02/08 Links Pt1: Hamas’ Latest Gory Video Full Of Antisemitic Imagery; What if Israel Funded Welsh or Scottish Independence Groups? ~ EoZ

From Ian:

IsraellyCool: Hamas’ Latest Gory Video Full Of Antisemitic Imagery

The terrorists of Hamas have released a new video aimed at Israel, threatening us with death and destruction. I guess it’s title Zionist, You Will Die in Gaza gives that away.
The video is hard to get through because of the singing in broken Hebrew to a backing track that sounds like a cross between Riverdance and Pacman, let alone the disgusting scenes.
In case you missed it, here is all the antisemitic imagery, or imagery that otherwise should let you know that Hamas has a real problem with Jews, and not just “Zionists” as the title and lyrics would suggest.

Hamas Music Video: Zionist, You Will Die in Gaza (English Subtitles)

'How Would You Feel if Israel Funded Welsh or Scottish Independence Groups?' PM Netanyahu Asks UK Counterpart in Call for Foreign Governments to Stop Giving Money to NGOs That 'Slander' the Jewish State

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has called on the leaders of both the United Kingdom and Belgium this week to stop funding left-wing NGOs that “slander” the Jewish state.
“I will continue to fight the lies and do everything to protect our soldiers,” Netanyahu vowed in a Facebook post on Tuesday.
Earlier in the day, the Israeli leader met in Jerusalem with visiting Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel. On Monday, Netanyahu was the guest of British Prime Minister Theresa May at 10 Downing Street in London.
In a Facebook video he filmed while in the UK, Netanyahu said, “I asked the British prime minister today: How would you feel if I was funding with Israeli government money organizations that call British soldiers ‘war criminals’? Or called for independence for Wales or independence for Scotland with Israeli government funding?”
“Well, unfortunately,” he continued, “this is what many governments do when they fund groups like Breaking the Silence, B’Tselem, Adalah, etc. So I asked that the British government cease funding these groups. I think the time has come.”

Isi Leibler: Are Trump and Israel on the Same Page?

It must be noted that the wealthy Arab countries, such as Saudi Arabia and other rich sheikhdoms, have pointedly refused to condemn Trump, and have themselves adamantly refused to accept “refugees” because they regard them as security risks. But that hasn’t warranted any protest by the pseudo-liberals who are accusing Trump of fascism.
Instead of shrieking Islamophobia, Muslim leaders should look in the mirror and realize that by their endorsement of or indifference to the violent jihadism emanating from their own ranks, they have created enormous concern and resentment. They should also observe that six of the seven countries “discriminated against” are among the 16 Muslim-majority states that deny entry to Israelis.
Notwithstanding that, it is totally appropriate for Jewish organizations to call on the administration to fine-tune the regulations in order to minimize the impact on our friends. To be productive, such criticism must be constructive and communicated in a responsible manner.
Those who now accuse Trump of introducing fascism and draw lurid comparisons with the Holocaust are hypocrites of the first order. They previously endorsed Obama for his sanctioning of regional hegemony to the Iranian terrorists who publicly proclaimed their intent to commit genocide against the Jewish people, for his bracketing of Israelis and Palestinians as birds of a feather and for his silence while Israel was treated as a rogue state. In so doing, they contributed toward an atmosphere that strengthens extremists and erects barriers to a reasonable and constructive discourse.

Who Are the Legitimate Representatives of the Palestinians?

The chance that Trump’s America and today’s other Great Powers can make the Gazan clans and West Bank clans unite in peace and harmony is close to nil. As a practical matter, those who propose a two-state solution are more realistically contemplating a three-state solution — Israel, Gaza and the West Bank — since the Muslim Brotherhood is unlikely to give up its power base. But even a three-state solution in which the many different West Bank clans would be expected to set aside their differences and come together would almost certainly end badly.
If there is hope that President Trump can find a solution to the Middle East morass, it stems from the instincts that are his hallmarks. One instinct is suspicion of multinational organizations — he prefers smaller governing and organizing units, as seen by his support for Brexit and other breakaway groups in the European Union. Applying the same instinct to Palestine would lead Trump to favour smaller self-governing units such as emirates, a traditional form of Arab governance — the United Arab Emirates is an example.
Another Trump instinct — to sanction rather than appease terrorist states — would also favour a multi-state solution for the Palestinian territories. Trump plans to squeeze the Palestinian Authority by cutting off its funds, including by cutting funds to UN organizations that support it. Without foreign funds, the Palestinian Authority would not only be unable to fund its continued support for terrorists, it would be unable to maintain itself in power by dispensing patronage to its supporters, and it would be unable to maintain its claim to being the sole representative of the Palestinian people. The weaker the Palestinian Authority becomes, the stronger the clans become in relation, allowing them to reassert their authority, and thus appoint legitimate representatives to negotiate a settlement with the Israelis.
Trump’s instincts, if applied to Palestine, could form the basis for lasting self-government determined organically by the Arabs of Palestine, unlike a single Arab state based on the pretence of a unified Palestinian people. No other governance model — at least none with a chance of surviving long — is remotely plausible.

Do Not Reward Bad Behaviour

Trump Must Bury Anti-Semitic UN Resolution
The Trump Administration needs to see to it that UN Security Council Resolution 2334 is rendered null and void.
UNSC Resolution 2334 also implies that Jerusalem's Jewish Quarter, Western Wall and Temple Mount are all occupied territory, when in fact, it was Israel that liberated them from the illegal Jordanian conquest of them in the war of 1948.
Given the history of violence which the Palestinians indulge in against the Jews, it would seem a counter-productive precedent to reward decades of terrorism and uncivilised behaviour with a state. It would also leave the Palestinians, who deserve a responsible and accountable leadership, under the domination of two corrupt and brutal governments, the Palestinian Authority and Hamas.
A study of the various proposals Israel has made to Palestine from time to time shows the key obstacle to peace is not the Palestinians' demand for any piece of land but their refusal to recognize the existence of the Jewish state, or presumably any state but an Islamic one.
The U.S. could also move its embassy to Jerusalem. This would send the Palestinian leadership and others in the region a strong message that Washington will support both historical facts and countries that comport themselves with civilised behaviour.

Palestinians Turn Jerusalem Into a Terror Tool

Palestinian and other Arab leaders have threatened violence in response to President Trump’s pledge to move the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. While Bill Clinton and George W. Bush also promised such a move as candidates, each backed off.
The terrorist who killed four Israelis in Jerusalem on January 8 by mowing them over with his truck expressed agitation after hearing a sermon at a local mosque criticizing Trump’s embassy relocation promise.
The Palestinian Authority (PA) leadership reportedly instructed the mosques that it controls to focus their religious sermons on the embassy relocation. Worse still, the PA promised the terrorist’s widow a lifetime $760-per-month stipend for her husband’s “martyrdom for Allah.”
Arab reactions to Trump’s embassy plans are more heated than they were to those of candidates Bush and Clinton, perhaps because of Trump’s pledge to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and relocate the embassy there from Tel Aviv, not only as a candidate (including during his address at last year’s AIPAC Policy Conference) but also as president-elect, issuing public reassurances on the issue. Trump even planned to visit the Temple Mount as a candidate, although the visit never materialized. As president, he said last Thursday that it was “too early” to discuss moving the embassy.

The true significance of Israel’s settlement legalization law

Criticism of the Regulation Law that passed Monday in the Knesset has been visceral and widespread. It comes from Israeli politicians on the deepest left as well as the right, from Palestinian officials as well as pro-Israel advocates, from European and Muslim-world governments as well as Israel’s own attorney general, and even from some Knesset Members who actually voted for it.
All seem to believe the law, which authorizes retroactively Israeli settlement homes built illegally on privately owned Palestinian land, is a watershed moment in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. But with so many voices vying to explain precisely why it is so bad, it can be easy to miss, or to misunderstand, the indigenous Israeli political impulses that forged it, and thus to misrepresent what it means for Israel’s presence in the West Bank.
In an important sense, the Regulation Law changes very little. Under Jordanian land law that still applies in the West Bank – Israel never applied its own civil law, and so the territory is run under a combination of various legal systems imposed by past rulers and IDF orders issued since 1967 – the governing authority in the territory is already permitted to seize privately owned land for public benefit. The Jordanian law is far more expansive and permissive as to what constitutes “public benefit” than is Israeli civil law within Israel’s borders, and more even than what Israel’s military administration has actually done in the West Bank.
And so the new Regulation Law does not, as often claimed, suddenly allow the Civil Administration, the Israeli agency administering the West Bank under the army’s auspices, to seize private property for Israeli settlements. The Civil Administration is already allowed to do so, at least on paper, and leaving out for the moment the rather significant question of international law and its obligations. Rather, the Regulation Law requires that it do so.

Abbas: Palestinians working with int'l courts against Israeli settlements

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas said on Tuesday that the Palestinian leadership plans to continue to confront Israeli settlements in international courts, following the Knesset’s passage of a law that legalizes settlement homes built on private Palestinian land.
“This legislation is in violation of international law, and we will continue our work with international courts to protect our existence and survival on the land of Palestine,” Abbas told a press conference in Paris, after meeting with French President Francois Hollande.
While Abbas did not specify with which international courts, the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court could are international courts could take on cases related to settlements.
Saeb Erekat, the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) Executive Committee secretary-general, said that the law amounts to land theft. “Israel’s ‘Legalizing theft law’ is another affirmation by the Israeli government for the Israeli settlers and occupation forces to continue their attacks against the land and people of Palestine,” Erekat said in a press release.

Abbas Israeli 'colonization' could force us to end security cooperation - Arab-Israeli Conflict

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas said on Wednesday he could be forced to suspend security cooperation with Israel if the ramp-up of Israeli settlements continued.
"If the colonization continues, I would have no other choice, it would not be my fault," Abbas told France's Senate during a visit to Paris.
On Tuesday, he met President Francois Hollande, who voiced concern over a law retroactively legalizing about 4,000 settler homes built on privately owned Palestinian land in the West Bank.

Palestinian municipalities petition Israeli court to axe settlements law

Seventeen Palestinian municipalities petitioned Israel's High Court of Justice on Wednesday to strike the recently-passed Settlements Law as unconstitutional, calling for an immediate freeze of its implementation pending a final ruling on its constitutionality.
“The law eliminates the basic rights of the Palestinian residents of the West Bank and leaves them with no legal protections by permitting the pilfering of their private property for the benefit of Israeli settlers in the West Bank on the basis of an ethnically-inspired ideological world-view,” said the petition, filed by NGOs Adalah, the Al-Mezan Center for Human Rights and the Jerusalem Center for Human Rights.
The NGOs wrote that the law violates both the international law of belligerent occupation, including the obligations that Israel has to protect Palestinian rights as long as it manages the West Bank. The petition also charged that the law breaches Israel’s own Basic Law of Human Dignity and Freedom.

Settlements law spells trouble for Jordan

The Settlement Regulation Law passed on Monday night leaves Jordan in the lurch, poses a fresh challenge to the stability of the troubled kingdom and puts more pressure on the Jordanian-Israeli peace treaty.
With the majority of its population of Palestinian origin and with the kingdom’s legitimacy bound up with its role – recognized by Israel – as protector of the holy sites in Jerusalem, Jordan has a greater stake than any other country in a two-state solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. Passage of the law is clear proof in Jordanian eyes that Israel is not interested in such a solution.
“The last fifty years we had the premise there is a concept of land for peace,” said Daoud Kuttab, a columnist for The Jordan Times. “Clearly now there is no concept of land for peace.”
“Now the government of Israel, the majority of the Knesset voted denying land for peace. What does Israel want to do with the Palestinians? Are they human beings? Do they deserve equal rights? Those are the questions Israelis have to answer,” Kuttab wrote.

French envoy: Int'l community wondering if it can trust Israel (not satire)

Helene Le Gal, the French ambassador to Israel, strongly condemned the Settlements Bill on Wednesday, saying the move further acted to raise international concerns over Israel's commitment to the peace process.
The Knesset on Monday night voted in favor of the bill, thus retroactively legalizing 4,000 settler homes that were built on private, Palestinian-owned land situated in Area C in a move that spurred widespread controversy.
Area C is under Israeli military and civilian control, but is outside of sovereign Israel.
“The land we are talking about is private land in the West Bank,” Le Gal said in an interview with Army Radio, as she noted that the territory was not within the Knesset’s purview and that it had no legislative powers there.
The French ambassador went on to explain that France had condemned the legislation because Paris sees the law as "taking a path which is not leading to peace."

Bolton: Trump should 'tear up' the Iran nuclear deal

Iran's ongoing tests of ballistic missiles has shown that Iran is in no mood to comply with the United Nations, and justifies a decision by President Trump to "tear up" the Iran nuclear deal, according to former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations John Bolton.
Bolton, who Trump was considering for secretary of state during the transition, said new sanctions and tougher talk from Trump won't be enough to curb Iran's actions.
"Iran's continued missile testing on Saturday has given President Trump one more reason to tear up his predecessor's deal with the regime in Tehran," he wrote in the Wall Street Journal.
Bolton called the Iran deal "diplomatic malpractice," and noted that the Iran nuclear agreement is an annex to a UN resolution that includes another annex that simply says Iran is "called upon" not to engage in any activity related to ballistic missiles that are "designed to be capable of delivering nuclear weapons."
Subscribe today to get intelligence and analysis on defense and national security issues in your Inbox each weekday morning from veteran journalists Jamie McIntyre and Jacqueline Klimas.
"Iran is not forbidden from engaging in all ballistic-missile activity, merely 'called upon' to do so," Bolton wrote.
He said those loopholes make it easy for Iran to claim non-violation. In fact, he argued, Iran has already argued that it has no nuclear weapons program, which means it's impossible from Iran's point of view to violate the ballistic missile language.

Telegraph Editorial: Israel Is a Vital Ally for Britain - Iran Must Not Be Allowed to Threaten It

The talks held on Monday between Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Theresa May are a timely reminder of how important it is for Britain to maintain a strong relationship with the Jewish state. As the region’s only truly democratic nation, Israel stands as a beacon of stability in a part of the world where the autocratic and dictatorial style of so many neighbouring regimes means the Arab world is now facing its biggest existential crisis since Israel’s victory in the Six Day War in 1967.
Maintaining good relations with Israel is vital to British interests, as well as helping to defeat Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (Isil). Israel is also an important ally when it comes to tackling rogue states like Iran, which is committed to undermining Western interests in the region. The Obama administration often turned a blind eye to Iran’s unwelcome meddling in the Arab world because of its desire to uphold its agreement with Tehran over its controversial nuclear programme. This has given Iran’s Revolutionary Guards free rein to export the ayatollahs’ poisonous ideology as far afield as Yemen, Iraq, Syria and Lebanon.
But Iran is in danger of overreaching itself after its recent test-firing of two ballistic missiles – a blatant violation of the nuclear deal – each with the slogan “Israel should be wiped off the Earth”. The British Government might have differences with Mr Netanyahu over his plans to expand settlements around Jerusalem, which critics argue jeopardises any prospect of reaching a solution to the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians. But the far greater priority must be to reassure the Israeli people that Britain is committed to resisting states like Iran that are dedicated to their destruction.

WATCH: The Bad, The Worse And The Ugly Protest Outside Downing Street

Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu was yesterday in London, meeting British Prime Minister Theresa May, a visit that prompted assorted antisemitic and anti-Israel scum and villainy to protest outside the Prime Minister’s office at 10 Downing Street.
Note the level of hatred and ignorance on display, particularly:

The talkative guy who, once discovering the interviewer is a “Zionist,” decides there is no more point talking to him.

Those crying out “From the River to the Sea, Palestine will be free”, which amounts to a call for the destruction of the entire state of Israel

The ignoramus who talks of Greater Israel, but can’t really describe what he is talking about, instead asking the interviewer to go “look it up on the Internet”

At around 3:29, the cameo in the background of Farrah Colgan, an anti-Israel numbskull who made her YouTube videos private since I ripped her a new one, but still posts the occasional video on her Facebook page.

Hamas confirms it rejected Israeli prisoner exchange offer

Senior Hamas officials confirmed Wednesday that their group was in talks over a possible prisoner exchange with Israel, but said the deal had been rejected for not meeting their minimum demands.
Reports have circulated in Israeli media in recent days of talks with the rulers of Gaza Strip to secure the release of three Israeli men who crossed into the coastal territory of their own accord: Avraham Mengistu and Hisham al-Sayed, as well as Juma Ibrahim Abu Ghanima, whose presence in Gaza is unconfirmed. Hamas, an Islamist terror group that seeks to destroy Israel, also holds the bodies of IDF soldiers Oron Shaul and Hadar Goldin, who the army determined were killed in action in the 2014 Gaza war.
A senior Hamas source told The Times of Israel that it wanted Israel to release 60 members of the terror group arrested after being freed in an earlier exchange.
“Only after that can we move forward in the negotiations between the sides,” the source said.
An Israeli source confirmed that talks were ongoing but said “we are not there yet.”

Israel Prepares for Possible Hezbollah Naval Commando Attack

The Israel Defense Forces is preparing for a possible Hezbollah incursion using marines and other naval commandos in the country’s north, Ynet reported Monday.
A group of commandos could try to infiltrate north of Nahariya while protected by mortar and anti-tank fire from Lebanon, the IDF believes. It also believes that Hezbollah will attempt to capture Israeli territory and hold it, even temporarily, in order to declare a victory against Israel.
Both the army and navy are preparing for a raid, which is similar to Hamas’s attempted assault on Kibbutz Zikim during Operation Protective Edge in 2014. However, Hezbollah would have more significant operational capabilities than Hamas did for such an attack, due to Hezbollah’s recent battle experience in the Syrian Civil War and its continued support from Iran and Syria.
In order to defend against such an attack, Israel has deployed a network of sensors to detect and prevent a breach of Israel’s naval perimeter. The Israeli Navy’s 914th division has been practicing defending against such possibilities together with the Golani Brigade’s 51st Regiment, which is charged with defending the coastline.

Israel left out of White House's ‘underreported’ terror acts list

No attacks in Israel were included on a list of 78 “underreported” terrorist attacks released by the White House.
The list, which includes attacks around the world from September 2014 to December 2016, was released Monday after President Donald Trump spoke of the dangers of “radical Islamic terrorists” and said the media often did not want to report on terror attacks.
“In many cases, the very, very dishonest press doesn’t want to report it. They have their reasons, and you understand that,” Trump said Monday, according to The Washington Post.
White House spokesman Sean Spicer later clarified that the president believes terrorist attacks are “underreported” — not “unreported” — by the media.

PA: Marwan Barghouti should get the Nobel Peace Prize

The PA is calling on Israel to immediately free arch-terrorist Marwan Barghouti from prison.
Barghouti is responsible for organizing thousands of terror attacks against Israelis - including suicide attacks, and is widely believed to have planned the “Second Intifada” of terror attacks which claimed thousands of Israeli lives from 2000 to 2005.
He is currently serving five life sentences for the murder of Israelis.
Nevertheless, even from his jail cell he continued to incite to terror and, several months ago, was elected to a top spot on the Fatah Central Committee.
In an interview for a documentary about Barghouti, PA official Rami Hamdallah praised Barghouti’s “national work” and that of other Palestinian terrorists in Israeli jails, and said that the PA is engaged in a struggle to free them.
Hamdallah also said that the PA supports the initiative of international bodies which brought up Barghouti’s name as a candidate for the Nobel Peace Prize.
Last year, Belgian Members of Parliament from across the political spectrum had announced their nomination of Barghouti for the coveted prize.

Elite Hamas fighters defecting to Islamic State

A member of Hamas’s naval commando unit defected from the Gaza-based terror organization nearly a year ago to join the Sinai Province — the Islamic State group’s branch in the Sinai Peninsula, Palestinian sources told The Times of Israel.
Abed al-Wahad Abu Aadara, 20, from the city of Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, was arrested approximately two months ago by Hamas while visiting Gaza due to his affiliation with IS. He has since been freed.
Although Abu Aadara is not the first Hamas operative to defect to IS, he is the first known member of the group’s naval commando unit to join its ranks.
The weeks following Abu Aadara’s arrest were marked by a dramatic increase in tensions between Hamas and IS, due in large part to the arrest of Gaza-based operatives identified with the group, as well as the reduction in the volume of goods being smuggled to the Gaza Strip from Sinai, which IS used as a means of pressuring Hamas in response to the arrests.

Hamas Rocket Fire Meant to Send Turkey Message From Gaza, Arab Security Official Says

Monday’s rocket attack on Israel was coordinated with Hamas, an Arab security official with close ties to the Palestinians told Breitbart Jerusalem.
“It is yet unclear whether Hamas actually carried it out, but the information is that they knew about it before it happened,” he said.
Monday’s rocket fire was “different from the previous trickling of rockets not just because it targeted the Ashkelon area, but also because of the Israeli reaction. Both sides understood it’s different this time.” Israel responded by shelling and bombing Hamas terror positions in Gaza.
He said that this time Israel and Hamas, whether involved in the hostilities or not, are looking to exchange diplomatic messages.
“Israel wants to send a message that any kind of fire will be answered with an iron fist because the Palestinians cannot be fooled into thinking that they can leverage rocket fire to send political messages or pressure Israel or any other player,” he said.

PreOccupiedTerritory: Progressive Advocates Laud Diversity Of Assad Execution Victims (satire)

Progressive organizations reacted with gratification to reports yesterday that Basher Assad’s regime has tortured and executed thirteen thousand people at a notorious prison since 2011, noting that the people killed in such brutal fashion represent all walks of life in Syria, indicating that the regime is dedicated to maintaining diversity.
Representatives of the Black Lives Matter movement, Médecins sans Frontières, the Committee against Torture, and several other groups dedicated to progressive human rights issued a joint statement this morning, following the Amnesty International report on Monday detailing the available information. According to the data in the report and several other sources, say the groups, it is clear that the Assad regime is trying to be as inclusive as possible, and as diverse as possible, in selecting who gets to be thrown in boiling water, who gets to have his or her nails pulled out with pliers, and who gets to be beaten to death.
“We applaud the government of Syria for its demonstrable commitment to diversity,” read the statement. “Given the sectarian nature of the Syrian conflict it would be expected for them to focus on Syrian Sunni Muslims, but our examination of the data indicates that the figure of 13,000 tortured and executed includes Shiites, Alawites, Maronite Christians, Druze, and Palestinians – both Palestinian refugees and non-refugees. Skin tones among those targeted has varied considerably, though that has been difficult to ascertain for all 13,000, considering that many were flayed alive before the statistics could be compiled, rendering that classification imperfect.”

Muslim conference under fire for DELETING faces of female speakers on promotional flyer

Organisers of a controversial Islamic conference in Melbourne have sparked outrage for publishing a promotional flyer with the faces of female speakers blacked out.
Australian Islamic Peace Conference planners came under fire for putting out the flyer advertising speakers at their conference to be held next month.
The pamphlet featured the often smiling faces of 12 male speakers, including controversial Sheikh Shady Alsuleiman and prominent community spokesman Keysar Trad.
But critics were furious the faces of three female speakers - psychologist Monique Toohey, social worker Nina Trad Azam and Islamic teacher Umm Jamaal ud-Din - had been replaced with shadowy veils.
'It's backwards and inappropriate,' said a person with knowledge of the conference planning.

We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.