(Excellent) Note to the EU and UN: The Palestinian leopard does not change its spots - by Charles Abelsohn

The time has come for the UN and the EU to recognize that the only parameter and framework relevant to Israel are that the Palestinian leopard has not, and apparently cannot and will not, change its spots. Both pre-1967 and post 1967, the Palestinian policy is for violence and terrorism against Israel`s very existence. The policies of the EU and UN strongly promote the Palestinians needing to be rewarded for their anti-Israel terrorism and violence since 1949.

Charles Abelsohn..
TOI Blog..
27 July '20

In 1948 the independent state of Israel was declared. The armies of several Arab armies invaded what was mandatory Palestine, intended to be the Jewish homeland under the San Remo Agreement. Much of Samaria and Judea was captured by the British officered, trained and supplied Trans-Jordanian forces. In 1949 cease fires were declared and armistice agreements entered into between Israel and several Arab states.

Trans-Jordan itself changed its name to Jordan and then renamed the captured area of Samaria and Judea as the West Bank. For the first time in its history, Jerusalem was divided. The Jordanians expelled the ancient Jewish community from the Jewish quarter of the Old City. The Holy Places, being the Western Wall, Rachel`s Tomb and the Temple Mount, were all held by Jordan and Jews and Israelis were not permitted access to their Holy Places despite provisions explicitly permitting access in the armistice agreement. In the Old City, now held by Jordan, 58 synagogues were destroyed and the ancient Jewish cemetery on the Mount of Olives desecrated. Egypt controlled and administered Gaza. The lines (not borders) between Jordan, Egypt and Syria and Israel were set out with a green pen in Armistice Agreements – hence the term “green lines” – without prejudice to the rights, claims and positions of either Israel or Jordan.

In 1967, the above areas were retaken by Israeli forces and Jews were again able to live in areas populated by Jews before their expulsion by Jordan in 1948 and Jews again had access to their Holy Places.

It is the return of Jews to the 6.4 km2 of the Old City of Jerusalem, the re-establishment of Jewish populations in Area C of the West Bank and the unification of Jerusalem (some may add Areas A & B as well; this aspect is not the subject of this article) which is generally referred to, as the “Israeli occupation”.

Since 1967, there has been considerable violence between the Palestinians and Israel. Most critics of Israel take the view “The cycle of violence between Israel and the Palestinians is triggered by the dynamics of the Israeli occupation”.

As shown above, there was no “Israeli occupation” between 1948 and 1967. Thus, according to this theme and outlook, since there was no “Israeli occupation”, these were the years of tranquility and Paradise Regained. The EU and the UN demand of Israel to return to the 1949 armistice lines so that peace and calm in the Middle East would be restored and the Israel – Arab conflict be deemed resolved. After all, the atmosphere in the Middle East before 5 June 1967 was idyllic. For the EU and UN, there was actually no good reason in 1967 for the UN to withdraw troops, for the Egyptians to impose a blockade on Eilat and for Egypt and Syria, subsequently joined by Jordan, to threaten Israel. Let`s just restore 4 June 1967 lines and all the “problems” will be resolved. It is really so simple.

Except that it is not.

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The "Zionism equals Racism" resolution lost its legal status in 1991, but ... - by Dr. Alex Grobman

Recognizing Israel as a legitimate entity means that there is “justice in Zionism.” By forcing Jews to reject Zionism as “Jewish nationalism,” the Arabs could deprive the Jews of their national status, leaving them only with a religious identity that gave them no rights to a state of their own, according them inferior status as a people. The ultimate conclusion, accordingly, would be to accept antisemitism on an international basis.

Dr. Alex Grobman..
Israelnationalnews.com..
13 May '20..
Link: https://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/280171

On the 37th anniversary of the Kristallnacht (Night of the Broken Glass), the UN General Assembly declared that Zionism is racism and a form of racial discrimination (Z=R) when it adopted Resolution 3379. The resolution, which passed on November 10, 1975, was part of an organized global campaign by the Soviets and the Arab states to delegitimize the State of Israel, after an abortive attempt to expel her from the UN.

On the same day, the UN General Assembly passed Resolution 3376, creating an Assembly Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People. Sixteen of the original 20 members on the Assembly committee did not have diplomatic relations with Israel, and some had never acknowledged Israel’s right to exist. [1]

Former U.S. Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley, placed anti-Israel hostility in perspective: “What I saw at the Security Council reminded me of what it felt like to be bullied when I was a kid.,,"
The Z=R resolution attracted worldwide attention to Zionism as “a form of racism and racial discrimination.” guaranteeing Israel would be viewed as a racist state the international community would have to confront. Although the resolution was abrogated in 1991, depriving it of legal status, the hostility it generated toward Israel in most UN member nations, and in the UN’s own institutions continues unabated. [2].

No Longer Just a Common Reprobate

Israel was “no longer among the ordinary evil-doers of this world, all of whom at one time or another attack and harm civilian populations, oppress minorities, and institute exclusive immigration laws and monopolistic religious laws.” wrote Ehud Sprinzak, a Hebrew University political science professor. Israel’s crimes were committed “as part of an entire ideological system” and therefore every Israeli government action was racist and “antihumanistic.”

Israel had gone from being a legitimate national liberation movement to one that opposed the rightful aspirations of other nations and peoples. The UN General Assembly provided the stage and a guilt free path, assuming one was needed, for antisemites and antisemitism at the UN [3]

Even more insidious, the resolution went to the heart of Israel’s right to exist, opined Norman Podhoretz, editor of Commentary magazine. Israel was denounced not only “as an illegitimate entity,” but, “the very idea of a sovereign Jewish state in the Middle East (Zionism), let alone the actuality of one, no matter what its boundaries might be, was by definition declared criminal (racist)…. Israel could only cease to be criminal if it ceased to be both Jewish and sovereign—if, in other words, it ceased to exist. Returning to the boundaries of 1967 or even the boundaries of 1948 would make not the slightest difference. For the resolution did not concern boundaries or occupied territories; it concerned the right of a sovereign Jewish state of any size or shape to exist in the Middle East.” [4]

For Yohanan Manor, director of the Center for Monitoring the Impact of Peace, anti-Zionism “is more a slogan than an ideology.” Anti-Zionism, anti-Israel and anti-U.S. slogans are the one of the few types of glue that somehow holds together the heterogeneous coalition against globalism.” [5]

Ignoring the PA's "Pay for Slay" policy, and asking the world for funding, UN neutrality at its worst - by Maurice Hirsch, Adv.

This approach of the UN will neither relieve the hardships of the Palestinians nor promote peace. Rather, it guarantees more dependence, terrorism, and conflict.

Maurice Hirsch, Adv...
Palestinian Media Watch..
12 December '19..
Link: https://palwatch.org/page/17025

Today the UN marks International Neutrality Day, stressing that “Neutrality is critical for the UN to gain, and maintain the confidence and cooperation of all.” In direct contrast to this statement, just yesterday, Dec. 11, 2019, the UN together with the Palestinian Authority launched a $348 million appeal “to address critical humanitarian needs of Palestinians.”

Asking the world to once again dig deeply into the pockets of their taxpayers, the UN request ignores the fact that the PA squanders hundreds of millions of shekels every year.

Most notably, the appeal failed to mention the hundreds of millions of shekels the PA squanders financing its “Pay-for-Slay” terror reward policy. In 2018, “Pay-for-Slay” cost the PA no less than 743 million shekels. 502 million shekels were spent paying the monthly salaries of terrorist prisoners and released prisoners and at least 241 million shekels were spent paying allowances to the families of dead terrorists, the so-called “Martyrs.”

As of the end of October 2019, PA financial reports show that it has spent 490,709,000 shekels on the PLO Commission of Prisoners, of which 396,103,000 shekels was paid to terrorist prisoners and released prisoners. Hundreds of millions more have been paid in 2019 to the families of dead terrorists.

In addition, in its appeal the UN ignored the fact that in the years 2011 – 2018, the PA transferred funds totaling more than 7 billion shekels to the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO). The PLO is not subject to any financial transparency and it is not clear what happened with these funds. Having said that, Palestinian Media Watch has already proved that the PLO uses the funds it receives from the PA to fund internationally designated terrorist organizations such as the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP).

No . . . The United Nations Didn’t Create Israel - by Ken Cohen

So, in discussions with friends, family and adversaries, beware of the canard “the UN imposed the Jewish state into Palestine,” or that “Israel should respect the United Nations, because it owes its very existence and legitimacy to the UN.” Explain patiently to them that Israel owes little to nothing to the United Nations, and that Israel’s reason for existence is its own ability to assert the Jewish people’s right as an indigenous people to its ancestral homeland. Oh yes—and Israel is also indebted to itself for its democratic vibrancy, its respect for its minority populations, and its ability to defend itself in the face of a hostile world . . . including the United Nations.

Ken Cohen..
Flame..
13 August '19..
Link: https://www.factsandlogic.org/the-united-nations-didnt-create-israel/

Hanan Ashwari, a member of the Executive Committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization, recently restated one of her favorite falsehoods about the creation of Israel. This falsehood—ironically often advanced by both Israel’s supporters and its enemies—holds that Israel was created by the United Nations in its Palestine Partition Resolution 181, passed on November 29, 1947 and implemented by Great Britain’s withdrawal on May 14, 1948.

It is a pernicious lie that portrays Israel as existing simply as a result of “the kindness of strangers” and as a foreign body imposed on the region by outside forces.

In fact, Jews have yearned and struggled to return to their ancestral homeland for three millennia. Zionism began as a movement in 1897, when Jews began to resettle in what was then called Palestine, culminating in Israel’s declaration of independence in 1948 on the same day Great Britain left.

Those dates in 1947 and 1948 were momentous events in the Zionist effort to create a Jewish nation in its indigenous land, and are celebrated annually in Israel and among most diaspora Jews. But November 29—the date of the UN General Assembly vote to recommend the partition of Palestine—is, appropriately, not an Israeli holiday. Appropriately though, May 14—or its equivalent date on the Jewish calendar—is feted as the Israeli Independence Day, Yom Ha’Atzmaut.

In any event, the UN’s Palestine partition is of merely symbolic value in explaining Israel’s creation.

After World War II, Great Britain was a thoroughly exhausted shadow of its former colonial power. While the creation of a Jewish homeland was the express purpose of the British Mandate starting in 1922 under the League of Nations, Britain utterly betrayed its Mandate obligations.

Rather than fulfilling its role of welcoming Jewish immigrants to Palestine, the British—in order to pacify Arab anti-Semitic terrorism—issued the notorious White Paper of 1939, which prohibited Jewish immigration to Palestine. It thus cut off six million European Jews from the only place in the world that could have saved them from Hitler’s genocide.

Another Anti-Israel Biased UN Body? - World Health Organization (WHO) Backgrounder - by Ricki Hollander

Were the WHO really interested in improving Palestinian healthcare, it would examine all the factors involved in regulating healthcare. But like the Hamas Health Ministry, the WHO seems more concerned with spreading anti-Israel propaganda than in seeking improvement to Palestinian healthcare.

Ricki Hollander..
CAMERA..
 26 June '19..

 The World Health Organization (WHO) is the United Nations agency responsible for international health. Like other UN bodies, the WHO singles out Israel for denunciation. At its annual meeting at the end of May, the WHO passed a resolution condemning Israel for “health conditions in the occupied Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem, and in the occupied Syrian Golan.” Of the 21 items on the meeting’s agenda only one focused on a single country—Israel. There was no mention of healthcare catastrophes in Syria, Yemen, Venezuela, or sub-Saharan Africa.

 One must be familiar with the source of biased reports and resolutions that bear the stamp of the WHO, a globally respected international organization focused on healthcare improvement. These reports are issued by a regional division of the WHO that is hostile to Israel, and extend beyond healthcare to take on a political tone blaming Israel for any inadequacies in the healthcare of Palestinians.

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Ricki Hollander is a senior media analyst at CAMERA. Her analyses, commentary and letters about the Arab-Israeli conflict and its media coverage have appeared in such publications as the National Review, Middle East Quarterly, Newsweek, Spectator, Chicago Sun Times, Algemeiner and Times of Israel. She has lectured across North America and in Israel about the topic. Hollander is co-author of the monograph "Indicting Israel: New York Times Coverage of the Palestinian-Israeli Conflict."