Saturday, May 22, 2021

The Anti-Israel Left Supports Ethnic Cleansing in Jerusalem - Daniel Greenfield

 

​ by Daniel Greenfield

What the battle over a few homes in Jerusalem is really about.

 


In 1948, the armies of seven Arab nations invaded Israel. They failed to wipe out the newly reborn nation,  but Jordan occupied part of Jerusalem and ethnically cleansed its Jews.

Among the former Jewish neighborhoods was a small area named Shimon HaTzadik or Simon the Righteous after a high priest who became famous for talking Alexander the Great out of putting up an idol in the Temple. The Arab Muslim colonists who had occupied the area however called it Sheikh Jarrah after an associate of the Iraqi invader Saladin.

Saladin had invaded Israel some 1500 years after Shimon HaTzadik’s death. His associate settled in Jerusalem and died there. A mosque was built over the house of the invader, Jarrah, which later gave its name to the neighborhood when the Husseini family set up shop there in the 19th century. Hitler’s Mufti, Haj Amin al-Husseini, grew up in the first house in the neighborhood.

Seven years after he got a pledge from Hitler to invade and kill all the Jews, the Islamic leader tried to finish the job with the Army of the Sacred Jihad backed by thousands of Muslim Brotherhood Jihadis. Aside from blowing up the newspaper that would later be known as the Jerusalem Post, the Jihadis performed poorly in battle and fell apart when their commander, another Husseini, was killed trying to cut off Israeli supply convoys to the siege of Jerusalem.

The Jordanians desecrated the synagogues of East Jerusalem, used Jewish tombstones to pave roads, and seized Jewish property through their Custodian of Enemy Property.

In 1956, UNRWA worked with the Jordanian occupiers to settle “Palestinian refugees” in this Jewish neighborhood. The UN agency had been entirely dedicated to caring for the Arab Muslim settlers who had failed in their invasion of Israel and was settling them in violation of international law in the homes of the Jewish residents who had fled the illegal occupation.

Once the UNRWA had “resettled” its “refugees” in homes stolen from their Jewish owners through ethnic cleansing, it deemed them to no longer be refugees. The actual refugees however were the Jewish residents who had their homes stolen by the UNRWA.

The only thing more disturbing than a UN agency collaborating in ethnic cleansing was that after Israel liberated and unified Jerusalem, the illegal Arab Muslim occupiers of the homes not only refused to leave, but their right to remain in homes stolen from their Jewish inhabitants was taken up by the UN and the international community. Not to mention a lot of lawyers.

It took the original Jewish owners five years to even win legal rights to the homes in court. But they didn't actually get the property back. In an attempt to avoid just the kind of international incident going on now, the Israeli authorities brokered a deal in which the Muslim squatters would pay rent and accept the legal rights of the Jewish owners of the trusts.

The rent on the homes was a fraction of what they would go for on the open market. But even that money was never actually paid. The next three decades were spent trying to evict the illegal Muslim settlers who wouldn't pay rent or leave.

The recent court decision on evictions, which was used by Hamas and the PLO as a pretext for the war that they had been planning on starting anyway, is the latest in a string of legal decisions over these homes going back 50 years.

These decisions came from independent courts, not the Netanyahu government, in a legal battle that began when he was a college student studying at MIT. There isn’t a single argument for why the Jewish trusts that owned the homes should have lost the right to them when Jordan invaded and seized those homes, or why the UNRWA’s decision to illegally collaborate in ethnic cleansing by settling members of an occupying nation in those homes was legal.

All their arguments come down to shouting, “apartheid” and “ethnic cleansing” when the only time there was apartheid and ethnic cleansing in Jerusalem was under Arab Muslim occupation.

Every anti-Israel radical in public office from Rep. Alexandria Ocasio Cortez to Senator Elizabeth Warren, Senator Bernie Sanders, Rep. Rashida Tlaib, Rep. Ilhan Omar, and the rest of the gang have denounced evictions from ‘Sheikh Jarrah’.

"We stand in solidarity with the Palestinian residents of Sheikh Jarrah in East Jerusalem. Israeli forces are forcing families from their homes," Rep. Alexandria Ocasio Cortez tweeted.

"The evictions of Palestinian families must not go forward,” Bernie Sanders ranted.

“The Administration should make clear to the Israeli government that these evictions are illegal and must stop immediately,” Senator Elizabeth Warren declared. Despite being a lawyer, she declined to identify how the Israeli court ruling was "illegal".

The Biden administration also got into the act.

“We are deeply concerned about the potential eviction of Palestinian families in the Silwan neighborhood and in Sheikh Jarrah, many of whom have lived in their homes for generations," State Department spokeswoman Jalina Porter, a former cheerleader who had falsely accused America of genocide, claimed.

The only way to argue that the homes were “theirs” is by recognizing the legitimacy of occupation and ethnic cleansing, at least when it’s practiced by Muslim invading armies.

The moral principle for which AOC, Sanders, Warren, and the State Department are fighting is that when Arab Muslims drive out the Jews and seize their homes, it’s their property now.

The entire legal basis for the court case by the squatters is their claim that the property had been given to them by Jordan’s Custodian of Enemy Property office. This claim has standing in Israeli courts which chose to wrongly recognize those seizures. And so the court cases have revolved around whether the squatters could ever prove that an illegal occupying power had transferred title to them during its ethnic cleansing campaign. The squatters couldn’t even meet this low bar because they were never given title to the homes, but the vicissitudes of local real estate law aside, there’s still the invasion, the illegal occupation and the ethnic cleansing.

When AOC, Warren, Sanders, Tlaib, Omar, the UN, and the Biden administration treat the occupiers of Sheikh Jarrah as the rightful owners, they’re defending ethnic cleansing.

And it should be called what it is.

The fundamental issue at stake in Shimon HaTzadik and Sheikh Jarrah are crystal clear. Unlike some parts of Israel where territory changed hands in more complex ways, we know exactly what happened and why it happened. And those simple facts tell a story of the UNRWA’s complicity in the ethnic cleansing of Jews, not just today when it serves as a storehouse for Hamas missiles and an employment agency for Hamas propagandists, but back in the 50s.

Jews were ethnically cleansed from Jerusalem after an invasion and occupation. The United Nations, through UNRWA, violated international law by taking part in population transfer by an occupying power which had expelled the indigenous population. This is the charge that the UN and the anti-Israel politicians and media have repeatedly lobbed at Israel.

And they’re the ones guilty of it.

Their Sheikh Jarrah argument is that ethnic cleansing and occupation are moral and legal when Arab Muslim armies do it. It’s that Arab Muslim squatters who moved into Jewish homes in 1956 had gained an immutable moral right to live in them by 1967 that outweighed those of the Jewish trusts which had owned them since the 19th century.

There’s no better way to show the hypocritical double standards of an anti-Israel movement that cries about occupation, ethnic cleansing, and apartheid while practicing those very things.

AOC, Sanders, Warren, the UN, the Quarter, the EU, and the Biden administration are demanding that the Arab Muslim occupation of Jerusalem continue. They are ordering a free country to overturn the legal ruling of a court in case that goes back to the 1970s because they believe that Arab Muslim occupiers have a right to live in Jerusalem… and Jews don’t.

That’s what this was about in 1948. That’s still what it’s about in 2021.

The occupiers cry about the “occupation” and the ethnic cleansers cry about “ethnic cleansing” as they fight to bring back the state of apartheid that drove the Jews out of Jerusalem.

 

Daniel Greenfield, a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the Freedom Center, is an investigative journalist and writer focusing on the radical Left and Islamic terrorism.

Source: https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2021/05/un-stole-jewish-homes-jerusalem-daniel-greenfield/

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It looks as if China did create and unleash COVID on the world - Andrea Widburg

 

​ by Andrea Widburg

Tucker Carlson puts all the pieces together in a report that essentially accuses China of biological warfare.

From the beginning of COVID's outbreak in China, there's been a steady drumbeat of information saying the Chinese created COVID in a lab and, accidentally or on purpose, unleashed it on the world.  The World Health Organization, the Democrats, the Deep State, and the tech tyrants managed to suppress that information in 2020, but it's roared back this year.  Tucker Carlson put the pieces together in his opening monologue and, with help from Chinese scientist Li-Meng Yan, makes it plain that, even if China didn't deliberately release the virus, it turned it into a weapon of biological warfare by withholding information about it.

Here's Tucker's monologue.  I'll have a few words to say after you've had a chance to watch it:

 

(If you can't watch the video through the above link, you can see it here.)

1. The video above does not include Tucker's most recent interview with Dr. Yan.  She again makes it clear that China created this virus in the lab.  Then she says something ominous: that the virus, because it's been weaponized, almost certainly has dangerous effects on humans that go beyond the obvious first phase sickness.

2. To the extent that Dr. Fauci used taxpayer money to illegally fund gain of function research in China, allowing the Chinese communist party and its military to weaponize viruses, including COVID, firing is not good enough.  He needs to be criminally charged for what he's done.

3. Again, if China deliberately released COVID, that's a clear act of biological warfare.  However, even if China's deplorably sloppy habits resulted in the virus being only accidentally released, China became culpable when it (a) failed to take timely steps to quarantine the virus within its own borders by stopping, rather than encouraging, foreign travel and (b) failed to give the world information it possessed about the virus.  Again, this is an act of war.

4. Currently, while Joe Biden likes to talk a little bit tough about China, his actions have been anything but tough.  One of Biden's first acts was to suspend Trump's Executive Order 13920, which stopped anything that might allow a foreign adversary (e.g., China) from getting near America's electric grid.  And while Biden is holding surprisingly strong on trade, he just allowed his government to end Trump's ban on U.S. investment in Chinese technology.  Biden even banned federal workers from saying "China virus."  It's also clear that secretary of state Blinken is out of his league in dealing with the Chinese.

However, even Biden must be brought to see that, if China really did commit an act of biological warfare against the world, a few little sanctions here and there are inadequate to the offense.  To date, rough estimates are the COVID has killed between 3.5 and 8 million people worldwide, and, as India shows, the virus is still claiming new victims.  This cannot go unpunished.  China needs to be completely isolated from the world in terms of trade, travel, and the flow of money and goods.

5. Just as a reminder, a top Chinese academic has already admitted that this was biological warfare, and he claimed victory for China.  As Tucker Carlson's analysis shows, this is not mere puffery.  One way or another, China fought a successful war and watched the world race to defeat itself.

Image: Tucker Carlson looks at COVID's origins.  Fox News.

 

Andrea Widburg

Source: https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2021/05/it_looks_as_if_china_did_create_and_unleash_covid_on_the_world.html

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Biden's Worst Move Yet: Giving U.S. Vaccine Tech to China - Gordon G. Chang

 

​ by Gordon G. Chang

Why should the United States support China's biological weapons program to enable another deadly attack? That is exactly what Biden is doing with his proposed TRIPs waiver.

  • A TRIPs waiver will not only impede vaccine production at this moment, it will also cause long-term harm. There are two principal concerns in this regard. First, a waiver for COVID-19 vaccines will obviously decrease the incentive for companies to make vaccines for the next disease. "The recent rhetoric will not discourage us from continuing investing in science," wrote Bourla, the Pfizer chief. "But I am not sure if the same is true for the thousands of small biotech innovators that are totally dependent on accessing capital from investors who invest only on the premise that their intellectual property will be protected."

  • Second, a TRIPs waiver will eliminate the most important of the barriers to China making sophisticated vaccines: patent protection. Reuters reports that the Biden administration does not want a waiver to aid the Chinese pharmaceutical industry and believes it can address this issue "through the WTO negotiations," but unfortunately it "did not specify how."

  • Of course, the Biden administration cannot stop Chinese companies once patent protection is waived. Furthermore, Beijing is not going to adhere to the terms of the waiver. As Reuters tells us, "Enforcing limits on use of the technology could be very difficult."

  • Chinese ruler Xi Jinping a year ago said China's vaccines would be made available as a "global public good," but Beijing has not offered them as such. Instead, China has offered its vaccines to other countries on extraneous and harsh conditions, such as de-recognition of Taiwan or the purchase of 5G networking gear from Huawei Technologies.

  • So why should the United States support China's biological weapons program to enable another deadly attack? That is exactly what Biden is doing with his proposed TRIPs waiver.

President Joe Biden is moving to surrender to China U.S. patent and trade secret protections on America's COVID-19 vaccines. Why should the United States support China's biological weapons program to enable another deadly attack? That is exactly what Biden is doing with his proposed TRIPs waiver. (Photo by Justin Tallis/AFP via Getty Images)

President Joe Biden is moving to surrender to China U.S. patent and trade secret protections on America's COVID-19 vaccines. Two of those vaccines, made by American-based Pfizer and Moderna, employ revolutionary mRNA technology.

Specifically, the Biden administration has agreed to support a request by India and South Africa for waivers that would permit members of the World Trade Organization to not enforce laws protecting patents and trade secrets covered under the Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights Agreement (TRIPs).

"This is a global health crisis, and the extraordinary circumstances of the COVID-19 pandemic call for extraordinary measures," declared U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai in a May 5 statement. "The Administration believes strongly in intellectual property protections, but in service of ending this pandemic, supports the waiver of those protections for COVID-19 vaccines."

Yes, extraordinary circumstances call for extraordinary measures, but not extraordinarily ineffective and counterproductive ones. The proposed TRIPs waiver, as it is called, is both.

Proponents of the waiver, who sometimes speak of "vaccine apartheid," argue that intellectual property rules prevent the making of desperately needed vaccines.

Such arguments appear correct on their face but in fact are not. As Albert Bourla, Pfizer CEO, explained on May 7 in a LinkedIn post, the "bottleneck" for more vaccines is the "scarcity of highly specialized raw materials needed to produce our vaccine."

A TRIPs waiver will not increase the supply of those materials — Pfizer's vaccine requires 280 materials or components from 19 countries — but it will increase the number of companies that enter the vaccine business. Therefore, the waiver will, as Bourla noted, "unleash a scramble for the critical inputs we require in order to make a safe and effective vaccine." He also issued this warning: "Entities with little or no experience in manufacturing vaccines are likely to chase the very raw materials we require to scale our production, putting the safety and security of all at risk."

There is another issue. Countries will need more than manufacturing facilities, patent waivers, and raw materials to make vaccines. They will need Pfizer's and Moderna's trade secrets, like the so-called "cookbooks." Unless the Biden administration plans to expropriate trade secrets — it is unlikely to do so — most developing world manufacturers will require months and perhaps years to obtain the know-how to actually make mRNA vaccines.

As Senator Ben Sasse, the Nebraska Republican, wrote in a May 17 Wall Street Journal op-ed, "The developing world lacks vaccine manufacturing, storage, and distribution capacities—and none of these problems are solved by an IP giveaway." Sean Lin, a microbiologist and a former lab director of the viral disease branch of the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research, told Gatestone that the proposed TRIPs waiver "is a nice political gesture."

A TRIPs waiver will not only impede vaccine production at this moment, it will also cause long-term harm. There are two principal concerns in this regard. First, a waiver for COVID-19 vaccines will obviously decrease the incentive for companies to make vaccines for the next disease. "The recent rhetoric will not discourage us from continuing investing in science," wrote Bourla, the Pfizer chief. "But I am not sure if the same is true for the thousands of small biotech innovators that are totally dependent on accessing capital from investors who invest only on the premise that their intellectual property will be protected."

Second, a TRIPs waiver will eliminate the most important of the barriers to China making sophisticated vaccines: patent protection. Reuters reports that the Biden administration does not want a waiver to aid the Chinese pharmaceutical industry and believes it can address this issue "through the WTO negotiations," but unfortunately it "did not specify how."

Of course, the Biden administration cannot stop Chinese companies once patent protection is waived. Furthermore, Beijing is not going to adhere to the terms of the waiver. As Reuters tells us, "Enforcing limits on use of the technology could be very difficult."

"Very difficult"? Make that "impossible."

So the waiver, which will impede the delivery of COVID-19 vaccines, will also help Beijing develop China's biotech business, one of the ten sectors originally listed in its WTO-noncompliant Made in China 2025 initiative.

At the moment, China has failed miserably when it comes to COVID-19 vaccines. Chinese enterprises have developed five such jabs, but, despite months of head start on the rest of the world, they are barely effective. None of China's vaccines has been proven safe. Beijing has refused to hand over Phase III trial data.

China will be the primary beneficiary of any waiver. As Sean Lin points out, "China does not have any prior experience on industrial-scale production of mRNA vaccines" and a waiver, he says, will encourage more Chinese biotech and pharmaceutical companies to jump into the sector. After all, these enterprises will get years of research and development for free if Biden gets his way.

Chinese ruler Xi Jinping a year ago said China's vaccines would be made available as a "global public good," but Beijing has not made good on this promise.. Instead, China has offered its vaccines to other countries on extraneous and harsh conditions, such as de-recognition of Taiwan or the purchase of 5G networking gear from Huawei Technologies.

Moreover, if the Chinese are able to develop a vaccine industry, they will be more likely to create another disease and spread it, as they maliciously spread SARS-CoV-2, the pathogen causing COVID-19, beyond their borders.

The country almost certainly has a bio-weapons program in contravention of its obligations under the Biological Weapons Convention of 1972. The Communist Party also has a doctrine of "Unrestricted Warfare," and a 2015 book by Chinese military scientists suggests "unrestricted" means exactly that. "The core weapon for victory in World War III will be bioweapons," the authors brag.

So why should the United States support China's biological weapons program to enable another deadly attack? That is exactly what Biden is doing with his proposed TRIPs waiver.

 

Gordon G. Chang is the author of The Coming Collapse of China, a Gatestone Institute distinguished senior fellow, and a member of its Advisory Board.

Source: https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/17393/biden-giving-china-vaccine-tech

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Why Does The Left Seemingly Hate Israel? - Victor Davis Hanson

 

​ by Victor Davis Hanson

Hat tip: Dr. Jean-charles Bensoussan 

With more than 3,000 rockets having been fired into Israel by Hamas recently, the Democratic Party seems paralyzed over how to respond to the latest Middle East war.

It’s not just that they fear that “The Squad,” Black Lives Matter, the shock troops of Antifa, and woke institutions such as academia and the media are now unapologetically anti-Israel.

They are also terrified that anti-Israelism is becoming synonymous with rank anti-Semitism.

And soon, the Democratic Party will end up as disdained as the British Labour Party under Jeremy Corbyn.

The new core of the Democrats, as emblemized by Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, and Rashida Tlaib of Michigan, has in the past questioned the patriotism of American Jews who support Israel, and occasionally has had to apologize for puerile anti-Semitic rants.

The left in general believes we should judge harshly even the distant past without exemptions. Why then, in venomous, knee-jerk fashion, does it fixate on a nation born from the Holocaust while favoring Israel’s enemies, who were on the side of the Nazis in World War II?

It wasn’t just that the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Amin al-Husseini, was a Nazi sympathizer. Egypt, for example, welcomed ex-Nazis for their hatred of Jews and their military expertise, including infamous death camp doctor Aribert Ferdinand Heim and Waffen-SS henchman Otto Skorzeny. The Hamas charter still reads like it is cribbed from Hitler’s “Mein Kampf.”

The left claims it champions consensual government and believes the United States must use its soft-power clout to isolate autocracies. But the Palestinian Authority and Hamas refuse to hold free and regularly scheduled elections. If an Israeli strongman ever suspended free elections and ruled through brutality, U.S. aid would be severed within days.

If history and democratic values can’t fully explain the apparent hatred of Israel on the left, perhaps human rights violations do. But here, too, there is another example of radical asymmetry. Arab citizens of Israel enjoy far greater constitutional protections than do Arabs living under either the Palestinian Authority or Hamas.

Is the left bothered by the allies of Hamas? After all, most are autocracies such as Iran and North Korea.

We return, then, to other reasons for the woke contempt directed toward Israel.

In part, the Western left always despises the unapologetically successful—as if they are inevitably beneficiaries of unfair privilege. Underdog Israel was not so hated from 1947 to 1967. Then, it was poorer, more socialist, and in danger of being extinguished by its many neighboring enemies.

But after the victories in the 1967 and 1973 wars, the Israeli military proved unconquerable in the region, no matter how large the numbers, wealth, and armaments of its many enemies.

For the left, Israel’s current strength, confidence, and success mean it cannot be seen as a victim, but only as a victimizer. As its Iron Dome missile defenses knock down the flurry of Hamas rockets, and as its planes take out the military installations that launched those rockets, the left bizarrely believes Israel wins too easily and acts “disproportionately.”

The left also has a strange idea of current “imperialism” and “colonialism.” The general rule is that Westerners cannot settle in numbers in the non-West. But the reversal is certainly not true. Millions of Middle Easterners are welcomed into Belgium, France, Germany, the UK, and the United States. Yet, Jews have been in what is now Israel since nearly the dawn of civilization. And their 1947 borders only grew after they were attacked and threatened with extinction.

The left claims that its anti-Israelism has had nothing to do with anti-Semitism. But it is almost impossible now to make that distinction, when woke criticism obsesses over democratic Israel and ignores far greater oppressors and oppressed elsewhere.

Why are there no demonstrations in major Western cities damning the Chinese government for putting 1 million Muslim Uyghurs in camps? Why are the world’s millions of former refugees—the Volga Germans, the East Prussians, the Cypriot Greeks—long forgotten, and yet the Palestinians alone are deified for being perpetually displaced?

Our formal NATO ally, Turkey, received little global pushback for its treatment of the Kurds, or its frequent intolerance of religious minorities. Why does Israel alone always earn such venom?

Hating democratic Israel while it’s under attack is not just a reflection of the new woke and ethically bankrupt left. It is also a symptom of a deeper pathology in the West, one of moral equivalence, amoral relativism, and self-loathing.

[ZH: Victor Davis Hanson's perspective is noteworthy given the fact  that today saw Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) introduce a resolution opposing the U.S. sale of $735 million in precision-guided weapons to the Israeli government, the Washington Post reports.]

“At a moment when U.S.-made bombs are devastating Gaza, and killing women and children, we cannot simply let another huge arms sale go through without even a congressional debate," Sanders told the Post in a statement.

"I believe that the United States must help lead the way to a peaceful and prosperous future for both Israelis and Palestinians. We need to take a hard look at whether the sale of these weapons is actually helping do that, or whether it is simply fueling conflict.”

Last week, before this bill, controversial lawyer Alan Dershowitz called Senator Bernie Sanders an "anti-Semite" and a "self-hating Jew" following an op-ed in the NYTimes titled, "The U.S. Must Stop Being an Apologist for the Netanyahu Government."

"But look what the internet allows us," Dershowitz continued. "...you get the social media, supporting Hamas, The New York Times supporting Hamas, and it sends a very powerful message: do it again, kill children...kill civilians...commit war crimes, you'll prevail on this because of the anti-Semitism...you can be a Jew and an anti-Semite. Biden has made some statements positively I commend them for that. But Bernie Sanders—who's Jewish—is a self-hating Jew, a self-hating Jew who is willing to see Israel be defeated militarily by a terrorist group because he's on the hard left."

[ZH: Which brings up one question we have seen raised numerous times in comments here and elsewhere online is various derivatives of "why do American jews democrat?"]

The best - and least politically incorrect - explanation we have seen came from a Twitter thread by John Hayward:

American Jews who vote Democrat should look at Dems rooting for Hamas and understand: this is all Critical Race Theory for them. It's the brain rot that has utterly consumed their collective hive-mind. Oppressed brown people vs. evil rich white oppressors. 

Jews are evil rich white oppressors to the left-wing hive mind - and yes, that includes American Jews who currently vote for them. They will grudgingly give you a limited parole from Critical Race Theory as long as they need your money and votes, and you pay tribute to CRT. 

It should be more clear than ever, after the events in Israel and Gaza, that Jews are White Oppressors to the CRT hive mind. You'll NEVER be People of Color. You'll never sit atop the intersectional totem pole. You're like Woke CEOs, receiving indulgences because you pay tribute. 

The cost of that tribute will increase until you can't pay it any more, the same way left-wing Israelis ought to have learned the "peace" they bought with concessions and giveaways was like a bubble mortgage. Now they have rockets flying at them from the land they gave away. 

It will be the same way in America, as prosperity collapses and desperate left-wing groups scrabble for money and power. One day Jews will refuse to pay the tribute demanded by the Left, and you'll snap back into the Evil White Oppressor slot reserved for you by CRT. 

It already happens in Democrat cities during times of "civil unrest." Soon all times will be times of civil unrest, and all American Jews will find themselves playing the Knockout Game with Critical Race Theorists. They're telling you something by rooting for Hamas. Listen.

[ZH: Sadly the hate from the Middle East has already spread to both coasts of the US]

Authorities are investigating whether an attack on diners that occurred outside a Beverly Grove restaurant late Tuesday night was a Jewish hate crime.

[ZH: Former NYTimes writer Bari Weiss attempts to explain the anti-semitism of newly progressive leftists]

   

As Victor Davis Hanson concludes, hating Israel has become the surrogate Western way of hating oneself.

 

Victor Davis Hanson

Source: https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/victor-davis-hanson-why-does-left-seemingly-hate-israel

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Biden is planning to throw money at Gaza - Andrea Widburg

 

​ by Andrea Widburg

A genocidal people get rewarded with free money after firing 4,000 rockets on Israel.

The 1959 movie The Mouse That Roared has as its premise a poor, backward nation declaring war on America because it hoped to benefit from American beneficence once it inevitably lost that war.  They end up profiting mightily from this scam.  The residents of Gaza are doing their own version of roaring.  Joe Biden, having decided that the Gazans lost the war they started (although they claim victory), is ready to shower them with money.

At this point, it's impossible to tell if Biden is malevolently anti-Semitic or completely moronic:

President Biden promised to help Palestinians who lost their homes during 11 days of Israeli strikes on Gaza as he offered prayers Friday for a ceasefire to hold.

During a press conference to mark the visit of South Korean President Moon Jae-in, he insisted he remained committed to Israeli security.

But he struck a careful balance between both sides as he announced plans to help Palestinians in Gaza rebuild their lives so long as Hamas militants, who rained rockets on Israel, were not able to rebuild their armaments.

'I am prepared to put together, and am going to attempt to put together, a major package with other nations who share our view to rebuild the homes and — without providing Hamas the ability to rebuild their weapons systems — rebuild Gaza,' he said.

'They need help and I'm committed to get that done.'

Did you catch that bit where he said that he would get the residents — who elected Hamas — their money "without providing Hamas the ability to rebuild their weapons systems"?  This is the same American government that, as part of last year's Paycheck Protection Program to provide loans for small businesses harmed by the lockdowns, handed out $7 million to fake businesses just in New Jersey.  The Secret Service has already recovered $2 billion in fraudulently obtained COVID relief funds.  Given the $780 billion the fund handed out, it's easy to believe there will be billions more in fraud discovered over time.

The likelihood that the Biden administration will be able to keep the money out of the hands of Hamas, an organization like the Mafia but with more genocidal aspirations, is ludicrous.

Additionally, this was not the kind of war that should result in the aggressors receiving any funds.  To appreciate that, you must understand history, something it's doubtful Biden ever did and it's certain he doesn't now.

After World War I, the victorious French and British demanded reparations from Germany.  Having to pay those reparations, combined with over a decade of collapsing government and multiple mini-revolutions, paved the way for Hitler.  He was able to convince the impoverished Germans that (a) he would bring stability and wealth and (b) that it was all the Jews' fault.

After World War II, America was the last great nation standing, and it was determined not to allow Germany and Japan — both of which had been flattened — to again cultivate their deadly Bushido and Nazi ideologies.  Therefore, it remained in both countries and, while it generously doled out money, it also forced both countries to abandon their murderous ways and become peaceful, functional democracies.

That is not the case here.  Israel did not completely flatten Gaza, although it could have had it wished to do so.  Instead, as usual, it engaged in surgical strikes intended to kill some of Hamas's leadership, infrastructure, and fighters.  Now that there's a tentative ceasefire, Hamas is claiming victory.

So, right off the bat, the situation is entirely different from that in 1945, when the United States was the only victor that wasn't trying for a communist takeover.  Germany and Japan were in ruins.

This is Tokyo:


Public Domain.

This is Hiroshima:


National archives. 

This is Berlin:


From a Flickr album.

This is Dresden:

By contrast, given Israel's carefully targeted attacks, most of Gaza is still standing.  If there is squalor, it's because of the poverty Hamas imposes on its citizens by diverting all of the funds to building tunnels and maintaining a terrorist infrastructure.

So, 1945: Aggressor nations completely destroyed; America the last major power; and America moves into those countries for the next 76 years to keep them out of trouble.

And now, in 2021: Aggressor nation somewhat damaged but claiming victory; America not even part of the fight; and America is going to send in money with no demands whatsoever on the people to straighten up and fly right, while at the same time making the ludicrous promise to keep the money away from the Gaza Mafia when it can't even keep money away from American fraudsters.

In other words, Biden is rewarding aggression.  And why shouldn't he?  Democrats are rewarding bad behavior all over the place:

They are rewarding people who illegally invade America, they're rewarding criminals by defunding the police and removing consequences, they're rewarding mentally ill men who are taking over women's sports and locker rooms, they're rewarding blue states that willfully destroyed their own economies, they're specifically rewarding BLM and Antifa by dismissing all charges despite the destruction they wreaked in 2020 — so honestly, why should we be surprised that Biden now wants to reward Hamas's hate-filled fanatics?

Unlike The Mouse That Roared, this is not a silly comedy.  Thanks to Biden, America is about to become complicit in evil.

 

Andrea Widburg

Source: https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2021/05/biden_is_planning_to_throw_money_at_gaza.html

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Is the Biden Administration an Enemy of Israel and the Free World? - Guy Millière

 

​ by Guy Millière

Most unsettling of all, while Iran's proxy, Hamas, was raining nearly 4,000 rockets and missiles into a country the size of New Jersey, the US was engaged in talks in Vienna to discuss how much money the US was prepared to give Iran – to buy more weapons to batter Israel again?

  • Biden made no distinction between a democratic ally of the United States and a terrorist organization he did not even name. He spoke as if he did not know that the calm was broken by a terrorist organization and by no one else, and that what prevents Palestinians from having freedom, prosperity and democracy is precisely that they are ruled by terrorists and people who supports terrorism.

  • On April 7, a US Department of State press statement said that the Biden administration had decided to restore US financial "aid to Palestinians", without requiring that American money not be used for terrorist purposes....

  • The appointment to the post of Deputy Assistant Secretary for Israeli-Palestinian Affairs of Hady Amr, a man who has accused Israel of "ethnic cleansing" and "apartheid", and said that he was "inspired by intifada", seemed to confirm that the Biden administration would not be particularly "pro-Israel".... Amr met Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Muhammad Ishtayya in Ramallah to negotiate the use of US financial aid to the PA while Israel was under missile fire....

  • In a PBS interview on April 2, one of the American negotiators, Robert Malley, announced that he wants "to remove those sanctions that are inconsistent with the deal", "so that Iran enjoys the benefits that it was supposed to enjoy". Nothing shows that the Biden administration has changed that position.

  • There were no threats to stop the new funding he had promised the Palestinians until they stopped firing rockets. He did not threaten to withdraw his promise of an office in Washington DC for them.

  • Most unsettling of all, while Iran's proxy, Hamas, was raining nearly 4,000 rockets and missiles into a country the size of New Jersey, the US was engaged in talks in Vienna to discuss how much money the US was prepared to give Iran – to buy more weapons to batter Israel again?

  • Seemingly to destabilize Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the US administration made public a report accusing the him of being responsible for the murder of the anti-Saudi writer, Jamal Khashoggi, without specifying that Khashoggi was an agent of the Muslim Brotherhood, an arch-enemy of the House of Saud.

  • A recent article by Michael Doran and Tony Badran on Tablet explains why Israel needs to stay on guard and be ready to act decisively. A project designed during the Obama presidency and aiming to "create a new Middle Eastern order" seems to be underway. It would place the interests of Iran over those of US allies in the Middle East, thereby leading to the hegemony in the region of Iran. The project would erode new the Abraham Accords, push Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates to come to an agreement with Iran and involve "forcing Israel into a more passive posture in the face of Iran's rising power". Is this project that the Biden administration is now implementing?

  • "[I]n war and conflict, one side wins and one side loses.... Israel must do what all nations... are doing to achieve victory: beating its enemy...." — Daniel Pipes, historian, Commentary, January 2017.

  • The Biden administration acts as if it does not see that it puts Israel and other longtime American allies in danger; it acts as if it does not see that behind Iran and the mullahs, China is on the move.

  • Is the Biden administration about to seriously diminish the status of the United States and the Free World to herald in a new world order that is radical and monstrous?

The Biden administration acts as if it does not see that it puts Israel and other longtime American allies in danger; it acts as if it does not see that behind Iran and the mullahs, China is on the move. President Biden made no distinction between a democratic ally of the United States and a terrorist organization he did not even name. Pictured: President Biden delivers remarks on the Middle East, at the White House on May 20, 2021 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

May 10, 6.07 pm. Six missiles fired by Iran's proxy militia, Hamas from the Gaza Strip fly into Israel and quickly become more numerous. Most were destroyed by the Iron Dome, but not all. Within a week more than 3,000 missiles had been fired by Hamas. Some caused deaths, injuries and destruction. Hamas's goal was to exhaust the capabilities of the Iron Dome and cause as many civilian casualties as possible. To that end, it targeted Tel Aviv at night when people are asleep. Without the Iron Dome, there would have been thousands of deaths. Hamas has committed war crimes and crimes against humanity.

Hamas's attacks were preceded by unrest in Jerusalem and assaults on Jews. An Israeli court decision to evict Arabs who did not pay the rent and squatted in homes belonging to Jewish families in Jerusalem, was used as a pretext for riots. Violent incidents also took place on the Temple Mount, where Arab rioters shouted Islamist slogans calling for the death of Israel and bombing Tel Aviv.

As Hamas launched its missiles, Israeli Arabs in mixed Jewish-Arab cities such as Lod, Jaffa, Acre, Ramle and Nazareth assaulted their Jewish neighbors, torched Jewish synagogues, homes, cars and businesses, and flew Palestinian Authority and Hamas flags.

The Israeli Defense Forces (IDF), in airstrikes in Gaza, destroyed countless missile launchpads, underground tunnel systems Hamas built to house its arsenals and protect its terrorists, and buildings that housed Hamas headquarters, offices, media outlets, cyber-warfare units and intelligence units. The IDF strikes also killed several senior Hamas leaders and the head of Palestinian Islamic Jihad, the other Islamic terrorist organization participating in the attacks from Gaza.

On May 11, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that those who attacked Israel would pay "a very heavy price". On May 14, he added that Israel now needed to fight on two fronts: Gaza and Israel. He promised to defeat Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and to "restore law and order to the cities of Israel".

Israel, attacked by Hamas in the past, in 2014 also had to intervene in Gaza, which Israel had totally evacuated in 2005 to give the Palestinians living there the opportunity of turning it into the "Singapore of the Middle East."

Arab Israelis have participated in riots before; some Israeli Arabs have even carried out terrorist attacks.

US Senator Marsha Blackburn tweeted on May 11,: "The conflict in Israel would not be happening if President Trump were in office". While it is impossible to know what would have happened if Trump were still president, it must be noted that sudden changes have taken place in American policy towards Israel, the Middle East, Russia, and China since President Joe Biden entered the White House.

The Biden administration has constantly shown its desire to return to the disastrous 2015 Iran nuclear deal, which permits Iran to keep enriching uranium and have all the nuclear weapons it wants just a few years from now. The Biden administration also apparently is eager to lift US sanctions against Iran, thereby enriching it to arm once again not only Hamas, but also other Iranian proxies in the region, such as Hezbollah, which now runs Lebanon; the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and the Houthis in Yemen. The Biden administration, however, never speaks of Iran's support for Islamic terrorist groups, or of the regime's obsessive will to destroy Israel.

The Biden administration has radically broken with the policies of the administration that preceded it: President Trump decided to walk away from Iran's nuclear deal precisely because the mullahs' regime was funding Islamic terrorism and constantly threatening Israel the United States, as well as Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Syria, Libya and Iraq. Iranian leaders appear see the Biden administration in a position of weakness and ready to turn a blind eye to even Iran's most hideous atrocities, either inside the country or outside it.

That the Biden administration chose Robert Malley, the lead negotiator for the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, to conduct negotiations again, makes the Iranian leadership even more intrigued by the Biden administration's weakness. Negotiations are currently underway in Vienna, Austria. The Iranians have refused to meet with the American delegation. The Iranian delegation has told Mikhail Ulyanov, Permanent Representative of Russia to International Organizations, that they were "still not ready" to meet Americans.

It seems Iran's leaders thought that they could supply Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad with sophisticated missiles without risking an American reaction -- and they did. The Biden administration did not react. In a PBS interview on April 2, one of the American negotiators, Robert Malley, announced that he wants "to remove those sanctions that are inconsistent with the deal", "so that Iran enjoys the benefits that it was supposed to enjoy". Nothing shows that the Biden administration has changed that position.

On January 26, less than a week after Biden's inauguration, his administration stated that it would work toward "a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict", and "restore relations with the Palestinians' leadership". It did not demand that the Palestinian Authority break its incitement to violence or support for terrorism. That policy, too, was a clear departure from that of the Trump administration, which decided to close PLO mission in Washington and said the United States would not have any relations with the Palestinian Authority until the PA completely broke with terrorism.

On April 7, a US Department of State press statement said that the Biden administration had decided to restore US financial "aid to Palestinians", without requiring that American money not be used for terrorist purposes -- also a clear departure from the policy of the Trump administration. In addition, President Biden waited for a month before calling Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu, a delay widely interpreted as a sign that the new administration wanted to distance itself from Israel. The appointment to the post of Deputy Assistant Secretary for Israeli-Palestinian Affairs of Hady Amr, a man who has accused Israel of "ethnic cleansing" and "apartheid", and said that he was "inspired by intifada", seemed to confirm that the Biden administration would not be particularly "pro-Israel".

Week after week during April and the first week of May, as Hamas speeches in the Gaza Strip grew more virulent, the Palestinian Authority leaders in the West Bank also made virulent speeches and did not seem nervous about drawing negative American remarks.

On April 29, PA President Mahmoud Abbas, now in the sixteenth year of his four-year term of office, postponed Palestinian parliamentary elections that had been scheduled for May, most probably out of fear of a Hamas victory. Hamas leaders apparently thought even then that they could launch an attack on Israel: they had weapons, Iranian support, and assumed that the United States would barely react. They were not wrong.

"Israel," President Biden said on May 13, "has the right to defend itself when you have thousands of rockets flying into your territory". He did not explicitly condemn the Hamas attack or even say that Hamas committed war crimes.

"Palestinians and Israelis" Biden remarked on May 16, "equally deserve to live in safety and security and enjoy equal measures of freedom, prosperity and democracy, and my administration will continue to engage Palestinians and Israeli and other regional partners towards sustained calm".

Biden thus placed Israel and the "Palestinians" on an equal footing. He made no distinction between a democratic ally of the United States and a terrorist organization he did not even name. He spoke as if he did not know that the calm was broken by a terrorist organization and by no one else, and that what prevents Palestinians from having freedom, prosperity and democracy is precisely that they are ruled by terrorists and people who supports terrorism.

Israeli commentators seem to think that the harsh rhetoric used by Hamas and the Palestinian Authority leaders -- combined with the view that Israel no longer had strong American support -- had led some Israeli Arabs to openly show their hatred for Israel and the Jews.

The Israeli government cannot afford to criticize President Biden, but they can clearly see that he does not show unambiguous support for Israel. There were no threats to stop the new funding he had promised the Palestinians until they stopped firing rockets. He did not threaten to withdraw his promise of an office in Washington DC for them. Most unsettling of all, while Iran's proxy, Hamas, was raining nearly 4,000 rockets and missiles into a country the size of New Jersey, the US was engaged in talks in Vienna to discuss how much money the US was prepared to give Iran – to buy more weapons to batter Israel again?

In addition, the Israeli government could see that the Biden administration's Deputy Assistant Secretary for Israeli and Palestinian Affairs in the US State Department, Hady Amr, met Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Muhammad Ishtayya in Ramallah to negotiate the use of US financial aid to the PA while Israel was under missile fire, and that Ishtayya had said that Israel was carrying out "aggression in the Gaza Strip" and practicing an "ethnic cleansing policy" in the presence of Hady Amr, who remained silent.

The Biden administration still appears to want to lift sanctions on Iran's regime, even though it is weapons designed or financed by Iran that are being used against Israel, while Iranian leaders praise Hamas for having launched an attack on Israel.

The Biden administration recently removed yet another Iranian proxy, the Houthi militias -- who have been waging another war on behalf of Iran against Saudi Arabia -- from the list of terrorist organizations. A few weeks later, the Houthis attacked a Saudi oil facility and a Patriot anti-missile system. The US still has not reacted.

The Biden administration has, instead, imposed a freeze on US arms sales to Saudi Arabia, and decided no longer to have any relationship with Crown Prince Mohamed bin Salman , popularly known as MBS. Seemingly to destabilize the prince, the US administration made public a report accusing the him of being responsible for the murder of the anti-Saudi writer, Jamal Khashoggi, without specifying that Khashoggi was an agent of the Muslim Brotherhood, an arch-enemy of the House of Saud.

The Israeli government realizes that if there are not to be rockets pummeling Israel every few years, Hamas must be made to pay a high price -- so that its leaders will think long and hard before initiating an attack on Israel again.

President Biden said that the United States would provide humanitarian support to Gaza, "in full partnership with the Palestinian Authority... in a manner that does not permit Hamas to simply restock its military arsenal". He did not explain what the United States could do to prevent Hamas from stockpiling weapons again. He ensured Prime Minister Netanyahu of his "full support to replenish Israel's Iron Dome system."

Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz said that the Israeli Defense Forces "reached military achievements unprecedented in their scale, precision and strategic significance for the struggle with terrorist organizations in Gaza.... The reality on the ground," he added, "will determine how we move forward."

"[I]n war and conflict," historian Daniel Pipes has written, "one side wins and one side loses.... Israel must do what all nations... are doing to achieve victory: beating its enemy...." Hamas's rocket infrastructure in Gaza, he said, must be "completely destroyed."

Israeli leaders know it, and it must be wished that the damage dealt this month to Hamas's military infrastructure is significant enough so that Israel does not face the risk of a major attack in the years to come.

A recent article by Michael Doran and Tony Badran on Tablet explains why Israel needs to stay on guard and be ready to act decisively. A project designed during the Obama presidency and aiming to "create a new Middle Eastern order" seems to be underway. It would place the interests of Iran over those of US allies in the Middle East, thereby leading to the hegemony in the region of Iran. The project would erode new the Abraham Accords, push Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates to come to an agreement with Iran and involve "forcing Israel into a more passive posture in the face of Iran's rising power". Is this project that the Biden administration is now implementing?

Sensing that the United States seeks to destabilize the Saudi kingdom and him, Saudi Crown Prince Mohamed bin Salman declared in April: "We are seeking to have good relations with Iran. We aim to see a prosperous Iran. We are working with our partners in the region to overcome our differences with Iran." He then went to Baghdad, Iraq to meet with Iranian diplomats.

The Biden administration acts as if it does not see that it puts Israel and other longtime American allies in danger; it acts as if it does not see that behind Iran and the mullahs, China is on the move. China and Iran just signed a 25-year "strategic partnership" that will allow the mullahs' regime to have hundreds of millions of dollars, help it expand its nuclear program, and presumably lead to greater military cooperation between them.

Journalist Melanie Phillips asks:

"Might Biden be turning America into Israel's foe?.... Obama's hostility to Israel and his empowerment of Iran made his double-term presidency a nightmare for the Jewish state. But if that was bad enough, it will take a measure of strategic genius for Israel to defend itself against Obama's surrogate third term and keep its people safe".

Is the Biden administration about to seriously diminish the status of the United States and the Free World to herald in a new world order that is radical and monstrous?

 

Dr. Guy Millière, a professor at the University of Paris, is the author of 27 books on France and Europe.

Source: https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/17392/biden-administration-israel-enemy

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Arabs: Hamas Does Not Care About Palestinian Suffering - Khaled Abu Toameh

 

​ by Khaled Abu Toameh

"Hamas likes to play the role of victim and kill Palestinians to win Arab, Islamic and international sympathy." — Abdulah Bin Binjad Al Otaibi, Saudi writer and researcher, Al-Ittihad, May 17, 2021.

  • These Arabs evidently understand what the anti-Israel activists around the world fail to see -- that Hamas has brought nothing but disaster and despair to the two million Palestinians living under its rule in the Gaza Strip.... [They] also seem to understand that Israel is not waging war on the Palestinians, but against an Islamist terrorist group.....

  • These Arabs can also see that if one cares about the Palestinians, why would one want them ruled by terrorists who place weapons caches near hospitals and schools, and use children as human shields?

  • Criticism of Hamas does not make you anti-Palestinian; on the contrary, holding Hamas responsible for the violence and bloodletting actually serves the interests of the Palestinians.

  • The Hamas terrorist group "Was well prepared for this war by building trenches in which its members can take shelter, while innocent Palestinians were being killed. Hamas likes to play the role of victim and kill Palestinians to win Arab, Islamic and international sympathy." — Abdulah Bin Binjad Al Otaibi, Saudi writer and researcher, Al-Ittihad, May 17, 2021.

  • "Hamas did not use the children of Ismail Haniyeh, Khaled Mashaal or Ali Khamenei as human shields. Hamas used the Palestinian people [as human shields]." — Ahdeya Ahmed Al Sayed, President of the Bahrain Journalists Association, Twitter, May 16, 2021.

  • The criticism shows that a growing number of Arabs are fed up with the continuous efforts of Iran to destabilize the Arab countries with the help of the mullahs' proxies in the Middle East, including Hamas.

  • Inexplicably, these Arab voices are generally ignored by the international community and the mainstream media in the West. Those who are demonstrating against Israel and Jews in the US, Canada and Europe might want to tune in to what Arabs themselves are saying about Hamas, Iran, Hezbollah and other terrorist groups. If they bothered to listen, they would understand that as far as many Arabs are concerned, the real threat to the future of Arab and Muslim children is coming from Iran and Islamic terrorist groups, and not from Israel.

Prominent Arab writers and political analysts hold the Iranian-backed Hamas responsible for the violence and bloodshed in the Gaza Strip over the past week. These Arabs can also see that if one cares about the Palestinians, why would one want them ruled by terrorists who place weapons caches near hospitals and schools, and use children as human shields? Pictured: Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh (center) at the Al-Shifa hospital in Gaza City on January 9, 2018 (Photo by Mohammed Abed/AFP via Getty Images)

While many in the West denounced Israel for its military strikes in the Gaza Strip over the past week, prominent Arab writers and political analysts held the Iranian-backed Hamas responsible for the violence and bloodshed.

These Arabs evidently understand what the anti-Israel activists around the world fail to see -- that Hamas has brought nothing but disaster and despair to the two million Palestinians living under its rule in the Gaza Strip.

These Arabs also seem to understand that Israel is not waging war on the Palestinians, but against an Islamist terrorist group whose charter openly calls for jihad (holy war) and the elimination of Israel.

These Arabs can also see that if one cares about the Palestinians, why would one want them ruled by terrorists who place weapons caches near hospitals and schools, and use children as human shields?

Those who are condemning Israel for defending itself against the rocket and missile attacks need to see what article 15 of the Hamas charter says:

"The day the enemies usurp part of Muslim land, Jihad becomes the individual duty of every Muslim. In the face of the Jews' usurpation, it is compulsory that the banner of Jihad be raised."

The message that the Arab writers and political analysts are trying to send to those Westerners who consider themselves "pro-Palestinian" is: Hamas serves as a pawn in the hands of Iran and the Muslim Brotherhood in the fight against Israel and the West.

There is another message that the Arabs are seeking to send to those in the West who are demonstrating against Israel: Criticism of Hamas does not make you anti-Palestinian; on the contrary, holding Hamas responsible for the violence and bloodletting actually serves the interests of the Palestinians.

How ironic that Arab Muslims are lashing out at Hamas while Israel-haters around the world see no evil in its actions, including the indiscriminate firing of thousands of rockets and missiles into Israel.

"Real sympathy with the Palestinian people means searching for solutions for an actual and practical peace that guarantees their safety, security, and development," commented Saudi writer and researcher Abdulah Bin Binjad Al Otaibi. "The solutions should also stop those [Hamas] who are ready to burn Palestine and its people."

The Hamas terrorist group, he said, "was well prepared for this war by building trenches in which its members can take shelter, while innocent Palestinians were being killed. Hamas likes to play the role of victim and kill Palestinians to win Arab, Islamic and international sympathy."

Denouncing Hamas for persecuting the Palestinians, Al Otaibi noted that the terrorist group carried out a bloody coup in 2007 against the Palestinian Authority in the Gaza Strip.

"Some ask, is this the right time to present the crimes of Hamas," he added.

"This is precisely the best time to do so. The reader can conduct a quick search on the Internet to learn about the crimes that Hamas has committed against the Palestinians. Hamas has the right to destroy its homes with its own hands, but it has no right to destroy the homes of Palestinians and underestimate their blood and the blood of their children."

Saudi writer Abdullah Nasser Al Otaibi called on Arab countries to help the Palestinians get new leaders.

"Hamas and its Muslim Brotherhood patrons do not care about the suffering or interests of the Palestinians," Al Otaibi wrote. "They only care about demonizing those who stand against them. Hamas is saying: Let the Palestinians die for the sake of a Muslim Brotherhood victory."

Another Saudi writer, Mishary Dhayidi, warned that Hamas was aligned with Iran and the enemies of the Arabs.

Dhayidi pointed out that Hamas has been associated with the Houthi militia in Yemen, Hezbollah, Egyptian terrorists and Qasem Soleimani, the commander of Iran's Quds Force who was killed last year in a US targeted drone attack near Baghdad International Airport in Iraq.

Emirati writer Al-Sheikh Wuldalsalek accused both Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and Hamas of "trafficking" in the Palestinian issue.

"Abbas wants to cover up for this decision to postpone the Palestinian elections so that he can continue to sit on the presidential chair at the expense of Palestinian blood," Wuldalsalek remarked. "Hamas aspires to increase its popularity and drain the pockets of those who see it as a resistance movement by launching futile missiles that harm it more than doing any good."

He accused Iran and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of "exploiting Palestinian blood without any shame or conscience."

"A few months ago, we were very happy with the signing of the Abraham Peace Accords [with Israel], which the people rely on to create peace that benefits everyone politically, economically and socially," Wuldalsalek wrote. "But the extremists are working to kill this dream. It is sad that some are working hard for peace, while others are working hard for the sake of war and the continuation of the conflict."

Egyptian writer Khaled al-Berry advised that "criticism of Hamas is in the interest of the Palestinians, now and tomorrow."

Criticism of Hamas, he said, "Is a message of awareness, caution, and a warning about the consequences of its organizational and regional ties."

Former Jordanian Minister of Information Saleh Al-Gholab said that Hamas should choose between being a Palestinian group or "a Muslim Brotherhood movement belonging to Iran." Al-Gholab pointed out that in 2007 Hamas launched a bloody coup against the Palestinian Authority and threw members of its rivals in Fatah from rooftops.

Ahdeya Ahmed Al Sayed, President of the Bahrain Journalists Association, wrote on Twitter:

"Those who support the terrorist militias [Hamas, Muslim Brotherhood, Hezbollah, Houthis, and the Iranian regime] are considered terrorists. The Palestinian issue does not need terrorists and traffickers. The Palestinian issue does not need traitors."

In another tweet, Al Sayed commented:

"Hamas did not use the children of Ismail Haniyeh, Khaled Mashaal or Ali Khamenei as human shields. Hamas used the Palestinian people [as human shields]. Shame on you to defend Hamas. This is a major betrayal!"

Such critiques of Hamas and other Iranian-backed terrorist groups are relatively new in the Arab world. The criticism shows that a growing number of Arabs are fed up with the continuous efforts of Iran to destabilize the Arab countries with the help of the mullahs' proxies in the Middle East, including Hamas.

Inexplicably, these Arab voices are generally ignored by the international community and the mainstream media in the West. Those who are demonstrating against Israel and Jews in the US, Canada and some European countries might want to tune in to what Arabs themselves are saying about Hamas, Iran, Hezbollah and other terrorist groups. If they bothered to listen, they would understand that as far as many Arabs are concerned, the real threat to the future of Arab and Muslim children is coming from Iran and Islamic terrorist groups, and not from Israel.

  • Follow Khaled Abu Toameh on Twitter

 

Khaled Abu Toameh is an award-winning journalist based in Jerusalem.

Source: https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/17390/hamas-palestinians-suffering

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