US and the 'Palestinian heritage'

"Could it be that the US is involved in stealing away some other people's cultural heritage?"


Yisrael Medad
Greenlined
16 June '10

This past week, I was informed that the Ambassadors Fund, a PACE partner, is engaged in training Arabs "to protect Palestinian heritage in West Bank".

It seems that in 1996, a group of Arabs decided to dedicate themselves to preserving a "Palestinian" cultural heritage. They formed the Palestinian Association for Cultural Exchange (PACE). It is engaged in more than 20 projects of heritage highlighting.

For its latest project, PACE has partnered with the US State Department's Ambassadors Fund for Cultural Preservation to preserve and protect cultural antiquities in three West Bank villages: Aboud, Al-Jib and Beitin.

The Preservation and Protection of Palestinian Cultural Heritage in Rural Areas project aims, in part, to raise awareness among the residents of the three villages about the relevance of protecting, preserving and presenting the historic areas.

Along with natural deterioration of ancient sites, illegal digging and sale of antiquities is a widespread phenomenon in the West Bank as a whole [note: that last bit about thievery refers to Arabs, mainly. Remember how we had to buy back the stolen Dead Sea Scrolls?]. In particular, the three villages in the project have been targeted because of their rich cultural resources. Among these are ancient dwellings currently occupied by residents. Aboud is a Roman-Byzantine site, while villages Al-Jib and Beitin have been continuously settled from the Bronze Age forward and contain biblical sites [note: the wording "biblical sites", not "Jewish", "Hebrew" or "Israelite"].

In addition to the project's goal of raising awareness among the local population, two other aims focus on heritage protection training and generating jobs through training and support for traditional crafts.

To achieve these goals, PACE is coordinating an education program that utilizes classes, on-site training and workshops. Classroom discussions focus on what constitutes heritage and how to present it to the public, how to assess local and socioeconomic conditions to determine the future of cultural resources and how to effectively communicate the values and history of cultural property.

Could it be that the US is involved in stealing away some other people's cultural heritage?

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WaPo, NYT spike coverage of Obama Admin Denunciation of Abbas, Palestinian Authority

Leo Rennert
American Thinker
09 April '10

In his press briefing on April 8, State Department spokesman Philip Crowley said the following:

"Regarding the Middle East, we are DISTURBED by comments of Palestinian Authority officials regarding reconstruction and refurbishing of Jewish sites in the Jewish quarter of Jerusalem's Old City.

"Remarks by the Palestinian ministry of Information denying Jewish heritage in and links to Jerusalem UNDERMINE THE TRUST AND CONFIDENCE needed for substantive and productive Israeli-Palestinian negotiations.

"We also STRONGLY CONDEMN the GLORIFICATION OF TERRORISTS.. Honoring terrorists who have murdered innocent civilians either by official statements or by the dedication of public places HURTS PEACE EFFORTS and MUST END.

"We will continue to hold Palestinian leaders ACCOUNTABLE FOR INCITEMENT."

Not one word of Crowley's statement appeared in the April 9 editions of the New York Times and the Washington Post.

Yet, this official U.S. statement with its STRONG CONDEMNATION of Mahmoud Abbas's Palestinian Authority, accusing it of HURTING PEACE EFFORTS and UNDERMINING U.S. efforts to restart peace negotiations was highly newsworthy for at least four compelling reasons:

1. It was the strongest slap yet at Abbas and the PA by the Obama administration. Yes, from time to time, Team Obama has criticized anti-Israel incitement by the Palestinian Authority, but mostly in a muted, non-specific way. In this instance, Crowley referred specifically to PA incitement against the reopening of the Hurva Synagogue, the most prominent of the Old City's Jewish houses of prayer, which was destroyed by Jordan in 1948.

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Alexander Maistrovoy: Jews in the Holy Land ? What Jews?

Alexander Maistrovoy
Solomonia
10 March '10

Welcome to the Holy Land: Al-Haram Al-Ibrahimi in Hebron, Bilal Ibn Ribah mosque in Bethlehem and Al-Burak Wall...

The Israeli government announced that it would include the Cave of the Patriarchs (Me'arat HaMachpelah) in Hebron and Rachel's Tomb in Bethlehem as part of a comprehensive plan to preserve Israel's national heritage and religious sites ("Moreshet"). The reaction of the Arab (and all Islamic) world to the decision has once again shown the real essence of the "Arab-Israeli conflict", which actually is the holy war that Arabs had proclaimed against the Jews.

Any conflict can be resolved if the conflicting parties recognize each other's right of existence. It becomes basically irresolvable if one of parties refuses to recognize the other. The key questions of borders, the status of Jerusalem and refugees are difficult but could be resolved in case Arabs recognized the right of the Jews to live in their land.

Arabs do not recognize it. All their policy, strategy, and ideology is directed to depriving the Jews of any connection with the land of Israel: virtually, and then physically to uproot the Jews from the history of the Holy Land. Jews have neither antiquities nor holy sites, they have no past. In other words, they do not belong to this land and have no right to exist at all.

It is this genocidal approach that is characteristic of Islam. Power and possession are inherent parts of religious attitude in Islam. This approach extends to all other religions, not only to Judaism. The idea consists in depriving other cultures of their spiritual base to achieve total physical domination over them.

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Why Palestinians Riot Over Jewish Heritage Sites

Moshe Dann
Frontpagemag.com
03 March '10

Last week saw an upsurge in Palestinian riots and attacks against Israeli vehicles in Gaza and the West Bank. What crime did Israel commit to invite the wave of violence? Israel’s government simply announced that it intended to honor the country’s heritage by including the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron, and Rachel’s Tomb in Bethlehem in a list of Israeli national “heritage” sites.

The violence-fueled Palestinian reaction may seem entirely disproportionate to Israel’s offense. But a look at the historical background shows that it is not without grim precedent.

For several decades, Palestinians have been attacking Jewish worshipers at the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, the Tomb of Rachel near Bethlehem, and the Tomb of Patriarchs and Matriarchs, Machpelah, in Hebron. After the Oslo and Hebron Agreements in the 1990’s, attacks intensified.

To protect visitors to Rachel’s Tomb, a fortified building was built around the tiny, 19th century building that had been built over the tomb. That wasn’t enough, since getting to the building from the closest Israeli checkpoint, a few hundred meters away, exposed Jews to sniper fire and bombs from adjacent buildings along the road. A new road was built, therefore, surrounded by high cement walls.

Palestinian riots against the rights of Jews to visit holy and historic sites are nothing new. In Jericho and Gaza, ancient Jewish synagogues from the Talmudic period have been destroyed and are off limits to Jews.

In Shechem, Nablus , the site of Joseph’s Tomb, was attacked by Palestinian mobs in 2000, fire-bombed and destroyed. A wounded Israeli soldier inside bled to death while Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak and his Defense Minister, Shaul Mofaz, negotiated with the Palestinian Authority.

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