Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Monday, November 20, 2017

Was Egypt pro-Zionist after Balfour?

This article in Egyptian Streets is sort of mind-blowing:

Contrary to widespread belief, in 1917, and for over a decade after that, the Balfour Declaration was not seen by most Egyptian intellectuals as a sentence detrimental to the Palestinians. Interestingly enough, some Egyptian Muslim & Christian families held parties to celebrate the declaration. Telegrams of gratitude were sent to Lord Balfour such as the then-Governor of Alexandria Ahmad Ziour Pasha, a Muslim.

“The Governor of Alexandria Ahmad Ziour Pasha – later Prime Minister of Egypt – went to a party in the city celebrating the Balfour Declaration, that culminated in their sending a telegram to Lord Balfour to thank him,” according to Leila Ahmed in “A Border Passage”.

A delegation of leading Muslims and Christians traveled to congratulate the Jews of Palestine. Many Egyptian Zionist leaders were also Egyptian nationalists and fully committed to the cause of independence from Britain.

Egyptians support of the Balfour Declaration lasted beyond 1917. The Grand Sheikh of Al Azhar officially hosted Chaim Weizmann in 1918, co-author of the draft of the declaration submitted to Lord Balfour, when he visited Egypt on his way to Palestine. The Grand Sheikh have allegedly made a donation of 100 EGP to the Zionist cause. Weizmann’s cultivation of regional support for the Zionist movement extended to his efforts with the rulers of Hijaz where he executed an accord with Emir Faisal endorsing the Declaration.

The Hebrew University was one of the early dreams of the Zionist movement, in 1918 construction commenced. Ahmed Lutfi el-Sayed, the renowned Egyptian nationalist, political leader and first director of Cairo University joined the celebration for the grand opening of the Hebrew University in 1952. [sic - 1925]

Also, in 1944, Taha Hussien, one of Egypt’s most influential literary figures also visited the Hebrew University.

As the Jewish migration to Palestine continued, tensions between the Palestinians and the migrant population also increased. The hardline Zionists, referred to as Revisionist Zionists, a political movement which emerged from the struggle for the Jewish homeland, and early Islamists such as Mufti Husseini, the mufti of Jerusalem, played a large part in whipping up mutual resentment, fear and anger.

These tensions culminated in the 1929 Palestine Riots in late August with the massacres of Jews in Hebron, Safad among others.

The reaction in Egypt remained decidedly pro Zionism well into the first half of the 1930’s, the Government reportedly banned the word ‘Palestine’ from Friday prayers, according to the Leila Ahmed.

The Wafed Government shutdown the sole Palestinian publication with the charge of being pro Palestinian propaganda. Zionist newspapers and magazines continued to operate freely well into the late 1940’s, according to Awatef Abdel Rahman.

The article goes on to claim that while refugee ships from Europe during the Holocaust were routinely turned back by Western nations, Egypt welcomed them. I have no idea if this is true.

....Yad Vashem, other memorials and Holocaust history in general, offers no special recognition of the role that Egypt and Egyptians played in saving the lives of Jews. A disgusting byproduct of the recent rise of anti-Semitism in Egypt with the wide circulation of books by Holocaust deniers states that few Egyptians are even aware of this important history that Egypt and all Egyptians should be proud of.

This seems incredible. If true, this should all be publicized.

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Palestinian terror groups choose Iran over fellow Sunnis

From CNN:

Saudi Arabia ramped up its campaign against Iran's growing influence in the Arab World Sunday by persuading most of the 22 member states of the Arab League to condemn Iran's Lebanese ally, Hezbollah, as a "terrorist organization."

Palestinian terror groups all decided to attack the Arab League, and support Iran's proxy Hezbollah.

The " Coalition of Palestinian Resistance Forces" condemned the decision, saying that this is a service to Israel and the United States and to satisfy Saudi Arabia. it said the decision was "dangerous", saying that "Hezbollah represents the most important forces of resistance against Israel and terrorism."

Islamic Jihad and the PFLP explicitly denounced the Arab League as part of this "coalition." When this alliance was founded in 1993 in Damascus, it included 10 terror groups including Hamas, the DFLP, PFLP-GC, as-Saiqa, Fatah al-Intifada, the Palestinian Liberation Front (PLF, Abu Nidal Ashqar faction), the Palestinian Popular Struggle Front (PPSF, Khalid ‘Abd al-Majid faction) and the Palestinian Revolutionary Communist Party (PRCP). It is unclear who them members are today, and indeed it looks like the organization exists only on paper.

As of this writing, I have not seen official Hamas or Fatah reaction to the news. Their media have largely ignored the news because they know it puts them between a rock and a hard place. They know that whoever's side they choose means losing financial support from the other.

Everything is about financial support.

But it seems clear that given a choice, Palestinian terror groups are more ideologically aligned with Iran over the Sunni coalition. Unlike the shift of attitudes towards Israel in the Gulf, the Palestinians instinctively choose whomever.is more anti-Israel.

Which is a very basic reason why there is no peace today, and why the Gulf countries have been increasingly impatient with the Palestinian cause.

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Encyclopedia Judaica (2007) is downloadable

The 2007 edition of Encyclopedia Judaica is downloadable as a 277 MB PDF file from archive.org.

It isn't often you can get a $2200 work for free.

Encyclopedia Judaica is an astonishing feat of scholarship.

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From the Hamas Al Qassam Brigades website:

The Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of the Islamic Resistance Movement Hamas commends one of its heroic Mujahideen of Deir al-Balah in the Gaza Strip, who died after a fatal illness.
The Qassam Brigades said in a statement that Mujahid al-Qasami, Rami Fuad al-Louh, 32, from the Suhaib al-Roumi mosque in Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip, died on Sunday 19/11/2017.
They stated: "To go to his Lord after a blessed life full of sacrifice, sacrifice, sacrifice and sacrifice for the sake of Allah, we will count him as the righteous and pure martyrs.
We ask Allah to accept him as a martyr, to paradise...

Didn't it used to mean something to be a martyr? Kill a few Jews, or something?

Now, you can be a martyr from a tunnel collapse, a traffic accident and a heart attack from eating too many Hamasburgers.

Do you think Allah is concerned about martyr inflation?

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11/19 Links: Nick Cave: BDS Movement is Responsible for My Coming to Israel; Iran’s Immoderate ‘Moderate’

From Ian:

IsraellyCool: Nick Cave: “In Certain Way, BDS Movement is Responsible for My Coming to Israel”

We are seeing more and more artists come to Israel and speak out strongly against BDS. But I have to admit – Nick Cave’s rejection of BDS is particularly satisfying, and not just because he’s a fellow Aussie.

He has actually thanked BDS for making him more determined to come perform herel!

Nick Cave decided to perform in Israel this week as a direct result of the attempt by the BDS movement to silence artists, the performer said on Sunday.

“In a certain way, the BDS movement is responsible for my coming to Israel,” Cave said at a press conference Sunday in Tel Aviv ahead of his two sold-out shows Sunday and Monday nights at the Menorah Mivtachim Arena.

The acclaimed Australian singer/songwriter said that a few years ago, British musician Brian Eno approached him about signing a pro-Palestinian petition that called for boycotting performances in Israel.

“I didn’t want to sign that petition. I didn’t connect to it, I don’t like lists,” said Cave, adding that he’s had a bad feeling, because despite not signing the petition, he hadn’t appeared in Israel for some 20 years.

“That made me feel like a coward, so as soon as I planned this tour, it was important for me to come out against this silencing of artists.

I like Israel and Israelis and it was important for me to do something.” Cave’s current tour in support of his latest album Skeleton Tree, the first since the accidental death of his 15-year-old son, has been meet with superlatives around the world.

That Nick Cave, he’s no bad seed.

Needless to say, Roger is going to be pissed!

JPost Editorial: Bigotry’s leader: Linda Sarsour to speak at antisemitism discussion

The New School, a Manhattan-based university, has aroused controversy over its choice of speakers to appear on a panel discussion about antisemitism given by a group that self-identifies as anti-Zionist and features BDS poster girl Linda Sarsour.

The event, titled “Antisemitism and the Struggle for Justice,” is scheduled for the end of this month and is sponsored in cooperation with the Jewish Voice for Peace and Jacobin Magazine, both of which promote the misguided causes of the alt-Left, one of which is its pretense that anti-Zionism is not antisemitism.

Sarsour is a well-known Muslim and Palestinian activist who supports a Palestinian state but denies Jews the right to national self-determination. Moreover, she has appeared alongside a convicted Palestinian terrorist murderer whom she has lauded for her “resistance” to the Zionist occupation.

Sarsour told an audience recently that she was “honored to be on this stage with Rasmea Odeh,” a member of the PFLP convicted in 1969 for her involvement in the bombing of a Jerusalem supermarket that murdered two university students and maimed nine more.

Jonathan Greenblatt, national director and CEO of the Anti-Defamation League, slammed the New School for agreeing to host Sarsour. “Having Linda Sarsour & head of JVP leading a panel on #antisemitism is like Oscar Meyer leading a panel on vegetarianism,” he wrote on Twitter. “These panelists know the issue, but unfortunately, from the perspective of fomenting it rather than fighting it.”

'A Palestinian state is a deathtrap for Israel'

The Sovereignty Movement founded by Women in Green is publishing a protest following the publication of the alleged principles of the Trump outline for a political settlement between Israel and the PA.

"Anyone who has forgotten: A Palestinian state between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River endangers the State of Israel. We are shocked by the weak memory that characterizes the planners of the deathtrap of the State of Israel."

"For all those who have forgotten the fundamental principles of Zionism, we will recall that the Land of Israel is our land, and the only way to lead to true peace is to apply Israeli sovereignty over Judea and Samaria," say the leaders of the Sovereignty movement.

“An Israeli concession to the Zionist-historical principle that this land belongs to the people of Israel alone, will lead to further concessions as has been proven in the past. Israel is once again asked to continue to pay in the currency of territory for insignificant signatures of the Arab side on pieces of paper" says the Sovereignty movement "and reminds “ that there is no country in the world that desires to live that gives up its achievements in a war that was forced on it."

"Israel will not be able to exist in a reality where an Arab terror state is established in its heart, a state that will lead to the Hamas takeover of the territory, the massive emigration of millions of Arab refugees to that country that will arise out of nowhere with the end result that the Jewish demographic majority is lost between the sea and the Jordan. In addition such a state would be a security threat to the entrance to Israel, to the Ben-Gurion Airport that will be shut down, Arab missiles will be launched towards the center of Israel and and Iron Domes will become an integral part of the entire of the landscape.

Did the Sultan tell Herzl that he would rather die than give Palestine to Jews?

From Wikipedia:

During his rule, [Ottoman sultan] Abdul Hamid refused Theodor Herzl's offers to pay down a substantial portion of the Ottoman debt (150 million pounds sterling in gold) in exchange for a charter allowing the Zionists to settle in Palestine. He is famously quoted as telling Herzl's Emissary "as long as I am alive, I will not have our body divided, only our corpse they can divide."

Muslim sites have a variant of the story of the Sultan's valourous turning down money. Here is a fairly complete mythology from "The London Post:"

A little peak [sic] in the history shows how honorable people lived and die for truth and justice. In 1901 the Jewish banker Mizray Qrasow and two other Jewish influential leaders came to visit Sultan Abdul Hamid II(Turkish Sultan), they offered to give him :
1) Paying ALL the debts of the Uthmani Khilafah.
2) Building the Navy of the Ottoman state.
3) 35 Million Golden Leeras without interest to support the prosperity of the Uthmani Khilafah.

In Exchange for
1) Allowing Jews to visit Palestine anytime they please, and to stay as long as they want “to visit the holy sites.”
2) Allowing the Jews to build settlements where they live, and they wanted them to be located near Jerusalem.

Sultan Abdul Hamid II refused to even meet them, he sent his answer to them through Tahsin Pasha, and the answer was

“Tell those impolite Jews that the debts of the Uthmani state are not a shame, France has debts and that doesn’t effect it.Jerusalem became a part of the Islamic land when Khalifah Omar Bin Alkhattab took the city and I am not going to carry the historical shame of selling the holy lands to the Jews and betraying the responsibility and trust of my people. May the Jews keep their money, the Uthamani’s will not hide in castles built with the money of the enemies of Islam.”

He also told them to leave and never come back to meet him again.

The Jews did not give up on Abdul Hameed, later in the same year, 1901, the founder of the Zionist movement, Theodor Hertzl, visited Istanbul and tried to meet the Sultan. Sultan Abdul Hamid II refused to meet him and he told his Head Of The Ministers Council “Advise Dr. Hertzl not to take any further steps in his project. I can not give away a handful of the soil of this land for it is not my own, it is for all the Islamic ummah. The Islamic ummah that fought Jihad for the sake of this land and they have watered it with their blood. The Jews may keep their money and millions. If the Islamic Khilafah State is one day destroyed then they will be able to take Palestine without a price! But while I am alive, I would rather push a sword into my body than see the land of Palestine cut and given away from the Islamic State. This is something that will not be, I will not start cutting our bodies while we are alive.”

This entire story, especially the Sultan's supposed response to Herzl, is a complete myth.

Herzl did meet the Sultan, in May 1901. And I can find no record of anything close to what the Sultan supposedly said. The earliest mention I can find of this story is from a message board in 2000.

I cannot find a single book that mentions this story.

The American Jewish Yearbook at the time summarized Herzl's meeting this way:

The Jewish Encyclopedia, published in 1907, says the Sultan even gave a medal to Herzl!

A number of reasons are given for the failure of the negotiations, but the Sultan's undying love for Palestine is not one of them..

Interestingly, Hamas dramatized a TV version of the fake Sultan story in 2010.

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In a 2013 speech about the US air wars in the Middle East, President Obama said, "Before any strike is taken, there must be near-certainty that no civilians will be killed or injured -- the highest standard we can set."

Jeffrey Goldberg once interviewed CIA director John Brennan about President Obama's philosophy on airstrikes and drone strikes in various warsa and he echoed Obama's words. "The president requires near-certainty of no collateral damage. But if he believes it is necessary to act, he doesn’t hesitate.”

Indeed, when the US released reports of people killed by airstrikes in July 2016 it claimed an amazing ratio of 2581 combatants and only 116 non-combatants killed in Pakistan, Yemen and Africa, although it did not release figures from Iraq, Syria or Afghanistan.

These numbers, if true, would be an astonishing ratio of combatants to non-combatants.

Too bad that the US military is lying and Obama was responsible for thousands of civilian deaths that were never admitted.

The New York Times had a major story last week about civilian casualties in the war against ISIS, and it found over a lengthy investigation that showed:

We found that one in five of the coalition strikes we identified resulted in civilian death, a rate more than 31 times that acknowledged by the coalition. It is at such a distance from official claims that, in terms of civilian deaths, this may be the least transparent war in recent American history.

And in Afghanistan? Another report from 2015 found:

Drone strikes conducted by the United States during a 5-month-long campaign in Afghanistan caused the deaths of unintended targets nearly nine out of ten times, leaked intelligence documents suggest.

A Guardian report once found 1,147 people killed as the US was targeting only 41 men.

The New York Times in 2015 reported "Every independent investigation of the strikes has found far more civilian casualties than administration officials admit. Gradually, it has become clear that when operators in Nevada fire missiles into remote tribal territories on the other side of the world, they often do not know who they are killing, but are making an imperfect best guess."

The Military Times once found that there were thousands of US airstrikes that were never even reported to begin with, let alone their casualty counts!

The Intercept, examining a major document leak last year, said (as quoted in The Atlantic):

The documents show that the military designated people it killed in targeted strikes as EKIA—“enemy killed in action”—even if they were not the intended targets of the strike. Unless evidence posthumously emerged to prove the males killed were not terrorists or “unlawful enemy combatants,” EKIA remained their designation, according to the source. That process, he said, “is insane. But we’ve made ourselves comfortable with that. The intelligence community, JSOC, the CIA, and everybody that helps support and prop up these programs, they’re comfortable with that idea.”
The source described official U.S. government statements minimizing the number of civilian casualties inflicted by drone strikes as “exaggerating at best, if not outright lies.”

There are major takeaways from this.

One is that the US claims under the Obama administration of exceedingly few civilian casualties from airstrikes are simply lies.

Two is that the administration, which promised transparency, is anything but transparent on this topic.

When John Kerry derided Israel's performance in the last Gaza war by sarcastically calling Israeli airstrikes that killed civilians "a helluva pinpoint operation," he probably knew quite well that Israel's ratio of terrorist to civilian dead was at least as good as the US ratio. Which tells you about the intellectual honesty of John Kerry.

It is abundantly clear that the quality of Israel's transparency and investigations after each airstrike far exceeds that of the US even under Obama's restrictive rules on airstrikes. And it looks like the actual ratios of combatants to non-combatants is far better for Israel, since Israel never counts the families of terrorists killed in each airstrike as being combatants - and the US does!

Keep in mind that there is no evidence that the US is breaking international law guidelines in these cases. One is allowed to use the best intelligence one has in determining a target and likely collateral damage.

But isn't it funny that there is so much less attention paid on US airstrikes over years of fighting in multiple theatres than there has been on relatively short wars in Gaza? How there aren't any major noisy campaigns about US "war crimes" from NGOs?

The hypocrisy and double standards are, as usual, stunning. And they can only be explained if one considers the Jewish state to be uniquely evil before the first investigation is even started.

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Ma'an reports that Majed Faraj, head of the Palestinian intelligence service and a close confidant of Mahmoud Abbas, met with Hamas leadership in Gaza on Friday.

And they both reiterated their support for terror.

Both sides emphasized that the "weapons of the resistance are the right of the Palestinian people as long as the independent Palestinian state does not exist."

"Weapons of the resistance" are things like Qassam rockets, suicide bomb belts, bus bombs, and anti-tank weapons aimed at schoolbuses.

And this is the "peaceful, moderate" PA that is saying this.

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11/18 Links: Is Anti-Semitism the Only Bigotry That’s Subject to Debate?; Abrams: Riyadh Realpolitik

From Ian:

Is Anti-Semitism the Only Bigotry That’s Subject to Debate?

Earlier this week, Shiri Moshe of the Algemeiner reported that the president of the student group J Street U said that it is “unfair and unhelpful overreach” to describe those advocating for the destruction of Israel as anti-Semites as that would ignore “the nuances and sensitivities of a complicated political debate.” It isn’t clear what nuances there are when discussing the destruction of the world’s only Jewish nation.

Reporting on last month’s Grand Slam Judo Tournament hosted by the United Arab Emirates, The Washington Post reported that the UAE defied the International Judo Federation and refused to allow the Israeli athletes to identify their national team on their uniforms. Though the UAE asserted that it didn’t allow the display of Israeli symbols in order to protect the athletes, the Post noted that UAE maintains “no diplomatic ties with Israel.” Overall though, the Post characterized the banning of Israeli symbols to “international politics.” Really? Is any other nation in the world treated this way?

In August, The New York Times reported that two Iranian soccer players were banned for life from the national team, because the Greek team they played for had competed against an Israeli team. Critics of the move, according to the Times, “say the ban on competing against Israel has hurt the development of Iranian athletes.” And while the report acknowledges that Iran doesn’t recognize Israel, it failed to mention that its leaders regularly call for Israel’s destruction, a sign not of a diplomatic dispute but of deep-seated hatred.

The problem with the New School’s call for debate is that it obfuscates the issue. It allows individuals whose views are abhorrent to obtain a cover of respectability.

What we need is clarity, not debate.

When an individual, entity, or nation singles out Israel for criticism that it applies to no one else, or denies that Israel has a right to exist, they are anti-Semitic and are deserving of censure.

Holding anti-Semites accountable may not be nuanced, but there’s no reason that anti-Semitism should continue to be excused.

Richard Millet: Anti-Israel meeting at SOAS stopped by peaceful pro-Israel protest.

Whenever I ask a question at SOAS it’s usually accompanied by abuse coming my way. For example, after asking a perfectly reasonable question in 2012 SOAS lecturer Gilbert Achcar accused me of being a “professional disruptor” and then falsely accused me of leaving insulting messages on his phone.

On Tuesday night at SOAS it was completely different and uplifting.

The members of the panel were Tony Lerman and ex-teacher Naomi Wimborne-Idrissi. Chairing was academic Mike Cushman who has more than a touch of Larry David about him in both look and mannerism. The subject of the evening was a new book they had contributed to called On Antisemitism.

The room of 50 sat relatively quiet listening to Lerman explain how “non-violent activism” like boycott, divestment and sanctions againt Israel (BDS) are under attack in America. And he quoted Judith Butler who claims that accusations of antisemitism, like those against BDS and anti-Zionists, “are meant to cause pain.”

Lerman went on to claim that “supremacist Zionism” attacks Israel’s internal critics like B’tselem and Breaking The Silence and he attacked the “notorious definition of antisemitism” adopted by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance which he felt was “an attack on pro-Palestinian activism”.

Wimborne-Idrissi read out her favourite parts of the book one of which was about how American Jews have now placed themselves within the “tent of whiteness” due to their identifying with a “white supremacist Israel dominated by white Ashkenazi Jews”.

Cushman allowed me to ask a question and so I put it to Lerman how it could be that BDS, which calls for the right of return of some five million so-called Palestinian refugees, can be considered anything other than violently antisemitic when such a return would result in the demographic demise of the only Jewish state.

British Activist Shows Ignorance of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict
Top Pro-Palestinian activist explains why he's against Israel

We interview one of the UK's most prolific pro-Palestinian activists... the gaps in his knowledge will shock you. Meet Damian (@cockneyactivist), a left wing Englishman that has organised countless anti-Israel protests. After speaking to Damian at several demonstrations, we genuinely believe he means well and this comes across in the interview. However, we were shocked at the reasons he gave for his opposition to Israel and were alarmed at his lack of knowledge about the conflict. For someone that has spent years and years campaigning against Israel, he comes across as absolutely oblivious to much of the history of the Middle East, the suffering of the Jewish people, the arguments for Jewish statehood and the current reality in Israel. We can't help but think had he been exposed to less biased information, he could have become an ambassador for peace rather than fighting imaginary European colonisers.
To set the record straight:

- Very few Christians in the Middle East were originally Jewish.
- Very few Muslims were originally Jewish.
- Almost all Jews trace their roots back to Israel (according to most DNA studies)
- Jews are not white European colonisers.
- In contrast the Arabs were colonisers, they replaced the indigenous cultures and religions with Islam
- Israel is not a colony of Europe, it is an independent, multi-cultural democracy.
- The Jews that fled Europe were not white colonisers
- they were fleeing persecution.
- The majority (57%) of Jews in Israel are not Ashkenazi.

Archbishop Abdallah Julio Brunella of the Melkite Catholic Church in Jerusalem was interviewed by Al Quds. And true to form of all Christian leaders who count Palestinian Arabs as their subjects, he is unrelentingly anti-Israel.

We've seen this phenomenon before with the Palestinian Catholic leaders of various stripes.

Brunella said:

Christians have been subjected to widespread persecution in Palestine. In Jerusalem today the occupation threatens the Christian presence and the migrations do not stop because of the lack of opportunities for life.
We must support the elements of steadfastness for Christians in Palestine. They are an integral part of the Ummah. The Christian belongs to his Arabism before his church and he is facing the struggle of existence as is the situation of the Arab citizen. There is a systematic Israeli policy aimed at emptying the land of Palestine from all its components. The suffering of Christians in Palestine is no less than the suffering of Muslims and is the main reason behind their growing emigration.

No, the reason Christians are fleeing is Muslims, but Brunella is too frightened to say so. So he blames Jews.

• Palestine is the cradle of Christ, the place of Christ's crucifixion and resurrection, and the origin of the Christian religion to the world. The Christian roots in Palestine are as old as history, our Lord Christ was born in Bethlehem Palestine, and this blessed land is the land of all religions, and Christianity also has its roots in Palestine and on Arab land and authentic as Islam is authentic.
Hence, the relationship between Arab Christian and Arab Muslim is very important to the importance of history, and it is united under one slogan, to be or not to be.
Christianity is a dogma as it is Islam. It is very important to distinguish between religious affiliation and national belonging. There is a common past, a present and a future that is also common to us. Arab Christianity has its own destination and concepts. There is a malicious plan that targets all the Arab nation and aims to destroy the one nation.

Muslims hate Christians just as much as they hate Jews, but Brunella will never, ever admit it - because they own him.

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11/17 Links Pt2: German court rules Kuwaiti airline may ban Israeli passengers; The film that speaks truth to terror

From Ian:

'Watching the moon at night': The film that speaks truth to terror

A documentary about terror, especially if you have come perilously close to experiencing it in your own life or have lost people you love to it, as I have, can have you biting your lips, pressing your hand against your mouth or shutting your eyes to avoid horrific sights. None of those reactions are applicable to "Watching the Moon at Night: On terrorism and anti-Semitism," a film which instead, has you wiping unexpected tears of empathy from your eyes, feeling your heart break or taking deep breaths to overcome the despair brought on by thiinking too much about the state of the human race.

This unforgettable movie is not out to show you gory details of terror attacks, although, of course, it cannot avoid them completely. The film is meant to make you think, to stay with you after you leave the theater. And it does.

"Watching the Moon at Night" is filled with ordinary people, not terrorists, people whose world has alternated for years between shock and resignation at the senselessness, the uselessness, of what befell them on what should have been an ordinary day. Swedish filmmakers Bo Persson and Joanna Helander have, with great sensitivity, given those bereft by terror the opportunity to describe the indescribable, and the effect is much more powerful than scenes of actual terrorist attacks.

Unadorned narratives of loss and the geographic range in which it has been experienced, the cultural diversity the speakers display contrasted with the commonality of their sadness, make for a gripping way to expose the spreading scourge of terror permeating the period in which we live and the political attempts to justify it. For me, a neighbor of sunny Malki Roth whose Australian-born father Arnold speaks in the film, his words about the feeling of isolation since her murder in Jerusalem's Sbarro pizzeria at the age of 15, were particularly devastating.

Learn How to Make the Case for Israel, with Professor Alan Dershowitz

WATCH: SJWs Protesting 'Nazi' Ben Shapiro's Speech Are Confronted By Reporter. They're Totally Clueless.

On Monday, about 200 SJW protesters took to the campus of UCLA in an attempt to silence conservative writer and commentator Ben Shapiro. The protest was unsuccessful and Shapiro gave his speech, which was, ironically, about creeping fascism on campus.

The protesters engaging in the sort of behavior that Shapiro was warning against inside the lecture hall were confronted by right-wing journalist Austen Fletcher, known as Fleccas. They were about as incoherent and clueless as you might imagine.

Flooding the venue, protesters chanted loudly, "Nazis go home!" — (Shapiro is an Orthodox Jew) — "Right-wing bigots go away!" and "It isn't a debate when you're just spreading hate!"

"I don't think he should be able to speak. Ben Shapiro incites hate speech, he does not incite free speech," explained one clueless female protester.

"Donald Trump is worse than Hitler!" screamed another anti-free-speech college student. As noted by Fleccas, this chant, like the rest of them, seems misplaced (and insultingly inaccurate) considering Shapiro did not even vote for Trump.

"Just because somebody is wearing a suit, just because he looks like Richard Spencer, is wearing a haircut like the Hitler youth, doesn't mean they're right," said one male protester.

Yeah, apparently there's a strong stereotype that a person who has a "Hitler youth" haircut is always "right." Shapiro doesn't even have that haircut. The protester was also completely ignoring Shapiro's consistent condemnation of the alt-right, which has consistently targeted him.

"F*** Ben Shapiro and f*** Milo Yiannopoulos," screamed another protester, apparently totally ignorant of Shapiro's take on Yiannopoulos.

Other protesters trying to shut down Shapiro were confronted by pro-free-speech counter-protesters. When the protesters were asked what their beef was with Shapiro, they deflected to President Trump, gave no specific answer, and then fled the interaction.

Free Speech Protesters Can't Compete with Ben Shapiro Supporters at UCLA

11/17 Links Pt1: Two Wounded in in Gush Etzion Ramming Attack; Breaking the Silence and the EUs industry of lies

From Ian:

Two injured, one seriously, in West Bank car ramming; terrorist shot

A Palestinian terrorist rammed his car into two people, seriously injuring one of them, before getting shot while trying to stab soldiers in the central West Bank on Friday morning, the army said.

The driver of the vehicle, a 17-year-old who was not immediately named, rammed his car into the first victim, a 70-year-old man, who sustained a light head wound, at the Efrat South junction, medics said.

He continued down the road to the nearby Gush Etzion Junction where he hit another Israeli man, 35, according to the Magen David Adom ambulance service.

The second victim was initially said to have been lightly-to-moderately wounded, but the hospital later said his condition was serious, with a brain injury.

The army said the driver then got out of his car with a knife and tried to stab soldiers.

“The soldiers responded by firing towards the attacker, resulting in his injury,” the Israel Defense Forces said in a statement.

Palestinian Terrorist Had 'Big Smile on His Face,' Israeli Wounded in Gush Etzion Ramming Attack Recalls

Two Israeli civilians were wounded — one seriously — in a vehicular-ramming attack carried out by a Palestinian terrorist in the West Bank on Friday morning.

The assailant — a 17-year-old male from the city of Halhul, north of Hebron — was shot and detained by IDF soldiers at the Gush Etzion Junction after he left the van he was driving and tried to stab them.

The seriously wounded Israeli — 35-year-old Evven Ezer Holhering, a married father of six from Kiryat Arba — was transported to the Hadassah Ein Kerem Hospital in Jerusalem with a head injury. His wife, Miriam, has asked the people of Israel to pray for her husband.

Holhering is a member of the Bnei Menashe community, a group of Indian Jews who believe they are descendants of one of the ancient ten lost tribes of Israel.

David Ramati — a 70-year-old Israeli man who was lightly wounded in the attack — told reporters the terrorist “had a big smile on his face” before running into to him on the side of Route 60, the main north-south thoroughfare in the West Bank.

IDF enforces closure on West Bank hometown of car-rammer

The Israeli army on Friday set up checkpoints around the West Bank town of Halhul, the home of a Palestinian terrorist who earlier in the day rammed his car into two people, seriously injuring one of them, the military said.

The family of the terrorist was also detained for questioning, the army said.

Just after 6:30 a.m., the 17-year-old barreled his car into the first victim, a 70-year-old man, who sustained a light head wound, at the Efrat South Junction.

From his hospital bed, the first victim, David Ramati, described seeing the Palestinian terrorist, “with a big smile on his face,” driving toward him at some 100 kilometers (60 miles) an hour. Ramati said he had a pistol and tried to shoot the 17-year-old driver, but he was hit by the car before he could.

The terrorist continued down the road to the nearby Gush Etzion Junction where he hit and seriously injured another Israeli man, 35, according to the Magen David Adom ambulance service.

Wife of seriously wounded terror victim urges prayers for his life

The seriously injured victim of Friday’s car-ramming terror attack was named as Even Ezer Holaring, 35, from the Bnei Menashe community, and his wife urged people to pray for the father of five.

Holaring was seriously wounded when he was hit by a car driven by a Palestinian terrorist early in the morning as he stood at the Gush Etzion Junction south of Jerusalem in the West Bank.

“I am the wife of Even Ezer who was wounded in the attack this morning,” his wife said in a short video from the hospital. “His condition is very serious and I am asking every one to pray for him, Even Ezer, the son of Malka,” she said.

Holaring was taken for surgery with a head wound, surgeons at the Hadassah Hospital Ein Kerem in Jerusalem said.

“He suffered a head wound. He has an intracranial hemorrhage and will require brain surgery,” his doctor said. “He’s in serious condition, but he is stable.