RUTHFULLY YOURS

geraldahonigman.com
From time to time, I will post thoughts and articles…Jerry

I am a Florida educator who has done extensive doctoral studies in Middle Eastern Affairs, created and conducted counter-Arab propaganda programs for college youth, lectured on numerous campuses and other platforms, and have publicly debated many Arab and other anti-Israel spokesmen. My articles and op-eds have been published in dozens of newspapers, magazines, academic journals and websites all around the world.
As a doctoral student in the late ’70s, I had my academic career nipped in the bud because I believed in academic freedom (not to mention the fact that this was, after all, America). I naively expected that the same lenses of moral scrutiny–which were routinely used to critique and dissect Israel in the classroom–would be applied to the so-called “Arab”/Muslim World as well. As I learned the hard way, that was indeed far too much to expect. I asked too many of the wrong questions. I was the most advanced doctoral student in the program at Ohio State University at the time, was a T.A. (Teaching Assistant), and the department used me to secure additional funding.

Somewhat earlier, I had received my M.A. and was an advanced doctoral student at the Kevorkian Center For Near Eastern Studies, a consortium of New York, Columbia, and Princeton Universities based at N.Y.U.’s Washington Square campus. A prolonged illness and financial matters led to an interruption in my studies, and I next found myself based in Columbus in a fulltime job. A professor subsequently heard one of my presentations and suggested that I resurrect my doctoral work at Ohio State. I reluctantly agreed to do this…and you’ll see why I had reservations shortly.

Unfortunately, Middle Eastern Studies was fast becoming the most politicized field in academia…even more so since my earlier years at the Kevorkian Center. Universities were receiving money and other support from Arab countries, their supporters, and the like.

Palestinians need to start taking responsibility for their own existence and stop relying on the world to take care of them while they use the money freed up — by the international community — to launch jihad and intifadas.

No entity should forever be permitted to devote its resources to terror while the world is expected to owe them everything: financial support, jobs, citizenship, and even building the infrastructure that they keep destroying. The moral of the story is that if you do not want to lose wars, it would be better not to start them.

The longer financial aid and the pampering of Palestinians continue as an “insurance policy” ostensibly to prevent terrorism, the longer the suffering, dependence, terror and conflict will go on. It is time for Palestinians to learn that threatening terror is not a way to earn a living.

A British woman, Kay Wilson, apparently realized that when a Palestinian terrorist “plunged a knife into her chest”, left her for dead and then murdered her friend, it was British taxpayers who had paid for it.

“Is the UK funding the terrorists who tried to murder me?”, she asked.

Yes, it is. “According to data collected by Israel’s Defense Ministry, the PA spent a total of 1.237 billion shekels ($358 million), or about 7% of the PA’s total annual budget, on terrorist stipends last year.”

International payments to Palestinians that are used to pay terrorists in jail, as well as their families, serve both as a “reward for bad behavior” and also as a powerful incentive for youths to become terrorists.

They are a jobs program.

Some Palestinians are complaining that Arab countries are discriminating against them, and even going as far as calling themselves victims of “shameless Arab Apartheid” against Palestinians.

Such an accusation is unfair to many Arab countries, especially Egypt, which has sacrificed the blood of hundreds of thousands of its citizens to support the Islamic jihad against Israel.

A prominent Tunisian-born French movie producer, Saïd Ben Saïd recently issued one of the frankest denunciations of anti-Semitism in the Arab world. The real culprit, he argued, was the prevalence of anti-Semitism fueled by Islamic extremists across the Middle East. Ben Saïd was forced to pull out of an Arab film festival last year because he had worked with Israelis.

A Lebanese director, Ziad Doueiri, did something even “worse”: he filmed some scenes on Israeli land!

“No one can deny the misery of the Palestinian people, but it must be admitted that the Arab world is, in its majority, antisemitic. This hatred of Jews has redoubled in intensity and depth not because of the Arab-Israeli conflict, but with the rise of a certain vision of Islam”. — Saïd Ben Saïd.

Fifty years have passed since many Arab countries were humiliated by Israel in 1967 in a war the Arabs started, with the explicit goal of destroying the Jewish State and throwing the Jews into the Mediterranean Sea. Today, Israel has solid diplomatic relations with two of these countries — Jordan to Egypt — while Saudi officials speak with their Israeli security counterparts about the Iranian threat.

But although the Middle East is engulfed in a new wave of internal destabilization, and Iran has recently experienced a new wave of protests in which people chanted “we don’t want an Islamic Republic”, the great taboo for the Arab and Muslim world is still that of cultural exchanges with the hated “Zionists”.

A prominent Tunisian-born French movie producer, Saïd Ben Saïd, after being forced to pull out of North Africa’s most prestigious film festival, recently issued one of the frankest denunciations of anti-Semitism in the Arab world. He revealed, in an op-ed for the French daily Le Monde, that an invitation to preside over the jury of the Carthage Film Festival had been rescinded because of his work with the Israeli film director, Nadav Lapid, and for having participated on a panel at the Jerusalem Film Festival earlier this year. The real culprit, Ben Saïd argued, was the prevalence of anti-Semitism fueled by Islamic extremists across the Middle East:

“No one can deny the misery of the Palestinian people, but it must be admitted that the Arab world is, in its majority, antisemitic… This hatred of Jews has redoubled in intensity and depth not because of the Arab-Israeli conflict, but with the rise of a certain vision of Islam”.

This piece was first published on the Hebrew-language website Mida on January 14, 2018, rendered into English by Avi Woolf, and republished here with permission. The original article can be found by clicking on the link at the bottom of this page.

While the Christian community in Israel is thriving and prospering, Christians living in the Palestinian Authority suffer from violence and unending persecution.

Last Christmas eve, the Muslim mayor of Nazareth, Ali Salem, decided to cancel celebrations in the city. He justified his decision as an act of protest against President Trump’s decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. However, we can assume that the coming Nazareth elections were a factor in his decision, as Salem is trying to get more votes from the city’s Muslims, who now constitute a majority since so many Christians have left in recent years.

The mayor’s decision aroused a great deal of anger among the Arabic-speaking Christians in Israel. Among the leaders of the protest was the Brit Aḥim (Brothers’ Covenant) organization which distributed protest letters on the subject to decision makers in Israel, Christian parties, and Israeli and international media outlets.

Among other things, the letter stated that “the mayor of Nazareth’s decision is a cynical exploitation of Christian residents and it does harm to Christians in Israel and their holiday, harm to the economy of the city, and harm to relations between the religions. . . . We want to remind Mr. Salem that Jerusalem was the capital of Israel 3,000 years ago and the Holy Books and history cannot be changed for political needs detached from reality. It’s time that the Christian community, which for the most part respects the state of Israel and sees itself as a partner in its construction, not be captive to radical political parties both in the Arab sector and the Christian community.”

In the wake of pressure from Israel and international media coverage, the mayor reversed his decision, but he moved the main stage [where public festivities were held] from its regular spot to another location in town. But Ali Salem is not the only one to take steps after the declaration of the American president.

Thirteen prominent Christian religious figures, including the Armenian patriarch, the patriarch of the Greek Orthodox Church, archbishops from the Coptic, Syriac, and Ethiopian churches, and the manager of the Latin patriarchate in Jerusalem signed a letter attacking the [White House’s Jerusalem] declaration. A few days later, they were present at a Christmas reception at the [Israeli] Tourism Ministry and were even hosted at the traditional gathering at the Israeli presidential residence for the New Year, and met with the mayor of Jerusalem.

Among Israeli Christians, there is a radical and vocal minority that promotes anti-Israel activity, with the prominent participation of the head of the Greek Orthodox Council in Nazareth (funded by the state of Israel), Bishop Atallah Khana. The bishop has been known to have called on Christian youth to enlist in Hamas and even recently met with Syrian President Bashar Assad.

The Palestinians do not even feel the need to condemn terror attacks against Jews, because the international community is no longer demanding that they come out against terrorism.

Instead of condemning the murder, the Palestinian Authority has been condemning Israel for launching a manhunt for the terrorists…..

Why do the Palestinians not want anyone to call them out? Because they are planning … a new intifada.

What do the Palestinians think about the murder of a young rabbi and father of six? They “welcome” it with open arms.

So what if Rabbi Raziel Shevach was said to have maintained good relations with his Palestinian neighbors?

The Palestinians are still happy that he was gunned down last week as he was driving his car in the northern West Bank. They are happy because the victim was a Jew. They are happy because the victim held a religious position: Rabbi. They are happy because the victim was a “settler.”

The fact that Rabbi Shevach was the father of six children does not faze the Palestinians one bit.

For them, what is important is that another Jew has been murdered. This meant, for the Palestinians, that his presence in the West Bank also carried religious weight. A rabbi living in the West Bank is emblematic of Jews’ historic and religious attachment to the land. For all those reasons, the Palestinians are happy about the murder. Notably, the rabbi’s political affiliation is irrelevant. He could be from the most extreme left-wing or right-wing party in Israel – this still would not make any difference. Rabbi Shevach was not murdered because of his political views.

Anyone who follows the news from Israel knows how this usually goes.

Rabbi Raziel Shevach, a 32-year-old father of six, died of his wounds following a shooting attack near Havat Gilad in Samaria this evening. The rabbi leaves behind a wife, 4 daughters and 2 sons, the younger of which is an 8-month-old baby.

Ilana Shevach, mother of Rabbi Raziel Shevach who was murdered in Tuesday’s terrorist attack near Havat Gilad in Samaria, told Channel 20 about her son who left behind a wife and six children.

“Raziel is our oldest son. We have four sons – Raziel, Barel, Matanel and Eldan, and a daughter, Ateret. He was married to Yael, an amazing woman, and they have six children. He was a humble child. From what I heard today at the funeral, I did not believe how much of a righteous man he was,” the mother said.

“My husband was listening to the news on the radio. I’m in mourning, my father died a month ago and we are not watching television these days. He turned on the radio and said, ‘Ilana, there was an attack at Havat Gilad.’ So I told him I was going to call Yael and Raziel. My cell phone was in the kitchen, and then I heard on the news a voice saying, ‘They shot me, shot me in the neck,’ (from Rabbi Shevach’s call to Magen David Adom –ed.) and I recognized his voice.”

That’s the cue for the State Department serving as ambassador to mumble a generic condolence, praise the Palestinian Authority for keeping the peace, and call for all sides to show restraint.

But it’s not business as usual anymore.
David M. Friedman
✔ @USAmbIsrael
An Israeli father of six was killed last night in cold blood by Palestinian terrorists. Hamas praises the killers and PA laws will provide them financial rewards. Look no further to why there is no peace.
Praying for the bereaved Shevach family.

You can see why J Street did everything it could to stop his nomination. But the anti-Israel hate group failed miserably. Though it did manage some entertaining performances from Cory Booker, Al Franken and Brian Schatz.

For the first time, American diplomats are standing up to the terrorists, instead of aiding and abetting him. And they’re challenging the Palestinian Authority/Fatah’s support for the terrorist attacks.