Empowering Women… To Murder

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There are many differences between the sexes. Beyond the biological, there are statistically significant differences between the jobs men and women take and associated pay. It is even more true about delivering death, whether in murder, suicide rates or enlisting in the armed forces.

Armed Services

The enlistment in armed forces in many cases is a function of the traditional roles of women being maintained in countries around the world. Years ago, when weapons of war were not as sophisticated as today, physical strength was imperative. However, today there is no particular advantage to raw power when flying a fighter jet. Technology has leveled the field between men and women.

In the United States Armed Forces, women constitute roughly 16 percent of the fighting force and 18% of the officers. The highest percentages are in the Air Force and Navy where they account for nearly 25% of the officers, while making up only 10% in the Marines.

In Israel, women make up roughly 20% of the standing army. While Israel remains the only country where national service is compulsory for women, they are allowed to take a variety of roles to strengthen society not involved in combat. The Israeli national service called Sherut Leumi remains very popular among women, while men not who don’t enter combat units more typically go into intelligence or logistical roles in the army.

Suicide

In the U.S., suicide rates among men are 3 to 6 times the rate of women for every age group. In 2017, there were more than twice the number of suicides (47,173) than homicides (19,510) and it is the second leading cause of death among people aged 10 to 34 years old.

Women are actually more likely to attempt suicide but choose less violent and effective methods than men who often use guns. Approximately one-third of U.S. men own guns while only 12% of women do and its higher ownership rate among men may account for some of the disparity in suicide rates between the sexes. Overall, firearms account for half of all suicides.

Murder

Unlike the armed services or suicide, murder is the deliberate taking of another civilian life. It is viewed as the most heinous crimes around the world.

In the U.S., women commit roughly 15% of the murders even though they account for half of the population. Women killed an intimate partner or family member in approximately 60% of cases, while men killed non-family members in 80% of their murders. As victims, women were more than twice as likely to be killed by a spouse or intimate acquaintance than a stranger.

The statistics are clear: men are more violent and commit many more murders than women, especially of strangers.

Empowering Women… To Murder

The subject of “women empowerment” is often used around the world. In some countries like Saudi Arabia, women lack basic rights like leaving the house without a male consent or driving a car. In other countries women can’t vote or work in certain professions. The more liberal countries would like to see such policies change and women achieve more rights and equality with men.

But not in murder. Most civil societies do not want to see their young girls grow up to murder innocent civilians the way that men do.

Most places are not the Palestinian Authority (PA) territories.

The Palestinian Women’s Affairs Technical Committee (WATC) is based in Ramallah, down the road from the headquarters of the PA. It’s stated mission and goals are to empower women, to develop their skills and competencies and erase stereotypes about women’s roles in society. On its surface, these seem noble goals, until one applies the competencies to the murder of children.

On May 15, 2017, the WATC helped open a new women’s center in the Samarian town of Burqa, near Nablus. They opted to name the center the Dalal al-Mugrahbi Women’s Center, named for a terrorist who killed 37 Israeli civilians, including 12 children in the infamous Coastal Road Massacre in 1978.


Palestinians inaugurate a square to commemorate Dalal Mughrabi, a Palestinian terrorist who killed dozens of Israeli civilians in a 1978 bus hijacking in Israel, seen in portrait, in the West Bank city of Ramallah, on March 13, 2011.
(AP Photo/Majdi Mohammed)

It was reported that at the center’s inauguration ceremony, Rim Haja, a member of the Burqa village council, said the center would focus on the history of the struggle of the shaheed (martyr) Dalal al-Mughrabi and on presenting her “heritage” to youth groups. She added that naming the center for Dalal al-Mughrabi led the way for other “enrichment activities” dealing with the history of the Palestinian “struggle.”

When news of naming the square after a terrorist got out, various sponsors began to withdraw their support, including the government of Norway and the United Nations which said it “disassociated itself from the Center once it learned the offensive name chosen for it and will take measures to ensure that such incidents do not take place in the future.”

The head of the official PA-owned news outlet Wafa, Sami Daghlas said that “the center has no intention of caving in to the pressure and changing its name,” and will continue on its mission “to serve and empower young women in the village and to help them develop them to become active members in society.” The question is of course, “active” in what way?

Over the following months, additional agencies and governments withdrew their funding support. When the European Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law Secretariat, a joint donor program sponsored by Denmark, the Netherlands, Sweden and Switzerland, pulled support from the WATC for its support in the center, Samia Bamya, the chairperson of WATC issued a statement:

“Despite the damage resulting from the cessation of funding, we will never make concessions as far as our principles and national and community role are concerned for the sake of receiving conditional funding.”

Amira Haroun, the undersecretary of the Palestinian Ministry of Women’s Affairs added her own thoughts to the defunding of the WATC stating:

“All of the women institutions working in the Palestinian territories are acting in accordance with Palestinian national strategies that support the Palestinian cause and preserve the history of our struggling people. Therefore, any foreign funding that does not go in tandem with these objectives is refused… Claims whereby reviving the names of our fighters by naming Palestinian centers, squares and streets after them fall under the category of incitement to violence. They are false claims and a distortion of the truth. Israel is the one inciting countries against us and killing our people continuously.”

It is part of an ongoing travesty in which Palestinians name schools and camps after the killers of children and teach the youth to emulate the murderers. Using terrorists as role models is a crime against humanity.

While much of the world seeks to empower young women to achieve equality in education, career opportunities and freedom, the Palestinians seek to empower their young women to become murderers of Israeli children.

Related First.One.Through articles:

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Paying to Murder Jews: From Iraq, Saudi Arabia and Iran to the Palestinian Authority

Reviewing the Rhetoric of Palestinian Arabs and Israelis

The Proud Fathers of Palestinian Terrorists

The UN Fails on its Own Measures to address the Conditions Conducive to the Spread of Terrorism

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

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

Muslim Women Debate Anti-Semitism

The UN Hates Israel More Than it Cares About Women

“Occupation”-Washing Honor Killings

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The New York Times All Out Assault on Jewish Jerusalem

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The week before Israeli elections always brings out the bile in the anti-Zionist New York Times. This election, scheduled for September 17, was no exception.

The front page screed (not worthy of being called news) on September 14, 2019 called “A Challenge to the Essence of Old Jerusalem, Coming by Cable Car,” was written by Michael Kimmelman, an architecture critic, leading a reader to imagine a piece covering the “essence” of Jerusalem’s architecture and the proposed modern cable car. While the article did touch on those points, the observations were drowned out by the paper’s anti-Jewish narrative of Judaism’s holiest city.


Front page and page A8 of the September 14, 2019 New York Times

The opening paragraph directs the reader that Jerusalem is a city of Muslims and Christians and… well, there aren’t any Jews.

“At a glance, Jerusalem’s Old City and its surroundings still look pretty much as they must have looked centuries ago. The Old City’s yellow walls still read in silhouette against an ancient landscape of parched hills and valleys. The skyline is still dominated by the city’s great Muslim and Christian shrines: the gold, glistening Dome of the Rock and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, where Jesus was said to have been buried.”

Has Kimmelman even visited the city? The “parched hills and valleys” are dotted with modern apartment buildings and hotels. The Old City skyline includes the newly rebuilt Hurva Synagogue (2010), reconstructed now for the third time, first built in 1694.

Jerusalem’s Old City with a mix of Muslim, Christian and Jewish sites
(photo: First.One.Through)

The article’s second paragraph showed ignorance in addition to blindness.

“But this is about to change. Israeli authorities have approved a plan to build an elevated cable car to the Western Wall, the holiest site in the Jewish world, by 2021.”

The Western Wall, the Kotel, is not the holiest site in Judaism; that is the Temple Mount. The Kotel is only a retaining wall of the Temple Mount where Jews have been relegated to use since Suleiman I kicked the Jews off of the Temple Mount in the 16th century.

With bona fides of ignorance established, the author leaned into his bias, pointing a finger at “right-wing Israeli leaders” as the promoters of a plan which “has provoked howls of protest from horrified Israeli preservationists, environmentalists, planners, architects and others who picture a global heritage site turned into a Jewish-themed Epcot.”

This is the “essence” of the article.

Israelis enjoy a full-throated democracy and opine on everything. Such a new visible transportation system would obviously prompt outcries, mostly on the basis of aesthetics, which is presumably why it was an architecture critic penning the article. But The Times’ anti-Israel politics quickly overwhelmed the story.

The article stated that the cable car proposal is being advanced by “right wing” leaders and opposed by many Israelis. The “global heritage site” – which readers were just educated has no Jewish ties – will be transformed by the radicals into a Jewish Disneyland (ie. fake and cheesy to bring in tourist dollars). Even fellow Jews were nauseated. The Arabs must be apoplectic.

Queue the Times’ right-wing racist Prime Minister Netanyahu theme music.

Moving quickly from the architecture of the site, Kimmelman went full-politics describing Netanyahu’s announcement of annexing “nearly a third of the occupied West Bank.” This diversion from transportation and architecture into politics went to the heart of the author’s view: the cable car is a Jewish takeover of Arab sites and heritage. Tying those themes together Kimmelman continued:

“The cable car project is an example, illustrating how Israel wields architecture and urban planning to extend its authority in the occupied territories. Whatever its transit merits, which critics say are negligible, the cable car curates a specifically Jewish narrative of Jerusalem, furthering Israeli claims over Arab parts of the city.“

For the Times, the environmentally-friendly approach of helping bring the over 2.4 million tourists visit the Kotel in the cramped ancient city had little to do with tourism or transportation, but served as yet another example of Israel’s right-wing government turning Arab lands into Jewish assets. The article never mentioned that Jews have been a majority in Jerusalem for 150 years, that two Jewish Temples stood at the center of the Temple Mount, nor that Jerusalem is the focus of prayer for Jews around the world.

Instead, the article continued on a theme that Jewish fanatics were forcing Arabs from their homes and entrenching an illegal occupation.

“From Mount Zion, the cars will land near the Western Wall, on the rooftop of what is to be multistory center for a right-wing Jewish settler organization called the City of David Foundation, in the midst of a Palestinian district of East Jerusalem called Silwan. The City of David oversees archaeological excavations centered on uncovering biblical Jewish remains in an effort to cement an ancient Jewish connection to a contested site. Israel considers East Jerusalem annexed, but international law considers it occupied territory.”

A paragraph so rich in alternative facts and fake history, it deserves to be unpacked:

  • The City of David Foundation is not a “right-wing settler organization” but a foundation which promotes archaeological discovery and tourism, something that people of all religions and political persuasions enjoy.
  • The City of David does not “oversee” excavations; they help fund the work which is performed by the Israel Antiquities Authority.
  • The area of Silwan was originally founded by Jews from Yemen in early 1880’s. It is not a “district of East Jerusalem.” East Jerusalem was a blip in history that lasted for only 19 of Jerusalem’s 4,000 years, which ceased to exist over 50 years ago. Further, it is not “Palestinian,” but a predominantly Arab neighborhood which also includes Jews.
  • The notion that the only reason that Israel is doing excavations is to “cement an ancient Jewish connection to a contested site” is vile and disgusting. Israel has archaeological excavations all over the country – do Jews need to validate their history everywhere in the holy land? Uncovering the unified Jewish capital city of King David and King Solomon from 3,000 years ago is an exciting discovery for the entire world and each discovery is a celebration for anyone who has read the bible. But not for Kimmelman, who added “Archaeology works hand in glove here with settler efforts to press Jewish claims to the land.“

Remarkably, the article descended into further conspiracy theories from there.

Kimmelman wrote that Israelis treat Arabs as invisible and are forcibly evicting them from their homes to make way for this attraction. The goal is to give tourists a “Jewish version of the city’s history” from a time when “there were no Christians or Muslims.”

The author leaves the reader with the feeling that it is also the current intent of the right-wing settler government of Israel to see a city devoid of Muslims and Christians, as “the cladding of East Jerusalem’s settlements in Jerusalem stone, the architectural uniform traditionally worn by buildings in Jewish West Jerusalem, helps spread the image of a single Jewish city.”

For the New York Times, the “essence” of the Old City of Jerusalem is its Arab character navigated via narrow walkways, now being violated by right-wing Jewish invaders changing and scarring its demographics, character and approach. Especially at election time, the Times wants to warn everyone that the “essence” of this Israeli government is racist colonial Jewish supremacists.

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The New York Times Inverts the History of Jerusalem

The New York Times Major anti-Netanyahu Propaganda Piece

750 Years of Continuous Jewish Jerusalem

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Will Bernie Sanders Push Birth Control in Gaza?

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The CNN Town Hall discussions on climate change had a little something for everyone. When it came to the poorest places in the world, Bernie Sanders was thinking birth control.

In response to a question about human population causing climate change, Sanders pushed beyond the questioner’s point of education, to introducing the notion that abortion is a solution which the United States should aid, particularly among the poorest countries, saying:

“the Mexico City agreement, which denies American aid to those organizations around the world that allow women to have abortions or even get involved in birth control to me is totally absurd. So I think especially in poor countries around the world where women do not necessarily want to have large numbers of babies and where they can have the opportunity through birth control to control the number of kids they have, is something I very, very strongly support.”

There is one place in the world which is not only poor and crowded with high birth rates but has thousands of United Nations feet on the ground already managing the health of the population: Gaza.

Poverty: According to a Palestinian Authority report, the 2016 GDP per capita in Gaza was $1,822. That would place the region as number 147 of 194 countries. The unemployment rate for people over 15 years old was 43.9 percent, around the same rate as the failed states of Venezuela and Yemen, the highest in the world.

Crowded: There were 1.9 million people in Gaza in 2017 in an area of 365 square kilometers, or 5,205 people per sqkm. That would rank the strip as number 6 behind the wealthy enclaves of Macau, Monaco, Singapore, Hong Kong and Gibraltar.

High birth rates. In Gaza, approximately 41.7 percent of the population is under 15 years old and the average household has 5.6 people. The high percentage of young people is a phenomenon found in poor African countries (Gaza rank #24) while the large average family size is found in the Middle East, North and western Africa. The fertility rates of the women in these countries are the highest in the world, in sharp contrast to the lowest fertility rates found in the small, densely-populated wealthy countries of Singapore and Hong Kong mentioned above.

Gaza has the poverty and birth rates of large African countries in a compact area that is typical of wealthy capitalistic enclaves. But Gaza has the advantage relative to the African countries of having a large United Nations presence – 13,189 in UNRWA staff as of January 2019 – to service them.

UNRWA provides free health services to the Gaza population which identify as refugees, and services close to 100 percent of all pre-natal and post-natal visits. Yet the use of contraception in the West Bank and Gaza stood at only 56.5 percent according to the UN, even though UNRWA has complete access to the population and provides free services. Additionally, as abortions are banned by the Palestinian Authority, women would have to seek regular means of seeking birth control as provided by UNRWA, or travel to Israeli hospitals for the procedure.

Which all brings us back to Bernie Sanders’ comment about allowing US funds to flow into poor countries to facilitate abortions and actively promote birth control.

Sanders is known as a foreign policy lightweight, never delving much into the issue during his decades in Washington, D.C. Now, for his presidential-run education, he has surrounded himself with pro-Palestinian voices like James Zogby and Linda Sarsour who have made Gaza a central theme in his short script.

So, will Bernie spend US dollars on getting the Palestinian Authority to legalize abortion and actively push birth control in one of the poorest and compact regions? Does his allegiance lie with with his climate change clientele or with his Arab activists?

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Bilhah and Zilpah Get Their Due

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A satire.

Rabbi Jonina Jett finished the last refrain of her song and put the guitar down alongside the holy ark which held the temple’s two torahs. She fixed her pink and white tallit which had slipped down her black leather jacket and moved towards the microphone to address the one hundred or so worshipers.

Her congregation at Sisters of Tikkun Olam in California were used to passionate sermons from their outspoken life minister, but she was clearly more agitated that Saturday morning.

“My dear sisters,” Rabbi Jett began, “today is World Population Day, the day when we all must speak loudly about the real threat of the human population growing wildly out of control. It is a growing risk which has exacerbated climate change and threatens our planet and our very existence.”

She paused to survey her lesbian Jewish parishioners. A few began to nod in agreement, so she leaned in a bit more.

“Bernie Sanders told the world the truth: that we need to think about radical population control to save our world. It is the very essence of tikkun olam, repairing the damage that we have caused.” The very mention of Sanders brought the whole congregation together and everybody nodded in agreement. A few womyn even clapped.

“We are not living in the totalitarian world of “The Handmaid’s Tale” where almost everybody is infertile! It’s the very opposite, where only a few of us holy sisters are taking action with our bodies and choosing to NOT have children while much of the world falls under the weight and might of the patriarchy!” Pay dirt. The call of “patriarchy” brought the crowd to its feet.

Her point made, Rabbi Jett pivoted the speech.

“Yes, yes! We have taken responsibility for our lives and our planet! Each of us has acted in noble ways in our homes. But today I want to talk to you about something we should do as a community, right here in our sanctuary, in our liturgy. I want all of you to open your prayer books to the Amidah, the silent prayer.”

The audience became a congregation again and took their seats, flipping open the prayer books until the found they right page.

“Decades ago, feminist and progressive rabbis altered the opening lines of this central prayer to add the names of the matriarchs of Judaism: Sarah, Rebecca, Leah and Rachel. They broke with the mold of a male-dominated history and connection to God. But they did not do enough.” Becoming emotional, she cleared her throat and took a sip of water before continuing.

“Like all of you, I have watched “The Handmaid’s Tale” several times. I have been shaken to my core at a world that actually does NOT seem so different from our own. A world where women’s bodies are treated as possessions, in which society decides the fate of our beings and our offspring. We must all internalize that this dystopian world is not just a creation of fiction, but has basis in fact. In our own religion.

“Our own matriarchs and patriarchs used women as breeding machines. Four of the twelve tribes were brought into this world by the handmaidens of Rachel and Leah. One-third of the Jewish people.” She paused to let the point sink in. “And we have erased these mothers. Their bodies are not buried in Hebron. We do not speak their names.

“But they have names, and it is time to recognize the dark side of our history.

“There is a pen in front of each of you and I want you to take it and write the names of ‘Bilhah and Zilpah‘ right after our treasured matriarchs. These women are part of our story too. We owe it to them, to the modern day sexual slaves around the world, and to ourselves to remember them each and every day.”

As the congregation dutifully inscribed their prayer books, Rabbi Jett removed her jacket and showed everyone the new tattoos of “Bilhah” and “Zilpah” inked in Hebrew letters on her left forearm. “Let us never forget our fellow women, or we will be doomed to follow their fate.”

While her face was cold and determined, Rabbi Jett smiled to herself as she watched her flock follow her lead mouthing the names of “Bilhah’ and ‘Zilpah’.

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“Occupation”-Washing Honor Killings

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“Occupation”-washing, the defense of any of the vile attitudes and actions of Palestinian Arabs by portraying them as victims of Jews living and controlling their holy land, took another turn this week as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives claimed that Arab men kill women in their families because of Jews.

Israa Ghrayeb, a 21-year-old Bethlehem resident, was reportedly tortured and beaten to death by her male relatives after posting an Instagram video showing her with her fiancé. The post incensed her family members, who regarded Israa’s being seen with a man before marriage as dishonorable.

Noted anti-Zionist and Palestinian-American Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) tweeted in response that the heinous murder stemmed from “ever-present toxic masculinity” and linked to an article which opened that “Honor killings are not Muslim and they are not Arab. This is a universal phenomenon which takes places in nearly all corners of the globe, from the United States to Europe.”  The comment was clearly designed to reorient the analysis to one about men generally, rather than men from the Muslim world.

According to the United Nations, roughly 5,000 women each year are killed in “honor killings,” the act of killing a female family member because they did something that was perceived to bring dishonor to the family. Roughly 40% of these killings occur in India and Pakistan. The vast majority of all of the world’s honor killings come from around southeast Asia – not “the United States and Europe” mentioned above – in Pakistan, India, Afghanistan, Bangladesh and the Palestinian territories, as well as people who come from those regions but now live in other countries, including the United Kingdom.

It cannot be a coincidence that the men from these same southeast Asian countries pour acid on women’s faces and cut off their noses and ears if they “dishonor” or embarrass men. Men from Pakistan now living in England raped 1,400 girls over 13 years, in a systematic attack on women which was not prosecuted by police because of direction that this was a matter of culture.

There’s a similar matter of female genital mutilation, which is practiced in 29 countries in Africa as well as India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Oman, the United Arab Emirates, Yemen, Iraq, Iran and the Palestinian Authority territories.

The “ever-present toxic masculinity” which Tlaib called out is over-weighted in Muslim-majority lands (Pakistan, Afghanistan, Bangladesh and the Palestinian Authority-ruled territories) as well as southeast Asian neighbor India (majority Hindu and 15% Muslim). But the redirection towards “the United States and Europe” was more soul-soothing to fellow Muslims than pointing the finger at the male preachers of radical Islam like those from the Taliban and Hamas.

The article’s deflection was followed by a defense, using the time-dishonored poisoned Kool-Aid of “occupation”-washing. For Tlaib, the grotesque crimes committed by Palestinian men is because they too are victims: a poor, subjugated group who have suffered under 500 years of foreign occupation dating back to the early 1500’s when the Ottomans took over Palestine:

“Now, here’s why Isra’s murderers stand to walk away from this untouched by the law. In Palestine, our legal system is the result of a century of occupation and political turmoil. It is a combination of Ottoman, British, Egyptian (in Gaza), Jordanian (in the West bank), and even no system (Area C). Despite various and continued efforts over the last decade, there has been very little reform to this outdated and dysfunctional legal system for two reasons: Israeli military occupation and a corrupt Palestinian Authority both hinder any legal, economic, and social progress…. Right now there are Arabic articles (this story has rightfully taken the Arab world by storm) and doubtless some Hebrew articles being published by some Zionist news outlets to try and pink-wash occupation (again lol).”

Palestinian toxic masculinity and violence against women is excused. These Palestinian men would be peaceful and wonderful husbands and fathers, if it weren’t for colonial invaders. Why isn’t the problem as bad in Lebanon, Syria, Jordan and Iraq which were also under the mandate system? Please don’t ask. The Taliban probably only cuts the ears and noses off of women because of the Russian and US invasions of their lands according to the twisted logic.

Perhaps one could defend Tlaib by noting that the United Nations engages in “occupation”-washing all of the time, even on the issue of violence against women.

In March 2018, the U.N. held a session titled “Challenges and opportunities in achieving gender equality and the empowerment of rural women and girls,” but only issued a paper for women in one part of the world: Palestinian women who suffer from Israeli “occupation.” The paper noted that:

Palestinian Arabs place a “high value placed on “honour”, with 47 percent of men and 38 percent of women believing that women and girls deserve punishment from their families when “honour” is perceived to have been breached. Thirty-five percent of men and 22 percent of women also indicated that “honour” killings should not be punished by law. In addition, one third of men and one quarter of women surveyed believed that some violence against women can be justified, and the majority of men and women believed that women should tolerate such violence.”

However, the 17-page report made clear that the over-riding issue for the suffering of Arab women was not their internal cultural background, but external factors, especially their new Jewish neighbors.

“Occupation”-washing has often been used to defend Palestinians from the charge of widespread antisemitism and the murder of Jews. It has now become mainstream to use it to excuse Muslim-Muslim family violence.

Related First.One.Through articles:

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The UN Hates Israel More Than it Cares About Women

Is Israel Reforming the Muslim Middle East? Impossible According to The NY Times

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Jizyah for Jews in Jerusalem

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The predominantly Christian town of Jifna in Palestinian Authority-controlled Area A of the West Bank was an opening scene from a horror movie in late April 2019. Members of Fatah, the major political party of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, stormed into the town firing guns into the air and demanded that the Christian Arabs be forced to pay jizyah, an annual fee which non-Muslims pay to be allowed to live in Muslim-majority lands.


Town of Jifna

The incident is a continuation of the assault on the Christian population in Palestinian Authority-controlled towns and cities since Israel handed some lands to the PA.

Unfortunately, many well known Christian cities in the holy land are no longer Christian.

Nazareth, a city which was once majority-Christian, is now 70% Muslim. The Islamic influence changed things large and small, such as at Mary’s Well, the site where the angel Gabriel came to the Virgin Mary according to Catholic tradition. Until the year 2000, there was a large sign describing the name and Catholic views of the site. The Muslims removed the sign and renamed the location ‘Nazareth Stream’ to remove any Christian orientation.

A similar story played out in Bethlehem, where the Christian population has dropped from around 86 percent in 1950 to just 2 percent today. In Gaza, a rapid Christian exodus is happening post the Hamas takeover, with a decline from 5,000 Christians in 2006 to only 1,100 today.

Meanwhile, in Israel, the Christian population has remained relatively constant at around 2 percent of the overall population, about 165,000 people.

If the Palestinian Authority is given more Israeli territory, what will that mean for the non-Muslim populations? Will Jews and Christians be forced to evacuate their homes either be direct order or discriminatory policies?

What is the going jizyah rate, and when would it be forced upon the Jews and Christians in a PA-controlled Jerusalem?

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UNRWA’s Fake Students, Curriculum and Shortfall

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The first day of school was a wonderful opportunity for the 70 year-old temporary United Nations agency to show pictures of children and ask for money.

Students attend their first day of the 2019-2020 school year at the UNRWA al-Sabra Preparatory Co-Ed School in Gaza on 25 August 2019. © 2019 UNRWA Photo

The United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) wrote about the 532,000 UNRWA students who went back to school, part of the “5.4 million Palestine refugees registered with UNRWA.”

But those two figures were not really accurate, even by UNRWA’s count.

  • As of January 2019, UNRWA figures show that 5.545 million people were registered as Palestinian Refugees and another 626,000 were “other registered persons” for a total of 6.2 million people getting assistance from UNRWA, 15% more than described in the UNRWA article.
  • UNRWA also runs schools which provide vocational training on top of the 532,000 students going to elementary and preparatory schools, plus secondary in Lebanon. A total of 7,688 were enrolled in the UNRWA Technical and Vocational Education and Training Programme (TVET) and another 1,681 were in Educational Sciences.

The head of UNRWA, Commissioner-General Pierre Krähenbühl who is being investigated for corruption, said that the schools help Arab students become “thoughtful and open-minded, to uphold human values and tolerance, and to contribute positively to the development of society and the global community.” Unfortunately, the exact opposite is the case. Just ten days before the first day of school, the UN was presented with significant findings of outright antisemitism in UNRWA textbooks. The IMPACT-SE study covered many examples of hatred and incitement in the classrooms including:

  • textbooks do not refer to Israel by name, and instead call it “Zionist Occupier”
  • an example for the word “beautiful” is “shahid” meaning martyr
  • A terrorist who killed many Jewish children is featured in textbooks with calls to emulate the act
  • Newton’s law of physics is demonstrated with a picture of an Arab shooting a slingshot at Israeli soldiers

Over a dozen other examples were given.

In concert with the corruption, the lies about the number and types of people getting services and the promotion of antisemitism, the ever-lasting temporary agency came begging for donations.

The Arab-friendly press said that UNRWA needs another $150 million to operate until the end of the year, about 10% of the annual budget of $1.2 billion.

One possible solution for the shortfall would be to remove all of the people in the “other” category who account for well over 10% of the population and should never have been getting services from the ever expanding temporary agency.

Another cure would be to stop UNRWA’s microfinance lending program which hands out tens of millions of dollars every year to Arabs to start businesses. It is unclear if any of the over $530 million in “loans” has ever been repaid.

Shutting all services in the Palestinian territories of Gaza and Area A is another possible answer to the incessant calls for global aid.

But more than anything else, it’s time to shut the school charade.

UNRWA’s textbooks and schools are the training manuals and grounds, respectively, for Hamas’s antisemitic war against Israel. Much like Hamas’s use of children as human shields in launching rockets against Israeli civilians, UNRWA is complicit in crimes against humanity. Not only should the agency’s mandate not be renewed in 2020, social media should block its pages and world banks should deny its ability to fund raise and distribute monies immediately.

Related First.One.Through articles:

UNRWA’s Ongoing War against Israel and Jews

The Gross OVER-Staffing of UNRWA Schools

UNRWA’s Munchausen Disease

The Growth of UNRWA’s “Other” Wards

Shut UNRWA in Gaza Immediately

Help Refugees: Shut the UNRWA, Fund the UNHCR

What’s Wrong with UNRWA

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Queen Rania on UNRWA

I Hate Israel – The UN Told Me So

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There’s Nothing Worse Than Terrorism in France

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On August 21, 2019, the United Nations marked an International Day of Remembrance of and Tribute to the Victims of Terrorism. The global body is making an effort to include the stories of the victims as part of its mission of healing. As part of the commemoration, UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said:

“I ask that we all reflect on the lives that have been changed forever as a result of terrorism. Let us commit to showing victims that they are not alone, and that the international community stands in solidarity with them, wherever they may be. In their call for healing and justice, they speak for all of us.”

Included in the remembrance was a photo exhibit of people who were deeply impacted by the scourge of terrorism. Not surprisingly, the UN did not include a single picture of any Israelis, as it continues to refuse to stand in solidarity with Israel and will not endorse Israelis call for justice against the killers.

That’s not new.

What was surprising was the limited focus on both massive and recent acts of terror. There was just one picture of a victim from the attack on the US on 9/11/01 and none of the victims of the bombings in Sri Lanka or shootings in New Zealand.

But the 2016 truck attack in Nice, France received three pictures with accompanying stories. It was the only terrorist attack to be featured multiple times.

Why France? Why minimize the US and ignore Israel? There were 86 people killed in the July 2016 attack in Nice, France, a horrific total. But there were 2,977 victims killed on September 11, 2001 in the United States and there have been 1,357 victims of terror in Israel from the start of the Second Intifada until today.

It is pure speculation why the bombings in other European cities like Madrid and London each got a single picture while Nice received three. Is it because Nice is not a capital city but a vacation spot? That it doesn’t represent a power structure the way New York City, Washington, DC or European capitals do?

If that is the reason, it seemingly undermines the definition of terrorism. Were the victims in the Twin Towers who were just going to work less innocent than the people watching fireworks in France?

The UN stated that the rationale for the exhibit was to hear the voices of the victims and incorporate their stories into the narrative. The stories are meant to show “resilience,” “purpose,” “hope” and “peace” as shown in the photo series.

The United States rebuilt Ground Zero. Israelis continue to live and work and transformed a third world environment into a First World country. They showed resilience and moved forward with purpose.

But those stories were minimized relative to the horror in France.

The entire world came out to stand alongside the people of France when terrorists killed journalists at the Charlie Hebdo magazine. Scores of world leaders walked the streets of Paris in a way they never did in London, Madrid, Mali or Nigeria.

Terrorism in France seemingly captures the hearts and minds of people around the world. Is it because of the country’s devout secular nature? That people view the country as non-aggressive?

Please share your thoughts.

Related First.One.Through Articles:

My Terrorism

The UN Fails on its Own Measures to address the Conditions Conducive to the Spread of Terrorism

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

The UN Never Demands Justice for Palestinian Killers

Blasphemy OR Terrorism

When Power Talks the Truth

The United Nations’ Incitement to Violence

The UN Declares that Palestinian Arabs Should Not Show “Restraint”

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Will the 2020 Democratic Platform Trash Israel?

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In the aftermath of Israel barring entry of two far left-wing anti-Israel members of Congress, Democratic politicians began to worry that Israel was becoming a wedge issue rather than an issue with bipartisan support. Staunch pro-Israel Congressman Eliot Engel (D-NY) said “refusing entry to members of Congress looks like Israel [is] closing itself off to criticism and dialogue. This decision will only strengthen the anti-Israel movements and arguments many of us find so troubling, further politicize support for Israel in the United States and ultimately play right into the hands of Israel’s enemies.”

Engel has been a member of Congress since 1989 and knows better. He has seen his own Democratic party moving away from Israel since President Barack Obama made deliberate efforts to create daylight between Israel and the United States in his outreach to the Muslim world.

If one were to look at the 2008 Democratic Platform, it would be hard to see much of a difference from the Republican Platform regarding Israel. Both parties considered Israel a strong ally and backed Israeli positions.

But Obama made a strategic pivot away from Israel running as an incumbent in 2012. With the blessing of left-wing groups like J Street, the Democratic Party officially changed course on several key issues:

  • Refugees. Until 2012, the Democrats agreed with Republicans that Palestinian refugees would find a home in a new state of Palestine, not Israel.
  • Hamas. Until 2012, Democrats agreed that Hamas should be isolated until it renounced terror and recognized Israel’s basic right to exist.
  • Borders. Until Obama, Democrats agreed with Republicans that a new Palestinian state would NOT be established along the 1949 Armistice Lines, but reflect current realities and need to ensure Israel’s security.
  • Jerusalem. Until Obama, the Democrats and Republicans agreed that Jerusalem would remain a united city and the capital of Israel.

Those points – with the exception of Jerusalem which was bitterly contested on the convention floor – would disappear from the 2012 Democratic platform.

Years before Donald Trump considered running for president and the rise of the alt-left, the Democratic Party pulled back from supporting Israel’s position regarding establishing peace with the Arab world.

The pro-Arab camp would gather steam with the presidential aspirations of Democratic Socialist Senator Bernie Sanders in the 2016 election season. In an effort to placate the Sanders camp when Hillary Clinton became the official party nominee, the Democrats allowed the Sanders team to help craft the official platform. Sanders chose anti-Israel figures to help draft the language, including Cornel West who calls Israel an “apartheid state,” Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN) and James Zogby who back the boycott of Israel movement.

In the end, the Clinton camp killed the Sanders’ team proposed language “aimed at criticizing the Israeli occupation of the West Bank, demanding ‘an end to illegal settlements’ and supporting the re-building of the Gaza Strip.” But the anti-Israel movement inside the Democratic party had taken yet another step, moving from pro-Israel (until 2012) to neutral (2012) to critical (almost in 2016).

The 2020 presidential race is underway, and three of the four top Democratic candidates are deep in the far-left fringe of the party, including Sanders, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) and Sen. Kamala Harris (D-CA). With the rise and remarkable defense of the anti-Israel ‘Freshmen Squad,‘ one can expect the ‘Senior Squad’ will likely draft an official party platform that will actively attack Israel on issues which once had strong bipartisan support.

Trump has not made Israel a wedge issue in politics; the Democrats have been actively doing that themselves since Obama.

Related First.One.Through articles:

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The Insidious Jihad in America

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Omar and Tlaib’s Antisemitic B.D.S.

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Two members of congress, Ilhan Omar (D-MN) and Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) were denied entry into Israel in August 2019 because of their work advocating for an economic war against Israel, called B.D.S. for boycott, divest and sanction. The two contend that their motives are noble in that they just seek to exercise their freedom of expression and speech to pressure Israel to improve the rights of Palestinian Arabs. In response to being rejected by Israel, they are now seeking to cut U.S. economic aid to Israel. It seems that haters of Israel can always find an excuse for B.D.S., including hurt pride.

Rep. Rashida Tlaib and Rep. Ilhan Omar hold press conference on the ban preventing them from traveling to Israel, Aug. 18, 2019, in St Paul, Minn.

These two congresspeople have been openly hostile to Israel for many years. The question being discussed is whether these two women and the B.D.S. movement are really about real or perceived actions of Israel OR pure antisemitism.

The Sole Jewish State.
There is only one Jewish state, a situation very dissimilar to the dozens of Christian and Muslim countries. Boycotting Israel is therefore an attack on every Jewish state. One could perhaps not be so cynical about the two Muslim women’s motives if they were targeting only one out of ten Jewish states, similar to President Trump’s temporary travel ban on 10% of the Muslim-majority countries because of their poor security controls. But these same women gave no allowance to Trump and said he was singling denying entry to Muslims in a “hateful” assault. So, one can draw a conclusion that these women are driven by their own “hateful” ideology, persecuting 100% of the Jewish countries, not just 10 percent of them.

Relying on Prior Comments
Omar had no compunction calling out Trump’s travel ban because of the prior comments he had made about Muslims and Islam. Yet she cannot understand people viewing her attacks on Israel through the prism of her repeated negative comments about Jews. She says that “Islamophobia and antisemitism are two sides of the same bigoted coin,” but the reality is people see her and Trump as two similar bigoted talking heads.

Outrageous Claims
The B.D.S. movement which Tlaib proudly supports, makes wildly false and inflammatory claims about Israel. It openly uses terms like “apartheid,” “settler colonialism” and “ethnic cleansing” in vile libels which not only have no basis in fact, but are incendiary comments designed to rile up people to actively attack the Jewish state.

  • Israel Welcomes non-Jews While the Muslim Countries Practice Antisemitism
    The “ethnic cleansing” attack on Israel is an inversion of facts. At Israel’s founding it welcomed 160,000 non-Jews as citizens, while at the same time, Jordan expelled every Jew from the land it seized from Israel and specifically denied any Jew citizenship. Fellow Arab and Muslim countries followed suit and evicted one million Jews between the 1930’s and 1960’s. Today, there are 100 times the number of Arabs living inside Israel as there are Jews living in Arab and Muslim countries. Arabs in Israel are thriving. where their numbers are growing faster than the organic population of any neighboring Arab country.
  • Israeli Arabs like the Jewish State
    When Israel passed its Nation-State Law, many supporters of the B.D.S. movement claimed that it showed Israel to be a racist country. However, they ignored the polls which showed that Israeli Arabs overwhelmingly support the law, even more than Israeli Jews!
  • Israel is more tolerant of Muslims than Europe
    Israel permits people to wear hijabs and burqas, to build churches, mosques and minarets, to have halal food, perform circumcisions and use Sharia courts. Those are freedoms you cannot find in France, Denmark, Norway, Ireland, Belgium, Switzerland, Germany, Latvia or Turkey, to name a few countries.
  • Israel is the most liberal country in MENA
    The simple fact is that Israel is an open liberal democracy, with rights and protections for all people. There are Arabs in the Israeli parliament, the Supreme Court and the army. Muslims are allowed to pray at Judaism’s holiest site and can become the prime minister in the country. Those liberties are in sharp contrast to its Arab Muslim neighbors.
  • Israel is the Reestablishment of Jewish Sovereignty
    The B.D.S. claim of “colonialism” is not just a lie but antisemitic. It deliberately erases the 3,300 years of Jewish history in the land and ignores Judaism’s focus of prayer and pilgrimage to Jerusalem for millenia. It is a part of a new type of repulsive “replacement theology” in which Arabs have transformed themselves into the indigenous people in the holy land and Jews are recent invaders.

B.D.S.’s Goal is the Destruction of Israel
The founder of the B.D.S. movement, Omar Barghouti, states very clearly that his movement seeks to end the Jewish State in any configuration or size, “most definitely we oppose a Jewish state in any part of Palestine.” Even long-time critic of Israel Norman Finkelstein said that the supporters of B.D.S. “don’t want Israel [to exist].”

B.D.S. Tactics are Attacks, not Protests
The tactics deployed by the B.D.S. movement are through economic and cultural warfare. Omar and Tlaib saying that they are just expressing their opinions is a far cry from reality. The movement wants universities, companies and countries to stop investing in Israel, from conducting any commerce, collaboration or trade, and to sanction it often and repeatedly. A small country like Israel would be crippled without its export/import industry.

Democratic Socialists Embrace B.D.S.
Tlaib and Omar have common cause with the far-left wing of the Democratic Party, Congressperson Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Senator Bernie Sanders’ Democratic Socialists which have also embraced B.D.S. In doing so, they are mainstreaming the falsehoods and vilification of Israel and advancing an economic war against the Jewish State.

Pressuring Only the Jewish State in the Dispute
The two members of Congress and the B.D.S. movement claim they are seeking a peaceful settlement to the Israeli-Arab conflict, but are only attacking one party, not attempting to bring them together.

  • Nominally about a Dispute or a Civil War
    The Arabs have been fighting with the Jews over the control of the land for 100 years in a long-simmering civil war. It has still not ended as neither side has claimed victory nor defeat, leaving millions of Arabs stateless. Progressive empathy is naturally drawn to the weaker party, without consideration of who is actually right or whether the fault of the terrible situation lies at the leadership of the weaker party. The alt-left and Muslim extremists either ignore or celebrate the acting-president of the Palestinian Authority (PA), Mahmoud Abbas calling for millions of fighters to descend on Jerusalem (1:03) and the Hamas Charter which calls for the killing of Jews and refusing to ever negotiate a peace with Israel.
  • Palestinians Have No Ability to Negotiate
    The leader of the PA’s four-year term in office ran out over a decade ago. He has no mandate to negotiate, and polls show that the Palestinians want him to resign. He also does not control Gaza, and has not been able to govern a Palestinian parliament which has 58% of the members belonging to Hamas, a U.S. designated terrorist organization. Abbas has never shown a compromise in his negotiations with Israel and has never been able to control Hamas. Therefore, there is no logic for Israel to negotiate with a straw man who cannot deliver, and it is unfair to punish Israel for failing to reach an agreement with such counter-party.

Omar and Tlaib Refuse Visit to Israel and Schedule Visit to “Palestine”
Over forty Democratic members of Congress went to Israel in the beginning of August and met with Israelis and Palestinian Arabs in a well organized trip. But Omar and Tlaib boycotted the trip and instead decided to go on a trip to the State of “Palestine,” even though the United States does not recognize such a country. Their agenda was organized by Miftah, a group which has excused the killing of Israeli civilians.

The B.D.S. movement is dedicated to the destruction of the Jewish State and the nullification of Jewish history and Jewish rights, which is why the Israeli government banned entry for people affiliated with the movement. It is manifestation of Palestineism which believes the dignity of Palestinians is predicated on erasing the dignity of Jews. Omar and Tlaib are its current ugly face, but it’s in the hearts and minds of other Democratic Socialists.

Related First.One.Through articles:

The Three Camps of Ethnic Cleansing in the BDS Movement

The Parameters of Palestinian Dignity

Ilhan Omar Isn’t Debating Israeli Policy, She is Attacking Americans

Muslim Women Debate Anti-Semitism

The Insidious Jihad in America

The Antisemitic Youth

The Mourabitat Women of Congress

The Democrats’ Slide on Israel

Anti-Israel Lobbyists Dwarf Pro-Israel Lobbyists

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