The Professor's name is Simona (Sima) Sharoni. Her academic credentials are here. This is from the second of the three links above.
Sharoni, a professor at the State University of New York at
Plattsburgh in the Gender and Women's Studies Department, said that both
the conflict and campus sexual assault feature institutionalized
disparity of power as a linchpin.
Sharoni articulated that the
pro-Israel narrative embraces a victim-blaming narrative akin to "she
was asking for it" allegations common in rape culture. "The assumption
that Palestinians bring the violence on themselves...it's similar to
telling a survivor that it's what she was wearing," Sharoni said.
Additionally, she asserted that supporters of Israel engage in a
behavior analogous to discrediting rape victims in their repudiation of
Palestinian claims.
"Palestinians are not believed, which is the
same with survivors [of sexual assault]. It's very similar to saying,
'No, he's actually a nice guy,' about a man accused of rape," Aharoni
remarked.
The professor concluded her interview by explaining
that drawing parallels between campus rape and the "Israeli apartheid"
is strategically advantageous for both the BDS movement as well as
sexual assault survivors groups because it serves as "a means to an
end...to create a just and equal society."
Well, Israel's treatment of 'Palestinians' does have something in common with campus rapes. It's widely exaggerated in the media, and the media reports about it (as well as the crimes themselves) are often based on lies by people who want to create abuse that doesn't exist. Often, both are based on fiction.
Israel Apartheid Week 2014 is based on a lie. The true reason behind it is hatred for Jews
Kennith Meshoe, a member of the South African Parliament and a man who
suffered through the true apartheid of South Africa speaks about the
false claim of Israeli apartheid. Kennith Meshoe exposes the false lie
and fraudulent narrative that Israel is an apartheid state.
In
Israel Arab, Muslims, Jews, Christians, atheists, Hindus, Buddhists, can
live in freedom compared to most Muslim countries in the Middle East
and majority Moslem countries. Gays and Lesbians are free to live their
lives in Israel, while in majority Muslim countries are either killed or
imprisoned.
The real reason there are attacks on Israel is
based on anti-Jewish hatred. The Palestinian leaders during World War II
were backers of Hitler and the Nazi movement of Germany.
In
Muslim countries they treat people practicing Christianity, atheism,
Buddhism, Judaism, or Hinduism like second class citizens without any
rights...why aren't people in Europe, Australia, Canada, and the United
States protesting those countries. In fact in some Muslim countries
slavery is still practiced.
Straphangers going to work in Boston on Monday are going to be confronted by the ad above and two others against 'Israeli apartheid.' The ads are sponsored by a group co-founded by a purported self-hating Jew.
"The ads simply state
the facts and are backed up with citations from credible human rights
and international organizations, including the United Nations," said
Chadi Salamoun, the president of Ads Against Apartheid, who added that
"if the ads are shocking, that’s because the reality on the ground is
shocking."
Richard Colbath-Hess, a Jewish-American faculty member at the
University of Massachusetts, and the co-founder of Ads Against
Apartheid, noted that "American tax dollars help the Israeli government
maintain an incredibly brutal military occupation, which has denied the
Palestinian people their basic rights for decades. These ads show what
Israel’s occupation and apartheid really look like, and it is important
for Americans to see that."
The NGO plans to expand its campaign both in Boston and in other cities across the US, and promised to introduce more ads.
Similar ads were posted on the MBTA in November 2013. Calling Pamela Geller....
Video: Michele Bachmann calls on John Kerry to resign
On April 28, 2014, Congresswoman Michele Bachmann (MN-06) spoke on the
House Floor to call on Secretary of State John Kerry to resign for
saying Israel is at risk of becoming "an apartheid state" if a two-state
solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict fails.
Google defines a gaffe as "an unintentional act or remark causing embarrassment to its originator; a blunder." Hold that definition for a minute - you'll see why. In Tuesday's Boston Herald, Adriana Cohen refers to John Kerry's statement that Israel risks becoming an 'apartheid state' as a gaffe.
Secretary of State John F. Kerry has stepped in it again — with a
gaffe that this time not only makes him look foolish but makes a mess of
U.S. foreign policy and destroys any chance he had of realizing his
legacy pipe dream of brokering Middle East peace.
In a private
meeting with senior international officials Friday, Kerry said that if
the Israelis and Palestinians can’t achieve a two-state solution, Israel
risks becoming “an apartheid state with second-class citizens.”
Israelis
are aghast — especially with Kerry’s remarks being reported yesterday
on Holocaust Remembrance Day — and have started issuing calls for his
resignation. Foreign policy experts are stunned, saying Kerry’s racially
charged statements are major setbacks to peace negotiations in the
Middle East.
“No wonder our diplomacy in the Middle East is so
wretched,” former U.N. Ambassador John Bolton told the Herald, calling
Kerry’s remarks “outrageous and defamatory.”
But for it to be a gaffe, Kerry would have to be embarrassed about it. There's no sign of that.
"I will not allow my commitment to Israel to be questioned by anyone,
particularly for partisan, political purposes," Kerry said in the
statement, issued by the State Department. "I do not believe, nor have I
ever stated, publicly or privately, that Israel is an apartheid state
or that it intends to become one."
"I have been around long enough to also know the power of words to
create a misimpression, even when unintentional, and if I could rewind
the tape, I would have chosen a different word," Kerry added.
No apologies there. Caroline Glick writes that there are no apologies because Kerry is an anti-Semite.
John Kerry’s recent use of the term “Apartheid” in reference to Israel’s future was an anti-Semitic act.
...
By ignoring the fact that every Palestinian leader views Jews as a
contaminant that must be blotted out from the territory the Palestinians
seek to control, (before they will even agree to accept sovereign
responsibility for it), while attributing to Jews malicious intent
towards the Palestinians that no Israeli Jewish politician with a chance
of leading the country harbors, Kerry is adopting a full-throated and
comprehensive anti-Semitic position.
It is both untethered from reason and libelous of Jews.
Speaking to the Daily Beast about Kerry’s remarks on Sunday, State
Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki was quick to use the “some of his best
friends are Jewish,” defense.
In her words, “Secretary Kerry, like Justice Minister [Tzipi] Livni,
and previous Israeli Prime Ministers [Ehud] Olmert and [Ehud] Barak, was
reiterating why there’s no such thing as a one-state solution if you
believe, as he does, in the principle of a Jewish state. He was talking
about the kind of future Israel wants.”
So in order to justify his own anti-Semitism – and sell it to the
American Jewish community – Kerry is engaging in vulgar partisan
interference in the internal politics of another country.
Indeed, Kerry
went so far as to hint that if Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu is
forced from power, and Kerry’s Jewish best friends replace him, then
things will be wonderful. In his words, if “there is a change of
government or a change of heart, something will happen.” By inserting
himself directly into the Israeli political arena, Kerry is working from
his mediator Martin Indyk’s playbook.
On the Senate floor on Monday, Senator Ted Cruz (R-Tx) called for US Secretary of State John FN Kerry to resign after Kerry warned of 'Israeli apartheid.'
AP's Matt Lee hits Jen Psaki on Kerry's apartheid comments
At Monday's State Department press briefing, the AP's Matt Lee hit State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki on Secretary of State Kerry's apartheid comments. Psaki owned them and warned that 'many' have used similar terms to describe Israel's future.
Let's go to the videotape.
Someone needs to get Matt Lee the figures on the true population of Israel (Jews v. Arabs) and how there really is no demographic threat to the future of Israeli democracy.
In the meantime, the rest of the Obama administration has gone silent on Kerry's comments.
Speaking with The Jerusalem Post, multiple officials in the
Obama administration declined to either defend or condemn the most
recent remark. Members of his team believe that kernels of truth exist
in his controversial statements— that, should a two-state solution fail
to come to pass, efforts to undermine Israel's legitimacy may be
emboldened, and Israel's Jewish population might come to rule a majority
of Arabs and Palestinians in its borders.
His communications
staff has made a concerted effort to discipline the secretary's message:
the State Department maintains that, without peace, Israel will
struggle to remain both Jewish and democratic.
But Kerry has, on several occasions, diverged from that message, to the frustration of his aides.
And American Jewish groups have condemned Kerry's statement across the board.
All
major American Jewish or pro-Israel organizations weighed in on the
reported comments, including the American Israel Public Affairs
Committee, with a rare statement released on Monday.
"Any
suggestion that Israel is, or is at risk of becoming, an apartheid state
is offensive and inappropriate," the AIPAC statement read. "Israel is
the lone stable democracy in the Middle East, and protects the rights of
minorities regardless of ethnicity of religion."
Israel Radio had an interview this evening with a government official who said that Kerry isn't anti-Israel but has gone overboard with love for Israel. Kerry wants his Nobel peace prize and he wants an 'achievement' as Secretary of State. The Obama administration believes that Israel is low-hanging fruit - we're the only foreign country who pays attention to them and who cares at all about what they have to say. But they hate us and treat us with contempt. This administration cannot come to an end soon enough.
Emergency Committee for Israel calls on Kerry to resign after he warns of Israeli 'apartheid'
Today the Emergency Committee for Israel released the following statement on Secretary of State John Kerry's use of the term "apartheid state" to threaten Israel:
On Friday, Secretary of State John Kerry raised the specter of Israel as an "apartheid state." Even Barack Obama condemned the use of this term when running for president in 2008.
Yet this was no gaffe. Secretary Kerry's musings on the Jewish state's dire future have become a regular feature of his public remarks. His latest prediction follows other statements in recent months that have in effect threatened Israel -- never the Palestinians -- with a list of disasters should his diplomatic efforts fail: violence, isolation, delegitimization, boycotts -- and now "apartheid."
It is no longer enough for the White House to clean up after the messes John Kerry has made. It is time for John Kerry to step down as Secretary of State, or for President Obama to fire him. And it would go a long way toward repairing the damage Kerry has done if his predecessor as Secretary of State, who is the likely Democratic Party nominee for president, explained why this kind of rhetoric had no place in her State Department and why it will have no place in her presidential campaign.
No, this post is not about Jimmy Carter or Barack Hussein Obama. It's about their good friend Desmond Tutu, who once again proves that his unbridled hate of Israel and Jews overcomes anything - including supporting his own people.
"I have witnessed the systemic humiliation of Palestinian men, women
and children by members of the Israeli security forces," he said in a
statement. "Their humiliation is familiar to all black South Africans
who were corralled and harassed and insulted and assaulted by the
security forces of the apartheid government."
The former Anglican archbishop of Cape Town made the statement as the 10th annual Israel Apartheid Week
opened Sunday in South Africa. The initiative, part of the
international boycott, divestment and sanctions movement’s campaign
against Israel, is being marked in 87 cities this year. Tutu visited
Israel in 1989.
International pressure similar to the BDS movement led to the end of apartheid in South Africa, the statement said.
"In
South Africa, we could not have achieved our democracy without the help
of people around the world, who through the use of non-violent means,
such as boycotts and divestment, encouraged their governments and other
corporate actors to reverse decades-long support for the apartheid
regime.
The same issues of inequality and injustice today motivate
the divestment movement trying to end Israel's decades long occupation
of Palestinian territory and the unfair and prejudicial treatment of the
Palestinian people by the Israeli government ruling over them."
Tutu,
who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1984 for standing up against
white-minority rule in South Africa, added that people who don't act
against injustice are complicit in it.
''Those who turn a blind
eye to injustice actually perpetuate injustice. If you are neutral in
situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor," he
said. "It doesn't matter where we worship or live. We are members of one
family, the human family, God's family."
Tutu has apparently forgotten what real apartheid is like. Let's remind him. Recall that I linked to a post from a South African blog here. Here's some of what Steve - who grew up with it - had to say about apartheid:
There
were two components to Apartheid – grand apartheid with its goal of
political separation, and petty apartheid which sought to segregate
whites from non whites. Both components were equally important and
intertwined for one could not succeed without the other.
Grand
apartheid was to be achieved by creating separate political realities
for whites and non whites. This was done by revoking the citizenship
from non-white South Africans reducing the ‘legal’ population of South
Africa so that the whites would be the demographic majority. Homelands
called Bantustans were created and these were eventually to become
separate independent states. Blacks were to either be physically moved
into these homelands, or nationally tied to them (i.e. they would become
a citizen of the homeland that they might have never set foot in; and
not a citizen of South Africa). Naturally, even blacks that were not yet
assigned a Bantustan, were denied suffrage (i.e. they were denied the
right to vote).
Legislation was passed to legally separate blacks
from whites in all aspects of daily life. The separate public amenities
act ruled that blacks and whites would receive separate public
services. Blacks and whites were to have separate education, medical
care, transport and beaches. The legislation even pervaded to the use of
parks – blacks could not sit on the same benches as whites and they
could not even use the same water fountains used by whites.
Laws
were also passed prohibiting blacks and whites from having sexual
relations. This was policed to the extent that a white could be
incarcerated for allowing a black of the opposite sex to sit on the
front seat in their car.
Apartheid ensured the domination by a
white minority over a black majority in every apsect of their daily
lives. Blacks could not participate in the political process, they were
forced to study in languages selected by the government and their
education was geared towards making them useful labourers for their
white ‘bosses’.
It is thus easy to see that Israel is not an
apartheid state. All citizens of Israel (whether Muslim or Jewish, Arab
or European) have equality before the law. There is nothing close to
resembling the separate provision of amenities – Muslims and Jews use
the same hospitals, Muslims and Jews use the same public transport,
Muslims and Jews all vote in Israeli elections, Muslims and Jews can run
for election etc etc. Muslims in Israel can choose to study in the
language of their preference and Arabic is even one of the national
languages of Israel. In apartheid South Africa, although blacks made up
over 80% of the population, not a single African language was recognised
by the state.
Tutu is cheapening what his own people endured out of hatred for Jews and Israel. He went through the entire experience of apartheid and learned nothing.
Video: 'Israeli Arab' MK's heckle Stephen Harper, walk out on him
Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper spoke at the Knesset on Monday. 'Israeli Arab' MK's Ahmad Tibi and Abu Arar heckled Harper and walked out of his speech as Harper spoke about what he calls the
twisted logic of calling Israel an apartheid state.
Let's go to the videotape.
Afterwards, Tibi complained to Canadian broadcaster CBC that there is discrimination against 'Israeli Arabs.'
"We are 20 per cent of the population, we are suffering
discrimination," Tibi said in an interview to air at 5 p.m. ET on CBC
News Network.
"That democracy of Israel is a selective democracy, ethnic democracy. Canada
is a democracy and people are equal without relation to their ethnic
background. Here, there's a problem with that," he said.
Tibi is a deputy speaker of Knesset and leader of the Arab Movement for Change, or Ta'al.
Canada's foreign policy toward Israel is "biased, non-balanced,
and that's why Canada has a very marginal role in the Middle East,"
Tibi said.
He and colleague Abu Arar walked out, Tibi said, "to say that
we are very much unsatisfied with the remarks and the policy of Prime
Minister Harper. It is very diplomatic. It's a protest which is
legitimate in any parliament."
"When you are controlling, discriminating,
confiscating, occupying lands from one side and putting them in the
corner without any basic rights, you are by this way ruling and
committing apartheid in the occupied Palestinian Territories," Tibi
said.
"If he is talking about freedom, why [is he] totally neglecting the
absence of freedom of the Palestinians under occupation? It is a
double-standard. These words are moral double-standard from the prime
minister of Canada."
Isn't it funny, then, that every time Avigdor Lieberman proposes a population exchange that would send 'Israeli Arabs' to 'Palestine' and Jews to Israel, the 'Israeli Arabs' object? I wonder why.... Oh yeah - and as you can note above, we discriminate against Tibi so much that he's deputy speaker of the Knesset.
Video: Esther Meshoe, South African leader's daughter dispels libels of Israel as apartheid
Esther Meshoe, daughter of conservative South African parliamentarian,
Dr. Kenneth Meshoe, refutes false allegations of apartheidism on the
part of Israel.
The New York Times actually runs a story that's favorable to Israel
It's been going on for months, but with an increase in civilians being treated, the New York Times has finally deemed it fit to print: Israel is treating casualties of the Syrian civil war at Western Galilee Hospital in Nahariya, Ziv Hospital in Safed, Rambam Hospital in Haifa and at a field hospital in the Golan Heights. They're getting better medical care than they could ever get in Syria, and the government of Israel is footing the bill (Hat Tip: Tamar H).
“Most come here unconscious with head injuries,” said Dr. Masad Barhoum, the director general of theWestern Galilee Hospitalhere in Nahariya, on the Mediterranean coast six miles south of the Lebanese border. “They wake up after a few days or whenever and hear a strange language and see strange people,” he said. “If they can talk, the first question is, ‘Where am I?’ ”
He added, “I am sure there is an initial shock when they hear they are in Israel.”
The identity of the patients is closely guarded so they will not be in danger when they return to Syria. Soldiers sit outside the wards where the adults are to protect them from possible threats and prying journalists. But doctors granted access to the children in the closed intensive care wing, on the condition that no details that could compromise their safety were published.
Like many Israeli hospitals, this one serves a mixed population of Jews and Arabs; its staff includes Arabic-speaking doctors, nurses and social workers. In the lobby, a glass display case contains the remnants of a Katyusha rocket that was fired from Lebanon and hit the hospital’s eye department during the 2006 war between Israel and Hezbollah. The rocket penetrated four floors but nobody was injured because all the north-facing wards had been moved underground.
With more than 100,000 people estimated to have died in the Syrian civil war, Dr. Barhoum, an Arab Christian citizen of Israel, acknowledged that the Israeli medical assistance was “a drop in the ocean.”
But he said he was proud of the level of treatment his teams could provide and proud to be a citizen of a country that allowed him to treat every person equally. He said the cost of the treatment so far had amounted to hundreds of thousands of dollars and would be paid for by the Israeli government.
Since late March, almost 100 Syrians have arrived at two hospitals in Galilee. Forty-one severely wounded Syrians have been treated here at the Western Galilee Hospital, which has a new neurosurgical unit as well as pediatric intensive care facilities. Two of them have died, 28 have recovered and been transferred back to Syria, and 11 remain here.
An additional 52 Syrians have been taken to theRebecca Sieff Hospitalin the Galilee town of Safed. The latest, a 21-year-old man with gunshot and shrapnel wounds, arrived there on Saturday. A woman, 50, arrived Friday with a piece of shrapnel lodged in her heart and was sent to theRambam hospitalin the northern port city of Haifa for surgery.
Little has been revealed about how they get here, other than that the Israeli military runs the technical side of the operation. The doctors say all they know is that Syrian patients arrive by military ambulance and that the hospital calls the army to come pick them up when they are ready to go back to Syria.
The Israeli military, which also operates a field hospital and mobile medical teams along the Syrian frontier, has been reluctant to advertise these facilities, partly for fear of being inundated by more wounded Syrians than they could cope with.
“I was afraid at the beginning,” Raha told me. “I was afraid because I
was the first Syrian to come here. But I went into the hospital, and saw
Arabs and all sorts of people, and I felt safe.”
The
doctors were the first Jews she had ever seen. She expected hostility
from the Israelis because she was Syrian, but was pleasantly surprised
at the welcome she received. “Everyone there treated me well, especially
the doctors,” she said.
Shevet Achim staff coordinated a trip for her
to pray at the Al Aqsa mosque on the Temple Mount, and she relished
taking in Jerusalem. “It’s nice to see how everyone lives together,” she
said. They also took her and Nadrah to the beach in Jaffa, the first
time they had ever seen the sea.
During the ride, Raha deflected questions about the civil war, or anything that even indirectly touched on politics.
“I am always thinking of my daughter, I just want her to get better,” she said emphatically. “That’s all I’m thinking about.”
Nadrah underwent her heart surgery on May 8,
Raha told me. The operation went smoothly, but she had to stay in the
hospital for 10 days.
One day while Nadrah was recuperating, Raha
took her daughter for a stroll down the hall. They didn’t walk long, as
Nadrah was still weak from her operation. They reached their room and
walked through the door.
A man she had never seen before was waiting by Nadrah’s bed. Raha noticed the pistol on his hip.
He began speaking in flawless Syrian Arabic. “I am Abu Salim,” he said, “and I heard you were here. You don’t know me.”
Raha was in shock.
How did Assad’s intelligence services track us to the hospital?
...
Meir Hazan, or Abu Salim as he’s known in Arabic, escaped Damascus at
the age of 17. He still speaks to his family in the Damascene Arabic
tongue of his youth. He was sitting reading Yedioth Ahronoth at his Bat
Yam home, as he does every morning, when he came across a story about
Raha and Nadrah. He decided immediately to go see them.
Read the whole thing. Tell it to the BDS'ers. And call Jodi Rudoren at the New York Times and ask her why neither she nor any other member of the international media has written about this story.
I am an Orthodox Jew - some would even call me 'ultra-Orthodox.' Born in Boston, I was a corporate and securities attorney in New York City for seven years before making aliya to Israel in 1991 (I don't look it but I really am that old :-). I have been happily married to the same woman for thirty-five years, and we have eight children (bli ayin hara) ranging in age from 13 to 33 years and nine grandchildren. Four of our children are married! Before I started blogging I was a heavy contributor on a number of email lists and ran an email list called the Matzav from 2000-2004. You can contact me at: IsraelMatzav at gmail dot com
