PA "peace partners" dream of erasing Jewish presence in Jerusalem

From PMW, 17 August 2011, by Itamar Marcus and NanJacques Zilberdik:

Official Palestinian Authority TV broadcast a documentary which stated that the PA plans to build an Arab residential area in place of the Western Wall Plaza in Jerusalem, "when they [Israelis] disappear from the picture, like a forgotten chapter in the pages of our city's history."

The Western Wall, a remnant of the Temple Mount, is Judaism's holiest and most important prayer site.

The PA TV documentary further rejected the Jewish connection to Jerusalem, referring to Jewish history as "their false history," while the Jews' praying at the Western Wall was called "sin and filth."

 

Click to view 

The following is the transcript of the excerpt of the PA TV documentary:

 "They [Israelis] know for certain that our [Palestinian] roots are deeper than their false history. We, from the balcony of our home, look out over [Islamic] holiness and on sin and filth (Jews' praying at Western Wall) in an area that used to have [Arab] people and homes. We are drawing our new maps. When they [Israelis] disappear from the picture, like a forgotten chapter in the pages of our city's history, we will build it anew (residential area). The Mughrabi Quarter will be built here (on the Western Wall Plaza)."

[PA TV (Fatah), Aug. 10, 2011]

Norway's sordid complicity with Nazism and Hamas terrorism

From Aish.com, by Alan M. Dershowitz:
 

In a recent interview, Norway's Ambassador to Israel has suggested that Hamas terrorism against Israel is more justified than the recent terrorist attack against Norway. 

... "We Norwegians consider the occupation to be the cause of the terror against Israel." In other words terrorism against Israeli citizens is the fault of Israel. The terrorism against Norway, on the other hand, was based on "an ideology that said that Norway, particularly the Labor Party, is foregoing Norwegian culture." 

It is hard to imagine that he would make such a provocative statement without express approval from the Norwegian government.

I can't remember many other examples of so much nonsense compressed in such short an interview. First of all, terrorism against Israel began well before there was any "occupation". The first major terrorist attack against Jews who had long lived in Jerusalem and Hebron began in 1929, when the leader of the Palestinian people, the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, ordered a religiously-motivated terrorist attack that killed hundreds of religious Jews-many old, some quite young. [Actually the Mufti inspired "fedayeen" earlier attacks in the early 1920s against Jews and also against Arabs who opposed him - SL]

Terrorism against Jews continued through the 1930s. Once Israel was established as a state, but well before it captured the West Bank, terrorism became the primary means of attacking Israel across the Jordanian, Egyptian and Lebanese borders. If the occupation is the cause of the terror against Israel, what was the cause of all the terror that preceded any occupation?
 

Norway is the most anti-Semitic and anti-Israel country in Europe today. I was not surprised to hear such ahistorical bigotry from a Norwegian Ambassador. Norway is the most anti-Semitic and anti-Israel country in Europe today. I know, because I experienced both personally during a recent visit and tour of universities. No university would invite me to lecture, unless I promised not to discuss Israel. Norway forbids Jewish ritual slaughter, but not Islamic ritual slaughter. Its political and academic leaders openly make statements that cross the line from anti-Zionism to anti-Semitism, such as when Norway's former Prime Minister condemned Barak Obama for appointing a Jew as his Chief of Staff. No other European leader would make such a statement and get away with it. In Norway, this bigoted statement was praised, as were similar statements made by a leading academic.

The very camp that was attacked by the lone terrorist was engaged in an orgy of anti-Israel hatred the day before the shooting. Yet I would not ever claim that it was Norway's anti-Semitism that "caused" the horrible act of terrorism against young Norwegians.

The causes of terrorism are multifaceted but at bottom they have a common cause: namely a belief that violence is the proper response to policies that the terrorists disagree with. The other common cause is that terrorism has often been rewarded. Norway, for example, has repeatedly rewarded Palestinian terrorism against Israel, while punishing Israel for its efforts to protect its civilians. While purporting to condemn all terrorist acts, the Norwegian government has sought to justify Palestinian terrorism as having a legitimate cause. This clearly is an invitation to continued terrorism.

It is important for the world never to reward terrorism by supporting the policies of those who employ it as an alternative to reason discourse, diplomatic resolution or political compromise.

I know of no reasonable person who has tried to justify the terrorist attacks against Norway. Yet there are many Norwegians who not only justify terrorist attacks against Israel, but praise them, support them, help finance them, and legitimate them.


The world must unite in condemning and punishing all terrorist attacks against innocent civilians, regardless of the motive or purported cause of the terrorism. Norway, as a nation, has failed to do this. It wants us all to condemn the terrorist attack on its civilians, and we should all do that, but it refuses to live by a single standard.

Nothing good ever comes from terrorism, so don't expect the Norwegians to learn any lessons from its own victimization. As the Ambassador made clear in his benighted interview, "those of us who believe [the occupation to be the cause of the terror against Israel] will not change their minds because of the attack in Oslo." In other words, they will persist in their bigoted view that Israel is the cause of the terrorism directed at it, and that if only Israel were to end the occupation (as it offered to do in 2000-2001 and again in 2007), the terrorism will end.

Even Hamas, which Norway supports in many ways, has made clear that it will not end its terrorism as long as Israel continues to exist. Hamas believes that Israel's very existence is the cause of the terrorism against it. That sounds a lot like the ranting of the man who engaged in the act of terrorism against Norway.

The time is long overdue for Norwegians to do some deep soul searching about their sordid history of complicity with all forms of bigotry ranging from the anti-Semitic Nazis to the anti-Semitic Hamas. There seems to be a common thread.

UN Human Rights "investigator" posts an antisemitic cartoon but "did not perceive any racist connotations"

From UN Watch, July 6, 2011 in Human Rights Council (UNHRC):

Reaction: UN’s Falk Denies, Then Deletes Anti-Semitic Cartoon

After UN Watch today exposed his publication of an anti-Semitic cartoon, the UN Human Rights Council’s Richard Falk first denied publishing the cartoon—and then deleted it. See his blog here.
For those wishing to see a screen-capture of the original post prior to its deletion by Falk, please click here.

Go directly to Richard Falk's Blog and read the comments to see what the public think of him...

Hamas looks forward to "the great massacre" of Jews

From The Wire, Thurs. 30 Jun. 2011:

Hamas foreign minister: as a ‘matter of principle’ Hamas will never relinquish ‘a single inch of the Palestinian land’.

‘In just a few years, all the Zionists and the settlers will realize that their arrival in Palestine was for the purpose of the great massacre, by means of which Allah wants to relieve humanity of their evil.’

Mahmoud Zahar, Hamas’ foreign minister, has used a recent interview to clarify the ideological difference between the Gaza-based Islamist party, and Fatah. According to the translation from Memri, Zahar stated during his 23 June appearance on the Hamas-affiliated Al-Aqsa TV that:

‘The difference between [Hamas and Fatah] is that we will not give up a single inch. We say that we should establish a state on any piece of the land, but without relinquishing a single inch. That’s it, in a nutshell. That’s the difference between us and them. They want to establish a state within the 1967 borders, with certain land swaps, and to forget about 78% of the Palestinian land of the past. We say that we should establish a state on any piece of the land – not necessarily [the entire] 1967 territories, but any inch of land – but without giving up a single inch of the land.’

The clear message is that, while Fatah might be willing to accept two states as a resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Hamas would only ever view the establishment of a Palestinian state alongside Israel as an interim solution – the claim to the whole of Israel would continue.
Zahar further clarifies that this is a ‘matter of principle’ which ‘pertains to our strategy for the future’:

‘That is the different between us and them, and it is a matter of principle – a historical, ideological, and political dispute, which pertains to our strategy for the future. The difference is clear… We say that we accept the 1967 borders, but without recognizing Israel, and without giving up our right to the rest of Palestine.’

He concludes by arguing that if it weren’t for this ‘matter of principle’, Hamas would simply be a ‘carbon copy’ of Fatah:

‘I think it is wise to stress this issue, because it is misunderstood. We say that we will establish a state on any inch of land that is liberated, but without relinquishing a single inch of Palestine. This is how we should put it. But when we start talking about readiness to accept 1967 or 1948… This makes you seem like a carbon copy of Fatah. We are not a carbon copy of Fatah. I take full responsibility for saying this. We will never relinquish a single inch of the Palestinian land, which has been and remains Palestinian – the 1948 [borders].’

Zahar’s clarification of Hamas’ position in relation to Israel is in line with an interview he gave in May 2011, when he told the Palestinian news outlet Ma’an that Hamas would never recognise Israel since this would ‘preclude the right of the next generations to liberate the lands.’
The explicit claim by Hamas’ foreign minister that he regards all of Israel as Palestinian land is only the latest in a series of rejectionist statements from the Islamist group. In May, Osama Hamdan, head of Hamas’ international relations department, stated that ‘armed confrontation’ would remain ‘the backbone of the resistance’. Earlier that month, Ismail Haniyeh, de-facto prime minister of Gaza, argued that ‘the Zionist project in Palestine must end’, while a Hamas cleric claimed that:

‘In just a few years, all the Zionists and the settlers will realize that their arrival in Palestine was for the purpose of the great massacre, by means of which Allah wants to relieve humanity of their evil.’

University and College Union (UK) "inhospitable to Jews"

From The Jewish Chronicle Online, July 1, 2011, by Jennifer Lipman:


A British academic has announced that he is taking legal action against the Universities and Colleges Union ["UCU"] after it made the "indecent" decision to distance itself from the European Union's working definition of antisemitism.

UCU general secretary Sally Hunt

"inhospitable to Jews"

Lawyers acting for Ronnie Fraser, the chair of the Academic Friends of Israel, have written to UCU general secretary Sally Hunt complaining that the UCU's vote breached the 2010 Equality Act's commitment.

The letter said Mr Fraser was to sue because as a result of the vote the UCU had "harassed" him by "engaging in unwanted conduct" relating to his Jewish identity. It went on to say that without the protection of the otherwise widely-accepted definition of antisemitism, Mr Fraser now faced an "intimidating, hostile, degrading humiliating" and "offensive environment".

The lawyers added: "In simple terms, the UCU is not a place that is hospitable to Jews. This is not just a violation of equality legislation, it is also a scandal."

They said the situation was worsened by the fact that union was breaching "energetically fought-for laws against discrimination".

The letter also accused the UCU of having been "inhospitable to Jews" since its inception, because of annual Israel boycott resolutions, a failure to engage with Jewish members and the welcome it gave last year to "a confirmed antisemite" Bongani Masuku.

"This indecent, discreditable resolution was passed in active disregard of the feelings of Jewish members - a disregard amounting to a kind of inflamed contempt for all Jews other than that minority among them ready to abet a degraded and obsessive "anti-Zionist" activism," said the letter. It said Mr Fraser had now "had enough" and felt he had little option but to sue.

After the UCU vote, the union was branded "institutionally racist" by the chief executive of the Jewish Leadership Council.

Its decision was also heavily criticised this week by cabinet minister Eric Pickles, who wrote that it sent "a chilling message" to Jewish students and academics.

The UCU said Ms Hunt would not comment on the lawsuit. She has until August to respond.

Egyptian delusions

From the JERUSALEM POST EDITORIAL 15 June 2011:

If the Grapel scandal is an indication of where the Arab Spring’s winds of change are headed, the portents are dismal indeed.

You need not be privy to classified intelligence information or have an intimate familiarity with the inner workings of Israel’s undercover agencies to grasp that Egyptian allegations of espionage leveled against against American-born Ilan Grapel, 27, are baseless.

“Delusional” was the way Grapel’s distraught mother Irene aptly put it, while father Daniel chose “totally false.” A senior government official traveling with Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu in Rome added, as if it were necessary to make such clarifications, that there was not a shred of truth to the claim that Grapel was connected to the Mossad.

Grapel, known for his left-wing political views and love for Arabic, is a third-year law student from Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia. He has been in Cairo since May 10 volunteering at St. Andrews Refugee Services as part of a program to advance democracy and constitutional rights in the Middle East. Something of a joker, Grapel cited on his Facebook page “preaching” at Al-Azhar University in Cairo as his job.

Egyptian officials do not merely lack a sense of humor, however. They are cynically exploiting the fact that Grapel made aliya and served as a paratrooper in the IDF (and was wounded in action during the 2006 Second Lebanon War) to remake him unfoundedly as a ruthless Mossad agent. A unit in the Egyptian security forces whose only job is to uncover Israeli espionage attempts has apparently concocted a story about Grapel to justify its own existence.

In this hallucinatory parallel world, young, adventurous Americans like Grapel are singled out and charged with outrageous, trumped-up charges: The Mossad, not Emory University, runs the absurd Egyptian security narrative, sent Grapel to Egypt to take advantage of a supposed “security vacuum” created in the wake of January’s Tahrir Square uprising. “Saeed,” a spokesman for Egypt’s general prosecutor, told CNN that Grapel, who had been followed “for months,” had been recruiting “informants” to provide Israel with vital military and political information. The purportedly “undercover” Grapel, who in actual fact openly posted his day to day activities on Facebook, was further alleged to have attempted to incite sectarian violence between Muslims and Christians (as if Egyptian Muslims needed any outside encouragement not already provided by radical Muslim religious leaders, who regularly incite against the embattled Coptic community).

Egyptian newspapers have lapped the story up, featuring it on their front pages Monday alongside photos of Grapel republished from his Facebook account. “Egypt arrests Israeli Intelligence Officer, a big blow to the Israeli Mossad Intelligence Agency,” one typically truth-deficient headline said.

SADDER STILL, it would be misleading to view the Grapel fiasco as simply a peculiar blip.
Anti-Semitism and anti- Israeli sentiments run deep in Egypt.
As Rivka Yadlin, a student of Egyptian anti-Semitism, pointed out two decades ago,

“The abominable traits expressed in the behavior of Israel are perceived as singular, inherent and intrinsic in its very Jewish being. They are inherited within the Jewish community and are thus shared by the whole of Israel as well as by other Jews.”

Little has changed since.

And Egyptians seem to have a particular fascination with the Mossad. Last December, for instance, when a 70- year-old German snorkeler washed up dead on the Red Sea shore with shark bites in her right thigh and right elbow, Egyptian officials claimed it was a Mossad plot. “What is being said about the Mossad throwing the deadly shark [in the sea] to hurt tourism in Egypt is not out of the question...,” South Sinai Gov. Mohamed Abdel Fadil Shousha was quoted as saying by state news site egynews.net.

A month before, Mostafa al-Feki, the head of the Foreign Affairs Committee in Egypt’s People’s Assembly, claimed that the Mossad was behind violent clashes between Copts and Muslims. The fact that an increasingly Islamist Egyptian bureaucracy had refused to provide a construction permit for a new Coptic church was conveniently ignored by Feki.

WITH US State Department officials involved, it appears likely that Egypt will eventually relent and free Grapel. The sooner the better.

Those responsible for inventing the baseless accusations against him will doubtless never admit their folly, however. And what should give pause for concern – not just to Israelis but to all who value justice – is the ease with which such blatantly anti-Israel claims can be concocted and spread and believed by a captive Egyptian public regularly bombarded with anti-Israeli propaganda.

If the Grapel scandal is an indication of where the Arab Spring’s winds of change are headed, the portents are dismal indeed.

Hitler’s First Anti-Semitic Writing

From NYT, 3 June 2011:

FRANKFURT — In 1919, a soldier in Munich discovered that he could galvanize small groups of fellow trench warfare veterans with virulently anti-Semitic oratory. A superior officer, impressed with the soldier’s oral skills, asked him to commit his ideas to paper.

Thus came into existence the first written record of Adolf Hitler’s obsessive hostility toward Jews, an embryonic form of the worldview that would later lead to the Holocaust and millions of deaths.

Now, the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles has acquired what it believes may be the original version of the document, known as the Gemlich letter. In July, the center plans to put it on public view for the first time, at its Museum of Tolerance, making the letter the centerpiece of its Holocaust exhibit.

The text of the letter is well known to scholars. It is considered significant because it demonstrates just how early in his career Hitler was formulating his anti-Semitic views.

“It is his first written statement about the Jews,” said the historian Saul Friedlander, who won a Pulitzer Prize in 2008 for his study of the Holocaust. “It shows that this was the very core of his political passion.”

The version of the letter best known to scholars is in an archive in Munich, and news that another copy had made its way to Los Angeles met with some skepticism among historians. The market for Hitler memorabilia is notorious for forgeries.

... Othmar Plöckinger, an expert on early Hitler documents, says it appears that the document acquired by the Wiesenthal Center is the original letter written by Hitler and that the one in Munich is a copy made about the same time...

...Hitler’s ability to hold the interest of his listeners drew him to the attention of a superior officer, Capt. Karl Mayr. When a soldier named Adolf Gemlich, who was doing similar propaganda work for the army in Ulm, wrote asking for a clarification of “the Jewish Question,” Captain Mayr gave Hitler the assignment.

Hitler wrote to Mr. Gemlich that occasional pogroms against the Jews were not enough — the Jewish “race” must be “removed” from Germany as a matter of national policy.

...The document in the state archives in Munich is not the original and is not signed by Hitler, said Johann Pörnbacher, a representative of the archives. He says the archives has no record of where the original is.

Mr. Plöckinger, the historian who examined both versions, said that the copy in the Munich archive corrected some typographical and punctuation errors in the Wiesenthal Center document ... “...structural aspects speak in favor of the authenticity” of the document acquired by the Wiesenthal Center.        The implication is that the signed version in Los Angeles was the letter originally sent to Adolf Gemlich...

Hamas prepares for genocide of the Jews

From The Wire, 16 May 2011:

Hamas MP argues that Jews were brought to Palestine for a ‘great massacre’, in order to ‘relieve humanity of their evil’.

Following the comments made last Wednesday by Hamas’ foreign minister, Mahmoud Zahar, reiterating that the Islamist group would never recognise Israel, further statements by senior figures have emerged that also highlight the group’s extreme ideology.

The Hamas cleric Yunis Al-Astal, who is a member of the Palestinian Legislative Council, argued that:

‘All the predators, all the birds of prey, all the dangerous reptiles and insects, and all the lethal bacteria are far less dangerous than the Jews.’

According to Memri, Al-Astal made the comments on Hamas’ Al-Aqsa TV channel on 11 May, expressing his belief that Allah had brought Jews to Palestine in order to ‘relieve humanity of their evil’:

‘The [Jews] are brought in droves to Palestine so that the Palestinians – and the Islamic nation behind them – will have the honour of annihilating the evil of this gang.’
‘In just a few years, all the Zionists and the settlers will realize that their arrival in Palestine was for the purpose of the great massacre, by means of which Allah wants to relieve humanity of their evil.’

The translation of Al-Astal’s words comes the day after Ismail Haniyeh, the incumbent leader in Gaza, told hundreds of Palestinians to ‘pray for the end of the state of Israel’. According to official website of Hamas’ Al-Qassam Brigades:

‘The Zionist project in Palestine must end,’ Haniya told participants at the dawn prayers at al-Omari Mosque, as Palestinians were marking Nakba Day.’

Haniyeh’s comments were widely cited during the coverage of the Nakba protests, which saw hundreds of Palestinians in various locations stream towards Israel’s borders. Notably, there was no mention of his statement in any of Harriet Sherwood’s coverage for The Guardian, despite her authoring five different articles on the subject for the broadsheet.

Global double standards: Bin Laden versus Yassin

From Ynet News, 3 May 2011, by Manfred Gerstenfeld:

Double standards applied against Israel: compare the international reactions to the killing of Osama bin Laden by USA, with those to the killing of Hamas terrorist leader Ahmed Yassin by Israel in 2004.

On Monday, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon told reporters that "the death of Osama bin Laden, announced by President (Barack) Obama last night, is a watershed moment in our common global fight against terrorism." Yet after the killing of Sheikh Yassin, then-UN Secretary General Kofi Annan said "I do condemn the targeted assassination of Sheikh Yassin and the others who died with him. Such actions are not only contrary to international law, but they do not do anything to help the search for a peaceful solution.”

The now-defunct UN Commission on Human Rights condemned “the tragic death of Sheikh Ahmed Yassin in contravention of the Hague Convention IV of 1907.” At the Security Council, the US had to use its veto power to prevent condemnation of Israel.

After the bin Laden killing, the leaders of the European Council and European Commission stated that his death made the world a safer place and showed that terrorist attacks do not remain unpunished. Following the Yassin killing, then-EU Foreign Policy Chief Javier Solana said, "This type of action does not contribute at all to create the conditions of peace. This is very, very bad news for the peace process. The policy of the European Union has been consistently condemnation of extra-judicial killing."

British Prime Minister David Cameron congratulated President Obama on the success of the bin Laden assassination. Cameron considered it a massive step forward in the fight against extremist terrorism. Former Prime Minister Tony Blair also welcomed bin Laden’s demise. However, the killing of Sheikh Yassin was called by the then-British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw “unacceptable” and “unjustified.” The official spokesman of then-Prime Minister Blair condemned the “unlawful attack“ and observed: "We have repeatedly made clear our opposition to Israel's use of targeted killings and assassinations.”

France's President Nicolas Sarkozy hailed Bin Laden’s killing as a coup in the fight against terrorism. He called President Obama, praised his determination and courage and all others who had pursued the head of al-Qaeda for 10 years. Sarkozy added that the two heads of state had agreed to continue the just and necessary fight against terrorist barbarity and those who support it. Yet after Sheikh Yassin’s death, a French Foreign Ministry spokesman, Herve Ladsous, said, “France condemns the action taken against Sheikh Yassin, just as it has always condemned the principle of any extra-judicial execution as contrary to international law.” Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin declared that “such acts can only feed the spiral of violence.”

German Chancellor Angel Merkel said at a recent press conference, “I’m glad that killing bin Laden was successful.” She also called it “good news.” Then Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer had stated after the killing of Sheikh Yassin that “the German government is deeply concerned about the development.”

Russia released a statement regarding bin Laden which the Voice of America quoted as saying that retribution inevitably reaches all terrorists and that Russia is ready to “step up” its coordination in the international fight against global terrorism.” After the Yassin assassination, a foreign ministry spokesman said that Moscow was deeply concerned about the situation.

President Abdullah Gul of Turkey declared that the killing of bin Laden was a message for terrorist organizations all around the world. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan had called the killing of Yassin “a terrorist act” and said that “the assassination was not humane.”

A case of anti-Semitism?


This comparison gets even more meaningful when seen in the context of the definition of anti-Semitism as regularly used in the European Union. It was prepared by one of the EU agencies. It gives examples of the ways in which anti-Semitism manifests itself with regard to the State of Israel, including the following: “Applying double standards by requiring of it a behavior not expected or demanded of any other democratic nation.”

Israel could considerably improve its public diplomacy by using the comparison of the two killings and other comparisons of events which occur with great frequency to stress such double standards. This is one of the many ways that Israel can fend off at least part of the unjust criticism against it.

Killing babies is not a tactic. It is a crime against humanity

From THE JEWISH CHRONICLE ONLINE, March 17, 2011, by Emanuele Ottolenghi, Senior Fellow at the Foundation for Defence of Democracies:

The silliest of all Western reactions to the slaughter of the Fogel family has been to suggest that the murder of three children was aimed at torpedoing the peace process.

Murdering Israeli babies was never a tactical move against negotiations. It is a crime against humanity.

Besides, there has not been a peace process since 2009. PA President Mahmoud Abbas has shunned direct negotiations with Israel since September - and then, only after agreeing to negotiate in August after more than a year of boycotting direct talks. President Obama has done everything in his power to perpetuate this.

The most morally depraved response was that the murder was caused by Israel's provocation - the settlements. Blaming the victims for their own suffering is the kind of moral inversion that runs through centuries of Western excuses for the murder of Jews.

Anyone trying to find an excuse for the disgorging of a three-month old girl has lost their moral compass...

The most hypocritical response was to criticise Israel for responding by authorising the building of new housing units in existing settlement blocs.

Curiously, there are those who assume peace can only be achieved by removing Jews from settlements, rather than finding a territorial compromise with guarantees for those who wish to continue to live there to do so without fear.

...Itamar ...highlights the double standard Israel is subjected to. It is expected to treat its Arab minority well. But a future state of Palestine is excused for [pursuing] ethnic purity in its population at the expense of people who have lived on the land for three generations or more.

...So, what impact will the slaughter have? It will strengthen the gut feeling many Israelis have about their neighbours. As Israel's foremost new historian, Benny Morris, concluded long ago, Israel is fighting barbarism. There shall not be any peace, any time soon. Not after this.

Shame on people for blaming Israel for the spilled blood of its children.

Swatikas fly in the Lithuanian capital

From The Simon Wiesenthal Center, March 13, 2011:

Jerusalem - The Simon Wiesenthal Center has labeled a neo-Nazi march of approximately 1,000 participants held this past Friday in the heart of the Lithuanian capital of Vilnius “the worst type of anti-Semitic and xenophobic incitement against Lithuania’s minorities” and harshly criticized the failure of the country’s political, intellectual, and religious leadership to condemn the march unequivocally.

In a statement issued here today by its Israel Director, Holocaust historian Dr. Efraim Zuroff, the Center called upon Lithuanian elected officials to denounce such demonstrations and upon the leaders of the ruling Homeland Union party to sanction their MP Kazimieras Uoka who was among the marchers.

According to Zuroff:

“Such demonstrations are an affront to all members of the minority groups living in Lithuania, and especially insulting to the country’s Jewish citizens, many of whom are Holocaust survivors. To see hundreds of young people marching with Lithuanian flags and swastikas down the main avenue of the capital of a member of the European Union and NATO is enough to send shivers down the spine of any person with a knowledge of Lithuanian history during the years 1941-1945 and any sense of morality.”

Let's stop pretending that the PA is "moderate"

From PMW, 15 March 2011, by Itamar Marcus and Nan Jacques Zilberdik:

In the following op-ed PMW argues that Palestinian cessation from incitement to hatred and glorification of terror is not just another issue - it is a prerequisite to a peace process.

The Palestinian Authority and its leaders share the blame for the murders of the five Israelis from Itamar on Friday - including two children and an infant - along with the terrorists who committed them. It is the PA and its leaders who have prepared the ground for these murders with the incessant incitement to hatred and the glorification of violence and terror.

In spite of its conciliatory statements in English, the PA continues to use all the structures it controls to demonize Israelis and to promote violence. Terrorists are presented as heroes and role models for Palestinians, teaching that killing Israelis is a way to earn eternal fame.

Just two months ago, PA President Mahmoud Abbas sent a clear message of support for terror when he awarded $2000 to the family of a terrorist who attacked IDF soldiers.

Last week, the PA's official daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida announced a football tournament named after Wafa Idris, the first female Palestinian suicide bomber, and three weeks ago PA TV, which is under the direct control of Abbas's office, broadcast videos glorifying the terrorist Habash Hanani, who in May 2002 entered Itamar and murdered three Israeli students. Twice the PA named summer camps after the terrorist Dalal Mughrabi, who in 1978 led the most deadly attack in Israel's history in which 37 civilians were killed in a bus hijacking, both in 2008 and again this past summer.

But the long arm of the PA's promotion of violence and terror goes even farther, penetrating the realm of culture and music, which has been used so often in recent years in other places in the world to promote peace and tolerance. Last year, PA TV broadcast a number of performances of a band called Alashekeen, including a song anticipating the conquering of Israel through holy war. The song presents all of Israel as "Palestine," mentioning the Carmel region near Haifa, and the cities of Lod, Ramle, and Jerusalem as regions to be liberated: "In Ramle we are grenades... the Palestinian revolution awaits [them]... We replaced bracelets with weapons. We attacked the despicable [Zionists]. This invading enemy is on the battlefield. This is the day of consolation of jihad. Pull the trigger. We shall redeem Jerusalem, Nablus and the country."

More significant than the repeated exposure on PA TV and at cultural events was the fact that Abbas chose to honor the musical group. He issued a presidential decree turning it into an official Palestinian national band.

COMPOUNDING THE PA's nationalistic hate promotion are its Islamic-based messages. The PA seems to have adopted what was once thought to be only Hamas ideology, that the conflict with Israel is a Ribat - a religious war for Allah to defend Islamic land in which conflict with Israel is uncompromising. Abbas's appointed minister of religion, Mahmoud Habbash, has taught repeatedly that the conflict with Israel is not territorial but is in accordance with Islamic law: "Allah has preordained for us the Ribat on this blessed land. We are committed to it by Allah's command. Let no one be mistaken or under the illusion that Ribat is a choice and nothing more. It is a commandment."

He has also preached that the conflict against Israel - over all of Israel - is cited in the Koran: "The catastrophe, in truth, did not begin in 1948, but began perhaps in 1917 with the cursed [Balfour] Declaration, which gave a promise to those who did not deserve it... Since that date, resolute people, fighters and Ribat fighters have not ceased upon our blessed land... This conflict is explicit in the Koran and our obligation with regard to it is clarified by the Koran."

In short, the PA, like the Hamas, is telling its people that Islam does not allow for reconciliation with Israel.

WITH CONTINUOUS messages like this coming from the so-called moderate leadership of the PA, is it any wonder that people can go on terror rampages like the one in Itamar this weekend? Palestinians may assume that their leaders and society will honor them if they murder Israelis, that their families will receive payment if they are killed, and that their religion encourages Israel's disappearance.

Was the terrorist who committed those brutal killings dreaming about a future Palestinian summer camp in his name? Was he imagining Allah granting him everlasting rewards in paradise for fulfilling his command? Did he feel that he was fulfilling his national duty and would receive a financial reward?

And what about the international community which has accepted and naively believed PA leaders' assurances that incitement had stopped? It was the international community, represented by US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, which stipulated preconditions for the PA to enter into a renewed peace process:

"We will only work with a Palestinian Authority government that unambiguously and explicitly accepts the Quartet's principles: A commitment to non-violence, recognition of Israel, and acceptance of previous agreements and obligations, including the Road Map"

(House Appropriations Subcommittee on State, April 23, 2009).

The Road Map states that "all official Palestinian institutions end incitement against Israel."

The international community has completely failed because it never followed up to see if these preconditions had actually been met, but gladly satisfied itself with Abbas's promises, and continues to fund the PA.

Everyone involved in the peace process is making a tragic mistake by assuming the incitement is just another issue that has to be dealt with, like the issues of water, borders, and refugees. All of those are issues that must be negotiated as part of a peace process. But as long as the Palestinian Authority continues to teach these messages, clearly there is no peace process.
It is incumbent on the international community to inform the Palestinian Authority that a condition for "working" with it, as Clinton stated, is that it erases the messages of hate and replaces them with peace promotion.

And until that time the international community must ostracize and isolate the Palestinian Authority, just as they do Hamas, and stop pretending there is a peace process.

New Trends in Arabic Anti-semitism

New Trends in Arabic Anti-semitism from Henrik Clausen on Vimeo.

Can the Arab world leave anti-Semitism behind?

From The Washington Post, Monday, February 28, 2011, by Richard Cohen:

During World War II, the leader of the Palestinians lived in a Berlin villa, a gift from a very grateful Adolf Hitler, who clearly got his money's worth. Haj Amin al-Husseini, the grand mufti of Jerusalem and as such the titular leader of Muslim Palestinians, broadcast Nazi propaganda to the Middle East, recruited European Muslims for the SS, exulted in the Holocaust and after the war went on to represent his people in the Arab League. He died somewhat ignored but never repudiated.

Husseini might have been a Nazi to his very soul, but he was also a Palestinian nationalist with genuine support among his own people. The Allies originally considered him a war criminal, but to many Arabs, he was just a patriot. His exterminationist anti-Semitism was considered neither overly repugnant nor all that exceptional. The Arab world is saturated by Jew-hatred.

Some of this hatred was planted by Husseini and some of it long existed, but whatever the case, it remains a remarkable, if unremarked, feature of Arab nationalism. The other day, for instance, about 1 million Egyptians in Tahrir Square heard from Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, an esteemed religious leader and Muslim Brotherhood figure whose anti-Semitic credentials are unimpeachable. Among other things, he has said that Hitler was sent by Allah as "divine punishment" for the Jews. His al-Jazeera program is one of that TV network's most popular.

I have read the assurances of scholars and journalists alike that the Muslim Brotherhood has mutated into the Common Cause of Egypt (Jordan, too) and that its anti-Semitism is merely an odd and archaic quirk, like the anti-fluoride positions of some American conservatives. I hope this is the case. But in truth, I put more faith in the staying power of anti-Semitism than I do in the forecasting gifts of my colleagues. If they are right, wonderful. If not, we all have something to worry about.

The trouble with democracies is that they tend to cater to the prejudices of the people - not just to their good sense. This explains why almost all the nations of Central and Eastern Europe turned rabidly anti-Semitic when democracy was instituted after World War I.

Anti-Semitism was a popular sentiment and it was exploited by unprincipled politicians. The result in Poland, for instance, was the stated policy of declaring the Jews - about 10 percent of the country - personae non gratae. By then, they had been in Poland for only about 1,000 years.

There are nearly no Jews in Arab lands - they were kicked out after Israel was established in 1948.

Nowhere in the Middle East is peace with Israel popular.

Nowhere in the Middle East is anti-Semitism considered aberrant or weird.

It is inconceivable to me that Arab politicians will not attempt to harness both sentiments, combining nationalism with anti-Semitism - a combustible and unstable compound. History instructs about what follows...

...The prominence of Qaradawi cannot be reassuring to Israelis. They know that words can be weapons and hate is a killer. Nonetheless, since the days of Husseini, a true Hitlerian figure, Arab nations have shamefully been granted an exception to the standards expected of the rest of the world, as if they were children.

If I were an Israeli, I'd be worried.

If I were an Arab, I'd be insulted.

If I were a critic only of Israel, I'd be ashamed.

Extreme "Human Rights" activism

A Islamist antisemite and supporter of genocide is outed by David Horowitz at a speech during "Israel Apartheid Week" at the University of California San Diego. Horowitz was hosted by Young Americans for Freedom.


Follow this link to visit the Horowitz Freedom Center Website.

BDS, Anti-Semitism's New Face

From Israel National News, 16 January 2011, by Moshe Dann:

No need for swastikas and terrorism ...Anti-Semites around the world have found a new and more subtle form of attack: Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) campaigns.

The Ramallah-based Palestinian BDS National Committee, [is] an umbrella organization for dozens of Palestinian organizations supported by the Palestinian Authority ...it is aided by the Muslim Brotherhood, with branches in 70 countries, and hundreds of campus and civic/social organizations and anti-Israel NGOs.

Wielding clichés like "apartheid," "war crimes," "stealing Palestinian land," "oppressing Palestinians," and "end the occupation," these groups seek to delegitimize and isolate Israel as part of their program to destroy Israel.

No need for swastikas and terrorism ...Bedecked with ethics, law and justice, they insist that Israel withdraw to the 1949 Armistice lines, or 1947 UN proposed boundaries, leaving it vulnerable to terrorists. Their weapons are non-violent resistance that appeals to a sense of idealism and fair play, civil and human rights.

Backed by European governments, the UN, and Arab and Muslim organizations and countries, a host of NGOs condemn Israel as a pariah state, unworthy of existence. Their hate-campaign is currently focused on the Conference on Racism, to be held at the UN in New York City this [northern-hemisphere] summer.

If this were just a handful of Islamist fanatics, one might dismiss them; but they have lined up diplomatic and organizational support from many non-Muslims. That's why the campaign to delegitimize Israel is so unique and dangerous.

Anti-Israel campaigns overlap with anti-Jewish sentiments, bringing together diverse groups that are otherwise ideologically, philosophically and theologically incompatible. Hatred of Israel seems to be the single overriding issue that unites fascists and communists, anarchists and fundamentalists, religious leaders and atheists, rich and poor.

Challenging Israel's identity as a nominally Jewish state - a form of de-legitimization - seems to be an acceptable way of denying Israel's right to exist. Objecting to the right of Jews to live in areas acquired in 1967, likewise, ignores Israel's legal and historical claims, the proven consequences of withdrawal, and the dangers posed by creating another Arab Palestinian state.

Claiming the moral high ground

...By arguing against what they claim are Israel's "racist policies," its "illegal occupation of Arab lands," its "colonialism," anti-Israel groups claim moral high ground.

Decrying "the occupation as a moral disaster" for Israel, therefore, identifies Jews as "occupiers," immoral, backed by a state-sponsored immorality, a legal and historical fraud that sharpens the sword of de-legitimization and justifies BDS campaigns.

When the Gaza Strip is considered "a vast prison," for example, then attacking those who made that prison is justified.

If a Jewish, democratic state is inherently discriminatory and "racist," those who oppose it can be honored as "freedom fighters." If Israel "steals Arab lands," those who struggle to regain what is rightfully theirs are reasonable and justified. If Israeli settlements are "illegal," that crime should be punished. This ugly representation of Israel is an intentional, one-dimensional portrait of evil.

The goal of BDS campaigns is not only to remove Jewish/Israeli presence from Judea and Samaria, the Golan and eastern Jerusalem, but total Israeli surrender.  ...The problem, therefore, is not territorial, but existential.

Ironically, BDS campaigns and unilateral Palestinian moves towards UN recognition and statehood sweep away illusions and clarify the real issues: Secure and recognized borders, and ending the conflict.

The convergence of BDS hate-campaigns, de-legitimization efforts, anti-settlement activities, anti-Semitism and a virulently anti-Israel media are not only dangerous to Israel; they are shameful examples of bigotry and intolerance.

"Friend of Palestine" convicted of anti-Jewish harassment and vilification

From the Friends of Israel Western Australia (FOIWA), 28 Jan 2011:

[A Western Australian,] Brendan Lee O'Connell was today convicted on 6 counts of anti-Jewish harassment and vilification in the Western Australian District Court by a 12-person jury.

Mr O'Connell was at a South Perth supermarket in 2009 as part of a Friends of Palestine "BDS" [anti-Israel delegitimisation and vilification] protest against the sale of Israeli oranges, when he harassed and taunted a Jewish student, shouting that Judaism is a "religion and race of hate" and the student is a "racist homicidal maniac".

During the trial he compared Judaism to an organised crime syndicate, said he was proud to be associated with holocaust denier Fredrick Toben, and asserted that "Jews control the entire world".
The charges carry maximum penalties of up to 14 years imprisonment.

When the jury retired yesterday afternoon, O'Connell shouted from the dock that it would be "an honour" to be imprisoned "for Palestine and Iraq". After the verdict was pronounced he shouted "Free Palestine ...Free Iraq!"

O'Connell was remanded in custody until sentencing at 12 noon on Monday 31 January in District Court 3-4.

For further information see previous FOIWA postings of

• 24 January 2011, 
• 18 January 2011, and
• 16 December 2010.

Kissinger: court Jew and Antisemite

From JPost, December 17, 2010, by Isi Leibler:

Few would be shocked with details of further anti-Semitic outbursts by former president Richard Nixon revealed in the latest transcripts of tapes released from the Nixon library. He was a vulgar man whose foul mouthing extended beyond Jews to Afro-Americans, Irish-Americans, Italian-Americans and other ethnic groups.

...Nixon's anti-Semitism primarily amounted to appalling negative stereotyping. But he did employ a Jewish Secretary of State and, according to his Jewish speechwriter William Safire, his heroes included Benjamin Disraeli, Louis Brandeis, Felix Frankfurter and Herman Wouk.

... despite his unsavory character and negative traits,  ...during the 1973 Yom Kippur War [Nixon] overruled his Jewish Secretary of State [Henry Kissinger] who sought to delay arms to Israel in order to boost Sadat and make Israel more pliable in negotiating with the Egyptians. Nixon's massive weapons airlift provided Israel with desperately needed arms. ...We should remain eternally grateful to him for having avoided countless additional Israeli casualties and possibly even having averted a disaster for the Jewish State.

Kissinger: antisemitic "Court Jew" with Nixon

...We are now privy to Kissinger's notorious outburst to Nixon following a meeting with Golda Meir during which she pleaded for the White House to support efforts to free Soviet Jews...

"The immigration of Jews from the Soviet Union is not an objective of American foreign policy. And if they put Jews into gas chambers in the Soviet Union, it is not an American concern."

He ended this obscene remark by conceding that gassing Jews "may be a humanitarian concern."


...Far from apologizing now for his outburst Kissinger justified it. In an email to the JTA, he insisted that the most callous statement about Jews ever recorded by a senior US official "had to be viewed in the context of what was happening".
 
Kissinger at the time had just lost a tough battle with Senator Henry Jackson who had managed to persuade Congress to adopt the Jackson-Vanik amendment linking trade with the Soviet Union to the extension of human rights and freedom of emigration.

Whilst this proved to be a turning point and a major victory for the campaign to free Soviet Jewry, it was enormously frustrating for Kissinger, whose principal objective was to bring about detente with the Soviet Union, even if that required ignoring human rights violations including the persecution of his own people...

There were other occasions when Kissinger adopted inexplicably negative attitudes relating to Jews. For example, he opposed the construction of the US Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington claiming that it would provide too high a profile for the Jews and reignite anti-Semitism.

...Menachem Rosensaft of the American Gathering of Jewish Holocaust Survivors called on Jewish organizations which had previously honored Kissinger, to strip him of his honorary doctorates, medals and awards. He caustically suggested that Kissinger still felt closer to Germany than to his Jewishness, noting that in 2007 when receiving a medal from the German state of Baden-Wurttemberg, Kissinger had referred vaguely to "the difficulties of my childhood" and then went on to lavishly praise Germany without making any reference to Nazism or the Holocaust.

...God help us from dependency on [such] Jews [like Kissinger,] appointed or elected to public office ...

Former EU Commissioner Frits Bolkenstein: "...no future for Jews in the Netherlands"

From JPOST, 7 December 2010:

Fritz Bolkenstein: piss off Jews...

Former European Union Commissioner Frits Bolkenstein said that Jews have no future in the Netherlands and recommended that they emigrate to the US or Israel....

...Bolkestein, former leader of the right-wing VVD party, said that due to anti-Semitism amongst young Moroccans Jews who look like Jews - those who wear kippahs or payot - should leave Holland for their own safety.

"I see no future for recognizable Jews, in particular because of anti-Semitism, specifically in Dutch Moroccans, who continue to grow in number," Bolkestein reportedly said.

The former politician added that the many Arab television channels in the Netherlands contribute to the spread of anti-Semitism. He said he has no confidence in proposed measures to combat anti-Jewish sentiment.

....Politician Geert Wilders, who visited Israel this week, responded that "Jews shouldn't emigrate, anti-Semitic Moroccans should."

Tutu borders on anti-Semitism

From Times Live (Johannesburg), Oct 29, 2010. by Allan Wolman, Rosebank:

...Desmond Tutu's call urging the Cape Town Opera to call off its tour to Israel confirms his agenda of demonising Israel. His stance borders on anti-Semitism...

...how can he deny the lies that he perpetuates when referring to Israel's "fallacious claim to being a civilised democracy". This is indeed rich given the neighbourhood that Israel is located in.

He goes on to claim "millions of citizens are denied the right to education and cultural opportunities in Israel and the Palestinian territories it occupies". How right he is if only he confines this remark to the Palestinian Authority.

I challenge the good Archbishop to deny that Israel practises absolutely no discrimination whatsoever regarding race, religion or creed, something that is enshrined in Israeli law and fiercely protected by an independent Supreme Court.

The tragic truth is that it suits Tutu's agenda to have the Palestinians endure permanent refugee and occupation status.