[Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News] 12/24 Link Pt2: Child killer - new Palestinian superhero; Has the anti-Israel BDS movement peaked?

From Ian:

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PMW: Child killer - The new Palestinian superhero

Samir Kuntar who murdered a four-year-old Israeli by smashing her head with the butt of his rifle, is the newest PA - Fatah hero and role model
Samir Kuntar is a Lebanese terrorist who in 1969 infiltrated Israel and murdered four Israelis. Kuntar murdered his youngest victim, four-year-old Einat Haran, by repeatedly smashing her head with his rifle butt.
After being released from Israeli prison in 2006, Kuntar joined Hezbollah and was planning terror attacks against Israel when he was killed in Syria last week.
Child-killer Kuntar is the newest Palestinian Authority-Fatah superhero.
The following are 15 statements by PA and Fatah officials glorifying Kuntar and his "heroic" act of murder:

NGO Monitor: An Irresponsible Civil Society Harms Israel

NGOs that claim to promote peace and human rights are big business in Israel, with dozens of groups competing for money and headlines. One group, Breaking the Silence, or BTS, with a 2014 income of $1 million, may not be the country's largest, but it's been making the biggest waves.
With about 10 activists on staff, BTS publishes anonymous and unverifiable testimonies from Israeli soldiers who claim to have witnessed Israeli forces committing war crimes. Representatives of BTS travel the world repeating these stories, appearing in parliaments and before United Nations bodies, university campuses and in the media.
To audiences with no experience in combat with terror groups, the emotional claims of these soldiers can easily appear authentic. Many of the details in these accounts are unreliable or are later proved false. But the accusations go unquestioned, and the political damage is significant.
The bigger problem is that groups like BTS get most of their money, up to tens of millions of dollars, from European governments, including Sweden and Switzerland, either directly or indirectly. The European Union, for instance, is reported as BTS's largest single donor of 2015. BTS is also one of about 20 similar groups that were built by the powerful U.S.-based New Israel Fund.

UCLA Student Whose BDS-Defeat 'Meltdown' Went Viral 'Deeply Regrets' Actions; Says Israel Is Great (INTERVIEW)

A University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) student whose angry outburst following the defeat of an anti-Israel vote went viral on the Internet has had a chance to educate herself better, she told The Algemeiner this week, after requesting an opportunity to express her change of heart.
"I don't believe Israel is evil," Danielle Dimacali said. "In fact I think it's a great progressive country that offers a lot of freedom for its citizens."
Dimacali, originally from the Philippines, was seeking to set the record straight about an incident that occurred in February 2014 during a meeting of the student council, where she still serves as a minutes-taker.
Dimacali attracted media attention at the time for weeping and cursing when a Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) motion, initiated by the activist group Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), was rejected. A video of the proceedings and Dimacali's subsequent "meltdown" was shared on social media and reported in this publication.
Dimacali said she was shocked by the angry response her disappointment generated, which was reflected in comments circulating on the web, and in hate mail and even death threats she received.
Dimacali said her intentions were "misconstrued."

Legal Insurrection: This story's ending gives me hope that anti-Israel campus hate is doomed

There have been other distrubing incidents at UCLA since then, such as the challenge to a student running for the Judicial Board on the ground that she was Jewish.
But the campus has seen a backlash against these SJP tactics. Last spring, the anti-Israel student slate of candidates was resoundingly defeated and its key members lost their positions in student government.
For me, Danielle Dimacali's evolution on Israel is a hopeful sign that the anti-Israel venom on some campuses will not last, and that students drawn into it for all the wrong reasons will see the truth through learning.

Daniel Gordis: What the American Jewish Left has against Israel

Beinart is right. Jewish statehood is always going to be a challenge for the sort of liberalism in vogue among American Jews.
As long as Israel is a Jewish state, making Israel both democratic and Jewish will be a challenge. Not impossible, but challenging.
For American Jews for whom that tension is discomfiting, it is Israel's Jewishness – and not its democracy – which will remain unsettling. For American Jews who do not understand (or cannot accept) that Israel is an ethnic democracy, not a liberal democracy along US lines, a state which puts Jews first (think Law of Return) will always be troubling, if not anathema.
Why does this shift in American Jewish sentiments matter? It matters because as long as the issue was a worry about dual loyalties, the problem could be addressed by how Jews (both American and Israeli) spoke about Israel, and by American Jews gradually feeling more secure in the United States. The new hostility to Israel, based on a commitment to a form of liberalism that often yields fundamental opposition to the idea of a Jewish state, cannot be so easily addressed.
Which explains why, when Samantha Power said nothing objectionable, but did not join the pile-on against Israel, she was greeted with a steely cold silence.
We would do well to take note. Because that reaction is just a glimpse of where we are all heading.

JPost Editorial: Silent night

Muslim desecration of Christian and Jewish shrines is a matter of record. Historically, both Jews and Christians are considered dhimmis, or second-class citizens, in Islamic society and are victimized accordingly. The PA territories, in accordance with Article 7 of the Palestinian Authority Constitution, are subject to Shari'a or Islamic law.
Since the War of Independence, Arab Christian communities have suffered from a different sort of "occupation" in the West Bank: Muslim refugees were cynically settled in their midst in camps to serve as a weapon against Israel.
Before the war, Ramallah was 90% Christian and Bethlehem was 80% Christian. By 1967, more than half of Bethlehem's residents were Muslim, while Ramallah is a large Muslim city today.
Palestinian Christians feel they have to speak out against Israeli "occupation," because if they don't, Muslims would perceive their silence as tacit support for Israel.
World Christian leaders who remain silent about the plight of Palestinian Christians blithely ignore one of the favorite slogans of the true target of Palestinian "resistance": "First the Saturday people, then the Sunday people."
First the Jews, then the Christians – a slogan daubed on many local churches. To our Christian readers, a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

The Real Palestinian Christmas Show

Apologists for the Palestinians will say that Israeli intransigence and a refusal to stop building settlements in the West Bank or relinquish territory is the reason for both the stabbings and Hamas plans. But that is a story line that only those who haven't been paying attention to events in the region can believe. Abbas has boasted of his refusal to accept Israeli offers, and Arafat did the same. Though the PA speaks of its acceptance of a two-state solution, they've proven over and again that they refuse to recognize the legitimacy of a Jewish state no matter where its borders are drawn. As for Hamas, it makes no pretense of wanting anything but Israel's destruction and the slaughter of its people.
Though their methods differ and the PA is ironically dependent on Israeli security for its continued rule in the West Bank, neither has any intention of making peace in the foreseeable future. That's why Israel continues to be stuck with its "occupation" of the West Bank even though the vast majority of its people would accept a division of the country in exchange for real peace. The problem is that they know pulling back from the West Bank, even including the dismantling of settlements, would produce the same results as in Gaza where every Jew, soldier, and settlement was withdrawn.
Those are the key facts to remember when you see tomorrow night's Christmas show from Bethlehem that will be repeated in an endless loop the following day on the news channels. The reality of Palestinian Christmas isn't the prayers of victims for freedom. Rather it is of a continued determination to wage a terror war against the descendants of the real Jesus as opposed to the Palestinian myth.

Im Tirtzu responds to 'The Jerusalem Post'

Tuesday's editorial in The Jerusalem Post was distressing, and not a little shocking.
In slighting the concerns raised by Im Tirtzu, and shared by the majority of Israelis, the editorial implicitly aligned itself with the organizations that were called out.
While grudgingly admitting that Im Tirtzu had the right to create an admittedly and deliberately provocative video, the editorial is largely focused on parenthetical and, yes, provocative condemnations of us. We are referred to as having a "far right wing agenda" as if this was a self-evident fact.
What is there about defending the rights and honor of Israeli soldiers, of honoring minorities that choose to embrace service to the state, and providing seminars about Zionist thought and values to hundreds of university students (taught by some of the leading academics and media figures in the country) that constitutes such an agenda? Making it sound like a deal with the devil that on one occasion some seven years ago we received a grant from Evangelicals is a slight against Christians. Analogizing Pastor Hagee to European governments completely misses the issue we are raising; that foreign governments are seeking to influence Israeli politics through the back door by seeking to have their agendas validated by Israeli NGOs.
It was distressing to read that somehow our taking umbrage and action at being labeled fascists, replete with storm-trooper photo reworks of our then CEO, should be somehow hypocritical.

IsraellyCool: Richard Silverstein Doubles Down In Defending Honor of Arch Terrorist Samir Kuntar

A few days ago, I posted about DouchebloggerTM Richard Silverstein's defense of murderer-cum-worm-food Samir Kuntar. In short: he posted as fact a claim that Kuntar never murdered 4-year-old Einat Haran, or her father Danny, and suggested any talk that he returned to terror after his release was fantasy. I showed how the Israeli psychologist who thought Kuntar was being truthful in denying the murder was completely unreliable, since he also believed Kuntar's promise he would not return to terror – and we all see how that went.
The psychologist Zvi Sela has claimed Danny and Einat were shot by IDF friendly fire, and Silverstein posted this as fact. But others have pointed out that the pathology report itself showed Einat's skull had been smashed with a rifle butt – not to mention the other compelling evidence presented at trial.
But when presented with this evidence – as opposed to opinion from an unreliable person – this is Silverstein's response.

Tikun Olam @richards1052
Oh u mean pathology report by same pathologist who harvested Palestinian & Israeli organs fr dead corpses?? Trustworthy!

The pathological hater of Israel clearly hates this pathology report.

IsraellyCool: Anti-Zionist-Not-Antisemite of the Day: Massachusetts City Commissioner David Obrien

Israellycool readers are well aware of the deceptive nature of the BDS (Boycott, Divestment & Sanctions) movement. BDS couches itself in the language of human rights to obfuscate their true goal, the destruction of the state of Israel. But every once in a while the truth slips out, as in this trifecta of a Facebook post.
A graphic posted by an outfit called "US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation" features a map of not merely the "West Bank" and Gaza, but the entirety of the State of Israel – making it very clear that when BDS speaks of ending the "occupation", they mean ending Israel. The comments section features a revealing query from David Goodman, a Reconstructionist Rabbinical Student, who asks in effect, whether BDS wants to "transform Israel" or "eliminate" it.
The BDS response to Goodman comes quickly enough via David Obrien, a dedicated public servant and Commissioner on the City Services Commission of Everett, MA. In his reply, Obrien channels the ghost of Helen Thomas, as he shamelessly calls for the ethnic cleansing and destruction of the one Jewish State.

After outcry, alternative wine guide to include settlement booze

A pair of right-winger lawmakers are looking to turn whine into wine with a guide to vino produced in the West Bank, after a group of settlement vintners cried foul over being left off another guide.
The guide is being spearheaded by nationalist MKs Yoav Kisch and Bezalel Smotrich, who head the so-called Caucus for Eretz Yisrael, as a countermeasure to the "New Israeli Wine Guide," which was criticized last week for leaving settlement wineries out, in what some termed an internal boycott.
The "New Israeli Wine Guide," written by Israel Hayom wine reporter Yair Gat and Gal Zohar, a former wine curator in London who is employed as a consultant by a number of Tel Aviv restaurants, announced that they would not include wines made in West Bank settlements.
Speaking to Channel 2, Vered Ben Saadon, owner of the Tura Winery in the settlement of Rehelim, south of Nablus, said that "she was delighted that the issue gathered attention and that there would be a concrete change regarding wines produced in the settlements with the publication of the new guide."

US Jewish groups condemn professor's use of yellow stars to fight Islamophobia

According to the Times, around 100 students have worn the badges, which she reportedly recommended only be donned off campus so that their intent is not misconstrued.
The university subsequently issued a statement to a local ABC affiliate explaining that the choice of a yellow star was "used as a learning tool" and that it was "adapted as a respected symbol of all three Abrahamic faiths of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam to represent unity and solidarity, and it was not intended to make an analogy between discrimination against Muslims and the persecution of Jews in Germany and throughout Europe during the Holocaust."
"The university acknowledges the historic significance and emotional impact of the use of the yellow star, and the professor regrets the pain and misunderstanding this has caused," the statement concluded.
"While the professor's intention to combat bigotry is laudable, the comparison is offensive," a spokesman for the Anti-Defamation League told The Jerusalem Post.
"It both cheapens the memory of the horrors of the Holocaust and, by implication, draws inapt comparisons to Nazis. We welcome the university's statement acknowledging the historic significance of the yellow star, and apologizing for any pain for misunderstanding the professor might have caused."
"The Holocaust is a distinct tragedy. No other genocide spoke of a final solution and it should not be used as a comparative calamity," agreed Rabbi Marc Schneier, the founder of the Foundation for Ethnic Understanding, a group focused on Muslim- Jewish dialogue.
"The spirit of Professor Davary's initiative is a dramatic response to growing concerns by Americans to the exponential growth of Islamaphobia in the United States."

IsraellyCool: Suzanne Vega On BDS: "I Didn't Want To Be Bullied"

Singer-songwriter Suzanne Vega performed in Israel earlier this year, withstanding pressure from the BDSHoles.
In a recent interview, she has explained why she opposes BDS.
"I've always been warmly embraced in Israel, from the release of my first album," Vega told Creative Community for Peace (CCFP), an organization representing prominent members of the entertainment industry devoted to promoting the arts as a means to peace. "I came this time because I really wanted to play with the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra. I felt it was important for my growth as an artist."
"I think the cultural boycott punishes people who make their living in the arts, both in Israel and [around the world]," Vega said. "If culture is the medium by which we have dialogue, boycotting cuts this off. It doesn't add to it."

Has the anti-Israel boycott movement peaked?

The Boycott, Divest & Sanction ("BDS") movement and the broader campaign to delegitimize Israel has had a tough few weeks. In academia and industry, the boycott campaign has been exposed as potentially discriminatory and unlawful, and yet another panel of experts has affirmed that Israel's use of force against Hamas is not only legitimate, but exemplary.
Law Professors Eugene Kontorovich and Steven Davidoff Solomon of the Northwestern University and University of California – Berkeley, respectively, make the case that boycotts by academic associations are unlawful. As one might expect, academic associations each have a stated purpose, typically to collect, share, expand and advance knowledge in the relevant field. Profs. Kontorovich and Davidoff explain that such associations cannot legally do anything other than pursue those stated purposes.
Important as it is to defeat BDS however possible, winning on technicalities does nothing to address the false, insidious underlying narrative.
Of all places, the United Auto Workers see through to the core of the issue. The students workers' union for all of the University of California, UAW Local 2865 adopted a resolution in support of BDS last year.
Last week, the UAW International Executive Board stepped in and rejected the vote. The Board noted that BDS "espouses discrimination and vilification against Israelis and UAW members who are of Jewish lineage," and that

The Anti-Israel Theater of Hate

Driven by fanaticism and the desire to act out fantasies of heroism and resistance, the anti-Israel movement is defined by symbolic acts that change nothing.
Adherents celebrate when pro-forma anti-Israel resolutions are driven through hospitable forums and pop stars are intimidated into cancelling their gigs in Tel Aviv. How this improves the life of a single Palestinian has never been established. When a moderate voice in the Palestinian leadership emerged some years ago in the form of PM Salam Fayyad, a technocrat who understood that a Palestinian state must be built before it can be recognised, he was invariably labelled a 'stooge' and 'collaborator', and hounded from office.
When Palestinians starve in their thousands in Syria barely a whimper is raised, never mind a street protest or a petition. When Palestinians are left homeless in Gaza by the Egyptian demolitions of houses to make way for an impenetrable cement barrier, through which not a bag of aid or food can pass (in contrast to the thousands of tonnes of supplies that enter Gaza through Israel each week), the activists are nowhere to be seen or heard from, frozen into indifference since Israel cannot be blamed.
And so, the legitimate aspirations of the Palestinian people are buried under the fantasies, delusions and self-serving conduct of their would-be rescuers. Meanwhile, the Palestinians remain stateless, divided and infantilised, suspended in the role of victims, despite being actors in a conflict it is within their power to resolve.

IsraellyCool: Entertainment Reporter's Mindblowing Casual Antisemitism

This next article for a site called Movie News Guide is equally bizarre and disturbing in its casual antisemitism.
The article, written by "season reporter" Meghna Subhedhar, is entitled ADAM SANDLER IS BECOMING THE MOST HATED CELEBRITY BECAUSE HE TALKS JEWISH SHOP ALL THE TIME (yes, in caps), and is an unintelligible, nasty rant.
Adam Sandler is making news again. He has produced "The Ridiculous Six" forNetflix, which is doing swimmingly well — I mean – they have taken it off the main page. He is probably becoming unpopular because he keeps playing the Jew card.
Who could forget the fact that Adam Sandler is a Jew. I mean, he is always playing the bumbling Jew in all of his comedies. He was recently on the Howard Stern Show where he told the listeners that he loved Israel because his parents told him to. Many people, reporters included, believe that he was serious, but he might have been joking too. Monodoweiss transcribed the whole interview on its webpage. We could smell a little bit of latent anger in the post. I mean it was pretty obvious when they put a Zionist twist on the page at the end.

No, Hannah Weisfeld, there isn't a 'war on human rights activists'. There's a terror war against Jews

This brings us to Hannah Weisfeld, director of the "pro-peace", putatively pro-Israel group in the UK called Yachad.
Weisfeld yesterday published an op-ed at the Guardian – still arguably the central media address for delegitimizing rhetoric about Israel in the UK.
No, she didn't use the forum provided to her to challenge Guardian readers' prejudices about Israel, or to help them understand the ongoing terror war, but rather to decry "Israel's war against its human rights community" which, she believes, "threatens its very democracy".
Of course, to most who are knowledgeable about life in the Jewish State, the suggestion that there's anything approaching a war against Israeli civil society would be dismissed out of hand. Indeed, to cite one example, there are 23 political advocacy NGOs operating freely in the country which are funded by foreign governments – most "which actively oppose, in varying degrees, the policies of the democratically elected government of Israel".
So, what precisely is Weisfeld referring to?

Times of London places Israel in story on international persecution of Christians

That's right: Christians face ethnic cleansing by ISIS; churches are being razed and worshippers beaten, murdered and jailed: Christian women are sold in into sexual slavery…
Yet, the journalists at Times of London find it important to tell readers that, in Israel, one marginal rabbi representing an extremist group went on an anti-Christian rant in an obscure publication. In fact, Gopstein's is so reviled by Israelis from across the political spectrum that the nation's Defense Minister has attempted to have his group categorized as a terrorist organization.
Israel is the only Middle East country which fiercely protects the rights of Christians (and all religious minorities), and one of the few countries in the region where the indigenous Christian population is growing.
To add one isolated incident in Israel in a report on countries which engage in systematic anti-Christian persecution represents an egregious failure to properly contextualize the extremely serious global threat facing adherents of one of the world's major faiths.

Russia slams 'faked' report accusing it of war crimes

Russia on Wednesday rejected allegations by human rights group Amnesty International that Moscow's strikes in Syria have caused
massive civilian casualties, saying its report was made up of "cliches and fakes."
"We examined this report," defense ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov told a briefing. "Once again there was nothing concrete or new that was published, only cliches and fakes that we have already repeatedly exposed."
"Amnesty International is confidently arguing that there were no military targets or militants in the areas that were allegedly hit with Russian strikes, but they cannot know this and have no way of checking," said Konashenkov.

Russia has identified groups behind plane explosion in Egypt, security chief says

Alexander Bortnikov, the head of Russia's Federal Security Service, said on Thursday Russia had identified groups behind the explosion of a Russian plane in Egypt, which killed all 224 passengers on board in October, local news agencies reported.
In November, Bortnikov told a meeting chaired by President Vladimir Putin that traces of foreign-made explosive had been found on fragments of the downed plane and on passengers' personal belongings.
Until the November meeting at the Kremlin Russia had played down assertions from Western countries that the crash was a terrorist incident, saying it was important to let the official investigation run its course.
"According to an analysis by our specialists, a homemade bomb containing up to 1 kilogram of TNT detonated during the flight, causing the plane to break up in mid air, which explains why parts of the fuselage were spread over such a large distance," Bortnikov said at the time.

Turkey Shoots Down Santa, Claiming Sleigh Violated Turkish Airspace (satire)

Turkish F-16s shot down Santa's sleigh over international waters late Thursday night, as the Turkish president claimed Saint Nicholas had violated the country's airspace. While the fate of Father Christmas remains unclear, several reindeer have been confirmed dead in an incident certain to further damage the already strained relationship between Ankara and the North Pole.
The incident occurred as Santa was flying over the Black Sea on his way from Georgia to Romania, two countries which had approved the North Pole's use of their airspace to deliver toys to well-behaved Christian children. Turkish officials had warned Saint Nick that violations of its airspace would not be tolerated; on Christmas Eve 2013, Santa flew deep into Turkish territory to deliver coal to President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, then the prime minister, at his residence in Ankara.
Officials at the North Pole denied violating Turkey's airspace and warned of consequences, though they stopped short of threatening a military response.
"This outrageous and unprovoked attack is a violation of international law and Christmas spirit," a North Pole spokes-elf told The Mideast Beast. "If Erdogan didn't want to get coal again, he should have stopped bombing the f__king Kurds."

Saudi Writer Jailed for Four Years for Criticizing Monarchy on TV

A court in Saudi Arabia sentenced reformist writer Zuhair Kutbi to fours years in prison and banned him from travel.
The Saudi media reported the Specialized Criminal Court (SCC) convicted him "on charges of sedition, inciting public opinion and reducing the government's prestige."
They cut the sentence to only two years, but forbade Kutbi from "writing for 15 years and traveling abroad for five, and fined [him] $26,600." He also must delete his Twitter account.
Saudi officials detained Kutbi on July 15 after he suggested the country become a "constitutional monarchy and pushing back against religious repression" on a television show.
Amnesty International reported that officials "beat him with their rifle butts." The police interrogated him, but said he needed medical attention since he has diabetes and high blood pressure and is recovering from cancer. It is not the first time Saudi officials harassed him:

Feel Good Story: Iranian Christian Pastor Finally Released From Prison

Unfortunately, we are subjected to negative reports on a daily basis about the state of our country and the world at large, but as Christmas approaches we are heartened to share this positive story of hope and vindication.
Iranian Christian pastor Farshid Fathi, who has been imprisoned in Iran's notorious Evin prison since the day after Christmas, 2010, has finally been freed.
CNSNews reports that Fathi was released from prison on Monday, two years shy of his full seven-year prison sentence. He will hopefully now be able to reunite with his wife and two children.

Review: David Wolpe on Antisemitism: A Very Short Introduction The Changing Face of Anti-Semitism

Antisemitism: A Very Short Introduction brings this passage repeatedly to mind. Everywhere one looks, there are corners of contempt, and every possible reason given to justify it. In his short survey of what has been called "the longest hatred," Beller starts with the Roman empire (although some scholars would argue cogently that Antiochus in the third century BCE already qualifies.) When Christianity broke with its Jewish roots, a family quarrel was frozen in theological amber, with disastrous consequences.
Beller skips quickly over the ancient and medieval worlds, the blood libel and synagogue burnings, giving only one paragraph to the Spanish Inquisition. He rightly sees the Islamic world as more tolerant in the Middle Ages than the Jewish world, although such notable exceptions as the Almohad persecution go unmentioned. Moreover, the daily petty humiliations and depredations may not make the pages of a short history, but they have surely embittered countless Jewish lives.
Beller notes, "There is good reason why 'Muslim antisemitism' was absent from most general works on antisemitism and has only recently been added to the main narrative: antisemitism is not an Arab or Muslim creation, but a Christian and European one." The sad and shocking shift in focus reminds us that anti-Semitism is hardly a historical curiosity; it continues to be of enduring relevance.

UK charity probed for accusing Jews of bugging phones

A British charity has come under investigation after one of its trustees uploaded a video accusing "f---ing Jews" of tracking people's cellular data, the UK's Jewish News reports.
The UK's official Charity Commission announced Wednesday its probe into misconduct and mismanagement at the Ghulam Mustafa Trust, which raises money to fight poverty in Pakistan.
The video (which contains offensive language - ed.) was uploaded to the trust's official Facebook page sometime last spring. In it, viewers are shown how to remove a so-called tracking device from their mobile phones.
The man narrating the clip claims the bug was "recording every of yours (sic) photographs…f---king Jews." He then says, "let's see if this works inshallah" before suddenly being interrupted.
The Charity Commission first contacted the trust in June over the post, after notifying the police. Upon receiving no response from the charity about changing its practices, the Commission launched a formal inquiry into Ghulam Mustafa's governance and management.

Israel pulls out of windsurfing competition in row over displaying national flag

Malaysian organizers told Israelis that they wouldn't be allowed to compete with Israeli flags or play anthem
The Israel Sailing Association decided Wednesday not to send two young windsurfers and their coach to a windsurfing competition set to begin Sunday in Malaysia after organizers did not agree to letting them compete with the Israeli flag or play the national anthem.
The association announced that windsurfers Yoav Omer and Noy Drihan and coach Meir Yaniv would not be attending the ISAF Youth World Sailing Championship in Langkawi, Malaysia.
The association's union sent a message to the International Sailing Federation, the International Olympic Committee, the organizers of the competition in Malaysia and the Olympic Committee of Israel.
Israel Sailing Association head Gili Amir said: "Because to this day they have not received visas, 24 hours before their planned departure, and the limitations and difficulties imposed on us by the Malaysian organizing committee, we decided not to participate in the competition."

Polish Jews demand 'firm reaction' to anti-Semitic MP

Jewish community leaders in Poland have demanded a "firm reaction" from President Andrzej Duda and Prime Minister Beata Szydło over a Polish MP's public use of anti-Semitic rhetoric.
Pawel Kukiz, who heads a 15-member parliamentary group including radical right-wingers, claimed Sunday that the recent opposition rallies in Warsaw were funded by a "Jewish banker."
In an interview with a local radio station Zet Radio, Kukiz said that "apparently the march was financed somehow from the outside. 150 million PLN (38 million USD) are to be given by the Jews, the Jewish banker, in organization of the march."
According to the station, the right-wing politician was referring to Hungarian-born American financier George Soros.

Ford, IBM, GE Among 25 Major Firms Visiting Israel This Week To Meet With Promising Startups

More than 25 of the world's largest multinational corporations will gather at the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange on December 16 for the Axis Tel Aviv Corporate Edition, an event aimed at connecting international companies with promising Israeli startups.
Senior representatives from firms such as Ford, IBM, GE, Tyco, GM, Singtel, PayPal, Yahoo, ProSieben and Kimberly-Clark will participate in the second annual networking and deal-making meetup.
"It is no secret about the large influx of international companies and corporate investors interested in Israel recently. The unique breadth of innovation and creativity has made Israel, and particularly Tel Aviv, a global high-tech hub," said Ed Frank, CEO of Axis Innovation, a boutique advisory firm connecting investors and corporations. "We put on this event to provide a platform for Israel's leading startups and global companies to pitch to each other, network and support a full-face dialogue for partnerships to be created, subsequently benefiting both parties."
The 2015 Corporate Edition is said to be the biggest event of its kind and the only event in Israel to target global corporate venture arms. Participating startups, whose identities are kept secret before the event, will be from a variety of sectors, including big data, cloud, cyber-security, mobile, fintech and e-commerce.

Susan Sarandon meets Israeli aid workers helping refugees

Hollywood actress Susan Sarandon asked a team of Israeli humanitarian aid workers on Lesbos to brief her on their activities in helping refugees and migrants arriving on the Greek island's shore.
The American actress, who is known for her humanitarian work, also spent a day with an IsraAID team to help greet refugees and migrants as they arrive from the nearby coast of Turkey.
The 69-year-old Sarandon has said she will spend Christmas in Lesbos, chronicling the refugee crisis as it unfolds in Greece.
IsraAID says it has been administering medical, psychological and social services on the island for the last few months. The Israeli volunteers also give out supplies including clothing for the winter season.

Israeli Teen Makes Bet With Mom; Wins Permission to Join IDF Combat Unit

An Israeli teenager made a bet with his mother to persuade her to allow him to join an IDF combat unit, Israeli Channel 2's PZM Magazine reported on Tuesday.
Ohad Benizri, whose step-brother was killed during the Second Intifada, and therefore would need parental permission to be recruited to a combat unit in his upcoming IDF service, knew that his distraught and worried mother would never agree to sign off on his desire to do so.
So Benizri, nearly 18, came up with an original idea: He uploaded a photo of the two of them to a Facebook page called "IDF Tweets," with a sign reading, "My beloved mother said that if I can get more than 5,000 'likes,' she will sign off on my becoming a combat soldier."
Within a day, his post received more than 10,000 likes and counting.

In the footsteps of their father, US twins become IDF medics

On the basketball court of the Israeli Defense Forces school for Medicine (Training Base 10), there stood an overjoyed Gal and Carole Zamura shoulder to shoulder. Gal had just completed a medics course for the armored brigades, while Carole had completed her medic course under the auspices of IDF medical corps.
While the twins smiled at each other, only their deceased father, Aaron Zamura who had served as a medical officer at the same base was missing.
"Dad always made sure to tell us what he did in the army," said Carole. "He said the IDF made him into the person that he was. From that point on, Gal and I knew knew that we wanted to continue in the path of our father, and to focus and excel in helping people through the medical corps of the IDF."
The Zamura twins hail from New York and grew up there until they were fourteen and their family moved to Israel. Upon arriving in Israel the family built a home in Rehovot, and the day before the twins enlisted in the army their father developed a cancerous tumour in his head.
"Dad began to suffer from spasms, and I had to push off my enlistment by six months," said Gal. "A few months after he passed, Carole and I enlisted. We enlisted in separate divisions and did not think that we would end up at the same place."

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Posted By Ian to Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News at 12/24/2015 06:00:00 PM