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‘Palestine’ and the Energy of Colonization
Pro-Hamas and anti-Israel activists march to the White House and demand a cease-fire in Gaza. Photo: Allison Bailey/NurPhoto via Reuters Connect
JNS.org – In what can only be considered as an ironic twist of intention, it has become apparent that not only has the idea of a free Arab state of Palestine become an agenda item of the first degree for the United Nations, human-rights NGOs, and other similar bodies and institutions, but it has become the ideal of these bodies as well. The slogan “Palestine must be free” has literally colonized the minds of intellectuals, academicians, diplomats and university students, thus assuring, at least for the short term, it being a constant of discussion, debate and involvement.
In what I have termed as the rhetoric of obversity—that is, the orchestration of language to mean not what was originally intended, as well as the expanding of their meaning to include new definitions—the normative definition of settler colonialism has been modified. Settler colonialism is when invaders occupy a territory to permanently replace the existing society with the society of the colonizers so as to enjoy metropolitan living standards and political privileges. It has been applied, wrongly and falsely, to Zionism.
This allows news items, such as one from Dec. 20, “Illegal Israeli Colonizers Raze Land,” to hammer the term into the heads of Jewish youth who should know better as it more easily does into the thinking of others.
Implicit in applying the “settler colonialism” terminology is to suggest that the goals of Zionism were and are the elimination and exploitation of the “native” population. However, that never happened, nor was it the intention of the Zionist enterprise. In fact, it’s the opposite.
Cary Nelson, is his magnificent “Israel Denial” on the faculty campaign against the Jewish state, notes on pages 120-123 how the older claim of Zionism as a colonialist movement has now been linked to the false assertion not only of a supposed Arab Palestinian identity but an Arab Palestinian indigeneity as well, thereby interlocking the core forces that drive the anger and involvement of college student even while this causes a racialization format.
In an academic treatment, Sai Englert quotes Fayez Sayegh who described the core of Zionism’s ideology as one of “racial self-segregation, racial exclusiveness and racial supremacy” on p. 22 in a 1965 PLO booklet. Sayegh, the Syrian-born founder of the Palestine Research Center of Beirut, is held to be a pioneering analyst in the field. Perhaps one of the more illustrative examples of language rape practiced by the proponents of pro-Palestine propaganda is the one used at the March 2011 Seventh Annual Conference of the London’s SOAS Palestine Society. It would have us believe that “[f]or over a century, Zionism has subjected Palestine and Palestinians to a structural and violent form of destruction, dispossession, land appropriation and erasure in the pursuit of a new colonial Israeli society.”
To give but one example of the relative primitiveness of the approach in its early period is to quote from Sayegh writing: “The frenzied ‘Scramble for Africa’ of the 1880s stimulated the beginnings of Zionist colonization in Palestine.” Jews at that time were a permanent feature for centuries in Jerusalem, Safed, Tiberias and Hebron. Leading up to 1740 and in the following decade, thousands immigrated to Eretz Yisrael expecting the Messianic era to evolve, including Rabbi Moses Haim Luzzatto and Kabbalist Rabbi Haim ben Attar.
Indeed, in all the previous centuries, Jews were moving to reside in Eretz Yisrael, including hundreds of rabbis and some of the greatest luminaries of Jewish scholarship. In the mid- to late 18th century, hundreds of Chassidim, many with families, were immigrating to the country. By the early 19th century, the pupils of the Vilna Gaon, too, were making the move. Not antisemitism but religious motivation was the force behind this.
To borrow a phrase from Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.), how did this theorizing warp the minds of young people?
As can be expected, one of the very first to spread the theme was a Jew, Maxime Rodinson, whose “Israel: A Colonial Settler-State?” (originally appearing in French in early July 1967) did much to take it out of the category of PLO propaganda. He provided a Marxist and even anthropological framework that allowed the idea to settle into academia in tandem with the success of the growth of race theory and the north/south model.
Nevertheless, there was a problem for Zionism is one of the most genuine, and most successful, repatriation movements in history. Jews came from what the world calls “Palestine.” Antisemites throughout the centuries demanded that Jews “go back to Palestine.” Most recently, even an extreme leftist such as Uri Misgav, in Haaretz, has written: “Zionism is not colonialism, despite the efforts of the politics of blame and identity to place it under this heading.”
There is, perhaps, a psychological element working here.
As Lee Smith asserts, in advancing the cause of the Arab Palestinians, they created “the prototype of ‘Third World man’ which “served the narcissism of Western elites.” To what purpose? Smith explains: “Removed from the apex of their strength, and their will to defend a civilization built by better men long depleted, Western elites’ self-image is sustained by Third World man.” Indeed, “Palestine … [is] not a place, it’s a spiritual principle guided by the inversion of reality and governed by the equation 2+2=5.”
A recent example of the progress of Palestine’s colonization process was the attempted protest by Doctors Against Genocide to take place at the US Holocaust Memorial Museum. It went too far and aroused too much pushback, and was walked back. But the idea was to invade the public representation of the Jewish Holocaust—a quite specific and unique event—rob it of its meaning, harvest its emotional value, and ultimately, to take it over as property of “Palestine.”
As Tafi Mhaka wrote in Al Jazeera this month: “The time is ripe for the end of Western colonization in Palestine.” It should be made clear that the time is overdue to end the colonization by pro-Palestine proponents.
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On International Holocaust Remembrance Day, SJP at Ohio State University Targets Jews
International Holocaust Remembrance Day, which happens on January 27 every year, is a time when the world commemorates the victims of the Holocaust and reflects on how pure hatred and antisemitism led to this atrocity. It is a time for moments of silence, thoughtful discussions, and a meaningful look at history.
But over at Ohio State University, Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) — a group whose nationwide members have glorified Hamas’ October 7 attack on Israel — decided that it was once again time to protest outside of a Jewish institution. At the off-campus Chabad House, on International Holocaust Remembrance Day, about 60 SJP members and their collaborators chanted for “liberation from the Zionist occupation.” They yelled that, “There are war criminals in this building,” referring to the fact that Chabad was hosting two IDF soldiers who were nearly murdered on October 7.
On OSU SJP’s Instagram was a flyer with the names and photos of the IDF soldiers from the Givati Brigade, as well as a blood-splattered IDF logo. Of course, the flyer was filled with egregious lies like, “The Givati Brigade has been a key component of the Zionist occupation since the Nakba of 1948 … Over the years, the Givati Brigade has been involved in repeated invasions of Gaza and the Lebanese border, and since 2000, they have relentlessly targeted and killed Palestinians in Gaza … Tomorrow, these war criminals, directly complicit in the ethnic cleansing and occupation of Palestine, will be on campus.”
In reality, the Chabad event was held on International Holocaust Remembrance Day because the two IDF soldiers were the ones who were targeted on October 7 — and narrowly survived the attack. The soldiers fittingly told their heartbreaking stories of October 7, which was the worst massacre of the Jews since the Holocaust.
Hamas wanted them dead simply because they are Jewish — just like the Nazis did.
One of the soldiers at the event, Maya Desiatnik, was a lookout at the Nahal Oz military base, which oversaw the Israel-Gaza border. When the attack started, she hid in the war room for six hours, while her entire unit suffered a worse fate: Fifteen of her colleagues were murdered and seven were kidnapped. Maya told Ynet News about her terrifying experience: “We could hear terrorists talking, going up to the war room roof, shouting ‘Allahu Akbar.’ They shot at the war room from outside and threw grenades in. When they realized they couldn’t get in, they set it on fire, with all of us inside.”
The other soldier, Saar Arie, was treating a family that had suffered a Hamas ambush. The terrorists burned their home while they were inside.
Maya and Saar are not only survivors — they are heroes. In a disgusting twist of facts, SJP called them war criminals, further victimizing the victims… on International Holocaust Remembrance Day, nonetheless. Showing up to a Jewish family’s home off campus wearing keffiyehs and shouting hateful chants into megaphones on what is supposed to be a solemn day in honor of victims of antisemitism is a new low.
This is not about free speech or peaceful protesting. If it was, then why did SJP at OSU post tips on covering your face and not getting arrested, along with what to do if the police did show up? Their flyer stated, “Do not speak to the cops. That’s what our police liaisons are for,” and “If you are placed under arrest, do not panic! Resisting and running from police can add charges.”
If they were there to peacefully protest, why would they need to publicize these tips?
Sadly, OSU has been a hotbed of antisemitism in the aftermath of October 7. In November of 2023, two Jewish students were verbally and physically assaulted, and in December of that year, people hurled objects at a Jewish fraternity and yelled antisemitic phrases. The genocidal phrase to eradicate Israel, “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free,” has appeared on campus, and the university’s Hillel was vandalized.
None of this has been done to help Palestinians. It is about targeting Jews on campus, and delegitimizing the fact that Israel is, indeed, a Jewish state. Antisemitic individuals and groups may use the word “Zionist,” but it’s interchangeable with the word “Jew.” Otherwise, why would they go after the Hillel and Chabad?
While the US Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights opened a Title VI investigation into OSU last year following all the reports of antisemitism, it’s time to take it a step further: OSU should ban SJP on campus altogether after their stunt last week.
Being hateful towards Jews at OSU is egregious anytime. But doing so after a horrendous massacre of the Jewish people — and then targeting them on International Holocaust Remembrance Day — is even more shocking.
It’s time for OSU to grow a backbone and stamp out Jew hatred on its campus once and for all. When we say, “never again,” it means never again anywhere — not in Israel, not in the US, and certainly not on the OSU campus.
Lizzy Savetsky works with numerous non-profit and philanthropic movements as an outspoken advocate for Israel and the Jewish people. You can find her on Instagram @lizzysavetsky.
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Iran May Be on the Verge of a Nuclear Weapon; Will Israel and the United States Act?

Russian President Vladimir Putin and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian attend a ceremony to sign an agreement of comprehensive strategic partnership between the two countries, at the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia, Jan. 17, 2025. Photo: Sputnik/Vyacheslav Prokofyev/Pool via REUTERS
US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu just met in Washington — and not a moment too soon. A team of scientists in Iran is reportedly working to short-cut Tehran’s route to nuclear weapons in case the Iranian leadership orders their complete construction.
Trump and Netanyahu have a narrow window to stop Iran if it opts to build those weapons. The US and Israel must urgently review and revamp their intelligence gathering and sabotage capabilities, while preparing military options to jointly destroy Iran’s nuclear facilities should it sprint for atomic weapons.
According to current and former US officials who spoke to The New York Times on February 3, during the waning months of Joe Biden’s administration, unnamed countries — likely the United States and Israel — gathered intelligence indicating “a secret team of [Iranian] scientists is exploring a faster, if cruder, approach to developing an atomic weapon if Tehran’s leadership decides to race for a bomb.”
These findings track with an Axios report from November quoting a US official who said that Iran had been “conduct[ing] scientific activity that could lay the ground for the production of a nuclear weapon. It was a top secret thing. A small part of the Iranian government knew about this, but most of the Iranian government didn’t.”
What is this so-called “crude” nuclear device that Iran might seek in a hurry, compared to a regular nuclear weapon?
Such a device, built more quickly, may lack the functionality assurances provided by a lengthier nuclear-weapon assembly time. This assembly process, known as “weaponization,” entails key scientific and engineering work that enables the production of a functioning nuclear bomb that integrates a uranium fissile core, a triggering mechanism, and explosives.
To short-cut its way to nuclear weapons, Tehran may even fuel a crude weapon with highly-enriched uranium (HEU) in lieu of the preferred weapons-grade uranium. While this would make Iran’s nuclear weapons larger and heavier, it would serve the purpose of establishing Tehran as nuclear-armed.
At last count, Iran had enough HEU for almost five nuclear weapons, and enough enriched uranium overall, if enriched further, for at least 16 weapons.
How fast could Iran weaponize its nuclear material?
Tehran could likely construct a crude device within six months of starting, only moving its enriched uranium stocks to a secret site for subsequent enrichment and/or weaponization around the four-month mark. Relocating those stocks would trigger international alarm bells, since the material remains under International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) safeguards. Yet unless the United States and Israel detect Tehran near day one of a six-month breakout to the bomb, they may just have weeks to stop Iran after the fuel goes missing.
To target Iran’s nuclear plants militarily, Washington and Jerusalem require exact intelligence about where Iran might be constructing nuclear weapons. A facility located deep underground raises additional obstacles, even for bunker-busting bombs.
If the United States and Israel were unable to stop Tehran, Iran could quickly declare itself a nuclear power, possibly issuing photos to the world and only later conducting a demonstration test.
What’s more, Iran knows well how to build nuclear weapons, having spent nearly three decades — from 1985 on — acquiring and then mastering the technology.
Under Tehran’s late 1990s to mid-2003 nuclear weapons program known as the Amad Plan, the regime set out to construct an initial five nuclear bombs and ready the capability to test them.
However, in 2002, opposition groups and non-governmental organizations detected Iran’s covert nuclear facilities. The possibility that the United States, under the George W. Bush administration, might invade Iran based on Tehran’s efforts to seek weapons of mass destruction — as America had done in neighboring Iraq — likely caused the regime to downsize the Amad Plan’s weaponization activities.
However, Iran planned to continue progressing some weaponization activities for a rainy day, while openly progressing its production of fuel.
Today, the IAEA has never been able to issue an all-clear that Tehran’s nuclear program is devoted to peaceful uses, as Iran obfuscates and maintains secrecy over past and ongoing activities.
Signs have periodically emerged of an ongoing weaponization effort, but the US intelligence community assessed, until at least July 2024, that Tehran maintained the Amad Plan’s halt. In early 2024, Israel and the United States reportedly acquired intelligence pointing to new Iranian weaponization-related activities.
During an October 2024 strike on Iran in retaliation for a missile attack, Israel destroyed a site known as Taleghan 2, where some of these alleged activities were taking place.
Facing Israel’s decimation of its proxies in Lebanon, Syria, and Gaza, lacking the means to defend its air space, and confronting an inability to quickly build new missiles since Jerusalem’s strike, the regime in Iran knows it is more vulnerable than ever — and is likely eager to have a plan to quickly acquire a nuclear deterrent.
Trump and Netanyahu have a historic chance to stop Iran once and for all.
They should immediately evaluate and enhance intelligence gathering and related operations aimed at detecting Iranian efforts to build nuclear weapons. They should ready sabotage operations to stop these efforts. Both countries have used sabotage in the past — namely cyber-attacks, supply chain disruption, and explosives — to successfully disrupt and deter Tehran’s nuclear progress at key facilities.
In addition, the two countries should hold a new round of Juniper Oak military exercises, the last of which were held more than two years ago. These exercises showcase their ability to jointly destroy Iran’s nuclear facilities and could help deter a breakout by the regime before it starts.
Washington and Jerusalem should also enhance the interoperability of such a mission. In particular, the United States should allow Israel to practice refueling its fighter jets using American KC-46 refueling aircraft while Israel awaits US deliveries of KC-46 refueling aircraft to replace Jerusalem’s aging fleet.
Tehran may be desperate and poised to acquire the ultimate deterrent — a move that successive administrations in Washington and Jerusalem have said they will never tolerate.
Trump and Netanyahu may soon have to enforce that threat.
Andrea Stricker is a research fellow and deputy director of the Nonproliferation and Biodefense Program at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD). Follow her on X @StrickerNonpro. FDD is a Washington, DC-based, nonpartisan research institute focused on national security and foreign policy.
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Australia Cracks Down on Antisemitism Amid Unrelenting Surge in Hate Crimes Targeting Jewish Community

Car in New South Wales, Australia graffitied with antisemitic message. Photo: Screenshot
The government of the Australian state of New South Wales (NSW) has introduced a proposal to criminalize specific protests outside places of worship in response to a recent wave of hate crimes targeting Jews in Australia.
“We have seen disgusting acts of racial hatred and antisemitism,” the NSW premier Chris Minns said in a statement outlining the proposed laws. “These are strong new laws, and they need to be because these attacks have to stop.”
Part of a broader set of measures, the reforms aim to address a recent wave of arson attacks and antisemitic vandalism across Australia over the past two months.
“These laws have been drafted in response to the horrifying antisemitic violence in our community, but it’s important to note that they will apply to anyone, preying on any person, of any religion,” Minns said.
The legislation also followed Israel’s call for the Australian government to take stronger measures against the “epidemic of antisemitism” that has swept across the country. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has maintained that his government is doing everything possible to combat attacks, including acts of domestic terrorism.
The attempted antisemitic terror attack at a synagogue in Sydney is intolerable. This joins a long list of antisemitic attacks in Australia, including setting fire to a childcare center in Sydney, firebombing a synagogue in Melbourne, and many other antisemitic attacks.
The…— Gideon Sa’ar | גדעון סער (@gidonsaar) January 29, 2025
On Sunday, the NSW Jewish Board said that in three weeks they had seen 10 publicly reported antisemitic incidents, primarily in the Sydney area, which included arson and vandalism — including property defaced with messages reading “f—k Jews.” The group said that number “doesn’t include the graffiti appearing in our streets on a daily basis or the abuse and harassment that goes unreported.”
Last month, Australian police said they foiled a potential mass-casualty antisemitic terrorist attack after discovering a caravan in a suburb of Sydney filled with explosives and material containing details about Jewish targets.
Under the new proposed laws, it would be an offense to block access to places of worship or harass, intimidate, or threaten people there, with a maximum penalty of two years in prison. The legislation gives the police heightened powers to enforce he law.
It would also become a crime to display a Nazi symbol near a synagogue, with a maximum two-year prison sentence, and the Graffiti Control Act would be amended to make graffiti on places of worship an aggravated offence.
These potential changes would come after two synagogues in Sydney were vandalized last month with swastikas, and an attempt was made to set one on fire.
Under the new legislation, sentencing could take into account whether an offense was “wholly” or “partially” driven by hatred or prejudice.
“The entire community will be safer as a direct result of these changes. The proposed changes will mean that divisive and hateful behaviors will not succeed in dividing our community,” said Michael Daley, the attorney general.
As authorities work to counter the alarming surge in anti-Jewish incidents, law enforcement has made several arrests across Australia.
On Wednesday, two 27-year-old men were arrested and charged for spray-painting antisemitic symbols and words on walls, bus stops, and signs in several Perth neighborhoods in western Australia.
“The Western Australia Police Force will not allow vile acts of hatred and racism to go unchecked,” a WA Police spokesperson said in a statement. “This swift outcome should send a clear message to anyone engaging in this kind of behavior. We will find you and you will be put before the courts to face the consequences of your actions.”
In Melbourne, a 68-year-old man has been charged with criminal damage, unlawful assault, and offensive graffiti after allegedly vandalizing a family home in a Jewish community and throwing bacon at a passerby who tried to intervene.
In Sydney, a woman was found guilty of sending a threatening message to a Jewish school just 11 days after Hamas’s invasion of and massacre across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023. However, she has escaped conviction.
In the letter, the 21-year-old wrote: “You are the children of Satan … get cancer and die a slow, painful death.”
“Praise Hitler. If only he was here to continue the mass destruction of your bloodline,” the message continued.
Many observers have expressed outrage over the woman escaping conviction. The verdict came as Jewish students were reported to be hiding their school uniform logos and avoiding public transport, in the wake of rising antisemitic attacks on Jewish schools, daycare centers, and synagogues.
AUSTRALIA’S SHAME – ANTISEMITISM EMERGENCY
This pic is the front cover of the Wentworth Courier, the local paper for much of Sydney’s eastern suburbs which is home to much of the Jewish community in NSW.
“Jewish children under police watch” in order to attend school.… pic.twitter.com/L6Itct35L9
— Australian Jewish Association (@AustralianJA) February 4, 2025
Last month, the NSW government also proposed a new law making it a criminal offense to intentionally incite racial hatred, with a maximum two-year prison sentence.
In their efforts to combat hate speech, this change would make inciting racial hatred a criminal offense, rather than just a civil one under the Anti-Discrimination Act.
The state government also announced an increase of $525,000 in funding for the NSW police engagement and hate crime unit, along with a $500,000 boost to a grants program for social cohesion.
The post Australia Cracks Down on Antisemitism Amid Unrelenting Surge in Hate Crimes Targeting Jewish Community first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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