Independent national security policy, the Ben-Gurion legacy - by Yoram Ettinger

While David Ben-Gurion’s defiance caused occasional short-term tension, which undermined Israel’s popularity, he earned long-term respect for himself and for his country.

Yoram Ettinger..
JNS.org..
30 July '20..

The legacy of Israel’s first prime minister, David Ben-Gurion, contradicts conventional wisdom. It rejects the assumption that a White House “green light” is a prerequisite for the application of Israeli law to the Jordan Valley and the mountain ridges of Judea and Samaria.

Ben-Gurion’s May 14, 1948, Declaration of Independence was not preconditioned upon a “green light” from President Truman. Ben-Gurion demonstrated independence of national security action in defiance of the U.S. State Department, the Pentagon, the CIA, The New York Times and The Washington Post. Furthermore, President Truman was irresolute until the day of the declaration, while the U.S. Mission to the United Nations was preoccupied with rounding up votes for a U.N. Trusteeship in Palestine (instead of an independent Jewish state).

Moreover, Ben-Gurion applied Israeli law to areas in the Galilee, coastal plain, the Negev and Jerusalem—which were acquired during Israel’s War of Independence, expanding Israel’s land by 30 percent—in defiance of a glaring “red light” from the White House and the entire foreign policy and national security establishment in Washington, D.C.

According to James McDonald, the first U.S. Ambassador to Israel: “[Ben-Gurion] warned President Truman and the US Department of State that they would be gravely mistaken if they assumed that the threat, or even the use of sanctions, would force Israel to yield on issues considered vital to its independence and security…. Much as Israel desired friendship with the US, there were limits beyond which it could not go. Israel could not yield at any point which, in its judgement, would threaten its independence or its security. The very fact that Israel was a small state made more necessary the scrupulous defense of its own interests; otherwise, it would be lost”

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Beinart’s further step in the international demonization of the Jewish State - by Karen Bekker

To put it another way, either you think that Jews can live safely and peacefully as a minority in a Palestinian-majority state, or you think they can’t. If they can, then settlements have not precluded a two-state solution with a contiguous Palestinian state in most of the West Bank. If they can’t, then creating a Palestinian-majority state in all the land between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea won’t fix that.

Karen Bekker..
JNS.org..
28 July '20..

Last December, in an article on CAMERA’s website, I asked whether Peter Beinart was advocating for a one-state solution to the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians. If so, I argued, he should state this clearly, rather than obfuscating, and he should also be honest about what such a state has the potential to look like.

Earlier this month, he did one of those two things; that is, he came out against the continued existence of Israel as a Jewish state in widely discussed essays in The New York Times and in the recently relaunched Jewish Currents, as well as in a segment on CNN. Instead, he argued, Israel should become a bi-national state, “Israel-Palestine.”

Despite an extremely negative response from the Jewish community, The New York Times again gave him its considerable platform to allow him to continue to promote his plan for dissolution of the Jewish State in a podcast last Thursday.

As my CAMERA colleague, Gilead Ini, has explained at length, Beinart’s long essay fails spectacularly in the honesty department, and treats Arab violence against Jews–not just since the State of Israel was reborn in 1948, but beforehand, as well–with extreme callousness. Shalem College Fellow Daniel Gordis, too, writes that Beinart is “so manipulative of his own readership.”

Beyond those points and others made in the many commentaries on Beinart’s proposal, however, is an overlooked yet massive logical flaw in his argument: Beinart’s underlying premise negates his own conclusion.

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Anyone surprised that J Street is attempting to desecrate Tisha B’Av? by Stephen M. Flatow

It may be hard to believe that any self-described Jewish organization could so viciously distort the meaning of a sacred Jewish day. But J Street has never met a Jewish religious commemoration that it hasn’t turned into a propaganda weapon for slamming Israel.

Stephen M. Flatow..
JNS.org..
Tisha B'Av '20..

If you thought Tisha B’Av was about the destruction of the holy temples and two Jewish states in ancient times, think again. According to J Street, the real meaning of the day is that the Israeli government is oppressing the Palestinian Arabs and will thereby cause the destruction of the Jewish state in our own times.

It may be hard to believe that any self-described Jewish organization could so viciously distort the meaning of a sacred Jewish day. But J Street has never met a Jewish religious commemoration that it hasn’t turned into a propaganda weapon for slamming Israel.

On Passover, J Street complained about the “plagues” for which it blames Israel, such as “the plague of home destruction.” According to J Street’s “Haggadah,” if the Israeli army undertakes a court-sanctioned dismantling of a home used by terrorists, then it is to blame for “encouraging retaliatory terrorist attacks.”

On Rosh Hashanah, when Jews engage in cheshbon hanefesh—the “accounting of the soul,” meaning spiritual introspection and self-assessment—J Street announced that everyone should “engage in cheshbon hanefesh” over Israel’s “demolition of Palestinian villages.”

Israel, of course, does not demolish Palestinian villages. J Street was referring to instances in which handfuls of illegal Arab settlers squat on Israeli land, call themselves a “village” and then accuse Israel of “demolishing” them when the police dare to enforce the law. But as far as J Street is concerned, if facts get in the way of the narrative, well, just push them aside.

Considering the way J Street has mangled the meaning of other sacred days on the Jewish calendar, maybe I shouldn’t be surprised at J Street’s crude exploitation of Tisha B’Av. But that doesn’t make it any more acceptable.

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Stephen M. Flatow is a vice president of the Religious Zionists of America, an attorney in New Jersey and the father of Alisa Flatow, who was murdered in an Iranian-sponsored Palestinian terrorist attack in 1995. His book, “A Father’s Story: My Fight for Justice Against Iranian Terror,” is now available on Kindle.

If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.Twitter updates at LoveoftheLand as well as our Love of the Land page at Facebook which has additional pieces of interest besides that which is posted on the blog. Also check-out This Ongoing War by Frimet and Arnold Roth. An excellent blog, very important work. 

FP's Faux Pas on Boycotts, Israel, and 'Annexation' - by Sean Durns

Foreign Policy claims to “draw on the world’s leading journalists, thinkers, and professionals” in order to “analyze the most significant international trends and events of our times, without regard to ideology or political bias.” That, however, is up for debate.

Sean Durns..
CAMERA..
24 July '20..

Foreign Policy claims that its mission is “to explain how the world works.” But when it comes to Israel, the magazine frequently allows misleading commentary. Take, for example, several recent op-eds on “annexation.”

For several weeks it seemed that—in keeping with the parameters of a peace plan that Israelis accepted and Palestinians rejected—Israel would apply legal sovereignty to parts of Judea and Samaria, often referred to as the West Bank, and the Jordan Valley. Israeli premier Benjamin Netanyahu suggested that such a move would occur by July 1, 2020. It never did. But this hasn’t stopped numerous media outlets from inaccurately reporting on the possibility.

Indeed, publications like Foreign Policy have repeatedly referred to the application of sovereignty as “annexation.” But this is inaccurate.

As the international law scholar Eugene Kontorovich has noted: “Annexation in international law specifically means taking the territory of a foreign sovereign country.” And neither the Jordan Valley nor the West Bank (Judea and Samaria) belongs to a “foreign sovereign country.” Further, as Dore Gold, Israel’s former Ambassador to the U.N., has highlighted: one can’t “annex territory that has already been designated as yours.” The League of Nations Palestine Mandate, adopted later by the United Nations, calls for “close Jewish settlement on the land” west of the Jordan River in Article 6. The UN Charter, Chapter XII, Article 80, upholds the Mandate’s provisions. The 1920 San Remo Resolution and the 1924 Anglo-American Convention also enshrined Jewish territorial claims into international law.

Unsurprisingly, this historical and legal context has been omitted in numerous media reports, including those by Foreign Policy. Instead the magazine has run several op-eds that misinform as much as they omit.

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If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.Twitter updates at LoveoftheLand as well as our Love of the Land page at Facebook which has additional pieces of interest besides that which is posted on the blog. Also check-out This Ongoing War by Frimet and Arnold Roth. An excellent blog, very important work.  

Our enemies are either collapsing on the brink of collapse. No Israeli interest is served by saving them. - by Caroline Glick

Israel's security community isn't alone in its preference for stability – even at the cost of strengthening enemies.

Caroline Glick..
Israel Hayom.
24 July '20..
Link: https://www.israelhayom.com/2020/07/24/stability-for-our-enemies/

Since the 1990s, the dominant view in Israel's national security community has been that Israel's top priority in relation to the Palestinians is to maintain the stability of their leadership. This is the case in relation to both the Fatah-controlled Palestinian Authority in Judea and Samaria and the Hamas regime in Gaza.

The rationale behind this view is that despite their hostility, if the regimes lose control, things will be worse, not better for Israel. Israel will have to take over, at great cost in lives and international stature. In other words, it's either Fatah and Hamas or the Israel Defense Forces. And Israel's security establishment prefers the former.

To achieve the goal of preserving the Fatah regime, Israel's generals and their think tank colleagues have long insisted the government ensure its financial viability. In practice, this has required Israel to collect customs and other indirect taxes for the PA and transfer the funds, with no strings attached to the PA every month. The fact that the PA has always used large portions of its budget to finance terrorism was of little consequence to the generals and their colleagues.

In the case of Hamas-controlled Gaza, preserving the terrorist regime has required Israel to permit the PA to transfer funds to its employees in Gaza, even though by paying their salaries the PA effectively enabled Hamas to devote its resources solely to waging its war against Israel. Preserving Hamas has also involved Israel allowing Qatar to send truckloads of cash to Gaza to keep Hamas's terror state afloat.

Safe in power – thanks to Israel – Fatah has been free to devote its energies waging its multidimensional war against Israel. It funds terrorists – with the tax arrears Israel collects for it. It incites terror on its media organs – again paid for by the taxes Israel transfers. It pays its security forces and indoctrinates its members to seek Israel's destruction. It engages in large-scale theft of government lands and illegal construction in Judea and Samaria to choke off Jewish communities. And the Fatah-PA wages diplomatic war against Israel at the UN, in the world capitals, and increasingly at the International Criminal Court.

Safe in power in Gaza, Hamas builds up its forces. It develops collaborative ties with Hezbollah and the Houthis and strengthens its client relationship with both Iran and Turkey. And every so often, it opens another missile offensive against aimed at killing and terrorizing Israeli civilians.

Whether they like it or not, the denizens of Hamastan and Fatahland alike have no choice other than to live under the jackboot of their regimes. Thanks to Israel – and its stability minded security experts – they have no chance of competing for power or rebelling.

Israel's security community isn't alone in its preference for stability – even at the cost of strengthening enemies. Their American colleagues are in the same cognitive boat. The place where the Americans have been pushing this position most strongly in recent years is in Lebanon. Following the Second Lebanon War in 2006, despite the direct assistance both the Lebanese government and the Lebanese Armed Forces provided Hezbollah in its war against Israel, the Bush administration massively expanded US civilian and military assistance to the Lebanese government and the Lebanese Armed Forces. Obama expanded the aid packages still further. And despite opposition from some quarters of the Trump administration, the Pentagon insists on maintaining the assistance.

Much like their Israeli counterparts, the US security brass insists that despite the fact that Hezbollah is a more powerful military force than the LAF, and indeed dominates it, and despite the fact that Hezbollah controls the Lebanese government, both the government and the LAF should be treated as independent organizations. Their stability and ties to US aid may in time, enable them to assert national authority over their country.

There are several problems with this view. The main problem is that under the current system, Hezbollah rules the roost and so long as the system remains unchanged, Hezbollah will continue to control the government and the LAF; no matter how many aircraft, night vision devices, mortars, and artillery pieces US taxpayers buy the LAF and no matter how much civilian assistance they buy the Lebanese government. The only way to change the situation is to change the system. And the US military and civilian assistance to the Lebanese government and LAF preserves the system.

The Camp David debacle 20 years later: Still holding onto the Oslo delusion

The disastrous peace summit that led to a Palestinian terror war remains an object lesson in hubris and an unwillingness to accept the truth about an insoluble conflict.

Jonathan S. Tobin..
JNS.org..
23 July '20..

It’s one anniversary that no one is celebrating. Twenty years ago this month, President Bill Clinton welcomed Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat to a peace summit at Camp David. Looking back on it now, even Clinton administration veterans understand that it was an act of monumental folly. As former State Department Middle East peace processor Aaron David Miller wrote, the effort was doomed even before it began.

The problem is that even those who have, in retrospect, acknowledged that they were mistaken still cling to the delusion that smarter diplomacy and different American, Israeli and Palestinian leaders might still produce a different outcome. Even those who are striving to be self-critical about being, as Miller noted, “lost in the woods” at Camp David in July 2000, are only gradually coming to grips with the fact that some problems have no solution. Even worse, some of those who followed them, like White House senior adviser and presidential son-in-law Jared Kushner, who was in charge of President Donald Trump’s Mideast peace efforts, seem to have failed to learn all of the appropriate lessons from the Camp David fiasco, even as he strove to do better than his predecessors.

Unlike the backdrop to the signing of the Oslo Accords seven years earlier, the circumstances that led the events of July 2000 are no longer much discussed. The famous photo op on the White House Lawn in September 1993 is still celebrated by some as a historic triumph, despite the catastrophic consequences of that agreement. But the ignominious conclusion to the 2000 summit has largely been thrown down the Orwellian memory hold by the foreign-policy establishment and the mainstream media.

They don’t want to draw appropriate conclusions from these events because the conclave exploded the entire concept behind the Oslo process from which it sprang as based on a myth.

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Showcasing Artists Who Erase Israel Off the Map - by CAMERA Arabic

“Batur,”opined Vogue Arabia, “created this graphic with one thought in mind: Hope.” Indeed, it seems to be an honest expression of Batur’s hope that all Israeli Jews simply empty out of Israel.

CAMERA Arabic..
22 July '20..

A common trait of contemporary Palestinian and Arab nationalist propaganda is the attempt to conceal its intrinsic contempt for millions of Israelis, Zionists and Jews under relatable labels such as “artistic expression,” “grassroots activity,” “personal initiative” or even “educational endeavor.” The flimsy veneer repackages the same old hateful content, making it seem just harmless enough for “respectable” media outlets to mindlessly amplify.

Vogue Arabia is the latest Western media outlet to fall for this stunt. In an article entitled “Arab Stars Criticize Absence of Palestine on Google Maps,” the fashion magazine featured a series of Israel-free maps under the pretense of “artistic protest” objecting to the absence of “Palestine” from Google and Apple maps. For example, Turkish artist Adige Batur’s take was a map of Israel and the Palestinian territories (pictured below), labelled only “Palestine,” with flowers covering almost everything with the notable exception of the Dome of the Rock.

“Batur,”opined Vogue Arabia, “created this graphic with one thought in mind: Hope.” Indeed, it seems to be an honest expression of Batur’s hope that all Israeli Jews simply empty out of Israel. While Vogue Arabia’s article conceded that “critical voices highlight” that Israel’s noticeable absence from the image fails to “offer a balanced understanding of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict,” its Instagram entry could not be bothered to include that minimal qualification; instead, it referred to the image as Batur’s “creative rendering of Palestine” and included an even more extensive quote from the illustrator.

A map labelled “Palestine,” covering Israel, the West Bank and Gaza, is hateful and incites violence, no matter how many flowers bloom upon it.

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If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.Twitter updates at LoveoftheLand as well as our Love of the Land page at Facebook which has additional pieces of interest besides that which is posted on the blog. Also check-out This Ongoing War by Frimet and Arnold Roth. An excellent blog, very important work. 

The Wisdom of Peter Beinart’s Grandmother - by Lyn Julius

The long history of oppression of Mizrahi Jews in the Arab Middle East is the key to understanding the main drivers of the conflict with Israel – an Arab and Muslim inability to tolerate difference, to co-exist with minorities, and an abhorrence for any exercise of Jewish power. Yet in the Western progressive mind, bound tight as it is by the postmodern conceptual straitjacket, only Palestinians can be victims. The Mizrahi Jews are airbrushed out of public discourse. In the current jargon, they are ‘cancelled’.

Lyn Julius..
Fathom Journal..
July '20..

At the beginning of July, Peter Beinart, bellwether of US Jewish liberalism, sent shockwaves rippling through the Jewish world when he penned a long essay disavowing Zionism and advocating, in place of Israel, a bi-national state where Palestinians and Israelis would enjoy ‘equal’ rights.

Many critics have pointed out that ‘Beinartistan’, as one described it, would soon become yet another Muslim Arab state with a vanishing Jewish minority. And if Islamic fundamentalists have their way, its Jews would swiftly find themselves reverting to the status of ‘dhimmis’, with few rights under Muslim religious law.

How come a liberal like Beinart has bought into such a ‘dangerous delusion? Because he has never needed Zionism and because he appears to have internalised today’s ‘woke’ categories, which see Jews as benefiting from ‘white privilege’. He seems to want to promote, in the words of Einat Wilf, ‘Jewish powerlessness in an effort to restore [Jewish] moral purity.’

In progressive Western circles, Zionism has become decidedly un-cool. Self-declared Zionists, like the writer Bari Weiss, complain of bullying at the New York Times. In the vogue for identity politics, Jews are framed as white oppressors.

This postmodern conceptual straightjacket perverts historical truths. It dictates that only ‘people of colour’ can be victims, while the oppression of one million Sephardi and Mizrahi Jews, resulting in the ethnic cleansing of pre-Islamic Jewish communities, among other minorities, from the Arab Muslim world from the 1940s, the subject of my book Uprooted!, must be passed over in silence.

The long history of oppression of Mizrahi Jews in the Arab Middle East is the key to understanding the main drivers of the conflict with Israel – an Arab and Muslim inability to tolerate difference, to co-exist with minorities, and an abhorrence for any exercise of Jewish power.

Yet in the Western progressive mind, bound tight as it is by the postmodern conceptual straitjacket, only Palestinians can be victims. The Mizrahi Jews are airbrushed out of public discourse. In the current jargon, they are ‘cancelled’. In this topsy-turvy world, merely to draw attention to Arab and Muslim antisemitism invites accusations of racism or ‘Islamophobia’.

(Continue to Full Article)

Lyn Julius is the author of Uprooted: How 3000 Years of Jewish Civilization in the Arab World Vanished Overnight.

If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.Twitter updates at LoveoftheLand as well as our Love of the Land page at Facebook which has additional pieces of interest besides that which is posted on the blog. Also check-out This Ongoing War by Frimet and Arnold Roth. An excellent blog, very important work. 

The misconception that is the 1967 line that divided Israel and the West Bank - by Shlomo Slonim

In short, the June lines were killed by Nasser and buried by the adoption of 242. The effort to resuscitate the June 5 lines must be acknowledged to have been aborted. Israel is acting in accordance with international and UN law in rejecting any such abortive effort.

Shlomo Slonim..
JPost/Opinion..
17 July '20..
Link: https://www.jpost.com/opinion/the-fallacy-that-are-the-1967-lines-that-divided-israel-and-the-west-bank-635359

In their inveterate drive to confer self-determination upon the Palestinians, European governmental officials invariably cite the line of June 5, 1967, as the dividing line between Israel and the proposed Palestinian entity. It is as if this line was sanctified in Holy Writ and is binding upon all concerned as the starting point for any negotiations between the parties.

However, the lines that separated Israel from the Arabs in June 1967 were shattered by one man several weeks before that date. On May 20, 1967, Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser closed the Straits of Tiran and proclaimed, contrary to the UN agreement, “These waters are ours... the Israeli flag shall not go through the Gulf of Aqaba ... we are ready for war.”

With that proclamation Nasser nullified the June 5 lines. The finishing touch was delivered when Jordan opened fire on Israel in Jerusalem on June 5. Earlier that day, Israel had offered to preserve matters intact between the two countries if Jordan refrained from hostility, but Jordan replied with a barrage, destroying the last vestige of the June lines.

This is not theoretical analysis; it is confirmed fully by the subsequent negotiations that ensued between the powers, and at the United Nations.

In the immediate aftermath of the Six Day War, the same Nasser demanded that Israel immediately withdraw from all territories it had occupied. Notwithstanding his belligerency, he charged Israel with aggression, something that would stamp Israel’s presence in the territories as a violation of international law.

The Soviet Union, smarting from the defeat of its weaponry, took up this refrain before the UN, but failed to secure the required majority in both the Security Council and the General Assembly that would charge Israel with aggression. Thereupon, Moscow dispatched its president, Alexei Kosygin, to the United States, in an effort to convince president Lyndon Johnson to join in pushing Israel back to the former lines. Johnson categorically rejected the Soviet proposal.

The president had earlier declared, “The nations of the region have had only fragile and violated truce lines for 20 years. What they now need are recognized boundaries and other arrangements that will give them security against terror, destruction, and war.”

IN REJECTING Kosygin’s suggestion, Johnson said, “This is not a prescription for peace but for renewed hostilities.” Moreover, “the parties to the conflict must be the parties to the peace.”

A dishonest attempt to end Israel. And then write the book - by Liat Collins

Beinart’s idea of Judaism is based on a cult-like belief in “Tikkun Olam,” mending the world. But breaking Israel won’t mend anything. Beinart is not making an honest attempt to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict but a dishonest attempt to end Israel. And then write the book.

Liat Collins..
My Word/JPost..
16 July '20..
Link: https://www.jpost.com/opinion/my-word-beyond-beinarts-states-of-the-mind-635344

Peter Beinart is back with a vengeance – and an idea. Beinart, who periodically provokes a publicity storm, must be pleased with the response to his latest articles. People are talking about him again. In an opinion piece last week with the headline “I No Longer Believe in a Jewish State,” published in The New York Times (of course), Beinart wrote: “Now liberal Zionists must make our decision... It’s time to abandon the traditional two-state solution and embrace the goal of equal rights for Jews and Palestinians. It’s time to imagine a Jewish home that is not a Jewish state.” The op-ed was a shorter version of an essay for Jewish Currents.

Beinart is the sort of progressive who hopes to be ahead of his time – changing the discourse and applying pressure in the age of bullying political correctness to try to change facts on the ground.

The articles and subsequent interviews show that Beinart looks to the South African model for inspiration. This has the double effect of falsely equating Israel with the apartheid regime, always satisfying for anti-Zionist liberals, and making the point that with enough pressure through the Boycott, Sanctions and Divestment movement, Israel will agree to give up and disappear.

The essay in Jewish Currents had the title: “Yavne: A Jewish Case for Equality in Israel-Palestine.” From this, we’re meant to believe that Beinart not only knows modern Israeli history to a fault, but is also an expert on its ancient past.

“When Rabbi Yochanan ben Zakkai asked the Roman Emperor to give him Yavne, he was acknowledging that a phase of Jewish history had run its course,” writes Beinart. “It was time for Jews to imagine a different path. That time has come again. Imagine a country in which, at sundown on the 27th of Nissan, the beginning of Yom HaShoah – Holocaust Remembrance Day – Jewish and Palestinian co-presidents lower a flag in Warsaw Ghetto Square at Yad Vashem as an imam delivers the Islamic du‘a’ for the dead. Imagine those same leaders, on the 15th of May, gathering at a restored cemetery in the village of Deir Yassin, the site of a future Museum of the Nakba, which commemorates the roughly 750,000 Palestinians who fled or were expelled during Israel’s founding, as a rabbi recites El Malei Rachamim, our prayer for the dead.

“That’s what Yavne can mean in our time. It’s time to build it.”

You can almost hear John Lennon’s “Imagine” playing in the background.

It’s easier to deconstruct Beinart’s thinking than build his Utopia – at least, it is for those of us who live here, in the Jewish state he wants to erase.

Stubborn Facts: The US State Department's clumsy calculus of Palestinian Arab terror - by Michael Freund

It was Mark Twain who once said, "Facts are stubborn but statistics are more pliable." For far too long, that has proven to be the case in how the State Department documents Palestinian terror. It is time for the whitewashing to end.

Michael Freund..
Pundicity/JPost..
17 July '20..
Link: http://www.michaelfreund.org/24396/state-dept-palestinian-terrorism

A number of years ago, on a visit to Manhattan, I entered one of the countless souvenir stores that dot the area in Times Square which are affectionately known as "tourist traps."

Amid the refrigerator magnets declaring one's love for New York, the fake subway signs and plastic snow globes enveloping the Statue of Liberty, I came across a hidden treasure that I continue to adore until this very day. It is a small purple pin which declares simply and with unvarnished irony: "Forty percent of all statistics are false."

If you have even a sliver of cynicism somewhere in your body and you take a moment and think about that sentence, it should bring a smile to your face because it sums up quite nicely what most of us already know to be true. In our data-drenched world, statistics are just about as reliable as pre-election promises made by politicians.

My thoughts turned to that pin the other day when I read through the US State Department's "2019 Country Report on Human Rights Practices: Israel," which was released on March 2 of this year. It contains what can most charitably be described as nothing less than an obscene distortion of reality.

On page 100 of the tome, under the rather oddly worded heading, "Other Societal Violence or Discrimination," the people at Foggy Bottom made the spurious claim that there were a grand total of just 101 Palestinian "violent acts" against Israelis in Judea and Samaria in 2019, "primarily stone-throwing," and asserted that this "represented a 49% decrease from 2018."

The only problem with this bit of data, if one can call it that, is that it is in fact a complete and utter falsehood.

Question. Should the Jewish community provide a ‘safe space’ for anti-Zionists? Jonathan S. Tobin

A community that wishes to have a future must understand that Israel provides the bedrock upon which Jewish civilization will rest. Those who wish to destroy that foundation deserve no “safe space.”

Jonathan S. Tobin..
JNS.org..
15 July '20..

A prominent Jewish writer used the bully pulpit of The New York Times op-ed section last week to call for the elimination of the Jewish state. At the same time, an assistant rabbi at one of the nation’s largest and most prestigious synagogues took to Twitter to vent his anger at those who say the Jews are “indigenous” to the land of Israel.

Both Peter Beinart and Rabbi Andrue Kahn received some furious feedback. The debates about Beinart’s conversion to anti-Zionism and Kahn’s absurd doctrinaire woke linguistics was not without value, as it brought out into the open just how prevalent the dangerous ideas they are promoting. It also shone a light on the way such radicalism is not only undermining traditional liberal Jewish support for Israel, but also working its way into the mainstream.

Beinart and those who rallied behind Rabbi Andy’s dubious cause believe that anyone who stands up for Zionism and Israel isn’t only wrong, but represents the past, while the anti-Zionists are the Jewish future. As a result, they believe that it is incumbent on the Jewish community not only to listen to the kids who they think are cheering Beinart and Kahn, but to provide them with a “safe space” where they can be protected from the scorn being meted out to anti-Zionists from those who write in defense of Israel, Zionism and Jewish rights.

Kahn’s belief that Jews couldn’t be called “indigenous” was so outrageous that his boss, Temple Emanu-El Senior Rabbi Bruce Davidson, felt constrained to write a letter to the Forward newspaper disassociating the synagogue from his position. Davidson rightly noted that such a stance lends weight to those who wish to deny Jewish rights and history. That, in turn, provoked a response from hundreds of prominent liberal Jews who signed a letter of support of Kahn.

The question is: Are they right to assert that the woke left is the future of American Jewry?

(Continue to Full Column)

If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.Twitter updates at LoveoftheLand as well as our Love of the Land page at Facebook which has additional pieces of interest besides that which is posted on the blog. Also check-out This Ongoing War by Frimet and Arnold Roth. An excellent blog, very important work. 

Surprise? Israel’s Critics Want to Destroy It — Not Improve It - by Adam Levick

Whereas Israeli leaders must reject annexation and continually work to keep the two-state solution alive, less they forfeit their very right to exist, nothing whatsoever is asked of Palestinian leaders. They aren’t asked to create, as Zionists leaders did in the decades before 1948, the apparatuses of statehood — healthy proto-state political and civil institutions that would inspire faith that Palestine won’t become a failed state.

Adam Levick..
Algemeiner..
15 July '20..

Guardian journalist Jonathan Freedland begins his recent Jewish Chronicle op-ed, “What next, if the two state dream is dead?” thusly:

Though annexation itself seems to be up in the air, one of annexation’s expected consequences is already materializing: a crisis of faith among those whose Zionist belief in the legitimacy of a Jewish state depended on there being at least the possibility of an eventual two-state solution, but who now see that prospect vanish before their eyes.

Freedland’s op-ed was addressing a recent 7,000 word piece by Peter Beinart calling for Jews to embrace a one-state, non-Zionist future, published at Jewish Currents — a shorter version of which was published by The New York Times.

You can read CAMERA’s response to Beinart’s call for the end of a Jewish state here, but Freedland’s framing of the crisis is interesting, as it — correctly — casts the (former) Zionism of Beinart and his allies as contingent upon a particular political outcome with the Palestinians. This contingent Zionism suggests that the very legitimacy of Israel is not, as with all other countries, to quote Abba Eban, “axiomatic and unreserved” — but is permanently “suspended in mid-air” awaiting others’ moral approval.

Contingent Zionism negates and erases the fact that Israel is, by any objective measure, a dynamic, successful, and democratic state; and demands, as the condition for political and moral international legitimacy, that it facilitate the creation of a Palestinian state. Conversely, this political calculus appears to conclude that no moral demands should be made of Palestinians for them to be granted the right to statehood and legitimacy.

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The Abbas-Hamas Courtship? Abbas Signs His Own Death Warrant - by Khaled Abu Toameh

...Abbas has chosen to sever all ties with Israel, including the security coordination that keeps him safe and guarantees his continued control over the PA.

Khaled Abu Toameh..
Gatestone Institute..
14 July '20..

After renouncing all agreements and understandings with Israel and the United States, including security cooperation, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and his ruling Fatah faction are now cozying up to their rivals in Hamas -- a move that may prove to be counterproductive and pave the way for the resumption of massive anti-Israel violence.

By courting Hamas, Abbas and Fatah are emboldening an Islamist movement that seeks to extend its control from the Gaza Strip to the West Bank. Hamas's declared goal is to replace Israel with an Iranian-style Islamist state.

Abbas may also be using his renewed ties with Hamas as a way of pressuring the international community into providing him with more financial aid. The message he is sending to Western donors is: "If you don't fully support us and exert pressure on Israel, I will throw myself into the arms of Hamas."

The apparent rapprochement between Fatah and Hamas began earlier this month when the two parties held a joint press interview by video-conference, during which they announced their intention to work together to "topple" both Israel's plan to apply its sovereignty to parts of the West Bank and US President Donald Trump's Peace to Prosperity vision for solving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

The appearance of Jibril Rajoub, Secretary-General of the Fatah Central Committee, alongside senior Hamas official Saleh Arouri, a founding commander of Hamas's military wing, Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, was aimed at sending a message to the Palestinians and the rest of the world that when it comes to Israel and the US, the Palestinians are prepared to lay aside their differences and stand united against "conspiracies aiming to liquidate the Palestinian cause and national rights."

Although he holds the title of "Deputy Chairman of Hamas's Political Bureau," Arouri, who is currently based in Lebanon, is anything but a politician.

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Judea and Samaria: The Historical and Legal Milestones that Make the Case - by Amb. Alan Baker

Israel’s claims to sovereignty regarding the West Bank areas of Judea and Samaria did not originate with Israel’s attaining control of the area following the 1967 Six-Day War. Israel’s rights are based on the indigenous and historical claims of the Jewish people in the area as a whole, virtually from time immemorial.

Amb. Alan Baker..
Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs..
13 July '20..
Link: https://jcpa.org/sovereignty-in-the-west-bank-areas-of-judea-and-samaria-historical-and-legal-milestones-that-make-the-case/

The subject of the rights of the Jewish People and the State of Israel under international law, in the West Bank areas of Judea and Samaria, involves a complex and extensive web of historical, legal, military, and political issues.

The Jewish People Have Historical Claims in Judea and Samaria

Israel’s claims to sovereignty regarding the West Bank areas of Judea and Samaria did not originate with Israel’s attaining control of the area following the 1967 Six-Day War.

Israel’s rights are based on the indigenous and historical claims of the Jewish people in the area as a whole, virtually from time immemorial.

Israel’s international legal rights were acknowledged in 1917 by the Balfour Declaration’s promise to the Jews to reestablish their historical national home in Palestine. These rights are based on clear historical, archeological, and Biblical evidence.

The Balfour Declaration was subsequently recognized internationally and encapsulated into international law through a series of international instruments commencing with the 1920 San Remo Declaration by the Supreme Council of the Principal Allied Powers, followed by the 1922 League of Nations Mandate for Palestine.

The continued validity of these foundational legal rights was also assured under Article 80 of the United Nations Charter.

Life in an Islamic state under Hamas rule sounds like a dream! - by Elder of Ziyon

Officially calling the state “Islamic” or not is a distinction without a difference. And that is the only difference between Peter Beinart and Hamas’ stated vision of the future of the borders of British Mandate Palestine.

Elder of Ziyon..
12 July '20..









I tweeted last night:

I think I figured out what being a "progressive" Jew means.

Peter Beinart "progressed" from supporting Yasser Arafat's vision of a "solution" into adopting Hamas' vision.

— Elder of Ziyon 🇮🇱 (@elderofziyon) July 12, 2020

This was not entirely facetious.

In 2017, Hamas famously took out the blatantly antisemitic language in its manifesto that was supposed-to-but-not-really replace their original Hamas charter.

Hamas affirms that its conflict is with the Zionist project not with the Jews because of their religion. Hamas does not wage a struggle against the Jews because they are Jewish but wages a struggle against the Zionists who occupy Palestine. …

Hamas rejects the persecution of any human being or the undermining of his or her rights on nationalist, religious or sectarian grounds. Hamas is of the view that the Jewish problem, anti-Semitism and the persecution of the Jews are phenomena fundamentally linked to European history and not to the history of the Arabs and the Muslims or to their heritage.

See? Hamas doesn’t say it wants to persecute Jews in its one state solution.

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Peter Beinart's intellectual journey towards anti-Zionism and self-immolation - by David M. Weinberg

The progressive Pope, Peter Beinart, seeks to denude the Jewish state of its rightful place among the nations. Alas, he seems to have decayed into a cocoon; inside a reactionary, defeatist brain that secretes poison. In this venal endeavor Beinart will fail.

David M. Weinberg..
A Citadel Defending Zion..
10 July '20..
Link: https://davidmweinberg.com/2020/07/10/the-beinart-betrayal/

The Pope of “liberal Zionism,” American Jewish journalist Peter Beinart, has ditched the Jewish state. “It is time for liberal Zionists to abandon the goal of Jewish-Palestinian separation and embrace the goal of Jewish-Palestinian equality” in one unitary state, he wrote in a caustic 7,000-word essay and New York Times op-ed article this week.

For Beinart, the Jewish state is a “cancer,” a “dehumanization (of Palestinians) masquerading as realism.” “The price of a Jewish state that favors Jews over Palestinians,” he rules, “is too high.” And “the notion of a state for Palestinians separated from a state for Jews, has failed.” Ergo, “it’s time to envision a Jewish home that is a Palestinian home, too.” In other words, disassemble the Jewish state and replace it with a binational state.

He blames “Jewish trauma” from the Holocaust for the “unfortunate Zionist obsession” with Jewish statehood. He alleges that “Jews have retroactively projected Nazism’s exterminationist program” onto the peace-seeking and civil rights-seeking Palestinians. He lauds Joint List leader Ayman Odeh’s call for “liberation of both peoples” in a binational state, and decrees that “only Palestinian freedom can make Jews whole.”

For anybody who has followed Beinart’s denouement from a proponent of “prophetic Zionism” (which is a concocted progressive concept) to a shill for Israel’s enemies, this does not come as a surprise. Nonetheless, it is sad and revolting. It tells us something frightening about the intellectual journey towards anti-Zionism and self-immolation that is underway on the American Jewish left.

Beinart’s degeneration tracks back to an infamous 2010 essay on “The Crisis of Zionism,” which ridiculously blamed right-wing Israel for disaffiliation among young American Jews, and which advocated a “Zionist BDS” – a boycott of settlement goods.

The book-length version of the same rant was launched at a J Street conference in 2012, where Beinart urged the Obama administration to bash Israel because of its “morally repugnant” settlement policies and its “unlawful and unjustified” assertion of sovereignty over united Jerusalem.

Later that year, he shimmied over to the dark side by declaring Hamas the victim of backwards-looking Western policy. Inverting cause and effect, Beinart asserted that Hamas was obstructionist and violent only because it had not been fairly and properly “engaged.” Poor Hamas, you see, never had been given an “incentive” to abide by a ceasefire, he wrote. Beinart’s insane solution was to undercut Mahmoud Abbas, and “incentivize” and empower Hamas in the West Bank.

Dear Latest Woker - Jews aren’t indigenous to Israel? According to whom? - by Jonathan S. Tobin

A woke rabbi who launched a Twitter war over the meaning of a word demonstrated how leftist politics pollutes language and cancels Jewish rights.

Jonathan S. Tobin..
JNS.org..
09 July '20..

There are a lot of things wrong with woke culture. While the impulse to demonstrate solidarity with the oppressed and opposition to bad things like racism is, in principle, praiseworthy, the virtue signaling is insufferable. As is the tone of self-righteous disapproval emanating from the woke towards all those that don’t measure up to their standards.

As a friend’s daughter eloquently summed up the problem, no matter how hard you try, “there’s always a woker fish” who will wind up shaming you for insufficient ardor for supposedly righteous causes. That means the competition to out virtue signal and shame lesser beings can lead even seemingly nice people to do and say things that are not only obnoxious, but actually have dangerous implications.

And that is the problem with Rabbi Andrue J. Kahn, assistant rabbi at New York’s famed Temple Emanu-El, the landmark Reform cathedral on Fifth Avenue. “Rabbi Andy,” as he styles himself on social media, seems like a well-meaning young man and posts lots of cute pictures on Instagram. And although he’s just one out of a staff of five rabbis (plus two with emeritus status) at that historic institution, he’s generally regarded as a comer in the world of liberal Judaism. So when he decided to rant on Twitter about something, it provoked a controversy that made news.

As his Twitter account demonstrates, Rabbi Andy is up to date as far as supporting things that woke rabbis should support, like abortion rights, Native American rights, why Black Lives Matter and smearing President Donald Trump’s supporters as anti-Semites. He also knows what to oppose, including America’s Founding Fathers, the Zionist Organization of America and, significantly, a letter signed by famous writers and artists against “cancel culture” and the repression of free speech that it encourages.

In other words, Rabbi Andy, like so many other well-meaning young liberal Jews, is just fine with cancel culture. Indeed, he’s ready to cancel the entire Jewish people, and by implication, Zionism and Israel, to demonstrate his impatience with the non-woke.

As part of his sermonizing about the wrongs of white supremacy and its companion evil, “white Jewishness,” the rabbi is particularly upset with the notion that the Jews are “indigenous” to Israel.

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Understanding Beinart, Understanding the Collapse of Liberal Zionism - by Jonathan S. Tobin

The retreat of the defeated to Yavne is an image that has nothing to say to Israelis. Rather, it is an apt metaphor for the failures of an American Jewish organized world drenched in ignorance and Jewish illiteracy that is suffering both a demographic implosion and a crisis of faith. The surrender of the self-described leading exponent of liberal Zionism speaks volumes about the failures of American Jewry.

Jonathan S. Tobin..
JNS.org..
08 July '20..

There’s a reason why most Israelis find it difficult to listen patiently to lectures from liberal American Jews. For Israelis, their country is a real place filled with real people and perplexing dilemmas that have no easy solutions. But for all too many American Jews, Israel is a dreamland—a place for intellectual tourism where we can project our own insecurities and anxieties on the Jewish state while expressing our moral superiority over the lesser beings who live there and lack our wisdom.

Which brings us to the problem of Peter Beinart.

Beinart, the former editor of The New Republic and columnist for The Atlantic, sought to carve out a place for himself as the leading liberal critic of Israel with his 2012 book The Crisis of Zionism. The book was as spectacularly ignorant as it was arrogant in its refusal to acknowledge the reality of the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians.

The conceit of the work was that Israelis needed to rise above their fears and recognize that a two-state solution was within easy reach. Anything that contradicted his assumptions—like the nature of Palestinian political culture or the continued rejectionism and obsession with the fantasy of Israel’s destruction—was either rationalized or ignored. Too immersed in their unseemly quest for security and profit, Israelis could only overcome the “crisis” of the title by listening to the wisdom of Beinart, a righteous American pilgrim, whose manifest good intentions should have generated respect and deference from his recalcitrant Israeli pupils.

Much to Beinart’s chagrin, rather than take the advice of a leading American public intellectual to heart, Israelis ignored it. In the eight years since then, Israel has endured more violence and political controversy while the Palestinians have continued to reject peace, whether along the lines laid out by President Barack Obama (whose alleged bona fides as a friend of the Jewish people was discussed at length in his book) or the less generous terms offered by President Donald Trump.

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A Miracle w/Grit: How Israel rescued the Promised Land from devastation and neglect - by James Sinkinson

Part of the Israeli miracle is the restoration of a depleted, deteriorating land through determination, ingenuity and back-breaking work.

James Sinkinson..
FLAME/JNS..
07 July '20..

Last week I toured much of northern Israel, from the Jezreel Valley and the Lower and Upper Galilee regions to the Golan Heights. The natural beauty of this part of Israel, as well as the explosive proliferation of agriculture, was striking and inspiring.

The abundance of flora in Israel today makes it easy to forget that this land at the turn of the 20th century was a parched wasteland. It also raises the questions: How did this miraculous transformation take place, and who was responsible?

On his visit to Palestine in 1867, Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain) called the Sea of Galilee “a solemn, sailless, tintless lake, as unpoetical as any bath-tub on earth.” On the other hand, last week I found the Kinneret (its Hebrew name) a sparkling blue jewel surrounded on its north, south and west by vegetable fields, orchards and forests.

Traveling by horseback through the Jezreel Valley, Clemens noted: “There is not a solitary village throughout its whole extent—not for 30 miles in either direction. There are two or three small clusters of Bedouin tents, but not a single permanent habitation. One may ride 10 miles, hereabouts, and not see 10 human beings.”

Clemens continues, “Of all the lands there are for dismal scenery, I think Palestine must be the prince. … Palestine sits in sackcloth and ashes. Over it broods the spell of a curse that has withered its fields and fettered its energies.”

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James Sinkinson is president of Facts and Logic About the Middle East (FLAME), which publishes educational messages to correct lies and misperceptions about Israel and its relationship to the United States.

If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.Twitter updates at LoveoftheLand as well as our Love of the Land page at Facebook which has additional pieces of interest besides that which is posted on the blog. Also check-out This Ongoing War by Frimet and Arnold Roth. An excellent blog, very important work. 

Question. What do U.S. Jews really think about annexation? - by Stephen M. Flatow

The only way to know is to poll the Jewish population. But the answers may come as a surprise.

Stephen M. Flatow..
JNS.org..
06 July '20..

What, exactly do American Jews think about the possibility of reuniting small parts of Judea and Samaria with the rest of Israel?

Rabbi Eric Yoffie, former president of the Union for Reform Judaism, says he knows. Writing in Haaretz this week, he declared: “American Jews are not happy.” Note he didn’t say “some” or even “many.” Rather, “American Jews”—all of them, apparently— are “not happy” about any possible annexation.

According to Yoffie, all American Jews are “shocked,” “panicked,” “puzzled,” “confused,” and “above all, angry” at what he calls “the monumental stupidity” of extending Israeli law to even the smallest part of the areas that have been at the center of the Jewish national homeland for more than 3,000 years.

Not that he is alone in his assumptions. Former U.S. Mideast envoy Martin Indyk, who has spent much of his life trying to create a Palestinian state in Israel’s backyard, recently claimed on Twitter that there is a “Diaspora Revolt” against annexation.

And presumably as one manifestation of that “Revolt,” 36 Conservative rabbinical students recently signed a statement denouncing any such Israeli actions.

I’m not surprised that some Conservative rabbinical students lean far to the left when it comes to Israeli issues. So do many Reform and Reconstructionist rabbinical students. That’s not news; it reflects long-standing ideological trends in those movement’s educational institutions.

And it’s surely no surprise that former ambassador Indyk, a professional crusader for Palestinian statehood, conjures up imaginary “revolts” to advance his agenda.

Yoffie himself, however, is a little more complicated.

As president of the Reform movement (then known as the Union of American Hebrew Congregations), Yoffie stood up in front of the delegates to its national convention, in Cleveland, on June 3, 2001, and named the real obstacle to peace.

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If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.Twitter updates at LoveoftheLand as well as our Love of the Land page at Facebook which has additional pieces of interest besides that which is posted on the blog. Also check-out This Ongoing War by Frimet and Arnold Roth. An excellent blog, very important work.  

Divorced from both the Israeli track record and Middle East reality - by Ambassador (ret.) Yoram Ettinger

The suggestion that the application of the Israeli law to the Jordan valley and parts of Judea and Samaria would severely undermine Israeli interests, jeopardize Israel’s peace treaties with Jordan and Egypt and Israel’s overall ties with Arab countries, is divorced from the Israeli track record and Middle East reality.

Ambassador (ret.) Yoram Ettinger..
The Ettinger Report/Mida Magazine
https://bit.ly/2Z4nFW1..
03 July '20..

Israel’s track record

The resurgence of the Jewish State from the ashes of WW2 to global prominence, technologically, scientifically, medically, agriculturally, economically, diplomatically and militarily – despite systematic adverse global pressure and Arab wars and terrorism – has demonstrated that there are no free lunches for independent nations, especially in the Middle East.

For example, in 1948, Prime Minister Ben Gurion, Israel’s Founding Father, did no wait for a green light from the White House, in order to declare independence. He was aware that a declaration of independence would trigger a costly Arab military invasion. The CIA estimated that it could subject the Jewish people to “a second holocaust.” However, Ben Gurion concluded that achieving a supreme goal was preconditioned upon the willingness to pay a supreme cost. Indeed, the war against the Arab invasion consumed 1% (6,000) of the Jewish population (600,000). Fending off the Arab invasion, Israel expanded its borders by 30%, and did not retreat to the suicidal 1947 lines, despite brutal global (including US) pressure. The pressure on Israel dissipated, but Israel’s buttressed borders were preserved.

In 1967, Prime Minister Eshkol preempted a planned Egypt-Syria-Jordan joint offensive, in defiance of a strong red light from the White House (“Israel will not be alone unless it decides to go alone”), and despite prominent Israelis who preferred the venue of negotiation and mediation, and predicted a resounding Israeli defeat on the battlefield. Eshkol was aware that Israel’s existence, in the violently intolerant and unpredictable Middle East, required a firm posture of deterrence, which could entail heavy cost. In the aftermath of the war, Eshkol reunited Jerusalem and renewed Jewish presence beyond the 1949/67 indefensible Green Line, in spite of a very heavy US and global pressure. Consequently, while the pressure on Israel has subsided, the Jewish presence in Judea, Samaria and eastern Jerusalem has surged to 700,000 people.

In June 1981, Prime Minister Begin ordered the destruction of Iraq’s nuclear reactor, notwithstanding the menacing red light from the White House and the opposition by the Mossad, the IDF Intelligence and additional Israeli defense authorities. The naysayers were certain that an Israeli attack had a very slim chance of success. They feared that this would trigger a global Islamic assault on Israel; it would produce a European boycott of Israel; would create an irreparable rift with the USA; and would doom Israel, economically and diplomatically. Begin decided that sparing Israel a traumatic nuclear assault justified even a traumatic cost. However, the pessimistic assessments crashed against the rocks of reality, while the Iraqi nuclear threat (to the region and the globe) was uprooted.

In December 1981, Begin applied Israeli law to the Golan Heights, disregarding the brutal US opposition, which included the suspension of a major US-Israel strategic accord and the supply of advanced military systems. While the heavy US sanctions were replaced by an unprecedented US-Israel strategic cooperation, the Golan Heights have become an integral part of the Jewish State.

The aforementioned Israeli Prime Ministers defied international pressure, and therefore were burdened with a short-term loss of global popularity. However, they earned long-term respect for their willingness to defy the odds at severe cost.

They realized that succumbing to pressure yields additional, and heavier, pressure.