The Presbyterian vote

Presbyterian vote to boycott is just old fashioned anti-Semitism. We’ve seen it 1000X.

"why would Presbyterians vote to advocate boycotting the ONE country in the Middle East where Arabs, Muslims, Christians, Jews, gays, women live in freedom and live without fear, and weekly invent things to improve the world, and advocate instead for a new Arab/Muslim corrupt, tyrannical, fanatical, hate filled, anti-gay, anti-women, anti-democratic, anti-Christian, anti-Jewish, genocidal advocating country, unless they are just an old fashioned anti-Semite?" They are. Never forget the PLO to liberate Israel was created in 1964 when Jordan controlled the West Bank and Egypt Gaza. Never forget in 1947 the Arabs voted against a Palestinian state in the UN. It could now be 66 years old. Never forget that everyday Palestinians schools teach young children to hate Jews and want to kill them. Never forget Abbas made a unity gov. with Hamas, which states in wants to kill Jews everywhere..,.

can't recall who wrote this
Who is responsible for Palestinian refugees?

“There is no doubt that there is real suffering among the Palestinians living in Gaza and the West Bank (which is actually ancient Judea and Samaria). The question is who, precisely, is most responsible for their suffering?

Certainly, Israel is far from blameless in its treatment of the Palestinians, and it helps no one when we overlook or whitewash Israel’s failings, as some Christian Zionists are prone to do.

But is Israel primarily responsible for the difficult living conditions faced by the Palestinians today? Absolutely not. The blame lays squarely at the feet of the Palestinian leadership.

Consider that in 1936, Haj Amin Husseini, the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, later a collaborator with Hitler and the father of many of today’s radical Islamic movements, had this to say about living in peace with the neighboring Jews: “There is no place in Palestine for two races. The Jews left Palestine 2,000 year ago, let them go to other parts of the world, where there are wide vacant places.”

In contrast, in 1937, David Ben Gurion, later to be Israel’s first Prime Minister, said, “We do not wish and do not need to expel Arabs and take their place. All our aspiration is built on the assumption – proven throughout all our activity in the Land of Israel – that there is enough room in the country for ourselves and the Arabs.”

Ten years later, when the U.N. had proposed separate states for the Jews and the Arabs, Golda Meir said, “We are happy and ready for what lies ahead. Our hands are extended in peace to our neighbors. Both States can live in peace with one another and cooperate for the welfare of their inhabitants.”

And Ben Gurion invited the Arabs living in what would be the new state of Israel to remain among them as partners (which many of them did, and they have grown from 200,000 then to 1.6 million today): “If the Arab citizen will feel at home in our state . . . if the state will help him in a truthful and dedicated way to reach the economic, social, and cultural level of the Jewish community, then Arab distrust will accordingly subside and a bridge will be built to a Semitic, Jewish-Arab alliance.”

In stark contrast, Azzam Pasha, Secretary of the Arab League, would have none of it, calling instead for an all-out war against Israel: “It will be a war of annihilation. It will be a momentous massacre in history that will be talked about like the massacres of the Mongols or the Crusades.”

And so, the five surrounding Arab nations attacked Israel and were defeated in a war that was costly and difficult for everyone, resulting in about 800,000 Jewish refugees who fled from the neighboring Muslim countries and about 600,000 Arab refugees who fled from the war on Israel.

What happened to those refugees? Most of the Jewish refugees were absorbed by the fledgling State of Israel; the Arab refugees were not absorbed by their neighboring countries.

Why? Because they were used as human pawns against Israel, to the point that in 1959, the Arab League passed Resolution 1457: “The Arab countries will not grant citizenship to applicants of Palestinian origin in order to prevent their assimilation into the host countries.”

That’s why, until this very day, there are hundreds of thousands of Palestinians living in refugee camps in countries like Lebanon and Syria, never integrated into the larger population or absorbed as citizens with full rights.

How dare the anti-Zionists blame Israel for this atrocious treatment of the Palestinians. The fault lies with their own leaders who have betrayed them in their hatred of Israel. (This is why historian Efraim Karsh entitled his very important book Palestine Betrayed, where much more relevant information can be found.)

As recently as 2004, Hisham Youssef, spokesman for the 22-nation Arab League, stated that, “Palestinians live in very bad conditions. That official policy is meant to preserve their Palestinian identity. If every Palestinian who sought refuge in a certain country was integrated and accommodated into that country, there won’t be any reason for them to return to Palestine.”

Do these leaders really care about their suffering brothers and sisters, or is their opposition to Israel, fueled by the theology of radical Islam, more important to them?

In 2012, the Palestinian Mufti, one of the senior Islamic leaders, repeated a well-known Muslim Hadith (authoritative tradition): “The Hour [of Resurrection] will not come until you fight the Jews. The Jew will hide behind stones or trees. Then the stones or trees will call: ‘Oh Muslim, servant of Allah, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him.’”

More recently, in a recent program on Hamas’ Al-Aqsa TV, Hamas cleric and parliamentary member Yunis Al-Astal cited the Quran in guiding Muslims to “massacre” the Jews. (See Palwatch.org for more details.)

With statements like this, which are seconded by many Palestinian leaders, does Israel really have a peace partner among the Palestinian leadership?

As journalist Caroline Glick wrote, “Nearly every day a Palestinian leader announces that the Palestinians will not make peace with Israel under any circumstances. These statements are part of the public record, and all are published to great approval in the Arabic media. Palestinian children regularly appear on PA-controlled television children’s programs, calling for the annihilation of Israel and demonizing Jews as subhuman. Summer camps are named after terrorists.”

And as Israel has released thousands of Palestinian prisoners as a gesture of peace, even though many of these prisoners have the blood of Israeli men, women, and children on their hands, they are hailed as heroes when they return home. This is a terribly painful slap in Israel’s face, and yet another stumblingblock to peace.

As for the billions of dollars of support that pours into Hamas and the Palestinian Authority from America and Europe, only a small portion of it finds its ways into the hands of the people, instead being used to pad the bank accounts of the leaders and to further their war on Israel.

But let us not forget where the ultimate blame lies for the suffering of the Palestinian people: It lies at the feet of their leadership, and shifting the blame to Israel will do these suffering Palestinians no good at all.”

Brandeis capitulates to Muslim radicals

Brandeis University has rescinded its offer of an honorary degree to Ayaan Hirsi Ali, the Somali-born activist whose work has focused on the barbaric misogyny rampant in Islamic societies, like the one in which she was raised. Capitulating to a campaign by CAIR (Council on American Islamic Relations) and voluble studentand faculty protests, Brandeis President Frederick Lawrence yesterday withdrew the honor. He has publicly shamed a courageous woman. CAIR is an unindicted co-conspirator in a terrorism funding case involving Hamas.

Please read the eloquent and noble response of Ayaan Hirsi Ali below, and then please reach out to the Brandeis administration and express your outrage at this shameful action.

President Fred Lawrence - lawrence@brandeis.edu 781-736-3001

Ayaan Hirsi Ali’s statement:

“Yesterday Brandeis University decided to withdraw an honorary degree they were to confer upon me next month during their Commencement exercises. I wish to dissociate myself from the university’s statement, which implies that I was in any way consulted about this decision. On the contrary, I was completely shocked when President Frederick Lawrence called me—just a few hours before issuing a public statement—to say that such a decision had been made.

“When Brandeis approached me with the offer of an honorary degree, I accepted partly because of the institution’s distinguished history; it was founded in 1948, in the wake of World War II and the Holocaust, as a co-educational, nonsectarian university at a time when many American universities still imposed rigid admission quotas on Jewish students. I assumed that Brandeis intended to honor me for my work as a defender of the rights of women against abuses that are often religious in origin. For over a decade, I have spoken out against such practices as female genital mutilation, so-called ‘honor killings,’ and applications of Sharia Law that justify such forms of domestic abuse as wife beating or child beating. Part of my work has been to question the role of Islam in legitimizing such abhorrent practices. So I was not surprised when my usual critics, notably the Council of American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), protested against my being honored in this way.

“What did surprise me was the behavior of Brandeis. Having spent many months planning for me to speak to its students at Commencement, the university yesterday announced that it could not “overlook certain of my past statements,” which it had not previously been aware of. Yet my critics have long specialized in selective quotation – lines from interviews taken out of context – designed to misrepresent me and my work. It is scarcely credible that Brandeis did not know this when they initially offered me the degree.

“What was initially intended as an honor has now devolved into a moment of shaming. Yet the slur on my reputation is not the worst aspect of this episode. More deplorable is that an institution set up on the basis of religious freedom should today so deeply betray its own founding principles. The ‘spirit of free expression’ referred to in the Brandeis statement has been stifled here, as my critics have achieved their objective of preventing me from addressing the graduating Class of 2014. Neither Brandeis nor my critics knew or even inquired as to what I might say. They simply wanted me to be silenced. I regret that very much.

“Not content with a public disavowal, Brandeis has invited me ‘to join us on campus in the future to engage in a dialogue about these important issues.’ Sadly, in words and deeds, the university has already spoken its piece. I have no wish to ‘engage’ in such one-sided dialogue. I can only wish the Class of 2014 the best of luck—and hope that they will go forth to be better advocates for free expression and free thought than their alma mater.

“I take this opportunity to thank all those who have supported me and my work on behalf of oppressed woman and girls everywhere.”

Delusion about peace

Delusion:
I heard these 2 lovely Israel female IDF reservists speak yesterday about their lives and services in defense of Israel and they both ended on notes of optimism about peace because each have had interaction with a few Palestinian children that were fine. I know they have to say that on their speaking tour but its nonsense. My question to them:
You both ended with optimism after talking to us for an hour about all the Palestinian rockets, suicide bombers, deaths of your friends, how they use children as shields, hide their weapons in mosques and hospitals etc. You admit Hamas is a terrorist group, controls Gaza and continues to fire missiles. Abbas, the supposed moderate, refuses to recognize Israel as a Jewish state, says no Jews can live in Biblical Jewish lands of Judea and Samaria, honors murderers of Jews and the MAJORITY of Palestinians by poll SUPPORT suicide bombers and missiles. You affirmed they teach hatred of Israel in their schools. How can you be optimistic?

The ladies said they knew all those, mumbled a few responses about a few experiences with nice Arab children, (even as they told us one of their great grandfathers was the only doctor in a while area treating Arabs and Jews and was murdered by his neighbors, whom he had treated in the riots of 1929) and reasserted their close about optimism. .

The "peace talks have collapsed". Obama and the world will blame Netanyahu. The Palestinians never intended to make peace. They want to destroy Israel. The Palestinians were invented by the Arabs as a tool to aid in Israel's demise. Their is no history of any Arab nation of Palestine.
J street and other pro Arab groups pretend to be pro Israel but parrot Obama and Kerry;s blame Israel first strategy.

Be optimistic if you like. Its an illusion. The Palestinians if ever achieve sovereignty will be ever a greater threat to Israel's security and make Israel 9 MILES wide.

What Just Happened to the Peace Talks?!

The Arabs didn't miss an opportunity for peace. Their goal has always been something else entirely.
By: JoeSettler
Published: April 4th, 2014
To anyone who has been through a few rounds of these peace talks over the years, it was kind of obvious that they were going to have to collapse. What wasn’t obvious was how, when or what excuse would be given.

Abba Eban once incorrectly said that the Arabs “never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity.” I say incorrectly because he assumed that the Arabs must have the same desire and goal for peace as he did, and they just keep messing it up.

But that statement is wrong because the underlying assumption is wrong. The Palestinian Authority is not interested in peace. At least not in the way Abba Eban understood it.

The Palestinian Authority was obtaining the release of some very horrible terrorists, a lot of them, and even lots more of them in the future. If the leaks were even partly true, they were, in their salami method, getting some seriously bad concessions from Israel, and they were doing it with the help of the most friendliest, pro-PA, anti-Israel government in US history.

And all they had to do was keep talking.

Yet they threw it all away.

Why?

It wasn’t because they weren’t getting major concessions in the talks, they were, and over time they would have gotten even more.

It wasn’t because they were being forced to offer any concessions in return – because they weren’t.

Well, except for one nonnegotiable.

Netanyahu demanded they acknowledge Israel as the Jewish state.

This would mean ending the fight, and recognizing the Jewish right to the land of Israel, and admitting that Israel was making concessions to the PA. But primarily it meant declaring an official end to the war and trying to destroy Israel.

Look at one of the precondition demands the PA made yesterday.

They demanded that 15,000 PA citizens be granted Israeli citizenship. Does that really jive with the narrative that they want their own state for their own people, or does that jive better with the fact that they still want to destroy Israel and overrun it with Arabs? The answer speaks for itself.

The PA collapsed the peace talks, most likely because they were reaching that point, just like they reached that point in the past, where they had to decide, do they want to be a normal, productive country, or do they want to continue to try to destroy Israel.

The answer is clearly the latter, and perhaps partially, because they have no culture to be the former.

But unfortunately, as experience shows, this doesn’t mean the end of the peace talks. It means the end of this round, and at some point they’ll be started up again.

Perhaps after (yet another) unilateral declaration of statehood. Perhaps after a UN vote. Perhaps after another intifada (which Israel will win). Perhaps next week, if the US gives them a big present.

And the game will continue. The talks will restart, and they’ll reach the point near the end, where they’ll collapse again, for only one reason, because a signed peace agreement won’t allow for the destruction of Israel.

Dershowitz on J Street

Dershowitz eviscerates Jeremy Ben Ami and J Street

March 29, 2014

   J Street’s hypocrisy must be exposed  (Jeremy Ben Ami and J Street) J Street’s ‘Big Tent’ is open only to one side – the anti-Israel and BDS-supporting hard left of its own position; pro-Israel centrists are censored.

Jeremy Ben Ami and J Street

From Haaretz:

Thanks to Elder of Ziyon
By Alan M. Dershowitz

J Street, the American organization that calls itself pro-Israel and pro peace but that always seems to be taking positions that are anti-Israel and pro-Palestinian, is asking America’s Jewish leadership to have a big tent and to open its doors to J Street. While I generally support that position, it is imperative that J Street’s hypocrisy be exposed. J Street insists that all major pro-Israel organizations be open to speakers who favor opposing views—such as supporters of the BDS movements, supporters of the single secular binational state approach, and those who oppose Palestinian recognition of Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people.

In the abstract, this open tent policy seems commendable. We should be committed to the open marketplace of ideas in which views prevail on their merits not on the basis of exclusion.

Now let’s see how J Street itself fares with regard to an open tent policy. It has categorically refused to allow speakers like me, who oppose J Street’s policies on Iran and other security matters, to speak to its members at its conventions. I have repeatedly and persistently sought an opportunity to present my perspective—which is shared by many American supporters of Israel—at the J Street convention, or at otherevents officially sponsored by J Street. When J Street invites BDS supporters and those oppose Israel’s right to exist as the nation-state of the Jewish people to speak at itsevents, it claims that it does not necessarily support these positions, but it believes in encouraging its members to hear views that are different from its official positions. That is total nonsense. J Street only wants people to hear views to the anti-Israel hard left of its position. It categorically refuses to allow its members to hear views that are more centrist and more pro-Israel, such as my own.

…
And there is a good reason why they have placed this cone of silence over its critics. J Street survives, and even expands, largely as the result of speaking out of two sides of its mouth. It seeks to attract centrist members by advocating the two-state solution, an aggressive stance towards peace negotiations and criticisms of Israel’s settlementpolicies. These are positions I fully support, and if they were J Street’s only positions, I would have joined that organization many years ago. But in an effort to expand leftward, particularly hard leftward, it has taken positions that undercut Israel’s security and that virtually no Israeli center-leftists support. It placed its imprimatur behind the despicable and mendacious Goldstone Report by bringing Richard Goldstone to Capitol Hill and introducing him to members of Congress. In doing so it undercuts the efforts of the Obama Administration, which was supportive of Israel’s self-defense efforts in Gaza and not supportive of the Goldstone Report.

…
J Street has also spoken out of both sides of its mouth on the issue of whether the Palestinian leadership should recognize Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people. While first appearing to oppose such recognition, it now seems to be saying that this issue should be left to final stage negotiations, but it leaves open the possibility that it will continue to oppose such recognition if and when such negotiations are reached.

Moreover, J Street has accepted funding from sources—such as George Soros—who are openly anti-Israel, and have kept this fact secret so as not to alienate its centrist supporters.

It is easy to understand therefore why J Street doesn’t want me, or others who holdpositions like mine, to enter into its tent. It does not want its own members to be confronted with the reality of J Street’s double talk. If I speak at its convention, I will be speaking at the same time to those centrists it seeks to attract and to those hard leftists it wants within its tent. Both sides will be shocked by J Street’s duplicity in telling each what they want to hear.

So here is my challenge: at the next J Street convention, show the film The J Street Challenge: The Seductive Allure of Peace in Our Time to all of its members, invite me to speak to them, allow me to distribute its conflicting position papers and positionsand let the marketplace of ideas remain open to its members. Only when J Street opens up its tent to views critical of its own should it be demanding that pro-Israel groups open its tent to them.

Now look at Ben-Ami’s “response” where he doesn’t respond at all:

…Instead of organizing to meet this existential threat, some on the far right of the American Jewish community are focusing their effort and their fire in a different direction – on members of their own community. In particular, there is a new well-funded and energetic campaign to defame and delegitimize J Street, centered on an hour-long attack-umentary called the “J Street Challenge.”

Sadly even a couple of mainstream, established Jewish organizations and figures are associating themselves with it – contrary to our community’s firm commitment to civil debate on issues of legitimate disagreement.

Those who’ve made the film and are hawking it are, however, missing the real challenges that J Street is posing to the Jewish community. Here are a few of them:

• With the world losing patience with Israel’s policy toward the Palestinians, will we rally to urge the national homeland of our people to change course before it loses its democracy or its Jewish character?

• As the BDS Movement against Israel gains traction, will we recognize that the best way to defeat it isn’t spending our energy on preventing its supporters from being heard, but on ending the conflict in two states for two peoples?

• If you recognize the existential necessity of a two-state solution for Israel to survive as a Jewish and democratic homeland, isn’t it time to acknowledge the price that has to be paid to achieve it? How can we say we support a two-state solution but oppose establishing borders based on the pre-67 lines with swaps? How can we say we support two states and oppose a Palestinian capital in the Arab neighborhoods of Jerusalem?

• Is it appropriate to call those who criticize Israeli government policy anti-Israel or anti-Semitic? Plenty of Israelis including security chiefs, former Prime Ministers and Members of the Knesset are critical of present policy, and they’re certainly not anti-Israel. In fact, using the anti-Semitism label to describe criticism of Israeli policy demeans the horror of real anti-Semitism.

• Is it right or smart to limit the right to speak in Jewish communal spaces to those with whom you agree? The more we limit admission to Jewish communal spaces by imposing ideological litmus tests regarding Israel, the smaller our Jewish community will be.

• Are we, as a people, treating the Palestinian people the way we ourselves want to be treated? Are we living up to the moral standards of our people and have we learned the lessons of our own oppression through the centuries and across the globe?

• Can we finally stop ignoring what is happening beyond the Green Line? The day-to-day maintenance of a 47-year occupation of another people runs counter to the interests and values of Israel and the Jewish people. It places all the wonder and accomplishment of the state of Israel at risk. It is time for the occupation to end.

We urge those attacking us to spend a little less time leveling baseless accusations against a now-established Jewish organization and a little more time addressing these fundamental challenges facing the Israel we love.
…
(Jeremy Ben Ami and J Street) In Jewish communal venues here and across the globe, let’s call an end to the attack videos and mudslinging and let’s start discussing the significant challenges that really threaten not just Israel but the heart and the soul of the Jewish people.

posted by Rabbi Jonathan Ginsburg

Abbas kills peace process

World Jewish Digest

Dead as a doornail. In the waste basket of history. Dead on arrival.

Whatever cliche you want to use, Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas officially killed peace talks Wednesday by unilaterally rejecting any recognition of a Jewish state. He was backed up his his Arab League colleagues unanimously.

This means a few things. First, the Arabs have not given up their dream of destroying Israel. Recognizing the Jewish state is a simple confidence-building gesture but they won't do it because they don't believe the Jewish state should exist.

Two, any Israeli government that agrees to a peace agreement after a statement like this will surely lose power and its right to govern.

Three, this is the latest evidence that all of President Obama's foreign policy initiatives have failed. One can not point to a major area of foreign policy where Obama has seen a success. Six years after winning the presidency, U.S. relations are worse off with Russia, China, Saudi Arabia, Israel and our former allies in Europe's east. They are only better with Iran, which still has not given up its desire to destroy both the U.S. and Israel.

Which is part of the reason Abbas sees no reason at all to accede to American demands. A weak president who wishes to withdraw from the world stage means that new alliances will be formed, likely to Israel's detriment. Obama is not only a disaster for Israel; he's a disaster for the world.

posted by Rabbi Jonathan Ginsburg

Harvard Hosts destroy Israel Conference

On March 3-4 Harvard will host a two-day conference at the Kennedy School of Government focused, in effect, on dismantling the Jewish state of Israel. A number of student groups and others associated with Harvard are sponsoring "One State Conference: Israel/Palestine and the One State Solution."

 

Those who promote a one-state "solution" advocate creating an entity which would, through its merger with the Palestinian Arab population of the West Bank and Gaza and a potential influx of Palestinians from neighboring states, lose its Jewish majority and its Jewish character. In effect, the right to Jewish self-determination would be nullified.

 

Conference speakers and organizers include extreme anti-Israel academics, the founder of Electronic Intifada, members of the radical Jewish Voice for Peace and an ex-PLO spokesperson. No one even remotely sympathetic to Israel appears to be affiliated with the conference.

 

The Kennedy School's own notorious Stephen Walt, author of The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy, a work discredited for its shoddy scholarship and bigoted charges against American supporters of Israel, joins other Harvard figures, including law school professor Duncan Kennedy, in lending the event the imprimatur of the institution.

 

According to the working definition of anti-Semitism developed by the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA), and recognized by the United States Department of State, the One State Conference, in implicitly "denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination" is an exercise in anti-Semitism.

 

The One State Conference website boasts the logo of Harvard's Kennedy School of Government and has been in the planning for a year. According to The Jewish Advocate, Kennedy School Dean David T. Ellwood released a statement, saying:

I want to emphasize once again that Harvard University and the Harvard Kennedy School in no way endorses or supports the apparent position of these student organizers or any participants they include. We hope that the final shape of the conference will be significantly more balanced.

Furthermore, the university is quoted saying that the event is being at least partially underwritten by "modest" funds set aside for student activities. According to Melodie Jackson, Associate Dean for Communications, also quoted inThe Jewish Advocate, "Generally administrators try to be supportive of student ideas for events that they are planning."

 

Increasingly, assaults on Israel's legitimacy and survival are promoted by academics, including at the nation's most prestigious universities. The public has a vital role to play in voicing its outrage at the use of these institutions by anti-Israel propagandists and at the often minimal response by university officials.

www.rabbijonathanginsburg.info

www.converttojudaismonline.blogspot.com/

www.rabbijonathanginsburg.com

www.converttojudaism.net

Palestinian Big lie

 

http://www.rightsidenews.com/2012011715407/editorial/world-opinion-and-editorial/the-palestinian-big-lie-revisited.html

The Palestinian Big Lie Revisited

By: Yedidya Atlas

As the US presidential elections draw closer, support for Israel becomes a mantra for every potential candidate. Republicans wave their pro-Israel flag to satisfy the significant majority of pro-Israel Republican voters (non-Jews). While President Obama renews efforts to prove to the left-liberal Jewish Democratic donors and Jewish voter blocs in key states that he too just loves Israel - despite his actual record while in office these past three years - including eating non-kosher pastrami on rye sandwiches in public.

So the Palestinians, in what appears to be a coordinated good cop/bad cop effort are redoubling promotion of their Big Lie about who their “deep roots in the Land” and that the “Palestinian-Israeli Conflict” is the big issue that requires a “just solution” - which is a euphemism for pressuring Israel to accept the Palestinian Arab position. Just one week after Dr. Ahmed Tibi attacked Majority Leader Eric Cantor in an op-ed in the local Richmond newspaper, PLO Mission head in Washington , DC ,Maen Rashid Areikat, blithely repeated many of the same lies in The Washington Post.

This unrelenting PR campaign continues to bear fruit. One hears many Republicans and nearly all Democrats talk about the “Palestinian-Israeli Conflict” and the dire need to solve it to stabilize the volatile Middle East . And here is the real problem: It assumes a false axiom which stipulates that the “Palestinian-Israeli Conflict” is the core of the conflict, and therefore solving it will solve everything else in the Middle East .

It seems that everyone under the age of 60 never heard the term “Arab-Israel Conflict” which was the only term used to describe the on-going war between the Arab States and the Jewish State of Israel up until after the 1967 Six Day War. And most people over 60 seem to have memory issues.

By assuming  the “Palestinian Problem”, as it was first called, is at the core of the Arab-Israel Conflict, one can now understand how it became today’s politically correct term: the “Palestinian-Israeli Conflict”, and one is forced to also assume that Arab enmity towards Israel began either after 1967 when Israel either liberated or captured (depends on whom one asks, of course) the territories that comprise the Biblically named Judea and Samaria (AKA as “the West Bank”) and Gaza, or at least no further back than the creation of the Jewish state in 1948. Yet even cursory examination of the historical facts belies these contentions because they are based on the false premise that the Arab-Israel Conflict has something to do with the so-called "Palestinian Problem."

Chronologically, Arab enmity preceded the “Palestinian Problem” before the State of Israel officially existed. The Arab countries declared war on Israel before the Palestinian Arabs fled. Logically, then, one can conclude that the Arabs had some other reason to attack the fledgling Israel other than Palestinian refugees that didn't yet exist.

It was in this vein that the semi-official Egyptian newspaper, Al-Ahram , printed the following editorial on  November 26, 1955: "Our war against the Jews is an old struggle that began with Muhammad and in which he achieved many victories ... it is our duty to fight the Jews for the sake of Allah and religion, and it is our duty to end the war that Muhammad began ..."

Al-Ahram makes no mention or reference to Palestinians or refugees because the highly touted “Palestinian Problem” of today was then considered, at best, nothing more than a secondary detail and, at worst, an artificially created political weapon (The PLO was only established in 1964). The Arab-Israel Conflict is based on Arab enmity towards the Jews, and therefore the Jewish state, and has nothing to do with either Palestinian Arab refugees or any specific Israeli policies.

Bearing that in mind, one wonders why the territories under discussion for the “Palestinian State” in the making, Judea and Samaria (AKA “the West Bank”, as in the west bank of the Jordan River), became holy soil in the eyes of Palestinian Arab nationalism only after Israel took possession of these territories following the clearly defensive war in 1967?

During the previous nineteen years, from 1948 to 1967, these areas were under Jordanian control/occupation after the Jordanian Legion captured it from the fledgling State of Israel in the 1948 War. Yet despite the alleged existence of a Palestinian Arab people, there was no public outcry for Jordan to return this region to anyone to establish a Palestinian Arab state. Nor were international protests made demanding that Jordan cease "creating facts" by building new Arab neighborhoods throughout these areas, thus creating "obstacles to peace". Arab leaders didn’t make pilgrimages to the al-Aqsa mosque on the Temple Mount in Jordanian-occupied Jerusalem , and PLO chieftain Yasser Arafat never once visited the “ West Bank ” during those 19 years.

The Palestinian Problem was created and promoted, and the Big Lie prospers: "Without unilateral Israeli territorial concessions the Palestinian Problem which is the core of the Arab-Israel Conflict will never be resolved." Thus the “Arab-Israel Conflict” was smoothly turned into the “Palestinian-Israeli Conflict” – the pre-1967 Arab Goliath against the beleaguered little Israeli David was transitioned into the intransigent Israeli Goliath versus the poor Palestinian David.

The Big Lie has seeped in everywhere. The first internet site, for example, seen by today’s students googling the “Arab-Israel conflict is Wikipedia. Irrespective of how really accurate it is, it is the top of the list. Wikipedia describes the “Arab-Israel Conflict” thusly:

“The Arab–Israeli conflict refers to political tensions and open hostilities between the Arab peoples and the Jewish community of the Middle East . The modern Arab–Israeli conflict began with the rise of Zionism and Arab Nationalism towards the end of the nineteenth century, and intensified with the creation of the modern State of Israel in 1948. Territory regarded by the Jewish People as their historical homeland is also regarded by the Pan-Arab movement as historically and presently belonging to the Palestinian Arabs(2) and in the Pan-Islamic context, in territory regarded as Muslim Lands.”

The line: “is also regarded by the Pan-Arab movement as historically and presently belonging to the Palestinian Arabs(2)” is footnoted as if seriously sourced. However, if one bothers to scroll down to the very bottom to see the source, Wikipedia (or the writer of said entry) accepts the “Palestinian National Charter [the PLO Charter written in 1964], as an unbiased reference source.

Further on Wikipedia’s version of history is not only in the so-called facts it includes, but those facts omitted. In the section on the conflict’s “History” it notes that “the area came under British rule as the British Mandate of Palestine”, but conveniently left out how and by whom the British received said “Mandate.” 

In fact, in 1920, the San Remo Conference of the Allied Powers issued what is called the “Palestine Mandate of the League of Nations .” Hence, the League of Nations, the forerunner of the United Nations, assigned to Great Britain a mandate to establish the Jewish national home. The Preamble to the Mandate specifies that “recognition has thereby been given to the historical connection of the Jewish people with Palestine .”

The Palestine Mandate does not mention Arab national or political rights in the Land of Israel . It does not relate at all to the Arab residents of Palestine 1920, as a separate people or nationality. It merely states that the civil and religious rights of all the inhabitants of Palestine , irrespective of race and religion, must be safeguarded. The reason for that is clear. Only one nation was recognized, the Jews. Hence the object and purpose of the Mandate was to reconstitute the political ties of the Jewish people to their homeland.

Moreover, the Arab delegates to the San Remo Conference led by the Hashemite Prince Faisel ibn Hussein (who would be appointed first king of Syria, then after he was ousted by the French, king of Iraq) accepted said “Palestine Mandate” and even declared Zionist demands “moderate.”

Mr. Areikat, in his December 28^th op-ed, would have readers of The Washington Post believe otherwise. “We lived under the rule of a plethora of empires,” he writes, “the Canaanites, Egyptians, Philistines, Israelites, Persians, Greeks, Romans, Crusaders, Mongols, Ottomans and, finally, the British.” In other words, the Palestinian Arabs must have been hiding in the closet since throughout thousands of years of well documented history nobody mentions them. But it doesn’t matter. The spokesmen for the PLO/PA simply repeat lie after lie until their political fellow travelers and useful idiots (to borrow terminology of another period when venal and foolish people acted similarly) in the mainstream media and academia repeat the lies as if there was a scintilla of truth in them.

One of Mr. Areikat’s more ironic lines are “Many in the United States forget that Palestinians are Muslims and Christians. They ignore the fact that Palestinian Christians are the descendants of Jesus and guardians of the cradle of Christianity.” Aside from the historical fact that Jesus was Jewish, and therefore the Israelis are the actual relatives, not the Palestinian Arabs, consider the fact that the Palestinian Authority has systematically driven out the Christian Arabs from Bethlehem , the birthplace of Jesus, according to the New Testament. Specifically, more than 70% of Christian Arabs have fled the PA controlled areas to any country that will issue them a visa. In Bethlehem , for example, whereas in 1950, Christian Arabs comprised 80% of the population, today under Palestinian Arab rule, it is less than 15%. But why tell the truth when one’s lies are accepted so easily?

So today the situation is far different then the pre-1967 period and has been further exacerbated by the incessant presenting of the “Palestinian-Israel Conflict” in asymmetrical form. The Palestinian Arabs cry “the Jews stole our Land” and demand “inalienable national rights” predicated on a false history. And then “pro-Israeli” western politicians declare support for a Palestinian State while mumbling about Israel’s security needs and wanting peace (e.g. President Obama’s UN speeches), rather than challenge the false premise and deal with an existent problem in its true reality – including the possibility that the two sides are not equal and that there may not be an actual solution.

Given the rise of Pan-Islamism throughout the “new” Middle East, the continued inflexibility of the Palestinian Arab leadership and their refusal to abandon murderous violence as a strategic method of achieving their goals, the odds of having a Hollywood-style happy ending of the Arab-Israel Conflict or the so-called Palestinian-Israel Conflict is not slim to none, but just none.

When that harsh reality is absorbed by Republican and Democratic policy makers alike, perhaps then the issue of Middle East stability and its ramifications for the West can be dealt with in light of the true facts on the ground, and not merely as short term verbal electioneering points.

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The author is a veteran journalist specializing in geo-political and geo-strategic affairs in the Middle East . His articles have appeared in such publications as The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Times, Insight Magazine, Nativ, The Jerusalem Post and Makor Rishon. His articles have been reprinted by Israel ’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and in the US Congressional Record.

www.rabbijonathanginsburg.info

www.converttojudaismonline.blogspot.com/

www.rabbijonathanginsburg.com