New York Times Grants Nobel Prize-in Waiting to Palestinian Arab Terrorist

Posted on February 29, 2016 by First.One.Through

There once was a journalist who won a Pulitzer Prize for reporting on terrorism. Thirteen years later, it would appear that he cannot find terrorism at all. Or worse. His paper endorses the terrorism itself.

Steven Erlanger has been a reporter for The New York Times for several decades. In 2002, he shared a Pulitzer Prize for his work reporting on the terrorist group al Qaeda. On February 28, 2016, he wrote an article that made a reader question whether he continued to have the faculties to recognize the nature of terror anymore.

In his article called “Talk Grows About Who Will Succeed Palestinians’ Fading Mahmoud Abbas,” Erlanger listed several potential candidates to succeed the inept current acting-President of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas. In addition to some leading candidates, Erlanger wrote:

“The other inescapable figure is Marwan Barghouti, 56, sometimes called the Palestinian Mandela for his long period in Israeli prison and his efforts to bring Hamas and Fatah together.”

No reasonable person calls Barghouti a Palestinian Mandela other than anti-Israel outfits like The Guardian in the United Kingdom. Will the Times also begin to refer to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as a “modern day Winston Churchill” like the National Review? I doubt it.

Using a referral to a secondary source (“sometimes called”) made Erlanger appear as an unbiased reporter rather than inserting his own editorial into the story. But sourcing such a narrow and biased paper for a quote, rather than broadly used terminology, is an editorial itself, not news.

Barghouti versus Mandela

Part of the reason the reference to Mandela is so absurd is the nature of the two individuals’ imprisonments. Nelson Mandela was imprisoned because he tried to fight the racist apartheid system in South Africa. Marwan Barghouti was not imprisoned for fighting for rights for Palestinians, nor for “his efforts to bring Hamas and Fatah together.” Barghouti was jailed for his direct involvement in murdering several civilians.

Between January and June 2002, Barghouti was directly involved with killing of: Yula Hen at a gas station (January 2002); Yosef Havi, Eliyahu Dahan and Selim Barachat in a restaurant (March 2002); and Gur Pzipokatsatakis, a Greek Orthodox monk (June 2002). For those crimes, he received five life sentences.

In addition to those direct murders, Barghouti was also held responsible for a failed suicide bombing at a major shopping mall in Jerusalem. For that crime, he received another 40 year sentence.

His involvement in the murder of scores of other civilians was beyond dispute, however, the Israeli courts deemed it was beyond its authority to convict him.

Barghouti is credited with launching the Second Intifada at the end of 2000. Tanzim, the terror arm of Fatah, targeted Israeli civilians around the country, such as on buses and at bat mitzvah celebrations. The Tanzim attacks went on continuously in 2001 and early 2002 until his arrest, and sporadically afterwards.

Marwan Barghouti, head of Tanzim

This background is in sharp contrast to Nelson Mandela, who also headed a terrorist group. UmKhonto we Sizwe, the terrorist arm of the ANC and South African Communist Party, carried out several attacks against South Africans in the 1980s.

But the similarity ends there. Mandela fought against the racism of apartheid, while Barghouti fought against the existence of Israel.

Mandela started the group after the South African government killed 69 people. Barghouti launched the Second Intifada after Yasser Arafat rejected the terms of the peace agreement with Israel.

Mandela was never directly involved in any murders. Barghouti was involved in several.

Today, Erlanger refers to Barghouti’s call for a unity government between Hamas and Fatah. He ignores Barghouti’s incitement for a Third Intifada.

The Evolving Palestinian Narrative of the New York Times

For several years, the New York Times has written about the Israeli – Palestinian Arab conflict from a Palestinian point of view. The biases included portraying Israelis as aggressors and Palestinians as victims. It softened the image of Palestinian fighters by not calling on Hamas as a terrorist organization, even while it is so designated by many countries including the United States.

Most recently, the Times has extended that Palestinian narrative to a new level: Palestinian terrorists are freedom fighters. Their fight against Israel is noble and just and should be welcomed by progressives:

On February 27, the Times called the terrorist group Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine as a “leftist group,” embracing the murderers of Israeli civilians as part of the progressive global movement.
On February 28, the Times awarded a convicted murderer a Nobel Prize-in waiting, by calling Marwan Barghouti a “Palestinian Mandela.”

These are new and problematic lows.

Feeling sympathy for people who suffer is natural (ignoring for a moment the debate about the cause for such suffering). But labeling terrorist groups and murderers in glowing terms is a hairs-breadth from endorsing murder and terrorism.

Will that be next? Is the Times preparing to endorse a Third Intifada?

Related First.One.Through articles:

The New York Times wants the military to defeat terrorists (but not Hamas)

Why the Media Ignores Jihadists in Israel

The Palestinians aren’t “Resorting to Violence”; They are Murdering and Waging War

What do you Recognize in the Palestinians?

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What’s “Left” for The New York Times?

Posted on February 28, 2016 by First.One.Through

On February 27, 2016, the New York Times ran an article on page A7 by Diaa Hadid titled “Palestinian Fugitive Is Found Dead in Bulgarian Capital.” The article described how “a Palestinian man who escaped from prison in Israel more than 20 years ago was found dead outside the Palestinian Embassy in Bulgaria.” The piece described how “Mr. Zayed, 52, was sentenced to life in prison after he was convicted of the murder of Eliyahu Amedia, an Israeli yeshiva student, in 1986…. Omar Zayed escaped custody in 1990 after he went on a 40-day hunger strike and was transferred from prison to a hospital in Bethlehem, according to a statement by the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, a leftist Palestinian group to which Mr. Zayed belonged.”

Wow. The New York Times described the PFLP as a “leftist group.” Is it?

Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP)

The PFLP was founded in December 1967, and makes no secret about its enemies: Israel; the “World Zionist Movement”; and the United States of America. The inclusion of the USA is clear, as the PFLP states on its website: “In the battle for the liberation of Palestine, we are facing a third force, that of world imperialism led by the United States of America.”

The goal of the PFLP is the complete destruction of Israel through armed conquest from all sides. As it states in its manifesto written in 1969: “The armed struggle against Israel and all imperialist interests in our homeland, the expansion of the armed struggle front which stands in the face of Arab reaction and all imperialist interests and bases in the Arab homeland, and the encirclement of Israel with the strategy of the people’s liberation war from every side – from Syria, Egypt, Lebanon, Jordan and inside the territory occupied before and after 5 June 1967 – is the only path that leads to victory.”

PFLP logo, showing map representing the Arab world
entering and consuming all of Israel

Some of the group’s activities have included:

Hijacking El Al plane (July 1968)
Hijacking three planes (September 1970)
The assassination Israeli Member of Knesset Rehavam Ze’evi (October 2001)
Suicide bombing in a pizza store in Karnei Shomron killing three civilians (February 2002)
Suicide bombing in a bus station in Tel Aviv killing three (December 2003)
Suicide bombing in a food market in Tel Aviv killing three (November 2004)
Killing four rabbis praying in a synagogue with axes and knives in Jerusalem (November 2014)

The PFLP continues to incite terrorism, as it praises attacks and calls “on all strugglers in Palestine to escalate the flame of the intifada.”

Due to its mission and actions, the US State Department labeled the PFLP a foreign terrorist organization (FTO) when it formulated such list at inception on October 8, 1997, together with the PFLP-General Command.

PFLP hands out sweets after the group claimed credit for hacking four Jewish worshipers to death in a Har Nof synagogue
November, 2014

And the New York Times decided to label this terrorist group a “leftist group’ rather than a terrorist group.

The New York Times Welcomes Arab Terrorism to the “Left”

The NYT is proud of its left-leaning ways.

Just recently, as the paper endorsed Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nomination for president, it considered that her challenger, Senator Bernie Sanders had fortunately brought the former Secretary of State further to the left: “[Sanders] has brought income inequality and the lingering pain of the middle class to center stage and pushed Mrs. Clinton a bit more to the left than she might have gone on economic issues. Mr. Sanders has also surfaced important foreign policy questions, including the need for greater restraint in the use of military force.”

Note that the Times considers the “greater restraint in the use of military force” to be a leftist ideal. Yet, somehow, the Times called a militant Palestinian Arab group, an organization which has led dozens of suicide bombings, murders and plane hijackings, a group which is a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO) according to the US State Department – a “leftist group.”

Perhaps the greater restraint of military forces is a leftist ideal, only when such force is used by America and its allies.

If the right-leaning Wall Street Journal decided to label a terrorist group a “left-wing group,” presumably, many people on the left would be greatly offended. Aligning mass murderers and people who are sworn enemies of the United States, with the liberal cause would be called out as a libelous charge. Letters to the editor would pour forth from “progressive” pens denouncing the comparison.

But here, the left-leaning NYT opted to embrace the terrorist group as one of its own. It actively chose to align their political points of view.

The liberal paper has long declined to label Hamas, another Palestinian Arab group, as a terrorist group. The paper often uses soft language like “a militant group” or “an Islamist group” to portray that FTO.

In February 2016, the Times moved passed softening the image of Palestinian terror. It baptized and embraced Arab terror.

If this is the modern day version of being “progressive,” the entire world should loudly condemn it in every way possible.

New York Times article by Diaa Hadid on February 27, 2016

Related First.One.Through articles:

The New York Times wants the military to defeat terrorists (but not Hamas)

Why the Media Ignores Jihadists in Israel

The Palestinians aren’t “Resorting to Violence”; They are Murdering and Waging War

What do you Recognize in the Palestinians?

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The Illogic of Land Swaps

Posted on February 22, 2016 by First.One.Through

The argument that using the “1967 lines” as the basis for the borders of Israel and Palestine in a two-state solution is flawed at the outset. “Land swaps” simply underscore that absurdity of the argument.

Obama on Israel-Palestine Borders

In May 2011, US President Barack Obama shared his thoughts on the contours of the ultimate borders of Israel and Palestine in a two-state solution: “We believe the borders of Israel and Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps, so that secure and recognized borders are established for both states.”

The comment infuriated Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and pro-Israel advocates. Obama clarified his comments before a pro-Israel group a few days later: “By definition, it means that the parties themselves, Israelis and Palestinians will negotiate a border that is different than the one that existed on June 4, 1967… it allows the parties themselves to account for the changes that have taken place over the last 44 years…. Including the new demographic realities on the ground, and the needs of both sides.”

Obama’s second statement moved away from his comments about “1967 lines.” By stating that the border would be arrived at through mutual negotiations and look “different than the one that existed on June 4, 1967,” Obama made the comment about the 1967 lines moot. If the parties agree to an entirely new construct for borders, than that would be acceptable too. There is no reason to even mention the “1967 lines” or land swaps.

obama aipac
President Barack Obama at AIPAC May 2011

But the left-wing group J Street was much more aggressive than Obama on the contours of Israel, and lobbied the US government about the 1967 lines and land swaps.

J Street on Israel-Palestine Borders

J Street clearly calls for a two-state solution to be based on the 1967 lines with land swaps as detailed on its site: “This border will be based on the pre-1967 Green Line, with equivalent swaps of land… land of equivalent quantity and quality will be swapped from within the pre-1967 Green Line.”

The group also urged the US government and Jewish groups to strongly condemn any Jews living east of the Green Line (EGL/West Bank). More specificaly, J Street stated:

“J Street is deeply concerned that the pre-1967 Green Line separating Israel and the occupied territory is being effectively erased both on the ground and in the consciousness of Israelis, Jews and others around the world.

The resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict will require establishing a border through negotiations between Israel and the new state of Palestine – based, as noted previously, on the pre-1967 Green Line with adjustments. Until that border is negotiated, the Green Line remains the internationally-recognized separation between the state of Israel and the territory won in the Six Day War in 1967.

A disturbing and growing lack of awareness of the Green Line is partially responsible for the 47-year occupation fading from the consciousness of the Israeli and international Jewish publics. Efforts to erase the Green Line from maps and from public awareness serve the interests only of those who seek to establish control over all the territory to the Jordan River.

One step American community groups, businesses, schools and governments could take to foster memory of the distinction between pre-1967 Israel and the subsequently occupied territory would be to use only maps that include the pre-1967 Green Line – a visual reminder of the Green Line and its significance.”

j street bookmark

All of J Street’s arguments: negotiations based on 1967 lines; equivalent swaps of land; and using equivalent “quality” are all illogical. The desire to push the US government to punish Israel was demonic.

The Illogic of “Land Swaps”

There are a number of issues regarding using the 1967 lines and subsequent land swaps as envisioned by J Street.

The 1967 Lines Rewards Aggression. Using the 1967 lines as a starting point for negotiations rewards aggression. When Israel declared itself as an independent state in 1948, it was immediately attacked by five Arab armies from Egypt; Jordan; Syria; Lebanon; and Iraq. The 1967 lines were the Armistice Lines where the warring parties stopped fighting in 1949.

Imagine that in 1948-9, Egypt conquered the entire southern part of Israel, all of the way up until Bethlehem, and Jordan conquered the entire eastern part of the country, leaving Israel as a narrow sliver of coastline from Tel Aviv to Rosh Hanikra. Consequently, imagine that it is this small state that becomes recognized by the United Nations in 1949, within Armistice Lines with Egypt and Jordan.

Further consider that history played out precisely as it did: in 1967 the Arab armies once again threatened to destroy Israel, so Israel pre-emptively attacked Egypt and Syria and then Jordan attacked Israel. Egypt and Jordan lost all of the territory that it took from the 1922 Palestine Mandate for a Jewish homeland in the war.

How would the world react? Would the world demand that Israel needs to return to a stub of a state and give Egypt and Jordan all of the land past the 1949 Armistice Lines? Even if Egypt and Jordan ultimately relinquished their claims to the lands they seized in favor of Palestinian Arabs, would those borders somehow be considered the appropriate borders for Israel and Palestine?

Of course not.

Pushing Israel to accept the borders that the UN endorsed in 1949 would be rewarding the five Arab armies assault on Israel. The areas within the Jewish homeland mandate that are some refer to as “Arab land,” are simply lands that were seized by Arab aggression. Using such 1967 lines/ the 1949 Armistice Lines, is a direct reward to an aggressive war to destroy the Jewish State.

Land Swaps Acknowledges that 1967 Lines are not Borders. Those parties that suggest that land swaps between Israel and a future Palestinian state, inherently admit that the 1967 lines have no merit. How could anyone suggest that a sovereign nation (Israel) give up some of its own land? How could a country annex land of another country (Palestine)? It can do so, if the two parties both acknowledge that the lines are not borders.

This was clearly spelled out in the Armistice Agreement with Egypt that stated “[t]he Armistice Demarcation Line is not to be construed in any sense as a political or territorial boundary.” Similarly, the Armistice Agreement between Israel and Jordan which stated “The Armistice Demarcation Lines defined in articles V and VI of this Agreement are agreed upon by the Parties without prejudice to future territorial settlements or boundary lines or to claims of either Party relating thereto.”

While J Street urges Israel and Jewish groups to “know its boundaries,” the actual suggestion to engage in land swaps undermines the J Street argument that the 1967 lines have any real significance. If there is any doubt, the Armistice Agreements that created those specific Armistice Lines stated those lines were not borders.

Land Swaps Undermine a call to limit Jewish “Settlements.” J Street and other groups that suggest that no Jewish Israelis should be allowed to live east of the Green Line (EGL/ West Bank), undermine their own argument when they suggest that there should be land swaps. If Israel should give over some of its land west of the Green Line to a future Palestinian State, that would mean that Jews should also be prohibited from living in those border areas in Israel too. Swapping land means that those Jewish communities in Israel would be considered a similar threat towards peace as the “settlements” in EGL/West Bank.

If people really believe that Jewish communities threaten the viability of a Palestinian State, the same parties that argue for banning Israelis in EGL/West Bank should argue similarly argue against Jewish communities in Israel that threaten the ability to effectively conclude land swaps.

That suggestion is clearly absurd.

Therefore if it is not a problem for Jews to move into communities that are west of the Green Line, than it is not an issue for Jews to move east of the Green Line.

Phantom Size. The suggestion that the exact number of square kilometers of the “West Bank” and Gaza that were created by the 1949 Armistice Lines is somehow a sacred amount is ridiculuous. As described above, the “West Bank” was an artifice created by a war of Arab aggression against Israel in 1948. There is/was nothing inherently special about where the warring parties stopped fighting.

It is therefore non-sensical to suggest that the “equivalent quantity”of land be exchanged between the parties. The Armistice Lines were arbitrary, non-permanent lines, and therefore the amount of land on either side of those lines are also arbitrary.

Further Absurdity of “Equivalent Quality.” J Street outdid itself in promoting a concept that went beyond the illogical suggestions of the 1967 lines land swaps. It proposed that the land swaps between Israel and the Palestinian Authority should be based on land of “equivalent quality.” In other words, J Street did not only propose that there be a swap of 50 square km on one side of the Green Line for 50km on the other side. J Street introduced the concept of “quality.” The far left-wing group argued that desert land would not be equivalent to an aquifer. Holy land would not be equivalent to non-Holy land.

What is the conversion factor between the different types of land? Who knows! Just add some subjective requirements to simplify negotiations that are already going nowhere for decades and are illogical at the start. That should speed things up!

benami-J Street
J Street leader Jeremy Ben Ami

When people pick on Obama for being anti-Israel, they should consider his rather moderate stance compared to the advice he receives from J Street.

Related First.One.Through articles:

J Street: Going Bigger and Bolder than BDS

The Legal Israeli Settlements

The Left-Wing’s Two State Solution: 1.5 States for Arabs, 0.5 for Jews

The Long History of Dictating Where Jews Can Live Continues

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The Big, Bad Lone Wolves of Terrorism

Posted on January 26, 2016 by First.One.Through

Brothers Grimm tell the tale of “Little Red Riding Hood” that went to visit her grandmother in the woods. On her trip she met a lone wolf, but she wasn’t afraid of it. She spoke to the wolf and picked flowers nearby and effectively led the wolf to not only devour herself, but her grandmother as well. After a huntsman saw what the wolf had done, he killed the wolf and managed to save the grandmother and little Red Riding Hood.

A little while later, another wolf came to kill the two women in the grandmother’s cabin, but this time, the women were able to hold off the second lone wolf. When this wolf continued to pursue the women, it failed and died of its own carelessness.

Lone Terrorists

On January 25, 2016, a young Israeli woman named Shlomit Krigman, went home to visit her grandmother in Beit Horon, a small town along the main road that connects Modi’in and Jerusalem. She was unlucky enough to encounter two Palestinian men with knives who were seeking Israeli Jews to kill. They stabbed and killed Shlomit, and then stabbed a 58-year old woman on the street before the two were shot and killed by a security guard.

Shlomit Krigman, killed by Palestinian men while going to visit her grandparents
January 2016

The latest round of attacks by Palestinian Arabs has been called by some the “Stabbing Intifada” being carried out by “lone wolves.” The term “lone wolf” is meant to describe people that are acting without the direction of central leadership, as happened under the direction of Yasser Arafat (fungus be upon him) in earlier intifadas which claimed thousands of lives. It also is meant to draw a distinction from the various wars that Hamas launched against Israel over the past eight years.

The United Nations described these Arabs as “desperate” about their situation for not having an independent Palestinian state. The Secretary General of the UN Ban Ki Moon and acting President of the Palestinian Authority stress that these terrorists are not barbaric creatures, but everyday people who were simply frustrated by their lack of autonomy.

The Wall Street Journal posted an analysis of lone wolf terrorists after the attacks in Sydney, Australia in December 2014 called “Is it Possible to Spot the Next Lone Wolf Terrorist.” It contended that the difference between a violent criminal and a lone wolf terrorist is that the latter seeks to achieve a political goal. Yet many people want to see political change and don’t hack passers-by on the street.

The news story continued that a Pew Research Poll found that 8% of US Muslims support suicide bombings in certain instances, but the number of terrorist attacks in the US fall far below that percentage. Why?

Researchers at Bryn Mawr College created a psychological profile of lone wolf terrorists. It contends that mass murderers and lone wolves typically have four characteristics:

a grievance at having been injured or persecuted
suffer from depression
“unfreezing,” meaning a loss in relationship or status that leave them unmoored to this world, with little to live for
experience with weapons

Yet the Wall Street Journal effectively walked away from this conclusion in an article on January 22, 2016 called “Can We Stop Homegrown Terrorists.” Other than 93% of the terrorists being male, the author, Peter Bergman, concluded that there was not much of a pattern, and that “in everything but their deadly ideology, they are ordinary Americans…. Every lethal jihadist terrorist attack in the U.S. since 9/11 has been carried out by individuals with no formal connection to foreign terrorist groups. The threat today is so-called lone wolves.”

Bergman discussed analyses completed by the New York Police Department that looked for signs of religious fundamentalism, and another by the FBI, that looked at radicalization, generally, without a tie to religion. Neither approach neatly captured every terrorist attack.

Even without a single comprehensive profile of the “lone wolf terrorist,” law enforcement and community leaders have made many attempts to counter radicalization of people through speeches in mosques and community centers, as well as on social media.

These approaches – to sort-out and identify lone wolf radicals, and attempt to de-radicalize them – are completely absent in the case of Palestinian Arab terrorists attacking Israelis.

Lone Wolf Terrorists in Israel

Palestinian Arabs that kill Israelis are excused by the world and celebrated by Palestinian leadership.

Palestinian terrorists are celebrated by their leaders as “martyrs” with “pure blood.” Streets, parks and soccer tournaments are named after them. Monies flow to the terrorist’s families.

The world excuses their actions with comments such as they were “desperate” and “humiliated.” According to the United Nations, their grievance is with their situation. But that situation cannot be divorced from their anger at Israel. One begets the other. They are not simply desperate for independence, they are desperate to destroy Israel.

As detailed in “Palestinians are “Desperate” for…” if Palestinians were solely desperate for a state, they would have agreed to the various offers made over the years. They wouldn’t stand in objection to recognizing Israel as a Jewish State, which has no impact on gaining autonomy and independence.

No, the Palestinian Arabs are not segmented into religious and non-religious; radical and non-radicalized when it comes to terrorism. The 93% of Palestinian Arabs that harbor anti-Semitic views, and 67% that favor stabbing random Israeli Jews, make it more akin to finding hay in a haystack, not a needle.

The Wall Street Journal noted that 45 people in the USA have been killed by radical jihadists since 9/11/01, a terrible, but relatively small number of people in a country of 300 million over a decade and a half. That figure compares to dozens of Israelis killed in just the past few months, in a country of 8 million. That is no longer the math of solitary, “depressed” “lone wolves” acting alone, but the essence of millions of wolves inhabiting a small forest.

The Palestinian terrorists are not crazed criminals. As the Wall Street Journal noted, these murderers have a political agenda, and as such, are defined as “terrorists”. These Arabs are still fighting a hundred year battle against other peoples living in the same land.

The world does not attempt to de-radicalize these killers. Instead it excuses their terrorism. It creates agencies to perpetuate the war against Israel. And it admonishes only one party – Israel.

There are millions of wolves roaming Israeli streets. Counting the UN – wolves in sheep’s clothing – there are billions. How does that square with “lone wolf terrorism?”

Related First.One.Through articles:

The Narrative that Prevents Peace in the Arab-Israeli Conflict

The Current Intifada against Everyone

“Peace” According to Palestinian “Moderates”

An Inconvenient Truth: Palestinian Polls

“Won’t you be my Neighbor?”

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Arabs in Jerusalem

Posted on January 22, 2016 by First.One.Through

Listening to the United Nations, one might fear that Palestinian Arabs are being “ethnically cleansed” in Jerusalem due to Israeli “occupation.” Here are some facts (statistics as of 2011 as compiled by the Jerusalem Institute for Israel Studies).

Fastest Growing Group in Jerusalem
and Most of the Middle East

The Arab population in Jerusalem has not only grown, it has grown faster than the Jewish population in Jerusalem, faster than Arabs around Israel, and faster than Arabs in the surrounding countries.

The annual growth rate in 2011 of Arabs in Jerusalem was 3.2%, higher than Jews who only grew by 2.1%.
Arabs now account for 36% of the population of Jerusalem, up from 26% when the city was reunited in 1967.
From 1967 to 2011, Arabs grew by 5.7 times, while Jews only grew by 3.4 times.
The Arabs of Jerusalem now account for 18% of the Arabs in Israel.
The mortality rate of Arabs in Jerusalem (2.7 per 1000) is lower than Jews (5.2 per 1000).
Jerusalem leads the country in the number of births, and the Arab births account for the same percentage (36%) as in the city. Jews had 27.8 births per 1000 and Arabs had 27.9 births per 1000. Both of those rates are extremely high, and are rates typically found in Africa, not in developed nations.
Arab students make up 38% of the school system in Jerusalem, more than the 36% Arab population.

Arab Women in Jerusalem entering the Western Wall Plaza
(photo: First.One.Through)

Muslim Arabs are Similar to Charedi Jews

The demographics of the Muslim Arabs in Jerusalem is very similar to that of the Ultra-Orthodox (Charedi) Jews in Jerusalem. Consider the following:

JERUSALEM	Children (0-14)	Seniors (65+)	Media Age
Charedi Jews	42%	6%	18
Muslim Arabs	40%	3%	20
Rest of Jews	26%	14%	31
Christian Arabs	23%	13%	33

The poverty rate among the Muslim Arabs is also similar to Charedi Jews. Each community tends to have much larger families than the rest of the population (Arabs have 5.7 people per household and Jews have 3.4, but skews much higher in the Charedi community). This typically leads to much poorer living conditions for both groups than the rest of the city.

Approximately 23% of the city considers itself Charedi and 36% Arab. These two groups account for the reason that 51% of all of Jerusalem’s residents are considered to live in the lowest socio-economic category. All of the Arab-majority neighborhoods and 24% of the Jewish neighborhoods (basically the Charedi ones) are ranked the lowest in terms of socio-economics.

Charedi Jews had a 20% lower participation rate (44%) in the workforce than other Jews (65%). Religious Arabs had an even worse workforce participation rate (13%) compared to less religious Arabs (59%), which is more comparable to secular Jews.

In Jerusalem overall, the Arab community is more religious than the Jewish community. Approximately 51% of Jews consider themselves either Charedi (30%) or Observant. This compares to 75% of the Arab population that considers themselves very religious. Both of these figures are much higher than found in other cities in Israel.

As the more religiously fervent have more children and are poor, they live in more crowded living conditions. The average Jewish household in Jerusalem has 1.0 people per room, while the average is much higher at 1.9 Arabs per room in Arab households. Due to this poverty and crowded living conditions, many Arabs take advantage of services from UNRWA: in 2011, the Shuafat Refugee Camp had the biggest gain (+690 people), while the Shuafat neighborhood outside of the UNRWA facility declined by 360 people.

Summary

Religious Arabs in Jerusalem are very similar to Jerusalem’s Charedi population, and they constitute a much larger percentage of the Arab community than the strictly observant Jewish community does in theirs. Both of these groups are growing very rapidly. The size and growth of the families, together with poor workforce participation rates have left both groups in poverty.

The unvarnished reality is that both Jews and Arabs in Jerusalem are caught in a similar trap: religious fervor often leads to poverty and crowded living conditions. Curiously, the satisfaction rate of the quality of life and place of work among Jerusalem residents was higher than elsewhere in Israel, while the frustration over income was highest in Jerusalem. It would appear that both the Arab and Jewish residents of Jerusalem are well aware of the trade-offs in life of being extremely religious.

It is unsurprising that the holy city of Jerusalem attracts many religious people – Jews, Muslims and Christians alike. The religiously fervent Jews and Muslims have spurred the city’s population growth (many religious Christians do not marry or have children), and have also increased the city’s poverty levels.

Religious Jews are easy to identify: men by their black hats and black yarmulkes, and women by their dress. Religious Arabs are harder to visually segment, but they are in Jerusalem in much greater proportion than Jews, and account for the rapid growth in the number of Arabs as well as the poorer living standards.

Contrary to the UN reports and Jerusalem “experts” like left-wing radical Danny Seidemann that the New York Times chooses to quote in articles like “Evictions in Walled Old City Stir Up a ‘Hornet’s Nest’“, Arabs in Jerusalem may apply for Israeli citizenship anytime and many do. However, just like the Charedi Jews of Jerusalem, becoming an Israeli citizen is not a ticket out of poverty.

Whether poor or rich, the Arabs in Jerusalem are the fastest growing group of any capital in the Middle East.

Related First.One.Through articles:

An Inconvenient Truth: Population Statistics in Israel/Palestine

The Populations statistics in Israel/Palestine do not support the Arab narrative

Palestinians agree that Israel rules all of Jerusalem, but the World Treats the City as Divided

The Battle for Jerusalem

Are you trying to understand Ethnic Cleansing in Israel?

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The Hollowness of the United Nations’ “All”

Posted on January 20, 2016 by First.One.Through

A Desire for Inclusion

For almost its entire existence, Israel has fought to belong at the United Nations. Whether in belonging to a Regional Group (it took until 2004), or the ability to serve at the UN Security Council like every other country, Israel was seemingly a nation that stood apart.

One would therefore imagine, that Israel would welcome the United Nations using inclusive language like “all” when it comes to attacks against Israel’s population.

A review of the select times that the UN leaders use such terminology, reveals that the UN has no such inclusive intent.

A Desire for Recognition

Israelis and decent people around the world expect at least the same amount of concern and consideration that the UN gives to other victims of terror. They want:

To hear that the attacks were acts of “terrorism”;
It to be clear that the victims were innocent;
Acknowledgment that they were attacked for being Jewish;
Blame placed on the perpetrators, the Palestinian Arabs and their leadership for incitement

The United Nations uses such format around the world, and clearly spells out the victims and perpetrators when Israelis attack Palestinian Arabs. However, the UN refuses to do so when Israeli Jews are killed by Palestinian Arabs.

Consider the comments by the UN Media Centre on January 18, 2016 when Palestinian Arabs stabbed two women, killing a mother of six and injuring a pregnant woman, and compare it to the UN comments when three Palestinian Arabs were killed in in arson attack in July 2015.

UN Responses	January 18 Attack on Israeli women	July 31 Attack on Palestinian Arabs
Words in press release	207	433
Victims	“Two women” (not Israelis)	“Palestinian child” (2x); “Palestinian toddler”; “Palestinian houses”
Comment on Victims	“civilians” (not innocent)	“Innocent life”
Perpetrator	None (not Arabs)	“settler violence”; “Jewish extremists”
The crime	“tragic incidents” Such terminology is not intentional and vicious; it could be used for a traffic accident	“heinous murder” (2x); “terrorist crime”; “vicious terrorist attack”; “deplorable act”
Cause	“extremists on all sides”	“Continued failures to effectively address impunity for repeated acts of **settler violence” “Israel**’s illegal settlement policy, as well as the harsh and unnecessary practice of demolishing Palestinian houses”
Perpetrators	“swiftly brought to justice“	“terrorist act/ deplorable act brough to justice” (3x)
UN Concern	“all victims of violence”	The Palestinians

Funeral of Dafna Meir in Jerusalem,
January 18, 2016 (photo: AP)

Why were the “Palestinians” mentioned over-and-again as “innocent” victims targeted in an act of “terrorism”, but the Israelis are merely generic “civilians” caught in amorphous “tragic incidents”? These female victims deserve to be referred to as Israeli Jews, as that was the rationale for the attack (as was the case for Palestinian Arabs). The women deserve more than being lumped in a generic “all,” in the UN’s short paragraph of condemnation on the attacks.

Similarly, the Palestinian Arabs that stabbed these defenseless women do not deserve to be coupled with Israeli extremists. The UN’s use of “extremists on all sides” rings hollow when the same body placed blame solely on “settler violence” and “violent extremists” when “Palestinians” are attacked.

The UN ignored the murder of the Henkins in the same way.

It ignored the murder of the Fogels in the same way.

Signpost for Teko’a, where one of the Israeli women was stabbed
(photo: First.One.Through)

The UN Considers Israel to be Fundamentally Wrong

The United Nations has endorsed the Palestinian desire for a Jew-free state, and consequently any Jewish deaths are tragic, but justified. Unfortunate, but understood.

Conversely, Palestinian deaths are criminal acts of Jewish extremists, abetted by the government. Jewish terrorism is a natural byproduct of an illegal “occupation.”

For the United Nations, there is only one group that are victims in the “spiral of violence.” The Palestinians.

As such, the perfunctory condemnation for Israelis murdered needed to include the Palestinians in “all victims.” Similarly, the true aggressors in the conflict are the Israelis, so the condemnation was addressed to “extremists on all sides.” The UN wasn’t trying to include Israelis in the victims of terror. It was deliberately omitting them, and placing blame for their demise of the victims themselves and the Israeli government.

Not only was the UN sympathy for the Israeli victims vacuous, the inclusion of Israeli extremists in its statement was insensitive. It is well passed time for the UN to show at least the degree of sensitivity that it offered to Palestinians, as they do with Israelis who were personally and viciously stabbed by Palestinian terrorists.

The radical Islamic terror that demands a pure Islamic caliphate is being fought daily in Israel and its territories, not sporadically in western Europe. Israel is part of the global “all” that is being attacked by radical Islam, not, as the UN portrays, part of the “all” of extreme religious fanatics.

UN text from January 18, 2015: “Strongly condemning the two stabbing attacks on two women, one of them fatal, in Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank, a senior United Nations envoy on the Middle East today called upon Israeli and Palestinian authorities to ensure that the perpetrators are swiftly brought to justice.

“These tragic incidents only highlight the urgent need for all leaders to work together against the spiral of violence and the targeting of civilians,” UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process Nickolay Mladenov said in a statement.

“The volatility of the current situation only serves the hate-filled agendas of extremists on all sides. I encourage all parties to promote calm and refrain from inflammatory statements and retaliatory actions,” he added, voicing increasing alarm at the continued attacks in the occupied West Bank taking place almost on a daily basis.

The stabbing attacks took place within the past 24 hours in the settlements of Otniel and Tekoa, resulting in the death of Dafna Meir, a 39-year-old mother of six, and seriously injuring Michal Froman, a pregnant woman in her 30s.

“Nothing justifies the murder of a mother in front of her own children,” Mr. Mladenov said. “My thoughts are with the families and friends of all victims of violence.”

UN Text from 31 July 2015 – United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and the UN special envoy on the Middle East have strongly condemned today’s arson attack in the West Bank that killed a Palestinian child and left the child’s parents severely injured.

“The Secretary-General strongly condemns today’s murder of a Palestinian child in the West Bank and calls for the perpetrators of this terrorist act to be promptly brought to justice,” reads a statement issued by his spokesperson in New York.

Continued failures to effectively address impunity for repeated acts of settler violence have led to another horrific incident involving the death of an innocent life, adds the statement. “This must end.”

The absence of a political process and Israel’s illegal settlement policy, as well as the harsh and unnecessary practice of demolishing Palestinian houses, have given rise to violent extremism on both sides, the statement continues.

“This [situation] presents a further threat to the legitimate aspirations of the Palestinian people for statehood, as well as to the security of the people of Israel. The Secretary-General urges both sides to take bold steps to return to the path of peace.”

Mr. Ban reiterates his call on all parties to ensure that tensions do not escalate further, leading to more loss of life, the statement concludes.

Earlier today, the United Nations special envoy on the Middle East today expressed his outrage over what he called a “heinous murder” and a “terrorist crime.”

“I am outraged by today’s vicious arson attack by suspected Jewish extremists in the Occupied West Bank village of Duma, near Nablus, which killed Palestinian toddler Ali, critically injured his mother and father, and injured his four-year old sibling,” the Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process, Nickolay Mladenov, said.

Joining in the “strong condemnations” issued by Israeli and Palestinian Governments and political leaders, the Special Coordinator also called for a “full and prompt investigation” to bring the perpetrators to justice.

“This heinous murder was carried out for a political objective. We must not permit such acts to allow hate and violence to bring more personal tragedies and to bury any prospect of peace. This reinforces the need for an immediate resolution of the conflict and an end to the occupation.”

Later today, the Security Council issued a statement to the press, condemning “in the strongest terms” the “vicious terrorist attack,” and underlining the need to bring the perpetrators of this “deplorable act” to justice.

Council members encouraged all sides to work to lower tension, reject violence, avoid all provocations, and seek a path toward peace.”

Related First.One.Through articles:

UN Media Centre Ignores Murdered Israelis

UN Press Corps Expunges Israel

The UN Can’t Support Israel’s Fight on Terrorism since it Considers Israel the Terrorists

UN Concern is only for Violence in “Occupied Palestinian Territory,” not Israel

UNRWA’s Ongoing War against Israel and Jews

The United Nations’ Remorse for “Creating” Israel

The New Blood Libel

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The Left-Wing’s Two State Solution: 1.5 States for Arabs, 0.5 for Jews

Posted on January 17, 2016 by First.One.Through

The two state-solution for the “Question of Palestine” has been bandied about for decades. At the 1993 Oslo Accords, the Israelis and Palestinian Arabs seemingly came to a conclusion that there would be a division of the land, one for Arabs and one for Jews. However, when the negotiations reached a critical juncture in September 2000, the head of the Palestinian Authority Yasser Arafat (fungus be upon him), opted to terminate the peace process and launched another war of terrorism against the Jewish State.

Fifteen-plus years and several thousands of dead and injured later, the concept of a two state solution still lingers. While in principle the concept harkens back to the 1947 United Nations Partition plan of two states for two peoples, the radical left has pushed aggressively for a different configuration of two states to the liking of Palestinian Arabs: one and one-half states for Arabs, and one-half of a state for Jews.

The 1.5 Arab States

The 100% Arab State of Palestine. Palestinian Arabs are seeking a new country which will be devoid of any Jews. Acting President of the Palestinian Authority made his demand clear in July 2013. His declaration is consistent with every action taken by Palestinian Arabs over the years:

Palestinian laws which make it a crime for any Arab to sell land to a Jew (consistent with Jordanian law);
Jordanian law specifically excluded Jews from the “West Bank”/ east of the Green Line (EGL) being granted citizenship;
Demand that any and all Jews be removed from EGL (including Jews who live in existing homes that have been around for decades);
No Jewish visitor on Palestinian college campuses (Bir Zeit);
No Jewish businesses may operate in the disputed territories

These demands are blessed by several radical left-wing Jewish groups. Groups like Jewish Voice for Peace, Independent Jewish Voices (Canada), and European Jews for a Just Peace, advocate for BDS (boycott, divestment and sanctions) for any business that operates east of the Green Line (EGL) and in Israel itself. Individuals like Rabbi Ellen Lippmann on the board of J Street, also see no problems with BDS for Jews living in EGL.

Non-Jewish left-wing radicals take note of the Jewish positions. US President Obama has not just called new Israeli towns in EGL “illegitimate,” but argued that no Jews should be permitted to live in EGL, even in homes they legally purchase such as in SIlwan, in eastern Jerusalem. Author Tuvia Tenenbom noted that Europeans and others need not be openly anti-Semitic anymore; they can just fund the rabidly anti-Zionist Jewish groups that bless a Judefrei Palestine.

Top picture: Silwan, in eastern Jerusalem, founded by Yemenite Jews
(photo: late 19th Century)
Bottom picture: mostly Arab Silwan in 2013 (photo: First.One.Through)

The 50% Arab State of Israel. Other left-wing groups like Adalah (supported by the New Israel Fund), seek to dismantle the Jewish State and replace it with a bi-cultural state. They advocate for the removal of anything associated with Judaism such as the Jewish symbols on the flag, in front of the Knesset and in the national anthem.

The left-wing groups are also against any Jewish preferences in Israel, such as the Law of Return which enables Jews from around the world to become citizens of Israel on an expedited basis. The revised neutral state of Israel would have Jews living as a minority, as the Palestinian Arab Right of Return would bring millions of Arabs into this bi-cultural state.

In the end, the Holy Land would have a completely Arab, Jew-free state called “Palestine,” and a second democratic, bi-cultural state where Arabs would be a majority, but where Jews would be allowed to live.

150% of the “Holy Basin” for Arabs.
The non-holy 50% for Jews

The 1.5 Arab states in the holy land would also have 150% of the “Holy Basin,” and all of the region’s holy sites.

When the United Nations first drafted a partition plan in 1947, it considered the two holy cities – Jerusalem and Bethlehem – to be a “Holy Basin” which would be part of neither state. As the left-wing now pushes for the 150% Arab plan, they are advancing a radical plan for the Holy Basin.

UN 1947 Partition Plan for the “Holy Basin”
of Greater Jerusalem and Greater Bethlehem

100% of Bethlehem. As part of the Oslo Accords, Israel handed over control of the City of Bethlehem to the Palestinian Authority at the end of 1995. Israel only maintains a small presence at Judaism’s third holiest site, the Tomb of Rachel. After Arafat’s Second Intifada, the Israelis were forced to create a wall around the small tomb to protect Jewish visitors. In general, the city is now virtually devoid of Jews and Christians since coming under the Palestinian Authority.

The Holy 50% of Jerusalem. The Palestinian Authority demands that the entirety of the Old City of Jerusalem, which contains Judaism’s holiest sites, Islam’s third holiest site, and many Christian holy sites, all be part of the Palestinian capital. It is content to let the newer part of the city to the west, which has no holy sites, to be the capital of Israel.

The radical left endorses the Palestinian Arab plan.

The fact that only Israel has allowed freedoms of access and religion in Jerusalem does not sway people who claim to seek “justice.” Groups which claim to advance “human rights,” advocate for an anti-Semitic Jew-free agenda in Palestine. Further, using the maxim that the best defense is a good offense, these groups consider anyone that points out the bias of their plan and impracticality of diving a capital city to be right-wing racists.

The joys of being a radical liberal is that you can feel 150% morally superior while waving banners of “justice” and “human rights”, even while trampling on those very principles.

Related First.One.Through articles:

The Israeli Peace Process versus the Palestinian Divorce Proceedings

The Arguments over Jerusalem

Squeezing Zionism

“Peace” According to Palestinian “Moderates”

Liberals’ Biggest Enemies of 2015

Israel, the Liberal Country of the Middle East

Today’s Inverted Chanukah: The Holiday of Rights in Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria

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Squeezing Zionism

Posted on January 15, 2016 by First.One.Through

Zionism started before the First Zionist Congress in 1897 and before Theodore Herzl wrote “The Jewish State” in 1896. However, the core elements of Zionism that people recognize came from the 1917 Balfour Declaration. Those key elements found their way into the 1920 San Remo Conference and ultimately, the 1922 League of Nation’s Palestine Mandate. Those key points are:

Jewish History in the Holy Land: “recognition has thereby been given to the historical connection of the Jewish people with Palestine”
Reestablishing the Jewish homeland: “recognition… to the grounds for reconstituting their [Jewish] national home in that country [Palestine]”
Immigration: “shall facilitate Jewish immigration under suitable conditions”
Owning land: “shall encourage, in co-operation with the Jewish agency referred to in Article 4, close settlement by Jews on the land, including State lands and waste lands not required for public purposes”
Citizenship: “facilitate the acquisition of Palestinian citizenship by Jews who take up their permanent residence in Palestine”
Freedom of worship and religion: “securing free access to the Holy Places, religious buildings and sites and the free exercise of worship…. complete freedom of conscience and the free exercise of all forms of worship, subject only to the maintenance of public order and morals, are ensured to all. No discrimination of any kind shall be made between the inhabitants of Palestine on the ground of race, religion or language. No person shall be excluded from Palestine on the sole ground of his religious belief.“

Each of these principles is under attack.

History

Palestinian Arabs did not always doubt the history of Jews in the Holy Land. In the 1920s, the official guidebook of “Al Haram al Sharif” published by the Supreme Moslem Council, stated that the Temple Mount’s “identity with the site of Solomon’s Temple is beyond dispute” (page 4). Yet today, the entire history of Jews in the Holy Land is challenged by Palestinian Arab extremists (and “moderates”).

Acting President of Palestinian Authority (PA) Mahmoud Abbas addressed the United Nations General Assembly several times. In those speeches he spoke of the history of Jesus and Mohammed in the Holy Land, but ignored the history of the Jews in the land including: Jacob; Joseph; Joshua; David; and Solomon.
Various leaders of the PA have declared that: there was never a Jewish Temple in Jerusalem; if there was a Temple it wasn’t on the Temple Mount; and Israel is manufacturing ancient artifacts to fabricate a Jewish connection to Jerusalem.
Abbas claimed that Israel has attempted to “Judaize” Jerusalem, including claiming that the Western Wall is actually Islamic and known as the al-Buraq wall.
Abbas claimed that Jesus was a Palestinian, rather than a Jew. His comments have continued to be repeated by PA officials and television.
Arab states are so upset about the history of Jews in the Holy Land, that 22 Arab states pressured UNESCO to cancel an exhibit called “People, Book, Land — The 3,500 Year Relationship of the Jewish People to the Holy Land”

Inscription dating to 840 BCE in Tel Dan, northern Israel
referring to the “House of David”

Recently, some politicians outside of Israel have finally begun to push back on the Arab narrative that denies Jewish history. US Representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL), remarked in December 2015 that “denying the historic connection of the Jewish people to Jerusalem is false. Amazing archeological discoveries are frequently made that prove the roots of the Jewish people are in Israel.”

Seal of King Hezekiah found in Jerusalem, around 700 BCE

Arabs came to the Holy Land during the Islamic invasion of the 7th centuries. An Arab claim to being indigenous to Israel is like the Portuguese claiming to be indigenous to Brazil because they have been there for hundreds of years. There were people who lived there for thousands of years before the new people invaded, and continue to live there and claim the place as their home.

RECONSTITUTING The Jewish Homeland

The Arabs hope that by denying the history of Jews in the Holy Land, they can claim that they are the indigenous people of the land, and Jews are simply European colonialists. The claim that Israel is a new colonial force is repeated often by Palestinians and plays well to Europeans that have rethought their own colonial past.

However, Israel is not, nor has it ever been, a European colony.

Jews have lived in the Holy Land for over 3,700 years and were the only people to have independent political governments in the land. They are also the only people to have their religious holiest sites in the land.

It is not a coincidence that Arabs shout to “Free Palestine” as opposed to “Create Palestine” as a new independent country. The Arabs claim that the land was never home to Jewish Kingdoms and has always been Arab land.

The Prism of Sennacherib, from roughly 689 BCE describing his attack on
the Jewish King Hezekiah in Jerusalem, as mentioned in 2 Kings: 18:13

Immigration

Arabs sought to deny Jewish immigration to Palestine immediately after the San Remo Conference. Several Arab riots broke out in the 1920s, and in the 1930s the Arabs were able to convince the British to curtail Jewish immigration. In 1939, on the eve of the Holocaust in Europe, the British issued the White Paper which capped Jewish immigration at 75,000 people for five years. The goal was to keep Jews as a permanent minority in Palestine.

Arabs and left-wing Israeli radicals continue to call on limiting Jewish immigration to Israel. In December 2015, Haaretz columnist Amira Hess said at a conference run with the New Israel Fund that Jewish “immigration to Israel under today’s circumstances — especially on the part of citizens of free Western countries — constitutes complicity in the crime.”

Owning Land

The British and Arabs reduced the amount of land available for Jews to settle since the time that the Mandate took effect in 1922.

By 1928, the area now known as Jordan, was split from Palestine.
In 1929, after Arabs massacred Jews in Hebron, the British evacuated all of the remaining Jews from the city
In 1937, the Peel Commission suggested partitioning the land into two
In 1940, British drafted the Land Transfer Regulations which limited where Jews could purchase land to only one-third of the remaining part of Palestine
In 1947, the United Nations voted to partition the land into Arab and Jewish States
In 1949, after five Arab armies attacked Israel at its founding, Jordan illegally annexed Judea and Samaria and evicted all Jews from the territory, including the eastern part of Jerusalem, counter to the Fourth Geneva Convention
In 1967, after Jordan (and Palestinians who were then Jordanian citizens) attacked Israel and lost the area that they had termed the “West Bank,” they still fought to keep Jews from living in the land

The Jordanians had a Land Law in effect in the West Bank that prohibited the sale of any land to Jews from 1949 to 1967, punishable by death. In 1997 – AFTER the Oslo Accords between the Palestinian Authority and Israel – the Palestinians confirmed that such land sales to Jews would be considered treason and a capital offense.

Radical left-wing activist Ezra Nawi blew whistle on Arabs selling land to Jews
was arrested by Israel in January 2016

Citizenship

When the British left Palestine in 1948, Israel gave citizenship to everyone in Israel – Jews and non-Jews alike. However, after the Arabs attacked Israel and Jordan assumed control of the West Bank, Jordan only granted citizenship only to Arabs. The 1954 Jordanian law extending citizenship to Palestinian Arabs spelled out that Jews were excluded: “Any person who, not being Jewish, possessed Palestinian nationality before 15 May 1948 and was a regular resident in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan between 20 December 1949 and 16 February 1954.”

Arab groups like Adalah and left-wing groups like the New Israel Fund (NIF) complain today about Israel’s Law of Return that allows Jews to become citizens of Israel on an expedited manner, a Law that non-Jews cannot use, claiming that such law is discriminatory. The groups fail to note that Israel institutes a Law of Return in the same manner that dozens of other countries use such a law to enable people with a lineage to the country to become citizens quickly. The Jewish people have ties to the prior Jewish kingdoms in the Holy Land, while the Arabs, many of whom arrived over the past century, but certainly not before the 7th century, have no such ties.

When you see an advertisement about “social justice” and “equality” from groups like the NIF, they are attacking these fundamental principles of Zionism and common international laws.

Freedom of Worship

When the League of Nations endorsed the principles of Zionism, they also sought to ensure equality and fairness for the Jewish and non-Jewish inhabitants throughout the region. One of the areas that they highlighted was the access to each religion’s holy places. In theory.

Jews were banned from visiting or worshipping on the Temple Mount back in the 1550s under Suleiman I. The Ottoman Muslim leader enabled Jews to pray at the Western Wall, or the Kotel, but denied them their historical access to their holiest place. Moslems similarly forbade Jews from visiting their second holiest place, the Cave of the Jewish Patriarchs in Hebron.

When Israel took control of the post-1929 Palestine Mandate land in 1967, they sought to reestablish Jewish rights at the holiest Jewish places – just as called for in international law endorsing Zionism.

As detailed in “The United Nations and Holy Sites in the Holy Land,” Israel attempted to assert Jewish rights at their holiest places including: The Temple Mount; the Cave of the Jewish Patriarchs; Rachel’s Tomb in Bethlehem; and Joseph’s Tomb in Shechem/Nablus. It has been a struggle.

To this day, Jews are still banned from worshipping on the Temple Mount. This is just fine with the United Nations as highlighted in “The UN’s Disinterest in Jewish Rights at Jewish Holy Places.”

The United Nations Complicity in
Squeezing Zionism

It is understood that the Arabs would argue strongly for their own cause. They have pursued an Arab and Muslim maximalist approach to the Holy Land for centuries.

However, the United Nations has backtracked significantly from its early endorsement of Zionism. Under British administration, immigration was cut and the ability to own land was diminished. When it came to vote at the United Nations to admit Israel as a new country, to “reconstitute the Jewish homeland,” Britain abstained.

The United Nations learned from Britain, and has continued to squeeze Zionism, such as recanting on the principle that Jews should have the freedom to worship at their holiest places, as discussed above.

While the UN constricted Zionism, it expanded the cause of Palestinian Arabs:

it created a new definition of “refugee” which included someone that left a house and town, rather than a country
It uniquely extended the definition of “refugees” to descendants, where the UN now considers there to be over 11 million Palestinians
The UN created a stand-alone refugee agency for Palestinian Arab “refugees” (UNRWA) that live in the surrounding area to the Holy Land, giving services to over 5 million people. Every other refugee in the world gets a single under-funded agency
UNRWA has promoted a narrative that all 5 million “refugees” will get to move to Israel, even though they are neither refugees nor have any right to move to Israel under the country’s Law of return
The UN altered its mission for refugees to one of protection and settlement (as it does throughout the world), to one that seeks to undermine Zionism

In 1975, the UN General Assembly endorsed Resolution 3379 stating that “Zionism is Racism,” essentially nullifying on the basic arguments and rights of Jews to their homeland. The effort to limit Zionism had become an effort to terminate it.

Summary

The “Zionism is racism” declaration was ultimately overturned in 1991, in part, because of the efforts of the United States. As US President George Bush argued before the UN: “Zionism is not a policy, it is the idea that led to the creation of a home for the Jewish people, to the State of Israel. And to equate Zionism with the intolerable sin of racism is to twist history and forget the terrible plight of the Jews in World War II, and indeed throughout history. To equate Zionism with racism, is to reject Israel itself, a member of good standing of the United Nations. This body cannot claim to seek peace and at the same time challenge Israel’s right to exist.”

Zionism has been getting squeezed since 1917, in rights, size and scope. As Zionism has been squeezed, so has the State of Israel itself.

The “Freedom CHOIR (Freedom of worship and religion; Citizenship; History; Owning land; Immigration; and Reconstituting the Jewish State)” which are fundamental building blocks of Zionism, are under attack. The Arabs have intensified their assault to include basic facts of Jewish history. The British and United Nations have constricted Zionism in size and scope. Left-wing radical groups have now joined the chorus using “progressive” language of “justice” and “equality,” while using the identical arguments of racists that seek to reject Israel.

Review the points of the Freedom CHOIR. Do you believe in Zionism? Will you join the CHOIR or seek to silence it?

Related First.One.Through articles:

The United Nations’ Remorse for “Creating” Israel

The United Nations Applauds Abbas’ Narrative

Liberals’ Biggest Enemies of 2015

Real and Imagined Laws of Living in Silwan

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Adalah, Dismantling Zionism

Posted on January 3, 2016 by First.One.Through

Adalah is also known as the Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel. It is funded by a number of left-wing organizations including: the New Israel Fund (NIF); the Ford Foundation; the Open Society Foundation (George Soros); Oxfam; and the European Commission.

Adalah claims to be “an independent human rights organization and legal center which… works to promote and defend the rights of Palestinian Arab citizens of Israel, 1.2 million people, or 20% of the population, as well as Palestinians living in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT).” It’s agenda is much more aggressive than simply defending Israeli Arabs.

The group seeks to replace Israel as a Jewish State with a bi-national, multi-cultural state.

Adalah protested Israel’s ban of Islamic party in Israel, November 2015. Caption states “Raed Salah, the head of the northern branch of the Islamic Movement in Israel, gestures in Nazareth on Nov. 17 after an Israeli police raid at the movement’s office.(Atef Safadi / European Pressphoto Agency).” The four-finger “gesture” is the salute “R4bia” supporting the Muslim Brotherhood. The United Kingdom also declared the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist organization in December 2015.

Dismantling the Jewish State

Adalah’s goal is a new Israel, which would no longer have any Jewish preferences, such as special symbols for Jews (in the national anthem and flag), nor special treatment for Jews (such as quick and easy approval for Israeli citizenship).

Adalah’s mission can be clearly seen in its “Democratic Constitution” for Israel, proposed in 2007:

Setting Israel’s borders at the 1949 Armistice Lines/ “1967 borders”
The “Right of Return” of all Palestinian Arabs that left the region, together with their descendants, back to Israel
“[T]he return of land and properties [for all Arab refugees] on the basis of restorative justice”
Israel would become a “democratic, bilingual and multicultural state,” replacing the Jewish State, because it views Israel as racist due to “the exclusion of the Arab minority based on the definition of the state as Jewish.”

The group rejects the international laws of 1920 (San Remo Conference) and 1922 (Palestine Mandate) that specifically called for “reconstituting their [Jewish] national home” THROUGHOUT Palestine, as Adalah claims that such international actions ultimately turned Arabs from a majority into a minority “against their [Palestinan Arab] will.”

The organization’s mission is to remove any particular “Jewishness” of Israel, and then flood the country with millions of Arabs to make Jews the minority. Homes would be taken away from Israeli Jews and handed to Arab “refugees.”

Refusing Equality for Israeli Jews

While the group fights against what it calls Israeli laws with embedded “racial inequality,” it shows no interest in promoting equality for Jews.

Where is the Adalah protest that Jews should not be barred from living in Judea and Samaria?
Where are the Adalah lawsuits to enable Jews to pray openly on the Jewish Temple Mount?
Why does the group find it offensive for Arabs with Israeli citizenship to be called “Israeli Arabs” and insists on being called “Palestinian Arab citizens of Israel?” Are they demanding dual citizenship with a future Palestinian State? Will they advocate that Israeli Jews should similarly get dual citizenship?
Adalah highlights that Arabs have lived in the region for generations which entitles them to particular rights in their homeland, yet they deny the history of the Jews and their rights to a homeland in the Holy Land.

Is equality for Adalah only a one-way street where Arabs get access and rights but Jews are denied?

Adalah: Having Your Country and Eating It Too

Adalah’s goals are clear. It seeks a two state solution for the region: one is called Israel, in which Jews are allowed to live as a minority in a bi-national state with a Palestinian Arab majority; the other country is called Palestine, which will have no Jews nor Jewish rights to their holy places.

As “Palestinian Arab citizens of Israel” are part of the broader Palestinian people, they would have citizenship in both countries, while Jews would be limited to just living in Israel. Over time, it is easy to visualize a future where those two Palestinian Arab states would merge. Goodbye Israel.

Full page NIF ad in The Jewish Week, November 20, 2015
stating it supports “Israelis working for a shared society” and claiming those opposed to NIF have an “ultranationalist agenda”

“Pro Israel” groups like the New Israel Fund state that they “are working for civil rights, social justice and religious tolerance.” Those are noble goals. However, why does NIF support organizations like Adalah which seek to destroy the Jewish State? Why does NIF label those people who want to see Zionism flourish in the Holy Land as “ultranationalist?”

Adalah openly opposes the vision of Zionism’s founders, as well as international laws which called for re-establishing the homeland of the Jewish people. How can NIF give Adalah funds ($1.875 million from 2008-2014) and claim that it is “pro-Israel?”

However the NIF chooses to stretch the definition of “pro-Israel,” it is certainly is not pro-Zionism.

Related First.One.Through articles:

Liberals’ Biggest Enemies of 2015

“Peace” According to Palestinian “Moderates”

Oxfam and Gaza

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UN Media Centre Ignores Murdered Israelis

Posted on January 1, 2016 by First.One.Through

In what has become a routine abuse of facts, the United Nations Media Centre continued to edit comments that have to do with Israelis being attacked and murdered by Palestinian Arabs.

On December 15, 2015, High Commissioner for Human Rights, Cécile Pouilly gave a press briefing about situations in “Burundi, Israel / Occupied Palestinian Territory, and Cuba.” In her opening statement about Israel, she said the following:

“We continue to be gravely concerned at the unrelenting violence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory and in Israel. Since the current escalation started at the beginning of October, 21 Israelis and 117 Palestinians have lost their lives (along with two foreign nationals), with thousands more injured.

Although international attention on the crisis has waned, the level of killings, injuries and arrests has continued, with on average one person dying every day.“

The UN Media Centre reported the comments as follows:

“Although international attention has waned regarding the crisis in Israel and the Occupied Palestine Territory, the United Nations human rights office today warned that the region is still rife with violence and the recent escalation in the fighting has claimed 117 Palestinian lives, along with two foreign nationals and injured thousands more.”

Poof. The murdered Israelis were erased. The Palestinians and two foreign nationals were killed, but the murdered Israelis were wiped from the comments and history of the United Nations Media Centre.

Cécile Pouilly, spokesperson for the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. (Photo: OHCHR)

While the various UN bodies have long established anti-Israel biases, the media centre which summarizes the comments of hundreds of those same UN bodies, further sanitizes Palestinian Arab crimes and ignores the suffering of Israelis.

How much hatred for Israel can an organization have to deliberately omit Israelis, while mentioning every other person killed? How far has the UN stretched itself to adopt an unbalanced, extremist Palestinian narrative?

When will western countries demand sanitizing the United Nations?

Related First.One.Through articles:

UN Press Corps Expunges Israel

UN Comments on the Murder of Innocents: Henkins

UN Comments on the Murder of Innocents: Itamar and Duma

The United Nations Audit of Israel

The United Nations’ Remorse for “Creating” Israel

The UN Can’t Support Israel’s Fight on Terrorism since it Considers Israel the Terrorists

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