[Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News] 01/12 Links Pt2: The fruits of cowardice and appeasement; Europe must sober up ~ EoZ

From Ian:

As French philosopher and scholar of anti-Semitism Alain Finkielkraut noted in an interview with Army Radio on Sunday, the French intelligentsia sees Jews as "in some ways responsible for what is happening to them, because of Israel's so-called racism and because Jews identify with Israel."
The willingness on the part of the French intelligentsia to blame Israeli policies for attacks directed against French Jews, says Finkielkraut, goes hand in hand with a tendency to blame "Islamophobia" for triggering Muslim-inspired violence against French society, like the attack on Charlie Hebdo.
Valls, Finkielkraut, and many others in France – including an estimated million who joined in the "march of freedom" in the streets of Paris on Sunday, many of whom Muslims – understand the fate of the Jews in France and elsewhere is intimately linked to the "soul" of Western civilization.
An unequivocal and uncompromising reaffirmation of the French Republic's values – things like freedom of the press, women's rights, free scientific inquiry, and human rights – is the best answer to the violently reactionary, anti-Semitic offensive launched by radical Islam. Upholding France's ideals against radical Islam will not only be good for the Jews – it will be good for all of French society.

Ben-Dror Yemini: France's Jews are under double attack

France is under attack, and the Jewish community is under a double attack. The French are starting to feel like foreigners in their country, and for the Jews it's a double foreignness. They are already accustomed to an anti-Semitic right, whose finest hour was the Dreyfus affair.
Dark people on the left, usually anti-Zionists, operate alongside the anti-Semitic right, and in the past summer's protests they marched alongside Hamas-supporting jihadists.
There are millions of French people, including decent and law-abiding Muslims – but the jihadists, even if there are only few of them, are far from being defeated.
France has its concerns. The Jews have more concerns. The events of the past week served as a milestone for France. Many Jews feel this is a milestone ahead of the end of the road in France.

Isi Leibler: The fruits of cowardice and appeasement

Jews have reassumed the role of the canary in the mine and are the first to be targeted, but the world would face the same threat if Jews did not exist. Israel has been at the frontline, confronting Islamic extremism, but has received scant support. Indeed, until recently Western governments ignored the carnage in Syria, Iraq, and other countries, preferring to concentrate on condemning Israeli housing construction in the Jewish neighborhoods of Jerusalem and regarding Israel as the major lubricant to Islamic extremism. French support of the Palestinian Authority application to the U.N. Security Council on Dec. 30, obviously designed to curry favor with local Muslims, did not deter terrorists from committing their massacres in Paris a week later.
For Jews, the writing has been on the wall for a long time. The virulence of the anti-Semitic hatred closing in on Jews in Europe (and elsewhere) is horrifying. Robert Wistrich, the world's leading scholar on anti-Semitism, says that anti-Semitism in France is now in an irreversible "advanced stage of disease." There were a series of anti-Semitic murders in France and Belgium preceding the latest Paris massacre, but they failed to raise the same level of outrage as the Charlie Hebdo murders. There were no popular campaigns saying "Je suis Juif." Indeed there seemed to be greater concern about "Islamophobia" than the targeted Jewish victims.
Europe is today facing a crisis as serious as the confrontation with Nazism. If Western leaders continue to behave like Chamberlain and fail to stand up to this global threat, it could usher in a new Dark Age in which the Judeo-Christian culture is subsumed by primitive barbarism. The writing is on the wall.
For Jews, the Zionist vision has once again been tragically vindicated.

Radicalism doesn't come from a vacuum

The vast majority of French citizens are in shock. They can't believe that terror tunnels threatening their existence are being dug under their noses. In Paris, the city of lights, freedom and equality, a sharply honed knife has been thrust into the heart of the values of the republic. The Arc de Triomphe has begun to shake, as if there was an earthquake.
If the Islamist fanatics had only killed Jews in the kosher supermarket, French hypocrisy would have moved on. There have been plenty such examples in the near and distant past. During the Holocaust, there was no protest when trains left the Drancy internment facility to transport Jews to the death camps, nor were there any large demonstrations supporting French Jews' right to live. Recently, the murder of Jews in Toulouse did not cause the devotees of the French Left and their political leadership to bat an eyelid. They have supported the Palestinians' fight against Israel for years, including their recent vote in the U.N. Security Council.
The horrific murder at the offices of the Charlie Hebdo satirical paper managed to shake the French out of their "Arab Spring" coma. When cartoons inspire Muslim fanatics to kill, the fundamental border between humanity and beastliness has been eradicated. But as is usual in France, we quickly heard soundbites from the factory of the French Left, according to which a distinction should be drawn between Islamic fanatics and Islam, which is a religion of peace that fosters brotherly love. As if the fanaticism sprang up out of nowhere.

Europe must sober up

Many Israelis are hurting with the French people over the terrorist attacks in Paris, and are sorrowful that French citizens, some of them Jewish, lost their lives. The horrors of terrorism strike in different places and in different ways, but in most cases these attacks have one thing in common: radical Islam.
Europe is struggling to deal with this threat in terms of awareness as well as organization. Europe is likely to find it difficult to counter such threats because of its innate reluctance to sober up to reality and accurately define the problem, Islamist terrorism. These terrorist elements fight against their countries, whose cultures they spurn; against their brethren, who do not share these radicals' contempt for Western democracies; and against the Jews, regardless of the State of Israel.

There is a price for living in a free society

As for our politicians, they go around saying "Islam is a religion of peace", which they would not need to repeat if they believed it. Under Labour, we came close to conceding a fully fledged law forbidding blasphemy ("religious hatred") and we introduced the repressive concept of a "religiously aggravated" crime.
Before she resigned from the Government over Gaza last year, the Muslim peer Lady Warsi worked with the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, which wants a worldwide ban on insulting religions. She supported the UN Human Rights Council Resolution 16/18, which would declare an attack on a faith to be an unacceptable affront to its adherents and vice versa. She was on television after the Paris murders, saying that they were "an attack on Islam". It seems a funny way to look at it (though two Muslims were among those murdered, I do not think that is what she meant).
As for civil society in general, we have tended to tiptoe round the problem. The media deplored the death threats that followed the (genuinely un-nasty) Danish cartoons, but did not publish them. We say "Nous sommes Charlie", but fight shy of reprinting the magazine's Mohammed gags, so readers never quite know what the story is about. Employers worry about their staff's safety. Some even fear upsetting Muslim newsagents. Terrorism is working.

When push comes to shove, isn't it curious how it's always about the Jews?

It's curious, isn't it, how for some people, when push comes to shove, it's always about the Jews?
Does anyone believe for a minute that when Amedy Coulibaly, in presumed solidarity with his alleged associates the Charlie Hebdo killers chose to make a grand gesture, he randomly picked a Hyper Cacher supermarket on the eastern edge of Paris?
Hyper Cacher translates to Super Kosher; hours before the Sabbath, it would have been a guaranteed big fat target, packed with those awful criminals, civilian Jews (and perhaps some Muslims too, looking for halal products) engaged in shopping.
As one Jeffrey Goldberg (a correspondent with The Atlantic) Tweeted Friday, "Selling kosher food is a provocative and vulgar act, sure to arouse the hostility of aggrieved extremists."
Anti-Jew and anti-Israel sentiment is the thrumming subtext to so much of this. Many more Jews than is usual have left France in recent years, for Israel, in the wake of rising anti-Semitism and attacks throughout Europe but notably at a Jewish school in Toulouse three years ago, when three children and a teacher were murdered by a young Muslim man.

Charlie Hebdo: it's time for war against Islamofascism

The massacre of Charlie Hebdo cartoonists in Paris by two men chanting "Allahu Akbar" is shocking, but not in the least bit surprising. After the brutal beheadings in Syria and Iraq by Islamic State and the slaughter of soldier Lee Rigby on the streets of Britain, the question is not whether there will be another Islamist atrocity but when.
Europe has been accepting and encouraging Islamic extremism for the last decade. Just like Nazism it has crept into every aspect of society; anyone who dares oppose it is branded 'racist' and anyone who mocks it risks either having their head cut off whilst walking down the street or being shot at point blank range.
Thousands of underage girls in Rotherham were being sexually abused and raped repeatedly; the Police, council and social services did nothing. We have witnessed gangs of Muslims waving placards on the streets of Britain praising 9/11 and stating, 'behead those who insult Islam', without fear of arrest. Trojan horse schools in Birmingham preached against gay people and enforced gender segregation for years before anybody realised what was going on.
A culture of political correctness, and fear of 'upsetting' or 'offending' minority communities has meant different laws for different people. Authorities turn a blind eye to illegal practices such as gender segregation, while extremist preachers with homophobic views are invited to preach on campus at our prestigious academic institutions.

These crimes have everything to do with Islam

When French president Francois Hollande addressed the nation on Friday in the wake of terrorist attacks that left 20 dead, he uttered the predictable mantra: "These fanatics have nothing to do with the Muslim religion".
His comment is understandable given that France has more than five million Muslims, a stagnant economy, 24 per cent youth unemployment and endemic social alienation among young Muslims.
His comment is also nonsense. A de facto world war is under way and it has everything to do with Islam. It is not thousands of lone wolfs. It is not un-Islamic conduct. It involves thousands of Muslims acting on what they believe is their religious duty to subjugate non-believers, as outlined in the Koran.

#JeSuisCharlie: Washington, DC Rallies for a Free Press

Loin des yeux, près du coeur.
I plugged it in to Google, which promptly spit out, "out of sight, near the heart." Not the most elegant translation, but I got the point as I walked through the crowd that gathered in Washington, DC to march in solidarity with those attending the National Unity Rally in Paris.
The French Embassy billed the event as a "silent march," saying that "[t]his march is open to all who would like to join together to honor the memory of the victims of the attacks and engage in solidarity in the fight for freedom of speech and freedom of opinion." There was very little pomp; the organizers seemed to be more concerned about making a statement than they were about making sure dignitaries had a chance to speak. Before the event began, the crowd mingled happily, taking pictures and talking about maintaining a free press; French flags and copies of Charlie Hebdo were passed around as the crowd spilled off the sidewalks and onto Pennsylvania Avenue.

Holocaust Comic Author Slams Charlie Hebdo Censoring

The American creator of "Maus," a graphic novel about the Holocaust, has denounced the "hypocrisy" of US media for refusing to republish the cartoons of Charlie Hebdo magazine, which was targeted in a bloody Islamist terror attack last week that left 12 dead.
Art Spiegelman said he "admires" Charlie Hebdo and thought the satirical magazine fulfilled its "mission" of exercising free speech in 2006 by publishing a controversial caricature of Mohammed.
"I think it's so hypocritical to drape yourself in freedom of speech and then self censor yourself to the point where you are not making your readers understand the issues," Spiegelman told AFP during a visit to Beijing.
"That cartoon was not making fun of the prophet, it was excoriating the believers who would kill," he pointed out.

'We vomit on all these people who suddenly say they are our friends', says Charlie Hebdo cartoonist as he scoffs at surge in support after attack

One of the surviving Charlie Hebdo cartoonists has scoffed at the surge in support for the satirical magazine after the attack, which killed eight of his colleagues and four other victims.
Bernard Holtrop, who was not in the office during the massacre on Wednesday, admitted the publication's new found fame was 'laughable' and comes from people who have 'never seen it'.
The Dutch-born artist reportedly said the provocative weekly had unexpected 'new friends' including the Pope, Queen Elizabeth and Vladimir Putin.
He told Dutch newspaper Volkskrant: 'We vomit on all these people who suddenly say they are our friends,' and added that most of the support has come from people who have 'never seen Charlie Hebdo.'
'It really makes me laugh,' he added. 'A few years ago, thousands of people took to the streets in Pakistan to demonstrate against Charlie Hebdo. They didn't know what it was. Now it's the opposite.'

Legendary Cartoonist Robert Crumb on the Massacre in Paris

Robert Crumb is considered by many to be the single best cartoonist America has ever produced. The creator of counter culture icons like Fritz the Cat, the Keep On Truckin guy and Mr Natural, Mr. Crumb was inducted into the comic book Hall of Fame in 1991, the same year he moved his family to France, where he has resided ever since. Writer Celia Farber reached him at his home on Friday, January 9, 2015, to talk about the massacre of cartoonists and others in Paris this week.
It's not the faith that is being insulted. It's the extremism, the psychosis. The totalitarian impulse.
Aline [Mr. Crumb's wife is the cartoonist Aline Kominsky-Crumb] saw something on the internet…All the big newspapers and magazines in America had all agreed, mutually agreed, not to print those offensive cartoons that were in that Charlie Hebdo magazine. They all agreed that they were not going to print those, because they were too insulting to the Prophet. Charlie Hebdo, it didn't have a big circulation. A lot of French people said, "Yes, it was tasteless, but I defend their right to freedom of speech." Yeah, it was tasteless, that's what they say. And perhaps it was. I'm not going to make a career out of baiting some f*cking religious fanatics, you know, by insulting their prophet. I wouldn't do that. That seems crazy. But then, after they got killed, I just had to draw that cartoon, you know, showing the Prophet. The cartoon I drew shows me, myself, holding up a cartoon that I've just drawn. A crude drawing of an ass that's labeled "The Hairy Ass of Muhammed." [Laughs.]
You did what?!
Yeah, I sent that to Liberation, so we'll see what happens. You know, that's the most I've stuck my neck out for a long time…

A response to Joe Sacco

The cartoon ends with melodramatic warnings against an anti-Muslim backlash – when the bodies of the victims hadn't been buried yet, and while the killers were still collecting new ones.
The place of publication delivers a final irony. The Guardian had just explained that it wasn't going to show its readers Charlie Hebdo's Muhammad cartoons (not because of the associated risk, but for "principled" reasons) – but had obviously no problem with publishing Sacco's cartoon, and the grossly racist images contained therein. So those looking for hypocrisy would be better advised to look to the Guardian than to Charlie Hebdo.

Four disturbing aspects of the 'Charlie Hebdo' media narrative

1. "Is it time to curtail free speech?" asked several debates on BBC. The BBC had previously refused to show images of the execution of Ahmed Merabet, the 40-year-old French policeman, that was on the cover of many newspapers.
For some reason showing actual images of what terrorists do is "offensive," just as the BBC deemed it "offensive" to show the images of Hebdo cartoons.
While Douglas Murray, associate director of the Henry Jackson Society, protested on BBC World's Have Your Say that the imposition of Islamic blasphemy laws was already happening de facto because of these terrorist acts, the very fact that the subject of discussion on the BBC in the immediate aftermath of the attacks was "perhaps speech should be curtailed" is extraordinary.
Why does the mere fact that a group of people is willing to kill imply that there is a reason to debate whether that group is somehow correct? Murray got it right when he noted that although those willing to kill over being "offended" is quite small, the number of people who implicitly accept their agenda is quite large.
Some in the media's cowardice in not showing the true face of the murders and not being willing to show what supposedly "enraged" people enough to kill is not helping anyone. It is like pretending that images of any great human rights crime, whether it is images of lynchings or the Holocaust, cannot be shown lest they offend someone's sensibilities.

New York Times Columnist: I Hold Moderate Muslims Responsible for Terrorism, 'To A Degree

During an appearance last night on CNN, New York Times columnist Roger Cohen declared that he thought moderate Muslims were partially responsible for acts of jihadist terrorism, especially in the light of the recent attacks on French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo.
"I do hold Muslims responsible, to this degree," he told Don Lemon. "I don't think we can solve this problem, Don." Cohen called on moderate Muslims to fully denounce terrorists and their actions. "Until they speak out in that way, I don't think we're going to see much progress. And I think that's a responsibility they have."
He then referenced an incident in which Lemon asked a Muslim human rights attorney, point-blank, whether he supported ISIS. "He gave a very wishy-washy answer," Cohen said. "Why can't a moderate Muslim like that just come out and say, 'these guys are slitting the throats of Western journalists, raping and slaughtering in Iraq and Syria, and I personally do not support this?' No! We got a very vague answer!"

Tariq Ramadan misrepresents his views on terrorism in Guardian op-ed

On Jan. 9th, Ramadan published a Guardian op-ed titled 'The Paris attackers hijacked Islam but there is no war between Islam and the west', which opens with the following declaration:
"The attack on Charlie Hebdo compels us to be clear and to be consistent. We have to condemn what happened in Paris absolutely. I said the same after 7/7 and after 9/11"
Later in his Guardian op-ed, Ramadan speaks more broadly about terrorism.
"We condemn the violent extremism that is targeting westerners."
However, the evidence suggests that Ramadan is mischaracterizing his views.
Though he indeed styles himself as a Muslim reformer and moderate, many have noted his support for the Muslim Brotherhood as well as radical, pro-terror Islamists like Sheikh Yousef Al-Qaradhawi. Qaradawi issued the infamous fatwa authorizing suicide terrorism by Palestinians, and the "fatwa permitting women to commit suicide terrorism".

BBC WS 'The Fifth Floor' highlights cartoonist known for antisemitic imagery

The day after the French president described the terror attack on the kosher supermarket in Paris in which four people were murdered as "an appalling antisemitic act", the BBC World Service's 'Fifth Floor' decided it would be good idea to highlight the work of a Jordanian cartoonist known for his antisemitic imagery.
As anyone who knows even a little about cartoons in the Middle East will be aware, the use of antisemitic themes and imagery is very common and long-established. That fact, however, was not communicated to BBC audiences in the Fifth Floor's discussion of Middle East cartoonists.

What if Charlie Hebdo had been published in Britain? (satire)

Week 1: Magazine's editors and staff get No Platformed by the National Union of Students on the grounds that their publication has been 'identified by the NUS's Democratic Procedures Committee as holding racist or fascist views'. They are forbidden from all campuses.
Week 2: Individual student unions ban the sale or display of Charlie Hebdo anywhere on their premises in order to protect students from feeling the need to 'succumb to media pressure to fear and loathe Muslims' and encourage students instead to 'celebrate Muslim students for their academic achievements and countless other talents'. Unions across the country justify the ban as 'an important symbolic step towards creating a culture of ethnic and religious parity on campus'.
Week 3: A Change.org petition is created, calling on supermarket chains to 'Stop Selling Charlie Hebdo'. A different petition is launched, by a campaign group called Muslim Eyes, demanding that supermarkets hide Charlie Hebdo in black plastic bags so that Muslims and others will not feel offended by its front covers. Supermarkets are called upon to 'promote the right environment in store' and not allow the open display of 'offensive material'.

NBC Reporter Puts Blame on U.S. For Islamic Terrorist Attacks

An NBC reporter on Sunday put blame on U.S. foreign policy for the spate of Islamic terrorist attacks around the world.
On Sunday's Meet the Press, reporter Ayman Mohyeldin said that "for some, radicalization and attacks against the U.S. stems from anger at American foreign policies and wars in the Middle East."
The show's pre-taped segment also quoted Muslim activist Kassem Allie, who said: "Whether it's the internet or television, this Islamophobia that has been going on for the last several years has been -- has hurt. It has really hurt."

Belgian Newspaper Le Soir Receives Bomb Threat over Charlie Hebdo Coverage

Le Soir, a Belgian newspaper that reprinted cartoons from Charlie Hebdo mocking Islam's prophet Mohammed, evacuated its offices Sunday after it received a bomb threat, according to its web site.
Le Soir's report states: "The individual who contacted the newspaper 'Le Soir'… [said] he wanted, on behalf of the 'extreme left,' to stop media coverage of the attack against Charlie Hebdo, which would feed the 'extreme right.'"

Terrorist who threatened South Park creators over Muhammad episode sues prison for prayer ban

The man convicted of threatening South Park creators Matt Stone and Trey Parker over an episode of South Park featuring the Muhammad is suing U.S. federal prison officials because he can't "fulfill Islam's religious obligations."
According to The Smoking Gun, 25-year-old Zachary Chesser says the U.S. Bureau of Prison regulations limiting religious gatherings are a violation of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act.
Chesser says Islam "obligates and encourages" various congregate activities, including five daily prayers, religious classes, and celebrations. The Bureau of Prison regulations, however, only allow him an activity once per week.
Chesser, was convicted in 2010 of terrorism charges and sentenced to 25 years in prison. Bureau of Prison memos state he was disciplined four times for participating in an unauthorized meeting or gathering. He also took part in congregational prayer with inmates, who are also convicted Muslim terrorists.

Economist map of the Middle East fails to list Israel

Earlier this month, the publishing house HarperCollins was the object of much negative publicity when it was revealed that they omitted Israel from maps in atlases sold to schools in the Middle East.
A spokesman for the HarperCollins subsidiary that specializes in maps told the British Christian newspaper, The Tablet, that including Israel would have been "unacceptable" to their customers in the Gulf and the amended map incorporated "local preferences." However, following the embarrassing row that ensued, HarperCollins expressed regret for the omission, and assured concerned parties that the product had been removed from sale, and all the remaining stock pulped.
More recently, The Economist (in a Jan. 10th story in their print edition about shifting economic power and political influence in the Gulf) published this "amended" map of the region.
Does the magazine's failure to note Israel's presence represent merely an innocent mistake? Or, were they – like HarperCollins – merely responding to "local preferences" in the Gulf?

Harper-Collins Releases Map For Israelis With No Muslim Countries (satire)

Publishing giant Harper-Collins announced today that it will soon issue an atlas for Israeli grade-school students that does not include the names of any Muslim or Arab countries, a launch that the company says is intended to atone for its earlier publication of an atlas for Muslim countries that does not include Israel.
A spokesman at the HarperCollins LLC offices in Manhattan told reporters today that in addition to destroying all copies of the atlas that left out Israel among all other countries so as not to run afoul of what a spokesman called "local sensibilities," the firm decided to make right with Israel by going in the other direction.
"Our editors realized that a more balanced approach would be the prudent course, so they elected to issue an inverse publication to the one that caused all the trouble, in the interest of evening things out," said Kloster Phoque of the Collins Bartholomew division. "We expect robust sales of this map in the Israeli educational market, especially now that the market is primed from the other recent episode. Since everybody knows Israelis and Arabs contribute in equal measure to the cycle of violence and delegitimization, obviously Israelis will be clamoring for this atlas, because they're just as eager to make everyone else disappear as Arabs are to destroy them."

NGO Monitor: The Lancet as a Political Platform for NGOs: Study of Articles on Palestinian and Israeli Health Care 2001 - 2014

It would be far more beneficial to both Palestinians and Israelis for The Lancet to serve as a truly open bridge between the Israeli and Palestinian medical communities. In its current form the LPHA prevents this from happening.
The refusal by Horton and The Lancet's parent company Reed Elsevier, to fully repudiate the Gaza open letter, retract the letter from The Lancet's website, and apologize for its publication contributes to the ongoing atmosphere of distrust between the Israeli medical community and The Lancet.
Further, this situation has contributed to the alienation from The Lancet by physicians internationally. Due to The Lancet's position, a number of prominent doctors have refused invitations from The Lancet to review or submit papers. The resignation by a senior Israeli scientist from an advisory board of The Lancet is another casualty of the ongoing situation. This breakdown in trust and communications within the world medical community harms the advance of medicine.

JPost Editorial: Words matter

How does this work? In the Middle East, as might be expected, some terms have evolved in peculiar ways. "Palestinians," to cite just one example, used to refer to the Jewish population of British Mandatory Palestine.
Settlers, those Palestinian Jews who before and during the Mandate established agricultural settlements and made the desert bloom a century before the Start-up Nation appeared, used to be national heroes. Today the term settler is used pejoratively to refer to a member of a Jewish community in the so-called West Bank, and is usually associated with the labels of extremism or racism.
And what happened to Judea and Samaria? They are the Roman occupiers' Latinized translation of the biblical Hebrew names Yehuda and Shomron, which are faithfully used by the government of Israel but ignored by the world's media.
In the best of rainy seasons, the Jordan River is only a few meters wide. The claim that its western bank is some 65 kilometers wide, encompassing Judea and Samaria, is patently absurd and just demonstrates how politicized terminology drives the ongoing conflict.
What is even more absurd about "West Bank" usage is the fact that the Jordanian government adopted the term in the 1950s in an attempt to legitimize its illegal occupation of the region as the result of its aggression in 1948. Before Israel's War of Independence, the British Mandatory authorities commonly referred to the area as Judea and Samaria.

Abbas's enablers

Honesty regarding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is a rare commodity in international forums. Most Security Council members – both the eight voting in favor and the five that abstained – justified their positions by expressing frustration with the deadlocked peace process. But it is the US that is rightly frustrated with the PA. It rejected Secretary of State John Kerry's proposals in April to extend the ongoing peace talks with Israel, partnered with Hamas, ignored US objections to offer the resolution at the Security Council, and then applied for membership in the International Criminal Court (ICC), where Abbas will use yet another international organization to go after Israel.
As a result, the PA now risks losing vital American aid.
Abbas seems not to care. Confident that internationalizing the conflict is better than engaging Israel, Abbas delivered a vicious speech before the UN General Assembly last September in which he accused Israel of waging a war of genocide, and compared Israel to Islamic State. The US was a lonely voice criticizing Abbas, calling his speech "provocative" and "counterproductive."
Nonetheless, support for Abbas and the PA in international forums resurfaced in the run-up to the Security Council vote.

Turkish FM: Hamas was ready to recognize Israel

Hamas, a Palestinian group governing Gaza, had reached a point of recognizing Israel but reconciliation efforts failed after Turkey's relations with Israel broken down, Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu said on Monday.
Çavuşoğlu, in remarks published on the website of the state Anadolu news agency, defended the Turkish government's dialogue with Hamas, despite US criticism, insisting that even the opponents of Hamas agree that it should be part of any talks on the resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
"Then why are you opposing Turkey's dialogue with Hamas in this regard? If our relations [with Israel] had not deteriorated, Hamas was going to recognize Israel in the event of a two-state solution," he said at a meeting with Anadolu editors. "Unfortunately, the settlement process failed."

Hamas Calls United States 'Rude and Racist'

The United States last week expressed its dissatisfaction over Turkey's contacts with Hamas, and the terror group took exception.
State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said in her daily press briefing on Thursday that Washington's position on Hamas has not changed and classified the group as a "designated foreign terrorist organization that continues to engage in terrorist activity."
Psaki's remarks came after she was asked about a statement by Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu, who said Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal is welcome to Turkey whenever he wants.
Cavusoglu's comments came after it was reported that Qatar had expelled Mashaal and that he was considering moving to Turkey instaed.
Hamas condemned the State Department's criticism as "rude and racist," expressing its belief that Ankara would not be affected by such positions.
Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri stated, according to Hamas's website, that the U.S. position was proof that Washington is "the archenemy of the nation's issues."

Egypt to Open Rafah Crossing for Three Days

Egyptian authorities have decided to open the Rafah crossing with Gaza for three days for special cases, the Palestinian Authority's ambassador to Egypt said Sunday, according to the Ma'an news agency.
The envoy, Jamal al-Shoubaki, said in a statement that the crossing would be open Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday on both sides.
For the first day, only university students who study abroad will be allowed to cross through to Egypt, al-Shoubaki said, according to Ma'an.

Pioneering titanium jaw implanted in Syrian citizen

A new groundbreaking procedure was used by doctors at Rambam Health Care Campus to implant a titanium jawbone in a Syrian shooting victim, who had come to Israel for medical treatment after a bullet demolished his lower jaw.
The 23-year-old Syrian man arrived at Rambam in critical condition after a rifle bullet had completely destroyed his lower jaw, rendering him unable to speak or eat.
Israeli doctors outfitted him with a custom-made jaw printed on titanium using 3D CT and then implanted it into the victim's face.
Professor Adi Rachmiel, director of Rambam's Department of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery, performed the ground-breaking operation with Dr. Yoav Leiser, who recently returned from training in Germany, where he specialized in restoring eye sockets, jaws, and cheek bones. One day after surgery, the patient was eating and speaking.

Israeli-produced 'The Affair' wins Golden Globe for best drama

"The Affair," a Showtime drama co-created and co-produced by Israeli Hagai Levi and American Sarah Treem, has won the Golden Globe for best TV drama series.
The series tells the story of an extramarital affair between two married people, looking at the ripple effects of an affair between novelist Noah Solloway and waitress Alison Lockhart. It stars Dominic West and Ruth Wilson, who picked up the award for best actress in a drama series.
"The Affair," which premiered in October 2014, beat out four longer-running, well-loved drama series: "Downton Abbey," "Game of Thrones," "The Good Wife" and "House of Cards."
Levi and Treem previously collaborated on the American adaptation of Levi's acclaimed Israeli series "In Treatment," which ran on HBO from 2007 to 2010 and won several Emmy and Golden Globe awards. "In Treatment" was also adapted and produced in 16 other countries.

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Posted By Ian to Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News at 1/12/2015 06:00:00 PM