The UN: Abbas’s Palestinian playground

For full article by Yisrael Medad  https://www.jns.org/opinion/the-un-abbas-playground/ 

(October 2, 2018 ) 

How important is the Temple Mount?  Ask Mahmoud Abbas. Elected leader in 2009, with no elections since then, of the Palestinian Authority that purports to be a state (but can’t even extend effectively its rule over Gaza).

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According to the Haaretz version of his speech at the U.N. General Assembly on Wednesday last week, he said:

“And you might note, ladies and gentlemen, that the Israeli settlers and even the Israeli army on every single day; they are committing acts of blasphemy against our holy sites, especially Al-Aqsa mosque.”

The media supporting the P.A. regularly employs purposeful terminology so as to distort and demonize Jews. One recent headline published during the Sukkot holiday reads: “Over 500 Israeli settlers storm Al-Aqsa.” Indeed, “storm” is their preferred word-of-choice, intimating that Jews as Jews should not be there at all, and that they are somehow breaking in illegally. Another referred to “religious rituals” as if they were witches from Macbeth.

Interestingly, that section was not in the official WAFA version.

By the way, Jews do not, indeed cannot, enter the Temple Mount compound daily, unlike prior to 2000. Almost 160 days in the year the Temple Mount are off-limits to Jewish visitors for various reasons.

But that was but one part of Abbas’s litany of lies.

He also touched on the Law of Israel as a nation-state and declared:

“This racist law talks about what is called the ‘land of Israel.’ Can you ask the Israeli government what exactly constitutes the ‘land of Israel’? What are the ‘borders’ of the State of Israel? I challenge anyone to tell us what they are.”

If one reads the Basic Law of the Palestinian Authority, no exact borders of a proposed Palestinian state exist. Worse, all we are informed geographically is that “Palestine is part of the large Arab world.”

In another version, we read of another land mass undefined: “On the land of the fathers and forefathers, the land of heavenly Messages … ,” but then deeper into the document, we read, “Its territory is an indivisible whole with its boundaries, as they existed on the eve of 4 June 1967.” And yet, Judea and Samaria were part of Jordan, illegally occupied and annexed, and Gaza was under Egyptian military rule. We also need not forget that the U.N.’s Resolution 242 does not mention Palestine as a state or other political entity.

So, what is Abbas claiming?

Quite simply, he is engaged in national-identity negation.

A bit later on in his address, Abbas notes that the Arabs of Palestine are “an indigenous people and our roots are deep across 5,000 years.” Arab collective identity within the general area of historic Palestine is 1,380 years old. Arabs may have been engaged in commerce or pilgrimage before 638 C.E. (and prior to them assuming an Islamic ethos), but to claim a 5,000-year history, even as Canaanites or Jebusites or even Natufians are false, ridiculous and outlandish suggestions.

What does Abbas mean when he said peace must include “an independent Palestinian state, with East Jerusalem as its capital, and not some place in East Jerusalem as its capital, and with all of its holy sites?” Do all holy sites refer to just Islamic sites? What about Christian or Jewish sites, and the claim that one cannot be Palestinian if one is Jewish? Of course, since Abbas and company promote a form of reconstructionism that suggests the Western Wall is actually the Al-Buraq tethering post, and outright denies of the 800-year existence of two Jewish Temples on the Temple Mount—despite their explicit mention in the Koran—perhaps Abbas really does disavow anything Jewish about Jerusalem.

One last excerpt of reveals Abbas’s strategy of self-denial, on the one hand, and his assumption that all will believe him no matter how pejorative he is on the other:

“We resist this colonial, settler Israeli occupation through the legitimate means created by this international organization. Foremost among these is peaceful, popular resistance as we witness today in the Great March of Return in Gaza.”

Incendiary kites, terror tunnels, sniper fire, tossing of grenades, IEDs, infiltration and more at the Gaza border occur almost daily, not to mention mortars, rockets and missiles.

But Abbas knows that the United Nations is his playground, his theater. He can be elected, as he was just now, to the Group of 77 with impunity despite his words and his actions. And his stage is becoming increasingly immoral, malevolent and extremely hazardous, revealed by the applause Abbas received from that seemingly august, peace-loving body.

It is that applause that assign to his appearances the tragicomic label.

Disproving 'Temple Mount Denial' One Bucket at a Time

 Daniel k. Eisenbud  October 6, 2017

Read full article at http://www.jpost.com/Magazine/Disproving-Temple-Mount-denial-one-bucket-at-a-time-506539 

When Wakf bulldozers illegally ascended the Temple Mount in 1999 to surreptitiously remove thousands of tons of ancient soil to make way for a subterranean mosque, two archeologists found hope in recovering some of the Jewish heritage that crime destroyed.

As countless invaluable artifacts dating from the First Temple period at Judaism’s holiest site were dumped in a garbage heap in the capital’s Kidron Valley, Dr. Gabriel Barkay and Zachi Dvira saw an opportunity.

Five years later, under the auspices of Bar-Ilan University, the two archeologists procured a government license to have the ancient debris transferred to Emek Tzurim National Park on the western slope of Mount Scopus, where they established the headquarters of the Temple Mount Sifting Project.

Today some 70% of the 400 truckloads of earth has been scrutinized by a staff of 15 employees and thousands of volunteers from around the globe, one bucket at a time.

OVER 200,000 volunteers from all facets of society, 

both Israelis and foreigners, have taken part in sifting 

earth from the Temple Mount. (Tommy Chamberlin)

Since then, more than 500,000 artifacts – from a 3,000-year-old seal from the time of King David to coins, stone vessels, jewelry and flooring tile fragments from the Second Temple period – have been painstakingly documented for future generations.

Nevertheless, to the outrage and utter befuddlement of millions, last October UNESCO approved a resolution denying Jewish ties to the Temple Mount.

“Temple denial started in the 1990s, even though the Islamic Wakf itself in the 1920s and ’30s issued booklets which were given to visitors of the Temple Mount in which they said the existence of the Temples is beyond any doubt,” said Barkay last month.

“It was accepted and in the Islamic literature through the generations there is a plethora of mentions of Solomon’s Temple and the Temple of the Jews in Jerusalem, so it is very strange that they deny it now.”

“The place was shown as the Temple Mount by Muslim guides to visitors all the time for centuries,” he continued. “The whole change came when a very naïve Bill Clinton wanted to solve all the problems of the world, and somebody whispered into his ear that the Temple Mount is the crux of the Middle East conflict, and he wanted to solve the conflict by solving the problem of sovereignty on the Temple Mount. “They claimed that Jerusalem has no significance to the Jews, and want to have sole control of Jerusalem and the Temple Mount,” he said. “The whole thing is a political matter and misuse of ancient history for current political purposes.”

Noting the fact that the Bible, Mishna and Greek and Roman historians wrote in depth about the Temples’ existence, Barkay deems Temple denial “shameful” and “anti-civilized,” because “UNESCO’s decisions are politically based on majority and self-interests.

“If it would be in their interest to declare that the Earth is flat, they would have a majority vote [claiming so]. They can vote about anything they wish, but this is to the shame of that institution. No civilized person in the world can claim Temple denial or lack of a Jewish link to Jerusalem.

In the meantime, Barkay said proving Jewish ties to the Temple Mount and Jerusalem is akin to “proving that water is wet.”

Barkay noted that roughly 10% of the datable finds sifted were linked to the 400 years of the Davidic dynasty of the First Temple period.

“From the Second Temple period during the fourth century BCE we have a large amount of coins from the Persian period with Hebrew inscriptions with the name of the province of Judah, ‘Yehud,’ which is a name mentioned in the Book of Ezra in the Bible. And those tiny silver coins are the earliest discovered that were minted in Jerusalem.”

Nonetheless, Barkay contends that there is no need for Jewish evidence from the Temple Mount during antiquity, because it has been universally accepted by scholars and researchers for centuries.

Meanwhile, despite being in need of funding to keep the enterprise operational, the celebrated archeologist said the tens of thousands of volunteers of all ages from all corners of the world have become as invaluable to the project as the historic relics they sift through.

Palestinian Hypocrisy? No, it’s worse, far worse!

It’s incitement to Murder!

Falseness, deceit, dishonesty, mendacity, pretense, duplicity – take your pick – can describe some of the Muslim world’s predictable knee-jerk reaction to Israel installing metal detectors placed outside at the entrance to al-Ḥaram al-Qudsī al-Šarīf, (“the Noble Sanctuary of Jerusalem”), or as referred to by Jews as the Temple Mount – but it is far worse.

It is incitement to murder and all those hypocritical counties supporting the PA’s nefarious position – it is nothing less than complicity of the same charge.

With a pretense of “holy sensitivities” – as if God; any God – would not support an action that saves lives, the PA, and their fellow merchants of death, have come up with the argument that metal detectors are “an instrument of the occupation”.

What a spurious ‘argument’; how disturbing that it finds traction with those same countries – including the PA – that have those same metal detectors to save lives at their holy shrines and sites.

Metal detectors are not political, they are devices to save lives – the lives of Muslims, Jews, Christians, Druze, Bedouin and atheists, heterosexuals, gays and our animals, who are not party to politics or religion but are all equally – creatures of God.

Whether to Laugh or Cry?

Whether to laugh at the obvious stupidity of hypocritical leadership or cry at the potential tragic results, one must ask – Why the sudden outcry?

Thousands of Palestinians pass daily through metal detectors at shopping malls and state institutions, such as the Post Office, Railway Stations, the National Insurance Institute, hospitals, and medical centers. They don’t complain because they know it’s for their personal safety. If they staged such protests at any airport in the world, they would not be allowed to fly anywhere – including to Mecca on Hajj!

Yes, in Mecca, the Saudi Arabia government has made compulsory the wearing of electronic bracelets by the millions of pilgrims as a security measure.

The only reason for the outrage is another means to galvanise support to undermine Israel.  If lives are lost, they don’t care; they invite it for they are the Merchants of Death. And the audacity to assume that God supports this murderous venture and to expect countries who all have introduced these same security measures, is beyond belief.

Who among the international community are likely to sign off on this?

• Surely not the Saudis as noted above

• Surely not Bangladesh, where Security Magnetometers were placed at the entrance to the National Central Mosque in its capital Dhaka, at the end of 2016 after a terrorist attack killed 20 people.

• Surely not in India

Security Magnetometers at the entrance

to a Mosque in New Delhi, India.

• Surely not Egypt where it installed Security Magnetometers in 2016 at the mosque in Giza

• Surely not Kuwait which installed Security Magnetometers at the entrance to its mosques in 2015 and 2016 after numerous terror attacks that took place in mosques in the kingdom at that time.

• Surely not Dubai which started in 2015 to install walk-through security gates with metal detectors and CCTV at all gates with a source saying at the time:

• Surely not Indonesia, which has the largest Muslim population than any other country in the world and has installed metal detectors at the entrance to a Catholic church in Jakarta to protect the lives of Christian worshipers.

• Surely not France, which has the largest Muslim population in Europe and where there was no outcry when in November 2015 manual security checks for worshipers were conducted to those entering a mosque in Paris after the combined attack in the French capital in which 130 civilians were murdered.

• Surely not the USA who is trying to restrict easy entry of citizens from certain Muslim countries even entering the country.

In truth, surely not any country in the world with a responsible government.

Israel installed the Security Magnetometers at the entrance to al-Ḥaram al-Qudsī al-Šarīf or Temple Mount ONLY after two Druze Israeli policemen standing guard were shot by weapons that had been smuggled inside earlier because there were no metal detectors. The tragic result was that the policemen who were looking outward were attacked by surprise from the inside. Where is the Palestinian outcry about this MURDER or the incitement that has followed with three elderly Jewish civilians being murdered in a bloody knife attack.

Is this what the PA is asking the world to endorse – the right to murder?

Lies and Deception

The PA, Jordan and Turkey are accusing Israel of violating the status quo by installing metal detectors. This could not be further from the truth.

The Israeli government did not take the decision to install the metal detectors to alter the status quo or stop Muslims from praying; on the contrary, they took it precisely to preserve the status quo in a secure and safe environment.

Why did they protest the plan? No brainer – the Palestinians were afraid that their violence, harassment and amassing of weapons to attack Jewish visitors and police officers would be captured on camera.

It is this same thinking as to why they oppose the metal detectors – they want to be free to murder Jews.

In the same manner as measures to secure holy sites in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Indonesia, the Emirates, France and nearly everywhere in the world, it should apply no less than in Jerusalem that has built into its name – shalom and salaam – PEACE.

The world needs to bring some sanity to the PA leaders that they are not free to incite murder!

UNESCO Ignores Jewish Connection to Temple Mount

The Muslim dominated UNESCO is now taking steps to remove any connection of the Jewish people to the Temple Mount. And this is only the start. Little by little all sites around the world relevant to other religions are being targeted by the Muslim communities.

The draft calls for the re-instatement of the "historic status quo" pre 1967, yet how many are aware that during the Jordanian occupation from 1948 -67, Arabs WERE NOT allowed to pray on the Temple Mount.

The draft now before UNESCO includes the following problematic language:

• The draft ten times refers to Al-Haram Al-Sharif, exclusively using the Islamic term for Temple Mount, without any mention that it is the holiest site in Judaism. This is part of a larger campaign at the UN, and particularly in UNESCO, to Islamize sites historically belonging to other faiths.

• This year’s proposed draft is even more extreme than the resolution adopted in 2015. The new version three times uses the Islamic term Buraq Plaza while placing the parallel name “Western Wall Plaza” in scare quotes, implying skepticism or disbelief concerning what is the most hallowed site for Jewish worshippers over two millennia, due to the ancient wall’s connection to the Holy Jewish Temple destroyed in 70 CE. Last year’s resolution also sought to diminish the Jewish connection by putting the name Western Wall in parentheses after the Islamic term, yet the new use of quotation marks intensifies the denialism that was famously promoted by Yasser Arafat’s negotiator at Camp David, and which continues in Palestinian Authority statements.

• Israel, which is referred to throughout as “the Occupying Power” in Jerusalem, is called to restore “the historic Status Quo,” with the new word “historic”—a change from last year’s text—implying a reversal of any changes since 1967.

• Jerusalem’s light rail, which is used daily by thousands of Arab residents among others, is accused of having a “damaging effect” on the “visual integrity” and “authentic character” of the walls of the Old City of Jerusalem—even though the track passes through an existing highway and only facilitates transportation for visitors of all faiths.

BBC News ignores latest Temple Mount rioting

Hadar Sela June 29th

https://bbcwatch.org/2016/06/29/bbc-news-ignores-latest-temple-mount-rioting/ 

Those getting their news from the BBC News website will not be aware of the fact that Palestinians recently engaged in pre-planned rioting on Temple Mount over a period of three consecutive days.

The violence began on the morning of June 26th.

“Mayhem ensued on the Temple Mount Sunday morning, when a group of masked Arab assailants threw rocks, shoes, metal objects, and chairs at a group of Jewish visitors at the contested compound during the first of the last 10 days of Ramadan.

According to police, who provided video of the disturbance, the group of 11 observant Jews were targeted shortly after entering the compound at approximately 9 a.m. in what appeared to be a premeditated attack.”

The rioting continued the next day.

“Police had deployed additional forces there as a precaution after learning, it said, that “Arab youths, some of them masked, barricaded themselves during the night in the Al-Aqsa Mosque on the Temple Mount with the aim of confronting police, and to disrupt the regular visits and visitors in the Temple Mount area during the Ramadan holiday.”

Of the 263 visitors to the Temple Mount on Monday, 33 of them were Jews, police spokeswoman Luba Samri said in a statement.

According to police, the rioters stockpiled stones and other objects, including firecrackers, inside the Al-Aqsa mosque, “all of which was intended as a confrontation with police and security forces, to prevent them closing the doors and to disrupt the regular visits to the Temple Mount.””

On June 28th a woman was injured at the Western Wall.

“Palestinians threw rocks at Jewish worshippers at the Western Wall on Tuesday, striking a woman of 73 in the head, on a third day of confrontations involving the adjacent Temple Mount.

Paramedics said they treated the woman at the scene for a light head injury.”

The background to this latest round of organised rioting lies in the fact that this year – in contrast with the two previous years – the police decided to keep Temple Mount open to all visitors throughout Ramadan.

“Although non-Muslim visitation to the compound was banned for the last 10 days of Ramadan for the previous two years due to threats of violence, [police spokesman] Rosenfeld said that morning tours will resume for the remainder of the holiday.

“Of course we will make security assessments this evening for the next few days of Ramadan,” he said.”

However, the thugs eventually got their way.  

“Following three consecutive days of rioting by Arab youths on the Temple Mount, police announced Tuesday morning that the contested holy site will be temporarily closed to non-Muslim visitors, at least through Thursday.

In a statement, police said the decision was made after security assessments indicated it was not safe for Jewish visitors, who have been the target of numerous attacks there since Sunday, when the final 10 days of Ramadan commenced.”

Notably, the BBC has not found it necessary to report on this latest round of organised violence intended to prevent non-Muslims from visiting a site of importance to three religions.

Meanwhile, Israel continues to facilitate Ramadan visits to the site by Palestinians from the Gaza Strip and PA controlled areas.  

Petition UNESC - take just two minutes

Everyone can spend just two minutes to sign this petition calling on the UN and its offices torecognise the deep connection of the land of Israel to the Jews. Have you go 2 minutes to spare?

Join the International Legal Forum (ILF) and StandWithUs in calling upon the United Nations Educational, Social and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) to recognize the deep historic, cultural and religious connection between the Jewish people and holy sites in the land of Israel.

The recent UNESCO resolution passed on April 15, 2016, follows a line of insulting resolutions that completely ignore and disregard the Temple Mount as also being an ancestral holy site for the Jewish people/religion for over 3,000 years.

UNESCO was created with the clear mandate to build networks among nations and intercultural understanding by protecting heritage and supporting cultural diversity. In accordance with these values, we call upon UNESCO to recognize immediately the deep historic and religious connection between the Temple Mount and Judaism.

According to the Jewish religion, the Temple Mount is the holiest site in the world to the Jewish people. Throughout history, Jews all over the world have prayed facing the Temple Mount. According to Jewish tradition, the world was created from the Foundation Stone located on the Temple Mount, and the two Jewish Temples stood on the Temple Mount at two different times in history (an internationally and historical known and accepted axiom, backed by numerous archaeological findings).