In a Nutshell: The State Department's Jerusalem - Then and Now - by Yisrael Medad

QUESTION: So the answer to the question is Jerusalem, correct?AMBASSADOR SATTERFIELD: That’s exactly right.

Yisrael Medad..
My Right Word..
08 December '17..
Link: http://myrightword.blogspot.co.il/2017/12/the-state-departments-jerusalem-then.html





Remember this from June 8, 2015?

MR RATHKE: Not in the habit of doing victory dances. Go ahead, Matt.
QUESTION: Well, just – can you remind us all what city – or what the United States regards as the capital of Israel?
MR RATHKE: Well, since I think – to come to the – maybe the nub of the issue, since Israel’s founding, administrations of both parties have maintained a consistent policy of recognizing no state as having sovereignty over Jerusalem. So we remain committed to this longstanding policy, and this decision today helps ensure that our position on the neutrality of Jerusalem remains – it remains clear.
QUESTION: That applies to both West Jerusalem and East Jerusalem?
MR RATHKE: Again, no change to our policy to announce.
QUESTION: Well, but I mean the contested part of Jerusalem is just the east part. Not even the Palestinians claim the west part.
MR RATHKE: Again, Matt, I’ve got no change to our policy to announce.

What a difference. From yesterday's briefing:

Reading Palestinian Media Responses to Trump’s Jerusalem Declaration - by Prof. Hillel Frisch

...The PA and Hamas are hopeful that unorganized Palestinian youth will mobilize against President Trump’s declaration acknowledging that Jerusalem is Israel’s capital. A groundswell from the streets would preclude the necessity for the two organizations to actively take the lead. However, the readers of al-Quds, the Palestinian silent majority, are loath to sacrifice their sons on behalf of the warring factions.

Prof. Hillel Frisch..
BESA Center Perspectives Paper No. 678..
08 December '17..

On December 6, 2017, President Donald Trump announced that the US is officially recognizing Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. A quick read of the major Palestinian media outlets reveals what the various Palestinian actors consider the appropriate response.

The picture is reminiscent of the three bowls of soup in the tale “Goldilocks and the Three Bears.” There was a call for a fierce, blood-curdling response (hot), an expression of hope that the announcement will trigger a third intifada (warm, though really only a few degrees shy of the first response), and a hope that there will be no popular response (cold).

The “warm” response appeared in al-Hayat al-Jadida, the newspaper set up by the Palestinian Authority (PA), which strictly expresses the position of Mahmoud Abbas. The PA, remember, is obligated by the various accords signed during the Oslo peace process to behave peacefully and to refrain from any form of incitement. There is nothing peaceful in the headline that appeared in the PA mouthpiece: “Tension, a Third Intifada Likely to Break Out the Moment Trump Declares Jerusalem the Capital of Israel.”

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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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NY Times dismisses Zionist connection to Zion, and ignores its own reporting - by Gilead Ini

...Got that? The Times made clear the city's importance to Jews and the fact that it was a spiritual center, and alluded to the many lives lost in Israel's vigorous attempts to defend the Jerusalem's Jewish Quarter against the Jordanian conquerors. But now the newspaper pretends otherwise.

Gilead Ini..
CAMERA Snapshots..
07 December '17..
Link: http://blog.camera.org/archives/2017/12/new_york_times_dismisses_zioni.html

A New York Times article purporting to explain the history of the Jerusalem conflict made a point of downplaying the historical connections between the Jews and their holiest city. Among several out of context or misleading quotes is this one, by Rashid Khalidi. After 1967, Khalidi insists,

“Jerusalem became the center of a cultlike devotion that had not really existed previously,” said Rashid Khalidi, a professor of modern Arab studies at Columbia University. “This has now been fetishized to an extraordinary degree as hard-line religious nationalism has come to predominate in Israeli politics, with the Western Wall as its focus.”

Considering the bigoted undertones of the comment, with its use of the words "cult" and "fetish" to describe traditional Judaism's connection to Jerusalem, and in light of the fact that Khalidi has previously used a hoax quote in The New York Times (and elsewhere), which eventually had to be corrected, the newspaper might have at least consulted its own coverage before printing Khalidi's claim.

BBC’s Plett Usher and the amplifying of Palestinian falsehoods on Christianity - by Hadar Sela

..Palestinian officials of course have a long record of falsifying history in order to negate Jewish connections to the region and the ‘Jesus was a Palestinian’ canard is just one of the themes used to promote that narrative, particularly at this time of year. Does the BBC really believe that amplifying the blatant falsehoods of professional PLO propagandists such as Ashrawi and Zomlot contributes anything of value to its audiences’ understanding of this story?

Hadar Sela..
BBC Watch..
07 December '17..

On December 7th the BBC News website published an article by Barbara Plett Usher on its ‘US & Canada’ page and the same article appeared on the website’s Middle East page as ‘related reading’.

Titled “Trumplomacy: Key takeaways from Jerusalem policy shift“, the article begins with a subheading informing readers that the US president has ruined Christmas for Palestinians:

“A blue Christmas for Palestinians”

Readers then discover that the first “key takeaway” proffered by Plett Usher is that the PLO has cancelled a party.

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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 Palestinian "Violence" is Not Exactly Spontaneous - by Elliot Abrams

...the violence we see is not the inevitable and natural result of Trump's decision. It is the inevitable and natural result of a Palestinian leadership that has decided that some violence will look good on TV and will help their own political position.

Elliot Abrams..
Pressure Points..
07 December '17..
Link: https://www.cfr.org/blog/palestinian-violence-not-spontaneous-1

There were widespread "predictions" that President Trump's decision on Jerusalem would "lead to violence." I use the quotation marks because many of those "predictions" were actually threats. When someone in a position to stop violence "predicts" violence, he is threatening or promising that violence will occur.

Today there has been violence in the West Bank and in Jerusalem. Is it a spontaneous protest by Palestinians, or has it been fomented by the Palestinian Authority? After all, once a leader has "predicted" violence, he has a good reason to ensure that it occurs. He wants to seem prescient, not out of touch.

Here is what Avi Issacharoff, a journalist in The Times of Israel, wrote about what happened today in an article entitled "Abbas must decide how far to let the demonstrations go:"

The Palestinian Authority and Fatah are organizing the rallies in the city centers, but a key question is whether the Palestinian security services will stop demonstrators from reaching the potential flashpoints. In light of the Palestinian-Arab-Muslim consensus against US President Trump’s decision to recognize Jerusalem, PA security may receive orders not to step in to block protesters on their way to the checkpoints, except, perhaps, to prevent the use of firearms....A very large number of people are expected to participate in protests Friday , with calls in the mosques to protect Jerusalem and the Temple Mount (or, as Trump called it, Haram al-Sharif) and nonstop broadcasting on Palestinian TV of clips showing past violence around Jerusalem.

The Palestinian Authority under President Mahmoud Abbas closed the schools Thursday, and called for a general strike in businesses. These move obviously flooded the streets with people, especially with young people. Does that sound like an effort to stop violence, or ensure it?

Media and the Real Palestinian Response to Trump's Jerusalem Speech by Bassam Tawil

...So, make no mistake about it: the "rivers of blood" we are being promised are flowing as we speak. Yet, it is the knife that Arabs and Muslims take to one another's throats that is the source of this crimson current, not some statement made by a US president. Perhaps that could finally be an event worth covering by the roving reporters of the region?

Bassam Tawil..
Gatestone Institute..
07 December '17..

A short three hours after US President Donald Trump phoned Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas to inform him of his intention to move the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, a number of Palestinian photojournalists received a phone call from Bethlehem.

The callers were Palestinian "activists," who invited the photographers to come to the city to document an "important event." When the photographers arrived, they discovered that the "important event" was a handful of Palestinian "activists" who wanted to burn posters of Trump in front of the cameras.

The "activists" waited patiently as the photojournalists and cameramen set up their equipment to get the "important event" on film. Shortly thereafter, the media was abuzz with reports about "angry Palestinian protesters taking to the streets to protest" Trump's intention to move the embassy to Jerusalem and his recognition of the city as the capital of Israel. The handful of Palestinians who were filmed burning the Trump pictures were made to look as if they were part of a mass protest sweeping Palestinian communities.

The incident represents yet another example of the collusion between the Palestinians and the media, whose representatives are always more than happy to serve as mouthpieces for the Palestinian propaganda machine and provide an open platform for broadcasting Palestinian threats against Israel and the US.

Had the photographers and cameramen not shown up to the erstwhile "spontaneous" poster-burning event, the Palestinian activists would have been forced to quietly slink back to one of Bethlehem's fine coffee shops.

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Bassam Tawil is a Muslim based in the Middle East.

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? Reform Movement Backs Palestinians against Israel on Jerusalem - by Evelyn Gordon

...Maybe to American Jewish ears, Jacobs’s statement sounds innocuous and reasonable; indeed, as a poll published in September showed, a whopping 80 percent of American Jews oppose moving the embassy right now. But effectively, what it means is that the Reform Movement–and 80 percent of American Jewry–has ceded sovereignty over Jerusalem to the Palestinians. They, and only they, have the right to decide if and when anyone else recognizes the city as Israel’s capital. Absent Palestinian consent, Israel isn’t entitled to have a recognized capital.

Evelyn Gordon..
Analysis from Israel..
06 December '17..
Link: http://evelyncgordon.com/reform-movement-backs-palestinians-against-israel-on-jerusalem/

That Arab and European leaders are protesting President Trump’s intent to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital is no surprise. Nor is it any surprise that groups like J Street and Jewish Voice for Peace joined them. I was, however, genuinely shocked that the leader of America’s largest Jewish denomination also joined the denunciations. Until recently, any mainstream American Jewish leader would have been embarrassed to oppose U.S. recognition of Jerusalem publicly.

And yet, it’s of a piece with recent decisions by non-Orthodox Hillel directors to bar mainstream Israelis from speaking on campus, and with the fact that Birthright Israel recently dropped the Union for Reform Judaism as a trip organizer because it was recruiting too few students. Taken together, all these facts paint a worrying picture.

I’ve always objected when I hear people on the right term the Reform Movement anti-Israel because of its stance on the peace process. After all, its views aren’t far from those of Israel’s mainstream center-left, and any mainstream view ought to be legitimate within the pro-Israel camp.

But in its opposition to recognizing Jerusalem, the URJ has zero support from Israel’s Zionist center-left. The chairman of the Labor Party, currently Israel’s largest opposition party, praised Trump’s expected decision. Yair Lapid, head of the other main opposition party (which is currently outpolling Labor), demanded that the rest of the world follow suit.

Indeed, only two Israeli parties shared the Reform Movement’s reservations: the Arab community’s Joint List and the far-left Meretz, which used to be a Zionist party but no longer is. Its platform doesn’t define it as Zionist, its official spokeswoman defines it as “a non-Zionist Israeli party,” and key backers of its current chairwoman are busy floating the idea of an official merger with the anti-Zionist Joint List. Thus, in opposing U.S. recognition of Jerusalem, the Reform Movement has aligned itself with the country’s anti-Zionists against the entire spectrum of Israeli Zionist opinion.

In his statement, URJ President Rick Jacobs insisted that the Reform Movement does consider Jerusalem to be Israel’s “eternal capital,” to which the U.S. Embassy should move someday. But the URJ “cannot support” Trump’s “decision to begin preparing that move now, absent a comprehensive plan for a peace process,” Jacobs said, as it objects to any “unilateral steps.” Other Reform Jewish organizations, including the Association of Reform Zionists of America, the Central Conference of American Rabbis and the Women’s Rabbinic Network, endorsed this statement.

Maybe to American Jewish ears, Jacobs’s statement sounds innocuous and reasonable; indeed, as a poll published in September showed, a whopping 80 percent of American Jews oppose moving the embassy right now. But effectively, what it means is that the Reform Movement–and 80 percent of American Jewry–has ceded sovereignty over Jerusalem to the Palestinians. They, and only they, have the right to decide if and when anyone else recognizes the city as Israel’s capital. Absent Palestinian consent, Israel isn’t entitled to have a recognized capital.

Pres. Trump Has a Capital Idea on Jerusalem - by Sohab Ahmari

...As for Palestinian groups’ threat of staging days of rage and rioting, that’s not so much an argument against Trump’s decision as it is a case study in why peace has remained elusive for so long.

Sohab Ahmari..
Commentary Mgazine..
06 December '17..
Link: https://www.commentarymagazine.com/foreign-policy/middle-east/israel/trump-has-capital-idea-jerusalem/

The journalistic class is apoplectic over President Trump’s decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. But conservatives, including those skeptical of this president, should add it to the list of Trump-administration foreign policies that deserve praise. The case for recognizing Jerusalem, and relocating the U.S. Embassy there, is formidable. Talk of the move throwing the region into chaos is overwrought and out of touch with Mideast reality.

For starters, moving the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem is in line with the democratic will of the American people. Congress in 1995 enacted a law requiring the State Department to make the relocation, but since then successive administrations of both parties have taken advantage of a waiver to delay it. The waiver process was written into the law. Even so, more than two decades of executive resistance amounts to defiance of Congress. Even die-hard Never Trumpers must admit: There is something refreshing about this administration’s willingness to carry out the law rather than sidestep it.

Yet professional peace-processors don’t care much for the foreign-policy preferences of the American people. They contend that Trump’s capital idea (pun intended) will scuttle any chances for a negotiated settlement to the seven-decade-long conflict. In this, they echo the Palestinian president-for-life, Mahmoud Abbas, who on Wednesday characterized the move as America’s “declaration of withdrawal” from the peace process.

Here’s the problem with this line of argument: What peace process?

Surprise! Europe Picks the Wrong Side. Again. - by Melanie Phillips

...The Europeans support the Palestinians and do not see the Iranian regime as their enemy – even though it has been in a state of self-declared war against the west since it came to power in 1979 and is the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism. Instead they are turning the Arab leader who is fighting their common enemy, and who may be prepared to make a historic peace with their ostensible ally, into a foe. Go figure.

Melanie Phillips..
melaniephillips.com..
05 December '17..

For years Israel has been blamed for standing in the way of peace with its Arab neighbours. When it rejected a “peace plan” by the the Saudi regime which would have brought about Israel’s destruction, it was excoriated for turning down a chance to end the Middle East conflict.

Now the new Saudi Crown Prince, Mohammed bin Salman, has proposed another peace plan. Unlike its predecessor, according to the New York Times, this one would enable the Palestinians and the Arab world to live in peace and harmony alongside the State of Israel. The century-old Arab war of extermination against Israel would end.

Prince Mohammed has told the Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas to accept this plan or he’s finished. The Palestinians have been screaming betrayal ever since to anyone who will listen.

Lo and behold, Europeans have a new bogeyman.

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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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Anti-Zionist Jews And Anti-Palestinian Arabs! - by Sheri Oz

...The anti-Palestinian does not seek to kill off all Arabs who identify as Palestinians. It just means that the individual does not believe in a sovereign Palestinian Arab state. The anti-Palestinian would like to see the Arab states take responsibility for the Arab refugees of 1948 in the same way Israel took care of the equal number of Jewish refugees from Arab countries, in addition to those from Europe who survived World War II. In other words, being anti-Palestinian is not being anti-Arab. In spite of this, I have not seen any anti-Palestinian Arabs, whether they are anti-Zionist or pro-Zionist. The anti-Zionist, however,...

Sheri Oz..
Israel Diaries..
06 December '17..

We know there are anti-Zionist Jews. Are there anti-Palestinian Arabs?

To be anti-Zionist means to believe that Israel has no right to exist; that Jews have no right to a sovereign state of their own. To be anti-Palestinian means to believe, not only that a state of Palestine never existed in the past, but that the Palestinian Arabs have no right to a sovereign state of their own today or in the future.

What is interesting is that one can be well aware that there was never a Palestinian “people” or state in the past, and yet believe that a Palestinian Arab “people” exists today, regardless of how it came into being, and that they deserve a sovereign state of their own. In contrast, one can believe/know that the Jewish People is an ancient people, that it lived on the land that is now the modern State of Israel plus Judea & Samaria, that Jerusalem was always its capital and, yet, that the Jewish People have no right to sovereignty in modern times over at least some of these lands.

This latter opinion is an expression of antisemitism, whether it is voiced as a vote for a one-state solution in which Arabs would be the majority or a two-state-solution within indefensible borders and a Jew-free Palestine.

We hear anti-Zionist sentiments expressed by many Jews, both those in Israel and those in the Diaspora. Until recently, however, we have not heard anti-Palestinian sentiments expressed by Arabs, whether they are Israeli Arabs or Palestinian Arabs living in either the Palestinian Authority (PA) or elsewhere;

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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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Hocus-pocus, suddenly, the Green Line has disappeared in Jerusalem - by Elder of Ziyon

...AFP adds its own lies in its backgrounder. It says garbage like " If the US unilaterally declares Jerusalem as Israel's capital, it would be seen as deciding an issue that was supposed to be left to negotiations, breaking with the international consensus." No one has ever suggested that pre-1967 Jerusalem was open to negotiations. Except for now.

Elder of Ziyon..
05 December '17..

Whenever Israel builds new houses or apartments in the parts of Jerusalem liberated in 1967, the world is up in arms about how Israel is building in "occupied territory."

Whatever happens in pre-1967 Jerusalem is OK - the problem, we are told, is only because Israel is building in neighborhoods that Jordan illegally occupied for a whopping 19 years.

But suddenly, when the US is poised to announce moving its embassy from Tel Aviv to the part of Jerusalem under Israeli sovereignty since 1948, the Green Line has mysteriously been erased.

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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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Israel As A Settler-Colonial Project: An Academic Make-Believe Story for the Gullible Scholar - by Sheri Oz

...It seems that, for many people, academics included, history only began with World War I as if previous non-Western colonialist enterprises, such as the huge Moslem invasion of North Africa (and southern Europe) had not happened, but that the Arabs had always been where they could be found at the end of that war.

Sheri Oz..
Israel Diaries..
04 December '17..

The paper I am looking at right now, written by the late Australian anthropologist Patrick Wolfe, was published in 2006 and has so far been cited in 1132 other articles. That is a very large number of citations. What this means is that at least 1132 scholars have seen fit to use this paper as a reference for their work, a paper that has served as a basis for calling Israel a settler-colonial project; four new papers citing Wolfe were published just in the past 10 days . Over 400 of those citing it used it in order to specifically promote lies about Israel, including academics writing about “Israeli settler-colonialism” while working at an Israeli university; I did not find even one article that contested the views about Israel presented in Wolfe’s paper. About 98 articles talked about Jews specifically and 154 about Zionists. Keep in mind that each of these articles citing Wolfe are, themselves, cited by other academics and so Wolfe’s influence can grow exponentially. My critique will not count as a citation because it is not published in an academic journal.

While the article includes references to a number of countries, let me show you what it says about Israel and why these are lies (I leave it to experts in other regions to critique what it says about them).

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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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Why does Europe continue to support Breaking the Silence’s demonization and smearing of Israel’s society? - by Daniel Laufer

...Breaking the Silence's anti-Israel track record would be worrying enough were it an actual grassroots part of Israeli society. But BtS’s foreign enablers, through the massive budget they provide, are ultimately responsible for the group’s international delegitimization of Israel and her people. These European funders need to consider why they are supporting such activities. They need to ask why there is such pushback from the Israeli public. And they need to decide whether their interest is to engage with that Israeli public, or whether they will continue to support BtS’s demonization and smearing of Israel’s society.

Daniel Laufer..
JNS.org..
04 December '17..

Last week, the Israeli State Attorney’s office closed its investigation into Breaking the Silence’s (BtS) spokesperson. The determination that the BtS official did not tell the truth mirrors the Israeli public’s rejection of the group’s radical anti-Israel agenda. While the NGO justifies the publication of anonymous and unverifiable allegations of wrongdoing by Israel’s soldiers in the name of “ending the occupation,” most Israelis see this campaign as an immoral attack on their entire society.

In fact, what the Israeli public thinks is not very important to BtS, which instead focuses its efforts on influential foreign audiences. This focus is not surprising considering that more than two-thirds of BtS funding comes from abroad, much of it from European governments. Continued funding is a sore issue among Israelis and was in part responsible for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s refusal to meet with Germany’s foreign minister earlier this year. Whether the latest blow to the group’s credibility will convince these supporters to end their embrace remains to be seen.

The case stems from claims by the BtS spokesperson that he physically beat a restrained Palestinian during the course of his military service, and the demand that police investigate such alleged violations of military ethics. If he was tried and found guilty of having committed a crime, BtS could claim that its anonymous testimonies against the Israeli military are not simply political props.

But the spokesperson’s fellow soldiers, in whose presence he said the incident occurred, have publicly refuted the story. A five-month-long investigation came to similar conclusions, as the state attorney’s office announced, declaring that “from the evidence collected, the events described by him did not happen whatsoever.”

This is only the latest instance of BtS spreading disturbing claims.

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Daniel Laufer is the international spokesperson at NGO Monitor, an independent research institute that provides information and analysis, promotes accountability, and supports discussion on the reports and activities of NGOs claiming to advance human rights and humanitarian agendas.

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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BBC continues to promote a political narrative on Jerusalem - by Hadar Sela

...Throughout the past year the BBC has repeatedly provided amplification for unchallenged PLO messaging to the effect that the opening of a US embassy in Jerusalem would bring an end to the chances of a solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and spark regional violence. If the US administration does make a statement concerning Jerusalem later this week, BBC audiences will be badly placed to understand the background to that story due to having been consistently deprived of relevant context – as we once again see in this report.

Hadar Sela..
BBC Watch..
04 December '17..

An article published on the BBC News website on December 4th devoted over 40% of its word count to amplification of condemnation of a statement that has not yet been made.

Promoted on the website’s main home page as well as its ‘World’ and ‘Middle East’ pages under the title “Jordan warns US over Jerusalem issue”, the article itself ran with the headline “Jordan urges US not to recognise Jerusalem as Israel capital“.

Readers were informed that:

“Jordan’s foreign minister has warned the US of “dangerous consequences” if it recognises Jerusalem as the capital of Israel.

Ayman Safadi said he had told US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson such a declaration would trigger great anger in the Arab and Muslim world. […]

In a tweet, Mr Safadi said: “Spoke with #US Secretary of State Tillerson on dangerous consequences of recognising Jerusalem as capital of Israel. Such a decision would trigger anger across #Arab #Muslim worlds, fuel tension & jeopardise peace efforts.” […]

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas is trying to rally international support to persuade Mr Trump not to make the announcement.

His office said he made phone calls on Sunday to world leaders including French President Emmanuel Macron and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

He wanted to “explain the dangers of any decision to move the [US] embassy to Jerusalem or recognise (Jerusalem) as Israel’s capital”, Mr Abbas’s adviser Majdi al-Khalidi told the AFP news agency.

Palestinian leaders have previously warned the move would threaten a two-state solution.”

So what is the background to that furious rhetoric?

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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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Another case of Palestinian rejectionism that the world accepts as normal - by Elder of Ziyon

...Palestinian propaganda since 1967 has made the entire world believe the myth that these two issues are critical to a two-state solution, not proof that Palestinians aren't really interested in a two-state solution. Prince Salman is showing that the emperor has no clothes - and the entire world is saying that he is insane and Abbas is clothed in the finest of silks and gold-threaded fashion.

Elder of Ziyon..
04 December '17..

The New York Times has a bombshell report:

In a mysterious trip last month, Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, traveled to Saudi Arabia’s capital for consultations with the hard-charging crown prince about President Trump’s plans for Middle East peace. What was said when the doors were closed, however, has since roiled the region.

According to Palestinian, Arab and European officials who have heard Mr. Abbas’s version of the conversation, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman presented a plan that would be more tilted toward the Israelis than any ever embraced by the American government, one that presumably no Palestinian leader could ever accept.

The Palestinians would get a state of their own but only noncontiguous parts of the West Bank and only limited sovereignty over their own territory. The vast majority of Israeli settlements in the West Bank, which most of the world considers illegal, would remain. The Palestinians would not be given East Jerusalem as their capital and there would be no right of return for Palestinian refugees and their descendants.
... the prince had offered to sweeten the agreement with vastly increased financial support to the Palestinians.

The reaction to this plan by everyone is to reject it out of hand. The highlighted portion of the NYT article shows that even the reporters cannot help but to say that the plan is unworkable - consciously taking as a given that the Palestinian demands for Jerusalem as their capital and ceding large areas where Jews already live as well as giving up on the nonexistent "right of return" are non-negotiable.

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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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Peace: What do Palestinian Arab insiders mean when they see it slipping away? - by Arnold Roth

...It's a shame this Koran-thumping, rabble-rousing man of extreme violence and major influence who explicitly wants to see more and more young Palestinian Arabs die in the service of the Abbas presidency isn't better known. Perhaps he will be now.

Arnold/Frimet Roth..
This Ongoing War..
04 December '17..

Our partners-in-peace, the Palestinian Authority and its president-for-life Mahmoud Abbas, are taking pains once again to lay out how peace is going to come about, and how not.

As reported earlier today ["Abbas aide: Jerusalem recognition will destroy peace", Israel National News, December 3, 2017], a senior adviser to Abbas, Mahmoud Al-Habbash, evidently reacted yesterday to news reports that US President Donald Trump is likely to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital as soon as Wednesday. Here are his views:

“Any American declaration of recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel – if there is one – would mean total destruction of the peace process," said Al-Habbash, who was quoted in Israeli media. “The whole world will pay a price for any change or harm to the political reality of Jerusalem,” he warned. The Yediot Aharonot newspaper noted that Al-Habbash made the comments with Abbas standing at his side, meaning that Abbas fully backed the remarks. “The Arab states stand by us, especially Saudi Arabia and Egypt, and the entire Arab-Islamic nation is united in one position,” Al-Habbash further claimed.

This Al-Habbash is no stranger to our blog even if his name is not so well recognized. He's the central player in "15-Jan-14: How jihadist messages heard in the Palestinian Arab villages go unreported in the wider world", and "2-Jun-14: Palestinian government ministers and the political necessity of speaking out of both sides of the mouth depending on who's listening".

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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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How did the BBC depict a story about an attack on Bar Mitzva hikers?

... in just seventeen paragraphs the BBC managed to turn a story about a violent attack by Palestinians against children on a Bar Mitzva hike and the unfortunate ensuing death of a man when one of the accompanying adults had to use his firearm in self-defence, into a story about “settlements” and “settler violence”.

Hadar Sela..
BBC Watch..
03 December '17..

On the afternoon of November 30th the BBC News website published a report titled “Palestinian shot dead by Israeli settler in West Bank” on its Middle East page.

The incident that report purports to describe had taken place a few hours earlier when a group of 22 children and two adults on a Bar Mitzva hike in Samaria were attacked by a large group of Palestinians throwing rocks. Like the headline, the report’s opening paragraph ignored that relevant background.

“A Palestinian man has been shot and killed by an Israeli settler in the occupied West Bank, officials say.”

The report then went straight on to describe the event’s circumstances as being disputed.

“There are conflicting reports about the circumstances surrounding the incident near the village of Qusra.”

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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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Seven critical lessons of the 1947 Partition Plan - by Yoram Ettinger

...To paraphrase George Santayana, policy-makers and public opinion-molders, who sacrifice the lessons of the past on the altar of oversimplification and wishful-thinking, are doomed to repeat past mistakes and suffer their dire consequences.

Yoram Ettinger..
TheEttingerReport.com..
01 December '17..
Link: http://theettingerreport.com/Palestinian-Issue/Critical-lessons-of-the-1947-Partition-Plan.aspx

Past experience tends to repeat itself, creating the most glittering writing on the wall. However, too often it is overlooked by Western policy-makers, who frequently sacrifice long-term interests, strategic complexity and reality-based hope on the altar of short-term convenience, oversimplification and wishful-thinking.

The November 29, 1947 Partition Plan produced a series of long-term geo-strategic lessons – relevant to the 2017 national security of Israel and the US – which have been largely ignored, although they have recurred and have been reaffirmed, systematically, since 1947.

Lesson #1. The foundations of the special ties between the US and Israel were not laid down by policy-makers, but - since the 1620 “Mayflower - by the American people. In 1947, the State Department opposed, aggressively, the establishment of the Jewish State, but the US public overwhelmingly supported the Partition Plan, equally among Democrats and Republicans, college-educated and non-college-educated. According to the October, 1947 Gallup poll, support of the Partition Plan was 65%, 10%,  with 25% “no opinion.” Lowell Thomas, a US radio icon, told his listeners on May 14, 1948: “Today, as the Jewish State is established, Americans read through the Bible as a historical reference book.”

Lesson #2. The pugnacious rejection of the 1947 Partition Plan by the Arabs – including the Arabs west of the Jordan River – reflects the crux of the Arab-Israeli conflict, which has never been the Palestinian issue, Jewish settlements, the reunification of Jerusalem, or the size of the Jewish State. It has always been the existence of the “infidel” Jewish State in the Abode of Islam, a land which is, ostensibly, divinely-ordained only to “believers.”

According to the October 11, 1947 issue of the Egyptian daily, Akhbar al-Yom, the Arab League Secretary General, Azzam Pasha warned of “a war of extermination and momentous massacre, which will be spoken of like the Tartar Massacre, or the Crusader wars… to win the honor of martyrdom for the sake of Palestine… the shortest road to paradise….” In 2017, hate-education dominates the Palestinian curriculum, Friday sermons and public discourse.

Lesson #3. The secondary-to-marginal role played by the Palestinian issue in shaping Arab policy has been demonstrated, repeatedly, since 1947. While Arab leaders have talked passionately about their support of an Arab state west of the Jordan River, they have never walked the walk.

In 1947, and since then, none of the Arab countries have considered the Palestinian issue a primary concern. Therefore, upon the conclusion of the 1948-49 war, Egypt, Jordan and Syria, occupied Gaza, Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) and the Golan Heights’ al-Hama, but never considered transferring it to the Palestinians.

Furthermore, in 1949, the Arab League established the Palestinian Desk, which was summarily abolished in 1951-52. None of the ensuing Arab wars against Israeli was launched on behalf of the Palestinians. Also, the Arabs have never intervened, militarily, in any of the Israel-Palestinian conflicts.

Understanding Jordan's ruler King Abdullah II and his "holistic" approach to terror - by Arnold Roth

...And what does the Royal Hashemite Palace and its central personage say to all this? Nothing, and nor can we expect them to for so long as he and they continue to be absurdly feted as central players in their "holistic" struggle to defeat the terrorists. Just so long as they're not Jordanian terrorists.

Arnold/Frimet Roth..
This Ongoing War..
03 December '17..

Regular readers know we pay more than the usual amount of attention to the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. It's where our daughter Malki's murderer lives free as a bird.

And even though

- she has boasted over and again for the cameras and the media of her central role in the 2001 bombing attack on the people inside Jerusalem's Sbarro pizzeria; and

- she confessed in an Israeli court in 2003 to the calculated murder of 15 innocent victims, most of them children, and to having done this on behalf of the Islamist terror regime, Hamas, whose first-ever female terror agent she is reputed to be; and

- the US government, the US Department of Justice and the FBI want her arrested and extradited to face Federal charges in a Washington court

Jordan's ruler King Abdullah II, aware of her celebrity status among his people, has stubbornly presided over a series of measures whose effect is to spit in the eye of the Americans, to deny the validity of the 1995 Jordan/US Extradition Treaty and to ensure one of his kingdom's - and the Arab world's - most admired females remains free to pursue her career of incitement to terrorism, Islamist values and the murder of Jewish children.

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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 cynical Palestinian lighting of a Christmas tree in a city that Christians are fleeing - by Elder of Ziyon

...The tree lighting isn't to remind people of peace on earth and goodwill towards men. it is meant to bash Israel, the only nation in the region that Christians aren't fleeing.

Elder of Ziyon..
02 December '17..

Today was the annual Palestinian Christmas tree lighting ceremony, with plenty of prominent Palestinians attending.

This is always a cynical exercise. As happens every year, it is a ceremony meant to back Israel, and to pretend that Christians are equal to Muslims under Palestinian Arab rule.

The facts are that Bethlehem was a majority Christian city until it was under Palestinian rule, and Christians have been fleeing Bethlehem for years as Muslims harass and intimidate and force them out.

But PA prime minister Rami al Hamdallah said at the ceremony, "Despite the settlement activities carried out by Israel, the Palestinian people still believe in the culture of coexistence, brotherhood and peace that our Lord Jesus Christ has brought to them...

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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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Proudly Singing Fidai and Waving PLO Flag on the Tel Aviv University Campus - by Sheri Oz

...If we allow haters to be in our face, they get more boldly in our faces. What will it take for us to regain our self-respect?

Sheri Oz..
Israel Diaries..
02 December '17..

Where is our self-respect?

A Druze student stands up for Israel at Tel Aviv University. Here is what he writes to “The Shadow” on Facebook:

and in English this is:

Hello Shadow, I am a Druze student at Tel Aviv University and I am sick of the contempt that goes on there . . . yesterday, to an activity for Arab students under the auspices of the Hadash Party, they brought in a Christian Arab singer, an antisemite from Nazareth, Dalal Abu Amneh, who sang the “Palestinian” anthem . . . and the entire audience and the lecturers stood and even waved the PLO flag and the truth is, as a Druze student there, I am enraged at all the contempt that goes on there . . . someone needs to wake up before it is too late. .

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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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Anniversary coverage of the Partition Plan? Not from the BBC. - by Hadar Sela

...While the BBC consistently and frequently tells its audiences that the two-state solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict is jeopardised by the existence of certain neighbourhoods in Jerusalem and Israeli towns and villages in Judea & Samaria, the fact that just such a solution was unilaterally rejected by the Arabs seventy years ago – long before most of the communities the BBC terms ‘settlements’ existed – obviously does not fit in with the corporation’s chosen narrative.

Hadar Sela..
BBC Watch..
01 December '17..

In stark contrast to its remarkably generous – and one-sided – coverage of the Balfour Declaration centenary earlier this month, the BBC did not produce any content whatsoever concerning the November 29th seventieth anniversary of UN General Assembly Resolution 181 – known as the Partition Plan – which called for the creation of a Jewish state alongside an Arab state.

Readers may recall that the BBC has had difficulty presenting that topic accurately to its audiences in the past.

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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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What was the crime? Walking while Jewish? - by Stephen M. Flatow

...In recent days, Rabbi Rick Jacobs, president of the Union for Reform Judaism, and some other prominent American Jews have denounced Israel’s deputy foreign minister, Tzipi Hotovely. They said they were “insulted” because she pointed out that Jews in the U.S. do not face the same kind of dangers that Israeli Jews face. The attempt to stone Jewish children to death in the Shomron on Thursday shows how right she was. 

Stephen M. Flatow..
JNS.org..
30 November '17..

Back in the 1990s, civil rights activists coined the term “DWB” (driving while black) to highlight the frequency of incidents in which African-American motorists were stopped by the police without just cause. It was as if the drivers were considered guilty of something simply because they were black.

In the wake of Thursday’s mob attack in Israel, it’s time to coin a new term: “WWJ,” walking while Jewish.

Two parents and a group of young Jewish children set out on a hike in the Shomron (Samaria) region, as part of a bar mitzvah celebration. The hike was coordinated in advance with the Israeli army, which gave its approval. Each of the parents carried a weapon, at the army’s request.

They didn’t hike through any Arab villages. They didn’t create a settlement. They didn’t bother anybody, violate any law or do anything wrong. Their only “crime” was that they were walking while Jewish.

Some Palestinian Arabs spotted the children. Keep in mind that these are Palestinians who have been educated in Palestinian schools.

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Stephen M. Flatow, a vice president of the Religious Zionists of America, is an attorney in New Jersey. He is the father of Alisa Flatow, who was murdered in an Iranian-sponsored Palestinian terrorist attack in 1995.

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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Favorable American Moves Shouldn't Change Israel's Red Lines - by Dr. Aaron Lerner

...We are here for the long haul. We simply cannot afford to fritter away our assets no matter how friendly or supportive an acting president may be.

Dr. Aaron Lerner..
IMRA Weekly Commentary..
30 November '17..
Link: http://www.imra.org.il/story.php3?id=72915

If President Trump were to honor his campaign promise and move the American embassy to Jerusalem it would be the right thing to do. But it wouldn't change the fundamentals on what should and should not be acceptable for Israel in a "deal" with the Palestinians.

It would not even change the fundamentals on what concessions of a permanent nature Israel should and should not make to the Palestinians prior to such a "deal".

And for good reason.

Whether the American embassy is in Jerusalem or Tel Aviv the fundamental problems with having a sovereign Palestinian state remain just that: fundamental.

A sovereign Palestinian state remains a sovereign state even if it openly declares the agreements that they signed as part of the package that facilitated its creation null and void.