“Hebrew Year Abroad”? Bashing opportunities to study Hebrew in Israel - by Ethan Dayan

A university that succumbs to the pressure of students making a claim based on a proven lie to serve a greater motive is not a stable one.

Ethan Dayan..
JNS.org..
01 September '20..

This month it was revealed that the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) moved its “Hebrew Year Abroad” scheme from Hebrew University in Jerusalem to Haifa University. The University of West London has also severed ties with Hebrew U and is yet to announce a replacement Hebrew program. If British universities continue to contribute to this wave of capitulation to anti-Israel activism, students may not have the opportunity to learn Hebrew abroad at all.

Many observers blame a recent open letter signed by more than 100 Students’ Union Officers that condemned all 11 universities in the United Kingdom partnered with Hebrew U. The letter claimed that its Mount Scopus campus trespassed Israel’s 1949 Armistice line with Jordan and was therefore “participating in the illegal occupation of East Jerusalem.” However, the European Union embassy in Israel has affirmed that the campus is in “Israel proper,” and consequently, “not located on occupied territory.”

SOAS’s divorce from Hebrew U following this letter was met with robust backlash from pro-Israel organizations such as Israel Academia Monitor, the Simon Wiesenthal Center and the Pinsker Centre, which reported on the decision before the official announcement. They suggested that the timidity of the Academic Board and the Hebrew professors reporting to it were responsible.

Anti-Israel activists remain conflicted about the outcome. Although Yara Derbas, a member of the pro-BDS campaign group “Apartheid Off-Campus” focused on the territorial issue specific to Hebrew U, another article from the same group framed Haifa as a lateral move. They claim that “both institutions are equally complicit in Israel’s occupation. … The fight must continue until SOAS is no longer affiliated with any complicit universities.” They used the guise of international law to intimidate the university into a separation yet only succeeded in moving the chessboard. It will be harder for them to do the same with Haifa.

In summary, the open letter was based on factually invalid premises attached to controversial international legal theories. The authors admit their objection is inconsequential to their goals because any other Israeli university is considered equally guilty of colonial occupation. They likely knew that such a sentiment would be regarded as too extreme to be effective. Judging by the result, their math checked out.

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#BDSFail - by Mitchel Bard

Failure and rationality have never been deterrents to Israel haters, however, so the antisemitic BDS campaign will endure until it is replaced by a new, but equally futile effort to delegitimize Israel. By that time, the Palestinians will be isolated and may be forced to accept that no one will save them from themselves.

Mitchell Bard..
Algemeiner..
26 August '20..

The normalization of relations between Israel and the United Arab Emirates may be one of the biggest and final nails in the coffin of the antisemitic BDS movement. The truth is that the movement has been a failure from the outset, and while it continues to attract a lot of attention, it has proven to be far less successful than the Arab League boycott, which crumbled long ago.

Many people do not realize that the Arab League initiated its boycott in 1945 before Israel existed, demonstrating, like the newer boycott, it was fundamentally antisemitic rather than anti-Israel.

The original boycott had a minimal impact despite the blacklisting of hundreds of companies, including major US brands such as Ford, RCA, and Coca-Cola. It began to crumble, however, when the United States passed anti-boycott legislation in 1978, and it became toothless after Egypt signed its peace treaty with Israel.

The BDS movement is an outgrowth of the UN forum held in Durban, South Africa in 2001. The “Durban Strategy” — called for “complete and total isolation of Israel … the imposition of mandatory and comprehensive sanctions and embargoes, [and] the full cessation of all links (diplomatic, economic, social, aid, military cooperation and training) between all states and Israel.”

On the diplomatic front, Israel has relations with more countries today than it did in 2001. The leader of Sudan backed recognizing Israel in a historic shift. The decision of the UAE, most importantly, broke the longstanding taboo among Gulf states against normalizing ties before the Palestinian issue was resolved.

The Palestinians themselves have rejected the boycott. Prior to the pandemic, more than 100,000 of them had jobs inside Israel — and an estimated 10,000 worked in those “obstacles to peace” settlements.

Some Palestinian leaders still give lip service to the boycott. And to the extent they’ve tried to enforce it, only the Palestinians have suffered. This has been particularly obvious as the Palestinian Authority has denied Palestinians access to health care in Israel and rejected shipments of vital medical supplies to fight the coronavirus because they were flown on UAE planes that landed in Israel.

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Combatting the Jewish state’s ‘BDS-from-within’ phenomenon - by Matan Peleg

Nine professors from Tel Aviv University, eight from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, three from Ben-Gurion University of the Negev and two additional “geniuses”—one from the Weizmann Institute of Science and another from the Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design—all came together in order to teach Germans that BDS is not really anti-Semitic. And not merely teach them, but try to get the government-appointed commissioner against anti-Semitism ousted because his opinion differs from theirs. Mazal tov! Israeli academia’s thought police has turned itself into Interpol..

Germany’s “anti-Semitism czar” Felix Klein. 

Matan Peleg..
JNS.org..
17 May '20..

Several weeks ago, Germany’s anti-Semitism commissioner, Felix Klein, made headlines for canceling the participation of prominent intellectual Professor Achille Mbembe at the popular Ruhrtriennale arts and music festival.

Mbembe, originally from Cameroon, is a star among Israel-haters around the world. He is not only a supporter of the BDS movement, but maintains that Israel is an apartheid state that is worse than the former apartheid regime in South Africa.

Once the pro-Israel Free Democratic Party caught wind of Mbembe’s appearance at the festival, its members penned a letter to the director of the festival asserting that hosting Mbembe violates law of North Rhine-Westphalia—where the event was set to take place—whose parliament passed legislation barring public funds from supporting BDS.

The letter reached Klein, who decided to ban Mbembe from participating in the festival, which was ultimately canceled due to coronavirus concerns.

Only that wasn’t the end of the story.

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Matan Peleg is the CEO of Im Tirtzu, Israel’s largest grassroots Zionist movement.

Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com. 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. 

BDS movement co-founder Omar Barghouti: Israel should save us and then die - by Jonathan S. Tobin

The boycott movement’s coronavirus hypocrisy doesn’t obscure its anti-Semitism. Good news about Israel will never convince those who hate it to change their minds.

Jonathan S. Tobin..
JNS.org..
07 April '20

Advocates of Israel have always liked to joke that supporters of the BDS movement shouldn’t be selective about their efforts to convince the world to boycott the Jewish state. In particular, lately they have said that they are waiting to see what those who seek to isolate and destroy Israel will do if its scientists come up with a vaccine for the coronavirus. The answer shouldn’t provide any comfort for anyone, especially those who continue to believe that the Jewish state’s scientific advances and other contributions to the world will eventually somehow convince its enemies to give up their century-long war on Zionism.

This issue arose this week because the founder of the BDS movement has actually provided a response to the quips of those who have invited foes of Israel to extend their boycotts to the fruits of the advanced medical research and innovation produced by Israel.

In a video posted on Facebook by an anti-Israel group, BDS founder Omar Barghouti said this past weekend that if Israel finds a cure for cancer or for a virus, then there is no problem to cooperate with it.”

Barghouti, who fancies himself a humanitarian, went on to say that if Israel were to perform such services for humanity, “then saving lives is more important than anything else.”

The chutzpah and the hypocrisy contained in this statement are hard to fathom. Those who seek to stigmatize all Israelis as persons that decent societies should shun and who advocate boycotts not only of all Israeli products, but of its culture and academics ought to at least be consistent. Where do those who think that the world should treat Israelis—and their technology and ideas—as beyond the pale get the gall to say that there would be “no problem” in using them to avoid a deadly disease?

What Barghouti is basically saying is that Israel should continue its incredible creativity, and go on transforming medicine and technology for the betterment of humankind, while also consenting to the elimination of the one Jewish state on the planet.

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Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com. 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. 

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The Attempted ‘Rebranding’ of BDS on the African Continent - by Ben Cohen

BDS South Africa’s shameful misrepresentation of Nelson Mandela as a militant anti-Zionist is simply one aspect of its broader campaign of defamation, in which no inaccuracy, half-truth or outright lie is too wild if it helps with the demonization of Israel and Zionism.

Ben Cohen..
JNS.org..
13 March '20..

The BDS movement, whose goal is for rest of the world to quarantine the State of Israel as though it was the coronavirus, is undergoing a “rebranding” in its South African heartland.

Last week, BDS South Africa—an NGO that enjoys significant influence within the ruling African National Congress—announced that it was adopting a new name, a new logo and a new(ish) mission. Henceforward, the group will be known as “Africa for Palestine.” Its understanding of what constitutes “Palestine” is displayed in its logo, which shows a Palestinian keffiyeh carefully folded into a map of the entire territory between the Mediterranean Sea and the River Jordan.

What’s with the organization’s redefined mission? According to a statement last week from BDS South Africa, the newly branded group—whose acronym, AFP, is suspiciously similar to that of Africans for Peace, a local grassroots group that is firmly opposed to the boycott of Israel—“will seek to build alliances and partnerships across the continent, reinforce direct support to Palestine and assist the Palestinian Diaspora.” The main means of achieving this is through “pushing back against Israel’s creeping infiltration into our continent.”

Leaving aside the “creeping” medieval echoes of this latter statement, one is struck by the sheer resentment underlying it. After the Jewish state developed close economic and political ties during the 1950s with African nations newly liberated from the shackles of European colonialism, Arab pressure forced Israel out of the continent for several decades. During this century, however, a combination of creative Israeli diplomacy, cutting-edge Israeli technology and development expertise, and a new determination among African leaders to set relations with Israel on their own terms (as opposed to those of pan-Arab or pan-Islamic organizations) have brought that period of isolation to a decisive end. The Israeli presence has mushroomed across the continent, and Jerusalem now has full diplomatic relations with 41 of the 44 sub-Saharan states.

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Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com. 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. 

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The UN's Very Selective Outrage on Occupied Territories - by Brenda Shaffer, Svante Cornell and Jonathan Schanzer

In fact, when it issued its blacklist, the UN Human Rights Office may have inadvertently opened the flood gates. In today's interconnected world, aggrieved parties are keenly aware of developments in other protracted conflicts. They will want to know why the world's most prominent multilateral organization is willing to apply sanctions in one protracted conflict, but not others. The UN Human Rights Office must now be prepared to explain why some occupations are inconsequential, but only Israel's control of the West Bank is deserving of a blacklist.

Brenda Shaffer, Svante Cornell and Jonathan Schanzer..
Pundicity.com/Real Clear World..
04 March '20..
Link: http://schanzer.pundicity.com/23885/the-un-selective-outrage-on-occupied-territories

Yesterday during remarks at the AIPAC annual conference, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo referred to the recent publication by the UN Human Rights Office of a database of companies that operate in the West Bank. Pompeo defined the report as "a real threat" that "only serves to facilitate the BDS movement and delegitimize Israel." Pompeo declared that the United States will take actions on behalf of the "members of our business community that are being threatened by this release."

The UN Human Rights Office on Feb. 12 published a database of 112 companies that operate in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. The vast majority of the listed companies provide basic goods and services to the people living in these disputed territories.

The database was originally slated to be released in March. However, it appears the United Nations released it early as part of its effort to counter the Trump administration's new Middle East peace plan. The plan seeks to legalize Israel's control over some of the territory it conquered in the 1967 Six Day War and has controlled ever since.

As Pompeo pointed out, the release of the database is also designed to do one more thing: to give a boost to the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign that seeks to wage an economic war against Israel. The database is deliberately designed to assist their efforts to deter businesses from working with Israel.

The best evidence that the UN Human Rights Council does not seek to act against foreign occupation of lands, but against Israel, is the fact that the database collects information on activities only in territories controlled by Israel, and not all territories regarded by the United Nations as under occupation. Indeed, the list does not include companies operating in Russia's occupations in five regions in neighboring countries. Nor does it include businesses in Northern Cyprus, Western Sahara, Kashmir, Nagorno-Karabakh, to name just a few. The list immediately lacks credibility because it ignores these conflicts.

Which One is Which? Funded by the EU, driven by Palestinians. BDS activism in EU clothing. by David Collier

There has never been an international delegitimisation campaign as all encompassing, as widespread and as insidious as the global one that exists to demonise Israel. Scratch the surface and you are left bewildered at how anyone takes anything seriously.

David Collier..
Beyond the Great Divide..
20 February '20..

Those of us involved in fighting back against spreading antisemitism and the lies about Israel understand that the deeper we dig – the more unbelievable the situation becomes. As I said to someone yesterday when news broke of a UK KS3 schoolbook which suggests the creation of Israel may be behind the 9/11 attacks – nothing surprises me anymore. There are no limits to the level of conspiracy and disinformation – no place that the lies do not exist. The EU have also just provided another example – here is what I found.

The EU photographers

Recently the EU advertised an EU ‘Photo marathon’. An opportunity open to young European photographers to spend a week ‘capturing different aspects of Palestinian life’. The week-long trip, flights, accommodation and meals is fully funded by the EU. As part of the process, there is a request to write a ‘motivation letter’, explaining why the applicant wants to participate and they are asked how they intend to ‘spread the word’ upon their return.

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Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com. 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. 

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Hmm. Opposes Iran sanctions, but supports BDS against Israel? - by Jonathan S. Tobin

Another lesson about why anti-Zionism is anti-Semitism from Ilhan Omar.

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

The rising tide of Jew-hatred that is sweeping around the globe is no laughing matter. So the idea of having a vote to determine who is the “Antisemite of the Year” may strike some as more of a publicity stunt than a sober attempt to deal with the problem. But whatever one may think of such a dubious label or whether it treats the subject with the requisite seriousness, the point of the Internet vote in which thousands took part was to call attention to the plague of anti-Semitism and how it is being legitimized. More to the point, it turned out that within days of the announcement, the “winner” of the title justified the choice with a statement that helped illustrate the way anti-Zionism is just another form of anti-Semitism.

The effort was sponsored by StopAntisemitism.org, which also recently published “The New Anti-Semites,” an authoritative report on the way the BDS movement is steeped in hatred of Jews, as well as the way its left-wing supporters receive vocal support from the far-right. And the result of the poll was in keeping with that theme. Though she had steep competition from the Nation of Islam’s Louis Farrakhan, Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke and white-supremacist Richard Spencer, the person who received the most votes was Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.).

In a year in which armed white supremacists have attacked synagogues killing and wounding Jews at prayer, and in which thugs have turned violent attacks on ultra-Orthodox Jews in the Greater New York area a near daily occurrence, does Omar deserve the title?

You can make a good argument that, like the other publicity hounds that make “the Squad” of left-wing members of Congress, especially Reps. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), Omar has been given far too much attention by the national press. Yet it’s hard to ignore a member of Congress with 1.8 million Twitter followers that spews anti-Semitic invective about Jews having dual loyalty and buying Congress to support Israel. Even harder to ignore is that fact that Omar and her allies were, despite their humble status on Capitol Hill as insignificant congressional freshmen, powerful enough to force House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to back off from efforts to censor Omar for her public anti-Semitism. And it can also be asserted that she and her colleagues have helped set the agenda for their party on issues like the Green New Deal, even if most House Democrats remain supportive of Israel rather than backers of BDS, as is the case with Omar and Tlaib.

Still, Omar deserves credit this week for illustrating not merely the hypocrisy of BDS, but how it treats Israel differently from other countries.

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Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com. 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. 

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Looks familiar? BDS, 1956: Arab firms tried to boycott "Jewish businesses" worldwide - by Elder of Ziyon

Nowadays, the Israel haters like to boycott "Zionist" businesses - to say "Jewish" is too crude. But there is a direct line from the Arab boycott to today's BDS - just because the messaging is more sophisticated doesn't mean the goals and bigotry aren't the same.

Elder of Ziyon..
17 December '17..

Today's BDS movement is a direct descendant of the Arab boycott of the 1950s and 60s against Israel.

Then, as now, the boycott isn't against Israel, but Jews. No boycott list today includes Israeli Arab companies but only Jewish owned businesses in Israel.

The Arab League in 1956 was a bit cruder. They had an explicit policy of not doing business with any companies with Jews in major roles.

This is from the same Congressional Record I quoted from yesterday.

The American Jewish Congress has in its possession correspondence from Arab firms located In Saudi Arabia, canceling contracts with American Jewish businesses because of a directive promulgated by the Saudi Arabian Chamber of Commerce, but unquestionably inspired by the Saudi Arabian Government, instructing Saudi Arabian firms to discontinue all relations with businesses abroad owned or controlled by Jews or that employ Jews. These letters state that any contract negotiated in violation of this directive will be subject to summary cancellation and that any merchandise imported into Saudi Arabla from firms employing Jews abroad will run the risk of confiscation. The Saudi Arabian Government evidently requires its domestic import companies to obtain affirmative and positive assurances that their business associates abroad are free of all Jewish connections,

The nature of the discrimination is clearly reflected in the following excerpts from letters in our files received by American firms owned by Jews from their Saudi Arabian customers

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Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com. 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. 

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Israeli winery Psagot and its challenge to Europe’s labeling regime - by Gabriel Groisman

The days when the Jewish people chose to do nothing in the face of discrimination are over. We must fight—even if some in Israel don’t want to.

Gabriel Groisman..
JNS.org..
01 December '19..

After years of European statements, resolutions and directives against the Jewish people’s right to live in Judea and Samaria (the “West Bank”), eastern Jerusalem and the Golan Heights, on Nov. 12 the European Court of Justice continued the trend, confirming that under longstanding European Union consumer protection law, food and wine from those territories may not be labeled “Made in Israel.” Instead, ruled the court, their labels must indicate that they come from an “occupied territory,” an “Israeli settlement” or the like.

The court reasoned that European consumers must be able to “make informed choices” and that product labels must include “health, economic, environmental, social and ethical considerations, including respect for international law.” The court explained that the term “settlement” must be used “since it refers to a population of foreign origin,” going on to state that the “West Bank” is the territory of “the Palestinian people” and that they “enjoy the right to self-determination” in that territory.

And of course, although E.U. law and the ECJ decision do not relate only to Israel, in practice the only “social and ethical” consideration for which the E.U. is specifically mandating such labeling is the dispute over the pre-1967 territories in Israel.

The underlying case was initiated by Psagot Winery, based in the Binyamin region just minutes outside of Jerusalem. I am a member of the multi-national legal team advising Psagot on this matter. Psagot had challenged the legality of France’s application of these very labeling requirements, which it argued were discriminatory. The French court, in turn, filed an action with the ECJ to seek guidance on the matter.

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Gabriel Groisman is an attorney at Groisman Law, PLLC based in Miami, Florida, and also serves as the mayor of Bal Harbour, Florida. Groisman is a legal adviser to Psagot Winery and a leading voice in the global fight against anti-Semitism.

Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com. 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. 

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Let's be clear about the anti-Israel organizations in Europe that support the BDS movement - by Itai Reuveni

We must ask, are assisting and funding boycott campaigns against Israel, harming Palestinian employment, discriminating on the basis of nationality and seeking to return the Golan Heights to terrorist groups in control of what was once Syria – also technical matters and part of the EU's consumer culture?

Itai Reuveni..
Israel Hayom..
17 November '19..
Link: https://www.israelhayom.com/opinions/paving-the-way-to-total-boycott/

The European Union's supreme court, which now requires all 28 member states to label Israeli products manufactured in Judea and Samaria, yet again bared its peculiar list of priorities in the areas of human rights and international law for all the world to see.

The Europeans and the organizations they fund have never labeled products from any of the world's other disputed areas, such as northern Cyprus, Western Sahara and dozens others, while EU member states even transfer money to and invest in these places. Every inquiry into other conflicts, unlike the Arab-Israeli conflict, has ended in the rejection of the idea to mark certain products.

This is because the European Court of Justice has direct links to the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement against Israel. This is more than a "classification" – all boycotts begin by singling out those designated to be ostracized. Proof of this can be found in the series of measures that have been implemented by EU-funded organizations, which have always argued that marking goods is merely the start of an evolving boycott campaign – with clear and intended ramifications for the Israeli economy inside the Green Line.

A study conducted by Israeli group NGO monitor points to a broad coalition of rights groups working to carry out an ideology of boycotting through product labeling. As early as 2012, for example, the Interchurch Organization for Development Cooperation asked for EU funding to "precisely mark settlement products as a first step," and suggested intensifying the sanctions until "the complete prohibition of settlement imports… and the prohibition of money transfers to settlements and related activities." The code-speak "related activities," incidentally, also includes Israeli and international business initiatives that have nothing to do with the settlements.

This isn't human rights. This is pure hate. And Human Rights Watch is part of it. - by Elder of Ziyon

HRW knowingly hires people with a rabid hate for Israel - and deliberately chooses to use these same haters to "research" Israel. 

Elder of Ziyon..
07 November '19..

Omar Shakir worked for Human Rights Watch in 2014, then left and joined again in 2016.

In between, he signed a petition supporting the boycott of Muslims - Muslims who care about Palestinians and who care about their own communities.

The crime that these Muslims committed? They showed an interest in learning about the Zionist point of view and attended a workshop in Israel called the Muslim Leadership Initiative.

In reality, what panicked BDSers about the MLI is that it showed that intelligent, caring Muslims could speak to Israelis and learn their perspective as a way to help bring peace. BDS is against any sort of "normalization" because it wants Israeli Jews to be demonized, not treated with respect.

These Muslims who want peace rejected BDS, so BDS called on all Muslims to boycott them - not to let them speak in schools and mosques.

We pledge to not give a platform to any MLI participant to speak about their experiences at our community centers, places of worship, and campuses and call on a complete boycott of MLI.

Everyone who signed this petition is against peace. They are against dialogue. They are against treating Israeli Jews or Zionists as human beings.

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Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com. 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. 

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Surprise? The Guardian fails to challenge the lies of HRW’s Omar Shakir - by Adam Levick

As is often the case when reporting on anti-Israel NGOs, the Guardian article reads more like a HRW press release than anything resembling professional journalism.

Adam Levick..
UK Media Watch..
05 November '19..

The Guardian is adept at amplifying, and failing to critically scrutinise, the unsubstantiated claims and accusations of anti-Israel NGOs, and today’s article about the Israeli Supreme Court decision on Human Right Watch’s regional director Omar Shakir – a long time BDS activist – follows this pattern.

First, as we predicted in a tweet before the article by Oliver Holmes (“Israel can deport Human Rights Watch official, court rules”, Nov. 5th) was published, the piece uncritically cites Shakir’s simply unhinged response to the court’s decision:

Shakir wrote on Twitter that if he was kicked out, Israel would join the ranks of Iran, North Korea and Egypt in blocking access to Human Rights Watch staff. “We won’t stop. And we won’t be the last,” he said.

The truth is that democracies all over the world reserve the right to deny entry to those seen as intent on harming the state. Moreover, there are in excess of 350 NGOs (such as HRW) operating freely in Israel, even those who continually deligitimise the state, support BDS and even reject Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state.

The denial of a work visa to one employee of one of these NGOs – after careful consideration by the country’s internationally respected supreme court – wouldn’t even minimally change the democratic nature of Israel. The human rights organisation Freedom House continually ranks Israel as the only truly free and democratic country in the region, and the suggestion that this status will change due merely to the supreme court’s decision on Shakir’s work visa is risible.

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Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com. 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. 

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BTW, whatever happened to the Palestinian ‘diplomatic tsunami’? - by Jonathan S. Tobin

Anti-Zionists may still be able to intimidate some people, like pop stars who visit Israel, but in the real world and even at the United Nations, their cause is an afterthought.

Jonathan S. Tobin..
JNS.org..
04 October '19..

It was only eight years ago that supporters of Israel were trembling at the possibility that support for the Jewish state would soon be washed away by a “diplomatic tsunami” that would be unleashed by the Palestinians at the United Nations.

In the spring of 2011, President Barack Obama demanded that Israel negotiate the creation of an independent Palestinian state based on the 1967 armistice lines. The Palestinian Authority chose not to embrace Obama’s initiative, but instead embarked on a campaign to get the United Nations to recognize their statehood without first requiring them to make peace with Israel. Figures such as then Defense Minister Ehud Barak predicted that such a “tsunami” meant “Israel’s delegitimization was in sight.” For Barak and others who still believed in the Oslo peace process even after its collapse a decade earlier in the violence of the Second Intifada, the prospect of such total international isolation meant that Israel had no choice but to withdraw from the West Bank and part of Jerusalem, regardless of the consequences.

Eight years later, no one speaks of a Palestinian tsunami at the United Nations—or anywhere else, for that matter. Instead, the only places where efforts to delegitimize Israel seem to be succeeding is on the social-media pages of pop stars. While Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas’s annual sojourn to the United Nations last month was greeted with yawns, the only recent success that haters of Israel can claim was the bullying this week of singer Demi Lovato.

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Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com. 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. 

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Clearly Israel can’t treat its own destruction as a legitimate aim - by Evelyn Gordon

Letting U.S. Reps. Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar enter would have sent the opposite message—that their desire to erase Israel isn’t beyond the pale, but merely a legitimate political disagreement. That’s why Israel had to bar them.

Evelyn Gordon..
JNS.org..
28 August '19..

When Israel barred two U.S. congresswomen from entering the country earlier this month, I initially thought it a stupid decision. But after hearing the reactions from both American politicians and American Jews, I’ve started to think it may have been necessary.

This isn’t to deny the substantial damage it has caused. Pro-Israel Democrats felt betrayed, and even some pro-Israel Republicans were outraged. Most of the organized Jewish community was horrified. And the BDS movement received media exposure it could never have gained on its own.

But nobody would have felt outraged or betrayed had Israel barred, say, white-supremacist politicians. Thus the underlying message of these reactions was that unlike white supremacism, advocating Israel’s destruction is a legitimate opinion, entitled to the same respectful treatment as the view that Israel should continue to exist. Yet no country can or should treat its own erasure as a legitimate option.

To understand why this was the issue at stake, a brief review of the facts is needed.

(Continue to Full Column)

Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com. 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. 

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Who would've thought? To Tlaib trip organizer, murderers are 'heroes' - by Moshe Phillips

...Shooting an American Jewish nature photographer in the head was a “military operation” and the shooter was a “hero.” That’s the group that Tlaib put in charge of her proposed trip to Israel. The House Ethics Committee should immediately investigate this sordid episode. It should insist that Tlaib explain the nature of her relationship with Miftah and the reasons behind her decision to embrace those who praise the murderer of a member of a US senator’s family.

On, March 11, 1978, Rubin was
photographing birds at the Maagan
Michael kibbutz in northern Israel. She
was approached by a group of men who
killed her and stole her car. She was
 the first of 33 people to die in the attack.
(Wikipedia)

Moshe Phillips..
Israel Hayom..
21 August '19..
Link: https://www.israelhayom.com/opinions/to-tlaib-trip-organizer-murderers-are-heroes/

First, they praised the terrorist who murdered a US senator’s niece. Then they were chosen by Rep. Rashida Tlaib to organize her now-canceled trip to Israel.

Tlaib’s outrageous choice of the pro-terrorist group Miftah to run her trip is a slap in the face of the United States Congress and deserves to be investigated by the House Ethics Committee.

The fact that Tlaib chose Miftah to organizer her trip is no secret; it was widely reported by major news media. The problem is that nobody is explaining what Miftah really is. The New York Times, for example, reported only that Miftah is a group “that promotes ‘global awareness and knowledge of Palestinian realities.’”

Ironically, one the “Palestinian realities” of which Miftah reminds us is that the Palestinian Authority and its American supporters regard Palestinian Arab murderers of American citizens as heroes.

The official Miftah website features an essay by one of the group’s leaders, Johara Baker, profusely praising Dalal Mughrabi, the murderer of Gail Rubin, the niece of the late US Senator Abraham Ribicoff (D-Conn.).

J Street, BDS and the willful blindness of the liberal peaceniks - by Ben-Dror Yemini

Some boycotts are justified, whether imposed by a state or individuals, but the drive to boycott the State of Israel is certainly nothing but an effort to deny Jews the right to self-determination, whatever so-called pro-peace organizations tell themselves

Ben-Dror Yemini..
Ynetnews/Opinion..
27 July '19..
Link: https://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-5556925,00.html

Ilhan Omar, a member of the US House of Representatives, is a clear supporter of the pro-Israel boycott BDS movement. Recently, she proposed a bill that supports boycotts, all boycotts, as freedom of expression, which sounds wonderful.

While most Democrats did not buy her into her sophistry, fear not, for J Street rushed in to support her.

"We do not support BDS," the organization stated, reiterating its old position in favor of two states, "but we are also in favor of freedom of expression."

How kind.

If we thought that Omar was breaking records for disingenuity, given that freedom of expression interests her as much as snow in summer and hatred of Israel is what really motivates her, J Street has actually managed to bypass her.

Fighting the Boycott-Divestment-Sanctions (BDS) movement (Part 2) - by Victor Rosenthal

BDS is all about delegitimizing and demonizing Israel. But where is the legitimacy in the claims of the Palestinian Arabs, who are at best descendants of colonialist invaders from Arabia, and at worst the children of 19th and 20th century migrants? And we don’t need to make up stories in order to demonize the Palestinian Arabs

Victor Rosenthal..
Abu Yehuda..
23 July '19..
Link: http://abuyehuda.com/2019/07/fighting-bds-part-ii/





Falsehood flies, and the truth comes limping after it. – Jonathan Swift

Summary of Part I:

The Boycott-Divestment-Sanctions (BDS) movement is not intended as an economic weapon against Israel, and has not succeeded as such. It does not seek to attain its stated objectives of forcing Israel to withdraw from the territories, grant rights to Arab citizens, or accept the “return” of Arab refugees. Rather, it is a cognitive weapon to facilitate the demonization and delegitimization of the Jewish state, which it does by providing opportunities for the promulgation of various “big lies” about Israel and its conflicts.

Such remedies as anti-boycott laws are unnecessary (there is little danger of economic damage from BDS). Worse, they play directly into the hands of Israel’s enemies. Every controversy about BDS, every resolution that is debated on a university campus or church board, in a union hall or the US Congress, provides a platform for the same false accusations of apartheid, racism, war crimes, and even genocide, as well as a reprise of the false historical and political Palestinian narrative.

The demonization and delegitimization of Israel present a real physical danger, because they affect the target populations, both the “street” in Western countries and their decision-makers. The effect is to increase tolerance of terrorism against Israel, to reduce support (such as the supply of arms) during wartime, to justify forcing dangerous “solutions” to the conflict, to prevent Israel from obtaining decisive victory in armed conflicts, and so on.

How should Israel and her supporters respond?

A cognitive attack demands a cognitive response. As we’ve seen, legal or legislative attempts to stop boycotts actually help BDS achieve its goal by providing loci for the promulgation of anti-Israel memes. Traditionally, Israeli “hasbara” in response to BDS has taken the form of denying its accusations. We insist that we are not an apartheid state, note that Arab citizens have full civil rights, and try to disprove particular accusations of mistreatment of Palestinian Arabs and war crimes.

But by repeating the accusations in order to deny them, we give them additional currency, and make formerly unthinkable concepts at least debatable. For example, anyone who knows anything about South African apartheid or Nazi genocide knows that there is absolutely no similarity between them and Israeli treatment of Palestinian Arabs. But if the lie is constantly repeated, it becomes a question to be taken seriously, with pros and cons. This is similar to the way Holocaust deniers claim that the existence of gas chambers at Auschwitz is an “open historical question.”

There is also the constant flow of what can be called “nuisance libels.” The most well-known and consequential of these is the alleged killing of the boy Mohammed al-Durah by the IDF in 2000, but it is just one of hundreds or thousands of accusations of murder, mayhem, or mistreatment that are alleged against Israel on a continual basis. It is trivially easy to make an accusation with the flimsiest of proof, but refutation requires time and effort. As Swift said, falsehood flies and truth limps. And of course the controversy itself is the objective, as former US President Lyndon Johnson well understood.

Our sporadic, reactive, and generally less-than-serious approach to the cognitive war that we are in (whether we know it or not) has so far proven ineffective. But why shouldn’t our cognitive war fighting follow the same principles that inform Israel’s doctrine of traditional, “kinetic” warfare? In other words, why shouldn’t we take the offensive and bring the war to the enemy’s own territory? Let’s see what this might mean in terms of cognitive warfare.

Anti-Israel Politics: Where human rights become acceptable collateral damage - by Evelyn Gordon

Palestinians’ rights matter when targeted by Israel, but not when targeted by the Palestinian Authority. And Israeli rights never matter, except when violated by Israel.

Evelyn Gordon..
JNS.org..
03 July '19..

Three seemingly unrelated incidents occurred last week, yet all share a common denominator: They exemplify the way anti-Israel politics has corrupted the concept of human rights.

Let’s start with best-selling British novelist Richard Zimler’s report that two British cultural organizations recently refused to host him for lectures about his new book, though he has lectured many times on previous books. “They asked me if you were Jewish, and the moment I said you were, they lost all interest,” he quoted his publicist as saying.

It’s not that these groups have anything against Jews per se. They simply feared that hosting a Jew would make them a target for anti-Israel protesters.

Zimler isn’t Israeli, has no relatives or investments in Israel and doesn’t write about Israel. His latest book is set in the Holy Land 2,000 years ago, but its storyline is Christian rather than Jewish (it’s called The Gospel According to Lazarus). So he wouldn’t seem an obvious target, given BDS apologists’ repeated claim that anti-Zionism isn’t anti-Semitic.

Unfortunately, much of the anti-Israel crowd hasn’t gotten that memo.

(Continue to Full Column)

Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com. 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. 

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Where BDS and Terrorists Converge - by Caroline Glick

...The Palestinian terrorist groups responsible for the ongoing terror campaign against Israel are not the only actors involved in the political war being waged against Israel in the West, and on the ground in Israel. But their involvement in BDS campaigns has worked to legitimize the organizations themselves, their terrorist aggression against Israel and ultimately, their goal of annihilating the Jewish state in the eyes of a large cross section of the hard core, and increasingly influential, hard left in America.

Caroline Glick..
Frontpagemag.com..
14 June '19..

On May 31, the cry went out from Times Square, New York City, to annihilate Israel and extend the terror war against the Jewish state to America.

As they did in Beirut, Berlin, London, Tehran, and Dearborn, Michigan, Israel-haters gathered at Times Square to call for Israel’s dissolution on the day the Iranian regime has determined to be “Al Quds Day,” that is, Jerusalem Day.

The Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI) posted a video of the event. In it, a series of speakers called over and over again for Israel’s annihilation, voiced support for terrorists and terrorism and called for the war against Israel to come to New York.



Nate Chase from the World Workers’ Party led the crowd in chanting, “We don’t want not two state! We want ’48!”

That is, we don’t want to partition the land mass west of the Jordan River. We want to annihilate Israel, which was established in 1948.

Chase continued, “Because every inch – from the [Jordan] river to the [Mediterranean] sea – is Palestine!

“Israel does not exist! It has not existed, it doesn’t exist, and it will never exist! There is only Palestine!” he cried.

Rokeya Begun, from a New York-based Palestinian pro-terror group called Within our Lifetime, called out, “Globalize the intifada!”

“From New York to Gaza!”

And Joe Catron from Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner [i.e. terrorist] Solidarity Network, led the crowd chanting, “There is only one solution!”

The crowd responded, “Intifada! Revolution!”

While unsettling, the pro-terror calls going out from Times Square were helpful. They laid bare the fact that terror groups are actively involved in the political campaigns against Israel.

(Continue to Full Article)

Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com. 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. 

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