01/10 Links Pt1: Jerusalem attack exposes Israel's false peace partner; Obama’s Dangerous Palestinian Gambit ~ EoZ

From Ian:

JPost Editorial: Jerusalem attack exposes Israel's false peace partner

What possesses a father of four with most of his life still ahead of him to get behind the wheel of a truck and embark on a vehicular murder spree that will almost certainly end in his own demise?
Fadi al-Qanbar, 28, the man who plowed his truck into a group of IDF cadets on Sunday, was not considered a security risk by the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency), though he had served time in prison. He had no known connections with a terrorist organization. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said al-Qanbar identified with ISIS. But why? Why would a resident of Jerusalem’s Jebl Mukaber neighborhood launch a suicide mission to murder Israelis knowing that his wife would be widowed and his two sons and two daughters would be orphaned in the process?
A saying attributed to Golda Meir comes to mind: “Peace will come when the Arabs will love their children more than they hate us.”
We agree. If al-Qanbar had cared for himself, his children and his family - not to mention the soldiers he rammed into - he never would have carried out his attack on Sunday.
While we still don’t know what pushed al-Qanbar to carry out his attack, the incitement that comes out daily from the Palestinian Authority plays an important role.
The failure by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to condemn the attack by Monday night – more than 36 hours since it took place – is part of a culture of hate, violence and intransigence. A “peace partner” does not remain silent when innocent 20-year-olds are deliberately run down by a truck on a sunny Sunday afternoon in Jerusalem. A real peace partner speaks up, shouts and condemns.

Berlin emblazons Israeli flag on Brandenburg Gate after Jerusalem attack

Berlin’s Brandenburg Gate was lit with the Israeli flag Monday night in a show of solidarity following a terror attack in Jerusalem Sunday in which four IDF soldiers were killed.
Like the Empire State Building, the Eiffel Tower and other landmarks, the gate is often used as a screen for national colors to show support in the wake of attacks and other incidents.
The landmark was illuminated with the Turkish flag last week following the Istanbul New Year’s attack.
East Jerusalem resident Fadi el-Qanbar drove a truck into a group of soldiers at the Haas-Sherover Promenade in the Armon Hanatziv neighborhood of Jerusalem on Sunday.

Ben-Dror Yemini: The gate of change

Lighting up Berlin’s Brandenburg Gate with an Israeli flag is a form of ceremony. Israel is entering the family of nations. Until now, in the Western public opinion and mainly in the elites’ opinion, Israel has been seen as the cause of terror. That has been expressed occasionally in editorials, or by figures such as former US President Jimmy Carter and Swedish Foreign Minister Margot Wallstrom, following the terror attacks in Europe. The Israeli flag on one of the most important symbols in Germany somewhat changes the picture.
Is this also a step towards a change in awareness? Possibly. Because in the past few years, Europe has been going through a certain change. Until less than a decade ago, Israel was perceived—both in comments and in public opinion polls—as one of the biggest threats to world peace. That was false consciousness, the product of successful poisonous propaganda.
But something is changing. The Europeans, who are not involved in any occupation or in any oppression, are becoming the victims of terror. Brussels, Paris, Nice and Berlin have joined Madrid and London as jihad targets. The Europeans are afraid of the radicalization of part of the Muslims. They are still failing to understand that it’s not the occupation that causes terror in Israel. But they are beginning to understand.

Palestinians: Glorifying Mass Murderers

The murderous legacy and personality of Yahya Ayyash, a Hamas mass murderer who masterminded a wave of suicide bombings, are being glorified not only by his Hamas supporters, but also by the "moderate" Western-funded Palestinian Authority (PA), headed by Mahmoud Abbas.
Ayyash won his reputation on the murdering and maiming of hundreds of Israelis, most of them innocent civilians. Had he fought for peace and coexistence, Ayyash would have been condemned as a "traitor" and gone down in history as a "defeatist" and "surrenderist."
"The mosque that produced the mujahed [warrior] Ayyash is continuing to produce heroes." – Sheikh Yusef al-Qaradawi, spiritual leader of the Muslim Brotherhood.
It is in these mosques that Ayyash was taught that Islam permits people like him to build bombs and dispatch suicide bombers to blow up buses. It is also in these mosques where he was taught that devout Muslims are best engaged in spilling Jewish blood.
Children and youths who attend prayers at these mosques are being fed the same hate-speech rhetoric that their hero Ayyash was exposed to in his childhood. Hence it is no surprise that the mosques in the West Bank and Gaza Strip continue to this day to churn out new terrorists, many of whom aspire to become like Ayyash – mass murderers.
These European leaders wrongly image that if they get rid of Israel, it will be only Israel. They fail see that Israel is just the first course. They imagine that if they accede to Muslims' wishes, they will be safe. What they fail to see, as in France, Germany, Sweden, Belgium and Britain, is that they will be next.

Caroline Glick: Netanyahu, Congress, AIPAC and the PLO

Although AIPAC condemned the Obama administration’s refusal to veto 2334, it continues to fervently support the PLO and Palestinian statehood. Indeed, just days after 2334 passed, AIPAC officials and missions were meeting with Erekat and other PLO operatives in Ramallah, as if there is anything pro-Israel about meeting with people who just got the Security Council to resolve that Israel is a criminal state.
AIPAC’s continued support for the PLO no doubt stems in part from its desire to keep the Democratic Party inside the pro-Israel tent. Unfortunately, that ship seems to have sailed.
Nearly 40% of House Democrats including minority leader Nancy Pelosi and assistant leader Jim Clyburn voted against the PLO state supporting resolution.
Rep. Keith Ellison, who is the front-runner to be elected Democratic National Committee chairman later this month, also voted no. Two thirds of the 95 Democrats supported by J Street opposed the resolution.
Most of the Democrats that supported Resolution 11 may well have supported it even if it had left out the goal of giving the PLO a state. It cannot be credibly argued that Reps. Elliot Engel and Steny Hoyer would have opposed Resolution 11 if it had simply stated that 2334 was antisemitic.
Certainly it is hard to argue they would have opposed it if the vote was delayed until January 21. Indeed, it is hard to understand why it was necessary to pass the resolution while President Barack Obama – who partnered with the PLO to pass 2334 – is still in office.
Resolution 2334’s passage must be viewed as an inflection point. It is no longer possible to credibly argue that the PLO is remotely interested in peace with Israel. Sunday’s murderous terrorist attack Jerusalem was further testament of this truth.
The time has come for Israelis and Israel’s supporters in the US to demand that our leaders – from Prime Minister Netanyahu to AIPAC to members of Congress – finally recognize and act of this truth. The whitewashing of the PLO must end.

Richard Epstein: Obama’s Dangerous Palestinian Gambit

The Jordanians were, of course, no friends of the Palestinians. Indeed, in September 1970 there was a fierce conflict, known as Black September, in which the Palestinian Liberation Organization forces led by Yasir Arafat were defeated by the Jordanian forces led by then-King Hussein, and were forced into exile after the death of thousands. Just what would have happened to Palestinian national ambitions if the territories had been returned to Jordan so that the Fourth Convention would no longer apply? We shall never know the answer to that question because Jordan never sought to regain the territories and indeed in 1988 renounced all claim to the West Bank in part to clear the path to Palestinian claims. Note that the Jordanians did not—nor could they have—transferred their claims to Palestine which did not (and still does not) have statehood status. At this point, we have the novel situation in which the stripping away of the initial sovereign leaves Israel without a genuine competitor for sovereignty over the territories. Nothing in the Fourth Convention covers these unique circumstances. And it is a political, not a legal, issue that governs the implementation of any potential two-state solution.
Nor is the situation made any clearer by the 2004 Advisory opinion, which addressed the legality of the wall that Israel erected around the West Bank to protect itself against widespread Palestinian terrorist attacks. Clearly the wall separated the West Bank from the rest of Israel, and it was condemned for that reason as illegal by the ICJ, which heavily relied on notions of customary international law that have never been supported by a consistent practice that requires nations to remain immobile in the face of systematic terror threats. To be sure, Resolution 2234 condemns terrorist activities, but only in a disembodied sense that makes no reference to the constant activities of Hamas or the active support for terrorist activities that is fully institutionalized by the Palestinian authority, which offers financial support for individuals and the families of those who kill or maim Israelis. Generalized pronouncements make it appear that Israel and the Palestinian Authority are equal offenders in the commission of terrorist acts, when it is highly likely that the Israeli security measures would be vastly curtailed if there were credible assurances that the bombings, shootings, and stabbings would come to an end.
The one-sided treatment of these legal issues is consistent with the general UN approach that obsessively condemns Israel while mostly overlooking the atrocities that have ravaged the greater Middle East. In light of these issues, it is somewhat odd to treat the settlements as though they were the major obstacle to the two-state solution. Remove them tomorrow, especially in response to the UN resolution, and the most likely outcome is that the PA and Hamas would intensify their activities to destroy the Jewish state, just as they did in 1948, 1956, 1967, and 1973 when Israel fought wars of survival, knowing full well that the first defeat would be the last one, even if the 1949 Geneva Convention places strict limitations on how occupying powers have to behave toward conquered people.
The Israelis know this all too well. They also know that the lesson of the 2005 withdrawal from Gaza led to the rise of Hamas and to repeated military actions and missile attacks between 2006 and 2014. Any unilateral surrender of lands in the West Bank to a new Palestinian state opens up the possibility that greater hostilities could be launched against an Israel weakened by successive rounds of fatal concessions. The Israelis claim that the only path to peace is through bilateral negotiations between the parties, backed by the US and the UN. Those negotiations were apparently close to success in 2000 and 2008, but the deal was never closed because of the Palestinians.
At this point, Resolution 2234 has killed the prospects for any negotiated peace in the foreseeable future. The Palestinian Authority will treat compliance with a ruinous Resolution as a precondition for further negotiations. The Israelis cannot live in a world that requires them to surrender territories under their control before 1967. The terms of the UN Resolution thus have put an effective end to all negotiations between the two sides. The Israelis are likely to continue the dangerous game of expanding settlements in the West Bank, as the only credible way of punishing the Palestinians for their continued delay. Whether this strategy will work, or should work, is a hard call. But much of the blame for the current impasse lies at the feet of Secretary of State John Kerry who never did understand the political dynamics of the Israeli-Palestinian negotiations.

Bret Stephens ($): On Palestinian Statehood

Would a Palestinian state serve the cause of Mideast peace? This used to be conventional wisdom, on the theory that a Palestinian state would lead to peace between Israel and its Arab neighbors.
Today the proposition is ridiculous. No deal between Jerusalem and Ramallah is going to lift the sights of those now fighting in Syria, Iraq or Yemen. Nor will a deal reconcile Tehran and its terrorist proxies in Lebanon and Gaza to the existence of a Jewish state.
Aren't the Palestinians entitled to a state? Maybe. But are they more entitled to one than the Assamese, Basques, Baloch, Corsicans, Druze, Flemish, Kashmiris, Kurds, Moros, Native Hawaiians, Northern Cypriots, Rohingya, Tibetans, Uyghurs or West Papuans - all of whom have distinct national identities, legitimate historical grievances and plausible claims to statehood? What gives Palestinians the preferential claim?
Comparisons aside, would a Palestinian state be good for Palestinian people? A June 2015 poll by the Palestinian Center for Public Opinion found that a majority of Arab residents in east Jerusalem would rather live as citizens with equal rights in Israel than in a Palestinian state.
But isn't a Palestinian state a necessity for Israel? Can it maintain its Jewish and democratic character without separating itself from the Palestinians?
In theory, Israel would be well-served living alongside a sovereign Palestinian state that lived in peace with its neighbors. But Israelis don't live in theory. They live in a world where Israeli prime ministers made good-faith offers of Palestinian statehood and were met with rejection and violence.

Anne Bayefsky: France Prepares Yet Another Anti-Israel International Assault, with Obama's Blessing

President Obama has gone rogue and only one man can protect American democracy in the next few days: the President-elect.
On January 15, 2017, with only five days left after 2,917 days in office, President Barack Obama is planning once again to feed Israel to the international wolves. The move is intended to tie the hands of President Donald Trump and is a direct repudiation of the will of the American electorate who rejected Obama’s calamitous foreign policy and a repeat performance by his secretary of state.
On Sunday, France is scheduled to hold an international conference to unleash an international mob on Israel. The meeting is taking place with Obama’s direct connivance. Seventy-states have been lined up to impose their preferences on the Middle East’s only democracy. Israelis are still dying in Israeli streets after seventy years of unending Arab terror – and the folks sitting in Paris munching on croissants know best how to protect Israeli national security.
The bare-faced power-grab by France and its Arab allies – with the blessing of President Obama – raises unavoidable questions: Who will attend? If they attend, how senior a representative will be sent by the main players on the Security Council: the U.S., Russia, and the United Kingdom? Will attendees sign on to an outcome document imperiling Israel that is already circulating? Will the Middle East Quartet – composed of the U.S., the EU, Russia and the UN – approve of the outcome document? Will a UN Security Council subsequently approve of the outcome document before January 20, 2017?
The French meeting follows on President Obama helping to ram through a UN Security Council resolution on December 23, 2016 that was clearly intended to unleash a legal and economic pogrom against the Jewish state. It didn’t take long for Palestinian terrorists to get the message: sidelining a negotiated solution between the parties by strong-arming an Israeli villain at the UN was a greenlight for the enforcers in Gaza City and Ramallah.

Shmuley Boteach: No Holds Barred: Obama and Israel: The final insult

By approving the resolution’s absurd language that Israel’s claim to the Western Wall and Jerusalem’s Jewish Quarter has “no legal validity,” and ignoring the Jewish people’s 3,000-year-old connection to Judea and Samaria, the Obama administration only encourages Palestinian jihadists to cling to their dreams of driving the Jews into the sea. No wonder Hamas and Iran-backed Islamic Jihad, who are dedicated to Israel’s destruction, have praised it.
In his speech about the resolution, Kerry said, “It is vital that we have an honest, clear-eyed conversation about the uncomfortable truths.”
Here are just a few of them: No agreement, including the Oslo Accords signed by the Palestinians, precludes Israel from building settlements in Judea and Samaria. In fact, even two-state proponents acknowledge Israel’s right to annex the major settlements as part of a land swap in the final peace agreement.
The “West Bank” territory is disputed – not occupied. It was never a sovereign Palestinian state. After the expulsion of Jews 2,000 years ago, the land was occupied by many nations, most recently by the Ottomans, British and Jordanians. Only in 1967, after Israel defeated Jordan in the Six Day War, did claims of “illegal occupation” become fashionable. After all, which legal entity did Israel illegally occupy it from? The Ottoman Empire? The British mandate? Certainly not from any state called “Palestine.”
What a tragedy for the legacy of Barack Obama, whose countless assurances of “having Israel’s back” have proven worthless.
Already tainted by the Iran deal, his legacy will be stained by this cowardly stab in Israel’s back in the fleeting days of his presidency.

Amb. Alan Baker: Debunking More False Assumptions Regarding Israel

Further to the recent publication of “Ten False Assumptions Regarding Israel,” which addressed many of the widely-held and universally-disseminated false and mistaken assumptions regarding Israel, a number of additional false assumptions – some even more willful and malicious – are addressed.
1. “Israel is committing genocide, mass murder and ethnic cleansing against the Palestinian People” – a false and malicious blood-libel.
2. “The Jews are not a people and have no rights in the Middle East” – False and Misguided
3. “The establishment of Israel was a catastrophe for the Palestinians” – False
4. “Israel prevents the supply of water to the Palestinian population” – False
5. “Israel violates its obligations in the Oslo Accords” – False
6. “Israel is denying the ‘right of return’ to millions of Palestinian refugees” – False.
7. “BDS is a progressive, non-violent movement in the best tradition of peaceful activism” – False and Deceptive
8. “Israel is undermining the ‘two state solution’”- False and Misleading.
9. “Israel’s maritime blockade of the Gaza Strip is illegal” – False.
10. Israel is conducting extrajudicial murders and is randomly and cold-bloodedly executing Palestinians – False and Malicious
11. “Israel committed war crimes in the Gaza Strip including the indiscriminate murder of children” – False

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On January 20, however, Kerry will no longer be in charge of the U.S.’s Middle East policies, and Barack Obama will no longer be President. President-elect Donald Trump has created much ambiguity as to where the U.S. will stand on the Israel-Palestinian conflict, just as he did on most other issues, so I will offer my humble advice.
The Trump administration should do the only thing that will break the impasse, something that every U.S. administration has so far been afraid to do, and that is to support Israel in resolving the conflict unilaterally. Let Israel set the borders and the separation rules to suit its own demographic and security needs. Let Israel build the wall. Let Israel defend itself as it sees fit. Most importantly, oppose any UN Security Council resolution that might interfere with Israel’s plan.
Israel won the Israel-Arab war, and despite that, Palestinians have had seven decades to shape their own future rather than be dictated by the victor. But after 69 years of obstructionism, the Palestinian leadership no longer deserves a seat at the table. It is time for Israel to behave as the victor of the conflict, and to win the peace just as it won the war.>Can Trump break the impasse and help Israel finally enjoy the fruits of victory?

Gerard Henderson: Block to Israeli-Palestinian peace remains the same as in 1967

The UN Security Council’s Resolution 2334, carried on December 23 with the US abstaining, is related to the Arab-Israeli War that ran between June 5 and June 10, 1967.
The resolution condemns “all measures aimed at altering the demographic composition, character and status of the Palestinian Territory occupied since 1967, including East Jerusalem”.
Australia appears to be the only Western democracy to indicate that it does not agree with the passing of the resolution. New Zealand was one of the sponsors of the motion.
In fact, there was no such entity as a “Palestinian Territory” in 1967. Following the creation of the State of Israel by the UN in 1948, the land between Israel and the Jordan River was controlled by Jordan. Jordan did not give independence to Palestinians before the Six-Day War. Large parts of the West Bank are administered by the Palestinian Authority.
Like many monumental events, the history of the Six-Day War is contested.
The conflict is well summarised, in a balanced way, by Eugene Rogan in The Arabs: A History. The Arab nations at the time did not recognise Israel’s right to exist, referring to the nation merely as the “Zionist entity”.

Spectator Editorial: The evil of 2334

If, as the Australian newspaper implied this week, The Spectator Australia has played a minor role in the recent acknowledgment by the Jerusalem Post that Australia’s multi-faceted support for Israel is worthy of special commendation, then we wear such praise as a badge of honour.
‘Australia has emerged as one of Israel’s few true friends… We should not take this friendship for granted,’ the Jerusalem Post editorialised. Which, to be blunt, is something of an understatement.
With New Zealand shamefully sponsoring the odious and breathtakingly anti-Semitic UN Security Resolution 2334; with a ragbag collection of Islamic and failed fellow-travelers gleefully joining in like ‘a pack of jackals’; with Britain equally shamefully voting for this disgrace; and with the US abstaining (in effect voting for) the resolution as part of Barack Obama’s and John Kerry’s vitriolic lame duck death throes, it is unclear if Israel has any real friends outside of Australia.
As this week’s cover stories by David Flint and Daryl McCann make depressingly clear, 2334 is a grotesque attempt by the failed Obama administration not only to disguise a plethora of disastrous actions and inactions they are responsible for, that have fuelled global and Middle East instability and war, but worse, is a direct existential threat to Israel. Already, historical revisionism is being given succour by 2334. This week, for example, saw Islamic guards harrassing an Israeli archeologist for using the term ‘Temple Mount’ on, er, the Temple Mount.

David Flint: Obama notes: Stabbing an ally in the back

Under article 80 of the UN Charter, these territories clearly remain legally subject today to the Jewish right of settlement established in the Mandate. The article was carefully drafted with precisely this in mind; no mere Security Council resolution can ever change this.
The opponents of Israel argue that the Fourth Geneva Convention introduced in response to Nazi atrocities in occupied territories outlaws Israel’s settlements. This is patently untrue; the convention only applies when the territory of a state party to the Convention is occupied which is clearly not the case with the West Bank. In accordance with the Mandate this remains part of the Jewish homeland. Israel alone can forfeit this, as she has to a great extent in Gaza.
The continual calls for a two-state solution, which would involve creating a tiny second Palestinian state smaller than Brisbane, have proved to be a smoke screen and have surely run their course. On the seven occasions when Israel or the Jewish community have agreed to these, her opponents have either backed away or imposed ridiculous conditions.
Their agenda remains. In the words of the Tehran mullahs, it is that agenda, unacceptable to the civilised world, of ‘Death to Israel’.

Ten Failed State Department Plans for Mideast Peace

1. The Divided Jerusalem Plan
As US ambassador to Israel in September 2000, Martin Indyk first publicly urged Israel to “share the governance of Jerusalem and its holy sites” with the Palestinians. Now, in his January 2017 New York Times op-ed, Indyk has urged the incoming Trump administration to push for dividing control of Jerusalem between Israel and the PA, which Indyk contends would “open the way to negotiation on other final-status issues like the borders of a Palestinian state.”
Political historian Gil Troy, of McGill University, told JNS.org that the State Department’s plans regarding Israel often have been driven by appeasement rather than principle. Kerry’s recent warning against moving the US Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem “wasn’t a principled argument, but was simply based on fear of violence by extremists,” and “is exactly the kind of cowardice that comes from State, and which [incoming President Donald] Trump will abhor,” Troy said. He predicted that “the chance of a clash between a tweet-driven, populist, seat-of-the-pants Trump White House and the striped-pants types at the State Department is huge.”
Professor Troy is the author of a recent book about Ambassador Daniel P. Moynihan’s fight against the UN’s “Zionism-is-racism” resolution, and Moynihan’s clashes with Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. Moynihan “feared that too many State Department bureaucrats were so concerned about how their actions would be perceived on the cocktail party circuit in Scarsdale, that it inhibited them from acting effectively; true then, true now,” Troy said. “Many State Department officials forget Moynihan’s essential lesson that diplomacy doesn’t just mean being nice, but requires using many different tools — because in a tough world, you can’t always play nice.”

Obama, in Israel TV interview, dismisses idea he betrayed Israel at UN

President Barack Obama on Monday dismissed the notion that he betrayed Israel at the United Nations Security Council last month by opting not to veto a resolution that branded settlements illegal and called the West Bank and East Jerusalem occupied Palestinian territory. Speaking in an Israeli Channel 2 TV interview, Obama said he had an obligation as president “to do what I think is right.”
In an excerpt of the interview broadcast Monday evening, the outgoing president was asked about Israeli claims that he had orchestrated Resolution 2334, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s specific description of the move as a “shameful, anti-Israeli ploy.” Did he understand the Israeli “sense of betrayal”? interviewer Ilana Dayan asked.
“No,” Obama replied. “I’ll be honest with you: That kind of hyperbole, those kinds of statements, don’t have a basis in fact.
“They may work well with respect to deflecting attention from the problem of settlements,” the president continued. “They may play well with Bibi’s political base, as well as the Republican base here in the United States, but they don’t match up with the facts.”

UN seeks to blacklist Israeli firms beyond the Green Line

The United Nations Human Rights Council is reportedly working on a "blacklist" of Israeli companies operating beyond the Green Line with aim of declaring them illegal.
The list, an initiative prompted by the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement, is scheduled to be released in March, but a source familiar with the issue told Israel Hayom Monday it may only come out in June.
The move reportedly aims to bar the presence of any Israeli company beyond the Green Line. If adopted, the list could deem even private security firms protecting Israelis in Judea and Samaria from terrorist organizations, as illegal.
The list is said to be the brainchild of known BDS activist Richard Falk, formerly the U.N.'s special rapporteur on Palestinian human rights. Falk first came up with the idea for the blacklist six years ago, while in office, and he has been strongly advocating for it ever since, this time with the support of several Arab U.N. members.
In an effort to thwart this initiative, NGO Monitor, a watchdog group that promotes greater transparency among foreign-funded Israeli nongovernmental organizations, has recently sent the Human Rights Council a position paper explaining that such a list would be a violation of international law and the UNHRC's own guidelines against discrimination based on national origin, arguing that as no such blacklists exist for any other conflict zone in the world, it would in effect be targeting Jewish-owned businesses.

No more playing by UN rules

It is up to Israel to notify its friends, old and new, that hostile votes at the U.N. will not be met with understanding. Up until now, friendly states played the usual game: They displayed general sympathy toward the Jewish state, but did not vote in its favor, offering instead endless excuses. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's firm response to the Security Council's hostile vote is the beginning of a new chapter on this issue. Friends are supposed to support us in U.N. votes, and certainly not to vote with our enemies.
Everyone has gotten used to the fact that during an average year, some 80-90% of U.N. condemnations are directed at Israel (and at the infamous Human Rights Council, there is even more persecution of Israel).
The rise of U.S. President-elect Donald Trump and a new U.N. secretary-general will provide a good opportunity to rewrite the rules of the game. Outgoing U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon found the courage to admit that his organization is biased, and we must demand that his successor take real action for change. If this is not done, the new American administration can allow Republican lawmakers to do what they have been hoping to do for a long while -- revoke financial support for the United Nations. In fact, interim steps (such as opposition to the continued existence of UNIFL troops) may also suffice. The important thing is to put an end, for once and for all, to the tradition of servility toward the anti-democratic majority at the United Nations.

Palestinian rock attacks on the rise since UN settlement vote

The West Bank has seen a sharp rise in the number of violent attacks, primarily rock-throwing incidents, since an anti-settlement resolution was passed on December 23, 2016 by the United Nations Security Council, Israeli defense officials said.
The rise was recorded in the last week of December 2016 and the first week of January 2017, an increase security forces say is mostly due to exam season in Palestinian high schools. They note, though, that it is a larger increase than in the same period in previous years.
In September 346 rock-throwing attacks were recorded, in October 375, in November 420, and in December 344. Most of the December attacks occurred in the final week of the month. In the first week of January there were 169 recorded attacks, a pace that, if maintained, would lead to almost 700 attacks by the end of the month.
The rock attacks were also linked to a series of anniversaries taking place around now, including that of Fatah’s founding and first terrorist attack on January 1, 1965, and of the assassination of Yahya Ayyash, Hamas’s chief bomb maker, on January 5, 1996.

Netanyahu orders ministers to attend funerals after all skip out on terror victims

After bereaved parents complained that not a single government minister showed up to any of the four funerals for soldiers killed in Sunday’s terror attack, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered new rules drawn up to avoid a similar situation in the future.
The funerals of Lt. Yael Yekutiel, 20, of Givatayim, Lt. Shir Hajaj, 22, of Ma’ale Adumim, 2nd Lt. Erez Orbach, 20, of Alon Shvut, and 2nd Lt. Shira Tzur, 20, from Haifa, took place in quick succession on Monday. Hundreds attended each of the ceremonies, the first of which began at 11 a.m. and the last at 3 p.m.
The four victims were among a group of IDF officer cadets who were hit by a truck driven at them by Palestinian Fadi al-Qunbar in the Armon Hanatziv neighborhood of Jerusalem. Two of the soldiers, Orbach and Tzur, were American citizens.
Qunbar, 28, was shot and killed by soldiers and an armed tour guide at the scene.

Wounded Soldiers From Jerusalem Truck-Ramming Attack Tell Netanyahu: We Want to Return to Officers’ Course

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday visited the IDF officers’ course cadets wounded in the previous day’s deadly truck-ramming attack at the Armon Hanatziv promenade in the country’s capital.
“It’s simply unbelievable,” Netanyahu — who was joined by Health Minister Yaakov Litzman — remarked from the Hadassah Ein Kerem Medical Center, where the young men and women are being treated for their injuries. “They [the wounded soldiers] told me one thing: Prime minister, we want to go back to the course; we want to return to service; we want to continue our mission as soldiers of the Israel Defense Forces.”
“This is the true secret of our country,” Netanyahu continued. “And this is why we will win, and this is why we’ve won until now.”
In Sunday’s attack, four IDF soldiers were killed and another 15 were wounded. According to the Hebrew news site nrg, five remained hospitalized on Sunday.
One female soldier who was seriously wounded was still in life-threatening condition at the Shaare Zedek Medical Center.

'I want to serve my country. It is my duty'

Moshe Orbach, whose grandson Erez Hy'd (may G-d avenge his blood) was murdered in the ramming attack at Armon Hanatziv, told Arutz Sheva about his grandson's character and referred to the fact that there were no government ministers at any of the funerals of those murdered in the attack.
"Erez had tremendous determination," said Orbach. "He fought sickness and the army which didn't want to recruit him. The professor (at the recruiting committee) asked him why he insisted on enlisting when 200 people outside were just waiting to get released and Erez answered that "I want to serve my country. It is my duty."
Orbach described other aspects of Erez's personality which were revealed after his death. "Erez was a very modest and humble person. Only now during the mourning period we are hearing from friends of his and from the army how dedicated and clever he was to the point that one of his commanders told us that Erez had begun to teach him things he hadn't known."

IDF Blog: “They’re my soldiers… I knew I had to handle it.”

Lt. Maya witnessed yesterday’s terror attack – and acted fast to end it.
Yesterday afternoon, a terrorist from East Jerusalem carried out a deadly vehicle ramming attack in the Armon Hanatziv area of Jerusalem, where cadets in the IDF’s Officers Training School were taking a field trip. The terrorist plowed his truck into a group on the promenade, killing four IDF soldiers and wounding 17 others.
Lt. Maya, 22, of Haifa, is the team commander of the company of cadets who were targeted in the attack. “I got on the bus to put away some gear and get my jacket, and I was standing right at the front of the bus, and from there I saw everything. The attacker drove at a very, very high speed, and drove into a big crowd of cadets who were standing shoulder-to-shoulder.”
Lt. Maya
As Lt. Maya watched the attack unfold, she knew that she had to do everything in her power to stop it. As an officer, it’s her duty to protect her soldiers, and as a soldier herself, it’s her job to save lives. That meant taking charge in the moment. “I felt like I had to take responsibility. They’re my soldiers, they’re my company, and as part of that sense of responsibility, I knew I had to handle it.”

Deri revokes residency status of Jerusalem terrorist's family

Minister of the Interior Aryeh Deri has decided to revoke the permanent resident status of 13 members of Jerusalem terrorist Fadi Al-Qunbar's family, including his mother, following consultations Monday with the Shin Bet and the Immigration Authority.
As a result of the terror attack, in which four IDF officers were murdered, Minwa al-Qunbar, a permanent resident of Israel who is also in bigamous marriage contrary to Israeli law, will lose her permanent residency and corresponding social benefits.
Such a measure has previously never been implemented and prevents the family from appealing to the High Court of Justice, as they are not Israeli citizens.
Minister Deri decided on the measure after discussions with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who supported the move.

4 arrested over Jerusalem graffiti praising truck-rammer

Israeli police arrested four residents of the Old City in Jerusalem overnight Monday for spray-painting graffiti praising the terrorist who carried out a truck-ramming attack in the capital on Sunday, killing four soldiers and wounding 16.
The graffiti, which was found sprayed across shopfronts in the Muslim Quarter the night after the attack, praises attacker Fadi al-Qunbar, a resident of East Jerusalem, while also declaring that the truck-ramming was “resistance, not terror.”
The graffiti also mentions the name Mesbah Abu Sabih, who killed two Israelis in a shooting attack in October at Jerusalem’s Ammunition Hill light rail stop, with “We will not despair until you give up” and “There is no place for you [Jews] in Jerusalem” written in Hebrew under his name.
Also found written in Hebrew was the statement, “Yesterday’s attack is the beginning of 2017.”

In Wake of Jerusalem Truck-Ramming, US Professor/Palestinian Rights Lawyer Says Journalists Must Not Call Arab Attacks on Israeli Soldiers ‘Terrorism’

Following Sunday’s truck-ramming attack in Jerusalem, an American academic took to Twitter to admonish journalists for calling “all acts of Arab violence terrorism,” when the target is Israeli soldiers.
Noura Erakat, assistant professor of international studies at George Mason University in Virginia and a Palestinian rights lawyer, wrote: “Journos, pundits show true colors when they [do this]. Don’t get it twisted. #Jerusalem.”
Calling it “irresponsible to elide distinction bw civilians & soldiers,” Erakat — the founder of the online magazine Jadaliyya, which focuses on the Middle East and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict — also criticized a Wall Street Journal headline that read: “Truck plows into pedestrians in Jerusalem, killing four.”

Belgian newspaper fires columnist who praised terror attack

A Belgian daily newspaper fired one of its columnists following his praise for the slaying of four Israeli soldiers in Jerusalem.
De Standaard, a left-leaning Flemish-language daily, said Monday that it would no longer feature columns by Dyab Abou Jahjah, a Lebanon-born activist from Belgium who has called for violent attacks on Jewish Israelis.
A day earlier, Belgian Jews took to Twitter to condemn Abou Jahjah’s remarks, which included: “By any means necessary, #freepalestine,” following an attack in which a Palestinian terrorist plowed a truck through a crowd of soldiers visiting a popular tourist spot. The driver, who was shot dead, reportedly was a supporter of the Islamic State terror group.
He also wrote on Facebook that the attack was “not terrorism but resistance.”

2015: Corbyn and the fanatic who gloated over troop deaths: He entertained radical who said 'death of every British soldier is a victory'

Jeremy Corbyn was tonight accused of being a ‘cheerleader’ for a controversial fanatic who glorified the murder of British soldiers - after it emerged he twice hosted the Lebanese extremist Dyab Abou Jahjah in London.
The runaway Labour leadership favourite invited the ‘well-known thug’ to the UK in 2009 to speak against the Iraq war at two separate events.
Jahjah, who recently described the Labour MP as his ‘friend’, was invited to Parliament as Mr Corbyn’s special guest.
Corbyn, Islington North MP since 1983, has emerged as a surprise frontrunner in the Labour leadership race
The pair also addressed a second public meeting hosted by the then backbench MP for the Stop the War Coalition.
Just after the meetings Jahjah was banned from entering Britain by the then Home Secretary Jacqui Smith because of his extremist views.

EXCLUSIVE - Gaza Cleric: Jerusalem Truck Attack Permitted by Sharia

Sunday’s deadly truck-ramming attack in Jerusalem is permitted by Sharia law, a Palestinian cleric claimed to Breitbart Jerusalem.
Ahmad Abou Aklein, a Gaza extremist imam, said the attack that left four Israelis dead and another 17 wounded is allowed under Sharia Islamic law because “it targeted an enemy that occupied Muslim land. None of the casualties was an innocent man who lives in a land that is his own. None of the dead could validly claim that occupied Palestine is his country of origin.”
Aklein referred to the entire state of Israel as “occupied Muslim land.”
“Compare it to a Chinese or an Iraqi soldier who comes to the United States or a European country and occupies it,” he added. “Will they let it happen? Will they not resist in every possible way? This is what the hero did today, he fought against the soldiers of the occupation and killed them, that’s all.”
“Palestine is occupied by an enemy that kills our sons and turns our wives into widows, that’s why our jihad is not only permitted by the Islamic Sharia, but by international law as well,” he said. “Even the UN allows the sons of a certain country to occupy those who occupy their land.”

‘Decepticons’ Claim Responsibility for Jerusalem Truck Terror Attack (satire)

Earlier today, the Decepticons released a statement claiming responsibility for the Jerusalem truck terror attack that left four Israelis dead. This comes after much confusion when the BBC, New York Times, and other outlets published headlines that made it seem like it was the truck that was to blame for the attack.
Indeed, as the attack was still in progress, the New York Times ran the headline “Truck Rams into Soldiers in Jerusalem” and the BBC described it as a “Lorry Attack” leaving many confused that might be a lone Wolf-Truck attack; the first of its kind.
The confusion was cleared up after Decepticon leader Megatron released a statement praising one of their members for the attack; he stated that the Decepticons believe that the Palestinian national struggle is intrinsically linked to their war with the Autobots and accused Optimus-Prime, and other Autobots, of transforming into caravans in illegal West Bank settlements between movies.

ISIS Applying For Palestinian Citizenship To Escape ‘Terrorist’ Designation (satire)

Jihadists around the world have begun to seek Palestinian citizenship as a way to avoid being considered terrorists when they engage in ideologically motivated violence against civilians.
Palestinian diplomats and bureaucrats in Belgium, West Africa, Somalia, Egypt, and elsewhere have noticed a marked uptick in the number of new applicants for citizenship, a development they attribute to the international community and media’s reluctance to describe Palestinian acts of terrorism as such, and those Islamist applicants seek to gain the Palestinian public relations advantage of rarely having their violent attacks referred to in those terms.
Since the 2014 increase in Palestinian attacks on Israelis, primarily involving vehicular homicide and stabbing attempts, Islamists across the globe have noticed that while their violent activities targeting enemies are referred to by governments and media outlets as terrorism, identical acts by Palestinians escape such designation. Almost invariably, they say, vehicular assaults, stabbing, stone-throwing, firebombings, rockets, bombings, and shooting attacks perpetrated by Palestinians are described in terms that studiously avoid direct use of the words “terrorist” and “terrorism,” invoking them only when attributing such words to Israeli security spokespeople.
In fact, notes Ali Figleef, a community activist of Pakistani origin in Antwerp, media coverage, and most governments’ treatment, of such Palestinian activities go out of their way to avoid assigning blame to the perpetrators, focusing wherever possible on the Israeli response and never mentioning the atmosphere of incitement to violence that saturates official Palestinian media.

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