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UNRWA Meets the Spanish Inquisition
View of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) building in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip. Photo: Abed Rahim Khatib / Flash90.
JNS.org – The collaboration between UNRWA, the U.N. agency solely dedicated to Palestinian refugees and their descendants, and the Hamas rulers of Gaza continues unabated.
Two episodes over the last week underscore that claim. On May 14, Israeli jets carried out a precision strike against a Hamas war room and weapons depot that was concealed beneath an UNRWA school in Nuseirat. Fifteen terrorists—10 of them members of Hamas’s elite Nukhba Force—were killed in the strike. Meanwhile, three days earlier, the Israelis released aerial surveillance footage of armed Palestinians in an UNRWA compound in the southern city of Rafah, where the IDF is facing off against four Hamas battalions. The video showed the gun-toting Palestinians milling inside the compound, from where they launched attacks on the gathering Israeli forces.
The intermingling of UNRWA facilities and personnel with Hamas and its nefarious aims has been a constant theme of Israeli messaging throughout the current war in the Gaza Strip. At the beginning of this year, it seemed as if other Western countries shared Israel’s concerns, with 18 of them, among them the United States, suspending funding to UNRWA. However, as the NGO UN Watch has documented, in the intervening period, nine of them have quietly restored their fiscal support. One of these countries was Germany, whose foreign ministry declared in an April 24 statement that UNRWA’s verbal willingness to implement the recommendations of an independent commission headed by former French Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna was enough to turn the money faucet back on. Israel’s vociferous objections—pointing out that Colonna had elided Jerusalem’s claim that more than 2,000 UNRWA staff members retain ties with Hamas—made no difference to the Germans, nor to the Japanese, or the Canadians or the other six nations who resumed financial assistance to the agency.
In the midst of all this, UNRWA received an award from the government of Spain—one of the countries that has maintained its funding throughout the conflict triggered by the Hamas pogrom in southern Israel on Oct. 7. The spectacle of a U.N. agency that indulges a terrorist group, whose tactics include the mass murder and rape of civilians for the crime of being Jews, being feted like this is, of course, deeply regrettable. But looked at from another angle, it is highly appropriate.
The award presented to UNRWA director general Philippe Lazzarini by Spanish Foreign Minister José Manuel Albares during his visit to New York on April 19 inducted him into the “Royal Order of Isabella the Catholic.” The “Isabella” referred to here is Queen Isabella I of Castile, who ruled Spain alongside her husband, King Ferdinand II, from 1474 until her death 30 years later. In 1492, at the height of the Spanish Inquisition, Isabella and Ferdinand issued an order for the ejection of Spain’s Jewish population, estimated to have been 300,000-strong.
The king and queen’s announcement of the expulsion—known as the Alhambra Decree—is on display, fittingly, at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C. Spanish Jews were given four months to pack up their belongings and settle their affairs, a chaotic and painful process that left Spain as a country economically and culturally impoverished. Sultan Bayezid II of the Ottoman Empire, who offered shelter to some of these Jews (among them my own family, who lived for centuries under Turkish rule in the Balkans), poked fun at the Spanish monarchs, questioning the judgment of those who would degrade their own kingdom only to “enrich ours.” In making that observation, Bayezid inadvertently grasped one of the more curious aspects of Jew-hatred—that its advocates will push for it relentlessly, even when it doesn’t suit their own interests to do so.
One of the more curious aspects of Jew-hatred is that its advocates will push for it relentlessly, even when it doesn’t suit their own interests.
Few institutions would be as receptive as UNRWA when it comes to Spain expressing pride in a monarch who deservedly has the reputation as one of the worst persecutors of Jews in their history. The history of antisemitism has been captured in a simple formula: You have no right to live among us as Jews; you have no right to live among us; you have no right to live. Queen Isabella’s place on this spectrum is evident and unarguable. Equally, Hamas belongs there no less. The Iranian-backed organization doesn’t like Jews, doesn’t like Jews living among Muslims and doesn’t like Jews being alive at all. They may be separated by seven centuries, but Isabella and UNRWA, which has actively promoted Hamas-style antisemitism in its schools, have a huge amount in common when it comes to the Jewish people.
Were Hamas to succeed in its goal of eliminating Israel as a sovereign state, we might well expect an announcement to that end not dissimilar to the Alhambra Declaration. Those Jews who survived the destruction of their only state would, if they were lucky, be given four months to liquidate their assets, hand over their properties to “returning” Palestinian refugees and make their way out of the country. No doubt some would figure out a way to stay—probably by hiding their Jewish identities and attempting to integrate with the rest of the population, as those Jews who remained in Spain after the expulsion did. UNRWA, by a twist of historical irony, might even offer to shepherd their exit within parameters set by Hamas that would prevent forever any possibility of returning. While such a scenario may seem improbable today, if history has taught us anything, it’s that it’s not improbable tomorrow.
The history of antisemitism has been captured in a simple formula: You have no right to live among us as Jews; you have no right to live among us; you have no right to live.
Fundamentally, the problem here is that too many states—not just Turkey, Iran, Russia, North Korea, China and other citadels of authoritarian rule, but democracies as well—believe that the way to convince the Palestinians to accept peace is by kowtowing to their jealously guarded victimhood status.
By the end of this month, it’s likely that several European Union member states, including Spain and also Ireland, Malta, Slovenia and Belgium, will have unilaterally recognized an independent Palestinian state. Albares is one of the foreign ministers actively promoting the fiction that such a move will bolster, rather than undermine, the prospects for the creation of a Palestinian state alongside Israel that will coexist peacefully.
Deep down, you have to believe that Albares knows that’s simply not true—that most Palestinians, as successive opinion polls since Oct. 7 have borne out, regard a state alongside Israel not as a final settlement but a step towards conquering the entire land “from the river to the sea.” These are the stakes that Israel has to contend with when it deals with diplomats and other foreign officials quietly sympathetic to the idea that the Jewish state shouldn’t be there in the first place.
Isabella the Catholic would be proud.
The post UNRWA Meets the Spanish Inquisition first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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A pro-Israel rally at the University of Toronto was headlined by Columbia University professor Shai Davidai
Around 200 people gathered for a pro-Israel demonstration at University of Toronto’s downtown campus at King’s College Circle—which was the site of one of Canada’s largest pro-Palestinian encampments during May […]
The post A pro-Israel rally at the University of Toronto was headlined by Columbia University professor Shai Davidai appeared first on The Canadian Jewish News.
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‘Not Welcome’: New Pro-Hamas Campaign Aims to Abolish Hillel Campus Chapters
A statue of George Washington tied with a Palestinian flag and a keffiyeh inside a pro-Hamas encampment is pictured at George Washington University in Washington, DC, US, May 2, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Craig Hudson
The campus group National Students for Justice in Palestine (NSJP) is waging a campaign to gut Jewish life in academia, calling for the abolition of Hillel International campus chapters, the largest collegiate organization for Jewish students in the world.
“Over the past several decades, Hillel has monopolized for Jewish campus life into a pipeline for pro-Israel indoctrination, genocide-apologia, and material support to the Zionist project and its crimes,” a social media account operating the campaign, titled #DropHillel, said in a manifesto published last week. “Across the country, Hillel chapters have invited Israeli soldiers to their campuses; promoted propaganda trips such as birthright; and organized charity drives for the Israeli military.”
It continued, “Such actions reveal Hillel’s ideological and material investment in Zionism, despite the organization’s facade as being simply a ‘Jewish cultural space.’”
DropHillel claims to be “Jewish-led,” although only a small minority of Jews oppose Zionism, and the group has been linked to and promoted by Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) chapters.
Hillel International has provided Jewish students a home away from home during the academic year. However, NSJP says it wants to “weaken” it and “dismantle oppression.”
The idea has already been picked up by pro-Hamas student groups at one college, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, according to The Daily Tar Heel, the school’s official student newspaper. On Oct. 9, it reported, a member of Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) unveiled the idea for “no more Hillel” during a rally which, among other things, demanded removing Israel from UNC’s study abroad program and adopting the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement. Addressing the comments to the paper days later, SJP, which has been linked to Islamist terrorist organizations, proclaimed that shuttering Hillel is a coveted goal of the anti-Zionist movement.
“Zionism is a racist supremacist ideology advocating for the creation and sustenance of an ethnostate through the expulsion and annihilation of native people,” the group told the paper. “Therefore, any group that advocates for a supremacist ideology — be it the KKK, the Proud Boys, Hillel, or Heels for Israel — should not be welcome on campus.”
The #DropHillel campaign came amid an unprecedented surge in anti-Israel incidents on college campuses, which, according to a report published last month by the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), have reached crisis levels.
Revealing a “staggering” 477 percent increase in anti-Zionist activity involving assault, vandalism, and other phenomena, the report — titled “Anti-Israel Activism on US Campuses, 2023-2024” — painted a bleak picture of America’s higher education system poisoned by political extremism and hate.
“As the year progressed, Jewish students and Jewish groups on campus came under unrelenting scrutiny for any association, actual or perceived, with Israel or Zionism,” the report said. “This often led to the harassment of Jewish members of campus communities and vandalism of Jewish institutions. In some cases, it led to assault. These developments were underpinned by a steady stream of rhetoric from anti-Israel activists expressing explicit support for US-designated terrorists organizations, such as Hamas, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) and others.”
The report added that 10 campuses accounted for 16 percent of all incidents tracked by ADL researchers, with Columbia University and the University of Michigan combining for 90 anti-Israel incidents — 52 and 38, respectively. Harvard University, the University of California – Los Angeles, Rutgers University New Brunswick, Stanford University, Cornell University, and others filled out the rest of the top 10. Violence, it continued, was most common at universities in the state of California, where anti-Zionist activists punched a Jewish student for filming him at a protest.
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
The post ‘Not Welcome’: New Pro-Hamas Campaign Aims to Abolish Hillel Campus Chapters first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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‘Muslim for Trump’ Launches Initiatives in Key Battleground States, Says Candidate Will Bring ‘Peace’ to Gaza
Former US President Donald Trump is seen at a campaign event in South Carolina. Photo: Reuters/Sam Wolfe
The “Muslims for Trump” organization has officially launched initiatives to help elect Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump to the White House, arguing that he would be more likely to end the war in Gaza than Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris.
In a statement released on Monday, the group said it will focus on recruiting Muslim voters in key battleground states such as Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Georgia, and North Carolina. The organization both praised Trump for his supposed “peace-focused” approach to ending the war in Gaza and condemned Harris for helping facilitate a so-called “genocide.”
“After meeting with President Trump, it was clear to me he is the right leader for Muslims to get behind,” Rabiul Chowdhury, co-founder of Muslims for Trump and former co-chair of the “Abandon Harris Movement,” said in a statement.
Chowdhury added that during his discussions with Trump, the former president vowed to “ending the escalation of wars and bringing peace to war-torn regions.” In contrast to Trump’s promise to stop the “bloodshed” in Gaza, he claimed, Harris has “recklessly pushed us toward World War III.”
Chowdhury, a self-described “peace advocate,” urged the Muslim community not to fall victim to supposed “misinformation” campaigns by the media and Democrats that paint the former president as hostile to immigrants. He claimed that the former president’s focus is on “ending war, not dividing families through false immigration claims.”
Samra Luqman, chair of the Michigan chapter of Muslims for Trump, underscored the need to punish the Biden administration for what he described as supporting a “genocide” in Gaza.
“The goal of this election is to hold the Biden administration accountable for a genocide. No amount of fear mongering or scare tactics will persuade my community into forgiving the mutilation, live-burning, and genocide of over 200,000 people,” he said.
According to data produced by the Hamas-controlled Gaza Health Ministry, roughly 40,000 people have died in Gaza since the war began last October. Israel has said that its forces have killed about 20,000 Hamas terrorists during its military campaign.
Israel says it has gone to unprecedented lengths to try and avoid civilian casualties, noting its efforts to evacuate areas before it targets them and to warn residents of impending military operations with leaflets, text messages, and other forms of communication.
On the organization Muslims for Trump’s official website, it claims that the Abraham Accords, a series of historic, Trump administration-brokered normalization agreements between Israel and several countries in the Arab world, helped stabilize the Middle East. It also says that had Trump not lost the 2020 presidential race, the so-called “genocide” could have been prevented.
“Under Trump’s leadership, the Abraham Accords were brokered, fostering peaceful relations between Israel and several Arab countries. Supporters might argue that Trump’s diplomacy prioritized peace and stability in the Middle East, reducing the likelihood of large-scale conflicts like genocide,” the group wrote.
Over the course of his campaign, Trump has repeatedly touted his support for the Jewish state during his singular term in office. Trump has boasted about his administration’s work in fostering the Abraham Accords, promising to resume efforts to strengthen them if he were to win November’s US presidential election.
Harsh US sanctions levied on Iran under Trump crippled the Iranian economy and led its foreign exchange reserves to plummet. Trump and his Republican supporters in the US Congress have criticized the Biden administration for renewing billions of dollars in US sanctions waivers, which had the effect of unlocking frozen funds and allowing the country to access previously inaccessible hard currency.
Trump also recognized Israel’s sovereignty over the Golan Heights, a strategic region on Israel’s northern border previously controlled by Syria, and also moved the US embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, recognizing the city as the Jewish state’s capital.
Despite Harris’s repeated efforts to woo Muslim voters, polling data indicates that the demographic has made a dramatic swing away from the Democratic Party. Polling data from the Arab American Institute reveals that Trump slightly edges Harris among Muslim voters by a margin of 42 to 41 percent. A report from the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) shows that Green Party candidate Jill Stein leads Harris and Trump with Muslim voters in the key swing states of Michigan, Wisconsin, and Arizona.
The post ‘Muslim for Trump’ Launches Initiatives in Key Battleground States, Says Candidate Will Bring ‘Peace’ to Gaza first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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