06/26 Links: Inside the PA's anti-Semitic propaganda machine; Huge blow to BDS – International UAW rules against BDS ~ EoZ

From Ian:

Filmmaker Calls for UNRWA ‘Self-Introspection’ Over Palestinian Classroom Incitement

A newly released 10-minute online video produced by the Jerusalem-based Center for Near East Policy Research says that many of the Palestinians who have murdered Israelis during the so-called “stabbing intifada,” which began in September 2015, were educated in schools run by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA).
Titled “The UNRWA road to terror: Palestinian classroom incitement,” the video claims that the current wave of violence was not spontaneous, but rather has roots deriving “from an educational curriculum taught to Palestinians beginning in first grade.”
Thirty-eight Israelis and tourists have been murdered in the nine-month-long Palestinian terror wave, most recently the shooting at Tel Aviv’s Sarona market that killed four Israelis.
UNRWA’s curriculum, the video says, is focused on “jihad,” while UNRWA teachers glorify the so-called “right of return” of Palestinian refugees through war. The video reveals a military-themed school play held in April 2016 at the UNRWA Nuseirat School in Gaza, in which students hold an Israeli hostage at gunpoint and emerge from a tunnel in order to carry out an attack against Israelis — the latter scene mirroring the Hamas terror group’s efforts to attack the Jewish state through cross-border tunnels running underground from Gaza to Israel.
The footage begins by zooming in on classrooms of Palestinian children repeating phrases chanted by their teachers such as “Palestine is an Arab land from the river to the sea” and “We want Haifa, we want Acre,” with no recognition of a state called Israel.

The UNRWA Road to Terror: Palestinian Classroom Incitement

JPost Editorial: Blood libel

What was Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas thinking as he addressed the European Parliament last week? Was it about jump-starting the long-suspended peace process? Perhaps declining an EU offer to meet with President Reuven Rivlin, coincidentally in Brussels?
Or perhaps it was about his Soviet doctoral thesis denying the Holocaust and explaining how Hitler was really a Zionist (“The Connection between the Nazis and the Leaders of the Zionist Movement”). It must have been along these lines, since Abbas chose to share with the parliamentarians of Europe – the cradle of anti-Semitism – a blood libel straight from the Middle Ages.
Israeli rabbis are ordering their disciples to murder Palestinians, Abbas shamelessly asserted. “Certain rabbis in Israel have said very clearly to their government that our water should be poisoned in order to have Palestinians killed. That is provocation and we are against this sort of call for violence,” he said.
“Our hands are extended with a desire for peace,” Abbas declared, although he went on to contend that Israel has started three wars in the Gaza Strip and killed thousands of his people. Moreover, he claimed, since 1967 Israel has imprisoned more than 1 million Palestinians. Israel has “turned our country into an open-air prison,” Abbas told the EU lawmakers.
Such appalling views are not uncommon in Palestinian society. A Hamas leader in Gaza, Salah al-Bardawil, said in an interview with Hamas TV last November that Jews have “ancient biblical beliefs, which instructed them to kill children and collect their blood, in order to knead it into the bread that is eaten on Passover. Today, they are trying to say that these things never happened, and that it was a joke or a lie, but these are the facts of history. Anyone reading about their history will find this there.”

PM: Water poisoning claims prove Abbas no peace partner

Ahead of his trip to Rome for talks with US Secretary of State John Kerry, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday said Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas’s recent address at the European Parliament again proved he was an unsuitable partner for pursuing peace.
Abbas last week told European lawmakers in Brussels that an Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank and East Jerusalem would end global terrorism, and repeated a debunked hoax story claiming that local rabbis had called for poisoning Palestinians’ water supply. Admitting the claim was “baseless,” Abbas on Saturday apologized and walked back the water poisoning allegation.
“Abbas again last week proved to the entire world that he is not interested in direct negotiations with Israel,” the prime minister said at the start of his weekly cabinet meeting.
“Worse, he also spread abhorrent lies about the State of Israel and Judaism. True, he quickly apologized, a halfhearted half-apology, but the things he said there were in keeping with what he has said about us on other occasions, including at the UN General Assembly,” Netanyahu said. “Therefore, I think that people can conclude from this who wants to advance peace and a peace process – and who does not.”

Inside the PA's anti-Semitic propaganda machine

The Palestinian Authority has revived the medieval blood libel that Jews are poisoning the wells of non-Jews. The PA even named a nonexistent rabbi and rabbinical council as being responsible for this call to poison all Palestinian water sources.
While Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas publicized this canard during his recent speech at the European Union parliament last week, the notion that Jews are poisoning Arab water supplies has become a prominent feature in local PA media outlets.
For example, last Monday a reporter on PA state television claimed that a non-existent religious council had been outed for promoting the poisoning of Arab water supplies.
"An Israeli human rights organization has exposed a religious ruling issued by Rabbi Shlomo Melamed (sic), Chairman of the Council of Settlement Rabbis (sic), that gave the settlers permission to poison the drinking water and the natural wells in the [Palestinian] villages and towns throughout the West Bank."
The report, which cites a fictitious rabbi and non-existent council, is only one of the more recent cases of the well poisoning libel receiving official government sanction.

Abbas Water libel EU debunked by Aussie Dave at Israellycool

BBC ignores Abbas’ antisemitic libel in EU parliament speech

Abbas’ libel was based on a story invented by the PLO (which he of course also heads) that prompted false accusations days earlier from one of his government’s offices and was promoted on official PA TV.
“The Palestinian Authority’s Foreign Ministry revived the well-worn blood libel of Jews poisoning wells this week.
The PA’s Foreign Ministry released a statement on Sunday citing a supposed ruling by a “Rabbi Mlmad” authorizing Israelis to poison Palestinian wells.
The official PA website called the supposed ruling a crime against humanity, and said Israel is fully responsible for it and should arrest the rabbi for incitement.”
Two days after the Brussels speech, Abbas walked back his preposterous libel.
To date there has been no stand-alone BBC reporting on Abbas’ public promotion of that antisemitic blood libel or of his refusal to meet the Israeli president who was also in Brussels at the same time. The BBC News website’s ‘Parliaments‘ page includes an item headlined “Rivlin and Abbas address MEPs” but the page to which it links includes no mention of Abbas’ racist canard.

British media ignore Mahmoud Abbas’s antisemitic ‘poisoning the wells’ libel

The omission represents a larger pattern within the British media whereby even the most extreme manifestations of Palestinian Judeophobia fail to pique the interest of putatively anti-racist news editors. Their tendency to bury news painting an unflattering picture of Palestinians was illustrated by the dearth of stories on the results of a 2014 survey commissioned by ADL which showed that Palestinians are the most antisemitic group in the world.
Here are some highlights from ADL’s survey:

88% of Palestinians believe Jews have too much control over global affairs.

89% believe Jews have too much power over international financial markets

88% of Palestinians believe that Jews have too much control over the global media

78% of Palestinians believe that Jews are responsible for most of the world’s wars.

87% of Palestinians believe that people hate Jews because of the way Jews behave.

And, herein lies the point: Abbas’s comments (which he later retracted, presumably to quell criticism) can only be properly understood as a reflection of the prevalence and acceptance of such irrational, racist views within Palestinian society.
Walter Russell Mead has argued persuasively that such a malign obsession with Jews does grave harm to Palestinians. “Attributing global events to the machinations of an all-conquering Jewish conspiracy”, explained Mead, “is the sign of profound mental and social failure – and a harbinger of more failures and errors to come.” Societies, he added, that are “in thrall to this kind of darkness…and whose intellectual leaders cannot understand how power works in the modern world…are unlikely to develop the vigorous, forward-looking and competent civil societies that can promote true democracy.”

Kerry-Netanyahu Meeting in Rome Not Expected to Bring Breakthrough in Israeli-Palestinian Peace Process

In what is being described as a last ditch effort to salvage the fraught Israel-Palestine peace process, the US Secretary of State John Kerry will meet Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Rome Sunday. However, as is evident from remarks made by U.S. officials ahead of the meeting, hopes of a breakthrough are slim at best.
“The Secretary plans to discuss a range of regional issues with the prime minister at their meeting in Rome, which includes the fight against Daesh [Arabic acronym for the Islamic State group], recent developments in Syria. He will not be trying to restart peace talks between the Israelis and Palestinians or offering any new initiatives,” US State Department spokesman John Kirby said during a press briefing Friday. “Obviously, as a part of this broader discussion that the Secretary will be having with the prime minister, they’ll talk about where things stand with respect to movement to or away from a two-state solution. But … he’s not going to restart talks.”

UK Increasing Budget For EUBAM Monitors Who Left Gaza Border In 2007

From the website for the EUBAM EU Border Assistance Mission in Rafah (my emphasis):
The operational phase of the mission began on 30 November 2005. The Rafah Crossing Point was last opened with the presence of EUBAM monitors on 9 June 2007. A total of nearly 450 000 passengers used the crossing before that date, with an average of about 1 500 people a day. Since then, the mission has remained on standby, awaiting a political solution and ready to re-engage at very short notice.
After 9 years on the edge of their seats, they’ve just had their budget for sitting around “ready to re-engage at very short notice” increased.
Just to reinforce the wisdom of the UK voting out of the EU, it appears the UK is giving money to the EU to pay for “EU Monitors” on the Gaza-Egypt border who haven’t been there since 2007. They sit in an office in Tel Aviv. Not only are they paying for a non-existent “sleeping beauty”, the budget is actually growing!

Herzog implies Israel should hold vote on two-state solution

In the same spirit of the 'Brexit' vote, opposition leader Isaac Herzog implied Sunday that the Israeli public vote on the prospect of a two-state solution in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
In an interview with Army Radio Sunday morning, Herzog, speaking from London, stated that the people of Israel "need to be asked whether they want an Israeli-Palestinian state or [just] an Israeli state."
Herzog's comments come in wake of the historic 'Brexit' vote that took place this past Thursday which has sent shock-waves across the globe and has been seen as democratic inspiration for numerous groups and countries.
Sparking initiatives for additional EU exits, a second Scottish independence referendum and even a Texas secession which has been dubbed 'Texit.'
"There is an issue that has been accompanying our lives for generations and it is the Palestinian issue," Herzog told the radio station. "I do not think that the elections necessarily reflect our attitudes in relation to this issue. We need to ask the citizens of this country whether they want an Israeli-Palestinian state or an Israeli state."
"The public majority wants an agreement with the Palestinians, knows there are dangers, and knows that there are essential security needs," Herzog added, "but lets take action. The people should determine and know what they are leaving for future generations."

Clinton would avoid Obama-like spats with Israel -- ex-diplomat

A possible Hillary Clinton administration would likely see any tensions between Jerusalem and Israel kept out of the limelight, Dennis Ross, a former US diplomat and top Middle East adviser to several US presidents, said Sunday in Jerusalem.
Clinton, the Democratic Party’s presumptive presidential nominee for the November elections, can be expected to act more like her husband Bill — who avoided public tension with Jerusalem during his time in the White House — than like the incumbent Barack Obama, who intentionally created gaps between the US and Israel, Ross said.
“Hillary Clinton would more closely follow the model of her husband, as opposed to President Obama, for whom creating differences with Israel in public was a fairly natural part of his administration,” said Ross, who served as a senior Middle East adviser to both the Clinton and Bush administrations. “It was not a natural part of the Clinton administration.”
Bill Clinton, who was president from 1993 to 2001, was unique in that he felt the US was Israel’s only true friend in the world, said Ross, who served as his special adviser on the Middle East. And while there were differences with the Israeli government, Clinton believed fundamentally that any arguments “should be managed in private and shouldn’t be magnified in public,” Ross said.

Sanders signals fight over Israel in DNC platform not finished

Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont did not push back against the characterization that he "lost" his battle to alter language on Israel and the Palestinians in the Democratic Party Platform on Sunday.
After a partial meeting of the party's platform committee held in Saturday, CNN's Jake Tapper told Sanders that his appointees had failed to include fresh, sharp language on Israel, the West Bank and Gaza, which the presidential candidate had previously advocated for.
According to an Associated Press report, the initial meeting ended with a compromise to include reference to Palestinian rights, but without any use of the terms "settlement activity" or "occupation."
Tapper "captured exactly what happened in St. Louis," Sanders said in response. "We lost some very important fights. We're going to take that fight to Orlando, where the entire committee meets in two weeks." Sanders then listed his priorities– specifically on climate change, raising the minimum wage and other domestic issues– without reiterating his policies on Middle East peace.

J Street lauds Democrats for putting Palestinian rights in platform

Drafting of the document lasted into the early hours of Saturday, with the committee eventually voting down an amendment led by James Zogby that would have called for providing Palestinians with “an end to occupation and illegal settlements” and urged an international effort to rebuild Gaza.”
Instead, the draft dropped that language and advocated working toward a “two-state solution of the Israel-Palestinian conflict” that guarantees Israel’s security with recognized borders “and provides the Palestinians with independence, sovereignty, and dignity.”
J Street head Jeremy Ben-Ami said in a statement that the language nonetheless represented a “more balanced approach” from previous Democratic party platforms.
“The new language breaks with the party’s practice of framing its aim of establishing a Palestinian state solely in terms of Israel’s interests,” he said. “By including parallel acknowledgement of Israeli and Palestinian rights, the party underscores its belief that the only viable resolution to the conflict–a two-state solution–requires recognizing the fates of the two-peoples are intertwined.”
The 2012 platform made no mention of Palestinian rights, but instead framed a two-state solution as necessary for making Israel safer.

PreOccupiedTerritory: Bible Codes Spell Out ‘Trump Has Tiny Hands’ (satire)

Scholars exploring the Biblical text for clues to current events have discovered an important message embedded in a passage about crushed testicles, to the effect that presumptive GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump has below-average-size hands for a person of his height.
So-called Bible Code researchers report that a verse in Deuteronomy that bars a man with severed or crushed genitals from marrying serves as the starting point for a string of letters, spaced at regular intervals, that spell out the Hebrew words for “Trump has tiny hands.” The researchers say the likelihood of such a phenomenon occurring by chance is so small as to be statistically impossible.
“We’re confident this demonstrates the validity of the statistical approach to proving the text’s divine origin,” asserted Kleiner Händen, Professor of Biblical Literature at the Hebrew University. “The uncanny ability of the text to anticipate so many of the key elements of this presidential campaign is a never-ending source of wonder.”
Händen claimed that no similar string could be found elsewhere in the text of the Pentateuch, the portion of the Hebrew Bible traditionally attributed to Moses. He did note, however, that a similar string was observed centered on the verse immediately following the one cited above, using “Drumpf,” the original spelling and pronunciation of the real estate mogul’s family name. The verse in question prohibits people of illegitimate birth from marrying those of legitimate birth, using the word “mamzer,” a term often mistranslated in English as “bastard.”

Israeli who charged Sarona gunmen with chair released from hospital

An Israeli man who tried to fight off the terrorists at the Sarona Market complex in Tel Aviv two weeks ago was released from hospital this week, with a bullet fragment still lodged in his body.
Hagai Klein was shot twice during the shooting attack at the Max Brenner cafe at the plaza on June 8, once in the chest — a near-fatal wound, and once in the thigh.
Four Israelis were killed in the terror attack, perpetrated by two Palestinian cousins from the West Bank village of Yatta.
Klein was seen in surveillance footage running at one of the shooters with a chair in hand before being shot and fleeing the other way. He can be seen in a blue shirt in the footage from the attack below.

Shin Bet: East Jerusalem dentists arrested for bombing attack that wounded IDF officer

An East Jerusalem dentist and several members of his family have been arrested for carrying out a bombing that left an IDF officer seriously wounded in May, the Shin Bet said in a statement on Sunday.
According to the Shin Bet, the dentist, 36-year-old Dr. Samer Mahmoud Dawoud Alhabiya, stashed 56 small pipe bombs in his dentist office in Abu Dis, as well as two Molotov cocktails and one large pipe bomb.
The Shin Bet said that Alhabiya told investigators that he began planning his attacks back in February due to what he said were “desecrations of the Al-Aqsa mosque and Israel’s harming of Palestinian children”.
In the attack on May 10th, several bombs were remote detonated by cellphone near the Palestinian village of Hizme, leaving an IDF officer seriously wounded. Second Lieutenant Shahar Roditi suffered shrapnel wounds and broken facial bones, but was released from hospital two weeks later.

Bravery & perseverance: woman wounded by terrorist gives birth

Five months ago, a knife-wielding terrorist entered a clothing store in the town of Tekoa in Gush Etzion, and stabbed the pregnant Michal Froman in her upper body. She was evacuated to Jerusalem's Sha'arei Tzedek hospital in moderate condition. Yesterday (Saturday), she gave birth to a healthy baby daughter.
Froman is the daughter-in-law of the late R' Menachem Froman, the Rabbi of Tekoa, who was famous for the unique combination of being both a settler and a champion of negotiations and interfaith dialogue with the Palestinians.
In an interview with 'Galei Tzahal' Froman said that every crisis brings with it the opportunity to find the positive and embark on a new journey. "I often think about what God was trying to tell me with this attack", she said.
Froman's husband wrote a facebook post detailing his thoughts and feelings about the birth of his daughter. "For 4 months already since the stabbing I've been wondering if we'll have a 'hilltop youth' girl or an extreme Leftist. Turns out she's just a bundle of sweetness. Of sweetness and serenity.

Gay pride stabber sentenced to life in prison

The Jerusalem District Court on Sunday sentenced to life behind bars Yishai Schlissel, an ultra-Orthodox Jewish man convicted of stabbing to death 16-year-old Shira Banki at the Jerusalem Gay Pride Parade last year.
Schlissel was given another 30 years in prison for attempted murders of the six other people he injured in the attack, and another year for breaking the terms of his release from prison for a similar stabbing attack he carried out in 2005.
He was also ordered to pay NIS 2.6 million ($670,000) in compensation to the families of his victims.
Schlissel was led into the courtroom with his hands and feet shackled.
In their ruling, the panel of three judges declared, “We have before us a man who doesn’t see people in front of him. A cruel man. A man who sees himself as ‘giving and taking life’ in the name of the principles that he set for himself to enforce.”
“This dangerous man can no longer walk the streets of Jerusalem or any other place,” they said.

Incomplete BBC portrayal of sentence for gay pride murderer

No mention is made of the judges’ remarks during sentencing.
“In their ruling, the panel of three judges declared, “We have before us a man who doesn’t see people in front of him. A cruel man. A man who sees himself as ‘giving and taking life’ in the name of the principles that he set for himself to enforce.”
“This dangerous man can no longer walk the streets of Jerusalem or any other place,” they said.”
The BBC report states:
“A police investigation last year called for the removal of six senior Israeli officers over the attack.”
Readers are left to guess whether or not the recommendation was implemented.

Arab convert to Judaism flees home after threats

With a black velvet kippah, tzitzit, and Hebrew name, Avihai Shanti looks like any other Orthodox Israeli Jewish man. But Shanti’s outward appearance belies his unique story and his journey as an Arab convert from Islam to Judaism.
Raised in the southern city of Beer Sheva, has been forced to flee his parent’s home, after members of his extended family responded with outrage to his decision to join the Jewish people.
Speaking with BeHadrei Haredim on Sunday, Shanti discussed his decision to convert and his family’s reaction.
“I was born to a Muslim family, and we lived in Beer Sheva. Since I was little I always saw Jews as being compassionate and forgiving people, and I always sensed a connection to the Jewish people.”
“We lived in a predominately Jewish area and I had a lot of Jewish friends in Beer Sheva, and we would hang out a lot. On Yom Kippur I respected [their practices] and wouldn’t smoke or eat [around them]. I always saw a connection with this people.”

Most French Jewish students want to leave, JAFI emissary says

The majority of young Jews studying at French universities want to leave France, according to one of the Jewish Agency for Israel’s shlichim (emissaries) in Paris, Eliav Geissmann.
“The situation of Jewish students in France is complicated,” Geissmann told The Jerusalem Post in an interview coinciding with JAFI’s Board of Governors gathering in Paris. “It is hard for those who have already started to study to leave their studies in the middle. But there is an overwhelming sense that the majority of students want to leave. Many talk about going to the US, Canada and of course, Israel.”
Asked how many French students were actually planning aliya, Geissmann said: “I can’t really say how many want to come to Israel, but I believe it is more than half.”
He urged the Israeli government to “do more to encourage them,” including the introduction of a student exchange program with French universities.
“If we introduced a student exchange, many might go to Israel and stay after their studies,” he said. “We are losing many students, many of whom are quality people.”

Student from York University offered compensation for antisemitism

Here’s an interesting story which, for obvious reasons, isn’t getting as much traction as one might expect. Zach Confino, a law student, has been offered £1000 compensation by York’s Student Union and an apology will be published online. This step has been welcomed by Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis.
Among the abusive messages Confino received on social media app Yik Yak were “Hitler was onto something,” “Jewish prick” and “Israeli twat.” When attempting to oppose a student union motion to boycott Israeli produce, Confino was told he was responsible for the anti-Semitic abuse he was getting because of his support for Israel, The Times says.
Confino was also, he says, accosted by several members of the university’s Palestine Solidarity Society, including Jeremy Corbyn’s son Tom.
“The number of anti-Semitic incidents I was subject to went from zero in my first year to about 20 in my second and third years,” Confino said, quoted in The Times.
“The university did not do much about it. It has taken me two years to fight a complaint and I am relieved I have finally got this apology. The stuff I was subjected to came from far-left students,” he continued.

Huge blow to BDS – International UAW rules no subordinate body can endorse BDS

The anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement is very adaptive. As its tactics fail, BDS adjusts.
The latest adjustment is moving its focus to graduate student unions, where the student population is a subset of the entire student population. In such unions (similar to some faculty associations), BDS supporters take over governing councils and turn the union into a BDS-controlled anti-Israel propaganda activist organization.
We saw this in the U. Cal. system, and again at NYU. In each of those instances, the grad student union was an affiliate of the United Auto Workers.
In the U. Cal. case, the UAW overruled the BDS resolution as contrary to the UAW’s governing rules.

Egypt: 'Fanatic' Mob of 1,000-Plus Islamists Set 80 Christian Homes Ablaze

An angry mob of more than a thousand Islamic extremists, described as “fanatic Muslims” by a terrorized witness, reportedly torched at least 80 Christian homes in an Egyptian village and injured Christians who tried to stop them, all over rumors that a Coptic resident was converting his home into a church.
The incident took place last week in Egypt’s Qaryat al-Bayda village, near Alexandria, reports The Foreign Desk, adding that the attack resulted in two Coptic Christians who were trying to reason with the Islamists being seriously wounded and caused thousands of dollars worth of property damage.
“On Friday afternoon, following Friday noon prayer, a great deal of fanatic Muslims gathered in the front of the new house of my cousin, Naim Aziz, during its construction because of a rumor spread in the village that this building would be turned into a church,” revealed Mousa Zarif, a Christian who witnessed the events, told the International Christian Concern (ICC), an advocacy group that reports on persecution against Christians.
“They were chanting slogans against us. Among these slogans were: ‘By no means shall there be a church here,’” added Zarif.
The mob, described as Islamic extremist by The Foreign Desk, destroyed the construction materials they believed were being used to turn the Christian-owned home into a church.

MEMRI: Saudi Writer: 'Mullah Obama' Provides Iran A Safe Haven To Realize Its Interests; U.S. Administration Now In Service Of Iranian Policy

On June 2, 2016, Muhammad Al-Sa'id, a columnist for the official Saudi daily 'Okaz, published an article titled "Ayatollah Obama – A Tehran Love Story," in which he attacked President Obama for supporting revolutionary Iran and striving to focus U.S. foreign policy on the far east, while abandoning the Middle East. According to him, this view by Obama is disconnected from reality and runs contrary to traditional U.S. policy, which considered Iran a country violating international law and supporting global terrorism. Al-Sa'id argued that Iran is exploiting Obama's support to realize its own interests, and harnessing U.S. administration circles to operate in its service and against its enemies.
"The ties between Tehran and Obama run contrary to the history of the relations between the U.S. and Iran, which experienced periods of great difficulty and suspicion over four decades. Moreover, the U.S. has always viewed Iran as a rogue country that violates international law and sponsors terrorism – [terrorism] that has targeted the U.S. in many places around the globe. These inexplicable ties [with Iran] that run counter [to America's past policy] sum up Obama's personality, which was shaped by his legal and academic background, and by the resistance of the [black] racial minority to the [white] race that surrounds it...
"The people at the Iranian foreign ministry, who are Islamic Revolution [loyalists], obviously understood this equation and they exploit it by painting themselves as victims and as having adopted values of democracy and [human] rights. However, like all revolutionaries, they will [eventually] fail and carry out the same acts of slaughter against those who collaborated with them and helped them to realize their dream of being accepted back into the global fold by means of the [nuclear] agreement... All the world's liberals, like Obama... support liberal ideology, yet they turn a blind eye to the hypocrites who use it as a means to seize power...

Isil are a gang of cowardly 'repressed Nazis,' says France's leading philosopher as he urges Britain to back Peshmerga forces

The Islamic State rose to power so quickly because the Arab world falsely believed it had escaped the influence of the Nazis, France’s leading philosopher has claimed.
Bernard-Henri Levy, whose documentary about Kurdish Peshmerga soldiers battling Isil will soon be screened in Britain, said he believed the jihadist threat was “the last pearl to be released from the Nazi oyster.”
“We are facing a world wave that started early in the early twentieth century, arriving at its peak now,” said the so-called “warrior-philosopher,” who visited the frontlines of northern Iraq during filming.
He described the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isil) as “a wave of radical Islam, which is a sort of fascism that is an Arab version of the Nazi revolution."
In a wide-ranging interview with The Sunday Telegraph, Mr Levy also called for Kurdistan to be recognised as an independent state given the full support of British, French and American forces.
And he urged coalition forces to break what he called the “prestige” of Isil – as he insisted that the group is a “paper tiger” which is skilled at spreading fear and hatred, but utterly inadequate at warfare.
The Peshmerga – who played a key role in the fight against Saddam Hussein in the First Gulf War – are currently locked in a battle to retake Mosul, Iraq’s second-largest city.

Vicar of Baghdad: 'When I invited Isil to dinner they said, "Yes, we’ll come, but we’ll chop off your head." Rather kind of them to warn me'

For more than 10 years, Canon Andrew White presided over the only Anglican Church in Iraq, a role that led him to be known universally as the Vicar of Baghdad.
But his old parish of St George’s has become too dangerous, and today he leads a peripatetic life, spending time with his displaced congregation in Israel and Amman, Jordan.
He is, in effect, a vicar without a parish. Recently he was to be found in Britain conducting a private service for ‘Christians in Government’ at St Margaret’s church, Westminster. For the past 17 years White, 52, has suffered from multiple sclerosis, so he would normally sit to conduct a service.
But today he is standing. There are two places, he says, where he will always stand: Cambridge, where he was educated, and Westminster. ‘It’s a matter of pride.’

At least 14 killed in Somalia hotel attack by jihadists

At least 14 people were killed when gunmen stormed a hotel in Somalia’s capital and took an unknown number of hotel guests hostage, police and medical workers said Saturday, before security forces hunted down the attackers and ended an hours-long assault that began with an explosives-laden vehicle blowing up at the hotel gate.
Islamic extremist group al-Shabab claimed responsibility for the latest in a series of hotel attacks in Mogadishu.
“We have finally ended the siege. The last remaining militants were killed on the top floor,” police Capt. Mohamed Hussein said after security forces pursued the gunmen who had retreated to upper floors of the Nasa-Hablod hotel, setting up sniper posts on the roof and throwing grenades. Police said at least four gunmen were involved in the attack.
“We have so far confirmed the deaths of 14 people. Some of them died in the hospitals,” Hussein said. The deaths included women who were selling khat, a stimulant leaf popular with Somali men, outside the hotel, he said.
Hussein said security forces killed two of the attackers. Police and medical workers said another nine people were wounded in the assault.

IsraellyCool: Carlos Santana “Excited To Come Back To Tel Aviv”

As I posted back in March, Carlos Santana is set to play in Israel July 30th.
Since the announcement was made, BDS-holes – who previously claimed Santana as one of their own – have been pressuring him not to come.
I hate to break it to them, but their bullying does not seem to be working.
In addition to this video, Santana’s staff have posted the following on his Facebook page, reinforcing his determination to bring a message of “peace, love and an end to conflict.”

A musical tribute to ‘the fiddler of the world’

Dame Helen Mirren was the celebrity master of ceremonies of Thursday night’s Genesis Prize ceremony at the Jerusalem Theater, but award recipient Itzhak Perlman was the star of the evening.
“You’ll be applauding him a lot tonight,” said Mirren at the start of the music-filled evening in honor of the renowned violinist. “He’s a man who hasn’t just survived, but thrived and flourished and inspired.”
Perlman, 70, is the third recipient of the Genesis Prize, the $1-million award created by a trio of Russian Jewish philanthropists. The previous two “Jewish Nobel” recipients were Michael Bloomberg and Michael Douglas.
Prizewinners are expected to donate the funds to projects and organizations they support. Perlman said he intends to invest a large portion in further developing talented Israeli classical musicians and in creating better access to museums, concert halls and centers for people with disabilities.
The evening, as such, was a tribute to the music and instruments that Perlman loves, with pieces performed by the Ra’anana Symphony Orchestra, as well as different ensembles of violinists.
Perlman and his wife, Toby, accompanied by three of their five children and seated in the middle of the auditorium, were visible to many members of the audience, with Perlman’s gray, curly head often bobbing along to the music.

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