1) “Nazism was a boon to Zionism throughout the 1930s.”2) “For all intents and purposes, the National Socialist government was the best thing to happen to Zionism in its history.”3) “In Germany, the average Jews were victims of the Zionist elite who worked hand in hand with the Nazis.”4) “Hitler could have just confiscated all the Jewish wealth. Instead he used the ‘Haavara Program’ to help establish the State of Israel.”5) “Between 1933 and 1939, 60 percent of all capital invested in Jewish Palestine came from German Jewish money through the Transfer Agreement.”6) “In fact, contra all other German Jews (and everyone else inside and outside Germany) who recognized Nazism as the Jews’ bitterest enemy, Zionism saw an opportunity to strengthen its colonization of Palestine.”7) “Zionists welcomed the Nazis’ anti-Semitic policies. Like the Nazis, they believed in race-based national character and destiny. Like the Nazis, they believed Jews had no future in Germany.8) “the Zionist Federation of Germany […] supported the Nuremberg Laws of 1935, as they agreed with the Nazis that Jews and Aryans were separate and separable races. This was not a tactical support but one based on ideological similitude.”9) “Zionism […] developed the idea of the first racially separatist planned community for the exclusive use of Ashkenazi Jews, namely the Kibbutz.”10) “The Zionists were afraid that the ‘Jewish race’ was disappearing through assimilation.”

The biggest Israel-related story of the decade that no one (right or left) wants you to know

Why are prominent British Zionists so willing to push the fake Palestinian narrative?

UK diplomat admits "second half of Balfour" doesn't exist - but it SHOULD

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"If UNRWA goes, the refugee issue is over"

"Shlomo Shekelberg" and using Jews as a political football

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Fact-free British columnist looks forward to Israel's destruction

Academic fraud Joseph Massad claims Ashkenazic Jews are really European

Balfour understood that Eretz Israel is an inextricable part of Jewish identity. Accordingly, he also understood that indigeneity is based on intellectual attachment and historical continuity no less than on physical presence or genetic lineage.

In 2014, when peace negotiations seemed somewhat hopeful, Palestinian chief negotiator, Saeb Erekat was reported in The New York Times as saying: “the Palestinians could never accede to Israel’s demand that they recognize it as the nation-state of the Jewish people. … I cannot change my narrative.” A few months later, when pressed to explain what narrative defines his position Erekat told the Times of Israel: “I am the proud son of the Netufians and the Canaanites. I’ve been there for 5,500 years before Joshua. ”

On this centennial celebration of the Balfour Declaration it is worth reminding Erekat and Khalidi that the declaration’s most profound imprint on the world’s conciousness has been a universal understanding that the essence of indigineity is cultural and intellectual, not genetic or geographical.

Palestinian resistance to accepting their neighbors as equally indigenous to the region has been so obsessive and so counter-productive that it begs to be enlivened through a hypothetical scenario, however imaginary. I can’t resist imagining Balfour attending Khalidi’s lecture at Columbia, raising his hand and asking politely:

“Professor Khalidi, can you name a Canaanite figure that you are proud of? A Canaanite poem that you enjoy reciting? A Canaanite holiday that you celebrate? A Canaanite leader who is a role model to your children?

Replace the word “Canaanite” with “biblical” and you will find four questions that every Israeli child can answer half asleep.

There is merit and wisdom in hypothetical scenarios. In this case, I would hope it could mitigate the Palestinian claim to exclusive ownership of the title “indigenous people” and, God-willing, usher a genuine reconciliation effort based on mutual recognition and shared indigeneity. (h/t Elder of Lobby)

What’s more, the meetings became known to the Foreign Office three months ago. If they were such a big source of concern, why was nothing done about them for so long? Why is it that the “scandal” was made public in Britain last Friday, to coincide with Netanyahu’s visit to London for meetings with May and to mark the 100th anniversary of the Balfour Declaration?

Meanwhile, the British press, in a tendentious attempt to sensationalize what was in reality nothing more than a breach of protocol, presented one leg of the trip as though Patel was seeking to transfer hard-earned British taxpayers’ money to the Israeli military.

In reality, however, Patel was looking into the possibility that Britain would help defray some of the costs for maintaining an Israeli field hospital on the Golan Heights that treats wounded Syrian refugees.

Both The Guardian and The Independent – at least initially – reported that the money was going to the IDF, as noted in a piece for The Algemeiner by Simon Plosker, managing editor of HonestReporting.com.

The Times of London claimed, meanwhile, that Patel sought to provide British aid to an Israeli Army program “treating wounded Syrian jihadists, including al-Qaida fighters.”

We understand that newspapers have to make money and that sensationalism sells. We also understand that nearly anything to do with Israel arouses strong emotions in Britain.

But what about journalistic integrity? There is much to appreciate in Britain’s approach to Israel. May is undoubtedly one of the most pro-Israel heads of state in Europe, though she is bogged down with political problems.

But Patel’s treatment is not just the collateral effect of May’s crisis-ridden government. Rather, the Patel scandal is an uncomfortable reminder of the toxic atmosphere of anti-Israel sentiment both in British society and in the Foreign Office. Apparently, it is no coincidence that this reminder was made now, as Israel and Britain celebrate the Balfour Declaration, the Jewish people’s first decisive diplomatic success on the road to statehood.

CAA Chairman Gideon Falter said that Charles’s letter was “disturbing.”

“It appears that our future king believed in 1986 that the ‘influx’ of Holocaust survivors to Israel were not ‘Semitic,’ ’cause great problems’ including terrorism, and should be ‘eliminated,’ presumably through their removal,” Falter said. “The letter also appears to endorse the view that Israel is not simply the result of Jewish self-determination in the historic Jewish homeland, but the result of bullying by an all-powerful ‘Jewish lobby,’ which holds US presidents in its clutches. We view these comments as unmistakably antisemitic.”

Noting that Charles retains a good relationship with the UK Jewish community, Falter called on Charles to “urgently repudiate” these “historic remarks” as a gesture of reassurance.

The eldest son of Queen Elizabeth II – who this year became the longest-reigning monarch in British history – Charles and his suitability for the throne have long been a favored topic of discussion in the British press. Critics of the prince charge that his publicly-expressed views over the years on matters as varied as architecture and religion show him to be remote and out of touch.

In a letter exposed today in the Mail on Sunday, it was revealed that Prince Charles made deeply troubling comments about refugee Holocaust survivors and the power of the “Jewish lobby”. Following criticism by Campaign Against Antisemitism and others, Clarence House, Prince Charles’ residence and office, has now issued a statement dismissing the views he expressed in a letter over thirty years ago.

In a 1986 letter to explorer Laurens van der Post, the heir to the throne wrote: “Dear Laurens, Am on my way to Cyprus and Italy having passed through Suez Canal. Lovely having three days at sea. This tour has been fascinating and have learned a lot about Middle East and Arab outlook. Tried to read a bit of Koran on way out and it gave me some insight into the way they think and operate. Don’t think they could understand us by reading the Bible though. Much to admire some aspects of Islam – especially accent on hospitality and accessibility of rulers. Also begin to understand their point of view about Israel. Never realised they see it as a US colony. I now appreciate that Arabs and Jews were all a Semitic people originally and it is the influx of foreign, European Jews (especially from Poland they say) which has helped to cause great problems. I know there are so many complex issues, but how can there ever be an end to terrorism unless the causes are eliminated? Surely some US president has to have the courage to stand up and take on the Jewish lobby in the US? I must be naïve, I suppose! Charles”

Following publication of the letter, Campaign Against Antisemitism issued a statement saying: “This letter is disturbing. It appears that our future king believed in 1986 that the ‘influx’ of Holocaust survivors to Israel were not ‘Semitic’, ‘cause great problems’ including terrorism, and should be ‘eliminated’, presumably through their removal. The letter also appears to endorse the view that Israel is not simply the result of Jewish self-determination in the historic Jewish homeland, but the result of bullying by an all-powerful ‘Jewish lobby’ which holds US presidents in its clutches. We view these comments as unmistakably antisemitic. However, since the letter was written, the Prince of Wales appears to have warmed to the Jewish community and we note his friendship with the former Chief Rabbi, Lord Sacks, as well as his attendance at the inauguration of the present Chief Rabbi, Ephraim Mirvis. In order to reassure the worldwide Jewish community, including Jews living in Israel, that the heir to the throne has changed his views, these historic remarks must urgently be repudiated by Prince Charles.”

With the emergence of the alt-right onto the American political scene, right-wing anti-Semitism has crawled back out from the shadows. In the 1950s, William F. Buckley, Jr. had made strenuous efforts to drive anti-Semitism out of the pages of National Review and out of the ranks of the new conservative movement that he was hoping to shape. He renewed these efforts in the 1990s, as his erstwhile colleagues Joseph Sobran and Patrick J. Buchanan became increasingly vocal about their hatred of Jews and the Jewish state. The experience resulted in a book, In Search of Anti-Semitism. In conversation with Jonathan Silver, Matthew Continetti discusses Buckley’s book and the issue of right-wing anti-Semitism then and now.

The questions come fast and furious for Israel Defense Force reservists Keren and Haitham, who goes by the nickname Tom.

“How do you show your support for Israel on campus?” “How does training and combat affect you?” “Do you have to live in Israel to show your love for it?”

About 40 students sit inside the book lined beit midrash, or study hall, of Hebrew High School of New England (HHNE). They have more questions than time allows. Still the pair does their best to answer each one clearly, concisely and completely.

This is the second to last stop on a nearly three-week long Israeli Soldiers Tour, or IST, through New York, New Jersey, Rhode Island and Connecticut. Along the way the two, whose last names have been withheld for security reasons, met students at University of Hartford and cadets at the United States Military Academy at West Point.

“This is something very important to us. The students here have a variety of views and it’s really important for us to show them the complexities of Israel. The reality on the ground is more complicated than what they might know,” said Rabbi Jeremy Bruce, HHNE’s head of school.

IST, sponsored by the Israel advocacy organization StandWithUs, is just one of several such tours to crisscross the United States, Canada and Europe each year. While each organization differs, they all seek to put a “human face” on the IDF. Additionally, they work to counter misconceptions about life in the IDF and push back against anti-Israel activists.

At McGill University recently, three board members of the University’s Students’ Society were removed from their appointments after a vote at the Fall General Assembly due to their alleged “Jewish conflict of interest.” The ouster was led by a pro-BDS student group, Democratize McGill, which was campaigning against pro-Israel students in the wake of a September ruling by the Judicial Board that had rejected the BDS movement on the McGill campus once and for all. This was done on the grounds that the movement failed to uphold the university’s constitution by “violat[ing] the rights of [Israeli] students to represent themselves” and discriminating on the basis of national origin.

In retaliation, and to eliminate pro-Israel views on the board, Democratize McGill launched an effort to purge the board of BDS opponents. This effort was based on the cynical notion that such opponents harbored a clear conflict of interest that arose from their purported biases. Because the students in question were Jewish or pro-Israel (or both), they were labeled by Democratize McGill as incapable of making informed or fair decisions as student leaders.

In stating this premise, the pro-BDS students ignored their own obvious biases as well as the lack of any balance in their own views on the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. They nonetheless felt entirely comfortable suppressing pro-Israel voices and Jewish students on the board, asserting that they sought to remove these students because they “are all either fellows at the Canadian Jewish Political Affairs Committee (CJPAC), an organization whose explicit mandate is to promote pro-Israel discourse in Canadian politics, or primary organizers for the anti-BDS initiative at McGill.”

Those students were to be disqualified, in other words, for having views that differed from those of the student leaders who sought to purge them. The Jewish board member and two other non-Jewish, pro-Israel board members were subsequently voted off the board.

McGill has a history of seeking to suppress pro-Israel expression, not only in the student government but also in its press. An example is a 2016 controversy involving The McGill Daily, which made the astonishing editorial admission that it was the paper’s policy not to publish “pieces which promote a Zionist worldview, or any other ideology which we consider oppressive.”

Barry Trachtenberg is a professor at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, where he was appointed to the Michael H. and Deborah K. Rubin Presidential Chair of Jewish History in July 2016. His areas of expertise include “the Nazi Holocaust,” as he emphasized in his recent testimony at the House of Representatives’ Judiciary Committee during a hearing on antisemitism at US college campuses.

Unfortunately, however, Trachtenberg’s testimony reflected his longstanding associations with anti-Israel activists whose ardent “anti-Zionism” regularly echoes age-old antisemitic tropes.

The views Trachtenberg expressed in the recent hearing prompted some shocked reactions, with commentators highlighting the fact that he downplayed antisemitism on campuses, while defending the antisemitic comparison between Israel and Nazi Germany.

It is noteworthy that Trachtenberg advanced the utterly disingenuous argument that this was a rather common comparison since e.g. “President George H. W. Bush famously compared Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein to Adolf Hitler.” But as a scholar of Jewish history and the Holocaust, Trachtenberg surely knows the difference: Israel is a country where the Jews who managed to escape or survive the Nazis’ genocidal campaign found refuge, and where their children and grandchildren live. Telling them that their survival resulted in Nazi-like evil is a monstrous echo of the Nazi slogan, “The Jews are our misfortune.”

By contrast, Saddam Hussein was a Baathist dictator — i.e. an Arab national socialist who espoused an ideology that is actually indebted to the Nazis. And presumably, Professor Trachtenberg has heard of the Farhud, which the US Holocaust Memorial Museum describes as “a turning point in the history of the Jews in Iraq.” That’s why Israel is not only home to Jews who escaped the Nazis, but also to Jews who escaped the predecessors of Saddam Hussein, as well as to those driven out of other Arab and Muslim countries.

Glamour Magazine just announced its 2017 “Women of the Year” awardees, whom they describe as “game changers, rule breakers, and trailblazers.” Perhaps some recipients are changing the world — though not all for the better — but nothing is changing at Glamour. The magazine continues its tradition of using this award to honor women who advance an extreme, leftist political agenda, while ignoring every woman with right-of-center views. The big question is, will this be the year that its readers decide enough is enough?

The average Glamour reader who seeks out the magazine for advice about this season’s hot lipstick shade and skirt length probably isn’t interested in a loving tribute to the organizers of the intensely partisan Women’s March.

The march, held in January to protest President Trump’s election, talked a lot about women coming together, diversity and inclusivity. But organizers weren’t even open-minded enough to allow a pro-life group that wanted to join them in protesting Trump to soil their ranks.

Today, it’s clear the march and movement were never really about women. The real purpose is to advance the left’s political agenda: The whole “women” thing is just a convenient political banner.

How else to explain why one of the march’s leaders, Linda Sarsour, who was featured by Glamour, defends sharia law and Saudi Arabia’s legal system — which, as CNN explains, denies women basic rights, such as the freedom to “marry, divorce, travel, get a job or have elective surgery without permission from their male guardians”?

Sarsour is pals with terrorist sympathizers and tweeted that female-genital-mutilation survivor and activist Ayaan Hirsi Ali is asking “4 an a$$whippin’ ” and “I wish I could take their vaginas away — they don’t deserve to be women.” Is this really the new poster girl for women’s lib?

Founded in 1919 by progressive New York intellectuals, The New School rose to prominence two decades later, when it took in a small band of Jewish intellectuals fleeing the Nazis. Eminences like Hannah Arednt, Leo Strauss, and Erich Fromm all benefited from the institution’s commitment to taking in the victims of the world’s most ancient and persistent hatred and giving them a place to pursue their ideas in peace.

How things change: Later this month, the university will co-sponsor a panel on anti-Semitism that will feature, among others, Linda Sarsour, who opined that “nothing is creepier than Zionism,” praised Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan, and believes one cannot support the right of Jews to a homeland of their own and still be a feminist. Alongside Sarsour will be Rebecca Vilkomerson, who heads the odious Jewish Voice for Peace. The group, as an ADL report aptly put 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.” Among JVP’s recent achievements are the enthusiastic support of Rasmea Odeh, a Palestinian terrorist convicted of a bombing attack on a Jerusalem supermarket that left two young students dead and who was recently deported from the United States after lying about the incident on her immigration forms. The group is also a frequent supporter, despite its allegations to the contrary, of Alison Weir, an activist robustly promoting modern-day blood libels against Jews.

It goes without saying, sadly, that the event—which is co-sponsored by prominent progressive institutions like the radical magazine Jacobin—features not a single actual scholar of anti-Semitism, nor one voice that doesn’t belong comfortably in the deep left. In supporting this pathetic farce, then, the New School betrays its mission and its heritage twice: First by inviting some of the leading purveyors of anti-Jewish prejudice to discuss anti-Semitism, and second by failing to invite to the panel anyone who might disrupt the torrent of invective with dispassionate facts and real expertise.

Of all the restaurants in the world possibly to deserve a feature article in the New York Times Sunday travel section, the newspaper has somehow chosen one whose interior features a big mural of a Jew-killing Arab terrorist.

The article appears under the headline, “An Arab Bakery in Oakland Full of California Love.”

The Times declaration that the bakery is “full of…love” is sure strange, because it will appear to a lot of people as if it is full of hate.

The Times handles the issue in two paragraphs.

The third sentence of the article reports, “Reem’s is one of a handful of Arab bakeries in the Bay Area — but it is likely the only one where you’ll find the children’s book ‘A Is for Activist’ on the shelves and an enormous mural of the controversial Palestinian activist Rasmeah Odeh on the wall.”

“Controversial” is such shabby journalism that the New York Times’ own style manual has an entry about the word: “This completely acceptable word becomes an unfair shortcut when attached to the name of a person, program or institution without elaboration: it places the subject under a sinister cloud without stating any case. At a minimum the issue should be specified soon after the word appears. Once that is done, the need for the adjective will often — though not always — evaporate.”

In this case, the Times waits until the last paragraph of the article to specify or elaborate, and then only vaguely:
While Ms. Assil’s food has drawn plenty of praise, the bakery’s mural has invited criticism: in late June, an online op-ed charged that Ms. Odeh’s portrayal glorified terrorism, and the bakery’s Yelp page was besieged by a slew of one-star reviews. “It was really scary,” Ms. Assil said of the experience, but added that it won her new allies. “I’m feeling really blessed by the following we’ve built,” she said. “It’s really a testament to when you build community, your customers support you.”

Days after a New York Times arts piece about the Louvre Abu Dhabi covered up an official Emirati ban on Israeli symbols at the international Grand Slam judo tournament last month, the paper of record this week published a travel article which whitewashes convicted bomber Rasmeah Odeh as a "controversial Palestinian activist."

The Nov. 11 "Bites" New York Times restaurant review is all about the love, community organizing and social justice purportedly exemplified by Reen Assil, owner of Reem's California ("An Arab Bakery in Oakland Full of California Love"). Rebecca Flint Marx writes:
Reem’s is one of a handful of Arab bakeries in the Bay Area — but it is likely the only one where you’ll find the children’s book “A Is for Activist” on the shelves and an enormous mural of the controversial Palestinian activist Rasmeah Odeh on the wall.

But there is not a word about the source of Odeh's "controversy," as The Times delicately puts it. As The New York Times itself reported May 27, 2017, Odeh "was convicted in Israel of playing a role in the bombing of a supermarket that killed two civilians in 1969."

Odeh was convicted of perpetrating the bombing in which Hebrew University students Leon "Arie" Kanner, 21, and Edward Joffe, 22, were murdered. That makes her a convicted terrorist, not an "activist."

And the victims are not Leon Kanner and Eddie Joffe – who perished in Odeh’s terrorist act – but rather Reems owner Reem Assil, who is painted as just a gal wanting social justice for all, yet who has been unfairly attacked, an experience that left her “scared.”

But while social justice “has always been a core component of Reem’s,” Ms. Assil said, her business was inspired by the bakeries she visited during a trip to the Middle East several years ago. “Even though there was political turmoil outside, you never would feel it inside,” she said. “In Oakland, I felt we didn’t have enough of those places where people could feel alive and safe and connected.”
—
While Ms. Assil’s food has drawn plenty of praise, the bakery’s mural has invited criticism: in late June, an online op-ed charged that Ms. Odeh’s portrayal glorified terrorism, and the bakery’s Yelp page was besieged by a slew of one-star reviews. “It was really scary,” Ms. Assil said of the experience, but added that it won her new allies. “I’m feeling really blessed by the following we’ve built,” she said. “It’s really a testament to when you build community, your customers support you.”

I would imagine as a Jew or even anyone with a sense of morality, walking into a bakery to find a convicted terrorist murderer staring down at me from the wall would be the scary thing. But then again, I am not the New York Times.

The piece spends a great deal of time describing Reem’s food, which Assil herself calls “Arab street food made with California love.” The author, having just spoken about the mural, exclaims “And there’s much to love here.”

Naturally, the piece ends with Reems’ details, because this is promoting Reems after all.

Also naturally: the author of this revolting piece, Rebecca Flint Marx, is Jewish. I say naturally, because we tend to be our own worst enemies. Or at least many of those who consider themselves “liberal.”

Not all that long ago, in a galaxy far away right here on Earth, an Israeli producer was one of those entrusted with the Star Wars franchise.

The Hollywood duo behind “The Last Jedi” have just been handed the keys to the future of the “Star Wars” franchise.

American director Rian Johnson and Ram Bergman, a prolific Israeli producer, have been tasked by Disney with creating a whole new “Star Wars” trilogy that, for the first time ever, will take place with characters and locations independent of the episodic Skywalker saga.

ABC News has belatedly admitted that “human error” caused Israel to be wiped from the following map:

This admission came during the investigation of a complaint lodged by me concerning a segment aired on Media Watch featuring the above map titled “Misplaced map outrage”

Audience and Consumer Affairs (“AACA”) – a unit separate to and independent of the content making areas of the ABC – dealt with my complaint alleging that Media Watch had breached the ABC's editorial standards of accuracy.

Media Watch had focused on a Daily Mail story dated 19 August which accused the ABC of wiping Israel off the map.

Media Watch sought to provide the context missing from the Daily Mail article – namely, that the ABC report was about repealing a law which allows rapists to escape punishment if they marry their victims, that Israel had never had that law whereas such laws had been applied in Palestinian territories.

This dismissive response coming from the annual $1 billion taxpayer-funded ABC is not acceptable.

Reprimanding those responsible for this “human error” and those who sought to publicly justify Israel’s exclusion from the map using artificially-contrived reasons is surely warranted – particularly as the ABC has been recently accused of anti-Israel bias.

A journalist known for his promotion of the notion of a secretive ‘pro-Israel lobby’ allegedly influencing British politics who regularly writes for one media outlet linked to Hamas and participated in a Balfour Declaration/Israel bashing ‘conference’ organised by another outfit with Hamas connections might not seem like the ideal presenter for an item discussing the Balfour Declaration centenary aired by a broadcaster supposedly committed to ‘impartiality’.

Nevertheless, Peter Oborne did present the October 28th edition of BBC Radio 4’s ‘The Week in Westminster’ and that programme included (from 22:03 here) “reflections on the letter which paved the way for the creation of the state of Israel, 100 years ago”.

One of the other people ‘reflecting’ was MP Stephen Kinnock who last December accepted an award from the Hamas-linked ‘Palestinian Return Centre’ as thanks for his support during its campaign for UN accreditation. Mr Kinnock’s views on Israel have long been clear: shortly after the conflict of summer 2014, for example, he wrote the following:

“This devastating onslaught on Gaza has triggered yet another humanitarian crisis, and that’s what’s creating headlines in the here and now. But it is also possible that it has inflicted such damage on Gaza’s already crippled infrastructure that it will become an unliveable place well before 2020. You just can’t help wondering whether the Israeli government factored this into its calculations when it opted to launch such a wide-ranging attack on the Gaza Strip.”

Kinnock is also on record as an enthusiastic supporter of the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign but Radio 4 listeners were not informed of that fact before they heard him promote it in this item

On November 10th – over five months after the programme was originally broadcast – we were informed by the Head of Executive Complaints that the ECU had upheld our complaint.

Of course the vast majority of people who listened to ‘PM’ on June 8th will be highly unlikely to search out the relevant page on the BBC website on the off-chance that a correction may have been made to something they heard over five months ago.

And so, the BBC’s partly outsourced complaints system (which one could be forgiven for thinking is primarily designed to make members of the public give up and go away) continues to do a disservice to licence fee payers by ensuring that by the time a material inaccuracy is addressed, virtually no-one will receive the corrected information.

Israel called a far-right march that took place in Warsaw “a dangerous march of extreme and racist elements,” and urged Polish authorities to act against the organizers Monday.

The Independence Day march Saturday was organized by groups that trace their roots to radical nationalist, pre-World War II anti-Semitic groups.

Some 60,000 people took part, including families with children, but also young men carrying banners with messages including “White Europe of brotherly nations.”

Some participants chanted anti-Semitic slogans such as “Pure Poland, Jew free Poland,” “Jews out of Poland,” and “Refugees get out.”

A number of participants carried the Celtic Cross, a white supremacist symbol, and marchers also spoke out against Muslims.

Participants marched under the slogan “We Want God,” words from an old Polish religious song that US President Donald Trump quoted during a visit to Warsaw earlier this year. Speakers spoke of standing against liberals and defending Christian values.

Police arrested a New York man in the Crown Heights area of Brooklyn last Thursday after he threatened a Jewish man as he walked past him.

The incident occurred at the intersection of Albany Avenue and Eastern Parkway last Thursday afternoon.

The suspect reportedly spat on the Jewish man and yelled “all you Jews must die”.

Immediately thereafter, the Jewish man notified police stationed nearby of the incident.

Officers searched for the suspect, who was quickly located and arrested. The suspect resisted arrest, but was eventually subdued by the two arresting officers.

According to CrownHeights.info, the suspect was taken to the 71st Precinct and has been charged with aggravated harassment. Authorities are treating the incident as a hate crime.

More than 100 people joined Jewish community leaders and local officials for the dedication of a new memorial plaque to Ilan Halimi – the 23 year-old French Jew kidnapped, tortured and murdered by an antisemitic gang in February 2006 – one week after the previous plaque was defaced with antisemitic graffiti. The event took place as new figures released by the French Jewish community’s defense organization disclosed that Jews make up 30 percent of the victims of all racist attacks in the country.

The plaque was dedicated in a park in the Paris suburb of Bagneux, where Halimi, who was buried in Israel, had lived with his mother and sister. Its wording paid tribute to Halimi as a victim of “barbarism, antisemitism and racism.” Speaking at the ceremony, Bagneux Mayor Marie-Hélène Amiable pledged that “we will never forget,” while local Jewish leader Elie Korchia declared that the “antisemitic thugs” who vandalized the previous memorial to Halimi “will never win.”

Halimi was kidnapped on January 20, 2006, by a mainly Muslim gang calling themselves “The Barbarians.” Lured into the gang’s hands by an attractive young woman who flirted with him in the cellphone store where he worked as a salesman, Halimi subsequently spent three weeks in captivity, during which he was constantly beaten and burned with cigarettes while being tied up.

Throughout the ordeal, “The Barbarians” attempted to extort 450,000 Euros in ransom money from Halimi’s relatives, believing them to be wealthy because – as one of the gang members later explained to police – “Jews have money.” On 13 February, Halimi was dumped, barely alive and with burns on 80 percent of his body, near a railway track on the outskirts of Paris. Discovered by a passerby who called for an ambulance, Halimi died on his way to the hospital.

Some 186,000 babies were born in Israel over the course of 2016, including 7,676 twins and 261 triplets, data from the country's maternity wards shows. On average, a baby is born in Israel every three minutes, and a cesarean section is performed every 20 minutes.

These figures, and many others, were presented at the annual conference of the Israeli Society for Maternal and Fetal Medicine, which looked at the country's 26 hospitals and discovered that the average fertility rate in Israel is 3.1 children per woman, the highest among Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development member-nations. Mexico placed a distant second with an average fertility rate of 2.2 children per woman, and the average fertility rate for countries like France, the U.S., Britain, the Netherlands, and Spain is less than two.

The average age at which women in Israel have their first child is rising, and for 2016 stood at 28.3. Births by mothers under the age of 19 are uncommon in Israel, comprising only 0.5% of births, whereas mothers over age 45 accounted for 3.52% of births.

A total of 4.5% of births were multiples (twins and triplets). Among women age 45 and older, most of whom used donor eggs to become pregnant, the rate of twins is four times higher, accounting for 17.8% of births among women in that age group, which also has a higher than average rate of premature births, before the 33rd week of pregnancy. Nearly 7% of mothers in that age group gave birth prematurely, compared to an average premature birth rate of 1.25%.

Israeli music lovers will have an aha moment this summer, when iconic Norwegian pop band A-ha takes the stage at the Tel Aviv Convention Center on June 21.

Lead vocalist Morten Harket formed A-ha in 1982 in Oslo with keyboardist Magne Furuholmen and guitarist Paul Waaktaar-Savoy.

The group's biggest success came in 1985 with their debut album "Hunting High and Low."

The album produced two international No. 1 singles: "Take on Me" and "The Sun Always Shines on TV."

The iconic video for "Take on Me" used a pencil-sketch animation – and became one of the most popular music videos in the U.S. In 1986, the video was nominated for eight awards at the third annual MTV Video Awards.

In October 2009, the band announced they would split after a worldwide tour in 2010, the Ending on a High Note Tour. Thousands of fans from over 40 countries on six continents congregated to see the last leg of the tour.

The Diary of Anne Frank, the young Jewish woman who was murdered in the Holocaust, is already one of the most well-read books around the globe. Now, Anne Frank Fonds, the Swiss-based foundation that was set up by her father, is publishing a graphic version of her story, aiming to reach an even wider audience.

While readership is on the rise, said the foundation, “a change is occurring in the behavior of readers. The youth of today are socialized differently and are growing up in a different historical context and with a different educational background. Due to the Internet, images are becoming increasingly important. This is the reason for the graphic diary edition with original texts, illustrations and images.”

The graphic version of Frank’s diary was created by Israelis Ari Folman and David Polonsky, the duo behind 2008’s Waltz with Bashir – the animated war film that was nominated for an Oscar. The pair were selected for the project, in part because the Anne Frank Fonds wanted it to “be thought of as a kind of film... The graphic narrative follows the structure of a movie.”

While the English version of the book will not be released until next year, versions in several languages, including Hebrew and French, have already come out. The foundation said it developed the project to coincide with the 70th anniversary of the publication of Frank’s diary in 1947. According to Anne Frank Fonds, her family has supported the project, including her cousin Buddy Elias, who died in 2015. “It was clear for Buddy Elias, who was himself a gifted narrator and actor, that this form can appeal to the youth of today at their level. It also manages to juxtapose the very prevalent humor and imagination in the family with the known sad and serious context of the story.”

Yad Vashem recognized a 106-year-old woman from Thessaloniki and her late husband as Righteous Among the Nations in a ceremony held in the Greek city last week. The ceremony was the initiative of the Israeli Embassy in Greece, the Yad Vashem Holocaust Museum in Jerusalem and the city's Jewish community.

During the Holocaust, Vasiliki and her husband Kostas Athiridis hid five members of the Essel family: Marcus, Aida and their children Freddie, Janine and Jacqueline.

Marcus was a businessman who at one point in time had helped out Kostas. An appreciative Kostas told him that if he ever needed anything, he would return the favor.

During the Holocaust, Marcus looked for a place for his family to hide. After two people refused to hide his family, Marcus turned to Kostas, who agreed. Marcus and his family spent the remaining months of the war in hiding in the Athiridis' home. Kostas and Vasiliki kept their young daughter home from kindergarten for months out of concern she would tell others they were hiding Jews in their home.

The ceremony was unique in that it was not held at the residence of Ambassador Irit Ben-Abba but rather in the auditorium of the local Anatolia school, where Vasiliki's grandchildren are enrolled and where many Jewish students who perished in the Holocaust once studied. Diplomats, city council representatives, the president of the school, the head of the local Jewish community, middle school students and members of Vasiliki's family were among those in attendance.

Meanwhile, Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked on Sunday visited the Japanese city of Tsuruga, where she met with Mayor Takanobu Fuchikami and thanked the city's residents for taking in Jews during the Holocaust.

And Gal Gadot is Wonder Woman of the year.... pic.twitter.com/jywpgHxPOe

— Yashar Ali 🐘 (@yashar) November 13, 2017

Leo Ferguson is the community and communications organizer for Jews for Racial & Economic Justice.
Lina Morales is a member of Jews of Color and Mizrahi/Sephardi Caucus of Jewish Voice for Peace.
Linda Sarsour is the former Executive Director of the Arab-American Association of New York, a co-chair of the National Women's March, and was a co-founder of MPower Change.
Rebecca Vilkomerson is the Executive Director of Jewish Voice for Peace.

Palestinian children learn that they are part of a long history of martyrs.
And the thousands of righteous and martyrs who have beautified her pure soil with their
innocent blood and who have given her their pure souls. And they defend her from
passing invaders and oppressive tyrants . . .

Arabic Language, Grade 10, Vol. 1, 2017, p. 18.

Children are encouraged to offer their blood, described in Tawfiq Zayyad's poem, "Remaining":
And [our] pure blood, we will not spare, will not spare, will not spare
Here we have a past, a present and a future.

Arabic Language, Grade 10, Vol. 1, 2017, p. 133.

The following is an excerpt from "Don't Tell My Mother!" by Muhammad Barash. The title
suggests that children not obey parents' warnings when called to be martyrs:
And the last scene I saw before I found myself unconscious was that of a child who came
running toward me, carrying a flag, shouting: martyr, martyr [shahid, shahid]!

Arabic Reading, Literature and Criticism, Grade 11, Vol. 1, 2017, p. 19. 

I am a Muslim; I sacrifice for the liberation of Al-Aqsa Mosque. Islamic Education, Grade 5, Vol. 1, 2017, p. 56.  

Following the agreement signed in Cairo on 12 October and the handover of Gaza crossings to the Palestinian Authority on 1 November, the European Union reaffirms its readiness to mobilise its full support to current efforts to reunite Gaza and the West Bank under one single and legitimate Palestinian Authority. While the agreement and the handover were important and welcome steps in this regard, they need to be followed up by further steps to enable the Palestinian Authority to resume its full responsibilities in Gaza and achieve intra-Palestinian reconciliation.
We are having consultations internally, with key international partners, as well as within the Quartet, on how best to help this process to succeed. How to grant targeted support to Gaza, in particular to the citizens, is part of these consultations. In light of special circumstances and needs, the EU has decided to exceptionally increase its annual contribution to UNRWA by another EUR 10.5 million. A considerable part of this funding is dedicated to Palestine refugees in Gaza, in particular for health and education.

After His Picture with Livni Went Viral, Turki Al-Faisal: “By Allah, This is an Innocent Picture, Don’t Let Your Imagination Run Wild, Get Over It, We Grew Old

After the picture of Turki Al-Faisal with Livni – who was described as the “Lover of Politicians”, and who is proud to provide“physical services” for Israel – went viral, he (i.e. Turki) spoke, after a long silence.

In an exclusive interview to Ad-Dabbour, Turki Al-Faisal said: “The picture is completely innocent, nothing happened between us, she grew old and she is worn out, and I am gone as well, I ask you not to make a big issue out of it, don’t let your imagination run wild.”

Al-Faisal added: “She (i.e. Livni) disgraced us, may Allah disgrace her, I thought that it is a private picture, only for her, but she published it without my knowledge. Anyway, Livni uses her body to bring down the most prominent politicians who are working with her in secret, whereas I am working with her overtly...., and this is strong proof that there was nothing between us.”

When Ad-Dabbour’s reporter asked Turki Al-Faisal about the nature of that “innocent meeting”, Turki Al-Faisal said: “I spoke with her about the will of my master King Muhammad Bin Salman, er, I mean the current Crown Prince [Note: this is a dig at Saudi Arabia, saying that it is really the Crown Prince running the show, not his father, the King.] to open an Israeli embassy in Riyadh soon.” He also said: “I said to her: ‘We are very close to open an Israeli embassy in Riyadh, we hope that this is realized soon.’”

Livni said: “We don’t want to hurry up with normalizing relations with Saudi Arabia right now, we want a total normalization with all Arab countries at once.
[Another dig at Saudi Arabia, i.e. that they are trying to normalize relations with the Jews, and it is the Jews saying “no”]

The Saudi prince (i.e. Turki Al-Faisal) proclaimed his gratefulness for his being in a Jewish synagogue for the first time, and he said that he hoped that it won’t be the last. He also defended his recurring appearance with former Israeli officials.

Ad-Dabbour’s reporter asked: “Why don’t you open a Jewish synagogue in Mecca, so that this joy is not denied to you?” (i.e. the joy of being in a synagogue) Al-Faisal: “There are ongoing negotiations to return the Jews of Khaibar to Mecca. As you know, they were here before us, and they have a right to the Ka’aba more than the Muslims. We hope that this happens soon, so that there will be peace in the entire world, and those who have rights regain their rights.”
[Once again, a dig at Saudi Arabia, saying that they are willing to give up the most sacred rights of the Muslims…]

We are still looking for Ad-Dabbour’s reporter at the time of the writing of this report.

Ninety-four years ago, on November 4 1923, Ze’ev Jabotinsky published an essay that would shape the worldview of the nationalist Israeli Right. Known as the “Iron Wall” doctrine, it stated that, so long as the Arabs have even a sliver of hope regarding the outcome of the Israeli-Arab conflict, the conflict will not end.

Peace would only be achievable, Jabotinsky argued, once the “Iron Wall” of Israeli military superiority was completely solid. Even so, in the years following the 1973 Yom Kippur War, the foundational ideas of the Iron Wall doctrine have steadily faded from Israeli political discourse.

The first “crack” in the Iron Wall occurred the moment that the Oslo Accords were signed. The Israeli government imported a group of certified terrorists, in the hope that they would become converted to our way of thinking — that they would combat terror “without Bagatz or B’Tselem” (without the Supreme Court or far-left NGOs).

To some Arabs, the Oslo Accords represented a bright new hope; the first stage in the multi-step plan to achieve their dream of driving us out of the country, as first devised in the 1974 PLO Phased Plan. Arafat’s successor, Mahmoud Abbas, continues on the same path — securing whatever concessions possible from Israel through negotiation, while using violence to achieve the rest of his goals.

In 2014, Abbas explained as much in Cairo at an Arab League meeting, stating that he would never recognize Israel as a Jewish State: Meaning that he would continue to work towards a Palestinian State encompassing as much territory as possible, while at the same time working towards turning Israel into a second Palestinian state.

While honoring terrorist Hussein Abayat who murdered one Israeli and was also involved in numerous attacks against Israelis during the PA's terror campaign (2000-2005), Fatah's Bethlehem Branch stated that his blood will not have been spilled "in vain," and neither will that of "all the [other] Martyrs."

Fatah promised continued violence and many more terrorists, stating that for every "rebel" killed by "the monster" Israel a thousand more will appear:

Posted text: "The 17th anniversary of the death as a Martyr (Shahid) of commander Hussein Abayat (i.e., terrorist, involved in numerous attacks including murder of 1) When the men cried over the passing of the one who fired the first bullet of the Al-Aqsa Intifada (i.e., PA terror campaign 2000-2005) in the first assassination operation that was carried out by the Israeli planes of hatred...
Martyr Hussein's blood and the blood of all the Martyrs who today are writing the lines of the future history will not be in vain When the monster kills one rebel, the ground sprouts a thousand others
O pride of the wound, if we die, the graves will fight" [Facebook page of the Fatah Movement - Bethlehem Branch, Nov. 9, 2017]

Palestinian Media Watch reported recently that Fatah's Bethlehem Branch glorified the PA terror campaign - the second Intifada - and posted "a souvenir picture" from it, showing rows of masked men apparently belonging to Fatah's Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades carrying rifles.

Over 1,000 Israelis, the vast majority of whom were civilians, were murdered during the PA terror campaign, mostly in suicide bombings by Hamas and the Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades. The Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades is considered a terror organization by the US and the EU.

Apparently, neither the Pentagon, nor the State Department, nor the National Security Council advised the new Trump administration of the implications of facilitating Iran's Middle East grand strategy. Obama's approach is, ironically, easier to understand, given his determination to secure his "legacy" by conceding vital U.S. national interests to nail down the Iran nuclear deal. Seeing Iran enhance its hegemonic aspirations throughout the region was, in his view, just another small price to pay to grease the way for the nuclear deal. Trump's advisers have no such excuse.

Hariri's resignation shows the inevitable consequences of blindly following Obama's approach. Very little now stands in the way of Hezbollah's total domination of the Lebanese government, thereby posing an immediate threat to Israel. In recent years, Tehran continued supplying the Assad regime and Hezbollah with weapons systems dangerous to Israel. Even more Israeli self-defense strikes are now likely, as Iran's conventional threat on Israel's borders grows.

Nearby Arab states also see the potential dangers of an unbroken Shia military arc of control on their northern periphery. The Middle East thus faces an advancing Syria, backed by Iran's imminent nuclear-weapons capability, deliverable throughout the region — and likely able to reach America in short order.

The Trump administration cannot continue idly watching Iran advance without opposition. Washington and its regional allies need a comprehensive strategy to deal with Iran, not a series of ad hoc responses to regional developments. Time is fast running out.

Please join me here as I discuss with Avi Abelow of Israel Video Network the political frenzy in Britain where a government minister, Priti Patel, was forced to resign as a result of her holiday activities in Israel; the re-emergence as a result of some ripe antisemitism from within the Conservative Party; and the calamitous mistake by Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson which worsened the desperate plight of a British-Iranian woman behind bars in Iran – but over which he has not been forced to resign (well, not yet).

Israel’s Sheba Medical Center at Tel Hashomer gained a luminary when it appointed Brig. General (Res) Professor Yitshak Kreiss, MD, MHA, MPA, as its director general in 2016. For more than three decades Kreiss has dedicated his life to saving lives on the battlefield, in Israeli hospitals, and around the world.

Believing that Israelis “are moral and ambitious about saving anyone’s life because these are Jewish values, ” Kreiss has traveled the world leading humanitarian missions to achieve that goal.
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The Jewish Press: Describe your background both in the army and as a doctor. In what way does your army experience distinguish you from other doctors?

Prof. Kreiss: I dedicated my life, until I took over as CEO of Sheba, to two goals. One is to treat and save the lives of soldiers on the battlefield and the second is to extend a hand and treat people all over the world in humanitarian missions. I think serving as a surgeon in the IDF combines professionalism in medicine and leadership, which are the two things that differentiate my career from other physicians.

If Israel had not taken action, Iran would already possess nuclear weapons, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Monday, in response to a joint U.S.-Russian statement Saturday outlining principles for post-war Syria.

Iran is a longtime backer of Syrian President Bashar Assad. Israel has long complained about the involvement of Iran and Iranian proxy Hezbollah in the ongoing civil war in Syria. Israel has said it will not tolerate the presence of Iran or its Shiite allies in Syria, particularly near Syria's shared border with Israel.

Israel signaled on Sunday that it would keep up military strikes to thwart the delivery of weapons to Hezbollah, as well as to prevent any encroachment by Iranian-allied forces.

"We are making sure Israel is secure, and we are doing it well – you know that," Netanyahu told his Likud party at their weekly meeting on Monday.

"We are doing it with a balanced combination of strength and responsibility. We are defending our borders, we are defending our country and we will continue to do this," he said.

"I have communicated to our friends in Washington, first of all, and also to our friends in Moscow that Israel will take action in Syria, including southern Syria, as we see fit and according to our security needs. That is the deciding factor, and it will continue to be the deciding factor."

Russia never promised the United States that Iran and Iranian-backed forces would withdraw from Syria, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Tuesday, adding that their presence in the war-torn country is legitimate.

Lavrov, who was quoted by RIA news agency, denied comments made by senior US officials that the recently announced ceasefire agreement in southern Syria included a Russian commitment to ensure that Iranian-backed militias would be withdrawn from the country.

The Iranian presence in Syria is “legitimate” Lavrov was quoted as saying, adding that it was the United States who posed the biggest threat in Syria.

"If you look at who is the greatest danger, it's just the wards of the United States, various foreign terrorists, militants who are attached to those groups of armed opposition that the US supports," Lavrov said.

The US has bought into the vague language as well because the US is not yet serious about removing Iranian-backed forces from Syria. This is because it has not acted against Iranian-backed Shi’a militias in Iraq that have been officially incorporated into Iraqi security forces since 2016. If the US was concerned about “foreign” forces, then it would have done more about them in Iraq.

Israel is in a bind. Jerusalem wants to rely on Moscow, Washington and Amman in relation to standing by a cease fire in southwest Syria. But Israel particularly wants Russia’s cooperation, because Russia is a close ally of Damascus.

Russia’s interest is the stability and perpetuation of the Syrian regime. Iran’s interests in Syria differ from Moscow’s.

To the degree that Israel has a way to guarantee keeping Iran and Hezbollah away from the Golan, it can set red lines relating to their presence. It has done this through its air strikes that have targeted weapons transfers to Hezbollah. It can also encourage Moscow to see that this presence is not in Russia’s or the regime’s long-term interests.

There is evidence Assad does not want to be too beholden to Iran. Ambiguity in the cease-fire deal will benefit Iran. Time will tell if the “foreign” forces actually do begin to withdraw from Syria.

Lebanese newspaper Al-Akhbar exposed Tuesday morning "The secret document of the Saudi Foreign Ministry," that it claims includes a road map towards rejuvenating the 2002 Saudi Peace Initiative and hints at meetings and understandings between Israeli and Saudi officials.

The document, claims the paper, proves everything that has been leaked over the last few months since US President Donald Trump's visit to the region in May. According to the leaks, Washington aims to mediate a peace agreement between Israel and the oil-rich kingdom. The document, said to be signed by Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir, also allegedly confirms mutual visits by senior officials including the rumored visit of the Saudi Crown Prince to Tel Aviv.

According to the Lebanese paper, which is aligned with Hezbollah and has a history of fabrications, the document also includes "the compromises Riyadh will offer to end the Palestinian issue," and in addition, "Riyadh's efforts to gain support against Iran and Hezbollah."

"Saudi Arabia's rapprochement with Israel involves a risk to the Muslim peoples of the Kingdom, because the Palestinian cause represents a spiritual and historical and religious heritage," reads the report claiming to quote the document. "The Kingdom will not take this risk unless it feels the United States' sincere approach to Iran, which is destabilizing the region by sponsoring terrorism, its sectarian policies and interfering in the affairs of others."

A key demand of the Saudis, according to the report, is the dismantling of Israel's alleged nuclear weapons capabilities.

On November 1, against all expectations, Hamas officials dismantled the checkpoints the organization maintained inside the Israeli-controlled crossings on the Israeli-Gazan border.

It was a dramatic step. No longer would Palestinians leaving Gaza for Israel or the West Bank face questioning by Hamas intelligence officials about their business. No longer would Palestinians entering Gaza face the exorbitant import taxes and other fees imposed by Hamas.

That bears repeating. In taking this step, Hamas, a group choked on almost every side by enemies foreign and domestic, willingly surrendered a lucrative source of income that fed many millions of shekels each year into its coffers.

More startling still: it was a step beyond what Hamas was strictly required to do at this stage under the reconciliation agreement signed with the Fatah-led Palestinian Authority in Cairo last month that handed some control over Gaza to the PA.

It is not enough to simply say these actions are part of “reconciliation.” Hamas’s commitment to “national reconciliation” has never extended this far in the past. What changed? What could possibly drive Hamas to surrender part of its rule over Gaza and renounce vital sources of influence and money?

Raji Sourani, head of the Palestinian Center for Human Rights, said that an international campaign is expected to be launched in early 2018 by anti-Israel NGOs in an attempt to motivate the International Criminal Court in The Hague to prosecute Israeli leaders.

In an interview with Hamas newspaper Filastin, Sourani said that the campaign would be directed to the Prosecutor of the International Court of Justice, so as to expedite the completion of the processing of documents transferred to it regarding supposed "crimes" that Israel carried out in the "Palestinian territories," thus enabling the court to deliberate on the documents in question.

The documents submitted to the Prosecutor deal with the war in Gaza (July-August 2014), including the military response in Rafah to the kidnapping of an IDF officer, the 11-year security blockade on Gaza, and “settlement” construction.

Surani added that at the end of this month, the Prosecutor will be presented with an additional document dealing with thousands of complaints and claims filed in Israeli courts for "crimes" committed by the IDF, in which only five soldiers were convicted.

Roundly rejecting Russian criticism of the task force, Israel on Sunday endorsed a UN watchdog report on Syria’s use of chemical weapons, saying it “unequivocally” proves Assad used poison gas and must therefore be punished by the international community.

Last month a report by a joint UN-Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) panel said the Syrian air force on April 4 had dropped a bomb on the opposition-held town of Khan Sheikhun, releasing the deadly nerve agent that killed more than 80 people, including children.

The OPCW has a team called Fact Finding Mission, which investigates whether chemical weapons have been used in Syria. The JIM was set up by the Security Council to apportion blame for such attacks.

But Russia has dismissed the Joint Investigative Mechanism (JIM) report, saying the experts did not travel to Khan Sheikhun and worked with samples Moscow maintains may have been tampered with by Western intelligence.

Israel has reportedly told Jordan that a joint agreement for the construction of a pipeline transferring water from the Red Sea to the Dead Sea will not go ahead until Israel is allowed to reopen its embassy in Amman.

In an escalating war of words and threats, senior officials in Jerusalem told Channel 10 that Israel notified Jordan that the water project will not move forward until Ambassador Einat Schlein and her staff are permitted to return to their posts.

Two weeks ago Jordan said it would not allow the embassy to reopen until an embassy guard who shot dead two Jordanian nationals was brought to trial.

Jordan refused to allow Schlein to return as Jerusalem’s envoy after she was photographed along with the guard, named as Ziv Moyal, during a meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu after the deadly incident occurred on July 23.

The incident has put a damper on the so-called Red-Dead project. Several weeks ago Israel and Jordan were to have finalized the details before calling for tenders from international companies to do the work.

Sheldon Adelson, the billionaire casino magnate, will not back Steve Bannon’s planned challenges to establishment Republican senators.

“The Adelsons will not be supporting Steve Bannon’s efforts,” Andy Abboud, an Adelson spokesman told Politico on Monday, referring to Adelson and his wife, Miriam. “They are supporting Mitch McConnell,” the Kentucky senator who is the Senate majority leader, “100 percent. For anyone to infer anything otherwise is wrong.”

Bannon, President Donald Trump’s strategic adviser from January to August, had praised Adelson lavishly at a gala dinner Sunday organized by the Zionist Organization of America, one of an array of right-wing pro-Israel groups heavily backed by Adelson. Adelson was not present at the dinner.

Bannon, has since returned to his old job, helming Breitbart News.

He is still close to the president, and has vowed to mount primary challenges to all but one incumbent Republican in the 2018 midterm elections, as well as to establishment picks in the 25 races where Republicans will challenge Democrats. Eight Republicans are up for reelection. Bannon’s exception among the incumbents is Texas Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas.

Washington is demanding Palestinians with American citizenship be allowed to fly out of Israel’s Ben Gurion Airport, as a precondition for being admitted into the US visa waiver program, Hadashot news (formerly Channel 2) reported Monday.

Currently, all Palestinians traveling abroad do so via Jordan, using the Allenby Bridge border crossing administered by Israeli authorities.

According to Hadashot news, Israel’s security establishment is opposed to the demand. Officials are said to be concerned over general security threats, but also of the legal precedent — and of the likelihood of Israel being accused of a double standard towards Palestinians with other dual nationalities.

Another issue holding up Israel’s entry into the program is the requirement that visa refusals be under 3 percent. Hadashot reported that one possibility being considered is that the waiver program not apply to the age group considered problematic by US authorities — young Israelis aged 21-30 who often seek to work in America illegally.

The sole Jewish parliamentarian from Austria’s ruling party is currently opposed to moving the country’s embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.

In an email interview with The Times of Israel, Martin Engelberg, a freshman lawmaker for the People’s Party (OeVP), endorsed the international consensus on the matter, arguing that any such steps should only be taken after an Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement has been signed.

Engelberg — an active member of Vienna’s Jewish community — was sworn in Thursday, marking the first time that two Jews are sitting in the country’s parliament since World War II. The other is David Lasar, a second-term legislator for the far-right Freedom Party (FPOe).

The OeVP, which with 31.5 percent of the votes became Austria’s largest party in the October 15 election, is conducting coalition negotiations with the FPOe. Many Jews consider the FPOe taboo due to its past as a haven for neo-Nazis and current populist policies. Israel has a no-contact policy with the FPOe, although some members of the Likud Party advocate for the government to change this position.

FPOe and OeVP are widely expected to agree on establishing a government in the coming weeks.

Elite Indian Air Force combat search-and-rescue soldiers took part on Monday in a first-ever joint drill with their Israeli peers.

The Indian troops — from the Garud Unit, the equivalent of Israel’s 669 Unit — are part of a delegation now in the Jewish state for the biennial “Blue Flag” exercise — in which the air forces of eight different countries are participating this year.

Israel and India are currently celebrating the 25th anniversary of the establishment of official diplomatic relations. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited Israel in July.

Ties between the two countries — including in the military realm — have flourished in recent years.

One of the Iron Dome batteries recently deployed in the center of the country in response to rising tensions with terrorist groups in the Gaza Strip was placed in the Dan region, which includes Tel Aviv, the IDF cleared for publication Tuesday.

Iron Dome batteries have been deployed in several locations in the center of the country, in case the terrorist organizations in the Gaza Strip fire rockets at Israel in retaliation for the destruction of a terror tunnel leading from Gaza into Israel. Several terrorists were killed in the destruction of the tunnel.

The IDF has stepped up its forces near the fence closing off the Gaza Strip in order to deal quickly with any attempts by the Islamic Jihad terrorist group, which lost a senior member and several other operatives in the destruction of the tunnel, to enact revenge.

Major General Yoav Mordechai, the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT), on Saturday night warned the terrorist organizations in Gaza that Israel will respond to any act of retaliation for the destruction of the terror tunnel.

"We are aware of the plot being planned by the Palestinian Islamic Jihad against Israel. They are playing with fire on the backs of the residents of the Gaza Strip and at the expense of internal Palestinian reconciliation and the region as a whole,” Mordechai said in an Arabic-language video he posted to YouTube.

As concerns grow that the Iranian-backed terror group Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) could strike from the Gaza Strip, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned on Sunday that his country would hold Hamas, which rules Gaza, “responsible” for any attack that targets Israel.

The prime minister’s warning underscored the complete military and political control that Hamas, which has recently been aligning itself more closely with Iran, exerts over the Gaza Strip.

Tension between Israel and PIJ have escalated since Israel destroyed a terror tunnel inside Israeli territory late last month, reportedly killing twelve terrorists, mostly from PIJ. It was later revealed that Israel recovered the bodies of five of the terrorists.

Hamas is currently trying to implement a reconciliation deal with Fatah, the Palestinian faction that rules the West Bank and controls the Palestinian Authority (PA). While the PA has assumed control of Gaza’s border crossings as part of the deal, Hamas has not relinquished its weapons.

Last week, PA police chief Hazem Atallah told reporters that as long as Hamas maintained its arsenal of rockets and guns the PA would be unable to provide security for Gaza.

Islamic Jihad provocations against Israel threaten Gaza's civilian population and are dangerous, said the US after the IDF moved its Iron Dome batteries to the center of the country out of concern for the potential of an attack from Gaza.

“Extremist statements & provocation vs. Israel by Islamic Jihad significantly harm the people of Gaza & are very dangerous," the US special envoy Jason Greenblatt tweeted early Tuesday morning.

“The PA must resume full responsibility in Gaza. [The] US is working with the PA, Israel, Egypt & others to try to improve the situation. Gaza deserves better," he said.

Earlier this week the UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process Nickolay Mladenov also chastised the group.
View from Gaza as IDF blows up Hamas tunnel reaching into Israeli territory, October 30, 2017. (Courtesy)

“The reckless actions and statements of militants in Gaza risk a dangerous escalation. Palestinians have embarked on a course to solve the humanitarian crisis in the Strip and bring back the legitimate authorities. They should not be distracted by extremists,” Mladenov said.

Israeli authorities have seized hundreds of parcels of prohibited products bought online and destined for terror groups in the Gaza Strip, the Defense Ministry announced Tuesday.

In the past few weeks security officials identified various elements in the Gaza Strip using online shopping sites, including AliExpress, to smuggle prohibited products into Gaza under the guise of
innocent packages.

Officials from the Crossing Authority of the Ministry of Defense along with representatives from the Gaza District Coordination Office (DCO) and the Office of the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT) seized the products at the Erez Crossing.

According to the Defense Ministry, the products seized in October include laser sights, telescopes, binoculars, laser pointers, metal detectors, radios, camouflage devices, miniature drones, cameras and night vision goggles.

Among other products discovered in the packages by Israeli authorities were computer motherboards and electronic circuits, inverters, optical cable cutter, optical magnification device, mini electric drills, professional headlamps, voltage stabilizers, power supplies and optical connectors.

The products, which are viewed by the defense establishment as dual-use because they can also be used for civilian purposes, were examined by COGAT officers. “It is suspected that some of the devices seized could have been used as improvised weapons,” read the Defense Ministry statement.

The Jerusalem District Attorney's Office, with the approval of Attorney General Avichai Mendelblit, on Monday announced it would submit an indictment against the head of far-right organization Lehava Ben-Zion Gopstein, on suspicion of inciting violence, inciting racism, inciting terrorism, and obstruction of justice.

Gopstein is accused of issuing calls to violence in statements he made to media outlets between 2012 and 2017.

In an interview with the Hadashot evening newscast, Gopstein said, "The first condition for me to go to a wedding is that we do not have Palestinians at our wedding. There are no Arabs at the wedding. With us, it is strictly Hebrew labor. Let's just say that if there was an Arab waiter, he would not be serving the food."

Asked what he would do if there was an Arab waiter, Gopstein replied, "I think he would be looking for the nearest hospital."

In addition, Gopstein is suspected of showing support for the actions of Baruch Goldstein, who murdered 29 Muslim worshippers at the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron in 1994.

According to the statement of prosecution, Gopstein took hold of a microphone at a wedding in Modiin Illit and began to sing a song praising the massacre.

Lebanon’s Prime Minister Saad Hariri, who plunged the country into crisis with his surprise resignation during a trip to Saudi Arabia, said on Tuesday he will return home in the next two days.

In his first tweet in more than a week, Hariri told his followers that he is okay, and that he would be returning without his family, who will stay “in their home” in Saudi Arabia.

Lebanese President Michel Aoun has refused to accept the November 4 resignation, which came under mysterious circumstances, until Hariri returns to the country.

Lebanon has insisted the resignation was forced by Hariri’s Saudi patrons and that he is being kept in the kingdom against his will. Hariri denied those reports in a Sunday TV interview and said he’ll return to Lebanon within days.

Some Lebanese officials have said he should return with his family, so he could be free of any Saudi pressure.

Following talk in Congress of imposing sanctions on Tehran for its ballistic-missile program, the commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) announced a decision to restrict the program to weapons with a range of no more than 2,000 kilometers. The move seemed like a preemptive concession, but, Richard Goldberg and Behnam Ben Taleblu explain, it is merely a ruse:

According to Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats, the regime can already “strike targets up to 2,000 kilometers from Iran’s borders,” a range sufficient to hit both U.S. military bases in the region as well as the entire state of Israel. In other words, the alleged cap on Iran’s ballistic missiles locks in the threat rather than rolling it back, while doing nothing to curtail the wide range of activities Iran is undertaking to improve its missile force. . . .

Neither the Trump administration nor Congress should take solace in Iran’s promise to cap its ballistic missiles at 2,000 kilometers. If anything, this declaration is an attempt by Tehran to overvalue something for which it has no immediate need—what are called intermediate-range ballistic missiles—in the hopes of forestalling coercive economic measures against its ballistic-missile program. During negotiations that culminated in the 2015 nuclear accord, Iran [likewise] strategically overvalued the few concessions it gave, including [giving up] its unreliable first-generation centrifuges. . . .

Now, by proposing an illusory cap on missile ranges, Iran is looking to dupe the West again. Meanwhile, the Islamic Republic is expected to continue improving the quality of its missile force, which . . . constitutes the Middle East’s biggest arsenal.

The US military will fight Islamic State in Syria "as long as they want to fight," Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said on Monday, describing a longer-term role for US troops long after the insurgents lose all of the territory they control.

As US-backed and Russian-backed forces battle to retake the remaining pockets of Islamic State-held terrain, Mattis said the US military's longer-term objective would be to prevent the return of an "ISIS 2.0."

"The enemy hasn't declared that they're done with the area yet, so we'll keep fighting as long as they want to fight," Mattis said, speaking to reporters at the Pentagon about the future of US operations in Syria.

He also stressed the importance of longer-term peace efforts, suggesting US forces aimed to help set the conditions of a diplomatic solution in Syria, now in its seventh year of civil war.

"We're not just going to walk away right now before the Geneva process has traction," he added.

US President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin affirmed joint efforts to stabilize Syria as its civil war wanes, including with the expansion of a July 7 truce in the southwestern triangle bordering Israel and Jordan.

Mattis said he believed the southwestern zone was working, and spoke hopefully about additional areas in the future that might allow for more refugees to return home.

Pakistan’s Shia leader has warned the public and the government of the dangers posed by Bahais and Ahmadis. Allama Iqbal Bahishti urged the public and authorities to be watchful of the ‘heretic’ Baha’is & Ahmadis.

Allam Iqbal Bahishti is the provincial secretary-general of Majlis Wahdat-e-Muslimeen (MWM), which is Pakistan’s largest Shiite political organization. He made the comments while speaking to members of the press on November 11.

The Islamic world was split into two groups, Sunnis, and Shiites but the colonial powers very cleverly planned the foundation of four fraudulent religions, for two of which they chose the Arab world and for the other two they chose the non-Arab [Persian] world. Then from these regions, prominent personalities were selected to lead those faiths.

Bahishti claimed that the Wahabi, Bah’ai and Ahmadiyya faith were the product of colonial conspiracy against the Islamic world. He claimed:

These superpowers conspired against Islam in the 18th century and laid the foundation of fraudulent and heretic faiths.From these four faiths, Wahabism quickly gained popularity and so did Qadianiat [Ahmadiyya]. However, the heretic faiths failed to gain any ground in the Shia world and the reason for this was the countermeasures by the Shia community.

He described Bahai and other faiths as heretics and said the colonial powers are scared of Islam and hence use these individuals to gain their objectives and the biggest obstacle that they face is Islam.

He further added that even though the public was aware of the dangers posed by Ahmadis, the Shia Muslims need to do more to raise awareness about the dangers posed by Baha’is in the country.

In Pakistan, there is a great deal of awareness of against Qadiyaniyat [Ahmadis]. After defeat in Iran, the Bahais directed their focus towards South Asia and Europe. The ideological center of the Bahais is in the city of Haifa which is located in the Zionist state of Israel. Bahais are more dangerous than the last three heretic faiths.

The Bahais have dozens of small centers from the Northern areas to Karachi in the south. It is very important that the public, as well as authorities including the interior ministry and the religious department, should be made aware of the danger of these beliefs.

The MWM follows Ayatollah, the supreme leader of Shias based in Iran. The Shia regime of Iran has long persecuted its Baha’i citizens, the Iranian Baha’is have long faced systematic persecution and suffered widespread discrimination in the country since the 1979 revolution, solely for believing in a faith that is not officially recognized by the Iranian Constitution.

Similarly, the Ahmadiyya Muslims have also faced severe persecution at the hands of Pakistani authorities. In 1974 Pakistan amended its constitution to declare the Ahmadi ‘non-Muslim’. Majority of Sunnis and Shiites consider the Ahmadis apostates due to which they are a target of sectarian attacks. Many Ahmadis continue to serve prison terms of the blasphemy including the crime of keeping copies of the Quran.

An Israeli minister on Monday welcomed remarks by a mufti of Saudi Arabia that Palestinian resistance group Hamas is a terror organization.

"We congratulate Abdul Aziz Al-Sheikh, the grand mufti of Saudi Arabia, as well as the head of Ulema (Islamic scholars) for his fatwa forbidding the fight against the Jews and forbidding to kill them," Israeli Communications Minister Ayoub Kara wrote on his official Twitter account.

The minister also welcomed the mufti's remarks in which he considered Hamas a terror organization, adding "I invite the mufti to visit Israel; he will be welcomed with a high level of respect."

Earlier, the mufti said while answering a question on a television program that fighting against Israel was inappropriate and said Hamas was a "terror organization" in reply to a question regarding last July's anger across the Israeli-occupied West Bank when Israel shut Al-Aqsa Mosque, which is venerated by Muslims and Jews, following a deadly shootout. (h/t Zvi)

In “Who Saved Israel in 1947?” Martin Kramer has usefully complicated the Truman-to-the rescue narrative that is favored in many circles by reintroducing both the key role played by the Soviet Union in supporting the yishuv’s aspirations for statehood and, not least, the behind-the-scenes lobbying of the great powers that was conducted by resourceful Zionist diplomats. But has he complicated it enough?

United Nations General Assembly Resolution 181 of November 29, 1947, recommending the partition of Palestine into two states, one Jewish, the other Arab, won the support of more than half of the UN’s then-56 member states (33 for, 13 against, 10 abstaining), thus expressing the will of the bulk of the international community. All of the world’s democracies voted “aye,” save for India and Greece, which voted “nay,” and Britain, which abstained.

Were the same vote held today, the 193 General Assembly members would likely vote, perhaps overwhelmingly, against Jewish statehood. The Arab and Muslim states would vote “nay”—as they did uniformly in 1947—for reasons of ideology. But many others would follow suit out of self-interest and a desire not to annoy the world’s Arabs and Muslims—because the Arab and Muslim worlds offer giant actual and potential markets for goods and services, because much of the world’s oil is in their grip, because they sit astride international air, land, and sea routes, because of Arab-Muslim clout in international forums, and because of the presence of Arab and/or Muslim minorities in the midst of majority non-Arab and non-Muslim countries.

But the truth is that back in 1947, too, most of the world’s states had good, concrete reasons to vote with the Arabs. Then, too, there were potential markets, communications routes, oil wells, Muslim minorities—and there were big powers like France, Britain, and the U.S. that had or hoped to establish military bases in Muslim lands. Given the cold-war background, the powers, including the U.S. and the USSR, had good reason to rally or keep the Arabs and Muslims onside. As the Indian prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, wrote to Albert Einstein on July 11, 1947, explaining by implication why India with its large Muslim minority was going to vote “nay”: “national policies are unfortunately essentially selfish policies. Each country thinks of its own interest first.”
.....
One final question is raised by Kramer’s piece. He seems to imply that the partition vote was crucial to Israel’s emergence. I’m not so sure. It was certainly important to Israel’s swift acceptance among the comity of nations during the ensuing decade, and to its future diplomatic well-being and foreign relations. But its birth and existence? The simple answer is probably “no.”

In all likelihood, the state would have arisen, in 1948 or a year or two later, whatever the UN had decided or failed to decide in November 1947. It arose because the yishuv had, for decades, prepared itself, psychologically and institutionally, for that day, because it had achieved a critical developmental and demographic mass that was—and proved to be—sufficient to establish a Jewish state, and because its armed forces (yes, with the important help of the Moscow-approved Czech arms shipments in the crucial months of April through June 1948) were able to beat the disorganized Palestinian Arab militias and then the Arab armies that invaded Palestine.

To all of this, the Holocaust had provided the immediate and necessary impetus and energy.

One of the complaints about the organized Jewish community is that it is silencing criticism of Israel. Left-wingers paint a dismal picture of a Jewish community in denial about Israel’s sins, and determined to squelch debate about the peace process or controversial issues like settlements.

So it probably came as quite a shock to many American Jews to read what happened at Princeton University this past week, when the Center for Jewish Life — as the campus Hillel is called — cancelled a speech by Tzipi Hotovely, Israel’s deputy foreign minister.

The Alliance for Jewish Progressives — a campus left-wing group — objected to the presence of Hotovely, an outspoken member of the Likud party, and a key figure in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government. They ginned up an indictment of her as some sort of extremist because she had dared to call out the Palestinian Authority for its attempt to erase Jewish history and ties to Jerusalem.

They claim that anyone who supports the Jewish presence across the Green Line or in parts of Jerusalem is, by definition, a racist. They were also upset that the Hillel chapter had refused to sponsor appearances by anti-Zionists, or those whose presentation consisted of slanders of the IDF for its efforts to halt Palestinian terror.

Yet rather than dismissing this complaint, the Princeton Hillel branch cancelled Hotovely’s appearance. Princeton’s Hillel Director Rabbi Julie Roth — who eight years ago shut down plans to host a critic of radical Islam — defended the move by disingenuously claiming that although the event had been planned some time ago and was part of a tour of US campuses, Hotovely’s speech had not been properly approved.

The anti-Zionist campus group Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) seeks “to isolate, demonize, and ultimately destroy” Israel with the help of terror-linked financial and ideological supporters, according to a new report by a Jerusalem-based think tank.

Authored by Dan Diker and Jamie Berk of the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, the report cautioned against viewing SJP “as a pro-Palestinian equivalent to pro-Israel student groups,” noting that it rejects cooperation with organizations that support Jewish self-determination, incites against Jewish students and rejects Israel’s existence in any borders.

The report highlighted multiple instances of American Jewish students being targeted for “anti-Semitic vandalism, verbal attacks, and outright violence” by SJP members, and pointed to studies conducted by the Brandeis University and the watchdog group AMCHA Initiative, which “found a correlation between the presence of SJP and a rise in campus anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism.”

In one of several examples provided, the report pointed to Professor M. Shahid Alam, Northeastern University’s SJP faculty advisor, who in 2012 told students that they should be proud to be called antisemites. “Wear that as a sign of distinction,” Alam said in filmed remarks. “This proves that I’m working for the right side, for the just cause.”

Jewish students also complained of being “spat on, harassed, and assaulted on campus by SJP protestors” at Stanford, Cornell and Loyola University in Chicago. “In 2014, a man tabling for SJP at Temple University punched a student in the face and called him a ‘kike’ and ‘baby-killer’ for asking to discuss Israel,” the report noted. “In 2010, a Jewish student holding a sign saying ‘Israel Wants Peace’ was rammed with a shopping cart by an SJP activist during University of California, Berkeley’s Israel Apartheid Week.”

Anti-Defamation League National Director CEO Jonathan Greenblatt slammed The New School on Monday over the Manhattan-based institution’s upcoming hosting of a panel discussion on antisemitism that will feature several prominent anti-Israel activists.

Participants in the Nov. 28 event — titled “Antisemitism and the Struggle for Justice” — will include Women’s March co-chair Linda Sarsour and Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) Executive Director Rebecca Vilkomerson.

“Having Linda Sarsour & head of JVP leading a panel on #antisemitism is like Oscar Meyer leading a panel on vegetarianism,” Greenblatt tweeted on Monday. “These panelists know the issue, but unfortunately, from perspective of fomenting it rather than fighting it.”

“Seriously there’s not a single Jewish organization that studies this issue and/or fights this disease (such as @adl_national) would take this panel seriously, let alone the institution that put it together,” Greenblatt continued. “It’s a sad day for the @theNewSchool.”

A description of the panel — found on its Eventbrite page – says, “Antisemitism is harmful and real. But when antisemitism is redefined as criticism of Israel, critics of Israeli policy become accused and targeted more than the growing far-right. Join us for a discussion on how to combat antisemitism today.”

Political BDS Fails
Maryland Governor signs order barring state business with companies that boycott Israel
Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan signed an executive order on Monday that prohibits the state from doing business with companies engaged in a boycott of Israel.

FIFA says it won’t sanction Israel over settlement teams, irks Palestinians
The Palestinians had hoped FIFA would censure Israel over the settlement teams, thereby forcing them to either drop the clubs from the Israel Football Association or risk losing FIFA membership.

Wisconsin Governor Bars Contracts With Firms That Boycott Israel
Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker signed an executive order that prohibits state agencies from entering into contracts with companies that boycott Israel.

Wisconsin Inks Water Technology Deals With Israel
Institutions from Israel and Wisconsin this week signed two agreements to collaborate on water technology. One accord, between the Zuckerberg Institute for Water Research at Israel’s Ben-Gurion University of the Negev and Wisconsin’s Water Council, paves the way for Wisconsin’s branch of the National Science Foundation to establish an Israel-based bureau.

Missouri Governor announces pact between Israeli cybersecurity firm and Missouri colleges
Gov. Eric Greitens announced on Friday a pact between the state of Missouri and HackerUSA, a cyber security education firm with roots in Israel.

Support for boycotts of Israel reaches a 4-year low

Jewish designers, in other words, aren’t worth so much as a nod in the Met exhibit, let alone in the Times. Ralph Lauren, Calvin Klein, Zac Posen, Marc Jacobs, Isaac Mizrahi, Donna Karan, Michael Kors, Levi Strauss, Tory Burch, Kenneth Cole, Diane von Furstenberg, Anne Klein, Arnold Scaasi, Jacobi Press, Martin Greenfield — what are they, chopped liver? It takes a certain amount of nerve to claim that these folks were all “engaged in a dialogue with Catholicism,” or that the real “majority” story of fashion and religion is a Catholic story, and that Jews are just some sort of sideshow.

As if to prove my point, the Times mentions that the exhibit is being sponsored in part by Condé Nast and by Stephen Schwarzman. Schwarzman is Jewish and Condé Nast is controlled by the Newhouse family, which is also Jewish.

The Times article carries the byline of Vanessa Friedman, last seen here mangling the Exodus narrative. Friedman had no problem summoning the courage to challenge Bolton’s judgment in other areas.

An article by Andrew Pierce published in the Daily Mail (Out of the shadows, the powerful fixer behind Priti Patel’s downfall, Nov. 9) profiled the “influential and shrewd political operator”, Lord Polak, the British Jew who reportedly set up Priti Patel’s meetings with Israeli political figures last August.

Polak, honorary president of Conservative Friends of Israel, is characterised by Pierce as “a smooth talker” who turned CFI “into one of the most powerful and influential lobbying groups in the history of the Tory Party”.

Pierce then added:
It has tentacles in every corner – it’s believed that as many as 80 per cent of Tory MPs are members – but he has done it by operating behind the scenes

Though this was not the first media outlet to contextualise the Patel row in terms of the dangerous influence of the pro-Israel lobby on British politics, we tweeted Mr. Pierce and lodged a complaint with Daily Mail editors over the word “tentacles”, a word which evokes classic antisemitic tropes and imagery accusing Jews of trying to control the world.

For one thing, you need a clear-cut plaintiff who has suffered as a result of sloppy media coverage, and who has the finances and fortitude to wage a lengthy legal battle whose outcome is by no means certain. Such lawsuits aren’t common, but two come to mind.

One was filed by the late Ariel Sharon against Time. In 1983, the magazine falsely reported that Sharon, then the Minister of Defense, had encouraged Lebanese Phalangists to massacre Palestinians living Beirut’s Sabra and Shatila refugee camps after the assassination of Lebanese president Bashir Gemayel.

Sharon and Time reached an out of court settlement in 1986 in which Time paid an undisclosed but reportedly “substantial” sum. Under the terms of the settlement, Time also admitted that the description of Sharon’s alleged conversations with Phalangists in Beirut was “erroneous.”

More recently was a lawsuit against Associated Press and the French paper, Libération over a September, 2000 photograph that incorrectly described US student Tuvia Grossman — who had been rescued from a Palestinian lynch mob — as a Palestinian.

A Paris judge in 2002 ordered the two news services to pay Grossman 4,500 Euros in damages for misrepresenting him. You can read more about Grossman’s story how it played into HonestReporting’s founding by seeing The Photo That Started It All.

Our latest Watchdog of the Week is Joel Schneider from Los Angeles. Joel was reading the BBC Travel website when he spotted the reference to “native people” revolting against the Romans in ancient Israel between 66 and 70CE.

Who were these “native people”?

The Jews of course, who, in this BBC story, had been erased from the history of the region as opposed to a number of other peoples who were specifically named.

While HonestReporting looks at an enormous number of media outlets, we rely on you, our readers, to alert us to serious problems in places that might not necessarily be on our extensive radar. BBC Travel was one of those places.

Joel contacted HR through our Red Alert page enabling us to take prompt action and demand a correction from the BBC. Following HR’s complaints and a significant wave of anger on social media prompted by our exposure of the issue, the BBC amended its story to include specific mention of the Jewish people and included an Editor’s Note explaining the change.

You might be familiar with Patreon, an online platform which enables users to pledge monthly donations to support their favorite artists, podcasters, and other content creators. You’re probably not familiar with its evil twin, Hatreon. Founded in response to moves by sites like Patreon and Kickstarter to crack down on hateful individuals, Hatreon provides the same tools to far-right bigots with none of the oversight. And in a few short months, it has been wildly successful.

In August, when Hatreon first went live but before it fully launched, alt-right luminary Richard Spencer began pulling in a modest $85 per month. Today, just a few short months later, he clocks in at $918 per month and counting. Back in August, Andrew Anglin, proprietor of the neo-Nazi Daily Stormer, was taking in $700 a month from fans. Today, he is raking in $7,739 a month, or a whopping $92,868 a year. In other words, despite the feel-good foisting of Anglin and company from mainstream internet crowdfunding platforms and online hosting services, he is still approaching a six-figure retainer for racism.

The success of Hatreon offers a cautionary corrective to those who argue that the solution to online hate is simply to censor it. Setting aside the free speech concerns raised by such an approach—who decides what is hateful?—it is not actually adequate on today’s internet. Bigots cannot truly be booted off the web, and can easily create their own alternative platforms when required. Bump them off one web host, and they will find another in a place like Hong Kong, as the Daily Stormer did. Knock them off Patreon, you get Hatreon.

The Washington Post often displays two standards of language in its international coverage: one for Israel and another for the rest of the world.

Take, for example, the paper’s use of the term “terrorist.” Post reporting on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict shows an aversion to the word, with the less descriptive “militant” often being a preferred substitute. An Oct. 30, 2017 report “Seven Palestinian militants killed as Israel blows up tunnel from Gaza,” is but one of many examples.

When he was The Post’s Jerusalem bureau chief, William Booth almost exclusively relied on the term “militant” to describe members of U.S.-designated terrorist groups, such as Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), among others who target Israel (see, for example “While Israel held its fire, the militant group Hamas did not,” July 15, 2014). By contrast, the paper’s reporters hardly—if ever—used the term “terrorist” to describe those perpetrating and planning terror against the Jewish state.

Now chief of the paper’s London bureau, Booth has reported on terrorist attacks by the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) in Europe (see, for example “Barcelona suspect says terrorist cell planned to bomb monuments in city,” Aug. 22, 2017). And now, he uses the more precise “terrorist” instead of “militant.” Yet, both ISIS and Hamas, to name two examples, are U.S.-designated terrorist groups who commit terror attacks; it’s unclear what difference there is beyond the fact that one is primarily engaged in the realm of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

As regular readers will be aware, since the beginning of this year there have been five separate incidents in which missiles were launched into Israel from the Sinai peninsula and nine additional missile attacks from the Gaza Strip.

The BBC’s English language services have not reported any of those fourteen attacks.

Fortunately – and not least because Israeli civilians are well-drilled in taking appropriate precautions when such incidents take place – none of those attacks resulted in serious injuries or fatalities.

On November 4th a missile fired at the Saudi Arabian city of Riyadh from Yemen was intercepted and no injuries were reported.

With the constant refrain of Islamophobia parroted by the mainstream media, it might be interesting for them to note one telling statistic from the FBI as they tallied hate crimes in 2016: Of the 1,538 hate crimes motivated by religious bias that were reported by law enforcement, a whopping 54% were anti-Jewish; more than double the 25% that were anti-Muslim. After the precipitous drop from the anti-Jewish crimes to the anti-Muslim crimes, there was another huge drop to the third-most targeted group: Catholics, at 4%.

15,254 law enforcement agencies participated in the Hate Crime Statistics Program.

834 hate crimes were counted against Jews; 318 against Muslims, and 63 against Catholics. Hate crimes against Jews rose 9% from 2015.

In 2014, Jews in the United States were targeted 40.7% more than Muslims.

Interestingly, despite the fact that Jews were far more targeted than Muslims, Attorney General Loretta Lynch, speaking at the Muslim Advocates annual dinner on December 3, 2015, focused on anti-Muslim acts, saying, “Since 9/11, we’ve had over 1,000 investigations into acts of anti-Muslim hatred, including rhetoric and bigoted actions, with over 45 prosecutions arising out of that. I think sadly that number’s going to continue.”

If David Icke is not Britain’s leading antisemite I am yet to come across anybody else who is preaching the Protocols of the Elders of Zion to thousands of bewitched followers in sold-out arenas in Britain. Former footballer and sports presenter David Icke has been Britain’s leading conspiracy theorist for decades; hugely popular throughout the world and capable of selling out venues usually reserved for those of rock star status. Most famous for his belief in multi-dimensional reptiles but unfortunately less well known for the ancient anti-Jewish prejudice that lie at the heart of so many of his theories.

That’ll be where I come in.

The Protocols of the Elder of Zion is a notorious piece of antisemitic propaganda. A forgery concocted by Czarist Russian secret police used to incite the Russian populace against its Jewish population. It tells the story of a secret meeting in 1897 where leading members of the Jewish community throughout the world convened to discuss the trivial matter of their secret plan to take over the world (hopefully with nibbles). To accomplish this dastardly plot they would infiltrate all political parties, take ownership of the press and media in order to control ‘both sides’ of the argument; they would even disseminate pornography alcohol and drugs to corrupt decent good folk.

They would do this in order to spread dissension which would lead to revolution which in turn would lead to all-out war. Down on their luck the people’s of the world would then look to the Jews, now in control of everything, to lead them out of the darkness the evil Jews had manufactured.

Mwahahah!

For the most part, Israel has remained silent about Holocaust revisionism and incidents of anti-Semitism in countries that have friendly ties to the Jewish state. But on Monday, a spokesman for its Foreign Ministry called the Warsaw event “a dangerous march of extreme and racist elements,” and urged Polish authorities to act against the organizers.

Last year, Israel’s ambassador to Poland, Anna Azari, hosted Tadeusz Rydzyk, a Catholic priest who runs a radio station that the US State Department has called a main purveyor of anti-Semitism. She defended the move as important outreach even as Never Again, Pankowski’s group, called it a “big mistake.”

Azari did speak out last month against proposed legislation on restitution, arguing its preclusion of claims by distant relatives and non-citizens discriminates against Jews whose families lost property in Poland during or after the Holocaust. An Israeli restitution official told JTA, referring to the proposed law: “First the Nazis seized private property and then the communist authorities of Poland seized it, when most Polish Jews were already dead.”

Ultimately, however, Israel’s attitude seems to be guided by comments Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made in 2013 during the visit by Polish President Bronislaw Komorowski to Jerusalem. Noting the suffering of non-Jewish Poles and Jews under Nazi occupation, Netanyahu observed that “Poland and Israel have to support each other.”

Two antisemitic posters were discovered at the University of British Columbia's War Memorial Gym on Saturday. The discovery came on the eve of Remembrance Day events which commemorate Canada's military veterans.

According to local news outlet CKNW, one poster depicted Nazi soldiers with text declaring: "Lest We Forget — The True Heroes of World War II." Another poster featured a large swastika. Both posters displayed the URLs of racist websites.

B’nai Brith Canada issued a statement on Sunday condemning those who put the posters up. “Once again, we see antisemitism and neo-Nazism raising their ugly heads at a B.C. university,” said Michael Mostyn, Chief Executive Officer of B’nai Brith Canada. “These disturbing incidents constitute a threat to Jewish students and other minorities on campus, as well as an unforgivable insult to Canadian veterans who made the ultimate sacrifice to defeat Nazi tyranny.”

A French court fined a teacher from a Parisian high school €1,500 last week for making anti-Semitic remarks including that the Jews “planned and organized the Holocaust.”

The ruling was welcomed by the World Zionist Organization on Tuesday.

According to an AFP report, the English teacher from the Lycée Janson de Sailly school made the anti-Semitic comments in 2016 on her Facebook account, which is accessible to students.

The court found her guilty of denying crimes against humanity and of racial defamation. She was also ordered to pay 500 Euros in damages to several organizations who brought the civil action, including SOS Racisme and the International League Against Racism and Anti-Semitism.

Yaakov Hagoel, vice chairman of the World Zionist Organization, welcomed the court’s decision and expressed his support for the judges “who saw fit to severely punish those who deny the injustice of the Holocaust and who try to blur history.”

The teacher, who was suspended in August 2016 and has declared that she is on long-term sick leave, did not attend her trial in October, citing her psychological state. Her lawyer had requested a psychological assessment but the court rejected this request, AFP reported.

Latin America's largest airline holding company, LATAM Airlines, announced last week that it will begin operating direct flights between Israel and South America in 2018.

According to the Chile-based airline, three weekly flights will be operated from Santiago en route to Israel, with a stop-over in Sao Paulo, Brazil. The Ministry of Tourism confirmed that talks are being held with the airline on the new commercial flights.

No direct flights currently exists between Israel and South American countries after Israel’s EL AL Airlines terminated its flights to Brazil, forcing passengers to stopover in European destinations.

LATAM was founded in 2012 as an umbrella airline incorporating LAN Airlines and TAM Airlines belonging to Chile and Brazil respectively. Since being founded, the group has set up subsidiaries in Colombia, Peru, Ecuador, Paraguay and Argentina.

The range of the airline’s aircraft includes a Boeing 787 and 767, and Airbus A350 and short and medium-range airbuses. (h/t Cliff)

Australian actor Bryan Brown is a household name in Australia – as is his wife Rachel Ward (who he met on the set of the Thorn Birds back in the day).

Bryan and Rachel were recently in Israel, firstly for the recent 100 years commemoration of the Battle of Beersheba

AUSTRALIAN film legend Bryan Brown has spoken of his admiration for the men of the Light Horse, who charged to victory at Beersheba.

Brown arrived in Beersheba on Sunday, as preparations were finalised for Tuesday’s commemoration. He will read from the writings of one of the ­Australians in the battle.

He said it was hard for ­people in 2017 to get their heads around what it must have been like for the soldiers 100 years ago.

“They charge, with their bayonets out of their guns, and charged and took over this town. And a lot of them died,’’ Brown said. “It’s pretty gutsy. It’s strange what is asked of people in wars.”

Brown was speaking at the Commonwealth War Graves Commission Cemetery in Beersheba, Israel. Today’s service will be attended by Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, Israeli Prime Minister Ben­jamin Netanyahu, and New ­Zealand’s Governor-general, Dame Patsy Reddy.

But also for the Arava International Film Festival, where Bryan was guest of honor, and where some classic films of Australian cinema were shown.

GQ named Israeli actress Gal Gadot its 2017 Woman of the Year — rebranding the honor “Wonder Woman of the Year” in her honor.

Gadot soared to international celebrity as the star of this year’s “Wonder Woman” blockbuster. Since the release of the movie, which grossed $412 million at the box office worldwide, she has become a household name in the United States and a source of pride for Israelis.

As Woman of the Year, Gadot will appear on the cover of GQ, a New York-based men’s magazine.

The article will be published Wednesday, but the monthly has already posted a teaser on its website, touting Gadot as a former Miss Israel and soldier in that nation’s army, and a “real-life badass.”

This once-pretty picture postcard town, on its own 4,000-foot high mesa nestling between a pair of much higher mountain ranges, is in a bad neighborhood when it comes to tolerance.

So the mystery of the Jewish holy figure Hazana, who is revered here by people of all the local faiths, is even more profound than it might otherwise be.
Amadiya is in the semiautonomous province of Kurdistan, which is the target of a crackdown by Baghdad after aiming to achieve independence from Iraq. This part of northern Iraq has been convulsed by violence since the advance of the Islamic State, which sent Christians fleeing, enslaved Yazidi women and killed Shiites on sight, until finally being wiped out in the area last month.

Today Amadiya’s population of 9,000 is overwhelmingly Kurdish Muslim. But in the early 20th century there were said to be about two-thirds that many people, about evenly divided among Muslims, Christians and Jews — although there were 10 mosques compared with two churches and two synagogues. Everyone was packed into a circumference of a mile and a half.

Amadiya’s Jews all left after the creation of Israel in 1948. And so many Christians have left amid successive regional upheavals that the remaining 20 or 30 families can no longer sustain both churches.

Eight decades ago, Jewish archivists facing death in the Warsaw Ghetto hid a trove of documents they hoped would bear testimony to the sufferings of the Holocaust.

Now part of the unparalleled archive has gone on display in its first permanent exhibition at the Polish capital’s Jewish Historical Institute.

“This is the greatest Jewish treasure of the war era, a treasure that shows death approaching. It conveys the testimonies of people destined to die in a few weeks, months or hours,” historian and exhibition curator Pawel Spiewak told AFP, ahead of the Ringelblum Archive’s official opening on Thursday.

Jewish historian and activist Emmanuel Ringelblum led a team that collected and hid the documents from the Nazis, burying them in metal milk jugs and boxes.

Seventy-five years and four days after my mother was sent into hiding as a baby in wartime Holland, her rescuers Aad and Fie Versnel were finally posthumously recognized by Yad Vashem as members of that select band, the Righteous Among The Nations.

It has been a long time coming, but had it not been for a Facebook post that miraculously traced the family within just four days, this story might never have been told.

Three years ago I published “Two Prayers Before Bedtime,” a memoir about my grandmother Cilla Bitterman, who sent her daughter (my mother) Renate into hiding during the war.

Lacking documentary records, we estimated that she was forced into hiding at just 19 months old, in the middle of September 1942, exactly 75 years earlier.

The bravery of my grandparents in making the heart-wrenching decision to send their son and daughter to an unknown fate was only possible thanks to those people, living in Nazi-occupied Holland, who were willing to face the utmost risk and sacrifice, endangering their own lives to save another.

You’ve probably never heard the story of Margaret Lambert, or Greta Bergmann, as she was known in her native Germany. Born in 1914 in Laupheim, a town in Southwest Germany, Bergmann quickly made a name for herself as a track-and-field star with a specialty in the high jump. But in the 1930s, as Hitler and the Nazi party rose to power, everything changed. Her admission to the University of Berlin was withdrawn, and in 1934 she moved to England for college, winning the British women’s high jump championship the following year.

And then she was called back to Germany with an unusual and threatening mandate: The Nazis wanted her to try out for the 1936 Olympics in Berlin.

Facing international pressure for hosting the Olympics while openly persecuting huge portions of their population, the Nazis needed to create at least the appearance of tolerance. Which meant they needed a prominent Jewish athlete like Bergman. She returned to Germany and set a record at the final Olympic trials—held in Adolf Hitler Stadium.

But her hopes of competing in the Olympics were soon dashed. Only days before the Games began, the German Olympic committee told her she didn’t make the team. She left for the United States in 1937, married fellow German Jewish runner Bruno Lambert, and never looked back. When she died in July of this year, she was 103 years old.

A new documentary, The Margaret Lambert Story, now airing on the Olympic Channel as the first installment in their Foul Play series, gives Lambert the spotlight she has long deserved. It’s not the first effort to bring Lambert’s story to the masses. Writer Molly Lambert, Margaret’s granddaughter, eloquently told her story in the New Yorker last month.

The Holocaust deprived them of celebrating an important Jewish milestone, but on Monday, 45 survivors finally celebrated their bar and bat mitzva ceremonies for the first time, at a communal event at the Western Wall.

The participants are all Israeli citizens who immigrated from the former Soviet Union.

“We ran away with nothing but the clothes we had on us," recalled Aspir Ravicher, 89, who was 11-years-old when WWII broke out. Her family fled from their homes in Ukraine to Russia. "We had nothing, we were hungry all the time, we lived in a crowded place – I remember that it was mostly cold and I was very hungry. A bat mitzva “was not something we could have done,” she explains.

"All my life, I felt that I missed it so much. I am so excited and happy,” said Alexander Buchnik, 87, who reached bar mitzva age immediately upon the liberation of Moscow from the Nazis. When the war ended, the family returned to the city. “But we could not celebrate my bar mitzva,” he said. His mother “was busy surviving and keeping us alive―we could not think about it at all.”

In 1994, Buchnik immigrated to Israel with his family and said that he had long been waiting for the moment when he would celebrate his bar mitzvah. “I thought about it during the course of my life, and all my life I felt that I missed it so much,” he says.

KUWAIT: An international conference on the continued plight of Palestinian children amid the ongoing Israeli transgression opened in Kuwait yesterday. sponsored and attended by HH the Amir Sheikh Sabah Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber Al-Sabah. along with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. Addressing a packed audience comprising local. Arab and Islamic dignitaries. the Palestinian leader said that this special event. held under the auspices of HH the Amir. shines a light on the plight of Palestinian children. Abbas lamented that Palestinian children have been on the receiving end of some of the most horrific crimes in the history of humanity, which illustrates the significance of this conference.

 The conference is aimed at highlighting the suffering of the Palestinian children in view of Israel's violations of the international conventions of the rights of the child.

Congresswoman Betty McCollum (DFL-Minn.) today introduced legislation— the Promoting Human Rights by Ending Israeli Military Detention of Palestinian Children Act — to prevent United States tax dollars from supporting the Israeli military’s ongoing detention and mistreatment of Palestinian children.

“This legislation highlights Israel’s system of military detention of Palestinian children and ensures that no American assistance to Israel supports human rights violations,” Congresswoman McCollum said. “Peace can only be achieved by respecting human rights, especially the rights of children. Congress must not turn a blind eye the unjust and ongoing mistreatment of Palestinian children living under Israeli occupation.”

The legislation has been endorsed by the American Friends Service Committee, Amnesty International USA, Center for Constitutional Rights, Churches for Middle East Peace, Defense for Children International - Palestine, Friends Committee on National Legislation, Global Ministries of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) and United Church of Christ, Jewish Voice for Peace, Mennonite Central Committee, Presbyterian Church (USA), the U.S. Campaign for Palestinian Rights, United Methodists for Kairos Response (UMKR), and United Methodist General Board of Church and Society.

Jerusalem continuing to remain under this occupation today is the result of the fact that the world order insistently and stubbornly works for a history and international order that serves Zionism. It is the result of considering that the world is made up of only five [countries]. But beyond all this, Jerusalem's current state is a reflection of the fact that more than 1.5 billion Muslims do not live in line with Islamic practices and do not know whom to accept as enemy or friend.

As long as Muslims do not distinguish between who are friends and who are enemies, as long as they struggle with each other and pave the way for tyrants, Jerusalem will continue to cry in its present state of sadness.
Seeing is not like hearing. We need to go and see Jerusalem's state. Which of mankind’s mistakes and evil has caused Jerusalem to end up in such a state? We need to think about this in Jerusalem.

 It is necessary to see how words about Jerusalem do not reflect the city’s state and how the words remain incompetent in describing the levels to which mankind can fall. To see it, we need to head out to Jerusalem.

Masjid al-Aqsa is the third major temple of Islam after Mecca and Medina, which the Prophet recommended and encouraged us to visit. This mosque should not be ruined there under the guardianship of the despicable Zionist occupation.

 Prophet Musa [Moses] circumnavigated his people in the mountains around Canaan for 40 years, expecting them to get rid of the slavery they had internalized for centuries under the Pharaoh's persecution. The moment they got rid of it, they started resorting to the heresy of slaving all people to themselves.

The scenes of intifada that Palestinian children repeat every day make you remember that Prophet Dawood [David] challenged Jalut [Goliath], against whom no one could dare to face, and that he defeated him with the weakest weapon, striking him with a slingshot.

Here, you also remember Prophet Suleiman’s temple construction  and meeting with Balqis, Jews’ settlement and their consecutive exile.

 As you remember all this by looking at each street and building, you continue to face today's bitter truth on all these layers of history at every corner: Zionist occupation.

Zionism is a form of perversion. It is precisely the extreme form of the feeling that what happened in Jerusalem is not actually over and that page will be reopened at any moment. Claiming to revert history, reconstruct a ruined building- temple, and go back to the beginning by ignoring what happened. Insisting on condemning the whole world to a reversed time cycle with the fantasy of reversing the time.

Title: Brood of Serpents  Caption (not shown): “The Jew’s symbol is a worm, not without reason. He seeks to creep up on what he wants.”

Title: Don't Let Go. Text: Do not grow weary, do not loosen the grip, This poisonous serpent may not slip away. Better that one strangles it to death Than that our misery begin anew.

Title: Insatiable  The lead article is on the Moscow show trials. The cartoon caption: “Far be it from the Jews to enslave a single people. Their goal is to devour the entire world.”

Since the late 1920s, Streicher's vulgar and inconsiderate style was increasingly a cause of embarrassment for the Nazi party. In 1936 the sale of the Der Stürmer in Berlin was restricted during the Olympic Games. Joseph Goebbels tried to ban the newspaper in 1938. Hermann Göring forbade Der Stürmer in all of his departments, and Baldur von Schirach banned it as a means of education in the Hitler Youth hostels and other education facilities by a "Reichsbefehl" ("Reich command").

Michael Chikindas' tweet

The creepiest infographic you'll see today, courtesy of the NYT. Categories include "Jewish?"http://t.co/NenSllbqk8pic.twitter.com/PxDgZY3bTE

— Oren Kessler (@OrenKessler) September 10, 2015

“blatantly anti-Israel, disparaging of Israeli soldiers … and is entirely inappropriate to include on a test administered to young minds.”

To a Jewish student on this campus, seeing this cartoon [of Dershowitz] in the Daily Cal is a reminder that we are not always welcome in the spaces we call home…

Telling Jews that we can or cannot define what is offensive to us, because of our status as privileged minority in the United States, is antisemitic.

If you found this post interesting or informative, please it below. Thanks!

Any genuine and serious peace negotiating plan for Israel and the Palestinians should naturally be seen as a welcome alternative to the present situation of impasse in the peace process. However, the American peace plan should not be overestimated or idealized by exaggerated media hype and political manipulation.

To succeed, there is the necessity to correct many of the existing factors that are presently feeding an atmosphere of hatred, distrust, and suspicion among the political leaderships and general publics of the two sides.

First and foremost, the ongoing Palestinian diplomatic offensive against Israel is incompatible with any claim by the Palestinian leadership that it desires peace with Israel or that it intends to return to any negotiating mode.

Mahmoud Abbas and the Palestinian leadership repeatedly deny both the historic rights of the Jewish people as well as the very right of Israel to exist. They cannot claim that they are willing to negotiate and live in peace with Israel, while at the same time openly denying the very right of Israel, the other party to any bona fide negotiation, to exist.

They cannot pretend to be open to reestablishing a neighborly relationship with Israel while, at the same time, deliberately discouraging any existing efforts at normalization of relations with Israelis. Their "denormalization" policy is anathema to any idea of developing good neighborliness between the two peoples for their mutual benefit.

The Palestinian-generated international BDS campaign aimed at harming and undermining Israel economically and culturally through boycotts and social propaganda is a further example of the very antithesis of any genuine intention to seek a peaceful mode of co-existence.

If Abbas and the Palestinian leadership genuinely intend to return to a negotiating mode with Israel, they cannot continuously and systematically alienate the Israeli public through incitement to terror and violence, false accusations, and hostile propaganda in violation of their Oslo Accord commitments.

Netanyahu said that he holds the Iranian-supported Hamas regime in Gaza responsible for any attacks against Israel emanating from its territory.

Netanyahu’s statement was notable since just last week Hamas and Fatah began implementing their power sharing arrangement in Gaza. Fatah forces, controlled by Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas, supposedly took responsibility for border crossings between Gaza and Israel.

By insisting that Hamas is responsible rather than Fatah, despite the agreement, Netanyahu signaled that as far as Israel is concerned, through its power- sharing deal with Fatah Hamas has succeeded in becoming the Palestinian version of Hezbollah. Just as Hezbollah pretends to be a faction in Lebanese politics, when in fact it controls all aspects of the Lebanese state, so Hamas remains in charge of all aspects of governance in Gaza while using the PA as a fig leaf.

This brings us back to Miller, Sokolsky and Malley and their pining for a reset button.

It is hard to view their positions as the basis for forging constructive US policies for the region, transformed by eight years of US appeasement of Iran at the expense of its allies and interests.

Insisting that Mohammed abandon the steps he has taken to expand the prospects of Saudi survival in favor of a policy of pretending that a stable equilibrium can be struck between Iran and Saudi Arabia (and Israel) is not a policy for restoring equilibrium.

Putting Hariri back in office in Beirut so he can continue to serve as a fig leaf for Hezbollah and Iran is not a policy for restoring equilibrium. They are both means for pretending reality away while enabling Iran to wage a continuous war against America’s allies with ever greater power and capacity.

It makes sense that Obama partisans are unhappy with King Salman and Crown Prince Mohammed. It makes sense that they are unhappy with Netanyahu and with Trump. All four of these leaders are impudently insisting on basing their policies on recognizing the reality Obama spent his two terms ignoring: Iran is not appeasable.

It takes particular gall for European Union representatives to express "humanitarian" outrage at Israel for razing illegal structures in the West Bank -- while the EU is in league with Palestinian criminals who have been brazenly stealing Arab-owned land.

There has been massive "behind-the-scenes" Palestinian construction, the goal of which is "to create irreversible facts on the ground," and completely encircle Jerusalem. Once the buildings – which "do not meet even the most minimum standards required by engineers, architects and housing planners"– are erected, the apartments are sold cheaply ($25,000-$50,000), to guarantee they are purchased and populated quickly.

If there is any debt to pay here, it is not Israel's to Europe, but the other way around. Belgium and the rest of the EU should be embracing its natural ally, the democratic Jewish state, against all forces that support and perpetrate violence, while rejecting peace.

In September, Palestinian Media Watch exposed that a PA school built using money from the Belgium government was named after Dalal Mughrabi, a terrorist who led the murder of 37 civilians. Shortly after PMW’s exposure, Didier Vanderhasselt, a spokesperson for the Belgian Foreign Ministry, responded that Belgium “unequivocally condemns the glorification of terrorist attacks,” and “will not allow itself to be associated with the names of terrorists in any way.” He added that “in the meantime Belgium will put on hold any projects related to the construction or equipment of Palestinian schools.” [The Algemeiner, Oct. 7, 2017]

Following the Belgian announcement, the official PA daily reported that Belgian and PA officials would meet on Wednesday, Oct. 18, 2017, to discuss the issue.

However, on the very same day that the meeting was scheduled for, Donia Al-Watan, an independent Palestinian news agency, reported that Eric De Muynck, a representative of the Belgian Development Cooperation Institution, participated in the inauguration of a new PA school named “Defiance 6 School.” [Donia Al-Watan, Oct. 18, 2017]

The name “Defiance 6 School” was given to the school in reference to the fact that the previous structures that housed the school were recently destroyed by Israel, since they were erected in Area C without the relevant building permits. The PA therefore built the new school to “defy” Israel.

A large, bipartisan delegation of lawmakers warned the Trump administration on Tuesday that its regional policies are laying the groundwork for Iran to takeover Syria, according to a letter sent to the State Department that urged the administration to present Congress with a plan for combating the Islamic Republic's foothold in the war torn country.

Nearly 50 members of Congress who recently returned from a trip to the Middle East warned Secretary of State Rex Tillerson that Syria is falling into Iran's hands, a situation that has caused anxiety among Israeli leaders, according to a copy of the letter obtained by the Washington Free Beacon.

The two-page letter includes intelligence that Iran is using Syria to establish weapons factories that arm the Lebanese terror group Hezbollah. If the United States does not take immediate action to combat Iran’s presence in Syria it is likely to establish a permanent military foothold in the country, which would endanger U.S. troops and allies such as Israel.

The letter comes as many in Congress on both sides of the aisle have begun to express concerns about what they say is the Trump administration's failure to effectively combat Iran's growing military foothold across the Middle East, including in Syria, Yemen, Iraq, Lebanon, and elsewhere.

The situation has become so pressing that Congress is requesting the Trump administration present it with a concrete plan to combat Iran's growing military foothold in Syria, according to the latest letter.

"Should Iran be allowed to maintain a permanent military presence in Syria, it would pose a significant threat to Israel, Jordan, and United States interests," the delegation of more than 40 lawmakers wrote. "A permanent Iranian presence in Syria would connect Lebanon-based Hezbollah to Iran via Iraq and Syria. This would give Iran the ability to project power from the Persian Gulf to the Mediterranean Sea."

"Any agreement or policy that allows Iran to station forces on or near Israel and Jordan's border does not serve U.S. interests," the letter stated.

The Palestinian Authority (PA) has denied reports that PA President Mahmoud Abbas was presented with an ultimatum by Saudi Arabia to accept a peace deal outlined by the Trump administration or to resign from his position.

In addition to the Saudi demand to “accept Trump’s peace plan or quit,” Abbas was also told that he and other Fatah party officials must distance themselves from Iran and its Lebanese terror proxy Hezbollah, Israel’s Channel 10 reported.

“We completely reject the Israeli report. This is not true at all. Abbas’ meeting in Saudi Arabia was a positive one,” a Fatah spokesman, Osama Qawasmeh, told Al Jazeera.

“The Saudis expressed support for the Palestinian position, which is a two-state solution built on the June 1967 borders, in line with international law. They also expressed support for the Palestinian reconciliation. Our position and the Saudi position are aligned,” he said.

Reports of the Saudi pressure followed Abbas’s unplanned visit to Saudi Arabia last week to meet with King Salman and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

The New York Times’ practice of hurling adjectives at Israeli politicians and pro-Israel Americans has been criticized here.

But sometimes the Times journalism is just bad journalism, not biased journalism. So in fairness to the Times, it’s worth noting that the newspaper has also hurled a not-exactly-favorable adjective — actually, a present participle — at the president of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas.

A front-page news article in Sunday’s Times by Peter Baker reported, “Abbas is aging.”

That is hardly news to careful readers of the Times.

A September 1, 2015, dispatch from Ramallah by Jodi Rudoren reported, “Mahmoud Abbas, the aging Palestinian president, may be paving the way for his exit from political life — or he may be trying to consolidate power by crippling all his rivals. “

A March 14, 2016, Times staff editorial described Abbas as “a weak and aging leader who has given up on peace.”

An April 17, 2017, dispatch from Jerusalem by Ian Fisher said Abbas “is aging and unpopular.”

And an October 10, 2017, report from Jerusalem by Isabel Kershner referred again to “the aging and unpopular Mr. Abbas.”

Mexico, a key nation in the Western Hemisphere and a major player in the exclusive G-20 club, has announced that it is changing the way it has tended to vote on issues relating to Israel. In the past, Mexico would automatically vote with the Arab bloc, and its representatives stuck their hands in their air against Israel with annoying uniformity. From now on, Mexico will abstain from votes or support Israeli positions in international forums. There is no doubt that the aid we sent to Mexico after the recent earthquake helped strengthen bilateral relations. But the real reason for Mexico's about-face runs much deeper and is far more significant.

For decades, Israel has excelled at security but passed up (mostly for objective reasons) any attempt to join the big players in the international arena. We needed big patrons – especially the U.S. – to provide us with coverage and protect us against nonmilitary attacks. Little by little, and without most Israelis even noticing, an exciting process has gotten underway. In recent years, our country has turned into a superpower in many fields: economics, research, development, and more.

But even more important: Our leaders, especially Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, were able to harness our new capabilities and turn them into diplomatic power. Israel has ceased to be a passive player, lacking initiative and reliant on the kindness of others. Rather than close ourselves off in a position of diplomatic defense, we've started to look for ways to reach out to a lot of countries that never gave us a thought in the past. Building bridges with the awakening powers in Asia, Africa, and Latin America was the right move, and it is already bearing fruit.

A Jewish group called Alliance of Jewish Progressives (AJP) organized a petition accusing Hotovely of “stating her opposition to a Palestinian state” and “repeatedly making racist statements.” The Hillel people panicked and canceled the speech, which was eventually delivered at the Chabad center in Princeton. Attendance was impressive, perhaps in protest of the silencing. Hillel International President Eric Fingerhut soon came to his senses and issued an apology to Hotovely.

I swear that my political opinions on the settlements are the exact opposite of Hotovely’s opinions, but I haven’t found a hint of racism in her comments. Hotovely issued a statement claiming that “there is a liberal dictatorship ruling here, which prevents American students from hearing a representative of the Israeli government … Instead of giving a young American a chance to hear a variety of opinions, a narrow mindset prevents him from doing so.”

Another attempt was made to cancel Hotovely’s speech at Columbia University, which was held as planned early last week. The Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) organization tried to prevent Hotovely’s speech at New York University, arguing that the deputy foreign minister is denying the Palestinians' right to an independent state. Hotovely, by the way, is in favor of an annexation that will lead to the bestowment of citizenship.

That’s interesting. The Kurds’ right to an independent state has supporters and opponents. Similar disputes are taking place concerning Tibet and Western Sahara, as well as Catalonia these days. Are political opinions a reason for boycotting someone?

Last spring, the same organization trying to silence Hotovely, JVP, hosted Rasmea Odeh, a Palestinian terrorist who is about to be deported from the United states after entering the country deceitfully. Odeh is calling for Israel’s destruction just like the BDS leaders are denying the state’s right to exist. Has it ever crossed these activists’ mind that there’s something wrong with their rules of ethics? Don’t make them laugh. Anti-Semites have no rules of ethics, even if they’re Jewish.

A candidate in Chile’s upcoming presidential election declared Israel “a threat to world peace.”

Eduardo Artes, leader of the leftist Patriotic Union party, made the comment in an interview broadcast Friday with Chile’s HispanTV. He also pledged that as president he would conduct a comprehensive review of his country’s relations with the Jewish state.


“The treaties that Chile currently maintains with the Israeli Zionist entity in military, police, economic and cultural terms must all be reviewed in a patriotic and popular government, since they clearly damage our independence,” Artes said.

“We are going to study all our relations with the Zionist entity because they are relations that generally harm world peace, not only the peace and survival of the Arab peoples, particularly the Palestinian people in the Middle East.”

Artes spoke days before Chile’s presidential, parliamentary and regional council elections, which are slated for November 19.

Artes is not expected to win enough votes to make it to the second round of voting.

Lebanon's Christian Maronite Patriarch arrived in Saudi Arabia on Monday, with his historic visit to the kingdom under even greater scrutiny amid serious political tensions between the countries.

Patriarch Beshara al-Rai heads the Maronite church, which has a presence in Lebanon, Syria and Cyprus and follows an Eastern rite of the Roman Catholic church. Maronites number about 900,000 in Lebanon, around a quarter of the population.

An official visit to Saudi Arabia by such a senior figure marks a rare act of religious openness for Riyadh, which hosts the holiest sites in Islam and bans the practice of other religions, but says it wants to open up more to the world.

During his visit, Rai is expected to meet King Salman, his son and heir-apparent, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, and Saad al-Hariri, who has been in Riyadh since resigning as Lebanese prime minister on Nov. 4.

Top Lebanese government officials and senior sources close to Hariri believe Saudi Arabia coerced Hariri into resigning and has put him under effective house arrest since he flew to Saudi Arabia more than a week ago.

Israel is extremely unprepared to address the multiple threats presented by drones, either from cross-border terrorism or from unregulated and dangerous domestic use, the State Comptroller reported on Wednesday.

Regarding cross-border terrorism-style drone threats, Joseph Shapira said that the IDF “has not developed a complete response” and “needs to immediately carry out more preparatory work” to address the issue.

Shapira also wrote that “gaps exist in regulating drone use” domestically and that his report is highlighting those gaps “in order to improve the response to the threat and to reduce the danger” posed by that threat.

According to estimates from the Civil Aviation Authority, by the end of 2017 there will be a staggering 20,000 drones being operated domestically for a variety of business and recreational use. That number is expected to grow to many tens of thousands in only a few years. Globally, around one million drones are bought per year.

Drone use has expanded at a stunning rate as drones have become cheaper, easier to use and more widely available in local stores.

The comptroller jumped on this issue quickly, having noted that the state often lags behind in addressing developing threats stimulated by new technologies and concepts – such as its slow response to the Hamas tunnel threat.

An Israeli woman whose husband and other relatives were killed in a July terror attack in the West Bank settlement of Halamish bemoaned this week to White House officials the expected financial reward to the family of the killer.

Michal Salomon’s husband, father-in-law and sister-in-law were brutally murdered by a Palestinian terrorist who broke into their home and stabbed members of the family as they ate Shabbat dinner.

She and her five children managed to escape, and shortly afterward the terrorist was shot dead by an off-duty soldier.

In a meeting with Trump’s Mideast peace envoy Jason Greenblatt, Salomon “expressed dismay that the [family of the] terrorist would be receiving compensation from the Palestinian Authority for his action,” a senior White House official told The Times of Israel on Tuesday.

Also in the meeting was National Security Council staffer Victoria Coates; Salomon’s father, Shlomo Dan Lando; her cousin Brian Zvi Lando; and her children — Avinoam, Reut, Amitay, Ariel, and Avishay.

Salomon’s comments came with the US Senate gearing up to vote on the Taylor Force Act, proposed legislation that would significantly cut US funding to the PA if it doesn’t discontinue the practice of paying monthly stipends to families of terrorists who kill Israelis.

IDF soldiers and border police entered the Palestinian village of Bayt Surik early Wednesday and blew up the home of the terrorist who shot dead three Israelis in the nearby Israeli settlement of Har Adar in September.

The military did not tear down the entire building, instead destroying only Jamal’s apartment. Often, the military carries out such demolitions with heavy engineering equipment, but in this case, the army used explosive charges to blow up the rooms.

On the morning of Tuesday, September 26, the 37-year-old Jamal approached the rear entrance of the Har Adar, a settlement that lies just beyond the Green Line in the hills northwest of Jerusalem, with a group of Palestinian laborers. When he was called to stop, he removed a stolen handgun from his shirt and opened fire at the Israeli security officers guarding the gate.

One Border Police officer, Solomon Gavriyah, 20, and two private security guards — Youssef Ottman, 25, of the nearby Arab Israeli town of Abu Ghosh, and Or Arish, 25, of Har Adar — were killed in the attack. The settlement’s security coordinator, Amit Steinhart, was wounded.

Jamal was shot dead by security forces at the scene.

Already on the next day, the IDF took measurements of Jamal’s home, which is the first step taken ahead of a demolition, and a week later they presented his family members with a demolition order.

Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit approved the expropriation of private Palestinian land for the building of an access road to an illegal West Bank outpost, in an unprecedented legal opinion on Wednesday.

Established without government approval in 1995, the Haresha outpost, in the Binyamin region near the settlement of Talmon, had been ordered to cease construction in 2005 following a High Court of Justice petition by the Peace Now settlement watchdog.

But following a legal decision last month made by now-retired Supreme Court justice Salim Joubran, Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked asked that the state’s opinion on Haresha be updated.

Responding to a petition regarding the legality of establishing a temporary living area for the evacuees of the Amona outpost while they wait for the new Amichai settlement to be built for them, Joubran ruled that abandoned private Palestinian land could be seized for the grounds as long as the original owners are compensated.

Under the military’s jurisdiction, Joubran described settlers as a protected population that the army is expected to care for through the paving of roads, for example. The unique status of the Amona evacuees superseded the legal problems that arise from the seizure of private Palestinian land, Joubran ruled.

Thousands of Palestinians hoping to exit the Gaza Strip on Wednesday through the border with Egypt will have to continue to wait.

“We don’t have any information about when Rafah border will reopen again,” Nazmi Muhanna, in charge of border crossings for the Palestinian Authority, told AFP.

The Palestinian Authority retook control of Gaza’s border crossings on November 1, following an Egyptian-mediated reconciliation deal between PA President Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah party and the Hamas terror group.

The day the PA retook control of Gaza’s crossings, it announced the Rafah crossing with Egypt would be permanently reopened on November 15, after years of Cairo allowing only intermittent exit through the vital passageway.

The PA is supposed to retake full civil control of the Gaza Strip by December 1, ending 10 years of Hamas rule over the enclave.

The hold-up at the border is apparently due to ongoing disagreements between the PA and Hamas over security arrangements in the Strip.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday offered humanitarian assistance to the victims of the devastating earthquake that has killed hundreds in Iran and Iraq, but was immediately rebuffed.

Netanyahu told a gathering of North American Jewish leaders that Israel had offered the aid via the Red Cross, following Sunday’s magnitude 7.3 quake that killed at least 530 people in Iran and several people in Iraq, and injured thousands across the region.

“I just saw the pictures of the destruction in Iran and Iraq from this week’s earthquake. And I saw these heartbreaking images of men and women and children buried under the rubble. So I am proud to announce tonight that a few hours ago I directed that we offer the Red Cross medical assistance for the Iraqi and Iranian victims of this disaster,” Netanyahu told the Jewish Federations of North America’s annual General Assembly in Los Angeles, via videoconference.

“I’ve said many times that we have no quarrel with the people of Iran,” he added. “Our quarrel is only with the tyrannical regime that holds them hostage and threatens our destruction. But our humanity is greater than their hatred. Israel continues to be a light unto the nations and this is what I am proud of. And all of you can be proud of Israel’s morals, and Israel’s might.”

An official in Netanyahu’s office said, however, the offer was immediately rejected.

“This shows the true face of the Iranian regime,” the official said.

This report and its predecessors are deficient in reporting on the verification and monitoring of the JCPOA overall, including Section T, which entails additional Iranian declarations and access to Iranian military sites associated with banned nuclear weapons development activities and associated, controlled dual-use equipment. The continued inclusion in the IAEA’s reports of a statement that it is verifying and monitoring Section T is at odds with Director General Amano’s remarks to Reuters in September that the agency requires more guidance on how to implement Section T and to The Financial Times in November that it would be positive if Iran made a declaration of all its equipment under Section T. Amano also stated to The Financial Times that Section T does not entail access to sites where potential equipment covered by the provision are located, which would likely include military sites in Iran. This statement is at odds with the text of Section T which implies monitoring must take place as part of verifying Joint Commission approvals concerning Section T equipment or activities. How such monitoring would occur without access to military sites is a mystery. Although the IAEA may be verifying Section T, it is unable to know if Iran is meeting the conditions of Section T or in fact violating these conditions.

The report also does not discuss the IAEA’s visits to a number of sites under complementary access arrangements provided in Iran’s Additional Protocol (AP) to the Comprehensive Safeguards Agreement (CSA). The IAEA still has not pushed for access to military sites in Iran where military-related nuclear activities are alleged to have taken place. Following criticism after IAEA officials stated to the media that the agency has not visited military sites in Iran since Implementation Day to verify the absence of military-nuclear related activities and to inspect sites previously associated with such activities, the IAEA appears to have inserted a pointed comment in this report regarding its complementary accesses in Iran. It states that it has had access to the sites it “needed to visit.” The IAEA overall appears to again be making a limited interpretation of its mandate to verify the JCPOA in what must be viewed as a stunning reversal of safeguards practices applied in countries such as South Africa and Taiwan, where it has periodically revisited sites associated with past nuclear weapons work, setting aside Section T requirements. The IAEA’s stance on this issue in Iran is likely to be to the detriment of both the verification and future of the JCPOA. It may also be to the detriment of future arms control agreements and monitoring efforts involving states such as North Korea, where a permanent end to its pathways to the bomb would be sought along with ensured access to military sites. Overall, the JCPOA suffers from the general problem of having time-bound nuclear limitations on Iran’s pathways to the bomb and inadequate access to Iran’s military sites, weaknesses that should be avoided in any agreement with North Korea.

In general, the IAEA should report much more fully to member states on Iranian nuclear activities under the JCPOA. Director General Amano claimed on November 6 at a Wilson Center conference, “IAEA at 60,” that UNSCR 2231 somehow relegates the Iran nuclear issue to being subject to the IAEA’s standard confidentiality practices with regard to reporting. This claim is unfounded. Nothing in the resolution specifies reduced reporting; moreover, Iran needs to prove its adherence to this agreement and the international community writ large should have access to the fullest reporting in order to make independent assessments.

The Russian Defense Ministry on Tuesday accused U.S. military forces of cooperating with the Islamic State against Syrian troops, but its evidence was a screenshot from a video game.

The Facebook post included five pictures purporting to be evidence of U.S. actions, and one of them was a screenshot from the mobile phone video game "AC-130 Gunship Simulator: Special Ops Squadron,"the Guardian reported. Investigators at Conflict Intelligence Team, which checks the accuracy of the Russian military's claims, pointed out the video game screenshot and also determined that the other photos were from the Iraqi Ministry of Defense in 2016.

"Twitter users quickly found out that 4 out of 5 ‘drone photos’ were actually taken from videos released by the Iraqi Ministry of Defence in June 2016, showing the Iraqi Air Force bombing IS near Fallujah," Conflict Intelligence Team wrote in a post. "Another photo was taken from a mobile game ‘AC-130 Gunship Simulator: Special Ops Squadron.'"

Leaders of Zimbabwe's Jewish community have instructed members of the tiny community to stay indoors following the military coup, Israel's Foreign Ministry said on Wednesday.

According to a statement released by the ministry, there are currently 170 Jews and 50 Israelis in the country: 108 of them are in the capital city of Harare and 64 in the city of Bulawayo.

They were advised by the local Jewish community council to stay indoors and as of now all appeared to be safe.

Israel's ambassador in Pretoria, South Africa, is in constant communication with the community.

Members of the Jewish community declined to discuss the situation with The Jerusalem Post, but one member of the Bulawayo community remarked that they were glad the situation had thus far been quiet and peaceful.

"Nobody really knows what's happening," he said, as the situation was still unfolding, but he expressed hope that it would continue to be peaceful.

Despite the tiny size of Bulawayo's Jewish community, they manage to get a minyan together every Friday night.

All told, the two Jewish communities of the United States and Israel constitute some 85 percent of the world’s Jews. Although other communities around the globe remain significant for their size or other qualities, the future of world Jewry will likely be shaped by the two largest populations—and by the relationship between them. For that reason alone, the waning of attachment to Israel among American Jews, especially but not exclusively younger American Jews, has rightly become a central focus of concern for religious and communal leaders, thinkers, and planners in both countries.

True, other concerns have lately encroached: concerns in both countries, for instance, over the Trump administration’s still-developing stance toward the Israel-Palestinian conflict and, in the U.S., over a seemingly homegrown series of anti-Semitic acts of vandalism and bomb threats against Jewish institutions (most of the latter exposed as the work of a disturbed Israeli Jewish youth). But the larger worry—American Jewish disaffection from Israel—remains very much in place, and its reverberating implications were underscored during the waning days of the Obama administration, when by far the greater portion of American Jews stayed faithful to the president and his party even after his decision to allow passage of an undeniably anti-Israel resolution at the United Nations.

What explains the growing distance between many American Jews and the state of Israel? Two recent books ventured answers to that question, and both authors basically agreed that the problem lay with Israel, a country that had fallen out of sync with the progressive movement of history. To Michael Barnett in The Star and the Stripes, while most American Jews embrace “a political theology of prophetic Judaism” and exhibit “cosmopolitan longings,” Israel is “increasingly acting like an ethnonational state.” To Dov Waxman in Trouble in the Tribe, the movement of the Jewish state in an “increasingly illiberal” direction has forced young American Jews to “turn away . . . in despair, or even disgust.” Making a similar point was a newspaper column by the veteran Israeli diplomat Alon Pinkas, aptly titled: “Sorry Israel, U.S. Jewry Just Isn’t That into You.” The reason, wrote Pinkas, was “the reality of decades of Israeli occupation” of Palestinian Arabs, compounded by “the dismissive, inconsiderate, and [at] times arrogant Israeli attitude toward [American] Reform and Conservative Jews.”

Not everyone has laid the blame on Israel, to be sure. Arguing explicitly to the contrary, Elliott Abrams in Mosaic located the source of the divide not in Israel’s policies or political culture but rather on the other side of the equation: the changed makeup of American Jews and American Judaism. Specifically, he pointed to the loosening of once-powerful communal bonds, as evidenced by the high rates of intermarriage and the move away from Jewish religious affiliation. In a published response to the Abrams essay, I added another factor: the gradual erosion of communal memory, especially of the Holocaust era and the history of the state of Israel itself.

The International Committee of the Red Cross, self-appointed guardian of the laws of war, has embarked on an exciting new online project: destroying the very laws it ostensibly seeks to protect. Of course, the ICRC would put it differently; it would say it’s teaching the laws of war. The problem is that the “laws” it teaches aren’t the actual laws of war, as codified in international treaties, but a made-up version that effectively denies countries any right of self-defense against enemies that fight from positions inside civilian populations. And it is thereby teaching anyone unwilling to concede the right of self-defense that the laws of war should simply be ignored.

When Israel Hayom reported on the “Don’t Be Numb” project last week, it sounded so outrageous that I suspected reporter error. But the project’s website proved even worse.

The website has four sections – “behavior in war,” “medical mission,” “torture” and cultural property.” But the big problem is the first one, which consists of three questions users must answer correctly to receive a “medal of integrity.”

Question number one: “You’re a military commander. The enemy is hiding in a populated village across the front line. Can you attack?” The correct answer, according to the website, is “no.”

This is simply false. The laws of war do not grant immunity to enemy soldiers simply because they choose to hide among civilians, nor do they mandate avoiding any military action that might result in civilian casualties. They merely require that civilians not be deliberately targeted (the principle of distinction), that reasonable efforts be made to minimize civilian casualties, and that any such casualties not be disproportionate to the military benefit of the operation (the principle of proportionality).

The second question was, “What if you know for a fact that many civilians would be killed? Can you attack?” Since the ICRC had already ruled in the first question that attacking populated villages is never permissible, I’m not sure what purpose this question served; it would only make sense if the answer to the first question had been “yes” and this were a follow-up meant to explore the limits of the license to attack populated villages. But let’s ignore that incongruity and examine the question on its own merits.

The ICRC’s answer, of course, was “no.” But the correct answer is “insufficient information.” As noted, the laws of war don’t prohibit civilian casualties as collateral damage of a legitimate military operation. They do, however, require that such casualties not be disproportionate to the military benefit, and the question doesn’t supply the information necessary to determine whether this attack would be proportionate. For instance, how many civilian casualties does “many” actually mean – 10? 100? 1,000? Even more important, what price will your own side pay if it doesn’t attack? For instance, how many of your own civilians might be killed if you don’t stop the enemy’s rocket and mortar fire?

Spurred by the digital revolution and pressured by Western moral standards about protecting innocent life, advances in battlefield technology have fundamentally changed the way we fight wars. Armies can now use pinpointed weapons to minimize civilian casualties. They can fire missiles at a single apartment in a crowded building, can identify the car of a terror cell leader and monitor it until it passes into an isolated area and be destroyed with a drone, and can use cyber tools to remotely disable weapons systems without ever dropping a bomb.

In short, precision weapons offer a more moral way to target enemies and their military assets, especially when non-state fighters use urban settings and civilians to shield themselves. These weapons, and their wise employment on the battlefield, are developments we should largely praise and sustain, even as important questions remain about how to employ them lawfully and about the true extent of their reduction of civilian casualties.

Many of the weapons that make precise combat possible have their origins in Israel. The Weapon Wizards: How Israel Became a High-Tech Military Superpower, penned by Israeli journalists Yaakov Katz and Amir Bohbot, recounts how and why the small state has developed such advanced weaponry. The book largely takes the form of narrative ­­nonfiction rather than an essay or a policy report, telling a series of stories about how “Israeli chutzpah” grew the country into a military technology hub.

Fashion designer Karl Lagerfeld of Chanel evoked the Holocaust this week in criticizing Germany’s open borders policy toward Muslim refugees, saying Berlin was taking in Jews’ “worst enemies.”

The Hamburg-born Lagerfeld sparked controversy when he lashed out at German Chancellor Angela Merkel, saying, “You cannot kill millions of Jews and then take in millions of their worst enemies afterwards, even if there are decades [between the events],” according to a translation by the The Times.

Lagerfeld, 84, made the comments during an appearance on a French talk show on Canal 8.

“I know someone in Germany who took in a young Syrian who spoke a little English,” he said. “After four days, do you know what he said to the [German] lady? ‘Germany’s best invention is the Holocaust.’”

A Spanish court has suspended a city council’s anti-Israel boycott, according to an announcement issued by nonprofit organization The Lawfare Project on Tuesday.

Last week, a district court in Seville, southern Spain, issued a writ of interim injunction against the City Council of La Roda de Andalucia, halting its boycott of Israeli products as well as its decision to join the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign.

The decision was hailed by The Lawfare Project in Spain, which initiated legal proceedings against the city council, as a “serious loss” for the BDS movement, and stated that it paves the way for further legal action against the enforcement of BDS policies.

The Lawfare Project is a US-based think tank and litigation fund that strives to protect the civil and human rights of pro-Israel and Jewish communities around the world.

The La Roda City Council announced its participation in BDS in August 2014, and has since been enforcing it by inspecting machine-readable barcodes from every item purchased in public tenders, and returning any product found to be Israeli-made.

La Roda Mayor Fidel Romero is a visible proponent of the boycott, and in 2014 said his town hall was likely the first in Spain to implement the boycott as an institution, and encouraged others to follow suit.

In January 2016, he appeared at the BDS Forum held in San Sebastian, where BDS leader Omar Barghouti and Riya Hassan, Europe campaigns officer of the Palestinian BDS National Committee, introduced the boycott strategy for Spain.

Two weeks have passed since the World Football Association (FIFA) announced that it was rejecting the Palestinian petition to disqualify Israeli teams that play in the West Bank. The drama, however, seems far from being over.

FIFA recently informed Israeli Minister for Regional Cooperation Tzachi Hanegbi and Israel's Ambassador to South Africa Lior Keinan that the Palestinians have not given up the fight and that they have decided to refer their petition to the international Court of Arbitration for Sport.

According to Tokyo Sexwale, chairman of the FIFA Monitoring Committee Israel-Palestine, the Palestinians are basing their argument on a technical pretext: The request to disqualify Israel from the organization was supposed to have been rejected by a special majority of 75%, and not by a simple majority.

The Palestinian insistence on pushing forward their agenda despite FIFA's decision apparently provoked much anger among the organization's top echelon, who had a harsh message for the head of the Palestinian Football Association Jibril Rajoub: "We are determined to reject your request again, even with an absolute majority."

Meanwhile, FIFA President Gianni Infantino sent UN Secretary-General António Guterres a letter saying that FIFA is tired of dealing with political issues. "We are not a playground for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict," Infinino said.

Yesterday I posted about the ridiculous and offensive panel on antisemitism led by the likes of Linda Sarsour and JVP, themselves no friends of the Jews.

Now the ADL has caught wind of it, and their CEO Jonathan Greenblatt hates the idea as much as me and other reasonable people out there.

It’s just a shame he used a US-specific reference and spelled ‘Oscar Mayer’ (the American meat and cold cut production company, owned by Kraft Heinz) as ‘Oscar Meyer’ (no-one in particular) – because it took this Aussie a little bit of time to work out the comparison. But I got there in the end.

Having Linda Sarsour & head of JVP leading a panel on #antisemitism is like Oscar Meyer leading a panel on vegetarianism. These panelists know the issue, but unfortunately, from perspective of fomenting it rather than fighting it. https://t.co/s4tvBrvjBj 1/2

— Jonathan Greenblatt (@JGreenblattADL) November 13, 2017

In a follow-up tweet, Greenblatt added that “there’s not a single Jewish organization that studies this issue and/or fights this disease… would take this panel seriously, let alone the institution that put it together. It’s a sad day for @theNewSchool.”

Reached for comment, the New School had this to say:
The New School has been contacted by several individuals who have expressed their concerns about the university’s participation in a forthcoming panel discussion, titled “Antisemitism and the Struggle for Justice.” This panel, moderated by Amy Goodman of Democracy Now!, marks the publication of a new book, On Antisemitism: Solidarity and the Struggle for Justice. The organizer of this event, Jacobin magazine, has planned several other public forums in collaboration with the Creative Publishing and Critical Journalism program at The New School.

The New School is founded on principles of tolerance, social justice, and free intellectual exchange. These values remain central to our mission today, and we believe that engaging in debate on a range of issues and ideas is critical to our role as an academic institution.

We understand that there are differing views on the issue of anti-Semitism. For that reason, the Creative Publishing and Critical Journalism Program has invited representatives of the magazine Tablet to organize an event to present some of these differing views on this important topic; the program has also invited to participate Jonathan Greenblatt, National Director and CEO of the Anti-Defamation League.

The aforementioned invitation arrived several moments later, to myself and other editors at Tablet, strongly suggesting that it had more to do with stanching the bleeding of a public relations problem that seriously resolving a brutal moral error. Even more insulting and infuriating is the fact that the invitation suggests that the New School sees this as a matter of balancing out two equally legitimate sides, each with its own point of view.

There ought never to be a debate between those who fan the flames of hatred and those who suffer its consequences. The New School of all institutions ought to know this, and it’s a shame that this once revered institution now peddles in the bluntest form of moral relativism rather than speak out against bigotry of all stripes.

At the age of 18, Tal Hagin is one of the first Zionist and Israeli speakers to present his message on university campuses in Ireland. His feat comes in a country where many observers believe that the environment for supporters of Israel can be hostile.

But with mentorship and funding from the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America (CAMERA), Hagin used Israel as a case study on overcoming media bias during a speaking tour from October 23 to 27.

“I went with the hope of changing opinions, helping the students to question the media in what they see of coverage of Israel, and I was able to do that,” Hagin told JNS.org. “I could tell that people were influenced.”

But how did it all come together?

Hagin met Alan Lyne, a second-year student at the University of Maynooth, while playing online games. After chatting and finding their mutual passion of Israel education, they came together to organize one of Ireland’s first Zionist speaking tours.

“When CAMERA heard that the one society in Ireland at Maynooth University needed support in educating their peers about Israel, and wanted to host an Israeli teenager to speak about his life and discuss biases within media coverage, it was an obvious and necessary choice for CAMERA on Campus to get involved,” said Aviva Slomich, international campus director for CAMERA, a media watchdog group devoted to promoting accurate and balanced coverage of Israel and the Middle East.

Legislation ostensibly addressing Israel and children’s rights, introduced in Congress yesterday by Rep. Betty McCollum (D-MN), is the latest BDS strategy to demonize and impose sanctions on Israel, notes Jerusalem-based research institute NGO Monitor. The accusations are based on a combination of false and distorted claims originating with radical NGOs, some of which are linked to terrorism,. The main source behind the bill is is a group calling itself Defense for Children International – Palestine (DCIP).

“Although only 10 members of Congress allowed themselves to be used by BDS groups, this campaign that consists entirely of distorted allegations about Israel’s alleged treatment of Palestinian children and invented international legal claims is built on immoral foundations,” said Prof. Gerald Steinberg, president of NGO Monitor. “Other members of Congress, as well as journalists and others interested in this issue, would be well advised to verify the NGO allegations with a credible source.”

NGO Monitor research has shown that the allegations echoed in McCollum’s proposed law originate with DCIP’s “No Way to Treat a Child” Campaign and the infamously defective 2013 UNICEF report, have no credibility – they are propaganda. Our analysis demonstrates that these campaigns simplistically misstate international and domestic law, including basic jurisdictional concepts, criminal adjudication, and juvenile justice standards. The proposed legislation repeats the same mistakes and reflects DCIP’s political and ideological goals. In addition, the bill and accompanying campaign ignore the systematic exploitation of Palestinian children for terror and confrontations with Israel.

Furthermore, Israeli treatment of arrested minors compares favorably to other Western countries and the procedures and standards employed by the military courts are identical in almost every respect to the Israeli civil justice system.

A Minnesota congresswoman has introduced a bill that seeks to prevent the United States from funding Israel’s military detention of Palestinian children.

The legislation introduced Tuesday by Rep. Betty McCollum, a Democrat, has at least nine co-sponsors. It would require the secretary of state to certify annually that US assistance to Israel has not been used in the previous year to militarily detain, interrogate or abuse Palestinian children.

“The purpose of this act is to promote and protect the human rights of Palestinian children and to ensure that United States taxpayer funds shall not be used to support the military detention of Palestinian children,” the bill reads.

Among the bill’s backers are the co-chairs of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, Rep. Raúl Grijalva, D-Arizona, and Rep. Mark Pocan, D-Wisconsin.

McCollum said the bill “highlights Israel’s system of military detention of Palestinian children” and ensures the United States does not support human rights violations.

The other week, when news broke out that Nihad Awad, Executive Director and co-founder of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), was honored with Harvard University’s Robert Coles “Call of Service” Award, Hillel International took the unusual step of writing a letter to Harvard’s president to protest.

“With its choice of honoree this year,” wrote Hillel’s president, Eric Fingerhut, the university “is applying its good name and reputation to a normalization or countenance of support for terror.” In the early 1990s, the letter continued, “Mr. Awad was the public relations director for the Islamic Association for Palestine (IAP) which published and distributed a monograph entitled ‘America’s Greatest Enemy: The Jew! And an Unholy Alliance!’”

According to an autobiographical essay published in 2000, Awad joined the IAP shortly after the Gulf War and worked for the organization through the spring of 1994 before leaving to start CAIR that summer. Sometime prior to August of 1994, the monograph referred to by Fingerhut, a shockingly anti-Semitic pamphlet containing the work of a noted Holocaust denier, was published, bearing the group’s logo on its cover.

When reached for comment by email, Awad said “I did not work for IAP in the summer of 1994, I am not aware of this particular document, and CAIR and I have a long history of challenging anti-Semitism in all its forms.” In a 2003 deposition as part of a civil case in which IAP was held partly liable for the Hamas murder of an American citizen in 1996, Awad recalled seeing anti-Semitic literature on display at IAP’s offices and ordering that it be removed.

A tenured professor at Columbia University has been criticized by students for a social media post in which he referred to "Jared Kushner's Zionist kins [sic]" who "kill and rob Palestinians," and described the Jewish White House adviser as a "creature."

Hamid Dabashi, the Hagop Kevorkian professor of Iranian Studies and comparative literature, wrote the offending Facebook post on Sunday.

"There is a reason why a small gang of European Zionists could land in Palestine and in broad daylight of history steal it from under the feet of Palestinians smack in the middle of hundreds of millions of Arabs and Muslims—that reason throughout the recent history has had many faces and today that reason is in the shape of this contemptible coward Mohamed bin Salman [Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia]," he wrote.

"Like a rich brat teenager that [bin Salman] is he hides behind the wing of his Israeli and American protectors and benefactors, buys them with his windblown wealth, so that Jared Kushner's Zionist kins can kill and rob Palestinians even more as they enable him to slaughter Yemeni women and children apace," he wrote.

"Look at all their ignoble ugly contemptible countenances— who are these creatures, from what subterranean holes did they creep out? What are they laughing at? What colossal misery of our doomed humanity has sent a giggle through their infested abdomens?" he wrote above a photo of bin Salman, Kushner, and Ivanka Trump taken during the official White House trip to the Middle East in May.

On October 20, 54 Egyptian policemen were killed in a firefight with “militants” in the desert, 80 miles from Cairo. Local media reported the police were attacked by the Hasm Movement, a terrorist organization that the Egyptian government claims is linked to the Muslim Brotherhood.

Governments around the world offered statements of sympathy to the Egyptian government over one of deadliest attacks against Egyptian security forces in many years. The U.S. State Department announced that it “condemns the terrorist attack,” “[offers] profound condolences,” and “stands with Egypt at this difficult time, as we continue to work together to fight the scourge of terrorism.”

But among some Islamist activists in America, there was jubilation. In a Facebook post, written on October 20, New York-based journalist Ayat Oraby applauded the killings, accusing the deceased soldiers and police of insolence and cowardice. In another post about one of the murdered soldiers, Oraby expressed “Joy at the death of that criminal!”

Oraby accused the deceased soldiers of having previously been paid by Egyptian General (and now President) Abdel Fattah el-Sisi to murder unarmed Muslims during the infamous Rabaa massacre in 2013, during which supporters of the deposed Muslim Brotherhood President, Mohamed Morsi, clashed with Egyptian police and military.

Oraby is a prominent figure. She serves as the editor-in-chief of Noon Al-Niswa, the “first Arab American Women’s magazine.” In 2013, Noon Al-Niswa held an event to celebrate its first printed issue after being an exclusively online publication. According to another Arabic-language online publication, the event was attended by self-styled “human rights activist” Linda Sarsour, former Deputy Secretary of Energy Randa Fahmy Hudome and New Jersey state senator Barbara Buono.

When George W. Bush was president, his administration banned European Islamist Tariq Ramadan from entering the United States. The 2004 order came after evidence emerged he financially supported a charity that funded terrorist groups.

But in 2010, then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton overturned that ban — and personally authorized a visa request to allow Ramadan, grandson of the founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, into America.

Now, the Swiss-born theologian Ramadan has taken leave from teaching at Oxford University after complaints of rape and assault filed by two French women.

PJ Media laid out Hillary's involvement in a detailed article, noting that The New York Times reported in 2010:
Six years after using the Patriot Act to revoke the visa of a prominent Muslim academic, the United States State Department reversed itself and said Wednesday that it would no longer bar the scholar from entering the United States.

The decision came in the form of an order signed by Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton. It paves the way for the scholar, Prof. Tariq Ramadan, to apply for a new visa free of the authorities’ former accusation that he had contributed money to a charity connected to terrorism.

The pro-Israel blogger Elder of Ziyon echoed these criticisms, saying calls for the destruction of the world’s only Jewish state and the denial of Jewish rights to national self-determination “invokes age-old antisemitic tropes in a slightly newer package.”

“Most of the modern antisemites claim that the Jewish people are not a people to begin with, in order to justify that they don’t have the same human rights of other peoples,” the blogger noted.

“There is no nuance in saying that Israel should not exist,” Elder of Ziyon continued. “It demands that Jews in Israel be treated the way that Jews in all the Arab nations are treated — meaning that they would be largely expelled from the region. It is advocating ethnic cleansing of Jews from the Middle East.”

J Street did not respond to a request for comment by press time.

The Duke of Westminster's son-in-law, the well-connected Dan comes from a broadcasting family: he's pompous Israel-bashing Channel 4 newspeader John Snow's nephew and BBC broadcaster Peter Snow's son. He himself presents television documentaries on historical topics.

Here's a recent photo of Dan with Israel-demoniser Professor Avi Shlaim, practically every British Israel-bashing event's de rigueur guest.

Judging from the chummy smiles, it's perhaps not so very surprising seems that Mr Snow, who calls himself "The History Guy," has been falling for and disseminating faux propaganda (in polite parlance "balls") on Twitter regarding a certain Declaration:

He soon found himself challenged. When asked whether he included Palestinian Jews in the above, he responded "Absolutely".

The questioner then observed: "Glad you clarified that, Dan because dig into the soil of Israel and you find eons of Jewish history."

To which Snow replied: "You bet. Texan soil has eons of Spanish history too but the British empire would have been behaving oddly giving it to Spain..."

Among the subsequent criticisms of Snow came this, from an international relations specialist at a UK university: 'I was more intrigued by "owned by the Ottomans" as if that's somehow a more legitimate form of imperialism than a League of Nations mandate.'

Quite so.

Extremist anti-Israel speakers being given a platform to spew hate on campuses is, sadly, all too common. So it was the case at University College London when Azzam Tamimi and Miko Peled were hosted for a speaking event.

Hamas fanboy Tamimi has a history of support for terrorism. In 2010 he stated: “You shouldn’t be afraid of being labelled extreme, radical or terrorist. If fighting for your home land is terrorism, I take pride in being a terrorist. The Koran tells me if I die for my homeland, I’m a martyr and I long to be a martyr.” Additionally, in a BBC interview in 2004, Tamimi argued that carrying out a suicide bombing for Palestine “is a noble cause. It is the straight way to pleasing my God and I would do it if I had the opportunity.”

Miko Peled has also made comments that have widely been considered anti-Semitic. At this year’s UK Labour Party Conference, Peled indicated that the Holocaust could be up for debate, saying: “the Holocaust: yes or no” and equated Zionists with Nazis.

The Times of London covered protests against the event. Its report includes the following:

A former IDF “agent?”

UPDATE
Following the publication of this article and the personal intervention of Hen Mazzig, the text of the article has been changed from former IDF “agent” to the more appropriate “officer.”

The false equivalency between anti-Israel attackers and their Jewish student victims has not as yet been addressed.

The add-on doesn’t interfere with the chair’s folding mechanism and is easily removed so it can be attached to a rented wheelchair that must be returned in its original condition.

The Electric Wheelchair Kit was devised by “Team 1577 Steampunk” from Aviv High School as part of its participation in the regional round of the global FIRST Robotics Competition (FRC). But the kids are not keeping it to themselves.

“Our idea was to release it on an open-source platform to nearly 7,000 FRC teams in the world who can become a hub for making these kits,” team member Roee Bar-Yadin tells ISRAEL21c.

The design, 3D printable programs and software are available for free online “so anyone can build it from scratch” using tools, programs and printers commonly available to FRC teams everywhere, adds teammate Yuval Dascalu.

“We have already been contacted by several people who are interested,” Yuval tells ISRAEL21c. “We encourage people to improve on our design in any way they see fit or at least spread the word to other teams.”

“Once, not long ago, a group of musicians came to Israel from Egypt,” this magical musical begins. “You probably didn’t hear about it. It wasn’t very important.”

In fact, nothing earth-shattering happens in this play. But everything that matters does.

There is, amazingly and mercifully, no talk of Islam, or Judaism—no mention of religion at all. The wars that made Egyptians and Israelis enemies for so long and which keep them apart to this day go unmentioned. Nor is there a word about the fractured peace that once made an Israeli invitation to a group of Egyptian musicians possible but unlikely today given Egypt’s cultural boycott of most things Israeli. There is no recitation by the play’s Egyptian or Israeli characters of their nation’s unending grievances, accusations or demands. There is no gun over the mantel, no suicide to prevent or murder to solve. But The Band’s Visit achieves something rare these days, particularly on Broadway: It explores in the most subtle, riveting way what it means to be human—what it means to be lonely, if not alone, and to wait for someone to come along, or something to happen to change one’s life, or even the scenery. The emptiness touches a musician in Alexandria, Egypt’s second-largest city and a bustling port by the sea, as much as an Israeli stuck in the fictional town of Bet Hatikva, somewhere in the Negev desert, a forsaken place that lacks a hotel or even a proper park.

How does the eight-member Alexandria Ceremonial Police Orchestra wind up in the middle of nowhere, Israel? By mistake.

Those who loved Israeli director Eran Kolirin’s magnificent 2007 film of the same name may recall the source of the confusion—the Arab language’s conflation of “b” and “p,” the latter of which has no precise equivalent in Arabic. Seeking to travel to Petah Tikvah, where it has been invited to inaugurate the city’s Arab cultural center, the band mistakenly buys bus tickets instead to Bet Hatikva. That’s Bet with a “B,” as Dina, (Katrina Lenk) the café owner, explains to them. Having missed the last bus to anywhere else, the musicians have no place to stay ’til morning. Dina reluctantly offers to take them in and volunteers friends to do the same.

The Band’s Visit is about this single, singular encounter.

Johny Srouji, Senior Vice President of Hardware Technologies at Apple, recently spoke about Israel’s contributions to Apple products and more in a (Hebrew) interview with Calcalist.

Thankfully, the below video is in English, so all of us can enjoy learning about just how critical is Israel’s role to Apple products – and BDS-holes around the globe can learn how many more devices they need to boycott.

The online retail giant Amazon is reportedly in the midst of a massive hiring spree in Israel and is offering unusually high salaries to attract top high-tech talent to its new Tel Aviv-based research and development (R&D) center.

Some reports state that Amazon has offered prospective hires salaries as high as NIS 100,000 ($28,180) per month, and is typically offering salaries of around NIS 60,000 ($16,900) per month with additional bonuses, in its bid to lure programmers.

Top programmers in Israel can already earn about NIS 40,000 ($11,370) per month, which is approximately four times the average Israeli salary, according to the Jewish state’s Central Bureau of Statistics.

The average Israeli high-tech employee earns around NIS 21,000 ($5,940) per month.

Amazon’s headhunting is creating pressure on local Israeli technology firms to retain their top employees, as the country’s high-tech sector is already suffering from a shortage of programmers and engineers.

An Israeli-developed, state-of-the-art space laboratory hosting four science experiments docked in the International Space Station Tuesday after a successful launch.

The space lab, built by Israeli company SpacePharma with the support of the Science Ministry's Israel Space Agency, is unique in that it requires no physical human contact, as it is controlled remotely by researchers on Earth.

Two of the experiments to be conducted on the space lab were developed by American researchers and one was developed by Swiss researchers. The fourth experiment was developed by Israel's SpacePharma.

The experiments are the first of their kind as they are to be conducted on living biological cells - something that has never been attempted in the microgravity environment of space.

In an unusual display of coexistence emanating from a divided Middle East, the Miss Universe international beauty pageant, the contestants from Israel and Iraq, which are officially enemies, posed together for selfies they posted to Instagram and Facebook.

“Get to know, this is Miss Iraq and she’s amazing,” enthused Miss Israel Adar Gandelsman in her Instagram post. “Practicing bringing world peace,” she wrote on Facebook, in time-honored beauty queen style.

“Peace and Love from Miss Iraq and Miss Israel,” wrote Miss Iraq Sarah Idan on her instagram post, followed by heart emojis.

Both had well over 1,000 likes on the photo-based social network as of Tuesday evening.

The warm greetings of the two women could land Idan in hot water.

A 2015 selfie that put then-Miss Israel Doron Matalon in the same photo with then-Miss Lebanon Sally Greige led to calls to strip Greige of her title. It is illegal for Lebanese citizens to have contact with the Jewish state. (h/t Zvi)

This statement coupled with calling Palestinian food “Israeli” though meant well, blatantly ignores the ethnic notions of what it means to be a Palestinian in Israel or the occupied territories. And though Solomonov might want food not to be related to politics, it is impossible and unrealistic to expect it to be so. Because food is a part of the culture and Palestinian culture is under attack in Israel, food can and does inherently become political.

Komarovsky’s statement and Solomonovo’s movie do not take into account the inequalities Palestinians face in Israel which whitewashes Palestinian suffering. By calling Palestinian food in particular, Israeli, one justifies these actions and appropriates Palestinian cultures that the Israeli government tries so hard to destroy. At the bottom of this debate is the idea of privilege and who holds it in a society. Privilege is the invisible advantage and unearned benefits which are given to dominant and powerful groups because of identity traits.

While Michael Solomonov and his associates did not consciously make the decision to participate in this cycle of oppression of Palestinians, it is something that happens automatically in privileged circles that interact with aspects of oppressed groups. The effect is the same. Because of the ethnic cleansing involved with the Palestinian people, Israeli words, and sentiments about Palestinian culture matter.

Israel cares more for the Iranian people than its own government does, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Thursday in a video message he issued from Jerusalem.

In the short message he repeated an offer that was initially made on Tuesday night to provide relief and technical assistance to regions in Iran and Iraq impacted by a magnitude 7.3 earthquake that struck Sunday evening.

The most severe such quake in a decade, it left at least 445 people dead and injured more than 7,000.

“I saw mothers and fathers searching for their children, children buried under the rubble from this horrible earthquake. As a father, as an Israeli, as a Jew I wanted to help,” he continued.

“That is why yesterday I instructed that Israel offer medical aid via the Red Cross to victims of this disaster. Israel has no quarrel with the people of Iran. We never have. Our only quarrel is with the cruel Iranian regime, a regime that holds its people hostage, a regime that threatens our people with annihilation,” the premier clarified.

Why did Israel offer medical aid to victims of the earthquake on the Iran-Iraq border? For one reason... pic.twitter.com/f12LGJfeMR

— PM of Israel (@IsraeliPM) November 15, 2017

The Deputy State Prosecutor decided in coordination with the State Attorney to close the investigation against Breaking the Silence spokesman Dean Issacharof.

The investigation was opened after Issacharoff said in a video that he had beaten an Arab during his military service in Hevron. The comments had been made to highlight alleged human rights abused by the IDF Breaking the Silence claims take place in Judea and Samaria.

However, the investigation revealed that the events described by Issacharoff "did not happen at all."

The State Attorney's office said in its decision: "During the interrogation, the suspect was questioned, messages were taken from the suspect's company commander during the relevant period, and various investigation materials were collected. From all the evidence, it appears that the incident described by the suspect is suitable for only one incident, in which a Palestinian named Hassan Giulani was arrested in February 2014.

During his interrogation, Issacharoff did not deny the statements made by him, adding details about the date and circumstances of the incident in question. The suspect even noted that "I had to use force to stop him" and that it was not possible to handcuff the Arab without the use of force.

In his statement, Giulani confirmed that he was arrested after throwing stones at the soldiers, as the suspect described. However, Giulani denied that his arrest was accompanied by any kind of violence on the part of the soldiers, except for the use of force to handcuff him, which was required in view of his resistance to the handcuffing. Giulani claimed he was not beaten, not bruised, did not bleed, did not feel dizzy and did not pass out.

The investigation further revealed that Giulani had filed no complaint over excessive force during his arrest, and that there were no indications of any wounds or injuries to Giulani's body. In addition, Giulani's testimony matched that of Issachoroff's commanding officer, and not that of Issachoroff.

The US, Israel, and others have demanded that Hamas denounce violence and disarm in order for them to accept the unity deal that Hamas and Abbas' Fatah party signed in October.

Responding to this demand, several Fatah leaders have spoken against disarmament and reiterated Fatah's position not to lay down arms, but rather to continue the "resistance" - a Palestinian euphemism for violence and terror.

Fatah Central Committee member Abbas Zaki stated that Fatah will "resume arming" its "brigades" in the Gaza Strip, and emphasized that Fatah adheres to violent "resistance" against Israel with weapons that are "pure." Zaki specified that the loyalty and allegiance of any Palestinian who suggests laying down "the weapons of the resistance" is cast into doubt, and such a person is perceived as a "traitor":

"The weapons of the resistance are pure, and must be kept. We are increasing our training daily and strengthening our capabilities for the appropriate day, because we are not like sheep going to the slaughter. Whoever harms the weapons of the resistance is not a patriot, and we must look at him in a different light, because these weapons are being used under occupation in a manner that is in accordance with the national decision. They can be beneficial if they are used, and they have a great effect on the other side, Israel. If there was peace and Israeli withdrawal, then perhaps this [issue] could be raised, and we would not treat one who raises it as a traitor... We suspect whoever talks about disarmament... It is forbidden to talk about the topic of the weapons at all..."
[Alam, local Hebron radio station, Nov. 9, 2017]

Zaki alluded to the future use of violence against Israel, mentioning that Fatah is preparing the weapons for "the appropriate day," and for "the coming day of battle." Furthermore, he emphasized that the decision on the usage and timing of violence is a "national decision":

"In the Fatah Central Committee we forbid raising the topic [of disarmament]. Let these weapons multiply and become more sophisticated. But their usage is subject to the authority of the highest institutions and the national decision. All talk of disarmament is consistent with [the interests of] Israel, while the talk of controlling [the weapons] is preparation for the coming day of battle."

Maintaining its long-lived tradition, the Palestinian Authority continued this year to spread the libel that Israel murdered Yasser Arafat with poison. On the occasion of the 13th anniversary of Arafat's death, a PA TV host stated:
Official PA TV host: "All the signs show that Israel is the one that assassinated and murdered [PA] President Yasser Arafat in some way, when it reached him and poisoned him."
[Official PA TV, Palestine This Morning, Nov. 11, 2017]

The official PA daily also repeated the libel:
"The most prominent [Israeli assassination] was the assassination of Yasser Arafat with poison after laying siege to his headquarters in Ramallah."
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Sept. 28, 2017]

PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas' advisor on Foreign Affairs and International Relations Nabil Shaath stated earlier this year that he knows for a fact - without "a millionth of a doubt" - that the Israelis killed Arafat "with poison":
Al-Arabiya TV host: "Did [Yasser Arafat] die due to the consequences of the [Israeli] siege, or was he killed by poison during the siege?"
PA Chairman Abbas' advisor Nabil Shaath: "No, the Israelis killed him with poison. I have no doubt of that, not even a millionth of a doubt!"
TV host: "Why are you so certain? Do you have information?" ...
Nabil Shaath: "...All food came through the Israelis. They besieged him from outside. Every cup of water came through the Israelis. Every pill of medicine... You can check the water before you give it to him... You can check the food, but the medicines?" [Al-Arabiya TV, Political Memoirs, Aug. 25, 2017]

Suburbs ("banlieues") -- distant from the affluent boulevards and bistros of Paris -- form the "other France". They are the "peripheral France", ("La France Périphérique") as the geographer Christophe Guilluy calls them in an important book. They are where "living together" between communities has really been tested.

In the last 20 years, these French suburbs have not only become "concentrations of poverty and social isolation", but have gone from being some of France's most densely-populated Jewish areas to "lost territories of the Republic", according to the great historian Georges Bensoussan, in his book, Les territoires perdus de la République.

These suburbs have become transformed into one of the most visible signs of the Islamization of France.

Anti-Semitism has returned as one of Europe's worst diseases. France hosts Europe's largest Jewish community, and Jews have been fleeing the suburbs to either emigrate or move to gentrified districts of the cities, where they feel more protected. What happens to the Jews will have a seismic impact on the entire continent.

In the Parisian suburb of Bagneux, someone recently vandalized the memorial plaque for Ilan Halimi, a young Jew who was kidnapped, tortured and murdered by a "barbarian gang" in 2006, just for being a Jew. At the time, it was France's first case of murderous anti-Semitism in many years. After it, Islamists murdered Jews at a school in Toulouse and a kosher supermarket in Paris.

As Le Monde reported in a chilling new inquiry, anti-Semitism now knocks daily at the doors of the French Jews. It has been creating a serious migratory trend: French Jews have become "internal refugees".

In France, any public mention of Muslim anti-Semitism can lead you to court. In February 2017, the scholar Georges Bensoussan was sued for "incitement to racial hatred" because he mentioned in a radio debate how vastly widespread anti-Semitism is among French Muslim families.

Now, however, two types of Muslim anti-Semitism are being highlighted by the media. These two types could be called "hard anti-Semitism" and "soft anti-Semitism".

Hard Muslim anti-Semitism is the anti-Semitism of murderers. Soft Muslim anti-Semitism is anti-Semitism of "anti-Zionists" and harrassers of various stripes.

The recently concluded trial of terrorist Abdelkader Merah is a clear and pathetic illustration of hard Muslim anti-Semitism. Abdelkader Merah is the brother of Mohamed Merah, a French Muslim extremist who murdered seven people, including three Jewish children and their teacher at a Jewish school, in Toulouse. Mohamed Merah was killed in a shoot-out with police on March 22, 2012. Abdelkader Merah, Mohamed's brother, was on trial during the past few weeks. He was accused of being a member of a terrorist organization and to have closely monitored his brother during his murder spree. Abdelkader's trial ended on November 2, 2017; he was convicted and sentenced to 20 years in prison.

Earlier this month, Abdelkader Merah was sentenced to 20 years in jail by a French court. He was found guilty of criminal terrorist conspiracy. Abdelkader had had much influence on his murderous brother, Mohammed Merah. Analyzing the background of the Merah family provides major insights into the problems of uncontrolled immigration of Muslims into Europe as well as other issues that go far beyond the crimes of the Merah brothers.

First the facts. In March 2012, Mohammed Merah, a French-born Muslim of Algerian parents, killed a Jewish teacher and three children in front of the Jewish school Otzar HaTorah in Toulouse. Several days earlier he had murdered three French soldiers. A few days after the murders at the school, Merah was killed in a shootout with French police. It was found that he had been a visitor to an al-Qaida stronghold in Pakistan.

Mohammed Merah claimed that he was motivated to murder Jews out of solidarity with Palestinian children. Thereafter then Palestinian prime minister Salam Fayyad distanced himself from Merah. He stated that Palestinian children should not be used to legitimize terrorism. Fayyad failed to mention that the Palestinians routinely glorify their own terrorist murderers of Israeli civilians in many ways.

According to the French daily Le Monde, the father of the Merahs said that to defend the Palestinians he was willing to become a suicide bomber. Souad Merah, the eldest sister of Mohammed, was quoted as saying that she wanted to turn into a suicide bomber together with her children, “It is not innocents which one is killing, but unbelievers.” Upon learning about the murders Mohammed committed, Merah’s mother Zoulikha said, “My son has brought France to its knees.” The current whereabouts of Souad Merah are unknown.

Lawyers and supporters of the chief suspect in a deadly attack on a Paris synagogue in 1980 expressed disappointment at his being denied release for an eighth time on Tuesday.

Hassan Diab, 63, had been ordered released pending the conclusion of the investigation into the case, but the decision was overturned on appeal.

The Lebanese-Canadian sociology professor is accused of being part of a Palestinian group blamed for the bombing on October 3, 1980 that left four dead and around 40 injured.

Diab has been detained in France since being extradited from Canada in 2014.

While the 37-year-old case has been investigated by French authorities, he has maintained his innocence and denied being a member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP).

Roger Clark, a former director of Amnesty International and member of a Diab support group, told AFP that his continued detention is “extremely disappointing.”

“The decision to deny his release reflects the ridiculous nature of what’s going on in his case. It’s grotesquely absurd,” he said.

I have just read Dothan Goren's "U'Va L'Tzion Goel" which details land purchases by Jews at the end of the Ottoman period of occupation of the Land of Israel specifically motivated by religious goals in and around Jerusalem. Last week I referenced it to detail land purchases north of Jerusalem in close proximity to the Tomb of Samuel the Prophet.

Now I will list the most outstanding instances of land purchases up until 1914 or so in and around Jerusalem.

And let's recall: the Jewish people are the only people that were required to buy back their stolen and occupied homeland.

Starting in the early 19th century, building and courtyards were purchased adjacent to the Kotel alleyway in the Mugrhabi Quarter by Moses Montiefiore 1828, Shmarya Luria 1833-35, the Sefardi Community Trust 1845. During his 1888 visit, Edmond Rothschild attempted to arrange for a transfer of ownership of the whole quarter as it was Waqf category. In 1908, the Odessa Geula Society tried as did David Tzvi Schneerson in 1911. In 1915 even Pasha Djemal suggested the houses near the alleyway be bought up by the Jews. Immediately after the city's conquest by England, attempts were renewed.

The Taylor Force Act and two other anti-terror measures passed the influential House Foreign Affairs Committee on Wednesday.

All three measures will move to the full chamber, where they will be voted on by all members of the House, The Times of Israel reported.

The Taylor Force Act is named for the United States army veteran who was stabbed to death in March 2016 by a Palestinian terrorist while visiting Israel. The terrorist who killed Force was later killed, but he was described as “heroic” by Fatah, the main Palestinian political faction, and his family receives a stipend from the Palestinian Authority (PA). The Taylor Force Act, which passed unanimously on Wednesday, would condition U.S. aid to the Palestinians on the PA’s ending the practice of paying stipends to terrorists and their families.

A study published this past summer estimated that payments to terrorists and their families amounted to roughly half of the foreign budgetary aid the PA receives from the U.S., EU and Israel each year.

The Congressional version of the Taylor Force Act exempts three payments from a potential cutoff: money for childhood vaccinations, water, and for PA hospitals.

“Since 2003, it has been Palestinian law to reward Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails with a monthly paycheck. Palestinian leadership also pays the families of Palestinian prisoners and suicide bombers. These policies incentivize terrorism,” Rep. Ed Royce (R – Calif.), chairman of the committee said. “With this legislation, we are forcing the PA to choose between U.S. assistance and these morally reprehensible policies, and I am pleased to see this measure move forward in both chambers with so much support.”

The United Nations approved earlier this week the extension of an Israeli technology project designed to bolster the security of the global intergovernmental body’s Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission (MINUSCA) in the Central African Republic.

“Since 2015, Israel has contributed both static and mobile observation systems to MINUSCA,” the UN said. “These capacities have proven highly successful in increasing situational awareness and preventing outbreaks of violence, including during the visit of Pope Francis, the election process in Bangui and many other events associated with potential security threats.”

The Israeli project will now be expanded to “include measures to fully integrate technological solutions into the mission’s day to day operations,” according to the UN.

The UN went on to thank the Israeli government for its “continued support” of peacekeeping operations.

In an unprecedented move, Israel on Tuesday co-sponsored a draft resolution against Syria that was submitted by Saudi Arabia at the United Nations Human Rights Council.

The resolution, which was also backed by the US, France and Germany, passed with an overwhelming majority of 108 countries voting in favor, 17 voting against and 58 abstaining.

Although Israel has previously supported resolutions submitted by Saudi Arabia at the UN, it has never signed on as a co-sponsor.

In a statement delivered prior to the vote, Saudi Arabian Ambassador to the UN Abdallah Al-Mouallimi slammed the “the grave deterioration in the state of human rights in Syria.”

When the list of the resolution’s co-sponsors was read aloud, Syria’s UN envoy, Bashar al-Jaafari, mockingly congratulated Riyadh for Israel’s direct involvement, stating that it served as evidence of a secret Israeli-Saudi alliance. The Syrian ambassador also accused all of the resolution’s co-sponsors of supporting terrorism.

In an unprecedented interview to a Saudi news outlet, Israel Defense Forces Chief of Staff Gadi Eisenkot said Thursday that the Jewish state is prepared to share intelligence with the Gulf kingdom in their joint efforts to curb Iranian influence in the region.

Israel and Saudi Arabia do not have official diplomatic relations.

Speaking with the London-based, Saudi-owned news site Elaph, Eisenkot, in his first-ever interview with Arabic media, laid out what he thinks are Iran’s ambitions in the Middle East, and made clear that Israel isn’t interested in a war now with the Iranian-backed Lebanese terror group Hezbollah, despite Iranian attempts to bring about an escalation.

“With [US] President Donald Trump there is an opportunity for a new international coalition in the region. There should be a major regional plan to stop the Iranian threat,” said Eisenkot.

“We are ready to exchange experiences with moderate Arab countries and to exchange intelligence to confront Iran,” he added.

Asked whether Israel has shared “information” with the Saudis recently, Eisenkot responded, “We are prepared to share information if it is necessary. There are many mutual interests.”

Dozens of Christian Arabs protested against the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of the Holy Land on Thursday, demanding the resignation of Patriarch Theophilus III for selling church land to Israelis.

Some 50 demonstrators rallied outside the Church of St. George in Lod, in central Israel, where Theophilus had arrived to pray.

Some waved banners calling him “not trustworthy.” Others scuffled with the patriarch’s supporters.

The church is one of the largest real estate owners in the Holy Land. It is dominated by Greek clergy while the flock is overwhelmingly Palestinian.

The protest was one of several held recently in Israel and the West Bank that have called for the ouster of the patriarch and the replacement of Greek clergy with Palestinian ones.

Activists are furious over a list of real estate sales conducted by the patriarchate with private companies registered in offshore companies whose investors are unknown.

Chief of Staff Gadi Eisenkot’s main work directive to the IDF for 2018, the last year of his term, is to destroy all border-crossing tunnels—both those Israel is aware of and those it isn’t aware of yet—which have been dug or are being dug from the Gaza Strip into Israel.

Eisenkot was able to issue such an order due to the fact that three years after Operation Protective Edge, the army has obtained the technology and the means to allow an effective detection and destruction of tunnels in general and of border-crossing tunnels in particular.

The current tensions along the Gaza border, therefore, are not just the result of Islamic Jihad’s threats to avenge the demolition of its tunnel on October 30. Both Israel and the Palestinian factions in Gaza are flexing their muscles and growling in preparation for the day after the next border-crossing tunnel is destroyed.

The chief of staff’s order is clear: If a tunnel is uncovered, it will be destroyed. A tunnel will face the same fate as weapons smuggled from Syria to Hezbollah. And another tunnel will surely be uncovered. According to IDF assessments, since the destruction of 15 border-crossing tunnels during Operation Protective Edge, Hamas and Islamic Jihad have kept digging tunnels into Israeli territory. If there are diggings, and if there are effective detection means, there will be demolitions too. It’s just a matter of time.

Islamic Jihad is talking about revenge but is actually trying to create deterrence against Israel: To claim a sufficiently high price that would make Israel think twice before deciding to destroy the next tunnel.

Palestinian Authority (PA) chairman Mahmoud Abbas vowed to the Palestinian people that the free and independent state of Palestine within the June 4, 1967 borders, with eastern Jerusalem as its capital, would be established with absolute certainty.

In remarks on the the 29th anniversary of the Palestinian Declaration of Independence in 1988, Abbas said that Yasser Arafat, the founder of Fatah, the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and the PA, wanted the 1988 Declaration of Independence to send a message of peace to the world.

Abbas said the world is more aware than ever of the rights of the Palestinian people, especially their right to self-determination, freedom and independence, and that the Palestinian state is recognized and can no longer be ignored.

He added that Israeli recognition of “Palestine” is now required as part of a solution of two states that coexist in peace and security.

A spokesman for the Hamas terrorist group stressed on Wednesday that the group will never recognize Israel.

The spokesman, Sami Abu Zuhri, said Hamas would remain faithful to its principles and will act to implement the national reconciliation and unite the Palestinian people behind the Palestinian problem, Jerusalem, the resistance and the prisoners until the last grain of the land is liberated.

He spoke at the opening session of the 26th International Conference of the Association of Islamic Organizations (ESAM) taking place in Istanbul.

"Hamas has succeeded in turning the resistance from a limited one into a people's culture which is a source of pride,” declared Abu Zuhri.

"Therefore, those who say they want to stop the resistance and dismantle the arms of the resistance [organizations] are delusional, because these dreams will not come true as the resistance is strong and capable,” he added.

The Hamas terror group on Thursday officially accused Israeli spy agency Mossad of carrying out last year’s assassination of Mohammed al-Zoari, a Tunisian aviation scientist and engineer who developed the terror group’s unmanned drones.

In a press conference in Beirut, Hamas official Mohamed Nazzal said, “We are absolutely certain that the Mossad is responsible for the assassination of Zoari.”

He added that the Mossad had received help from other security services, but he did not elaborate on who they were.

Nazzal said the accusation was the result of Hamas’s own investigation in the scientist’s death. However, the Hamas official’s narrative of the alleged assassination was built almost entirely off of details released by Tunisian officials following the incident in December 2016, including that the killers had posed as two foreign journalists.

In the Hamas version, the two journalists, who used their alleged work as a way to get close to Zoari and scope out his neighborhood, claimed to have Bosnian citizenship. The two assassins were using Bosnian passports, Nazzal said.

Israeli foreign ministry spokesman Emmanuel Nahshon declined comment.

A Jordanian parliamentarian has openly declared his support for suicide bombings in Israel.

The lawmaker, Yahya Al-Saud, serves as chairman of the Palestine Committee of the Jordanian Parliament. He made his comments in an interview with a Palestinian Arab website as he visiting Ramallah as part of a delegation of Jordanian parliamentarians.

The interview was posted on the Donia Al-Watan website on November 9, and was translated by the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI).

Al-Saud acknowledged in the interview that Fatah is the sole representative of the Palestinian people but added, “I do support the option of resistance. The resistance must continue to be a strategic option for all the Arabs.”

Asked whether he was referring to armed resistance or to peaceful resistance, he stated, “Both armed and peaceful.” The interviewer then asked, “Do you support martyrdom bombing operations in Israel?”

“If the purpose of these martyrdom operations in Israel is to defend Palestine and its people, then yes, I support these operations,” Al-Saud replied.

Al-Saud is already infamous for the incident in which he invited MK Oren Hazan (Likud) to a fight at the Allenby Border Crossing between Israel and Jordan.

Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri has accepted an invitation to visit France after his surprise resignation from Saudi Arabia nearly two weeks ago that rattled the region, the French president's office said Thursday.

Hariri is expected in France in the coming days, according to an official in President Emmanuel Macron's office, speaking on condition of anonymity because the official was not authorized to talk publicly to the media.

Lebanon President Michel Aoun said Hariri and his family will arrive Saturday in France, "where he will rest for few days" before returning to Beirut to make "a decision regarding the resignation." Aoun's statement was carried by the state-run National News Agency.

Aoun had welcomed Hariri's decision to accept the French invitation, saying he hoped it "opened the door for a resolution" of the political crisis in Lebanon.

"I wait for the return of President (of the council of ministers) Hariri to decide the next move regarding the government," Aoun told journalists. The comments were published on his official Twitter account.

Following a change to the law last month that saw the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia make it legal for women to drive motor vehicles, the society has begun to shift toward the norm in countries where female drivers are commonplace: generalizations about the supposedly erratic, incompetent driving of women drivers.

Observers of culture and media in the conservative kingdom have noted the shift, and welcome it as a sign that the Saudi society, as traditional as it has always been, shows the capacity to adapt quickly to such changes.

“It’s encouraging to see so much stereotyping going on, out in the open, so soon after the law changed,” gushed Bihanda Weel, a columnist for The Times of Arabia. “Some of us expected there to be a difficult transition period in which the Saudi people would struggle to adopt the active use of these stereotypes on the road, but they have made such a smooth switch to the new reality. I’m proud to be Saudi.”

“We still have some catching up to do,” cautioned TV commentator Daatan Qalla. “That might just be a function of numbers, there being so few women driving at the moment, but we can’t make a serious claim to having matured as a society until we’re hearing about everyday encounters with women failing to parallel park because of a supposed inability to perceive depth, or rotate objects in their heads. It will take more than simply grafting our traditional disdain for women’s cognitive abilities onto this new medium.”

Iran is claiming that it has sued the United States for $60 billion in response to efforts by the American government to seize the Islamic Republic's assets as a result of terror attacks that have killed Americans and others.

Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif, a chief negotiator of the landmark nuclear agreement, claimed on Wednesday that the Iranian judiciary has issued rulings for the United States to pay the country at least $60 billion over the dispute.

Similar legal complaints by Iran against the United States have been filed with the International Criminal Court, which has longstanding jurisdiction to adjudicate several pending cases between the United States and Iran.

The Obama administration, late in President Obama's second term, reached a multi-million dollar settlement with Iran to avoid resolving at the ICC long-standing disputes over past arms deal that went awry following the Islamic Republic's 1979 revolution that brought in the country's hardline government.

"So far court verdicts have been issued in the U.S. against Iran to pay a sum of $60bln and similar rulings have been issued in Iran against the US to pay a similar sum," Zarif was quoted as saying in Iran's state-controlled press.

The U.S. Supreme Court has issued judgments in the past permitting the United States to seize Iranian assets as a result of its past terror attacks and other activities against America.

Britain is reportedly looking to pay approximately $600 million to Iran, settling a decades-old debt, as it attempts to secure the release of an Iranian-British woman being held in the Islamic Republic on espionage charges.

But Iranian and British officials denied that the two matters were tied.

Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson is hoping to improve relations with Iran while he works to free Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe by paying for a 1970s arms deal interrupted by the Islamic revolution, British media reported on Thursday.

The former shah of Iran paid the British government £650 million ($855 million) for 1,750 tanks, but only 185 were delivered before his regime was brought down in 1979 and the remainder of the order was canceled.

In 2009, the International Chamber of Commerce ordered Britain to repay Iran £450 million ($592 million) for the tanks that were never delivered, but UN and EU sanctions levied against Iran prevented the repayment.

Former Secretary of State John Kerry has continued his efforts to spread calm in a world troubled by the possibility of escalated sectarian conflict, reassuring Europe’s pre-WWII Jewish population that a religious ruling exists against attempts to annihilate any specific ethnic, religious, or racial group.

The Secretary spoke at an event to buttress the Iran nuclear deal, at which he repeated his claim that the deal made the world safer and implied that those who opposed the deal sought to spark war.

“My friends in the European establishment assure me there is a fatwa the specifically prohibits genocide,” he asserted. “It is not in the political or spiritual interest of the powers in Europe to pursue any such policy, and it undermines good faith dealings with them to constantly harp on this point.”

Kerry declined to specify what religious authority informed him of such a fatwa, or what spiritual authority issued it. “You have to trust people sometimes,” he explained. “That’s how deals are made, relationships develop.”

European leaders greeted Kerry’s words with warmth. “We are glad Mr. Kerry made this pronouncement,” read a statement by German Minister of Foreign Affairs Joachim von Ribbentrop. “Too much militant rhetoric has been poisoning the air of late, and it is important for a voice of reason, of calm, to prevail.”

“Yes, yes, what Kerry said, whatever it takes to get people to calm down about this,” concurred Mufti of Jerusalem Haj Amin al-Husseini, in the Balkans for a visit with like-minded Muslims in the area. “When Al-Aqsa is threatened by Jews, it is important to say these things.”