Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Thursday, November 16, 2017

An open letter to the people of Sutherland Springs from Israel (Forest Rain)

Dear people of Sutherland Springs,

I am writing to you, from Israel, to tell you that I see you.

Half way around the world, with enough worries of our own, it was heart-breaking to hear of the devastating shooting in your community.

We know what it means to have our loved ones ripped from us.

I see you. I see your pain. I see the children who no longer have parents. I see the parents who yearn for their children but will never again have the luxury of embracing them or reading them a bedtime story. Who will watch other children grow up, knowing that theirs should be the same age, be having similar experiences but, instead, are a memory, frozen in time.

I see the kids who want to play with friends who are no longer alive. I see cousins, uncles, grandparents, friends who are left behind, not knowing how to go on living when other family members, other friends are dead.

I see gaping holes that can never be filled. Lives lost, love lost.

And those who are left behind, injured in body, hurting in soul. A community, like a person trying to get warm under a blanket only to discover that the blanket is full of holes…

I see you.

An insane, sick murderer is not the same as the ideological terrorists who attack us and yet, what is experienced by those left behind, is very similar. We know your pain.

When people from abroad hear about attacks on my people they often see agenda, not people. They see politics, not humanity. Similarly, in your case, I saw the media jump on the issues of gun control, NRA and religion, whether or not Stephen Willeford is a hero (he acted heroically, all real heroes say that they are not heroes. Many, like Stephen, mourn those they did not manage to save). Much focus is put on agendas and very little attention to the people behind the headlines...

I am writing you to say that I see you.

I see decent, God fearing people, who just want to live their lives the best way they know how – just like us. I see people who would have preferred no one ever heard of their little town, if only they could have their loves ones back – just like us.

I also see something else. I see opportunity.

You cannot control what happened to you. You do not have the power to turn back time and undo this horror. But, at the same time you are not powerless.

You have a power that seems lost to much of America. You have love. You have each other.

While people who live in other towns and cities do not know their neighbors, you already know yours well. You know how to look beyond self-interest, beyond the walls of your own home, to reach out to help a neighbor in need, to make your community a better, stronger, kinder place.

To you, We the People, still means something.

I am not writing to tell you how to deal with this tragedy. From everything I have read about your community, I believe your hearts and your faith will lead you to do what is right.

This horror will not divide you, instead it will make you stronger.

While the gaps in your individual families cannot be filled, it is possible to step closer to each other as a community. To be there for those who no longer have the ones they wish were there. Parents who lost children can do wonders for the children of others, children who no longer have their parents. Friends can do amazing things for husbands and wives who no longer have their spouse to rely on.

No murderer can break you. Only lack of love can do that.

I am writing you to say that your tragedy is also an opportunity. By being who you are, you provide a shining light to the rest of the Nation. My people are those commanded to be a “Light to the Nations.” We do our best to fulfil this task by being the best we can be, by returning darkness with light, by deliberately infusing happiness and positivity in the places where our attackers tried to create sorrow and horror. By living and living well, when others wish us dead.

You can do the same.

Today, the USA seems enshrouded by darkness, division and anger. This makes America weak and a weak America makes the world more dangerous (believe me, I know). I pray the people of America look to you and remember what it means to be decent, regular folks who look out for each other.

This may just be the moment when you are the most powerful you have ever been, could ever be.

Dear people of Sutherland Springs, I see you. I see your pain and I see your light.

I pray for your injured to be healed, for your bereaved to find comfort and that the people of America see what I see when I look to you.

Blessings from Israel,

Forest Rain

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J-Street's new lying campaign against Israel proves how anti-Israel they are

J-Street, led by J-Street U, started a new campaign this week called "Stop Demolitions, Build Peace."

Acting exactly like any anti-Israel organization, J-Street U is "partnering" with six Arab communities in the West Bank to protect them from Israel demolishing illegal structures.

So for example, one of the communities being partnered with is Jabal al-Baba, a village I cannot find listed in the comprehensive Survey of Western Palestine indicating that it is not an ancient village at all. In August, Israel was accused of destroying a kindergarten there - but in reality it was an illegally erected shed that had never been in use.

Another community that J-Street is partnering with is Susya, which is simply an illegal village created after "occupation." It didn't exist in 1999.

The slick video that J-Street produced for this effort claims, falsely, that Israel demolishes Arab communities and then builds Jewish settlements on the same areas.

J-Street falsely says in the video, "The Israeli government is engaged in a process of 'creeping annexation' in the West Bank. Central to this trend is the systematic demolition of Palestinian communities in the West Bank to make way for more Israeli settlements."

If there have been no new settlements built in decades, then what Arab communities have been destroyed and replaced by Israel?

If you consider Area C to be occupied, then Israel has the obligation under international law to uphold zoning laws on the land, although security concerns trump other considerations - again, under international law. When Israel demolishes a structure that was illegally built, it is following international law, not spurning it. The Palestinian Authority would do the exact same thing.

And Israel isn't destroying any communities unless they were set up illegally - in recent years - to begin with.

J-Street is once again shown to be completely anti-Israel, anti-international law and anti-truth.

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There is a documentary making the rounds called "In Search of Israeli Cuisine."

From watching the trailer, it is clear that the chefs and experts in the film readily acknowledge the influence of the cuisine of the Arab world as influencing Israeli cuisine, even going so far as pointing to hummus and calling it "Palestinian" - which is of course absurd.

“Yemenite, Palestinian, Iraqi, Moroccan, Russian, Turkish… I don’t even know- how many countries are represented in one place,” says renowned chef Michael Solomonov as he points to an array of salads and appetizers that are ubiquitous to Israeli restaurants.

An Israeli baker says “Food is not political. It is what is grown on this land by the people who are living in it. If they are called Palestinians or Israelis, I don’t think the tomato cares.”

Arab America is very upset. To them, Israeli cuisine is political and even Israeli chefs admitting the influence of "Palestinian" food culture is cultural theft.

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.

Setting aside that Palestinian culture is essentially a myth, the experts in the film are elevating it beyond what it deserves to be - putting it on par with every other culture.

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.

This paragraph is a neat piece of hypocrisy. At the same time of asserting, without any evidence, that the Israeli government is trying to hard to destroy Palestinian culture (Israel has museums dedicated to Arab culture) the writer reveals that she doesn't admit that there is anything that can be considered Israeli cuisine. Because the chef mentioned many countries as contributing to Israeli cuisine, but this Arab writer does not accept that Israel has created a new and vibrant cuisine over 70 years. It isn't Jewish - it is Israeli.

So the only person denying a food culture is the Arab, not the Israeli Jew.

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.

Where exactly is the ethnic cleansing of a people who didn't exist a hundred years ago and now say they are 12 million strong? A people who literally would not exist if Israel wasn't created?

The complaints given to the film are so over-the-top (and creative) that one wonders what Palestinians could accomplish if they spent one tenth of the effort they give towards being pissed off to doing something constructive.

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11/15 Links Pt2: The Red Cross Destroys the Laws of War; The Moral Case for High-Tech Weapons

From Ian:

Why Many American Jews Are Becoming Indifferent or Even Hostile to Israel

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.

Evelyn Gordon: The Red Cross Destroys the Laws of War Making War More Deadly

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?

The Moral Case for High-Tech Weapons

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.

It was Saturday night. My son's laundry was sweet and clean, dry, and folded into a neat, solid square pile on the sofa. On top of this pile was a plastic ice cream container, repurposed, and filled with fresh-baked Toll House cookies, the hot, buttery aroma of which still lingered in the air. I remarked to my husband that I felt good: I'd done everything possible to take care of my son, to pamper him and give him a nice break from the hard work of soldiering.

There is satisfaction in that, I said to my husband, and it is felt on more than one level. I'd done my duty as a mother, been good to my child. But I'd also done whatever I could for an IDF soldier. We do love our soldiers, here in Israel. And when you help them, you're helping your country.

That was the heart of the thing: a love of sons, and a love of country, expressed in the most practical of terms.

How lucky am I, to be a mother of sons who serve my beloved country? I get to spoil IDF soldiers.

I get to spoil my sons.

Already on Wednesday, my son had written to ask if I'd make apple pies for Shabbos. I'd done that and more. I made fresh tehina sauce and roasted garlic for him to have with homemade sourdough challah. I prepared his favorite sweet and sour brisket and my famous mashed potatoes.

In between cooking tasks I got right down on the floor with his dirty laundry, to pretreat and make sure nothing important was left behind in his pockets. This might have been a disgusting task to someone else, but to me, it was an honor, the clothes having been anointed with the sweat of an IDF soldier. Soldier stench is an honest stench. Especially when that soldier is one who defends Eretz HaKodesh, the Holy Land.

When our soldier sons have leave, we, my husband and I, are doing everything we can to give them a break from the stress, to help them in any way possible. One week, my son came home after a grueling hike of many kilometers. He limped into the house. He had chafe. His feet were covered with blisters.

Not knowing what else to do, I took my prized bottle of Aveeno bath soap from America, and made a little foot bath for him. "Wow. That smells so good. What is that?" and then nothing more after that except a moan of pleasure that escaped his lips as his feet sank into the hot and foamy scented water. His enjoyment of this small gesture suffused my own heart with joy.

There is nothing I wouldn't do for him, or for my other boys in their service.

My husband, meantime, does what he can to give them rides to and from the Central Bus Station, quite a distance from our home. Yes. They could take the bus home. But they are tired, the boys. And they are carrying packs that are incredibly heavy. It's a backbreaking weight. And we Epsteins are kind of small.

The truth is that while Dov can ill afford the time away from work, not to mention the extra burden at the end of a hard week, those rides are important. The boys and Dov have come to call this time "road trip." They connect, father and sons. It's good for Dov and good for the boys. They talk army.

The boys know their father was in the army too, once upon a time. They feel comfortable talking with him about operations and army tactics. It's like a debriefing for them. And Dov gets to learn new tidbits from the seemingly bottomless well of IDF acronyms.

Aside from the road trips and guy time, Dov tries to put aside spending money for them to take back with them, too, though the boys receive a small salary for their services. We don't want them to spend their money. We want them to save it for after the army, if they can. Money is tight with us, but we do the most we can to help them.

Weeks the boys don't come home, we miss them so. It's lonely and too quiet without them. We miss their goofing around, their hilarious impressions of celebrities. We wish they hadn't volunteered to stay on base over Shabbos.

At the same time, we're proud they went the extra mile, volunteering to do more than their share for their country. We worry about them. We scour the news and try to calculate the distance from where we know they are situated, to trouble spots making the news.

One has just finished serving, one is still in, and the third goes in next year.

You never think that your tender newborn baby is going to grow up to be a soldier. And when it happens, you find your love for them fair explodes in your heart. They look so handsome in their uniforms, raised on the soil of Eretz Yisroel, tanned, fit, and strong in olive green.

You want them to be safe.

And there really isn't anything you wouldn't do for them.

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Mossad Keeps Resetting Iran's Countdown-To-Israel's-Destruction Clock (PreOccupied Territory)

Our weekly column from the humor site PreOccupied Territory.

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Tehran, November 15 - Security officials of the Khamenei regime believe Israel's secret intelligence service has hacked the clock in Iran's capital that counts down to the Jewish State's predicted destruction, causing it to keep starting over.

Sources in Iran's intelligence community who requested anonymity reported Monday that Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei had ordered the clock shut down until the source of the Mossad hack could be isolated and neutralized.

"Every hour the thing is out there and not working is an embarrassment for the regime," noted one official with knowledge of the incidents. "The first couple of times it was attributed to power failures, software glitches, and the like. But as time went on and the clock kept not showing that Israel's destruction was getting closer, operators began to suspect something more sinister was afoot. At least one technician on the team has already been imprisoned."

"This is at least as advanced as Stuxnet," concurred another official, referring to a successful attempt several years ago on the part of suspected Israeli and American hackers to introduce delays into Iran's nuclear program via sabotage of centrifuges by causing them to overheat but still display monitoring details as if the system were functioning properly. "It might even be on par with the stealing of Islamist activists' shoes, in terms of technical sophistication."

Analysts observed that while the propaganda effect of the clock, when it operated properly, could not be measured, its neutralization provides a clear public image victory for Israel. "Iran talks up destroying Israel all the time, so individual moves in that respect kind of get lost in the shuffle," explained Asghar Bukhari, a London-based Middle East expert. "But in the Islamic world appearances are really, really important, so this one case of Israel undermining an Iranian propaganda device in such a way that embarrasses Iran - well, that carries weight."

The episode would be at least the sixth time since 2006 that the Mossad has, according to Iranian intelligence, sabotaged strategic facilities inside the Islamic Republic. Aside from the countdown clock and Stuxnet, intelligence officials from multiple countries believe Israel had a hand in several occasions on which Ayatollah Khamenei emerged from the bathroom with toilet paper clinging to his shoe. In 2015 operation, the Mossad also released onto the internet a detailed account of the pornography-consumption habits of multiple Arab heads of state and terrorist leaders, including Khamenei. The Supreme Leader then compounded the embarrassment by denying that the genre alleged to be his favorite was different from his actual preferences

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11/15 Links Pt1: Back to Israeli-Palestinian Negotiations? – Some Basic Truths; EU's Collusion in Palestinian Illegal Land Grab

From Ian:

Amb. Alan Baker: Back to Israeli-Palestinian Negotiations? – Some Basic Truths

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.

Caroline Glick: Pining for fig leaves

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.

Ruthie Blum: Europe's Collusion in Palestinian Illegal Land Grab

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.

The Line Between Criticism and Demonization of Israel (Daled Amos)

Monday, my daughter asked me to help her with her homework. She needed help with a project on Antisemitism. The assignment was to take 4 cartoons -- 2 antisemitic cartoons from the Nazi era and 2 current anti-Israel/antisemitic cartoons -- and compare them..

She wanted my help to find them.

The first two cartoons were easy to find online. Der Stürmer cartoons are easy enough to find.

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.”

There is no problem or argument in seeing these cartoons for what they are. They portray Jews as ugly, threatening and outright dangerous.

According to Wikipedia, the Nazis themselves found Streicher's cartoons downright embarrassing:

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").

Though Hitler supported him, Streicher's luck finally ran out after the war when he was tried at Nuremberg. According to the prosecutors, Streicher's paper incited Germans to kill the Jews, thus making him an accessory to murder. He was found guilty of crimes against humanity and hanged.

Fast forward to today.

If the Nazis themselves realized that Streicher was going too far, can we assume that today's antisemites are equally aware of lines that cannot be crossed?

Not if you are Rutgers Professor Michael Chikindas

Michael Chikindas' tweet

Over two weeks later and Rutgers is still trying to figure what to do about this.

Let's face it: we will always have people who get deranged over Der Sturmer.

Those older cartoons demonized Jews, and did it in a way that was so obvious and so over-the-top that a time came that the Nazis themselves had a sense they had gone to far.

Are people more sensitive to antisemitism and anti-Israel propaganda today?

How about the cartoon below from a Berkeley editorial. I gave it to my daughter as a current example of an anti-Israel/antisemitic cartoon.

Raphael Magarik at the Forward justified the cartoon and claimed it wasn't antisemitic at all, but to do so he had to resort to proving his point by avoiding it.

He picked up on the accusation that this was a "blood libel" -- and defended the cartoon because the whole issue was that blood is being spilled. He then goes on to defend the cartoon by claiming that the various implied attacks in the cartoon on Dershowitz and his politics are justified, which is actually besides the point.

Overlooked was the fact that the image was not of Alan Dershowitz, but of Dershowitz with the body of a spider, an image used in Nazi cartoons, with all that image implies.

I pointed out to my daughter the demonization in the cartoon and I think she understood the point.

A few years ago, the Economist printed a cartoon that it then retracted as being antisemitic:

In the cartoon, the US and Iran, symbolized by Obama and Khamenei are being prevented from completing the Iran deal. Iranian hardliners are holding Khamenei back. Congress is holding Obama back. But one of those stars on that emblem of Congress is a Jewish star.

The issue is not the implication that Jews in the US were trying to prevent the Iran deal. As citizens they had the right to oppose it. The implication was that Jews (or Israel) controlled Congress. It may be more subtle than the Dershowitz cartoon, but there that implication was an element of demonization of Jews -- and it was a point that was brought home when even the New York Times attempted to make opposition to the Iran deal into a "Jewish" issue.

The creepiest infographic you'll see today, courtesy of the NYT. Categories include "Jewish?" http://t.co/NenSllbqk8 pic.twitter.com/PxDgZY3bTE
— Oren Kessler (@OrenKessler) September 10, 2015

In another cartoon, at the beginning of the year, The New York State Education Department apologized for including a political cartoon on its global studies Regents exam that critics claimed was anti-Israel propaganda.

Here is the exam question:

Considering the correct answer is (3) Negotiations have failed, the cartoon -- which criticizes Israel and only Israel -- is a poor illustration of the point. Using Natan Sharansky's 3 D's for determining antisemitism -- demonization, double standard and delegitimization -- none of those 3 factors seem to exist in the cartoon in a blatant hyperbolic way.

The AJC condemned the cartoon as being

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

Granted the cartoon is "blatantly anti-Israel" and "disparaging of Israeli soldiers," does that make it "inappropriate"?

The exam was in New York.
What would have happened if this appeared on a test in Iowa?

Antisemitic and anti-Israel cartoons may not be as blatant as this one attack Ariel Sharon and Israel:

But this Ariel Sharon cartoon was "cleared" of being antisemitic by a UK press watchdog. More than that, the cartoon went on to win the UK's "Political Cartoon of the Year Award for 2003" of the Political Cartoon Society.

But what about the resemblance to the Nazi cartoon above of a Jew eating people? Someone decided the cartoon was criticism, not demonization. Does over-the-top criticism automatically become demonization, antisemitism and anti-Israel propaganda?

Fourteen years later, how do we distinguish antisemitic cartoons from criticism -- valid or not -- of Jews or Israel, especially when those cartoons can sometimes be more nuanced?

Dershowitz opens what may be a Pandora's Box when he quotes approvingly from a letter to the editor from students from a pro-Israel organization at Berkeley printed in the Daily Cal:

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.

Considering that this strategy is being used by other groups on campuses across the US, Jewish students should be able to use it too -- especially when the antisemitism on campus is such a threat.

Not to mention antisemitic crime incidents over the years as tracked by the FBI:

But do we really want to have to resort to the "safe spaces" argument?

If we demand the right to define what is offensive to us as Jews, as opposed to seeing it as mere criticism, are we validating the claim that Jews deliberately define criticism of Israel as antisemitism?

Safe spaces are not the answer.
The line between criticism and demonization of Israel may not always be so clear.
We have little choice but to stand our ground.

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Turkish columnist can't find anything wrong with Jerusalem - except Jews, of course

Yasin Aktay, writing in conservative pro-ErdoganTurkish site Yeni Safak, quotes an earlier article of his on Jerusalem:

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.

So he decided to visit Jerusalem and see how terrible it is.

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.

OK, so what is so awful about Jewish rule over Jerusalem. After all, the Zionists are letting an Israel-hating Muslim visit, so it can't be that they have closed the city off to everyone but Jews the way Muslims treat their holy cities. So what is it?

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.

Well, Mohammed never once said people should visit Jerusalem. But besides the despicable Zionist occupation, what specifically is so terrible?

First he has to give some background:

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.

Oh, so Jews have always been oppressors.

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.

Wasn't Goliath the native Philistine and David the invading Jew who was in the midt of enslaving the people? I'm so confused.

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

Hello?

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.

OK. So what did you see?

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.

So did you visit the Al Aqsa Mosque or the third Temple?

The entire article is about how awful things are in Jerusalem but the only thing he can say is that Jews are controlling it - allowing him to visit freely.

Is this anti-Zionism or antisemitism?

Actually, it is Islamic supremacy. And that is at least as dangerous.

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Two days ago, Mahmoud Abbas attended a conference in Kuwait:

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.

The cynicism of pretending to care about Palestinian children in order to provide a photo op to bash Israel is obvious.

Anyone who truly cares about Palestinian children would insist that they not be taught to throw rocks at Jews. They should not be told on TV shows that murderers are heroes. They should not be taught in schools that martyrdom is their ultimate aspiration for them. They would complain about Hamas' use of children as human shields, about their building tunnels under schools, about their shooting rockets from playgrounds

Arabs saying that they care about Palestinian children is as convincing as...Arabs saying they care about Palestinians.

Certainly no one in the West would be this stupid to believe this transparent ploy of politicizing "children" as a means to attack Israel.

Oh, wait:

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.

Yep. A member of US Congress is acting just like Mahmoud Abbas - not caring about Palestinian children except for how they can be used to hurt Israel.

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11/14 Links Pt2: Saudi mufti's fatwa against Hamas; Benny Morris: UN Partition Vote in 1947 Was Important, but Not Crucial

From Ian:

Israeli min welcomes Saudi mufti's anti-Hamas remarks

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)

Benny Morris: The UN Partition Vote in November 1947 Was Important, but Not Crucial

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.

Shiite clerics rail against Baha'i and other Islamic sects as Western/Zionist plot

From Rabwah Times:

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.

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