06/10 Links: Dershowitz: Bernie Sanders: Knave or Fool?; Vogue: Israel’s ‘Stunning Beaches’ Have ‘Something for Every Type of Sand Lover’ ~ EoZ

From Ian:

Alan Dershowitz: Bernie Sanders: Knave or Fool?

It is clear that if Corbyn were anti-black, anti-women, anti-Muslim or anti-gay, Sanders would not have campaigned for him. Does this make him a self-hating Jew? Or does he just not care about anti-Semitism? The answer to that question requires us to look broadly to trends among the hard left of which Sanders is a leader.
Increasingly, the "progressive wing" of the Democratic Party and other self-identifying "progressives," subscribe to the pseudo-academic theory of intersectionality, which holds that all forms of social oppression are inexorably linked. This type of "ideological packaging" has become code for anti-American, anti-Western, anti-Israel and anti-Semitic bigotry. Indeed, those who consider themselves "progressives" – but who are actually repressives – tolerate anti-Semitism as long as it comes from those who espouse other views they approve of. This form of "identity politics" has forced artificial coalitions between causes that have nothing to do with each other except a hatred for those who are "privileged" because they are white, heterosexual, male and especially Jewish.
It is against this backdrop that Sanders's cozying up to bigots such as Corbyn can be understood. Throughout the presidential campaign and in its aftermath, Sanders has given a free pass to those who are anti-Israel – which is often a euphemism for anti-Jewish. Consider, for example Sanders's appointments to the Democratic National Committee (DNC) Platform Committee last summer. Seeking to satisfy his radical "Bernie or Bust" support base, Sanders appointed James Zogby and Cornell West -- both of whom have peddled anti-Semitic conspiracy theories throughout their careers. Professor Cornell West -- who was a Sanders surrogate on the campaign trail -- has said that the crimes of the genocidal terrorist group Hamas "pale in the face of the US-supported Israeli slaughters of innocent civilians," and is a strong advocate of trying to eradicate Israel through the vehicle a campaign of Boycott Divestment and Sanctions.
He has also repeatedly accused Israel of killing Palestinian babies -- an allegation that echoes historic attacks on Jews for "blood libel."
Mr. James Zogby of the Arab American Institute once described the motivations behind Israel's interventions in Gaza as "putting the natives back in their place," and has compared the "plight of Palestinians" to the experience of Jews during the Holocaust.

Sanders ‘delighted’ by Corbyn’s strong result in UK election

Former US presidential candidate Bernie Sanders has congratulated Jeremy Corbyn and his Labour Party for winning unexpected gains in Britain’s snap general election on Thursday.
“I am delighted to see Labour do so well,” the Independent senator from Vermont said in a Facebook post Saturday.
“All over the world, people are rising up against austerity and massive levels of income and wealth inequality. People in the UK, the US and elsewhere want governments that represent all the people, not just the 1 percent,” Sanders said. “I congratulate Jeremy Corbyn for running a very effective campaign.”
According to a report in the UK’s The Guardian, members of Sanders’ campaign team helped Corbyn in campaigning ahead of the June 8 vote.
A number of Sanders’ campaign aides held training sessions for Labour activists to teach them how to effectively campaign.

‘Corbyn surge’ in London faltered in ‘bagel belt’ suburbs with strong Jewish vote

Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn has long been a bête noire for the British Jewish community. His anti-Israel activism, combined with the spate of allegations of anti-Semitism in the party on his watch, triggered a visceral reaction.
As the elections results Friday showed a drift back to Labour that cost Theresa May’s Conservative Party its parliamentary majority and left May battered and discredited, British Jews seemed to move sharply in the opposite direction. A poll last week for the Jewish Chronicle had indicated that 77 per cent planed to vote Tory and only 13 per cent Labour, and nothing in the results appeared to contradict those findings.
Corbyn’s surge in support during the campaign – evident as the results came in overnight – was powered by young people. Young Jews, however, remained largely immune to his appeal: the JC poll indicating that less than one-quarter of those aged 18-34 planning to vote Labour.
Given the closeness of the result, Jewish voters, who are concentrated in a small number of highly marginal seats, may potentially have helped preserve May’s premiership.
Early indications had predicted that – in line with its strong performance in the capital – Labour would pull off a number of upset victories in the north London “bagel belt”. Finchley and Golders Green, Hendon and Chipping Barnet were all slated to fall to Corbyn’s party. Finchley and Golders Green – where an estimated one in five voters are Jewish – and Hendon would have been particularly sweet victories for the party. Both were contested by leading lights in the Jewish Labour Movement who had faced criticism within the community for attempting to unseat pro-Israel Tory incumbents.

Conservative Jewish Students Disappointed Peers Voted for Labour in UK Elections, Fear ‘Mainstreaming’ of Antisemitism

A number of Conservative Jewish students told The Algemeiner on Friday they were disappointed in their peers who voted in droves for the Labour Party in the previous day’s general election, with one saying he feared the results might “mainstream” antisemitic views.
Jack Aaron — a masters student at Birkbeck, University of London — said the reportedly high youth turnout that was said to have contributed to Jeremy Corbyn’s success demonstrated the Labour leader’s “popularity with the young and will keep him as leader of the opposition, meaning he can rally more young support for the next election.”
“Naturally, this will mean his views on Israel and the issues of antisemitism in his party will stay mainstream,” Aaron continued.
In his nearly two years at the helm of Labour, Corbyn has been dogged by accusations of personal and party-wide anti-Jewish sympathies. Just last month, two of Corbyn’s campaign advisers were exposed as having made comments in support of the Hamas and Hezbollah terror organizations.
Aaron said he worried campus tensions between the political Right and Left would grow, and that factionalism among Jewish students specifically would worsen.

Thug 'wielding crow bar' yelled 'kill all the Jews' at north London polling station

A Jewish voter suffered a vile tirade of anti-Semitic abuse from a thug carrying a crow bar outside a north London polling station.
Election staff in Clapton Common, Stamford Hill, were forced to rush to the aid of the victim when a man allegedly yelled “f***ing Jews, kill all the Jews, what are you doing here?” at him as he entered to vote.
The attacker then returned wielding the weapon and shouting more threats just after 5pm on Thursday, according to neighbourhood watch group Shomrim.
The victim was said to be “frightened” by the attack and was led to safety by polling station staff.
Chaim Hochhauser, from Stamford Hill Shomrim said: "This was a frightening experience for the victim. I would like to thank the woman at the polling station who came to the aid of the victim and helped him leave the premises to find a safe place.

London attackers had Molotov cocktails, tried to rent 7.5 ton truck

The assailants behind a terror attack in London last week had also prepared a stash of Molotov cocktails and initially tried to hire a truck rather than a van to mow down pedestrians, British police said on Saturday.
In a statement, the Metropolitan Police said forensic officers examining the white rental van found “13 wine bottles with rags wrapped around them and believed to be filled with a flammable liquid,” as well as two blowtorches.
The three attackers struck pedestrians with the van and then went on a stabbing spree wearing fake suicide vests last Saturday in the London Bridge area, a popular nightlife district.
Eight people were killed before the assailants — Khuram Shazad Butt, Rachid Redouane and Youssef Zaghba — were shot dead by police. Forty-eight people were injured.
Police also said Butt had tried to hire a 7.5-ton truck hours before carrying out the attack, but was turned down because the payment failed.

Israel demands UN response following Gaza tunnel discovery

Israel's Permanent Representative at the United Nations, Danny Danon, called on the UN Security Council on Friday to "strongly and unequivocally condemn Hamas" following the discovery of a tunnel that runs beneath two UNRWA schools in the Gaza Strip.
In a letter to the President of the Security Council, Danon demanded that "this time, the international community must not turn a blind eye toward such cynical exploitation" of civilian infrastructure in the Gaza Strip by Hamas.
Earlier on Friday, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) announced that they had discovered on June 1 a tunnel that runs under two adjacent schools during construction work on one of the school buildings. A statement by UNRWA spokesperson Christopher Guiness stated that they had protested "robustly" to Hamas following the discovery.
"This latest finding verifies once again that Hamas' cruelty knows no limits, including endangering centers of learning and education, and using children as human shields," the letter continued. "This latest abuse is not only a flagrant misuse of UN premises and civilian infrastructure, but more important, is a direct threat to the safety and security of children."

Hamas denies it built tunnel under UN schools in Gaza

Hamas denied that it or any other terror group built a tunnel under two UN schools in Gaza after its discovery drew a strong UN protest.
Over the years, Gaza’s Hamas rulers have built a labyrinth of tunnels, some passing under the border into Israel which they used to launch attacks during their last conflict in 2014.
On June 1, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) found “part of a tunnel that passes under two adjacent agency schools in the Maghazi camp” during construction work, spokesman Christopher Gunness said on Friday.
Hamas late Friday “strongly condemned” the UNRWA revelation, saying it would be exploited by Israel to “justify its crimes”.
The terror group denied it built the tunnel and said it had clarified the issue “with all factions and resistance forces, who clearly stated they had no actions related to the resistance in the said location,” the movement said, adding that it respected UNRWA’s work.
Gunness said that the tunnel “has no entry or exit points on the premises nor is it connected to the schools or other buildings in any way”.

Saudi newspaper: Hamas digging tunnels and endangering Gaza citizens

You might have to pinch yourself to believe a Saudi Arabian newspaper's criticism of Gaza-based terrorist organization Hamas. The Israeli Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT) could just copy and paste the article on their Arabic-speaking website.
In an exceedingly stinging criticism, Saudi newspaper Okaz wrote on Friday that "Hamas' actions are a double betrayal on the issue of Palestine, with the organization investing $120 million in the last three years in intensive tunnel construction."
According to the newspaper, Hamas has taken millions of dollars from Saudia Arabia and the United Arab Emirates in order to dig tunnels and hold hostage two million Palestinians.
"Hamas' should have quickly put right the ongoing disaster in the Gaza Strip, instead of criticizing statements made by the Saudi foreign minister, Adel al-Jubeir," who recently demanded that Qatar sever its links with Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood.

IsraellyCool: Yair Lapid Gives It Right Back To Hostile Interviewer

Former HardTalk host Tim Sebastian is still trying to ask the hard questions, this time for Deutsche Welle’s Conflict Zone. As such, he makes one hell of a hostile interviewer.
He recently put Israeli MK Yair Lapid in the hot seat. Lapid hits back, giving it right back to Sebastian, even silencing him at certain points.
It is easy to sit here and be critical. But given Lapid has to respond immediately in the face of such intense and hostile questioning, I think he does an admirable job.

Abbas Adviser Western Wall can only remain under Muslim sovereignty

The Western Wall can only remain under Muslim sovereignty, a senior adviser to Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas said during a Friday sermon.
“It is an Islamic endowment that absolutely cannot belong to non-Muslims,” Mahmoud Habash, Abbas’s religious affairs adviser said, referring to the wall. “It is our property and endowment. It is impossible to concede one millimeter of it.”
Jews revere the wall as the remnant of a retaining wall that surrounds the site where their ancient temples once stood. Muslims regard the wall as the location where the Prophet Muhammed tethered his winged steed during his overnight journey from Mecca to Jerusalem.
Habash’s comments came approximately a week after Jabril Rajoub, a senior Fatah official, told Israel’s Channel 2 that the wall ought to remain under Jewish sovereignty.

US should drop out of UN Human Rights Council

U.S. participation in the HRC has been a contentious issue since the HRC replaced the much-scorned U.N. Commission on Human Rights in 2006. The Bush administration declined to join the HRC doubtful of its “effectiveness” in promoting human rights. Sen. Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) introduced S. Res. 418 opposing U.S. participation.
In May 2017, the Senate Subcommittee on Multilateral International Development held hearings on whether the U.S. should remain in the HRC. There was clear consensus in the expert testimony that the HRC needs to be a “credible, multilateral institution capable of supporting countries attempting to reform and of responding decisively to violations of human rights”.
The HRC is an intergovernmental body with a membership of 47 states distributed among the U.N.’s regional groups. The HRC was established to strengthen and promote global human rights protections and make remedial recommendations. HRC members must uphold “the highest standards in the promotion and protection of human rights during their term of membership.” A member may be suspended for engaging in “gross and systematic violations of human rights”.
HRC has indeed become a “haven for dictators” and a den of gross human-rights violators. Haley correctly argues the “presence of multiple human rights-violating countries on the Human Rights Council has damaged both the reputation of the council and the cause of human rights: a human dignity is discredited.” It is ludicrous to expect the foxes to safeguard the henhouse.
Haley singled out various countries notorious for human rights violations serving on the HRC, but glaringly omitted one of the most egregious violators of human rights in Africa that is serving a second term on the council: Ethiopia is the poster child for the types of complaints and criticisms made by Haley against the HRC.

2015: UN rights chief Zeid addresses US Holocaust Museumhttps://t.co/9b8RwTEweW
2017: He compares Israelis to Nazishttps://t.co/yzsmL7TFYH http://pic.twitter.com/A0ybPZWbIM
— Hillel Neuer (@HillelNeuer) June 9, 2017

Texas Governor, Israeli PM Reaffirm Strong Ties During Call

Texas Governor Greg Abbott spoke by phone to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu Thursday about three bills lawmakers passed during the 2017 legislative session which reaffirm strong ties between the Lone Star and Jewish states.
“Texas has enjoyed a long and productive relationship with Israel, and I am proud to reaffirm our commitment to our most trusted partner in the Middle East with the signing of these laws,” said Abbott, according to a press release issued by the Governor’s office. “I thank the Texas legislature for passing laws to strengthen the relationship between Texas and Israel, and I look forward to further fortifying our alliance moving forward,” he stated.
In May, Breitbart Texas reported Abbott signed House Bill 89, the toughest anti-boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS), or “anti-BDS,” legislation in the nation, saying, “Any anti-Israel policy is an anti-Texas policy.” This law stands firmly against the discriminatory BDS movement that uses false, distorted, and anti-Semitic rhetoric to demonize Israel and its citizens to isolate the Jewish state.
“Texas is not going to do business with any country that boycotts Israel,” Abbott has said. The Texas anti-BDS law mandates companies that contract with Texas government entities verify they do not and will not boycott Israel, also barring state pension and endowment funds like the Teacher Retirement System, the Employees Retirement System of Texas, the University of Texas Investment Management Company, and the permanent school fund from investing with companies that boycott Israel.

US: Israel’s plans for new settlement homes won’t ‘help advance’ peace

The State Department gently chided Israel for moving forward with plans to build roughly 2,500 new settlement homes in the West Bank in the near future, including housing units for the first new settlement in 25 years.
Asked about Israel’s plans for building the new housing units in the contested area, the department’s spokesperson Heather Nauert on Thursday made a reference to US President Donald Trump’s February request to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to “hold back on settlements for a bit.”
“President Trump has talked about this consistently, and he has said, in his opinion, unrestrained settlement activity does not help advance the peace process,” she told reporters during a press briefing Thursday. “He’s been pretty clear about that. It doesn’t help the prospect for peace.”
“The Israeli-Palestinian peace process is important to this administration, and they will keep promoting [peace],” she said.

US senator scolds leader of Zionist group over praise for Steve Bannon

Sen. Sherrod Brown [endorsed by J-Street], D-Ohio, scolded the Zionist Organization of America for what he perceived to be its support for Stephen Bannon, US President Donald Trump’s senior strategist.
Brown, speaking Tuesday at the conservative pro-Israel group’s annual Washington conference, appeared upset that the room had applauded the mention of Bannon’s name by a prior speaker, Sebastian Gorka, another Trump advisor. The exchange came to light in footage posted of the event on Thursday on the Axios political news site.
“I know that Mr. Gorka mentioned Stephen Bannon,” he said. “I saw some people cheer when he mentioned Stephen Bannon.”
Brown’s remarks spurred murmurs, cheers and boos. “I know the history of Breitbart,” he added.
Bannon is the former CEO of the Breitbart News website, which Bannon has called a platform for the “alt-right” — a loose assemblage of anti-establishment conservatives that has been accused of promoting racism, anti-Semitism, anti-feminism and homophobia. But the movement also includes libertarians and fierce defenders of Israel.

Trump’s proposed $3m cut to Holocaust museum sparks bipartisan backlash

A proposed budget cut by President Donald Trump of $3 million to the US Holocaust Memorial Museum has sparked a bipartisan backlash in the nation’s capital.
Sixty-four members of Congress sent a letter to the president Friday demanding the budget proposal be amended to maintain the museum’s current funding levels, while Anti-Defamation League chief Jonathan Greenblatt issued a statement calling the cuts “a mistake.”
Trump’s 2018 budget request — titled “A New Foundation for American Greatness” — calls for massive cuts in non-discretionary spending to make room for increased spending on infrastructure, a border wall and national defense.
The proposed cuts include $3 million in federal support that goes to the Washington, D.C. Holocaust museum, roughly a 5 percent decrease in the museum’s budget. The cut would return the museum’s budget to its 2016 level of $54 million.

Experts: Trump needs to rebuild U.S. ability to target terrorist’s money networks

The Trump administration needs to significantly rebuild and expand law enforcement agencies' ability to target and take down terrorist financing networks after President Obama systematically disbanded the work in an attempt to ease relations with Iran for the nuclear deal, according to former senior U.S. officials with decades of experience in the field.
There was a mass exodus of top officials who spent years trying to bolster the U.S. government's ability to target these terrorist networks' illicit financing after the Obama administration dismantled their investigative units over the past several years, these experts say.
Trump now has a chance to reconstruct and redouble economic warfare against terrorist entities tied to Iran and others, but both Congress and the White House need to devote the necessary resources to do it.
Hezbollah, an Iranian terrorist organization based in Lebanon, has morphed into a transnational criminal terrorist organization over the last decade, fueled by a large and global illicit financial and business apparatus relying on cocaine and heroin trafficking and partnerships with Latin American drug cartels to fund its activities, the experts told the House Foreign Affairs Committee Thursday.
To weaken and take down Hezbollah and other terrorist groups, the FBI, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), Customs and Border Protection, and the Secret Service need more resources to tackle the financial backbone of these groups.

West Bank water theft drains Israelis and Palestinians dry

To be heard above the din of the water tanker, Migdalim Director Yael Hashash had to raise her voice considerably. “The year is 2017, and we are forced to receive water under these conditions. It’s unbelievable!” she said, throwing her hands up in frustration.
As the summer heat engulfs the country, this settlement northeast of Shiloh in the northern West Bank has been riding out a water crisis for the fourth consecutive year.
The Shiloh pipeline, which provides water to Migdalim as well as to nearby Palestinian villages, was shut off this week by Israel’s Mekorot water authority. But even a week earlier, scant amounts reached the settlement overlooking the Jordan Valley, and a tanker began shuttling water to Migdalim four to five times a day from various Mekorot sources as had been required in recent years.
“I regularly have to alert residents to limit the amount of water they use. Sometimes we have to tell them not to shower,” said Hashash.
The 90 families living in Migdalim depend on her for updates throughout the day on the status of the water supply.
“I am constantly calling Mekorot to confirm that the tanker is coming on time in order to fill our water tower,” she said.
As to who was causing the problem, Hashash did not mince her words: “Arabs from the surrounding villages, such as Kusra, steal the water by drilling dozens of holes into the pipeline to reroute it all for themselves.”

Lines in the Sand: Qatar's increasing isolation in the Arab world

The decision by Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Egypt and Yemen to cut off diplomatic relations with Qatar is the latest step in the reemergence of a clearly defined US-led Sunni Arab bloc of states.
The task of this alliance is to roll back Iranian influence and advancement in the region, and to battle against the forces of Sunni political Islam.
Little noticed by Western media, this conservative Sunni alliance against Iran and Sunni Islamism has been under construction for some time.
Saudi Arabia and the UAE were the first to recognize the new regime of Gen. Abdel Fattah al-Sisi following the military coup on July 3, 2013. Financial support from both countries has been crucial in ensuring the avoidance of economic disaster in Egypt.
The Saudis and Emiratis were the moving force behind the interventions into Bahrain in 2011 and Yemen in 2015. In both cases, the intention was to prevent the advance of Iranian interests.
Both Saudi Arabia and the UAE maintained high levels of military spending over the last half decade, in spite of low oil prices. The two countries have sagely invested in air power and special operations forces – the areas most relevant to the type of wars being fought at present in the Middle East.
The results have been visible over the last two years.

TIP CEO: US Must Hold Qatar Accountable for Its Terror Support

Now that Saudi Arabia and other Arab allies have broken off ties with Qatar due to its terror support, it’s time for the United States to do the same, Josh Block, CEO and President of The Israel Project, wrote Friday in an op-ed published in the Los Angeles Times.
Qatar by virtue of its natural gas reserves has become “one of the region’s most consequential players and one of the richest countries in the world.” But though the emirate posed as a supporter of the Arab Spring and democratic values, Qatar, ruled by the al-Thani family “has become a financier of terrorism,” Block wrote.
He noted that just one week after hosting United States Secretary of Defense James Mattis, earlier this year, Qatar hosted a conference for the Gaza-based terror group Hamas. Qatar’s support for Hamas extends beyond playing host, as the al-Thanis are major financial backers of Hamas “Last year alone,” Block wrote, “Qatar transferred $31 million to Hamas, and the country is expected to pledge an additional $100 million to Gaza.”
The Muslim Brotherhood is another beneficiary of the al-Thani’s largess and it was a major backer of the short-lived Mohammad Morsi regime in Egypt. Leaders of the Brotherhood have lived in Qatar for years and are often given a platform to spread their anti-American and anti-Western ideology to some 60 million people on Qatar’s Al Jazeera television network.
In Syria, the Qatari’s have given somewhere between $1 billion and $3 billion in aid to Sunni Islamists groups, including some affiliated with al Qaeda. Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, Qatar’s current emir, has been lobbying to have Jabhat al-NusraMail removed from the U.S. list of terror organizations by promoting a cosmetic separation between the group and its parent organization al Qaeda.

Qatari FM insists Hamas ‘a legitimate resistance movement’

As Qatar faces increasing pressure from its Arab neighbors to cut ties to jihadist groups, Qatari Foreign Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani insisted Saturday that Palestinian terror group Hamas is “a legitimate resistance movement.”
Al-Thani, during a visit to Russia to discuss the crisis, said: “The US sees Hamas as a terror organization, but to the rest of the Arab nations it is a legitimate resistance movement. We do not support Hamas, we support the Palestinian people.”
“We cooperate with the Palestinian Authority,” he said, adding however, that Doha saw Palestinian reconciliation between Hamas and the PA’s Fatah as a duty. “Hamas’s presence in Qatar doesn’t mean there’s support for Hamas in Qatar. Hamas’s presence is a political representation of the Hamas movement.”
Al-Thani noted that the movement’s leadership “is currently in Palestine” and no longer in his country, since Khaled Mashaal was replaced by Gazan Ismail Haniyeh as head of the group’s political bureau.

Amid pressure for Qatar to cut ties, Hamas delegation to visit Iran

A senior Hamas official said Saturday that a delegation headed by the group’s leader Ismail Haniyeh would visit Iran in the near future as the terror group struggles with a possible loss of its main source of international support
According to the official, Osama Hamdan, the delegation will visit several other countries as well, though he did not provide details, the Hebrew language Walla news site reported.
Hamadan’s statement on Iran came as Qatar, one of the few foreign backers of Hamas, faces massive pressure from its Gulf neighbors to cut ties with the Islamic terror group. If it does, the result could be disastrous for Hamas-ruled Gaza.
Qatar has invested hundreds of millions of dollars in roads, housing and a major hospital in the tiny territory. Its infrastructure projects are one of the few job-creators in a beleaguered economy.
A Hamas source told Israel Radio on Saturday that the organization’s leadership was also concerned the Qatari diplomatic crisis would harm recent efforts at reconciliation between the organization and the Egyptian government.
The two had been at loggerheads over Hamas support from the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, who were deposed from power by the military.

Spanish police arrest Hamas supporter accused of inciting violence against Jews

Police in Spain arrested a young Arab woman whom they said called for violence against Jews online and was flagged gathering intelligence about Israel’s embassy in Madrid.
The 23-year-old woman, who is a Moroccan citizen of Syrian and Palestinian descent, was arrested this week in Zaragoza, 170 miles northeast of the capital, for hate speech and incitement to violence, police sources told the ABC newspaper. The paper’s article Wednesday about the arrest did not identify the suspect by name.
According to ABC, police flagged the woman in 2016 after noticing her several times near the embassy in Madrid, including in the presence of unidentified men. Police reportedly followed the woman and discovered her identity, leading counterterrorist researchers to monitor her activities online.
On Facebook, where the woman moderated one anti-Israel group with more than 2,000 subscribers, the researchers documented the suspect praising Hamas and speaking favorably about the murder of Jews, leading to her arrest.

PreOccupiedTerritory: Moderate Cannibals Feeling Pressure To Disavow Extremists (satire)

Community leaders among those who consume human flesh in a moderate fashion complain that they are being unfairly targeted by critics of the practice who lump them together with more radical perpetrators.
Moderate cannibals face unjust pressure from politicians, the media, and advocacy groups, the leaders contend, even though the ideology of the moderate cannibals in no way supports the activities of extreme cannibals. At a joint press conference of several cannibal community organizations, the spokespeople for the groups called on the public to distinguish between them and extreme cannibals, or risk alienating the moderates and driving them into the arms of the extreme followers of the practice.
A coalition of grassroots cannibal groups called the Federation of Levantine Eaters of Succulent Humans (FLESH) assembled the press conference this afternoon and called on the news media, especially in the West, not to paint all cannibals with the same broad brush.
“It is irresponsible at best, and outright destructive at worst, to group all cannibals together,” insisted Waleed Aniwan, head of the Khaneh-Ümraniye “Recycling” Union (KURU), which brings together moderate cannibals from Iran and Turkey, where the cities of Khaneh and Ümraniye, respectively, are located. “Our doctrines and practices have nothing to do with the barbaric crimes committed by extremist cannibals. In fact we deny that what those monsters are doing is cannibalism at all.”

NGO Monitor: UN Women Report on Israel - Faulty Methodology and Promotion of NGO Political Warfare

Analysis
As shown in the following analysis, the report recommends legal measures (“lawfare”) against Israel, relying extensively on unverifiable accounts and legal interpretations of political NGOs and BDS activists, while misrepresenting a number of academic and legal sources. The report additionally advocates for enhanced financial and technical support for NGO lawfare activities, such as filing submissions to the International Criminal Court. This activity is blatantly political and is not in keeping with UN Women’s limited humanitarian mandate.
No Data and False Claims
The UN Women paper “aims at providing an analysis that articulates the particular impact of occupation on the rights of women and girls.” The bulk of the publication, however, simply repeats this same generalized allegation with few, if any, specifics provided. No data or statistical information is presented to support the author’s assertion. Instead, most of the examples offered do not support the claim of a disparate impact on women or girls, or that these outcomes are attributable to Israeli policy. Other claims are blatantly false.
For instance, in one of the few cases (p. 16) where an actual disparate impact on women is described, the paper claims that “the 2014 conflict in Gaza has had profound impacts on women: ‘700 women were widowed and now face difficulties in providing for their families.’” However, the publication goes on to admit that the cause of the impact is due to “female-headed households (sic) struggle to access humanitarian assistance and inherited assets due to social restrictions; women have limited or no control over benefits and entitlements due to unequal gender relations and male domination within the family,” and that “discriminatory inheritance and family laws and practices in Palestinian society exacerbate the impact of conflict on widowed and divorced women in Gaza, including in relation to their ability to receive humanitarian assistance.”
In other words, negative impacts disproportionately affecting women and girls in Gaza was due to cultural factors and personal status laws adopted by the Palestinian Authority that severely limit the rights of Palestinian women, not “Israeli occupation policies” as claimed by UN Women. See NGO Monitor’s monograph “Second Class Rights” to learn more about the destructive impact of personal status laws.

Fordam Files Motion to Dismiss Lawsuit That Challenged Ban of Notorious Anti-Israel Group

Fordham University filed a motion this week requesting that a New York court dismiss a lawsuit brought by students whose application to establish a chapter of a notorious anti-Israel group was denied by administrators.
The motion outlined the reasons Keith Eldredge, Fordham’s dean of students, rejected the request in December for a chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) to become an officially recognized club at the university’s Lincoln Center campus.
The students, represented by lawfare group Palestine Legal, have claimed their freedom of speech rights were violated.
Fordham has now insisted that administrators followed “club approval policy and procedures” and had a “rational basis” for rejecting the application.
Although the SJP chapter was approved by the student government in November, the motion cited the Fordham Club Registration Process guidelines that state the “Dean of Students has a right to veto any new club.”

Fresno State Administration Rejects Accusation That Jewish Faculty Influenced Decision to Terminate Search for New Middle East Studies Professor

California State University-Fresno (Fresno State) administrators have vigorously denied a faculty member’s accusation that his Jewish peers pressured the administration into terminating the search for a new Middle East studies professor.
Fresno State President Joseph Castro released a video statement on Wednesday stating the “allegation that the search was cancelled because of pressure from anyone is untrue.”
Allegations have been raised by some in the Fresno State community that Jewish faculty directly contacted members of the search committee to speak against the four finalists in the effort to fill the new Edward Said Professorship position.
Those behind the accusations include Joe Parks, an education professor who served as the Equal Employment Opportunities representative on the search committee, who reportedly said that “when the finalists came to campus, the Jewish faculty complained” — because the contenders “happened to be Middle Eastern in nature.”
The university “caved” to Jewish demands, said Parks.
The now-former director of Fresno State’s Middle East studies program, Vida Samiian, has resigned entirely from the university in protest.

Globe Gives Anti-Israel Detractor a Platform to Attack Israel

As UN Special Rapporteur on human rights in “Palestine”, Michael Lynk (pictured right) is duty bound to be an objective, impartial and neutral arbiter of the Israeli-Palestinian impasse. Yet, due to his being an ardent anti-Israel detractor and Palestinian apologist, he fails to meet the basic criteria for this role. Accordingly, former Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister Stéphane Dion called on the UNHRC to review Lynk’s appointment, and Conservative Critics Tony Clement and Peter Kent also condemned Lynk’s appointment.
As the Conservatives noted at the time, Lynk played “a leading role in the Canadian Palestinian Education Exchange, a group which promotes “Israeli Apartheid Week” events, addresses “One State” conferences which seek to eliminate Israel, and calls for the prosecution of Israel for war crimes.” Three days after 9/11, UN Watch notes that Lynk blamed the West for the attacks on the World Trade Centre towers. Lynk is also known for sitting on the boards of Arab and Palestinian lobby groups and is a signatory to anti-Israel petitions.
As seen in his Globe oped on June 9 (also seen appended below), Michael Lynk singles Israel out exclusively for opprobrium and conveniently forgets that in 1967, Israel fought for its survival in a war of impending annihilation waged by pan-Arab armies seeking its destruction.
Israel will not apologize for having defended itself from genocide.
Though Lynk cites Theodor Meron, who in 1967 was the newly appointed legal adviser to the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, he fails to note that many legal opinions differ with Meron’s and contend that under international law the status of the territories is “disputed”, rather than “illegal”. UN Security Council Resolution 242 authorizes Israel, having conquered the land in a defensive war, to remain in possession of the territories. According to Resolution 242, when “a just and lasting peace in the Middle East” is achieved, Israel can withdraw to ‘secure and recognized boundaries’”. Furthermore, Israel has legitimate claim to these areas in accordance with international law and bearing in mind its ancestral, religious, and historical rights to the lands of Judea and Samaria where it claims sovereignty.

First French Nazi transit camp being converted into memorial

A train station that during the Holocaust became the first Nazi transit camp in France — where Jewish children were separated from their parents, who were then sent to concentration camps including Auschwitz — is to be turned into a memorial museum.
Pithiviers station housed around 3,500 Jews in May 1941. That was before the infamous deportations of French Jews, and before Jews were being murdered en masse in Auschwitz.
Last week, local authorities said they would devote hundreds of thousands of euros to preserve the place, set up educational exhibitions on its walls and declare it a historical monument.
The abandoned train station, whose old rails have not been replaced, had remained unused for years after the Holocaust, the France3 television channel reported last week. Schools in its region of eastern France have been bringing pupils for years to see the station, which is currently closed to the public.
Separately, a website devoted to the memory of over 100,000 Dutch Jews who were murdered in the Holocaust was honored by the prestigious European Design Awards last month. The Jewish Monument website, which went online in 2005, is designed as a memorial wall featuring the names of Holocaust victims.
A physical memorial monument with the names of the Dutch victims of the Holocaust is currently being built in Amsterdam.

Vogue: Israel’s ‘Stunning Beaches’ Have ‘Something for Every Type of Sand Lover’

Vogue magazine published on Tuesday a list of “must-visit” beach spots in Israel for tourists hoping to soak up some sun.
The magazine said Tel Aviv’s 13 beaches — such as Nordau Beach, Hilton Beach, and Alma Beach — were part of the city’s culture and cited a local restaurant owner as saying, “Life happens outside in Tel Aviv, in the cafes and on the streets. The connection to the sea is part of our daily life.”
Other areas recommended by the magazine included Coral Beach and Mosh Beach in Eilat; the seaside of Old City Acre; Aqueduct Beach (also called Arches Beach) in Caesarea; and Ein Bokek, a resort town on the Israeli shore of the Dead Sea.
Vogue noted that the Jewish state’s “standing as a stellar beach destination often goes unsung” and the beaches of Israel have “something for every type of sand lover.”

Legal Insurrection: Six-Day War Day 5 — Golan Heights are Captured

As we reported in prior posts, for the past four days Egypt’s media has been incessantly reporting about false military victories.
But by this morning, President Gamal Abdel Nasser could no longer hide the truth. Appearing on national television, he admitted the defeat of the Egyptian armed forces and told the nation that he was resigning from office.
With Egypt and Jordan maintaining cease-fires, the southern and eastern fronts are now quiet. But that’s not the case for the beleaguered Israeli communities in the north of country. They’ve been coping with a barrage of rocket fire over the last four days.
Syria’s government is giving no indication of any interest in a cease-fire.
So this morning, Israel’s Defense Forces finally received the go-ahead to ascend the Golan Heights in a necessary counter-offensive.
Moving on the Golan’s slopes, the brigades of the region have been engaging in fierce fighting throughout the afternoon.
We’ve just learned that Israel is now holding all the roads and access points. But the high ground of the strategic plateau is still in Syria’s control.
So the war isn’t over yet.

Israeli Paratroopers From Famous 1967 Western Wall Photo Speak to Ohio Students on 50th Anniversary of Six-Day War

The three former Israeli paratroopers captured in the iconic Western Wall photograph taken during the Six-Day War spoke this week to students at Ohio’s Fuchs Mizrachi School about their experiences in the June 1967 fighting, the Cleveland Jewish News (CJN) reported on Thursday.
Haim Oshri, Dr. Yitzhak Yifat and Zion Karasenti, snapped by the late Israeli photojournalist David Rubinger, described the battle to liberate Jerusalem’s Old City to students at the K-12 modern Orthodox school.
“We got to the Kotel (Western Wall), and we had this supreme feeling — it’s impossible to describe the emotions, the excitement,” Karasenti said in Hebrew, according to CJN footage.
Yifat explained that their unit was not originally tasked with fighting for Israel’s capital, but were instead “very ready to go to El Arish” in the northern Sinai region. Suddenly, Yifat recalled, their commander told them, “No guys, we change the mission. We cancel the parachute into Arish, and we are heading to Jerusalem.”
“And the rest is history,” he said.

Bret Stephens and Yossi Klein Halevi - Six Day War (h/t Elder of Lobby)

PreOccupiedTerritory: 4 Million Injured In Hand-Wringing Over 50 Years Since 6-Day War (satire)

Hospitals around the world reported an influx of emergency room patients with finger and wrist injuries over the last week as a result of wringing their hands in response to the passage of five decades since Israel assumed control over territories previously held by Jordan, Egypt, and Syria.
Medical facilities in New York, Berkeley, London, Paris, and other strongholds of anti-Israel feeling in the West have experienced an marked increase in outpatient demand for orthopedic treatment of contusions and strains involving the carpals, metacarpals, phalanges, and the various connective and muscle structures of the hands since discussion of the anniversary of the 1967 Six-Day War began to take a prominent place in the media. The facilities reported that close to one hundred percent of the cases were attributed to hand-wringing by the patients over various aspects of the conflict’s lingering aftermath.
At Bellevue Hospital in Manhattan, administrators remarked on the spike in hand-wringing-related injuries, which they noted were occurring in many places at the same time. “We were prepared for this eventuality, given the buildup of media coverage over the last several months,” remarked Bellevue Assistant Emergency Room Director Dr. Libby Ruhl. “We also have had time to study the public-health trends that have been developing since discussion began months and months ago of the impending centennial of the Balfour Declaration later this year. Our medical staff and procurement staff noted the uptick, and correctly foresaw there would be such a spike.”

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