Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Tuesday, October 17, 2017

Explainer: What Trump did with the Iran deal, and how everyone is getting it wrong

The Corker-Cordin law describes what the President must do every 90 days:

COMPLIANCE CERTIFICATION.—After the review period provided in subsection (b), the President shall, not less than every 90 calendar days—

“(A) determine whether the President is able to certify that—

“(i) Iran is transparently, verifiably, and fully implementing the agreement, including all related technical or additional agreements;

“(ii) Iran has not committed a material breach with respect to the agreement or, if Iran has committed a material breach, Iran has cured the material breach;

“(iii) Iran has not taken any action, including covert action, that could significantly advance its nuclear weapons program; and

“(iv) suspension of sanctions related to Iran pursuant to the agreement is

“(I) appropriate and proportionate to the specific and verifiable measures taken by Iran with respect to terminating its illicit nuclear program; and

“(II) vital to the national security interests of the United States;

Much of the media is reporting that President Trump didn't certify based on condition 1, that iran is not implementing the agreement, or condition 2 or 3 or even 4(II.) . But what Trump did was to decertify based on condition 4(I), that the suspension of sanctions are not "appropriate and proportionate to the specific and verifiable measures taken by Iran with respect to terminating its illicit nuclear program."

Trump said this explicitly:

When the agreement was finalized in 2015, Congress passed the Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act to ensure that Congress’s voice would be heard on the deal. Among other conditions, this law requires the President, or his designee, to certify that the suspension of sanctions under the deal is “appropriate and proportionate” to measure -- and other measures taken by Iran to terminate its illicit nuclear program. Based on the factual record I have put forward, I am announcing today that we cannot and will not make this certification.

Given that Iran does not allow the IAEA to inspect its military facilities, meaning that there is no transparency on what Iran is actually doing, and the sanctions were removed anyway, this is quite accurate. It is consistent with what Trump has said all along about the deal.

This was explained on NPR by NSC spokesperson Michael Anton to clueless reporter Rachel Martin:

MARTIN: If President Trump thinks this is such a bad deal, why not just rip it up altogether? Why this half measure of punting the issue to Congress?
ANTON: Well, a couple of things. First of all, you know, when you - in the lead-in, you used the phrase decertify, which isn't exactly accurate. And the other point I want to make, which is a related point, is we're talking about two different things. The action that the president declined to take on Friday was an action under U.S. law, the so-called INARA, or Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act. And it really does not directly relate to the deal. That's a law that Congress passed because the prior administration did not submit the deal to Congress as a treaty but made it an executive action only. And Congress wanted to have a say. One of the things they did is they put this 90-day requirement into a law that says an administration has to tell Congress if they think Iran is working in good faith in four particular areas.
MARTIN: But the bottom line is the president believes that Iran is not complying with the deal.
ANTON: No, that's not what he said. What he said was - again, there are four criteria. And what he said - one of those criteria - is the deal - the sanctions relief provided under the deal appropriate and proportional to the benefits? And he has said all along, since he first started running for president, that he thought the main flaw of this deal was that it gave Iran too much for too few concessions. That is a criteria that Congress wrote into the INARA law. And that is the criteria in which the president cited when he declined to certify the deal.
MARTIN: Then how does that change? Because now you've said Congress sits in your court. But Congress can't unilaterally renegotiate what was a deal that was...
ANTON: No.
MARTIN: ...Brokered between many allies.
ANTON: Right. That's not what we're asking Congress to do or what we're working with Congress on. What we're asking Congress to do is to set new conditions in U.S. law that hold Iran accountable and that - to a standard. So for instance, what we want to say is if Iran gets within one year of a breakout period where they can achieve a nuclear weapon, then American sanctions automatically step back. Everything that we're asking Congress to do are things that are designed to prevent Iran from ever acquiring a nuclear weapon. And if the goal of the nuclear deal is to prevent that, it's hard to see how anybody could oppose these measures.
MARTIN: Do you think that's likely to happen? I mean, Congress, even with Republicans holding the majority, have struggled to move ahead with a whole lot of things the president has called them to act on. So do you think Congress is going to get in line?
ANTON: We'll see. We're very hopeful. As I said, there doesn't seem to be, in my view, any constituency in Congress for Iran to get a nuclear weapon. So the passage of some new, tough measures to ensure that that never happens should not be controversial.
MARTIN: The president has put a lot of stock in the opinions of his military advisers, talking often about the generals, how much he values their advice. But both the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Joe Dunford, and the secretary of defense, James Mattis, have said the president should stay in the deal unequivocally. What are they missing?
ANTON: There's no - this is a misinterpretation of comments that they've made. What they said is right now it's in the national interest of the United States to remain in the deal. Well, guess what? The United States is still in the deal. The principals, that is including General Mattis, General Dunford, the secretary of state and others, presented the president with a consensus recommendation of what to do this time, which was to remain in but seek to address the deal's flaws both in U.S. law and working with allies.
And the one thing, too, that I need to make clear, which is a fundamental point here - what the president did on Friday was much more than announce his decision on what to do with a certain 90-day certification requirement in U.S. law. Although he did announce that, he - what he really did more fundamentally was roll out a comprehensive Iran strategy that puts forth ideas and plans for the United States to counter the full range of Iranian malign behavior, which includes nuclear weapons activities but also includes ballistic missile development proliferation, support and funding for terrorism - they're the world's No. 1 state sponsor of terror - and regional destabilization, including fueling the Syrian civil war.

Too bad the media doesn't want to get this right.

(h/t TIP)

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10/17 Links Pt2: The British Labour Party’s ‘Kosher Stamp’ for Anti-Semitism; BBC radio: Nazareth is a ‘Palestinian city’

From Ian:

David Collier: Inminds Jew haters gather. Fools, conspiracy theorists and antisemites

On Saturday 14 October, a group of anti-Israel activists went to protest outside of Jason Atherton’s ‘Little Social restaurant’. The group behind the demonstration was ‘Inminds’, a small, highly active, and particularly thuggish group, whose activists clearly have an issue with Jews. This time, they gathered to protest a restaurant participating in ‘Round Tables‘, an international culinary festival in Tel Aviv. As is so often the case now, you can become a target for these haters merely for not being antisemitic yourself.

When I arrived, Jonathan Hoffman was already there. Standing by the door of the restaurant with an Israeli flag. Taking this position meant the Inminds crew wouldn’t be able to crowd the restaurant door and intimidate the restaurant’s clients. Three other counter demonstrators arrived, Richard Galber, Tony Jacobs & Stephen Franklin. These four Zionists spent their Saturday lunchtime, countering an attack on the legitimacy of the State of Israel.

On the other side of the argument, the Inminds crew arrived. In the end there were fifteen protestors in total (not counting two children). As is always the case when dealing with material of this sort, many of the links on this page may not be safe to open at work.

MEMRI: Algerian Journalist In Antisemitic Article: 'Our Dispute With The Jews Is A Religious One'

In an article published August 10, 2017 in the Algerian daily Al-Shurouq, journalist Sultan Barkani wrote that the Muslims' dispute with the Jews is religious rather than political. He stated that the Jews have been plotting against the Muslims since the days of the Prophet Muhammad, and that they are responsible for most of the disasters that have befallen the Muslim ummah. By controlling media, cinema, art and fashion, he said, they control the Muslims' minds and character, inciting them to promiscuity and depravity and causing them to be feeble and defeatist. He called on Muslims to search their souls and return to Islam before it is too late and before the Jews and their secularist agents strip the Muslim ummah of everything it has.

The following are excerpts from his article.
"We all know that the Jews hated the Prophet Muhammad and fought his da'wa [call to Islam]. We also know that they plotted against the [Muslim] ummah after the Prophet's time, that the Righteous Caliphs [the first four Caliphs] were killed because of their slander and the quarrels they sparked, and that the disagreement among the [Prophet's] companions broke out because of their treachery and deception. We know that the Jews continued to plot against the Islamic Caliphate until they eventually managed to topple it in the first quarter of the 20th century,[2] and that they exploited the ummah's weakness to conquer the blessed land [of Palestine] and turn it into the headquarters of their scheming against the ummah. But is that all the Jews did and are still doing against us and our ummah?

"Today, many among us believe that our conflict with the Jews is only because they occupied Palestine, but the truth is that our conflict with them is a religious one, because they hated our Prophet and plotted against our religion and faith, and continue to do so. They were also behind most of the calamities that befell the ummah before the toppling of the Caliphate and the conquest of Palestine, and they continue to be behind most of the troubles that afflict it. It was they who acted to divide the ummah into small countries. [Then] they appointed unambitious rulers to head them and embroiled them in corruption and immorality scandals, so [they could] pressure them and carry out their plans in the Muslim countries.

"It is the Jews who control the media that afflicts the ummah today – media that spreads lust and religiously-dubious [ideas], fills the Muslims' hearts with feebleness, turn food, drink, clothing, cosmetics and cars into their greatest desires... causes them to fear the power and the weapons of the enemies, and turns them into empty-headed cowards. This media fights good traits and morality [by] spreading corruption and depravity, destroys the family unit, and encourages wives to tease and oppose their husbands and daughters to rebel against the authority of their fathers.

Why is the Center for Jewish History celebrating anti-Zionism?

The campaign demanding the firing of David N. Myers as CEO of the Center For Jewish History has been covered by The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, and countless other media outlets including establishment Jewish newspapers such as the New York Jewish Week and Los Angeles Jewish Journal.

Allowing Mr. Myers, who mourns the “nakba” (the term meaning catastrophe, used by the Arabs for Israel's Independence Day) to remain in his role, seems to mean that events celebrating forms of anti-Zionist activity become the norm at the Center for Jewish History. Events as these are the direct result of having a CEO who supports a boycott of the Jewish state. If, for no other reason than the fact that in the course of two weeks, multiple events have been planned which are Anti-Zionist, Is there no reaction to an organizational leader hosting events which are violently Anti-Israel?

Mr. Myers remains an active board member of the New Israel Fund, an organization which Israel’s Education Minister Naftali Bennett has called upon to be boycotted (as does Birthright Israel). Bennett said that he would “boycott whoever persecutes Israeli soldiers,” and “not apologize for it.” Bennett went on: “Members of the New Israel Fund, listen carefully: Whoever harms, slanders and persecutes Israeli soldiers are not my brothers. The NIF works methodically and consistently to attack our Israeli soldiers, accuse them of war crimes, of torturing Palestinians and intentionally attacking women and children. They turn to the UN and to the committees that are most hostile to Israel and try their best to convince them that Israel is a war criminal.”

How can the leader of the Center for Jewish History sit on a board that persecutes Israeli Soldiers?

We call upon the board of the Center for Jewish History, including Bruce Slovin, Ira H. Jolles, Martin Karlinsky, Bernard Blum, David Dangoor, Michael Jesselson, Ed Stelzer as well as the American Sephardic Federation, Yeshiva University Museum, American Jewish Historical Society, Leo Baeck Institute and YIVO Institute for Jewish Research to stand up and replace David N. Myers as head of the Center for Jewish History.

Saudi paper: Why so many Jewish Nobel Prize winners? It's obviously fixed!

Saudi Arabia's Al Watan looks at Nobel Prize statistics:

Over the history of the award, Jews who make up 0.2 percent of the world's population and 2 percent of the population of the United States received 179 of the Nobel Prize winners. For example, Jews accounted for 22% of the recipients of the award between 1901 and 2009, and 36% of the Americans who received the Nobel Prize in the same period in the fields of scientific research in chemistry, economics, medicine and physics...

31 Jews won the Nobel Prize for Chemistry which is 20% of the world's total. 13 Jews won the Nobel Prize for Literature, 12% of the total recipients in the world. 9 Jews won the Nobel Peace Prize. 47 Jews won the Nobel Prize in Physics. Fifty-three Jews were awarded the Nobel Prize in Medicine, accounting for 27% of all of them.

On the other hand, the total number of Muslims in the world to about one billion people, or 20% of the world's population. Muslims and Christian Arabs received seven Nobel Prizes in literature, peace and medicine.

This is a mystery to the Saudi writer.

At first glance, it may be understandable why so many Jews win in the branches of medicine, physics, chemistry and economics. But the number does not seem logical. There is no scientific theory of their association with a particular race or religion.
In the fields of literature and peace, the exaggeration of Jewish favoritism among Israelis and non-Israeli Jews is revealed to a large extent. To name but a few, where is the peace created by Yitzhak Rabin - who wanted to break the bones of the Palestinians in the first Palestinian intifada, - and Shimon Peres, godfather of the Israeli nuclear project, and who was turning the Middle East into a new Hiroshima ?.

Arafat, of course, deserved his prize. After all he was the father of modern terrorism and a pioneer in pretending to be peaceful in some venues while planning terror attacks in others.

Every once in a while I see a story in the Arab media that notices the Nobel disparity between Arabs and Jews and it causes a little bit of self-reflection. Not this time. The Jews obviously control the Nobel Prize.

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Time for the annual olive harvest lies by the Palestinian Authority

The PA's official Wafa news agency reported on Sunday:

Palestinian locals Sunday managed to foil an Israeli settlers’ attack against olive pickers in the village of Qaruot to the south of the West Bank district of Nablus, said a local activist.

Ghassan Daghles, monitoring Israeli settlement activity in the north of the West Bank, told WAFA settlers coming from 'Eli’ and 'Shilo’; two illegal Israeli settlements located along Nablus-Ramallah highway, attacked Palestinians harvesting olives in the village of Qaruot.

Locals scuffled with settlers and managed to fend off their attack. No injuries were reported.

Yisrael Medad, who lives in Shiloh, checked out the story and it is complete fiction.

Fake news.
Never happened.
All made up.https://t.co/dNsLXNNZed @odedrevivi @epieprz
— ymedad (@ymedad) October 15, 2017

Long time readers of the blog may recognize the name of the person who made this accusation, Ghassan Daghlas.

Over the years, his accusations have been published in Arab media - almost invariably without a single photo or video to corroborate his accusations.

He is literally paid by the Palestinian Authority to make up these stories. His job is to "monitor Israeli settler activity." And he knows that no one will check his stories.

Wire services and major newspapers will quote him without the slightest reservation.

Hundreds of times.

Daghlas has been busy during this start of olive season, with daily stories in Wafa. Yesterday he claimed that Israelis stole the entire olive harvest of two villages and today that the exact same thing happened with two more villages.

Evidence? Photos? Names? No need. Daghlas knows that his stories will end up in Ma'an and Mondoweiss, and with luck Reuters and the New York Times. As long as they are quoting him, without saying that his record of truth-telling is virtually nonexistent, he has no fear about lying again and again - being paid with your tax dollars.

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10/17 Links Pt1: Netanyahu's Blistering Attack On Iran's FM; Tony Blair: It was wrong to boycott Hamas

From Ian:

Caroline Glick: The opportunities and risks of Trump's Iran initiative

So long as the US continues to maintain a policy based on the false view that all that is necessary to destroy the threat of a nuclear armed Iran is a combination of the nuclear deal and economic sanctions, it will continue to ensure that Iran and its nuclear program remain a major threat. Distressingly, US Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley, the most outspoken supporter of decertifying Iranian compliance in the Trump administration, told NBC on Sunday that the US intends to remain in the nuclear deal.

To understand what must be done we must return to Trump’s speech and its strategic significance.

By taking a holistic view of the Iranian threat – grounded in a recognition of the inherent hostility of the regime – Trump opened up the possibility that the US and its allies can develop a holistic policy for confronting and defeating Iran and its proxies. If the Iran deal and sanctions are two components to a larger strategy rather than the entire strategy, they can be helpful.

A wider strategy would target Iran’s regional aggression by weakening its proxies and clients from Hezbollah and Hamas to the regimes in Iraq, Yemen, Syria and Lebanon. It would target the regime itself by empowering the ayatollahs’ domestic opponents. It would pin down Iranian forces by arming and otherwise assisting the Iraqi Kurds to defend and maintain their control over their territory along the Iranian border while strengthening the ties between Iranian Kurds and Iraqi Kurds.

Friday, Trump created the possibility for such a strategy. It is up to members of Congress, and US allies like Israel and the Sunni Arab states to help Trump conceive and implement it. If they fail, the possibility Trump created will be lost, perhaps irrevocably.

Amb. Dore Gold: There Is a Precedent for Renegotiating Flawed Agreements

Is it realistic to try to deal with the flaws in the Iran agreement and change them? In fact, there's precedent for it. In 1979, the Carter Administration negotiated the SALT-2 treaty with the Soviet Union. Whereas the Iran agreement was never a formal treaty, SALT-2 was a negotiated treaty.

But the SALT-2 treaty was flawed. It did not adequately address the arms race between the U.S. and the Soviet Union. It put a limit on the growth of the nuclear forces of the two superpowers, but it didn't reduce them.

Subsequently, however, a new administration came into power under President Ronald Reagan and he decided a different approach was necessary. It was called START - strategic arms reduction talks. Rather than limiting the growth of nuclear weapons, it reduced them, and this became the preferred approach.

During the last few weeks a number of flaws in the Iran agreement have come out, but the one that received the most focus was "Section T" of the JCPOA. What Section T tries to do is define activities in the area of weaponization that are prohibited. But, of course, Iran has not allowed the International Atomic Energy Agency or anyone to do proper verification to see that Section T in the Iran agreement has been addressed by them.

This is a huge flaw. One has to remember that in the May 2011 report of the International Atomic Energy Agency, there are frightening details about the Iranian nuclear program that include weaponization activities. It says that the Iranians were conducting design work and modeling studies involving the removal of the conventional explosive payload from the warhead of a Shahab-3 missile and replacing it with a spherical nuclear payload.

Presently, President Trump's strategy to reopen the Iran agreement to remove the flaws and produce an agreement that will safely protect the interests of the West is the only reasonable approach.

US bipartisan support for Israel -- when and how did that start?

Apparently, the birth of that bipartisan support for Israel came about during the term of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, despite FDR's antagonism towards Zionism.

FDR. Photo by Leon A. Perski, 1944.
Source: Wikipedia

And a lot of the credit seems to be due to Netanyahu.

In FDR’s Retreat on Zionism–and What it Means Today, Rafael Medoff writes about Roosevelt's attitude towards then-Palestine and Zionism.

Roosevelt opposed both, vigorously:

On January 17, 1943, on the question of restoring the pre-war equal rights of North Africa’s 330,000 Jews following the liberation of Casablanca, Roosevelt suggested that “the number of Jews engaged in the practice of the professions (law, medicine, etc) should be definitely limited to the percentage that the Jewish population in North Africa bears to the whole of the North African population,” so that local Arabs would not be angered.

Roosevelt also opposed settling Jewish refugees in North Africa: “I know, in fact, that there is plenty of room for them in North Africa but I raise the question of sending large numbers of Jews there...That would be extremely unwise.”

In April 1943, Roosevelt approved of a suggested Allied ban on all public discussion of Palestine until the end of the war. He backed down after Secretary of War Stimson called such a measure "alarmist"

On March 9, 1944, Roosevelt rejected the request of Rabbis Stephen S. Wise and Abba Hillel Silver to open Palestine to Jews fleeing Hitler. He claimed that the move would enrage Arabs and responded to them, “Do you want to start a Holy Jihad?”

Rabbi Stephen Samuel Wise; Library of Congress portrait.
Wikipedia

Abba Hillel Silver; excerpt from YouTube video

Also in 1944, Republican Senator Robert Taft introduced a resolution affirming US support for the creation of a Jewish national home in Palestine. In response, Roosevelt claimed that the resolution would be “responsible for the death of a hundred thousand men.” As a result, the resolution was table for a year, and when Congress passed it – there was no Arab rioting.

Yet despite all this, the same Roosevelt who rejected a request by the Palestine (Jewish) Symphony Orchestra to name one of its theaters the “Roosevelt Amphitheatre” for fear it would link him too closely the Zionists -- did in fact turn around and support Zionism.

To a degree.

In the fall of 1943, it appeared that the Republican contender in the 1944 presidential election would go after the Jewish vote.

A major factor in adapting a strong pro-Zionist plank at the Republican National Convention was Netanyahu -- Benzion Netanyahu, the father of Israel's current prime minister.

Benzion Netanyahu in 2007. Source: Wikipedia

Medoff writes:

Benzion Netanyahu, scholar and activist (and father of the current prime minister) arrived in the United States in 1940 as an emissary of Revisionist Zionism, the militant wing of the Zionist movement, headed by Vladimir Ze’ev Jabotinsky. Netanyahu organized rallies and authored full-page newspaper advertisements challenging the Roosevelt administration for abandoning European Jewry and the Zionist cause.

Netanyahu also spent part of his time on Capitol Hill. In an interview with this author, Netanyahu recalled the political landscape he encountered in the nation’s capital: “Most of the Jewish and Zionist leaders, led by Rabbi Stephen Wise, were devoted Democrats and supporters of President Roosevelt. The idea of having friendly relationships with Republicans was inconceivable to them.” In the months prior to the June 1944 Republican National Convention, Netanyahu did the inconceivable–he took his case to GOP leaders, including former president Herbert Hoover; Senator Robert Taft, who was chairing the convention’s resolutions committee; and the influential Connecticut congresswoman Clare Booth Luce, who was slated to deliver the keynote address at the convention and would also serve on the resolutions committee. Netanyahu’s goal was to have the GOP platform include a plank supporting Jewish statehood in Palestine. Neither party had ever before taken such a stand.

The efforts of Netanyahu -- and Rabbi Abba Hillel Silver -- resulted in the inclusion of the following in the Republican platform :

In order to give refuge to millions of distressed Jewish men, women and children driven from their homes by tyranny, we call for the opening of Palestine to their unrestricted immigration and land ownership, so that in accordance with the full intent and purpose of the Balfour Declaration of 1917 and the resolution of a Republican Congress in 1922, Palestine may be reconstituted as a free and democratic commonwealth. We condemn the failure of the President to insist that the Palestine Mandatory carry out the provisions of the Balfour Declaration and the Mandate while he pretends to support them.

In response, Rabbi Wise felt forced to try to get the Democrats, with Roosevelt's approval, to include a pro-Zionist statement in its platform as well.

To a large degree he was successful. The Democratic platform supported the “unrestricted Jewish immigration and colonization” of Palestine as well as the establishment of “a free and democratic Jewish commonwealth.”

One could argue that this was the beginning of the bi-partisan support for Israel that despite its ups and downs continues to this day.

Medoff writes:

Wise summed up what was achieved: “With the plank in both platforms the thing is lifted above partisanship.” The adoption of the two party planks ensured that support for Zionism, and later Israel, would become a permanent part of American political culture. No subsequent Republican or Democratic convention could go back on it without significant electoral ramifications.

Despite the questions that are raised today about the extent and degree of Democratic support for Israel, that bi-partisan support does in fact continue.

As does the tendency of Netanyahu's not to quietly acquiesce to US policy towards Israel.

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Palestinian Arab snowflakes upset at Balfour celebration at Manchester U

From Al Jazeera:

A British university has drawn criticism for its decision to allow a Balfour Declaration "celebration" organised by a pro-Israel group.

The Manchester Balfour 100 event will be held at the University of Manchester's main campus later in October and is part of a broader series of events to mark the anniversary of the declaration made by then British Foreign Secretary Arthur James Balfour on November 2, 1917.

The university's decision has been slammed by both academics and students.

"Having the celebration of the Balfour declaration on campus is totally disrespectful to students of Palestinian origin," said Ayham Madi, a Palestinian studying at the university, adding: "Many people lost their homes, land and their lives."

The cybersecurity student said a hundred years later, Palestinians continued to feel the impact of the declaration and that he felt "great pain" that the university has allowed the event to take place.

The National (UAE) adds:

BDS campaigner Huda Ammori, 23, told The National that the university’s decision to allow the event to take place on its premises had upset many Palestinian students.

“The Balfour Declaration is seen by many Palestinian students as the invitation of the ethnic cleansing, which took place in 1948,” she explained.

Ms Ammori, who is in the third year of an international business, finance and economics degree at Manchester, described how some of the students on campus felt when they discovered the celebration was taking place.

“It was quite an emotional step back for some of the Palestinian students because it’s a mockery, especially when they are painting it as a celebration. Not an educational talk - a celebration,” she said.

“They (the university) are making a clear statement by holding it on the campus. They are completely disregarding Palestinian students.”

The BDS campaign at the university has joined other student societies in writing a letter to president and vice chancellor, Nancy Rothwell, demanding the event be cancelled. If it is not, Ms Ammori said a protest will take place outside the venue where the celebration is held.

Poor snowflakes.

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Anti-Israel "Balfour Project" cant quite find "Palestine" stamps that don't make them look stupid

The "Balfour Project" is an attempt by a bunch of British Israel-haters to force Great Britain to apologize for the Balfour Declaration.

They illustrate their site with the first stamps used by Great Britain in Palestine after they occupied it.

So what are these stamps?

The first set of four stamps look like this:

Note that it doesn't say "Palestine" or anything close. It says "E.E.F" which stands for the British Egyptian Expeditionary Force which occupied Palestine in 1917. The E.E.F. stamps were valid in Palestine, Cilicia, Syria, Lebanon, and Transjordan.

Nothing "Palestinian" about them.

The other stamps are variants of this one, but with an overstrike that says "Palestine" in English and Arabic that Great Britain started in 1920 with the Mandate. In Hebrew it says "Palestina E.Y." where the "E.Y" stands for Eretz Yisrael, the Land of Israel.

Palestinian Arabs didn't like the idea that the "E.Y." were on the stamps. They countered that they wanted their own national name on the stamps as well in Arabic if the Jews were allowed to place the "E.Y" after their name.

And the name they wanted to print was not "Palestine."

They wanted the stamps to say ""Suria El Jenobia" -Southern Syria!

This was all recorded in the Palestine Bulletin of October 13, 1925.

Israel-haters keep trying to make "Palestine" look like is was a real Arab country. And they always fail, spectacularly.

(h/t Irene)

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10/16 Links Pt2: UN Threatens to Blacklist Bezeq Phone Company, Bezeq CEO Calls Them Out

From Ian:

UN Threatens to Blacklist Bezeq Phone Company, Bezeq CEO Calls Them Out

The UNHRC blacklist letter to Bezeq is on display at the end of this article.

The United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) has threatened to blacklist Bezeq, Israel’s most prominent telecommunications corporation, because the company provides services to Israeli communities in Judea, Samaria and eastern Jerusalem.

In their letter to Bezeq, the UNHRC wrote that Bezeq could keep their response confidential, but Bezeq CEO Stella Handler chose to play no part in the UNHRC’s anti-Semitic game and publicized the UNHRC letter as well as her response on Facebook.

In her Facebook post on Monday, Handler said the company would not collaborate with what which she called “nothing more than anti-Israel propaganda.”

“Bezeq will continue to protect the rights of all our customers without discrimination. We will continue to provide service to all Israeli citizens without respect to religion, race or gender and we respect their right to choose to live in any part of this land – be it Raanana, Jerusalem, Ariel, Sakhnin or Ma’aleh Adumim.”

Handler said attempts to blacklist Israeli companies were nothing than “illegitimate pressure to ‘head-butt’ Israel.”

My message to Iran's foreign minister: Delete your account pic.twitter.com/i0Ca57uc4u
— PM of Israel (@IsraeliPM) October 16, 2017

When a Jewish laborer took on 20,000 US Nazis in Madison Square Garden

A new short documentary compiles archived footage to recall an event held in New York on the eve of World War II in which tens of thousands of people gathered at New York’s iconic Madison Square Garden venue to cheer on US Nazis at what was billed as a “pro-American rally.”

Documentary filmmaker Marshall Curry’s latest work includes the moments when a Jewish man was beaten to the floor as he tried to rush past dozens of uniformed Nazis on the stage in a failed attempt to disrupt the main speaker.

The seven-minute “A Night at the Garden” is made up of various clips showing the drama on the night of February 20, 1939, when 20,000 people packed into Madison Square Garden for a rally organized by the German American Bund, a Nazi movement led by German-American Fritz Julius Kuhn.

The film was recently screened at 22 US cinemas in the Alamo theater chain.

Curry made the film for the documentary unit Field of Vision after learning about the history of the rally a year ago.

YNet reported:

A small, unlikely “dream team” delegation comprised entirely of minorities in Israel is preparing to embark on a trip to the US and Europe as part of a concerted effort to debunk the campaigns circulating on university campuses slamming Israel’s treatment of different groups in the country.

Hailing from different locations across the country, the participants are vocal in their common belief that Israel affords them equal opportunity.

Expressing their love for and faith in the state, they are determined to disseminate their message and counter the smear campaigns against Israel that have permeated college campuses, often spearheaded by the Boycotts, Divestments and Sanctions (BDS) movement.

Dima Tiya, 25, is an Arab Muslim, originally from Qalandiya and today is a resident of Kafr Manda in the lower Galilee.

“The State of Israel is important to me on a personal level and is important for all minorities who live there,” Dima says. “I am happy to represent the state. My father is a liberal and taught me the meaning of co-existence.”

Qassem Halila, 24, an Arab Muslim originally from Iksal in northern Israel explained that he had agreed to take part in the initiative despite the resulting ostracization he has faced from family and friends.

“I pay a heavy personal price for my opinions. My cousin kicked me out of the house, another uncle stopped me from being invited to a wedding, and I was even kicked out of the family WhatsApp group,” said Qassem.

Despite his estrangement, nothing could throw the national character of the country into dispute. “Thankfully, my parents support me. At the end of every week I go to my village and believe that this is a Jewish and democratic state. I feel equal in everything and I have no feelings of discrimination,” he insisted.

Bassem A’yid, a 59-year-old Palestinian from Beit Hanina in east Jerusalem, who is also embarking on his new journey as an Israeli ambassador, emphasized the damaging impact that boycott movements are having on the Palestinians themselves.

“The BDS is endangering the livelihoods of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians,” A’yid complains. “I have come to defend the Palestinian economy and not to endanger my life with my opinions. I intend to say this any place I want in the US.”

Jonathan Alhori, 25, an Arab Christian from Haifa who is the son of an officer in the South Lebanon Army, stated the importance of the mission, believing it would serve as an eye-opener for many misinformed people.

Already many of these Arabs are getting death threats on social media.

But the "moderate" Fatah party is really upset. Ma'an quotes prominent Fatah leader Hatem Abdel Qader as condemning these young Arabs who ignore what Mahmoud Abbas wants them to say.

Abdel Qader described the group as stray and outcast and desperate He was especially upset at the members who say that the boycott of Israel negatively affects the economy of the Palestinian people, saying this was a false allegation and a failed attempt to mislead international public opinion.

"If Israel thinks that this empty group can cover up the nakedness of the occupation that has become exposed to the whole world, or beautify its ugly face and polish its shattered and distorted image," he said, they are mistaken.

Which makes one wonder why he feels so threatened by them if he knows that they will have no impact?

Perhaps he is much more frightened of the truth than he is of a small group of Israeli (and Palestinian) arabs.

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Guess who is to blame for ISIS terrorists in Gaza? (Petra Marquardt-Bigman)

By Petra Marquardt-Bigman

A few days ago, Ali Abunimah’s Electronic Intifada published a story about the situation in Gaza that started out with the untimely demise of Nidal al-Jaafari, a recently married 29-year-old, who “was killed on 17 August in a suicide bombing near Gaza’s boundary with Egypt.”

Since Nidal al-Jaafari was a member of the Qassam Brigades, he would have certainly been among those who would celebrate any suicide bombing targeting Israelis. But other Islamist terror groups love suicide bombings just as much as Hamas, and Jaafari was killed in a “bombing [that] was attributed to the Islamic State group.”

Unsurprisingly, Abunimah’s Electronic Intifada doesn’t mention terrorism in this story that is really about one terrorist group – namely Hamas – being forced to fight another terrorist group – ISIS – in order to appease the Egyptians.

The reader learns that already in June, “Hamas also began clearing a buffer zone along its boundary with Egypt” – and the link leads to an article in Ha’aretz that notes that this “will force a lot of families out of their homes.” Well, if even one Palestinian faced the prospect of being forced to move just a few yards because of Israel, Abunimah’s Electronic Intifada would have had plenty to say about this terrible hardship…

But now that Egypt is forcing Hamas to confront ISIS supporters in Gaza, it’s of course time to trot out the usual variations of the Nazi slogan “The Jews are our misfortune” – so here goes:

“Some also see an Israeli hand in the area.

Akram Attalla, a political analyst and columnist for al-Ayyam newspaper, speculated that Islamic State in Gaza and the Sinai is funded by Israel in order to undermine Hamas.

‘Israel is aware that the Palestinians have adapted to the division among them and the siege,’ he told The Electronic Intifada. ‘Hence, Israel is trying to create groups that can wear Hamas down.’

Omar Jaara, an Israel affairs expert and lecturer at An-Najah National University in the West Bank, echoed this theory. Islamic State, he said, is a ‘tool controlled by Israel to maintain instability’ at the boundary with Egypt. As the group’s threat to Egypt grows, he added, it becomes a ‘wild card’ that Israel can wield against Hamas.”

Well, if even an “Israel affairs expert and lecturer at An-Najah National University” thinks Israel is behind ISIS, there must be something to it, right? And indeed, I think no one can deny that this view reflects as much “expertise” as Dr. Omar Ja’ara’s amazing performance on Palestinian TV a few years ago, when he explained that “Moses the Muslim” led “the first Palestinian liberation through armed struggle to liberate Palestine from the nation of giants led by Goliath.” As he said: “This is our logic and this is our culture.”

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10/16 Links Pt1: The Growing Autocracy of the PA; Israel destroys Syrian AA after it fires at IDF jets

From Ian:

Alan M. Dershowitz: President Trump Did the Right Thing by Walking Away from UNESCO — for Now

Among the reasons are that by withdrawing from UNESCO – again – President Trump is sending a powerful message to the international community: the United States will no longer tolerate international organizations that serve as forums for Jew-bashing. This important message was encapsulated in a powerful statement made by U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, Nikki Haley: "The purpose of UNESCO is a good one. Unfortunately, its extreme politicization has become a chronic embarrassment...US taxpayers should no longer be on the hook to pay for policies that are hostile to our values and make a mockery of justice and common sense."

The political thinker Charles de Montesquieu famously said: "There is no crueller tyranny than that which is perpetuated under the shield of law and in the name of justice." It is precisely because UNESCO purports to be a cultural and educational body that its false credibility masks its pervasive bigotry.

On Friday afternoon it was announced that former French Culture Minister Audrey Azoulay – a Jewish woman – was elected as UNESCO Chief. Azoulay said that "UNESCO is going through a profound crisis" but that she hopes to fix it from within. I hope she succeeds in this mission. I hope she can turn UNESCO from an organization that promotes bigotry in the false name of culture, into one that opposes all forms of bigotry. Given the nature of its voting membership, this will not be easy, but with pressure from the U.S., it may have a chance of succeeding. Perhaps then the U.S. will maintain its membership in and financial support for UNESCO.

CAMERA Op-Ed: The Growing Autocracy of the Palestinian Authority

On Sept. 26, 2017, the Palestinian Authority, the self-governing body that rules the West Bank (Judea and Samaria), hailed a terrorist named Ahmed Al-Jamal, for murdering three Israelis. Twenty-four hours later, the PA was welcomed into INTERPOL, which purports to work to “make the world a safer place.” Both instances are examples of the authority violating the Oslo accords which created it and from which it is still funded.

The PA was established in May 1994 as a result of the Israel-Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) Declaration of Principles (DOP) during the Oslo peace process. As with the PLO, the Fatah movement has long dominated the PA. All three entities are currently led by Mahmoud Abbas, the 82-year old successor to Yasser Arafat, who is currently in year twelve of a single elected four-year term.

Abbas has been variously described as a “moderate” and a “peace partner” by press and policymakers alike. Much of his record suggests otherwise.

On several occasions, Abbas—like his predecessor—has rejected opportunities for a Palestinian state if it meant living peacefully next to the Jewish nation of Israel. For example, a 2008 offer issued by then-Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert included 93% of the West Bank (Judea and Samaria) and a Palestinian state with its capital in eastern Jerusalem. Abbas himself has acknowledged that he rejected this plan “out of hand,” and failed to so much as submit a counteroffer.

Instead of accepting statehood and peace with the Jewish state, Abbas has opted for war, by promoting anti-Jewish violence and seeking to delegitimize the Jewish state.

Amb. Alan Baker: Palestinian Unification Must Honor Palestinian Commitments

The Hamas-Fatah unity agreement could, in principle, be seen to be a positive development in the general framework of the Middle East peace process.

However, such a positive development, to be meaningful and to signal genuine momentum, would have to fulfill two very basic tenets laying at the foundation of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.

The first is that the general aim of the unification must be to enable a responsible and unified Palestinian leadership, speaking with one voice and duly empowered, to further the peace negotiation process. This aim must be publicly declared and acknowledged by all Palestinian factions.

If to the contrary, the aim of the unification is to enhance and consolidate Palestinian opposition to peaceful coexistence with Israel, through enabling Hamas to retain its armed capabilities and to continue its belligerency through terror tunnels, rockets, and acts of terror, then this unification will be flawed, false, and misleading. It will undermine international efforts at reconciliation and negotiation.

The second basic tenet of such unification must be to openly reaffirm the already existing and valid Palestinian commitments vis-a-vis Israel and the international community, signatories as witnesses to the Oslo Accords