Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Sunday, December 10, 2017

UNSC debate indicates that "west Jerusalem" is an international city, "east Jerusalem" is "Palestinian"

The extraordinary UN debate over The US recognition of Jerusalem was indeed extraordinary. Never has this council been convened over the actions of one state recognizing the capital of another, something which is, in every other example in history, a pretty benign decision.

But some of the speeches made at the debate indicate that the UN is still schizophrenic as to the actual legal status of Jerusalem.

When it comes to the areas to the east of the Green Line, it is considered "occupied Palestinian territory."

But when it comes to the west of the same line, it is still not considered Israeli. In that case it is "corpus separatum" - a completely separate territory that was envisioned as an international city under UNGA 181, which was never implemented.

So we saw the representative from Uruguay say "Yesterday a communiqué was issued by my government affirming our support to resolution 181 establishing a Jewish state with Jerusalem as corpus separatum."

And Sweden, which was one of the countries behind the special session, said "We requested this meeting, along with 7 others due to the repurcussions of the statement made by US president. We clearly disagree with the capital of Israel as Jerusalem and the move of the embassy. It contradicts international law; Jerusalem is a final status issue. Already in 1947, the UN attributed to Jerusalem a special legal and political status as corpus separatum.."

The representative from France said "France recognizes no sovereignty over Jerusalem."

And Nickolay Mladenov, UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process, invoked UNGA 181 in his speech as well.

However, the other UNSC resolutions invoked over Jerusalem during the debate - especially 252, 478 and 2334 - do not refer to UNGA 181, and are more concerned over territories liberated by Israel in 1967. No one seems to be considering those territories to be part of the "corpus separatum" that appears to animate the UN's insistence that even the western part of the city not be under Israeli sovereignty.

If all of Jerusalem was a corpus separatum, then Bethlehem and many other towns considered "Palestinian" would no longer be considered Palestinian at all, but all part of the international city envisioned by UNGA 181.Yet no one claims that Bethlehem is anything but "Palestinian," which itself is a peculiar legal status given that no one can point to any date when the land was legally recognized to be transferred from Jordanian control to Palestinian control.

We see here that even within the context of a single debate, the hypocrisy and latent antisemitism of the world community is exposed. If "east Jerusalem" is Palestinian than "west Jerusalem"is Israeli; if "west Jerusalem"is an international city than so is all of the area up through Bethlehem. But the UN and its members use literal doubletalk to avoid these contradictions.

There is only a single thread of consistency within these two definitions. One is designed to wrest control of the western side of the city from Jews, and the other designed to wrest control of the eastern part of the city from Jews.

After all, otherwise why would an embassy on the west side of the Green Line be cause for an extraordinary debate to begin with?

And once you understand that, everything else makes sense. Legal definitions and UN resolutions are simply fig leaves for the UN's and its member states' antisemitism.

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Danny Danon's speech on Jerusalem at UNSC (Video)

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There was an anti-Trump rally in Kuwait on Saturday organized by the Palestinian embassy there.

The speeches all had a similar theme.

The "Ambassador of the State of Palestine," Rami Tahboub, said that Jerusalem will remain an "Arab Christian Islamic" city and the capital of the eternal state of Palestine, and it is a red line.

The Ambassador of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan Saqr Abu Shattal expressed Jordanian-Palestinian unity and their common interest in protecting Islamic and Christian holy sites in Jerusalem.

The Secretary General of the Kuwaiti Democratic Forum, Bandar Al-Khairan, stressed the support of the Kuwaiti people to Palestine, and that Jerusalem is an Islamic Christian Arab city.

Spokeswoman Lulwa Mulla condemned the American decision, considered it null and void, and stressed that Jerusalem will remain a Muslim Arab Christian city.

When speaking in English, the Arab critics of Trump's move are careful to talk about the importance of Jerusalem to all three major monotheistic religions, and how Muslims and Jews lived in harmony in Palestine for centuries before Zionism, and other soothing liberal-sounding phrases.

But listen to them in Arabic and the idea that Jews have any connection or right to live in Jerusalem is simply not acceptable. It is an Islamic and Christian, and always Arab, city.

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12/09 Links: Collier: Antisemitism runs free on the streets of London; Trump Puts Fact Ahead of Fiction in Israel; How The GOP Became A ‘Pro-Israel’ Party

From Ian:

David Collier: Islamic war cries heard, as antisemitism runs free on the streets of London

The anti-Trump bandwagon
Everyone is also up in arms because the POTUS, Trump, was the one who made the declaration. Which creates a problem for the media outlets who see Trump as the devil incarnate. These people, who are convinced that everything Trump does is wrong, and about to cause World War 3, cannot support Trump even when he is right or tells the truth. An anti-Trump reflex came into play. Israel didn’t just suffer from those people who always hate Israel, it suffered because the only thing more hated by many European media outlets than Israel, is Donald Trump.

In effect, it left little motive in the media to try to act responsibly, or diffuse any anger, because a ‘spontaneous’ violent outburst would help ‘prove’ that Trump is a danger to world peace. Rather than run articles explaining that in effect, Trump had only pointed out that because everyone already acts as if Jerusalem is the capital, and because Israel has the right to name its own capital, surely it is better to recognise the reality, they chose to focus on and amplify the angry voices. Even some staunch Zionist outlets, failed to support the move, because it originated with Donald Trump.

The London demonstration
Across the world, over the last two days we have witnessed the usual mob gathering in cities to attack the ‘blatant provocation’. Absurdly pushing the idea that pointing out reality can somehow damage a peace process, that the Palestinians have been blowing up for decades. Last night, 8th December, there was one in London. It was called by groups like the Palestine Solidarity Campaign and Stop the War Coalition, and friends of Al Aqsa. It was also supported by organisations such as War on Want, Socialist Worker, and Jewish Voice for Labour.
Religious incitement and hate

The event itself was full of religious incitement and anti-Jewish hatred. The crowds were chanting anti-Jewish (not anti-Zionist) statements in Arabic. Calling for a war to free Al Aqsa, and reciting the phrase ”Khaybar Khaybar, ya yahud, Jaish Muhammad, sa yahud’ ( Khaybar, Khaybar, O Jews, The Army of Muhammad Will Return ) – in reference to the attack by Muslim soldiers on native Jews in Khaybar in 628ad. There were also cries of death to America and Israel. You can see a short clip of the footage here:

Melanie Phillips: The British and European perfidy

Twenty-four hours after President Trump’s watershed speech recognising Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, there has been predictable Palestinian violence and equally predictable, almost unanimous condemnation from Western European leaders and the western left.

What needs to be understood is that the former is symbiotically connected to the latter. As I said in my blog post yesterday, the Palestinians use violence in order to get a reaction that advances their agenda.

Until now, the west has duly obliged. For a variety of reasons including fear, ideology and bigotry the west has bought into the lie that the “Palestinians” have a historic and religious right to the land. It therefore sees them (to a greater or lesser extent, depending on whether it thinks of itself as a “friend” to Israel) as a legitimate resistance movement being crushed by the Israelis. The more violence the Palestinians commit against Israel, the more they entrap it into responding with greater force. Then they can rely on the west putting pressure on Israel to make suicidal concessions to them.

This western response is crucial to their strategy. They know they alone can’t defeat Israel. So they need to get the west to do their dirty work for them: forcing Israel into concessions which will enable them to mount their final attempt to exterminate it from the IDF-vacated “West Bank” just down the road.

To get the west to do so, it’s vital that it believes and endorses the Palestinians’ mendacious claims about their own history and religion. Which the west has duly done for decades.

Jonah Goldberg: Trump Puts Fact Ahead of Fiction in Israel

The only reason recognizing Jerusalem as the Jewish State’s capital is controversial is that the world has been pretending it’s not for decades.

The most exhausting thing about the Middle East — except for the bloodshed, poverty, tyranny, etc. — is that it refuses to conform to how it’s described in the West.

It’s like journalists, diplomats, and politicians want to announce a football game, but the players keep insisting on playing rugby. The field looks similar. The scoring isn’t all that different. It’s just a different game. But don’t tell the gang in the booth. They get furious when you point out that the facts don’t line up with the commentary.

Consider President Trump’s momentous (though for now mostly symbolic) announcement that the United States will recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. Before you can debate whether this was a good move, you must acknowledge one glaring fact that the chatterers want to ignore or downplay: It’s true. Jerusalem is the capital of Israel. The Knesset, Israel’s parliament, convenes there. Israelis call it their capital for the same reason they claim two plus two equals four. It’s just true.

What makes the decision controversial is that everyone had agreed to pretend it wasn’t the capital in order to protect “the peace process.”

That’s another term that doesn’t quite correspond with reality. There is no peace process. Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president finishing the twelfth year of his four-year term, has refused to meet with the Israelis to discuss anything since early in the Obama administration.

Watch Nikki Haley speak to UN Security Council about Jerusalem (video and text)

Worth watching.

Thank you, Mr. President. The Jewish people are a patient people. Throughout three thousand years of civilization, foreign conquest, exile, and return, Jerusalem has remained their spiritual home. For nearly 70 years, the city of Jerusalem has been the capital of the State of Israel, despite many attempts by others to deny that reality.

The American people are less patient. In 1948, the United States was the first nation to recognize the independent state of Israel. In 1995, the U.S. Congress declared that Jerusalem should be recognized as the capital of Israel, and that the U.S. Embassy should be located in Jerusalem.

Presidents Clinton, Bush, and Obama all agreed with that position, but they did not act. They delayed, in the hopes that a peace process would produce results – results that never came.

For 22 years, the American people have overwhelmingly supported that position, and they have waited . . . and waited. This week, President Trump finally made the decision to no longer deny the will of the American people.

It’s important to be clear about exactly what the President’s decision does. The President has announced that the United States recognizes the obvious – that Jerusalem is the capital of Israel. He has also instructed the State Department to begin the process of relocating the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. That is what the President has done.

And this is what he has not done: The United States has not taken a position on boundaries or borders. The specific dimensions of sovereignty over Jerusalem are still to be decided by the Israelis and the Palestinians in negotiations. The United States has not advocated changing any of the arrangements at the Temple Mount/Haram al-Sharif. The President specifically called for maintaining the status quo at the holy sites.

Finally, and critically, the United States is not predetermining final status issues. We remain committed to achieving a lasting peace agreement. We support a two-state solution if agreed to by the parties.

Those are the facts of what was said and done this week. Now, there are a few more points that are central to the discussion of this issue.

Israel, like all nations, has the right to determine its capital city. Jerusalem is the home of Israel’s parliament, president, prime minister, Supreme Court, and many of its ministries.

It is simple common sense that foreign embassies be located there. In virtually every country in the world, U.S. embassies are located in the host country’s capital city. Israel should be no different.

The United States took this step in full knowledge that it will raise questions and concerns. Our actions are intended to help advance the cause of peace. We must recognize that peace is advanced, not set back, when all parties are honest with each other. Our actions reflected an honest assessment of reality.

I understand the concern members have in calling this session. Change is hard. But we should never doubt what the truth can do. We should never doubt that when we face the truth, believe in the human spirit, and encourage each other, that peace can happen.

To those who have good faith concerns about the future of peace between the Israelis and the Palestinians, let me again assure you that the President and this administration remain committed to the peace process.

To those who do not act in good faith – to any person, leader, country, or terrorist group that uses this week’s decision as a pretext for violence – you are only showing yourselves to be unfit partners of peace.

Finally, I will not let this moment pass without a comment about the United Nations itself. Over many years, the United Nations has outrageously been of the world’s foremost centers of hostility towards Israel.

The UN has done much more to damage the prospects for Middle East peace than to advance them. We will not be a party to that. The United States no longer stands by when Israel is unfairly attacked in the United Nations. And the United States will not be lectured to by countries that lack any credibility when it comes to treating both Israelis and Palestinians fairly.

It is no coincidence that the historic peace agreements between Egypt and Israel, and between Jordan and Israel, were both signed on the White House lawn. If and when there is a historic peace agreement between Israelis and Palestinians, there’s a good likelihood that it, too, will be signed on the White House lawn.

Why is that? It’s because the United States has credibility with both sides. Israel will never be, and should never be, bullied into an agreement by the United Nations, or by any collection of countries that have proven their disregard for Israel’s security.

To my Palestinian brothers and sisters, I can tell you with complete confidence that the United States is deeply committed to achieving a peace agreement between the Israelis and the Palestinians. We have demonstrated that commitment over many years and with the investment of large quantities of financial resources and diplomatic energy.

Sadly, peace between the two sides has not been achieved, but we will not give up. Our hand remains extended to you. We are more committed to the cause of Israeli-Palestinian peace today than we’ve ever been before. And we believe we might be closer to that goal than ever before.

Both Israelis and Palestinians have very real stories to tell. Painful stories of challenges, distrust, and destruction. But this conflict is not just about the past. It must not be about all of those painful stories. It must be about future generations. Palestinian and Israeli children both deserve a future of peace, one no more and no less than the other.

When those children are grown, they should look back and look to this time when the parties genuinely negotiated for their sake. These Palestinian and Israeli children deserve to have hope of a brighter and more peaceful future.

Our wish and prayer is that this is the time both sides stop thinking about present needs and start thinking about future generations‎. I urge all countries in the Security Council and in the Middle East to temper their statements and their actions in the days ahead.

Peace remains achievable. We must all do our parts to achieve it.

Thank you.

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12/08 Links Pt2: UK: 176 anti-Israel events in a month; Palestinians try to claim the Dead Sea scrolls at UNESCO; The "Ottoman Balfour Declaration"

From Ian:

David Collier: Obsessive and suffocating, 176 anti-Israel events in a month

At the start of a recent event at the House of Parliament, an MP opened his speech by claiming it was necessary to give the argument of ‘Free Speech on Israel’ – ‘a platform’ because apparently criticism of Israel receives no airtime. The first speaker at the event, even claimed it necessary because their argument is not given ‘any form of platform’ at all.

How wrong they both are. What follows is simply a list of events. I produce it here because I believe few understand the scale of, nor the fallout from, the problem at hand.
The larger picture

The research took time, and until the very end, when I stumbled across yet another remote exhibition in a library, I knew I would never provide a complete picture. The image is of a single month, November 2017, and contains all of the ‘pro-Palestinian’ (anti-Israel) events I could find.
The big lies

The list puts paid to the ‘no platform’ lie. Built alongside the straw man argument that ‘all criticism’ of Israel is considered antisemitism, there is a myth that anti-Israel events almost never happen. It plays on the trope of Jewish power and influence, suggesting Jews are manipulating governments into silencing legitimate criticism. This dangerous myth, even being spread by MP’s in parliament, is one of the elements behind the rise in antisemitism.

The list below shows that those claims are simply not true. The list shows how obsessed and suffocating the anti-Israel cause is.

These events are activity from a single 30 day month – November 2017. The list of events is not complete, and I welcome any additions (seriously – contact me). Some street stalls are not advertised, some groups are closed, group names have to be known to be searchable, and some one-off events would never be picked up.

French Antifa calls for ‘striking a blow’ in Paris over US Jerusalem recognition

Amid Palestinian rioting in the West Bank and Gaza, the Paris branch of the far-left Antifa organization appeared to call for Israel’s destruction and for violent protests in that city against the United States’ recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.

The call to arms by the Antifa organization in Paris, or Antifascist Action by its full name, came Friday amid widespread rioting in the West Bank, and the death of one Gazan, in protests over US President Donald Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital on Wednesday night.

Noting that CRIF, the umbrella group of French Jewish communities, “is asking President Emmanuel Macron to also recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, we can strike a blow against the imperialist West from within the belly of the beast,” the Paris Antifa group wrote in a call on Facebook, inviting supporters to a demonstration at Republique square on Saturday “against the colonization of Jerusalem.”

The invitation ended with the words: “Al Quds belongs to the Palestinians, Palestine stretches from the sea to the Jordan River.”

The "Ottoman Balfour Declaration"

In a great, historical irony, ninety-nine years after the Ottoman Empire, the then-temporal and religious leader of the world's Muslim community and Palestine's longtime imperial master, voiced support for "the establishment of a religious and national Jewish center in Palestine," the Palestinian leadership demanded an official apology from Britain for endorsing the same idea at about the same time.

It is true that the Ottoman declaration came too late to make a real impact on the course of regional events and quickly faded into oblivion, in contrast to the Balfour Declaration which was endorsed by the entire international community. It is also true that the Ottoman pronouncement was largely driven by ulterior motives, notably the desire to harness the real or imagined "international power of the Jews" and the economic fruits of the Zionist project in Palestine to the Ottoman imperial interests—as was the Balfour Declaration as well. Yet the fact that support for the Jewish national revival in Palestine was considered the natural quid pro quo for these prospective gains underscores both the pervasive recognition of the historic Jewish attachment to this land and the ability to transcend millenarian Muslim dogmas regarding non-Muslim communities.

If only for these reasons, and having been an alternative option at a time when the war's outcome was yet to be decided and diplomacy was to be foreseen, the "Ottoman Balfour Declaration" needs to be re-examined and highlighted, especially at a time when Islamist intolerance and supremacism rear their heads.

From Pakistan Observer:

On appeal of Ameer Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) Pakistan, Senator Sirajul Haq, countrywide protest demonstrations were held on Friday against US President Donald Trumps’ recognizing Jerusalem as Israel capital, as thousands of people came out on roads to express their solidarity with the Palestinians.

In Peshawar, a protest rally was held outside the historic Mahabat Khan mosque. JI provincial chief Mushtaq Ahmed khan said on the occasion that Trump had stabbed the Muslim world at the back.

However, he said, that Al-Quds belonged to the Muslims and it would remain so in future. He said that recognition of Jerusalem as Israel capital was a step towards greater Israel and warned that Israel’s next target would be the holy Ka’ba.

The entire reason that the world is against Trump's stating a plain fact is that they are afraid of Muslims who can spin such absurd fantasies.

And they are too frightened to tell the Muslims the truth - because they don't want to be targets, too.

The Muslim world is holding the West hostage, and most of the world has Stockholm syndrome.

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12/08 Links Pt1: Donald Trump Strikes a Blow against International Anti-Semitism; Phillips: A historic watershed shames Britain and Europe

From Ian:

David French: Donald Trump Strikes a Blow against International Anti-Semitism

By moving America’s embassy to Jerusalem, the U.S. confronts the bigoted double standards of the international community.

President Trump’s decision to formally recognize that Jerusalem is the capital of Israel and to announce plans to move America’s embassy to the seat of Israel’s government is one of the best, most moral, and important decisions of his young administration. On this issue, he is demonstrating greater resolve than Republican and Democratic presidents before him, and he is defying some of the worst people in the world.

Think I’m overstating this? Think I’m too enthusiastic about an isolated diplomatic maneuver — especially when that maneuver, to quote the New York Times, “isolates the U.S.” and “has drawn a storm of criticism from Arab and European leaders”? Let’s consider some law, history, and context.

First, sovereign nations are entitled to name their capital, and it is the near-universal practice of other nations to locate their embassies in that same capital. I say “near-universal” because the nations of the world have steadfastly refused to recognize Israel’s capital. They’ve steadfastly placed their embassies outside of Jerusalem. They do so in spite of the Jewish people’s ancient connection to the City of David and in spite of the fact that no conceivable peace settlement would turn over the seat of Israel’s government to Palestinian control — even if parts of East Jerusalem are reserved for a Palestinian capital. Israel’s government sits on Israeli land, and it will remain Israeli land.

Yet the international community condemns America for recognizing reality, for treating Israel the way the world treats every other nation. Why?

From the birth of the modern nation-state of Israel, an unholy mixture of anti-Semites and eliminationists have both sought to drive the Jewish people into the sea and — when military measures failed — isolate the Jewish nation diplomatically, militarily, and culturally. Working through the U.N. and enabled by Soviet-bloc (and later) European allies, these anti-Semites and eliminationists have waged unrelenting “lawfare” against Israel. (Lawfare is the abuse of international law and legal processes to accomplish military objectives that can’t be achieved on the battlefield.)

Danny Ayalon: The Truth About Jerusalem

Melanie Phillips: A historic watershed shames Britain and Europe

It’s a seismic event, a great decision and a historic watershed. This is where blackmail and intimidation are faced down. This is where appeasement ends.

President Trump’s speech recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital has signaled that, for America, the century- long Arab attempt to destroy Israel’s legitimacy – the essence of the Middle East conflict – has failed.

Trump was careful and subtle. He did not say all of Jerusalem was Israel’s capital. The US will support a two-state solution if Israel and the Arabs agree to it.

The boundaries of Israeli sovereignty in Jerusalem or the borders of Israel itself will be left to the parties to resolve. And he merely started the process of moving the US Embassy to Jerusalem.

It was the balanced, strategic and principled speech of a statesman.

This is not to downplay the risks involved. The incendiary threats of vengeful violence should be taken seriously. But the Arabs need no excuse to try to murder Israelis.

The purse-lipped refusal by Western countries to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital didn’t prevent the Palestinians from hurling rocks from the Aksa Mosque at Jews worshiping below and stabbing them in the street, all in the name of the Jerusalem status quo.

Bennett: Jerusalem was our capital before London even existed

Caroline Glick: Trump’s great and ingenious gifts

With his recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital on Wednesday, US President Donald Trump gave a Hanukka gift to the Jewish people. But he also gave a Christmas gift to the American people.

Trump’s gift to Israel is not merely that 68 years after Israel declared Jerusalem its capital, the US finally recognized Israel’s capital.

In his declaration, Trump said, “Israel has made its capital in the city of Jerusalem, the capital the Jewish people established in ancient times.”

By stating this simple truth, Trump fully rejected the anti-Israel legacy of his predecessor Barack Obama.

In his speech in Cairo in 2009, Obama intimated that Israel’s legitimacy is rooted in the Holocaust, rather than in the Jewish nation’s millennial attachment to the Land of Israel. Whereas the Balfour Declaration and the League of Nations Mandate rooted the Jewish people’s sovereign rights to the Land of Israel in its 3,500-year relationship with it, Obama said that Israel is nothing more than a refugee camp located in an inconvenient area. In so doing, he gave credence to the anti-Israel slander that Israel is a colonialist power.

By asserting the real basis for Israel’s legitimacy, Trump made clear that the Jewish people is indigenous to the Land of Israel. He also made it US policy to view Israel’s right to exist, like its right to its capital city, as unconditional.

Trump’s extraordinary gift to Israel was an act of political and moral courage. It was also a stroke of strategic brilliance.

Muslim coin with seven branched menorah

From Times of Israel:

Jerusalem’s Muslim identity was forged alongside the dawn of Islam. However, according to a pair of Israeli archaeologists, that identity was originally one of coexistence and tolerance. They say they have the 1,300-year-old archaeological evidence to prove it, and now they want to share it with the Muslim world.

Jerusalem-based doctoral students in archaeology Assaf Avraham, 38, and Peretz Reuven, 48, launched a crowdfunding campaign Wednesday to gather funds to continue their work in exposing a lesser-known period of Jerusalem history which, they argue, saw Jews and Muslims conducting “an inter-religious dialogue.”

Their archaeological evidence includes the use of Jewish symbols during Muslim rule. Avraham said in conversation with The Times of Israel on Wednesday that this and other findings illustrate an era of Jerusalem history in which the Muslim conquerors felt themselves to be the continuation of the People of Israel.

“At the beginning of the Muslim rule, not only didn’t they object to the Jews, but they saw themselves as the continuation of the Jewish people.” They adopted the Jewish narrative and symbols for their own, said Avraham. The menorah was a Jewish symbol; its use is testimony that Muslims didn’t have a problem with the Jews, he said.

As evidence, the researchers offer 1,300-year-old coins and other vessels from the Umayyad period (from 638 CE) which bear the seven-stemmed menorah. Additionally, the archaeologists point to an inscription mentioning the Temple Mount which the pair dramatically deciphered and unveiled last year and which links the Dome of the Rock with the Temple Mount.

The inscription, found in a working mosque in the village of Nuba, was etched in 1,000-year-old Kufic script onto a limestone block which points to Mecca and reads: “In the name of God the merciful, the compassionate, this territory, Nuba, and all its boundaries and its entire area, is an endowment to the Rock of Bayt al-Maqdis and the al-Aqsa Mosque, as it was dedicated by the Commander of the Faithful, Umar ibn al-Khattab for the glory of Allah.” The tie to the Temple Mount, said Avraham, shows the Muslim rulers wanted to rebuild King Solomon’s Temple, not supersede it.

This is wishful thinking, not science.

We've looked at the Muslim use of the menorah before. It is true that they started depicting a seven-branch menorah in their coins, but soon they changed it to a five-branch menorah with a base of two legs instead of three as virtually all menorahs were depicted on Jewish coins.

Some scholars say that the five branches as meant to represent the give pillars of Islam, and one intriguing theory says that these later coins - which were all minted in Jerusalem - were meant to be a visual pun, where turning them one way looks like a menorah but turning them the other way looks like the Dome of the Rock, complete with the crescent on top formed by the anomalous two-leg base! And on at least some coins the text was written as if the Dome picture is meant to be primary.

It is true that Islam originally tried to attract Jews by emphasizing its Jewish roots. But, as with Christianity, this was not evidence of co-existence - it was evidence that Judaism was being superceded by Islam, and anyone who did not see the light was clearly a problem.

The researchers pushing this "co-existence" meme are seeking crowdfunding for their efforts to paint early Islam as a tolerant religion based on biased reading of archaeology. True research doesn't decide what the results would be ahead of time.

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Recognizing Jerusalem as Israel's capital was a (rare) smart move by President Trump.

But the idea of sending Vice President Mike Pence to meet with Israeli and Palestinian leaders later this month, mentioned in his speech, is brilliant.

Vice President Pence will travel to the region in the coming days to reaffirm our commitment to work with partners throughout the Middle East to defeat radicalism that threatens the hopes and dreams of future generations.

The immediate reaction from top Palestinian officials was not so smart:

A senior Palestinian official in President Mahmoud Abbas’s ruling Fatah party said on Thursday that U.S. Vice President Mike Pence, due to visit the region later this month, “is unwelcome in Palestine”.
“In the name of Fatah I say that we will not welcome Trump’s deputy in the Palestinian Territories. He asked to meet (Abbas) on the 19th of this month in Bethlehem, such a meeting will not take place,” Jibril Rajoub said.

The White House response to Rajoub:

Amid indications that Abbas may withdraw from a planned meeting later this month, a White House aide said Pence “still plans to meet with Abbas as scheduled” and “believes it would be counterproductive for him to pull out of the meeting.”

Abbas will look bad no matter what happens on the 19th.

If he spurns the American vice president, he shows that he has no interest in peace, nor in a Palestinian state. It would be a slap in the face of the US, and it would piss off the most powerful man on the planet.

If he meets with him, it not only shows that Rajoub is a liar but also indicate that Abbas' own warnings ahead of the Trump declaration that the peace process would be killed is hot air. It would show that the US recognition of reality has not changed anything, despite the dire warnings of the "experts" and Arabs themselves. And it will make Abbas answer more clearly to his own people whether he wants to work for a Palestinian state or not.

For all his many faults, Trump's Middle East ideas are a welcome step towards demolishing the myths that the world has been accepting as truth for way too long. And real peace cannot be built on myths. Pence's visit will show that the myth that acknowledging the reality about Jerusalem is somehow harmful to peace is as baseless as the others.

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Safa reports that the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, the "military wing" of Fatah that operates mostly in Gaza but that sometimes shows up in full armed glory in the West Bank, has called on Palestinians "to engage with the Israeli occupation forces in Palestinian towns and villages in all legitimate and especially armed ways."

The press release from thr Abu Nidal Brigades makes a number of demands:

O sons of the Arab and Islamic nation:
Today we witness the summit of terrorism represented by the American Zionist administration and therefore we appeal to everyone to unite and support our resistance for the holiest holiness and the first qibla of Muslims [Jerusalem] and raise our guns as the only way to liberate our land.

Today, Satan has come out against us, thinking that he will create a new reality, erase history and distort the doctrine. A verse of the Quran will not be shaken, and will remain the kiss of all the revolutionaries.

The Al - Aqsa Martyrs ' Brigades Palestine Nidal Al Amoudi Martyrs Brigades:

We call upon the PLO and the Palestinian leadership to assume the national authority and to cancel all agreements with the occupying state

We call on the resistance factions to start the battle for the complete liberation of Jerusalem and Palestine

The Arab and Islamic nation should expel American and Israeli ambassadors who have relations with them

The Arab and Islamic nation must support the option of armed struggle to liberate all of Palestine.

To the steadfast sons of our steadfast people, we die and we live for the holiest and most holy place of the land of the first Qibla and the second Holy Haram, "Al-Quds Al-Sharif", the core of our faith and dignity.

Remember, this group is part of Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah, and therefore considered by the world to be the moderate, peaceful alternative to Hamas.

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12/07 Links Pt2: BDS has failed; Six Facts The MSM Isn’t Reporting About The Jerusalem Issue; BDS: Sudden Converts to Caution

From Ian:

JPost Editorial: BDS has failed

It has become abundantly clear that the campaign to boycott, divest from, and sanction Israel is losing steam.

Radiohead, Bon Jovi, Elton John, Neil Young, Madonna and Bryan Adams either have already performed here or plan on coming. All of these artists have rejected calls by BDS lobbyists – led by Pink Floyd’s Roger Waters – to skip Israel on their tours.

When singer Nick Cave was in Israel last month, he held a press conference in part to rebut proponents of BDS. “I came to Israel for two reasons,” Cave said.

“One is because I love Israel and Israelis. Two is to take a principled stand against anyone who attempts to shut down, censor, silence or bully musicians.”

On US college campuses, while there is still a toxic atmosphere that makes many students who are openly pro-Israel feel unsafe, pro-Palestinian movements have repeatedly failed to pass resolutions that would force their universities to boycott Israel.

Just last month, the University of Maryland’s student government association rejected a resolution, brought by Students for Justice in Palestine, that accused Israel of human rights violations and that called for the university to divest from a range of American companies investing in Israel. The same dynamic has been played out on other campuses as well.

And while doomsayers have for years warned that Israel faces imminent diplomatic, military and economic isolation and censure for its policies, this has not happened. If anything, Israel has succeeded in cultivating relations with a wider range of nations, not just in Africa and South America but also in Europe. Just last month Israel hosted Blue Flag, an 11-day joint military exercise that brought together the air forces of Germany, Poland, India, France, Italy, Greece and the US. If this is isolation, what do open diplomatic relations look like?

The reason the BDS movement is failing is that it is based on lies and people are not stupid. Anyone with access to the Internet can easily uncover the many inconsistencies and internal contradictions of the BDS movement.

StandWithUs at the Jerusalem Post Diplomatic Conference

BDS: Sudden Converts to Caution

As I write, we do not know what might go into President Trump’s planned announcement on Jerusalem. But on at least some of our college campuses, protests are already being prepared.

At Oklahoma University, Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) are set to argue that any declaration, even if it is merely an acknowledgment of Israel’s claim to West Jerusalem as its capital, “will fuel extremism, violence, and tension in Palestine and the Middle East, and the consequences will be costly for all the parties involved.” SJP of the City College of New York quoted American Muslims for Palestine to the effect that any declaration will “unleash chaos in the Arab World.”

This is pretty rich. Students for Justice in Palestine is the campus wing of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement. BDS and SJP laud figures like Ali Abunimah, a fixture on the anti-Israel campus speaking circuit, whose apologetics on behalf of Hamas are well-documented, and Leila Khaled of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, known mainly for her work as a hijacker. Hatem Bazian, chair of the national board of American Muslims for Palestine, is most recently in the news for sharing a blatantly anti-Semitic tweet. He apologized, but he also has a track record.

Faced in 2015 with an opportunity to condemn violence against civilians during the “knife intifada,” BDS organizations instead issued statements of solidarity. “A new generation of Palestinians is marching on the footsteps of previous generations, rising up against Israel’s brutal, decades-old system of occupation, settler colonialism, and apartheid.” But now, they worry about fueling extremism?

Student Activists Plan to Protest Trump’s Expected Announcement Recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s Capital

Student activists around the country are planning protests of President Donald Trump's expected announcement later Wednesday recognizing Jerusalem as Israel's capital and expressing his intention to relocate the U.S. embassy to the city.

In New York City, the Palestine Solidarity Alliance of Hunter College and Jewish Voice for Peace, a far-left organization, are cohosting a protest titled, in Arabic, "We will not abandon Jerusalem."

Hundreds have expressed interest in attending the demonstration. Students from Columbia University, Brooklyn College, and the New School have marked themselves as "going."

Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) at the University of Oklahoma have organized a similar protest for this afternoon.

Trump's move would be in "violation of international law," insists SJP.

The group has claimed, "The demonstration is not associated with our organization or any OU association," though the club is listed as the official hosts of the demonstration and promoted the event on their social media page.

SJP did not respond to request for comment and clarification of its role.

Some 300 people may be expected at an "emergency rally" in Boston organized by the Jewish group IfNotNow, which believes Israel is a "daily nightmare" for Palestinians.