WEDNESDAY’S “NEWS IN REVIEW” ROUND-UP

Contents: | Weekly Quotes |  Short Takes   |  On Topic Links

On Topic Links

Palestinian Authority's Future is Not in Rewriting History: Daniel Taub, Jerusalem Post, Oct. 16, 2016

The Angel of Death in Aleppo: Mordechai Kedar, Breaking Israel News, Oct. 11, 2016

What Can the Next President Do About Russia?: Robert D. Kaplan, Wall Street Journal, Oct. 16, 2016

Remember Cable Street, When the Labour Movement and Zionists Were Allies: Mark Regev, Guardian, Oct. 6, 2016

“Today UNESCO adopted its second decision this year denying the Jewish people’s connection to the Temple Mount, our holiest site for more than 3,000 years…What’s next? A UNESCO decision denying the connection between peanut butter and jelly? Batman and Robin? Rock ‘n’ roll?” — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. In a 24-6 vote, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization gave preliminary approval to a resolution that denies Jewish ties to the Temple Mount and the Western Wall. Netanyahu slammed the vote stating: “The theater of the absurd continues at the UN.” Netanyahu also suggested UNESCO members should visit the Arch of Titus in Rome. “On it one can see what the Romans brought back to Rome after they destroyed and looted the Second Temple on the Temple Mount 2,000 years ago. There, engraved on the Arch of Titus, is the seven-branched menorah that is the symbol of the Jewish People, and I remind you, is also the symbol of the Jewish state today…Soon, UNESCO will say that the Emperor Titus engaged in Zionist propaganda,” Netanyahu said. (Jerusalem Post, Oct. 13, 2016)

“The heritage of Jerusalem is indivisible, and each of its communities has a right to the explicit recognition of their history and relationship with the city…To deny, conceal or erase any of the Jewish, Christian or Muslim traditions undermines the integrity of the site, and runs counter to the reasons that justified its inscription on the UNESCO World Heritage list…When these divisions carry over into UNESCO, an organization dedicated to dialogue and peace, they prevent us from carrying out our mission.” — Irina Bokova, director-general of UNESCO. Though she did not explicitly mention the resolution, Bokova made her disapproval of the motion clear, saying that efforts to deny history and Jerusalem’s complex multi-faith character harm UNESCO. (Times of Israel, Oct. 14, 2016)

“What this indicates is that things are shifting for Israel…You are not going to get a total re-definition about how states are going to vote in the UN system in a matter of a few months, but a new trend is clear, which I hope Israel can build upon in the months and years ahead.” — Israeli Foreign Ministry director-general Dore Gold. In the aftermath of the UNESCO vote, Gold focused on the changes in the voting roster since the executive board last approved such a resolution in Paris in April. Gold, who resigned his position on Thursday because of "personal issues," said that the UNESCO vote was a “going away present.” Ten countries which voted for the resolution the last time it came before vote abstained this time around. What that means, he said, is that more countries voted for Israel or abstained, than voted against Israel. The ten countries which switched their vote from last time were France, Sweden, Slovenia, Spain, Argentina, India, Sri Lanka, Togo, Guinea and Ghana. Gold noted that none of the European countries voted for the resolution. (Jerusalem Post, Oct. 13, 2016)

“UNESCO’s decision to deny Jewish history is also a decision to deny Christian history. If the Jews don’t have a legacy on the Temple Mount, neither do Christians. And yet we know that our Messiah Jesus came to the Temple throughout his life to worship and pray to the God of Israel, as a Jew, six centuries before Muhammad was even born.” — Robert Nicholson, head of the Philos Project, a nonprofit group that “seeks to promote positive Christian engagement in the Middle East.” Nicholson went on to call it “mind-boggling” that “Christian-majority countries like Brazil and Mexico” would back the resolution. “It demonstrates just how far some Christians around the world have strayed from their origins,” he said. “Christianity is not a European or American religion — it is a Hebraic religion with roots in the land of Israel. Our faith only makes sense when it is moored in its original Jewish context.” (Algemeiner, Oct. 14, 2016)

“The absurd part of this story is that even if the resolution passes, it cannot void the fact that Jerusalem, its Old City and its walls have already been intractably inscribed as a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1982, denoted as having meaning for three religions. So today’s resolution would have no political teeth. The Palestinians know that. But, like the campus boycott, divest and sanction crowd, they also know that it is “narratives” that win hearts and minds. In shamelessly propagating the crazy idea that Palestinians…have been a people for thousands of years, historical deniers know they can count on widespread historical ignorance, enough to win a critical mass of hearts and minds. Truth means nothing to such schemers…The Palestinians are using UNESCO-conferred credibility to keep playing their long game of delegitimating Israel as a nation.”  — CIJR Academic Fellow Barbara Kay. (National Post, Oct. 18, 2016)

“America’s intrepid secretary of state has now taken the meaningless step of suspending talks with Russia over Syria. Meanwhile, Mr. Assad and Mr. Putin are creating military facts on the ground in Syria that will enable them to dictate the terms of a peace secured by carnage. They have decimated coalition-backed Syrian groups, slaughtered countless civilians, consolidated the Syrian regime’s hold on power, and even struck a United Nations humanitarian-aid convoy. And they have done all of this with no consequences…While the U.S.-led coalition is making progress in the fight against Islamic State, we cannot forget this terrorist organization is a symptom of the Syrian civil war. The future of that conflict will have significant strategic impact on U.S. national security.” — John McCain, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee. (Wall Street Journal, Oct. 4, 2016)

“Russia kills many Syrians brutally. They pretend to be human by asking for a cease-fire. They prepare their weapons to kill others after the cease-fire. This cease-fire is not for us as Aleppo people, but this is for you respected journalists, to say Russia is reviving a cease-fire.” — Abdelkafi al-Hamdo, a schoolteacher and antigovernment activist in Aleppo. Russian and Syrian warplanes halted their bombardment of rebel-held districts in Aleppo on Tuesday, in what Russia called a gesture of good will ahead of an eight-hour unilateral “humanitarian pause” it has promised for Thursday. Medical workers, residents and activists in the besieged rebel-held districts said they did not trust the Russian offer, as humanitarian groups expressed skepticism that the proposed pause would be long or solid enough to allow meaningful aid to be delivered to trapped civilians. (New York Times, Oct. 18, 2016)

“People around the world are saying, ‘We don’t want Syrian refugees,’…Well, the Syrians don’t want to be refugees. We can help them help themselves, and we can start in the southern part of Syria, near the borders with Israel and Jordan.” — Israeli-American businessman and activist Moti Kahana, who founded the U.S.-based NGO Amaliah. Kahana said the establishment of a safe zone for civilians in southern Syria would benefit the national security of both the US and Israel. Kahana said the Israeli government has done an “amazing job” in enabling his organization to achieve its goal, which he said was to assist Syrians in rebuilding civil society in their country. “I don’t get the support from the American government that I get from the Israelis, unfortunately, and I don’t understand this…The Americans know exactly what I’ve been doing. But the only thing I get from them is, ‘Oh, that’s a good idea.’” The US, Kahana declared, has “no Syria policy.” (Algemeiner, Oct. 16, 2016)

“Most or all of the key elements of the Holocaust pointed out by a variety of top scholars do not apply to the horrible Syrian war and its carnage. What is central to the Holocaust is that never before — nor since — had a state aimed at murdering systematically all members of a certain ethnicity, wherever they were in the world. None of the parties in the Syria war even remotely aim at something similar. The Holocaust was a genocidal program carried out systematically and — however horrible it sounds — “efficiently.” There is no similar systematic and “efficient” program by anybody in Syria, not even ISIS.” — CIJR Academic Fellow Manfred Gerstenfeld. There is a dispute among antisemitism experts on whether comparing the crisis in Syria to the Holocaust is legitimate. Gerstenfeld, author of The Abuse of Holocaust Memory: Distortions and Responses, said that doing so is “radically wrong.” (Algemeiner, Oct. 16, 2016)

“Today…we are in communication with other states in the Middle East. For many years, the assumption was that Israel makes peace with the Palestinians and that opens up the Arab world for Israel. Maybe we are seeing the beginning of the opposite, in other words, by changing the atmosphere in the region, by greater dialogue between Israelis and Arabs, between the state of Israel and Arab governments; there is a new climate which will have a positive impact on the Israeli-Palestinian track. That offers a certain amount of optimism as we enter the new year…Jewish people face challenges. We see hatred in Europe, we see turmoil in the Middle East, we see Islamic extremism – but there aren’t only challenges, there are also opportunities. And this realignment between us and the pragmatic Sunni states — this is a small revolution, and it’s something we have to nurture.” — Israel’s ambassador to the UK, Mark Regev. (Times of Israel, Oct. 7, 2016)

“Politics is like sausage being made. It is unsavory, and it always has been that way, but we usually end up where we need to be. But if everybody’s watching . . . then people get a little nervous, to say the least. So, you need both a public and a private position.” — Democratic Presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton, in an April 2013 speech to the National Multifamily Housing Council released by WikiLeaks this past week. Excerpts of the speeches given in the years before her 2016 presidential campaign included some blunt and unguarded remarks to her private audiences, which collectively had paid her at least $26.1 million in speaking fees. (New York Post, Oct. 15, 2016)

Contents

IRAQ LAUNCHES BATTLE FOR MOSUL (Baghdad) — Iraqi government forces launched a U.S.-backed offensive on Monday to drive I.S. from the northern city of Mosul, a high-stakes battle to retake the militants’ last major stronghold in the country. Two years after the jihadists seized the city of 1.5 million people and declared a caliphate from there encompassing tracts of Iraq and Syria, a force of some 30,000 Iraqi and Kurdish Peshmerga forces and Sunni tribal fighters began to advance. A U.S.-led air campaign has helped push I.S. from much of the territory it held but 4,000 to 8,000 fighters are thought to remain in Mosul. The UN humanitarian coordinator for Iraq said the military had told the U.N. it expected the first significant population movement to begin in five to six days. (Globe & Mail, Oct. 17, 2016)

CANADIANS SUPPORTING KURDS IN FIGHT TO FREE MOSUL (Damascus) — Canadian troops are supporting Kurdish fighters as they push toward the Iraqi city of Mosul, says Defence Minister Sajjan. Kurdish and Iraqi forces launched the offensive in a bid to free Iraq's second-largest city from I.S. Local media reported that the Kurds, whom Canadian troops have helped train over the past two years, freed several villages during the drive to Mosul. The offensive comes two weeks after the deputy commander of Canadian Special Forces revealed his troops were spending more time at the frontlines as a result of the campaign against I.S. shifting from defence to offence. (CTV, Oct. 18, 2016)

SYRIAN REBELS SEIZE DABIQ FROM I.S. (Damascus) — Free Syrian Army rebels backed by Turkish airstrikes have captured the Syrian town of Dabiq from I.S., averting, for now, the terror group’s long-promised battle of the apocalypse. Dabiq, a town of fewer than 4,000 people 10km from the Turkish border, is named in an Islamic prophesy as the site of a final battle between Christianity and Islam. It has been a key stronghold for I.S. since the group first expanded across Iraq and Syria in 2014. I.S frequently refers to its prophesied victory at the future battle of Dabiq. The terrorist group named its English-language propaganda magazine after the town. (Telegraph, Oct. 16, 2016)

SAUDI-LED COALITION FOUND RESPONSIBLE FOR YEMEN FUNERAL ATTACK (Sana’a) — A Saudi Arabia-led investigation into an airstrike last week on a Yemeni funeral has concluded that Saudi-led coalition jets “wrongly” bombed the ceremony, killing more than 100 people, after receiving faulty information. The Joint Incidents Assessment Team based in Riyadh said that “a party affiliated” with the chief of staff of Yemen’s president, Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi, “wrongly passed information that there was a gathering of” armed rebel Houthi leaders in the Yemeni capital, Sanaa. Last Saturday’s attack on the Grand Hall was one of the deadliest assaults of the civil war in Yemen. The U.S. has come under fire from human rights groups and lawmakers for its backing of Saudi Arabia’s air campaign, which has routinely targeted hospitals and other civilian areas. (Washington Post, Oct. 15, 2016)

U OF T CAMPUS HIT WITH RASH OF ANTISEMITIC GRAFFITI (Toronto) — Over the past two weeks, seven areas on or near the University of Toronto’s downtown campus have been defaced with antisemitic graffiti in what appears to be at least two separate incidents. On Sept. 30, students began reporting sightings of swastikas throughout the campus. The first three swastikas were found on a sign outside of U of T’s Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, as well as a bus stop on Harbord St. and a sign for the medical sciences building. On Oct. 13, another swastika was discovered on a sidewalk down the street from the mural, outside U of T’s anthropology building. (CJN, Oct. 14, 2016)

N.C. G.O.P. BUILDING IS FIREBOMBED (Charlotte) — A firebomb tore through Republican headquarters in North Carolina’s Orange County, and graffiti warning its members to flee town was painted on the walls of a neighboring building. The party posted images on Twitter of the damaged building in Hillsborough, N.C., that showed blackened walls, charred couches and burned campaign signs for Trump and several local candidates. A window was broken, and a swastika was spray-painted nearby alongside the words “Nazi Republicans leave town or else.” (New York Times, Oct. 16, 2016)

CLINTON MAY HAVE TAKEN MONEY FROM QATAR (Washington) — Hillary Clinton’s family charitable foundation may have received a $1 million donation from Qatar, according to emails leaked by Wikileaks. Emails released this week reveal that a senior official at the Clinton Foundation informed his colleagues that Qatar’s government planned to make a donation in 2012 in honor of Bill Clinton’s birthday. In the email, the Qatari ambassador asked to “see WJC (Bill Clinton) for ‘five minutes’ in NYC, to present a $1 million check that Qatar promised for WJC’s birthday in 2011.” Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton promised to curb donations made by foreign governments to her family’s charitable organization when she was U.S. Secretary of State. (Arutz Sheva, Oct. 16, 2016)

ISRAEL BASED NGO, “B’TSELEM” ACCUSED OF “TREASON.” (Jerusalem) — An activist for the Labor party has filed a police complaint for alleged treason against the “human rights” group B’Tselem, amid anger over a speech by the organization’s director criticizing Israeli settlement policy at a UN forum last week. The complaint alleges that B’Tselem has worked to damage the sovereignty of the state, give land away to a foreign entity, and has taken steps that could cause a war. B’Tselem’s address to the UN Security Council meeting, titled “Illegal Israeli Settlements: Obstacles to Peace and the Two-State Solution,” has drawn fierce denunciations from Israeli politicians. B’Tselem, along with other left-leaning NGOs, has been accused in the past of working to undermine Israel’s legitimacy by lobbying international forums. (Times of Israel, Oct. 16, 2016)

US, AT UN, SAYS ISRAEL MUST CHOOSE BETWEEN SETTLEMENTS OR TWO-STATE SOLUTION (Geneva) — The U.S. on Friday called for immediate action to salvage the two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as the Security Council weighed its next steps to revive peace prospects. US Deputy Ambassador David Pressman told an informal council meeting on Israeli settlements that the continued building of Jewish outposts on Palestinian land was “corrosive to the cause of peace.” UN diplomats have kept one eye on the US vote as they consider whether to move on a Security Council resolution that could nudge the sides back to the negotiating table. The outcome of the US vote on could lead to a shift in relations between Washington and its close ally Israel. (Times of Israel, Oct. 15, 2016) 

JEREMY CORBYN CONDEMNED IN UK ANTISEMITISM REPORT (London) — The U.K.’s Labour Party has been accused of “demonstrable incompetence” in addressing antisemitism in a stinging report by a cross-party group of MPs that savages Jeremy Corbyn. The hard-hitting report, following a probe into antisemitism in the UK by the Home Affairs Select Committee, also proposes a revised definition of antisemitism to be adopted by law enforcement agencies and all political parties. Jeremy Corbyn – who stands accused by the MPs of not understanding modern antisemitism – condemned the greater focus on Labour compared to other parties as the document’s release threatened to reignite the row over antisemitism among members of his party. (Jewish News, Oct. 16, 2016)

F-35 INSULATION FIX: ALL AIR FORCE PLANES FLYING BY END OF YEAR (Washington) — Israel is likely to get its first F-35 Joint Strike Fighters on schedule, and the Air Force‘s operational F-35s should be flying by the end of this year without faulty insulation in fuel pipes that could damage the aircraft. Flight operations for the 15 F-35A aircraft were suspended in September following an inspection and discovery of debris in the fuel tank of an F-35A aircraft. A supplier provided insulation that disintegrated when immersed in fuel. The 42 aircraft still in assembly — including those for Israel — should start rolling off the line with fixed insulation in December. (Breaking Defense, Oct. 14, 2016)

ISRAEL IN TALKS WITH GERMANY TO EXPAND SUBMARINE FLEET (Berlin) — Israeli and German officials have opened preliminary talks regarding a potential future expansion of the Jewish state’s nuclear-capable submarine fleet. As things stand now, the Israeli Navy is set to receive its sixth German-made Dolphin-class submarine in 2018. At that point the navy is expected to retire one of its three older submarines, keeping its underwater fleet size at five. If the nascent negotiations with Germany bear fruit, however, that number will grow in the coming years. Israel’s newest submarine — the INS Rahav — arrived in Haifa in January after a sea journey from the German city of Kiel. (Algemeiner, Oct. 14, 2016)

CZECH MPS SLAM ‘HATEFUL’ UNESCO RESOLUTION (Prague) — Lawmakers in the Czech Parliament condemned this week’s UNESCO resolution that denies the deep historic Jewish connection to holy sites in Jerusalem, saying it reflected a “hateful, anti-Israel” sentiment. 119 of the 149 lawmakers present approved a protest against the step, saying the resolution denies historic links between the Jews and their holy sites, discredits UNESCO and fuels antisemitism. Only the four members of the Communist Party voted against the motion. The Czech Republic, one of Israel’s closest allies in the EU, is not a member of the UNESCO executive board. Elsewhere in Europe, hundreds of people protested in Rome against Italy’s abstention in the UNESCO resolution. (Times of Israel, Oct. 19, 2016)

AUSTRIA SEEKS TO SEIZE, AND POSSIBLY TEAR DOWN, HITLER’S HOUSE (Vienna) — The Austrian government moved to seize the house where Hitler was born, and it may tear it down, in an effort to demystify a site that has become a magnet for neo-Nazis and tourists. The move comes after decades of hand-wringing over the fate of the property, which has been vacant since tenants left in 2011 after a dispute with the owner, who refused to allow necessary renovations. Fears that the house — in the town of Braunau am Inn, next to the Austrian-German border — could become a pilgrimage site led the Austrian government to take over the main lease on the building in 1972, to ensure that it would not fall into the hands of someone seeking to glorify its link to a dark history. (New York Times, Oct. 18, 2016)

PETITION TO DEMAND CONCORDIA U. ADMINISTRATION CONDEMN ANTI-ISRAEL PROPAGANDA (Montreal) — The annual anti-Israel campus BDS event Israeli Apartheid Week is co-organized by the Quebec Public Interest Research Group (QPIRG), a resource centre for student and community research and organizing at Concordia University. Hasbara Fellowships, a pro-Israel campus activism organization, is demanding that the administration of Concordia take action against QPIRG at Concordia for “using university-owned space to host a(n) anti-Israel event which denied Israel's right to exist and which draped the PLO (Palestine Liberation Organization) flag over a university-owned building.” Sign the petition here—Ed.  

Contents

On Topic Links

Palestinian Authority's Future is Not in Rewriting History: Daniel Taub, Jerusalem Post, Oct. 16, 2016—Once again, the UN organization charged with promoting intercultural understanding and preserving cultural heritage has airbrushed the connection between the Jewish people and its holiest sites.

The Angel of Death in Aleppo: Mordechai Kedar, Breaking Israel News, Oct. 11, 2016 —Whatever lies ahead of us in the new year is determined during the period of the High Holydays, when the Book of Life – and that of Death – are opened in the Heavens. The Book of Death does not only name those who will die but by what means each will meet his end:  by the sword, by falling prey to wild beasts, from hunger, pestilence  or other horrors that the fruitful mind of the human beast has managed to invent.
What Can the Next President Do About Russia?: Robert D. Kaplan, Wall Street Journal, Oct. 16, 2016 —Of the two great autocratic powers in Eurasia, Russia is emerging as a greater short-term threat than China. The Chinese hope to gradually dominate the waters off the Asian mainland without getting into a shooting war with the U.S. Yet while Beijing’s aggression is cool, Moscow’s is hot.

Remember Cable Street, When the Labour Movement and Zionists Were Allies: Mark Regev, Guardian, Oct. 6, 2016—This week we commemorate 80 years since the famous battle of Cable Street, in which the labour Zionist youth movement I grew up in, Habonim, stood shoulder to shoulder with anti-fascists and leftwing demonstrators to prevent the British Union of Fascists from marching into the Jewish East End.