Dance Under Fire: The rhythms of life on the Israeli side of Gaza border - by David E. Kaplan

...While dance instructors anywhere else in the world might be concerned over issues of students facing personal problems or being ill, Dror is anxious: “Will we be able to rehearse? Will we get to finish that rehearsal or will the rocket sirens go off? After all, it’s my responsibility to put on a show even under rocket fire.”

David E. Kaplan..
Lay of the Land..
23 October '19..

A planned dance performance on the Gazan border reminds me of the Gulf War of 1991 when Iraq were raining Scud missiles down on Israel and maestro Zubin Mehta raced back from New York to conduct concerts. “I had many obligations in New York that should have prevented me from coming, but I couldn’t imagine not being here,” he said at the time, while he was director of the New York Philharmonic. He conducted full-house concerts keeping his gas mask nearly as close to him as his baton, “just in case!”

“Can you imagine,” he told this writer in an exclusive interview on the occasion of his 80th birthday in 2016 in Tel Aviv, “Scuds where dropping out of the sky, possibly with chemicals but this did not deter Israelis from wanting to hear classical music.”

It sent a powerful and poignant message not to the likes of Saddam Hussein – a waste of time – but to the people of Israel who were asserting, despite the dire situation, their grit and love of culture.

Fast forward to the present and again that characteristic is being expressed by Liat Dror‘s Sderot-based dance company which is staging a performance on the Gazan border to express “our humanity” in the face of living under constant attack. “It’s my responsibility to put on a show even under rocket fire,” says a proud and defiant Liat, artistic director at the Sderot Adama Dance Company.

So, what is daily life like, living “Under Fire”?

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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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PM Netanyahu, Mandelblit, the media and the fate of Israeli democracy - by Caroline Glick

The Israeli establishment has long sought to destroy Netanyahu, the only political leader in Israeli history who was never a member of their club and never sought their approval. They haven’t been able to defeat him at the ballot box and now they have placed their hopes in the politicized state prosecution. If Mandelblit chooses to make their dream a reality, he will not merely get rid of Netanyahu. He will criminalize routine politics and so end Israeli democracy while replacing our political leaders with unelected prosecutors who have richly demonstrated their lack of objectivity and contempt for the public.

Caroline Glick..
Carolineglick.com..
20 October '19..
Link: http://carolineglick.com/netanyahu-the-media-and-the-fate-of-israeli-democracy/

The ongoing criminal probes against Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyhahu are reaching their climax. After conducting a marathon four-day pre-indictment hearing for Netanyahu earlier this month, Israel’s Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit reportedly intends to complete his review of the state prosecution’s cases and decide whether to indict Israel’s longest-serving prime minister by the end of next month. The main charges against Netanyahu relate to his associations with media owners.

For three years, illegal leaks from the investigations have dominated the news. The key question – indeed, just about the only question – that has been endlessly discussed is whether or not Mandelblit will end Netanyahu’s political career by indicting him on corruption charges.

The importance of this question is self-evident. On the one hand we have a democratically elected leader. On the other hand, we have unelected state prosecutors who wish to oust him from power by indicting him.

For nearly a year, Israeli politics have been in a state of chaos because of the criminal probes. The probes played a central role in the April Knesset elections and arguably were the primary reason that Netanyahu failed to form a coalition despite his electoral victory. Today the probes and Mandelblit’s deliberations are the primary reason that no one can form a government in the wake of last month’s repeat elections. If Israel holds a third election in the coming months, the probes will again be the central issue determining both the result and the ability of whoever wins to form a government. The center-left Blue and White party is using the probes as an excuse to refuse to join a coalition government with Netanyahu.

While the probes’ impact on Netanyahu’s political future is a key question, and on the composition of the next government is certainly a big deal, neither of these issues is the central matter than hangs in the balance as Mandelblit holds his deliberations.

If Israel’s Attorney General relies on these probes as a means to end Netanyahu’s career, he will do far more than overthrow a political leader. He will embrace a legal doctrine that rejects the very essence of democracy.

Excellent Question. Does Angela Merkel Deserve a Prize for Zionism? - by Soeren Kern

"Why is Merkel being awarded the Theodor Herzl Award? Because her representative at the United Nations abstains in anti-Israel resolutions — and thereby de facto supports them? The same official who equates Hamas rocket attacks on Israeli civilians with Israel's demolition of the homes of Palestinian terrorists? For not relocating the German embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, as the United States did, and also warning other countries against taking such a step? For all this, she gets the Theodor Herzl Award?" — Henryk Broder, German Political Commentator, Die Achse des Guten.

Soeren Kern..
Gatestone Institute..
19 October '19..

A decision by the World Jewish Congress (WJC) to honor German Chancellor Angela Merkel with its prestigious Theodor Herzl Award for Zionism has sparked anger and bewilderment among Jewish leaders in the United States and Europe.

The WJC, founded in August 1936 in Geneva, Switzerland, to confront the rise of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi persecution of Jews in Europe, bestows its annual award to individuals who act to promote the goals of the late Theodor Herzl, the founder of the modern Zionist movement, "for the creation of a safer and more tolerant world for Jews."

Critics say that Merkel, because her domestic and foreign policies have in recent years made the world less safe for Jews, is uniquely undeserving of the award. These policies include:

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From Arafat to Abbas: Lubing the Palestinian Authority donor machine - by David Bedein

Western donor humanitarian funds have one purpose: to act as a political resource for Abbas and his supporters. The notion that humanitarian aid to the P.A. reaches the Palestinian Arab people has no basis in reality.

David Bedein..
JNS.org..
17 October '19..

When it comes to humanitarian aid to the Palestinian Authority, transparency does not exist.

The result has become a wealthy Palestinian elite that builds exclusive neighborhoods around Ramallah, leaving thousands of shoddily constructed apartments without services for the rest of Palestinian society.

Yasser Arafat set the tone for the P.A. when he arrived in Gaza in 1994. Arafat took control of every contract and investment, using donor money to build a secret $1 billion portfolio, including investments in Coca-Cola, a Tunisian cellular phone company and venture-capital funds in the United States and the Cayman Islands.

Arafat stole $1 billion in tax revenue relayed by Israel for Palestinian workers. The money went to Arafat’s personal account in Israel’s Bank Leumi in Tel Aviv. And a whopping $100,000 a month went to his wife, Suha, living in Paris. Arafat was estimated by U.S. investigators to be worth between $1 billion and $3 billion.


Within three years of the P.A.’s establishment, Palestinian auditors found that 40 percent of the P.A. budget ($326 million) was misappropriated—a figure that rose to $700 million a decade later.

Not one Western government objected. This set the tone for theft at all levels in the P.A.; officials paid themselves high salaries and skimmed from others.

Enter Mahmoud Abbas

Under Arafat’s successor, Mahmoud Abbas, nepotism reached every level of civil service.

(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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President Trump’s Mideast moves show why Israeli deterrence is crucial - by Evelyn Gordon

...Despite Iran’s willingness to engage in military provocations, it has shown no desire to risk serious military consequences on Iranian soil. Indeed, it has escalated very carefully, moving up to each new level only after concluding—based on the non-response to previous attacks—that it could do so safely. And so far, it’s been right: Even the attack on the Saudi refineries, its worst to date, drew no military response from Riyadh or Washington. But years of Israeli airstrikes against Iranian and Iranian-affiliated targets have proven that the Jewish state won’t let Iranian aggression go unanswered, and any Iranian escalation will be met commensurately.

Evelyn Gordon..
JNS.org..
16 October '19..

U.S. President Donald Trump’s latest Mideast decisions cast Israeli airstrikes in Syria and (reportedly) Iraq in a different light. Previously, these airstrikes seemed to be aimed solely at preventing Iran from establishing military infrastructure in both countries that could threaten Israel. But it now turns out they were also sending an important deterrent message: If Tehran attacks Israel, Jerusalem will have no qualms about striking back.

The conventional wisdom has been that even if these airstrikes were necessary for Israel’s defense, they posed a real risk of escalation. And obviously, that remains a possibility.

But given Trump’s latest moves, they may actually be making war less likely by letting Tehran know that Jerusalem—unlike, say, Saudi Arabia—won’t sit with folded hands if it suffers a significant Iranian attack like last month’s strike on Saudi oil facilities. The realization that Israel has both the ability and the will to hit back hard might well deter Iran from launching such a strike, even though it now knows that it wouldn’t be risking an American response.

For this reason, much of the rhetoric about how Trump’s recent decisions will affect Israel is overblown, even though the decisions themselves are unequivocally horrible. Strategically, the U.S. withdrawal from northern Syria abandons that area to very bad actors (Turkey and/or Iran). It’s also a moral atrocity, as it abandons the Kurds to Turkey’s tender mercies despite their having been America’s most loyal and effective partner against the Islamic State. And it signals the world that Washington won’t protect its allies, thereby reducing the incentive to be an American ally. Trump’s inaction after Iran destroyed half of Saudi Arabia’s oil processing capacity sent a similar message.

(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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Actually, the Guardian buries real cause of peace process failure - by Adam Levick

...as we’ve demonstrated continually, one of the leading factors behind the Guardian’s institutional pro-Palestinian bias is their refusal to take Palestinians seriously as agents of their own fate – a failure to grant Palestinians agency which invariably leads to a mono-causal, Israeli focused explanation that’s fundamentally ahistorical, thus grossly misleading readers on the root cause of the conflict.

Adam Levick..
UK Media Watch..
15 October '19..





The narrative that the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin by extremist Yigal Amir killed the Israeli-Palestinian peace process is advanced in the headline of an Oct. 11th Guardian review of a new Israeli film on the 1995 tragedy:

It’s also included in the opening paragraph of the review, written by Anne Joseph:

The murder of an Israeli prime minister by an Orthodox Jew was inconceivable,” says American-Israeli film-maker Yaron Zilberman. “For anyone who was pro-peace, it was beyond anything that we could fathom.” The assassination of Yitzhak Rabin by the religious ultra-nationalist law student Yigal Amir, at a peace rally on 4 November 1995, was one of the most traumatic events in Israel’s history. Rabin’s death buried the prospect of peace, further divided an already riven society and left an indelible mark on Israel’s politics.

The Guardian claim doesn’t hold up to scrutiny.

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The Hebron Riots of 1929: Consequences and Lessons - CAMERA Op-Ed

...The commission noted that Arab objections to Zionism were ideological, comprehensive, intense, and inflexible. In its report, it nonetheless devoted thousands of words to minute details of specific Arab grievances. It plumbed complaints that Jews, on one occasion, brought a chair to Jerusalem’s Western Wall and, on another, set up a screen there to divide male and female worshipers.

Sean Durns..
CAMERA..
15 October '19..

In 1929, Arab clerics and politicians provoked riots across Palestine by accusing Jews of plotting to take control of Jerusalem’s al-Aqsa Mosque. This month marks the 90th anniversary of those riots — but they are not a bygone. Palestinian Authority and Hamas leaders incite violence today using similar falsehoods and ideology.

The 1929 riots destroyed the Jewish community in Hebron. They persuaded Labor Zionist leader David Ben-Gurion that socialist fraternity among Jewish and Arab workers and peasants would not ensure peace. They impelled Palestine’s Jews to bolster the Haganah, their underground self-defense group. And they vindicated Zionist warnings against relying on foreigners for security.

To investigate the riots, the British government, which controlled Palestine at the time, appointed an inquiry board known as the Shaw Commission.

The commission noted that Arab objections to Zionism were ideological, comprehensive, intense, and inflexible. In its report, it nonetheless devoted thousands of words to minute details of specific Arab grievances. It plumbed complaints that Jews, on one occasion, brought a chair to Jerusalem’s Western Wall and, on another, set up a screen there to divide male and female worshipers.

All this brings to mind the story of a man who thoroughly detests his wife but makes his case for divorce on the grounds that she doesn’t put the cap back on the toothpaste tube. Obviously, what he gripes about is not what accounts for his detestation. Confusion on this score was characteristic of Middle East policy officials in 1929, and it still is.

(Note: The rest of this Op-Ed, authored by Douglas J. Feith, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, and CAMERA Senior Research Analyst Sean Durns, can be read at National Review)

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? NY Times, B'Tselem misinform on "Palestinians' in Jordan Valley - by Gilead Ini

...Whatever the exact percentage of off-limits land in the Jordan Valley, it seems clear that the figure is significantly less than 85 percent. And it should be equally clear to the New York Times that it is extremely misleading to cast restrictions that apply to both Palestinians and Israels as affecting Palestinians, specifically.

Gilead Ini..
CAMERA..
08 October '19..

The New York Times misinformed readers in two recent stories about Palestinians in the Jordan Valley — and although the newspaper promises to correct mistakes big and small, it has yet to correct its errors.

Access to Jordan Valley Land


In the first story, a Sept. 10 piece by Ben Hubbard, the paper erred about Palestinian access to the Jordan Valley, a stretch of land parallel to the Jordan River that runs along the West Bank’s eastern border. Citing the Israeli advocacy group B’Tselem, Hubbard told readers Palestinians are “barred from entering or using about 85 percent” of the Jordan Valley where it passes through the West Bank.

The claim that Palestinians are only able to enter 15 percent of the territory, though, is false.
Depending on where exactly one draws the boundaries of the Jordan Valley — there’s no single, official delineation of the territory — between seven and thirteen percent of the region is designated as Area A or Area B — the names given to West Bank territory in which civilian matters are administered by the Palestinian Authority, in line with peace agreements signed by Israel and the Palestinians.

Israeli communities and their lands, which sit within Area C, the third and largest portion of the West Bank, take up another roughly eight to fifteen percent of the Jordan Valley. The New York Times itself has frequently documented that Palestinians can enter these settlements. Indeed, on the very day Ben Hubbard’s piece was published, a separate Times story noted that that nearly all the male population of Fasayil, a Palestinian village in the Jordan Valley, are employed in the neighboring settlement of Tomer. Even if these agricultural workers needed to obtain security clearances from Israeli authorities, their daily presence in Tomer — along with the tens of thousands of Palestinians who enter settlements across the West Bank every day for work or health care — shows that Palestinians are not “barred from entering” settlement lands.

Between Area A, Area B, and the settlements, then, roughly 15 to 28 percent of Jordan Valley land is accessible to, and accessed by, Palestinians.

So what of the remainder of Jordan Valley land — Area C territory that isn’t attached to settlements?

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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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Still harboring the Sbarro pizzeria bomber, Jordan's inscrutable US relationship - by Arnold Roth

Jordan continues, despite the outrageous finger-in-the-American-eye, to be treated by the United States as if nothing had happened. Our objections, as the parents of a child, a US citizen, murdered in the Sbarro massacre, are for all practical purposes ignored.The government-controlled Jordan Times has just produced the next chapter in this ongoing process of US self-debasement.

Arnold/Frimet Roth..
This Ongoing War..
08 October '19..

The Jordanian government harbors and safeguards within its borders the Sbarro pizzeria bomber, Ahlam Tamimi, a Hamas jihad agent. It has been doing this since at least March 2017, days after the US Department of Justice unveiled terrorism charges against her and announced that it had called on Jordan to extradite her under their 1995 treaty.

Since then, and despite repeated efforts by us - Frimet and Arnold Roth whose daughter Malki was murdered in the terror attack masterminded by Tamimi - the US government has not once stated publicly in any form or any language that it views Jordan's unstated failure to extradite as being in clear breach of the 1995 Extradition Treaty signed by the two countries.

From US law enforcement services, we have learned that they are ready to take Tamimi into custody. The problem is Jordan won't allow it.

We have written polite and carefully drafted letters to a variety of senior officials in the Department of Justice, to officials in the State Department, to the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, to a variety of US diplomats posted in the Middle East. Not one of these has produced a satisfactory response, no matter how generously "satisfactory" is defined.

Jordan continues, despite the outrageous finger-in-the-American-eye, to be treated by the United States as if nothing had happened. Our objections, as the parents of a child, a US citizen, murdered in the Sbarro massacre, are for all practical purposes ignored.

The government-controlled Jordan Times has just produced the next chapter in this ongoing process of US self-debasement.

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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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Is there some lack of clarity that a state that threatens Jewish genocide isn’t normal? - by Jonathan S. Tobin

Iran isn’t a normal country, and neither Europe nor America’s opposition party should speak as if it were.

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

Gen. Hossein Salami, the commander-in-chief of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, gave a speech last month in which he celebrated Iran’s military might and its goals. As is Tehran’s policy, the IRGC commander refused to use the word “Israel,” but had plenty to say about the Jewish state. According to the state-controlled IRNA news agency, Salami said that 40 years after the Iranian revolution that put the Islamist regime in power, it had “managed to obtain the capacity to destroy the imposter Zionist regime.” And lest anyone think that the amassing of military might was purely defensive in nature, Salami also maintained that, “That sinister regime must be wiped off the map” and this is no longer … a dream.” It was, he boasted, “an achievable goal.”

Salami isn’t the first Iranian leader to make such threats. They have been a staple of Iranian political rhetoric for decades, including from the country’s top ayatollahs who run that theocracy. But the fact that the IRGC—the terrorist group that runs Iran’s international terrorist network, as well as the entity that exercises a great deal of influence over its economy through the companies it owns—is still spouting talk about wiping out the sole Jewish state on the planet does raise some interesting and painfully obvious questions to which there are no good answers.

The first concerns the unwillingness of Iran’s European trading partners to confront the fact that they are still seeking to cultivate good relations with an Iranian regime that embraces genocide of Jews as a legitimate policy goal.

(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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There Should Be No Surprise in What Iran's Friends Are Doing in Gaza - by Khaled Abu Toameh

In other words, Islamic Jihad's promise is one of unending toxicity: to go on poisoning the hearts and minds of generation after generation of Palestinians – as well as to continue investing millions of dollars in building tunnels and amassing weapons to ensure that the fight against Israel continues forever.

Khaled Abu Toameh..
Gatestone Institute..
07 October '19..

As Egypt, Qatar and the United Nations pursue their efforts to spare the two million Palestinians in the Gaza Strip another war with Israel, the Islamic Jihad organization is promising its people more suffering, violence and bloodshed. The terrorist organization is also promising to continue the fight until it achieves its goal of annihilating Israel.

The Iranian-funded Islamic Jihad's latest pledges came as the organization, the second largest group in the Gaza Strip after Hamas, celebrated this week the 32nd anniversary of its founding.

Tens of thousands of Palestinians participated in a major Islamic Jihad rally in Gaza City under the banner "Our Jihad [holy war] – The Promise Will Soon Be Fulfilled." The promise, of course, refers to Islamic Jihad's pledge to "liberate Palestine, from the [Mediterranean] Sea to the [Jordan] River – a well-known euphemism for the destruction of Israel.

Particularly disturbing is that a large number of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, an enclave often described as suffering from a high percentage of poverty and unemployment, continue to support Islamic Jihad, one of the organizations there that has done nothing to improve the living conditions of its people. Their hatred for Israel seems to be stronger than any wish to better their situation by revolting against failed Palestinian leaders and groups.

Islamic Jihad has, since its establishment, brought on Palestinians in the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip nothing but misery, destruction and death.

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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 European Union's Hypocritical, Patronizing Attitude Towards Israel - by Amb. Alan Baker

The fact that the Palestinian leadership proudly pays salaries to terrorists (and their families) who have killed Israelis – in clear violation of Palestinian obligations in the Oslo Accords, as well as in other international counter-terrorism conventions and resolutions – does not appear to concern the EU representative to the peace process.

Amb. Alan Baker..
JPost/Opinion..
03 October '19..
Link: https://www.jpost.com/Opinion/The-EUs-hypocritical-patronizing-attitude-toward-Israel-603650

The curious article in The Jerusalem Post (“Peace needs international law and political will,” September 21), by European Union Special Representative for the Middle East Peace Process Susanna Terstal, is indicative of a serious and worrying lack of awareness as well as considerable possible ignorance by the EU as to the legal and political realities inherent in the peace process.

The EU representative evidently believes that incessant repetition of the phrase “two-state solution” adds some element of legitimacy and feasibility to the idea. But the two-state solution has never been agreed-upon between Israel and the Palestinians, and does not figure in any of the agreements between them. It is nothing more than an expression of wishful thinking within the UN and the EU.

To the contrary, the Oslo Accords, to which the EU itself is a signatory, clearly leaves the issue of the permanent status of the territories to be decided in negotiations. The accords do not predetermine the outcome of the negotiations. Thus, whether the outcome will be one, two or three states, or a federation or confederation, remains on the negotiating table. This cannot be dictated by the EU, however much they might be enamored with the idea of a two-state solution.

By incessantly plying a two-state solution, the EU is in fact prejudging an agreed negotiating issue and going against its own responsibilities as a signatory to the Oslo Accords.

In referring to electioneering suggestions by Israeli leaders to “apply sovereignty,” the EU representatives complain that unilateral modification of the Oslo Accords “undermines the entire agreement” and “dismantles Oslo.”

One wonders why the EU did not view the recent declarations by the Palestinian leadership canceling the territorial division between areas A, B and C in a similar light. Did this not undermine the accords?

Similarly, where was the EU when the Palestinian foreign minister formally declared in Japan that the Palestinians had no intention of returning to negotiations with Israel?

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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(Excellent) PM Netanyahu’s fate and the future of Israeli democracy - by Jonathan S. Tobin

The flimsy corruption charges he’s facing are creating a precedent that is a greater threat to the rule of law and the future of Israel than anything he’s charged with doing.

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

This week a legal proceeding is taking place that may have as much if not more to do with the future of Israel’s government as the stalemated negotiations to form a new governing coalition. Lawyers representing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are presenting evidence to Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit in four days of hearings that are his last chance to stop indictments on corruption charges. The prime minister’s attorneys say they are presenting new evidence. Yet the expectation is that Mandelblit, who has already signaled his willingness to formally charge Netanyahu on three separate cases of alleged wrongdoing, is just going through the motions and will, in due course, decide that the prime minister will be put on trial and face jail time if convicted.

The unseemly spectacle of a prime minister called on the carpet in this fashion has been widely depicted as being more about preventing Israeli democracy from being subverted by a criminal would-be tyrant as it is about Netanyahu’s fight for his freedom. However, even those who disagree strongly with the prime minister’s policies should be opposed to the manner in which he may be taken down. Far from being a defense of Israeli democracy, the effort to destroy him via the legal system is actually a greater threat to the future of the Jewish state than anything the prime minister has allegedly done.

(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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The toxicity of Palestinian solidarity – the obsessive stepping stone to antisemitism - by David Collier

Palestinian solidarity has created a travesty. Not only does picking up a Palestinian flag require you to support a fictitious narrative. It means you adopt toxic beliefs and it holds everyone hostage – even the Palestinians.

David Collier..
Beyond the Great Divide..
02 October '19..

What is Palestinian solidarity? Last week, I sat and witnessed a mainstream political party in the UK deliberately spit in the face of the Jewish community. The problem of growing antisemitism extends far beyond the shores of the UK and recently inside the US Democratic Party, we have seen a similar struggle *begin* to surface. So is Palestinian solidarity related to rising antisemitism, where does this animosity come from – and how is it being allowed to successfully propagate?

If this were simply swastika wearing Jew hatred resurfacing, you would hope it would be easily identified. Which tends to suggest that it isn’t – or if it is – then at the very least much of it is well disguised.

Layers and institutions


There are several layers to the problem of rising antisemitism and the ‘obsession’ that was frequently referenced during the Labour Party conference is only one of those layers. Half a million people die in conflict each year – another half a million through interpersonal violence. There is climate and conflict induced famine, and whole regions that experience horrific abuse of women and minority groups. The world is home to rampant sex, child and people trafficking. Nobody can even tell you the level of modern slavery because there isn’t enough money or political will to deal with the problem. Yet the democratic state of Israel is always the first item on the agenda.

That obsession is institutionally racist against Jews. It does not matter what the excuses are, just as it did not matter what the Met Police used as an excuse for the disproportionate attention towards ‘non-whites’. Nor its dismissal of the relevant community concerns. The Palestine obsession, partially driven by circumstance and partially by people who hate Jews, combines to create an institutionally racist environment.

If you or your organisation are not willing to address the Apartheid system in Mecca, Christian persecution in Pakistan or the abuse of women throughout Asia and Africa – because you cannot raise a consensus or do not want to alienate those sitting around your table – then opting to pick on Israel becomes the institutionally racist choice. It explains the Labour Party obsession and the growing problem in the United States – as well as the fixation on Israel by the UN, Amnesty International and far beyond. Continually picking on just one tiny group of people and ignoring all the real human rights abusers in the world is not just hypocrisy – it is racism.

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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? Palestinians Steal Electricity, Then Blame Israel - by Bassam Tawil

The controversy surrounding the unpaid electricity debts is yet another example of the Palestinians' unceasing search for ways to blame Israel for self-inflicted miseries. Instead of assuming responsibility for the electricity theft and unpaid bills and taking punitive measures against the offenders, the Palestinians are doing what they do best: trying their utmost to convince the world that it is all Israel's fault.

Bassam Tawil..
Gatestone Institute..
01 October '19..

For a long time now, many Palestinians have refused to pay their bills to the Arab-owned Jerusalem District Electricity Company (JDEC).

Many other Palestinians, taking a more direct line of theft, have been stealing electrical power from their company, a crime punishable by fines and/or incarceration in any country that respects law and order. The thieves do so by directly hooking to the power line ("cable hooking") or tampering with electric meters.

The JDEC purchases electricity from the Israel Electric Corporation (IEC), the largest supplier of electrical power in Israel. However, because of the electricity theft and widespread non-payment of electrical bills, the JDEC has not been able to pay its debts to the Israeli supplier, IEC.

On September 22, the IEC announced that it has begun cutting power supply to some Palestinian villages and cities in the West Bank to put pressure on the Palestinians to pay their debt of 1.7 billion shekels (about $483 million). The IEC has been trying for years to collect the debt, which over the years has continued to grow. While there has been sporadic payment of some of this debt, the Palestinian Authority (PA) has not forwarded any money to the Israeli company since January 2019, when Israel cut by about half the money it transfers to the Palestinians because of the salaries the PA pays to families of terrorists.

While the Palestinians openly admit that their company loses millions of dollars each year because of the non-payment and electricity theft, they are at the same time claiming to the world that Israel is imposing "collective punishment" on them by cutting the power supply. The Palestinians, in short, are asking the international community to condemn Israel for daring to demand that they pay their debts for the electricity they purchase from the IEC.

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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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Jordan's King Abdullah says that no crisis has done more global damage than "Palestinian-Israeli conflict" - by Elder of Ziyon

Israel has done far more to save and preserve Muslim history in Jerusalem than King Hussein ever did. The difference is that Israel also preserves Jewish history, and King Hussein and his father before him did everything they could to erase that. The hypocrisy is off the charts. And this is the "moderate" Jordan, with a king who seems cool and modern with excellent English.

Elder of Ziyon..
27 September '19..

Jordan's King Abdullah, in his speech to the UN, said literally nothing about Jordan.

Most of his speech was to support "Palestine" and to insult Israel.

But this section was so over the top as to sound like a parody:

My friends,
Collective action is also vital for ending bitter crises and conflicts. And no crisis has done more global damage than the core conflict in my region, the Palestinian-Israeli conflict

Global damage?

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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? Denying Jerusalem's Jewish History Despite Archaeological Evidence - by Lawrence A. Franklin

"Rewriting the history of the Land of Israel in order to deny Israel's right to exist is central to Palestinian Authority (PA) policy. Long before it started the PA terror campaign (the 'Intifada,' 2000-2005), the PA was fighting a history war – erasing Jewish history and replacing it with a fabricated Palestinian history."

Lawrence A. Franklin..
Gatestone Institute..
26 September '19..

The City of David Foundation recently delivered a major blow to the Arab effort to erase Judaism's 3,000-year ties to Jerusalem. On September 9, the foundation's leading archaeologist, Eli Shukron, announced the discovery of a 2,600-year-old royal seal, found near the Western Wall in the Old City of Jerusalem, which bears the name (in Hebrew) of Adenyahu, a son of King David mentioned in the biblical Book of Kings.

As has been true with previous archaeological discoveries in Israel, however, this one is unlikely to put a dent in the long-term international campaign to delegitimize the Jewish state by rewriting and distorting its history, even by renaming the Jewish sites Rachel's Tomb near Bethlehem to "Bilal ibn Rabah mosque" (it was never a mosque) and Hebron's Tomb of the Patriarchs the Ibrahimi Mosque.

This international campaign of delegitimization, moreover, far predates the establishment of the modern Jewish state.

The ancient Romans tried to strip the area of it Jewish identity to make it more Roman by renaming Judea "Syria Palaestina."

Later, Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan, the fifth caliph of the Umayyad dynasty of Syria -- who ruled during the late 7th century -- employed the tactic of delegitimizing both Judaism and Christianity by constructing the Dome of the Rock on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, atop the biblical spot where Abraham was prepared to sacrifice his son, Isaac -- also the site of the twice-destroyed Jewish Temples. The famous Western Wall, a retaining structure of the Temple Mount, is all that remains of their existence.

In contemporary times, a version of this tactic of revisionist history was attempted by the late PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat, who -- during the US-brokered Palestinian-Israeli peace talks at Camp David in 2000 -- tried to assert that the first and second Jewish temples were not erected in Jerusalem, but rather miles away in Nablus.

That episode followed a staggering report, three years earlier, by the Palestinian Ministry of Information, according to which no archaeological excavations in Jerusalem had supposedly ever unearthed Jewish artifacts.

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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 Hamas Leaders Continue Fooling Palestinians - by Bassam Tawil

The problem... is when your father is a senior terrorist leader who devotes himself to inciting against Israel and Jews and encouraging other young Palestinians to sacrifice their lives in the war against Israel. Hamad, like the rest of the Hamas leaders, would never send his own son to attack soldiers at the border with Israel.

Bassam Tawil..
Gatestone Institute..
25 September '19..

The leaders of Hamas, the Palestinian terror group ruling the Gaza Strip since 2007, seem to have hearts of stone regarding the suffering of the people living under their regime.

These leaders have no problem sending Palestinians to risk their lives near the border with Israel, while they and their families enjoy a comfortable life. More than 250 Palestinians have been killed and thousands injured in clashes with the Israel Defense Forces since the beginning of the Hamas-sponsored weekly protests near the Gaza-Israel border in March 2018.

While the protests are continuing and more Palestinians continue to put their lives at risk at the behest of the Hamas leadership, the terror group's senior officials are busy throwing lavish parties for their family members and upgrading their personal treasuries. It is as if the Hamas leaders were telling their people: Sacrifice yourself for the cause of destroying Israel and killing Jews so that we and our families can continue to live it up.

The latest example of this exploitation of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip surfaced in the form of a video of the birthday celebration of 20-year-old Mohammed, son of senior Hamas official Ghazi Hamad.

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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 do Israelis Near Gaza Cope With the Gaza Rocket Threat? - by Tracy Alexander

So, who are the people living on Israel’s most active military front; where ordinary life goes hand in hand with conditions unimaginable to those in the West? How do these residents contend with the reality of witnessing the carnage of the ongoing conflict up close?

Tracy Alexander..
Honest Reporting..
24 September '19..

Walking through the streets of any southern Israeli neighborhood, the untrained eye could be led to believe that life there is no different to any other city or community in the country. In fact, one might need to be alerted to the pieces of infrastructure unique to a region which, for almost two decades, has endured the threat of rockets being fired from Gaza, compelling residents to run for cover.

In Kibbutz Alumim, less than three kilometers from the coastal enclave, Israel’s well-known air defense system, the Iron Dome, can be seen sitting up on a hill pointing towards the sky, in full view, as residents mosey through their neighborhood.

Meantime, underground, Israel’s military is building a defensive wall against Hamas attack tunnels.

Life in the Sha’ar HaNegev region is anything but ordinary.

A thin barbed wire fence is all that blocks the view from Israel into Gaza, where now a thick cloud of smoke is all but permanent since those Great March of Return protests began in 2016.

One could mistakenly believe an Israeli child had neglected their kite in the garden, looking at it laying torn and deteriorating in a family’s back yard. In reality, this is the remnant of an arson device flown over the border fence into Israeli territory from Gaza.

While the first Palestinian rocket was fired from Gaza in 2001, the launches have increased after Israel withdrew from the Strip in 2005.

Since the disengagement, more than 13,000 rockets and mortars have been fired at Israel.

In the most intense barrage, Palestinians fired more than 600 rockets in one weekend in May 2019.

So, who are the people living on Israel’s most active military front; where ordinary life goes hand in hand with conditions unimaginable to those in the West?

How do these residents contend with the reality of witnessing the carnage of the ongoing conflict up close?

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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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