Social Media’s “Fake News” and Mainstream Media’s Half-Truths

Posted on November 27, 2016 by First.One.Through

Liberals have taken to the streets to protest the loss of the Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton. Some (like Clinton) blamed the loss on a late breaking notice by the FBI about more emails surfacing from Clinton’s email server, while others blamed the Russians for interfering in the US elections. The latest scapegoat from US President Barack Obama was that “fake news” that spread on Facebook, Twitter and Google, undermined Clinton.

Obama claimed that the “active misinformation” that spread on social media continues to threaten the “democratic freedoms and market-based economies and prosperity that we’ve come to take for granted.”

If only the president were as concerned about the active use of half-truths that are told routinely in the left-wing media and the United Nations. Those “credible” sources deliberately tell a fraction of the story and lead people to focus on the wrong targets through vicious alt-left editing. Those half-truths are just as lethal and the authors are just as guilty of spreading lies.

Consider the liberal media source, NPR. On November 15, 2016 it wrote about President-elect Donald Trump consideration of moving the US embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. In giving background to the story, NPR wrote: “The western part of Jerusalem is almost entirely Jewish. The eastern part of the city was entirely Arab when Israel captured it in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war. Many Israeli Jews have moved into the eastern part of the city, and Israel claims all of Jerusalem as its capital, though no other country recognizes this.”

The NPR background made it sound like Israel took over the eastern half of Jerusalem in a war, and then asserted its control over the area, even though no country recognizes Israel’s positions. NPR deliberately omitted that:

Jews had always lived in Jerusalem, and have constituted a majority of the city since 1870
The Arabs initiated a war against Israel in 1948-9 and took control of the eastern half of the city and then EVICTED ALL OF THE JEWS from that part of the city, that’s why there were no Jews there in 1967.
When Jordan annexed the “West Bank” and eastern part of Jerusalem in 1950, no country recognized Jordan’s claim on the land.
Israel took the eastern half of Jerusalem in a DEFENSIVE WAR, after Jordan attacked Israel in 1967.

These facts are never shared in the liberal media, and by doing so, the liberal press provides the public with a biased half-truth narrative that Israel was an aggressor in seizing land that belonged to Arabs by history and right. It is simply not true.

Consider the beacon of the left-wing media, The New York Times. It covered anti-Semitic riots in Europe in 2014 with a passing comment that there may have been a “tinge” of antisemitism when mobs called out that “Hitler was Right.” It did this repeatedly.

The Times also actively shielded its liberal champion, President Obama from criticism. Consider that when the Times wrote about Israel during Operation Protective Edge in 2014, it chose to include pictures of Israeli soldiers, Palestinian Arab victims and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu throughout the conflict. The paper never showed the leadership of the Palestinian Authority, of Hamas or of Israeli victims. These pictures were also in sharp contrast to articles about US drone attacks that kill civilians, that NEVER show pictures of Obama alongside the story. Ever wonder why?

Regarding racism in the United States, the Times continued to suggest that racism was rising from the right-wing against blacks and Muslims in various articles. They did this, even though the number of hate crimes committed by whites dropped significantly, from 63% in 2007, to 29% in 2015.

The liberal papers have company at the United Nations.

The UN media center is a frequent peddler of half-truths. It is seemingly not sufficient for the global body to be extremely prejudiced against Israel; its media center deliberately omits comments made on the world stage that could be construed as sympathetic towards Israel. Consider:

When world leaders spoke about the alarming attacks against Israelis in October 2015, the press corps only mentioned attacks against Arabs, and completely deleted “Israel” from the summary comments, as detailed in “UN Press Corps Expunges Israel.” The media center refused to publish the comments made by the UN Assistant Secretary General complimenting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for trying to calm the situation.
On December 15, 2015, the High Commissioner for Human Rights gave a press briefing where she spoke about violence in Israel which killed dozens, including 21 Israelis. The UN media centre deliberately deleted any mention of Israelis, and only spoke of Palestinians and foreigners that were killed.

The list of disturbing “half-truths” which relay a false narrative is long.

Fake news is indeed a problem, but arguably a smaller one than the half-truths peddled by the mainstream media. The fake news sites will ultimately earn a reputation for doing so, such as magazines that tout that Elvis is alive and that Hollywood stars are having babies with aliens. The flash of news is rapidly revealed as entertainment.

However, the persistent and dangerous problem of lies, stems from the “accepted” mainstream media that distort reality to fit their liberal agenda.

Christiane Amanpour, a journalist for CNN received a Press Freedom Award in November 2016. In her remarks she attacked Donald Trump as a demagogue who would stifle free speech. She stated that “journalists… need to recommit to robust fact-based reporting without fear.” As she made such comments, her smugness masked her complicity in feeding the world half-truths. Her fellow journalists have spent years feeding a feast of delicious liberal fabrications, at the expense of unvarnished accuracy.

Christiane Amanpour Receiving Press Freedom Award November 2016

Amanpour added that “I learned a long, long time ago – when I was covering the genocide and ethnic cleansing in Rwanda and Bosnia – never to equate victim and aggressor. Never to create a false moral or factual equivalence, because then, if you do,… you are party and accomplice to the most unspeakable crimes and consequences.” Perhaps she was criticizing the New York Times which gave a glowing review of the opera “Death of Klinghoffer,” about Palestinian Arab terrorists that threw an elderly Jew in a wheelchair off of a ship to his death, which it called a “masterpiece” as “the opera gives voice to all sides.”

Amanpour called for advertisers to stop advertising on the “fake news sites,” a call for action that seemed a bit cheeky, considering she makes her living from those same advertisers.

In short, Amanpour has still not internalized that she is a part of a biased-and-bought media industry that is the core of the problem.

It has therefore become an unfortunate necessity for blogs such as FirstOneThrough to do a critical and factual analysis of the world affairs, because of the failures of mainstream media, not the fake news sites. It does the original analysis without any advertising, and is not beholden to any purchaser’s point of view. The digital revolution that cares about truth will ultimately abandon today’s popular press in favor of such sites, and use fake news sites as entertainment, much as they view The Onion.

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The New York Times Wrote About Computer Hackers Charged by the US and Israel. Differently.

The New York Times Refuses to Label Hamas a Terrorist Group

What’s “Left” for The New York Times?

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NY Times Discolors Hate Crimes

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

On November 14, 2016, the NY Times published an article about hate crimes in which it deliberately misled its readers in several areas.

The article entitled “U.S. Hate Crimes Surge 6%, Fueled by Attacks on Muslims,” sought to continue a NY Times narrative that Trump supporters are white racists and xenophobes. In this article, it chose to do this by emphasizing certain facts, redirecting the reader, and omitting some statistics completely.

All crimes are terrible, and hate crimes are particularly noxious. If America wants to confront them with solutions, it needs to review them honestly.

The Focus on Muslims

The title of the article focused on the rise in hate crimes against Muslims, as did the article itself. While there was a significant jump in the anti-Muslim attacks, an average Muslim in 2015 was still 50% LESS likely to be attacked than an average Jew (257 attacks against an American Muslim population of 3.3 million, versus 664 attacks against 5.8 million American Jews).

The Times did say that Jews were the most frequently attacked religious group, while blacks were the most targeted race – in the article’s seventh paragraph. However, it then sought to redirect the reader to the significance of the anti-Muslim attacks:

“Blacks were the most frequent victims of hate crimes based on race, while Jews were the most frequent victims based on religion, according to the F.B.I. data. But the increases in attacks on these groups were smaller than the rise in attacks against Muslims and transgender people.”

Hey reader! Over here! Focus on Muslims and transgender attacks! That’s the real story, not the groups that are subject to the most hate crimes! Never mind that the total number of attacks against Muslims and transgender people COMBINED was LESS THAN HALF of the number of attacks against Jews.

Blame Trump

For over a year, the Times has called out Donald Trump and his supporters as being racists, homophobes and xenophobes. The Times told all of its readers to fear the local radical right much more than radical Islamic terrorism in articles throughout the year. This article began:

“WASHINGTON — The F.B.I. reported Monday that attacks against American Muslims surged last year, driving an overall increase in hate crime against all groups.

The data, which is the most comprehensive look at hate crime nationwide, expanded on previous findings by researchers and outside monitors, who have noted an alarming rise in some types of crimes tied to the vitriol of this year’s presidential campaign and the aftermath of terrorist attacks at home and abroad since 2015.

That trend appears to have spiked in just the last week, with civil rights groups and news organizations reporting dozens of verbal or physical assaults on minorities and others that appear to have been fueled by divisions over the election.”

This is complete editorializing by the Times. The FBI report gave a statistical analysis and breakdown of attacks that occurred in 2015. The report did not get into speculation about what drove people to commit the crimes. It certainly did not cover November 2016 when the report was solely about 2015.

The Times seemed to further add support for its rationale of blaming Trump, by stating “Attacks against Muslim Americans saw the biggest surge. There were 257 reports of assaults, attacks on mosques and other hate crimes against Muslims last year, a jump of about 67 percent over 2014. It was the highest total since 2001, when more than 480 attacks occurred in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks.”

For the Times, Donald Trump equals September 11 for Muslim Americans.

Yet, if one were to scratch the surface, it would be clear that the number of attacks against Muslims has up-and-down years. For example, hate crimes against Muslim Americans spiked in the early Obama years compared to the George W Bush years. Under President Bush in 2008, there were 105 anti-Muslim attacks, which jumped by 52% to 160 attacks in 2010 under President Obama. Such attacks also jumped 15% between 2013 and 2014, well before the rise of Trump.

No Mention about the Offenders

The Times did not discuss other statistics from the FBI report, such as the ethnicity of the offenders.

In 2015, whites were twice as likely to commit a hate crime as a black American. Consider that there are over five times more whites than blacks in the US. That means that black people disproportionately are committing hate crimes (if all people are as likely to commit a hate crime, it would suggest that there would be roughly five times as many white offenders as black offenders, not two times).

The trendline about the offenders of hate crimes is also important to highlight, but dismissed in the Times.

In 2001, white people committed 4.5 times more hate crimes than black people (5,149 versus 1,157). That difference is more in line with what would be expected by the larger white population.

However, the New York Times did not report on the alarming trend of black people committing a growing and more disproportionate share of hate crimes, because it undermined the paper’s narrative that white Trump supporters are the bigots and “deplorables.” Shining a light on the SHRINKING number of white attackers (2,657 in 2015 versus 5,149 in 2001), went against the liberals view of the world.

The reason that independents and libertarians are abandoning the Democratic Party is liberal’s blind adherance to a narrative that has no basis in facts. How can such a party hope to arrive at solutions to society’s ills if it will not honestly look at the world as it is?

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The New York Times Thinks that the Jews from Arab Countries Simply “Immigrated”

Posted on October 30, 2016 by First.One.Through

On October 20, 2016, the New York Times profiled a rising Israeli member of Knesset, Miri Regev. The article, “Miri Regev’s Culture War,” highlighted her background in Israel’s “periphery,” as part of the Mizrachi or “Eastern” communities.

The Times stated that “Mizrachi” is “a catchall term that includes Jewish communities from Muslim countries in the Middle East and North Africa, as well as the Sephardic Jews, whose origins can be traced to Spain and Portugal, who settled there. These communities immigrated to Israel in mass waves after its founding in 1948 and into the early 1950s, upending its demographic makeup. The Jewish population, almost exclusively Ashkenazi, became more than 40 percent Mizrahi. But it wasn’t just the country’s ethnic composition that changed. The Jewish population that predated the founding of the state was primarily young, secular and idealistic; it was also heavily male. By contrast, the new Mizrahi arrivals tended to be large families from traditional societies. In their ethnic garb, often with no knowledge of Hebrew, they struck the native-born Israeli sabras and the European Ashkenazim as provincial and uneducated.”

Read the passage again. It sounds like these Jews simply left the MENA region because they wanted to go to the newly reestablished Jewish State after Israel was founded in 1948. Nowhere in the article is there any sense that these Mizrachi Jews suffered any persecution by the Muslim nations. Such poor treatment was only under the elitist Ashkenazi Jews from Israel.

This was a continued insult and mischaracterization of history by the media of the over 850,000 Jews that were forcibly expelled or fled for their lives from communities that they had lived in for centuries, due to Muslims anger over the founding of the Jewish State in a place that they deemed “Arab land.”

New York Times announcing the danger to Jews in Moslem countries, 1956

The Muslim Expulsion of the Jews

Roughly two-thirds of the Jewish refugees from the MENA region (Middle East and North Africa) went to Israel, while one-third fled to France. France was a natural place for Jews to flee French-speaking Arab countries such as Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia.

Algeria. Pogroms in Algeria began shortly after the Palestine Mandate to reestablish a Jewish homeland took effect, killing dozens in the 1920s and 1930s. During World War II, Jews were stripped of their citizenship when Nazis took over France, as Algeria was technically part of France. The French Vichy regime was particularly harsh to Jews, stripping them of most rights and ability to work.

Even as the war ended, Muslims put in place their own anti-Jewish laws. In 1962, when Algeria declared independence from France, virtually the entire Jewish community fled, seeing the Nuremberg-type laws in Muslim countries, and the fate of Jews in the rest of the MENA region. The majority of Jews went to France, while many moved to Israel.

Egypt. Nationality Laws in 1927 and 1929 gave preference to Egyptians who were Arab-Muslim. The laws made it difficult for Jews to gain citizenship, and in 1947, it is estimated that only 10,000 of the 75,000 Jews in Egypt had citizenship, while the rest were either stateless or were foreign nationals.

Jews came under direct attack at the founding of Israel, including bombings of Jewish neighborhoods in 1948 which killed 70, and a bombing in the Cairo Jewish Quarter in 1949 that killed 34.

When the Suez War with Israel broke out in 1956, there was no more room for Jews. On November 23, 1956, the Egyptian Minister for Religious Affairs declared that “all Jews and Zionists are enemies of the state,” as Egypt moved to expel the Jews and confiscate their property.

Iraq. In the 1920s, Jews were prohibited from teaching Hebrew or Jewish history. In July 1948, Iraq made Zionism a crime, punishable with up to seven years in jail. In October 1948, all Jews who held positions in government were fired. In May 1950, Jews in Iraq were stripped of their citizenship and the government began to seize all Jewish property.

In response to the edicts, in 1951 and 1952, Israel launched Operation Ezra and Nechemia to airlift the Jews out of the country to safety. The Jewish community in Iraq that had stood had close to 130,000 people was quickly down to a mere 3000.

After the Arab armies were defeated in another war in 1967, the remnant of Jews in Iraq would find the situation unbearable. On January 27, 1969, the government hanged nine Jews in the public square to the cheers of Iraqis. The Jewish community in Iraq was soon no more.

Libya. Jews were attacked by Libyans in the immediate aftermath of World War II, with 140 murdered in a pogrom. The Libyan government’s Nationality Law of 1951 prohibited Jews from having Libyan passports, and Jews were no longer allowed to vote or hold public office. By 1953, Jews in the country were subject to broad economic boycotts. The community of roughly 40,000 Jews dwindled to just 6 people.

Morocco. The Jewish community in Morocco was one of the largest in the MENA region, estimated at over 250,000 people.

After Israel’s declaration of independence in May 1948, two pogroms broke out in Morocco, in the towns of Oujda and Djerrada. The attacks killed 47 people, wounded hundreds and lefts hundreds homeless. Not surprisingly, 10% of the country’s Jews quickly fled the country.

After Morocco declared independence in 1956, an Arabization of the country commenced, cutting Jews off from parts of society. At the same time, the government prohibited emigration to Israel, which lasted until 1963. In 1961, roughly 90,000 Moroccan Jews had to be ransomed in Operation Yakhnin, bringing Jews to Israel. In the aftermath of the 1967 Six Day War, another 40,000 Jews fled to Israel.

Syria. In 1947, the sale of any real estate to Jews was prohibited, Jews were discharged from public office, and in 1949, the governments seized Jews’ financial assets. In 1950, Jews were forced to leave the farming industry. Syrians took the message, an initiated pogroms from November 1947 through August 1949, killing many as they looted Jewish homes and stores.

As Jews fled, the country had their assets seized by the state.

More edicts would follow for the Jews that remained. In 1967, Muslims were placed as principals of all Jewish schools. In 1973, with the onset of the Yom Kippur War, new edicts were enforced that Jews could no longer communicate with anyone outside of Syria.

Tunisia. Tunisia’s independence in 1956 led to an Islamification of society and placed Jews in a secondary dhimmi status. From that point on, all Jewish businesses were forced to take on a Muslim partner.

The old Tunis Jewish cemetery was expropriated in 1957, and the great Tunis synagogue was destroyed in 1960. As Jews began to flee the country in 1961 as they had in the rest of the MENA region, Tunisia only allowed Jews to take one dinar with them, as the country confiscated the rest of their possessions.

Yemen. Sharia law was instituted in 1913, and all Jewish orphans were forcibly converted to Islam. In the 1920s, Jews became excluded from the army and public service.

In 1947, riots in Aden killed 82 Jews, and in 1948, Yemeni Jews began to lose control of their possessions, with laws forcing Jews to transfer all crafts to Arabs before leaving the country.

As a result of the crisis, Operation Magic Carpet airlifted 49,000 Jews out of the country between June 1949 and September 1950.

TOTALS. The number of Jews that fled persecution from homes they lived in for centuries was between 850,000 and 1 million people.

Algeria 140,000
Egypt 75,000
Iraq 135,000
Lebanon 5,000
Libya 38,000
Morocco 265,000
Syria 30,000
Tunisia 105,000
Yemen 55,000

This total of 850,000 Jews does not include the Jews who fled Iran and Afghanistan.

Yet the New York Times chose to write that Jews “immigrated” to Israel, implying no malice on the part of Arabs, nor fear in the hearts of Jews. The paper implies that the Mizrachi Jews sought to take advantage of the new Jewish State. Maybe for economic opportunities.

This characterization comes from the same media source that makes every effort to describe Palestinian Arabs as “refugees,” and despondent, even when they are living just a few miles from the homes where their grandparents sought to destroy the nascent Jewish state.

The New York Times has a long history of only parroting the Palestinian Arab narrative in their collective fight against Israel. It has now further chosen to whitewash the crimes of the entire Muslim Arab world that forcibly rid their nations of Jews as they robbed them of their dignity, lives and property.

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The Cancer in the Arab-Israeli Conflict

Posted on October 11, 2016 by First.One.Through

Chemotherapy is a terrible thing at first glance.

The treatments make the patient feel terrible and make them look even worse. After repeated treatments, the person becomes a shell of their former selves, losing hair, weight and energy. They often appear as living dead.

Amazingly, people suffering from cancer before commencing chemotherapy often do not look ill to the outside world. While the disease may be destroying the individual internally, the cure looks to be the actual instrument of death.

But appearances can be deceiving. The chemotherapy gives hope to an otherwise terminal situation.

The Confusion between Cancer and Chemotherapy
in the Middle East

Israel’s military administration east of the Green Line (EGL)/ the West Bank is neither pleasant for Israelis or Palestinian Arabs. The patrols, checkpoints, security barriers, raids and arrests make the region appear as a battleground rather than a holy land.

But for those that look past the skirmishes and understand the nature of the protagonists in the land, the Israeli military is not the sickness, but forces that may enable peace in the region.

The Israeli Perspective

For Israelis, the cancer in the region is the adamant refusal of Palestinian Arabs to accept the rights of Jews to live in the region and to be self-governing.

The Arabs’ violent opposition started in the 1920s with several riots and pogroms against Jews throughout Palestine, and became multi-year riots in the 1930s when the Arabs convinced the British administrators to limit admission of Jews to the region on the eve of the Holocaust. The opposition grew into all out wars, from Israel’s founding in 1948, successive wars in the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s, to other violent intifadas and wars from the 1980s until today.

The refusal to accept the Jewish state was made clear by the terrorist Palestinian party Hamas, which seeks the complete destruction of Israel as declared in its charter and by its current leadership. The refusal is seen in the “relatively moderate” Fatah party which controls the West Bank, which seeks to “eradicate the Zionist entity.”

The acting-President of the Palestinian Authority Mahmoud Abbas reiterates these positions continuously, including a refusal to accept the basic history and religious rights of Jews in Israel:

In July 2016, Palestinian Arabs pushed UNESCO to sever any Jewish connection with the Western Wall in Jerusalem.
In March 2016, Abbas accused Israel of “Judaizing” the Temple Mount, as if there weren’t two Jewish Temples that stood on the platform for hundreds of years.
In October 2015, Abbas addressed the UN Human Rights Council where he referred to Israel as a “colonial” power, as if Jews had not lived in the land for thousands of years.
In September 2015, Abbas called on Arabs to martyr themselves for Jerusalem.
In 2014, Abbas stated that he will never recognize the Jewishness of the State of Israel.
In 2013, Abbas said that he does not want a single Jew – soldier or civilian – living in Palestine.

The “moderate” leader of the Palestinian Arabs praised people who killed Israeli civilians and named schools after the terrorists. His government has a Palestinian law that considers it a capital offense to sell land to Jews, and Palestinian universities do not allow Jews to step foot onto the campuses.

For Israelis, the cancer in the region is the Arab and Muslim hatred for any Jews living in the holy land and a desire to expel them. The Iranian leader summed up the feelings of many Muslims in the region in 2012 when he said that Israel was a “cancerous tumor that should be cut and will be cut.”

Rabbis killed by Palestinian terrorist while they prayed in synagogue
November 2014

Whether the Arabs use lethal force, threats of boycotts, or UN resolutions, the tactics are just components of a war against the very presence of Jews and the existence of the Jewish State. The Palestinian hatred was highlighted in an ADL poll which showed almost every Palestinian Arab as being an anti-Semite.

The Palestinian Arab Perspective

The Palestinian Arabs do not see their hatred for Jews as the core problem. The Arab argument is that the Jews have no right to be on their land and to create a state for themselves.

Simply put, if the Jews would not be living in their land, the Arabs would not hate them. If the Jews lived in another part of the world the Palestinian Arab anti-Semitism may resemble the hatred of Jews found in other parts of the world, not more nor less.

For the Palestinians, the “cancer” is the Jewish theft of their land, whether in the West Bank or Israel proper. That is why in September 2016, Abbas asked Great Britain to apologize for the 1917 Balfour Declaration, which served as a starting point to reestablish the Jewish homeland in Palestine as then laid out in international law in the 1920 San Remo Agreement and the 1922 Mandate of Palestine. The Arabs feel that the imperialist world powers had no right to dictate what should happen in the Arab lands.

The United Nations Perspective

The United Nations sees the core of the conflict as stemming from the Palestinian Arabs not having full independence and autonomy. The UN sought an independent Arab state alongside a Jewish state when it put forward the 1947 Partition Plan. While the Jews accepted the plan, the Arabs rejected it, and since 1948, the Jews have had autonomy in their own state while the local Palestinian Arabs have not.

In 1977, the UN used the 30th anniversary of the 1947 Partition Plan, to establish an annual International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People. The UN has continued to advance a two-state solution, albeit only since 1993, with some Arab support.

Overall, the UN believes that it is the “frustration” of the Palestinians that makes them “desperate” and “resort” to violence against the Jews.

Three different opinions as to the core of the Arab-Israeli conflict:

For Israel, it is the perceived Arab hatred and their refusal to accept Jews in the land
For Arabs, it is the perceived Jewish theft of Arab land
For the United Nations, it is the perceived frustrations of Arabs not having a state

Each view of the conflict has its own path towards resolving it.

Long Term Treatment

The United Nations Perspective

From the UN’s perspective, the solution seems pretty straight-forward: if the core of the conflict is the lack of a Palestinian State, then create a Palestinian State.

The issue is that the 1947 Partition Plan is no longer viable.

After five Arab armies invaded Israel in 1948, the Israelis pushed the line of their territory further, to the 1949 Armistice Lines. While the warring parties all agreed that those lines were NOT to be viewed as permanent borders, the international community recognized those lines as being the limits of Israeli law, and do so to this day.

When Israel conquered more lands in another defensive war in 1967, and then annexed the eastern part of Jerusalem, the issue started to become even more complicated. While Israel offered to return land immediately for peace after the war, the Arabs refused to engage. It would take another 21 years, until the 1988 Madrid Conference, for the Israelis and some Palestinian Arabs to begin to formulate a plan for co-existence.

Land for Peace: As the Israelis and Egyptians were able to successfully forge a peace agreement based on returning the Sinai Peninsula to Egypt, the UN pushed more aggressively for the Israelis to hand land – specifically Gaza and the West Bank – to Palestinian Arabs for a new state. For the UN, land = statehood = peace, and the end of the conflict.

However, in 2005, after the Israelis left Gaza unilaterally, the area was taken over by the elected terrorist group Hamas which subsequently fought wars against Israel in 2008, 2012 and 2014. Land for Palestinian Arabs did not equal peace for Israel.

Still, the UN believes that land-for-peace and the creation of a Palestinian State will ultimately stop the fighting. As such, the UN views Israel’s presence (civilian settlements) and administration (military control) of the West Bank as key parts of the problem. Therefore, as part of getting to peace, the UN is pushing for all Israelis to abandon the West Bank to create a “viable” Palestinian State.

The Palestinian Arab Perspective

Many Palestinians – including Hamas and its supporters – feel that the only way to solve the problem of land theft is to return the land to its rightful owners – the Arabs. To meet that end, they seek the full destruction of the Jewish State.

The more moderate Palestinian Arabs do not seek to destroy Israel; they just want to return to homes and villages that existed 70 years ago, even if they no longer exist. They want to live in a state that has no Jewish preferences, and resembles the Arab and Muslim countries in the region.

The more pragmatic Palestinian Arabs are willing to follow the recommendation of the United Nations: a new State of Palestine without Jews in the West Bank and Gaza, and many Arabs (fewer than the millions they desire) sent to Israel to reclaim their land.

The Israeli Perspective

For Israelis, the cancer of violent hatred and a refusal to accept a Jewish presence and a Jewish State is not easy to cure. The hatred is systemic on many levels in the Arab culture, particularly among Palestinian Arabs today.

Israelis employ a number of approaches:

Champion Arabs in Israel. Israelis point out the liberal nature of the country and the integration of Arabs throughout Israel.
Respect for Holy Sites. Even after taking over the Old City of Jerusalem and the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron in 1967, Israel gave full rights to Muslim worshippers, even though the Jordanians forbade any Jewish access to their holy sites when they ruled the sites.
Protection. The Palestinian Arabs have killed thousands of Israeli civilians over the decades, whether they were children in school, mothers in pizza stores, or families in their beds. Israel actively seeks to protect all Israelis from violence, wherever they live. While not addressing the hatred, it addresses the murders.

A possible long-term solution that incorporates the three parties’ perspectives could be achieved through a negotiated process between the Israel and the Palestinian Authority that would include:

Payment to descendants of refugees for homes lost 70 years ago, and invitations to actual Palestinian Arab refugees to return into Israel (address perceived “theft”)
Removal of any “settlement” built on privately-owned land (address theft)
Ban Hamas from being part of any Palestinian government (address Arab hatred)
Recognize Israel as a Jewish State and permit Jews to live in a Palestinian state(address perception that Arabs reject Jewish rights to live in the land)
Demilitarized Palestinian State and annexation of key blocs of Area C into Israel (address security)
Mutual and mirrored control of holy sites, such that Israel has special authority over the Cave of the Patriarchs in Palestinian Hebron, and Arabs have special authority of the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, Israel (address rights and access to holy sites)

In all likelihood, should the parties ever get to a two-state solution, it will likely look something like the bullet points above.

But how can the parties get to a new starting point to advance peace?

Current Treatment

For the Palestinians and United Nations, the Israeli military control in the West Bank and the blockade of Gaza are part-and-parcel of their perception that the root cause of the conflict is Israeli presence in Arab lands. But for the Israelis, the military presence is a basic security requirement to defend themselves.

How does one undo the Catch-22 of the situation to resolve the conflict?

If the Israeli presence was removed from the West Bank, would the Arabs recognize the rights of Jews in the region? Not based on the history of three wars from Gaza; or according to Abbas who will never recognize Israel as a Jewish State; let alone the basic suggestions of removing every Jew means that there is no recognition of Jewish rights. FAIL.
If the UN tries to dictate a two-state solution without the parties involvement, then each party will fight the implementation as they have no ownership for the compromises required to make peace happen. FAIL.
If the Palestinians stop incitement, beginning with banning Hamas and all terrorist groups from the government, Israel could – and should – begin to soften the Gaza blockade and other security restrictions. The process begins. SUCCESS.

According to the Oslo II Accords, the last agreement signed between the Israelis and Palestinian Authority, Israel is in complete control of Area C in the West Bank, where all of the Jewish towns exist. In Area B, the Israelis and PA security teams coordinate security together. It is a matter of modern record that the current Israeli military presence in the West Bank has been approved by the Palestinians themselves.

In general, it has worked.

Israel’s security measures have kept the Syrian civil war and ISIS from overwhelming the country. Millions of Syrian refugees currently reside in Jordan, a short swim from Israel and the West Bank.
Israel’s security measures have minimized the flow of heavy weaponry into Gaza and the country’s Iron Dome blocked many missiles emanating from Gaza. These efforts reduced the counter-measures and duration of the wars with Gaza, saving many lives.
Israel’s security measures in the West Bank, including the security barrier, reduced the number of attacks and deaths from Palestinian terrorists during the Second Intifada. Patrols prevent potential attacks from happening. Consider that during the three wars from Gaza, there was little violence in the West Bank.

Sticker in Jerusalem
(photo: FirstOneThrough)

Israel’s “military occupation” of the West Bank may appear ugly, but it has saved both Israeli and Palestinian Arab lives.

Ultimately, no hatred and killings, no military response.

If there’s no cancer, there’s no chemotherapy.

Related First.One.Through articles:

The Israeli Peace Process versus the Palestinian Divorce Proceedings

Stabbing the Palestinian “Right of Return”

Abbas Knows Racism

Nicholas Kristof’s “Arab Land”

Obama’s “Palestinian Land”

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Stopping the Purveyors of Hateful Propaganda

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

Propaganda has been an important tool in war efforts for centuries. Today, there is a growing consensus to forcefully confront the people and machinery used to promote terror, as much as the effort to eradicate the terrorists themselves.

Nazi Germany

Nazi Germany exterminated millions of civilians that it considered undesirable before and during World War II. Historians have long considered the reasons that so many Germans and other Europeans turned on their fellow citizens, and attributed some of the rationale to an effective Nazi propaganda machine.

While Adolf Hitler was the leader of the Nazi Party that led the effort to kill Jews, Gypsies and others, it was his propaganda specialist, Joseph Goebbels, who spearheaded the effort to coopt all Germans and other Europeans to despise and turn in those targeted by the Nazis. Goebbels’ efforts to rally Germans against Jews included actions to make Germans appear as victims after WWI, and to portray Jews as sub-humans that undermined the purity of Aryans. His depictions of Jews in advertisements and film helped deceive the public and sway opinion against the Jews.

Goebbels never stood trial for his actions, as he committed suicide at the end of the war.

ISIS

Today, the Islamic State / ISIS is considered the most lethal terrorist organization that kills thousands in the Middle East. It has made and released many videos showing its barbarity which it uses to recruit soldiers from around the world.

US presidential candidate Hillary Clinton voiced her concern about the terrorist threat from ISIS in several debates, including its online propaganda:

“We also have to do a better job combating ISIS online, where they recruit, where they radicalize. And I don’t think we’re doing as much as we can. We need to work with Silicon Valley. We need to work with our experts in our government. We have got to disrupt, we have got to take them on in the arena of ideas that, unfortunately, pollute and capture the minds of vulnerable people. So we need to wage this war against ISIS from the air, on the ground, and online, in cyberspace.”
September 7, 2016

Those Clinton comments seemed like an online fight: a battle fought on the internet against an online threat.

However, in her comments during the September 26, 2016 debate, Clinton seemed to increase her threat against those involved in making the evil propaganda:

“And I would also do everything possible to take out their leadership. I was involved in a number of efforts to take out Al Qaida leadership when I was secretary of state, including, of course, taking out bin Laden. And I think we need to go after Baghdadi, as well, make that one of our organizing principles. Because we’ve got to defeat ISIS, and we’ve got to do everything we can to disrupt their propaganda efforts online.”

Those comments seemed to convey Clinton’s desire to physically attack those members of ISIS that produce the propaganda. She coupled the assassination of terrorists with the online battle. That was a major ratcheting up of the fight against terrorist propaganda by a politician.

For their part, civilians have taken to the courts to block the spread of terrorist propaganda online. January 2016 saw a suit against Twitter, and in June 2016, Facebook and Google were also sued for airing ISIS videos. These online forums had nothing to do with producing or posting the videos, but were attacked for not taking down the propaganda, thereby allowing the evil messages to spread globally.

The incitement to violence and terrorism is also found in many places beyond social media and Iraq.

Palestinian Arabs

In between the first two presidential debates, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addressed the United Nations General Assembly. In his remarks, he noted the disgraceful incitement to terrorism and anti-semitism prevalent in Palestinian Arab society:

“Now here’s the tragedy, because, see, the Palestinians are not only trapped in the past, their leaders are poisoning the future.

I want you to imagine a day in the life of a 13-year-old Palestinian boy, I’ll call him Ali. Ali wakes up before school, he goes to practice with a soccer team named after Dalal Mughrabi, a Palestinian terrorist responsible for the murder of a busload of 37 Israelis. At school, Ali attends an event sponsored by the Palestinian Ministry of Education honoring Baha Alyan, who last year murdered three Israeli civilians. On his walk home, Ali looks up at a towering statue erected just a few weeks ago by the Palestinian Authority to honor Abu Sukar, who detonated a bomb in the center of Jerusalem, killing 15 Israelis.

When Ali gets home, he turns on the TV and sees an interview with a senior Palestinian official, Jibril Rajoub, who says that if he had a nuclear bomb, he’d detonate it over Israel that very day. Ali then turns on the radio and he hears President Abbas’s adviser, Sultan Abu al-Einein, urging Palestinians, here’s a quote, “to slit the throats of Israelis wherever you find them.” Ali checks his Facebook and he sees a recent post by President Abbas’s Fatah Party calling the massacre of 11 Israeli athletes at the Munich Olympics a “heroic act”. On YouTube, Ali watches a clip of President Abbas himself saying, “We welcome every drop of blood spilled in Jerusalem.” Direct quote.

Over dinner, Ali asks his mother what would happen if he killed a Jew and went to an Israeli prison? Here’s what she tells him. She tells him he’d be paid thousands of dollars each month by the Palestinian Authority. In fact, she tells him, the more Jews he would kill, the more money he’d get. Oh, and when he gets out of prison, Ali would be guaranteed a job with the Palestinian Authority.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

All this is real. It happens every day, all the time. Sadly, Ali represents hundreds of thousands of Palestinian children who are indoctrinated with hate every moment, every hour.

This is child abuse.

Imagine your child undergoing this brainwashing. Imagine what it takes for a young boy or girl to break free out of this culture of hate. Some do but far too many don’t. How can any of us expect young Palestinians to support peace when their leaders poison their minds against peace?”

The Palestinian Authority and much of the society is rife with terrorist propaganda.

Did the world listen to Netanyahu’s speech, fact-check his statements and call out the Palestinian Arab vile anti-Semitism and propaganda?

No. It parroted the Palestinian Arab argument about settlements, “The Quartet emphasized its strong opposition to ongoing settlement activity, which is an obstacle to peace, and expressed its grave concern that the acceleration of settlement construction and expansion … (is) steadily eroding the viability of the two-state solution.” Nothing about Arab propaganda being an obstacle to peace.

Hateful propaganda leads directly to violence and terrorism. Depending where that propaganda is posted, that message can spread like wildfire globally.

In parts of the world, there are leaders that are willing to step up and fight against the poisonous contagion. Regretfully, not at the United Nations, where its leader, Ban Ki Moon, actively promotes that the terrorist group Hamas should become part of the governing Palestinian Authority.

Perhaps it is time for people to sue the United Nations – just as people are suing Facebook and Twitter – in giving a platform and pass to Palestinian Arab anti-Semitic propaganda.

Related First.One.Through articles:

What’s “Outrageous” for the United Nations

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

Palestinians of Today and the Holocaust

The United Nations’ Ban Ki Moon Exposes Israeli Civilians

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

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Black Lives Matter Joins the anti-Israel “Progressives” Fighting Zionism

Posted on August 4, 2016 by First.One.Through

In an effort to expand its base of support, the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement has sought to align itself with a variety of global “progressive” causes including transgender rights and combatting global warming. It has also taken some poor advice in connecting itself with an anti-Israel organization.

As part of its new broad platform, BLM worked with Nadia Ben-Youssef of Adalah, a group that claims it is “advancing democracy and equality for all Israelis.” As detailed in “Adalah, Dismantling Zionism,” the group does not seek equality for all Israelis, but seeks to replace the Jewish State with a bi-national state, and to insert a new Jew-free state into the West Bank.

The BLM platform includes a call to “Invest-Divest” with the following statement:

“The US justifies and advances the global war on terror via its alliance with Israel and is complicit in the genocide taking place against the Palestinian people….
Israel is an apartheid state with over 50 laws on the books that sanction discrimination against the Palestinian people. Palestinian homes and land are routinely bulldozed to make way for illegal Israeli settlements. Israeli soldiers also regularly arrest and detain Palestinians as young as 4 years old without due process. Everyday, Palestinians are forced to walk through military checkpoints along the US-funded apartheid wall.”

What advisors suggested that BLM align itself with such an anti-Israel organization like Adalah? That demonizes the only liberal country in the Middle East?

Could it be that left-wing radicals like Senator Bernie Sanders and his advisors at J Street pointed him in this direction? Perhaps Cornell West, one of Sanders consultants who worked (but failed) to include language that demonized Israel in the 2016 Democratic platform, found a new platform to make his mark? The author of this smear campaign was one of his students at Princeton. Maybe it was the New Israel Fund, that donates to the group?

Cornell West (photo by: SHFWire/ Erin Bell)

One could perhaps understand the BLM’s desire to expand its appeal and conflate its cause with that of other people. However, seeking advice from an increasingly anti-Israel left-wing cohort, to support demonizing Israel is beyond bad judgment.

Recently, the Black Lives Matter movement was furious that Donald Trump did not disavow the endorsement of the racist David Duke of the KKK. Trump never asked for that endorsement; it was just given to him. But now the BLM movement ACTIVELY invited an anti-Israel organization to draft its new platform, AND inscribed their slander as its official cause. Which action was more racist and malicious?

One can only imagine how deeply the BLM leadership must have wanted to forcefully jab their fingers into Israel lovers worldwide.

Related First.One.Through articles:

Squeezing Zionism

“Peace” According to Palestinian “Moderates”

The Fault in Our Tent: The Limit of Acceptable Speech

Liberals’ Biggest Enemies of 2015

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

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An Open Letter to Non-Anti-Semitic Sanders Supporters

Posted on April 11, 2016 by First.One.Through

Liberal presidential candidate Bernie Sanders may say that he is a proud Jew, but he is the only person among the five major candidates still running for president, that continues to attack Israel for defending itself against Palestinian Arabs that are sworn to the country’s destruction.

Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders
(picture: Dan Tuohy, Union Leader)

On April 9, 2016, Sanders spoke to an audience in Harlem, New York that asked a series of anti-Semitic questions of him. As Daniel Greenfield noted about Sanders’ response to this anti-Semite’s invective about “Zionist Jews” who “control the media”, the liberal candidate made no attempt to denounce the vile anti-Jewish comments. Instead, he protested his bona fides about being uniquely critical of Israel.

Just one month ago, Ryan Grim, the Washington bureau chief for the liberal media spot The Huffington Post, wrote an article called “An Open Letter to Non-Racist Donald Trump Supporters” asking Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump’s supporters to distance themselves from the kind of people that attend Trump rallies. He wrote:

“You may not physically assault anti-Trump protesters, think Abraham Lincoln’s decision to free enslaved African-Americans was hasty or want immigrants immediately deported. But you know as well as we do that a portion of Trump’s fans do feel this way.

It may not be fair, but it has fallen to you to disavow these people. Your silence is condoning a violent environment. You’re serving as a welcoming committee of sorts to new racists hoping to enter the party. From a crass political perspective, it’s self-defeating: You will never win a national election on a ticket with the Klan. But it matters from a moral perspective, too. “

Liberals, it is time for you to take your own advice and “disavow” the anti-Semites and other liberals that seek the destruction of Israel at rallies for your liberal candidate.

Related First.One.Through articles:

The Democrats’ Slide on Israel

Liberals’ Biggest Enemies of 2015

The Invisible Anti-Semitism in Obama’s 2016 State of the Union

The Candidates Feed the Pro-Israel Community’s Fears and Aspirations

What’s “Left” for The New York Times?

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The Only Religious Extremists for the United Nations are “Jewish Extremists”

Posted on March 30, 2016 by First.One.Through

On March 21, 2016, Robert Piper, the UN Coordinator for Humanitarian Assistance and Development Aid for the occupied Palestinian territory (yes, that’s an actual title), condemned an arson attack in Judea and Samaria/ East of the Green Line (EGL)/ the “West Bank” in which no one was injured. Without any evidence, he called out the Jews:

“I strongly condemn today’s arson attack by suspected Jewish extremists on the home of Palestinian Ibrahim Dawabsheh in the occupied West Bank village of Duma. Mr. Dawabsheh and his wife were at home during the attack and sustained light injuries as a result of smoke inhalation. I wish them both a full and speedy recovery.”

As it turns out, the blaze was set by Palestinian Arabs who tried to frame Israelis. The person who fabricated the story is now in police custody. Oops.

The UN does not waste a moment in vilifying Jews, even when there’s no supporting evidence. Incidents and allegations are opportunities to validate their opinion that all of the problems in the region stem from Jews living in homes that they purchased.

Meanwhile, the United Nations never calls out Muslim terrorists.

When Muslim terrorists killed five members of the Fogel family while they slept in their home, the UN condemned the attack, but never referred to the attackers as “Muslims” or “Palestinian Arabs.” It never even called the attack “terrorism.” However, when an arson attack killed three Palestinian Arabs a few miles away, the UN called the attack “terrorism” three times and placed blame on “Jewish extremists.” That phrase seems to have a certain ring at the UN.

The United Nations singularly uses the term “extremists” when it comes to Jews.

On March 17, just four days before the UN jumped to conclusions and blamed “Jewish extremists” for a Palestinian Arab crime, the United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki Moon addressed the UN Human Rights Council. He referred to his new “Plan of Action to Prevent Violent Extremism,” which clearly spoke of violent extremism generically, and not tied to any religion in particular. In fact, the UN specifically tried to distance religion from the term “extremism.”

UN Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights Kate Gilmore said at the event that “selective application of the term “violent extremism” only to Muslim believers reinforces intolerance and discrimination.”

Kate Gilmore, United Nations Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights.
(photo: UN File Photo/Jean-Marc Ferre)

She would do well to look at the UN’s record, which only uses the term “extremism” in conjunction with one religion in the world: when it discusses Israeli Jews. She will then better understand the embedded “intolerance and discrimination” that Israeli Jews feel from the UN.

Related First.One.Through articles:

The United Nation’s Ban Ki Moon is Unqualified to Discuss the Question of Palestine

The Hollowness of the United Nations’ “All”

UN Media Centre Ignores Murdered Israelis

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

UN Press Corps Expunges Israel

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

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While Joe Biden Passionately Defends Israel, He Ignores Jewish Rights and the History of the Jewish State

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

Vice President Joe Biden addressed the AIPAC Policy Conference in Washington, D.C. on March 20, 2016. He spoke passionately about the importance of the security of Israel and America’s commitment to defend Israel.

At roughly the 29 minute mark of the speech, he said that “One thing is certain: the United States will constantly and forever have Israel’s back….no administration has done more to advance the security of Israel than we [this administration] have. Our commitment to Israel’s qualitative military edge is unquestionable; it will not change.” Putting aside the enormity of the pending threat of Iran from the JCPOA, the statement strikes many people in the Israeli government as accurate.

Vice President Joe Biden at AIPAC, March 20, 2016

However passionately Biden spoke about the importance of Israel’s security and America’s commitment to such, he confused the cause of safety, with the contours of the basic history of the Jewish State. At three different occasions Biden spoke about the Holocaust and the current anti-Semitism in Europe. He stated that Israel needs to exist “as the ultimate guarantor of security for Jewish people around the world…Never, never, never again! And without Israel, there is no guarantee.”

The pro-Israel crowd rose to its feet in a standing ovation (video 33:30).

I was sad.

“Never Again” is universal. It is the moral, ethical and primary responsibility of every government to protect each and every one of its citizens. It is true that many countries throughout history have turned on the Jews. But in 2016, I expect the Vice President of the United States of America to stand a foot taller and declare twice as loud as the French Prime Minister Manuel Valls who said “if 100,000 Jews leave, France will no longer be France. The French Republic will be judged a failure.”
”Never Again” should not just be a slogan inside of Israel; it must be the slogan of every country in the world. How could a leader of the greatest country in the world pawn off the security of Jews to Israel alone?
Modern Israel is the Third Jewish State. Israel was not created as a reaction to the Holocaust in World War II. It was not made as the United Nations’ pen for holding people out of harm’s way. That is a mischaracterization that President Obama has made repeatedly over his term. In his interview in The Atlantic in 2015, Obama compared the security of Jews to American blacks when he said “There’s a direct line between supporting the right of the Jewish people to have a homeland and to feel safe and free of discrimination and persecution, and the right of African Americans to vote and have equal protection under the law. These things are indivisible in my mind.”
Nope.
Israel was established in international law as the homeland of the Jewish people in 1920 in the San Remo Agreement, well before World War II. The 1922 British Mandate for Palestine clearly stated that the reason for the Jewish homeland in Palestine was specifically because of “the historical connection of the Jewish people with Palestine and to the grounds for reconstituting their national home in that country.” The mandate facilitated Jews to move there, acquire property and citizenship once again.

Does the myopic view of Vice President Biden seeing and describing Israel solely as a safe haven for Jews matter?

You bet.

Without an understanding of Jewish history that dates back more than 3000 years in the land, and the international law that gives Jews the option of living throughout the land, Jews have no real rights. They are interlopers and recent arrivals in “Arab lands,” rather than the indigenous people. They are only entitled to security – and that security could be in an arbitrary, very small part of the holy land.

That is why the Obama administration calls Jewish homes east of the Green Line (EGL) as “illegitimate.” That is why the administration could propose “settlement freezes.” It leads to a view that Jerusalem, the holiest city to only one religion (Judaism), that has been the capital city of only one people in history (Jews), could be subject to negotiation and division.

When Biden said (video 20:45-22:45) that settlements hurt the chance for peace with Palestinian Arabs, he wasn’t just advocating splitting the land; he was segmenting his logic and ignoring facts. To him, Israel has no inherent rights and Jews have no freedom to live where they want. Israel and Jews are only entitled “to exist” with security.

For their part, the Democratic administration argues that Palestinians are entitled to “dignity and self-determination.” And if that “dignity” means anti-Semitic laws, banning Jews and squashing the freedoms and rights of Jews, this administration will support it – as long as Israel has security.

Such a view destroys there ever being peace between Israel and Arabs.

The underlying reason preventing peace is the Arabs’ refusal to recognize the basic and fundamental rights Jews have for living in the land – regardless of whether it is under an Israeli flag, a Jordanian flag or a future Palestinian flag. Sadly, the Obama administration holds the same position.

Perhaps, sadder still, is watching a pro-Israel community applaud.

Related First.One.Through articles:

The Narrative that Prevents Peace in the Arab-Israeli Conflict

The Invisible Anti-Semitism in Obama’s 2016 State of the Union

Obama’s “Values” Red Herring

The Arguments over Jerusalem

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Names and Narrative: Genocide / Intifada

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

William Shakespeare once wrote “What’s in a name? that which we call a rose, by any other name would smell as sweet.” The suggestion of Juliet’s comment to Romeo was that the name given to a person or a thing is less significant than the essence of what that person or item is. The famous phrase is often repeated; it is a widely-held belief in the western world: essence trumps labels.

It is therefore surprising that so many concentrate efforts to precisely label things. Consider the term “genocide,” which the United States government just used for only the fourth time.

ISIS Committing Genocide

On March 17, 2016, US Secretary of State John Kerry defined the actions of the Islamic State/ ISIS as “genocide.” He stated that “in my judgment, (ISIS) is responsible for genocide against groups in areas under its control including Yazidis, Christians and Shiite Muslims.” Kerry made such declaration after the US House of Representatives unanimously passed a resolution stating that ISIS was committing a genocide against Christians in Syria and Iraq, just days before. Their action followed the European Union designating the killings as a genocide in February.

Does labelling the actions of ISIS a “genocide” change anything? Will the United States be forced to take action to stop the brutal slaughter of Christians and other minorities by these jihadists? No.

Will ISIS be so upset by the declaration that it will stop killing people? No.

Senator Marco Rubio noted as such when he said “That it took so long for the administration to arrive at this conclusion, in the face of unspeakable human suffering, defies explanation. At long last the United States is no longer silent in the face of this evil, but it would be travesty if we were to mistakenly take solace in this designation, if the designation did not then yield some sort of action.”

Possible actions could include: pushing for the restoration of property and lands taken; offering aid and asylum to those being persecuted. It may also mean that the US must take action according to the Genocide Convention which was adopted after World War II. Article I of that Resolution specifically states that genocide is a crime “to prevent and to punish.”

Islamic State executing prisoners

The Definition and Roadmap to Genocide

The Genocide Convention enumerates what constitutes a genocide in Article II.
“[G]enocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:

Killing members of the group;
Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
Imposing measures intended to prevent births with the group;
Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.”

These actions are clearly being taken by the Islamic State against the Yazidis.

A group called “Genocide Watch” described a multistep pathway in which many genocides unfold. The pathway includes:

Classification
Symbolization
Dehumanization
Organization
Polarization
Preparation
Extermination
Denial

In addition to labelling the pathway to genocide, the authors of this list enumerated actions that society could implement to prevent a genocide from happening during each phase. For example, in the case of “Organization,” they suggest that “membership in these militias should be outlawed. Their leaders should be denied visas for foreign travel. The U.N. should impose arms embargoes on governments and citizens of countries involved in genocidal massacres.”

While people may agree or disagree with the pathway to genocide enumerated by Genocide Watch, it is a useful tool to examine evil intent as it unfolds in some societies, and some potential remedies.

Palestinian Intifada or Genocide

The Palestinian Arabs have launched numerous wars, riots and “intifadas” since the world approved the reestablishment of a Jewish homeland in the holy land in 1920. The Arab activities over these almost 100 years can be benchmarked against the definition and roadmap of genocide described above.

Classification, is the deliberate use of ethnic and racial divisions in a society to promote intolerance. Muslim-majority countries often rule with unique systems of laws, where ethnic and religious minorities are given a “dhmmitude” status. These dhimmis have secondary status in society. When Islam invaded the holy land in the seventh century, they gave the indigenous people the option of converting to Islam, dying, or living in dhimmitude.
The Arabs of EGL (east of the Green Line) extended the pariah classification of Jews when they evicted all of them from the region including the Old City of Jerusalem in 1949. The Jordanians granted all people in the area citizenship, but explicitly excluded any Jews. To this day, Palestinian Arab leadership has called for a country to be devoid of any Jews, and has official laws that call for the death sentence for any Arab caught selling land to a Jew.
Symbolization, is the use of special symbols like the yellow star that Nazis forced Jews to wear. The Palestinian Arabs have no authority over any Jews so such comparison is not apropos, at this time.
Dehumanization of Jews is a something that Palestinian Arab media and leadership does repeatedly. Actions include calling Jews the “sons of apes and pigs“.
Organization is the assembly of special groups and militias to carry out the killings. This is a Palestinian Arab specialty, as they have more terrorist entities than any other group in the world. They include: Abu Nidal; Hamas; Palestine Liberation Front; Palestinian Islamic Jihad; Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine; PFLP- General Command; and Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, to name a few.
Polarization includes broadcasting hate propaganda and the targeting of moderates. MEMRI and Palestinian Media Watch have hundreds of examples of Palestinian hate propaganda. The Hamas Charter calls against any negotiation with Israel. Palestinian leadership assassinates anyone considered collaborating with Israel.
Preparation includes limiting where people can live and identifying them for death. As noted above, the “moderate” Palestinians call for removing all Jews from EGL/Judea and Samaria, while the more popular and extreme Palestinians openly call for targeting Jews for death and wiping out Israel in its entirety.
Extermination has been an ongoing Arab effort since the riots of the 1920s and 1930s, to the war to destroy Israel in the 1940s, and the wars and “intifadas” of the past two decades.
Denial only exists after the genocide is complete, which fortunately has not happened to the Jewish State. An example of genocide denial can be best captured by the “moderate” acting-Prime Minster of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas, who wrote his doctoral thesis on Holocaust denial, and the champion of Hamas, the Turkish leader Recep Erdogan who continues to deny the genocide of Armenians to this day.

The Palestinian war against Israel fits the UN’s definition of genocide as well. Can the Palestinians claim they are simply “resisting” Israel and “resorting” to violence?

Killing Jews has been going on since 1920. Today the actions are with knives and cars. In 2014 it was with missiles. In 2002 it was with bombings. The focus on killing a subset of Israelis – the Jews – is made clear in Palestinian founding documents which include such statements as:
1. “Our struggle against the Jews is very great and very serious….”
2. “The Day of Judgement will not come about until Moslems fight the Jews“
3. “In face of the Jews’ usurpation of Palestine, it is compulsory that the banner of Jihad be raised…”
4. “Israel, Judaism and Jews challenge Islam and the Moslem people…”
5. “Israel, by virtue of its being Jewish and of having a Jewish population, defies Islam and the Muslims.“
Causing serious bodily and mental harm is also part-and-parcel of the attacks. The dehumanization (mentioned above), denying Jewish history in the holy land and the rights to live in their holy land are also forms of inflicting mental harm.
As noted above, Palestinians have repeatedly tried to destroy Israel. The wars of 1948 and 1967 were intended to destroy Israel completely. Terrorism has targeted Jewish schools, synagogues and everywhere that people live.
The Palestinian Arabs have not been able to enforce items 4 and 5 under the UN definition of Genocide as they have not have sufficient control over Jews.

Whether by the United Nations own definition, or the pathway described by Genocide Watch, it is clear that the Palestinians are actively trying to engage in a genocide of the Jews in the Middle East. According to an ADL poll, Palestinian Arabs are almost 100% anti-Semitic.

Murder in Synagogue in Har Nof neighborhood of Jerusalem
November 2014 (photo: Israel Government Press Office)

Actions to be Taken

Genocide Watch recommends embargoes and denying visas to genocidal groups like Hamas. The United Nations is mandated by the Genocide Convention to “to prevent [massacres] and to punish [those committing and inciting such actions].” And what has the United Nations done with the Palestinian Arabs? The opposite.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon has pushed for a Palestinian reconciliation government that includes the terrorist group Hamas
The UN promises Palestinian Arabs that they will all get to move into Israel
The UN emphasizes Palestinian victims while it ignores Israeli victims
The UN pushes for this anti-Semitic group to get their own country and become a member of the UN
The UN Secretary General pushes to end the blockade of Hamas-ruled Gaza
The UN gave the podium and recognition to Mahmoud Abbas, who blamed Jews for the Holocaust in his doctoral thesis, and then added to the insult, claiming from that UN platform that Jews were committing a genocide against Palestinians

The UN is supposed to fight to prevent genocide. However, when it comes to Palestinian Arabs, the organization either chooses to not recognize the vileness of Palestinian actions, or it simply forgives their activities, in the belief that Arab self-determination will pacify their blood lust beyond their new borders.

If one chose to be more “generous” about the UN’s actions and statements regarding Palestinian Arabs, it is that the world wants to prevent an inevitable genocide by Palestinian Arabs against the Jews, so it supports enforcing anti-Semitic edicts and evicting Jews from their homes and businesses in Judea and Samaria. Give the Palestinian Arabs their Jew-free state, and prevent a large scale genocide.

What’s in a Name?

ISIS has been slaughtering minorities for a long time, and only in March 2016 did the United States opt to call the brutality a “genocide.” Will the new designation of “genocide” make people and governments take a stand against the racist jihadist slaughter?

The world has used Palestinian terminology of their war against the existence of a Jewish State, calling it an “intifada,” or an uprising. In a similar vein, the UN refers to Arabs “resisting” Israel and the New York Times says that Hamas “resorts” to violence. Arab violence and incitement get a pass.

The labels and terms do not conceal the murders or bold statements that Hamas declares in its charter and its leaders call out today. They seek a genocide of the Jews and Jewish State. Yet their genocidal movement is labeled in soft reactionary language.

Do names and labels matter?

If people called the ISIS campaign in Iraq and Syria an “intifada,” would they consider that their goal of a Sunni state is legitimate? Would the world embrace the eviction of Christians from their homes in Iraq, so the Islamic State can be self-governing in a new caliphate?

If the world acknowledged the evil of the anti-Semitism of the Palestinian Arab mission to ban Jews from living in their homes, and their mission to drive Jews from the holy land, and called their attacks a “genocide,” would they demand an end to Hamas instead of including it in a reconciliation government?

Will a label produce an action? Or is a designation simply a conclusion? A statement of opinion of right versus wrong; good versus evil.

Perhaps the United States will take new actions against the Islamic State, and actively protect the persecuted, now that they have taken to calling the actions of ISIS a “genocide.”

Maybe the pro-Israel community can stop calling the Palestinian Arab attacks an “intifada,” and clearly call out the “genocide” and put an end to the war on the Jewish State.

Related First.One.Through articles:

The United Nations’ Adoption of Palestinians, Enables It to Only Find Fault With Israel

UN Press Corps Expunges Israel

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

UNRWA’s Ongoing War against Israel and Jews

The United Nations’ Remorse for “Creating” Israel

Names and Narrative: Palestinian Territories/ Israeli Territories

Names and Narrative: The West Bank / Judea and Samaria

Names and Narrative: CNN’s Temple Mount/ Al Aqsa Complex Inversion

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