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A guest post by AKUS
News item:
“The queues of cars waiting to cross from the tiny 2.6 sq mile territory into [the neighboring country] have lengthened dramatically in the last week, as … border patrols have been ordered to make things more difficult for motorists and workers, increasing security checks in a move condemned … as “childish”.
No, this is not from another article about the attempt to prevent terrorists entering Jerusalem. Nor is the territory in question “Al Kuds”.
It is Jabal Tariq – i.e. Gibraltar – and the neighboring country manning the checkpoints is, of course, Spain. And where better to read about the issue of checkpoints than in The Observer: Gibraltar’s jubilee party sends signal to Madrid .
The reason for the Spanish crackdown is the celebration of the British Monarch’s Jubilee. The Jubilee is being celebrated with particular emphasis in Gibraltar, which was ceded under the Treaty of Utrecht to the British in 1713 by the Dutch, who won the War of the Spanish Succession – whatever that was – which probably had a lot to do with royal jewels and possibly ‘strategic marriage’.
Even worse – Gibraltar – I meant to say the fourth most sacred rock in Islam, Jabal Tariq – was captured from the Caliphate by the Spanish in 1462 – almost 700 years ago.
Of course, history would not be the same without the Jews. Yes, it appears to be the case that the Spanish used their mandatory powers to sell the holy territory of Jabal Tariq to Jews in 1474.
I am not about to check the following, except to note that Spain pulled a particularly dirty trick on the Jews two years later in 1476. In fact, Spain should be using the UN and EU and UNHRC and Amnesty International to force Britain to hand over גברלטר to those to whom Spain sold it then stole it back.
After the conquest, King Henry IV assumed the title of King of Gibraltar, establishing it as part of the municipal area of the Campo Llano de Gibraltar. Six years later Gibraltar was restored to the Duke of Medina Sidonia who sold it in 1474 to a group of Jewish conversos from Cordova and Seville in exchange for maintaining the garrison of the town for two years, after which time the 4,350 Jews were expelled by the Duke as part of the Inquisition.
But as we celebrate Jerusalem Day, the next time the a member of Spanish government has something to say about checkpoints, or Catherine Ashton has something to say about the “occupation”, I will grimly mutter “Tariq Jabal and Utrecht”.
And if, 700 years from now, anti-Zionist activists are still trying to divide Jerusalem (or call it Al Kuds), or the EU is still going on about the plight of the millions of stateless Palestinian refugees and UNRWA’s budget has swallowed up more resources which could be better spent on developing countries, I hope there will be some blogger also whispering the magic words on Jerusalem Day: “A Tariq Jabal and Utrecht to your Al Kuds and Oslo”.
As HonestReporting observed:
“The history of Jerusalem did not start in 1967. Thousands of years of Jewish history took place in what is now called “Arab East Jerusalem.” Only when the Jewish residents were driven from their homes in 1948 [by Jordanian forces] was the city divided between East and West.”
This HR video shows the reality of Jerusalem, which today is celebrating 45 years of reunification.
Related articles
- Jerusalem Day: celebrating 45 years of reunification (cifwatch.com)
- The Guardian’s Chris McGreal and moral logic of a Jew-free Arab East Jerusalem (cifwatch.com)
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As Israel commemorates Yom Yerushalayim – the 45th anniversary of the reunification of Jerusalem on the 28th of Iyar – it is important to remember the situation in the city during the 19 years in which it was divided.
Those of us who follow the wonderfully informative Twitter account @1948War have, in recent weeks, been getting real-time reminders of the events which culminated in the fall of the Old City and Jerusalem’s eastern neighbourhoods to the Jordanian forces in 1948. Elsewhere, there are poignant reminders of the expulsion of the city’s Jewish population from areas conquered and occupied by the British-funded, equipped and led Arab Legion.
Jewish families leaving the old city through Zion Gate. June 1948. John Phillips
Jewish families being evacuated from city. June 1948. John Phillips
During the 19 years of Jordanian occupation, neither Muslim nor Jewish Israelis had access to their holy sites in the Old City (in violation of article VIII of the 1949 Armistice Agreement) and 58 synagogues were destroyed, in addition to other sites of religious significance such as the Mount of Olives. Neither did Jerusalemites enjoy peace in their divided city, as the following pre-Six Day War newspaper cutting shows.
Translation:
Jerusalem Municipality to the citizens of Jerusalem
The border with the Old City is mined. The Jordanian snipers are still active; two people were killed by sniping in the Old City. It is strictly forbidden by the army authorities to approach the border or to enter the Old City until further notice.
In fact, divided Jerusalem appears to have been a cause of regret even for the British film-makers of a Pathe newsreel dating from May of 1967. Leaving aside the now anachronistic (and in parts, borderline racist) style of commentary by someone apparently unable to comprehend why visitors from a country which contributed quite a bit to the division of the city may not feel welcomed with open arms, it is nevertheless interesting to note that whilst 45 years ago Jerusalem’s division was perceived as a problem, many of the commentator’s modern-day contemporaries appear to take the exact opposite view.
The rest of us will today celebrate the fact that the city is reunited and that members of all religions are today free to live there and visit, in keeping with the words of the then Defence Minister Moshe Dayan on the 28th of Iyar 5727 (June 7th, 1967).
“This morning, the Israel Defense Forces liberated Jerusalem. We have united Jerusalem, the divided capital of Israel. We have returned to the holiest of our holy places, never to part from it again. To our Arab neighbors we extend, also at this hour—and with added emphasis at this hour—our hand in peace. And to our Christian and Muslim fellow citizens, we solemnly promise full religious freedom and rights. We did not come to Jerusalem for the sake of other peoples’ holy places, and not to interfere with the adherents of other faiths, but in order to safeguard its entirety, and to live there together with others, in unity.”
Happy Jerusalem Day!
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A guest post by AKUS
Read the caption to the picture below, captured off the Guardian’s website.
“Passengers on a tram in Jerusalem observe a two-minute silence for Yom HaShoah, when the nation remembers the 6 million Jews who died during the Holocaust”.
Apparently in the April 20th 2012 print edition, on page 24, a fuller version of the caption also correctly termed Jerusalem the Israeli capital.
Now read the following correction made by the Guardian on Sunday 22 April 2012, which is found on the web here. As I did, you may have to read it twice to realize what it says:
• The caption on a photograph featuring passengers on a tram in Jerusalem observing a two-minute silence for Yom HaShoah, a day of remembrance for the 6 million Jews who died in the Holocaust, wrongly referred to the city as the Israeli capital. The Guardian style guide states: “Jerusalem is not the capital of Israel; Tel Aviv is” (Eyewitness, 20 April, page 24).
Did you need to read it again to grasp the “wrong reference” that the Guardian is correcting? In case you missed it, here it is again: the caption, the Guardian claims, violated its style guide by noting in passing that Jerusalem is the capital of Israel.
This calls for a correction, since the Guardian style guide apparently decrees:
“Jerusalem is not the capital of Israel; Tel Aviv is”
The Guardian has decided that even though Jerusalem has been Israel’s capital since the founding of the state, its Parliament, Supreme Court and ministerial offices are there, it, the Guardian, believes that Tel Aviv is the country’s real capital. It has apparently enforced this absurdity by codifying it in its style guide.
Is there any other country in the world for which the Guardian’s style guide defines the capital as being other than the city that country has selected as its capital? If any newspaper’s “style guide” decreed that London is not the capital of England, would that not be ludicrous? Is the next step for the Guardian style guide to decide that Israel is not a country but Palestine is, even though exactly the opposite is true?
More than anything else this absurd refusal to acknowledge Jerusalem as Israel’s capital demonstrates the utter perversity of the Guardian’s reporting about Israel. It shows in their own words, in print, the Guardian’s cringing acceptance of Arab propaganda that is rewriting the history of Jerusalem, the attempts to write the Jewish history out of the history of Jerusalem, and the Guardian’s attempts to delegitimize Israel and deny its right to exist.
If they had any shame, the people running the Guardian should be ashamed of their style guide and this ridiculous “correction” of a truthful statement. But they have no shame.
Related articles
- What the Guardian should have posted about Holocaust Memorial Day in Israel (cifwatch.com)
- Yom HaShoah: ‘Unto every person there is a name’. (cifwatch.com)
- Guardian’s duty to Jews on Yom HaShoah? Don’t publish accusations that we’re “supremacists”! (cifwatch.com)
- Follow-up post about Guardian Travel site’s curious omission of the nation known as “Israel” (cifwatch.com)
- The Guardian, Raed Salah and Yom HaShoah. (cifwatch.com)
- Seth Freedman’s attack on Israel’s Jewish nature: Classically Guardian egregious absence of context (cifwatch.com)
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A guest post by Hadar Sela
Roman Catholics at Church of the Holy Sepulchre (Photo: AFP)
How unfortunate it is that participants in last month’s ‘Christ at the Checkpoint’ conference in Bethlehem such as Stephen Sizer and Ben White did not extend their stay. What a pity it is too that the ‘Global March to Jerusalem’ folks didn’t hang around a little longer.
Had they done so, they would have had to confront the fact that despite GMJ organiser Sarah Marusek’s off the wall claims about “limitations on Christians and Muslims from accessing holy sites” in Jerusalem, thousands of Christians are currently celebrating Easter in the city including – for the first time in years – Egyptian Copts.
The latter were apparently prevented from worshipping at the St. Helena Chapel (the Egyptian part of Jerusalem’s Church of the Holy Sepulcher) – although by church officials, not by Israeli authorities, so we will probably not be seeing any headlines on that subject in the ‘progressive’ Western media.
Ben White – a denier of Islamist persecution of Palestinian Christians – and his fellow Sabeel star turn and promoter of the ‘Israeli apartheid’ myth Stephen Sizer would have had to somehow explain away Israel’s provision of entry into the country to 500 Christians from Hamas-controlled Gaza and a further 20,000 from the PA-controlled territories in order to enable them to celebrate their holiday.
Would such a confrontation with reality have made a difference to the style and content of the rhetoric spouted by people such as Marusek, White and Sizer? Probably not.
After all, Sizer is one of the authors of the ‘Christ at the Checkpoint Manifesto’ which – inter alia – provides the magical ‘get out of jail free’ card in the form of the statement that “[c]riticism of Israel and the occupation cannot be confused with anti-Semitism and the delegitimization of the State of Israel”.
But at least the rest of us can be sure that just about the last subject of concern for the Whites, Sizers and Maruseks of this world is the right of people of all faiths in the Middle East to freedom of worship.
Related articles
- Christians celebrate Easter in Jerusalem (ynet.com)
My friend Judy Lash Balint, who blogs at Jerusalem Diaries, published an essay recently at Times of Israel. Balint wrote:
The so-called Global March on Jerusalem [GMJ] and the annual Land Day ritual that took place last Friday fizzled to a predictable end. But the non-event did produce yet another series of images that reinforce the world’s perception of Israel as a place of conflict and violence.
I’m an occasional stringer for a photo news site based in the U.K–here’s what the assignment editor sent out to his Israeli contacts on Friday:
Like almost every other news editor, he isn’t interested in seeing Israelis in all their complexity and color, it’s just so much simpler to portray us as tear-gas firing, helmet-wearing, faceless aggressors.
Clearly, the Guardian got the memo. Their photo story on GMJ protests, Israeli police and Palestinians clash during Land Day protests, included this:
The propaganda value of this photo is priceless, and represents quintessentially Guardian caricatures of cruel, sadistic Israelis juxtaposed with innocent Palestinians – devoid of any trace of context.
There were hundreds of Palestinians rioting on Friday, many throwing rocks and firebombs at uniformed Israelis, and the IDF, as they always do, employed non-lethal riot dispersal means to quell the violence in a manner most likely to minimize injury. This was no small challenge in the context of a broader GMJ movement which clearly wanted to provoke violent confrontations to achieve propaganda victories.
Balint concluded:
So, for the record, here are some faces of Israel and her security forces that may shed a little light on just who we are as we approach Passover 2012.
Here are the photos she took and posted at Times of Israel:
Police on patrol at Jaffa Gate
Posing in Akko…
Consulting with the locals at Qasr al Yahud in the Jordan Valley
Naval cadets in Jerusalem
Border patrol in Jerusalem
Visiting Herodian
Local coordination at Wadi Kelt
IDF Entertainment Group welcoming new olim at Ben Gurion Airport
IDF conquers the Old City
Border patrol on break at Kikar Safra, Jerusalem
Related articles
- Guardian’s “relative calm” in Israel continues, 130 rockets fired from Gaza in last 30 hours (cifwatch.com)
- Global March to Jerusalem violence update: & +972′s Lisa Goldman gets owned by IDF on Twitter (cifwatch.com)
- Guardian’s Phoebe Greenwood runs interference for Global March to Jerusalem organizers and rioters (cifwatch.com)
- Global March to Jerusalem post event round-up: #GMJ #EpicFailure (cifwatch.com)
- The Global March to Jerusalem – another terrorist provocation on Israel’s borders (cifwatch.com)
- Metula Diarist: A tribute to Guardians of the Jews (cifwatch.com)
- Harriet Sherwood legitimizes characterization of Israel’s border fences as ‘sign of weakness’ (cifwatch.com)
Though GMJ organizers’ ambitious anti-Zionist plan for a million man march on Israel’s borders (part of an effort by Arabs and far-left “activists” to “steal Jerusalem from the hands of the illegal Zionist occupation“) has, thus far, seemed to have failed miserably, here’s a brief update on GMJ related violence today:
- Approximately 150 violent rioters in Bethlehem hurled rocks and firebombs at Israeli security personnel (see video below).
- Approximately 200 rioters in Qalandia hurled rocks and firebombs at IDF forces.
- Though the media (including the Guardian’s Phoebe Greenwood) have been uncritically repeating Palestinian claims that politician Mustafa Barghouti was hit in the head by a tear gas canister, requiring medical treatment, the IDF contradicted these claims stating definitively that Barghouti was hurt in a brawl that broke out among the Palestinians over who would lead the protest march.
- The IDF responded to Palestinian violence with non-lethal riot dispersal means.
Elsewhere there was this exchange between +972′s Lisa Goldman and the IDF on Twitter.
I just couldn’t help but weigh in.
Here’s a photo of just one of the “protesters” in Bethlehem today – aka, Palestinian child abuse.
Related articles
A guest post by Gidon Ben-Zvi, a freelance Israeli writer
Purim in Nachalot, Jerusalem, 2012: Photo taken by Assaf Astrinsky
A weekend that ended with over 200 rockets and mortar shells being launched from the Gaza Strip toward Be’er Sheba, Ashkelon, Ashdod and other Israeli cities began with an explosion of another kind: that of light, color, dance and general mayhem.
Before the skies turned fat and dark with plumes of grey-black smoke, there was Purim 2012 – and what a holiday it was!
Officially, Purim celebrates the deliverance of the Jewish people in the ancient Persian Empire from destruction in the wake of a plot by Haman.
Unofficially, the holiday is a license for grizzle-faced security guards to sachet through Machne Yehuda in skirts, wigs, rouge and high heels; normally prim and proper school teachers to get dressed up as sexy, whip-wielding librarians and well-scrubbed Yeshiva bochers to stay up into the wee small hours – smoking, yelping and imbibing the night away.
I had the great good fortune to experience Purim 2012 in the heart of all the madness – the hip, artsy, freewheeling neighborhood of Nachlaot, Jerusalem. With an endless supply of blind alleys, improvised schuls and sidewalk troubadours, Nachlaot infuses the city with a checkerboard study in contrasts: tin roofs rubbing up against the neighborhood’s drive to gentrify.
While Purim celebrations in such Jerusalem garden communities as Rechavia and Baka provide wholesome fare for one and all, Nachlaot is a roving spectacle of hastily organized block parties, bearded ladies and magically appearing DJs – piping out an irresistible medley of traditional holiday songs, hip hop – courtesy of “Dag Nachash” and Lady Gaga.
My wife Debbie and I attempted to infuse the party atmosphere with a semblance of that Old Time Religion – by attending a perfectly sane and somber Megillah reading from the Book of Esther at one of Nachlaot’s many synagogues. However, a “quick” detour to Machne Yehuda forced us to revise our plans. With the neighborhood’s Kurdish, Ashkenazi and Sephardic synagogues all overflowing with the bewigged and bejeweled – we decided to take the digital path towards revisiting Mordechai’s triumph – courtesy of YouTube.
While YouTube provided the text, the synagogue located directly above our heads provided the uproarious soundtrack. Whenever Haman’s name was read out during the synagogue service, the congregation engaged in noise-making – meant to blot out the evil prime minister’s name.
With the passage of time, my mental faculties will inevitably dim; my hairline will continue its march towards oblivion and my eyesight will probably fade – forcing me to experience the world as a moving procession of shadows and fog.
Yet, the memories made during Purim 2012 – of costumes, ciggies and even rockets – will provide me with warmth, succor and tenacious hope in the remarkable endurance of the Third Jewish Commonwealth – forged in hellfire and consecrated by countless acts of heroism – until my soul slips the surly bonds of earth.
Purim in Nachalot, Jerusalem, 2012: Photo taken by Assaf Astrinsky
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Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, addressing the International Conference for the Defense of Jerusalem in Qatar on Sunday called on Muslims to go to Jerusalem and confront Israel’s accelerated efforts to “Judaize the city”.
The conference’s aims, per their website, includes
…pointing out the weaknesses of the Jew’s historical arguments backing their claims to the holy city. Of paramount importance is the disclosure of Israel’s deeds at falsifying History and archeology by means of destruction, omission, modification and fabrication of historical and archeological facts.
Muslim Brotherhood spiritual leader, Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, at Qatar Jerusalem Conference http://www.qatarconferences.org/jerusalem/photo_gallery2.php?id=gallery/01
That there is yet another coordinated effort by the Arab world to delegitimize Israel and erase the Jewish connection to Jerusalem isn’t at all surprising.
However, included in the list of conference participants – a who’s who of Arab leaders, Islamists, and others committed to the end of the Jewish state – is an American named Kenneth Raymond Insley, described as a consultant for the U.S. Department of State.
Insley’s LinkedIn profile notes that he is currently Director of Public Diplomacy at Capital Communications Group, Inc, (CCG) which, according to their website, “organizes briefings, workshops and seminars on the structure of U.S. government…with special emphasis on foreign, defense and trade policies.”
Among the clients CCG highlights (which include several Arab governments, as well as the PLO Mission in Washington, DC) are quite a few U.S. government agencies and departments, including the Department of State.
The following are Insley’s prepared remarks for the original Qatar Jerusalem conference which was to take place in February 2011 – postponed till this week due to the political upheavals in the region erupting at the time:
“Most Americans are unaware of the impact its overwhelming support for Israel, while simultaneously turning a blind eye to their shameful treatment of Palestinians in Gaza, and in Jerusalem, has caused their country be viewed more negatively in the Arab world than all the positive contributions it has done for the Arab world combined.”
Other passages in Insley’s speech include the suggestion that “US politicians care more about Israel than the foreign policy interests of their own country” and the argument that the US “blindly supports Israel no matter which government is in power”.
Insley also warned, darkly:
“It is now well understood by almost everyone that either Israel will cease to be a democratic state, or a Jewish one, because it can’t have both without the creation of a Palestinian state…or it will lead to Armageddon.”
Here are other passages from Insley’s prepared remarks, as they appear in context, from the online Google document:
Insley then added:
“Perhaps it is understandable to be perceived as racist when you are considered by some in the world to be God’s own ‘chosen people’…”
Finally, Insley noted in his speech that he has, for the past decade, “coordinated international exchanges with State Department delegations”.
Evidently the style of hateful, demonizing vitriolic rhetoric about Jews and Israel which is endemic in the Arab and Muslim world has gained a foothold in Washington, DC.
Related articles
This is cross posted by Pesach Benson at the blog of Honest Reporting
In the middle of an article about a plan to relocate Bedouins, The Guardian‘s Harriet Sherwood worries that Maale Adumim might one day bisect the West Bank:
Many Palestinians see this as part of a strategic plan to close a ring of Jewish settlements that would cut East Jerusalem off from the West Bank. By stretching down to the Jordan valley, an expanded Ma’ale Adumim would also bisect the West Bank, making a contiguous Palestinian state impossible.
I’m not going to address the Bedouin issue – thats a separate discussion (which Sherwood and The Guardian have muddied before).
But as for her sense of geography, we heard the same hot air in 2005 over a parcel of land known as E-1.
The inconvenient fact for Sherwood and her Palestinian fixers is this: Even if Maale Adumim morphed into a sprawling metropolis up to the borders of its designated area, the Palestinians would still have a waistline of nine miles (15 km) connecting their north and south. Our colleagues at CAMERA published this useful map making the very point.
Map courtesy of CAMERA. Text and graphics added by CiF Watch.
To put it in perspective, the narrowest point of Israel’s waistline is the roughly nine km distance between Netanya and the Palestinian city of Tulkarm.
But who worries about Israel’s contiguity?
Related articles
- Harriet Sherwood’s report on Bedouin copy-pastes UNRWA anti-Israel propaganda (cifwatch.com)
- Palestinian Guardian propaganda photo of the day (Soldier vs. child) (cifwatch.com)
- Harriet Sherwood legitimizes Gazans’ complaints that they can’t enter Israel to sue the Jewish state (cifwatch.com)
- Peace activist’s home vandalized with death threats: Harriet Sherwood blames Bibi (cifwatch.com)
It’s getting near that time of year when people in the UK, fed up of their dank, grey winter, begin flicking through holiday brochures and the travel supplements in their weekend newspapers, dreaming of a warm and exciting destination for their summer break.
Sarah Irving - Former ISM activist
As may be expected, the Guardian’s travel section also contains articles on a variety of tempting destinations. Las Vegas, Spain, Turkey and the Red Sea to to name but a few, and this week there’s also an article by the author of the newly published Bradt Guide to Palestine, Sarah Irving, on its top 10 attractions.
The vast majority of readers of the article will of course be unfamiliar with the region and may therefore not pick up onIrving’s distinctly partisan style or the inaccuracies in her article and, one can only assume, her book.
Already in her introduction,Irving makes much of potential travel difficulties visited on the unsuspecting voyager by the Israeli authorities. Of course she makes no mention of why inconveniences such as checkpoints or airport security checks may be necessary in order to protect the lives of tourists just as much as Israelis.
Irving then proceeds to give her recommendations for places to visit. Sebastia becomes a site of “Hellenic watchtowers, ruined Samaritan palaces and crumbling Byzantine churches” along with “Islamic shrines”: no mention of the history before the relatively late naming of the town Sebastia after Augustus Caesar, which includes the archeological excavations of the royal citadel and kings of Israel, including Ahab, between 880 and 721 BCE.
Next, Irving moves on to the Dome of the Rock which, despite this being a guide to Palestine, is of course situated in Israel. The only clue the reader might get about that fact is her claim that the site is “[u]sually closed for Islamic holidays, Jewish holidays, Fri/Sat (except Muslim worshippers), and whenever the Israeli authorities consider there to be a security risk.“ Ah, those unpredictable and hysterical Israelis again!
Northwards to Jenin and Irving cannot resist yet another context-free remark: “this bustling town, sadly better known for the Israeli army’s massive 2002 attack on the refugee camp.” Of course one does have to admit that Jenin’s other title as terror capital of the Palestinian Territories is somewhat less likely to draw in the crowds.
Next Irving manages to turn Abraham, after whom a hiking trail is named, into “the Prophet Abraham”, and to skip meticulously over any Jewish history in Taibeh or Jericholiable to distract the reader, before arriving in Hevron. The tomb of Abraham and the other patriarchs at Machpela is not recommended to visitors – presumably because that would not fit into the narrative – but she does manage the by now obligatory mention of wicked Israelis. “Many [shops] have closed, shut by Israeli military order to protect the settlers who have occupied parts of the city, or because the settler threat makes business unviable.” In fact, rather than having ‘occupied’ it, the Jews living in Hevron do so under the terms of the Oslo Accords signed by the representatives of the Palestinian people.
Irving’s attention turns next to Acco – or as she for some reason calls it ‘Akka’. Acco is of course situated in Israel, but Irving gets round this by informing her readers that “The new Bradt guide also covers areas of Israel that are home to large numbers of Palestinians and where their culture survives.” The Arabs living in Acco are Israeli Arabs – who chose not to leave Israel during the War of Independence in 1948.
It is clear that far from being a ‘travel guide’, Irving’s book is actually a political polemic.
Why Bradt should have selected such an obviously biased author to write a guide which appears to attempt to erase Jewish history from Judea and Samaria (unless in the form of context-free references to contemporary security issues) is a mystery.
A quick Google search would have shown Bradt’s editors that Sarah Irving has a very rich history of her own.
In 2002 she visited the Palestinian territories as a member of the International Solidarity Movement. She writes for ‘Electronic Intifada‘ (among others) and also maintains her own fiercely anti-Israel blog. She has co-written a book (promoted by the ISM) about Operation Cast Lead which she describes as “the massive Israeli invasion in December 2008 and January 2009, when 1,400 people were killed, mainly children and other civilians.”
As is well known, Hamas itself has admitted that over half the casualties were members of its own terrorist organization which had fired rockets at Israeli civilians for years before the Israeli military operation.
Currently Irving is writing a biography of the hijacker and terrorist Leila Khaled, also to be published by the same Pluto Press which includes Gilad Atzmon in its stable of reviewers, and runs a blog dedicated to Leila Khaled.
Irving’s ‘understanding’ and ‘expertise’ on the Middle Eastis summed up here in her own wors:
“On a wider political scale, it’s impossible to disconnect the West’s support for Israel and our governments’ apparent blindness to Israeli human rights abuses and also to the massive theft of land for settlements, the discrimination meted out to Palestinians in the Occupied Territories and Palestinian citizens of Israel, from issues like control of the Middle East and its oil, racism and anti-Islamism, and global hatred and hostility which feed religious fundamentalism – Christian and Jewish as well as Islamic.”
Obviously, this article byIrving calls into question the reliability of this particular Bradt travel guide as far as genuine tourists are concerned but it also prompts one to wonder if their previous publications also cater exclusively to the terror-chic market.
That the Guardian’s travel editor apparently saw nothing unprofessional in publishing an article and promoting so blatantly faulted a book by a terrorist-supporting writer indicates that readers need to regard its travel recommendations with considerable caution.
(h/t Infinity)
Before commenting on the latest report by the Guardian’s Chris McGreal, “Israel plans new settlement of 2600 that will isolate Arab East Jerusalem“, an understanding of the designation “Arab East Jerusalem” is in order.
This isn’t, of course, a comprehensive history, but represents important context sorely lacking in the Guardian’s frequent misrepresentations about issues pertaining to Jerusalem.
Around the year 1010 B.C.E., King David made the Jerusalem the administrative capital of Israel and brought the Ark of the Covenant to the city. It is believed that David’s son, Solomon, built the first Jewish Temple as a permanent resting place for the Ark of the Covenant, a place which would become the focus of Jewish veneration from that point to the present.
In 597 B.C.E. the Babylonian army captured Jerusalem, deported thousands of Jews, and razed the city.
In 560 B.C.E., the Persians conquered “Palestine” and told the Jews they could return to their homeland, and rebuild their Temple. The Second Temple was completed in 516 B.C. Over the next 150 years Jews rebuilt Jerusalem and developed the surrounding areas.
In 332 B.C.E., the Greeks, under Alexander the Great, became Palestine’s new ruler.
In 167 B.C.E., Jews rose up and, three years later, Jerusalem was recaptured from the Greeks and the Temple restored, an event that gave birth to the holiday of Chanukah.
After 76 years, the Romans wrested control of Jerusalem and the rest of Judea from the Jews.
Under King Herod, the area of the Temple Mount was doubled and surrounded with four retaining walls, including the area known as the Kotel or Western Wall. In 66 A.D., after a failed Jewish revolt against Roman rule, The Romans laid siege to the city and in the year 70 A.D. destroyed the Second Temple.
After the destruction of the Second Temple, Christianity began to rise, until the Islamic conquest in 633 – the beginning of a 1,300-year span during which more than ten different empires were to rule in the Holy Land prior to the British occupation after World War I.
The Ottoman Turks took control of Jerusalem at the beginning of the sixteenth century.
The Ottoman Turks were defeated in World War I and Palestine was captured by the British, who subsequently were awarded a mandate from the League of Nations to rule the land.
When the United Nations took up the Palestine question in 1947, it recommended that all of Jerusalem be internationalized. The Jewish Agency agreed to accept internationalization, while the Arab states were opposed to the plan, as they were to the rest of the partition plan.
In May 1948, upon Israel’s declaration of Independence, Arab armies invaded the newly created Jewish state and (by the end of the war, per the 1949 armistice lines) Jordan occupied east Jerusalem, dividing the city for the first time in its history, and driving thousands of Jews — whose families had lived in the city for centuries — into exile.
Jewish girl, Rachel Levy, 7, fleeing from street with burning buildings as the Arabs sack Jerusalem after its surrender. May 28, 1948.
For the next 19 years, from 1948-67, the city was split between Israeli and Jordanian control, a period which represents the only time the city has been divided in its history.
This is what is meant by the extremely misleading refrain by Guardian reporters (and others in the MSM) of “Arab East Jerusalem“.
Jews living in the Jordanian controlled section of Jerusalem were expelled and all Jews were denied access to the Western Wall. Jordan also subsequently desecrated Jewish holy place and attempted to erase all traces of Jewish history in the city. Fifty-eight Jerusalem synagogues — some centuries old — were destroyed.
Also, under Jordanian rule, Israeli Christians were subjected to restrictions and many subsequently emigrated from Jerusalem, leading their numbers to dwindle from 25,000 in 1949 to less than 13,000 in June 1967.
Upon the beginning of the Six Day War in June of 1967, Jordanian forces launched multiple attacks on Israel, which included thousands of mortar shells fired at West Jerusalem.
However, Israeli forces fought back and within two days managed to repulse the Jordanian forces and retake eastern Jerusalem.
Within weeks, free movement through Jerusalem became possible. Israeli Muslims were permitted to pray at the Al Aqsa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock for the first time since 1948. And Israeli Christians came to visit the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.
The Knesset passed the Protection of Holy Places Law granting special legal status to the Holy Sites and making it a criminal offence to desecrate or violate them, or to impede freedom of access to them.
Arab residents were given the choice of whether to become Israeli citizens and, while most chose to retain their Jordanian citizenship, all Jerusalem Arabs are permitted to vote in municipal elections.
The Israeli-Palestinian Declaration of Principles (DoP) signed September 13, 1993, left open the status of Jerusalem. Other than an agreement to discuss Jerusalem during final status talks, Israel conceded nothing regarding the status of the city during the interim period.
In both 2000 and 2008, Palestinian negotiators accepted in principle (in the context of final status negotiations) that large Jewish communities beyond the Green Line, such as Gilo, would remain under Israeli control.
Finally, moving to Chris McGreal’s report, he writes, regarding Israeli plans to build new homes in the Givat Hamatos neighborhood of Jerusalem:
”…it would virtually cut off the Arab east of the city from the rest of the occupied West Bank.”
The word “virtually” is an interesting word, meant to obscure the fact that the neighborhood wouldn’t actually cut off the “Arab east of the city”, as this map shows.
More broadly, McGreal spares no effort to characterize the potential construction of new homes in Israel’s capital in the most hyperbolic and hysterical terms, quoting a leftwing city council member thusly:
“The people behind this are pyromaniacs and terrorists because they are lighting fires all over the place that at the end of the day will set up a new wave of terrorist attacks.”
But, as the Jerusalem Post noted about the proposed community.
“The plan for a new neighborhood at Givat Hamatos has been in the works for years. The general construction plan for Givat Hamatos with 2,610 housing units was approved in September. At least some of the housing units will be reserved for an Arab extension of Beit Safafa.
However, the project’s approval in September did not raise any red flags since the land for the project has many different owners, including the Spanish government and the Latin Patriarch, said Margalit. Determining and reorganizing the ownership for building purposes is a complicated legal process called “reparcelization” that can take years, leading activists and politicians to focus their energies elsewhere.”
Moreover, the logic which suggests that Israelis shouldn’t live in the east section of the city represents an acceptance of the logic of the Jordanian expulsion of Jews, and destruction of Jewish life, from 1949-1967 – the only time in history the city was divided by religion.
Equally as important in understanding the issue of Israeli building in Jerusalem, Palestinians in East Jerusalem consistently indicate that, in a final status agreement, they almost universally do not want the city divided.
Jerusalem has been the center of Jewish life for over 3,000 years. Moreover, Jews have constituted the largest single group of inhabitants there since the 1840′s.
As Yaacov Lozowick observed about the possibility of a divided Jerusalem:
Imagine a city with an international border running between buildings on the same block in Jerusalem; to one side a free and rich society, to the other: not. The rich enjoy a world-class health system and social security; the poor lost access upon division. Each side has its own police force, with no love lost between them. Could it ever work? Wouldn’t it generate never-ending tension?
That’s the optimistic scenario, where both states share a cautious wish to live in peace. Now imagine if one or both comes to regret the arrangement, immediately or in 50 years.
Go to the website of the Geneva Accord and its detailed recommendation to divide Jerusalem. Follow the line, imagining it: What do the divided streets look like? Between which buildings will there be a border? What about where the line runs through single structures in the Old City? Ponder the possibility that the gamble fails, and the townspeople on either side of this hellish border decide not to live in peace.
Refusal to divide Jerusalem need not preclude creating a Palestinian state. Jewish settlements throughout the West Bank should be dismantled to enable the Palestinians to have a coherent state. Within Jerusalem’s municipal boundaries, outlying Arab neighborhoods that don’t abut Jewish ones should be transferred to Palestine. Not the Holy Basin, however. Dividing the historic sections of Jerusalem is delusional. It will never bring peace, and it could lead to war.
Of course, such stubborn logic will never penetrate the ideological blinders which continue to skew the Guardian’s view from Jerusalem.
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Guardian defames Israel with wild, unsubstantiated charge on Palestinians disabled by IDF
May 23, 2012 in Comments which are off-topic, ad hominem, racist, vulgar or include threats of violence will be deleted | Tags: anti-Zionism, Comment is Free, Delegitimization, Gaza, Guardian, Hamas, Harriet Sherwood, Jerusalem, Terrorism | by Adam Levick | 17 comments
‘Activist Journalism’ – in the anti-Zionist context – refers to the capacity to frame any event in the Jewish state in a manner consistent with a pre-determined narrative.
So, any isolated case of injustice is reported as evidence of the state’s alleged systemic and institutional racism or oppression, while counter evidence – indicating that the behavior in question may represent the exception and not the rule – is typically ignored.
For instance, the Guardian will report a Palestinian civilian death in Gaza during an IDF anti-terror operation but largely fail to note the context of Hamas terror or the remarkable care Israel takes to avoid non-combatant deaths – including precision bombing of terrorist targets which often results in far better outcomes in comparison to other armies’ military operations around the world.
Of the 100 Gazans killed in IDF anti-terror operations in 2011, 91 were terrorists and 9 were civilians. That is a civilian to combatant death ratio of roughly 1 to 10.
This contrasts quite dramatically with the average civilian to combatant death ratio in recent conflicts involving NATO forces in Iraq and Afghanistan: There, NATO had a 3 to 1 ratio (i.e. there were 3 civilian deaths for every 1 combatant death).
Similarly, Israel has been accused on the pages of the Guardian of making it very difficult for Palestinians in Gaza to receive medical care, often with the particular circumstances of each decision ignored, along with that of the broader context of a state which – though at war against a terror movement which calls for Israel’s destruction – still allows thousands of Palestinians (100,000 in 2011) to receive medical care in its hospitals.
Harriet Sherwood’s latest report is an even more egregious illustration of such journalistic bias. Her report entitled “Palestinian Paralympians visit Jerusalem holy site” of May 21st, (tucked away in the sports section of the Guardian), had it been based on the raw facts, could have fairly advanced the following narrative:
Israel, though in a state of war with a Hamas government which does not recognise its right to exist and launches hundreds of deadly projectiles into its cities each year, still allowed – on humanitarian grounds – disabled Palestinian athletes (who are competing in the Paralympics in London this summer) to visit al-Aqsa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock.
But, we’re talking about Harriet Sherwood, after all, and so Israel was not credited. Instead she wrote:
Unreported by Sherwood is the fact that for years there has been an unofficial boycott of Jerusalem by Arab states to protest Israeli control of the city.
Sherwood continues:
Then Sherwood’s tale devolves even further. She quotes a paralympian, Hatam Zakut, who says:
Adding to Zaku’s vague charge, Sherwood writes:
“Tens of thousands…”?
There is no source provided to back up Sherwood’s outrageous claim, but after doing a bit of research I found an official United Nations report on Operation Cast Lead – the war in Gaza with the most casualties in recent history.
Per the UN report, there were an estimated 600 Palestinians disabled as a result of injuries sustained during Cast Lead.
While no figures seem to be available on the total number of people disabled in Gaza as a result of conflicts with Israel, a report by the Gaza Ministry of Public Works and Housing, in August 2009 (seven months after Cast Lead), placed the total figure of all disabled Palestinians in Gaza – for all reasons – at 19,763.
In fact, the only reference this definitive report makes to Israel is this line on page 2:
So while there are – according to the official agency in Gaza responsible for collating this data – just under twenty thousand disabled Palestinians in total in Gaza, even the Hamas-run ministry does not attempt to quantify the percentage of this total who were disabled due to IDF military actions, let alone make the claim that “tens of thousands” were disabled by Israeli military operations”.
So, where did Harriet Sherwood get this number?
We’ll likely never know.
But this is no minor question.
Harriet Sherwood is the Jerusalem correspondent for one of the more influential liberal English-language broadsheets and what she reports as fact necessarily has an impact on how millions of readers filter the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Most importantly, such reports greatly influence their readers’ degree of moral sympathy towards Jews’ defense of their right to self-determination in a region resistant to this supremely modest aspiration.
The additional moral issue pertains to the very real world impact Sherwood’s reports have on the Arab world – serving to fuel antipathy towards the Jewish state.
Finally, and no less important, Harriet Sherwood is a professional journalist and therefore owes her readers more than hearsay and half-truths.
Even as a blogger – one with unapologetic and transparent pro-Zionist sympathies – I would never make a specific statistical claim without a link leading to a credible source.
It speaks volumes about the Guardian that their reporters are evidently not held accountable to such basic professional standards.
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