The law professor Alan Dershowitz has thrown a legal hand-grenade into America's political civil war by claiming to have evidence that former President Barack Obama "personally asked" the FBI to investigate someone "on behalf" of Obama's "close ally," billionaire financier George Soros.
He made his cryptic remark in an interview defending US President Donald Trump against claims he interfered in the prosecution of his former adviser, Roger Stone.
Dershowitz, a confirmed liberal, drew the ire of the left by joining Trump's impeachment defense team – not because he's a Trump fan, but because he cares about upholding the rule of law and the US constitution, which he believes (with good evidence) are being trashed in the anti-Trump witch-hunt.
Now, though, Dershowitz has crossed yet another line. For to criticize Soros, the principal funder of treasured activist causes, means automatically turning into a bogeyman of the left.
Predictably, therefore, Dershowitz has been painted as a wild conspiracy theorist. Other critics of Soros, a Jewish Holocaust survivor, find themselves labeled anti-Semites.
Two months after its shellacking in the United Kingdom's general elections, the Labour Party continues to remind British voters of why they chose the "anyone-but-Jeremy-Corbyn" option.
Last week, it was the turn of John McDonnell — Corbyn's main lieutenant and a stalwart of the party's far-left — to plumb the depths of illogical, offensive, and plain ignorant political rhetoric. Speaking immediately after a visit to Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, in the grim surroundings of south London's Belmarsh prison, McDonnell produced an unforgettable soundbite. Just not in the way he intended.
"I think this is one of the most important and significant political trials of this generation, in fact longer," said McDonnell, referring to the possibility that Assange will be extradited to the United States to face 18 charges related to national security violations, of which 17 are covered by the Espionage Act.
Warming to his subject, McDonnell then ventured, "I think it's the Dreyfus case of our age."
Perhaps McDonnell believed that this comparison would send journalists scurrying onto Google for a quick refresher course on "Dreyfus," and that he would consequently be congratulated for having offered such a thoughtful, historically resonant observation. No such luck.
Diligently performing their duties as representatives of the Jewish community, organizations including the Community Security Trust and the Holocaust Educational Trust swiftly countered McDonnell's claim. Whatever Assange might be, they said, he is no Dreyfus.
This, by the way, is not a slight towards Assange. Even if you temporarily forget McDonnell's breathtaking gall in appropriating one of the seminal episodes of modern antisemitism to make his point that Assange is facing a show trial, on a purely empirical level, the comparison with Dreyfus is hopeless.
The U.S. special envoy to monitor and combat anti-Semitism implicitly criticized the decision in France not to try a man who killed his Jewish neighbor.
Elan Carr referenced the decision on the killer of Sarah Halimi during a conference Monday on anti-Semitism organized by the European Jewish Association in Paris.
In December, a judge decided not to try Kobili Traore of killing Halimi in 2017 while shouting about Allah. The judge cited psychiatric evaluations saying Traore's consumption of marijuana before the incident led to a "delirious episode" that made him not legally responsible for his actions. But the judge also said that Traore, who is in his 30s, killed Halimi because he is an anti-Semite.
The ruling provoked outrage by French Jews. Last month, President Emmanuel Macron said that "there is a need for a trial" for Traore.
"You don't dismiss hate crime charges for issues like the consumption of marijuana," Carr said, referencing his credentials as a former prosecutor in Los Angeles. "It doesn't explain away hate crimes that need to be prosecuted to the utmost severity of the law."
The conference, titled "Jews in Europe: United for a Better Future," was held at the European Center for Judaism, a $17 million community center opened in October.
Menachem Margolin, chairman of the European Jewish Association, said the building and growing engagement with Judaism by many European Jews is making him "hopeful of the future of Jews here" despite the challenges.
While the international consensus seems to be serious about combating antisemitism throughout the world, the same cannot be said about Big Tech – more specifically, the social media giants. While Facebook, Twitter and Google are private companies, they also have a huge social impact and as such responsibility. For that reason, they have faced multiple legal battles in removing terrorist activity, antisemitic hate speech, calls to violence against Jews, neo-Nazi propaganda, and even just online bullying against Jews. That's not even getting into social media sites like 4Chan, Reddit, 9Gag, and others which have become hubs for antisemitic indoctrination and hate in recent years.
Facebook, Twitter and YouTube all have their own set of "community standards," yet the high number of antisemitic posts and content compared to "community standard" violations in other content areas is alarming. In 2017, the World Jewish Congress reported that every 83 seconds an antisemitic post is published online. In January 2018, it reported that Holocaust denial online was up by 30%. A survey by the European Union's Agency for Fundamental Rights showed that 80% of respondents who had come across antisemitic statements in the past year had experienced it online, and that number jumped to nearly 90% for ages 16-29.
This is especially problematic given that one of the key problems with online antisemitism is that it normalizes things like Holocaust denial and outrageous antisemitic beliefs. Free speech matters, but hate speech isn't free speech – even according to the definitions of social networks.
For years, Facebook has struggled with failure to remove hate pages with titles such as "death to zionist babykillers." While there has been some improvement on Facebook (perhaps partially as a result of a class action lawsuit by Shurat HaDin), these companies are clearly floundering when it comes to deciding what is and isn't antisemitic content. It would be helpful not only for the world, but also internally for their employees and algorithms, to use IHRA's definition of antisemitism to determine if content posted is indeed antisemitic.
Today, antisemitic content continues to creep up on a daily basis on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and more. We continue to see that terrorists from the far Right, or from radical Islam, use the Internet and social media as a critical tool in their radicalization.
Belgium is home to the European Union. It is also currently a member of the United Nations Security Council, and even heads the UNSC throughout the month of February. Tension between Israel and the EU has increased recently. Late last year, the Court of Justice of the European Union delivered a binding interpretation of the EU's rules on labeling the origin of products, in effect, singling out Jewish-owned Israeli companies over the Green Line for a blacklist. The Geneva-based United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights took a similar discriminatory step two weeks ago.
Israel continues to be concerned by European support and funding for organizations that delegitimize Israel, including some linked to terrorist organizations.
Earlier this month, Jerusalem reprimanded the Belgian deputy envoy after Belgium invited a senior adviser for an NGO with ties to the terrorist group Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) to brief the UN Security Council. Belgium then called in Nahshon to protest the reprimand. It did, however, later revoke the invitation to Brad Parker, a senior adviser for policy and advocacy at Defense for Children International – Palestine, to address the Security Council.
Belgium professes to be concerned about the welfare of children worldwide – but where is the concern for Israeli children? Only yesterday, thousands were forced to stay home from school after the heavy rocket onslaught from Gaza on the South of Israel. Israeli children were running for shelters as Aalst was celebrating its carnival.
A country that is truly concerned about children and the future would not permit the poisoning of minds that was shamefully on display in Aalst this week. Belgium should be ashamed that such a parade of antisemitism, bigotry and hatred took place on its soil. The world last month marked 75 years since the liberation of Auschwitz. The Aalst carnival shows that the lessons of where Jew-hatred leads have not yet been learned.
This week's carnival procession in the Belgian town of Aalst, which featured Nazi uniforms, costumes of Jews as vermin and several other anti-Semitic tropes, was widely condemned by Jewish groups, Israeli officials and even the government in Brussels.
But Michael Freilich, the only Orthodox Jew currently serving in Belgium's national parliament, on Monday dismissed most of the criticism, saying the event was not entirely anti-Semitic. Rather, he told The Times of Israel during an interview in Jerusalem, a few dozen people wanted to give critics "the middle finger" but do not harbor any ill-will toward Jews.
Freilich, an Antwerp-based freshman lawmaker for the center-right NVA party, even compared the Aalst carnival to Israeli Purim parades, positing that it was always possible to find a few bad apples who make fun of minorities.
"We have to see the bigger picture," he said, stressing that 6,000 people actively participated in the Aalst carnival procession, cheered on by some 80,000 spectators.
"The large floats were all okay, there was no problem with them. When you have 6,000 people getting dressed up, you will have a number of people go beyond what's allowed," he went on. "I think we're talking about 20 or 30 people. So that means that more than 5,950 people were okay. Do we allow these 50 people to hijack everything and focus just on them? Or do we say, most people were okay?"
Meanwhile, there are other Arabs in the region who are more fortunate than the Palestinians of the West Bank and Gaza Strip: the Arab citizens of Israel. These citizens are lucky that they do not live under the rule of the corrupt and incompetent leaders of the Palestinian Authority and Hamas. These Arab citizens are fortunate because they live in Israel.
Here is more unwelcome good news regarding the Arab citizens of Israel: The Israeli government announced in 2018 that in the last two years, it has invested 4.5 billion shekels ($1.3 billion) in the Arab regions. The government also announced that it would invest 20 million shekels ($5.6 million) in the Arab high-tech market. Overall, the government has decided to invest 15 billion shekels ($4.3 billion) in the Arab-Israeli sector by the end of 2020....
The $50 billion dollars the Trump plan offered the Palestinians will end up being withheld because Palestinian leaders have something else on their minds: to continue enriching their own bank accounts at the expense of their people. No wonder, then, that when Arabs -- including Palestinians -- dream of a better life, they often dream of moving to Israel. No wonder, as well, that most Arab Israelis do not want to become part of a Palestinian state, and have been demanding to stay in Israel.
Ya'acov Heruti, 93, lives today in a retirement home in Tel Aviv. A little over 70 years ago, he stood at the cusp of an act that, if carried out, would have earned him a prominent place in the history books - the planned assassination of then-British foreign secretary Ernest Bevin by the Lehi (Israel Freedom Fighters). Bevin had made himself hated by the Jewish Yishuv in then-Mandatory Palestine for his pro-Arab actions, his opposition to Israel's establishment, and the frequency of his anti-Semitic rhetoric.
Heruti, a Lehi member who became an explosives expert, had been dispatched to London where he registered as a law student at the University of London. At the same time, he built the covert structure that lay behind the planned killing of Bevin, which by early 1948 was poised and ready for action. Heruti was also tasked with the assassination of former commander of British forces in Palestine Gen. Evelyn Barker, and Maj. Roy Farran, who had tortured and killed a young Lehi member, Alexander Rubowitz, in Jerusalem. Letter bombs were sent to both men.
A conference of foreign ministers in central London was chosen as the site for the attack on Bevin. Surveillance was carried out and an escape route was identified. Then Heruti received a message from Lehi headquarters in Israel. "A message came from Nathan Friedman-Yellin (the Lehi operational commander), calling it off. As to why - I had no idea," Heruti recalls. Then the 1948 war was beginning and Heruti was called back to Israel. The Lehi cell in London was shut down and ceased operations.
Not a day goes by that Israeli sports fans don't read or hear the word 'Maccabi.' It is a name attached to dozens of Israeli teams in most sports played in the Jewish State. Much less familiar is the fact that there are still active teams in other parts of the world that proudly bear this name. Here we will tell the story of one of these – a little-known football (soccer) team from Berlin.
Indeed, in the year 2020, the Makkabi Berlin football team plays in the Berlin-Liga, a sixth-tier division which consists solely of clubs based in the German capital. True, this semi-professional organization doesn't exactly pose a threat to the giants of German soccer, but it has a rich history which stretches back more than 120 years.
The team's story begins with an event, or rather an idea, that sparked the creation of a long list of Jewish sports and athletic associations and clubs. In late August of 1898, Max Nordau stood at the podium of the Zionist Congress and called for the promotion of 'Muscular Judaism' (Muskeljudentum), an idea which envisioned the creation of a 'new Jew', typified by physical strength, which was, in his opinion, necessary in order to achieve the national revival of the Jewish people. Sometime later, at the end of October of that year, 48 young Zionists gathered in Berlin and founded an athletics club in the city, a true realization of Nordau's ideas. They named the club 'Bar Kochba', after the legendary Jewish hero who led a revolt against Roman rule. During those years, Jewish clubs of the sort began to spring up like mushrooms after the rain. Most of them chose powerful Hebrew names like HaKoah ("The Force" or "The Strength") and HaGibor ("The Hero"), or names of heroic figures from scripture such as Gideon and, of course, Maccabi ("Makkabi" in German).
Bar Kochba Berlin was originally established as a general athletics club, as was common in those days in Germany. It was the first of its kind – that is, the first Jewish athletics club in Germany. It was likely a reaction to, or perhaps a reflection of, the general development of athletic culture in Germany during those years. This was also the context for Nordau's ideas; the Zionist leader didn't necessarily picture 22 people chasing a ball when he spoke at the Congress in 1898. Only later did the club expand by opening individual departments dedicated to boxing, swimming, tennis, gymnastics – and football.
Mainstream US Jewish groups reacted with outrage on Monday to what they saw as 2020 Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders' "offensive" attack on the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, as the hashtag #AIPACProud went viral on Twitter in protest.
Sanders — who has emerged the frontrunner in the ongoing contest for the Democratic nomination — tweeted on Sunday that he would not attend AIPAC's upcoming annual conference in Washington, DC, because he was "concerned about the platform AIPAC provides for leaders who express bigotry and oppose basic Palestinian rights."
The senator gave no indication as to who these leaders were or what they had, in fact, actually said.
As a barrage of criticism came down on Sanders under the hashtag #AIPACProud, major Jewish groups and their leaders expressed anger and pain at the longtime Vermont senator's statement.
The Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations called Sanders' words "irresponsible and counterproductive," saying, "AIPAC brings together a bipartisan diversity of all sectors of society from across the political spectrum."
Jonathan Greenblatt, CEO of the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), characterized Sanders' claim as "offensive" and accused him of encouraging antisemitism, saying, "At a time when we see a surge of real hate across the US, it's irresponsible to describe AIPAC like this."
EPIC! @benshapiro slaying @SenSanders over boycotting AIPAC and his professed Judaism and support for Israel:
"In terms of how much he actually cares about his Judaism, he is as Jewish as a ham sandwich."
The American Israel Public Affairs Committee wants the world to know that American Jews and lawmakers from across the political spectrum support it, even if Bernie Sanders does not.
A day after Sanders, a leading candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination, announced on Twitter that he would be skipping AIPAC's annual conference for ideological reasons, the organization took steps Monday to showcase the bipartisan support that has long set it apart among Israel advocacy groups.
With a week before the organization's annual conference, the organization released an expanded list of speakers — including multiple Democratic leaders who had not previously been confirmed as attending.
Among the Democrats speaking will be two high-profile New York lawmakers, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, chair of the US House Democratic Caucus and one of the House managers in the impeachment trial of President Donald Trump.
An AIPAC spokesperson said the group had also initiated efforts to demonstrate widespread support for attending the conference, which more than 18,000 people are expected to attend.
When Senator Bernie Sanders blasted the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) on Sunday, while confirming he wouldn't attend their annual conference, he probably didn't realize he was hurting the Palestinian cause.
Sanders certainly merited the pushback he received for accusing AIPAC of promoting "leaders who express bigotry and oppose basic Palestinian rights." Rabbi David Wolpe, for one, tweeted: "I've attended AIPAC more than ten times. Every time Palestinian rights were mentioned people applauded. There are a range of views presented, left, right, and center. This dismissal is unwarranted and unworthy."
My friend Sarah Tuttle Singer, who often writes in support of the Palestinian cause, posted this "Dear Bernie" message on Facebook: AIPAC is not monolithic.
It is a varied and multi-faceted tent encompassing all kinds of folks — including many who supported you back in 2016 and probably still support you this time around.
When I first spoke at [the] Policy Conference, I criticized certain [policies] of the government of the State of Israel, talked about how we have to end the Occupation, restore justice to The Land, and how Israelis and Palestinians — Jews and Arabs — must live together in equality, freedom, and security.
I was invited back to share this message again and again and again.
You should come and see the enormous tent for yourself.
So, yes, it was unfair for Sanders to harshly criticize a conference he has never attended.
As AIPAC noted in its response, Sanders "has never attended our conference and that is evident from his outrageous comment. In fact, many of his own Senate and House Democratic colleagues and leaders speak from our platform to the over 18,000 Americans from widely diverse backgrounds — Democrats, Republicans, Jews, Christians, African Americans, Hispanic Americans, progressives, Veterans, students, members of the LGBTQ+ community — who participate in the conference to proclaim their support for the US-Israel relationship."
But let's give Sanders the benefit of the doubt and grant that he really believes those things he tweeted about AIPAC. Wouldn't it still be in his interest to use this huge platform to convey his message of equal rights for the Palestinians? Sanders has made it his lifelong mission to care for the weak and the downtrodden, often mentioning the plight of the Palestinians.
By blasting and boycotting AIPAC, he missed the opportunity to help his own cause.
Ex-US Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley slammed 2020 Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders on Monday over his announced boycott of next week's American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) conference in Washington, DC.
Sanders, Haley pointed out, "has never attended and has no clue what the organization is about or what it stands for."
"Go back to defending [Fidel] Castro and socialist dictators," the former South Carolina governor and potential future Republican presidential candidate added. "We will go back to defending peace, democracy, and our ally Israel."
Bernie Sanders announces he is not going to @AIPAC. To be clear, has never attended and has no clue what the organization is about or what it stands for. Go back to defending Castro and socialist dictators. We will go back to defending peace, democracy, and our ally Israel.
In a statement on Sunday, Sanders — who has emerged as the frontrunner in the ongoing contest for the Democratic nomination — said, "The Israeli people have the right to live in peace and security. So do the Palestinian people. I remain concerned about the platform AIPAC provides for leaders who express bigotry and oppose basic Palestinian rights. For that reason I will not attend their conference. As president, I will support the rights of both Israelis and Palestinians and do everything possible to bring peace and security to the region."
Sen. Bernie Sanders's (I., Vt.) campaign manager Faiz Shakir on Monday dodged a question about whether Democratic leaders are bigots for attending the American Israel Public Affairs Committee's (AIPAC) annual conference.
MSNBC's Stephanie Ruhle asked Shakir about Sanders's announcement that he will not attend the AIPAC conference because he believes the group is a platform for politicians to "express bigotry." Ruhle said prominent Democratic members of Congress have supported the conference.
"Last year Speaker Pelosi, Senator Chuck Schumer, and congressman Steny Hoyer all spoke at AIPAC," Ruhle said. "Are those leaders that express bigotry?"
Shakir said in reply that Sanders was committed to protecting Palestinian human rights in order to achieve peace in Israel.
"You asked me one foreign policy question before, I'll answer it again on this one," Shakir said. "You see honesty and conviction on his part. He doesn't play political games with this when he sees a system that doesn't seem to respect Palestinian rights but talks a lot about what he believes is preserving and maintaining the security of Israel."
In 1971 the Japanese Red Army and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) were featured in a communist propaganda film.
In these clips we see early examples of the antizionist revisionism and propaganda that's still recycled on the far-left today: pic.twitter.com/DvgkOoDmYZ
This is apparently a member of @UKLabour called J Thomas.
For some reason @RLong_Bailey ignores his CLEAR antisemitism or doesn't know it's antisemitic, either way someone with this little understanding of antisemitism shouldn't be in charge of a political party riddled with it! https://t.co/v9eTOPTFNc
A progressive group targeting Jewish youths hopes to recruit a large number of new adherents to its philosophy by means of a campaign that involves billboards, online graphics, video clips, posters, and flyers, urging them to adopt an interpretation of Jewish values and tradition that ignores, contradicts, or abandons both the bulk of their millennia-old heritage and of their coreligionists and communities.
Organizations such as Jewish Voice for Peace, If Not Now, J Street U, Jews for Racial and Economic Justice, and the International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network launched a public awareness and advertising initiative this week to encourage young Jews to embrace a more fully Jewish existence by stepping away from almost everything that has characterized Jewishness for most of Jewish history: longing for restored Jewish sovereignty in the Land of Israel; devotion to sacred texts and practices; rich literary and intellectual pursuits; defiance of the prevailing, dominant surrounding culture; and attachment to the welfare and safety of their fellow Jews, among other values.
"Be more Jewish," reads one billboard: "Reject Jewish sovereignty."
"It's not Jewish to show concern for Jews in particular," argues a pamphlet. "It smacks of racism, as if we Jews, the victims of one of the greatest racist crimes in history, have learned nothing from the experience. But come to think of it, using that language to refer to the Holocaust implies that others' struggles with racism, notably communities of color, rank as lesser, and we must shy away from any such implications."
As parents of one of the many children murdered in the #Sbarro terror bombing, my wife and I are engaged in frustrating efforts to have #AhlamTamimi extradited from Jordan to faces US federal charges. In this new video, I explain what the media don't: https://t.co/IFpzci03h2pic.twitter.com/b0CHVL2N2I
First, the claim, in her article, that the bulldozer "stormed a Palestinian protest" is extraordinarily misleading.
As IDF Spokesperson Jonathan Conricus confirmed to UK Media Watch, the army vehicle was being used to remove rocks from the road placed by Palestinians to prevent the army from responding to violent riots that were taking place around the West Bank village of Kafr Qaddum. The vehicle was clearing such rocks and slabs of concrete when it was confronted by stone throwing Palestinians.
In other words, contrary to the message conveyed to readers and those following Ms. Trew on Twitter, the vehicle was not targeting "protesters", and certainly not intentionally "hurling" slabs of concrete at Palestinians. Any large stones or pieces of concrete that rolled in the direction of Palestinians on that road was a consequence of their decision to place themselves in front of a vehicle that was on a mission to re-open roads that Palestinians themselves had blocked. You'd think, based on reading the tweet and article, that the driver of the IDF vehicle was attempting to kill or maim Palestinians.
Further, the "unconfirmed" Palestinian claim – cited in Trew's tweet – that "40 were injured" is untrue.
In fact, Haaretz only reported that one rioter was reportedly injured – a fact confirmed to us by Conricus. As you can see in the (clearly edited) video in question we embedded below, the injured Palestinian was evacuated by an ambulance which was (conveniently) waiting for him at the scene.
"The Western Press," the author and former AP journalist Matti Friedman noted in 2014, "has become less an observer of" the Israel-Islamist conflict "than an actor in it." Friedman's observation holds true today. And a recent Foreign Policy magazine article offers an example of how the media can—and does—create stories to fit a preexisting narrative.
In a Feb. 4, 2020 dispatch, Foreign Policy magazine reporter Keith Johnson claims that "one of the many reasons that Palestinian leadership dismissed" the latest U.S. Israeli-Palestinian peace proposal "out of hand" was "that it included a demand for Palestinians to cede the water-rich West Bank and the entire Jordan Valley to Israel." The subhead of the article blares "one reason the Palestinians swiftly rejected the flawed U.S. peace plan was that it does nothing to address their claims for water rights." Foreign Policy then proceeded to use this claim—that Palestinians rejected the latest peace plan due, in part, to concerns about water issues—to write an entire article which asserted that "access to water has for decades been at the heart of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict."
But there's a problem: it doesn't appear that a single leader of the Palestinian Authority (PA), the entity that rules the West Bank (Judea and Samaria), has cited water as a reason for rejecting the plan. Ditto for the Central Committee of Fatah, the movement that dominates the PA. In his numerous comments about the proposal, PA President Mahmoud Abbas hasn't ever cited water as his reason for opposing the plan.
Indeed, CAMERA was unable to find any statements by leading Fatah, PA or Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) leaders—that is, those who were in a position to accept or refuse the proposal—that cited water as a reason for their rejection. As The Jerusalem Post reported, PA President Abbas has even threatened to sue any entity "involved in the implementation of the Trump peace plan"—but water wasn't cited by the PA as a motivating factor.
CAMERA Arabic staff checked with sources who identified the location as Taibeh, in central Israel next to Kfar Saba, and also recognized some of the photographed people as political activists from Taibeh. The misnomer "Yabeh" apparently derived from an erroneous rendering of "Taibeh." The relocation of the Israeli Arab town into the West Bank, however, is less understandable given that those well versed in regional politics would know that West Bank Arabs do not vote in Israeli elections.
In addition to the large Israeli Arab town of Taibeh (population more than 40,000) in central Israel, there is a smaller Israeli Arab village by the same name next to Nazareth. In addition, there are two Palestinian locations with the same name; one in the Jenin district, and a second, Christian village in the Ramallah district, which is where the popular Taybeh Brewing Company is located.
CAMERA contacted the Associated Press about the error. Stay tuned for an update.
UPDATE, 1:10 pm EST: AP Corrects In response to communication from CAMERA's Israel office, editors commendably corrected the captions, and they now accurately refer to Ayman Odeh campaigning in Taibeh, Israel.
As readers may recall, the January 29th edition of the BBC Radio 4 programme 'Midnight News' included a report (which is still available online) concerning the US administration's "Peace to Prosperity" plan that included several misleading statements.
BBC Radio 4 news implies previous existence of Palestinian state in US plan report
BBC reporter Aleem Maqbool told listeners that "They [the Palestinians] have been wanting the return of occupied East Jerusalem to establish their own capital" and spoke of "Palestinians no longer having a border with Jordan and relying entirely on Israel for access".
As noted here at the time, Maqbool's use of the phrase "the return of occupied East Jerusalem" inaccurately suggested to listeners that that location had previously been under Palestinian control (rather than under Jordanian occupation for 19 years). His reference to "Palestinians no longer having a border with Jordan" was also misleading to listeners: none of the areas controlled by the Palestinian Authority since 1994 have a "border with Jordan" and a Palestinian entity with such a border has never existed.
In addition the programme's newsreader told listeners that "Jordan said the only path to peace in the Middle East was to establish an independent Palestinian state based on its borders before the 1967 war".
BBC Watch submitted a complaint concerning that long report which included a reminder that – as stated in the BBC Academy style guide's entry for 'Green Line' – no such "borders" existed "before the 1967 war" and that the lines were actually the 1949 Armistice lines which were specifically defined as not being borders.
The Lawfare Project announced on Monday that it has been retained as co-counsel in a lawsuit against both the city of Ann Arbor, Mich., and a group of anti-Israel protesters who demonstrate weekly outside a local synagogue.
"The City of Ann Arbor has completely abdicated its responsibility to protect the Jewish community from targeted, racist harassment at the hands of these protesters," said Brooke Goldstein, executive director of the Lawfare Project. "There are few greater civil-rights violations than impeding the free exercise of worship and assembly, and we are here to demand the city hold the protesters accountable under existing federal, state and local laws."
The plaintiffs in the lawsuit are Beth Israel Congregation member Marvin Gerber and Ann Arbor resident Miriam Brysk, a Holocaust survivor. Ann Arbor Mayor Christopher Taylor, protester Henry Herskovitz and his two organizations—Jewish Witnesses for Peace, and Palestinian Friends and Deir Yassin Remembered—are listed as defendants.
Every Saturday for the last 16 years, a group of protesters has harassed congregants outside of Beth Israel Congregation and placed in front of the synagogue signs that say "Jewish Power Corrupts," "Zionism is Racism" and "RESIST Jewish Power," among other statements.
The protesters are in violation of the city's existing ordinances; however, Ann Arbor has done nothing to limit the protests and refuses to place "even modest restrictions" on them. This has gone on for more than a decade-and-a-half, according to Michigan attorney Marc Susselman, co-counsel in the lawsuit.
More than 50 Jewish community centers in 23 states have received emailed bomb threats since Saturday.
None of the threats have been found to be credible, though local law enforcement agencies have been notified. Officials do not know who sent the threats. They targeted Jewish community centers in New York, New Jersey, California, Texas and elsewhere throughout the country.
The Jewish Telegraphic Agency has learned from officials familiar with the threats that most of the JCCs affected received identical emails containing bomb threats. None of the emails, however, named the specific institutions in question or contained anti-Semitic language.
"Our goal has been — and we seem to be succeeding — to go about our day with as much normalcy as possible," said Martina Hull, interim executive director of the Sidney Albert Albany JCC in New York, which received a threat Sunday morning. "There was an indication of a threat and the Albany JCC was not mentioned specifically within that, but it was enough to raise awareness."
The spate of threats recalls successive waves of bomb threats made against JCCs and other Jewish institutions in 2017, many of which led to building evacuations. Most of the threats came from a 19-year-old American-Israeli citizen, Michael Kadar. Last year, Kadar was sentenced to 10 years in prison.
Amazon pulled antisemitic Nazi-era books off of their website following outcry, Newsweek reported.
The World Jewish Congress expressed outrage over the sale of Nazi-era book on Amazon, in addition to hateful material that is currently being sold on their website, including an antisemitic children's book depicting Jews in devilish form, written by Julius Streicher from the infamous Der Stürmer magazine, called The Poisonous Mushroom.
Head of the World Jewish Congress, Ronald S. Lauder, called for its removal from the popular e-commerce website, in addition to imploring Amazon head Jeff Bezos to take action himself on removing the book and other racist and xenophobic content from his website.
"It is bewildering and frightening that in this digital age, in which we are more than well-aware of the dangers that can arise from the dissemination of hateful material online, Amazon would continue to allow the sale of an unquestionable piece of Nazi propaganda that brands Jews as no less than 'poisonous mushrooms,'" Lauder said.
Researchers at the Technion–Israel Institute of Technology said last week that they have developed a novel, standalone system for producing water from air, even in arid desert regions.
The new system, dubbed H-to-all, differs from existing technologies because of its energy efficiency, the researchers said.
Existing methods of generating water from air cool the entire air mass, then extract the water, which requires a lot of energy since water vapor can only be about three percent of air's total mass, even at a high level of humidity.
In the Technion system, moisture is first stripped from the air with a desiccant. Then the moisture is removed from the desiccant using heat and sub-atmospheric pressure, and the moisture is condensed into liquid water.
In addition to its efficiency, the system filters the water better than existing methods, the researchers said. When the whole air mass is cooled in the process, so are air pollutants, and they can find their way into the water. The Technion team's concentrated saline solution used in the desiccant kills bacteria.
It is a cruel irony that tropical regions blessed with abundant rainfall are often cursed with an inability to deliver clean water to thirsty people.
In the slums of Mumbai, for example, it rains close to half the year, sometimes in monsoon-like deluges. Yet residents are forced to stand in long lines to collect water for drinking, cooking and bathing. Alternatively, they must pay exorbitant prices for bottled water.
The same problem can happen as a result of collapsed infrastructure following a natural disaster like a hurricane or earthquake.
It was the latter that drove home the dire message for Eyal Yassky, cofounder and CEO of Hilico. The social-minded startup developed a simple and inexpensive rain harvesting device for off-grid communities.
Yassky had been traveling the world as a professional photographer, documenting local cultures with an emphasis on sustainability.
In 2016, he was in Ecuador taking pictures of a unique chocolate-making operation ("There are only 47 of this type of cacao trees left in the world," he says) when a 7.8 magnitude earthquake hit.
Dr. Gilat Raisch recently fulfilled an old dream: she took a month off work, packed up her things and went to volunteer in a faraway hospital.
Deeply affected by a visit to a Cambodian hospital over a decade ago, she vowed that one day she'd return somewhere similar to offer her services as a pediatrician. Now, with her children all grown up, she decided it was time to go.
"I felt it was time to fulfill this dream. I decided I was giving myself a birthday present, taking off a month without pay from work and going to volunteer."
Raisch found herself alongside other international volunteers at a hospital in Luang Prabang, an ancient city and the former capital of Laos. And she was shocked by what she found.
"Such a scarcity of resources, with children in unimaginable conditions, diseases that you don't see in Israel but only read about in books." Israeli backpackers lie back to donate much-needed blood at the hospital. (Courtesy)
"The first week I was there I noticed that they kept on asking for blood donations from the volunteer team," she says, explaining that the hospital's blood bank stood empty because of local beliefs that donations are harmful to the body and due to possible donors' state of health.
We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.
As I was researching the broadcast announcements in Palestinian Arab schools I came across this one from 2017 that has a "Did you know?" section about how important Palestinians have been in history.
2- Did you know that the Palestinian emperor of Rome was the one who ordered the expulsion of the Jews from Jerusalem due to their lack of politeness and their hatred against Christianity and Christians at that time?
Palestinians are trying to take credit for expelling Jews from Jerusalem - for the crime of being "impolite!"
In reality, the emperor who expelled the Jews from Jerusalem in 136 CE was Hadrian, born in Italy.
3- Did you know that the first historian in the world is Syoss Cassiros, who is Palestinian and whose book Pleistino is still preserved in the Louvre Museum ..
They appear to be referring to Simonides of Ceos (who was a poet, not a historian) and possibly his book now known as the Palatine Anthology of which part of it is in Paris. Simonides was born in Greece, not "Palestine."
The first historian is generally agreed to be Herodotus.
This seems to be the quality of a Palestinian education.
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The latest round of violence between Israel and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad terror group has not yet ended, but already there are a few things that stand out as different from previous rounds.
Syria commanders no longer immune Israel may have chosen to strike various targets in the Gaza Strip, including rocket-launching cells, but the main response was far away, on the Syrian front, where many PIJ targets near Damascus were hit.
This is a surprising step, designed to make PIJ decision-makers think twice and thrice before attempting another attack. The military and the government are trying to set up a new equation by which escalation with Israel will hurt not only Gaza but also PIJ leaders in Syria, who have thus far enjoyed a degree of immunity from Israeli strikes.
This may not be the first time Israel attacked PIJ targets in Syria, but this time it is a direct reaction to rockets launched at Israel.
PIJ is doing quite a bit to lead to this escalation. The violence began Sunday early morning with the attempt to place a bomb next to the border fence and continued after the terrorist was killed and his body was dragged back to Israel by a military bulldozer. After a brief lull, the violence renewed Monday afternoon.
Even by its own standard, PIJ went overboard with its response, considering it all started with a cell trying to lay an explosive device. Having launched dozens of rockets into the night and on Monday, it is clear the organization seeks to drag the whole of Gaza into war — despite this being one of the better periods the Strip has experienced recently in terms of Israeli concessions.
Terrorists in the Gaza Strip fired rockets at the city of Sderot and nearby communities on Monday night, some 20 minutes after a ceasefire was reportedly due to go into effect at 10 p.m.
There were no immediate reports of injuries or damage from the attack. Residents of the area reported seeing multiple Iron Dome interceptor missiles fired into the sky.
Over the course of Sunday and Monday, some 90 rockets were fired at Israel from the Gaza Strip — most of them by the Palestinian Islamic Jihad terror group — and approximately 90 percent of those heading toward populated areas were intercepted by the Iron Dome system, according to the Israel Defense Forces.
In response to the attacks, the Israeli military launched multiple rounds of retaliatory air raids against Islamic Jihad bases in the Gaza Strip, as well as one airstrike on a squad it said was preparing to launch rockets, injuring four.
Just before the ceasefire was meant to begin, terrorists in the Strip also fired a number of rockets at the Eshkol region of southern Israel. One rocket struck inside a community in the region, causing no injuries, but light damage to a nearby building, which was hit by shrapnel.
In light of the ongoing attacks from Gaza, the military ordered schools to remain canceled Tuesday in Gaza periphery communities, including the city of Ashkelon, representing some 55,000 students.
A child from Israel's south recounted on Monday the traumatic fear and terror she was facing as rocket fire from the Gaza Strip pounded the region once again, saying the air raid sirens made her "shake in my hands and legs."
Dozens of rockets have been fired from Hamas-ruled Gaza into southern Israel over the past two days. While there have been no casualties thus far, the psychological and economic impact is severe.
Schools were closed in the Gaza border area on Monday, as were main highways and train lines.
Those businesses still open had almost no customers, as residents stayed in their homes close to bomb shelters and fortified rooms.
The IDF has undertaken retaliatory attacks against Palestinian Islamic Jihad, which it blamed for the rocket fire, in Gaza and Syria.
Roni, an eight-year-old second grader from the border city of Sderot, which has absorbed thousands of rocket strikes over the past two decades, was in a store with her grandmother buying a Purim costume when the warning sirens sounded.
"When I was with grandma in the store, a red alert caught us," she told Israeli news site N12. "Immediately we got under the table that was in the store. I was under stress."
"Every red alert makes me shake in my hands and legs. Every boom terrifies me," she said.
"My big sister has a bat mitzvah soon and I hope there won't be another red alert," Roni added.
"At school they try to give us tools to deal with the fear with the help of games, and I hope that when I'm grown up I can be a dancer without sirens in the background," she said.
Hosni Mubarak, who died on Tuesday, never expected to be president. But when a very public assassination thrust the former bomber pilot into the job, he made it his mission never to give it up.
His story became Egypt's story for the next 30 years until, finally, his people found they could write it themselves, in a 2011 Arab Spring revolution that consigned him to history.
An unremarked vice president to Anwar Sadat, he was a stopgap in the anxious days of 1981 after Sadat was gunned down beside him at a military parade. Few thought he would last.
Yet slowly, surviving attempts on his own life, he became "Pharaoh," presiding over decades of stagnation and oppression and offering his people a choice: Mubarak or mayhem.
Many believed him, not just in Egypt. US administrations showered him — and the biggest army in the Middle East — with billions of dollars in gratitude for his loyalty to Sadat's Cold War switch of allegiance and peace with Israel.
But it was his struggles with the Islamists — who by killing Sadat handed power accidentally to a man who would spend 30 years suppressing them — which defined his politics.
Yet to the question of how Egyptians should be governed in the future, he never had an answer beyond "Mubarak" and always refused to indicate a successor. Washington expected him to go on rigging elections till he died, when his son Gamal might take over.
"Nobody imagines that we can press a button and freedoms will arrive. Otherwise it would lead the country to chaos and that would be a danger to people," Mubarak once said.
Mubarak died aged 91 on Tuesday after undergoing surgery, state television said.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday eulogized former Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak, who died earlier in the day at the age of 91 in a Cairo hospital.
"On behalf of the citizens and government of Israel, I would like to express deep sorrow on the passing of President Hosni Mubarak," Netanyahu said in a statement.
"President Mubarak, my personal friend, was a leader who led his people to peace and security, to peace with Israel. I met with him many times. I was impressed by his commitment; we will continue to follow this common path."
Netanyahu added that he sends condolences to Egypt's current president, Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi, as well as to Mubarak's family and to the Egyptian people.
The Israeli prime minister was one of the first international leaders to comment on Mubarak's passing.
Israel's embassy in Cairo took to Twitter to express "great sadness" at the former president's death.
President Trump's Peace Plan released on 28 January 2020 recognizes Israeli sovereignty being extended into parts of Judea and Samaria whilst recognizing the creation of a 22nd Arab State in the residue for the first time in recorded history.
Rejection of Trump's Plan by the Arab League on 1 February has led to the formation of a joint American-Israel Mapping Committee which is expected to produce a map in two months designating the areas of Judea and Samaria where Israeli sovereignty can be extended immediately.
Gantz has not embraced Trump's Plan with the same enthusiasm as Netanyahu – choosing to maintain the existing status quo in Judea and Samaria for an indefinite period of time.
Had Gantz and Netanyahu agreed – voter apathy would not have mattered. Both major political parties would have been locked in to immediately implementing sovereignty in Judea and Samaria with America's approval. Lack of unanimity demands condemnation by Jews worldwide.
The portents for another low voter turnout have been signalled by the announcement that only 66% of eligible Israeli diplomats, members of official delegations and their families abroad have voted – a decline from the 69.5% turnout in the September 2019 election.
Hopefully the historic significance of these elections will generate a much larger local turnout of at least 75-80%. The future of the Jewish People's heartland deserves this level of minimum participation from those Jews and Arabs blessed to have been chosen to make this momentous decision.
Both Likud, and Blue and White, are fighting for the votes of the undecided in the right-wing sector. Blue and White's message is focusing on the fact that Netanyahu cannot run the country while he has to be in court for his trial on corruption charges, which begins March 17.
Likud has been responding by declaring that even while in trial, Netanyahu can do a better job than Gantz. Likud has also promised a series of action items should they maintain the premiership, including moving forward with US President Donald Trump's Middle East peace plan; further construction in the settlements and Jerusalem; and even erasing the criminal records of Israelis convicted of possessing or using marijuana.
Complicating matter for Blue and White is the decision by acting state attorney Dan Eldad to open a criminal probe into Fifth Dimension, a now closed intelligence company that was chaired by Benny Gantz, over allegations of illegalities in securing a contract with the Israeli police. While Gantz is not a suspect in the case, Netanyahu has succeeded in convincing undecided swing voters that the Blue and White leader is not as clean as has been portrayed. In response, Blue and White has been contesting the matter with declarations about their zero-tolerance policy for corruption and their legislative plans to support this.
Despite all the herculean efforts on both sides to garner more votes, unless Netanyahu succeeds in bringing 61 seats to the right-wing religious bloc—regardless of who wins more votes—neither he nor Gantz has the ability to reach a majority.
This could mean—the expense and patience of Israeli voters notwithstanding—that a strong likelihood exists that the Jewish state will head to a fourth election, most likely to be held in September.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced that he plans to authorize the construction of 3,500 homes in an undeveloped area of the Ma'aleh Adumim settlement known as E1.
"We are building up Jerusalem and the outskirts of Jerusalem. I gave an immediate directive, to deposit plans to build of 3,500 housing units in E1," Netanyahu said.
The US has prevented the construction of that Ma'aleh Adumim neighborhood since 1994, out of fear that it would harm the territorial integrity of a future Palestine state. Construction of that neighborhood has long been considered a redline by the US and the international community, particularly the European Union.
Netanyahu had pledged to advance building in E1 after UNESCO recognized Palestine as a member state, but he never made good on that pledge.
Netanyahu made the announcement on Tuesday at the Beersheba Conference in Jerusalem, where he spent close to an hour defending his record as a right-wing leader and his decision to not immediately apply sovereignty to all the West Bank settlements.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office on Sunday ordered that 12 illegal outposts in the West Bank be connected to the state's official power grid in the premier's latest gesture to settlers just eight days before the March 2 elections.
Director-General of the Prime Minister's Office, Ronen Peretz, wrote in a letter to the Defense Ministry's adviser on settlement affairs, Avi Roeh, that the dozen wildcat hilltop communities handpicked for the upgrade "were established many years ago on [what is considered] state land, often times with the government's encouragement and out of security considerations."
Peretz added that the government is also in the process of legalizing many of the over 100 outposts in the West Bank. But in the meantime, "these residents find themselves spending many hours without basic living conditions such as electricity and water," the Peretz lamented.
"This harsh reality poses a real security threat when all outposts are in complete darkness during the night," he said.
While the international community considers all settlement activity illegal, Israel differentiates between legal settlement homes built and permitted by the Defense Ministry on land owned by the state, and illegal outposts built without necessary permits, sometimes on private Palestinian land.
Yet on the same day, Abbas' deputy to Palestinians: All Israel is "Palestine"
Political strategy: "Stages Plan" Senior Fatah official says Fatah's goal is "Palestine" replacing Israel: "Palestine" on the 1967 borders is "an intermediate statement"
Media: Official PA daily crossword puzzle teaches the Galilee in northern Israel is in "Palestine"
Education: Activists to distribute the PA's map of "Palestine" that erases all of Israel in Palestinian schools Consistent with Palestinian Authority policy, there is one message for the Palestinian street and another for the world. Since US President Trump revealed his Middle East peace plan, Palestinian leaders have intensified their message to Palestinians that they will never accept a "Palestine" that does not replace all of the State of Israel. At the same time, PA and Fatah Chairman Mahmoud Abbas assured the UN Security council that the Palestinians "recognize Israel:" Abbas: "In 1993 we signed the Oslo Accords, and we are committed to the Oslo Accords – with all of its details and all of its clauses. We have also recognized Israel and Israel has recognized us. We recognize Israel – in the Oslo [Accords]." [Official PA TV, Feb. 11, 2020]
On the same day that Abbas reminded the UN Security Council and the world of the PLO's recognition of Israel in 1993, his Fatah deputy, Mahmoud Al-Aloul, was busy talking to the Palestinian street. At a PA event protesting Trump's Middle East peace plan and expressing support for Abbas and his mission at the UN, Al-Aloul held up the PA's map of "Palestine" that replaces all of Israel and shouted: "This is Palestine."
The PA's Prime Minister Muhammad Shtayyeh was also present at the event, and in fact he is the one who uploaded the video of Al-Aloul denying Israel's existence to his personal Facebook page:
Abbas' deception at the UN: PA claims to recognize Israel, yet message to Palestinians is that all of Israel is "Palestine"
Business Activity in the Settlements Is Not Illegal
While this submission does not analyze the status of the territories that came under Israel's control in 1967 and the Israeli settlements there, it is to be noted that according to international law, as observed by experts and recent national European judgments, business activity in the settlements is not illegal.
James Crawford, a judge of the International Court of Justice (ICJ), wrote in 2012, before his nomination to the ICJ, an opinion, acknowledging that: " … a private sector entity or person does not bear any international legal responsibility for aiding or assisting the unlawful settlement program nor for ensuring that the people of Palestine can exercise their right to self-determination…"21
Judicial decisions rendered in recent years by European national courts in lawsuits against Israel and third-country business in the West Bank supported the position that international law did not forbid business activity in occupied territories.22
Clearly, although the recent report released by the OHCHR does not accuse the companies of violating international law, the database is the first-ever international attempt to list corporate activities in disputed territories. Out of more than 100 territorial disputes in the world today, including Moroccan-occupied Western Sahara, Turkish-occupied Northern Cyprus, and Crimea annexed by the Russians, the UN chose only to blacklist companies "related to the Israeli settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory." The HRC has never before asked such a list to scrutinize business enterprises and rightly so. The HRC cannot tell companies where or where they should not operate, and it is left for the company to decide.23
In conclusion, the Arab-Israeli conflict, including all the permanent status issues, among them settlements and borders, can only be dealt with and determined between the parties themselves, as part of direct bilateral negotiations, as agreed upon in the Oslo Accords.24 As such, any attempt of the politicized HRC to pressure Israel to make concessions beyond the negotiating table is useless. The relentless fixation on Israel does not add to the credibility of the HRC. Nor does it help to promote the Palestinians' interests. It only undermines the prospects for peace between the Israelis and the Palestinians in sharp contrast to an agreed negotiating issue between them.
Shameful that Venezuela's corrupt socialist regime — one of the world's worst human rights abusers — will take its seat on the so-called Human Rights Council today. Help support my friends@Diego_Arria & @UNWatch's effort to remove Maduro from the council: https://t.co/1To55Kj54rpic.twitter.com/7GOREgAy9B
The UN dominated the headlines last week when it released a database of 112 companies doing business in the West Bank. The intent was to encourage a boycott. However, the UN database is only a prelude to another, potentially more damaging measure: bringing Israel before the International Criminal Court for purported war crimes.
The ICC is investigating Israel's conduct during the war it fought against Hamas in 2014, its response to violent protests in 2018-2019, and its building of Jewish communities in the disputed West Bank. In late December 2019, chief ICC Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda found a "reasonable basis to proceed with an investigation" into alleged war crimes committed in territories controlled by Israel.
The Palestinians say they are merely pursuing justice but it is increasingly clear the Palestinians are using the court as a weapon. The Palestinian committee in charge of pursuing the case has 45 members. No less than 10 of them appear to have ties with terrorist groups. In other words, they are affiliated with groups whose raison d'etre is to conduct war crimes.
Ghazi Hamad, a senior official from the Iran-backed terrorist organization Hamas, serves as the spokesperson for the Supreme National Committee (SNC). Hamad has called for "small stabs" rather than large offensives to eliminate Israel. Committee chairperson Saeb Erekat has said that five other members of the committee are also Hamas members.
The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) also enjoys representation in the committee. Designated a terrorist group by the United States, the European Union and others, the PFLP gained notoriety in the 1960s and '70s for high-profile hijackings and attacks on Israelis. The group assassinated an Israeli minister in 2001 and claimed responsibility for an attack on a Jerusalem synagogue in 2014 that left six dead, including three American rabbis.
For months, the Israeli government has pursued the objective of trying to stabilize the Gaza Strip. It tried to reach new truce understandings with Hamas through indirect negotiations—brokered by the Egyptians and others—and avoid a new war.
But the latest incidents show that the goal of stabilizing Gaza is growing increasingly distant by the day.
On Sunday, Palestinian Islamic Jihad attempted to carry out a border bomb attack, which was foiled successfully by the Israel Defense Forces, when they shot dead the terrorist as he planted the bomb. Outrage spread throughout Gaza when video emerged of an IDF bulldozer removing the assailant's body from the scene. As a result, some 30 rockets were fired at Israel on Sunday, half of which were intercepted by the Iron Dome and the rest landing in open fields.
On Monday, the IDF launched a series of airstrikes against PIJ after the terror group fired at least 14 rockets against Israel. The border bomb attack and rocket fire are just the latest signs of how untenable the Gazan situation is becoming.
There are a few reasons for this. First among them is the fact that Hamas—Gaza's ruling regime and its largest terrorist army—is unable or unwilling to constrain PIJ, the second-largest armed faction.
A ceasefire brokered by Egypt and the United Nations took hold on the Israel-Gaza border on Tuesday after two days of fighting between Israel and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad group.
Islamic Jihad had fired 80 rockets towards Israeli communities along the Gaza border since Sunday, an Israeli military spokeswoman said, while Israel attacked sites in Gaza and Syria that killed three members of the Iran-backed organization.
No casualties were reported on the Israeli side of the frontier and many of the rockets were intercepted by Israel's Iron Dome aerial defense system.
The violence came a week before an Israeli election in which Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is seeking a fifth term in office after two inconclusive votes in the past year.
The frontier fell quiet early on Tuesday, after a Palestinian official said Israel and Islamic Jihad had reached a "reciprocal and simultaneous ceasefire" mediated by Egypt and the United Nations.
"This round is over and Palestinian resistance promised its people that every act of aggression by the Zionist occupation would be met by a reaction from the resistance," Khader Habib, a senior Islamic Jihad official, told Reuters.
Political figures and organizations both on the Left and the Right reacted on Monday to the latest round of escalation in which the Palestinian Islamic Jihad fired over 100 rockets at Israel over 24 hours.
Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas) shared a report about a rocket that hit the city of Sderot, landing next to a children's playground, tweeting: "This is wrong. This is cowardly. This is disgusting. This is something every single one of my colleagues in Congress should be able to agree upon – that Israeli children should not have to live their lives in fear of terrorist rockets raining down on them."
Congressman Ted Deutch (Florida-22nd District), Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on the Middle East, said in a statement: "Israelis and Palestinians do have the right to live in peace and security. The rocket attacks from Palestinian Islamic Jihad against Israel threaten the security of innocent Israelis and Palestinians. I strongly condemn these ongoing attacks."
The Anti-Defamation League issued a statement as well. "We are deeply concerned by dozens of rockets fired by Palestinian Islamic Jihad from Gaza at southern Israeli cities and towns," the organization tweeted. "Our thoughts are with those under attack, and we hope the situation de-escalates quickly."
The progressive Jewish group J Street reacted as well. It said in a statement that the organization is "deeply concerned by the latest fighting between Israel and the terrorist group Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), which over the past 24 hours has launched a barrage of rocket attacks toward the Israeli South – while Israeli forces have responded with air strikes in the Gaza Strip and Syria.
Photo taken today of a rocket being fired by Islamic Jihad from a densely populated neighborhood in Gaza. It's a double war crime to use Palestinian civilians as human shields while firing at Israeli civilians. #IsraelUnderFirepic.twitter.com/quo1Hfb2wZ
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas rejected the resignation of a top official tasked with reaching out to Israelis, several members of the Palestine Liberation Organization's Committee for Interaction with Israeli Society said on Monday.
Mohammmed al-Madani, the head of the PLO committee, offered Abbas his resignation on Saturday after gatherings of Israelis and Palestinians that the body organized earlier in February faced fierce criticism, mostly on social media.
Abbas informed Madani of his decision to turn down his resignation at a meeting with members of the committee at the PA presidential headquarters in Ramallah on Monday.
"The president told Madani that he would not accept his resignation," Ashraf al-Ajrami, a member of the committee and a former PA minister, said in a phone call. "Madani agreed to stay in his position and he left the meeting reassured and encouraged."
Madani, a Fatah Central Committee member, has served as the head of the committee since its establishment in 2012 after the Palestinians attained non-member observer state status at the United Nations.
During the meeting on Monday, Abbas told members of the committee that he "salutes" them and that the Ramallah-based Palestinian leadership would not accept any person "belittling" them.
Palestinian ambassador to Iraq Ahmad 'Aql: We Will Resist Deal of Century until Last Drop of Palestinian Child's Blood pic.twitter.com/YpUV6BJwML
Leaders of the Palestinian national liberation movement repeated their offer offer of assistance this week to the People's Republic of China in the latter's efforts to combat a virulent respiratory epidemic, suggesting that Beijing adopt the methods Palestinians have employed for a hundred years against Jews: stabbing, bombing, hijacking, shooting, ramming, and hostage-taking, among others.
China's struggle to date to contain the spread of coronavirus prompted Palestinian Authority President and PLO Chairman Mahmoud Abbas and several of his high-ranking officials to restate their suggestions, amid concerns that the original offer of assistance last week may have gone unnoticed in the furor. Abbas sent a personal message to Chinese President Xi Jinping with specific mention of the Palestinian people's extensive experience with many of the methods, even those such as hijacking that only some older veterans of the resistance still know.
"It would be our honor and privilege, not to mention our duty, to assist your country in any way we can," Abbas stated. "I would like to place at your disposal our vast knowledge of techniques to drive away this trouble, as we have amassed more than a century of experience in this arena, fighting the Zionist scourge."
Qatari news network Al Jazeera portrays itself as podium for free speech in the Middle East. But since its 1997 founding, it has gained notoriety as an outlet willing to air views of Islamist extremists and jihadists. It often was the first to receive al-Qaeda statements and videos, including those by Osama bin Laden.
The Qatari network promoted Islamist movements during the 2011-12 Arab Spring revolutions. It propped up Islamist agendas in the Middle East, especially those tied to the Muslim Brotherhood. The network's pro-Brotherhood bias prompted more than 20 Al Jazeera staffers to resign in 2013 in protest.
That background is relevant in understanding an Al Jazeera anchor's reaction last month to the new US peace plan for the Middle East.
Ambassadors from the United Arab Emirates, Oman, and Bahrain attended a news conference where Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu announced the plan.
Al Jazeera senior anchor Jamal Rayyan asked his Twitter followers whether Arab leaders who supported the deal should be assassinated.
In a February 16, 2020 speech, Hizbullah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah stated that the U.S. economy and the dollar are America'' Achilles heel, and therefore called to boycott American products as part of the struggle against the U.S.
Nasrallah's call drew mocking responses from Lebanese media figures and social media users. Taking to Twitter, they accused Hizbullah of hypocrisy, because its members and leaders openly use the dollar, American social media platforms and various American products. They posted many photos showing prominent Hizbullah members using such products, and similar photos of officials from Iran, which is Hizbullah's patron. For example, photos were posted of Nasrallah's son Jawad and of the late Iranian commander Qassem Soleimani wearing the Timberland brand, as well as a photo showing the car that carried Soleimani's coffin during his funeral: a U.S.-manufactured Chevrolet.
The following is a sampling of the reactions in Lebanon to Nasrallah's call for a boycott on American products.
One of the pictures that went viral as part of the mocking response to Nasrallah's call was a photo of his son, Jawad, wearing a shirt bearing the logo of the American Timberland brand. Twitter activist Fatima Eid posted it with the comment: "Nasrallah: Boycott American Goods. [His son] Jawad Nasrallah: No way."[1]
Photo of Jawad Nasrallah in a shirt saying "Timberland USA.73"
User Abu Awadi tweeted two versions of this photo, one titled "before the boycott" and showing Jawad wearing the shirt, and another titled "after the boycott," showing him without it.
Sens. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., and Ted Cruz, R-Texas, have introduced a biting new sanctions bill aimed at senior Lebanese officials involved in the holding of U.S. citizens -- in response to the detention and torture of 57-year-old American citizen Amer Fakhoury.
Fakhoury is believed to be the only U.S. citizen currently being held by Lebanon.
The sanctions legislation -- "The Zero Tolerance for Unlawful Detentions of U.S. Citizens in Lebanon Act" -- seeks to impose sanctions against Lebanese officials "who are involved in the unlawful detainment, arrest or abuse of any United States citizen in Lebanon."
While no names are mentioned in the legislation, U.S. officials have been in contact with Lebanese counterparts over Fakhoury's case, as Fox News has previously reported. The bill brings together Shaheen, a strong backer of the U.S.-Lebanon relationship, and Cruz, an outspoken skeptic of giving financial assistance to the Lebanese government due to Hezbollah's influential role there. Amer Fakhoury is pleading the Trump administration to work to get him back from Lebanon.
In a press release announcing the new bill, Shaheen who has worked with White House and State Department officials to get Fakhoury released, stated: "The U.S. Government has provided ample opportunity for Lebanese officials to free Amer Fakhoury. However, Amer is fighting for his life and time is running out. Lebanon's officials know that their behavior – which is motivated by Hezbollah's desire to sow discord in Lebanon – are illegal even under their own laws. There must be consequences for this flagrant disregard of international norms and human rights."
Since his detention, he has developed stage 4 lymphoma cancer.
Lebanese Political Science Professor Al-Naboulsi: Coronavirus - Possible Anti-Chinese Biological Warfare by the U.S. pic.twitter.com/j97Suf4ntd
A hard-line student group in Iran has threatened to destroy the Tomb of Esther and Mordechai in the north of the country in revenge for the Trump administration's peace plan.
The Basij group in Hamadan province, where the tomb is located, earlier this month said it would tear down the historic building and replace it with a Palestinian consulate in revenge against Israel and Washington over the recently unveiled proposal.
The threat was first published in the Iranian Student News Network.
The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom tweeted last week that it was "troubled by reported threats to the tomb of Esther and Mordechai in Hamadan, Iran, and emphasizes the Iranian government's responsibility to protect religious sites."
The Alliance for Rights of All Minorities in Iran also tweeted about the plan to destroy the tomb and put a Palestinian consulate in its place. The building is believed to house the tombs of Esther and Mordechai, the heroes of the Purim story. Purim will be celebrated this year on March 10.
The tweet noted that the burial site "has been a significant Jewish landmark for Jews and history buffs around the world."
1) This is Amir Hossein Moradi, 23, a protester from #IranProtests who's just been sentenced to death. One of his family members told me: "When his family saw him give forced confessions on TV, they didn't think he'd be sentenced to death this quickly" His family is devastated. pic.twitter.com/iWxSmZEHYF
Two more people infected with the new coronavirus have died, taking the toll in Iran to 16, officials said on Tuesday, as Iranians worried that authorities could be underestimating the scale of outbreak.
Iran has the highest number of deaths from coronavirus outside China, where the virus emerged in late 2019. Among the infected was the deputy health minister, who tested positive for coronavirus, state media said.
"Among those who had been suspected of the virus, 35 (new cases) have been confirmed and two died of the coronavirus infection," said Health Ministry spokesman Kianush Jahanpour. He said 95 people had been infected across Iran.
Jahanpour put the death toll at 15, but later Iran's state news agency said one person infected by the virus had died in the city of Saveh. Some unconfirmed reports gave a higher death toll.
The outbreak in Iran has coincided with mounting U.S. pressure on Iran's clerical rulers that has hit the economy hard. In 2018, the United States exited Tehran's nuclear deal with major powers and reimposed sanctions on the country.
Worried that official numbers could underestimate the scale of Iran's outbreak, many Iranians took to social media to accuse authorities of concealing facts.
So, the guy sweating profusely on left is Iraj Harirchi, #Iran Deputy Health Minister, insisting they have the #coronavirus under control. The video was from yesterday. Today, it has been confirmed that he now has the corona virus himself.
We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.
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