#Palestinian and Jordanian are basically the same

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

The Israel & Palestine Double Standard | Douglas Murray

I'm so fed up of the double standards on all of this. Hundreds and hundreds of thousands of Muslims have been killed in the last 12 years by Bashar al-Assad and other Muslims in the civil war in Syria.

There's no one on the streets of Sydney or Melbourne. There's no one on the Streets of London. We have seen hundreds of thousands of people killed in the last decade in Yemen, Muslims being killed. There's no one on the streets of Melbourne. Nobody is standing outside the Sydney Opera House calling gas the Hutus or gas the Shia, gas the...

Nobody's marching for the dead Muslims in Yemen. Their co-religionists -- we're always told about care so much about their co-religionists -- don't give a damn about their co-religionists. They really don't.

Muslims do not love other Muslims. They have no love for them. They have no love for the Palestinian peoples. None. If they had any, the Jordanians would have taken in the West Bank Palestinians, Egyptians would have taken in the territory they used to run, the Gaza, and own the Gaza. And they would have taken in the Palestinians from the Gaza. Why have the Egyptians made sure that not one Palestinian is allowed to leave Gaza? Why do they make sure that their border wall is tough as anything?

What do they mind? One thing. Jews living. Jews living and Jews winning. It hits them deep in their soul, in their psyche. It's an ancient, ancient hatred. Perhaps the most ancient among the monotheisms. And the deepest and the ugliest, the nastiest. And the one that that has been least addressed.

And we've imported it. As we sit here, roughly the same population of the Gaza is being forcibly moved by the government of Pakistan. Almost 2 million Muslims are being moved by the Pakistani authorities into Afghanistan. Okay. We have a very large Pakistani community here in the UK. If their country of origin can do that, why can't we?

If it comes to that. If it has to come to that. And why does nobody notice this, why is nobody saying this is an appalling war crime by the Pakistani government? Well, only because there are so many Pakistani politicians and others in the UK and other countries who have a deep connection to their country of origin and would never want to see it looked at in a bad way. They will not criticize that. They haven't said a word about that.

So no, I think that if you are zoning in, zooming in on Israel, lambasting Israel and are basically not bothered with everything else in the world, you're not motivated by anything other than being anti-Jewish, antisemitic of course. And it just has to be said.

I mean, I've said this so many times that I tire myself with it but, it's necessary to say. Antisemitism is a shape shifter. It's a shape-shifting virus. It can come from anywhere. At times in the past, it was the case that people didn't like Jews because they were seen to be a different religion and strange and different, and so they were hated for their religion. Then after the wars of religion, you couldn't hate anyone for their religion, so people started to hate the Jews for their race. And after the Holocaust, you couldn't hate people because of their race anymore, so people hated the Jews because of their nation. On and on...

[nightwingsnightblog]

It’s okay to change your identity over time! I am queer, I know what it’s like to try and find a label that fits you. Current day Palestinians used to consider themselves as Syrian or Jordanian, or just as Palestinian Arabs. And there were Palestinian Jews, and Palestinian Christians, and Palestinian Druze, and so on! If you lived in that region known at that time as Palestine, you were Palestinian.  All people have the right to self-determination and a safe and comfortable life. It’s okay that the Palestinians call themselves Palestinians, even though it is the colonized name of Israel. Even Jews used that name. But now the Jewish Palestinians and diaspora have reclaimed their land and chosen to identify it and themselves as Israel. It was after this point, in around 1964-1968 that the current day Palestinians chose to become the Palestinian People as a nation. Unfortunately, this was done in some part to undermine the Jewish right to Israel and self-determination, fanning the flames on an impossible conflict. Some Jews even forfeit their right to self determination out of love and respect for the Palestinian people. It does not mean that Jews do not have the right to self-determination, and it does not mean that Jews are not indigenous to Israel. It is a testament to the depth of humanity that we can all possess.

Did you know that I am sick of having to speak like this? That you afford me no humanity, but I have to get onto my damn knees to placate you? Of course I believe in the humanity of every single person on this planet, of course I believe we all deserve, by merit of existing, to have our basic human rights met, and to go well beyond them as well. The fact that the majority of the left cannot hold two truths in their mind at once is sorely disappointing. Imagine what the world could be if you stopped yelling and started caring. I have been doing a lot of learning recently, about Israel, and Palestine, and the history, and the claims. I keep coming back to the same conclusion that I have come to for years. We both have a right to Israel, to live there and be free there. But how can we live there and be free there when organizations like Hamas and the general antisemitism of the Arab and Muslim world governments leaves Jews vulnerable to violence and dispossession time and time again. We have been facing war, genocide, and expulsion from before ‘Palestine’ was even a name. Show some compassion, show some grace.

Find me a solution that isn’t a globalized intifada or driving the Jews into the sea. Show me a Palestine where there is safety and equality and human rights. Show me true indigenous solidarity. Israel is not perfect. But it is a hell of a lot closer than many Arab countries. Maybe if you shared support instead of hatred, we could move forward to a better version of a mixed country like Israel already is, even thought the majority are Jews. This doesn’t seem to bother you when it is majority Muslim or Arab countries that Jews were ethnically cleansed from by colonizing Muslim/Arabs. For some reason, it is the one place in the whole world that having a majority anything demographic is a problem, even though Jews are a worldwide minority everywhere but in the indigenous Jewish land. Or, we could have a two-state solution, like all the ones that never happened because of the hatred, and violence, and wars of the Arab world. Stop clutching your western pearls and open your eyes. It’s okay to change your identity, or your mind, over time.

[spider-xan]

I know it's important to keep amplifying Palestinian voices, but it feels almost pointless to keep doing so on IG bc I don't really have a following there and apparently, no one looks at any of my IG stories at all, which I suspect is a mix of no following, possible shadowbanning, and the fact that most of my mutuals are Vote Blue hardcore Dems whom I suspect always found me annoying as 'the mean person always complaining about racism' and have probably blocked or muted me a long time ago for raining on their party - a Jordanian acquaintance who has many of the same mutuals also expressed frustration about this and basically figured that at this point, either you already care or you won't start caring now if you still don't after a year of accelerated genocide, and apparently, most people do not care.

[hero-israel]

The discourse about water is just as insidious as that of trees. All throughout the 2010s I heard from antizionist leftists that Israel was actively engaged in water theft. Palestinian wells were becoming salty because Israel pumped up so much groundwater you see. Maybe that was true at one point (probably not). But it's actually ludicrous and hilarious to deny how ahead of the curve Israel is on water conservation and efficient farming.

I'd almost say it's like blood libel on a national scale. "Israel is sucking the life out of the land! We need to boycott divest and sanction to save Palestinian farmers from their livelihood being leeched away!" Jews are framed as parasites in their own homeland, taking far more than they need. Even the basic act of needing water to drink, bathe, cook is an act of foreign imperial aggression. Jews existing and needing water to live (in their native land!) is a threat to Palestinians.

And for the forests specifically, they imply that by "terraforming" Palestine, Israel is using an unconscionable amount of water. Reforestation is now actually an environmental disaster, surely if a free Palestine from River to Sea ever bothered to reforest, it would be in a pure and good and ethical way, and would magically not need a lot of water to get it done. And they insist that Israel dumps insane amount of water on foreign cash crops to sell on the global market, poisoning the wells of humble Arab olive farmers in the process. But Israel waters these new forests using desalination, drought resistant native species... Israel waters its farms using drip irrigation, shading technology, genetically modified crops, literal ai to calculate where and when water is needed.

I'm not saying Palestinians wouldn't be capable of achieving the same thing if they ran everything (Saudi and Jordanian permaculture projects are wildly successful), but to a braindead American leftist, "Caretakers of their Homeland" is necessarily and irrefutably "White Man's Burden", so they have to lie, and then lie some more, to dismiss every single leaf on every single tree as apartheid capitalist genocide against Palestinians.

More on Palestinian propaganda about water:

[girlactionfigure]

How BDS can be Totally Ineffective and yet Extremely Dangerous

You scream, I scream, we all scream for ice cream – 1927 popular song

The decision of Ben and Jerry’s to stop selling ice cream in Judea and Samaria has galvanized diverse pro- and anti-Israel groups and individuals. The best reaction came from the Israeli lawfare group Shurat HaDin, which says that it will begin using B&J’s copyrighted trademark to sell ice cream in the areas that B&J will boycott, and invites the company to challenge it in court. The stupidest statement was made by B&J Board Chair Anuradha Mittal, who said (in reference to a disagreement with the parent company about the precise wording of the boycott announcement), “I can’t stop thinking that this is what happens when you have a board with all women and people of color who have been pushing to do the right thing.” Of course.

If this boycott is actually carried out, it will have absolutely zero effect on Israel’s economy. The present manufacturer of B&J’s ice cream in Israel, Avi Singer, refused to honor the boycott and will have his license terminated in a year and a half; he will have to scramble to rebrand and reformulate his products, which are made a few miles down the road from here in Beer Tuvia, within the pre-1967 boundaries of Israel by Jewish and Arab employees. It will cost him something, but Israelis have responded by buying a lot of ice cream from him and the company will survive.

But the Boycott-Divestment-Sanctions movement is not really an attempt to wage economic warfare. Rather, it is another weapon in the cognitive war that is being pressed against Israel by her enemies worldwide. And in the cognitive theater of operations it is having a great deal of success.

The function of the BDS movement is to frame the antisemitic worldwide Arab/Muslim/European/Leftist campaign to erase the Jewish state (and for some, the Jewish people) as a struggle for human rights for an endangered minority, the “Palestinians.” It is to change a large-scale ongoing pogrom into a cause that right-thinking, moral, caring people can get behind, with their money and their votes. The Palestinian Arabs, the point of the spear aimed at the Jewish state, are transformed by BDS into a plucky band of “natives” who are oppressed and even mass-murdered by technologically advanced (but morally deficient) Zionists.

The BDS movement takes the false Palestinian narrative as a given, muvan m’eilav, and moves on to motivating its adherents to take action on their behalf. The debates on college campuses and corporate boards do not deal with the question of who has aboriginal rights to Eretz Yisrael or whether Jewish communities east of the Green Line are legal under international law, or whether the land is actually “occupied” by Israel. Nobody asks about the Jordanian occupation of Judea and Samaria from 1948-1967. Everybody knows, it is implied, the answers to these questions.

This is a trick known to every good car salesman, who wants his customer to argue over the size of the monthly payments rather than the total amount he will end up paying.

There is also what I call “the argument from South Africa:” apartheid South Africa was guilty of crimes against an oppressed group which were inseparable from the regime; only replacing the regime by one dominated by the oppressed group could fix it. This was accelerated by international pressure (combined with terrorism, but never mind). The boycotters are calling for the same kind of pressure against Israel, and so therefore Israel must be as evil as apartheid South Africa – and the same remedy applied. I don’t think I need to explain why this argument is fallacious!

Once it’s established that “Palestine” is a good cause, then the more that a person aspires to moral goodness, the more anti-Israel they become. It doesn’t hurt that preexisting antisemitic conditioning, subliminally present in both non-Jews and Jews, makes it easy to see Israel as evil.

Every time there is such a debate, the basic premises are restated, and never challenged. And that, in my opinion, is the raison d’être of the BDS movement: its actions themselves are of little consequence; it’s the injection of the false narrative into the collective consciousness that is significant.

This implies that the passage of various anti-BDS laws, with the debates and court fights that are entailed by them, is actually counterproductive. And there will be more legal battles coming. BDSnik Lara Friedman, of the misnamed Foundation for Middle East Peace, says that court tests of these laws so far have been resolved on technical issues, and their constitutionality hasn’t been decided.

This also implies that the proper strategy to fight BDS is not to challenge it on the enemy’s terms, that is, not to argue that boycotts are illegal, or that BDS hurts Arabs as much as Jews. Rather, we should attack the premises that it rests on: the supposed aboriginal rights of the Palestinian Arabs, the denial of Jewish sovereignty on either side of the Green Line (the Palestinian Narrative denies the legitimacy of a Jewish state of any size anywhere in Eretz Yisrael), and the allegations of oppression, apartheid, and other crimes.

Finally, we should expose the moral failings of the Palestinian culture, its misogyny, homophobia, and obsessive violence. We should draw attention to the viciousness of Palestinian terrorism. We should note that where Palestinian Arabs govern themselves, there is endemic corruption and oppression of the population. And of course we should point out that the accusations of Israeli atrocities and war crimes are mostly false, exaggerated, or lacking relevant context.

So, although I applaud the legal action of Shurat HaDin to create overwhelmingly negative consequences for the boycotters, this isn’t the solution to BDS. The real answer is for the State of Israel to very publicly make the case for the sovereign right of the Jewish state to all of Eretz Yisrael,including a direct refutation of the poisonous Palestinian Narrative.

Abu Yehuda

[job-ross-the-second]

Hi I'm sorry for rthe lack of of punctuation it was really late and as you can tell English isn't my first language.

OK so first of akhi and akhoy are literally the exact same but akhi is fos'ha /MSA while akhoy is used in certain dialects like mine, and since we don't really know where he is from I just thought I'd write it in MSA. Let's just say that if he IS Palestinian/Jordanian he would say Akhoy.

Okay so I will juat say that he uses akhoy and speaks like a normal Arab person instead of a robot. You CAN say 'where is my akh' 'where is akhoy' or you could even go all out in and ask it in Arabic (basically 'ween akhoy') it's just that you can't put my if you said akhi/akhoy as they already have it. Also yes akhi/akhoy is completely first person pov so like you wouldn't say 'he wanted to find his my brother' inenglish you don't say that Arabic either.

Also 'Ween akhoy' is like specifically the dialect I speak which is Jordanian/Palestinian but if he spoke like Lebanese it would sound something more like 'weeno khayi' and if the league has like its own dialect then it'd be something else. Personally I always headcanoned him as Iraqi cause I love Iraq also they have one of the most like attractive dialects but I genuinely can barely understand them.

OK so one thing that pisses me of about batfam fanfic is when they write Damian speaking Arabic and like I know the people who write the fanfic most likely don't speak Arabic but as an Arab person I'm gonna help you guys cause I'm so nice first you only say akhi IF you are saying my brother and are talking to said brother like you can't write akhi if your thinking also akh is brother while akhi is MY brother also most people don't say akhi unless they are joking or like they and akhi is like the formal Arabic and depending on the dialect it would be saud differently like personally we say akhoy and we don't call our siblings brother and sister unironically. do you know what is a word we Arab people use a lot 'Ya' this is basically the Arabic version of yo it's like used to call sort-of like hey and if you say akhi you could most like say ya before it also you could say y'akhi in place of goddamnit but for small stuff and when you're talking to someone or if like someone told you bad news you could be like "y'akhi, tell me you're lying". the word yalla is also used a lot it basically means c'mon or coming or hurry up and im so used to saying this word that sometimes I say it in front of non Arabs and they'd get so confused and then I remember like oh not everyone uses this word also habibi is masc. While habibti is fem. And pls remember that Arabic has so many fem. And masc. Words anyways that's basically it and if you have any questions just ask and I'll try my best to answer

[daloy-politsey]

Palestine was more prepared for the first coronavirus wave than many other governments because the PA’s security forces successfully lobbied the international community to provide them with a public health emergency simulation the previous year. “International donors gave them a workshop, and they modeled it on the basis of a potential MERS [Middle East respiratory syndrome] outbreak,” said Tahani Mustafa, a Jordanian-based research fellow at the London School of Economics.

The exercise proved beneficial, since the PA already suffered from limited logistical options and an obstructed health sector as a result of the Israeli military occupation, which has prevented the acquisition of supplies and equipment and greatly constrained the travel necessary to keep up-to-date with medical training and development, according to a report by al-Shabaka, an independent global Palestinian think tank.

Mustafa explained that the simulation was meant to include a workshop for representatives of the various branches of the security sector first, followed by a workshop for relevant political actors, such as representatives of the Health Ministry. The first workshop in 2019 addressed potential solutions to anticipated problems—which included a novel respiratory coronavirus.

Before the second workshop could take place, Covid-19 hit. With the first simulation fresh in memory, the PA moved fast, setting up a joint operations center where the Health Ministry, the prime minister’s office, and the security branches came up with procedures and rules and then delegated them to each governorate in the West Bank.

“With the first wave, what you had was an instantaneous response as soon as there was an outbreak in Bethlehem,” Mustafa said. “They basically shut down the area, and then a week or two later you ended up having the entire West Bank go into this severe lockdown. They did an OK job in the first couple of months. From what I was told, there was a lot of public consistency, where people were complying with the rules.” But unlike the simulation, the pandemic didn’t end.

Ten months have passed since those early days of relative success, and a different reality has emerged in the occupied territories. Makeshift checkpoints of dirt and stone now divide the towns. Travel and trade with Israel have been restricted even more than usual. And testing kits and supplies have run critically low. All 350 artificial respirators available in the territories had been put to use by July, according to the Health Ministry. At the same time, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was pushing for annexation, a threat that preoccupied the Palestinian leadership. With the government overwhelmed, the PA saw no choice other than to look abroad for financial support. But it ran into a roadblock.

In the past, Palestinians relied heavily on US support, which amounted to around $400 million a year, according to a 2018 congressional report. But the bipartisan Anti-Terrorism Clarification Act, which was signed into law by President Trump in 2018, slashed that funding to virtually nothing. According to that law, any foreign entity receiving US aid must consent to the jurisdiction of US courts regarding anti-terrorism claims, meaning the PA would be subject to terrorism-related lawsuits based on American law. Considering that it pays a stipend to the families of Palestinian citizens who are imprisoned in Israel, some of whom are being held on terrorism charges, the PA opted against accepting any US money. When the Palestinian economy shuttered after the first wave of the coronavirus, Washington pledged $5 million in aid—a paltry sum, roughly 1 percent of what had been the annual US aid budget to the PA.

According to data from the Palestinian Finance Ministry Service and an analysis by the London-based Al-Araby Al-Jadeed, since March, the PA has received no aid from Arab countries, some of which signed US-backed normalization agreements with Israel during that period. These cuts arrived on top of a 50 percent decrease in foreign aid from outside the region, with total funding dropping from $500 million in 2019 to $255 million in 2020.

“When we ask how Palestinians are able to live under these conditions, we have to understand that it’s never been much better,” said Yara Asi, a postdoctoral scholar at the University of Central Florida who is researching health and development in fragile and conflict-ravaged populations. “For Palestinians who can afford it, they will continue to access higher-quality private facilities or, travel conditions permitting, travel to Jordan, Egypt, or other states for advanced [health] care they are unable to get in the territories,” she said. “Low-income Palestinians will continue to rely on the public health sector, buoyed by inconsistent aid to the Palestinian Authority, as US funding has essentially ended.”

While donors in other parts of the world have filled some of the funding shortfalls, Asi added, many Palestinians will now be unable to access health care altogether while resources run dry and medical facilities and providers remain overworked and understaffed. For example, “thousands of Palestinians are missing needed vision care, as they have not been able to access ophthalmologists for months,” she said. “One report estimated that 1,200 surgical procedures to help restore vision have been canceled since April.”

[deborahdeshoftim5779]

An excellent article from Dov Lipman which highlights and refutes incredibly contentious statements made by former President Barack Obama as concerns Jewish history and the State of Israel. 

(Disclaimer: I have not read the full book, and I am making my judgements based on the quotes provided by Lipman). 

It is ironic that the former President would use a phrase coming from the Jewish Bible to refer to the Jewish State, while making statements about that same land which range from misleading to patently false. I give him the benefit of the doubt that he sincerely believes this account, and does not wish to inflame anti-Jewish sentiment. 

Unfortunately, as Lipman says, someone with minimal education can read some of Obama’s statements and feel unjustified anger against Israel. 

Whether you agree with the general policies of President Obama or not is irrelevant here. Lipman demonstrates again and again that when it comes to Israel, the former President was often plain wrong. 

Since being a Zionist has nothing to do with political allegiance, it behooves anyone who supports Israel to criticise his portrayal of Israeli history, even if they agree with him in general. 

Key historical facts, context, and even frankly basic fairness are often discarded in an attempt to present the unsuitably named “Zionist leaders” as occupiers and all reactions of Palestinian Arabs as justified. 

Just a few examples: Obama claims that Israel seized the “West Bank” from Jordan, not acknowledging that Jordan had no legal claims in that region, and that they invented the name “West Bank”, to join the “East Bank” (in Jordan). 

He also refers to East Jerusalem as though it was a city in 1967, when in fact the whole city was united prior to the Jordanian invasion of 1949, and had regained its Jewish majority in around 1860. 

Like I said, I have not read the entirety of “Promised Land”, so I am not making any judgement about the quality of the rest of the book. 

Nor am I here to take sides in American politics, as I do not fit into either the Democrat or Republican camps. I am more interested in Jewish history, including Zionism and Israel advocacy, so I must agree with Dov Lipman that this book revises history of the latter and misrepresents the former. 

[eretzyisrael]

Hen Mazzig, one of the best pro-Israel voices out there, tweeted:

We can’t ignore Palestinian national identity and desire for a state of their own. If we are serious about solving  the conflict, we must address this issue. Ask yourself before commenting: Do you support the right of self-determination for all people? Or only for Israelis?

I believe that the framework for the question is flawed.

There is no comparison between the quality, history and purposes of Jewish and Palestinian peoplehood, and any answer to this question must include those facts.

Jewish peoplehood was forged thousands of years ago. It remained strong throughout history, through the destruction of the Jewish nation, through persecution and pogroms, Crusades and the Holocaust. It is based on shared history, shared customs and shared laws, even as the Jewish people themselves were scattered across the globe.

Modern Zionism notwithstanding, Jewish nationalism is just as old. Every day Jews pray to return to Zion, and throughout the millennia, many of them have.

Palestinian peoplehood was created in the 1950s by the members of the Arab League. Their decision to not allow Arab refugees from Palestine to become citizens and to leave them stateless and miserable is what created the Palestinian people.

These Arab leaders weren't shy about describing why they made that decision: to keep the refugees as a thorn in Israel's side. Their misery was a strategy to destroy Israel over the long term. Every Arab has the right to become a citizen of any Arab country - unless they are Palestinian. The UN and the West eventually capitulated to this truly evil plan and allowed Palestinian Arabs to be treated as stateless refugees until they "return" - to destroy Israel.

Palestinian nationalism is not organic. It is not a yearning for a state. If it was, they would have one by now. The entire purpose of Palestinian nationalism is ta response to, and a weapon to destroy, Jewish nationalism.

Jewish nationalism is indifferent to Palestinian nationalism. Palestinian nationalism wouldn't exist without Jewish nationalism. The people known as Palestinians today would happily be Jordanians or Egyptians or Syrians depending on which countries would have taken over Palestine had Israel lost the war in 1948.

I agree that Palestinians are a people now - because of the misery they have been forced to go through as stateless and second class residents of the Arab world.  But being a people is not a binary option of yes or no. The quality of Palestinian peoplehood and nationalism is far, far inferior to that of Jewish nationalism, and they cannot be treated even remotely equally, or else we are rewarding the cynicism and malevolent impulses that created that people to begin with.

In short, Palestinian nationalism can and must never be allowed to compromise Jewish nationalism in the slightest. Otherwise we are rewarding those who have been using the Palestinians as pawns for 70 years.

In real terms, this means that the Jewish claim on Hebron or Bethlehem and even Jericho and Shechem (Nablus) is morally and historically far superior to that of the recently created Palestinian people. (To be honest, any Jewish claim on parts of Jordan would also be morally and historically superior to that of Jordanians, although there is little international law support for that claim and there is no real desire to act on it.)

Israel has to be practical. It doesn't want a large hostile population under its control. For better or for worse, Areas A and B have been given up by Israel during the Oslo process and it is not realistic to reclaim those areas.

Within those areas, for the most part, Palestinians do have self determination, today. (Or they would if their leaders would set up an election.) This is not because they deserve it as a people. It is because Israel ceded its rights to those areas in the interests of peace.

Except for some isolated cases like Hebron and Bethlehem, those rights are not impeding very much on Jewish rights of self determination (although they do impede on other Jewish rights such as the right to worship at and visit holy spots.)

At the same time,

Palestinians must have the right to become full citizens of the Arab nations that they were born in if they so choose.

This basic human right is all but ignored nowadays. If the West wants to solve the Palestinian issue, that is a vital component of the solution. The silence from so-called "human rights" organizations on this issue tell you all you need to know about how little they truly care about Palestinians.

All peoples deserve the right to self determination, but that right does not extend to damage the rights of others whose peoplehood is far more deserving of that right. A balance must be found between the two, but when the rights are far from equal, it is immoral to claim that they are.

[ruminativerabbi]

Defending Dr. King’s Legacy

It’s hard to imagine anyone arguing with the notion that freedom of the press will always be among the most basic features of life in any democratic state. And, indeed, ever since December 15, 1791, when the first ten amendments to the Constitution were formally adopted, this has been true with respect to our American republic not merely philosophically but legally as well. That, surely, is as it should be. But, just as freedom of the press exists specifically to permit the publication of even the least popular ideas, so do citizens have the parallel right—perhaps even the obligation—to respond vigorously to published essays rooted in ignorance, fantasy, and a prejudicial worldview. And it is with that thought in mind that I wish to respond to a truly outrageous op-end piece about Israel—and, more precisely, American support for Israel—published in the New York Times last Sunday in which the author appears to have no understanding of ancient or modern history, no sympathy for any of Israel’s security needs, no ability critically to evaluate even the most baseless Palestinian claims about the history of the land, and no interest even in getting the facts straight.  

The author, Michelle Alexander, is formally employed as an opinion columnist at the Times. And her essay, published on Martin Luther King weekend, presented itself as the result of the author’s brave decision finally “to break the silence” regarding the Israel-Palestinian conflict. It’s hard to imagine what silence the author imagines she has boldly broken by daring to criticize Israel viciously and in print—just lately the number of opinion pieces hostile to Israel published by her own newspaper gives lie to that notion easily. Nor was there anything at all new or groundbreaking in her essay, which mostly just parroted the same propagandistic claptrap the enemies of Israel cite regularly to justify their anti-Israel stance. But most outrageous of all was the suggestion that she was somehow keeping faith with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s legacy by finding the courage to speak out against Israel. That last point, then, is the first I will address.

I am personally too young to have been present in 1968 when, just a week before his horrific death, Dr. King came to the annual convention of the Rabbinical Assembly, my own professional organization, and spoke these words:

Peace for Israel means security, and we must stand with all of our might to protect its right to exist, its territorial integrity and the right to use whatever sea lanes it needs. I see Israel, and never mind saying it, as one of the great outposts of democracy in the world, and a marvelous example of what can be done, how desert land can be transformed into an oasis of brotherhood and democracy. Peace for Israel means security and that security must be a reality.

Those were his final remarks about Israel, never revised or updated. How could he have? He was dead a week later! And, with his horrific end, his unqualified support for the right of Israel to defend itself against its enemies entered history as part of his formidable legacy, a legacy that touched on many areas of American domestic and foreign policy and not solely on the questions related to civil rights, non-violent protest, and race relations for which he is justifiably the most famous.

In her essay, Alexander broke no new ground. She seemed ignorant about Israel—about its history, its foreign policy, its long history of one-sided overtures to the Palestinians, its withdrawal from Gaza, and the restrained way it has responded not to dozens or hundreds but thousands of separate acts of terror aimed specifically at the civilian population over these last years alone—and neither did she seem to know, or care, how it was that Israel came to control the West Bank in the first place. But when boiled down to its basics, she seemed unable to move past her sense that the Jews who founded the State of Israel were colonialist interlopers from Europe who were intent on doing to the indigenous Arab population what the Belgians in that same era were attempting to do to the Congolese, the British to the Indians, and the French to the Algerians: seize other people’s land and then ignore the presence of those people other than when it came to subduing them and forcing them to serve their new masters. As I read it, that was the core of her argument.

The fact that the Palestinians have refused offer after offer to negotiate a fair, just peace seems to be unknown to her. Perhaps more to the point, the fact that there is nothing at all preventing the Palestinian leadership from doing what they should have done in 1947 and finally declaring a Palestinian State, then negotiating its borders with the neighbors and getting down to the business of nation building—this too seems not to have occurred to Alexander, who finds it courageous to support the notion of boycotting Israel (and who is paradoxically appalled by the publication of the names of individuals who support the BDS movement, although you would think she would be proud for their names—and her own name—to be known widely in that context). And she certainly has no interest in responding thoughtfully (or at all) to the inconvenient fact that the Arabs, hardly the indigenes, came to the Land of Israel in a series of invasions in the seventh century CE in the course of which they successfully wrested control of the land from its then Byzantine masters. (Nor was the Land of Israel the sole target of the Caliph Umar and his hordes back in the day: the Arab armies, true colonialists precisely in the style of the age of imperialism, also overran modern-day Turkey, Cyprus, Armenia, and most of Northern Africa.) On the other hand, there is every imaginable kind of evidence—literary, archeological, genetic, epigraphical, and numismatic—to support the argument that the ancestors of today’s Jewish people were present in the land in hoariest antiquity and have remained present, one way or the other, ever since. But of that truth, Alexander has nothing at all to say.

It’s true that there have been Arabs living in the Land of Israel for many centuries. But the detail Alexander passes quickly by is precisely that there is nothing at all preventing the outcome she clearly dreams to see: the establishment of a Palestinian state in the Middle East. If they will it to happen, then it will surely be no dream! (I’ve lost track of how many nations already recognize the non-existent State of Palestine as though it were an actual political entity.) Yet all the misery of the Palestinians, so Michelle Alexander, is exclusively the fault of Israel. The Jordanians, who ruled over the West Bank for nineteen years and kept the Palestinians interned in refugee camps, are not mentioned. The extraordinary acts of violence directed against Israel—the tens of thousands of missiles fired at civilian towns and villages within Israel from Gaza, for example—these too are left unreferenced. Perhaps the author considers each of those missiles to constitute a valid expression of political rage. But I would only begrudgingly respect her right such an opinion if she were to write similarly about the people who brought down the Twin Towers on 9/11—that they weren’t terrorists or violent miscreants, just brave martyrs making a searing political statement.  

Alexander makes much of the fact that Martin Luther King apparently cancelled plans to travel to Israel after the Six Day War in 1967. She cites a phone call—but without saying to whom it was made or where recorded—according to which King based his decision on the fear that the Arab world would surely interpret his visit as an indication that he supported everything Israel did to win the war. That King had misgivings about this or that aspect of Israeli military or foreign policy is hardly a strong point—I myself  harbor grave misgivings about many Israeli policies, including both domestic and non-domestic ones—but infinitely more worth citing are Reverend King’s remarks the following fall at Harvard. Some of the students with whom he was dining began to criticize Zionism itself as a political philosophy, to which criticism King responded by asserting that to repudiate the value or validity of Zionism as a valid political movement is, almost by definition, to embrace anti-Semitism: “When people criticize Zionists, they mean Jews. You’re talking anti-Semitism!” And King’s final statement about Israel, cited above, certainly reads clearly enough for me!

To take advantage of the freedom of the press guaranteed by the Constitution implies a certain level of responsibility to the facts. To be unaware that Israel withdrew from Gaza in 2005 is possibly merely to be uninformed and lazy in one’s research. To write about the West Bank as though it were the site of a formerly independent Palestinian state now occupied by Israeli aggressors is either to be willfully biased or abysmally ill informed. But to write about Israeli checkpoints designed to keep terrorists from entering Israel without as much as nodding to the reason Israelis might reasonably and fully rationally fear a resurgence of violence directed specifically against the civilian population—that crosses the line from ignorance and poor preparation into the terrain of anti-Semitic rhetoric that finds the notion of Jewish people doing what it takes to defend themselves against their would-be murderers repulsive…or, at the very least, morally suspect.

I have been a subscriber to the New York Times forever. My parents were also subscribers. In my boyhood home, the phrase “the paper” invariably referenced The Times. (If my father meant The Daily Mirror or The Post, he said so. But “the” paper without further qualification was The Times.) Much of what I grew up knowing about the world and thinking about the world came directly from its editorial and, eventually, its op-ed pages; that the writing in “the” paper was presumed unbiased, informed, and honest went without saying. That, however, was then. And this is now. I haven’t cancelled my subscription. Not yet, at any rate. And I really do believe that people should be free to express even the least popular views in print without fear of reprisal. But when someone crosses the line from harsh criticism of Israel to propose that there is something reprehensible about Israel defending itself vigorously against its enemies—that is where I stop reading and try to calm down by looking at the obituaries or the crossword puzzle instead.

[blogkhaki-scarf]

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[xtruss]

Biden's $735 Million Arms Sale to “an Illegal Regime of Zionist Cunts: Isra-hell” to Include Missile Type That Hit Gaza Tower

— By Tom O'Connor | Newsweek | May 17, 2021

$735 million arms sale to Israel approved last month by President Joe Biden would include the same kind of precision-guided weapons that the Israel Defense Forces use to target hundreds of sites across the Gaza Strip, including a tower housing international media outlets.

Congressional committee chairs were notified on May 5 of the weapons sale, first reported Monday by The Washington Post and confirmed to Newsweek by two congressional staffers. The notice came just days before the rising tensions between Israelis and Palestinians erupted into a deadly campaign involving rocket fire by Palestinian groups led by Hamas on one side and IDF airstrikes and artillery fire on the other.

The proposed U.S. package includes Joint Direct Attack Munitions (JDAMs) that convert missiles into so-called "smart bombs" with lethal accuracy and destructive effect. The sale is subject to a 15-day review that is set to end on Thursday, amid a sharp spike in the decades-long Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

The deepening violence on both sides of what has already become the worst conflict between Israel and Palestinian factions in years has garnered international concern. It was one reportedly bloodless attack that has particularly captured global attention.

On Saturday, the IDF bombed Gaza's Al-Jalaa Tower, which housed the offices of top media outlets including The Associated Press and Al Jazeera, whose employees rushed out of the building after being given a warning of the impending attack by Israeli authorities shortly before the strike.

The dramatic destruction of the site, which the IDF argued was a legitimate target because it "contained military assets belonging to Hamas military intelligence," was captured in photo and film. The footage of the attack also reveals the munitions used, one that comes from the very same family of JDAMs included in Biden's proposed weapons sale to Israel.

Asked by reporters Monday about the planned arms sale, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki deferred to the State Department, which she said did not believe had announced "any future sales or weapons sales." She did, however, note the robust continued ties maintained between the two allies.

"We do have an ongoing and abiding strategic security relationship and partnership with Israel," Psaki said.

A State Department spokesperson told Newsweek that U.S. officials "are restricted under Federal law and regulation from publicly commenting on or confirming details of licensing activity related to direct commercial sales of export-controlled defense articles or services."

But given the ongoing violence in the region, the spokesperson added a call for de-escalation as the Biden administration works with regional countries in an effort to resolve the crisis.

"We remain deeply concerned about the current violence and are working towards achieving a sustainable calm," the spokesperson said.

Smoke billows as a Joint Direct Attack Munition dropped on Al-Jalaa Tower during an Israeli airstrike in Gaza, a city controlled by the Palestinian Hamas movement, on May 15. The U.S. considers Israel a key security ally and contributes billions of dollars a year in military assistance, but President Joe Biden has expressed concern over the IDF strike that destroyed a building housing international media outlets who were told to evacuate. MAHMUD HAMS/AFP/GETTY IMAGES

The targeting and destruction of Al-Jalaa Tower have been condemned by a number of local and foreign media groups, including two of its occupants, The Associated Press and Al Jazeera, which launched its own investigation identifying the weapon that wrecked its offices as a GBU-31, one of several JDAM variants known to have been exported by the U.S. to Israel in past years.

As Israel faced pressing questions regarding the decision to take out the building, IDF spokesperson Lieutenant Colonel Jonathan Conricus offered a three-part rationale for the strike. He said the structure was "not a media tower, and it's not a media center," but rather a militant headquarters used by Hamas for three main purposes.

The first entailed "officers of the military intelligence, basically collection and analysis of military intelligence, obviously used for military purposes, against us."

The second was "research and development, where the best subject matter experts were operating from inside that building, using the hardware, computers and other facilities inside the building to develop weapons, military weapons against us as well."

And the third involved "highly advanced technological tools that are in or on the building."

Conricus declined to go into specifics, citing security concerns, on the final point, but said such tools were used by Hamas "in fighting against us in order to hamper or limit the activity of the IDF inside Israel and on civilian activity along with the Gaza envelope." He reiterated the extent to which the IDF has identified how groups like Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad embedded their military infrastructure "within civilian facilities."

He also emphasized the degree to which the IDF went out of its way to ensure non-combatants had left the building beforehand, even if this the forewarning "was also used by Hamas and Islamic Jihad, to salvage a lot of very important equipment. That, he said, "is a military loss that we are willing to 'suffer' in order to minimize and to make sure that there are no civilian casualties in the strike on the building."

Later that same day, President Joe Biden phoned Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The U.S. leader expressed his support for Israel's right to defend itself, condemned Hamas' rocket launches and mourned the loss of life both sides. He also "raised concerns about the safety and security of journalists and reinforced the need to ensure their protection."

Netanyahu defended the operation in an interview aired Sunday by CBS News, in which he described Al-Jalaa as "an intelligence office for the Palestinian terrorist organization housed in that building that plots and organizes the terror attacks against Israeli civilians," making it "a perfectly legitimate target." He said it was thanks to the IDF that the building's inhabitants escaped in time.

"You weren't lucky to get out. It wasn't luck," Netanyahu said. "It's because we took special pains to call people in those buildings to make sure that the premises were vacated, and that's why we brought down that building."

The Israeli leader also suggested that he had shared with the U.S. evidence backing up the Israeli claims of Hamas' involvement at Al-Jalaa Tower, saying "we share with our American friends all that intelligence." Specifically, he said such matters are communicated "through the intelligence services."

Secretary of State Antony Blinken, for his part, told reporters Monday that he had "not seen any information provided" regarding the airstrike, "to the extent that it is based on intelligence, that would have been shared with other colleagues and I'll leave that to them to assess."

Following Blinken's consultations with regional officials, including Israelis, Palestinians, Egyptians, Jordanians and Qataris, Biden held Friday his third call with Netanyahu since the latest conflict began and for the first time "expressed his support for a ceasefire."

U.S. Air Force senior airman and 33rd Aircraft Maintenance Squadron weapons load crew member runs checks on an inert GBU-31 V3 bomb during a weapons load competition April 16 at Eglin Air Force Base, Florida. The U.S. exports such Joint Direct Attack Munitions to around 30 countries around the world. AIRMAN COLLEEN COULTHARD/33RD FIGHTER WING PUBLIC AFFAIRS/U.S. AIR FORCE

Hamas has denied that it had a presence in the building, one of a growing number of Gaza high-rises reduced to rubble over the past week.

"The targeting of Al-Jalaa Tower is part of a series of war crimes and crimes against humanity that are being committed against civilians," Hamas spokesperson Fawzi Barhoum said Monday in a statement obtained by Newsweek, "in addition to the targeting of homes, residential neighborhoods and civilian institutions."

Abu Obeida, spokesperson for Hamas' Al-Qassam Brigades, threatened on Monday to unleash a new round of rockets against Tel Aviv if the IDF did not cease bombing what he called "civilian homes and apartments." The IDF on Monday stepped up its bombing of what it said were "houses served as a part of Hamas' terror infrastructure."

Hamas and affiliated organizations such as Palestinian Islamic Jihad have fired what the IDF estimates to be 3,350 rockets toward Israel over the past week, hundreds of which were said to have fallen short of Israeli territory and hundreds more of which were intercepted by the advanced Iron Dome defense system. Israeli operations from land, air and sea, meanwhile, have targeted hundreds, if not thousands of sites across the densely-populated Palestinian enclave.

The conflict's death toll is estimated have reached well over 200, with the Gaza-based Ministry of Health placing the Palestinian toll at 212, most from Israeli bombings but also including nearly two dozen killed by Israeli police in the West Bank, and the IDF counting 10 Israelis dead due to rocket fire.

[beneath-the-mundane]

Departure

Hi everyone,

For the next four months I will be studying Arabic language and culture in Amman, Jordan. At the recommendation of Karen, and the insistence of many others, I will be doing a blog about this trip. In a time when the country is divided and many are ignorant toward the Middle East and its inhabitants, it is essential to make greater efforts to educate ourselves. I plan to learn much, and I hope you will join me in the journey. My blog posts will be connected to my Facebook. I will update once a week (hopefully).

Some basic things:

Country: Jordan / الاردن

           • Has friendly relations with the US.

Language: Arabic    اللغة العربية

           • Levantine Arabic colloquially and Modern Standard Arabic formally.

City of stay: Amman

           • The capital of Jordan.

           • A large, urban, developed city

           • More info in the following weeks.

Religion: mainly Muslim, however, there are Christians and many other religious groups.

Currency: the Jordanian Dinar (JD/JOD)

           • At this time, 1 JOD exchanges for ~$1.40 USD. $1 USD exchanges for ~0.70 JOD. This is the interbank rate, which is NOT the rate consumers get.

           • All money exchanges by consumers in small quantities are deducted a percentage fee. I exchanged $188 USD for 117 JOD. I only later found out that this was a bad rate.

           • Jordan is a cash based economy. Having bills bigger than 10 JOD/١٠ can be hard to exchange. It's better to keep 1's/١ and 5's/٥.

           • More on money later.

Airfare: ~$1,100 Round trip to and from Queen Alia Airport originating from San Francisco International Airport (SFO). On the pricey side it can be around $1500.

           • If you do not book a round trip, I am told you can possibly be denied entrance into the country.

           • Visa can be obtained for 40 JOD/٤٠ there, about $60 USD. Must be cash.

                       ○ Visa lasts for 30 days and then you must extend your stay by going to a local police station.

                       ○ Multi-Entry Visas can be purchased months in advance if you plan to enter and exit Jordan multiple times to travel. These can be obtained by visiting a US embassy. I believe they are around $180 or so, but don't quote me.

Bordering Countries:

           • Israel & Palestinian Territories to the West

                       ○ If you visit Israel, get a visa stamp on a separate piece of paper. Many middle eastern countries will not let you in if you have an Israeli stamp on your passport.

                       ○ There is a lot of tension between Israelis and Arabs due to land disputes. Avoid voicing your political view on the subject if you favor one side when visiting the opposing group.

           • Syria to the North

                       ○ If you've been living under a rock and don't know, Syria has been experiencing a civil war for the past several years. There are many different refugees in Jordan from violence over the years. At this time it would be best to avoid the Syrian border, especially because there is a travel warning imposed on that specific area due to terrorist threats.

                                   § Terrorism by extremists does happen against everyday people and governments in the Middle East. Government buildings, tourist hot spots, mosques, and other areas are higher risk. Attacks are more frequent during dates of religious importance, such as Eid or Ramadan. Mosques are more often targeted during those times.

                                   § In reality, attacks are more likely to occur in Europe than in a country like Jordan.

           • Iraq to the East

                       ○ There have been recent efforts to eliminate ISIS in Iraq with foreign assistance.

                       ○ It may not even be possible to visit Iraq at this time. I'm not sure.

           • Saudi Arabia to the South West

                       ○ Saudi Arabia has much stricter laws. You should thoroughly research this country or any other middle eastern country if you plan to visit. Saudi Arabia has good relations with the US, but don't expect that to save you if you act inappropriately.

                       ○ Additionally, I have heard that most Americans can't even get a visa into Saudi Arabia. This may not even be a location one can visit. I recommend more research.

Bodies of Water:

           • The Dead Sea to the West

                       ○ Known worldwide for its mud, spas, and resorts.

           • The Red Sea to the South West

                       ○ A small coast in the coast, but you can still snorkel, dive, explore, etc.

SF to Chicago

My departure from SFO landed me in a connecting flight in Chicago. I spent about 4 hours from SF to Chicago, departing at 8:30AM. I booked through United. From Chicago, we landed in Terminal 1 and had to rush to Terminal 5 and go through security a second time. We only had 1.5 hours to make the connecting flight. They almost left without me, because I got caught up in security. I had purchased food and water in Terminal 1, not realizing that I had to switch terminals (by going on a light rail) and go through security a second time to get to my connecting flight. I forgot the water in my backpack. It was a waste of $4 and time. Luckily my friend Felice was there and she held up the plane for me! Lesson: do NOT stop for food or anything else if you have a layover in Chicago.

Chicago to Austria

My connecting flight was around 8 hours long with Austrian Airlines. It was an overnight flight with dinner and breakfast. We departed around 4pm and dinner was served almost immediately after takeoff. The food was ok. They had a chicken burger or creamy pasta. I chose the pasta, which came with a small salad, pudding, a bread roll, water, tea or coffee (optional) and the necessary condiments. Breakfast was just a sweet muffin with a variety of drinks. The plane has no Wi-Fi, but it offers games, tv shows, and movies on a screen. There are also earbuds, a small pillow, and a small blanket at each seat for passenger use. Note that carry on suitcases for United Airlines are slightly bigger than the acceptable size at Austrian Airlines. I was reprimanded by the attendant, but we got my suitcase to just barely fit. After landing, thankfully we were able to get to our next gate without having to leave and go through security again.

Vienna to Amman

The Vienna Airport area was busy, but not overly packed. This flight also served drinks and a hot meal, despite only being a 5 hour flight. Everyone was served the same meal: a tomato based pasta and a hazelnut cream/yogurt consistency dessert. They also go around with a tray of bread rolls twice. Every tray comes with a small cup of water. And they also offer regular soda and juice with no ice. In addition, you can get coffee or tea. They offer drinks about 3-4 times during the flight. It's rather generous compared to American flights.

Surprisingly, an attendant went around selling perfume, jewelry, cigarettes and other things. The guy next to me bought a pack of cigarettes and it was 49 euros! In the in-flight magazine it said they don't sell the cigarettes in the EU. All cigarette ads also had a lot of health warnings on them.

That’s it for now! I eventually want to hit topics like culture, transportation, food, etc. This weekend most Jordanians are celebrating Eid, a very important Islamic holiday. I’ll try to make my next post on Eid. (: 

Until next time!

Stephanie

[matan4il]

@bottlepiecemuses is of course right, @throwawayfurb. Plenty of anti-Israel posts on Tumblr use biased, anti-Israel sources, many times they're simply tweets or posts the OP wrote, and are not linked to any journalistic sources (which can also be biased, but at least they have to do some basic fact checking). It's particularly ironic coming from you, when all you seem to be doing is to reblog Jewish bloggers in order to contradict them with ZERO sources offered. You're just making the worst allegations, and putting them out there, as if your opinion is fact.

The whole point of the daily update posts is to share what Israelis are going through. Because we're being literally de-humanized, these posts are to inform, but also to invite people to consider what it's like to walk a mile in our shoes. And in order to do so, you have to see our POV. Our urgent news IS something that focuses our POV (Jews and Israelis are generally very diverse in opinion, so I would not say it shapes our POV, because you can take any topic, 2 Israelis, and get 3 opinions, but it does focus what it is we are debating on a given day).

And Israeli news sites are actually generally highly reliable. A part of it is the fact that Israel IS a democracy, in which the press can be and IS scrutinized. I watch an Israeli TV show that fact checks stuff on the news, both by people featured on it such as politicians, and the media itself. In fact, the show has actually even ended up fact checking itself, correcting their own previous research on a certain news item. Show me even just ONE anti-Israel resource with that much self-criticism. And I can also show you Israeli news sources with a range of opinions. Yisrael Ha'yom is Israeli and very right wing, while Ha'aretz is Israeli and so left wing, it's sometimes anti-Israeli in its positions. I am not familiar with any such diversity on the other side of this conflict. Here is an article covering the freedom of the press in Israel since its inception. Are you gonna dismiss this source as well? It's not Israeli, but it is Jewish... Then how about this non-Jewish source, Freedom House, the main NGO monitoring the levels of freedom in societies around the world (you absolutely can find the relevant country and territories in this table), confirms that Israel has a free press ("Legal protections for freedom of the press are robust"), and it also generally rates Israel as a free society. Meanwhile, when it comes to Gaza, FH has given it ZERO out of 4 possible points on the question of whether there is any free media there. It has named Hamas' "security forces" (*cough* terrorists) as being a huge part of restricting the freedom of press in Gaza. FH generally rates Gaza as being NOT free. And Gaza has been independent since 2005, and under Hamas rule since 2007 (which was democratically elected by the Palestinians in 2006). The same is true regarding freedom of press and general freedom rating for the area the report refers to by the occupying Jordanians' term (funny how occupation is fine and can be overlooked, so long as it's done by Arabs), West Bank. So yeah, IDK how to tell you this, but when you accept the narrative led by Hamas (an antisemitic, genocidal Islamist terrorist organization), which allows its people no freedom, over fact checked news sources from Israel, it's as if you were looking at a conflict between the US and the dictatorial North Korea, and chose to dismiss every single American news site, based solely on them being American, while accepting the North Korean narrative. It's more biased than any news source I quoted.

But literally, all you needed to do, if you aren't biased against Israeli Jews, is do something like Google "Jewish attack Zurich" and find non-Israeli sources reporting the exact same thing as the Israeli ones. But no, you chose to piss on a Jewish blogger's post instead. What does that say about you? Saying "antisemitism is bad" is not good enough, if you're committing antisemitic bias, too. Because Israel IS the Jewish state, and Israel IS the biggest Jewish community in the world today, and to dismiss a headline about Jewish news, because it's coming from the biggest Jewish community, IS antisemitic, whether you get it or not.

Beyond that, there's also news stories coming out of Israel, that are totally factual, but are simply not reported on outside of Israeli news sites. When Israel demolishes houses built illegally by Arabs, it's reported on international news sources, because it fits into a vilifying narrative of Israel, that's very appealing to some. And news coverage IS a business. They do want profits, they do want rating. If a biased, anti-Israel story sells, they WILL cover it. And if there's no chance for interest and ratings from the international community, they won't cover a story, such as Israel demolishing houses built illegally by Jews. Both happen! Israeli news sites cover BOTH. But the international media only covers one of these two types of story, the one that lends itself to bias against the Jewish state. Because people who go around calling Israel an occupier (even though Jews are native to Israel) or accusing it of genocide (even though that's a complete distortion of what a genocide is), are not interested in hearing a more nuanced take on the Jewish state.

Update post:

In Hezbollah's rocket attack on Israel's north today, one person was killed and at least 9 are injured. All are from Thailand. I got to guide groups of students from Thailand, who come to study agriculture in Israel, and as part of their degree, they also work in the fields. They were so lovely, and they absolutely don't deserve this, for having tried to better their lives and the lives of those around them. Which is making me think of this vid from Oct 7 that I just can't forget of a Thai man, who was murdered by Hamas terrorists, footage I will never forget for as long as I live. You could argue that Hezbollah's rockets didn't mean to target Thai nationals, but the terrorists on Oct 7 KNEW that they were torturing (they took their time sadistically toying around with the man in the vid) and murdering non-Israelis. They KNEW they were kidnapping non-Israelis. And they still did it. Remind me, which part of Palestine is Thailand supposedly occupying?

On Thursday, in an independent shooting terrorist attack in Eli, two Israelis were murdered. They have been identified as 16 years old Uriah Hartom, and 57 years old father of three Yitzchak Zeiger. The Palestinian terrorist was identified as a Palestinian police officer, affiliated with Fatah (the party which currently rules the Palestinian Authority), not Hamas. He had previously been imprisoned by Israel twice, for dealing in illegal arms. The owner of a hummus diner, located near the gas station where the terrorist attack took place, was by chance on a break from his reserves service in Gaza. He heard the shots, came out, fired loosely at the terrorist to attract him away from civilians, went back inside, took a better shooting position, and finished the terrorist off.

A 57 years old man from the Israeli city of Ashkelon was stabbed during an independet terrorist attack in the area of Hebron on Saturday. The terrorist has been arrested.

Globally, we continue to see a rise in antisemitic incidents, including violent ones. Over the course of the past few days alone, we got an attack in Switzerland (in Zurich, where a Jewish man was stabbed on Saturday eve. The 15 years old terrorist was arrested by Swiss police. Please remember this for the next time you see Israel being vilified for arresting teenage terrorists), an attack on a Jewish man exiting a synagogue in Paris, France on Friday eve (Israeli TV reports that the terrorist called the victim, "a dirty Jew") and a Muslim former patient who shot his Jewish dentist to death, not too far from San Diego in the US (yeah, sorry. I don't buy that the moment a supposedly disgruntled ex patient decides to kill his Jewish doctor just so happens to be a moment when anti-Jewish violence is being justified, normalized and rising everywhere. A part of how antisrmitism, homophobia, racism and other forms of generalized hatred work, is that even when grudges are personal, these forms of hate give the hater socially acceptable terms and tools to openly hurt the person they hate, more than they would have dared to if they had a grudge against someone who wasn't a member of a marginalized group. Apparenntly, I'm not the only one who thinks the antisemitic angle mustn't be left out).

Meanwhile, Israel has arrested the members of a terrorist squad in Hebron, which was inspired by ISIS. They had already managed to produce 100 explosive devices, and we can only imagine how many lives have been saved thanks to these arrests.

This is 33 years old Dennis Yakimov.

He was killed the other day during the fighting in Gaza. Every day, Israeli soldiers are dying there, and Israelis watch the news, and hear their family members mourn them, and cry over the loss. IDK if any words I write here can express the grief, so today I'm just going to share this short vid of Dennis' only daughter, Danelina, speaking at his funeral:

IDK how people can actually think that after the loss, pain and horror of Oct 7, Israelis are putting themselves through this added loss, pain and horror just to see more Palestinians killed. And that's what they mean, every time they ask, "How many Palestinians have to die..." as if the goal was ever dead Palestinians, rather than Hamas being destroyed and Israelis knowing that Hamas could never perpetrate another massacre as it did, also aiming to deter other terrorist organizations such as Hezbollah from trying such a massacre, knowing that if they did, Israel wouldn't relent before they're destroyed, too. I think this kind of question can only be asked by people, for whom we're not really human beings, and the devastating pain that we feel over our fallen and their loved ones, who will never be the same, really doesn't register.

May Dennis' memory be a blessing.

(for all of my updates and ask replies regarding Israel, click here)

[arabianculture-blog]

Dress

Men

Arab dress for men ranges from the traditional flowing robes to blue jeans, T-shirts and business suits. The robes allow for maximum circulation of air around the body to help keep it cool, and the head dress provides protection from the sun. At times, Arabs mix the traditional garb with clothes.

Thobe In the Arab states of the Persian Gulfmen usually wear their national dress that is called "thobe" but can be also called "Dishdasha" (Kuwait) or "Kandoura" (UAE). "Thobes" differ slightly from state to state within the Gulf, but the basic ones are white. This is the traditional attire that Arabs wear in formal occasions.

Headdress The male headdress is also known as Keffiyeh. Headdress pattern might be an indicator of which tribe, clan, or family the wearer comes from. However, this is not always the case. While in one village, a tribe or clan might have a unique headdress, in the next town over an unrelated tribe or clan might wear the same headdress.

•Checkered headdresses relate to type and government and participation in the Hajj, or a pilgrimage to Mecca.

•Red and white checkered headdress – Generally of Jordanian origin. Wearer has made Hajj and comes from a country with a Monarch.

•Black and white checkered headdress – The pattern is historically of Palestinian origin.

•Black and grey represent Presidential rule and completion of the Hajj.

Guthra (headdress) in the Arab states of the Persian Gulf The male headdress in the Gulf states is called Guthra and it is different in each country (size and shape). It is usually worn with a black cord called "agal" that keeps the guthra on the wearer's head.

•The Qatari guthra is heavily starched and it is known for its "cobra" shape.

•The Saudi guthra is a square shaped cotton fabric. The traditional is white but the white and red (shemagh) is also very common in Saudi Arabia.

•The Emirati guthra is usually white and can be used as a wrapped turban or traditionally with the black agal.

Women

Adherence to traditional dress varies across Arab societies. Saudi Arabia is more traditional, while Egypt is less so. Traditional Arab dress features the full length body cover (abaya, jilbāb, or chador) and veil (hijab). Women are only required to wear abayas in Saudi Arabia. In most countries, like Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Jordan, Syria, Palestine and Egypt, the veil is not prevalent.

[newstfionline]

Right of return or time to move on?

By Loveday Morris and Suzan Haidamous, Washington Post, November 18, 2018

BOURJ EL BARAJNEH REFUGEE CAMP, Lebanon--The do-it-yourself tattoo on Jihad al-Qassim’s arm shows a faded outline of Jerusalem’s al-Aqsa Mosque, a brand from decades ago signifying a teenage hope to return to the land his family fled.

But now, at age 49, his yearning is to get out and go anywhere. “We are suffocating,” he said.

Over 70 years, this half square mile of canvas tents erected by Palestinian refugees who fled the fighting when Israel was created in 1948 has grown into a densely packed neighborhood of at least 50,000 people.

Despite the fact that many were born and raised in here in Lebanon, Palestinian residents remain reliant on the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), an entity that provides aid to millions of Palestinians around the region, particularly for basic services like health care and education.

Now, however, the Trump administration is trying to dismantle that lifeline, leaving many Palestinians fearing for their futures.

In a statement last summer announcing its decision to halt funding, U.S. State Department officials described UNRWA as “irredeemably flawed,” echoing the Israeli sentiment that the agency perpetuates the refugee problem, rather than solving it, and allows the countries that host them to shirk their responsibilities in resettling them.

The move placed increased scrutiny on UNRWA, which has struggled to raise the $1.2 billion it needs annually to serve a population it estimates has grown from 700,000 to 5.5 million--with some Palestinians even acknowledging that the time has come to hold the agency to account.

At the same time, the United States has also tied the matter of UNRWA reform to a much wider aim: taking off the bargaining table Palestinians’ “right of return,” one of three key issues integral to the Middle East peace process.

These efforts have sparked debate over what it means to be a Palestinian refugee and highlighted questions on resettlement, and whether residency or citizenship in another country would diminish their claim to a future Palestinian state.

For the United States, at the heart of the matter is how to define those like Qassim, who has only ever known Lebanon as home, and whom UNRWA classifies as a refugee.

Yet, erasing the right of return in the context of the Israeli-Arab conflict is unlikely to prove as simple as rearranging the agency’s head count, and U.S. efforts to financially squeeze UNRWA appear to be failing. Last week, the agency announced it had almost closed the funding gap triggered by the cut in U.S. aid, with more than 40 other countries increasing their contributions this year.

Qassim and his family live in a spartan, leaky two-room apartment, tucked into a jumble of alleyways tangled with electric lines, pipes and Internet cables.

“We were born here. We live here. We know Lebanon more than Palestine,” he said. “We don’t know Palestine.”

But Lebanon is a perpetual limbo for the Palestinians here.

“We are still on the road,” said Ibrahim, Qassim’s 22-year-old son, describing the feeling of not belonging. Life in the camp is like being stuck in a “horror movie.”

He can’t find work. His sisters want to study at university, but he can’t afford to send them. He describes his daily routine as “coffee, cigarettes, coffee, cigarettes.” By doing odd jobs, he has saved $430 of the $1,200 he needs to buy a scooter, which he hopes could secure him a job as a delivery driver.

Unable to return to their ancestral homes, the refugees are also unwelcome in Lebanon, where they are legally banned from more than 30 vocations as well as from owning property. Camps have become a magnet for drugs, crime and extremism, with security left to their own committees, rather than the state. UNRWA had been slowly reducing services long before Washington--previously its largest single donor--slashed $360 million in annual funding.

The Trump administration is conflating two issues, said Daniel Kurtzer, the former U.S. ambassador to Israel and Egypt and a professor of Middle East policy studies at Princeton University.

“What the Trump administration is doing, in one sense, is long overdue, which is to hold up a mirror to the international community and say: Is this what you really intended?” he said, citing the millions of dollars the international community pays to support an ever-growing population.

However, Kurtzer said the way the administration went about addressing issues with the agency was “ham-handed” by tying it to the broader question of refugee status, a separate issue that should be settled in negotiations.

Even if UNRWA is eliminated, Palestinians will continue to assert that the United Nations has endorsed their right of return, as well as the Palestinian leadership that will negotiate on that basis, he said.

“You can’t simply announce that you’ve taken it off the table,” Kurtzer said. “You’ve got to deal with it; that’s going to be hard,” he said, adding that the way officials have dealt with it “undercuts the administration’s ability to make any progress in the peace process.”

Palestinian officials have called the cuts cruel and vindictive, saying that together with the decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, it is an attempt by the United States to unilaterally impose a solution before a plan was ever unveiled.

Those who rely on UNRWA fear that U.S. funding cuts may bring about its demise. The Qassim family fears this more than most, as Jihad works as a guard in a UNRWA-managed school, where he takes home $1,000 a month. Everyone is anxious that their livelihoods may soon disappear, he said. For the stateless, the agency is more than an employer and aid provider.

“This institution has been our caretaker on all levels,” said Sharaban Abul Razac, a principal at an agency school in Bourj el-Barajneh. “It is the father and the mother of the Palestinians. When this organization is threatened, we panic.”

Cordone warned that U.S. actions to undermine UNRWA could spark something “everybody will regret ... There are enough powder kegs that haven’t exploded yet.”

Jordan, home to 40 percent of the Palestinian refugees registered with UNRWA, is particularly vulnerable. Jordan suffers from high debt and unemployment, and large street protests earlier this year resulted in the prime minister’s ouster. Jordanian officials fear the elimination of UNRWA’s services could provoke a new crisis.