Tag Archives: Abbas

“Won’t you be my Neighbor?”

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The fall of 2014 saw an explosion of personal clashes between Arabs and Jews in Israel, Judea and Samaria. Jews were killed at train stations, at bus stops, on the streets and malls. Arabs were shot by security personnel at the scene of the attacks.

Attacks in the land date back to 1920. The first large scale riot of Arabs against Jews in multiple cities took place in 1929 and the first multi-year “intifada” went from 1936 to 1939. All of these took place before Israel was created or controlled any land.

The common theme of all attacks until the present day has been the Arab anger at Jews for living in Israel.

  • “Living” meant Jews moving to Israel, buying homes and living in the land.
  • “Living” meant Jews praying at the Western Wall or the Temple Mount.
  • “Living” meant Jews walking the streets, taking the bus or train in Israel.
  • “Living” meant being a Jewish baby in Israel.

When Israel was created in 1948, it offered all non-Jews citizenship and 112,000 became citizens. However, Abbas has called for a new Palestinian state to be free of any Jews. Abbas has repeatedly stated he will never recognize Israel as a Jewish State. Palestinian leadership constantly refers to Jews as foreign invaders who have no history in the land or right to live there.

Until Arab leadership finally recognizes the rights of Jews to live in the region, will there ever be a chance for peace?

Palestinian Xenophobia music video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eQS1XVQR-Xc

untitled

Sources:

2014 attacks on Israeli Jews: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-29993066

http://www.jpost.com/Israel-News/Watch-Palestinian-terrorist-runs-over-Israeli-pedestrian-in-Jerusalem-light-rail-station-380857

Acting Palestinian President Abbas call to “defend al aqsa”: http://www.palwatch.org/main.aspx?fi=157&doc_id=12915

2014 Palestinian song to run over Jews: http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2014/11/09/run-overthe-baby-the-song-that-rallies-palestinians-to-kill-israeli-infants/

Fatah call to kill sellers of land to Jews: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YfVsLzfuVu0

1920, 1921, 1929 attacks: http://www.ifcj.org/site/PageNavigator/sfi_about_war_settlement

1936-9 Arab riots: http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/History/riots36.html

Israel demographics: http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=3&ved=0CDAQFjAC&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.cbs.gov.il%2Fstatistical%2Fstatistical60_eng.pdf&ei=xe9hVJ77EumIsQS43oK4Bw&usg=AFQjCNHXYq05pquPovaVEnqaO7FQGRum9A&sig2=PYh_eXTl1bEpwiPP03Lw1A

Hamas Charter calling for death of Jews and destruction of Israel: http://avalon.law.yale.edu/20th_century/hamas.asp

Abbas call for Jew free Palestine: http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/07/30/us-palestinians-israel-abbas-idUSBRE96T00920130730

Abbas never recognize “Jewish State”: http://www.palwatch.org/main.aspx?fi=709&fld_id=709&doc_id=1143

Palestinian denial of Jewish history in Israel: http://www.palwatch.org/main.aspx?fi=490

Tolerance at the Temple Mount

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The Temple Mount in Jerusalem has become the focus of much debate both between religions (Islam and Judaism) and between different segments within a religion (Judaism). At its core, the debate is whether the most fervent believers continue to dictate the religious practices of everyone at the Temple Mount, or whether there is a place for a pluralistic approach to prayer.

 The Temple Mount

The Temple Mount is a 35 acre platform built by the Jewish King Herod over 2000 years ago. The platform held the second Temple, built around 515BCE until it was destroyed by the Romans in 70CE. The site of the two Temples (the first one lasted from around 954BCE to 586BCE), is considered Judaism’s holiest spot. It is now occupied by the Dome of the Rock, a gilded shrine built by Caliph Abd al-Malik in 691, and later richly adorned in 1561 by Suleiman I into the building we recognize now.

Al Aqsa is the only mosque on the Temple Mount. It is considered the third most holy site in Islam. It was built in its current configuration in 754CE, and sits on the far southern edge of the platform, in an area that did not exist until Herod expanded the platform southward 800 years earlier.

 Jews and the Temple Mount

In 1948, five Arab armies invaded Israel in an attempt to destroy the nascent Jewish State. Jordan seized Judea and Samaria and much of eastern Jerusalem including the Old City which contained the Temple Mount. The Jordanians then expelled all Jews from the territory it conquered (including the Old City) and the area later became known as the “West Bank”.

In 1967, the Jordanians and Palestinians attacked Israel again and lost all of the West Bank including the eastern part of Jerusalem. Rather than take full control of the Temple Mount, the Israelis handed religious control of the Temple Mount compound to the Waqf- the Islamic religious order run from Jordan, and assumed security control. The Jordanians continued to prohibit Jews from worshiping anywhere on the Temple Mount, even in areas far removed from the Al Aqsa Mosque, such as areas Muslim families used for picnics and football.

Many Jews are unhappy about the ban on Jews worshiping at their holiest spot on earth. People such as Rabbi Yehuda Glick made many arguments to Israeli authorities to loosen the anti-Jewish restrictions. For those efforts, he was shot in October 2014 by Palestinian Arabs after acting-President of the Palestinian Authority Mahmoud Abbas, incited his followers to “defend Al Alqsa by whatever means possible”, even though Jews who visited the Temple Mount never entered, nor attempted to enter, the mosque.

Liberal media outfits branded the Jews who sought the right to pray “right-wing extremists”. The New York Times referred to Glick and others as “agitators”. The “agitators” calls for equal prayer rights were considered outlandish. The opening paragraphs of a 10/30/14 New York Times article:

“An Israeli-American agitator who has pushed for more Jewish access and rights
at a hotly contested religious site in Jerusalem was shot and seriously wounded Wednesday night by an unidentified assailant in an apparent assassination attempt.

The shooting of the activist, Yehuda Glick, compounded fears of further violence
in the increasingly polarized holy city, where tensions are already high over fears
of a new Palestinian uprising against Israeli occupation.”

Glick was not alone in seeking greater religious rights for people in Jerusalem.

 Women of the Wall

The “Western Wall” or the “Kotel” is part of the western retaining wall that Herod built to increase the size of Temple Mount. For many centuries, the Kotel was one of the areas closest to Judaism’s holiest site, which Jews could access. While several other spots on the retaining wall were closer to the site of the Jewish Temples, they were either very small, hard to access or considered unsafe. As such, the Western Wall achieved the status of Judaism’s holiest site because Jews could practically use the site for prayers.

After Israel reunited Jerusalem in 1967, it demolished the buildings in front of the Kotel and made a large plaza where thousands of Jews could pray. It gave religious control of the plaza to the Orthodox rabbinate to oversee religious activities. Those rabbis have restricted prayers to only be in the orthodox tradition.

In 1988, a group of feminist Jewish women who objected to the restrictions of the Orthodox rabbinate, formed a group seeking the right to pray at the Kotel in a manner of their own choosing. The Women of the Wall (WOW) were predominantly “progressive” orthodox women that believed that women wearing a tallit, tefillin and using a Torah were “kosher” actions under orthodoxy, if they prayed only with other women. However, the Orthodox rabbis use a more traditional approach to prayer and have established laws which prohibit those women from praying in their desired fashion at the Kotel.

In October 2014, WOW brought a miniature Torah to the Kotel and held a bat mitzvah on the women’s side of the plaza. The rabbis did not attack the women but stated that they will seek to prevent women from holding such services in the future.

Liberal media such as the New York Times did not refer to these women who broke the law and challenged the religious status quo as “right-wing extremists” or “agitators” but “advocates”. The opening paragraphs of the 10/25/14 article stated:

“Members of a group advocating equal prayer rights for women at the Western Wall,
one of Judaism’s holiest sites, held its first full bat mitzvah there Friday,
fooling the strict male Orthodox overseers by sneaking in a miniature Torah scroll
that was read with a magnifying glass for the ceremony.

The action by the group, Women of the Wall, signaled a new phase of activity
after years of legal and religious struggles that have reverberated
among progressive Jews around the world.”

The battles for pluralism at Jerusalem’s holy sites by the activists were the same. The actions of both Glick and WOW were non-violent. However the reactions to their activities were polar opposites:

  • the Palestinian authorities incited violence on the Temple Mount; the rabbinate called for stricter law enforcement at the Kotel
  • the world demanded that Israel maintain the status quo of barring all Jewish prayer at their holiest site; the world was silent on how Jewish denominations pray at the Kotel
  • Liberal media described the Temple Mount religious activists as “right wing extremists”; the media lauded the “activity” of “progressive Jews” seeking “equality”
  • Rabbi Glick was shot four times at point blank range and the acting Palestinian leader called the shooter a martyr destined for heaven; the Women of the Wall celebrated the bat mitzvah peacefully and decorum at the Kotel was maintained
  • Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu repeatedly told the Muslim world that he would maintain the anti-Jewish “status quo” edicts on the Temple Mount; the Jewish State is examining enacting new laws and new spaces along the Kotel for other religious denominations

Does liberal support of activism end when it elicits violence? Should Malala Yousafzai, the young Pakistani woman who defied Taliban law to not attend school, be described as an “agitator”? The world embraced Malala and awarded her the Nobel Peace Prize in the same month as the Glick shooting and WOW bat mitzvah. Will “progressives” and “liberals” rally to Rabbi Glick and advance the cause for Jewish rights on the Temple Mount? What do you think?

Sources:

Abbas call to defend al aqsa mosque: http://palwatch.org/main.aspx?fi=157&doc_id=12915

CAMERA on the Temple Mount: http://www.camera.org/index.asp?x_context=7&x_issue=4&x_article=1404

Women of the Wall: http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Judaism/WOW.html

Women of the wall use torah for bat mitzvah: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/25/world/middleeast/women-hold-western-wall-bat-mitzvah-in-jerusalem.html?_r=0

Shooting of Rabbi Glick: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/30/world/middleeast/right-wing-israeli-activist-shot-jerusalem.html

Malala Nobel prize: http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/peace/laureates/2014/yousafzai-facts.html

Related First One Through articles:

“Extremist” or “Courageous”

The United Nations and Holy Sites in the Holy Land

The Arguments over Jerusalem

20141104_062922

The Battle for Jerusalem

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The Battle for Jerusalem was been waged for many years.

In October 2014, the acting Palestinian Authority President Abbas took umbrage at Jews moving into homes they purchased in Silwan- an area that was originally settled by Jews.  Abbas called for hard labor and life imprisonment (or death) for any Arab that sold land to a Jew. There was no reaction from the world to Abbas’s racist edict.

The October comments from Abbas continued with a call to prohibit any Jew from praying on the Temple Mount. He then insisted that no Jews should be allowed to live anywhere east of the 1949 Armistice lines, including in heavily populated Jewish neighborhoods of Jerusalem.

The stated rationale for the comments to try to mask the anti-Semitism was that such moves “threaten a two state solution”. That is absurd.

A two state solution can exist very easily- it just would not have a new Palestine with everything that Abbas would like.  Specifically, Jerusalem.

The Israelis have already split the “Holy Basin” proposed in the 1947 UN Partition Plan by giving the Palestinians Bethlehem.  The other half of the basin, Jerusalem, would remain Israeli.  Keeping Jerusalem as the united capital of Israel in no way threatens the viability of a new Palestinian State.

Here is the music video (The Who) that reviews the tired and flawed arguments Palestinian supporters used in fighting the development of E1, east of Jerusalem. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PIXimxfeuS8

Sources:

Laws of Silwan: https://firstonethrough.wordpress.com/2014/10/20/real-and-imagined-laws-of-living-in-silwan/

Abbas call for “hard labor” if sell land to Jews: http://www.jpost.com/Arab-Israeli-Conflict/Abbas-adds-hard-labor-to-punishment-for-Palestinians-who-sell-land-to-hostile-countries-379350

Abbas, the racist, calling Israel racist: https://firstonethrough.wordpress.com/2014/10/27/abbas-knows-racism/

Abbas call for banning Jews on Temple Mount: http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4581262,00.html

Abbas against Jews in eastern Jerusalem: http://www.timesofisrael.com/abbas-calls-for-emergency-un-security-council-meeting-on-jerusalem/

Short Palestinian control of Jerusalem: https://firstonethrough.wordpress.com/2014/07/07/east-jerusalem-the-0-5-molehill/

Obama complicit in agreeing to Abbas racism: https://firstonethrough.wordpress.com/2014/10/02/obama-supports-anti-semitic-palestinian-agenda-of-jew-free-state/

Abbas Knows Racism

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Acting President of the Palestinian Authority (PA), Mahmoud Abbas took the podium at the United Nations General Assembly in September 2014. In the speech which covered many attacks on Israel, he repeatedly called the country “racist”:

  • “the third war waged by the racist occupying State in five years against Gaza,”
  • “[Palestinian] legitimate right to resist this colonial, racist Israeli occupation”
  • “racist and armed gangs of settlers persisted with their crimes against the Palestinian people”
  • “the subjugation of the racist settlers and army of occupation, and at worst will be a most abhorrent form of Apartheid.”
  • “terrorism by the racist occupying Power and its settlers”
  • “an attempt to give a religious nature to the conflict and with the rising and rampant racism in the Israeli political and media discourse”
  • “This culture of racism, incitement and hatred”

The video below gives a long review of Israel’s policies and compares them to the policies of not just the surrounding Arab countries, but to democracies around the world. The comparison does not just act as a rebuttal and defense to the charge, but highlights laws that many countries have against Muslims which do not exist in Israel.

But that video is really meant for western viewers who might think they come from non-racist countries and who thereby feel empowered to rebuke Israel. For Abbas to make the charge of racism against Israel can either be viewed as laughable, or as an insightful criticism as it comes from an expert.

Palestinian Racism

Abbas’s charge of racism spans the entirety of Israeli society: the State is racist; the “occupation” is racist; the settlers are racist; the military is racist; Israeli politics and media are racist; and the culture is racist. How does the Palestinian Authority do in these categories?

  • State is racist: Palestinian Authority has a law that condemns any Arab that sells land to a Jew to death.  Universities bar entry to Jews. Gaza forbids UNRWA schools from teaching about the Holocaust.
  • The occupation is racist: Abbas has demanded a new country free of Jews.
  • Military is racist: Hamas charter calls for the killing of all Jews and the destruction of the Jewish State. Hamas states that the essence of the conflict is that Israel is Jewish and that Islam must destroy it. For its part, the entire Palestinian Authority regularly applauds murderers of Jewish civilians and names tournaments and squares after them.
  • Media is racist: The list is too long to review, but turn to MEMRI.org or PalWatch.org to see the vile anti-Semitic rants that Palestinians post on their televisions on a regular basis.
  • Culture is racist: Palestinians are the most anti-Semitic group on the planet, with 93% holding anti-Semitic views according to a poll in May 2014.

Abbas in his own words

  • No Jews: “we would not see the presence of a single Israeli – civilian or soldier – on our lands,” (2013)
  • Holocaust Denial: Abbas spent several years and completed his phd on Holocaust denial. The denial of the Holocaust is considered illegal in: Austria; Belgium; Bosnia and Herzegovina; Czech Republic; France; Germany; Hungary; Israel; Liechtenstein; Lithuania; Luxembourg; Netherlands; Poland; Portugal; Romania; Spain; and Switzerland. He has continued to belittle the Holocaust with calling Israel “genocidal”, including in the UN speech in 2014.

·         Denial of Jewish history: “The occupation authorities are continuing their efforts to achieve their final goal of Judaizing Jerusalem…whose purpose is to serve delusional myths and the arrogance of power. They imagine that by brute force they can invent a history, establish claims and erase solid religious and historical facts” (2014)

  • Denial of Jewish State: “I’ll never recognize Israel as a Jewish state.” (2014); “We shall never agree to recognize the Jewish state.” (2013); “I will never recognize the Jewishness of the state, or a “Jewish state.” (2011)

Sources:

Abbas UN Speech 2014: http://www.timesofisrael.com/full-text-of-abbas-speech-to-un/

Holocaust denial criminal offense: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laws_against_Holocaust_denial

Birzeit University bans Jews: http://www.timesofisrael.com/haaretz-writer-booted-from-palestinian-school-because-shes-israeli/

Death Penalty for selling land to Jews: http://www.jpost.com/Middle-East/PA-affirms-death-penalty-for-land-sales-to-Israelis

1939 British White Paper: http://www.historycentral.com/Israel/1939WhitePaper.html

1988 Hamas charter: “In face of the Jews’ usurpation of Palestine, it is compulsory that the banner of Jihad be raised“; “Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it,” http://avalon.law.yale.edu/20th_century/hamas.asp

Abbas comparing Holocaust to Israeli “racism”: “The Palestinian people, who suffer from injustice, oppression and denied freedom and peace, are the first to demand to lift the injustice and racism that befell other peoples subjected to such crimes” http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/27/world/middleeast/palestinian-leader-shifts-on-holocaust.html?_r=0

“Judaization” of Jerusalem: http://www.palwatch.org/main.aspx?fi=606

Not recognizing Jewish State (2014): http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/27/world/middleeast/palestinian-leader-shifts-on-holocaust.html?_r=1

Not recognizing Jewish State: http://www.memritv.org/clip_transcript/en/4179.htm

2011 refusal for Jewish State: http://www.memritv.org/clip_transcript/en/3163.htm

ADL poll: http://www.adl.org/press-center/press-releases/anti-semitism-international/adl-global-100-poll.html

The United Nations “Provocation”

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On October 13 2014, the UN Secretary General parroted Palestinian propaganda perfectly with “provocations”.

Using the term “provocation” does many things: it puts all of the blame completely on the person doing the provocation, and it implies that everything would be peaceful if the initiating party were not being belligerent.

The Palestinians deliberately voted for war when they elected Hamas to 58% of the government in 2006. They have made their preference for war and Hamas clear in poll after poll since that time, the latest being August 2014 which showed Hamas winning 61% of the vote. Just because the world prevents new Palestinian elections from occurring and leaves a straw-man in Abbas to act as president for six years after his term ran out, does not change that fundamental reality. The Palestinian war is eight years running with Israel responding three times (Cast Lead; Pillar of Defense; Protective Edge).

UN Secretary Ban Ki-Moon described the Israeli “provocation” of Jews moving into homes in the eastern part of Jerusalem. As detailed in the FirstOneThrough article below, the idea that there should be Jew-free zones is: blatantly anti-Semitic; was only instituted by the Palestinians and Jordanians from 1949-1967; and is against international law (including from the prior incarnation of the UN itself, the League of Nations), in the Palestine Mandate which forbade barring anyone from living in Palestine solely due to their religion.

Palestinians (and Jordanians) have used the term “provocations” often regarding Israeli action in Jerusalem. Some of those “provocations” have included actions such as:

  • Rebuilding a synagogue that the Jordanians destroyed
  • Building an exit for tourists at an archaeological site
  • Visiting the holiest site for Jews during regular visiting hours (and not going near Muslim sites)

A political music video on “provocations” with music by The Clash (Rock the Cashbah):  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v3fKXyxKixE

The rebuilt Hurva Synagogue (the original dates back 250 years)

Sources:

UN Secretary on “provocation” (start at 10:10): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ckX3Ut-r_Mw

Abbas, the straw man for 6 years: https://firstonethrough.wordpress.com/2014/09/30/the-disappointing-46-anniversary/

The illegality and racism of suggesting a Jew-free region in Palestine: https://firstonethrough.wordpress.com/2014/10/02/obama-supports-anti-semitic-palestinian-agenda-of-jew-free-state/

 

 

 

Obama supports Anti-Semitic Palestinian Agenda of Jew-Free State

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US President Obama again made his opinion clear that he supports Acting-President of the Palestinian Authority Mahmoud Abbas’ calls for creating a Jew-free country.

President Obama told visiting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in October 2014, that the US is against both Jews building new homes and against Jews moving into existing homes in areas that Abbas wants to keep Jew-free.

The Obama administration comments were in response to two events: planned construction of 2600 new homes in Givat Hamatos and six Jewish families moving into homes they purchased in the predominantly Arab neighborhood of Silwan. Both neighborhoods are in the eastern part of Jerusalem.

White House spokesman Josh Earnest said “The US condemns the recent occupation of residential buildings in the neighborhood of Silwan by people whose agenda provokes tensions.” Note this Obama condemnation was not about building a new town in a remote region of the West Bank; this was about Jews buying and moving into existing houses in Jerusalem.  The reason?  Because it makes the Arabs angry.

Abbas has been on record that he doesn’t want any Jewish presence in a future Palestinian country.  He wants Israel to keep Jews out of potential Palestinian land now so he won’t have to evict them or pay them compensation to leave later (similar to the compensation he expects Israel to pay to Arabs who left property in 1948). In July 2013, Abbas said “In a final resolution, we would not see the presence of a single Israeli — civilian or soldier — on our lands.”

Blatantly anti-Semitic statements from Palestinian leadership which call for banning Jews from the region is not new. In the Arab riots of 1936-9, Arabs effectively convinced the British to limit Jewish immigration to only 75,000 over the 1940-5 years, at the end of which time, Jews would be banned from moving to the country altogether. The Arabs and British took this action during the Holocaust in Europe, aiding in the murder of thousands of innocents who could have found refuge in their homeland, which the League of Nations had mandated 17 years earlier to be “national home for the Jewish people”. While the Jews were being killed in Europe, hundreds of thousands of Arabs from around the Middle East moved into Palestine.

Liberals could perhaps try to forgive Obama’s ignorance regarding Jews in the region – maybe he doesn’t know that:

  • Jews have consistently been a majority in Jerusalem since the 1860s- 100 years before the 1967 war;
  • Jews were always allowed to live throughout the land- including under the Ottomans for 500 years and then under the British Mandate;
  • Yemenite Jews were the original settlers of Silwan, back in 1882;
  • The League of Nations Palestine Mandate (1922) specifically stated that no one should be barred from living in the land due to religion: Article 15: “No person shall be excluded from Palestine on the sole ground of his religious belief”;
  • The Palestinians and Jordanians started both the 1948 and 1967 wars which gave Israel half (in 1948) and then all of Jerusalem;
  • The Palestinians and Jordanians evicted all of the Jews from the eastern half of the city in 1949, barred the Jews from visiting the holy sites and are attempting to recreate that Jew-free environment in that part of the city today;
  • Jerusalem was never intended to be Jew-free or a Palestinian city according to the 1947 UN Partition Plan;
  • Israel already gave the Palestinians half of the “Holy Basin” when it gave control of Bethlehem to the Palestinian Authority;
  • In the more macro story:
    • Jews have lived in Jerusalem for over 3000 years – 1600 years before Islam brought the Arabs to Jerusalem;
    • Jerusalem is the holiest city for only one religion – Judaism;
    • Only one people – Jews – ever made Jerusalem its capital in its 4000 year history;
    • The identity of Israel is Jerusalem; it is the only country to have a national anthem ABOUT its capital

Beyond a willful ignorance of the long and deep history of the Jews in all of Jerusalem, how could the first African-American president of the United States advocate creating Jew-free zones, knowing first-hand about racism? Would Obama stand for a housing policy that barred blacks from living in Washington, DC?

How can the US support the Arabs’ racist suggestion that would bar Jews from living in Jerusalem?

20141002_100159

Sources:

Obama criticizing Netanyahu on new Jerusalem homes: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-10-02/obama-netanyahu-talks-clouded-as-u-s-slams-settlements.html

http://www.timesofisrael.com/us-israel-ties-in-crisis-over-east-jerusalem-building-plans/

Obama criticizing Jews living in Silwan: http://www.timesofisrael.com/us-israel-ties-in-crisis-over-east-jerusalem-building-plans/

Abbas on Jew-free Palestine: http://www.commentarymagazine.com/2013/07/30/abbas-arabs-in-israel-no-jews-in-palestine-peace-process/

1922 League of Nations Mandate: http://avalon.law.yale.edu/20th_century/palmanda.asp

1939 White Paper: http://avalon.law.yale.edu/20th_century/brwh1939.asp

Yeminite Jews in Silwan: http://www.meforum.org/3281/silwan

 

Related First One Through articles:

800,000 Arabs moving to Palestine during the British Mandate:

The anthem of Israel is Jerusalem: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wulmUGVG3jA

Short history of Palestinians+Jordanians controlling Jerusalem

The Arguments over Jerusalem

The Disappointing 4+6 Abbas Anniversary

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October 1, 2014 will begin the 100 day-countdown to a peculiar anniversary on the world stage. January 10, 2015, is the tenth anniversary of Mahmoud Abbas winning a four-year term as President – and then never leaving.

abbas UN
The Palestinian Straw Man, Mahmoud Abbas

Abbas’s first four years (while actually sitting and ruling) watched him lose all control of the territories he was supposed to govern:

  • One year after his election, in 2006, his Fatah party was trounced in governmental elections. The rival Hamas party took 58% of the 132 seats in parliament.
  • A year later, in 2007, Hamas evicted Fatah from the Gaza Strip. Abbas and Fatah have had virtually no presence there since then.
  • Abbas showed no ability and/or willingness to stop missile attacks from Gaza into Israel (1777, 2807 and 3716 projectiles in 2006, 2007 and 2008, respectively). Those rockets killed 12 people and injured 1500. In 2008, Israel finally took action. Abbas complained about Israel’s action even though he was then elected leader of the territories that did nothing to halt the attacks.

No matter. The world seemed to love this “moderate” leader. After his term expired in January 2009, no new elections were held.

  • For six years, the world has continued to pretend that Abbas had any legitimacy as an elected leader.
  • For six years, the world ignored the will of the Palestinian people who had repeatedly shown in every poll, their preference to elect Hamas, a rabidly anti-Semitic rival party to Abbas’s Fatah party. The world has been complicit in holding up elections which would confirm that there is no possibility for peace at this time.
  • For six years Abbas did nothing to deliver peace. Rocket fire from Gaza only slowed down because of Israel’s 2008 Operation Cast Lead (858, 365 and 680 projectiles fired from Gaza at Israel in 2009, 2010 and 2011, respectively). When missiles jumped to 2273 in 2012, Israel needed to step in for Abbas’s failure, with Operation Pillar of Defense. Rocket fire dropped 95% in 2013 after the Israeli action. However, missile fire, the murders of teenagers and terror tunnels into Israel brought Israel to “quiet” the situation with Operation Protective Edge in 2014 – again, due to Abbas’s either failure or unwillingness to provide security for Israel and Gaza.
  • For six years, the world has pushed Israel to sit and negotiate with Abbas, the straw man with neither legitimacy nor power to deliver peace.
  • The United Nations gave Abbas the main podium to address the General Assembly, even though he was simply an acting-President for a non-country. He used those opportunities to repeatedly lie about Israel, lie about Jews in the Holy Land and lie about his performance.  And why not? The world actively engaged in the charade.

Perhaps the United Nations would like to produce a 10th anniversary stamp to honor the accomplishment of holding onto a four-year presidential title for so many years, in the face of a public that does not want him. Perhaps a fitting image would be a combination of the UN’s 1981 Palestinian stamp, together with a scarecrow: the inalienable right to be a Palestinian President.

scarecrow stamp palestine stamp

Sources:

Abbas election 2005: http://www.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/meast/01/10/palestinian.elections/

Hamas win elections 2006: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/01/26/AR2006012600372.html

Abbas demands respect music video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LipAKFsUNq8

Hamas leads in polls 2014: http://www.jpost.com/Middle-East/Hamas-Haniyeh-would-trounce-Abbas-if-elections-held-today-Palestinian-poll-says-374297

FirstOneThrough on the will of the Palestinians: https://firstonethrough.wordpress.com/2014/09/04/its-the-democracy-stupid/

Gaza rocket fire: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestinian_rocket_attacks_on_Israel

 

The United Nations Applauds Abbas’ Narrative

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Acting Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas took the stage at the United Nations in September 2014. When he took the podium in 2011, 2012 and 2013, he distorted history out of all bounds as seen in the music video below.

 

In 2014, Abbas opted to move past simply lying about history. He chose the Jewish New Year of 5775 to repeatedly described Israel as a racist colonial occupier which was waging genocide on the Palestinian people. Hamas could not have written the speech any differently.

Abbas concluded by essentially calling for an end to negotiations with Israel.

The United States had the only immediate reaction, saying the speech “included offensive characterizations” and was “counterproductive”. Little reaction could be heard from the rest of the world.

If governments applaud complete distortions of fact and history, it abets war and undermines prospects for peace. Will the world finally call out Abbas or will it also refuse to engage with Israel?

Sources:

Abbas UN speech 2014: www.timesofisrael.com/full-text-of-abbas-speech-to-un/

US comment on speech: http://www.timesofisrael.com/us-slams-abbas-un-speech-as-offensive/

NY Times skewed view on Pope prayer invitation and MidEast Peace

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NYT May 27, 2014 “For Middle East, Region of Religious Conflict, Pope Suggests a Respite in Prayer”

 

Jodi Rudoren penned a piece in a “Memo from Jerusalem”, freeing her from the invisible constraints of reporting news “truthfully”, and shared her personal observations about the pope and the Middle East conflict. Her bias towards the Palestinian narrative remains clear.

 

  1. Her opening sentence states that Pope Francis came back from the “Holy Land with the typical bag of ceremonial gifts, including, from the children of Bethlehem’s refugee camps, a mock-up of an identification card in the name of Jesus that lists family members as Mohandas K. Gandhi, Nelson Mandela, Yasir Arafat and Martin Luther King Jr.” Wow.
    1. I’ve been to Israel 30+ times. I’ve been to Jerusalem, Jericho and Bethlehem. I never once came back with a propaganda ID card. Does she really think that it’s “typical”?
    2. Jodi has often written about the Vatican and the UN now referring to the “State of Palestine”. You cannot have a refugee camp of Palestinians in a “State of Palestine”. You cannot claim to have a state and be a refugee of that state while living in such state.
  2. It is quite impressive to list a terrorist like Yasir Arafat with Gandhi and MLK. I would have hoped Jodi would have continued to detail the outrageousness of the comparison, but alas, I believe she thinks it fine to equate a civil rights leader with the man who brought the world airplane hijackings. Here are two quotes: one from Arafat and one from Gandhi. See if you can guess who said which:
    i.      “I suppose leadership at one time meant muscles; but today it means getting along with people.”
    ii.      “We will not bend or fail until the blood of every last Jew from the youngest child to the oldest elder is spilled to redeem our land!”
  3. The article compliments the pope navigating his trip “without seeming to offend” any of the parties.  A strange comment considering over the prior three days Jodi pointed out the anger of the Palestinians for the pope’s laying a wreath at Herzl’s grave and of the Israelis anger for the pope stopping at the security barrier near a sign that labeled it an “Apartheid Wall”.
  4. Jodi goes on to compare the pope’s stopping at the security barrier, with a wall commemorating Israeli victims of terror. In a “normal” world, these two visits would be THE SAME prayer to stop violence, as the security barrier was built during the Second Intifada specifically to stop terrorism. However, Jodi’s remarks make clear that the stop at the barrier was not just the pope connecting with Palestinians and Israelis, but was meant to “shame” the Israelis. How can a parallel be drawn between a security mechanism and a memorial to innocent victims?
  5. She dismissed the prospects of the “peace prayer” at the Vatican “particularly” because Israeli President Peres role is “ceremonial” and he is set to leave the post in July.
    1. NYT again blames Israel for any path forward.
    2. Ignores the fact that Palestinian President Abbas’s term in office expired in 2009 – over four years ago.
  6. Jodi chose to liken the parties stating that “extremists on both sides have exploited religion to block resolution”. That statement is not an over-simplification, it is dishonest:
    1. Hamas won the last elections the Palestinians held, winning 58% of the vote back in 2006. Kahane’s party has been banned in Israel for decades.
    2. Hamas controls Gaza and 1.7 million people. Jewish “extremists” are individuals who do not control land or a population.
    3. The “right-wing” (NYT terminology) Likud and The Jewish Home parties have no disparaging comments about Christians or Muslims. However, the Hamas governing charter is a rant of anti-Semitism. A few quotes here:
      i.      Article 20: [the Jews are] “a vicious, Nazi-like enemy, who does not differentiate between man and woman, elder and young…The Nazism of the Jews does not skip women and children, it scares everyone.”
      ii.      Article 22: “[Jews] have been scheming for a long time,… they took over control of the world media such as news agencies, the press, publication houses, broadcasting and the like. … They stood behind the French and the Communist Revolutions and behind most of the revolutions”
      iii.      Article 7: “The prophet, prayer and peace be upon him, said: The time will not come until Muslims will fight the Jews (and kill them); until the Jews hide behind rocks and trees, which will cry: O Muslim! there is a Jew hiding behind me, come on and kill him!”
  7. Notable for its absence over a week of reporting on the pope visiting the Holy Land, and again in this article dedicated to religion and prayer, was the current status of Christianity in the region.
    1. Israel has freedom of religion for all; all churches are open and people are free to pray in the manner of their choosing. That is not true in most of the Middle East
    2. Israel is the only country in the Middle East where the Christian population is growing
    3. Israel is the only country in the Middle East where the number of Christian tourists surpasses any other religion, including Jews.
    4. Israel is the only country in the region which is the target of BDS by some Christian groups
  8. Also absent from the articles was Abbas’s comment to the pope that “Israel is systematically acting to change [Jerusalem’s] identity and character, and strangling the Palestinians, both Christians and Muslims, with the aim of pushing them out”. No comment from the NYT about the religiously charged lie:
    1. The Christian population in Jerusalem has increased since Israel re-unified the city in 1967. The only time that the Christian population declined over the past 100 years was during Jordanian rule 1949-67
    2. The Muslim population in Jerusalem never increased more over the past 150 years than it has under Israeli rule
    3. From 1967-2011, Muslim population in Jerusalem increased 4.4x, compared to 2.5x for Jews
    4. Jerusalem has had a Jewish majority since 1870. How has the “identity and character” changed in Abbas’s mind? Oh, Jews are once again living in the Old City, now that the 1949 Jordanian expulsion of the Jews and 19-year ban is over.

 

Frightening New York Times 4/27/14 article on “Mahmoud Abbas Shifts on Holocaust”

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  1. Abbas new statement that the Holocaust was bad does nothing to negate his various prior comments, phd paper and published book that claim: 1) that 6 million Jews were not murdered in the Holocaust; and 2) that Zionists conspired with Nazis so that more Jews would move to Palestine (so Zionists are at least partially to blame for the Holocaust).
  2. (By way of comparison, If Abbas would have reversed his prior statements and negated his research, that would have been a “shift”.  OR, if Abbas would have come out and said that the Palestinian Arabs of 1936-46 who fought successfully against the Zionists and British who then limited Jewish immigration to Palestine before and during WWII were responsible for 100,000+ Jews dying in the Holocaust, that would have been a shift).
  3. NYT claims that Abbas’s latest comment “goes further” in back-tracking from his Holocaust denial and attacks on Zionism because he claims that Palestinians understand suffering from Israeli “ethnic discrimination and racism”. Not only does the Abbas comment not negate his offensive comments, but it further insults Jews and Israelis by calling them racists, and suggests that the Holocaust is similar to the situation of stateless Arabs.
  4. Hamas is called a “militant Islamist faction” and not a terrorist organization
  5. No NYT mention of the fact that the Hamas Charter calls for the death of Jews
  6. No NYT mention that Hamas refuses to allow Holocaust education in the schools of Gaza against the wishes of the United Nations
  7. Thank you New York Times, for posting an article on Holocaust Remembrance Day about Abbas, the Holocaust denier, and his latest anti-Israel comments, and for phrasing the headline and article to try to make him look like a progressive.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/27/world/middleeast/palestinian-leader-shifts-on-holocaust.html?_r=0