The United Nations met this week to discuss counter-terrorism. One of the discussions focused on a left-wing term-of-art called “masculinities” and its need to be studied and addressed in the field of terrorism. Specifically, a 90-minute discussion called “Bridging the gap: Connecting research, policy and practice on masculinities to more effectively counter terrorism and prevent and counter violent extremism” urged the UN and members states to tackle the issue of “toxic masculinity” and how it is used to draw recruits to terrorism.
At 1:18:15 of the talk, Sanam Naraghi Anderlini of the International Civil Society Action Network spoke via Zoom. She described the work she did on behalf of the UN to explore the role that “toxic masculinity” played in terrorism in ten countries. It was an interesting question to ask a women who runs a women’s peace organization, as she focused her work on “what does it mean to be a man? Whether in Liberia, Nigeria, Palestine, Jamaica, Yemen, Syria, Iraq.”
Sanam Naraghi Anderlini
Anderlini contended that four themes emerged in each country as critical elements for male self-definition and worth, the 4 “Ps”: Provide, Protect, Prestige and Procreation. She argued that men living in societies where they failed in their “manly” roles to provide for the family monetarily, to protect them, to have a position of prestige or power, or to procreate and have progeny, were easy prey for radical actors. People like radical jihadis tap into the male aggrieved status and advance the idea that their religion is greater than all others and the pathway to power and prestige is to protect their families and communities via violence.
In regards to Palestinian Arabs, the fourth “p”, to “provide”, is addressed by the Palestinian Authority’s “martyr payments” in their infamous pay-to-slay program.
It’s a peculiar lens to examine the Palestinian Arab-Israeli Conflict, as not being about two people fighting a century-old civil war over a small stretch of land, but of emasculated Arabs being played by their leaders.
And by others.
Anderlini added that “the Islamists, the jihadi movements, that are around didn’t appear out of nowhere. They’ve been funded since the 1990s by UN member states like Saudi Arabia or Wahabi movements that come out of our member states…. These boys and these young men aren’t born violent. They are being exploited by and for powerful elites.”
If a key feature of Jihadi terrorism is emasculated Muslims being preyed upon by powerful leaders, then cutting off the funding and providing young Muslim men with better role models is seemingly a key pathway to stopping the systemic violence.
ACTION ITEM
EMAIL THE WHITE HOUSE “It is time to cut off funding to countries that fund violent extremism such as the Palestinian Authority, Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey. The Middle East is in terrible need of better role models to promote peace and coexistence.”
Members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee:
There have been constants as well as changes in the century-long assaults by Palestinian Arabs against Jews in the holy land, yet the number of terrorist attacks goes up and down. It begs the question as to the reasons.
Latest Wave 2021 To Present
After years of relative calm between 2016 and 2020, Arab terrorism slaughtering Jews began to rise in 2021 and has not slowed down. The number of murdered Jews is on pace to surpass the number of murdered in the Gaza War of 2014.
There are a few reasons for the higher total: more multi-person deaths and a greater number of deaths by guns.
The years 2016 and 2017 saw two and four multi-person fatality incidents from terrorism, respectively. The totals then dropped for several years, with a single multiple person killing in 2018, when a Palestinian terrorist ran over two soldiers with a car. In 2019 and 2020 there weren’t any multi-person deaths. In 2021 there were two, each from rocket attacks from Gaza. That changed dramatically in 2022 when there seven, with five in the first half of 2023.
As the chart above shows, Palestinians have used guns, knives and cars for many years, while rockets and bombs have been used more recently in multi-victim attacks. Many more Arabs own guns than historically, both in Israel and in the West Bank. It has led to a huge spike in Arab-Arab violence in Israel, as well as capabilities for Palestinian Arabs to kill many people. Hundreds of guns were smuggled into the region by a Jordanian diplomat.
While guns contributed to the higher death toll, it doesn’t address the motivation behind Palestinians committing more attacks.
Palestinian Sentiments
Palestinians have polled themselves every quarter since 2000. Many sentiments have remained constant about Jews and Palestinian leadership, especially for Gazans. However, the attitudes of West Bank Palestinians have changed since 2020.
Poll findings saw two significant shifts of West Bank Palestinian Arabs’ attitudes in the June 2021 poll and the polls of December 2022 and March 2023; break-out changes which did not appear during the relatively quiet prior years.
While the majority of Palestinian have consistently wanted PA President Mahmoud Abbas to resign, the June 2021 poll showed a 10% jump of those in favor. It coincided with a ten percentage jump in West Bank Arabs who believe that the Palestinian Authority has become a burden on Palestinians.
In December 2022 the number of West Bank Arabs who said they feel safe dropped below 50% for the first time. In the March 2023 poll, the West Bankers who felt that the PA was a burden jumped another 10%, as did the number of people saying they wanted to dissolve the PA, reaching 49% for the first time.
These inflection points are also seen regarding West Bank Arabs’ attitudes about Israel.
From the March 2021 poll to the June 2021 poll, West Bank Palestinians desire to murder Israeli civilians inside of Israel jumped from 18% to 33%, while those favoring another multi-year pogrom called an “intifada” jumped from 29% to 51%. Those attitudes held constant or slightly declined until jumping again in December 2022 and March 2023. In March 2023, 57% of West Bank Arabs said they were in favor of terrorism inside of Israel and 51% support a new intifada.
A similar shift in attitude happened regarding West Bank Arabs support of a two-state solution, with those opposed jumping to 61% in June 2021 from 51% three months earlier. In March 2023, those opposed to two-states crossed 70% for the first time.
Palestinians in the West Bank have moved away from supporting the Palestinian Authority and a peaceful resolution to the conflict to seeking a war with Israel, with inflection points happening in May 2021 and the fall of 2022.
The Rapture of Violent Jihad, May 2021
The various charts show how Palestinians used few rocket and mortar attacks from Gaza during the “lull” between 2016 and 2020. It is not as though they didn’t have much to complain about under the pro-Israel policies of U.S. President Donald Trump. Those initiatives included:
First sitting US president to visit Jerusalem’s Western Wall (5/17)
Recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital (12/17)
Signed Taylor Force Law banning funds to Palestinians if paid for terror (3/18)
Moved US embassy to Jerusalem (5/18)
Pulled US out of United Nations’ Human Rights Council due to obsession with Israel (6/18)
Pushed for major reforms at UNRWA (8/18)
Recognized Israeli sovereignty on Golan Heights (3/19)
Launched Israel-Palestinian Peace Initiatives (6/19 and 1/20)
Rejected notion that Israelis living in “West Bank” did so illegally (11/19)
Backed Israel in face of International Criminal Court allegations (6/20)
Despite all of the pro-Israel efforts, terrorist attacks against Israel were at all-time lows.
The world changed in several ways in early 2021. Joe Biden became president of the United States in January and in early May, after another round of elections in Israel, Naftali Bennett and Yair Lapid announced that they would form a coalition government to oust the long-time Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
While the news that Netanyahu was on his way out was breaking on May 9th, Arabs were rioting between May 6 and 10 about the pending eviction of long-term Arab squatters living in apartments in the Sheikh Jarrah section of Jerusalem who had refused to pay rent to the Jewish owners. Between May 10 and 25, riots spread into mixed communities in Israel and in the West Bank. Over that same time, Hamas rained rockets upon Israel.
The June 2021 PCPSR poll captured the change in mood on the Arab street well: “a semi-consensus that Hamas has won the May 2021 confrontation with Israel triggers a paradigm shift in public attitudes against the PA and its leadership and in favor of Hamas and armed struggle;… and the majority says Hamas, not Fatah under Abbas, deserve to represent and lead the Palestinian people.”
But Hamas did not follow-through to the liking of West Bank Arabs. While the political-terrorist group used language of incitement daily, it refrained from continuing to attack Israel. Even in May 2023, while Israel took out leaders and militants of Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Hamas remained on the sidelines.
New popular terrorist groups emerged to fill the thirst for violent jihad.
In September 2021, the Jenin Brigades was formed, the Nablus Brigades in May 2022, and then the Lions’ Den in August 2022. These West Bank terrorist groups led the spike in attacks against Jews in 2022 and 2023.
The December 2022 PCPSR poll captured the tide of events in the fall of 2022 which further increased West Bank Arabs’ quest to murder Israeli Jews: “The World Cup in Qatar helps to restore Palestinian public trust in the Arab World after years of disappointment; and in light of the escalating armed clashes in the West Bank and the near formation of a right wing and extreme government in Israel, the Palestinian public becomes more hardline while indicating a greater confidence in the efficacy of armed struggle.” The same poll showed almost every Palestinian thought that the PA had no right to interfere or arrest any member of the new terrorist groups.
Even as Hamas, Fatah and twelve other parties met in Algeria in October 2022 to reconcile and hold elections within the year, the Palestinian street chose to shun politics in favor of war. As one Palestinian said “This dialogue [Algerian Accords] will be recorded in the files within the long list of dialogues that the Palestinians have engaged in to achieve reconciliation, and it will not have any impact on the ground, whether in Gaza or the West Bank.”
Palestinians witnessed how violence stopped the evictions in Sheikh Jarrah and believe that terrorism will yield greater rewards than negotiations. The right-wing Israeli government that formed in the wake of those attitudes is intent on proving them wrong.
Yet, despite readily available information, the press publishes its typical inanity about the conflict.
After two Palestinian terrorist slaughtered Jews at a restaurant and gas station in June 2023, The New York Times offered that “The vanishing likelihood of a Palestinian state in the West Bank, the entrenchment of Israel’s control and a weakening of the mainstream Palestinian leadership have all contributed to a rise in Palestinian militancy.” That NYT opinion-stated-as-fact is complete stupidity. If those things were true, there would have been more acts of terrorism during the Trump years, not the fewest on record.
Palestinians know that they will not be able to achieve their goal of a Jew-free region without a global jihad, as the Jewish state will not negotiate away its existence. Palestinian terrorism spikes when local Arabs believe that the world supports its “armed struggle” and Israel backs down to its demands.
That’s the plain truth as shown by statistics and the sentiments aired in Palestinian polls. And Palestinians are backing these new leaders, nascent terrorist groups armed with thousands of guns committed to the violent jihad.
The United Nations is holding its 2023 Counter-Terrorism Week from June 19 to 23. It is an annual ritual held since 2001 which attempts to combat the violence plaguing many parts of the world.
Some countries like the United Kingdom spoke about terrorism being bred inside its borders, while others like those in Africa, noted that “the spill-over of terrorism from the Sahel to the northern regions of the West African coastal countries is no longer a risk; it is a reality.”
A few speakers spoke of “lone wolves” who become radicalized online in just days, as opposed to fifty years ago when it took months or years of planning by organized groups to commit an attack. Few commented that terrorism has become more institutionalized, capturing the attention and intoxicating academia.
The overall theme was that terrorism is not uniform but all of the countries fear its impact in the near and longer term.
So various nations came together to figure out how to prevent the scourge through the exchange of ideas, best practices and sharing of information. Topics ranged from stopping the flow of weapons and blocking financing for violent groups, to building forums for inclusivity and preventing poverty.
The UN said little about the appropriate penalties for terrorism. The global body relies on its “four pillars for combatting terrorism,” three of which are prophylactic and the fourth, a wrapper of respecting human rights.
It is a monstrous hole in its strategy, atop failed prescriptions, such as the notion that fighting poverty prevents terrorism which has been disproven in multiple studies.
It leaves the agency as unsullied, with an easy perch to admonish those who live in terrorism’s trenches of park benches.
Israel has faced Palestinian Arab terrorism since modern Zionism took root in the Jewish holy land in the 1920s. Instigated and rewarded by its leaders to this day, Palestinian individuals shoot, stab and run over innocent Israeli Jews because they object to the basic presence of these non-Arabs.
Israel takes a number of preventative measures to stop the terrorism, some within the UN playbook and others outside. It tries to stop the flow of weapons and financing to terrorist groups, while it also facilitates the flow of people and goods to help the local Palestinian economy.
However, that is not enough to stem the daily barrage. Israel actively monitors terrorists and launches raids to arrest them before the attacks. It punishes the terrorist by destroying their home, an action the United Nations condemns as “collective punishment” for the terrorist’s family.
Lost in the rebuke is acknowledging that terrorism is inherently a collective attack on a community, not just the parties personally injured. A proportionate response to terrorism must, therefore, include accounting for those who aided and abetted the crime.
For many years, Palestinian Arab leaders warned Israel against dividing the Jewish Temple Mount in Jerusalem in time and place. That reality may be coming closer.
The Old City of Jerusalem including the Jewish Temple Mount/ Al Aqsa Compound
For centuries, Muslims had prevented Jews from going to their holy places in the Jewish holy land. In both Hebron and Jerusalem, Muslims declared that Jewish holy sites were purely Islamic and denied Jews any rights. That changed after the neighboring Arab states conspired to destroy Israel in June 1967 but lost control of those two holy cities which Jordan had illegally annexed in 1950.
After the 1967 war, Jews were finally able to go into the Cave of the Jewish Matriarchs and Patriarchs, which Muslims call the Ibrahimi Mosque. Israel made the site available to both Jews and Muslims, and in June 2023, opened an elevator to facilitate visitation by handicapped persons in a broad effort of inclusivity.
While Israel took over the Old City of Jerusalem in the same June 1967 Six Day War, it handled the situation very differently, giving administrative control of the Jewish Temple Mount/ Al Aqsa Mosque Compound to the Jordanian Waqf, while Israel maintained security control. Even after eastern Jerusalem, including the site, was officially annexed as part of Israel, the Waqf continued to forbid Jews from praying at their holiest location, even as they allow a small number of Jewish visitors.
In October 2014, a Palestinian attempted to assassinate Rabbi Yehuda Glick because he advocated for peace and equal rights for both Jewish and Muslim prayer on the Temple Mount. In response, Mahmoud Abbas, President of the Palestinian Authority declared “Israel’s leaders are making a big mistake if they think they can turn back history, to impose a reality, and to divide the al-Aqsa Mosque [into separate prayers times and areas] as they divided the Ibrahimi Mosque in Hebron.”
Rabbi Glick survived the four bullets, and was nominated to the Israeli Knesset in 2016, continuing to advocate for Jewish rights on the Temple Mount. His efforts resulted in few practical changes, however, the number of Jewish visitors to the holy site has steadily increased since that time.
For his part, Mahmoud Abbas continues to warn Israeli leaders about Jewish prayer and dividing the Temple Mount. In April 2022, Jordanian politicians joined in condemning then-Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennet’s non-controversial comments that Jews, Christians and Muslims should all be free to celebrate their holidays (Passover, Easter and Ramadan), which Arab leaders viewed as a precursor to dividing the Temple Mount.
The back-and-forth continues.
In early June 2023, Amit Halevi, a member of Knesset from Likud, put forward an official proposal to divide the religious site between Jews and Muslims, calling for the southern 30% of the compound – which includes the al Aqsa Mosque – to be for Muslims, and the northern 70% – which includes the Dome of the Rock where the Jewish Temples stood – to be for Jews. The political-terrorist group Hamas declared that such proposal was part of an “Israeli religious war launched by the fascist Israeli government… [and] the Al-Aqsa mosque will remain an exclusively Muslim holy site and the Palestinian people will continue to defend the mosque against Israeli partition and Judaization schemes.” Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammed Shtayyeh voiced concerns about the “order to impose temporal and spatial division in the blessed al Aqsa Mosque. We warn the occupation authorities against taking such a step that would have unpredictable results.”
Most of the media ignored the story, presumably because Halevi is a low level MK without portfolio, and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has repeatedly said that he will uphold the Waqf’s antisemitic “status quo” banning Jewish prayer at the site.
The event may be unreported, but the situation will not remain ignored.
There are competing natural desires which have long brewed in the holy land: for Palestinian Arabs to return into the land of Israel to towns where grandparents had lived; for Jews to pray openly and frequently at their holiest site on the Temple Mount; and to live throughout the area. For years, the United States attempted to keep a lid on those aspirations until President Obama reversed precedent, nodding to Arab migration into Israel (2012), while making it illegal according to international law for Jews to move to the eastern parts of Jerusalem and the holy land (2016), and maintaining the ban on Jewish prayer on the Temple Mount.
The “status quo” is not a ban on Jews praying on the Temple Mount but of competing points of tension. The large holes in the holy land dam are readily apparent to everyone. One can ignore them and wait for the fissures to crack open unpredictably, or facilitate the spillway, with some Jews praying openly and discretely at their holiest site.
Congressman Mike Lawler (R-NY17) has been very active supporting his constituents, particularly those interested in combatting antisemitism and promoting peace in the Middle East.
Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY17)
It may make him a target of powerful left-wing politicians in New York State.
Lawler: Pro Peace and Bi-Partisan
On June 12, 2023, Lawler took to the House floor to promote a bill he co-sponsored with Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-NY15). He spoke about H.R.3099 to create a “special envoy for the Abraham Accords in the U.S. Department of State… to coordinate efforts across the United States government to expand and strengthen the Abraham Accords with key allies and strategic partners… making clear that the United States government prioritizes our relationship with Israel and the advancement of peace and prosperity.”
Rep. Torres also took the floor and discussed the bill he co-sponsored and led with the importance of bipartisanship. “I want to thank the gentleman from New York, Mike Lawler, for his legislative partnership and leadership. If there is one cause that should transcend partisanship, it is the cause of peace in the Middle East. Building a bridge between Israel and the Arab world is neither a Democratic value nor a Republican value; it is an American value.”
Lawler concurs, and is proud of his willingness to work with Democrats saying “you need to be able to build relationships within your own conference and across the aisle, especially coming from a district like mine. My objective is to get things done.”
Not everyone agrees.
Rep. Jamaal Bowman, the anti-Israel and Jew-ambivalent congressman whose district sits between Lawler and Torres, voted against the measure. Bowman is among the most partisan members of Congress, almost never voting with Republicans, ranking #396 out of 435 by the Lugar bipartisanship index.
Bowman is the male version of Alexandria Ocasio Cortez (ranked #401 by the Lugar Index), part of the emerging extremist wing taking over the Democratic party. They are the anti-Lawlers, highly partisan and anti-Israel.
Lawler: Fighting Antisemitism
Lawler has been active fighting for peace elsewhere.
On June 1, 2023, he introduced legislation, H.R.3773, to rescind federal funding for colleges that promote antisemitism on their campuses. It was drafted in reaction to the horrible wave of antisemitic incidents taking place on City of New York (CUNY) and State of New York (SUNY) college campuses. Lawler said that “CUNY should be ashamed of itself for allowing insidious anti-semitism to permeate on its campuses, and my bill will ensure they face stiff penalties if they continue to let hate have a home.”
Unfortunately, Jew hatred has been given a home in New York by the growing horde of left-wing radicals.
How sad and frightening that condemning Jew hatred has become a partisan issue.
Lawler: In the Democratic Crosshairs
In the 2022 elections, Lawler defeated Democrat Sean Patrick Maloney, chair of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. With his powerful position, Maloney poured $6.7 million into his losing campaign to Lawler who barely spent $1.5 million. The loss was a stinging embarrassment for New York Democrats, and helped the Republicans take a majority of the House.
The powerful Democratic machine is now intent on taking out this Republican, with millions of dollars in negative ads with fake news about him being deeply unpopular, as well as actions hidden from sight, through the most partisan of actions, the gerrymander.
New York’s new liberal court may soon take the pen and rework district lines to make Lawler vulnerable, as he only won with only a 2,000 vote margin in 2022. Slight alterations to his district lines could make his tenure in congress very short.
Democrats will soon decide whether they care more about power and politics in using gerrymandering to try to oust Rep. Lawler, or working for a future of peace and bipartisanship.
I am not optimistic.
ACTION ITEM
EMAIL GOVERNOR HOCHUL: “Do not gerrymander NY17, Mike Lawler’s district. The courts put forward a fair New York map in 2022 and we do not want to see a bipartisan, pro-peace, fighter against antisemitism be removed from Congress with political trickery.”
On March 9, 2023, Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY16) spoke in Congress about his views on discrimination, specifically against what he thought were attempts to harm the transgender community with a proposed bill to prevent trans-women from competing in sports against biological women. He spoke about the history of discrimination in the United States saying “whether they are Black, Latino, Asian, LGBTQ, poor, people with disabilities, women, we have an ugly history of discrimination in this country.”
In calling out eight groups of people facing discrimination, he omitted the most targeted people of hate crimes: Jews.
Not only did Bowman ignore the most prevalent form of hate crimes in his denouncement of discrimination, he implied that most of the offenders are White. Meanwhile, according to FBI statistics, it is Black people who are disproportionately the attackers of the LGBT community, accounting for 27.2% of such hate crimes even though they are 13.6% of the overall population.
Bowman’s antisemitism and race baiting is so ingrained, that he cannot fathom facts, and instead promotes himself with political theater performed for a narrow slice of his constituents.
The latest Palestinian poll of June 14, 2023 showed a familiar preference for violence that has been a constant sentiment for years. Now a new headline has emerged: that Palestinians think Israel will disappear within the next 25 years.
Preference For Violent Jihad
When asked about the most positive things to happen to Palestinians over the past 75 years since the reestablishment of the Jewish State of Israel in the so-called “Nakba catastrophe”, the number one response was the establishment of the terrorist groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad. Second, were the two “Intifada pogroms” which killed over 1,000 Israeli Jews. Trailing those responses was the creation of the PLO and the Palestinian Authority (PA) and last, the formation of the more moderate political party, Fatah.
A large majority of 71% are in favor of the formation of the newest terrorist groups “Lion’s Den” and “Jenin Battalion” which sparked the dramatic rise in deaths among both Israelis and Palestinians over the past two years. An incredible 86% of Palestinian Arabs think the terrorist groups should operate outside of the PA. Not surprisingly, with such support, 58% expect “these armed groups to expand and spread to other areas in the West Bank.”
When asked about the most effective means of creating a Palestinian state, “the public split into three groups: 52% chose armed struggle [aka violent jihad] (55% in the Gaza Strip and 49% in the West Bank), 21% negotiations, and 22% popular resistance.”
These findings are not meaningfully different than results of past polls. The alarming question about the preference to kill Jewish civilians inside of Israel was not asked in this latest poll. In March 2023, 61% were in favor of such terrorist attacks (question 70).
The End of Israel
The quarterly Palestinian poll occasionally introduces new questions based on recent events. For example, this poll asked about opinions related to the Iranian-Saudi reproachment. Last poll asked whether people were in favor of killing two Israelis who drove into the town of Huwara (a vast majority were).
In the latest poll, people were asked a more general question about the future of Israel as the country celebrated its 75th anniversary. In response to the question of Israel making it to its 100th anniversary, “two-thirds say Israel will not celebrate the centenary of its establishment, and the majority believes that the Palestinian people will be able in the future to recover Palestine and return its refugees to their homes.”
While the world debates how to set the “peace process” on track and solely blames the Israeli government for the failure of progress, Palestinians have mentally moved on, and see the end of the Jewish State in their lifetimes and its replacement with an Arab country.
ACTION ITEM
While the world debates how to set the “peace process” on track and solely blames the Israeli government for the failure of progress, Palestinians have mentally moved on, and see the end of the Jewish State in their lifetimes.
CONTACT Sen. Christopher Murphy (D-CT) “Palestinians polled themselves once again and not only show a strong preference for violence but see the end of Israel in the near future. Stop efforts to condition aid to Israel.”
A mural in the town of Greenburgh in Westchester County, NY, which was meant to celebrate Black history has instead become a symbol of the Black community’s anti-Jewish sentiments: that the rise in Black power will come at the expense of Jews.
Farrakhan in Greenburgh
Louis Farrakhan is a notorious antisemite and Black supremacist. He is the current leader of the Nation of Islam (NOI), which the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) – a group devoted to defending Black people – labels as a hate group where “seeds of antisemitism are deeply rooted.” It listed just a few of his vile comments such as calling Hitler “a very great man” and Judaism a “dirty religion,” but the list is extensive. At a rally in 2020, he said “Those of you that say that you are Jews, I will not even give you the honor of calling you a Jew. You’re not a Jew. You’re so-called. You’re Satan. And it’s my job now to pull the cover off of Satan.”
A portrait of Farrakhan is now in public, on government property, paid for by local Westchester taxpayers.
In response to the Black Lives Matter movement, the town of Greenburgh hired a local artist to paint a mural on Manhattan Avenue on Black history. The town approved the initial sketches but town supervisors were later upset to see that the final version included Farrakhan, with hand raised, screaming over the U.S. Capital building. On August 25, 2022, the town said that it “voted to remove the unauthorized imagery. The Artist has agreed that Louis Farrakhan will be taken off of the mural and the image will be removed this week.” That never happened as the pictures above attest (taken June 9, 2023). Instead a barrier was placed at the platform’s stairs making it difficult for people to ascend to view the mural up close, while the platform’s rails obstruct the view for passers-by.
Black Westchester Magazine wrote an article about the mural and defended it with arguments that Farrakhan was an instrumental part of fighting for Black rights, and as there was no specific commentary against Jews in the mural, Jews should not get overly offended. The author added that he would be more sympathetic to Jews if they spoke out forcefully when Blacks were offended, curiously making sympathy an emotion with preconditions.
A few months later, in December 2022, the New Rochelle Public Library hosted an event to discuss Black-on-Black gun violence after a local rapper was shot and killed in October. Two politicians attended, including Council Member Yadira Ramos-Herbert who is running to be the next Mayor of New Rochelle and former New Rochelle Board of Education President Lianne Merchant who is running to replace Ramos-Herbert as the representative for Council District 3. Several speakers took the stage including NAACP President Minister Mark McLean, New Rochelle Municipal Housing Authority Executive Director Angela Farrish and City of New Rochelle Director of Economic Development Jorge Ventura.
Then Brother Arthur Muhammad of the Nation of Islam and a “drill team” performed. They recommended that the “FOI” – Fruit of Islam, the armed wing of the Nation of Islam – manage New Rochelle’s streets. They chanted “War! War! Farrakhan! Salute Elijah! Raise Front Farrakhan! There’s a time for peace, there’s a time for war! Hear the guards! Hear the guards knocking at your door! You need the FOI to the day we die!”
Members of the Nation of Islam at the New Rochelle Public Library, December 2022
As described by the “Talk of the Sound”, The Fruit of Islam (FOI) is the security and disciplinary wing of the Nation of Islam (NOI). It has also been described as its paramilitary wing. The FOI was created at the founding of the Nation of Islam and existed until the death of Elijah Muhammad in 1975 when it was disbanded. The FOI was reestablished by Louis Farrakhan with him as Commander-in-Chief.
Congressman Jamaal Bowman (NY16)
Jamaal Bowman is the congressman who now serves the newly redrawn NY District 16 which covers lower Westchester County. He won principally on the strength of the turnout in the predominantly Black areas, including Greenburgh where the Farrkhan mural hangs in public. While that town is less than half the population of the city of Yonkers, it had more votes in the Democratic primary, with 8.1% of the residents coming out to vote, a remarkable 20% of all primary voters. Bowman’s tally in Greenburgh, Yonkers, Mount Vernon and New Rochelle (13,918) was more than enough to sail to victory in 2022.
On June 6, 2023, Bowman endorsed Working Families Party candidate for New Rochelle mayor Yadira Ramos-Herbert. She was one of the attendees at the New Rochelle Public Library as the Nation of Islam performed who has refused to comment about the event.
Bowman has a long history of upsetting his Jewish constituents, both within the former contours of District 16 and in the current borders of lower Westchester. He has failed to support resolutions condemning antisemitism and supported anti-Israel initiatives. In 2020, he replaced Jewish congressman Eliot Engel in the Bronx, and Bowman now serves the region which had been represented by Jewish congresswoman Nita Lowey for decades.
Lower Westchester County is home to some of the wealthiest towns in the country, including Scarsdale, Bronxville and Larchmont. It is also becoming the home of left-wing and radical Muslim extremism, as those communities put forward extremist candidates in local elections (like those backed by the Working Families Party), and organize to get out the vote, as much of the county ignores local primaries – next one on June 27 – to their own detriment.
Many people waited for the United States Supreme Court to rule on a case of trademark infringement before leaping into the market with their own parody products. The case involved a dog toy named ‘Bad Spaniels’ that mimicked Jack Daniel’s Whiskey. The justices came back with a unanimous 9-0 ruling in favor of BS arguing that no one could possibly confuse a ‘poop-themed’ dog toy for the alcoholic beverage.
One of the first new products to hit store shelves was “U.N.Circumcized”, which sported the United Nations global body logo, with a tagline which offered “protection for the world’s bodies, except for Jews.”
Another person opted to open a store across the street from the United Nations called Hunter College Store for Jihad. It had highly flammable Israeli flags, a map of all Jewish institutions in America following the format of the Massachusetts Mapping Project, and several life-sized effigies in nooses with masks of various Jewish and Israeli personalities.
The holy city of Jerusalem, the capital of Israel held two parades over the past couple of weeks. One was done by the right-wing and the other by the left-wing. Each side claimed the moral high ground and accused the other of acting in bad faith.
Let’s speak about both honestly.
The Flag Parade
On May 18, thousands of Israelis marched through the streets of Jerusalem carrying Israeli flags to mark the reunification of the city at the end of the 1967 Six Day War. The tremendous pride in country and messianic feel of Jews controlling Judaism’s holiest site for the first time in almost two thousand years was palpable at the time, and many tried to recreate that sense of awe 56 years later.
Marchers near Damascus Gate of Old City during Jerusalem Day, 2023
The parade route into the Old City to the Western Wall could have worked its way through the Jewish Quarter but the nationalist spirit of the marchers directed them through the Arab Quarter, essentially re-educating the Arabs about their defeat. While the march was basically peaceful, roughly 2,500 police officers came to maintain order as past years saw scuffles as the Arabs in the Old City resented the march.
The Gay Pride Parade
On June 1, thousands of Israelis marched through the streets in a gay Pride Parade. While such a parade would have happened without controversy in the liberal and secular city of Tel Aviv, the religious beliefs of devout Jews and Muslims in Jerusalem caused friction.
Thousands of police came to protect the marchers as there were attacks in past years. This year’s event proved peaceful and uneventful.
Some Truths
The Flag and Pride Parades were both legal and unnecessarily provocative. The right wing Jewish nationalists did not need to go through the Arab Quarter and the left wing secular Jews did not need to march through religious sections of the country. Each sought to drive home their own point that they are free and able to hold such events, and enjoyed rubbing the spectators’ noses in the fact.
The left-wing media only focused on the right-wing in both cases. CNN described a “contentious flag march” in which a” number of Palestinian shopkeepers told CNN before the event that they would close their shops in the Old City for fear of attacks by far-right Jewish nationalists.” The New York Times covered the “Conflict With the Far Right Shrouds Jerusalem’s Pride Parade,” with the backdrop of “the most hard-line and religiously conservative government in the country’s history took power.”
Both the right-wing and left-wing held their parades in Jerusalem being proud and provocative, yet the mainstream opinion shapers could only find fault with right-wing and religious Jews. It fed their macro narrative of right-wing White Supremacist Jews as the elite amongst the bigots, despite being the most persecuted group in the world.
First One Through 