The existence of "God's chosen people" has been a destabilizing factor in human history since God first made the covenant with Abraham.

Tuesday, 6 September 2011

‘Brand Israel’ has failed

Via: http://mondoweiss.net/2011/08/brand-israel-has-failed.html

Yet, as strange as it may sound coming from a marketer with an advertising background, who has represented hundreds of Jewish organizations worldwide, I have arrived at the conclusion that the solution will not be found in branding, marketing, public relations or the writings of political pundits. The problem is that all their concepts, strategies, words and legitimate defenses – no matter how powerful and clever – are not going to elevate Israel’s plummeting image. Hundreds of thousands of dollars from donors and the Israeli government have been poured into this effort, yet the situation only worsens every month. I am as much to blame as anyone for being a supporter of these actions.

It has become clear that the world doesn’t care about Israel’s wines, its Bauhaus architecture, its fashion, its alluring women, its sexy gay men, its beaches, its ballet or its hummus. The world, its media and its university campuses are riveted upon Israel’s relationship with the Palestinians as well as the state of its democracy.

No, the answer to Israel’s image problems does not depend upon the marketing. It depends first upon the policies.

Something is proving wrong with several of the ingredients in Israel as a product. The policies – whether we argue they are right or wrong internally – are spoiling the taste for the world consumer as well as for many in a new generation of young Jews, even those who have been on Birthright. This is not a left- or a right-wing opinion. It is a fact. No matter how Israel markets or defends itself in the media, the policies seep into the equation and kill the success of the image.

Do I have the answer for how to fix the policies, or even which policies need fixing? No. But I’m not a politician. I’m an adman and a marketer. And I can tell you, from my years creating ads for products from Coca Cola to Apple Computer, if people keep reading about some bad ingredients in the ketchup, very few people will buy the bottle, no matter how much money and creativity you pack into the marketing. No amount of branding, slogans, viral ideas or clever engagement is going to lead towards the success that supporters of Israel need.

Read the whole article "Israel's Image Won't Improve Without Policy Changes" here.

Wikileaks Bombshell: New Israel Fund Official Endorses End of Jewish State

This essay was written by Noah Pollack, and published at the blog of Commentary Magazine.

Two Wikileaks cables from 2010 confirm with stunning accuracy the critique of Israel’s foreign-funded NGO movement that many have been making for years — and they do so from the mouths of the NGO leaders themselves. The cables summarize meetings between U.S. officials and leaders of the New Israel Fund, B’Tselem, and the Association for Civil Rights in Israel, called ACRI, a flagship NIF project.

In one cable, we learn that leaders of these groups have been telling U.S. officials the Israeli legal system is incapable of investigating claims against the Israeli government and military. In fact, Israel’s judiciary, both civil and military, is among the world’s most independent, and the former president of Israel’s High Court was cited by President Obama’s nominee to the U.S. Supreme Court, Elena Kagan, as a significant role model. Yet advancing claims of judicial indifference to war crimes has become a central ambition of the NGOs, because establishing Israel’s supposed inability to investigate itself would open the door to international prosecutions where verdicts against Israel are foreordained. The credible prospect of such prosecutions would paralyze the IDF — which is exactly the point:

Limor Yehuda of ACRI argued that military police investigations could not resolve the main issues of how Israel conducted the military operation [Operation Cast Lead], including its targeting and policy decisions…she believed only international pressure could influence the GOI [Government of Israel] to create an independent investigation that could hold senior leadership accountable for alleged violations.

And here is Jessica Montell, the head of B’Tselem:

She wanted the highest level decision-makers held accountable for the decisions they made on how to prosecute the conflict, including Military Advocate General (MAG) Mandelblit…Her aim, she said, was to make Israel weigh world opinion and consider whether it could “afford another operation like this.”

What Montell means by that last sentence is frighteningly clear: she wants to create the conditions in which “world opinion” can prevent the IDF from defending Israelis from attack.

Then there is a cable about a draft Knesset bill (since extensively modified) that seeks greater transparency for foreign-funded NGOs:

B’Tselem Director Jessica Montell…estimated her 9 million NIS ($2.4 million) budget is 95 percent funded from abroad, mostly from European countries.

Here Montell is giving credence to what B’Tselem’s critics, such as NGO Monitor, have been saying for years: that the group is essentially an arm of European foreign policy, more interested in condemning Israel than in promoting human rights.

And then there’s the bombshell:

New Israel Fund (NIF) Associate Director in Israel Hedva Radovanitz, who manages grants to 350 NGOs totaling about 18 million dollars per year, [said] that the campaign against the NGOs was due to the “disappearance of the political left wing” in Israel and the lack of domestic constituency for the NGOs. She noted that when she headed ACRI’s Tel Aviv office, ACRI had 5,000 members, while today it has less than 800, and it was only able to muster about 5,000 people to its December human rights march by relying on the active staff of the 120 NGOs that participated.

She commented that she believed that in 100 years Israel would be majority Arab and that the disappearance of a Jewish state would not be the tragedy that Israelis fear since it would become more democratic. [Emphasis added]

Read the rest of the essay, here.

Uncovered: Israel’s role in planned US lawsuit to fight BDS

A group of pro-Israel activists, backed by StandWithUs, a national US organization funded by individuals who have played a leading role in stoking Islamophobia, is planning to take legal action to force the Olympia Food Co-op to rescind its historic decision to boycott Israeli products.

The Electronic Intifada has obtained a copy of a 31 May 2011 letter sent to the Board of Directors of the Olympia Food Co-op in Olympia, Washington, threatening “expensive” legal action if the pro-Israel activists’ “demands” to end the boycott of Israeli products are not met.

Other documents, supported by interviews, confirm that the Israeli government has taken part in discussions about, and been given advance knowledge of, the planned lawsuit and another planned action against Evergreen State College in Olympia in response to Palestine solidarity activism by students.

Evergreen State is noted for being the school attended by Rachel Corrie, who was killed by an Israeli occupation soldier operating a bulldozer in the Gaza Strip in March 2003.

These developments indicate new, even more aggressive tactics by pro-Israel organizations funded by anti-Muslim agitators including Steven and Rita Emerson to suppress, deter and malign any form of Palestine-related dissent, protest or solidarity action.

An historic vote

On 15 July 2010, the Olympia Food Co-Op (OFC) became the first grocery store in the United States to ban Israeli-made items from its shelves.

The highly symbolic action, which gained global attention, came in response to the Palestinian civil society call for boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) measures against Israel until Israel respects Palestinian human rights and international law.

From the first moment the boycott resolution was passed, Olympia community members who supported and organized for it were accused of anti-Semitism by the Northwest chapter of StandWithUs.

Now, StandWithUs is taking its assault against the OFC to a new level with its backing for legal action.

Also in June 2010, students at Evergreen State College voted overwhelmingly to back an initiative calling on college administrators to divest the school’s assets from any companies that profit from Israel’s occupation of Palestinian lands, and specifically Caterpillar Corporation, which makes bulldozers Israel uses to demolish Palestinian homes.

It was a Caterpillar bulldozer that Israeli forces used to kill Rachel Corrie as she attempted to prevent such a demolition. According to a StandWithUs flyer (PDF), Rachel Corrie “died in Gaza after interfering with Israeli counter-terrorism operations.”

Documents show that in addition to targeting the Olympia Food Co-op, StandWithUs is helping to plan a civil rights complaint against Evergreen State College.

Threat of legal action against Olympia Food Co-op

The 31 May letter (PDF) sent individually to members of the Olympia Food Co-op Board of Directors is signed by five individuals who identify themselves as “members of the Olympia Food Co-op (‘OFC’) who oppose OFC’s boycott of Israeli made products (‘Israel Boycott’) and divestment from Israeli companies (‘Divestment’).”

The five are Kent L. Davis, Linda Davis, Susan Mayer, Susan G. Trinin and Jeffrey I. Trinin. All except for Mayer also appeared in a StandWithUs Northwest video published on YouTube in June entitled “Why BDS Scars Don’t Heal: A StandWithUs Production.”

The video alleges that the BDS effort in Olympia has been motivated by and generated anti-Semitism, and was run by a secretive and conspiratorial “dark organization” from outside the community.

It also claims that the BDS effort in Olympia and a similar initiative in the town of Port Townsend, north of Seattle, last year had generated “a climate of fear and terror for Jews.”

The activists’ letter makes sweeping allegations that the OFC board engaged in “numerous procedural violations” in passing the boycott of Israeli goods, but it does not provide any examples of such violations.

The letter writers claim to have made many sincere efforts to rectify the unspecified “violations” but asserted that their complaints had “fallen on deaf ears as the Board steadfastly refuses to revisit its position on the Israel Boycott and Divestment policies.”

At this point,” the letter states, “we are left no choice but to demand in no uncertain terms that OFC act in accordance with its rules and bylaws and rescind the Israel Boycott and Divestment policies.”

The letter sets a thirty-day deadline for a response and adds, “Regrettably should the board reject our demand, we are prepared to pursue relief through the court system.”

The pro-Israel activists’ letter concludes, “If you do what we demand, this situation may be resolved amicably and efficiently. If not, we will bring legal action against you, and this process will become considerably more complicated, burdensome, and expensive than it has been already.”

Lawsuit “a matter of time”

Reached by telephone, Avi Lipman, a Seattle-based attorney that The Electronic Intifada learned represents the letter writers, confirmed that two letters had been sent to the OFC board — the 31 May letter obtained by The Electronic Intifada and a follow-up.

However, Lipman said that a lawsuit had still not been filed, and “there is still an opportunity for the board to take the remedial action my clients have asked for.”

Lipman would not specify any procedural violations made by the OFC board. “I don’t want to get into it in any detail,” he said, indicating that the 31 May letter described “in general terms what our concerns are.”

But Lipman did not seem optimistic that the board would rescind the boycott decision as demanded. After the initial thirty-day deadline, Lipman said his clients had given the board an additional fifteen-day period to act.

That time has also expired,” Lipman said. “The board has indicated that it plans to stand by the actions it has taken, so it seems clear to me that remedial action will not be taken.”

It’s just a matter of time before we go to court and seek relief from the court,” Lipman added.

Lipman was keen to emphasize that his clients’ complaints were not based on the substance of the BDS decision, but merely the alleged, unspecified procedural violations. “The issue is how the process unfolded and the procedures that were followed and not followed by the board,” Lipman said.

He stressed that if the boycott of Israeli goods was revoked, and then reinstated according to the proper procedures, his clients would abide by it.

An allegation that doesn’t have an allegation”

We don’t have any statement on the non-existent lawsuit,” Jayne Kaszynski, Staff Representative to the Olympia Food Co-op Board, told The Electronic Intifada. “It’s pretty much impossible to respond to an allegation that doesn’t have an allegation.”

Kaszynski said that the BDS decision and the procedures used to reach it had generated widespread public debate among Co-op members, especially on the OFC’s blog. She added that any member who was unhappy with a decision of the board had “democratic alternatives” to legal action.

If you’ve read the bylaws you know that we have a simple member petition process. Any member can create a petition and if they get 300 members to sign it, they can get pretty much any issue put on a ballot,” Kaszynski said.

The OFC has 22,000 active members, according to Kaszynski, “so the 300 signature requirement is not very high. So far no one has exercised this democratic right in relation to the boycott.”

The petition procedure is described in the Olympia Food Co-op Bylaws.

Lipman, however, said his clients did not think they should use this procedure because they see the original boycott decision as illegitimate, and therefore the burden should be on the board, not on his clients, to take remedial action.

Smearing BDS as “anti-Semitism”

At one point, the StandWithUs YouTube video briefly displays an image of a Nazi Swastika superimposed on a Star of David, with a caption above it stating “Actual image from handout.”

The video provides no information on where this handout was supposedly distributed or any evidence that it has anything whatsoever to do with the Olympia Food Co-op.

Yet the smear is clearly meant to tar any and all BDS supporters — presumably including those who self-identify as Jewish — as anti-Semites.

I really don’t think it’s comfortable for Jews to live in the city of Olympia and be outwardly expressing Jews,” Kent Davis, one of the letter writers, claims in the video. “You know, you can be a closet Jew and that’s fine. I just don’t feel comfortable discussing my religion or my beliefs in a mixed group environment anymore.”

As with the swastika “handout,” no evidence is ever presented of any specific incidents that back up this grave charge likening placid Olympia to 1930s Berlin, or to link the alleged climate of fear to the Olympia Food Co-op’s boycott of Israeli goods.

A “dark” outside conspiracy

In the StandWithUs video, the letter writers and other speakers allege that the BDS action at the Olympia Food Co-op was planned by a shadowy organization that came in from outside the community, and then disappeared leaving behind acrimony and conflict from which there has been no “healing.”

None of these allegations come with any specifics or facts and the overall tone is conspiratorial.

It’s amazing that I’ve been pushed aside as a Jew in this town because of the BDS,” says Tibor Breuer, identified as an OFC member in the video. “It’s a very, very dark organization that has no interest in anything that has to do with the two-state solution.”

BDS is, in fact, not an “organization,” but the term given to a set of principles and tactics which have been taken up by independent individuals and solidarity groups all over the world in response to the 2005 Palestinian civil society call for boycott, divestment and sanctions measures on Israel until Israel ends its human rights violations and respects Palestinian rights and international law.

When BDS comes into these communities, they just divide people in all sorts of ways and then they leave and the community is stuck with having to somehow heal and we can’t heal yet,” Linda Davis, another of the five letter writers, alleges in the video.

BDS was over there in Europe celebrating their victory, and we’re stuck with this shit,” Breuer adds.

In fact, at the time the OFC boycott was passed, and since, those who initiated it spoke frequently to the media, and all have been local Olympia community and Co-op members.

Ironically, Robert S. Jacobs, the director of StandWithUs Northwest, acknowledges as much.

Refuting suggestions that the pro-Israel counterattack against BDS is centralized, Jacobs told The Electronic Intifada, “Similar to the BDS movement, we’re made up of activists in the community who passionately feel they want to express a certain perspective and hope that opinion leaders will adopt that perspective.”

Jacobs admitted in the interview that there was no such thing as “BDS central.” Yet the video that bears the StandWithUs name and features the letter writers paints an altogether different picture.

Meanwhile, the vilification of Palestine solidarity activists as anti-Semites is not surprising given the views of some of the StandWithUs leadership.

One board member and founder in Los Angeles, Mordechai “Moti” Gur, describes the purpose of StandWithUs in the following terms on the website for another organization he founded: “We combat the soft jihad and local intifadas by Muslim organizations by exposing everyone to the light of truth” (The Moses Project).

Other StandWithUs documents and websites routinely malign Palestine solidarity activists — including the nine civilians killed by Israeli commandos on the Mavi Marmara as “jihadists.”

But while the pro-Israel activists in the StandWithUs video allege — without offering a shred of evidence — that OFC was the victim of a “dark” external conspiracy by anti-Semitic outsiders bent on dividing their community, they themselves are receiving significant external backing.

How StandWithUs describes its role

StandWithUs is a national pro-Israel advocacy organization which has taken a lead in fighting “delegitimization” and BDS.

Pro-Israel groups and the Israeli government have since last year claimed that virtually all Palestinian solidarity work amounts to an effort to delegitmize Israel. In recent policy speeches, US officials have vowed to help Israel combat “delegitmization” — though precisely what this means in practice and how it may affect civil liberties and free speech is unclear.

The Northwest chapter of StandWithUs has been particularly active in combating BDS efforts not only in Olympia but at the food co-op in Port Townsend, north of Seattle, where there was an unsuccessful bid to emulate the OFC boycott. (Disclosure: I was invited to Port Townsend in August 2010 to speak at a community event in support of BDS).

But how deeply involved is StandWithUs, and how does the organization liaise with the Israeli government in mounting these local battles?

Jacobs characterizes StandWithUs Northwest as little more than a small local chapter, “a two-person office,” providing basic support and advice to individuals such as those threatening to sue the Olympia Food Co-op.

Jacobs told The Electronic Intifada his group’s contact with the five letter writers was largely limited to providing printed materials, helping bring in speakers and offering advice. He said he had not seen either of the letters sent to the OFC board.

Although Jacobs did acknowledge working with and meeting repeatedly with the letter writers, he characterized the relationship to any potential lawsuit as arms length:

Since we’re not actually a party to anything down there, frankly we’re not in any of the loop regarding the legal matters. Just from an attorney-client privilege standpoint anything we would do with anybody would be violating some kind of potential privilege. So, we know that they’re doing some stuff. I know they’ve been working with an attorney. I know which firm it is but beyond that we have not in any way participated in the legal discussion.”

Jacobs acknowledged attending one meeting related to the potential lawsuit.

We were at one meeting, I don’t know how many months ago, before anything actually happened,” Jacobs explained.

We had been asked by some of the folks down there if we knew any attorneys up here [in Seattle], so we mentioned a number of names. But I was at a meeting where they had an initial — they had not retained any attorney or developed any permanent relationship with an attorney — when they had someone there talk off-the-cuff about what an attorney could do for them.”

Jacobs was also adamant that his office had not done any fundraising toward a potential lawsuit. “I don’t foresee us putting any money into a lawsuit,” he said, adding, “I don’t know of anybody who’s giving them money. I’ll be that blunt about it.”

Jacobs estimated that the amount of money his office had spent on work related to the OFC boycott — presumably not including staff time — amounted to just hundreds of dollars principally for printing flyers and brochures.

The role of the Israeli consulate

Asked what role the Israeli government plays in StandWithUs Northwest’s work, Jacobs stated that he personally knew Akiva Tor, the Israeli Consul General for the Pacific Northwest, based in San Francisco, and that Tor would be speaking at an upcoming StandWithUs fundraising event. Jacobs acknowledged that StandWithUs had helped to bring Tor’s deputy to speak in Port Townsend.

Jacobs said that the Israeli consulate did not play any “active role” in opposing the OFC boycott, but, he added, “from the information standpoint they want to know what’s going on.”

We update him [Tor] on what’s happening in the community here,” Jacobs said.

If what you’re talking about is if there is some sort of central coordination out of Israel for the activity we are doing here, absolutely not,” he added.

Tor had also offered to speak in Olympia, but it had not happened yet, according to Jacobs. “I know he met in a coffee shop with the Corries [Cindy and Craig, the parents of Rachel Corrie]. I heard that from all sorts of people in Olympia,” Jacobs stated.

Yet, this characterization is at best incomplete.

A deeper role for Israeli officials?

Although Jacobs has confirmed reporting to Israeli officials what goes on in the local community, the relationship may be even closer than he acknowledged.

A “Weekly Status Report” of StandWithUs Northwest, for the week of 5-11 March 2011 states that the following meetings took place:

Rob [Jacobs] and Carolyn in Olympia with Olympia activists, Akiva Tor and Avi Lipman on Thursday - Presentation of legal case, discussion of Evergreen strategy and Olympia community speaker opportunities.”

Carolyn Hathaway is the co-chair of StandWithUs Northwest.

In his conversation with The Electronic Intifada, Jacobs did not disclose that Israeli Consul General Tor had not only already traveled to Olympia at the behest of StandWithUs, but had participated in a meeting with the activists threatening to sue the OFC and their lawyer.

The “status update” was posted on a website that archives emails sent to members of a private list of StandWithUs affiliates, but the website itself is unprotected.

It appears that this and other documents may have been published inadvertently, given how revealing they are of StandWithUs Northwest’s activities and strategy and the contradictions with Jacobs’ own characterizations.

Akiva Tor did not respond to a request to speak to The Electronic Intifada left with a staff person at his office.

The attorney, Avi Lipman, would not disclose what was discussed at the March meeting, again citing attorney-client privilege. Lipman said, however, “The Israeli consulate has nothing to do with this action. StandWithUs is not our client. We represent the individual co-op members who have asked the board to take remedial action.”

While all that may technically be true, none of it is inconsistent with a close advisory and an eventual fundraising role for StandWithUs and even the Israeli consulate.

Nor does it explain the presence of an official from a foreign government at a meeting in which legal action against OFC and possibly Evergreen State College was discussed.

Lipman would also not discuss how his clients might be able to afford an “expensive” — as the 31 May letter put it — legal action.

Another worrying possibility is that through StandWithUs, and possibly other organizations, Israeli diplomatic missions may collect intelligence about local activists or people who express views sympathetic to Palestinian human rights in order to exclude such people from visiting the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip on political grounds.

In July, for example, Israel detained and deported dozens of individuals who planned to visit the occupied West Bank at the invitation of Palestinians.

StandWithUs remains fully engaged in Olympia lawsuit

Jacobs’ characterization of his organization’s role with the planned lawsuit as almost incidental is flatly contradicted by another document made public via the StandWithUs email archive.

The agenda for an upcoming 27 September 2011 StandWithUs Northwest Executive Committee meeting includes the following items:

Project Status
  • The civil rights complaint against Evergreen State College
  • The law suit against the Olympia Food Co-op
  • Working to shut down the “educational” programs that Ed Mast has circulated to all Washington State social studies teachers and librarians
  • Speakers Bureau

Thus the OFC lawsuit and the Evergreen State College civil rights complaint are both “projects” of the StandWithUs Northwest Executive Committee, and firmly on its agenda.

Ed Mast, it is worth noting, is a Seattle-area activist and playwright who has provided educational resources on Palestine.

In addition to everything else, it would appear that rather than merely providing an alternative, pro-Israeli viewpoint, StandWithUs is working to censor and exclude other viewpoints from schools and libraries and exclusively impose its own.

And, far from being merely restricted to its local area, StandWithUs Northwest is apparently assuming a national role:

StandWithUs Northwest helping other regions
  • Helping Avi Posnick in NY oppose the BDS boycott proposal at the Park Slope Food Co-op in Brooklyn
  • Helping Gail Rubin in Davis oppose the BDS boycott proposal at the Sacramento Food Co-op in Sacramento

It is clear from its agenda that not only is StandWithUs Northwest playing a continuing role in Olympia, but expanding its anti-BDS activities across the country.

Focus on procedure, not substance

During his interview with The Electronic Intifada, Jacobs characterized the grievances the letter writers had with the co-op in a manner remarkably similar to the 31 May letter which he said he had not seen. He acknowledged that it was StandWithUs’ advice that the case should focus on procedure, rather than substance.

Courtrooms aren’t the place to discuss foreign policy and they wouldn’t make a decision based on that,” Jacobs explained. “The same is true with the board members that were on the board [of OFC] at the time. Most of them were sympathetic to the BDS movement and trying to make an argument counter to theirs would be a huge educational effort and probably not very successful.”

This, Jacobs said, was the rationale for focusing on procedure, rather than substantive arguments.

StandWithUs, fundraising and donations from Islamophobic extremists

Jacobs presents StandWithUs Northwest as almost a shoe-string operation. “We’re thought of as this huge, incredibly wealthy organization,” he told The Electronic Intifada. “As far as Jewish community organizations go, even on a national basis, we don’t have anything near the kind of resources of some other organizations such as ADL or AJC. Here frankly, we barely cover our own costs just in operations.”

But public financial filings of StandWithUs, which raises funds under the legal name “Israel Emergency Alliance,” (IEA) tell a quite different story.

The IEA’s mandatory Form 990 financial filings to the Internal Revenue Service (available from the website Guidestar) show an organization with $4.2 million in annual revenue and impressive fundraising capacity, including donations from leading Islamophobic extremists Steven and Rita Emerson.

In 2008, Jacobs himself received an annual salary of $96,923 for an average forty-hour week, more on a pro-rated basis than StandWithUs founder and national executive director Roz Rothstein who received $100,000 for an average sixty-hour week, according to the filings. In 2009, Rothstein’s salary was raised to $150,000.

StandWithUs also has an international presence, with an Israeli office and a European base in Brussels, which together accounted for a million dollars in expenses in 2009.

The largest area of expenditure, however, is for campus advocacy at US colleges and universities, which accounted for $2.6 million in 2009.

The growing role of the Emersons

The growing role of husband and wife Steven and Rita Emerson in StandWithUs is highly significant. The couple have been key supporters of Islamophobic campaigns in the United States, and they have considerable fundraising muscle that could potentially be flexed to support the planned Olympia lawsuit and civil rights complaint against Evergreen State.

US nonprofit organizations are not required to reveal their sources of funding, but IEA’s 2007 IRS filing includes a list of donations with the names of donors redacted. However, some names are still visible.

One donation for $25,000, for example, came from “Friends of Israel Defence Forces” and another, for $15,500, came from Steven J. Emerson.

There are dozens of other five- and six-figure donations from addresses in several states, especially California, New York and Illinois.

While donation amounts for subsequent years are unavailable, other evidence indicates that Steven and Rita Emerson have assumed a growing role in StandWithUs and have likely donated considerably more money.

In 2009, for the first time, the Emersons assumed an official leadership role, Rita as a board member and Steven as vice-president.

StandWithUs also introduced a program named for the couple called “The Emerson Fellowship” — almost certainly indicating a substantial financial contribution by its namesakes.

The Emerson Fellowship is a program to pay for students all over North America to engage in pro-Israel advocacy and agitation on their campuses. The 27 September StandWithUs Northwest Executive Committee meeting agenda includes an item about “Completing the 2011-12 Emerson selection process.”

At the center of an Islamophobic network

Steven and Rita Emerson have enriched themselves from fear-mongering, incitement and defamation against Muslims, a phenomenon a recent New York Times op-ed likened to 19th century anti-Semitism (“Don’t Fear Islamic Law in America,” Eliyahu Stern, 2 September 2011).

A 2010 investigative report by The Tennessean newspaper found that in 2008 Steven Emerson paid his own for-profit company $3.4 million in fees from a nonprofit charity he founded, which, according to the newspaper, “solicits money by telling donors they’re in imminent danger from Muslims.”

According to the investigation, Emerson’s nonprofit acted as a front for a lucrative for-profit venture (“Anti-Muslim crusaders make millions spreading fear,” 24 October 2010).

Unusually, the Emerson nonprofit’s 990 forms do not list any staff, board members or salaries except for Steven Emerson who is the organization’s sole officer.

The alarming rise of virulent Islamophobia in the United States in recent years is not something that just happened. It was the result of assiduous and deliberate campaigns by a well-funded network of donors, organizations and prominent individual ideologues or “misinformation experts,” as a recent report by the Center for American Progress documents (“Fear, Inc., The Roots of the Islamophobia Network in America,” August 2011 [PDF]).

Steven Emerson is one of the top five “misinformation experts” named in the report. These individuals, according to the report, “travel the country and work with or testify before state legislatures calling for a ban on the nonexisting threat of Sharia law in America and proclaiming that the vast majority of mosques in our country harbor Islamist terrorists or sympathizers.”

Targeting Evergreen State College for student activism

The planned civil rights complaint against Evergreen State College may be an attempt to use alleged incidents of campus anti-Semitism as the basis for a legal action to discredit the divestment campaign at the school.

On 8 November 2010, a story appeared on the news website MyNorthwest.com under the byline of Alex Silverman with the headline “Pro-Israel students harassed, leave Evergreen State.”

It alleges that Evergreen State, once an oasis of tolerance, had become a place where some students have faced “torment and harassment” and have even left “simply for expressing their opinions about a controversial issue.”

The story claims five unnamed students “transferred out” of Evergreen State because of “harassment,” but the only source is a student named Joshua Levine. “There are days I feel uncomfortable walking across campus alone because I wear a yarmulke [Jewish skull cap] on my head,” Levine alleges.

Levine, president of the campus chapter of Hillel — another national pro-Israel organization — is also a StandWithUs Northwest Emerson Fellow

But what were the examples of “harassment” that supposedly led to this situation? Just like the StandWithUs video, the only ones Levine provides conflate Palestine solidarity with “anti-Semitism”:

Checkpoints were erected outside the bus stop,” Levine told Silverman. “People claiming to be IDF [Israeli army] veterans shoving toy assault rifles in people’s faces, demanding to see their student ID before they could go onto campus.”

Students have staged similar actions on campuses across North America to highlight the well-documented abuses Palestinians face living under Israeli military occupation.

The article quotes Israeli Consul General Akiva Tor decrying the supposedly dire situation.

The MyNorthwest.com story also notes: “This summer, the student body at Evergreen State voted overwhelmingly to divest from companies with economic interests in Israel, further fueling the anti-Israel fervor on campus.”

That, it would seem, is what is making Levine so uncomfortable.

Laying the ground for a civil rights complaint

Recently, the US Department of Education began investigating precisely such a civil rights complaint stemming from charges of anti-Semitism because of Palestine solidarity activism at the University of California-Santa Cruz.

That federal investigation is the first of its kind, though it may well be the model for targeting Evergreen State College.

Has StandWithUs, through Levine, been carefully laying the ground for a similar effort to use US civil rights protection legislation to suppress criticism of a foreign government that engages in massive human rights abuses and discrimination of precisely the kind civil rights legislation is meant to prevent?

Importing Israeli repression to the US?

What is particularly troubling about the threatened legal action against OFC and Evergreen State backed by StandWithUs and its close collaboration with the Israeli government, is that it appears to import Israeli tactics of political repression into the United States.

Earlier this year, Israel passed a law that imposes heavy fines on anyone who participates in or advocates a boycott of Israeli businesses, universities and social and cultural institutions or illegal West Bank settlements. The law was strongly condemned by human rights organizations as a violation of basic freedoms.

The threatened legal action against the Olympia Food Co-op may be a “do it yourself” version of the law on US soil. Simply taking someone to court imposes a punishment on them through high legal fees before any judgment is ever rendered. That may be the whole point.

It should serve as a red flag that however small and tight-knit a community, powerful pro-Israel groups, backed by racist anti-Muslim demagogues and funders, in coordination with Israeli officials, are prepared to go to any length to smear and harass people.

They’ll do whatever it takes to keep people quiet about Israel’s human rights abuses, war crimes and the international complicity that the BDS movement seeks to expose, challenge and bring to an end.


Ali Abunimah is co-founder of The Electronic Intifada, author of One Country: A Bold Proposal to End the Israeli-Palestinian Impasse and is a contributor to The Goldstone Report: The Legacy of the Landmark Investigation of the Gaza Conflict (Nation Books).

Monday, 5 September 2011

Petition against Israel radio station which does not allow women on the air


The Israel Media Watch organization is preparing to file a petition in the High Court against the Kol Berama radio station, which does not allow women to broadcast on the station. The station, part of the Second Broadcasting Authority, is loosely affiliated with the Shas party.

“All our attempts to resolve this issue with the Second Authority and the Attorney General have not produced any results, and so we have no choice but to ask the High Court to intervene,” IMW chairman Eli Pollak said. “Kol Berama is not a private radio station. It is responsible to the state, and is licensed by it. Just as we would not tolerate a radio station that refused to allow blacks or right wingers on the air, we cannot tolerate this situation.

It is sad that the state allows this kind of discrimination and illegal activity.


http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/Flash.aspx/219387#.TmVFqGqOKgo

Golda Meir wanted Allies to bomb Auschwitz


[jewisnazi2.png]

Golda Meir, the future Israeli prime minister, wanted the United States and its allies to bomb Auschwitz, researchers have learned.

Researchers from the David S. Wyman Institute for Holocaust Studies found documents in Israeli and American archives that shed light on Meir’s support for the unsuccessful campaign by Jewish leaders to persuade the Allied powers to bomb the Nazi death camp.

Meir, then known as Goldie Myerson, was serving at the time as a senior official of the Histadrut, the Jewish labor federation in British Mandate Palestine.

Amid reports of the deportations of Hungarian Jews to Auschwitz, Meir and a Histadrut colleague cabled the labor federation’s U.S. representative, Israel Mereminski, on July 29, 1944 saying that the Allied powers must be urged to bomb Auschwitz and the railways used to transport Jews to the camp.

Mereminski replied that he had contacted the U.S. government's War Refugee Board, which conveyed to “competent authorities” their request for the "destruction of gas chambers, crematories, and so forth."


http://www.jta.org/news/article/2011/09/05/3089236/golda-meir-wanted-allies-to-bomb-auschwitz#When:15:20:00Z

Saturday, 27 August 2011

The Islamophobe Money Machine


Wednesday, 3 August 2011

Israeli Government Welcome Russian Neo-Nazi Holocaust Deniers to Knesset, Yad VaShem

When an Israeli reader sent this story to me I couldn’t believe the headline summarized above. Further, in this day and age of Norwegian neo-Nazi, anti-jihadi attacks which wrap themselves in the Israeli flag, this story is simply mind-blowing.

It begins with a visit from a Russian neo-Nazi delegation to Israel. Under the auspices of Tuvia Lerner, editor of the Russian edition of Arutz 7, the media voice of the settler movement, they inveigled themselves an invitation to meet with far-right MKs Aryeh Eldad and Ayoob Kara. They also toured Yad VaShem without telling anyone there that they were Holocaust deniers. Like I told you, this story has to be read to be believed. The two Russians have been photographed giving Nazi salutes, celebrating Der Fuhrer’s birthday, and they published songs of praise to Adoph Hitler on their website.

Naturally, when they met with the MKs the ideas they espoused were quite different. One of the neo-Nazis told Israeli TV that the concept of Israel “excites me,” because it involves “an ancient people who took upon itself a pioneer project to revive a modern state and nation.” The TV reporter tartly asked how the neo-Nazi of yesterday suddenly became a Zionist. How they did it, is by finding a common enemy: Islam (sound familiar?). The second neo-Nazi tells the interviewer:

“We’re talking about radical Islam which is the enemy of humanity, enemy of democracy, enemy of progress and of any sane society.

With friends like this does Israel need enemies? Does it wish to lie down with dogs who kill Chechens and Africans for sport only to rise up with fleas? Who assassinate human rights activists and lawyers? Who dream of a master race following its destiny? Is Israel so desperate that it needs such friends in order to battle the common Muslim enemy? Have we not learned a single thing from Anders Breivik?

Lerner attempts to defend his efforts to ingratiate the Russian fascist movement into the good graces of Israeli society by claiming that the two neo-Nazis told him they regretted the anti-Semitic statements they’d made fifteen years ago. But can the leopard changes its spots?? The reporter notes that in just the past year the group wrote that the Holocaust was “a myth.” Then he asks whether the apology was sincere and whether such figures belonged in a place in which the elected representatives of the nation gathered.

The report also features an interview with Eldad in which he feigns an intelligence he clearly lacks, when he says that he knew from the outset that something “didn’t smell right.” And that he met them for only a few minutes (when the TV screen fills with images of him shaking hands and laughing jovially with the Russian delegation).

Anyone reading this blog knows my views about settler extremists, but how can Israel countenance such shocking, disgraceful acts from Arutz 7 and these disgusting representatives of the Israeli people elected to the Knesset? Is anyone using their brains there? Or has everyone lost their senses? Regaling neo-Nazis with anti-jihadi jokes in the halls of the Knesset? Defiling Yad VaShem with unreconstructed Holocaust deniers? Please someone explain this to me (if you can).

http://www.richardsilverstein.com/tikun_olam/2011/07/28/rightist-knesset-members-welcome-russian-neo-nazis-to-knesset/


Monday, 25 July 2011

ADL: Norwegian Terrorist Motivated By Growing Jewish Extremist Ideology In Europe And The U.S.

The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) said the actions of a [Zionist Freemason] Norwegian terrorist whose views were apparently influenced, in part, by [Zionist] anti-Muslim voices in the U.S. are a reminder that hateful ideologies and lone-wolf terrorism [my ASS(istant)] remain a "serious and potent" threat.


"The attacks in Norway are a stark reminder of the broad range of violent terror threats faced around the world and in the United States," said Abraham H. Foxman, ADL National Director. "These attacks underscore the serious and potent threat of violence posed by a variety of dangerous extremists from across the ideological spectrum. This includes the 'lone-wolf' extremists, who have access to extremist ideologies on the Internet from around the world."


The suspect in the July 22 attacks, Andrew Behring Breivik, published a 1,500-page manifesto quoting from the writings of [Zionist] European and [Zionist] American anti-Muslim writers, including Robert Spencer and Pamela Geller, who promote a conspiratorial anti-Muslim agenda under the pretext of fighting radical Islam.


According to ADL, Breivik's views seem to be influenced by a coherent [Zionist] ideology present in growing numbers both in Europe and the United States, which views Islam as an existential threat to the world and sees leaders and governments as collaborators in allowing Islam to "infiltrate" the West.


"The suspected terrorist in the Norway bombing and shootings seems to have been motivated by anti-Islamic sentiments, but he did not attack Muslims. Rather, he reserved his extreme actions for those whom he thought were collaborating with Muslims and allowing them to take over Norway," said Mr. Foxman. "Breivik was clearly influenced by an ideological movement both in the United States and Europe that is rousing public fear by consistently vilifying the Islamic faith. While the situation of Muslims in America -- and how government and society deal with Muslim minorities and multicultural issues -- is quite different and better in America, there are extremists here who think much like him and must be a matter of concern."


The League has extensively reported on individuals who promote a conspiratorial anti-Muslim agenda in this country, including Spencer and Geller and their group, "Stop Islamization of America."


According to ADL, Breivik's focus on "left-wing" multiculturalists destroying white European culture in favor of minority cultures such as the Muslim community is common among the [Zionist] far-right and the [Zionist] groups that straddle the [Zionist] far-right and [Zionist] conservative worlds in the U.S. They [Zionists] blame the government, universities, and the media for promoting diversity and minority cultures over European or American culture and accuse them of undermining "Western civilization" or European-American values.


The League, which has strongly condemned the attacks in Norway and expressed deep sympathy for the Norwegian people, also warned against the rush to judgment that led some to blame Muslims for the attack before all of the facts were known to authorities.


"The rush to judgment that resulted in many initial accounts inaccurately blaming the attack on Islamic terrorists underscores the obligation to assess terrorist threats and acts without creating an atmosphere of blame and suspicion of the larger Muslim community," said Mr. Foxman.


http://www.adl.org/PresRele/TerrorismIntl_93/6087_93.htm

Was Israel Behind Norway Terror Attacks?

Friday’s bloodbath in progressive Norway bears the markings of an Israeli Mossad false flag terror attack. No Western country has supported the Palestinian cause more than the Norwegians. The cursory Islamist “claim of responsibility” was promptly dialed in from Afghanistan. The “lone gunman”, who had just one week earlier launched both Facebook and Twitter accounts, even had three names.

According to Oregon journalist Tim King of Salem-News.com, the terrorist attacks in Oslo took place exactly 65 years to the day after the fascist Israeli Irgun blew up the King David Hotel in Jerusalem, killing 91 people while injuring 46 more. That attack targeted British soldiers who helped create Israel after defeating the Nazis.

King says the 32-year-old Norwegian assassin Anders Behring Breivik – who killed 76 people – had connections to both fascism and Israel. Aside from the July 22, 1946 attack on the King David Hotel, the Irgun group is remembered best for the Deir Yassin massacre in Palestine that killed hundreds of men, women and children. [1]

Norwegian Minister of Foreign Affairs Jonas Gahr Store had recently inflamed the Israeli government when he said, “We are ready to recognize a Palestinian state. I await the actual resolution text Palestinians will promote at the UN General Assembly in September”.

Store had visited the Labour Youth League summer camp at Utøya the very day before the attacks, where he was urged by the left-leaning youth to support Palestinian statehood and to boycott Israeli goods. [2]

The Israeli Knesset had recently outlawed domestic involvement in the growing Israeli boycott. Anyone in Israel caught referencing or promoting the BDS (Boycott Divestment Sanction) movement faces severe penalties.

Breivik – a farmer – quickly confessed Lee Harvey Oswald-style to Oslo police to both the Utøya camp shootings and the Oslo bombing targeting Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg. Breivik is a self-proclaimed Christian conservative fundamentalist said to be virulently anti-Muslim, obsessed with multiculturalism and a staunch defender of the state of Israel. He is also a Freemason.

The Norwegian website Dagbladet states, “The alleged offender is a member of the John Lodge St. Olaus TD Three Pillars of the Norwegian Masonic Order. He has 3rd degree status, where the peak is 10 degrees.”

“We have no way to express an opinion on individuals or incidents related to any members,” spokesman of the Norwegian Freemasons Helge Qvigstad told Dagbladet. [3]

According to Bob Tuskin, the three-named assassin had just launched both a Facebook and a Twitter account one week ago. On July 17th he tweeted a quote from philosopher John Stuart Mill, “One person with a belief is equal to the force of 100,000 who have only interests.” [4]

Of course it is possible that Breivik was just a whack job sharpshooter farmer “with a belief” carried out with military precision. But it seems much more likely that there were multiple shooters at the summer camp and that whoever planted the simultaneous Oslo bomb had demolitions training. Israel had plenty of motives.

Eleven months ago, Norwegian Finance Minister Sigbjørn Johnsen announced that the sovereign wealth Norway Oil Fund would boycott Israeli firms involved in building West Bank Jewish settlements.

The Ministry issued a statement that read, “The ethics council stresses that construction of settlements in the occupied territories violates the decision of the Geneva convention regarding defense of civilians during war time. Several decisions of the UN Security Council and the International Court of Justice have reached the conclusion that construction of Israeli settlements in the Palestinian territories is prohibited.”

The Norway Oil Fund has assets worth $450 billion and divested $1.16 million in Africa-Israel Company shares. It also sold shares in Danya Cebus – Africa-Israel’s construction subsidiary. [5]

Zionist icon Itamar Eichner writes for Israel’s leading newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth. He recently wrote an article titled “Israel: Norway is Inciting Us” in which he cited Norway as a dangerous country to Israel’s security.

The Israeli government accused the Norwegian government of funding and encouraging blatant anti-Israel incitement through its support in circulating the play Gaza Monologues. The play, which deals with the suffering of children in Gaza as a result of the Israeli occupation, will soon be presented at United Nations headquarters.

Norwegian embassies in Damascus, Beirut and Amman have also been helping to display an exhibition by Norwegian artists in Syria, Lebanon and Jordan. The exhibition shows deceased Palestinian babies next to Israel Defense Forces (IDF) helmets, which are reminiscent of Nazi soldiers’ helmets, and an Israeli flag drenched in blood. [6]

The Norwegians are also aiding in the distribution of a documentary film called “Tears of Gaza” to festivals across the world.

A book written by two Norwegian doctors who were the only foreigners in Gaza to give interviews during Operation Cast Lead was published recently. The book accuses IDF soldiers of deliberately killing women and children and is a bestseller in Norway, where it has been recommended by abovementioned Norwegian Foreign Minister Jonas Gahr Støre. [7]

Maybe Breivik is just a nut job Freemason Christian fundamentalist in ideological service to Zionism. That would be horrible enough. But considering the complexity of the terror attacks and the recent animosity between Norway and Israel, I smell a Mossad rat.

[1] http://www.salem-news.com/articles/july232011/oslo-israel-tk.php

[2] http://israelmatzav.blogspot.com. 7-24-11

[3] http://www.dagbladet.no/2011/07/23/nyheter/terror/drap/17421854

[4] http://www.bobtuskin.com/2011/07/23/illuminati-freemason-mind-controled-slave-anders-behring-breivik-identified-as-suspect-in-norway-shooting

[5] http://ivarfjeld.wordpress.com/2010/08/24/norway-oil-fund-to-boycott-israeli-construction-companies/

[6] http://www.salem-news.com/articles/july232011/oslo-israel-tk.php

[7] Ibid

www.deanhenderson.wordpress.com


http://deanhenderson.wordpress.com/2011/07/24/was-israel-behind-norway-terror-attacks/

Israeli orchestra will play Adolf Hitler's favorite composer at Wagner shrine

Wouldn't surprise me to learn one day that Hitler is buried inside Yad Vashem

The Israel Chamber Orchestra will play a work by Adolf Hitler's favorite composer Richard Wagner in Germany on Tuesday, challenging a seven-decade taboo in their homeland.

Adolph Hitler, the Mass Murdering Jew

Hitler Loved Jewish Tunes

Jewish music works found in Hitler's personal record collection


Actually Hitler loved Jews (so much honest) and everything Jewish >>>


Israeli ensembles rarely play Wagner because of the seminal 19th century composer's anti-Semitism and the appropriation of his music by by the Nazis, calling it insensitive to Holocaust survivors.

But orchestra conductor Roberto Paternostro said on Sunday it was time to separate Wagner's worldview from his music.

"Wagner's ideology and anti-Semitism was terrible, but on the other hand he was a great composer," he told Reuters. "The aim is in the year 2011 to divide the man from his art."

The orchestra will play Wagner's Siegfried Idyll, an orchestral piece, in Bayreuth, Germany, famous for its annual Wagner opera festival in July and August.

It will be the first time an Israeli orchestra plays Wagner in Germany.

"It was a very difficult and rocky path to get to this point," Paternostro said earlier at a news conference. "There wasn't a moment when I had any doubts about this project."

"It was my greatest conviction to bring together these two sides -- Israel and Wagner," said Paternostro, who is Jewish and whose mother and other relatives were Holocaust survivors. "For me it wasn't much of a problem."

Attempts over the years by some musicians in Israel to perform Wagner's music have caused audience members to walk out in protest and have triggered heated public debate.

Wagner is also taboo on state-owned media in Israel which largely keep his work off the air.

TIME TO CONFRONT WAGNER

"I know that in Israel this isn't accepted," Paternostro said. "But many people have told me,'it's time we confront Wagner', especially those in the younger generation."

Still, not enough time has passed for a performance in Israel, he said. The orchestra did not even rehearse the music in the country.

Even though Wagner died half a century before Hitler rose to power, the Nazi dictator was a fervent admirer and drew on the composer's writings in his own theories on Germanic racial purity.

Aside from anti-Semitic overtones in some of his operas, Wagner also penned a number of polemics raging against the corruption of music and the "German spirit" by Jews.

The unofficial ban on Wagner predates Israel's creation in 1948. The Israel Philharmonic under its former name, the Palestine Orchestra, imposed it in 1938 after Nazi attacks on Jews in Germany.

Dan Erdmann, a clarinetist in the Israel Chamber Orchestra, said his fellow musicians understood the history that is linked to Wagner's music.

"However, the conflicts and emotions associated with the history of Wagner are exactly those which make it so special for us," he said.

The orchestra's performance is part of a fringe festival here linked to the annhttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifual Wagner opera festival that attracts thousands of opera fanatics and celebrities each year.

They will also play a piece by Israeli composer Zvi Avni and music by German-born Felix Mendelssohn and Austrian-born Gustav Mahler, two of the most prominent Jewish-born composers.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/07/24/us-israel-germany-music-idUSTRE76N24Z20110724


Prominent jews admit Nazis funded by international jewish banksters


.

Norway killer espoused Zionist right-wing philosophy

Via xymphora

"German journalist Ulrich Sahm reported on the pro-Israel Israelnetz.com website that many of the youths who survived the massacre said they thought the killer, dressed as a police officer, was simulating Israeli crimes against Palestinians in the occupied territories. They believed that "the cruelty of the Israeli occupation" was being demonstrated to them, Sahm wrote."


The rder of Death

The confessed perpetrator in the attack in Norway that killed as many as 98 people espoused a right-wing philosophy against Islam that also purports to be pro-Zionist.

Anders Behring Breivik is charged with detonating a car bomb outside Oslo’s government headquarters, which houses the office of Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg, and of shooting and killing at least 85 mostly young people at a political summer camp on nearby Utoya Island. The July 22 massacre reportedly was the the worst attack in Norway since the end of World War II.

In numerous online postings, including a manifesto published on the day of the attacks, Breivik promoted the Vienna School or Crusader Nationalism philosophy, a mishmash of anti-modern principles that also calls for "the deportation of all Muslims from Europe" as well as from "the West Bank and the Gaza Strip."

According to the manifesto, titled "2083: A European Declaration of Independence" and published under the pseudonym Andrew Berwick, the Vienna School supports "pro-Zionism/Israeli nationalism."

Breivik listed numerous European Freedom Parties and neo-Nazi parties as potential allies because of their anti-immigrant, anti-Muslim stance, and mentioned that right-wing populists like Dutch politician Geert Wilders "have to condemn us at this point which is fine. It is after all essential that they protect their reputational shields."

Among the potential allies he listed for Germany were the three largest neo-Nazi parties -- the National Democratic Party, Deutsche Volksunion and Republikaner. In Holland, Wilders' Freedom Party topped the list, and the British National Party topped a long list of potential supporters in the United Kingdom.

European right-populist parties increasingly have been waving the flag of friendship with Israel, as well as expressing vehement opposition to Europe’s multicultural society.

Last month, after it emerged that German-Swedish far-right politician Patrik Brinkmann had met in Berlin with Israeli Likud Party lawmaker Ayoub Kara, who is deputy minister for development of the Negev and Galilee, Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman wrote to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu demanding that Kara be prevented from making further trips abroad. According to Ynet, Lieberman accused Kara of meeting with neo-Nazis and causing damage to Israel's image. Brinkman said he had reached out to Israeli rightists hoping to build a coalition against Islam.

In postings on the website Document.no that appear to be by Breivik, the poster pondered whether one could "accept the moderate Nazis as long as they distance themselves" from the extermination of the Jews.

The words of right-wing populist politicians "are dangerous, it allows them to radicalize," Hajo Funke, an expert on right-wing extremism in Europe and the Holocaust at Touro College Berlin and the Free University Berlin, told JTA in a phone interview.

"It is a tactical viewpoint of the rising populist right-wing to use this kind of identification, or forced identification with Israel, to be accepted," he said. "They say, 'Our enemies are not any more the Jew ... the real enemy as you can see all over the world is Islam, and not only Islam, but the Islamic person.' This is the new, great danger."

Stephan Kramer, general secretary of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, told JTA that "in the recent years we have witnessed the phenomenon of radical rightists proclaiming their sympathy for Jews and their support for Israel, also in Germany," adding that "In many cases, it is clear that this is no more than a PR maneuver to create an air of respectability."

"Whatever 'support' for Israel Anders Behring Breivik may have had in his abominable mind, it is not any kind of support we want," Kramer said.

One day after the attack, members of Norway’s small Jewish community gathered at the Synagogue of Oslo to pray for the survivors.

“We also pray that the authorities will be less naive on security issues and threats,” businessman Erwin Kohn, newly elected head of the 750-member Jewish community, said in a telephone interview from Oslo.

Kohn added that it appeared that no one in the Jewish community was injured or killed in the attack, but “we are affected just the same as the Norwegian society in general.”

On the reports about Breivik's online postings, he offered his concerns.

“You have many others who are in the same ballpark, being scared of multiculturalism,” Kohn said, adding that Breivik’s alleged pro-Zionism is a sham. “We don’t need such friends, we don’t need such friends.”

Serge Cwajgenbaum, secretary general of the European Jewish Congress, in a call from France said that Breivik “is not pro-Israel -- he is anti-Muslim.

“It is a national catastrophe," he said, "and we share the sadness of the sorrow of the families."

German journalist Ulrich Sahm reported on the pro-Israel Israelnetz.com website that many of the youths who survived the massacre said they thought the killer, dressed as a police officer, was simulating Israeli crimes against Palestinians in the occupied territories. They believed that "the cruelty of the Israeli occupation" was being demonstrated to them, Sahm wrote.

Meanwhile, Israel on Saturday night condemned the attacks in Oslo.

"Nothing at all can justify such wanton violence, and we condemn this brutal action with the utmost gravity," the Foreign Ministry said in a statement. "We stand in solidarity with the people and government of Norway in this hour of trial, and trust Norwegian authorities to bring to justice those responsible for this heinous crime."

Israeli President Shimon Peres called the king of Norway, Harald V, to express condolences. "Your country is a symbol of peace and freedom. In Israel we followed the events over the weekend in Norway and the attack on innocent civilians broke our hearts. It is a painful tragedy that touches every human being. We send our condolences to the families that lost their loved ones and a speedy recovery to the wounded. Israel is willing to assist in whatever is needed," Peres said, according to his office.

The king thanked Peres for his phone call and for the expression of Israeli solidarity.

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas visited Norway last week and was told that Oslo will recognize Palestine, but not immediately.

While much attention in Norway has been focused on the threat of Muslim extremism, the threat from the far right was generally considered to have abated.

Kohn noted that anti-Semitism in the country remains a serious problem. A recent study of 7,000 Norwegian teens showed that more than half of youth of all backgrounds, whether Christian or Muslim, use the word “Jew” as an expletive.

Anecdotally, Kohn said, “one-third of the Jewish kids in our schools have experienced harassment ... but not from one specific group."


http://www.jta.org/news/article/2011/07/24/3088679/norway-killer-espoused-new-right-wing-pro-israel-philosophy



Monday, 18 July 2011

9/11 and Israel: Alan Sabrosky’s Shocking Press TV Interview

“We Know Who, We Even Know Why…”

Tying Israel Irrevocably to 9/11

By Gordon Duff, Senior Editor


This week, Dr. Alan Sabrosky, Managing Editor at Veterans Today, was interviewed on 9/11 and Israel’s involvement and their influence in American affairs. Dr. Sabrosky is interviewed by Susan Modaress of Press TV. Runtime is 20 minutes.

Alan, I call him that, a fellow editor, fellow Marine and good friend, does what few do when discussing issues of such extreme controversy. Alan sticks to the facts, takes the facts to logical conclusions and stops there. Any American of any political leaning or ethnicity can and should, out of patriotism and out of sanity, watch this interview.





The case made is a case that will stand up in a court of law, a case not contrived for entertainment, for propaganda or for an emotional “fix,” feeding hate, prejudice or the desire by some for conspiracies to fill the void of a life bereft of meaning.


Alan Sabrosky is “serious as a heart attack.”


There is an underlying message to this interview, intended or not. Dr. Sabrosky establishes a defensible position and sets limits.


A majority of Americans are aware that 9/11 had clear signs of government complicity, both operationally and in the subsequent investigation that even Judge Napolitano and Geraldo Rivera of Rupert Murcoch’s FOX NEWS called a “whitewash.” A major Australian poll taken last fall showed 77% of people there believe the US government to be fully complicit in 9/11. Similar polls in the US regularly score over 50%, some much higher.


Sabrosky’s case, presented with much clarity, plants responsibility for 9/11 at the feet of Israel and Americans whose loyalties, if we can call them that, are certainly not to the United States. That these “Americans” now believed to be complicit in the planning and execution of the 9/11 terror attacks are, for the most part, officials of the government, is telling.


Their complicity couldn’t be more obvious if they were caught standing with the detonation switches in their hands.


Israel is a different story, a public relationship characterized as “close friendship” and a private one that more closely resembles that between America and the Soviet Union at the height of the Cold War.


Most Americans are not aware of how the relationship between Israel and the United States has soured over the past 40 years. Behind an endless barrage of stories of the holocaust and fear mongering about Antisemitism, political extremists in Israel and their allies in the US, many in positions of extreme power and influence, have contrived to seriously harm the United States,
ostensibly under the guise of “support for Israel” and misrepresented security issues.


Sabrosky calls it “high treason.”


Below, the forgotten Geraldo Rivera report on 9/11, now “disappeared” from history, from the archives, forgotten and victim of its own “coverup.”






Postscript


Beyond this, the past decade has bombarded the American public and the world with wildly conflicting conspiracy theories and phony science, the worst of it from the American government itself.


What can I say as a postscript or commentary to the interview? Liberal, conservative, Jew, Gentile, what Alan Sabrosky says is simply the truth. He has the credentials and the character to know the truth.


The message:


Believing the government and mainstream media’s version of 9/11 and
allowing Israeli “dual citizens” to serve in government or electing and
appointing officials whose relationship with Israel is detrimental to the
security of the United States is inconsistent with citizen responsibility
for any American.


Related Interview:

Declassified: Massive Israeli manipulation of US media exposed


Sunday, 17 July 2011

Israel: 'Delegitimization' is just a distraction

Israel can't be delegitimized, and no one is trying to do so. But the idea does serve the purpose of diverting attention from the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and the blockade of the Gaza Strip.

Brilliant song: "We are the Mossad"

The Gitmos - We Are The Mossad

Featuring Ravi Sinatra on Sitar!



WE USE SAYANIM
AGAINST THE GOYIM
OUR NETWORK OF SPIES
ALL LOYAL TO THE TRIBE

AMDOCS COMVERSE INFOSYS
ONLY SCRATCHES THE SURFACE
WE SCOUR THE NET, YOUR PHONES AND YOUR TEXTS
OUR DATA SET IS THE VERY BEST

ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

WE INFLUENCE YOUR NEWS
THE CANDIDATES YOU CHOOSE
SUBJUGATE YOUR LEADERS
DESTROY THOSE WHO REFUSE

PROPAGANDA OR HASBARA
THEY'RE BOTH THE SAME IN YOUR MEDIA
OUR BLACK OPS COVERED HOW WE WANT
WE INFILTRATE-ASSASSINATE!

Aaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhh

WE ARE THE MOSSAD
CHOSEN BY G-D
BY DECEPTION WE WAGE WAR!
BY DECEPTION WE WAGE WAR!
BY DECEPTION WE WAGE WAR!
BY DECEPTION WE WAGE WAR!

Instrumental!

WE AND THE CIA
ALONG WITH MI6
MANIPULATE THE WORLD
WITH AN IRON FIST

ON THE GRAND CHESSBOARD WE ARE NOT PAWNS
WE ARE KINGS AMONG KINGS, UNITED AND STRONG
FOR WESTERN WAYS AND WESTERN BANKS
FOR WESTERN WARS WE GIVE OUR THANKS

ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

WE ARE THE MOSSAD
CHOSEN BY G-D
BY DECEPTION WE WAGE WAR!
BY DECEPTION WE WAGE WAR!
BY DECEPTION WE WAGE WAR!
BY DECEPTION WE WAGE WAR!

CLOAKED IN RELIGION'S SHROUD
YOU DARE NOT SPEAK ALOUD.

Monday, 11 July 2011

Recognizing Palestine

Obama has fanned the flames in Mideast dispute

The Obama administration is facing a major embarrassment at the hands of the Palestinian Authority. The “Quartet” powers - the United States, the European Union, the United Nations and Russia - are seeking a way to restart direct talks between Israel and the Palestinians in order to forestall the proposal for the U.N. General Assembly to recognize Palestinian statehood when the international body convenes in September. The recognition would be largely symbolic; full membership in the U.N. would require a vote before the Security Council, which almost certainly would face a U.S. veto. But a vote of confidence from the General Assembly would in theory give the Palestinians increased diplomatic momentum and cap two years of failed White House peace initiatives.

The Palestinians have been rallying supporters for their proposal despite strong U.S. objections. Last week, U.S. special Mideast peace envoy David Hale and White House adviser Dennis Ross met with lead Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat to press him to give up the plan. Mr. Erekat held firm, saying opponents of the declaration need to “rethink their position.” The Palestinians are daring Mr. Obama to take stronger action against them, seemingly confident that he won’t.

It’s a sad state of affairs when America lacks the political leverage to stop such a needlessly provocative diplomatic maneuver, but it was inevitable given the Obama administration’s approach to foreign policy. Mr. Obama came into office believing the problems the United States faced in the global arena were due to the arrogance of his predecessor. His view was that it’s better to be loved than feared among nations, and he acted accordingly with a series of outreach efforts, proposed “grand bargains” in various regions and a general strategy of “leading from behind.”

Sincerity can also be read as weakness, and if simple good intentions could resolve the Israeli-Palestinian dispute, it would have been settled long ago. Instead of bringing the two parties together, the administration’s approach has alienated them from each other and from Washington. A series of missteps with Israel drove a wedge between Mr. Obama and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The Palestinians, frustrated at the lack of progress in the American diplomatic framework, figured they had nothing to lose by going outside the box.

Mr. Obama may have himself to blame for conjuring the recognition idea. “This time we should reach for what’s best within ourselves,” he said before the General Assembly in September. “If we do, when we come back here next year, we can have an agreement that will lead to a new member of the United Nations - an independent, sovereign state of Palestine, living in peace with Israel.” Direct talks collapsed within weeks, but the notion of a Palestinian state being declared at the U.N. in September 2011 persisted. The Palestinians concluded that if they could not get there by negotiating with Israel, perhaps they could rally the rest of the world to their cause.

The White House now faces a countdown to a bruising diplomatic defeat. It will take more than high-toned rhetoric to derail the recognition drive. American negotiators should make an honest, interest-based assessment of the state of play in the region, free of the misplaced idealism that has typified the Obama administration’s approach to date. The Palestinians are among the largest per-capita recipients of foreign aid in the world. If the hundreds of millions of dollars the United States provides them annually cannot buy leverage, there are plenty of other good uses for those funds.

© Copyright 2011 The Washington Times
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