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Denying Jewish Sovereignty of Israel is Antisemitic

A general view shows the plaza of the Western Wall in Jerusalem, amid the coronavirus pandemic, May 6, 2020. Photo: Reuters / Ronen Zvulun.

JNS.orgIn just a few weeks, the Jewish people will celebrate Chanukah, commemorating the end of the Greek occupation of Jerusalem and the restoration of Jewish sovereignty to Jerusalem. The Maccabees lit a menorah, and as we know, though there was only enough oil for one night, the menorah stayed lit for seven more nights nights.

That menorah was located on the Temple Mount, the holiest site in Judaism, below which stands the Western Wall. Those who claim that Judaism has nothing to do with Zionism or claim that the Jewish people are not the indigenous people of Israel epitomize antisemitic rejection of documented Jewish history in Israel and the Jewish celebration of Chanukah.

The Palestinian Liberation Organization, which decades later would become the Palestinian Authority, was formed in 1964—three years before Israel’s victory in the Six-Day War and the start of the so-called Israeli “occupation” of Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria. Article 24 of the PLO’s original “National Covenant” states: “This organization does not exercise any regional sovereignty over the West Bank in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, on the Gaza Strip or the Himmah Area. Its activities will be on the national popular level in the liberation, organizational, political and financial fields.”

In other words, the PLO, at its inception, gave up any claims to Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria, as well as Gaza, because Jordan controlled eastern Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria, and Egypt controlled Gaza. All the PLO cared about was destroying the small Jewish State of Israel in its 1949 borders.

The Jewish people’s claim to Israel is based upon the fact that God gave the land to the Jews, as the Torah makes clear when God spoke to Abraham and told him to travel to Israel, and again when God told Moses and the Jewish people after leaving Egyptian slavery to journey to Israel. A famous biblical commentator, the Chizkuni, wrote hundreds of years ago that Noah owned the world at the end of the flood, and he gave the land of Israel to his son Shem, who then gave it to his descendant, the forefather of the Jewish people, Abraham. Another famous commentator, the Maharal of Prague, said that the seven nations in the land when the Jews left Egypt were all invaders and had no right to the land of Israel. The Bible even records the purchases of the Temple Mount in Jerusalem by King David, the Cave of the Patriarchs and Matriarchs, Machpela in Hebron by Abraham and Joseph’s Tomb by Jacob in Shechem (modern-day Nablus).

The International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s (IHRA) working definition of antisemitism makes it clear that those who oppose the existence of Israel are antisemitic. King David made Jerusalem the capital of Israel more than 3,000 years ago, and the two Jewish Temples were located on the Temple Mount, the last one having been destroyed by the Romans 2,000 years ago.

The Jews never gave up their rights to Israel. Even under Ottoman Turkish rule, when there was limited ability for Jews to return to their homeland, a 1906 Baedeker travel guide listed the population of Jerusalem as consisting of 40,000 Jews, 13,000 Christians and 7,000 Muslims. The international community agreed to the Jewish right to the Land of Israel and a right of return for Jews to Israel at San Remo in 1920, in a unanimous League of Nations Resolution in 1922 and in the Anglo-American Treaty that was ratified by the U.S. Senate and signed by President Calvin Coolidge in 1925. Article 80 in the U.N. Charter affirmed the binding nature of the League of Nations decisions.

Palestinian Arab rioting in Hebron in 1929 massacred 67 Jews, and the subsequent massacres of more than 500 Jews between 1936 and 1938 led to the British White Paper, which restricted Jewish immigration while allowing Arab immigration. A bipartisan majority of 15 members of the U.S. House Foreign Affairs Committee at the time declared in a public letter that the British White Paper violated the Anglo-American Treaty. It also meant that the Jews of Europe had no place to go to escape Hitler. The result was six million Jewish deaths.

The Holocaust had nothing to do with the establishment of the State of Israel, if anything, there was greater world support for Israel before the Holocaust, when U.S. presidents Wilson, Teddy Roosevelt, Harding, Coolidge and Hoover were all counted among those who supported the establishment of a Jewish state. The United Nations reiterated their support for a Jewish state in U.N. Resolution 181 in November 1947, and the Arab world rejected a two-state solution of an Arab state alongside a Jewish state. Israel only came into existence in a fight for its survival without a single ally, as President Harry Truman would not provide arms to Israel, and only Czechoslovakia sold arms to Israel. The Jewish state had to smuggle arms from America. President Lyndon Johnson would not even assist Israel in the 1967 Six-Day War and only supplied Israel with military arms after Israel was successful in the war.

Former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak and the former head of the Israeli Shin Bet, Ami Ayalon, recently stated that if they had grown up as Palestinian Arabs they would have become terrorists. We actually know someone who grew up as a Palestinian Arab terrorist and who came to the belief that this was wrong—Mosab Hassan Yousef, the son of a Hamas leader, Sheikh Hassan Yousef. Mosab Hassan Yousef is an eloquent defender of the Jewish right to Israel. He has shown that it does not matter what kind of family someone grows up in when there is a clear objective case of right and wrong. It is difficult to grow up among evil people as he has done and change one’s ways, yet he has done so. Barak and Ayalon, however, still fail to see the objective Jewish right to Israel.

May we incorporate in our Chanukah celebrations the acknowledgment of the miracle of the restoration, after 2,000 years, of Jewish sovereignty once again over Jerusalem.

The post Denying Jewish Sovereignty of Israel is Antisemitic first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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After False Dawns, Gazans Hope Trump Will Force End to Two-Year-Old War

Palestinians walk past a residential building destroyed in previous Israeli strikes, after Hamas agreed to release hostages and accept some other terms in a US plan to end the war, in Nuseirat, central Gaza Strip October 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa

Exhausted Palestinians in Gaza clung to hopes on Saturday that US President Donald Trump would keep up pressure on Israel to end a two-year-old war that has killed tens of thousands and displaced the entire population of more than two million.

Hamas’ declaration that it was ready to hand over hostages and accept some terms of Trump’s plan to end the conflict while calling for more talks on several key issues was greeted with relief in the enclave, where most homes are now in ruins.

“It’s happy news, it saves those who are still alive,” said 32-year-old Saoud Qarneyta, reacting to Hamas’ response and Trump’s intervention. “This is enough. Houses have been damaged, everything has been damaged, what is left? Nothing.”

GAZAN RESIDENT HOPES ‘WE WILL BE DONE WITH WARS’

Ismail Zayda, 40, a father of three, displaced from a suburb in northern Gaza City where Israel launched a full-scale ground operation last month, said: “We want President Trump to keep pushing for an end to the war, if this chance is lost, it means that Gaza City will be destroyed by Israel and we might not survive.

“Enough, two years of bombardment, death and starvation. Enough,” he told Reuters on a social media chat.

“God willing this will be the last war. We will hopefully be done with the wars,” said 59-year-old Ali Ahmad, speaking in one of the tented camps where most Palestinians now live.

“We urge all sides not to backtrack. Every day of delay costs lives in Gaza, it is not just time wasted, lives get wasted too,” said Tamer Al-Burai, a Gaza City businessman displaced with members of his family in central Gaza Strip.

After two previous ceasefires — one near the start of the war and another earlier this year — lasted only a few weeks, he said; “I am very optimistic this time, maybe Trump’s seeking to be remembered as a man of peace, will bring us real peace this time.”

RESIDENT WORRIES THAT NETANYAHU WILL ‘SABOTAGE’ DEAL

Some voiced hopes of returning to their homes, but the Israeli military issued a fresh warning to Gazans on Saturday to stay out of Gaza City, describing it as a “dangerous combat zone.”

Gazans have faced previous false dawns during the past two years, when Trump and others declared at several points during on-off negotiations between Hamas, Israel and Arab and US mediators that a deal was close, only for war to rage on.

“Will it happen? Can we trust Trump? Maybe we trust Trump, but will Netanyahu abide this time? He has always sabotaged everything and continued the war. I hope he ends it now,” said Aya, 31, who was displaced with her family to Deir Al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip.

She added: “Maybe there is a chance the war ends at October 7, two years after it began.”

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Mass Rally in Rome on Fourth Day of Italy’s Pro-Palestinian Protests

A Pro-Palestinian demonstrator waves a Palestinian flag during a national protest for Gaza in Rome, Italy, October 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Claudia Greco

Large crowds assembled in central Rome on Saturday for the fourth straight day of protests in Italy since Israel intercepted an international flotilla trying to deliver aid to Gaza, and detained its activists.

People holding banners and Palestinian flags, chanting “Free Palestine” and other slogans, filed past the Colosseum, taking part in a march that organizers hoped would attract at least 1 million people.

“I’m here with a lot of other friends because I think it is important for us all to mobilize individually,” Francesco Galtieri, a 65-year-old musician from Rome, said. “If we don’t all mobilize, then nothing will change.”

Since Israel started blocking the flotilla late on Wednesday, protests have sprung up across Europe and in other parts of the world, but in Italy they have been a daily occurrence, in multiple cities.

On Friday, unions called a general strike in support of the flotilla, with demonstrations across the country that attracted more than 2 million, according to organizers. The interior ministry estimated attendance at around 400,000.

Italy’s right-wing government has been critical of the protests, with Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni suggesting that people would skip work for Gaza just as an excuse for a longer weekend break.

On Saturday, Meloni blamed protesters for insulting graffiti that appeared on a statue of the late Pope John Paul II outside Rome’s main train station, where Pro-Palestinian groups have been holding a protest picket.

“They say they are taking to the streets for peace, but then they insult the memory of a man who was a true defender and builder of peace. A shameful act committed by people blinded by ideology,” she said in a statement.

Israel launched its Gaza offensive after Hamas terrorists staged a cross border attack on October 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 people hostage.

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Hamas Says It Agrees to Release All Israeli Hostages Under Trump Gaza Plan

Smoke rises during an Israeli military operation in Gaza City, as seen from the central Gaza Strip, October 2, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Dawoud Abu Alkas

Hamas said on Friday it had agreed to release all Israeli hostages, alive or dead, under the terms of US President Donald Trump’s Gaza proposal, and signaled readiness to immediately enter mediated negotiations to discuss the details.

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