (TRDF) and UG Capital Management (UGC), a fund management company based in Hong Kong.
The management team for the joint venture will be based in both Israel and Hong Kong. It includes Jonathan Mitchell, CY Lau and Thomas Lau of UGI, and Eddy Shalev, Dr. Eyal Kishon and Gary Gannot, the founders of the Genesis venture capital fund, who are joining the new Technion group.
“The Technion has been increasing its commercialization activities in recent years and we have already noted many successes in this field, including more than doubling the number of startup companies set up at the Technion through the new Technion DRIVE Accelerator,” said Prof. Wayne D. Kaplan, executive vice president for research and director general of TRDF.
UGI’s Jonathan Mitchell praised the new venture and team as a kind of “alchemy.”

Since January of last year, Greece, Israel, and Cyprus have been working to create a pipeline that could transport natural gas to Europe from the reserves in Israeli coastal waters; Italy joined the negotiations two months ago. If this initiative, which is technically difficult and expensive to implement, does not pan out, Israel will be forced to choose between the less desirable options of cooperating with either Egypt or Turkey. George Tzogopoulos writes:
Turkey will not be considered a reliable partner by Israel for as long as President Recep Tayyip Erdogan dominates the political sphere, despite the rapprochement achieved last summer. Israel also has reservations vis-à-vis Egypt: the growing Russian role in Egypt’s energy sector cannot be ignored.
If the EastMed project, [as the proposal is being called], develops, it will certainly improve Israel’s relationship with the EU. Commissioner for Climate Action and Energy Miguel Arias Cañete has said construction of this pipeline would contribute to the reduction of Europe’s dependency on Russian energy, a potential result also viewed with favor by the U.S.
The traditional division among EU member states regarding their view of Moscow can work in EastMed’s favor. While Germany is looking favorably toward the Nord Stream 2 [pipeline], which will complement Nord Stream 1 in the transporting of Russian gas to Europe under the Baltic Sea, the EU might well emphasize energy security instead and push (with the support of the U.S.) for the realization of EastMed.

A diagnostic system developed at the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology enables rapid and accurate customization of the antibiotic to the patient. The system makes for faster diagnostics, earlier and more effective treatment of infectious bacteria, and improved patient recovery times. The findings were published this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).
Antibiotics are one of the most effective ways to treat bacterial infections. However, the widespread use of antibiotics accelerates the development of bacterial strains that are resistant to specific antibiotics. In 2014, infections with antimicrobial resistance (AMR) claimed the lives of more than 700,000 people worldwide, in addition to a cumulative expenditure of $35 billion a year in the US alone.
For patients with threatening infections, urgent treatment is required for their health. According to established estimates, for every hour that effective antibiotic treatment is delayed, survival rates drop by ~7.6% for patients with septic shock. Therefore, in order not to leave the patient without adequate protection while awaiting the results, many doctors will prescribe an antibiotic with a broad spectrum of activity in large doses. This phenomenon facilitates the emergence of AMR and also affects the microbiota - the population of "good bacteria" found in the human body that protects it.

Sir Tom Jones, in his performance in Tel Aviv, proved to the audience that despite being 77 and gray-haired for several years now, he is still a successful singer who has the endurance to hold a crowd captive for a 90-minute show. Jones is still able to hit the standard of professionalism he’s set for himself for the past five decades.
The consummate performer showed up on time, without delay. He began with a big bow to the huge crowd that greeted him at Tel Aviv’s Menorah Mivtachim Arena. He earned brownie points with the crowd after mentioning that he visited Jerusalem for the first time and enjoyed his visit to the Holy City very much.
He began to sing his songs when the audience joined him in applause, with the third song earning him a standing ovation.
The legendary singer did not forget to mention Leonard Cohen, who recently passed away, and performed one of his songs.
In the middle of the performance, he sang to the audience “Yiddishe Maman” followed by his big hit “Delilah.” With the audience’s average age leaning towards an older crowd, most in attendance were able to follow along easily with these old classics . With his booming voice, which may not even need a microphone at all, and his hips, which were constantly in motion, he made sure the audience got their money’s worth.

The cornerstone laying ceremony for Ariel University's new School of Medicine and Health Sciences, named after Dr. Miriam and Sheldon Adelson, was held on Wednesday.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu praised the Adelsons, who donated $5 million to the project, saying, "You are not only great friends, you are great patriots of the Jewish people and the Jewish state."
Netanyahu said the school reflects Israel's values.
"We will live with our universal mission to provide medical care and relief, but we will simultaneously continue fighting terrorism and lead the global efforts to counter terrorism," he said. "The School of Medicine and Health Sciences will leave a lasting imprint and will serve as a hub for true excellence, and attract great doctors and the sharpest minds. It will train generations of students to come."
Education Minister Naftali Bennett lauded the establishment of a medical school in Ariel. Like Netanyahu, he also thanked the Adelsons.

Another absolute pearl from part one of Pillar of Fire (which I posted here): Listen to former British politician and diplomat Philip Noel-Baker explaining how he was converted to Zionism.

In 1922, a few years before he fled the Soviet Union, the sixth Chabad-Lubavitch Rebbe Yosef Yitzchak Schneerson petitioned the Russian government to return 35 crates of books they had seized years earlier.
The books had been passed down to his father, Rabbi Shalom DovBer Schneerson, by his grandfather and had belonged collectively to generations of Lubavitch Hasidim going back to Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liady, who began the collection in the 18th century.
There was an illustrated haggadah, published in 1712 in Amsterdam, its pages stained by wine that was spilled at Passover seders hundreds of years ago. There was a book printed in 1552 in Venice, not long after the printing press was invented, with a handwritten inscription in cursive Hebrew reminiscent of Arabic. There was a Torah from 1631, with comments in Latin, written in pencil by Christian scholars who had studied the Jewish holy book.
The Soviet government did not return the books, and for almost a century they remained on the shelves of the Lenin public library in Moscow. But this month the Russian State Library will finish scanning and putting online the more than 4,500 books in the Schneerson Collection, making them accessible to everyone in the world at the click of a mouse.
“We have about 10 to 20 books left to scan. They’ll be on the site in a month,” said Svetlana Khvostova, the Russian State Library employee in charge of the Schneerson Collection at the Jewish Museum and Tolerance Center in Moscow.

To many Muslims — especially radical Islamists — Jewish sovereignty in any part of the Holy Land is a red line that cannot be crossed. The mere existence of a Jewish State in the Middle East is totally unacceptable to their Islamic doctrine. As a consequence, Jews in Israel have been subjected to violence, murder and destruction. And until that doctrine undergoes reformation, the “religion of peace” will view the Jewish state as an unacceptable intruder in the Middle East.
This is the true heart of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was very prescient to demand that any peace agreement include the formal recognition of Israel as a Jewish state — because violence and war by internal and external Muslim terrorist organizations and by neighboring Muslim countries have remained an inescapable barrier to a final status peace agreement.
Israel has no choice but to protect its existence as the Jewish homeland, against all those who wish to destroy it. Genuine peace can only come after hostility from Islamists ends. Violence, incitement and anti-Jewish diatribes preached by Muslim and Palestinian leaders must stop.
Ultimately, the transition of Islam to a true religion of peace will end conflicts in Muslim societies, the Middle East and elsewhere. Shias and Sunnis will stop killing each other, and civil wars will end. ISIS will be defeated. And the Muslim world and local Arab leaders will formally accept the reality of the Jewish state of Israel.
We can hope that — in the near future — the influence of global communications, the internet and social networks can help trigger a 21st century Islamic reformation. In past centuries and millennia, Islam’s elder brethren — Judaism and Christianity — underwent significant reforms that helped lay the foundation of the modern world. The time has now come for Islam to become a genuine religion of peace.

The overriding responsibility, however, rests with the terrorist regime of Iran which finances the Lebanese terrorists and supplies them with weapons. Although Hezbullah is very much a Lebanese organization that is motivated by its own hatred of Israel, it is also a proxy of Iran, and it would be far less dangerous without Iran, despite Hezbullah’s strong support among the Lebanese population. Iran, however, has a free hand in supporting Hezbullah. Iran is even considered somewhat respectable after it signed a nuclear deal with the US, the UK, France, China, Russia, and Germany.
Since the nuclear deal with Iran did not require that Iran stop supporting terrorism, all six nations that signed the deal also hold part of the responsibility for the impending war. Barack Obama, David Cameron, Francois Hollande, Xi Jinping, Vladimir Putin, Angela Merkel, and their governments did not try to stop the terrorist regime’s single-minded determination to attack the Jewish state, but chose the economic benefits of trade with Iran instead.
So-called peace groups indicate by their names a distaste for war; however, they are busy denouncing Israel, the country that would be at the receiving end of the war. Denouncing Hezbullah, the side that is itching for war, seems to be the furthest thing from their minds. Among those so-called peace groups are Act Now to Stop War and End Racism (ANSWER), CODEPINK: Women for Peace, and Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP), which are listed by the Anti-Defamation League among the top ten anti-Israel organizations in the United States.
The United Nations Security Council stated in resolution 1701 that, “The clear path forward was by disarming and disbanding Hizbollah and other militias, as well as by Lebanon’s exercise of authority over all its territory”, but neither the United Nations nor its Security Council has done anything to enforce that direction. On the contrary. Since 2006, the UN General Assembly adopted numerous resolutions against the Jewish state (20 in 2016 alone), but not a single one against the Lebanese terrorists.

The issue of Traore’s motives was front and center during a recent panel discussion on the popular weekend TV talk show “On n’est pas couché” (“We’re not lying”).
The main guest was Michel Boujenah, a French Jewish actor and writer, who engaged in a sometimes emotional examination of Halimi’s murder with three other panelists and the show’s presenter, Laurent Ruquier.
On the subject of Traore, Halimi’s killer, Boujenah told the audience: “They said it was a mentally unstable person. But it was a mentally unstable person who chose his victim, who tortured her, insulted her with every antisemitic slur, and threw her out of the window.”
Boujenah, who was born in Tunis, continued: “He was crazy. But he was a crazy antisemite. There is no doubt about this question.”
Another panelist, Yann Moix, said that the silence around Sarah Halimi’s murder was reminiscent of the case of Ilan Halimi, no relation, the 23 year-old kidnapped, tortured and murdered in 2006 by an antisemitic gang who set out to find a Jewish victim in the belief that Jews were wealthy and therefore would pay a ransom demand.
Responding, Boujenah reflected, “We are 15 million Jews on this planet. There are a billion and a half Chinese. What did we do? What did we do that is so bad? To be hated in this manner. What did we do? I would like an explanation.”

Israel’s Ambassador to the UN Danny Danon accused the United Nations of “colluding with supporters of terror seeking to harm Israel,” following a two-day panel Thursday-Friday marking “50 years of occupation” in which groups Israel says have links to Palestinian terror organizations participated.
The panel was addressed by Palestinian officials, an Israeli MK, Israeli and Palestinian activists and others.
“It is beyond comprehension that UN funds are supporting organizations which aid terrorists and incite against Israel,” Danon said in a statement about the event, which was organized by the Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People and held at UN headquarters in New York.
The committee was tasked in 2016 with “bring[ing] together international experts, including from the State of Palestine and Israel, representatives of the diplomatic community, civil society, as well as academics and students to discuss the ongoing occupation.”
Israel protested the meetings which began Thursday, saying that two of the groups participating, Al Haq and the Al Mezan Center for Human Rights, had links to Hamas and the PFLP.

The director of Israeli human rights group B’Tselem told a conference at the UN in New York on Friday that Israel was sabotaging efforts to combat anti-Semitism in order to retain control of the West Bank.
Speaking on the second day of a two-day forum at the UN headquarters in New York marking “50 years of occupation,” the left-wing NGO’s executive director Hagai El-Ad said that Israel tries to minimize international criticism of its West Bank policy by labeling it anti-Semitic.
“Palestinians who oppose the occupation are terrorists, Israelis who oppose the occupation are traitors, and those in the international community who oppose the occupation are of course anti-Semitic,” El-Ad said.
“The Israeli government is prepared to undermine the real fight against anti-Semitism in order to preserve the occupation with minimal repercussions from the international community,” he charged. (h/t Elder of Lobby)

A UN forum on the Palestinian issue on Friday provided a platform for anti-Zionist activists to promote the BDS campaign, claim that Israel practices “apartheid worse than South Africa,” and even – in the case of one Israeli Jewish speaker – proffer a formal apology for having taken up Israeli citizenship under the Law of Return.
The second day of the two-day forum marking “Fifty Years of Occupation” was designed to showcase the perspectives of Palestinian NGOs and their international supporters. Hosted by the UN Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People (CEIRPP), the forum was earlier this week strongly condemned by Israeli diplomats at the UN, who stated that some of the speakers were connected to terrorist groups including Hamas and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP).
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres – who declared in April that the denial of Israel’s right to exist is a “modern form of antisemitism” – earlier distanced himself from the meeting. Stephane Dujarric, the spokesman for Guterres, told reporters on Thursday that the forum “is not something that is being sponsored by the Secretariat. I think any questions as to the invitees and the way the meeting is organized should be directed to the members of the committee.”
Friday’s speakers did not hold back from recycling the favored themes of anti-Zionist activists, such as the analogy between Israel and the white supremacist regime in South Africa, and the familiar accusation that expressing concern about antisemitism is designed to mute criticism of Israeli policy. Allusions as well as explicit references to the supposedly overwhelming power of pro-Israel groups in the US were frequently made, with the moderator of the final panel – Helena Cobban, a veteran pro-Palestinian activist – telling the audience that “the name of the Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People needs to be restated again and again. And that needs restating in this city (New York) and this country.”

The General Assembly on Friday agreed to a significant cut in the budget for the UN’s far-flung peacekeeping missions, a reduction that the Trump administration fought hard to achieve though it wanted an even larger decrease.
After lengthy and heated negotiations, the assembly’s powerful budget committee agreed to a $7.3 billion budget for 14 peacekeeping missions for the year starting July 1, a $570 million cut from the current budget of $7.87 billion.
The 193-member world body voted by consensus to approve $6.8 billion. It also agreed to an additional $500 million for two missions that are in the throes of downsizing — the joint UN-African Union mission in Sudan’s troubled western Darfur region and the UN peacekeeping mission in Haiti.
US Ambassador Nikki Haley said after the budget committee’s agreement early Thursday: “Just five months into our time here, we’ve already been able to cut over half a billion dollars from the UN peacekeeping budget and we’re only getting started.”

Former foreign minister Tizpi Livni criticized the UN’s cultural body for its repeated decisions against Israel and called on the organization to reject a further provocative vote on the flash point West Bank city of Hebron set for Sunday.
The Palestinians are pushing to have Hebron — the site of the Tomb of the Patriarchs — declared as a “World Heritage Site in Danger” during the upcoming World Heritage Committee meeting.
Speaking Friday at the UNESCO International Conference on the Empowerment of Women in Paris, Livni, a member of the opposition Zionist Union party, said she had seriously considered skipping the event due to previous “false” decisions against the Jewish state, Ynet reported.
“I am an opposition leader in Israel, but I am not in opposition to the history of my people and not an opposition to the truth,” Livni said. “These decisions will not harm my people’s connection to [Jerusalem and Hebron], but they will hurt UNESCO and the ability to promote common interests.”

For a rudimentary introduction to its true splendor, just look at what happened this week in Jerusalem. When their bid to force the Israeli government into a compromise failed this week—to the surprise of precisely no one—the leaders of the Reform and Conservative movements reacted much as the Democrats do these days, by declaring the defeat a moral victory and vowing more outrage. The setback, Reform and Conservative movements exclaimed, was nothing less than a “betrayal,” a blow so cataclysmic after which any further conversation was futile: The Reform movement, thundered its head, Rabbi Rick Jacobs, was no longer interested in negotiating with the Jewish state.
That’s a shame. While many of us in Poughkeepsie and Phoenix and Portland don’t particularly care for Bibi, we care even less for leaders who spend almost all of their time advancing fashionable progressive causes and almost none of it doing what to us comes naturally, which is to recognize that when real and present dangers abound, we ought to set our priorities accordingly. And when we see a leadership that time after time after time lectures the democratically elected government in Jerusalem on its imperfections while, say, praising the leader of an Israeli-Arab party whose colleagues have smuggled cellphones to convicted terrorists and compared the Jewish state to Nazi Germany, we may feel a little unsure about the wisdom of our leadership.
How, then, should we proceed if we are people who are both deeply committed to egalitarian access to the Kotel but not interested in torching our entire relationship to the state of Israel over it?
This is where the art of politics comes in, and it offers us three weapons with which to wage our wars: our bucks, our butts, and our words. (h/t Elder of Lobby)

Germany's National Security Council has approved the sale of three advanced submarines to Israel, another chapter in a controversial defense deal.
According to the report, Israel will receive three more Dolphin submarines in a $1.5 billion deal with German shipmaker ThyssenKrupp, in addition to the one already being built in a deal mired in corruption allegations.
In April, Israel agreed to a request by Germany to insert a clause into the contract in a memorandum of understanding. The clause gives Germany the right to cancel the deal if the any improprieties or criminal offenses were proven by the Israeli police investigation.
Israel currently has three Dolphin-class submarines and two Dolphin 2-class submarines (another one is expected to be delivered in 2018). The new Dolphin 2-class submarines would not reach Israel’s coast for another decade are expected to replace the older Dolphins at a cost of combined price of NIS 5 billion ($1.3 billion), a third of which will be financed by Germany.

A projectile landed in Israel’s northern Golan Heights believed to be from fighting between the Assad regime and rebel groups near the city of Quneitra, the army said Saturday evening.
Less than an hour later, a second projectile struck Israeli territory between Quneitra and the Valley of Tears in what the IDF described as spillover from the Syrian civil war.
No injuries were reported from the incident and IDF forces were sent to the scenes to find the projectiles which landed in a "no man's land" between the border fences of the two countries.
A number of projectiles have landed in Israeli territory due to the fighting which has intensified the Syrian side of Quneitra as the Assad regime fights against the al-Qaida-linked Hayat Tahrir al-Sham and other rebels groups who launched an offensive to take control of the city of al-Baath (new Quneitra) which is one of the few towns in the province that has remained under control of Syrian government forces.

This is simply incredible.
Assaf A. Voll’s book, A History of the Palestinian People: From Ancient Times to the Modern Era, which we first reviewed here, became the #1 ranked History book on Amazon, until Amazon banned the book.
Yesterday, we reported that the book can be bought on Barnes & Noble.
Today, the blank book is ranked #16 in best-selling books on Barnes & Noble, beating out books like The Handmaid’s Tale (#17), Harry Potter Paperback Boxed Set, Books 1-7 (#28), House of Spies (#30), Al Franken, Giant of the Senate (#38), and Understanding Trump (#55)
Way to go Muqata readers (and JewishPress.com).
You can buy the book at this link and help make it #1.
The anti-Semites are probably going to notice the book there and start putting pressure on B&N to take it down, so you might want to order your copy sooner rather than later.
Update: June 30, 2017: B&N has taken the book down.

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas is pushing Hamas toward a war with Israel, Sufian Abu Zaida, a close confidant of self-exiled Fatah leader Muhammad Dahlan, said on Thursday.
“If Abu Mazen’s [Abbas’s] pressure on Gaza continues with Israel’s participation, Hamas will not just accept it,” Abu Zaida, who is a former PA prisoner affairs and civil affairs minister, said in a telephone interview with The Jerusalem Post. “Hamas will decide that it has no choice but to have another confrontation with Israel.”
Over the past two months, Abbas has undertaken a series of measures to pressure Hamas to concede control of the Gaza Strip. He has slashed the salaries of PA employees in Gaza, reduced electricity supplied to the area (with Israel's help) and cut medical budgets.
Abu Zaida is not the only one saying Abbas’s moves could lead to another round of combat. Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman told the Herzliya Conference last Thursday that the PA president is aiming “to pull Israel into a war with Hamas.”

Following the June 27, 2017 Israeli airstrikes in Gaza in response to the firing of a rocket from Gaza into Israel, articles in the Gulf press attacked Hamas and the countries that support it: Qatar, Iran and Turkey. The articles – published against the backdrop of the inter-Gulf tension and the Boycott imposed on Qatar, chiefly by Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain and Egypt – blamed Hamas of the firing of the rocket into Israel, and claimed that it was escalating the situation in Gaza on purpose in order to serve the interests of its three patron countries. These countries, said the articles, place innocent Palestinians in danger in order to divert global attention away from the Gulf crisis.
The following are excerpts from two articles on this topic:
'Al-Ittihad' Editorial: Qatar, Iran, Turkey Use Gaza As Bargaining Chip, Toying With The Lives Of Its Innocent People
Muhammad Al-Hamadi, editor of the UAE daily Al-Ittihad, wrote: "On June 27, without any warning, the Arabs woke up to discover that Gaza had been bombarded. Why? What has happened that we don't know about? What did the Gazan Palestinians do to find themselves under Israeli fire? Has a third intifada broken out? Has the battle for the liberation of Jerusalem begun?
"In practice, none [of the above] happened. All [that happened was] that those who trade in the Palestinian problem, who are themselves in trouble, remembered an old bargaining chip that they have long been using successfully, [and decided] to use it in the dire circumstances that have befallen their friend Qatar, which serves as their open bank [account]. They thought that [using this bargaining chip] would be a good way to divert the Arabs' attention away from Qatar and focus it [instead] on Gaza and its residents who are being bombarded with missiles by the Israeli enemy.

Attacks against Israel by jihadi organizations and supporters of the Islamic State group are expected to increase, a Palestinian jihadi associated with the Islamic State told Breitbart Jerusalem in response to a rocket attack Monday from the Gaza Strip into southern Israel.
The rocket was fired in the evening at an Israeli town near the border with Gaza. A group affiliated with the Islamic State organization claimed responsibility. The Israeli Air Force responded to the attack by striking Hamas targets in the Strip, as Israel holds Gaza’s Hamas rulers responsible for any rocket attacks launched from the costal enclave.
In response to the incident, Abou Baker Almaqdesi, a jihadi from the Gaza Strip who fought in the ranks of the Islamic State in Syria and Iran and managed to return to the Gaza Strip after being wounded, said that the attacks against Israel are expected to continue.
Citing an attack in Jerusalem in which an Israeli policewoman was stabbed to death, and for which both the Shin Bet and Palestinian organizations rejected the Islamic State group’s claim of responsibility, he stated, “It won’t necessarily be with rocket fire. It could also be attacks like that carried out two weeks ago in Jerusalem, and it could be attacks in the heart of Tel Aviv. The Jews will always be a target for our brothers in the leadership and this will manifest itself soon.”
Almaqdesi claimed, “Israel is directly involved in the war against the Mujahedeen in Sinai alongside the infidel Egyptian army. Israeli intelligence is involved in the war against us by the crusader coalition led by the chief infidels, the United States, in Syria, Iraq, Libya and other places. And as our leaders in the Caliphate promised, all who are involved in the war against the Muslims will pay the price.”

The Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, Hamas’ so-called military wing, has begun a process of redeployment that includes the reorganization of the movement’s terrorist infrastructure, a Hamas official told Breitbart Jerusalem.
According to the source, the organization of terror units in the al-Qassam Brigades has been cancelled by the Brigades hierarchy and the movement has begun rebuilding and integrating its fighters in a structure that more closely resembles a military regiment.
The source noted that Hamas units were disbanded in all five areas of the Gaza Strip: the north, Gaza City, the center, Khan Younis and Rafah. The five companies, said the official, will be integrated into two main regiments.
One terror regiment will incorporate the northern Gaza company as well as companies from Gaza City and part of the old central district. The second regiment will integrate the rest of the central district along with jihadists previously responsible for southern Gaza.

Eleven jihadist residents of the Gaza Strip who swore allegiance to the Islamic State organization succeeded last weekend in joining Wilayat Sinai, the Egyptian branch of the Islamic State, a senior jihadist source in Gaza told Breitbart Jerusalem.
All 11 managed to flee the Strip through the tunnels that connect Gaza to Sinai and joined the ranks of IS in Sinai, where the group is fighting a difficult war against Egyptian military forces.
According to the jihadist source, all 11 were jailed in Hamas prisons in the last few months. He stated that they were sentenced to 6-9 months and were all released last week. “Our brothers spent four days out of jail before making their way to the ranks of the mujahedeen in Sinai,” he said.
The Gazan jihadists’ flight from the Strip to Sinai is a blow to Hamas after the organization made a commitment to Egypt in recent weeks to increase enforcement and military presence along the Gaza-Sinai border in order to prevent the movement of jihadists between the two zones.
The commitment from Hamas was declared during a delegation of Hamas officials’ visit to Egypt, led by Hamas’ Gaza politburo chief Yehya Senwar, who met with Egyptian representatives responsible for Palestinian affairs.

The coalition of Shiite forces that invaded Syria (Iranians, Iraqis, Lebanese, Afghans) are carrying out ethnic cleansing against Sunni Syrian citizens, and in parts of the country have ejected Sunni residents in order to preempt their homes and villages for Shiite migrants from Syria, Iraq and Afganistan.
This is how, maneuvering between Obama government's purposeful intentions and Trump's choice of objectives, Iran managed to become the clear victor in the Syrian war. No one in the world will succeed in removing the Iranian army from Syria, and we, in israel, Europe and the US, will have to get used to the fact that Iran now includes large swathes of Iraq, Syria and Lebanon. Hezbollah in Lebanon is now connected to Iran by land, and that is the reason Hassan Nasrallah feels such confidence vis a vis Israel, and why Israel hesitates to build a concrete wall in its own territory to protect Israelis from Hezbollah snipers.
Two years ago, when Syria was in the midst of falling apart, there were Israelis who claimed that Israel's security situation had improved now that Syria was a threat no more and Hezbollah was stuck in the Syrian quagmire. Today it looks very different. Instead of Syria, we have Iran as our immediate neighbor. Hezbollah is no more an isolated terror group in Lebanon but an important arm of the Iranian entity, parked only a short distance from Israel's border.
Worst of all is the fact that Israel's media, which reports from time to time on Iranian forces in Syria, does not show the larger, more threatening picture, the one that has developed from the Iranian line that connects the dots on the map of what was once Syria.
Iran has emerged the great, ultimate victor of the civil war in Syria. The sooner we and the rest of the world realize this, the better off we and the rest of the world will be. (h/t Elder of Lobby)

On June 8, the Department of Justice (DOJ) made an announcement that deserves more attention. Two alleged Hizballah operatives had been arrested inside the United States after carrying out various missions on behalf of the Iranian-sponsored terrorist organization. The plots took the men around the globe, from Thailand to Panama and even into the heart of New York City.
Both men are naturalized U.S. citizens. And they are both accused of performing surveillance on prospective targets for Hizballah’s highly secretive external operations wing, known as the Islamic Jihad Organization (IJO).
Ali Kourani, a 32-year-old who was living in the Bronx, New York (pictured on the right*), allegedly gathered “information regarding operations and security at airports in the U.S. and elsewhere,” while also “surveilling U.S. military and law enforcement facilities in Manhattan and Brooklyn.” Hizballah asked Kourani to identify “individuals affiliated with the Israeli Defense Force” inside the U.S. and locate “weapons suppliers in the U.S. who could provide firearms to support IJO operations” as well. Kourani allegedly conducted all of these missions on behalf of his IJO “handler,” who was safely ensconced back home in Lebanon.
Samer el Debek, a 37-year-old resident of Dearborn, Michigan, is charged with “casing security procedures at the Panama Canal and the Israeli Embassy” in Panama, identifying “areas of weakness and construction at the Panama Canal,” and determining for Hizballah “how close someone could get to a ship passing through the Canal.” His “IJO handlers” also “asked him for photographs of the U.S. Embassy” in Panama, as well as “details” concerning its “security procedures.” (El Debek told authorities he did not provide Hizballah with the information requested on the American embassy.)

Two Qatari movie theater chains have pulled showings of “Wonder Woman” over the weekend, apparently because the film stars Israeli actress Gal Gadot.
Advertising for the superhero movie disappeared from the websites of Vox Cinemas and Novo Cinemas on Friday, according to DOHA News. Both chains later confirmed that they would no longer be screening Wonder Woman at any of their theaters.
It is not clear why they had the change of heart after apparently showing the film for several weeks.
Last month, both Lebanon and Tunisia banned the movie over Gadot’s role. Lebanon is officially at war with Israel and bans Israeli products. Later that month, a prominent Palestinian movie theater in Ramallah banned the movie, citing “political reasons related to the Israeli occupation and the Israeli actress starring in the film.”
Gadot, 32, does not shy away from touting her Israeli heritage. She praised the Israeli military in a widely shared Facebook post during the 2014 Gaza war.

A Tunisian watchdog group on racism accused promoters of a boycott against Israel of anti-Semitism after they protested the invitation extended to a Jewish comedian to appear at a local festival.
The accusation Thursday by the Tunisian Association for Support of Minorities was over an open letter sent earlier this week to the Tunisian Ministry of Culture and the organizers of the annual Catharge Festival of music next month to protest the invitation extended by organizers to Michel Boujenah, a well-known Tunisia-born French Jewish standup artist.
The letter, authored by Tunisian activists of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement against Israel, says that Boujenah, who often speaks lovingly of his native Tunisia during his shows, should not be allowed to perform because he is a Zionist.
Boujenah, who is not a citizen of Israel, has often spoken during interviews about his support for Israel, including during a 2009 talk with Gilles Sitruk, an organizer of interfaith delegations to Israel and writer. (h/t Zvi)

The German-Israel Society branch in Berlin has lodged a criminal complaint against three BDS activists for disrupting a talk at the city’s Humboldt University in late June.
The panel at the discussion on “Life in Israel – Terror, Bias and the Chance for Peace” consisted of MK Aliza Lavie (Yesh Atid); Holocaust survivor Deborah Weinstein, 82, a musician from Tel Aviv; and four young Israelis. An estimated 60 people attended the June 20 event, the society said.
According to the complaint obtained by The Jerusalem Post, a female BDS activist “swung [her fists] wildly around her and attendees” as she was escorted from the university room for disrupting the event. She “continuously attempted to reenter the lecture hall and pounded on the door.”
A member of the German-Israel Society positioned himself by the door to block her reentry, noted the complaint. Humboldt University security appeared after the start of disruptions to provide assistance.

Vice recently posted a fine piece that affirms what I have seen while teaching in the Bay Area over the last few years: a growing level of anti-Semitic incidents carried out by students against other classmates. Max Cherney writes:
During the first quarter of 2017, compared with the first quarter of 2016, there has been an 86 percent spike in anti-Semitic incidents nationwide, according to the Anti-Defamation League. Among those 541 preliminarily identified incidents were 380 cases of harassment and 155 reports of vandalism—as well as the wave of 161 bomb threats against Jewish institutions.
…
I decided to take a closer look at what’s happening at Bay Area public schools, requesting records of reported anti-Semitic activity from approximately 40 districts in the region. Those records showed a spike in incidents at schools in nearly every county, from Marin to the Peninsula to the East Bay and beyond.
So far this year, 29 anti-Semitic incidents have been reported by more than 25 schools—compared with 25 incidents reported by more than 16 schools in all of 2016. Some schools have experienced multiple incidents, while others faced ongoing problems in the classroom. Many of the incidents have not been reported in the news media, and some parents of the affected students have complained about slow or lackluster responses from administrators and school districts.
Unfortunately, I believe that last statement from Max is more common than one would expect. There is a general unwillingness for schools to report when these incidents occur. Even at a good public school like the one I work at, the general tendency is to try and deal with these issues discretely and not draw attention from community activists.

If mathematics were not such a patriarchal system, I would feel comfortable about counting the number of times we progressives have been accused of “soft” bigotry by not demanding that all peoples adhere to the same standards of behavior. I am here to correct that misimpression. There is nothing soft about my bigotry.
This is about, and has always been about, my participating in the heroic rescue of oppressed peoples, thus burnishing my credentials as a superior moral being. It will simply not do to have those oppressed peoples be capable of self-empowerment, and not be dependent on my nobility of spirit. I must therefore adopt the position that they are irredeemably oppressed, and are therefore owed all consideration, understanding, and double standards that we can apply. It’s an essential part of the identity I assign them. It must be so, or my identity as knight in shining armor swooping in to rescue the populations in distress is in jeopardy, if you’ll pardon the patriarchal Eurocentrist sexist violent metaphor. Nothing soft about it.
Of course it does not look good when phrased in those terms, so we must always phrase it differently. The vocabulary of intersectionality does that for us. In the hierarchy of victimhood – the only hierarchy that we can accept – the more numerous the victim-points one amasses, the more flexibility and understanding they are owed when they perpetrate the same actions against others that we decry the white, male, cisgender oppressors for perpetrating. They cannot help it, the poor souls. They were oppressed, and are forever doomed to victim status. The poor dears, But I can help them! And so must you! And if you don’t you’re a racist!

Another anonymous Gaza resident — all of Roy’s sources in the piece are curiously anonymous — insists that the pious Muslims of Gaza are on the verge of forgetting about Jerusalem. Roy credulously relays his assessment: "One well-placed person claimed that ‘50 to 60 per cent of Hamas’ would give up any claim to Jerusalem in return for the Rafah border crossing being opened up again."
This type of all-it-takes thinking is also directed at Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian leader in the West Bank. "I was consistently told that if Abbas wanted to win the support of Gaza’s people all he would have to do is pay the [Hamas] civil servants their salaries," the author writes.
Roy endorses each of these grandiose assurances without question or skepticism, steering her readers to do the same. In other words, with her Harvard affiliation as a certificate of authenticity, she is selling snake oil to the urbane readers of the London Review of Books.
Does the Gaza businessman who insisted his countrymen only want "open borders for export" truly represent his fellow citizens, as Roy suggests? Surely, she is familiar with polls showing that a majority of Gazans want much, much more. In one recent survey, for example, over 60 percent of Gaza Palestinians indicated that even a Palestinian state in all of the Gaza Strip and West Bank wouldn’t be a conflict-ending solution in their eyes. An even higher percentage expressed their opposition to a binational state. (What, then, is their preferred solution?)

Affinity Magazine is a publication written by and for teenagers. Its Editor-in-Chief, Evelyn Woodsen, is nineteen, and its Senior Editor Alex Brown is in high school.
Its website gets between 200,000 and 600,000 views per month, and it claims that it “serves a purpose of showcasing the voices of aspiring teen journalists.” The publication aims to “mix[] pop culture with social justice and politics….”
The young age of its writers and editors, however, does not excuse its promotion of an antisemitic conspiracy theory. In January, the magazine published an article titled, "Money and Israel Control the Media: Who Cares?" (January 8, 2017) Seventeen year-old author Zoya Wazir, relying on the antisemitic Rense website, wrote that:
Israel has political and economic ties to America of such necessity that they control the majority of the media. In fact, the big six corporations mentioned earlier all have Israeli ties and are headed by powerful Jewish families within the United States.
Given the publication's left-wing bent, Affinity's editors might be dismayed to learn that in promoting this myth, they are joining former Ku Klux Klan grand wizard David Duke, who made the same claim last fall. One can also find similar content on the neo-nazi sites Stormfront and Daily Stormer, and in the /pol/, or “politically incorrect,” section of 4chan. (Ironically, a June 15 4chan thread asked, “If the Jews control the media (which they do), then why do they take such an anti-Israeli stance?”)

In December 2014, I blogged about how the latest Israeli construction statistics in the West Bank at that time had been distorted in the news, revealing how clear data showing a drop in construction had been spun into a story claiming a "surge" based on a misleading interpretation of the data.
Now, it has happened again.
On June 19, Israel's Central Bureau of Statistics issued its housing construction report for the first quarter of 2017. The statistics revealed that Israeli housing starts in the West Bank were down 59% in the first quarter of 2017 compared to Q4 2016 and 23% compared to Q1 2016.
According to the report, 344 new homes were started in West Bank settlements in the quarter, compared with 477 in Q1 2106 and 839 in Q4 2016.
Yet not only housing starts dropped, but housing completions, down 34%, with 403 completions in Q1 2017 compared to 611 in Q1 2016.
This story made the front page of the Jerusalem Post, which reported the news accurately.
Yet, in reporting the same news item, the Times of Israel used an AFP story with only supplemental reporting by a TOI staffer. Their story had the misleading headline: "Israeli settlement building has risen, official data shows" and the subhead "West Bank construction increased by 70% in past year, while work in the rest of the country declined".
How was the AFP story misleading? It used a much longer timeframe in order to spin the narrative on the latest data into a construction surge instead of a decline.

Austria’s highest court ruled Friday in favor of last year’s controversial expropriation of the house where Adolf Hitler was born, ending a long-running bitter saga between the state and the former owner.
The government took control of the dilapidated building in the northern town of Braunau in December after MPs approved an expropriation law specifically aimed at the property.
The move came after years of wrangling with owner Gerlinde Pommer who had been renting the house to the interior ministry since the 1970s and refused to sell it or carry out essential renovation works.
The government said it had been necessary to force a decision on the issue to stop the premises from becoming a neo-Nazi shrine.
A lawyer for the notoriously reclusive Pommer accused the move of being excessive and launched an appeal in January.
But the constitutional court in Vienna has sided with the government, arguing that the expropriation was “in the public interest.”

The Brazilian government denied some 16,000 visas to European Jews attempting to escape the Nazi regime, according to new research looking at thousands of Brazilian documents from the World War II era.
The research was undertaken by Brazil’s Virtual Archives on Holocaust and Antisemitism Institute, or Arqshoah. It was made public for the first time last week in a documentary aired on Brazilian television.
The figures were based on monthly reports sent by Brazilian diplomats in service in Germany and Nazi-occupied countries. They obeyed 26 secret memos that forbade the Brazilian Ministry of Foreign Affairs to grant visas to during the terms of presidents Getulio Vargas and Eurico Gaspar Dutra between 1937 and 1950.
“I believe the number could be much higher, since I researched only part of the documentation. Even after the news about the Holocaust was released, the Brazilian government continued to deny visas to survivors who, in many cases, obtained visas as Catholics,” historian and Holocaust expert Maria Luiza Tucci Carneiro told JTA.
“Both the Vargas and Dutra governments were intolerant, with political actions marked by xenophobia, anti-Semitism, and nationalist sentiments that had serious consequences for Jews seeking a host country,” she said.

A comedic roast of recently-retired Red Sox baseball star David Ortiz was not aired as scheduled last weekend due to racist and antisemitic jokes made during the taping, the New York Post reported.
The roast — filmed by the New England Sports Network (NESN) — featured comedians Bill Burr, Lenny Clarke and Sarah Tiana, and also others poking fun at Ortiz. The comics also attacked each other and, at one point, New England Patriots football player Rob Gronkowski became a target of the roast when Burr mentioned the Ku Klux Klan to joke about the NFL athlete’s willingness to endorse items.
“Do you ever turn anything down, Gronk?” Burr said. “You would f–king spike a flaming cross at a Klan rally if they promised you travel and some buffalo wings.” Gronkowski joined in when he quipped, “You wanna know why Jews do play football? To get their quarter back, you cheap f–k.”

Move over Gal Gadot, another Israeli woman is set to steal the Hollywood headlines: singer Daniela Pick has gotten engaged to boyfriend Quentin Tarantino.
The two met in 2009 when the filmmaker was in Israel to promote “Inglourious Basterds,” and have since led an on-again, off-again relationship.
However the couple appears to have decided to settle down, with Hebrew media reporting Saturday that the two are officially engaged.
Pick confirmed the news to the Ynet news website, saying “It’s true. We’re very happy and excited.”
Pick is the daughter of Israeli singer and songwriter Tzvika Pick.
Tarantino himself is no stranger to Israel, having last visited along with Pick in January. Last July he was an honored guest at the 33rd Jerusalem Film Festival.

Researchers at Philadelphia’s Temple University have found that extra-virgin olive oil helps improve one’s learning capacity and protects against memory loss associated with Alzheimer’s disease.
Domenico Pratico, a professor at Temple’s medical school, said that the new research contributed to a number of studies showing the benefits of the olive-oil infused Mediterranean diet, which is considered to have multiple health benefits.
The study will be particularly welcome in Israel and the Palestinian territories, where olive oil is a staple, used extensively in cooking and dressings, and poured liberally over plates of hummus.
In the course of their research, scientists at the university’s Lewis Katz School of Medicine discovered olive oil’s role in helping to prevent the formation of amyloid-beta plaques and neurofibrillary tangles in the brain, two of the most prominent signs marking Alzheimers.
“The thinking is that extra-virgin olive oil is better than fruits and vegetables alone, and as a monounsaturated vegetable fat it is healthier than saturated animal fats,” he said. (h/t Elder of Lobby)

The arrival of US fighter jets in Israel, as part of a month-long arms drop, was critical to turning the tide of the Yom Kippur War in favor of the Jewish state.
But for the American pilots who volunteered to deliver the aircraft, it was just another mission. Alan Chesterman, part of a US Navy squadron that flew a handful of the jets, said he had little knowledge of Israel or its security situation when he landed here in October 1973.
“We knew we were flying into a combat zone, but we didn’t know anything about it,” he said. “It was more like I’m young, adventurous and fearless – you might say young and stupid. I just lived to fly.”
Chesterman, 72, was one of two pilots who this week reunited with some of the Israelis to whom they handed the Douglas A-4 Skyhawks. Along with nine other American pilots and their wives, they took a VIP tour of Israel to see what has become of the country since they helped to fend off the surprise onslaught by its Arab neighbors 44 years ago.
The Americans landed at Ben-Gurion Airport Saturday on commercial flights, and have since been traveling around the country and receiving briefings from top military officials. They visited the Tel Nof airbase Wednesday, where they exchanged war stories with more than a dozen Israeli pilots who flew the American Skyhawks and recreated a photograph several of them, including retired US fighter pilot Roy “Bubba” Segars, 76, and former Israeli airman Jacob “Booby” Daube, had taken together during the war.

A video of a 3-year-old Israeli boy displaying impressive soccer skills has gone viral online.
Toddler Matan Shaulov’s Instagram page, which more than 60,000 people follow, features numerous clips in which he showcases his talents.
Attention was first brought to Shaulov’s abilities last month by Bleacher Report, which dubbed him the “3-year-old football trick-shot king of Instagram.”

Hi
Thanks for getting in touch
On initial inspection, the site is still categorised under the Dynamic and Blogging categories. So if this is the case, then no filters on the Broadband Shield would restrict this site.
I have asked our content list provider Symantec to review the site to make sure the category is correct. There is a possibility that malicious software was detected which would be filtered by the Broadband Shield under Phishing and Malware, but this may already be removed
Once I have a reply I will be back in touch
Kind regards
Brian Bolton
Service Excellence Consultant

Palestinian Media Watch's recent exposure of the PA's new square in Jenin named after terrorist Khaled Nazzal who was responsible for the murders of 31 Israelis, among them 22 children, led to public protests by Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and others. As a result, the mayor of Jenin briefly took down the monument in the square. However, only two days later, he changed his mind and put the monument up again. On Friday, the Israeli army entered Jenin and dismantled the terror-glorifying monument.
Now Abbas' Fatah Movement has pledged to restore it:
"It does not matter how many times the occupation removes the monument in memory of the Martyr - it is our obligation to rebuild it."
[Official Fatah Facebook page, June 30, 2017]
Fatah further announced that - as an act of solidarity with Jenin - a monument in honor of terrorist Nazzal has been placed by "young people" in Ramallah (See photo above). Fatah stressed that terrorist Nazzal "remains in our hearts, in our memory, in our squares, and in our streets":
Text on monument: "This is a monument in memory of Martyr (Shahid) Khaled Nazzal, which was established as a challenge to the occupation authorities
#The_Palestinian_people" [Official Fatah Facebook page, June 30, 2017]
Posted text: "An initiative of the young people in Ramallah; Khaled Nazzal remains in our hearts, in our memory, in our squares, and in our streets, and the monument will return to Jenin in order to serve as testimony to the period, to the history, and to a special kind of fighter"
[Official Fatah Facebook page, June 30, 2017]
Already a makeshift sign marked with the logo of the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP) has been set up in the square in Jenin where the monument stood, announcing the "Martyr Comrade Khaled Nazzal Square." Fatah posted a photo of it and its "inscription":

Anderson said she has been contemplating this very issue — and she is drawing upon the wisdom of one of America’s greatest LGBT equality leaders and icons, who also happened to be Jewish.
“Harvey Milk said, ‘Come out, come out, wherever you are,’” Anderson said. “I think for gay people, that has been the number one tool for changing hearts and minds. I think now is the time for progressive Jews to start doing that.”
Admittedly, it seems odd at best to think progressive Jews should “come out” in America. However, it is not about merely identifying ourselves but challenging stereotypes and expectations for how we must behave in our communities.
“People just have a very one-sided view of what it’s like to be Jewish in America and all the different views Jews can hold,” Anderson said. “I understand why people have been quiet. I have been quiet. But if we don’t speak, others dictate the conversation, and we get pushed out even more.”
Grauer is optimistic that, at the very least, the strong emotions surrounding the Chicago Dyke March will force an open discussion and, ideally, change.
“Hopefully, now that we have shared how we feel, how do we come together towards something better — whether it be a way we understand each other or the way we have relationships with Israel and Palestine and with people around these issues?" she said. "I would love to see us move towards something around those lines. It may be too soon for that to happen, but that’s where I would love to see this move. I think everyone — I would hope everyone — would, as well.”
For Grauer, it is “too soon to tell” if she would march in next year’s Dyke March. “I want to make sure that we’re marching together and accepting each other [and] our differences and recognizing that we’re here for a good reason together. If that’s the kind of Dyke March it turns into, that’s the kind of one, I’d be proud to walk in it.”
Anderson, on the other hand, was dubious she would join or, for that matter, feel secure at the next Dyke March. “I think I would feel physically unsafe if I came back with that same flag,” she said. “I think I would feel physically unsafe if I came back with anything short of a forehead tattoo that said ‘Israel is the worst thing that has ever existed’ — and I am not going to play that game. I should be able to be there as a Jew without passing a test.” (h/t Think of England)

Laurie Grauer, one of the women forced to leave told the Windy City Times that the flag was “from my congregation which celebrates my queer Jewish identity, which I have done for over a decade marching in the Dyke March with the same flag.” She continued, “People asked me if I was a Zionist and I said ‘Yes, I do care about the state of Israel but I also believe in a two-state solution and an independent Palestine.”
It is unfortunate at best that members of the queer community are confusing the making of spaces threatening-free and comfortable with fascism, confusing political astuteness with tyranny. Who decides which individuals and groups are considered the “in groups” and the “out groups”? Who elected these organizers as the Thought Police?
No matter how the organizers attempt to frame the issues, this is anti-Jewish oppression plain and simple! Shame on them and those who supported their decision!

The Jewish Home party said Sunday that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vetoed a bill that would require a special two-thirds Knesset majority on any decision to divide Jerusalem under a future peace deal with the Palestinians.
The proposal was set to face a vote in a weekly meeting of the Ministerial Committee for Legislation early Sunday afternoon but the prime minister pulled the bill from the agenda at the last minute, the pro-settlement Jewish Home party said in a statement.
“We are sorry narrow political considerations outweigh the need to prevent the division of Jerusalem. We will continue pushing this bill, and will do all we can to advance it in the upcoming days,” the statement read. “Jerusalem will be united by actions, not words.”
The Likud party slammed Jewish Home’s announcement, saying the bill was proposed without seeking the cooperation of any coalition partners.

Last week, the UN’s Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People sponsored a two-day anti-Israel hate-fest called: Ending the Occupation: The Path to Independence, Justice and Peace for Palestine. It was held to mark 50 years since Israel liberated the so-called occupied territories from Jordan, Egypt and Syria (my words, not theirs).
The speakers’ lineup is a who-who of anti-Israel scum and villainy. Friday’s keynote speech was delivered by Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Jody Williams. To say her speech was disgraceful is an understatement.
But hear for yourself – I compiled the “best” bits – and by best I mean worst. She blame us for the entire conflict and lack of peace; she does not mention palestinian terrorism even once, ridicules the notion that we have security concerns, claims we invent such concerns so we can subjugate the palestinian Arabs, completely rejects Israel’s narrative, promotes collective punishment against Israelis through measures like BDS, claims we are racist, justifies palestinians not giving diplomacy a chance, and calls for everyone to recognize the state of Palestine.What is it about so many Nobel Prize winners and their moral bankruptcy?

UNESCO experts warned the Palestinian Authority that it has overly focused on Hebron’s Muslim history, at the exclusion of the Judeo-Christian heritage, in its request that the West Bank's city's “Old Town” be inscribed on the "World Heritage in Danger" list.
The failure to make a full case for inscription as a heritage site combined with Israel’s decision to ban experts from visiting the city make it difficult to conclude if an emergency situation exists, the International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS) said in an 11-page report it submitted over the weekend.
The 21-member World Heritage Committee is expected to vote on the inscription of Hebron’s Old Town and the Tomb of the Patriarchs to the “State of Palestine” this Friday in Krakow, Poland during its annual meeting that began on Sunday.
The PA’s written proposal had focused on Hebron’s “Old Town” history from the Mamluk period of 1250 and onward. This includes the Tomb of the Patriarchs, whose Herodian structure houses both Jewish sanctuaries of worship and the Ibrahimi Mosque.

Palestinian historical revisionism and attempts to negate Judaism's legacy in its homeland have been increasingly used as a political tactic by the Palestinian leadership and its Muslim allies. (See “The Battle Over Jerusalem and the Temple Mount”) What began as the absurd denial of Judaism's historical and religious ties to Jerusalem and the Temple Mount by Palestinian and Muslim leaders soon advanced to the enlistment of international bodies to pass resolutions eradicating the Jewish people's connections to their holy sites and repudiating Israeli sovereignty over Jerusalem.
Buoyed by their successes at UNESCO, which passed several resolutions condemning Jewish visits to and policing of the Temple Mount while referring to Judaism's holiest site solely in Arabic terms, the Palestinian Authority (PA) is now using the same tactic to get the UN body to invalidate the Jewish legacy in Hebron, Judaism's second holiest site after the Temple Mount. Turning to UNESCO's World Heritage Center to declare the Old City of Hebron and the Cave of the Patriarchs a “Palestinian World Heritage Site” that is endangered by Israel, the PA sent a letter to the World Heritage Center Director Mechtild Rossler, alleging a long list of supposed Israeli violations, including the placement of security barriers near the Cave, and other Israeli security measures, as well as the purchase of property by Jewish residents of the city.
UNESCO, which is dominated by Muslim and Arab allies of the Palestinians, is voting on the matter at the 41st session of the World Heritage Committee, held on July 2-12, 2017 in Krakow, Poland.
It is noteworthy that while Hebron was in Muslim hands, Jews were often barred from their holy site and subject to pogroms by their Arab neighbors. But after coming under Israeli control in 1967, both Jews and Muslims share access to the shrine.
Those who seek to eradicate Jewish claims to their holiest sites bank on the credulity of those unfamiliar with Hebron's long history who willingly accept Palestinian and Muslim historical revisionism and fabrications.

The Palestinian Authority's decision to pay salaries to terrorists and their families has been excused by some analysts and media commentators as a form of social welfare. They overlook the PA's own stated reasons for the payments, as well as the role that they play in promoting anti-Jewish violence and a culture of hate.
In recent commentaries for The Hill and elsewhere, some have argued in favor of the Palestinian Authority's decision to pay salaries to terrorists and their families. But these payments violate both the terms and spirit of the Oslo accords under which the authority was created. Palestinian society and leadership promote terror by rewarding those who support and carry out terrorist attacks.
Commentators such as Palestinian-American journalist Daoud Kuttab have asserted that U.S. and Israeli efforts to force the PA to stop paying terrorists and their families constitute “collective punishment.” They maintain that the money “is not given to terrorists” and are not “a reward for acts of terror,” and instead constitute “a natural act of social support that is provided to all Palestinian families.” This is disingenuous, as a few important facts make clear.
The Palestinian Authority's own Ministry of Public Affairs, in a 2010 report, noted that 63 percent of those imprisoned and receiving payments were single. Yet, they still received the same basic salaries as those with families, according to Palestinian Media Watch (PMW), a non-profit organization that translates Arab media in the West Bank (Judea and Samaria), eastern Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip. Moreover, PMW noted, “Palestinian law explicitly refers to the payments of salaries (Rawatib), ”not “social welfare” payments as some claim. Indeed, the Palestinian Authority even treats the payments as salaries by withholding income tax on them.

Israel reportedly will soon launch a slew of lawsuits against the families of terrorists with the aim of recouping outlays on the associated costs of terror attacks.
Last month, prosecutors from the Jerusalem District Court filed the first such damages suit, in which they are seeking NIS 8 million ($2.3 million) from the widow and four children of Fadi al-Qunbar, the Haaretz daily reported Sunday.
Qunbar, a resident of East Jerusalem’s Jabel Mukaber neighborhood, killed four soldiers in January when he rammed his truck into a group of troops getting off a bus at a popular tourist site in the Armon Hanatziv neighborhood of the capital before being shot and killed by soldiers.
According to Haaretz, the state is seeking compensation from Qunbar’s family for the costs of the burial of the soldiers and the payments to the bereaved families, as well as for “the loss of earnings for the lost years, loss of pension and pension rights, shortening life expectancy” and “compensation for [the] pain and suffering that reflects the cruelty of the acts and the great suffering of all the murder victims.”

Police have arrested a fourth Palestinian suspect in the murder investigation of 23-year-old Border Policewoman St.- Sgt-Maj. Hadas Malka, who was stabbed to death by a terrorist while guarding the Old City’s Damascus Gate on June 17.
The arrest follows an intensive investigation initiated after three terrorists from the West Bank illegally entered Jerusalem and carried out two simultaneous coordinated attacks using an improvised automatic weapon and knives.
All three assailants, who also wounded two others by Zedekiah’s Cave some 100 meters from Damascus Gate during a shooting spree, were shot dead by responding officers.
On June 21, three suspects accused of aiding the assailants were arrested, including a 52-year-old man from Isawiya who transported the terrorists to the area, and the mother and father of one of the terrorists suspected of abetting their son.

Military prosecution on Sunday indicted a Palestinian suspected of involvement in the March 2009 murder of two Israeli policemen in the Jordan Valley.
Muhammad Radwan Daraghmeh of the northern West Bank village of Tubas has been in police custody since being arrested by Shin Bet security forces in April.
Authorities believe he took part in the killing of Yehezkel Ramzerker and David Rabinovich eight years ago, marking a major breakthrough in a case that has stymied investigators for the better part of a decade. Two other people suspected to have been involved are still at large.
Daraghmeh was arrested over the killings, and police found an improvised gun and bullet magazine in his home during searches of his home.
According to the indictment, Daraghmeh, 35, was part of a cell of three bandits who targeted West Bank residents. The strategy of the group was to stop on the side of the road with their vehicle, pretending to have car trouble. When one of them succeeded in flagging down a truck driving by, another would pull a gun on the driver and instruct him to proceed to an isolated area. There, the three would steal the car along with the contents inside and leave the driver stranded.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will lift his ban on lawmakers visiting the Temple Mount for a trial period later this month, the State Attorney’s Office plans to tell the High Court of Justice.
According to the state’s planned response to a petition by MK Yehudah Glick (Likud) calling to overturn the ban on lawmakers visiting the Temple Mount, which went into effect in October 2015, they will be allowed back at the holy site for a five-day period beginning July 23.
During those five days, the government will assess whether the visits sparks violence or not. The assumption that they do was behind Netanyahu’s ban.
Glick said, “The decision to open the Temple Mount is right and appropriate. It’s too bad that we had to petition the High Court for it to be made."

Israeli security forces rearrested Palestinian lawmaker Khalida Jarrar early Sunday morning in Ramallah for allegedly promoting violence.
Jarrar, a senior member of the Palestinian Front for the Liberation of Palestine, was sentenced to a 15-month prison term in December 2015 after being convicted of inciting to violence, membership in an illegal organization—Israel considers the PFLP to be a terrorist group—participating in illegal protests, and violating a travel ban. She was released in June 2016.
“She was arrested following her involvement in promoting terror activities through the PFLP,” the IDF said in a statement on Sunday morning.
In addition to Jarrar, security forces arrested ten others, whom the IDF spokesperson alleged “were [also] participating in terror activities.”Palestine Liberation Organization leader Saeb Erekat slammed Israel for the arrests, saying they are “a part of a premeditated and continued campaign” against the Palestinian leadership and people.
Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhoum said that the arrests “will not dissuade [the Palestinian people] from continuing the Jerusalem intifada and its valiant resistance.”

In a speech marking al-Quds [Jerusalem] Day, as established by Ayatollah Khomeini to identify with the Palestinian struggle on the last Friday of the month of Ramadan, Hizbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah threatened that in the next war with Israel he would open the borders of Lebanon to tens of thousands of fighters from Yemen, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran, and Iraq.
In effect, Tehran received an open invitation to fight Israel with the “Shi’ite Legion” which was established under the command of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards’ Quds Force commander, Qassem Soleimani, who is now fighting in Iraq and Syria.
Nasrallah’s words put an end to the so-called “national” claim by Hizbullah that the national consensus in Lebanon is based on the holy triangle of people-resistance-army. This claim supposedly unites Lebanon and grants Hizbullah legitimacy for its existence as a military militia. Furthermore, Nasrallah demonstrates with his words and actions contempt for the basic component of the Lebanese state, that being its borders. First, he violated the border to send troops to war in Syria on the pretext of defending the Shi’ite holy sites in Damascus. Second, Nasrallah declared after the assassination of Samir Kuntar, a terrorist released by Israel, the expansion of the borders of the conflict with Israel from Nakura, on the Mediterranean coast in the west, to the Syrian Golan Heights in the east.
Now he is threatening to violate Lebanon’s border once again toward Israel in the south, and he is inviting foreign, non-Lebanese, forces to take part in the war with Israel.

Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman issued a stern warning to the Lebanese terror group Hezbollah and its Iranian patrons over the development of rocket manufacturing installations inside Lebanon.
“We are fully aware” of the rocket factories, Liberman told military correspondents in a briefing in Tel Aviv Sunday. “We know what needs to be done… We won’t ignore the establishment of Iranian weapons factories in Lebanon.”
Still, he cautioned against overstating the threat. Since the Second Lebanon War in 2006, Israel has pulled significantly ahead of Hezbollah, he said. “There’s no need for either hysteria or euphoria on this issue.”
Asked about the spike in spillover fire from Syrian battlefields hitting the Israeli side of the Golan Heights, Liberman said the Syrian army was trying to prevent further incidents.

Analysts at Israel’s Ministry of Defense have been focusing on the Lebanese Shiite militia Hezbollah and the battle experience it has gained in Syria, and now note that the organization must be considered a more formidable foe than when Israel last fought a war with it in 2006: it has now had a hand in the wanton destruction of two Arab countries, as opposed to only Lebanon.
In a report prepared for Minister of Defense Avigdor Liberman in advance of a strategy session this week, the analysts warned not to underestimate Hezbollah’s sharpened ability to devastate Arab countries.
“We have already observed the organization’s capacity to bring mayhem, death, and ruin on vast swaths of Lebanon itself,” read the report’s abstract, in reference to the punishment Lebanon received when Hezbollah kidnapped several Israeli soldiers in 2005 and set off a war. “But the last five years in Syria have shown the depth and intensity of the movement’s dedication to bringing such destruction to other Arab countries.” Hezbollah, along with numerous other Shiite militia groups, have been fighting alongside Syrian regime forces against an assortment of rebel groups, and participated in some of the most destructive battles of the six-year-old conflict.
An analyst who contributed to the report outlined some of the thinking that governed its preparation. “Of course we are always considering Hezbollah’s military capabilities, especially its substantial arsenal of Iranian rockets,” began the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity under ministry rules. “But seldom before have we focused our attention on the specific aptitude the organization has displayed for destroying Arab countries. In addition to analyzing how that aptitude translates into direct threats to Israel’s population, our report considers how it might be possible to harness Hezbollah’s Arab-country-destroying moxie to Israel’s advantage.”

When Ismail Patel and his Friends of al-Aqsa group organise a conference on Palestine, one can be confident that the speakers will be suitable for the cause. Namely, hating Israel and loving Hamas. This is Mr Patel’s lifelong mission.
Sure enough, the prominent South African preacher Ebrahim Bham is on the bill for Mr Patel’s Palestine Expo, which will be held next weekend at the QE II Centre in Westminster.
Mr Bham’s preaching record shows that he is a perfect match for Mr Patel.
The Israeli People? Nazis!
In a sermon on Israel, Bham knows exactly where to turn. Tell people the Israelis are like the Nazis. First he quotes Goebbels:

“People tell me that Jews are human beings. Yes, I know they are human beings. Just as fleas are also animals. Just as fleas are also animals, they are also part of human beings like that.”

Those words, he then says, explain Israelis today:
Using that example, the psyche of the whole people seems to be to mete out the very same treatment to others the way was meted out toward them. And that seems to be the psyche. That they don’t regard Palestinians as human beings.
Note the slur on the entire Israeli people rather than a politician, a party, or the IDF.

The Spanish High Court of Justice in Madrid last week dealt the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement two legal blows, upholding a lower court's ruling against full boycotts of Israeli institutions, companies, and organizations or those involved in the so-called "occupation," calling such boycotts "discriminatory."
The court's rulings, which came on the heals of petitions by local Jewish communities aided by the New York-based Lawfare Project, pertain to the municipalities of Castrillon and Corvera in Asturias Province in northern Spain.
The latest success in court notwithstanding, the legal victories were only partial, as dozens of municipalities across Spain in the past year alone have declared their support for the BDS movement and have decided to fully adopt boycotts against companies with ties to Israel.
In October, the Jewish Telegraph Agency reported, a Spanish high court in the Asturias region declared a pro-BDS resolution endorsed by the Langreo City Council illegal and discriminatory.

Two events over the last week illustrate just how hypocritical so many professors and university programs of Middle Eastern studies have become when it comes to politics and principle.
First, consider the Middle East Studies Association (MESA), the oldest and most prominent professional organization for professors whose field of study loosely correlates with the Middle East.
In response to President Donald Trump’s executive order temporarily freezing entry to the United States for citizens of Yemen, Sudan, Iran, Syria, Somalia, and Libya, MESA joined as a plaintiff in the lawsuit to overturn the executive order, which MESA president Beth Baron, a City University of New York (CUNY) professor, writes in MESA’s April 2017 newsletter is a “Muslim ban.” In response to the Supreme Court’s unanimous decision to issue a limited stay on lower court rulings against the Trump policy, MESA released a statement declaring, “We believe that the exclusions of people from six Muslim-majority countries is discriminatory and does damage to academic institutions in the United States. We continue to believe that the EO is at odds with fundamental principles upheld by MESA including the commitment to the free exchange of ideas.” So far, so good. But, if that’s the case, why then does MESA not oppose the Boycott, Divest, and Sanctions (BDS) movement against Israeli academics in which so many of its members engage? Indeed, as an institution, MESA has changed its bylaws to allow greater political activity and recently passed a “right to BDS resolution.” Baron’s program at CUNY passed a BDS resolution, as well, and Baron herself has pledged to boycott Israeli academics. In short, for all its lofty rhetoric about academic freedom and the right to travel, MESA seems to believe that such rights should be first passed through a political and perhaps religious litmus test: When it comes to the Middle East, Muslims and Arabs welcome, Jews and Israelis not.
Second, consider yesterday’s court decision allowing the US government to seize a Manhattan skyscraper owned by the Alavi Foundation to compensate victims of terrorism who won a court judgment against the Islamic Republic of Iran.

The time has come to state facts: Jewish Voice for Peace is not a “fringe” Jewish organization. JVP is not merely “anti-Zionist.” JVP is the vanguard of a movement of far-left antisemitism. The new JVP campaign “Deadly Exchange”?—?which alleges a moneyed Jewish conspiracy to kill innocent Americans?—?reveals how far JVP has fallen down the rabbit hole.
There was already plenty of evidence of JVP’s indulgence of antisemitism. The group has offered a conspicuous lack of condemnation when Palestinian terrorists murder Jewish civilians. The supposed “Jewish Voice for Peace” in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is typically silent in the wake of such attacks on Jews. When JVP does react to terrorist attacks on innocent Jews, the reactions seem nearly indifferent in contrast to JVP’s unrestrained outrage in any number of other instances. JVP has never extended solidarity to the half of the world’s Jewish population that lives in Israel, and yet it always stands ready to express their solidarity with non-Jews, even with Palestinian killers of Jews. JVP stands proudly in solidarity with the “Palestinian popular resistance,” Palestinian prisoners, and convicted PFLP supermarket bomber Rasmea Odeh. JVP has never offered such solidarity when Israeli Jews were the targets of murderous terrorists.
JVP is not in complete denial over the possibility of antisemitic anti-Zionism. At one point, JVP cut ties with Alison Weir, not exactly for being an antisemite, but for openly sharing her blood libel with white supremacists. And yet six months later JVP returned to sponsoring talks by Weir. In September 2016, JVP supported the cancelation of a talk by Miko Peled because of his antisemitic tweets. But within days JVP backtracked, claiming “we clearly made a mistake.”
Most notable about JVP, however, has been, as the ADL reported, that it “uses its Jewish identity to shield the anti-Israel movement from allegations of anti-Semitism and to provide the movement with a veneer of legitimacy.” Whenever anti-Zionist groups face allegations of antisemitism, JVP invariably races to defend them.

Except that the rest of her article is full of distortions and outright lies.
In critiquing the 1917 Balfour Declaration that paved the way for a Jewish homeland, she writes:
In that tide of history, five million inhabitants were displaced – and the suffering of the Palestinians only got worse.
Where does this figure of five million come from? In 1948, the creation of the State of Israel witnessed the displacement of some approximately 750,000 Palestinians. A greater number of Jews from Arab countries subsequently arrived in Israel having been thrown out of their homes.
But that’s not the only exaggeration:
Propped up by its western allies, Israel ignores international laws and obligations and does what it wants. I think the country has been harmed more by its unwavering friends than by its unforgiving enemies. The US, UK and EU should have tempered Israel’s excesses which at times befit a rogue state.

Tom O’Connor, a repeat offender when it comes to blatantly distorting facts about Israel, is at it again, in the pages of Newsweek.
This time, O’Connor makes two claims that Israel is militarily behind the Al-Qaeda linked terror organization Al-Nusra Front.
Battling for Terrorists
O’Connor says:
Israeli helicopters attacked the Syrian military Saturday as it attempted to repel an offensive by the former Nusra Front, a hardline Sunni Muslim group…affiliated with Al Qaeda.
His source for this melodramatic statement? The Syrian Army.
Yes, you read that right.
Syria has been an enemy of Israel since its creation, and during that time has been a constant source of exactly these kind of dramatic and unrealistic accusations. For example, Syria made a similar claim in March, which Israel immediately dismissed.

UAE cleric Wassim Yousuf said that "media was the first weapon of the Jews in their efforts to make the Muslims doubt their faith" and that they continue to control the media, relying upon the "falsification of facts.""Look at the wickedness of the Jews," he said, speaking on Abu Dhabi TV on June 13.

A Bank of Japan policymaker praised Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler's economic policies on Thursday, although he said they enabled the Nazi dictator to do "horrible" things to the world.
Yutaka Harada, a member of the board of Japan's central bank, said Western policymakers had helped bring Hitler to power by being slow to apply British economist John Maynard Keynes' proposals to fight the Great Depression. Hitler became German chancellor in 1933.
Speaking at a seminar on monetary policy in Tokyo, Harada said Hitler had taken "wonderful" fiscal and monetary stimulus steps, although these led to "something horrible for the world" as his strengthened grip on power led to the Holocaust and massive human casualties during World War II.
"Because Hitler had taken appropriate fiscal and monetary policy steps, tragedy resulted. What I'm saying is that someone should have taken appropriate fiscal and monetary policy steps before Hitler did," said Harada, an academic-turned Bank of Japan policymaker.

Anti-racism campaigners reacted with indignation Friday after Czech President Milos Zeman said he backed keeping open a pig farm on the site of a former Nazi camp for Roma people.
“These declarations are a grave offence for victims and survivors of the Holocaust and their families,” Miroslav Broz of the anti-racism association Konexe told AFP.
The pig farm was constructed during Communist rule in the early 1970s at Lety, a village south of Prague that was the site of a Nazi-era concentration camp where hundreds of people in the Roma and Sinti minorities were murdered in 1942 and 1943.
“I am against the liquidation of a company which is prospering, as that would be a loss for the national economy,” Zeman told Czech television on Thursday.

A local teenager has been arrested and charged with vandalizing a Jewish camp in upstate New York.
Camp Shomria in Liberty, New York, run by the Hashomer Hatzair movement, was broken into on June 12. The interior and exterior of several of the buildings was damaged and covered in anti-Semitic graffiti.
Christopher Santoro, 18, was arraigned on Wednesday in the Town of Fallsburg Justice Court on felony charges of third-degree burglary and fourth-degree criminal mischief as a hate crime. He will return to court on July 5, the Times Herald-Record reported.
Police found in their investigation that Santoro acted against the camp out of “a dislike for the religion of the owners and occupants of the camp.” The state police hate crimes unit has been involved in the investigation.

Livraria Ets Haim is the world’s oldest functioning Jewish library. As such, it is no stranger to the prospect of imminent destruction.
Founded in 1616 by Jews who fled Catholic persecution in Spain and Portugal, the three-room library is adjacent to Amsterdam’s majestic Portuguese Synagogue in the Dutch capital’s center.
The 30,000-volume collection mostly contains manuscripts written by people who fled the Inquisition on the Iberian Peninsula or their descendants. The oldest document is a copy of the Mishneh Torah, the code of Jewish religious law authored by Rabbi Moshe ben Maimon, or Maimonides, that dates to 1282. Ets Haim’s volume is pristine but for the scars left behind by an Inquisition censor, a Jew who had converted to Christianity and singed away entire passages of the book.
Ets Haim as a whole faced a similar fate — or worse — in 1940, when the Nazis invaded the Netherlands and had 75 percent of its Jews murdered. Yet the Nazis left the Portuguese Synagogue intact, and instead of burning the library’s collection, they shipped the books to Germany. The collection was discovered there, with light damage, after the war, and returned to Amsterdam.
But the Dutch Jewish community lacked the resources to preserve the collection. Library curators determined that the Ets Haim building would need to be renovated thoroughly to ensure the proper conditions, so in 1979 the books were sent to Israel.

If you thought you were finally out of TV to binge, you are wrong in the best way.
Your favorite Haganah sniper-turned-international sex educator—that is, Dr. Ruth Westheimer—has a huge treasure trove of footage set to stream. Night Flight, a online video service focused on the crazy ’80s, will now be showing Dr. Ruth’s TV show library from the decade.
Dr. Ruth had several shows on and off in the 1980s on Lifetime, like Good Sex with Dr. Ruth Westheimer and What’s Up, Dr. Ruth? She did everything from traditional celebrity interviews (Gloria Steinem, Jerry Seinfeld, e.g.) to counseling for audience members about the birds and the bees (and in at least one clip, a pirate fetish); and what turns women on. Quite frankly, I find her shows to be absolutely riveting. Dr. Ruth didn’t just build her sexy empire on good advice about condoms; on these shows she’s engaging, and charming, and warm, and all the things you like about your Jewish grandmother combined with all the openness of the Internet in a pre-Internet age.
Take, for example, the following, in which Dr. Ruth talks with a very anxious Richard Lewis, and with Jerry Seinfeld about sex.

Canada will officially celebrate its 150th anniversary on Saturday, marking 150 years since the confederation of Canada in 1867. For the last 69 years, Canada has proved itself to be a close friend and ally of Israel.
Today, Canada is home to 385,000 Jews, with the community's origins dating back 250 years, and the Maple Leaf nation has strong bilateral ties with Israel. 20,000 Canadian citizens currently live in Israel.
The Canada-Israel story commenced prior to the establishment of the Jewish state.
In 1947, Canada was one of eleven nations that made up the United Nations Special Committee on Palestine. Established in May, the committee's September report supported the termination of the British mandate in Palestine and proposed the famous partition plan that would be adopted by the United Nations General Assembly on 29 November 1947.
Canada, alongside 32 other countries, voted in favor of the partition proposal, Resolution 181, to gradually withdraw British forces from Mandatory Palestine and create independent Arab and Jewish states. Whereas the plan was joyfully welcomed by Jews in Palestine and around the world, Arab leaders immediately rejected the resolution.

In a surprise move, a senior member of the so-called National Salvation Government of Khalifa Ghwell has announced that Libya’s Jewish community has the right to return as well as be compensated for any losses its members may have suffered.

The call was made by Mohamed Ali Triki, a top official in Ghwell’s “foreign ministry”, on Thursday at a three-day conference held on the Greek island of Rhodes. It was organised to mark the 50th anniversary of the last exodus of Jews from Libya as a result of the 1967 Six-Day War. Libya’s Jewish community was part of the national fabric, Triki was quoted as saying, adding that the national salvation government would enable them to return.

The right-to-return was supported by Omar Gawairi, the Beida-based government’s information chief, who was also attending.

Ghwell is reported today to have angrily denied reports that Triki was speaking on his behalf in Greece. He also claimed he had no prior knowledge of the Rhodes conference.

Announced three months ago and organised by Rafael Luzon, head of Libyan Jewry abroad, its aims was reconciliation between the exiled Libyan Jewish community and their original home country.

Although it was not officially supported by the Israeli government, one Israeli minister attended – Ayoob Qara, the Arab Druze politician who is minister of communications.

There are no thought to be almost no Jews left in Libya.

WHILE Muslims across the globe have observed the Al-Quds day on June 23, the Israeli institutions and organizations are reportedly awaiting the Netanyahu government’s go-ahead for the construction of a so-called ‘Third Temple’ in place of al-Aqsa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock in the Israeli-occupied Jerusalem al-Quds. ‘Wall politics’ have been a part of the ongoing antagonism between ‘occupier and occupied’. Ironically, the Zionist-backed propaganda move is being covertly and overtly supported by Israeli premier’s cabinet ministers who harbour Jewish fundamentalism.
Since the Israeli occupation of East Jerusalem in 1967, Israeli governments in power— the Likud or Labour have been intermittently trying to divert the global attention from the simmering issue of Arab-Israeli conflict via propaganda or political treachery. Today, the Likud government under Netanyahu is sponsoring a Zionist project via propaganda strategy— under the Temple Movement— to build a third Temple in the Al-Aqsa compound. 

Hordes of Zionist settlers, escorted by Israeli regime forces, stormed and desecrated al-Aqsa Mosque via the Maghareba Gate in the occupied al-Quds (Jerusalem).

Before the sacrilegious incursion on Sunday, Israeli regime forces unlocked the Maghareba Gate and cordoned off the plazas of al-Aqsa Mosque.

The assault makes part of the morning break-in shift launched by fanatic Zionist settlers at 07:00 a.m. at holy al-Aqsa Mosque—the third holiest site in Islam.

Palestinian Islamic institutions have warned of Israeli regime's plots against al-Aqsa Mosque amid intensification of Zionist settlers' desecration of the holy Islamic site.

We’ve had a rough week, those of us who care about the American Jewish – Israel relationship. As in all relationships, rough patches are painful, but they are also opportunities to think anew, to understand better. That’s what I would like to try to do in this open (and admittedly rather lengthy) letter. Prime Minister Netanyahu’s shameful capitulation to the ultra-Orthodox on the Kotel and conversion issues actually affords us a valuable opportunity. For decades, the Jewish world has been struggling with what, precisely, should be the relationship between American Jews and Israel. Now, we’re primed to talk about it.
We’re not going to settle this issue now – the fraught relationship goes back almost a century. In 1920, Louis Brandeis and Chaim Weizmann had a now famous blowup about Zionist policy, following which Weizmann said, “There is no bridge between Washington and Pinsk.” In other words, we are very different at our cores – let’s not pretend otherwise. Jacob Blaustein (then the President of the American Jewish Committee) and David Ben-Gurion had another explosion in 1950, and their “agreement” was always tenuous at best. Leading American Jews were livid when Israel captured Adolf Eichmann and brought him to Jerusalem for trial. “Who made you the representative of the Jewish people,” they wanted to know. Eichmann, after all, had murdered Jews, not Israelis. He was party to genocide before Israel even existed, so by virtue of what right did Israel kidnap him and try him (and later, execute him)? Did Israel think it represented world Jewry?
There have been periods when Israel did claim to represent world Jewry. And there are other times, like this week, when it acts as if only its own citizens matter. Now is the time to try to figure some of this out.
It’s complicated, of course. On one hand, American Jews are not citizens of Israel, and do not – and should not – have a vote on most of Israel’s policies, domestic or foreign. There is a difference between being a citizen and not being a citizen. On the other hand, though, American Jews have long felt deeply connected to Israel. (That may be changing among the younger generation, but that is the subject of a different conversation. See a long exchange about that here.) You feel pride in Israel’s extraordinary accomplishments, worry when Israel faces frightening threats, and feel ashamed when Israel makes bad decisions.
And Israel, conversely, has no compunction about asking or telling you that you “must” support us. Israeli Prime Ministers have gone to American Jewry to advocate aliyah. Others have gone to raise money, both in times of crisis and at more placid moments. Still others have gone to rally the political troops, at the UN, in Congress or elsewhere. So American Jews are not citizens of Israel, but neither are you entirely non-citizens. Surely, you have a different status than even feverishly pro-Israel American Christian Evangelicals, do you not?
At the risk of annoying every single person who will read this column, I’d like to use this space to sketch some preliminary thoughts on how we might define this relationship. I realize that much of what will follow here will be controversial, and there are elements that I myself still struggle with. Still, I’d like to take a stab at defining ways in which we ought to think about this relationship, by discussing two examples of issues – one on which American Jews should not seek to determine Israel’s policy, and another on which they should – and how they should do it.

Taking a break from his long Fourth of July weekend in the mountains of North Carolina, Isaac “Ike” Fisher, a member of the board of the pro-Israel lobby AIPAC (American Israel Public Affairs Committee), told The Times of Israel on Sunday that reports of the demise of his support for Israel have been greatly exaggerated.
The Florida real estate tycoon, a leading fundraiser in the Greater Miami Jewish Federation who is active in many Jewish philanthropies, was splashed on the front page of Yedioth Ahronoth on Sunday morning vowing to “suspend” all further financial support for Israel. This, in reaction to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s June 25 decision to “suspend” a long-negotiated January 2016 government decision which would have seen construction of a permanent pluralistic prayer pavilion, over which non-Orthodox Jewish leaders would have a share in oversight, in the southern section of Jerusalem’s Western Wall.
Fisher elaborated on Israeli Channel 2 on Sunday afternoon that he had spoken of “suspending” his philanthropy, rather than ending it, just as the Israeli government had “suspended” its original Western Wall commitment, and that he was reacting to the government moves in “language they understand.”
Speaking with The Times of Israel later on Sunday, Fisher said he used the term “suspend” to raise awareness of the dire consequences Israel would face in losing the support of the Diaspora.“I am trying to speak in the language of the politicians: They suspended this agreement and I said I was suspending my support,” he explained.
Having spoken out, he said, however, he was not planning any next step.

The "understandings" reached between Dahlan and Hamas may help alleviate the suffering of the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip and pave the way for improving the economy. However, the biggest winner will be Hamas, which is not being required to make any meaningful concessions other than allowing Dahlan and his loyalists back into the Gaza Strip.
Dahlan will be functioning under the watchful eye of Hamas, which will remain the real de facto and unchallenged ruler of the Gaza Strip. Hamas is willing to allow Dahlan to return to the Palestinian political scene through the Gaza Strip window. But he will be on a very short leash.
Dahlan's presence in the Gaza Strip will not deter Hamas from continuing with its preparations for another war with Israel.
Hamas is not going to stop digging tunnels along the border with Israel for fear of Dahlan. He will likely enjoy extensive civilian powers, but security matters will remain in the hands of Hamas and its military wing, Ezaddin al-Qassam.
Dahlan will find himself playing the role of fundraiser for the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip while Hamas hides behind his formidable political shoulders.
This new reality could buy quiet in the short term. In the long term, however, Hamas is likely to emerge as stronger and more prepared for the next war with Israel.
For Dahlan and Hamas, it's win-win. No wonder, then, that Abbas and his friends in the West Bank are angry and anxious.
The unholy alliance between Dahlan and Hamas, in their view, is nothing less than an attempt to establish a separate Palestinian state in the Gaza Strip.
The international audience might wish to take note: it is now official -- the division between the West Bank and Gaza Strip marks the end of the so-called two-state solution. On the Palestinian street, it appears that the Palestinians are closer than ever to achieving two separate entities of their own -- one that is run by Abbas's Palestinian Authority and another controlled by Hamas and Dahlan.

On 11 January 2014 Abbas stated:
“Israel’s problem is that the Palestinians know more than the Israelis about history and geography, We talk about what we know”
Abbas was talking through his keffiyeh Abbas’s twice-repeated claim contradicted article 2 of the 1968 PLO Charter – which organisation Abbas heads:
“Palestine, with the boundaries it had during the British Mandate, is an indivisible territorial unit.”
The boundaries of the British Mandate – created in 1922 under the League of Nations Mandate for Palestine – encompassed the territory that is today called Israel, Jordan, Judea and Samaria (West Bank) and Gaza.
Article 25 of the Mandate restricted the reconstitution of the Jewish National Home to an area extending to the Jordan River - 22% of the territory comprised in the Mandate.
The Mandate – administered by Great Britain until 1948 – saw the creation of:
· one Arab State in 78% – Jordan – in 1946
· one Jewish State in 17% – Israel – in 1948
· sovereignty remaining unallocated in the remaining 5% – Judea and Samaria (West Bank) and Gaza
Abbas’s claim at the UN in 2012 and 2013:
· is deceptive and misleading
· amounts to intellectual fraud and
· rejects international law as established by the Mandate
Trump’s acknowledgement that Jordan – not Israel – comprises 78% of historic Palestine would greatly enlarge the territorial field within which Trump could hope to resolve the long running conflict which now hinges on who should exercise sovereignty over a piece of land no larger than Delaware.

After a fallout between the two coalition parties over a proposal to make it harder to cede Israeli control over parts of Jerusalem, Jewish Home chair Naftali Bennett and Likud minister Ze’ev Elkin agreed Sunday night to work together in order to bring the legislation to a ministerial vote next week.
Jewish Home said earlier in the day that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had vetoed the “Unified Jerusalem” bill that would require a special two-thirds Knesset supermajority to pass any decision to divide the capital city under a future peace deal with the Palestinians.
The proposal was set to face a vote in a weekly meeting of the Ministerial Committee for Legislation early Sunday afternoon, but the prime minister pulled it from the agenda at the last minute, the pro-settlement Jewish Home party said in a statement.
“We are sorry narrow political considerations outweigh the need to prevent the division of Jerusalem. We will continue pushing this bill, and will do all we can to advance it in the upcoming days,” the statement read. “Jerusalem will be united by actions, not words.”
The Likud party slammed Jewish Home’s announcement, saying the bill was proposed without seeking the cooperation of any coalition partners.

To protect itself, the Jewish state must always retain control of the Jordan Valley, a former Israeli national security adviser explained in a newly-published video.
The concept of “defensible borders,” Maj. Gen. (ret.) Uzi Dayan said in a Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs clip, was based on three key components — “strategic depth, [the] ability to defend yourself from an attack from the outside and…fighting terrorism effectively.”
Against threats Israel faces from the east, “the Jordan Valley is the best line that you can rely upon,” Dayan noted. “There is the Jordan River, there is the ridge overlooking the Jordan Valley, [and there are] only five strategic passages. And [there are] actually very few Israelis and almost no Palestinians in this strip, so it’s enough to deploy, for example, two divisions in a crisis time if needed.”
Also, Dayan pointed out, “we know that if you don’t control the envelope of the region, very quickly some terror groups like Hamas will take over, and they invite the Iranians and, all of a sudden, you have an Iranian outpost. There is an outpost in Lebanon, there is a partial one in Gaza, we don’t need another one in…the West Bank and near Jerusalem.”
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has repeatedly stated publicly, as recently as earlier this month, that Israel would not give up military control of the Jordan Valley in any future peace deal with the Palestinians.

Dan Shapiro, the former US ambassador to Israel, indicated Sunday that he would have preferred if Washington had not allowed the United Nations Security Council to pass a resolution condemning settlements in late December.
He firmly rejected, however, the Israeli government’s claim that the Obama administration ambushed Jerusalem by initiating and promoting the resolution, and noted that, six months later, Israel has yet to offer any of its promised proof to bolster this accusation.
“At a personal level, I could’ve lived without it,” Shapiro said of the December 23 Resolution 2334, speaking at a Times of Israel Presents event in Jerusalem. “Among other things, it happened in the week of my daughter’s bat mitzvah. And I was rather focused on other things, including her beautiful parsha [weekly Torah portion], which I had taught her to layn [recite], and family, and so forth. So it was something I could have lived without.”
Shapiro — who is staying on in Israel with his family for the next year or so, and is now a distinguished visiting fellow at the Institute for National Security Studies think tank in Tel Aviv — defended the resolution as “perfectly in line with longstanding US policies.” But he revealed on Sunday that he had recommended that Washington take a different course. “I suggested something else,” he told Times of Israel’s founding editor David Horovitz in an hour-and-half-long interview.
Rather than the US refraining from vetoing the draft proposed by Malaysia, New Zealand, Senegal and Venezuela — a decision which enabled the resolution to pass — Shapiro said he proposed shaping a text modeled on a July 2016 report published by the Middle East Quartet. That report was seen as far more balanced, since it placed significant emphasis on Palestinian incitement and condemned the “illicit arms buildup” and terrorist activities by Hamas.

US Ambassador to Israel David Friedman met a delegation of J Street members on Monday.
The meeting included J Street president Jeremy Ben-Ami as well as seven Democratic congressmen.
The content of the meeting has not been revealed to the press.
J Street attempted to block Friedman from being nominated as ambassador to Israel and said he is "beyond the pale" of reasonable appointees.
However, the organization seems to have softened its approach toward the US envoy. On Monday J Street issued a statement in which they said that they "believe it is vital to keep an open line of communication between Jewish American and Israeli leaders with different political backgrounds."
Ambassador Friedman previously referred to members of the organization as "worse than kapos" in a shocking statement that received intense backlash.

A 23-year-old man has been charged with plotting to assassinate French President Emmanuel Macron at France’s Bastille Day parade, a judicial source said Monday.
The self-described nationalist, who was arrested last Wednesday, told investigators he wanted to kill Macron at the July 14 national day parade in Paris, a source close to the investigation said.
He said he also wanted to attack “Muslims, Jews, blacks, homosexuals,” the source added.
Police arrested the man at his home in the northwest Paris suburb of Argenteuil on Wednesday after being alerted by users of a chatroom linked to a video game where he allegedly said he wanted to buy a firearm.
Three kitchen knives were found in his vehicle and analysis of his computer found that he had conducted internet searches on potential targets, the source said.

After years of rumors and reports regarding clandestine relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia — mainly motivated by the countries’ shared concerns over Iran’s nuclear program and destabilizing regional activities — two recent developments highlight a potential route for Israel to firm up its support within the Arab world.
First, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi ratified a treaty to hand over two strategic islands in the Red Sea to Saudi Arabia. Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia’s King Salman promoted his 31-year-old son, Mohammed bin Salman, to crown prince, making him next in line to be king.
The deal to hand over the islands of Tiran and Sanafir was reached in 2016, after a visit to Egypt by King Salman. The uninhabited islands that sit on the southern entry to the Gulf of Aqaba were originally given to Egypt in 1950 by Saudi Arabia, in order to protect them from Israel. Later, the islands played an important role in setting off the 1967 Six-Day War, when Egypt closed the Straits of Tiran to Israeli ships, preventing Israeli access to the Red Sea and Indian Ocean.
New direction for Saudi Arabia
Mohammed bin Salman’s rise to crown prince signals a new direction in Saudi Arabia, and his rise may have implications for Israeli-Saudi ties and the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.
Saudi Arabia is dealing with low oil prices, its rivalry with Iran, a dispute with Qatar and civil wars in Yemen and Syria. In his former role as defense minister, Prince Salman sought to boost ties with the US, as well as to overhaul and diversify the Saudi economy, which is heavily dependent on oil.
In a rare public comment on Saudi Arabia by an Israeli official, Communications Minister Ayoub Kara said that the appointment of the new crown prince “means more economic cooperation in the Middle East, and not just regarding oil.”

The Nazareth District Court on Monday convicted 22-year-old Yinon Reuveni for a 2015 arson attack by Jewish extremists that heavily damaged a church in northern Israel where Christians believe Jesus performed the miracle of the loaves and fishes.
During the hearing, Judge George Azulay acquitted​ ​21-year-old Yehuda Asraf, who was accused of assisting Reuveni in setting fire to the church building.
In their 2015 indictment, the Shin Bet said that Reuveni, currently a resident of the southern town of Ofakim, had been banished from the West Bank on several occasions and is a suspect in a series of hate crimes, including the February 2015 arson attack at Jerusalem’s Dormition Abbey.
Asraf, the Shin Bet said, had been living on an illegal outpost and is active in extremist Jewish circles.
Two rooms of the Church of the Multiplication of the Loaves and Fishes in Tabgha on the Sea of Galilee were vandalized and badly damaged in the fire two years ago.

Almost three years after the end of Operation Protective Edge, Israel's clash with Hamas that saw Israel's southern communities bombarded with rockets, the Gaza periphery is blooming. Although many residents are worried that the calm could be torn apart at any moment, building starts are at record numbers and more people are moving into the area than are leaving.
Maya and Marcus Lieberman, parents to Ariel (a year and 10 months) are one of the couples who have moved to Kibbutz Nirim in the Eshkol Regional Council. The kibbutz took a brutal hit in the 2014 operation against Hamas: on the last day of the fighting, residents Zevik Etzion and Shahar Melamed were killed by a Qassam rocket fired from Gaza.
"The Gaza periphery communities are known for their quality of life because of the supportive community, the good schools, the quiet surroundings, and personal safety [of residents], despite the proximity to the Gaza Strip," explains Maya Lieberman.
"We had a lot of concerns, and after Ariel was born, we decided the time was right. The security situation wasn't ideal. The security consideration was a dominant one, but what eventually determined our decision was the quality of life, the school system, and mostly the wonderful community and the ideal place to raise children," she says.

Ongoing debate over the role and presence of religious content in the secular education system intensified over the last two weeks, leading the Tel Aviv Municipality to remove all use of the Hebrew language in municipal schools, owing to the language’s religious associations.
Mayor Ron Huldai signed the measure this morning, after several weeks of intense national media exposure of alleged religious coercion in the education system in the form of religious phrases, concepts, names, and references in texts discussing non-religious subjects such as arithmetic.
“We have to answer to the parents,” explained the mayor, “and the parents in the Tel Aviv-Yafo secular school system have made it clear they oppose religious indoctrination in any form. Lest such objectionable content make its way into the children’s curriculum by dint of linguistic or literary allusion, however unintentional, the Education Department of the municipality, under my instruction, has begun to implement a phase-out of Hebrew from all secular materials in Tel Aviv public schools.” Huldai predicted the process would be completed by the end of the coming school year, in June 2018.
“Some subject areas might pose a challenge in that regard,” observed pedagogical consultant Ivri Balshan. “Local history, for example, is replete with place names from the Bible, which are mostly Hebrew. National figures from the present and past are largely Jewish, so weeding out what doesn’t belong is not going to be an exact science.”

The Palestinian Authority's [PA] efforts to cultivate the legacy of armed resistance to Israel and glorify the prisoners and martyrs finds expression, inter alia, in the commemoration of figures, especially PLO members, who carried out attacks against Israelis, including civilians. The PA commemorates the perpetrators of attacks by holding events and erecting monuments in their honor, and naming public facilities and city squares after them.
Recently the Jenin municipality inaugurated a square and monument honoring Khaled Nazzal, who was head of the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestinian (DFLP) and masterminded brutal attacks, the deadliest of which was the 1974 massacre in Maalot, in which 27 Israelis, most of them schoolchildren, were killed. One week after the monument's inauguration, following pressures from the U.S. and Israel, the Jenin municipality removed the monument, but Fatah activists later restored it. After the IDF destroyed it, Jenin activists built a similar monument in another part of the city, which was also destroyed by the IDF. Another monument for Nazzal was built in Ramallah, and has not been destroyed.
The DFLP, which is part of the PLO, condemned the demands to remove the monument, and charged Palestinian President Mahmoud 'Abbas "not to succumb to the dictates of the occupation government, especially when it comes to the martyrs, the prisoners and the wounded." Fatah's Jenin branch, whose members rebuilt the monument after the Jenin municipality removed it, said in a statement that the martyrs are "a red line that must not be crossed." Condemnations were also voiced by Palestinian officials and writers, including Nazzal's widow, who stressed the importance of commemorating Nazzal and other martyrs. This report deals with Palestinian commemoration of terrorists, focusing on the case of Khaled Nazzal.

The Fatah movement, led by Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, has harshly condemned an incident in which the IDF destroyed a monument erected in the center of Jenin to a Palestinian terrorist who was involved in the murder of dozens of Israelis.
Palestinian media reported that on Friday morning a group of IDF soldiers destroyed the monument to Jamal Nazal, who was the head of the so-called military wing of the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine terrorist group. According to the Palestinian report, IDF soldiers left a written declaration at the scene stating, “The site was destroyed because of incitement and because it praises a terrorist responsible for terror attacks against Israeli civilians.”
Nazal was involved in the planning of many attacks against Israelis. The most severe was a massacre perpetrated in Ma’alot in northern Israel in 1974. The attack killed 26 Israelis, 22 of whom were students taken hostage in a school by a cell from the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine on a mission from Nazal.
Two weeks ago, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu condemned the Palestinian Authority’s decision to erect the monument for Nazal, and claimed that Abbas is poisoning Palestinian youth against Israel. Netanyahu called on Abbas “to educate Palestinian youth for peace and not for terror.”
Nazal was assassinated in Athens in 1986, an act Palestinians blame on Israeli intelligence.

Palestinian activists on Saturday re-erected a monument set up in honor of a Palestinian terrorist in the town of Jenin, a day after it was bulldozed by the Israeli military.
The Jenin municipality last month named a square after “martyr” Khaled Nazzal, a Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP) operative who planned a massacre in the northern town of Ma’alot in which Palestinian terrorists murdered 22 schoolchildren and four adults. It also erected a monument in Nazzal’s honor.
On Friday Israeli forces entered Jenin and removed the monument. During the operation, clashes broke out between soldiers and locals, during which one Israeli soldier was shot and moderately injured, while six Palestinian protesters were injured, one of them seriously.
On Saturday, DFLP activists again restored the monument to its location, images posted to thee group’s Facebook page showed.

The Palestinian city of Ramallah, just north of Jerusalem, is opening its arms to tourists, marking itself as a hip, energetic destination with accommodations and attractions matching anything Israel can offer — and for about half the price. But so far, the “if you build it, they will come” philosophy hasn’t quite worked.
The city, home to the Palestinian Authority’s main headquarters and office buildings, has grown in recent years into a modern, bustling Middle Eastern metropolis, and is a window into the political, cultural and social lives of the Palestinian people.
Over the past decade, the city has also seen three five-star hotels open — with another on the way — ostensibly a sign that Ramallah’s tourism prospects are looking up.
The hotels are receiving rave reviews online, and charge only about half as much as comparable accommodations in Tel Aviv or Jerusalem. Two hostels are also available for the thrifty traveler.
But according to information provided by the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, though the number of five-star hotels may be on the rise in the city, the number of guests visiting in recent years has hardly changed, and the occupancy rate hovers at around just 27 percent, on average.

An ultimatum issued by Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates to Qatar that it drop support for terrorists and meet a list of 13 demands toward that end is nearing its expiry amid a torrent of threats against Doha in the Saudi media.
The threats raise the possibility of fresh steps against Qatar to follow up a boycott and the severing of diplomatic relations by the four allies on June 5.
The ultimatum was issued on June 23 and expires on Sunday. Among its demands are that Qatar close Al Jazeera television; curb ties with Iran; close a Turkish military base; and hand over designated terrorists to the allies.
A writer in the Saudi daily Okaz, Muhammad al-Sultan, warned on Saturday that “Qatar should realize it is only one drop in the sea of Saudi politics, which is deep, profound and roaring. Riyadh and its sisters in Abu Dhabi, Manama and Cairo are serious this time about putting an end to the strife and the games of the petty. Qatar, which benefited from the patience of Riyadh, should understand that the anger of Riyadh will be very painful such that a small emirate can’t bear it.”

On June 17 the Iranian ambassador to Turkey said that Tehran wanted to cooperate with Turkey in the struggle against terrorism.
According to a report in the Daily Sabah, a Turkish pro-government newspaper, Mohammad Ebrahim Taherian Fard was asked if his country views Kurdish groups in Syria, the People’s Protection Units and Democratic Union Party, as terrorists, the way Ankara does. “[Iran] describes the PKK, the PYD and the YPG to be terrorist groups,” the ambassador said.
The latest Iranian comments, as well as Turkey’s decision to send troops to Qatar amid a dispute with Saudi Arabia represent the creation of a new Qatar-Turkey-Iranian sphere of influence that has potential to influence the region and Israel. Qatar and Turkey have both had close relations with Hamas over the last decade. The creation of a warmer relationship between Doha, Ankara and Tehran could threaten Israel and could bring Jerusalem closer to Riyadh and Cairo. It also marks a departure from the narrative that the Middle East is divided between a Sunni-led alliance in Riyadh and a Shi’ite-led alliance in Tehran.
By aligning itself with Turkey against left-wing Kurdish groups in Syria, Iran is sending an important message. Several months ago experts and commentators were suggesting that Iran’s influence in Syria and its attempt to construct a “road to the sea” would go through Sinjar in Iraq and via Rojava in Syria, two areas where the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) and the YPG are influential. Now Iran has pulled a 180-degree policy shift.

Some significant developments are going on in the Persian Gulf nation of Qatar, according to local sources whose job it is to notice such events.
Journalists on the ground in the Middle East commercial and media hub report that people are buzzing with something evidently important, and that has been occurring for a number of weeks. The journalists promised to provide more details as they become available.
“This is big,” stated Hugh Dope, a correspondent with WWUT News. “No one can stop talking about it – it affects everyone in a massive way. I’ll have more on this once more information is forthcoming on what exactly is happening.”
Other sources indicate the important developments are not restricted to Qatar. “It looks like there are reports of stuff happening, or about to happen, or that might happen if something doesn’t change, in Saudi media as well,” observed Klu Liss of Dissociated Press. “Our colleagues in Bahrain, Kuwait, and the United Arab Emirates indicate they’ve gotten wind of similar things. Clearly, we have a major story here.”
Foreign diplomats also expressed anxiety over the developing situation, and reportedly held intensive consultations with both local staffers and officials in their home countries, another sign that the thing that is happening carries weight in international circles.“This thing has been claiming our attention for a good couple of weeks now, after being more or less on the back burner for a long time before that,” offered one diplomat. “It’s going to have consequences.” The diplomat declined to elaborate further.

The Saudi author Turki al-Hamad set off a storm of controversy on social media in Saudi Arabia after tweeting an accusation against local educational facilities, which he claimed espouse ideology that supports Islamic terrorism.
Alhamad wrote in the controversial tweet, “ISIS is a virus located in our schools, in our universities, in our institutions, in our families, in the air and atmosphere around us, a virus waiting for the opportunity to recover anew. The virus will remain as long as the legacy of Ibn Taymiyyah and all his students stays among us.”
The Islamic philosopher Taqī ad-Dīn Ahmad ibn Taymiyyah is considered the spiritual father of the Salafi movement in Islam and a source of inspiration for jihadists in the Islamic State and other groups. He lived in the 13th century. His supporters claim that accusing him of being the father of jihadist terror does an injustice to him since his later teachings moderated his earlier messages that called for violent jihad against the enemies of Islam.
Hamad’s tweet stirred up much debate, with one Twitter user saying, “Taymiyyah dies in 728 according to the Islamic calendar (1328 A.D.). Could it be that after his death and throughout all these years ISIS was only created because of him? Liar.”

Anxiety in Tehran over US President Donald Trump’s decision to actively side with rival Sunni Arab states in the ongoing Qatar crisis led on Sunday to fiercely anti-American statements from conservative and so-called “moderate” leaders alike, who believe that the administration’s behavior demonstrates a renewed American commitment to “regime change” in Iran.
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani – a vocal advocate of the 2015 nuclear deal agreed between Iran and six world powers – told a meeting organized as part of the Islamist regime’s “Judiciary Week” that “being revolutionary means isolating the United States.”
Claiming that the US had alienated the international community after the US Senate imposed tough new sanctions on Iran in June, Rouhani said the goal of Iranian foreign policy should be to “make powers condemn the US and reproach it should it choose to stand against us.”
At the same event, Ali Larijani – a conservative hardliner and Holocaust denier who currently serves as the speaker of Iran’s parliament – contrasted the current administration with the previous Obama Administration’s approach to Iran. “The Americans have been expressing their anti-Iran policies in a much more transparent way in recent months,” Larijani observed, adding that concerns about Iran’s missile program, its human rights record and its support for terrorism were simply “pretexts” for the US to pursue regime change in Iran.
Larijani also accused the US of violating its agreements under the nuclear deal, warning that a “strong response” from Iran should be expected.

Iranians have organized a “Trumpism” cartoon contest in which hundreds of participants have been invited to submit artwork mocking the US leader.
The same organizers held a Holocaust cartoon contest last year, which they said was meant to highlight Western double standards on free speech and not to cast doubt on the Nazi genocide.
The logo for the Trump contest is based on the Nazi emblem, with a diagonal “T” in a white circle against a red background. One cartoon shows US President Donald Trump painting a Hitler-like mustache on the face of the Statue of Liberty.
The exhibition, which opened Monday, includes the works of some 1,600 Iranian and foreign participants. The winner of the top prize will get $1,500.

Hizbullah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah took a stand against efforts to legalize same-sex marriage in Lebanon, saying that homosexuality "defies logic, human nature, and the human mind." In his address, delivered on March 18, the "Muslim Women's Day," and broadcast on Al-Manar TV, Nasrallah criticized the "culture of opposition to early marriage," saying that proponents of this culture were "unknowingly serving Satan and the devils.""The response should be the spreading of the culture of early marriage."
Hassan Nasrallah: "There are societies abroad that were ruined by homosexuality, and now they are exporting it to Lebanon and to the Arab and Islamic world. They want to legalize same-sex marriage in the parliament. Homosexual relations defy logic, human nature, and the human mind. These relations... Some people say: 'But this is about freedom of choice. What's the problem?' No, this is a big problem. A big problem. In Lebanon and elsewhere, everybody - the Muslims, the Christians, and the non-religious... Anyone who cares about his society and about the purity of humanity must take a stand against this kind of enterprise.

THERE is no denying the fact Malaysians are very passionate. We will commit and dedicate ourselves to whatever social affair or issue we feel passionate about, such as the Palestinian-Israel issue, the ISIS issue, even the Rohingya refugee crisis.

But the commitment hardly ever lasts.

Remember two years ago in 2014 when emotions against the Zionist movement and oppression towards Palestinians by Israel was at an all-time high? There were protests and calls for the boycott of Jewish-linked businesses such as McDonald’s, Starbucks and the like.

How long did the boycott last? Obviously not very long. Everyone was so angry in the beginning. They took to the streets with their banners and scarves. And yes, they did boycott the franchises, for a week or two maybe. But then it was Big Macs and Latte Grandes all over again.

Today, there seems to be yet another call to boycott these franchises.

But this time, it isn’t an issue related to the Zionists. The Malay nationalist group Perkasa wants Malay Muslims here to boycott coffee chain Starbucks, purportedly because the company supports marriage equality and LGBT rights in the US.

And of course, there is the current BDS movement (Boycott, Disinvestment and Sanctions) that started in 2005 with the intention of isolating Israel due to their stand on Palestine.

But again, a very different story (the movement isn’t doing too well either).

Unsurprisingly, Falk is equally fixated on the supposed crimes of the Jews. In a blog post about the Boston Marathon bombings — he seizes every opportunity he can get — he repeated the old canard that Israelis control American foreign policy and insist on war. “The war drums are beating at this moment in relation to both North Korea and Iran,” he wrote, “and as long as Tel Aviv has the compliant ear of the American political establishment, those who wish for peace and justice in the world should not rest easy.”
For those who refuse to see the meaning or history behind portraying a global power as “compliant” to the Jewish state, Falk goes further. He has vulgarly compared the Israeli government to the Nazis: “Is it an irresponsible overstatement to associate the treatment of Palestinians with this criminalized Nazi record of collective atrocity? I think not.” And he once wrote an article entitled: “Slouching toward a Palestinian Holocaust.”
You read that right: The man who for six years investigated Israel on behalf of the international community sees the Jews as the Nazis and the Palestinians as the Jews of Germany. The realization that Falk was probably appointed to investigate Israel not in spite of these views but because of them helps explain why the U.N. treats Israel the way it does.
Back in 2011, when he was still the sitting U.N. special rapporteur, Falk chose to write a blurb in praise of the anti-Semitic book The Wandering Who, by (ethnically Jewish) holocaust denier Gilad Atzmon. Atzmon writes in the book that “The history of Jewish persecution is a myth, and if there was any persecution the Jews brought it on themselves.” The book calls the credit crunch the “Zio-punch” and blames the media, which “failed to warn the American people of the enemy within.” Falk’s blurb, placed on the book’s front cover, calls the work “a transformative story told with unflinching integrity that all [especially Jews] who care about peace, as well as their own identity, should not only read, but reflect upon and discuss widely.”
With U.N. officials like that, the “Israeli apartheid,” and “ethnic cleansing” reports almost seem to write themselves.

Op-ed: The organization’s director says soldiers’ testimonies of war crimes are not being investigated. But when the Military Advocate General wanted to investigate the few testimonies that do point to a suspected offense, Breaking the Silence demanded protection of sources.
Breaking the Silence director Yuli Novak is furious about the investigation against the organization’s spokesperson, Dean Issacharof, who stated that he had committed a war crime of beating a Palestinian until he bled. Why is he being interrogated of all people, Novak complained. There are, after all, hundreds of other testimonies.
I checked the “testimonies” Novak was referring to. And not just any testimonies, but the department of “selected testimonies,” which are supposed to be the most serious and severe ones. One of the testimonies deals with a three-year-old toddler who was left under the bed during a search using live ammunition. He wasn’t hurt. “We were shocked by it,” said the soldier who gave the testimony, adding that “it emphasized the procedures.” It’s definitely unpleasant and definitely sad, yet I had trouble understanding where the crime was and what exactly should have been investigated.
I went on to another testimony, which claims that the IDF ignored the ban on using the “neighbor procedure” (the use of non-combatant Palestinian neighbors and relatives to help arrest wanted suspects). It’s unclear when the incident happened, as an interim order was issued against the procedure in August 2002, and the High Court ruled against the procedure in 2005. But the claim that the IDF ignored the order is slightly odd. In 2007, for example, the Military Police conducted an investigation against Major-General Yair Golan, who served as deputy Judea and Samaria Division commander at the time, for violating the ban on the “neighbor procedure.”

And regarding the LGBTQ community, we were proud to stand against discrimination of HIV/AIDS patients decades ago and, more recently, to champion marriage equality. We continue to fight housing and workplace discrimination targeting people based on who they love or how they self-identify their gender. And while great progress has been made in recent years, we continue to resist efforts to turn back the clock under the guise of religious freedom.
On the other hand, when hatred comes from individuals in those very communities or organizations for whom we advocate, we are duty bound to raise our voice. In recent times, anger over specific policies of the Israeli government has been used by some activists to excuse broad anti-Semitism directed at members of the Jewish community. In some cases, we have seen painful rhetoric unfold on college campuses or outright exclusion of self-identified Jews from progressive circles simply because of their faith. All of it is inexcusable.
At ADL, we work with various communities not only because it is the moral thing to do but also because our freedoms are bound to theirs. That said, even as we fight alongside other groups on issues of mutual concern, we should not sacrifice our principles, and we will forcefully denounce those who would slander our community and resort to stereotypes.
This does not mean we need absolute ideological alignment with every prospective partner. But it does mean that we need to draw lines in a clear manner — and demand that our allies observe those fundamental values that we also seek to live by: equality, fairness and respect for all.

Since Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the BJP party came to power in May 2014, his administration has shed its predecessors' reservations about regular public discourse regarding India's ties with Israel.
Modi's trip to Israel on July 4 is not planned to be "balanced" with a visit to the Palestinian Authority, indicating that India has freed its relations with Israel from its historical commitment to the Palestinian issue. Indeed, India has modified its voting pattern at international organizations by refraining to join the automatic majority against Israel.
India and Israel display high levels of threat perception and share a common strategic agenda. They are both involved in protracted conflicts characterized by complex ethnic and religious components not always well understood by outsiders.
Both face weapons of mass destruction (WMD) in the hands of their rivals. The two nations share a common threat: radical offshoots of Islam in the greater Middle East. Moreover, India fears the Pakistani nuclear arsenal might ultimately fall into the hands of Islamic radicals.
Initially, Russian failure to deliver promised weapons at expected prices and/or schedules led India to turn to Israeli companies to upgrade its aging Soviet platforms, such as its Mig-21s and T-72 tanks. Today, Israel is India's third-largest arms supplier.
India and Israel represent two ancient civilizations. They share a British colonial past and were the first to become independent (in 1947 and 1948, respectively) in the post-WWII decolonization wave. Both were born as the result of messy partitions and have maintained democratic regimes under adverse conditions ever since.

As Prime Minister Modi comes to Israel on the 4th of July, 2017, the first Indian Prime Minister to visit Israel, for a stand-alone trip, decoupling the India-Israel relations from Palestine, it is important to understand the depth, history and evolution of the Israel-India relationship. While the visit has many dimensions, the most important aspect is not the joint development of arms, not the prospect of free trade agreement but rather the shared values and historical ties.
Hindus and Jews have shared a history which goes back 2500 years. The first group of Jewish sailors, came to India as traders in around 562 BCE and settled in India. Some say it could have even been earlier during King Solomon's reign (around 957 BCE, when the first Temple was being built). Jews came and settled in India while they were in charge of the flourishing spice trade that existed between India and Europe. Those were the happy times.
Thereafter Jews seeking refuge, escaping the Roman genocide, came down to Cochin right after the second Jewish temple was destroyed in 70 AD. Be it the Bene Israelis (Jews who had settled in the Konkan region of India) or the Jewish community in Cochin or the community of Baghdadi Jews in Kolkata, the Jewish communities in India never had to relinquish their culture and religion. Unlike the pogroms against Jews in Iraq, Yemen, Egypt, Tunisia, Lebanon, Jordon, and nation after nation in the Arab world, not a single attack happened against the Jewish community in India.
The Hindu kings of India treated the Jewish community as equals. In fact, in around 1000 CE, legendary Hindu emperor from Kerala, Kulasekhara Bhaskara Ravi Varman I (962-1019 CE) received Jewish leader Joseph Rabban and presented a set of copper plates granting the community 72 property rights equivalent to the ruling nobles of Malabar region in India. In the plates the rights are mentioned "as long as the World and Moon exist". The Hindu Kings gave the Jewish community land rights and the community even served in the King's army. The community representative was also made head of powerful trade bodies and was conferred trade rights called Anjuvannam.

It is not every day that one meets a prime minister representing 1.2 billion people, one considered a superstar at home and abroad. Maybe that is why the meeting with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi felt so special.
Modi is set to arrive in Israel on July 4 for what will be a historic visit: the first to this country by a sitting Indian prime minister. Despite the disparity in the sizes of the two countries, the relationship between them is one of equals, as far as he is concerned.
Modi is a different kind of leader. With sky-high popularity among Indians, he can say what he wants and push for the reforms he seeks. He has tried to move India forward and make it a global leader. For him, the path to achieving those goals passes through Israel. This should be a badge of honor for all Israelis. He knows Indians love him, but he also knows that he must not fail. That is his big challenge.
When I arrive at Modi's official residence, I discover that the man who always looks tough in front of the cameras is a friendly person who knows how to smile. He takes immense pride in his success in pulling himself up by the bootstraps after being born into poverty.
Exuding confidence, Modi shares with me a local dictum he uses as his mantra: "Sarvajan Hitay Sarvajan Sukhay, Sabka Saath, Sabka Vikas." Loosely translated, it means, "In the interest of all, for the benefit of all, together with all, development for all."

The decision by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to forge closer ties with Israel -- being demonstrated in his upcoming historic visit to the country -- comes as part of his efforts to locate partnerships in the international community, according to Israeli Ambassador to India Daniel Carmon.
Carmon, who is in Israel ahead of the visit, said that Modi's past experience partnering with Israel as chief minister of the western Indian state of Gujarat, as well as the "excellent relationship he forged with his colleague Prime Minister [Benjamin] Netanyahu and a belief in Israel's technological capabilities," had all played a part in the decision.
Carmon said India considers Israel to be "one of its most important partners in the field of bilateral relations" as a result of its success in ensuring security, welfare, a thriving economy and high quality of life for its citizens.
He said that through India's current foreign policy, Modi aims to implement major reforms and meet the country's many socio-economic development challenges.

Israel and India are expected to sign several major defense deals during Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Israel marking 25 years of diplomatic relations between the two countries.
Modi, who is set to arrive on Tuesday in the first-ever visit by a sitting Indian prime minister, has stressed that defense will not be the primary focus of the trip. The two sides are also expected to sign number of agreements in the fields of innovation, development, science, technology and space.
India and Israel gained independence from Britain within nine months of each other, in 1947 and 1948, respectively.
India voted against the 1947 UN partition plan for Palestine and recognized Israel only in 1950, and its foreign policy was characterized by a pro-Arab stance despite Israeli military aid during its conflicts with China in 1962 and Pakistan in 1965.
It wasn’t until 1992 that the two countries established full diplomatic relations.

Perhaps Reyhana Patel hoped that by smearing the Middle East Forum, and telling her readers about her love of "diversity ... tolerance and inclusion," she could sell Islamic Relief as a force for good. The charity's regular promotion of hate preachers and financial links to terrorist groups, however, says otherwise.
And is Patel herself really so dedicated to supporting peace and tolerance? Her social media posts and a short-lived career as a journalist suggest not. Patel has a history, it seems, of attacking organizations that oppose religious extremism. In 2014, Patel wrote an article condemning Student Rights, an British organization that works to expose homophobia, racism and other forms of extremism on campus. Without seriously addressing the group's research, Patel described the organization as "sensationalist and misleading." Sound familiar?
Patel has also defended gender-segregation imposed by Muslim student groups at Britain's public universities, and then complained that Muslim women who oppose this misogynistic behavior "seem to want to discredit and deamonise [sic] me."
Further, Patel has expressed praise for Malia Bouattia, a prominent student activist in Britain whose anti-Semitism was the subject of national media coverage. In 2011, Bouattia condemned a university with a large Jewish population as a "Zionist outpost." In 2014, she opposed a motion at a student conference that condemned ISIS on the grounds that such condemnation was "Islamophobic." That same year, a British parliamentary report concluded that Bouattia was guilty of "outright racism."
If this is the company Reyhana Patel keeps, then perhaps Nouman Ali Khan's extremism is a perfect fit for Islamic Relief Canada.
Islamic Relief was designated a terrorist organization by a pious Muslim country. Western banks have closed its accounts over terrorism concerns, and, just last month, Britain's Charity Commission starting investigating the charity for hosting a preacher who justifies killing homosexuals.
The Islamic Relief franchise is a charitable front for extremism in the West. That it has managed to build a favorable reputation is testament to the careful doublespeak of its officials. Such duplicity should not be tolerated.

Yes, it sounds impressive — but when you hear the list of leftwing loonies who've also won this "honour," you'll see that there's nothing peaceful about any of them.
Ironically, that means BLM will fit right in...

The United Church of Christ overwhelmingly approved a resolution condemning Israel for its treatment of Palestinian children living in the West Bank, eastern Jerusalem and Gaza.
The vote Sunday night by delegates at the 31st General Synod of the United Church of Christ in Baltimore, Maryland, was 79 percent in favor, 13% against and 9% abstaining, according to a statement issued by the church.
The resolution calls on Israel to “exercise an absolute prohibition against torture and ill-treatment of detained children.”
It also calls on the United States to withhold military assistance from Israel over what the church says are violations of human rights in its treatment of Palestinian children. The resolution says the churches and members must learn about the plight of children in Palestine and the State of Israel.
It comes two years after the church voted to divest from companies that profit from Israel’s control of the West Bank. The church’s House of Bishops later defeated the boycott plan as laid out in several resolutions.

Now that he's no longer the vicar of Virginia Water, Stephen Sizer, CEO of the so-called Peacemaker Mediators organisation, has no diocesan overlord to rein him in.
And as the centenary of the Balfour Declaration draws ever closer, our old friend is keenly posting anti-Israel material.
Here's something he's dragged up from 2010.

It's sparked some lively discussion between our old mate and his friends, who include this chap Cozzens:
A skim of his Facebook page shows that Cozzens, who frequently comments on Sizer's posts, is unlikely ever to be mistaken for a Judeophile. In fact, with this unpleasant introduction, he has in the past 24 hours linked on that page to an article that invokes that antisemitic forgery "The Protocols of the Elders of Zion".
Surely, in view of his own notorious brush with the "Israel did 9/11" trope, Stephen Sizer should long since have given a Facebook friend and commentator like this (and Cozzens is not the only one) the old heave-ho.
How about it, Mr Sizer? Surely you and the rest of the Peacemaker Mediators are not unconcerned at that body's CEO being seen in such company?

Recently the BBC’s defence correspondent Jonathan Beale produced two reports concerning the use of “heavy weapons in densely populated areas” in another part of the world and the potential resulting civilian casualties.
War against IS: Have RAF air strikes killed civilians? June 29th 2017
Can civilian deaths be avoided in RAF strikes on IS? July 2nd 2017
Particularly noteworthy is the fact that – in contrast to his colleague – Beale did not attempt to provide his viewers and readers with amateur interpretations of “the laws of war” in either those two reports or in a similar one he produced last September titled “Have RAF air strikes against IS killed no civilians?“.
In all three of those reports Beale did clarify to BBC audiences that civilian casualties are most likely unavoidable.

The recent decision by Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Bahrain and the UAE to blockade Qatar over its regional policies, including alleged support for terror organisations, Muslim fundamentalist groups and Iran, has put the spotlight once again on ABC and SBS telecasts and broadcasts of full news programs and smaller packaged stories and interviews by Al Jazeera, Qatar’s state-owned and funded global news outlet.
For years, ABC has defended its use of Al Jazeera’s English language news programming, despite mounting evidence that its use violates the editorial policy that the taxpayer-funded ABC must respect, according to its charter.
On ABC radio’s news program The World Today on June 9, Australian journalist Peter Greste — a former Al Jazeera employee who Egypt imprisoned for months as part of a thinly veiled political row with Qatar — gave further reason to question ABC’s ongoing relationship with Al Jazeera.
Greste said that he and his colleagues at Al Jazeera were not aware of any connection between the network and terrorist organisations or the Muslim Brotherhood, but that “there may be some truth in that at a higher level, a management level (there was)”.
Greste added: “It seems pretty clear from watching some of Al Jazeera’s Arabic coverage and the coverage of Al Jazeera’s Egyptian channel Mubasher (Misr) that there was a bias in favour of the Muslim Brotherhood,” he said. “Politically they seemed quite aligned with the Brotherhood.”

The South Australian Labor government used its majority to pass a motion last week that also recognised a state of Palestine alongside the state of Israel, marking the first formal recognition by a parliament in Australia.
A senior Labor source said it was now impossible for next year’s national conference to not adopt the same policy, with the numbers on the floor of the national­ conference dominated by the left, which on this issue would now be supported by the NSW right.
A source close to Mr Shorten said that the Labor leader, who has been a staunch defender of Israel, now believed Labor’s unequivocal support for Israel could not be maintained...
“He did not lobby against it,” the source said. “He is smart enough to know it is happening and is allowing it to happen.”
The biggest push has come from within the NSW right, includi­ng some of Mr Shorten’s most committed supporters, who are also facing pressure within their own branches to support a stronger resolution. Mr Shorten expressed Labor’s support for Israe­l at the time of his meeting with Mr Netanyahu but had also raised the contentious issue of settlem­ents in a meeting with the Israeli leader.
“We want to see Israel safe and secure of its borders; we support the rights of the Palestinians people­ to have their own state,” Mr Shorten said at the time.
The outgoing vice-president of the Queensland ALP, Wendy Turner, welcomed the move by NSW and said that momentum was now there for the national conference to adopt the policy.... She confirmed that the Queensland conference would seek to re-affirm its resolution passed last year for a federal Labor government to unconditionally recognise a state of Palestine.

How can the BBC continue employing someone who proudly parades with the Hezbollah flag?
Just what is Ali Alizadeh’s official position with BBC Persian? We’ve seen him labelled as commentator. We have seen him labelled as Iran expert. He certainly appears often on the BBC.
Are there more than one Ali Alizadeh? It appears to be a common Iranian name including a famous footballer and an Iranian Australian academic. Decide for yourself.
The BBC has multiple non English services that are near impossible to monitor without a good knowledge of that particular language. So HT Iroon and Freedom Messenger – Ghasedane Azadi for bringing it to our attention.

Vandals defaced the Holocaust memorial at Lakewood Synagogue in New Jersey, draping it with a large antisemitic banner on Sunday.
Black letters printed on the large white canvass read "(((Heebs))) will not divide us." The word "Heebs" is an ethnic slur used for Jews, and the use of triple parentheses around the word is an antisemitic symbol known as an "echo," to highlight Jews, predominantly used to flag people perceived to be Jewish on social media, singling them out for harassment.
At the bottom of the banner is the link to a website run by an American White supremacist group, which also features on recently distributed anitsemitic flyers in the town. The leaflets feature pictures of three Jews and reference the arrest of seven Lakewood couples last week, including a rabbi and his wife, over an alleged fraud scheme.
New Jersey Attorney General Christopher Porrino described Sunday's incident as "sickening," and said the authorities are offering a $10k reward for information about the crime and conviction.

Berlin’s sprawling Memorial for the Murdered Jews of Europe consists of over 2,000 gray stone rectangles without any sort of enclosure, signs, or plaques. On one side there is a row of restaurants and postcard shops known in the German press as “Holocaust Beach.” Finding the monument an ideal place for all sorts of activities, visitors not surprisingly begin uploading photographs of themselves engaged in sunbathing, picnicking, calisthenics, and stunts. The Israeli-born Berlin resident Shahak Shapiro created a website merging these photos with actual pictures from the Holocaust. Amy Newman Smith comments:
Much has been made of the striking images: a young woman in workout gear demonstrating her strength and flexibility is paired with twisted bodies piled up in a concentration-camp building, the doorframe replacing the stele she was balanced against, her feet in the air. A man kneeling, juggling bright pink balls, is transported from the memorial to a burial pit. . . .
In part because a visitor can enter the Berlin memorial from any side, there is nothing in the way of preparation or guidance as to what, if anything, it should mean. There is an information center (which, as it happens, [the monument’s architect] Peter Eisenman strenuously resisted), but it is tucked underground, and few visitors ever make it there. . . . Care has been taken, however, to post signs warning of pickpockets.
Time is, of course, picking memory’s pocket, pilfering public memories of the Shoah, even among the Germans, even among the Jews. Memorials remain, unmoved and unchanged by this inevitable erosion of memory. Think, for instance, of the emotional impact of the Lincoln Memorial upon most of its present-day visitors. How many truly feel the rupture of that conflict, fought over the fates of four million slaves and leaving more than 620,000 dead?

Prince William and Catherine 'Kate' Middleton, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, are due to visit multiple sites commemorating Holocaust victims and the tragedies of World War II during an upcoming tour of Germany and Poland, Kensington Palace announced Monday.
The royal couple's five-day trip starting July 17 will include somber visits to the former site of the Stutthof Concentration Camp in what is now Poland, along with stops at the Warsaw Rising Museum and the Berlin Holocaust Memorial.
The pair's first official joint trip to the European nations will "include time acknowledging the complex 20th century histories of each country," the palace stated. "At each location Their Royal Highnesses will meet survivors of these periods, who will describe their personal experiences."

Empow, SafeBreach and Optimal+ were among Israeli companies cited in information technology research and advisory company Gartner’s 2017 Cool Vendors listing.
Each year Gartner releases its Cool Vendors picks based on its research into worldwide providers that are changing the digital paradigm in areas such as data science and machine learning, threat management, IoT, analytics, artificial intelligence for legal affairs, DevOps, manufacturing, cloud infrastructure, blockchain application and business and IT services.
“Cool Vendors are typically companies that are lesser well-known,” said Chief Gartner Fellow Daryl Plummer. “They’re not going to be too old, because that could suggest they’ve maybe had too many rounds of funding, had maybe even a public offering. Typically they have to be under $100 million in US revenue. They have to be compelling and offer something interesting to the market, that either shifts or disrupts the market or brings a solution to the market that’s really necessary.”
Ramat Gan-based Empow, a pioneering cybersecurity startup, was cited earlier this year by Forbes as one of the few disruptive technologies in the software-defined cybersecurity arena.

Cyber security researchers at Ben-Gurion University have developed a new firewall program for Android phones that will repair certain security vulnerabilities found in these mobile devices.
The program, developed by Dr. Yossi Oren and his students, adds a missing layer of security in the communication between Android cell phone components and the central processing unit (CPU). The researchers developed the fix after discovering the security breach earlier this year and alerting Google to help them address the problem, according to the university.
“We are now working on fine tuning the software-monitoring capabilities and on ensuring it does not interfere with the use of the phone,” said Oren, whose lab is housed in the software and information systems engineering department.
The vulnerability pinpointed by the Oren and his team is located outside the phone’s standard storage mechanism – in the “field-replaceable units” (FRUs) such as touchscreens, charger, batteries or sensor assemblies. FRUs are susceptible to significant security breaches, including password and financial theft, fraud, malicious photo or video distribution and unauthorized app downloads, the researchers explained.

David Ben Gurion’s dream of filling Israel’s barren hills with trees will soon extend to the remote deserts of Kenya, after Kenyan government officials and Keren Keyemet L’Yisrael/Jewish National Fund signed a memorandum of understanding on Tuesday to exchange knowledge and expertise about planting forests in dry climates.
“Dry lands are home to 2.5 billion people, or 30 percent of the world’s population, and cover 40% of the world’s land surface,” said Professor Judi Wakhungu, Kenya’s Cabinet Secretary (Minister) for Environment and Natural Resources. “They are also home to the most disenfranchised and marginalized people in the world.” About 80% of Kenya’s land is considered arid or semi-arid.
Wakhungu said large Kenyan delegations have been attending forestry conferences in Israel, especially at Ben Gurion University of the Negev, which focus on conservation and forestry in desert climates. In 2014, officials from the Kenyan Forestry Service started working with members of their Israeli counterpart, KKL/JNF, for a series of visits and meetings.

Pop princess Britney Spears was mobbed by over-enthusiastic crowds while visiting the the Western Wall in Jerusalem during her first visit to the country Sunday.
Spears, who arrived in Israel Sunday morning, headed straight to the Western Wall. While there, and despite considerable security, the pop star was mobbed by rambunctious fans who even tried jumping on her, Israeli daily Yediot Aharonot reported.
“It was a huge mess, with hundreds of fans and photographers gathered around her,” the report quoted a source close to Spears as saying. “It was a real ‘Israeli celebration’; she didn’t stop an excursion during any other part of her latest tour. This could only happen here.”
The singer is in Israel for a show on Monday at Tel Aviv’s Hayarkon Park as part of her upcoming world tour. Local music producers have been working to bring Spears to Israel since last year, and the performance will cost more than $2 million.

It isn’t just Britney Spears who’s hanging out at the Western Wall this week.
Jersey Boy crooner Frankie Valli landed in Israel on Sunday, and has been traveling around Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, despite the intense July heat.
American pop star Britney Spears also arrived in Israel on Sunday ahead of her Monday performance at Tel Aviv’s Yarkon Park, and headed straight to the Western Wall in Jerusalem.
At the Western Wall and the Western Wall tunnels, Spears was surrounded by paparazzi and security staff who tried to keep the fans at bay. Afterward, she was unable to make it to a dinner date with Netanyahu, his wife, Sara, and pediatric cancer patients from Hadassah Hospital in Jerusalem, the Ynet news site reported.
Valli managed to get around without being mobbed.
He and The Four Seasons will perform Tuesday at Tel Aviv’s Charles Bronfman Auditorium, their first time performing in Israel.

Most Americans don’t know it, but the United States has been involved in the Holy Land for a long, long time.
Starting in the early 19th century, as travel to the region became safer — in the wake of the wars fought by the US and Europe against the Barbary Pirates (1801–1805 and 1815–1816), and the 1830 French conquest of Algeria — North Americans came to make their stamp, particularly in archaeology and specifically in Jerusalem.
Most notable of all, perhaps, was American biblical scholar Edward Robinson, for whom is named the wide stone arch that once supported a monumental staircase at the southwestern corner of the Temple Mount in Jerusalem.
The remains of Robinson’s Arch on the western side of the Temple Mount. Photo courtesy of Wikipedia.
A New Englander with proficiency in Greek, Latin and Hebrew, Robinson is known as the “Father of Biblical Geography” for his work in identifying the historical artifacts that confirmed Bible accounts. His well-known “gospel harmonies” attempted to reconcile differing accounts in the Christian Scriptures into a single narrative.

If you’re like most Americans, you picture walls of concrete enclosing an austere and strict country. The men wear black hats, the women long skirts. Everyone looks pretty serious.

To illustrate how the world sees Israel today, Apfelbaum showed a short clip of a focus group study. Small groups of Americans sitting around a table were asked to imagine stopping by various homes, each one inhabited by a family of a different country, and described what they imagined they would see and experience. In each case, the participants decribed a pleasurable experience--all, except in the case of Israel.

When describing walking to and entering an Israeli home, participants described a home dominated by cement without a grass lawn. As opposed to all the other homes, in this one the man of the house answers the door--the woman of the home is not even seen. One participant said that it would be uncomfortable to enter, because the home would be 'Orthodox' and the people living there would probably not even want guests. In essence, many of the participants identified Israel with Saudi Arabia. It reminds me of when I was at Disney World--in the "It's A Small World" exhibit, Israel was represented by a chassid.

The key point is that here were intelligent Americans, Americans who tend to support Israel--yet they had no clue as to what Israel and Israelis are like. The fact that Americans support Israel is not because they actually understand or identify with her.

Aharoni said the ministry has conducted market research over the past few years that showed “Israel is viewed solely through the narrow prism of the Arab-Israeli conflict… Israel’s personality is 90 per cent dominated by conflict-related images and some religious connotations,” he said. “Those of us who know the brand intimately are disturbed by the divergence of brand and the perception.”

...aspects of Israel are worthy of promotion, including its culture and arts; its accomplishments on environmental matters such as water desalination, solar energy and clean technology; its high-tech successes and achievements in higher education; and its involvement in international aid, he added.

Getting Canadians – both Jewish and non-Jewish – to see Israel in that light is part of the branding effort. Not only would that change Israel’s image, it could lead to more tourism and investment, educational exchanges and other benefits, Aharoni said.

Even if it might cost him his presidency, Abbas has pledged he won't stop paying salaries to imprisoned terrorists and the families of the so-called "Martyrs." According to his own Fatah Movement, Abbas has made the following statement, vowing to continue honoring terrorists and murderers with monetary rewards no matter what:
"'Even if I will have to leave my position, I will not compromise on the salary (rawatib) of a Martyr (Shahid) or a prisoner, as I am the president of the entire Palestinian people, including the prisoners, the Martyrs, the injured, the expelled, and the uprooted.'
[PA] President Mahmoud Abbas." [Official Fatah Facebook page, July 2, 2017]
According to the 2016 PA budget, the PA currently pays 26,800 families of "Martyrs" a total of 660 million shekels ($183 million) per year, and 6,500 terrorist prisoners receive PA salaries amounting to 486 million shekels ($135 million) per year.
A member of Fatah's Central Committee, Jamal Muhaisen, also quoted Abbas' promise, and emphasized that the payment of salaries to terrorist prisoners and "Martyrs" is not an issue of money, but rather is about the "Palestinian historical narrative":

A historic visit to Israel commences today. It will be the first ever of an Indian Prime Minister to Israel. The two of us have met before but this is the first time we do so on Israeli soil.
The natural partnership between India and Israel, formally elevated 25 years ago to full diplomatic relations, has grown stronger from year to year. The deep connection between our peoples reflects our many similarities in spirit, if not in size. Ours are two modern, vibrant democracies that draw on our rich historical traditions while striving to seize the promise of the future for our peoples.
Both our nations are complex. Like yogic asanas grounding down and pulling up at the same time, they face many challenges. By working together we can overcome some of the challenges.
Over the centuries the philosophies and histories of our ancestors inspired one another. Today the entrepreneurial drive of Indians and Israelis brings us closer together. The Jewish community in India was always welcomed with warmth and respect and never faced any persecution. The Jews of Indian origin in Israel are proud of their heritage and have left an indelible imprint on both societies. Both communities serve as a human bridge between our nations. (h/t Elder of Lobby)

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Israel this week marks more than the 25th anniversary of diplomatic ties between the two nations.
It marks as well Israel’s coming of age as a nation.
When in 1992, India and Israel forged full diplomatic relations, the Indian government was reacting to a transformation in the international arena, rather than to changes that were specifically related to the Jewish state.
In 1991 and 1992, in response to the US victory over the Soviet Union in the Cold War, a large group of countries restored or inaugurated full diplomatic relations with Israel. These states – including the Russian Federation and China – had by and large been either on the Soviet side of the war, or leaned toward Moscow. Their refusal to forge full ties with Israel, a key US Cold War ally, became a liability in the US-dominated post-Cold War global order. Hence, they abandoned their Cold War rejection of Israel and instead embraced it.
Although ingratiating themselves with Washington loomed large in the considerations of most governments involved, they also took the step due to Israel’s independent power. If Israel had been a strategic basket case facing an uncertain future, then even in the face of the demise of the Soviet Union, Moscow and its allies could well have had second and third thoughts. Why anger the Arab world by recognizing a soon-to-be gone Jewish state?
Had Israel recognized and built on the sources of its power and attraction for other governments, it would have spent the rest of the 1990s strengthening itself still further – defeating Hezbollah in Lebanon, weakening the Iranian regime and working with the Americans to end its ballistic weapon program. It would have moved quickly to liberalize its economy to enable the million new Israelis from the former Soviet Union to immediately transform Israel into the global innovator rather than waiting for this to gradually occur over decades.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi landed in Israel at 4 p.m. on Tuesday afternoon to begin a historic visit to Israel as the first Indian Prime minister ever to visit the Jewish state.
The historic nature of the visit was not lost on Modi who in his remarks at the airport stated, “My visit marks a path breaking journey of engagement."
Modi, who will be in the country for 49 hours said that, “India is an old civilization but a young nation, " and his country regards Israel is an important partner for its sustained growth.
"It is my singular honor to partake on this groundbreaking visit."
Modi was greeted at the airport by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, a number of senior ministers and senior religious figures from around the country.

But the centerpiece government decision is the creation of a $40 million Innovation Fund that will encourage cooperation in hi-tech between the two countries.
And Israel has already worked with India on a number of military technology projects, many based on Modi’s “Make in India” campaign, which encourages foreign firms to use Indian workforce and resources. Israel Aerospace Industries recently announced it would join forces with India’s Dynamic Technologies Ltd. to develop unmanned aerial vehicles, or drones, for the Indian market. Israeli arms industries have also signed huge deals to provide India with medium-range missiles and missile defense systems. And Israeli innovators used India’s space technology – world renowned for its low cost and high quality – to launch a nanosatellite.
The increased cooperation comes against a backdrop of broader political changes taking place inside India. The rise to power of Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party has resulted in the assertion of Hindutva or “Hindu-ness,” an unapologetic approach to India’s Hindu majority religion and culture. If India’s leftists viewed Israel as a “neo-imperialist proxy of America,” BJP supporters – and Hindus in general – tend to see Israel as a plucky democracy with a strong, non-Muslim religious identity standing up to nihilistic Islamist terrorists – not unlike the Indians themselves.
Many parallels can be drawn between BJP and our Likudled government. Both seek to strengthen what they see as a more authentic national identity – Hindutva in India, Judaism in Israel – while maintaining a robust democracy.
The political transformation that has taken place within India has also had an impact on its foreign policy vis-a-vis Israel. During Operation Protective Edge, India refrained from criticizing Israel’s actions in the Gaza Strip. In July 2014, India abstained in the vote on the UN report condemning Israel for Operation Protective Edge. And Modi has not felt compelled during his present visit to stop in with the Palestinian Authority to make a show of India’s evenhandedness on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
We welcome Prime Minister Modi, join him in celebrating 25 years of diplomatic ties and look forward to a new era of cooperation and innovation in the ties between our countries.

This week's historic visit to Israel by India's prime minister revived memories of my ‎associations with India in the 1980s.‎
At that time, India was a leader of the Non-Aligned Movement, dependent on Arab oil and ‎expatriate income from the Persian Gulf states, and home to 100 million Muslims.‎
I shall never forget an unpleasant meeting I had with Prime Minister Indira Gandhi on December ‎‎1981. She claimed that American Jews had turned the U.S. government and media against her ‎because of her policies toward Israel. The discussion became hostile and she came close to ‎becoming anti-Semitic. I reminded her -- to no avail -- that Anglo Jews were among the most ‎fervent supporters of Indian independence. The meeting left me deeply distressed and ‎pessimistic. ‎
India's Israel policy during the Six-Day War and Yom Kippur War echoed the Soviet line. Indira Gandhi sought to strengthen Indian support for the Arab world and intensified her hostility ‎against Israel. When her son Rajiv became prime minister following her assassination in 1984, ‎the anti-Israel policies were maintained and even intensified.‎
Nevertheless, India's Hindus never had a record of anti-Semitism, anti-Jewish triumphalism or ‎proselytizing. ‎

At a curry house in central Israel, a poster welcoming Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi greets patrons even before they encounter the rich scent of spices wafting from the kitchen.
Modi’s three-day visit beginning Tuesday — the first ever of an Indian premier to Israel — is a landmark moment for the Jewish state, a country seeking the friendship of powerful allies and customers for its advanced military equipment.
But for members of the small Jewish Indian community in Israel, the trip is a cause of genuine excitement and a unique opportunity to increase their visibility.
“There’s not a single (Indian) household that’s not talking about it. This is all people are talking about,” said Elazar Ashtivker, owner of the Maharaja restaurant in the city of Ramla, south of Tel Aviv.
“It’s historic,” he said.

The Indian-Israeli singer expected to sing the countries’ national anthems when Prime Minister Narendra Modi visits the Jewish state this week reportedly gave up a blossoming Bollywood career in order to be in Israel.
Liora Itzhak, who was born to Indian immigrant parents from Mumbai, told the Press Trust of India (PTI) that she gave up her music career in India because of homesickness. She had traveled to India at the age of 15 to study music and soon after saw a breakthrough when she was asked to sing in an Indian movie, and later alongside well-known Indian singers. But after eight years living apart from her parents, Itzhak felt compelled to return to her family in Israel. She declined other music industry offers and instead returned home to the Jewish state.
“I was 23 and terribly homesick having spent eight years away in difficult conditions from my parents and siblings. I love India but I just could not bear this separation anymore,” Itzhak— who has previously collaborated with Israeli singer Idan Raichel — told PTI. (h/t Elder of Lobby)

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday toured the USS George H.W. Bush aircraft carrier as it anchored off the coast of Haifa, and told told US sailors aboard the ship that it is a symbol of “freedom and victory.”
“This great aircraft carrier is a floating island of America. It’s a symbol to the world of freedom and victory,” he said in an English speech aboard the world’s largest warship.
“The war against ISIS should be seen for what it is: a clash between good and evil. And every sailor on this ship should be immensely proud that you are serving good,” Netanyahu said.
“Israel too is a symbol to the world of freedom, victory, and it too helps secure the world against terror. It too is on the front line of the battle between civilization and darkness,” the premier added. “I thank you, the people of Israel thank you, and the free world thanks you.”

US Ambassador to Israel David Friedman invited several leaders of the Israeli settlement movement to the American embassy’s July Fourth celebration for the first time, highlighting a shift in policy towards the settlements from previous administrations.
“It’s an interesting change of approach to Judea and Samaria by the American government, which until [President Donald] Trump’s election definitely placed [the settlements] outside of the fence [of acceptability],” the Samaria Regional Council said in a statement.
Among the settlement movement leaders invited to the July Fourth celebration are Avi Ro’eh, head of the Council of Jewish Communities of Judea and Samaria; Yossi Dagan, leader of the Samaria Regional Council; Ma’aleh Adumim Mayor Benny Kashriel; Ariel Mayor Eli Shaviro; and Oded Revivi, chief foreign envoy of the Yesha Council, a coordinating body for Israeli settlements’ municipal councils.
Two delegations of settlement leaders were also invited to President Trump’s inauguration in January.

The Gaza Strip has been a flashpoint between Israelis and Palestinian Arabs for many years — but especially since 2005, when Israel unilaterally withdrew its military and civilians from the territory it had conquered in the Six-Day War. The Israeli withdrawal — calculated at once to divest Israel of the headache of ruling a tinderbox and as an earnest gesture of goodwill — actually proved a fillip for Hamas, the radical Islamic movement that is committed in its charter to destroy Israel, and murder the country’s Jews.
As a history lesson, it’s important to know that since its founding in 1988, Hamas has been a challenger to Fatah — a party founded by Yasser Arafat, and the dominant power within the Palestinian Authority. Indeed, in 2007, Hamas seized control of Gaza, ejecting Fatah forces and throwing their officials and loyalists from the tops of buildings. After the coup, rocket fire into Israel increased exponentially, leading to three major Israeli military incursions into Gaza since then. The latest, the Gaza War of 2014 and the issues arising from it, are the subject of a new documentary produced by Robert Magid.
Eyeless in Gaza investigates how the outside world and mainstream media outlets arrive at the popular perceptions that have prevailed over the Gaza conflict. At its basic core, the prevalent international perception of Gaza is of a dominant Israeli power, unwilling to grant independence to stateless Palestinian Arabs, who have taken up arms as a result. As a corollary, there is much sympathy for the residents of Gaza, who have found themselves in the midst of Israeli-Palestinian firefights. There is also much anger against any Israeli military action, which results in dead and shattered Gazan lives. It is the contention of Eyeless in Gaza that this version of events is the product, in large part, of profoundly and systemically flawed international reportage and media bias.
Eyeless in Gaza opens with a flourish of footage from protest rallies against Israel during the 2014 war, seeking the origin of the passions that the conflict unleashed. The film then embarks on a journey through news footage; interviews with journalists, researchers and participants, both local and foreign; an examination of the methodology of reportage; and telling excerpts of Arabic language interviews with Hamas officials that undermine the prevalent international perception of Gaza.

Israel took nine visiting UN ambassadors on a tour of the City of David archaeological park in Jerusalem on Sunday in a bid to highlight the Jewish heritage of the holy city following a spate of UN resolutions denying that historic link.
The diplomats, representatives of Australia, Estonia, Gabon, Kenya, Lesotho, Malawi, Papua New Guinea, Poland, and Togo, were led on the tour by Israeli’s UN envoy Danny Danon and Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat and shown ancient remains believed to be from the Jewish town that stood on the site in biblical times.
The visit was organized by Project Interchange, an educational institute of the American Jewish Committee.
“To defeat the lies spread about our capital city at the UN, nothing is more important than for my fellow ambassadors to learn the truth about Jerusalem and see the beauty of this city firsthand,” Danon said in a statement. “The more UN ambassadors visit Israel, the more they appreciate both the challenges we face and the opportunities that exist in our region.”
The City of David — which archaeologists believe is the actual site of biblical Jerusalem and the epicenter of the Davidic dynasty — draws about half a million visitors each year. Its two sections are located beyond the pre-1967 lines in the city’s east, which the international community does not recognize as part of the State of Israel.
Foreign dignitaries therefore rarely visit these sites in an official capacity and generally do not meet Israeli officials there.

"Defensible borders" means the line from which you can defend yourself with your own forces. The average distance between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea is 40 miles, which does not provide minimal strategic depth. The Jordan Valley with the ridge to the west is the best line that you can rely upon. There are only five strategic passages through the ridge.
We know that to fight terrorism effectively, if you don't control the envelope of the region, terror groups like Hamas will quickly take over, and they will invite the Iranians and, all of a sudden, you have an Iranian outpost in the West Bank. They already have an outpost in Lebanon and in Gaza. We don't need another one in the West Bank and near Jerusalem.

An event featuring Breaking the Silence, an organization that promotes criticism of the IDF, was canceled at Kibbutz Neve Ur in northern Israel Monday due to pressure from kibbutz residents.
The decision follows a wave of similar cancellations of events featuring the controversial group in kibbutzim and other small communities. Breaking the Silence collects testimonies from former Israeli soldiers on alleged human rights violations against Palestinians in the disputed territories.
All of the canceled Breaking the Silence events were initially planned to be held in public buildings. Faced with fierce resistance from residents, some of the meetings were forced to move to private homes or rented auditoriums. In one kibbutz, event planners rented an auditorium in a nearby hotel, and in another, the conference was moved from the kibbutz meeting hall to another facility sponsored by the area’s regional council.

Ontario’s Court of Appeal upheld a US$1.7-billion judgment against the government of Iran in favour of American victims of terrorism, rejecting the state’s immunity and accusing Tehran of trying to derail Canada’s Justice for Victims of Terrorism Act.
The appeal court’s resounding rejection of Iran’s appeal is another victory for victims of terrorism holding Iran accountable for its support of Hamas and Hezbollah during terror campaigns from the 1980s through to 2002.
“The terrorist attacks out of which the respondents’ U.S. judgments arise are repugnant to civilized society. The fact that a foreign government would engage in the sponsorship of such atrocities is chilling,” wrote Justice Justice C. William Hourigan, on behalf of a panel of concurring judges.
“There is nothing offensive about using peaceful legislative means to combat terrorism,” the judgment says. “To the contrary, awarding damages that may have a deterrent effect is a sensible and measured response to the state sponsorship of terrorism and is entirely consistent with Canadian legal morals.”
The unusual case sees a long list of American victims of terrorism suing Iran in Canada to recover massive U.S. court awards.

The American ambassador to Israel, David Friedman, hosted his first Independence Day reception as US envoy on Monday evening, giving Israeli officials and guests a red carpet welcome at his residence in the coastal city of Herzliya, north of Tel Aviv.
The event, live streamed on Facebook, included live performances, speeches by Friedman and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, an offering of such “American food” as hamburgers, pizza and ice cream, and fireworks.
In his remarks before some 1,600 guests to mark the US’s 241st Independence Day on July 4, Friedman honored the memories of Hadar Goldin — an IDF soldier and US citizen killed during the 2014 summer war and whose remains, along with those of another IDF soldier, Oron Shaul, are being held by Hamas— and other fallen Israeli and American forces.
One of the values that unites the US and Israel is the “honor and respect for the sacrifices of those who have preceded us,” said Friedman, who also told the audience that among the artwork in the residence “is a beautiful painting by Hadar Goldin, whose parents are here tonight and who still grieve not just for their lost son but because his remains have not yet been returned.”

A firebomb was thrown at Jewish worshippers on Monday at Rachel’s Tomb in Bethlehem.
Jerusalem police said that “an object was thrown at the Tomb of Rachel, near the wall of the facility; there were no casualties and no damage was caused.”
Rabbi Tzvi Uziyahu, one of the rabbis administering Rachel’s Tomb institutions, told Israel National News, “By God’s grace we had a miracle. If God forbid the explosives had ignited, there would have been many casualties at the bus stops and at the entrance to the tomb.” Jewish studies and prayers continued at Rachel’s Tomb despite the firebomb attack, he added.
Located on the northern edge of Bethlehem, the tomb is revered as the burial place of the Jewish biblical matriarch Rachel, the wife of Jacob and mother of Joseph and Benjamin. It is considered one of Judaism’s holiest sites.

It seems Mahdi’s father was not shot by terrorists recently – it happened a long time ago. He mentioned it (albeit not at all clearly), prompting a number of people to contact me and write about the supposed recent attack. Reading Mahdi’s posts, I also thought his father had now been attacked. Nevertheless, I apologize for putting out what looks to be incorrect information.
As it turns out, his father has just succumbed to cancer. We wish Mahdi and his family a long life and send them our prayers.
Mahdi Satre is a young Israeli-Arab Zionist who has written on here on a number of occasions.
Mahdi has been aware of the danger some pose to him and his family, but this latest news has still come as a shock to him and his legion of friends around the world: his father was recently shot multiple times by terrorists.
Mahdi writes: At this hard time I wanna thank My Country and the IDF for standing with my family
they didn’t forget my father who was a soldier and they stood and still standing with my family
Today an IDF officer came to the hospital with his soldiers , they stood with us and they helped my family economically and morally
the military officer said and I quote ” The whole people of Israel stands behind you”
I’ve no words
and I feel so proud of my country
Please Pray for My father Omar the Son of Fatima
Update: Mahdi updates: 3 days passed and my father still in a Coma please pray for my father Omar the Son of Fatima and Ahmad

Border police said they foiled a terror attack Tuesday after finding a bag of knives, stun grenades and Molotov cocktail materials during the search of a Palestinian vehicle at a checkpoint near East Jerusalem.
The car was heading into the Jerusalem side of the Mizmoriya checkpoint, outside Bethlehem, when it was stopped after security forces noticed that its front and back license plates did not match.
The officers ordered the six riders, who also lacked entry permits, to exit the vehicle for it to be examined.
Upon discovering the various weapons, the suspects were detained, the vehicle was seized and the checkpoint was temporarily closed.
According to the police spokesperson, the suspects admitted during initial questioning to planning to carry out a terror attack in Jerusalem.

One of the most wanted Palestinian terrorists, believed by Israeli intelligence to have planned the kidnapping and murder of three Israeli teens in the West Bank in the summer of 2014, has moved to Lebanon after being expelled last month from Qatar.
Lebanese terror group Hezbollah is hosting Saleh al-Arouri in its Dahieh stronghold in southern Beirut, Channel 2 news reported Monday.
Citing unnamed Palestinian sources, the television station said that Arouri and two other senior Hamas figures have relocated to the Hezbollah-dominated neighborhood in the Lebanese capital, an area heavily protected with checkpoints on every access road.
On June 5, Palestinian sources confirmed that Qatar — which is embroiled in a boycott by Saudi Arabia and four other Arab states — had asked several top Hamas officials to leave for Lebanon, Turkey and Malaysia.
A few days later, Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman charged that Arouri had resettled in Lebanon, where he has been planning, along with two other activists, terror attacks against Israel.

The Palestinian Authority on Tuesday forced 6,145 of its civil employees in the Gaza Strip into early retirement, as a part of measures to pressure Hamas to concede control over the territory, a PA government spokesman said.
Over the past two months, the PA has slashed the salaries of its employees in Gaza, reduced electricity to the area, and cut medical budgets.
PA spokesman Tariq Rishmawi said the moves are aimed at restoring the unity of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.
“We will not allow for Hamas to perpetuate the split,” Rishmawi said in a phone interview. “We will take all the necessary to measures to end it.” Rishmawi called on Hamas to enable the PA government to operate fully in Gaza.
Hamas ousted the PA from Gaza in 2007 in a coup d’etat. The Islamist group has since signed multiple agreements with Fatah to unite the West Bank and Gaza under one PA government, but heavily restricts the PA from operating in the Strip.

The interview with Muslim Brotherhood spiritual leader Yusuf al-Qaradawi on Al Jazeera television was chilling.
“If Al Jamaa [the Muslim Brotherhood] saw that there is a need for someone to blow himself up to kill others and it is something required,” Qaradawi said, “Al Jamaa will show him how to do it.”
Qaradawi is among 59 individuals listed as terrorists by Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates. He joins a rogue’s gallery of terrorists who have appeared uncritically on Al Jazeera, including Islamic State (ISIS) leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. Al Jazeera, launched and funded by the Qatari government in 1996, has proved itself a useful platform for disseminating radical Islamist views.
Al Jazeera is a tool for the larger Qatari effort to support terrorism and harbor terrorists and their financiers. That’s why Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Bahrain and the UAE recently cut ties with Qatar and imposed sanctions on it. They have had enough.

And let's be clear: Even if somebody were to say to you that the regime is in full compliance with the nuclear deal, it doesn't make any difference. North Korea is already perilously close to the point where they can miniaturize a nuclear weapon, put it on an intercontinental ballistic missile, and hit targets in the United States. And the day after North Korea has that capability, the regime in Tehran will have it as well, simply by signing a check. That's what proliferation is, that's what the threat's about, and that's why Donald Trump's views on North Korea are so similar to his views on the regime in Tehran.
But in the region as well, we face a very, very dangerous point. As the campaign to destroy the ISIS Caliphate nears its ultimately successful conclusion, we must avoid allowing the regime in Tehran to achieve its long-sought objective of an arc of control from Iran, through the Baghdad government in Iraq, the Assad regime in Syria, and the Hezbollah terrorists in Lebanon -- an arc of control, which if it's allowed to form, will simply be the foundation for the next grave conflict in the Middle East. The regime in Tehran is not merely a nuclear-weapons threat; it's not merely a terrorist threat; it is a conventional threat to everybody in the region who simply seeks to live in peace and security.
The regime has failed internationally. It has failed domestically, in economics and politics -- indeed its time of weakening is only accelerating, and that's why the changed circumstances in the United States, I think, throughout Europe and here today, are so important.
There is a viable opposition to the rule of the ayatollahs, and that opposition is centered in this room today. I had said for over 10 years since coming to these events, that the declared policy of the United States of America should be the overthrow of the mullahs' regime in Tehran. The behavior and the objectives of the regime are not going to change, and therefore the only solution is to change the regime itself. And that's why, before 2019, we here will celebrate in Tehran! Thank you very much.

French energy giant Total defied US pressure on Monday by signing a multi-billion-dollar gas deal with Iran, the first by a European firm in more than a decade.
Total will invest an initial $1 billion (880 million euros) in the South Pars offshore gas field as part of a consortium with Chinese and Iranian firms.
The 20-year project, which will eventually see the firms inject $4.9 billion, is by far the biggest vote of confidence in the Islamic republic since sanctions were lifted under a 2015 nuclear deal with world powers.
"Today, for Total, is a historic day, the day we come back to Iran," Total CEO Patrick Pouyanne said at the signing ceremony in Tehran.
"We aren't a political organisation, but I hope this agreement will encourage other companies to come to Iran because economic development is also a way of building peace," he told AFP.
"We are here to build bridges, not walls," he added.
The project in South Pars, a field shared between Iran and Qatar, is the first under a new Iranian Petroleum Contract which offers better terms to foreign investors but has faced intense criticism from hardliners who said it was too generous.
Oil Minister Bijan Namadar Zanganeh said the deal was a direct result of moderate President Hassan Rouhani's resounding re-election victory in May and strong public support for rebuilding ties with the West.

North Korea said Tuesday that it has successfully test-launched an intercontinental ballistic missile, which flew a trajectory that an expert said could allow it to hit the U.S. state of Alaska.
The launch came days before leaders from the Group of 20 nations are due to discuss steps to rein in North Korea's weapons programs, which it has pursued in defiance of U.N. Security Council sanctions.
The launch, which North Korea's state media said was ordered and supervised by leader Kim Jong Un, sent the rocket 933 kilometers (580 miles), reaching an altitude of 2,802 kilometers (1,741 miles) over a flight time of 39 minutes.
Officials from South Korea, Japan and the United States said the missile landed in Japan's Exclusive Economic Zone after being launched near an airfield in Panghyon, about 100 kilometers (60 miles) northwest of the North Korean capital, Pyongyang.
"The test launch was conducted at the sharpest angle possible and did not have any negative effect on neighboring countries," North Korean state media said in a statement.
North Korea also said its missiles are now capable of striking anywhere in the world.

The government of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea announced the successful test of a ballistic missile yesterday, claiming the weapon’s capabilities bring almost anywhere on Earth into range, and prompting the inhabitants of North Korea to wonder whether the missile, once it travels that far, can pick up some of the surplus foodstuffs that must exist outside the country, and deliver them to the starving DPRK population.
While foreign defense and intelligence sources questioned the veracity of North Korea’s claims that the missile has the range to cross, for example, the Pacific Ocean, to threaten the US, inside the DPRK, citizens are looking to the new weapons technology to help them, reasoning that even if the missile can only reach as far as Alaska, Hawaii, or Japan, those places have significant quantities of actual food, a resource North Korea lacks.
“There’s only so much ammunition and rocket fuel a family can eat,” explained Aimong Rhee, a father of two. “We’ve been subsisting on that, on barbed wire, and on leaflets distributed by the government to the effect that we live in a workers’ paradise whose prosperity is unrivaled anywhere else on Earth thanks to the wisdom, resolve, and just all-around greatness of the Kim dynasty. Maybe the amazing new missile, which we are told can carry a nuclear warhead, can also carry some bread and meat back to us? Maybe some vegetables? We’re not picky.”