Labels: Arabs, Gaza, Hamas, hypocrisy, Jews, Pat Condell, progressives
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 9:34 AM
0 comments
100 Shofars to be blown in ManhattanI will not be in New York on the 29th, but if you will be, you know what to do.
A Demonstration/Rally
April 29, 2014UJA-Federation Building130 East 59 Street (Between Park & Lex)New York City, 5pm to 7pm : Shofars to be blown at 5:30 pm
The largest number of Shofars ever blown in Unison to take place in Manhattan by a Coalition of Jewish groups; to protest the inclusion of Boycott, Divestment & Sanctions against Israel in the Israel Day Parade.
Join Us and Bring Your Shofars!
Labels: B'Tselem, BDS, JCC Watch, Jeffrey Wiesenfeld, Manhattan JCC, New Israel Fund, New York Jewish Federation, progressives, Salute to Israel Day Parade
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 11:06 AM
1 comments
NEW YORK, April 8, 2014 – A rally held today at the headquarters of the UJA-Federation spoke truth to Jewish power in no uncertain terms.I could not agree more.
Speaker after speaker called on the UJA and JCRC to disallow three BDS-supporting Jewish organizations to march in the upcoming Celebrate Israel Parade, and brought forth compelling evidence that the three offending organizations deserve not only to be barred from marching in the parade, but also deserve to be kept out of the “big tent” of Jewish communal life.
Organized by JCC Watch, National Conference on Jewish Affairs, and Americans for a Safe Israel, the days leading up to the event sparked discussion and controversy that has spread from New York to Los Angeles, London and Tel Aviv. Helen Freedman of Americans for a Safe Israel introduced many of the speakers.
She spoke about the fact that all of the protesters respect and admire the humanitarian and social service work of the UJA and JCRC, but that it is also vital to Israel's survival and the well-being of the Jewish People that the BDS issue -- including Jewish support for BDS -- be addressed publicly.
Mark Langfan spoke of his respect and admiration for the protesters who came out to the rally. He discussed many of the security concerns of Israel, and how the BDS movement harms the Jewish State and puts Jews in jeopardy.
Rabbi David Algaze spoke at length about the skewed values of those in the Jewish community supporting anti-Israel activities and the Hamas-backed BDS movement, and also strongly took to task those in major Jewish organizations who are not vocal enough to speak out publicly and clearly against the BDS movement. "The decision by the JCRC and UJA is neither democratic nor Jewish. It is not democratic because the organizers in allowing these boycotters to March they are ignoring the feelings of the predominant majority of those who participate and attend the Parade. It is not Jewish because Judaism has many values but suicide and self hatred are not among them."
Beth Gilinsky, president of Jewish Action Alliance and founder of the National Conference on Jewish Affairs, an umbrella of pro-Israel, pro-America Jewish leaders, gave a rousing speech about not just the parade controversy, but also about the BDS movement in general. She addressed the real-life impact of BDS here in the United States and England on college campuses, across Europe where Jews are being targeted in violent attacks, and in Israel.
She asserted that while some people believe BDS is just a grassroots effort of a few Arab activists who desire a Palestinian Arab state, in reality it is linked to and driven by radical Islamist organizations such as Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood that are bent on Israel’s destruction. After asserting that BDS attempts to denigrate and demonize Israel and is, in fact an anti-Semitic movement aimed at dehumanizing Jews, she addressed establishment accusations that opposition to Jewish BDS groups in the parade was pitting Jew vs. Jew, firing back with: “Jewish participation in the Hamas-backed BDS movement is the epitome of Jew vs. Jew! “
Responding to assertions that criticizing the establishment organizations creates “disunity” in the community and hurts Israel, Gilinsky stated: “In the name of unity, we are being asked to allow destructive forces to threaten our fellow Jews. NO, we are Jews FOR Jews. We are here to proclaim that we stand in solidarity with Israel, and that includes Judea and Samaria, and we are here to fight FOR the victims being targeted by BDS aggression.”
A Member of the Israeli Knesset was present, MK Nissim Zeev, and he spoke with full support for all of Yehuda and Shomron and spoke of the Yehuda and Shomron being the heart of the Jewish people and Eretz Yisrael.
Richard Allen, founder of JCC Watch, took on the UJA directly, calling out “DO NOT SUPPORT BDS!” to UJA-Federation employees and leaders as they left the building, and saving particular criticism for John Ruskay. “Under John Ruskay’s leadership of the UJA-Federation, the Celebrate Israel Day Parade has invited groups to march that actively call for a Boycott of Israeli Companies. Under front names like Partners for Progressive Israel, New Israel Fund and B'Tselem these groups organize and work against the Jewish State.
"It is shameful that the UJA Federation and the Jewish Community Relations Council (JCRC) are supporting the New Israel Fund in their efforts to delegitimize and fund Boycotts, Divestment, and Sanctions against Israel," continued Allen, an active member of the Pro-Israel Parade Committee. "It's time the UJA Federation stop supporting radical groups that work for BDS against Israel. If the BDS supporting groups are allowed to march, we will call for posters and leaflets on the day of the parade.”
Coalition for Israel founder Howard Weber, spoke eloquently about BDS and the peace process. “For those passers by asking what "BDS" stands for, it means "Blind, Deaf and Stupid’--"Blind to the fact that the reason Mr. Kerry can't obtain a peace agreement has nothing to do with the Jews living on less than 3% of the West Bank, but rather, as Mr. Abbas bluntly put it, the non-recognition of Israel as a Jewish State. "Deaf" to the pleadings of the Palestinian Authority and Mr. Abbas who urge BDS not to boycott Israeli goods since the factories producing them employ West Bank Arabs who enjoy much higher wages and standard of living than their Arab brothers. And finally, "Stupid" because they have decided the best way to put forth their political ideology is by economically crippling Israel.
He continued: “Is this the ‘Celebrate Israel Parade’? or is it the ‘Denigrate Israel Parade’? ”
Dr. Paul Brody of the Great Neck-based Jewish Political Education Foundation (JPEF), said that there is a difference between "opinions and destruction." "Our group is opposed to Israel's relinquishing sovereignty over any of our Biblical Land. But, in terms of marching in the parade, there are individuals and groups who support all sorts of solutions with which we disagree. However, calling for boycotts, divestments and sanctions should be a redline."
Buddy Macy, a founder of Never Again is Now, spoke of his family’s involvement with raising funds for Federation, and stated, “It is called the Celebrate Israel Parade. However, 364 days a year, Partners for Progressive Israel, B’Tselem and the New Israel Fund not only do not celebrate Israel, they lambast and work against her by promoting the boycott of products produced by Israeli companies and/or fund organizations that boycott Israeli products. In other words, these three organizations embrace the narrative created by Israel’s enemies, who are intent on destroying the Jewish State.
What is equally absurd and potentially more dangerous, is that the Jewish Community Relations Council of New York, under the watchful eye of the UJA-Federation of New York, provides a platform for those organizations to gain respect and esteem among the hundreds of thousands of parade goers. Make no mistake about it: we will not permit enemies of Israel to become role models for the Jewish people…especially, for our youth.
Julian Rapaport, from the Russian Jewish community, stated: “We are joining the voices of protest against the participation of BDS-connected groups in the Celebrate Israel Parade. We know from history that the Nazi Holocaust began with the boycotting of Jewish stores. Our group sticks tightly to the principle: NEVER AGAIN! We are calling on the UJA to modify and clarify its controversial policy and guidelines to make sure that participation in the Israel Day Parade, as expected, means to strengthen the State of Israel and the Jewish community, not weaken them.”
Rabbi Aryeh Spero, whose two hard-hitting articles in Jewish newspapers created a stir this past week, stated today in response to the rally: “Promoters of BDS do not love Israel, and through their boycotts wish to harm Israel and its people. And the acceptance by the establishment Jewish community of these groups reflects a perverse form of Jewish suicide. “
The rally organizers expressed special thanks to the National Council of Young Israel for their endorsement of the rally. A representative of Endowment for Middle East Truth addressed the crowd, emphasizing the importance of continued activism and pressure on the UJA and JCRC to do the right thing, as well as the importance of bringing the community’s attention to the truths about BDS in America and abroad.
Endorsing organizations of this rally were: JCC Watch, Jewish Action Alliance, AFSI, Z Street, National Conference on Jewish Affairs, Endowment for Middle East Truth, Americans for Peace and Tolerance, Ha-Emet, Coalition for Israel, National Council of Young Israel, International Committee for the Land of Israel, Jewish Political Education Foundation, IsraelLives.org, Amcha Initiative, and Never Again is Now.
Labels: B'Tselem, BDS, JCC Watch, Jeffrey Wiesenfeld, Manhattan JCC, New Israel Fund, New York Jewish Federation, progressives, Salute to Israel Day Parade
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 9:45 PM
0 comments
Several groups are organizing a protest rally for April 8 as part of a campaign to have the parade sponsors remove their invitations to the controversial groups. Further, unless the groups are pulled, several local rabbis, including day school and yeshiva principals, are considering boycotting the event, thereby significantly reducing the number of participants.
"Partners for Progressive Israel" lists Israeli products to boycott on its website; the New Israel Fund (NIF) has supported BDS and reportedly been encouraging Arab riots; volunteers with B'Tselem have taken part in Arab riots. NIF and B'Tselem have also been implicated in pro-BDS activities, including via subsidiaries, videos and statements. All three are currently set to march in the parade under their own banners.More on those three organizations here.
"Boycotting is an action that far exceeds disagreement. At its core, it is a public venue designed to demonize, ultimately to make something, in this case, the State of Israel, illegitimate. It is a form of anti-Semitism,” the rabbi noted.
“These BDS groups work every day to isolate Israel and make her a global pariah, announcing to the world the names of specific Jewish-owned companies operating in Judea and Samaria that they want punished," charged Rabbi Spero.
Rabbi Spero adds that "these ‘Jewish’ groups are being invited to infiltrate the Parade, either because of agreement with their tactics or as a way of affirming what the UJA-Federation calls ‘an open tent.’ UJA’s desire for an ‘open tent’ should not devolve into the destruction of the tent."
Referring to the BDS claims that they target only areas east of the 1949 Armistice line, the rabbi noted "to the world, a boycott is a boycott, east of the Green Line or west of it. Approving one leads to the other. Boycotting Israel will spur future boycotting of those ‘bad’ Jews, for example, in Brooklyn or London."
The rabbi added that the boycotting groups "never boycott Arab or Muslim businesses, despite the ubiquitous terrorism coming from PA neighborhoods and their violations of human rights. Their outrage is only against the Jewish state and its Jews."At least one rabbi has already announced that the four organizations that he controls will not march if the BDS'ers do.
Showing the widespread fallout the groups' opposition to the parade may bring about, Rabbi Elie Abadie has threatened to pull the support and float of his Edmond J. Safra Synagogue. He also represents the Moise Safra Community Synagogue, Congregation Magen David of Manhattan, and the Sephardic Academy of Manhattan.
Rabbi Abadie warned he would be “urging every rabbi and leader of every Sephardic organization—as well as many others—in our community" to boycott the parade if the BDS groups were not pulled.
The rabbi decried the BDS-supporters for harming a fellow Jew's ability to earn a livelihood, citing the Jewish legal precept from the Torah "not to stand idly by the blood of your brother."And the real reason why the BDS'ers are being allowed to march is... wait for it... money.
Jeff Wiesenfeld, a member of the Jewish Community Relations Council (JCRC) which organizes the parade, revealed the decision process that led to the groups' inclusion.
While a majority of JCRC's leadership would have opposed the "detestable" BDS groups, according to Wiesenfeld, "there was no debate. It was a decision handed down from ‘above’ because, I think, it was determined that, financially, the UJA stood to lose more from the left if the BDS groups were excluded than they would gain from the right."And you're not opposing this, Jeff? Say it isn't so! You're going to condone Tony Kushner's BDS friends marching in the Salute to Israel parade? Weren't you one of the founders of JCC Watch precisely because it was meant to call out the Manhattan JCC for supporting BDS? What a disappointment!
Organizers of the rally against the BDS groups' inclusion call on those who cannot attend the protest rally, which will be held on Tuesday, April 8, between 4:00-7:00 pm, outside the UJA-Federation headquarters at 130 E. 59th St. in Manhattan, to send protest letters to the UJA and JCRC.
Peter Kohlmann, executive producer of the parade can be reached at 212-983-4800 ext 162 (kohlmannp@jcrcny.org), while Michael Mittelman, director of the parade, can be reached at 212-983-4800 ext 487 (mittelmanm@jcrcny.org).
“Let the directors of the UJA and other Jewish organizations know of your concerns," called Rabbi Spero. "Real Jewish leaders should not be indifferent, silent, nor lend support to boycotters and others wishing to tear us down."
The rabbi added "directors of our Jewish organizations proved their fallibility during the 1930s and ‘40s, teaching us that blind obedience is foolish and leaving our destiny and safety to those who claim they ‘know best’ can be devastating. This time in history, we must not make the same mistake."And I invite all of you to send those two gentlemen links to this post.
Labels: B'Tselem, BDS, JCC Watch, Jeffrey Wiesenfeld, Manhattan JCC, New Israel Fund, New York Jewish Federation, progressives, Salute to Israel Day Parade
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 11:30 AM
8 comments
Evelyn Garcia, a member of the Democratic National Committee from Florida (left in the picture), has resigned after a collection of anti-Israel emails that she wrote were leaked to the media. Garcia, a Haitian-American elected to the DNC in 2008, sent the emails in 2011, but they were first released by BizPacReview.com after being passed on to South Florida Democrats last week. The emails evince a vicious contempt for Israel and echo the propaganda and trite canards that usually mark those on the radical anti-Israel left.It gets worse too. But what's really curious here is that whether or not Garcia is sorry for what she did seems to depend upon who is listening.
In an email dated May 24, 2011 Garcia wrote: “Slavery was ended, apartheid was ended and so this occupation must end.”
Two months later, on July 26, Garcia wrote that “by supporting Israeli occupation with US foreign aid, we are all complicit and guilty of their crimes against humanity.
“Palestinians had nothing to do with the Holocaust,” she continued, “and it’s about time this guilt trip was taken off their backs.”
In her resignation letter to the DNC she wrote: “In passionately advocating my position supporting the rights of people I felt were being harmed, I used language that I now regret. The gist of the conversation had to do with my concern for innocent people being oppressed, but such support for the oppressed does not diminish my support for the good people of Israel.” Amazingly, she seemed to shift the blame for her comments, saying that her “private emails” had been released “by someone I believed was my friend.”Garcia is just another symbol of today's Democratic party. It's why I could never be a Democrat again.
Garcia also emailed a statement to the Palm Beach Post on Friday, writing that her comments were “inappropriate and hurtful” and “ exactly the kind of ugly rhetoric that is not conducive to the overall atmosphere needed to create a prosperous peace.” She also apologized to “members of the Jewish faith whom I have worked with for years.”
Still, the controversy is showing no signs of abating, as some Florida democrats are being accused of knowing about the emails but sitting on them.
...
Despite sounding contrite in her resignation letter and statement to the Post, Garcia seemed less than repentant in an a statement on Mondoweiss.com, a website that claims to cover Israel from a “progressive Jewish perspective.”
Casting herself as the victim of an unjustified witch hunt, Garcia said she has received a “barrage of hate mail and threats…from places as far away from Palm Beach County as Oklahoma.” Garcia returned to a tone more reminiscent of the emails that got her into trouble in the first place: “Don’t our loyalty and patriotism belong first to our country–the United States of America? Or, did they [the Palm Beach County political action group that released the emails] really intend a conversation among the wider electorate of the extent to which U.S. taxpayers are subsidizing an illegal occupation by Israel? And, who says it’s an occupation and illegal? Well, let me count the ways: numerous United Nations resolutions, J Street, Jewish Voice for Peace, the Presbyterian Church, CodePink, religious and political leaders and public opinion worldwide.”
Labels: Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Leftist anti-Semitism, National Democratic Party, progressives
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 10:56 PM
3 comments
Here's Soccer Dad's Middle East Media Sampler for Tuesday, December 13. 1) Invention
Newt Gingrich's comment about the Palestinians being an invented people has been much discussed. (See memeorandum for more.)
Barry Rubin writes:Yet again I don’t see this point as very significant. What’s important is whether a large portion of the people in question believe that they are a people. Moreover, the same “invented” charge has been made against the Jewish people by Stalin and of course by Arab and Islamist propaganda.The fact that today, a Palestinian people does exist doesn’t give the Palestinians a right to invent history, of course. ABC News didn’t point out that they regularly claim a history of two thousand years or more. And Golda Meir was pointing to the fact that the dominant politics of the Palestinian movement certainly as late as 1945 was a pan-Arab nationalist one. If the “invention” of a Palestinian (Arab, Muslim) people is relatively recent, though, that does imply that they don’t have a claim to everything between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea. And that’s what’s important.Daniel Pipes adds:Everyone from the PLO to a Mitt Romney spokesman jumped on Gingrich for this assertion, but he happens to be absolutely correct: no Arabic-speaking Muslims identified themselves as "Palestinian" until 1920, when, in rapid order this appellation and identity was adopted by the Muslim Arabs living in the British mandate of Palestine.At the New Yorker, David Remick attacked Gingrich and made this observation:It should also go without saying that radical and bigoted polemicists on the other side of the Arab-Israeli dispute have their own pseudo-scholarship—their own numbing, often anti-Semitic, tracts—which make the case that Israel, and the Jewish people, are alien and have no claim on the land.Those "radical and bigoted polemicists on the other side" represent the mainstream view of Fatah, the supposed moderate faction of the Palestinian Authority. Article 20 of the PLO's charter states:The Balfour Declaration, the Mandate for Palestine, and everything that has been based upon them, are deemed null and void. Claims of historical or religious ties of Jews with Palestine are incompatible with the facts of history and the true conception of what constitutes statehood. Judaism, being a religion, is not an independent nationality. Nor do Jews constitute a single nation with an identity of its own; they are citizens of the states to which they belong.One may claim that the Palestinians rewrote their charter, but that doesn't change the fact that this is still a belief held by many in Fatah. Palestinian Media Watch quotes from a recent article by the PA's ambassador to India:"The demands of this enemy [Israel] are strange and amazing demands, unique in the history of conflicts... They [Israelis] are not satisfied with Palestinian recognition that is a function of their state and its existence, but want recognition of the eternal right of Israel to exist. Possibly their nature will bring them to ask for compensation for the years that have passed without their state's existence, during the time it had the right to exist upon our skulls... They have a common mistake, or misconception by which they fool themselves, assuming that Fatah accepts them and recognizes the right of their state to exist, and that it is Hamas alone that loathes them and does not recognize the right of this state to exist. They ignore the fact that this state, based on a fabricated [Zionist] enterprise, never had any shred of a right to exist... Hamas, Fatah and the others are not waging war against Israel right now for reasons related to balance of power. There are no two Palestinians who disagree over the fact that Israel exists, and recognition of it is restating the obvious, but recognition of its right to exist is something else, different from recognition of its [physical] existence."And this of course the premise behind Mahmoud Abbas's refusal to accept a Jewish state."They talk to us about the Jewish state, but I respond to them with a final answer: We shall not recognize a Jewish state," Abbas said in a meeting with some 200 senior representatives of the Palestinian community in the US, shortly before taking the podium and delivering a speech at the United Nations General Assembly.Remick claims "some people ... cannot accept, or even deal rationally with, the claims of Palestinians." I wish for once he and others like him would acknowledge that there are those who cannot deal rationally with the claims of Israel, and that includes the mainstream Palestinian political leadership.
Barry Rubin's argument about inventing history is also relevant here. Palestinians claim that they've already compromised and need not do more.On November 15, 1988, the Palestinian National Council, then led by late President Yasser Arafat, declared the independence of the State of Palestine within the 1967 borders. This was the historic Palestinian compromise: we accepted that our state would exist on only 22 percent of our historic homeland. Israel responded by colonizing more of our land and entrenching its control over the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip.Critics of Israel like Remick, accept this at face value and demand that Israel meet the Palestinian demands. According to these critics any Jew in the 22% of "historic" Palestine is a "settler" who has no right to be there. In other words, Remick, effectively accepts the premises of the "radical and bigoted polemicists" that he criticizes.
This, of course, encourages ever more Palestinian resistance to making peace.
2) Anti - Israelism
Asaf Romirowsky on Israeli academics who cannot deal rationally with Israel:In its response, the BGU administration claimed that the department was structured to differ from traditional political science departments by offering a multidisciplinary perspective. Unfortunately, according to Israel Academia Monitor analysis, the department failed to execute this policy as illustrated by the roster of tenured and tenure- track faculty, which shows that a majority of professors specialize in various aspects of the Arab-Israeli conflict with an emphasis on what is termed the subjugation and mistreatment of the Palestinian and Arab- Israeli population. This peculiar reading of a multidisciplinary approach stems from the political activism of neo-Marxist faculty members who have coopted similarly minded scholars.This is one issue that few people focus on. Israel's critics aren't simply critics. They condemn Israel not seek its betterment.
3) Sargent at arms
Greg Sargent notes that Two top think tanks may cut ties with former AIPAC spox for calling critics `anti-Semitic’. ( I have no idea that these two think tanks are top. I've never heard of one of them. But the story's much better if it's spun that way.)Two top think tanks in Washington are mulling whether to sever ties with a controversial former AIPAC spokesman after it emerged that he was encouraging conservative writers to echo charges that critics of Israel are guilty of anti-Semitism, according to sources familiar with the discussions.What's odd is that Alana Goodman observes that the Center for American Progress (CAP) has "scrubbed" its website of references to "Israel firstsers." In other words, CAP effectively acknowledged the correctness of Block's charges. (Sargent, not known for his candor, didn't mention the "Israel first" terminology until he posted an update noting that one of the bloggers charged by Block had pleaded ignorance.)
The fate of the former AIPAC spokesman, Josh Block, will be a big deal to people in left-leaning foreign policy circles in Washington. For them, the question of whether the think tanks will remain affiliated with Block will be seen as a referendum on the larger issue of whether demeaning Israel critics as anti-Semitic will be considered acceptable discourse among foreign policy experts.
Block stirred a lot of discussion and anger among foreign policy types when Salon reported last week that he was shopping “opposition research” on bloggers critical of Israel to friendly neoconservative journalists. Salon said that Block threw around accusation of anti-Semitism on a friendly listserv, calling on others to “echo” and “amplify” his efforts to “attack the bad guys.” The Salon story came after Block accused writers at the left-leaning Center for American Progress of writing “borderline anti-semitic stuff.”
As I noted above Israel's critics often go a lot further than simply criticizing Israel; they condemn it and question its legitimacy. For Sargent there's nothing wrong with that. He even notes at the end of his original post:It also sheds light on how intense the battle over what it means to be “pro Israel” has become, now that left leaning groups are mounting a serious challenge to the reigning and long unchallenged Washington consensus about what that term means.Sargent has been here before, claiming that it is really Israel's critics who are pro-Israel. But after 18 years of peace negotiations during which Israel has made significant material concessions and taken substantial risks, only to get 3 terror wars and continued assaults on its legitimacy in return, it's the critics who insist that Israel is fundamentally at fault for the failure of the peace process who have to show that they really have Israel's best interests at heart.
Labels: AIPAC, anti-Israel obsession, Ben Gurion University, Josh Block, Middle East Media Sampler, Newt Gingrich, Palestinian people, progressives, Soccer Dad
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 10:19 PM
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Here's Soccer Dad's Middle East Media Sampler for Friday, December 9. 1) The enigma of Jeffrey Goldberg
The other day, Jeffrey Goldberg asked a few questions and demonstrated that Max Blumenthal made up a slander against Israel.
The next day, Goldberg quoted Peter Beinart and agreed with Beinart's slander.I think we're only a few years away, at most, from a total South-Africanization of this issue. And if Israelis believe that the vast majority of American Jews -- their most important supporters in the entire world -- are going to sit idly by and watch Israel permanently disenfranchise a permanently-occupied minority population, they're deluding themselves. A non-democratic Israel will not survive in this world. It's an impossibility. So Israel has a choice -- find a way to reverse the settlement process and bring about the conditions necessary to see the birth of a Palestinian state (I'm for unilateral closure of settlements but the military occupation's end will have to be negotiated with the Palestinians) or simply grant the Palestinians on the West Bank the right to vote in Israeli elections. Gaza is an entirely separate problem, but one not solvable so long as Hamas is in charge, but even without Gaza's Arabs, Israel would cease to be a Jewish state if West Bank Arabs became citizens.I don't get it. What occupation is he referring to?
It will be extremely difficult for any number of reasons for Israel to leave the West Bank, but it will be impossible for Israel to survive over the long-term if it remains an occupier of a group of people who don't want to be occupied. I understand the security consequences of an Israeli departure from most of the West Bank, but I also understand that there is ultimately no choice. I don't believe a one-state solution is any sort of solution at all; Israel/Palestine will devolve quickly into civil war. The only solution is a two-state solution.
In December, 1995 the Los Angeles Times reported:In the last seven weeks Israel has handed over six West Bank towns and more than 400 villages to the Palestinian Authority. The authority now controls about 90% of the West Bank's more than 1 million Arabs, and about one-third of the land in the Delaware-size territory.Efraim Karsh has expanded on this (h/t Daled Amos):On September 28, 1995, despite Arafat's abysmal failure to clamp down on terrorist activities in the territories now under his control, the two parties signed an interim agreement, and by the end of the year Israeli forces had been withdrawn from the West Bank's populated areas, with the exception of Hebron (where redeployment was completed in early 1997). On January 20, 1996, elections to the Palestinian Legislative Council were held, and shortly afterward, both the Israeli civil administration and the military government were dissolved.(Emphasis mine)
The geographical scope of these withdrawals was relatively limited; the surrendered land amounted to some 30 percent of the West Bank's overall territory. But its impact on the Palestinian population was nothing short of revolutionary. In one fell swoop, Israel relinquished control over virtually all of the West Bank's 1.4 million residents. Since that time, nearly 60% of them – in the Jericho area and in the seven main cities of Jenin, Nablus, Tulkarm, Kalkilya, Ramallah, Bethlehem and Hebron – have lived entirely under Palestinian jurisdiction. Another 40% live in towns, villages, refugee camps and hamlets where the Palestinian Authority exercises civil authority but where, in line with the Oslo accords, Israel has maintained "overriding responsibility for security."
In short, since the beginning of 1996, and certainly following the completion of the Hebron redeployment in January 1997, 99% of the Palestinian residents of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip have not lived under Israeli occupation; rather, they have been under the jurisdiction of the Arafat-led PA.
Recently Sa'eb Erekat said something incredible:In an interview with the Arabic radio station As-Shams two weeks ago, chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said that based on an aerial photograph provided by European sources, the settlements cover only 1.1 percent of the West Bank.So a vast majority of Palestinians do not live under Israeli jurisdiction and the percent of the West Bank on which Jewish communities exist, is miniscule. How exactly do these data demonstrate an ongoing "occupation?"
So if settlements cover only 1.1 percent of the West Bank, why does the entire West deem them the main obstacle to peace? Because admitting that settlements aren’t the main obstacle to peace would force it to confront an unpalatable truth: that the real obstacle to peace is Palestinian unwillingness to accept a Jewish state in any borders.
The only possible explanation is that Goldberg subscribes to the Palestinian Authorities belief that it is the only party that can declare the occupation over. If so, Goldberg gives the PA the power to determine Israel's legitimacy. If so, what incentive does the PA to compromise or ever agree to terms? At some point, according to Goldberg, Israel will lose its legitimacy and the Palestinians will have won.
And this also means that the Palestinians are never held accountable for their incitement and their refusal to accept Israel as a Jewish state. By Goldberg's calculus only Israel has legitimacy issues and the Palestinians are absolved from any responsibility towards advancing or even, maintaining peace.
So one day after demolishing one libel against Israel, Jeffrey Goldberg perpetuated another.
2) The progressives regress
Recently a Ben Smith wrote about the disturbing trend among Democrats to be hostile to Israel.Two of the Democratic Party’s core institutions are challenging a bipartisan consensus on Israel and Palestine that has dominated American foreign policy for more than a decade.James Taranto observed that the claims of these organizations sound familiar:
The Center for American Progress, the party’s key hub of ideas and strategy, and Media Matters, a central messaging organization, have emerged as vocal critics of their party’s staunchly pro-Israel congressional leadership and have been at odds, at times, with Barack Obama’s White House, which has acted as a reluctant ally to Benjamin Netanyahu’s Israeli government.
The differences are ones of tone – but also of bright lines of principle – and while they have haven’t yet made any visible impact on Democratic policy, they’ve shaken up the Washington foreign policy conversation and broadened the space for discussing a heretical and often critical stance on Israel heretofore confined to the political margins.We can't recall if it was somebody from CAP or MediaMutters who said: "There are only two groups that are beating the drums for war in The Middle East--the Israeli Defense Ministry and its amen corner in the United States."Jennifer Rubin notes something else about this controversy:
Oh wait, that was Pat Buchanan in 1990. That year he also observed: "If it comes to war, it will not be the 'civilized world' humping up that bloody road to Baghdad; it will be American kids with names like McAllister, Murphy, Gonzales, and Leroy Brown."
So how is it that two decades later Buchanan's themes--widely and not unreasonably described as anti-Semitic at the time--are being picked up by American lefties with names like Rosenberg, Duss and Alterman? Left-wing antipathy to Israel is not especially new. The academic left in particular has long glorified "Third World" political movements, including Arab ones.This is frankly bizarre. Block is a self-identified Democratic activist whose pro-Israel credentials are well known. He’s actively worked for years to elect scores of Democrats. Of course he wants the anti-Israel left to be exposed. Of course he wants pro-Israel Democrats on record as distancing themselves from the CAP-housed bloggers who peddle in anti-Israel attacks and out-and-out anti-Semitic hate speech.
Labels: Jeffrey Goldberg, Middle East Media Sampler, progressives, Soccer Dad
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 3:07 PM
0 comments
As reported here yesterday, the blog Mondoweiss first published, then rescinded without explanation, a fundraising plea falsely claiming the blog needed help because it was "under Israeli attack". When a regular reader who had seen the original version posted a sympathetic comment asking what form the Israeli attack on Mondoweiss had taken, an editor of the blog was forced to admit that the charge had been false, but failed to explain how it came to be published. The headline was changed to something innocuous and the fraud was forgotten. (Read here.)Here's a screen capture of the page in question (in its original form).
Continue reading here.Labels: blogosphere, Mondoweiss, progressives
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 4:38 AM
16 comments
Labels: Michelle Malkin, progressives
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 6:46 AM
1 comments
Labels: apartheid state, Bears, progressives, protesting against Israel
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 1:21 PM
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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
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