The crime of building a house
At the end of the last post, I said that Secretary of State Clinton falling down as she boarded an airplane was a 'comeuppance.'
Here's why.
In Niger, two Frenchmen were murdered by their Islamic kidnappers. Saudi Arabia sentenced a 23 year old girl who was gang raped to a year in prison and 100 lashes. Iran arrested two dozen Christians for the crime of being well... Christians. Which of these awful things did Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and the EU's Red Baroness Ashton forcefully condemn?
The answer is none of them.
Instead they forcefully and vigorously condemned the demolition of a hotel built by a Muslim Nazi collaborator and now owned by an American-Jewish businessman who bought it in order to build an apartment complex on the spot. An apartment complex for a mere 20 families that is somehow worse than all the aforementioned murders and atrocities. So much worse that they demanded the personal intervention of the highest diplomatic officials of the United States and the European Union.
...
In her statement, Hillary Clinton said the United States is "very concerned" about the demolition of a Nazi collaborator's abandoned hotel. In a world where North Korea and Iran are racing ahead to build nuclear weapons, Russia and China are racing to outstrip the United States in weapons development and the economy is on the brink-- that is what the Obama Administration is "very concerned" about. That 20 Jewish families will be able to have homes in the capital of their own city.
Hillary Clinton chose to attack Israel from Abu Dhabi, capital of the UAE, a totalitarian regime whose own construction boom was built on slave labor imported from India. Where there are no political freedoms and where non-Muslim foreigners have few rights, if any. Where a video showed the brother of the ruler of Abu Dhabi torturing a man in ways too horrifying to describe, with the approval of the police and the judicial system over a debt. Where 42 percent of the prisoners are there for being indebted. The UAE is essentially a slave state, built on the backs of mostly non-Muslim migrant workers with no human or legal rights.
While in Abu Dhabi, Hillary Clinton might have called on its rulers to open up the system to democratic elections. She might have raised the issue of Western women who are raped in Dubai and then sentenced to jail for being raped. Or the case of Roxanne Hillier, who was sentenced to jail for just being in the same room as her male boss. It certainly would have been appropriate for Hillary Clinton to have challenged the UAE on its abusive treatment of female visitors and tourists. But none of that happened.
Instead Hillary Clinton used the platform of a barbaric skyscraper studded dictatorship to denounce the only democracy in the region. In a speech more inspired by Monty Python, than any concern for human rights, she described the demolition of a long abandoned hotel as a "disturbing development" and warned that "this move contradicts the logic of a reasonable and necessary agreement between the parties on the status of Jerusalem". Yet oddly enough, Arab construction does not contradict such an agreement, only Jewish construction does.
Read the whole thing.
Labels: Catherine Ashton, Hillary Clinton, Sheikh Jarrah, Shepherd's Hotel
Don't miss this: A virtual tour of the Shepherd's Hotel complex
The picture is that of the current owner of the Shepherd's Hotel complex, Irving Moskowitz. He's a hero in my book.
Yaakov Lozowick wandered around the area on Tuesday, and provides a
virtual tour that will bring the place to life for you.
Set aside the legal aspects of the matter, not because they aren't interesting, but because they've been set aside by all the negotiating parties for at least the past decade. When on December 24th 2000 President Clinton slowly dictated his terms for peace to a group of Israeli and Palestinian negotiators, he determined that Jerusalem would be divided along the lines of ethnic division, irrespective of which part of the town had been in which country prior to its unification under Israel in 1967; his proposed lines would have had some Jordanian areas incorporated to Israel, and some Israeli ones incorporated to Palestine. Ever since then the principle of division along the ethnic lines has been the single option discussed in all relevant forums, effectively overriding earlier discussions of history, legality, morality or what have you.
I have written repeatedly about how this practical solution is not practical, and indeed should anyone ever try to impose it, the imposition will inevitably lead to violence bloodshed and eventually back to war .... I have demonstrated this on various parts of town.... Today I suggest we have a close look at the situation on the ground at the Shepherd Hotel compound.
Read the whole thing. It's completely illustrated.
Labels: Jerusalem construction, Jerusalem is the capital of Israel, Sheikh Jarrah, Shepherd's Hotel
'Palestinian landmark' gone
I mentioned in an earlier post that one of the things that really bothers me about the coverage of the Shepherd's Hotel renovation and reconstruction are all the references to it being '
historic' and a 'landmark' when it has sat vacant and rundown for years. I'm not the only one who is bothered by that. Here's
Jonathan Tobin.
When the New York Times reported the fact that ground was being broken for the new housing in Sheikh Jarrah in a story published on Sunday, what it did was to focus on the destruction of what it claimed was a Palestinian “landmark.” What landmark, you ask? Was it a medieval structure that in some way represents the longstanding Arab presence in the city or its culture? No. The building that was toppled to make way for some new apartment houses was just a large home that was built in the 1930s as a villa for one of the most notorious figures in 20th-century history: Haj Amin al-Husseini, the mufti of Jerusalem. Husseini may never have spent much time in what eventually was renamed the Shepherd Hotel, but he did make his mark on the region by inspiring bloody pogroms against the Jews then living in the country. After the outbreak of World War II, he joined forces with the Nazis, meeting with Hitler and then spending the war making Arabic propaganda broadcasts for the Axis and successfully recruiting Muslims (mostly Bosnians) to serve in a special SS brigade. He was promised that, in the event of a German victory, he would be made the puppet ruler of what is now Israel, where he would assist the Nazis in the massacre of the several hundred thousand Jews who lived there.
That a home that was in any way connected to Husseini or any other Nazi would be considered a landmark whose demolition inspired statements of sadness from contemporary Palestinian leaders like Saeb Erekat speaks volumes about the nature of Palestinian politics. That the intended home of the man who dreamed of wiping out every last Jew in Jerusalem is coming down to make room for Jewish homes is certainly ironic. One needn’t necessarily agree with the politics of Daniel Luria, a representative of Ateret Cohanim, the group that promotes Jewish building throughout Jerusalem, to appreciate what he termed the “beautiful poetic justice” of this event.
Indeed.
Labels: Ateret Cohanim, Mufti Haj Amin al-Husseini, Nachlat Shimon, Shepherd's Hotel
'Pro-Israel, pro-peace'?
They're not very interested in condemning 'Palestinian' instances of Pallywood, but the demolition of a privately-owned obsolete hotel by its elderly Jewish owner is enough to get J Street
excited.
The demolition of the Shepherd’s Hotel in East Jerusalem is a deeply provocative action, and we urge the Israeli government to find a way to stop such provocations and refrain from unilateral actions that undermine peace efforts.
We applaud Secretary of State Clinton’s strong words on the matter, emphasizing that “this move contradicts the logic of a reasonable and necessary agreement between the parties on the status of Jerusalem.”
The viability of a two-state solution hangs by a thread. Actions such as this make the prospects of peace – and therefore Israel’s security and survival as the democratic homeland of the Jewish people - all the more unlikely.
We renew our call on the Obama Administration to step forward with its own “Borders and Security” approach that urgently and assertively works to achieve a two-state resolution of the conflict before it is too late.
Still waiting to hear them object to 'Palestinians' living in 'west' Jerusalem.
Labels: J Street, Nachlat Shimon, pro-Israel pro-peace, Shepherd's Hotel
Construction gets underway on Shepherd's Hotel site
I'm sure that many of you recall the
Shepherd's Hotel in the Nachlat Shimon (Sheikh Jarrah) neighborhood) of Jerusalem. The hotel was formerly owned by the Mufti of Jerusalem, Haj Amin al-Husseini. The site was purchased by investor Irving Moskowitz in 1985.
On Sunday, bulldozers began to knock down the building to prepare for its replacement: A group of 20 apartments to be
populated by Jews.
The Shepherd Hotel is to be replaced by 20 apartments for Israelis. Workmen and earth-moving equipment were knocking down the structure at the site in the neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah on Sunday.
Chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat condemned the demolition of the hotel. "As long as this government continues with settlement and acts like the demolition of the Shepherd Hotel there will no negotiations," he said.
MK Dov Henin (Hadash) also harshly criticized the demolition of the hotel, saying the move "exterminates the chance of a Palestinian capital in east Jerusalem existing side-by-side with an Israeli capital in the west."
Henin said that the building of the new Jewish neighborhood in Sheikh Jarrah was a calculated political move meant to prevent the Palestinians from making their capital in the eastern part of the city.
"Without two capitals in Jerusalem, there can be no two-state solution and we will be sentenced to eternal war," Henin added.
The land is owned by a Jew and there is no reason he should not be able to build on it for Jews.
There's a
march against the construction (it actually says that it's against the 'Judaization of east Jerusalem) scheduled for 4:00 pm on Sunday (link in Hebrew followed by English). I wonder if any Abu Rahma's will show up.
Labels: Irving Moskowitz, Jerusalem is the capital of Israel, Nachlat Shimon, Sheikh Jarrah, Shepherd's Hotel
At the end of the last post, I said that Secretary of State Clinton falling down as she boarded an airplane was a 'comeuppance.' Here's why. 
