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Category: Israel

The View Israel 

Betrayed Brexit voters will give up on democracy

Melanie, , ,

Betrayed Brexit voters will give up on democracy Who can doubt the contribution to Friday’s Chequers debacle made by the storied ranks of Whitehall’s Sir Humphreys, skilled beyond measure in manipulating politicians into standing on their heads and swearing they are still the right way up? Right from the moment Britain voted to leave the EU, it was clear that the entire political establishment would unite to thwart this. On Friday, it won and the British people lost. With the resignations of David Davis and Boris Johnson, however, both the…

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Culture wars Israel 

Time to leave? The question the Jews of Britain and Europe must ponder

Melanie, , ,

These are alarming times for Jews in Britain and Europe. The British Labour Party is convulsed over the realization that it is riddled with antisemitism. Jeremy Corbyn, its leader and a friend to Hamas, has been exposed as belonging to Facebook groups hosting claims that the Jews were behind ISIS and 9/11, that the Rothschilds controlled the world’s finances and other such paranoid theories. The backwash from the exposure of these groups revealed a tsunami of anti-Jewish insults, smears and libels by Labour supporters. Corbyn’s responses, often truculent and insulting…

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antisemitism Global conflict Israel 

The hurdles in front of the Trump peace plan

Melanie, , ,

President Trump’s peace plan for Israel and the Palestinian Arabs, his attempt at the “deal of the century,” will apparently soon be revealed to the world. His envoys, Jared Kushner and Jason Greenblatt, have been making the rounds in the region to get Arab allies on board. Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyhau has paid a visit to the King of Jordan. No one yet knows the terms of this deal. Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas has refused even to talk to the United States about it and has presumptively rejected…

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reframing Britain Israel 

Does the British government now recognise a country called Palestine?

Melanie, , ,

Oh dear. Prince William appears to be under the impression that there’s a country called Palestine. On his “apolitical” visit to Jordan, Israel and the Palestinian Authority, he reportedly told the PA President Mahmoud Abbas today: “I’m very glad our two countries work so closely together and have had success stories with education and relief work in the past…” Of course, there is no country called Palestine. Abbas’s strategy of war against Israel is to assert that there is, not just in contradiction of the truth but in flagrant repudiation…

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HRH Britain Israel 

HRH, the FCO and the big lie about Israel

Melanie, , ,

One of the most startling aspects of the demonisation of Israel is the use of international law as a key weapon. Israel represents law and justice against those who deny them. Yet it is falsely painted as fundamentally illegitimate and guilty of repeated illegality and breaches of international norms. Defenders of Israel, including its own government, seldom push back publicly against this. False assertions by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office about Israel’s illegal settlements or the “Occupied Palestinian Territories” are met with silence. Not surprisingly, this failure to engage has…

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Britain Israel 

Prince William comes to Israel under a Foreign Office cloud

Melanie, , ,

Next week the second in line to the British throne, Prince William, will make the first ever official visit to the State of Israel by a member of the Royal Family. The royals are merely the servants of the British government. Until now, the notoriously anti-Israel Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) has refused to permit an official visit to Israel by a member of the Royal Family out of concern for Arab anger. Whether it has now softened its stance or been overruled by Prime Minister Theresa May is unclear.…

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HRH Britain Israel 

Prince William: an FCO hostage in a minefield

Melanie, , ,

It was always a racing certainty that next week’s visit to the Middle East by Prince William, featuring the first official visit to Israel by a member of Britain’s Royal Family, would prove to be a diplomatic minefield. It now turns out, however, that rather than playing the role of minesweeper-in-chief Britain’s Foreign and Commonwealth Office has left one of its own landmines defiantly in place – and is guiding Prince William straight for it. Prince William is to visit Jordan, Israel and the area controlled by the Palestinian Authority.…

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reframing Israel 

Reframing the Middle East narrative: my ten-point guide

Melanie, , ,

Reframing the Middle East narrative: my ten-point guide I wrote a couple of weeks ago that those trying to defend Israel in the court of public opinion needed a strategic rethink. Defending Israel against the calumnies being thrown at it is to concede defeat from the start by engaging upon ground defined by its enemies. Instead, Israel’s defenders need to go onto the front foot. They need to do to its enemies what is done to Israel: to paint them as extreme, unconscionable and a mortal threat to life and…

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kaddish Israel 

The lethal moral confusion of saying kaddish for Hamas

Melanie, , ,

The lethal moral confusion of saying kaddish for Hamas The Hamas onslaught against Israel at the Gaza border fence has illustrated a danger for the Jewish people even more fundamental than the declared attempt to invade Israel and slaughter Jews. This is the fallout among the Jews themselves. In London, a group of young Jews assembled outside parliament to recite the kaddish prayer for the Hamas terrorists who were killed while attacking the fence in the most violent riots on May 15. In the US, Jonathan Greenblatt, head of the…

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BBC Israel 

A climate of suspicion, or prudent defence against terror?

Melanie, , ,

A climate of suspicion, or prudent defence against terror? MI5 is to declassify and share information on UK citizens suspected of having terrorist sympathies. “Key” biographical data on potentially hundreds of people will be given to neighbourhood police, councils and other public agencies such as the Probation Service and the Charity Commission. Is this only prudent in the interests of national security, or does it needlessly compromise privacy and freedom? I discussed this on BBC Radio’s Moral Maze this week with fellow-panellists Giles Fraser, Claire Fox and Tim Stanley. Our…

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