The UK is paying Palestinians to murder Jews

The following letter sent to my constituency MP is self-explantory (triggered by today's news):

As one of your constituents I would like to know if you are aware of the following (full details provided in links at the end) and will raise these concerns with the Foreign Secretary:

a) That UK tax payer money (through its funding of the corrupt - and otherwise bankrupt - Palestinian Authority) is now being used to give every freed Palestinian terrorist murderer $50,000 plus a guaranteed 'government' job for life.

b) That every one of the latest batch of terrorists that Israel was forced to release (for nothing in return) was a convicted murderer. This includes, for example Issa Abd Rabbo, who also received a $60,000 bonus, with the PA reportedly also offering to foot the bill for a wedding should he choose to marry. He was convicted of murdering two Israeli hikers, after tying them up at gunpoint and placing bags over their heads.

c) That every Palestinian terrorist captured by Israel now receives a salary from the Palestinian Authority for life  - starting from the minute they are captured (the salary is typically 15 times that of the average Palestinian worker). This includes, for example, Hussein Ghawadra who just last week was captured after killing an 18-year old Israeli Eden Atias while he slept on a bus from Afula to Tel Aviv (by slashing his neck 25 times with a knife in an attempt to decapitate him).   Ghawadra said he committed the terrorist act because he was aggrieved that two of his relatives (convicted of murder) were still in Israeli prisons. Since Ghawadra is himself just 16 he is guaranteed to become a wealthy man courtesy of UK taxpayers. He is also unlikely to serve more than a small number of years in jail since experience proves that Israel will be forced by the EU and the USA to release him as a 'painful concession for peace' .

The policy of the Palestinian Authority clearly encourages the terrorist murder of Jews, since the murderers are guaranteed not just wealth beyond the dreams of ordinary Palestinians, but also great adulation (it is standard for the PA to name roads, squares, and even soccer tournaments after convicted murderers).   Since the Palestinian Authority is funded solely by the EU and USA perhaps you can assure me that you will ask the Foreign Secretary to:

a)  immediately stop all payments to the Palestinian Authority, hence putting a stop to this incitement and direct support for terrorism; and

b) avoid pressuring Israel to release terrorist murderers (perhaps noting that this is the equivalent of expecting the UK to release people like the murderers of soldier Lee Rigby as a 'peace gesture').

Yours

Edgar Davidson

LINKS:

http://www.timesofisrael.com/palestinian-authority-gives-freed-prisoners-50000-each/
http://elderofziyon.blogspot.co.uk/2013/11/the-best-way-to-get-job-in-pa-just.html#.UoqOtOLX840
http://edgar1981.blogspot.co.uk/2013/11/jihadist-murder-of-soldier-spot.html
http://palwatch.org/main.aspx?fi=157&doc_id=10101
http://palwatch.org/main.aspx?fi=1005
http://www.jpost.com/Diplomacy-and-Politics/Palestinians-shower-freed-prisoners-with-handsome-cash-payments-perks-332078
http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_article.php?id=13407 http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/174166#.UoqeLuLX840

Update 22 November 2013 There MPs letter of response is here.

Obama dispenses with Israel

Before Obama was elected in 2008 some Jewish American friends assured me that Obama would be 'good for Israel'. Of course, Obama could not possibly have known - or aproved of - Jew haters such as his 'pastor' and close friend Reverend Wright whose anti-semitic sermons he listened to for 20 years and who conducted his marriage to Michelle. Nor could he have been aware of the views of - or approved of - radical Palestinians such as Rashid Khalidi who support the destruction of Israel,  even though he was such a close friend that, when he attended a party for Khalidi in 2003 it is reported that Obama said “Israel has no God-given right to occupy Palestine” plus there’s been “genocide against the Palestinian people by Israelis.” Obviously Obama just got carried away with the spirit of the celebration.

When Obama was reelected in 2012 and put together a foreign policy team made up entirely of politicians with a record of anti-Israel rhetoric (Kerry, Hagel, Rice, Powers) that was also just purely coincidental and in no way did it suggest that he was now about to 'throw Israel under the bus'. His love of Israel was demonstrated by his insistence that Israel release 1000 convicted Palestinian terrorists (including child murderers) in return for a lecture by John Kerry on why every Israeli settlement beyond the 1967 borders is 'illegal'.  Obviously he has no plan to weaken and marginalise Israel despite his decision last week to offer a 'deal' to drop sanctions against Iran while still allowing them to pursue a nuclear weapon, and then by making clear he was going to punish Israel for not submitting to every Palestinian demand in the current 'peace talks'. OK, so Kerry threatened Israel with a third intifada if Israel does not surrender all its settlements, while all trade links with Europe would be severed. But, hey, since Obama is insisting on dropping all sanctions against Iran it surely makes sense for him to manoeuvre for a sanctions campaign against Israel? Obviously this is all in Israel's best interests. And just in case there was any doubt about where Obama stands he has just provided yet another massive cash injection to the Palestinians, which is obviously punishing them for their latest round of terrorism and incitement and is in no way encouraging them to continue such behaviour.

Thankfully, all those American Jews still believe that Obama is a 'friend of Israel'.

p.s. Caroline Gluck sums up Obama's disastrous impact not just on Israel but on the standing of the USA:

America’s appalling betrayal of Jerusalem under Obama ... is the straw that has broken the back of American strategic credibility from Taipei to Santiago.

And a highly relevant and punchy article here by by Allan West

Jewish Press also ignores cold blooded terrorist murder of Israeli boy

Jewish News: 48 pages but no room for the story

Following on from the story yesterday of the media silence on the Lee-Rigby-like terrorist murder of Eden Atias I was at least expecting major coverage in the two UK weekly Jewish newspapers - the Jewish Chronicle and the Jewish News (notwithstanding their dismal record of failing to either stand up for, or even report accurately on, Israel).

 Both of these  papers go to print on Thursday. For them the 'best' possible time for a news story to happen is Wednesday morning as it gives them time to cover the story properly while also presenting it as fresh news. The murder of Eden Atias was announced on Wednesday morning and so should have been their lead. Despite this the Jewish News does not find any room at all for the story in any of its 48 pages - not even in the 'Israel news' section or the 'world news' section. Its front page story shown here is obviously of far greater significance.

Jewish Chronicle: Finally a mention ... on Page 28

In 68 pages of the Jewish Chronicle ('the world's oldest and leading newspaper dedicated to Jewish affairs') the story does get a mention as shown....buried on page 28 with the mysterious headline "Soldier dies in stabbing" as if it was some natural self-induced event. The JC's headline writers have clearly been learning from the BBC and Guardian. And they cannot find the room to even mention the dead boy's name in the brief report.  The JC apparently does not want to humanise the story by giving the victim a name.

Like the rest of the media there is also a continued news blackout of the ongoing appalling violence against Jews in the Mount Scopus area of Jerusalem. Presumably under pressure from Obama, the Government of Israel seems to have abdicated its repsonisibility to defend its citizens (as brilliantly expressed in this article). And it seems that news of Jewish Israelis under attack is now the sole responsibility of a handful of bloggers.

Jihadist murder of soldier: spot the difference

Most people in the world have heard the story of the young off-duty soldier murdered in cold blood in his home country by a Jihadist fanatic slashing a knife across the soldier's neck in an attempt to decapitate him. .....Except this story is not about the British soldier Lee Rigby whose murder in Woolwich earlier this year grabbed the whole world's attention for days on end.  This is the story of Israeli Eden Atias, murdered on an Egged bus from Afula to Tel Aviv yesterday by a young Palestinian Jihadist terrorist. And, despite the obvious similarities in the nature of the crime, the world's reaction to it - and the almost certain outcomes for the terrorists - could not be more different.

In many respects the murder of Eden Atias is even more tragic and despicable than that of Lee Rigby. At just 19 Eden was 5 years younger than Lee. Moreover, unlike Lee (who was a professional soldier) Eden was (like the vast majority of young Israelis) a conscript - just two weeks into his basic training.  A child more than an adult. And while Lee at least had the small possibility to resist his attacker, Eden was brutally murdered while he slept on the bus.

While there was universal outrage and condemnation of Lee's murder, Eden's has gone completely unreported in the West. Even the Jerusalem Post (determined to tow the Israeli Government line of downplaying Palestinian terrorism while the facade of the 'peace talks' continues) only managed to put it as their 4th news item yesterday with the bizarre headline "Palestinian murders IDF soldier in suspected terror attack to avenge relatives jailed in Israel." Today - the day of his funeral - the Jerusalem Post has no reference at all to Eden on its home page despite there being no less than 15 stories there. Well, actually there is one story with an oblique reference to Eden: it is this one:

Suspected far-right activists set fire to Palestinian home in 'revenge' for slain IDF soldier: 5 Palestinians suffer smoke inhalation in Ramallah area attack.

..which gives you an indication of how bizarre notions of moral equivalence are just as bad in the Israeli press as on the BBC and in the pages of the Guardian.

There was one important non-Israeli reaction to the story. The Palestinian Press celebrated the murder and the Hamas spokesman Fawzy Barhoom announced on his Facebook page “Congratulations to the Palestinian West Bank hero who killed an Israeli soldier in Afula this morning”. Can you imagine what the reaction would have been in the UK - and the rest of the world -  if the Muslim Council of Britain had congratulated Lee Rigby's murderer for his heroism?

And what will happen to Eden's murderer - who himself is apparently just 16 years old (and according to IsraellyCool is called Hussein Ghawadra)? We know that his jailed relatives are two cousins. One of them, Muhammed Juwadra, is serving three life sentences for the murder of Cartiso Radikov and Amos Mantiu, a Bezeq employee shot dead in the village of Baka al- Gharbiya in 2003. The other cousin is serving a 12-year-sentence for attempted murder.  Ghawadra, along with both his murderous cousins, will soon be released like all other Palestinian terrorists as a 'gesture of peace' forced on Israel by the Americans for nothing in return. And, unlike murderers anywhere else in the world, they will be received as heroes, with the Palestinian Authority naming streets and football teams in their honour. They will all receive a salary for life that is 15 times higher than that of the average Palestinian employee- all paid for by EU and US taxpayers. This salary is paid to them from the moment they are imprisoned, since these terrorist murderers are considered political prisoners not just by the Palestinians but by whole swathes of the Western liberal elite. Indeed, the 16-year-old Ghawadra is already classified as a child political prisoner (remember that when you hear leftists screaming about Israel imprisoning Palestinian children). He will be free before he reaches the age of 21 because the West will demand it of Israel. Nobody will dare make any such demands of Lee Rigby's killer.

Finally, remember that Eden is just the latest of a steady stream of Israelis murdered without a murmur or even the notice of the rest of the world in the last few months as a result of a low level intifada encouraged by the Palestinian Authority and now - disgracefully - by the American Secretary of State John Kerry.

p.s. I see Elder of Ziyon,  Raheem Kassam and others have also picked up on the Rigby analogy.

Update 15 November : See how the UK Jewish Press has covered the story

Apartheid Israel?

Totally unremarkable: Israeli Arabs dining in Kosher restaurant in Jewish neighbourhood of Jerusalem

Here is a typical scene you will see everywhere in mixed Jewish-Arab areas of Israel. Because of the poisonous anti-Israel propaganda that permeates the Western narrative, visitors to Israel are often surprised by such scenes. Remember this when some leftist idiot starts talking about Israeli 'apartheid'. Also remember where the real apartheid lies in the Middle East.  Israeli Jews cannot step foot in Palestinian controlled areas without risking their lives - indeed it is becoming increasingly dangerous for Jews to enter many Arab neighbourhoods and villages even inside Israel. The Palestinian leadership has made it clear that not a single Jew will be allowed to live in any future Palestinian state. But at least that will make any future Palestinian state entirely consistent with the apartheid policies of every other Arab state.

Tel Aviv blocks anti-Jihad websites

Tel Aviv beach 31 October 2013

Anyone who spends a lot of time in Israel or with Israelis living in Europe or the USA will know that a very sizable number (especially those under 40) have been indoctrinated with left-wing (and at times extremely anti-Zionist) views that would put most Guardian readers to shame. It can also be surprising to discover, given that they are effectively 'living in the eye of the storm', how little those same Israelis know of the extent to which Islamists hate them and want them destroyed. This is especially true of many in Tel Aviv. The main stream Israeli newspapers and TV channels are not much different to those in the UK both in their left-wing bias and in covering up Jihadist activities around the world (e.g. still no main stream comment anywhere on the Jihadist suicide bombing in Beijing which the BBC -when it mentioned it -  tried to convince viewers was down to 'democracy dissidents').

Religion of Peace website:blocked as "Discrimination"

I discovered today an example of the above, which confirms that those in power in the Jewish State are determined to show that they are the biggest 'dhimmis' of all.  On LaLa beach in Tel Aviv today I noticed that the Municipality was now providing a free wifi service (FREE_TLV). I'm not sure how new this is because I normally go to Bograshov beach and I have never noticed this service before. After checking my emails I decided to catch up on some real  news only to discover that websites like Robert Spencer's excellent jihadwatch and thereligionofpeace (which simply documents jihadist attacks and news stories) were blocked as either "Discrimination" or (strangely) "Advocacy Organisation" (curiously one of the only anti-Jihad sites not blocked was Pamela Geller's). I did a quick check of some well known antisemitic and anti-Israel websites and not one of those was blocked.

Jihad Watch website blocked

Isn't is great to imagine that you can avoid a problem simply by trying to make sure nobody knows about it?  And is it any wonder therefore that the Israeli Government can actually get away with releasing convicted terrorist murderers (like the latest bunch freed yesterday to appease Obama and the PLO) without there being mass demonstrations?

June 2014 Update

The new 'moderate' Iran: 16 Baluchi political prisoners hanged in act of vengeance - West ignores it

Obama, the EU - and of course the entire main stream Western media - are so desperate to maintain the nonsensical narrative of a new 'moderate' Iran that there has been barely a mention of this story that can be found at the bottom of  page 32 of today's Telegraph.

The story reveals more than just the fact that 16 political prisoners from the Baluchi minority community were hanged in revenge for an attack by Baluchi rebels on an Iranian border post. We also discover that the Iranians use the threat of killing prisoners to deter any rebel actions, and that it in 2010 the Iranians committed an act of international air piracy to force a civilian aircraft flying from Dubai to Kysyzstan to land in Iran so that they could arrest the leader or the Baluchi rebel group. The leader was subsequently forced to make a TV confession saying:

“They [the Americans] promised to help us and they said that they would co-operate with us, free our prisoners and would give us military equipment - bombs, machine guns - and they would give us a base.” 

They hanged him anyway three months later. Did this story make the news in the West? Not that I recall. Can you imagine how the West would have reacted if Israel had done anything like that even to a mass murderer? You don't need to, because you only have to compare the West's silence on Iran to their hysterical reaction when Israel killed mass-murdering Hamas and Islamic Jihad terrorists in pinpoint targeted assassinations that involved no civilian loss of life.

Note also that the Sistan-Baluchistan province is occupied by Iran against the wishes of the Baluchis. While every Western political 'activist' is obsessed about 'Palestinian independence' did you ever hear a single one of these anti-Israel goons highlight the plight of the Baluchis? On the contrary, 99% of Western activists insist that Iran is peaceful nation against whom sanctions should be dropped. And that is the same narrative now being pushed by Obama and Western governments - which is why there will be no official reaction to this kind of story and why only Israel can stop Iran getting their nuclear bomb.

Israel's Save a Child's Heart Charity: combatting UN, EU and UK anti-Israel bias

Save a Child’s Heart (SACH) is an incredible Israeli-based international humanitarian project, whose mission is to improve the quality of paediatric cardiac care for children from developing countries who suffer from heart disease and to create centers of competence in these countries. SACH is a team of  surgeons and support staff at Wolfson Hospital near Tel Aviv (including Jews, Muslims and Christians) who are world leaders in paediatric cardiology. SACH has saved the lives of thousands of children from all over the world by performing complex and dangerous cardiac operations. In most cases the charity brings the children to Israel for the operations but members of the team also travel abroad to perform the operations, and increasingly the team is training doctors from the developing countries to perform the surgery themselves.

Many of the children saved by SACH are from countries that are hostile to Israel including Indonesia, Iraq, Jordan, Morocco, Somalia, Sudan, and Syria. But far and away the most children whose lives are saved (over 50%) are from the Palestinian Authority (both Gaza and the West Bank) - more on that below.

Walter Felman
(Chairman, SACH UK)

Hannah Shabathai
(President, SACH Switzerland)

This evening  Hannah Shabathai and Walter Felman from SACH (pictured here) spoke at Woodford Liberal Synagogue in East London. Both Hannah and Walter are among the key volunteers who help make SACH  function as it does. In addition to speaking about what SACH does, Hannah focused on the story of how SACH became one of the very few non-political Israeli organisations to gain recognition as an NGO (non-government organisation) at the UN.  SACH's eventual recognition only came about as a result of an extraordinary level of planning and lobbying. Eventually, despite their impeccable application they, unlike other applicants were called back for further questioning. During this latter session the Syrians - who were not even on the committee but were there as an observer - tried to spike the application (despite the fact that SACH is saving Syrian children).

SACH is an incredible and heart-warming example of how Israeli skill and selfless humanitarianism benefits the world. But it is also an incredible example of how much more Israel could do for the world if it was not singled out for such hostility by the very nations who would benefit most from an Israel unburdened by the threats and torments it faces in every aspect of its existence. And it is not just the UN, of course, that creates such problems. While the EU provides some financial support for SACH, this is conditioned on it being spent only on children from the Palestinian Authority. This partly explains the disproportionate numbers mentioned above. But the irony of this is that the EU's stance is inconsistent with SACH's mission statement (that "every child deserves the best medical treatment available, regardless of the child's nationality, religion, color, gender or financial situation"). It also exposes the political racism at the heart of the EU agenda - the notion that Palestinian children are somehow inherently more deserving of life than children from far more deprived countries in Africa for example. But this is something I have reported on many times before (see, e.g., here and here for how the Palestinians receive many more times per capita foreign aid support than any other people in the world despite many countries being far poorer).

The final important point made was that there is a portable exhibition about SACH that is suitable for display in public places. However, unlike many similar exhibitions provided by other oganisations (including anti-Israel groups) which have no trouble finding public places to exhibit, such is the hostility to anything associated with Israel that nowhere in London has agreed to allow SACH to exhibit. So any old Israel demonization will be welcomed in many places in London (as I have blogged about many times) but London is a no go area for anything showing Israel in a positive light.  

Update 24/10/2103: More about SACH at Elder of Ziyon

What the UK media will and will not tell you

Following on from my post about the Muslim victimhood narrative, it is interesting to note that in the last 48 hours alone (see here for more details) the following major events have happened, but have been almost totally ignored by the British media:

• A Muslim woman in Volgograd, Russia detonated an explosives-laden suicide vest on a bus, killing six strangers. 
• A group of Muslim terrorists opened fire at Church wedding in Cairo, Egypt murdering the pastor, two woman and an 8-year-old girl.
• Sixty civilians were murdered at a packed cafe in Baghdad, Iraq when first one Muslim suicide bomber detonated and then another detonated when people rushed to help.
• Over forty motorists were obliterated by a Muslim suicide truck bomber at an agricultural exchange in Hama, Syria. 
• A Palestinian Muslim - whose brother had previously used a bulldozer to attack civilians and motorists in the centre of Jerusalem, used a bulldozer to attack soldiers on an army base near Jerusalem
• Muslim terrorists in Nigeria shot, burned and hacked to death 19 civilians in Nigeria.

Despite 24-hour news channels like BBC News, Sky News and CNN, none of those channels found the time to report on any of the above events in any of their prime time spots. Yet last night and this morning BBC News and Sky News led with the story of  a Ukrainian in the UK who pleaded guilty of murdering a Muslim man and of attacking mosques. This was, of course, a terrible crime. But the wall-to-wall coverage this story has received - with the major focus being on this man's hatred of Muslims and hence pushing the 'Islamaphobia' narrative - should be contrasted not just to the refusal of the main stream media to report on much more serious atrocities by Muslims, but also to their under-reporting of Muslim terrorism and gang crimes in the UK. Thus, the multiple cases of Muslim terrorist cells and Muslim sex-slave gangs are covered up in the sense that the ethnicity of the gangs (if reported at all) is said to be "Asian".

None of the above is coincidental. As reported here today CNN are actually paid by supremacist Islamic regimes to not to report what they consider are 'damaging' stories. The BBC's leftist editors need no external payment to dictate their news agenda since any story of Muslim terrorism simply does not fit well with their "Muslims as victim narrative" and so needs to be obfuscated or not reported at all. As for Sky, ever since Saudi Prince Al-Waleed bin Talal bought 10% of News Corporation (which owns Sky news) their news coverage has had a biased agenda easily on a par with the BBC (just search "Sky" on this blog for an indication of the extent of this bias in the last 3 years). For the same reason, Britain's most popular newspaper - the Sun (owned by News Corp) - has gone the same way (again just search "Sun" on this blog). That's why NONE of the stories at the start of this article were reported at all in the Sun, but the Ukrainian murderer was given a full page of coverage today.

The incredible irony of what is happening in the UK (and the rest of the Western world) is that if you still rely on the main stream media for your news, then the only way you will get to hear of the regular Muslim terrorist atrocities taking place every day in every part of the world is if you tune in to Al Jazeera.

The ultimate in Muslim victimhood mythology: 'they were victims of the Nazis, just like Jews were'

Another day, another cultural event in London, and (as is standard) another opportunity to demonize Israel. But, for me, the most astonishing exhibit at the "Other Art Fair" in London's Brick Lane was this print by "anonymous guerrilla artist and painter" who goes under the pseudonym Ego Leonard.

Jews, gays, and .... Muslims in concentration camp uniforms - equal victims of the Nazis

There can be no ambiguity in what the artist is claiming here: Jews, gays, and ... Muslims (dressed in concentration camp outfits) were equal victims of the Nazi holocaust. The myth of Muslim victimhood and 'Islamaphobia' is one that is now constantly pushed not just by the Muslim Brotherhood, but even more so by their useful idiot leftist allies, like the 'guerilla artist' here. To cast Muslims as equal victims, when they were actually among the most enthusiastic participants in the Nazi persecution of Jews, takes the myth of Muslim victimhood to a whole new level; and  as with most Muslim propaganda it is a perfect inversion of reality.

Hitler was actually inspired by the Muslim Brotherhood's antisemitism and the Palestinian Arab leader Haj Amin al Husseini was a key ally of Hitler who helped set up Hitler's Muslim SS division, who were active in murdering Jews in Eastern Europe.  Hitler promised al Husseini that he would be allowed to carry out the murder of every Jew in Palestine once the Nazis advanced there, and al Husseini had drawn up detailed plans of the execution programme. And, of course, Arab countries such as Iraq were formally allies of Nazi Germany.

Anyway, just to makes sure that nobody can be in any doubt where the 'guerilla artist' Ego Leonard's true sympathies lie he was also exhibiting a print showing that the Arabs - with the ubiquitous large key - have been the true owners of the land of Palestine 'since the time of Jesus' (a good quality image of this print can be seen on the artist's website here).

Arab with ubiquitous key to Palestine

For an alternative view of this story see here. 

p.s. Unlike Muslims, many gays were persecuted by the Nazis (it is estimated that up to 100,000 were arrested between 1933 and 1945 and that up to 10,000 of these died in concentration camps) . But suggesting that this persecution was equal to that of the Jews could also be considered offensive when you consider that over 33,000 Jews were killed in just 36 hours at Babi Yar, while at Auschwitz 20,000 were killed per day for prolonged periods.

p.p.s (20 October 2013 update). A highly relevant story here today that the Egyptian family of the only Arab to have been honored by Yad Vashem for saving Jews during the holocaust has rejected the honour. And today the Palestinians are proudly flying a Nazi flag over an Israeli throughfare.

Demonization of Israel by left-wing Israelis

I have blogged many times about how extreme leftist Israelis play a major role in the international demonization of Israel (see, e.g. here and here as examples). Often, (as in this example) they do so with the unwitting support of local diaspora communities who assume that "an Israeli speaker" is somebody who will be putting forward a positive, objective view of Israel. Often it is cultural forums (plays, films and even music events) where leftist Israelis are given a platform - again often by unwitting Jewish organisations - to promote their anti-Zionist propaganda.  So, for example, the annual UK Jewish Film Festival is currently taking place with, as in previous years, films by Israeli directors dominated by those with an anti-Zionist narrative.

Particularly depressing is when friends who are pro-Israel, but not particularly well-informed, go to one of these events not even realising that they have been subjected to two hours of anti-Israel propaganda. For example, friends were chuffed to tell us recently they had been to see an Israeli production "Ballard for the Burning Star" at the Edinburgh Festival in August. It turns out that this play is based on the writer's work with the extreme leftist NGO "Breaking the Silence", which was set up to exploit the 'experiences' of anti-Zionist Israelis who had been in the IDF and use it for propaganda to accuse Israel of war crimes. Most of the 'personal stories' have turned out to be either completely made up or grossly exaggerated (see here, here and here).

Sometimes, when confronted with the extremes of anti-Israel bigotry in the West even extreme leftist Israelis finally take a reality check. A very important example of this is the story being told by Hen Mazzig. Daniel Greenfield has a brilliant overview of his story here. This is a must read, not only for its exposure of the depths of anti-Semitism among the supposed Western intelligentsia, but also for Greenfield's exposure of the extent to which some anti-Zionist Israelis (in this case the unhinged Tal Nitzan) have contributed to this anti-Semitism.

18 Oct update: Caroline Glick has posted an especially relevant story about an anti-Israel play by an Israeli here.

Jerusalem Report article on pro-Israel bloggers

The Jerusalem Report is a monthly magazine that I subscribed to for a number of years up until 2011 when I could no longer stomach its left-wing anti-Zionist bias any longer (to give a feel for some of its typical nonsense check out the last section of my blog posting here). Well, today Elder of Ziyon and IsraellyCool both report on an article in the Jerusalem Report about pro-Israel bloggers in which they are featured. This is very interesting given the following self-explanatory letter I wrote in 2011 to cancel my subscription  (I also reproduce the response I got from Editor-in-Chief Eetta Prince-Gibson, who seems to miss the point that having the occasional 'pro-Israel article' does not address my particular concerns. It's a bit like finally finding a single Spurs calender in shop which sells hundreds of Arsenal calendars only to discover that half of the pictures in the Spurs calendar are of Arsenal players 'in order to provide a balanced view'):

**************************************************

Cancellation of subscription number 5631598 (Jerusalem Report)

I have an annual subscription that is automatically deducted from my credit card. I wish to cancel this subscription.

The reason for my cancellation is very simple. I can no longer tolerate the number of anti-Israel, Islamist apologist articles in the magazine written by  uninformed leftist writers such as Annie Roiphe, Danny Rubsenstein, Mona Eltahawy** and Kessel.  Every newspaper and magazine in the UK prints ignorant, poorly researched and argued anti-Israel articles such as these, so why do I need to pay for an Israeli publication printing the same?

The Jerusalem Report should consider getting some new writers - there are many fantastic bloggers (across the political spectrum) offering genuine in-depth insights on Israel matters that make your writers look quite pathetic. Have a look at some of these and you will see what I mean:

http://rubinreports.blogspot.com/
http://www.michaeltotten.com/
http://elderofziyon.blogspot.com/
http://sultanknish.blogspot.com/
http://www.daphneanson.blogspot.com/
http://www.spectator.co.uk/melaniephillips/

If and when you publish decent quality material like that I would certainly resubscribe. But given the views of the editor I guess I will be waiting a long time.

***************************************************

Dear Mr Davidson

The subscriptions department has forwarded your email to me, in which you express your displeasure with the current "political line" of The Jerusalem Report.

I hope you don't mind that I have taken the liberty of responding to you directly.

First of all, please do allow me to thank you for taking the time to state the reasons for your displeasure.  As Editor-in-Chief, I, together with all the staff, value our readers' opinions.

But I do hope that you will also allow me to differ with your assessment. First of all, I do not think that we are anti-Israel.  While we are critical, as, I believe, a newsmagazine should be, we are proudly Israeli and proudly Zionist.

The Jerusalem Report seeks to provide its readers with a balanced view of events in Israel, the Middle East and the Jewish World, with a wide variety of opinions and positions, from very different socio-political positions. In addition to the columnists you mentioned, may I draw your attention to the other columnists and op-ed contributors, may I also point out that regular contributors also include, for example, Amiel Ungar (who describes himself as a right-winger), Robert Hornstein, Bruce Maddy-Weitzman and others whose opinions are very different from those of, for example, Anne Roiphie or Kessel (who is not a regular contributor.)  We have also published op-eds from authors such as Gerald Steinberg, head of the NGO Monitor and from the Israel-based Im-Tirzu.

May I also point out that, from the UK itself, we have been proud to print an extensive critique of the boycott-divestment-sanctions movement and a review of the most recent book by Anthony Julius by Winston Pickett, a well-regarded pro-Israel resident of the UK.

I appreciate the list of bloggers that you have presented, some of whom I am familiar with and some of whose work I hope to get to know, thanks to your list. However, The Report does not usually include bloggers because their articles are not vetted by a professional editorial staff.

I do want to note that your wrote "given the views of the editor I guess I will be waiting a long time."  I personally see myself as a Zionist and am proud to live in Jerusalem, but the views of this editor, whatever the are, are not the substance of the magazine.

Lastly, I do want to invite you to either write to us or, even better, to write a letter to the editor, whenever you feel that our research is inadequate or sloppy....we pride ourselves on our in-depth reporting and research, so if you "catch" us when we are remiss, we would appreciate knowing it.

I hope you will reconsider your decision and would welcome all of your feedback,
Eetta

Eetta Prince-Gibson
Editor-in-Chief
The Jerusalem Report 

**I think I was the first to publicly flag Mona Eltahawy as an Israel-hating, Islamist supramacist - see some of her more recent exploits here and here.That an Israeli magazine should be employing her is pretty contemptible.

Israeli leftists' suicidal determination to help Syrians who promise to kill them

JC article - click to read

This is not about the Israeli hospitals quietly treating Syrians injured in the civil war, but rather a story of Israelis putting themselves in harm's way to help people who promise to kill them.

The story - in this week's Jewish Chronicle - perfectly captures the naive and dangerous mindset of Israeli leftists, who simply cannot get it into their heads that the world's anti-Semites do not hate them any less than they hate any other Israelis or Jews.

It is the story of a leftist Israeli NGO (non governmental organisation) whose volunteers have been risking their lives actually going into Syria to provide aid - according to the article this includes 300,000 meals and five ambulances. While this sounds like a very noble venture, such is the risk of what they are doing that the name of the NGO cannot be revealed, and the volunteers lack any protection - meaning they could easily be taken hostage and hence ultimately risk the lives of many Israelis in trying to free them.  But the most important message in the story is the statement by the Syrian rebel commander (these are the guys the USA and UK are supporting remember) who has been aided by this NGO, who told the Israelis helping them:

"Let me finish with them [the Syrian government], and then I'm coming for you."

If World War 2 had been conducted like this

If World War 2 had been conducted the way Western Governments are now conducting the Jihad war being fought against them we might have had the following kind of behaviour:

The Scene: May 1940. We have just gone through the 254th consecutive night of German bombers blitzing London. The British Government announces its total surprise that on this particular night London should have been chosen to be attacked. The PM goes on the radio and makes the following statements about the current "War on Airplane bombers":

• Nobody should jump to conclusions about who might be responsible for this particular bombing, especially as we have no conclusive evidence yet that any of the previous 253 bombing raids were in any way related.
• In fact, our intelligence on previous raids reveals they were carried out by men from different cities with nothing whatsoever in common other than the fact that the cities all happened to be in Germany.  What we must not do is infer from this that the German people mean us any harm whatsoever especially as their Government adheres to the Nazi philosophy which we know seeks worlds peace. 
• At present we have no idea what the  motive was for any of these attacks but we must treat each one as a separate crime with separate motives. We do not yet know the names and nationalities of the men who carried out tonight's bombing raid. They are just as likely - indeed more likely - to be British men with a grudge against the Government's new income tax system as men of any other nationality. There is certainly no reason to be believe this is in any way connected with Germany. 
• And just because we have been bombed now for 254 consecutive nights there is no reason to believe that this will happen again. Obviously citizens should be extremely vigilant as they go about their nightly activities tomorrow - be especially on the look out for British men complaining about income tax who are known to have access to bomber planes. 
• However, what we will not tolerate are those racists among us who assert that if we spot German bomber planes entering UK airspace tomorrow that we should assume anything other than purely peaceful intent. Attempting to stop such planes flying over London would be considered by us to be unacceptable racial profiling. 
• In the extremely unlikely event that bombs are dropped again we will treat each individual bombing as a separate criminal act and will spare no expense in attempting to track down the individual pilot responsible in each case. In the unlikely event that such a pilot is found to be from a foreign country (which is just as likely to be Honduras, New Zealand, or Zaire as it is to be Germany) we will expect the government of that country to help us track down the criminal.  Indeed we now have reason to believe that a man named Fritz Schmidt of Hamburg was a pilot involved in a previous bombing and as a result I have asked Herr Hitler the German Chancellor to consider bringing this man into custody. 
• Moreover, because several men from German towns have been previously implicated My Majesty's government is hereby donating 15 billion pounds to Herr Hitler's Germany to ensure that they have the resources to find and punish the guilty men.

Yes a war cime happened today...

While nobody knows whether or not there really was a chemical weapons attack in Syria or whether it was by Assad's forces or the Jihadists, there is no doubt that the firing of several rockets from Lebanon into civilian areas of Israel today was a genuine war crime. Unlike whatever happened in Syria, this attack had no military purpose. It was purely to terrorise civilians.

Of course you won't even hear about this attack in the main stream media and, in order not to upset Obama by actually defending themselves (the Americans have already demanded no response from Israel), the Israelis are desperately trying to minimize the event by calling it a "one-time incident". If they know this already I can only assume they have re-employed Uri Geller for his ability to see into the future.

Statement from the families of Israelis murdered by terrorists now being released for no good reason

Isreally Cool has a statement from the families of Israelis murdered by terrorists who are being released after being pressured to do so by the Obama Administration. The statement should be read in full as it brilliantly lays out the case that releasing these terrorists inevitably produces exactly the opposite effect expected of the 'peace makers' who demand it. The statement is addressed to John Kerry who, despite all the turmoil and mass killings taking place in the Arab countries surrounding Israel, has decided that it is only Israel that deserves to be the focus of his attention and anger.

Like his boss Obamo, Kerry has a long history of supporting dictators, communists and anti-Semites as well as being wrong on just about everything. Until Obama appointed him Secretary of State he was, fortunately, unable to do too much damage to the world with his idiotic views. That has all changed now. His pressure on Israel alone, coupled with his angry statement this week that "all Israeli settlements are illegitimate" breaks all previous US policy and written agreements with previous administrations. It not only confirms him (and his boss) as an ignorant antisemitic bigot, but means that extremely dangerous times lie ahead.

More on the terrorists release here.

Warsi displays her anti-Israel obsession and gross incompetence at the same time

Anybody who has has paid the slightest bit of attention to what Baroness Warsi is really all about would not be surprised by today's story that she lied to Parliament about the number of Palestinian 'killed by Israelis' since January 2012. She claimed the number was 3643 when even the anti-Israel UN Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) gives the number as 262, of whom most were combatants (OCHA takes its information primarily from Hamas who include, for example, people they kill themselves as 'collaborators'). I have not seen the figures that Israel provides, but I doubt if they are more than 50 of whom almost all are combatants.

Responding to - of all people the Jew baiting Jenny Tonge - Warsi would have been very eager to take the most exaggerated figures she could find to satisfy Tonge (and her own) blood lust against Israel.

People who think that an educated Muslim woman who refuses to wear a veil cannot also be an Islamist supremacist  should start looking at the evidence. They should also take a look at Danny Lockwood's book "The Islamic Republic of Dewsbury", which has has some very interesting first hand accounts of Warsi's duplicity.

What the peace process means for Israel

Daniel Greenfield has written an article about the "Sacrifices of peace" which is one of the most important and brilliant I have seen. Every person who cares about Israel should read this in its entirety.

What he has done is look at the direct quotes by the 'leaders' of Jewish communities during the holocaust (especially Chaim Rumkowski of the Lodz ghetto) as they tried to 'negotiate' with the Nazis over which Jews could be sacrificed in order that some could survive. He compares these quotes with those of Israeli leaders like Rabin and Sharon (and now Netanyahu) as they make their 'painful concessions' to ensure that at least part of Israel can survive. The analogy is striking and difficult to dispute. For example, when the Nazis demanded all Jewish children and old people be sent for extermination Rumkowski said:

The ghetto has been struck a hard blow. They demand what is most dear to it - children and old people. ... In my old age I am forced to stretch out my hands and to beg: Brothers and sisters, give them to me! Fathers and mothers, give me your children! Yesterday, in the course of the day..I was given the order to send away more than 20,000 Jews from the ghetto, and if I did not – 'we will do it ourselves'. Should we have accepted this and carried it out ourselves, or left it to others?'But as we were guided not by the thought: "how many will be lost?" but "how many can be saved?" we arrived at the conclusion – those closest to me at work, that is, and myself – that however difficult it was going to be, we must take upon ourselves the carrying out of this decree - I must carry out this difficult and bloody operation.. I must cut off limbs in order to save the body! 

Fast forward to 2005 and see how Ariel Sharon, of all people, described his unilateral decision to forcibly remove the entire Jewish community of Gaza and all Israel defence forces there, leaving the South of Israel at the mercy of Hamas rockets.

This step is very difficult for me personally. It was with a heavy heart that the Government of Israel made the decision regarding Disengagement, and the Knesset did not lightly approve it, ...The responsibility for the future of Israel rests on my shoulders. I initiated the Plan because I concluded that this action is vital for Israel. Believe me, the extent of pain that I feel at this act is equal only to the measure of resolved recognition that it was something that had to be done.

Like the Nazis, the Palestinians have made it very clear that they will not stop until every single Jew is 'removed' from the entire land of Israel. Like the Nazis they are prepared to achieve their goal in stages knowing that they can rely on the Jews to cut off their own limbs. While the Jews of the holocaust did it because they could not resist the Nazis' demands, the Jews of Israel do it because they feel they cannot resist the demands of the 'international community'. Despite the following words by Rumkowski every Jew of Lodz was ultimately sent to the death camps:

I tried everything I knew to get the bitter sentence cancelled.....When it could not be cancelled, I tried to lessen the sentence. Only yesterday I ordered the registration of nine-year-old children. I wanted to save at least one year – children from nine to ten. But they would not yield. I succeeded in one thing – to save the children over ten. Let that be our consolation in our great sorrow.

Daniel Greenfield concludes, by analogy:

Rabin warned that if Israel did not accept an autonomous territory, then it would be forced to accept a state. Peres warned that if Israel did not accept a state in Gaza and the West Bank, it would lose Jerusalem. Sharon warned that if Israel didn't accept the expulsion of the Jews of Gaza, it would lose everything up to the '67 borders. Olmert warned that if Israel didn't accept the partition of Jerusalem, it would lose the entire city. Israel accepted most of these things and each of the terrible losses it sought to avert came about anyway, not naturally, but because of these prior concessions. The autonomous territory paved the way for a state. The loss of Gaza and the West Bank made Jerusalem next on the schedule.

Unusual example of Sharia imposed in the UK: no mankinis* allowed during Ramadan

This extraordinary story - in which a charity-raising pair were attacked by a violent mob of Muslims in Birmingham for 'insulting Muslims on Ramadan' because of their fancy dress attire -  is reported in today's Sun**. But equally extraordinay is that (consistent with the story I reported on Monday) the Sun goes to great lengths to avoid the Muslim angle completely, referring only to an  'angry mob'.

Mankini pair face mob riot

TWO men who dressed in mankinis for a sponsored walk had to be rescued by police after they were attacked by an angry mob. Steven Ellis, 41 and brother-in-law Jason Hendry, 22, were pelted with stones and eggs by the crowd — who accused them of insulting locals during Ramadan.

The animal-loving pair donned the comedy outfits — skimpy trunks with shoulder straps — for a dare on their eight-mile trek to raise £300 for Birmingham Dogs’ Home. But they were attacked as they stopped in the city’s Sparkbrook district to give two dogs with them a drink. Steven’s wife, Victoria, 36, who was following the pair in a car, said: “We stopped in a supermarket car park and were suddenly surrounded. “There was a crowd of about 30 to 40 men who began throwing stones and eggs at us. “They were shouting at Jason saying that he was a pervert and a paedophile, and one of them called me a dirty white slag. “The abuse was appalling. I had our five young children in the car and they were terrified. “We called the police who escorted us out of the area. They said the trouble was due to sensitivities over an EDL march and Ramadan.” Jason added: “It was disgusting behaviour. I was angry with them for how they reacted. “We tried to explain it was just a bit of fun, to raise money for charity.” 

* The mankini was pioneered by Sacha Baron Cohen for his Borat character

**I have reproduced the story here as the Sun online is no longer free.

Sun suggests Boston bomber was white supremacist after all

The main stream media's determination to downplay, or even whitewash altogether, the central role of Islam and Jihad in terrorist attacks around the world has been the subject over the years of many of the postings on this blog.

Sometimes the extent to which the media will go to cover up the Islam angle can be breathtaking. But todays' article in the Sun (note to non-Brits: this is the largest circulation newspaper in the UK by a very long way and is supposed to be 'conservative') ranks as the most incredible I have ever seen in this respect:

In the immediate aftermath of the Boston marathon bombings the main stream media were desperately hoping that this was carried out by right wing extremists. Even after the overwhelming evidence that it was a Jihadist attack the media were still 'looking for motives'. When the surviving bomber made it clear in his own words that his motive was Jihad against the USA and the West (after he had trained with Al Qaeda affiliates in Chechnya) the main stream media did what they always do in such situations - go very quiet.

In the UK there has been almost no coverage of the case since the immediate aftermath of the bombings (primarily because it is one of those stories that very blatantly contradicts the main stream narrative that Islam is a religion of peace).The article in today's Sun is the first it has carried about the bombings for a while. Note that the Sun, like the rest of the media, previously ignored all of the evidence of the bomber's writings and readings about Jihad because they did not consider this relevant. So, actually saying things like "I will dedicate my life to Jihad" and reading Al Qaeda manuals are considered irrelevant but reading a white supremacist publication is apparently enough to reinstate the media's desired outcome after all.

Update: I see that Jihad Watch  and Pamela Geller are also reporting that the BBC is running with this story. That makes perfect sense. It seems the BBC have invested an enormous amount of effort to do everything they can to find a motive other than Jihad.  But all they have come up with is the fact that white supremacist material has stuff that would be of common  interest to a Jihadist, most notably a desire to kill Jews. Hence this classic quote from the BBC article:

Reading material he had about white supremacy commented that "Hitler had a point".

Wow - that really proves he was not a Jihadist.