07/14 Links Pt2: Critics of Israel’s NGO ‘Transparency Law’ Are Wrong; UNESCO fiasco ~ EoZ

From Ian:

Alan Dershowitz: Who Do Bigots Blame for Police Shootings in America? Israel, of Course!

Intersectionality seems to be driving hard left activists towards a "No True Scotsman" worldview: increasingly, they insist on a package of unrelated left-wing causes that must be embraced by anyone claiming the label of progressive — including the demonization of Israel as a racist, apartheid state.
Perhaps more worryingly, intersectionality tends towards the conclusion that the existing social, political, and economic system is flawed in so many profound ways, that any attempt at remaking it through democratic means is unacceptable. Activists have become increasingly obsessed with "Shut it Down" protest tactics, and a proud politics of "disrespectability," that prioritizes resistance to a "corrupt," "rigged" socio-economic system over respectful discourse and political compromise.
This helps to explain the sympathetic attitude of Black Lives Matter activists towards groups like Hamas, which embrace terror as a mode of "resistance" (in their view) against Israel. Indeed, Black Lives Matter activists have visited Gaza to express solidarity with Palestinians oppressed by so-called racist Israeli self-defense measures. While Black Lives Matter claims to disavow violence in securing its political objectives, many of its most prominent members are far more eager to criticize the "Israeli genocide of Palestinians" than to criticize Hamas for using rockets to target Israeli civilians. Black Lives Matter and other hard left groups have been notably silent about other oppressed ethnic groups such as Tibetans, Chechens, and Kurds. The only alleged "oppressors" they single out for condemnation are the Jews. This double standard raises legitimate questions about their real motivations.
Moreover, the conflation of police actions in American cities with Israeli military actions in Gaza raises a disturbing question: if the so-called oppression of Palestinians in Gaza and the oppression of people of color in the United States are two sides of the same coin — as the SJP implied in its tweet — are the violent tactics employed by Hamas, and perversely supported by many on the hard left, an appropriate model to emulate in the United States? One hopes that the answer is no, and that the intersectionalist radicals will make that clear to their followers.

Eugene Kontorovich: Why Critics of Israel’s New NGO ‘Transparency Law’ Are Wrong

Israel this week passed a law requiring domestic organizations that are primarily funded by foreign governments to disclose this connection in their communications with the government. The law, shepherded by Ayelet Shaked, is totally neutral with regard to the activities of the funded organization. However, European governments that fund political groups only on the left- and far-left of the political spectrum, have denounced the law in apocalyptic terms as undermining Israeli democracy and rightly inviting international opprobrium.
A major talking point of the law’s critics is that it has “no democratic parallel,” and that it puts Israel in the category of non-democratic regimes like Russia, and even sets it on the road to fascism. But if these claims are true, there is little hope for democracy in the U.S., which has had similar rules for decades, and imposed new ones a few years ago without a peep of international objection.
Critics of the Israeli law generally concede that the required disclosures are legitimate. They object that the application of such disclosure requirements only to groups funded by foreign governments, as opposed to those funded by foreign private individuals (who, unlike the EU, support both left- and right-wing political NGOs), are arbitrary and therefore sets Israel apart from other democracies. Both claims are specious.
First of all, treating foreign government contributions differently from private ones is entirely commonplace and rational, especially in the case of Israel.
Governments are indeed different from rich individuals. Governments have foreign policies, trade rules, and United Nations votes—and they use the groups they fund in Israel to produce documents that they then invoke when taking those actions. Private people have no similar powers. As a matter of basic democratic integrity, groups that depend largely on government funds should not be able to advertise their “NGO” status without at least some small-print clarification.

PreOccupiedTerritory: It Dawning On NGOs What ‘NGO’ Stands For (satire)

Following the passage of a law mandating greater disclosure for Non-Governmental Organizations that receive more than fifty percent of their funding from foreign government entities, the directors of such organizations are beginning to realize what the “non-governmental” phrase in the term means.
Organizations such as B’tselem, Breaking the Silence, and other NGOs have reacted with dismay and alarm since such a law was proposed during the previous Knesset term, as have various arms of the European Union and Obama administration. But whereas publicly those bodies rail against the law as a threat to Israeli democracy, privately a number of NGO directors have voiced a dawning awareness that perhaps defining themselves as non-governmental organizations should require that in fact they not be de facto agents of foreign governments.
“Maybe there should be another category of organization,” suggested one organizational director, speaking on condition of anonymity. “I mean, there already is the concept of foreign agent, but that sounds too sinister, and we could never get away with foisting our extreme left-wing agenda on the public if we were perceived as doing the bidding of foreign governments. We’re kind of in a bind like this.”
Another activist confessed that the terminology had bothered her for a long time. “When we accepted millions of dollars from the European Commission over the years the money functionally blinded us to the contradiction between our activities and our status as non-governmental,” she explained. “It was glaring, and my colleagues and I noticed it but chose to ignore it as long as the cash was flowing freely and we didn’t have to make the extent of our dependence on foreign governments public. But lately, with all the debate around this new law, I have to admit I’m uncomfortable.”

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JPost Editorial: UNESCO fiasco

A half century later, the Palestinian Authority is leading a campaign to delegitimize Israel, particularly in Jerusalem, with a narrative that denies history. This recalls the comment by then-foreign minister Chaim Herzog to the General Assembly in September 1967 that the Arab League could table a resolution that the world is flat – and get 40 votes.
“Ever since the Palestinians were accepted to UNESCO in 2011, things have changed,” Dr. Shimon Samuels, director of international relations of the Wiesenthal Center, told The Jerusalem Post.
“It used to be a favorable arena for us, especially at the World Heritage Committee. But the Palestinians have launched a theft of the Jewish narrative. The Palestinians are trying to deny the Jewish narrative, because the validation of the Palestinian narrative depends on deleting the Jewish-Israeli one. It’s a replacement ideology.”
The Temple Mount has been a focal point of violence over the past 10 months, incited by transparently false claims by Palestinian leaders that the government plans to change the status quo there. In the Palestinian-sponsored resolution, Israel is repeatedly referred to as the “occupying power” while being accused of damaging the site by illegal excavations and preventing the Jordanian Wakf from conducting repairs and renovations. The text also refers to the Western Wall plaza in quotation marks, instead using the Arabic term Al-Buraq Plaza.
The draft resolution also accuses Israel of “planting fake Jewish graves in Muslim cemeteries” and of “the continued conversion of many Islamic and Byzantine remains into the so-called Jewish ritual baths or into Jewish prayer places.”

Israel ‘concerned’ over EU revision to UNESCO Jerusalem proposal

A European Union revision to a controversial resolution by the UN’s cultural body on the Old City of Jerusalem had Israel “concerned” on Thursday, with the Foreign Ministry saying the new text still downplays Jewish historical ties to its holiest site.
A statement from the Foreign Ministry in Jerusalem expressed “concern’ over the EU revision to the UNESCO resolution, which it said “nullifies the bond and relationship of the Jewish people to the Temple Mount.”
“The EU proposal still denies the connection of the Jewish people to the Temple Mount,” the Foreign Ministry statement said.
The text of the proposal has not yet been released by the EU.
In its statement, the Foreign Ministry singled out EU member France, which expressed remorse over its “yes” vote on an April UNESCO resolution that ignored Jewish ties to Jerusalem.
It also emphasized Jerusalem was still applying diplomatic pressure to quash the current version.
“Nothing is finished yet,” the ministry added.

EU Coordinator To Knesset: We Are Aware Anti-Zionism Hiding Anti-Semitism

The European Union (EU) recognizes that anti-Zionism is a term often used to mask anti-Semitism, its newly appointed official tasked with combating the phenomenon said Tuesday.
Katharina von Schnurbein, the first person to fill an official EU position fighting anti-Semitism, told a Knesset debate that the EU was doing everything in its power to tackle anti-Semitism in Europe, The Jerusalem Post reported.
“We have very much intensified our efforts, and we must pull our forces to fight this together,” said Schnurbein, quoting recently deceased Holocaust survivor Eli Wiesel: “The opposite of hate is not love, but indifference,” she said.
Yaakov Hagoel, vice chairman of the World Zionist Organization, said while Schnurbein’s appointment gives “new wind in the EU,” it doesn’t reflect its stance as a whole.
While a newly released poll shows that anti-Semitism is on the rise in Western Europe, in Eastern Europe there has been a decrease.
However, the reliability of statistics is questionable since 74% of anti-Semitic incidents are not reported to authorities.

David Collier: Summer Vacation on the Front Lines of Palestine

Katie’s post highlights how full-on and immediate the propaganda and conversion process is. These blogs are not written by people on the ground who ‘know the truth’, but rather naive young adults who have swallowed propaganda whole. These blogs are not a consequence of the NGOs activity but rather a required and advertised activity that provides a vital service in spreading highly politicized and prefabricated disinformation. These ex-volunteers can cross lines that the NGOs cannot. They are also seen as more impartial and trustworthy than either Arabs or Jews—in part because they come from outside the region, and in part because their passion for justice is obviously real.
But manipulating young Western students with no sense of history and who are legitimately shocked by realities that are harsher than those of their university dorms doesn’t take much in the way of political genius—simply a willingness to lie in the service of a cause. These NGOs knowingly mislead people who may truly believe the Palestinians are randomly being murdered in the streets—because they know they can lie and still receive funding from Western governments. It is time to state that many of these groups are openly and knowingly lying, with the intent of presenting an image that is simply not remotely supportable by the facts on the ground—a practice which only perpetuates the conflict.
It is notable that not a single one of the two dozen NGOs we looked at is actively calling on the Palestinians to negotiate, to talk peace, to stand behind a call for a multilateral cessation of all violence. Their purpose is to provoke, and in doing so they strengthen those elements of the Palestinian society that seek conflict and weaken those that do not.

Brexit Disrupts Nonchalant European Union Meddling

In respect of the Palestinian problem, the European political elites have only the means to destabilize the status quo without installing an alternative. But Israel's leaders can take heart. Any declarations made at French President François Hollande's conference will be unenforceable, because the EU on its own lacks the means and because its energies must now focus on stopping its own disintegration.
The underlying reasons for Brexit and for EU disintegration in general have still not been widely understood. Brexit was not merely a vote of no confidence in the EU but also in the UK establishment. Similar gaps between establishment and electorate now exist in several other major European states. In some cases, however, governments are united with their electorates in detesting the EU dictatorship in Brussels.

Like his boss, new UK FM Boris Johnson is an Israel backer

Boris Johnson, the man who almost succeeded David Cameron and was Wednesday appointed Britain’s foreign minister by new Prime Minister Theresa May, has made a name for himself as a decidedly pro-Israeli politician — so much so that he has even managed to alienate Palestinians with past statements.
May too is regarded as a good friend of Israel and Britain’s Jewish community, and has called the Jewish state “the fulfillment of many generations of struggle.”
Johnson visited Israel most recently in November to boost tech ties between the nations, saying London was “a natural partner for Israeli companies seeking to grow.”
During his visit Johnson met with Israeli leaders and toured the Yad Vashem Holocaust museum. He took part in a football match with Arab and Jewish children and was photographed trying out Tel Aviv’s bicycle sharing-system alongside Mayor Ron Huldai. He also opened day trading at the TA Stock Exchange.

Guardian characterizes Boris Johnson’s pro-Israel, anti-BDS comments as a “gaffe”

The Guardian published a story today (July 14th) by Chris Johnston on the appointment, by Britain’s new prime minister, of former London Mayor Boris Johnson as foreign secretary titled ‘Britain’s new foreign secretary Boris Johnson: a career of international gaffes‘.
Among the “gaffes” listed, were comments by Johnson while on a trip to Israel and the Palestinian territories last year.
Israel – November 2015
Johnson’s visit to the occupied Palestinian territories is severely curtailed by his hosts in protest at a series of strongly pro-Israel remarks. They included telling an audience in Tel Aviv that a trade boycott of Israeli goods was “completely crazy” and supported by “corduroy-jacketed, snaggletoothed, lefty academics in the UK”.
Tellingly, another Guardian journalist today on twitter (deputy editor Paul Johnson) repeated the mantra that Johnson “insulted” the Palestinians during his visit.

Likely Trump VP ‘cherishes Israel,’ met Netanyahu, passed anti-boycott laws

For presumptive GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump, picking a running mate may be the closest this campaign gets to echoing his famed reality show “The Apprentice.” While politics-watchers waited with bated breath for the businessman’s anticipated Friday announcement, rumors circulated Thursday that Trump’s selection would be Indiana Governor Mike Pence, a seasoned politician with strong conservative credentials.
Trump was scheduled to make his big reveal on Friday in New York and rumors began to swirl when Pence was spotted late Thursday morning boarding a plane bound for Trump’s hometown.
Pence has strong credentials for his support for Israel, a topic that seems to offer the possibility of unanimity in a party fractured by discord. During this week’s meeting of the party’s platform committee, an unusually strongly worded plank in support of Israel was adopted without any dissenting votes. Both the platform and the VP announcement come ahead of the Republican nominating convention, which will take place next week in Cleveland, Ohio.
While Trump has run afoul of some Jewish Republicans for his failure to disavow anti-Semitic imagery and rhetoric from his supporters, Pence is well-known among Republican lawmakers as a longstanding supporter of Israel.

Trump: 'Is President Obama trying to destroy Israel with all his bad moves?'

Presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump took a stab at US President Barack Obama's stance on Israel late Wednesday, taking to Twitter to ask: "Is President Obama trying to destroy Israel with all his bad moves?"
"Think about it and let me know!" the billionaire real-estate mogul continued.
As Obama's personal relationship with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been marked by tensions, Trump has previously criticized the current US president and his administration for its attitudes toward Israel.
Trump's tweet came days after the Republican Party's Platform Committee unanimously agreed to language on Israel that omits references to a two-state solution with the Palestinians.
In his tweet Wednesday, Trump claimed that the new proposed language of the platform is the "most pro-Israel of all time!"

The Story Behind the GOP’s Anti-Two State Platform

Amid the intrigue and speculation over the upcoming Republican National Convention (RNC) in Cleveland, one item that the party has settled is its firm support for Israel and opposition to a two-state solution for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
On Tuesday, the Republican Platform Committee unanimously approved a number of significant changes to its platform in an attempt to further set the party’s pro-Israel credentials apart from the Democrats, who are facing concerns over their party’s future support for the Jewish state. The GOP’s platform changes included removing language encouraging a two-state solution as well as reinstating a reference to an “undivided” Israel that was previously included in the party’s 2008 platform, but was removed in 2012.
“The U.S. seeks to assist in the establishment of comprehensive and lasting peace in the Middle East, to be negotiated among those living in the region,” the approved amendment said. “We oppose any measures intended to impose an agreement or to dictate borders or other terms, and call for the immediate termination of all US funding of any entity that attempts to do so.”
Alan Clemmons, a member of the South Carolina House of Representatives and a Republican convention delegate, conveyed his disappointment over the 2012 GOP convention, when the platform committee chose not to recognize Jerusalem as the undivided capital of Israel.

BDS is a marginal phenomenon

Ever since the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement against Israel began picking up steam three years ago, its proponents have brazenly declared the movement's inevitable triumph. In April, for example, a pro-divestment group at the University of Chicago issued a statement proclaiming that by the school's student government passing a BDS resolution, the university "finally put (itself) on the right side of history."
BDS proponents interpreted the momentum in progressive circles, such as student government and academic bodies, as a sure sign from the political gods that BDS will gain acceptance in wider and wider swaths of American society. Eventually, they assert, Americans will realize that their supposed ally Israel is an apartheid state and will cease their support.
I must admit to the occasional bout of exasperated resignation. There's no denying that increasing numbers of progressives were embracing the BDS cause. A number of student governments that had initially rejected BDS had later endorsed it. Momentum had turned in the movement's favor.
Could there be, as the BDS proponents alleged, an unfolding historical dialectic at work here -- one as unmistakably foreseeable as the eventual triumph over apartheid South Africa -- that would culminate in Israel's ultimate delegitimization in American society? Is it just a matter of time?
Not so fast. In the past several months, the tables have turned. Anti-BDS bills have passed in state legislatures by huge margins and BDS resolutions have gone down in defeat at several progressive institutions.

Important context the UK media missed in stories alleging rabbi condoned rape

British media reports on controversial comments made by the IDF’s new nominee for chief rabbi (Colonel Eyal Karim) which elicited criticism from women’s groups and some politicians have, for the most part, been reasonably fair.
Though, the Guardian, Telegraph and Independent have all lead with the most sensationalist charges, that, in 2002 (before serving in the military), he seemed to suggest that soldiers may commit rape during wartime, all noted that he was speaking theoretically, based on his understanding of verses in the Torah, and was not discussing how soldiers should behave in modern times.
All reports also noted Karim’s subsequent clarification, stressing that rape is always wrong.
Whilst the reports largely avoided misrepresentations of Karim’s comments, the decision by editors to publish the stories at all seems quite questionable in light of the fact that – as they’ve all noted – he in fact denied (several years ago) ever claiming that, in the modern era, rape was ever justified in battle.
However, there’s a larger point.
The news-worthiness of a story seems predicated upon a question concerning the larger context: why is this particular story relevant today? In publishing these articles, are readers to believe that the rape of Palestinians by Israeli soldiers during wartime is or has ever been a problem in the IDF? Because, the available research indicates that the opposite is true.
Specifically, research conducted by Elisabeth Wood, an expert on wartime sexual violence from Yale University, demonstrated that the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict represents a rare example where rape during wartime is extremely rare “if not totally absent”.

Terror-Tied Muslims Co-opting Black Lives Matter: 'You Are the New Black People of America'

Muslim-American activists and organizations are actively co-opting the Black Lives Matter movement and making it a movement of their own.
The call was sent out in December of last year at the 14th Annual MAS-ICNA convention in Chicago by the founder and executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, Nihad Awad. He told the thousands in attendance:
"Black Lives Matter is our matter. Black Lives Matter is our campaign."
Awad also said that every mosque in the United States needs to be turned into voter registration centers:
"You are powerful. You can make whole difference in 2016. You can change the reality of our time. This is the time for us American-Muslims to be in the front, not to retreat. Because all of you are leaders. Your votes are your negotiating power in the year 2016. Turn your centers -- Islamic centers, mosques -- into registration centers for voters."
David Horowitz's Discover the Networks tells you everything you need to know about terror-tied CAIR's leader, Nihad Awad: a supporter of Hamas who rejects Israel's right to exist, blames U.S. presidents for being "servants to Israel, and partially blames America for the 9/11 attacks.
Also speaking at the Muslim American Society (MAS) convention was its executive director and project developer Khalilah Sabra, a prominent Islamic activist. Here's what she had to tell the Muslims in the crowd:

Black Lives Matter: Hamas Pawn

Black Lives Matter: Marxist and Anti-Israel to the Core

In a lengthy Discover the Networks profile of the group, we learn the following:
BLM's Anti-Israel Orientation
In January 2015, BLM co-founder Patrisse Cullors joined representatives from the Dream Defenders as well as a number of likeminded anti-police-brutality protesters in taking a 10-day trip to the Palestinian Territories in the West Bank. Their objective was to publicly draw a parallel between what they defined as Israeli oppression of the Palestinians in the Middle East, and police violence against blacks in the United States. A complete list of the delegates who made this trip included five Dream Defenders (Phillip Agnew, Ciara Taylor, Steven Pargett, Sherika Shaw, Ahmad Abuznaid); Tef Poe and Tara Thompson from Ferguson/Hands Up United; journalist Marc Lamont Hill; Cherrell Brown and Carmen Perez of the Justice League NYC; Charlene Carruthers from the Black Youth Project; poet and artist Aja Monet; and USC doctoral student Maytha Alhassen.
In August 2015, BLM co-founder Patrisse Cullors was one of more than 1,000 black activists, artists, scholars, politicians, students, “political prisoners,” and organizational representatives to sign a statement proclaiming their “solidarity with the Palestinian struggle and commitment to the liberation of Palestine’s land and people”; demanding an end to Israel's “occupation” of “Palestine”; condemning “Israel’s brutal war on Gaza and chokehold on the West Bank”; urging the U.S. government to end all aid to Israel; and exhorting black institutions to support the Boycott, Divestment, & Sanctions movement against the Jewish state.

Visiting BBC Journalist Surprisingly Tells the Truth About Israel, Hezbollah

A BBC correspondent usually based in Mexico City is currently visiting Israel and on July 12, she produced two reports — one written and one filmed — relating to the 10th anniversary of the Second Lebanon War.
In her filmed report titled “On patrol with the Israel Defense Forces on Lebanon border,” Katy Watson gave viewers a rare view of Hezbollah’s use of the residents of southern Lebanon as human shields.
“The soldiers tell me they can see weapons being stored in areas where civilians live.”

CNN’s Anti-Israel “Comedian” Rages Against Israel – And It’s Not Funny

CNN published a furious rage against Israel by Amer Zahr, whom the network describes as “a Palestinian-American comedian and adjunct professor at University of Detroit Mercy School of Law.” But Zahr’s delusional tirade is far from funny.
Zahr was nominally responding to a Jason Greenblatt op-ed in support of Donald Trump’s presidential campaign. But in fact, Zahr barely mentioned Trump at all, instead focusing his vitriol almost entirely on Israel.
Zahr’s “article” is merely a laundry list of lies, conspiracy theories and out-of-context “facts” that are popular among Israel-haters, but have long ago been proven untrue.
Fortunately, HonestReporting and other sources have already addressed many of the items on Zahr’s laundry list of lies.
Zahr begins with the well worn fairy-tale that upon its creation, Israel forcibly evicted large numbers of Palestinians from their homes.

The New York Times Ignores Huge Story of State Department Using Tax Dollars in Anti-Netanyahu Scheme

The State Department spent US taxpayer dollars funding a political campaign against Benjamin Netanyahu, then destroyed emails that documented the campaign, a US Senate investigation found.
It’s big news, as several journalistic institutions recognized this week. “The State Dept. Plan to Bring Down Netanyahu,” was the headline that Tablet used in an email to promote its news article. “Senate report: State Dept. grant also aided campaign to unseat Netanyahu,” was the headline over Politico’s story.
Over at the Council on Foreign Relations, Elliott Abrams, a former State Department and National Security official, wrote a blog post about the situation. “Is foreign intervention in Israeli politics a serious issue? You bet, and one of the main culprits turns out to be the United States of America,” Mr. Abrams wrote. Mr. Abrams also pointed out the hypocrisy — Prime Minister Netanyahu was accused by critics of meddling in American politics by speaking to Congress against the Iran deal, yet here was the Obama administration funding a campaign to oust the Israeli premier from office.
The Washington Post found it worthy of coverage, too: “Senate investigation says top U.S. diplomat deleted emails,” said one Post headline, over an Associated Press article. “NGO connected to Obama’s 2008 campaign used US dollars trying to oust Netanyahu,” was the headline over another Washington Post account of the news.

IsraellyCool: Ridiculous Anti-Israel Propaganda Found In Singaporean School

The following anti-Israel propaganda was reportedly seen in a Catholic school in Singapore, of all places.

Yup, the main reason for the conflict is Israeli rockets into palestinian territory (that explains the Hebron massacre of 1929!), which the palestinians have apparently left. And the territory is strangely simultaneously a closed military area, despite the absence of palestinians.
And that poor palestinian girl with the sign “I’m dying in the desert”? Yeah, she’s Iraqi.
Remember, if you have to lie about everything, you might just be on the wrong side.

German cops raid online anti-Semites, Holocaust deniers

German police on Wednesday launched nationwide raids targeting social media users who posted racial hatred, including anti-Semitism, on Facebook and other online networks.
Police swooped down on the homes of some 60 suspects across 14 of Germany’s 16 states, the BKA federal crime bureau said, in a crackdown on “verbal radicalism” and related criminal offences.
No arrests were made, but computer equipment, cameras and smartphones were seized in the first-ever such mass raids targeting online hate crime.
Most of the suspects allegedly belonged to a neo-Nazi Facebook group whose users had posted xenophobic, anti-Semitic or other far-right messages.
The posts included messages denying or relativizing the Holocaust, celebrating aspects of National Socialism and using Nazi symbolism, and calling for attacks on refugees and politicians.
BKA chief Holger Muench said police were taking a “clear stance against hate and incitement on the internet,” which had increased amid the refugee crisis and was poisoning public discourse.

Polish education minister says massacres of Jews an ‘opinion’

Poland’s education minister has sparked criticism for appearing to deny Polish responsibility for two massacres of Jews in the 1940s.
Anna Zalewska’s comments on Wednesday evening raised questions about the commitment by the populist ruling party, Law and Justice, both to historical truth and to opposing anti-Semitism.
Since coming to power last year, leaders of the Law and Justice party have sent mixed messages on where they stand on issues of tolerance. President Andrzej Duda, who hails from the party and remains an ally, has strongly condemned anti-Semitism at multiple state observances. But some ruling party members have appeared to pander to extreme nationalists at times.
The comments concerned the Jedwabne massacre of 1941, when Poles burned alive more than 300 Jews in a barn and the Kielce massacre of 1946, in which 42 people died. Anniversaries of both pogroms were marked with observances last week, with Duda condemning anti-Semitism at the Kielce event.

Car-tracking company employs drones to retrieve stolen cars

Authorities have now permitted private security companies to operate drones. Mamon, Ynet's sister publication, learned that Ituran, a company that provides tracking and protection services for vehicles, has successfully employed drones to locate stolen car in the past few weeks.
Drones are now providing the largest stolen car tracking companies in Israel with capabilities that had been previously limited to the security forces. These companies can use drones in the locating phase wherein the thieves are attempting to hide stolen cars in orchards and non-residential areas until law enforcement reaches the scene. Additionally they will employ them to locate stolen vehicles that cross the green line.
For example, last week Ituran rescued a stolen Buick Lacrosse in Tulkarem. Company employees first used the drone to locate the car in the Palestinian city and then traveled there with IDF forces and loaded the car onto a tow truck. Thereafter, they returned the car to Israel and its legal owners.
"Drones constitute an additional force in the war on car theft," said Oded Paz, Ituran's head of Operational Systems. The downward trend in stolen cars continued this year. According to police data, 5400 cars were stolen between January and May, a decrease of 19 percent decrease compared to the same period in 2015.

Santana thumbs nose at BDS to appear in Tel Aviv

The legendary Grammy-award winning guitarist Carlos Santana is scheduled to appear in Park Hayarkon is Tel Aviv on July 30, Yediot Aharonot reported.
When asked what his stance is regarding the anti-Israel BDS movement, that encourages the boycott of Israeli businesses and often pressures artists not to perform in Israel, Santana stated that "I prefer to do something productive with my energy. The majority of proceeds from the concert will go to Israeli and Palestinian children.
"A friend once told me, 'stop whining, either do something helpful or shut up.' That's my answer to a lot of people. I do things from my heart, in order to help the world and get to greater compassion and forgiveness."
Santana emphasizes the universal aspects of music. "Music is something holy, an inspiration that helps people see how to live together in coexistence. When you hear all the music in the world, age doesn't matter. It's a collective celebration, energy and other world views - it keeps you really young," he said.

Israeli company to build $640 million toll road in Colombia

An Israeli company will have a pivotal role in a multinational plan to upgrade Colombia’s roads.
Shikun & Binui will build the nearly 100-mile-long Cundinamarca 010 toll road near Bogota, the South American country’s capital, the Israeli news portal Israel21c reported. The project – including financing, construction costs, rehabilitation, operation and maintenance – is estimated at approximately $640 million.
An Israeli global construction and infrastructure company headquartered in Airport City, near Ben Gurion International Airport, Shikun & Binui said it recently completed the financing for the construction, operation and maintenance of its $1 billion toll lanes project in metropolitan Houston.
In both Colombia and Texas, the construction will be performed by SBI, Shikun & Binui Group’s international contracting subsidiary.

Chicken Without the Egg: Israeli Startup Creates Bioengineered Meat Without the Bird

The Israeli startup SuperMeat launched their crowdfunding campaign on Monday, hoping to deliver on their tagline: “Real meat, without harming animals.” The company bioengineers chicken from cultured cells to create meat without harming animals.
A visit to the SuperMeat website prompts users to choose between “Meat is delicious!” or “Stop animal suffering!”— then proposes an option to satisfy both camps: tasty meat that causes no animal harm or environmental degradation. Co-founder and co-CEO Koby Barak, a vegan and longstanding animal rights activist, promises that SuperMeat will be both vegan and kosher.
“The vast majority of the vegan-vegetarian movement is very supportive, and we thank them for really supporting us,” Barak explained in an interview with the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. “I have spoken to about 10 rabbis and I don’t see any problem. It will be kosher.”
SuperMeat’s process starts with taking cells from a chicken without harming the animal. The cells are then developed within a machine that replicates the bird’s biological environment, spurring the cells to self-assemble into meat. While SuperMeat isn’t the first cultured meat company, it is the first to specialize in chicken, and it uses a new and patented technology developed by Yaakov Nahmias, a biomedical engineer at Hebrew University of Jerusalem who is the startup’s co-founder and head of research.

In Israel, Belgian nobles meet Jews saved by their relatives in Holocaust

They are directly or indirectly related to most of the royal houses of Europe and can trace the lineage for more than a millennium. Led by Prince Michel de Ligne, 35 of them, representing four generations from several countries, are currently in Israel to close a noble circle. They are descendants of Eugène, the 11th prince of Ligne, and his wife, Philippine, who during the Second World War hid hundreds of Jewish children in Beloeil, the de Ligne family castle, which is widely known as the Versailles of Belgium.
Eugène and his wife were recognized by Yad Vashem as Righteous among the Nations in June 1975, long after their deaths.
Their descendants have come to plant a tree at Yad Vashem in their memories and to meet some of the children they saved, who now, as senior citizens, are living in Israel.
Six of those Jewish children accompanied the de Ligne family on its tour of the country and also accompanied it to the President’s Residence to meet with President Reuven Rivlin.
Only three people knew about the Jewish children separated from their parents and sheltered at Beloeil, and they remained silent, Prince Michel stated.
One of the survivors, Avraham Kapotka, speaking on behalf of the children who had been saved, said: “We were alone. We didn’t know if or when we would see out parents again, but we were in a safe and quiet place, and we thank Prince Michel for preserving the memory of our salvation. We owe a deep debt of gratitude to all those who worked toward saving our lives and providing us with a safe haven.”

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