Greece: Jews celebrate outlawing of neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party

 
Via Jewish News:

Greek Jews celebrated a court decision to outlaw the neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party, calling it a “landmark” ruling that protects democracy.

The ruling on Wednesday by the Athens Court of Appeals convicted seven of the party’s former lawmakers, including party leader Nikos Michaloliakos, of leading a criminal organisation, a felony that carries a prison sentence of up to 10 years, the Associated Press reported. The remaining 51 defendants were convicted of belonging to a criminal enterprise.

The court decision caps a trial that began in 2015 with prosecutors arguing that Golden Dawn leaders were criminally responsible for the fatal stabbing of rap singer Pavlos Fyssas by a party supporter. Other cases supporting the prosecution  were assaults on immigrants and left-wing activists.

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Leaders of Golden Dawn, which uses a Swastika-themed symbol, have a history of Holocaust denial and incitement against Jews.

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Germany: Jewish student attacked with shovel in Hamburg

Via BBC:

A Jewish student has been badly injured in an attack by a man wielding a shovel as he entered a synagogue in the northern city of Hamburg.

The 26-year-old sustained severe head injuries and was taken to hospital, according to local media.

The suspected attacker was arrested and police confirmed they were investigating the case as attempted murder with anti-Semitic intent.

Last month Chancellor Angela Merkel warned of rising anti-Semitism.

The incident took place almost one year after a gunman attacked a synagogue in the city of Halle during Yom Kippur, killing two.

The victim of Sunday's attack was entering the synagogue when he was repeatedly hit on the head by the attacker.

The suspect, 29, was dressed in military clothes and had a hand-drawn swastika in his pocket, police said.

Police said the suspect was in a confused state when he was detained, reportedly by officers guarding the synagogue.

"The current assessment of the situation suggests this is an anti-Semitic motivated attack," a statement from police and prosecutors said. 

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Belgium: Antwerp Jews to lose army protection under new government’s plan

 

Via JTA:

Antwerp’s Jewish community will lose its military protection under a plan by Belgium’s new government to eliminate the presence of soldiers in urban centers.

Approximately 18,000 Jews live in the city in close proximity. Several troops protect its Jewish quarter.

A clause in the government’s plan, which was announced in the coalition agreement signed earlier this week, speaks of a “gradual withdrawal” of the military from urban centers.

“This plan is causing real alarm in the rank-and-file of the Jewish community of Antwerp,” Hans Knoop, a spokesman for the Forum of Jewish Organizations of the Flemish Region of Belgium, or FJO, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency in an interview about the plan. “Neither the actual threat nor the government’s own assessment of it have diminished.”

Thousands of troops were deployed in Belgian cities in 2015 following deadly jihadist terrorist attacks in Paris at the Charlie Hebdo satirical magazine and at a kosher supermarket. Most have been reassigned.

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Germany: Politicians part of 'Anti-Israel International', says expert

Via The Jerusalem Post:

Henryk Broder, Germany’s leading authority on contemporary antisemitism in the federal republic, wrote on Monday that scores of left-wing German politicians are anti-Israel because they signed a letter slamming Israel’s plan to exercise sovereignty over parts of the disputed West Bank territory.

Broder, who has testified in the Bundestag about new forms of Jew-hatred since the Holocaust, titled his article “The anti-Israel International” on the popular journalist website “The Axis of Good.” [...]

He mocked German politicians from the Left, Social Democratic and Green parties who signed the protest letter for not directing their letter to Turkey’s occupation of North Cyprus, Russia’s annexation of Crimea and China’s occupation of Tibet.

Critics have cited the European political preoccupation with the Jewish state as a form of double standard. Israel’s democracy is singled out while non-democratic nations who commit massive human rights crimes are not targeted.

The German politicians from the European parliament and the Bundestag, along with other politicians, wrote in their June 23 letter: “We, parliamentarians from across Europe committed to a rules-based global order, share serious concerns about President Trump’s plan for the Israeli Palestinian conflict and the imminent prospect of Israeli annexation of West Bank territory. We are deeply worried about the precedent this would set for international relations at large.”

A number of the German politicians who signed the letter promote the Boycott, Sanctions and Divestment campaign against Israel or have failed to take action against BDS-animated antisemitism within their party.

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Belgium: Auschwitz is a "tourist attraction" according to newspaper

One of Belgian quality newspapers, La Libre Belgique, has "tactfully" designated the Auschwitz extermination camp as a "tourist attraction":

"Tourist attraction?"

UK: Jewish man 'scared to leave the house' after antisemitic attack

Via LancsLive:

A Jewish man was left unable to see out of one eye after three man battered him in an unprovoked attack.

Ashley Walne, from Burnley, was standing outside his home on March 16 when he was set upon by three assailants.

The 29-year-old shares the home with his mother Dawn, 51, who tried to stop the three attackers as they relentlessly beat her son.

The attackers called him a "filthy Jew" before assaulting him and leaving him with numerous injuries to the face and eye.

"The attack has affected me mentally a lot," Ashley told LancsLive.

"I keep reliving the incident over and over again, my GP thinks I may have a form of post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

"I'm scared to go out of the house, I just keep thinking that someone else could come and attack me."

Ashley, who works as a funeral director, says that he is well known about the town for being proud of his Jewish heritage.

He was born in Burnley and has always been interested in his Jewish roots.

He said: "I'm quite well known about the town because I wear my Kippah (a traditional Jewish cap) all the time.

"I get a lot of verbal abuse on a daily basis but this was the first time I was physically attacked."

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Belgium: Two-year jail sentence for man who made antisemitic threats against MP

Via Jerusalem Post:

A man has been sentenced to two years in prison and ordered to pay a fine of €800 for carrying out an antisemitic death-threat campaign against a Jewish Belgian member of parliament.

Viviane Teitelbaum, a parliamentary representative for the capital of Brussels, was subjected to a stream of antisemitic insults over the Internet including death threats in 2018, by the unnamed man. The messages included antisemitic tropes and conspiracy theories, such as a connection between Teitelbaum and the diamond trade in Antwerp, and issued the parliamentarian with a series of deadlines, threatening to kill her if she did not meet them, The Algemeiner has reported.

One message read: “After this deadline, Ms. Teitelbaum, I promise you that nothing will be left !!! Neither from your stalls, nor from your constructions made with our programs, nor from your network, nor therefore from your money, nor from your cities, nor from your diamonds…!”

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Belgians call for murder of Jews in public (video)

Belgians shout: "Khaybar ya Yahud"

Via EJP:

Around 500 people, some waving Palestinian flags, who rallied around Place du Trône to denounce plans to apply Israeli sovereignty to parts of the West Bank, called for a boycott of Israel and the implementation of international sanctions against the country. 

But a video shared on Twitter shows protesters shouting anti-Jewish slogans in Arabic and calling for the murder of Jews. The video led to angry reactions from readers. "Scandalous; It is an incitement to hatred." "It is incredible that this is allowed to be screamed in total impunity in the capital of Europe." "Under the pretext of anti-Zionism, they hate the Jews and call for their extermination." "Is Belgium still a country or a caliphate?"

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Portugal: Jews are always dirty and like being dirty

Source

Today I was having coffee outside with my family in a small village in the Portuguese countryside when we heard a guy at a table next to us tell his friends that there are no poor Jews, that Jews are always dirty and like being dirty, that there were 12 banks in Belmonte (a village close by with the only remaining "native" Jewish community in Portugal)... It was pretty surreal...

UK: Labour politician sacked for tweeting actress's antisemitic conspiracy theory

Via Guardian:

Keir Starmer is facing a showdown with the left of Labour after his decisive sacking of Rebecca Long-Bailey reignited the party’s internal turmoil over the issue of antisemitism.

In a swift move, Long-Bailey was summarily dismissed as shadow education secretary for sending an approving tweet about an interview in which the actor Maxine Peake said the US police tactic of kneeling on someone’s neck was taught by the Israeli secret service.

This was emphatically denied by Israel, and Peake later retracted the claim. By then, however, Long-Bailey had been fired.

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Germany: Celebrity chef accused of anti-Semitic social media posts

Via Times of Israel:

A German celebrity chef has upped his output of anti-Semitic social media posts, including one suggesting that Chancellor Angela Merkel was appointed by “Zionists,” according to a German fact-checking blog.

Attila Hildmann, a vegan chef and author, has been publishing material that is rife with anti-Semitic canards, Volksverpetzer said.

Hildmann is among a handful of German celebrities who have drawn attention recently for promoting conspiracy myths, some involving Jews. They often blame Germany’s strict coronavirus lockdown measures on Jews.

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Portugal: Death of a Jew-hater (June 18, 2010)

"We can better understand their biblical god when we know his followers. Jehovah or Yaweh or whatever he is called, is a fierce and spiteful god, whom the Israelis always live up to." José Saramago

"What is happening in Palestine is a crime we can put on the same plane as what happened at Auschwitz... A sense of impunity characterises the Israeli people and its army. They have turned into rentiers of the Holocaust."

On the 10th anniversary of the death of José Saramago.

David Frum @ National Post:

Jose Saramago, Nobel laureate in literature and anti-Semite, died Friday aged 87 [2010].

Saramago won his prize in 1998. He put his new global fame to the service of a new cause: denunciations of Israel. But unlike other European anti-Zionists, Saramago explicitly connected his dislike of Israel to his feelings about Jews.

In a speech in Brazil on Oct. 13, 2003, Saramago reportedly unburdened himself of this thought about the world’s Jews: “Living under the shadows of the Holocaust and expecting to be forgiven for anything they do on behalf of what they have suffered seems abusive to me. They didn’t learn anything from he suffering of their parents and grandparents.”

It was Judaism itself that Saramago blamed for everything he disliked in Israel. He wrote in the Spanish newspaper El Pais on April 21, 2002:

“[C]ontaminated by the monstrous and rooted ‘certitude’ that in this catastrophic and absurd world there exists a people chosen by God … the Jews endlessly scratch their own wound to keep it bleeding, to make it incurable, and they show it to the world as if it were a banner. Israel seizes hold of the terrible words of God in Deuteronomy: ‘Vengeance is mine, and I will be repaid.’”

A few weeks previous, Saramago had visited Ramallah. The visit occurred shortly after the Passover 2002 suicide bombing at the Park Hotel in Netanya, Israel that killed 30 people and wounded 140 more. Saramago expressed no grief for these murdered innocents. Instead, he toured areas damaged during fighting between Israeli and Palestinian armed forces and pronounced to a Portuguese radio interviewer: “[I]n Palestine, there is a crime which we can stop. We may compare it with what happened at Auschwitz.”

Most European critics of Israel try to draw some kind of line between anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism. The line may be half-hearted and unconvincing, but still — they try. Saramago ignored such niceties. He followed the example of Middle Eastern anti-Zionists: He hated Israel, he hated the Jews who lived there and he did not scruple to express his hatred bluntly.

In 2006, Saramago joined a group of other writers in a statement denouncing Israel’s campaign against Hezbollah in Lebanon: Noam Chomsky, Gore Vidal, Howard Zinn, Arundhati Roy, Canada’s Naomi Klein. They accused Israel of plotting the “liquidation of the Palestinian nation.”

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Saramago wrote in the Madrid newspaper El Pais (as translated by Paul Berman in The Forward):

"Intoxicated mentally by the messianic dream of a Greater Israel which will finally achieve the expansionist dreams of the most radical Zionism; contaminated by the monstrous and rooted 'certitude' that in this catastrophic and absurd world there exists a people chosen by God and that, consequently, all the actions of an obsessive, psychological and pathologically exclusivist racism are justified; educated and trained in the idea that any suffering that has been inflicted, or is being inflicted, or will be inflicted on everyone else, especially the Palestinians, will always be inferior to that which they themselves suffered in the Holocaust, the Jews endlessly scratch their own wound to keep it bleeding, to make it incurable, and they show it to the world as if it were a banner."

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Europe/Portugal: Anti-Semitism in Europe: ‘The devil that never dies’

Belgium: Vote by Parliament of a resolution to recognize a "State of Palestine"

Via European Jewish Press:

The vote last week by a Belgian parliament committee of a motion of resolution to recognize a "State of Palestine" is "not a useful step", said Israel’s ambassador to Belgium, Emmanuel Nahshon.

The Foreign Affairs Committee of the House of Representatives, the lower chamber of the parliament, voted a motion for resolution calling on the Belgian government to recognize a "State of Palestine". The motion was presented by a Socialist MP and co-signed by the Greens, the French-speaking Christian Democrats and the far left. It was adopted by a small majority of 8 votes to 7. The Liberals, the Flemish Christian Democrats, the Flemish nationalist NV-An, the far right Vlaams Belang opposed the motion. [...]

The resolution must now be examined soon in the plenary of the House of Representatives.

Emmanuel Nahshon admits that this resolution risks complicating relations between Belgium and Israel.

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UK: Man makes Nazi salute in front of Jewish restaurants in North London

Via Shaul David:

This evening an idiot walked past a few jewish restaurants giving the Nazi salute in North London, a number of mostly girls and women outside. First time I witness this in my 17 years in London. This is going to be a long, difficult summer.

Belgium: Holocaust series claims Jews massacred and displaced Palestinians

Via Jerusalem Post:

A Belgian state broadcaster claimed in a Holocaust documentary that Jews repeatedly “massacred” and “systematically” displaced Palestinians.

The claim was aired on May 26 in a voiceover narration in the fifth episode of the Dutch-language television documentary series titled “Children of the Holocaust” produced by the VRT broadcaster.

After seven Arab armies declared war on and invaded Israel in May 1948, “Israel’s army systematically destroyed Palestinian villages, expulsed the population and destroyed their homes,” the narrator said about the days following the end of the British Mandate over Palestine.

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France: Protesters shout ‘dirty Jews’ at Paris rally against police racism

Via Times of Israel:

Paris police are investigating after multiple participants were heard shouting “dirty Jews” at a demonstration in Paris focused on Adama Traore, a black man who died in police custody there in 2016.

The chants erupted at Republique Square on Saturday during a “Justice for Adama” rally, part of an international protest movement against police violence that has unfolded in recent weeks.

After counter-protesters unfurled a banner that said “Justice for victims of anti-white crimes,” several members of the crowd began shouting about Jews, in an episode caught on video.

more here

Is Hezbollah a Threat to Europe?, by Bruno Tertrais

The evidence is clear: Hezbollah is a terrorist organization in its entirety. It's time for the EU to do the right thing and end Hezbollah's ability to fundraise and recruit in Europe. (AJC)

Analysis for the American Jewish Committee (AJC) by Bruno Tertrais, Deputy Director of the Fondation pour la recherche stratégique (Foundation for Strategic Research), in Paris:

[...] Presence and Propaganda on the Continent The organization is reportedly present one way or another in at least a dozen European countries. Such presence includes propaganda and operations inside Europe. Hezbollah also uses the continent as a staging area and recruiting ground for operations outside Europe. Germany's domestic intelligence agency has reported that Hezbollah at one time had nearly 1,000 active operatives in the country. In 2004, France banned Al-Manar television. Earlier this year, it closed down one of the largest Shi’a propaganda centers in Europe, the Zahra Centre France, and clamped down on three affiliate organizations (the Anti-Zionist Party, the Shi’a Federation of France, and France Marianne TV), on the grounds that all three sympathized with Hezbollah’s terrorist activities. Activities of Funding and Procurement in Europe or by European Nationals In rechttps://www.ajc.org/news/is-hezbollah-a-threat-to-europe#_ftn2ent years, a number of arrests have testified to the growing extent of Hezbollah criminal activities in Europe, mostly related with money laundering, trafficking, and arms procurement.

• In 2013, two Lebanese passengers at a Brussels airport were caught with nearly 770,000 Euros in their possession. Europol suspected that some of this cash was intended for Hezbollah.
• Also, in 2013, Germany raided the offices of the Orphan Children Project Lebanon in Essen, accusing the group of serving as a Hezbollah fundraising front organization.
• In 2014, the U.S. Treasury blacklisted a network of individuals centered around a Lebanese firm (Stars Group Holding), which allegedly functioned as a key Hezbollah procurement network to acquire drones and was active in Europe.
• In 2015, Hezbollah weapons procurer Ali Fayyad was detained in the Czech Republic, and later expelled to Lebanon after the disappearance of five Czech citizens.
• Also in 2015, a French-Lebanese national, Iman Kobeissi, was arrested in Paris and arraigned on money-laundering conspiracy charges, unlicensed firearms dealing, conspiracy for laundering funds believed to be drug money, and for arranging the sale of thousands of firearms, including military assault rifles, machine guns, and sniper rifles.
• In 2016, a major international operation led to the arrest of several Hezbollah members in France, Italy, Belgium, and Germany, on suspicions of criminal charges involving drugs and money laundering to fund the organization’s weapons procurement. The operation revealed the existence of a massive Hezbollah drug and money laundering scheme operating largely in Europe.
• In 2016, Colombia-based Hezbollah associate Mohammad Ammar was arrested in the United States for laundering narcotics from or through several countries, including the Netherlands, Spain, and the United Kingdom.
• In 2016, French-Lebanese national Ali Ahsoor was arrested in Cote d’Ivoire. Authorities caught him trying to smuggle 1.7 million Euros to Hezbollah in Lebanon.
• In 2018, the U.S. Treasury designated Hezbollah financier Mohammad Ibrahim Bazzi and five companies he owns or controls. Bazzi had provided millions of dollars to Hezbollah from the businesses he operates, inter alia, in Belgium. One of the designated companies was Global Trading Group NV, a Belgian energy services conglomerate.

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Europe: EU hypocrites take territory while blasting Israeli annexation

Via European Jewish Press:

France, the Grand Annexer, lectures Israel? How do you say chutzpah in French?  by Stephen M. Flatow, a vice president of the Religious Zionists of America, an attorney in New Jersey and the father of Alisa Flatow, who was murdered in an Iranian-sponsored Palestinian terrorist attack in 1995. His book, “A Father’s Story: My Fight for Justice Against Iranian Terror,” is now available on Kindle. 

The member states of the European Union—both individually and collectively via the Quartet—are in a tizzy and hypocritically warning Israel against annexation, even as those same countries continue to occupy numerous territories that they have annexed.
Let’s start with the French. France recently urged the European Union to take punitive measures against Israel if it annexes anything.

That’s right, France—which has been ruling the 890-square mile Reunion Island, off the southeast coast of Africa, for more than 300 years. And the 144-square mile Mayotte Island for nearly 200 years. The area of the Gush Etzion communities is all of 45 square miles.

France, which has been occupying the five so-called “Scattered Islands” in defiance of a 1979 U.N. resolution demanding that those islands be surrendered to Madagascar.

France, which in 1955 announced that the thousands of miles of what it calls “French Southern and Antarctic Lands” would henceforth be considered an official French Overseas Territory. By what right, exactly?

And France, the Grand Annexer, lectures Israel on annexation? How do you say chutzpah in French?

While it has one foot in and the other out of the European Union, England, too, has weighed in. The Brits are furious at the thought of Israeli annexation. Cabinet minister (and chairman of the ruling Conservative Party) James Cleverly told parliament that such Israeli action would be make it “harder” to achieve peace.

I wonder why the British never had such concerns when Jordan annexed all of Judea and Samaria—not just the tiny portion Israel is considering—back in 1950. In fact, England was one of only two countries in the entire world (the other was Pakistan) that recognized the Jordanian annexation.

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Germany: 30 Hezbollah associations across Germany

Via The Jerusalem Post:

Dramatic increase of Hezbollah supporters in Hamburg - German intel 

The domestic intelligence agency for the city-state of Hamburg announced on Friday that there are 50 Hezbollah members in Hamburg and roughly 30 Hezbollah-affiliated associations spread across Germany.  

Germany authorities banned activities connected to Hezbollah in April and declared the pro-Iranian movement a “Shi’ite terrorist organization.”

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France: Lawmaker Claude Goasguen, staunch Israel supporter, dies of virus aged 75

Claude Goasguen

Via The Times of Israel:

Claude Goasguen, a Republican deputy and long-time right-wing Parisian figure, died Thursday morning of a heart attack brought on by coronavirus, his family told AFP.

In intensive care for the past 22 days because of coronavirus, the former mayor of Paris’s 16th arrondissement was said to have been in a “much better condition and was walking again,” but subsequently experienced cardiac complications and died at 9:00 a.m.

A supporter of an “uninhibited” right, Goasguen was chairman of the France-Israel parliamentary friendship group and was a long-time supporter of Israeli policies. In 2017, he called to transfer the French embassy to Jerusalem, aligning with the United States.

He repeatedly expressed his rejection of anti-Semitism and participated in numerous events held by the Parisian Jewish community.

“I am in total solidarity with Israel, my great regret is that I am not a Jew myself,” he said last year. 

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Czech Republic: Sale of calendar featuring leading Nazi figures criticised

Via EJP:

A storm has erupted in the Czech Republic over the publication and sale of a calendar of “Personalities of the Third Reich” featuring a dozen leading Nazis, including Hitler, Himmler, and Heydrich.

The calendar is published by Naše Vojsko, which publishes materials “on military, historical and technical topics”. It is listed for sale in its website for CZK 499 (18,5 euros).

Czech Interior Minister Jan Hamacek called the calendar “tacky and immoral”.

The Israeli and German embassies in Prague both condemned the publication. Israeli ambassador in Prague Daniel Meron said he was “shocked and disgusted by such a calendar.’’

Rabbi Menachem Margolin, Chairman of the European Jewish Associaton (EJA) condemned the publication. ‘’Such items have no place in civil society, especially in a country that suffered so much under the nazi jackboot,’’ he said in a statement, urging the Czech government to outlaw and ban the sale of any and all Nazi memorabilia.

‘’The publisher states that there is demand for such items. We heard similar words from an auction house in Munich that was selling Nazi memorabilia in 2019. This is not an excuse,’’ said Rabbi Margolin.

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UK: Study finds 20% of Britons believe Jews behind coronavirus pandemic

Via The Algemeiner:

Almost 20% of Britons believe that “Jews” are behind the coronavirus pandemic, a new survey by Oxford University revealed.

According to a university statement, the survey sought to test public attitudes toward various coronavirus conspiracy theories. One of the statements given was “Jews have created the virus to collapse the economy for financial gain.”

5.5% of those surveyed said they agreed “a little” with this statement, 6.8% “moderately” agreed, 4.6% agreed “a lot,” and 2.4% “completely” agreed. Taken together, 19.3% of all respondents agreed with the antisemitic theory to some degree.

A full 80.7% said they “do not agree” with the idea that the Jews are behind the pandemic.

The numbers were similar in regard to other conspiracy theories that blamed Muslims, Bill Gates, the World Health Organization, and politicians for the outbreak.

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Belgium: Jordanian businessman behind delivery of millions of protection masks is a member of a bank blacklisted by Israel for funding terrorism

Via EJP:

A Jordanian businessman who signed a contract with the Belgian government [Ministry of Defence] for the delivery of 15 million protection face masks, via Luxembourg-based mailbox company Avrox, is involved in a bank blacklisted by Israel for funding terrorist activities, Belgian newspaper Het Laatste Nieuws reported.

Hamza Talhouni is a major shareholder of Cairo Amman Bank, and his brother sits on the board of directors. The bank holds hundreds of accounts of former Palestinian detainees convicted of terrorist attacks. It was on these accounts that the money they received for their deeds ended up.

Israel views the banks as financiers of terrorism. The Israeli embassy in Belgium confirmed to the paper that Cairo Amman is on a blacklist, despite having frozen the accounts in the meantime.

The contract between the businessman and Belgium amounts to at least 40 million euros.

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A first batch is expected to arrive today (7 sur 7)

Netherlands: Jewish activist attacked in Amsterdam (video)

Via Watch Antisemitism in Europe and CIDI:

Shocking images: Jewish activist Michael Jacobs was attacked on Dam Square in Amsterdam on Saturday afternoon. The umpteenth incident. When will the city of Amsterdam finally put an end to the pro-Palestinian demonstrations on Dam Square that attract anti-Semites and violent individuals?

UK: Anti-Semitism runs deep in Britain and cuts across party lines (Labour and Conservative supporters)

Via Unherd - Matthew Sweet:

Anti-Semitism runs deep in Britain.  There is a strong native tradition in this country and it cuts across party lines.

[…] The journal Political Quarterly has just published the first academic study of Labour’s anti-Semitism crisis. Its authors are the sociologists Ben Gidley and Brendan McGeever, and the historian David Feldman — all attached to the Pears Institute for the study of Antisemitism at Birkbeck University of London.

Their purpose is not juridical. They are not, like the Equalities and Human Rights Commission, investigating whether unlawful acts have been committed by the party or its employees or agents. Instead, they have crunched data on the views of Labour and Conservative supporters, and examined the language with which the arguments of the crisis were advanced, by those who believe Jeremy Corbyn to be a conscious, unconscious or perhaps semi-conscious anti-Semite, to those who regard the whole business as a smear campaign calculated to damage his electoral prospects.

Their conclusions will comfort few. Conservative voters, the data suggests, are more likely to assent to an anti-Semitic proposition than their Labour equivalents. These numbers are alarmingly large: added together, they work out as about 30% of the population. So why has Tory anti-Semitism failed to become a source of controversy? Because, Gidley and his co-authors argue, a tradition of Left-wing thinking about capitalism — the view that it is a system rigged by a powerful elite — raises questions to which anti-Semitism provides simple answers. […]

The most emphatic point made by Gidley, McGeever and Feldman is a conceptual one. They suggest that most of the participants in the crisis — from Jeremy Corbyn to Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis — are guilty of the same intellectual error. They have chosen to characterise anti-Jewish racism as a poison, a virus, a disease — a foreign pollutant that has breached the defences of a 120-year-old British institution. “Figures on all sides,” the article concludes, “conceive antisemitism as an exogenous force which contaminates and spoils the political body it inhabits.”

Rather as the 1999 McPherson Report on the murder of Stephen Lawrence rejected the “bad apple” theory in favour of the less localised and dismissable concept of institutional racism, Gidley and his co-authors want us to reject the reassuringly alien idea of the virus. “If we should use a metaphor to comprehend anti-Semitism,” they argue, “it is not virus but reservoir: a deep reservoir of stereotypes and narratives, one which is replenished over time and from which people can draw with ease.”

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The European Union has circled back to focus on its favorite pet issue: Israel

Via Israel Hayom - Prof. Eyal Zisser:

After eradicating the coronavirus that ravaged the countries of Europe and mending the deep rifts within its ranks, the European Union has circled back to focus on its favorite pet issue: Israel.

The new government, which was barely assembled and hasn't even published a plan of action yet, is already facing EU threats of punitive action, including economic sanctions and even the suspension of diplomatic ties if Israel dares follow through with its intention to apply Israeli law in parts of Judea and Samaria.

The bureaucrats at EU headquarters in Brussels can't actually drag Europe into a war on Israel, which has close ties with many countries on the continent, such as Austria, The Czech Republic, Hungary and others. These countries all harbor animosity for the EU, which failed in the moment of truth and left them, each on their own, to contend with the quarantines, deaths and economic crises caused by the coronavirus. But several leading European countries, chief among them France, Belgium, Spain and Ireland, are determined to spearhead an anti-Israel initiative and have threatened to enact punitive measures even if the majority of EU countries don't join them.

Disagreements between friends are legitimate, but when it comes to Israel-European relations, and to be more precise, several EU countries, this isn't the case. The EU doesn't care about the Palestinians whatsoever. Its concern for international law, which it says Israel is violating, also isn't a top priority. After all, the EU is indifferent to the Turkish occupation of Cyprus, and Brussels doesn't typically care about Tibet and Western Sahara either. 

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Ukraine: Nationalists commemorate SS Galizien at gatherings at which its founder's son is an honoured guest

Otto Wächter with German settlers in Sanok in 1940. Wiki Commons.

Review by Christopher Hale @ History Today (The Exhumation of a Nazi Perpetrator):

[…] In The Ratline, Sands deepens this enquiry by pursuing a perpetrator of such crimes and laying bare in quotidian detail the life and times of SS General Otto von Wächter. Wächter was deputy to Hitler’s lawyer and Governor General of occupied Poland, Hans Frank, before becoming governor of the Galician District of German occupied Ukraine. He was also the founder of one of the ‘foreign’ divisions of the Waffen-SS, the Galizien. I wrote about the SS division and Wächter himself in Hitler’s Foreign Executioners (2011) and tried to clarify the role he and his Ukrainian recruits played in Hitler’s war of annihilation and the Holocaust. […] 

Born in 1901, Wächter was a product of the Habsburg Empire. His father was a monarchist antisemite but Otto grew up in a Vienna that was being revolutionised by Freud, Mahler, Schnitzler and others. Otto was educated in law and, in the ruins of empire, he made an early commitment to his fellow Austrian Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party – a passion shared with his wife, Charlotte. Through their decades-long correspondence, Sands reconstructs Wächter’s rise to the Nazi elite. He was, we discover, a committed and ambitious activist, who took a leading role in the July Putsch (1934) and in the assassination of the Austrian chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss. He then tenaciously grappled the rungs of power in occupied Poland and the former lands of the Habsburg Empire. Wächter’s rise depended on his evident commitment to the movement, his bond with Frank and a proven legal and administrative proficiency that facilitated the liquidation of the enemies of the Reich in his domain. The SS Galizien, like many of the other ‘foreign’ divisions of the Waffen-SS, was primarily used to flush out real and imagined ‘partisans’, including Jews. When the ‘Galizien’ was thrown into battle, it was eviscerated by the Soviet Army. As Sands discovered, the division’s crushing defeat at Brody is still commemorated by Ukrainian nationalists at gatherings at which Horst von Wächter is an honoured guest. 

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Christopher Hale is the author of Deception: How the Nazis Tricked the Last Jews of Europe 

Europe: A pandemic of anti-Zionist signification: exploiting Gaza for ideological gain

Via Fathom - Cary Nelson:

As Gaza was acquiring its first two cases of the coronavirus in March 2020, the world’s longest hatred inevitably found local expression. […]  

The Anti-Defamation League is formally tracking anti-Semitic COVID-19 accusations internationally, documenting a number of them in its 25 March report ‘International Scapegoating of Israel and Jews for Spreading COVID-19.’[iv] In France, ‘Alain Mondino, head of a party list belonging to the far-right National Rally political party, posted a video on social media trying to link Jews to the spread of the coronavirus.’ ‘French far-right figure Henry de Lesquen spoke at a “Swiss Resistance” meeting in Aigle and said “There’s worse than coronavirus—judeovirus (Jewish virus).”’ Echoing a number of similar slanders, ‘Ivo Sasek, a Swiss Holocaust denier, posted on his organisation’s website, klagemauer.tv, an article falsely accusing Jewish American George Soros of spreading the virus.’[v] The trend is mounting across Europe: ‘In an article published on the extremist Spanish website, kaosenlared.net, the far-left Basque political party, Herritar Batasuna, wrote: ‘Today, March 14, we emphatically declare that the coronavirus is an instrument of the Third World War that has unleashed Yankee Zionist imperialism. The Anglo-Saxon capitalist and Zionist elite that is the enemy of all Humanity has taken a further step in its criminal and genocidal offensive.’ […]

It is easy to cast out far-right anti-Semitism from a zone of supposedly rational debate. Some of the more virulent anti-Semitic conspiracy theories do come from the dark web. Some spring from pervasively hostile countries like Iran. Anti-Zionist faculty members prefer to believe they are engaged in reasoned critique of Israeli policies. But coronavirus conspiracism does not establish a clear line between rational and irrational argument. At best there is a continuum along which one may place different rhetorical strategies and claims. This emerging conspiracism echoes centuries of anti-Semitism based on medical accusations. As Topor reminds us, ‘During the Black Death pandemic of the Middle Ages (1347-61) Jews were accused of “poisoning the wells.”’ Now, ‘Al Masdar, an Algerian news website recently published a report titled ‘”A Zionist organisation is behind the coronavirus and the Zionist entity (Israel) claims to have found the vaccine.”’ The Jews distribute the virus, then control the cure; they want us under their power.

Such views actually underlie a letter that recently appeared in a distinguished biomedical journal, The Lancet. While the publication was withdrawn by the journal’s editors shortly after being distributed, it is worth analysing the letter’s arguments because they are both unique and representative. What is unique, first, is that such a letter made its way into a major medical journal, and, second, that the journal’s editors did the right thing and removed the letter from their website after receiving several complaints (including one from me that made a number of the points raised here) detailing what was inaccurate or biased in the letter. But the letter is unfortunately also representative of what are likely to be an increasing number of publications by academics, journalists, and activists taking advantage of a world crisis to denounce Israel for any spread of the virus in Gaza and the West Bank.

In their 26 March letter in the The Lancet, titled ‘Structural violence in the era of a new pandemic: the case of the Gaza Strip,’ David Mills and three coauthors join a small but counterproductive effort to weaponise the serious concern that Gaza could succumb to the COVID-19 pandemic by using it to comprehensively delegitimise the Jewish state.[ix] Following the pattern modelled for years in the international BDS (boycott, divestment, and sanctions) movement, they make no realistic suggestions about how to improve Gaza’s fragile, decaying infrastructure and instead concentrate on demonising Israel. Nor do they hold Hamas leaders responsible for their indifference to the general health and welfare of Gazans, the iron and cement smuggled from Egypt used for attack tunnels not building hospitals.

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Germany: Burning of Israeli flag leads to law to ban torching of all flags

Via The Jerusalem Post:

An antisemitic rally where an Israeli flag was torched caused German lawmakers on Thursday to pass legislation outlawing the burning of all foreign flags within the borders of the federal republic.  

The Jerusalem Post reviewed the 16-page change in German to law that imposes a criminal penalty that could lead to a three year prison term for flag burning.  

The Social Democratic Party faction wrote in the proposed law ahead of its passage “that the draft law and the coalition factions' amendment were not about restricting freedom of expression. Rather, a clear criminal law barrier should be set and a gap in criminal law should be closed. It was unbearable and unacceptable for the flag of the State of Israel to be burned in public.”  

The main triggering event for the legislation was a 2017 demonstration in Berlin, in which 2,500 people, most of whom were German Muslims, protested against US President Donald Trump’s decision to relocate the US embassy to Israel’s capital, Jerusalem. The protestors torched an Israeli flag, prompting police at the time to initiate investigations into 11 people in connection with the flag burning.

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Spain: State hires group accused of anti-Semitism to ‘teach against hate’

Related:
Matisyahu: Anti-Semitism at Spanish festival was something I never experienced before

Via JTA:

A regional government in Spain hired an organization that is widely regarded as anti-Semitic to train teachers on how to combat racism. The group, BDS Pais Valencia, is scheduled to begin the training 20-day seminar on June 8, ACOM, a pro-Israeli organization in Spain, wrote in a statement Wednesday.

The online seminar was listed on the Spanish Education Ministry on April 27 under the title “Solidarity and human rights. Learning to teach against hatred and racism (Judeophobia, Islamophobia, and Palestine-Israel).”

In 2015, BDS Pais Valencia initiated what resulted in the exclusion of the American singer Matisyahu from a music festival.

Matisyahu, who is Jewish but not Israeli, was the only performer to be asked his views of Palestinian statehood by organizers of the Rototom Sunsplash festival in Benicassim, Spain. Amid an international storm of condemnations over what critics said was naked anti-Semitism, the organizers reinvited Matisyahu and apologized for their previous action, which they said was the result of pressure from BDS Pais Valencia.

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Europe: MEPs express outrage over terror-linked groups being eligible for funding of NGOs

Via EJP:

Several Members of the European Parliament have expressed outrage over terror-linked groups being eligible for EU funding of NGOs. Last week, the Israeli foreign ministry summoned the EU envoy to Israel, Emanuele Giaufret to demand a "clarification" over the matter and demanded a complete overhaul of funding rules ensuring taxpayer money is spent in line with European laws and values. "We are alarmed that a senior EU diplomat stated that Palestinian NGOs that are affiliated with EU-designated terrorist groups will remain eligible to receive EU funding," wrote MEPs Lukas Mandl (Austria), Anna Michelle Asimakopouloun (Greece), Petras Auštrevičius (Lithuania), Carmen Avram , Dietmar Köster (Germany) and Alexandr Vondra (Czech Republic) in an open letter to Eu foreign policy chief Josep Borrell. 

The issue came out after the head of the European Union Office to the West Bank and Gaza Strip, Sven Kühn von Burgsdorff, wrote in a letter on 30 April 2020 to an umbrella organization of Palestinian NGOs that "it is understood that a natural person affiliated to, sympathizing with, or supporting any of the groups or entities mentioned in the EU restrictive list is not excluded from benefitting from EU-funded activities unless his/her exact name and surname (confirming his/her identity) corresponds to any of the natural persons on the EU restrictive lists."

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Portugal to limit citizenship to descendants of expelled Jews

Via Portugal Loves Israel (FB group):

It was too good to last:

The Portuguese government is working on a proposal to limit nationality concessions to Jews descendants of Sefardis expelled from Portugal after dozens of thousands citizenships were offered in the last years. It will require 2 years of residence in Portugal starting next year. The reasons mentioned include aggressive publicity campaigns in Turkey and Israel, and big law offices building a big business out of it.

Netherlands: Syrian migrant smashed the windows of a Jewish restaurant in Amsterdam

Via EJP:

The man who smashed the windows of a Jewish restaurant in Amsterdam is a 31-year-old Syrian migrant. He was arrested on Friday after smashing the windows of the HaCarmel kosher restaurant, the second time he has done so.

Saleh Ali was subdued with pepper spray by officers after he used a metal pipe to smash the windows of the kosher restaurant while holding a lighter in the other hand which which he attempted to light an Israeli flag.

Because the restaurant was closed due to the coronavirus crisis, no one was present at the time of the destruction in the restaurant located on the Amstelveenseweg. A suspicious package was found outside the restaurant’s door early this year but ultimately it turned out to be a false alarm.

In 2017, Ali smashed HaCarmel’s windows with a wooden club while waving a Palestinian flag. He stole an Israeli flag hanging there. Police officers stood by as he vandalized the place but arrested him when he came out. The man was convicted of vandalism after 52 days behind bars while awaiting trial, but he was released without further penalty.

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France: Muslim man suspected of spitting on influential Jewish intellectual

Video posted by the attacker Mehdi Korchi:

Via JTA:

An influential French-Jewish intellectual who has criticized Islam was threatened and allegedly spat on by a young Arab man in Paris.

Eric Zemmour was walking with shopping bags in his hands on April 30 when the incident occurred, the Bureau for Vigilance Against Anti-Semitism, or BNVCA, wrote in a statement Thursday, adding that a man identified as Mehdi Korchi filmed himself accosting Zemmour.

Police identified Korchi and plan to indict him for assault, Le Point reported.

Korchi, who appears to have livestreamed himself screaming at Zemmour “I’ll f*** your mother, son of a whore” while following him for minutes, explained in a later video that he had no interest in debating the right-leaning pundit. A video that seems to show him spitting at Zemmour also surfaced, though Korchi denies doing it.

Spitting on people is illegal and violates France’s emergency measures to curb the COVID-19 pandemic.

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Europe: EU’s position on Hezbollah "has not changed", spokesperson tells

Via EJP:

While several European countries like Britain and The Netherlands, and now Germany, have banned Hezbollah entirely, other member states still defend Hezbollah’s legitimacy due to its political role in Lebanon. An artificial distinction between Hezbollah’s “political wing” and “military wing” that even the group itself does not recognize.

An EU spokesperson stated that the European Union’s position on Hezbollah “has not changed’’ after being asked if the EU would follow the example of Germany and designate Hezbollah in its entirety as a terror organisation and ban it on European soil.

Last week, Germany announced its decision to ban all of Hezbollah’s activities in the country as anti-terror police launched raids in several cities against institutions and individuals associated by the group. […]

Besides Germany, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, the United States, Australia, Canada, Israel, the Arab League and the Gulf Cooperation Council have all designated the entire Hezbollah as a terrorist organisation.

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UK: “Jews are racist! Heil Hitler”, screams woman while trying to break down door of Jewish home

Via Antisemitism UK:

A woman has been arrested by police while screaming “Jews are racist! Heil Hitler” and trying to break down the front door of a Jewish home in Stamford Hill.

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Finland: Amnesty International board member says Israel worse hhan Hezbollah

Via The Algemeiner:

An Amnesty International board member from Finland was criticized on Monday after denouncing Germany’s decision to ban the Lebanese terrorist group Hezbollah.

Syksy Räsänen, a Finnish physicist with a long history of anti-Israel activism — including the publication of a book called Israeli Apartheid — commented, “Germany’s ban on Hezbollah is a perfect illustration of how terrorist lists are tools of power politics.”

“Hezbollah is banned because it ‘calls for the violent elimination of the State of Israel and questions the right of the State of Israel to exist,’” he said. “Replace Israel->Palestine, and this describes most Israeli parties.”

“Admittedly, there is the difference that most Israeli parties have been implementing the elimination of Palestine, not just called for it,” he asserted.

Räsänen wrote, “Yet Likut [sic], Yesh Atid, Shas, Labour etc. are valued partners for Germany and the EU, instead of being labeled terrorists.” […]

Amnesty International’s Finland branch has run into trouble before regarding anti-Israel statements by prominent members. 

NGO Monitor reported in 2010 that its executive director, Frank Johansson, referred to Israel as a “scum state.”

Amnesty refused to take action against Johansson, who later apologized to the Israeli ambassador to Finland.

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Finland: Lenin’s statue vandalized with anti-Jewish graffiti

Via Antisemitism.il:

A statue of Lenin has been vandalized in Kotka.  

A star of David, symbolizing Judaism, was painted on the forehead and base of the statue.

The inscription "Jewish mass murderer" was also painted on the monument.

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France: Policemen attacked for 'Palestinian cause'

Via The Times of Israel:

Suspect, identified by French media as pro-Palestinian activist Youssef T., reportedly referenced Gaza and the Islamic State during arrest 

A driver who rammed two policemen in France Monday afternoon said that he carried out the attack because of “the situation” in Palestine. 

The suspect, identified by French newspaper Le Parisien (French) as pro-Palestinian activist Youssef T., drove his black BMW into two motorcycle cops as they conducted roadside inspections in Colombes, near Paris.

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Germany bans Hezbollah’s activities, police raid mosque organisations in several cities

Via EJP:

Germany has decided to ban all activities of Hezbollah on German soil as the country’s authorities have classified the Lebanese Shiite group as a terrorist organization.

Raids took place in several German federal states concurrently, a spokesperson for German Interior Minister Horst Seehofer said on Thursday. He said that even in times of crisis, the “rule of law is able to act.”

The police raids are focused on four mosque associations in Berlin, Dortmund, Bremen and Münster accused of belonging to Hezbollah. German Foreign Minister Heiko Haas said that Hzebollah “denies Israel’s right to exist, threatens with violence and terror and massively upgrades its rocket arsenal.”

His Israeli counterpart, Israel Katz praised Germany’s move. “I applaud the German govt for the decision to designate Hezbollah a terror organization. In my conversations with German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas, he promised to help and I thank him,” Katz tweeted. “Hezbollah is a terrorist organization and must be treated as such.”

The minister called on other European countries and the EU to do the same. In 2013, the EU banned Hezbollah’s military wing but not its political work in Europe. The UK designated Hezbollah as a terrorist organization in February last year.

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UK: Top public health expert compared 'Zionists' to Nazis

Related:
Top public health expert's attacks on Ellman and 'Zionist' Berger

Via The Jewish Chronicle:

A public health expert at the centre of criticism of the government’s response to the coronavirus pandemic has a long history of making inflammatory statements, comparing "Zionists" to Nazis and wrote that "Jews" should reflect on the actions of the Israeli military, the JC can reveal.

Professor John Ashton, a former regional director of public health for north-west England, appeared on BBC Panorama on Monday to discuss the findings of an investigation into the failure to stockpile personal protective equipment (PPE) for NHS staff.

But aside from offering his advice over health issues, Professor Ashton, who has been a long-time member of the Labour Party, regularly posts on social media on issues involving Israel and Zionism. In one tweet he suggested it was, "Time to isolate Zionists and all religious fundamentalists whatever colour of black."

An analysis of social media posts made by the former President of the Faculty of Public Health from 2012 until 2018 shows that he has frequently equated Zionism with Nazism.

Writing in November 2012 in response to Israeli military actions in Gaza, he stated: "Sickening to see Zionists behave like Nazis."

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UK: “Typical Jewish behaviour”, says landlord to owner of Edinburgh’s Bross Bagels after she asks for rent relief during COVID-19 crisis

Via Antisemitism UK:

A landlord reportedly told the owner of the Bross Bagels shops in Edinburgh that she was displaying “typical Jewish behaviour” when she asked for rent relief during the COVID-19 crisis.

Rent relief has been widely introduced as the pandemic causes enormous financial difficulty to countless businesses and individuals.

The owner of the chain explained that when she tried to arrange alternative rent payments with the landlord for the three months (during which the pandemic was expected to affect businesses most acutely), as she had done with the landlords of the other stores, the landlord disputed whether the relief was necessary. But when she texted back to him that she preferred to continue their exchange in writing rather than over the telephone so that she could make their exchange available to her solicitor, her landlord responded that this was “typical Jewish behaviour”.

The landlord was apparently in Turkey for medical treatment when the lockdown was imposed, leaving him stranded. Without regard to the merits or otherwise of the claim for rent relief, the insulting reference to the Jewish ethnicity of the owner is totally unacceptable.

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Spain: MEP suggests to his country’s PM ‘to follow the example of Israel in the formation of a coalition government’

MEP Antonio López-Istúriz

Via EJP:

"The only part of the statement that I do agree with is that we must now focus and cooperate in the fight against coronavirus," said Spanish Member of the European Parliament Antonio López-Istúriz, who chairs the European Parliament Delegation for Relations with Israel, in a reaction to Thursday’s statement by EU foreign affairs chief Josep Borrell on the announcement earlier this year of an agreement to form a new government in Israel. […]

In his statement, Borrell said: "The European Union takes note of the political agreement that could pave the way for the formation of a Government in Israel. The European Union is willing to closely cooperate with the new Government on fighting the coronavirus. Technical cooperation is ongoing and will be strengthened on all aspects of the pandemic. The health of our citizens and addressing the economic consequences of the coronavirus are our shared paramount priority."

In the second part of the statement, the EU foreign chief added: "The European Union’s position on the status of the territories occupied by Israel in 1967 remains unchanged. In line with international law and relevant UN Security Council resolutions, including resolutions 242 (1967) and 338 (1973), the European Union does not recognise Israeli sovereignty over the occupied West Bank." […] 

"High Representative Borrell should spend some time convincing the Prime Minister of Spain to follow the example of Israel on the formation of a Government coalition between responsible political forces," commented Antonio López-Istúriz.

The Spanish MEP is also Secretary-General of the Europe People’s Party, the largest political group in the European Parliament.

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Germany: Drugstore chain shows ad with Palestinian antisemitic conspiracy rapper

Via The Jerusalem Post:

German and Israeli Jews say they will no longer shop at Rossmann

The giant German drug store chain Rossmann sponsored an advertisement with a rapper who has advocated an antisemitic conspiracy theory against Israelis during the jihadi plane attacks on 9/11 in New York City.

Rossmann is the second largest retail drugstore in Germany, with a total of 4,088 stores and 56,200 employees.

The German rapper Wasiem Taha, who is of Palestinian origin, circulated on social media a statement that “On September 11, 2001, 4,000 Israelis did not show up for work at the World Trade Center.” A caption under the statement and a picture of a passenger plane about to strike a WTC tower reads “More facts about Islam.”

Taha wrote above the social media post: “Weird, isn’t it.”

Taha fantasized in a song a number of years about a terrorist attack in Tel Aviv with a bomb belt. The popular Rossmann video advertisement targets a young audience and addresses the post-coronavirus climate: “Clubfeeling 2020. So that we all celebrate after corona.”

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UK: Coronavirus-related anti-Semitism in Lancet medical journal

Via Fathom:

‘Close and unprecedented’ was how the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OCHA) described Israeli-Palestinian cooperation in its first ‘COVID-19 Emergency Situation Report’ on 24 March. This has not stopped antisemites and anti-Zionists the world over trying to exploit the pandemic to demonise the Jewish people and Israel. Cary Nelson examines the phenomenon, focusing on a recent letter published in the medical journal The Lancet before being withdrawn. […]  

The Jews distribute the virus, then control the cure; they want us under their power. 

Such views actually underlie a letter that recently appeared in a distinguished biomedical journal, The Lancet. While the publication was withdrawn by the journal’s editors shortly after being distributed, it is worth analysing the letter’s arguments because they are both unique and representative. What is unique, first, is that such a letter made its way into a major medical journal, and, second, that the journal’s editors did the right thing and removed the letter from their website after receiving several complaints (including one from me that made a number of the points raised here) detailing what was inaccurate or biased in the letter. But the letter is unfortunately also representative of what are likely to be an increasing number of publications by academics, journalists, and activists taking advantage of a world crisis to denounce Israel for any spread of the virus in Gaza and the West Bank. 

In their 26 March letter in the The Lancet, titled ‘Structural violence in the era of a new pandemic: the case of the Gaza Strip,’ David Mills and three coauthors join a small but counterproductive effort to weaponise the serious concern that Gaza could succumb to the COVID-19 pandemic by using it to comprehensively delegitimise the Jewish state.[ix] Following the pattern modelled for years in the international BDS (boycott, divestment, and sanctions) movement, they make no realistic suggestions about how to improve Gaza’s fragile, decaying infrastructure and instead concentrate on demonising Israel. Nor do they hold Hamas leaders responsible for their indifference to the general health and welfare of Gazans, the iron and cement smuggled from Egypt used for attack tunnels not building hospitals.

read more

• Author of anti-Israel letter in the Lancet promote David Duke antisemitic video 
• Lancet editor ‘deeply regrets’ publishing Gaza letter
• Lancet medical journal accused of extremist hate propaganda 

EU says annexation of parts of the West Bank ‘will not be left unanswered’

Via EJP:

The Netanyahu-Gantz agreement sets a date of July 1 from which the process to annex parts of the West Bank, as envisioned in the Trump administration’s peace plan, can begin.

Under the Trump plan, Israel can expect to receive the United States’ support for the application of Israeli sovereignty over all settlements in the territory as well as the Jordan Valley, which lies along the border with Jordan. […]

"We see annexation as not in line with international law and a breach of international law and as it was stressed several times, if this proceeds, it will not be left unanswered," said Peter Stano, the EU foreign affairs spokesperson, as he responded questions from journalists during the daily EU Commission press briefing on the new Israeli government.

He declared: "We noticed of course that an agreement was made on the future coalition government and we are looking forward to working with this government once in the office. There are still necessary procedures to make this happen. So at this stage we won’t go into speculations."

He then referred to questions about the possible annexation of parts of the West Bank, which is foreseen in the coalition agreement between Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud and Benny Gantz’ Blue and White parties, by saying: "The position of the EU has not changed. I would refer you to the latest statements by High Representative (Josep Borrell) or by the EU on the issue of annexation. We see annexation as not in line with international law and a breach of international law and as it was stressed several times indeed if this proceeds, it will not be left unanswered."

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Germany: Anti-Israel activists disrupt Holocaust Remembrance Day memorial in Berlin

Via the Jerusalem Post:

Anti-Israel activists disrupted a Zoom meeting by the Israeli Embassy in Berlin commemorating Holocaust Remembrance Day by posting pictures of Hitler and shouting antisemitic slogans, according to Israel's Ambassador to Germany, Jeremy Issacharoff.

The event, which hosted Holocaust survivor Zvi Herschel, was suspended and reconvened shortly afterwards without the activists.

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Denmark: Bible Society’s translation omits dozens of references to Israel

Via The Times of Israel/JTA:

The Danish Bible Society has omitted dozens of references to Israel from translations of the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament. Defending the deletions, the society said they prevent confusion with the modern-day country.

The omissions occurred in a project titled “Bible 2020” that was published earlier this year under the society’s supervision, the 24NYT news site reported Sunday. It’s the first translation into Danish in more than 20 years.

Jan Frost, a Bible enthusiast and supporter of Israel from Denmark, drew the media’s attention to the omissions on YouTube and other social networks. He counted 59 omissions out of 60 references to Israel in the Greek origin for New Testament texts. References to “the People of Israel” were replaced with “Jews,” while “Land of Israel” became “the land of Jews.”

In other places, references to Israel were translated as referencing all readers or all of humanity.

The Song of Ascents from the Book of Psalms in the Hebrew Bible, a popular Shabbat hymn for Jews, originally states that “He who watches over Israel will neither slumber nor sleep.” In the new translation, Israel is replaced by the word “us.”

A Bible Society representative told Frost that the decision was made to avoid confusing the Land of Israel with the State of Israel. However, the names of other countries from that time that still exist, such as Egypt, have not been changed.

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Germany: Murder charges filed against synagogue attack suspect

Via The Times of Israel:

German prosecutors said Tuesday they have charged the suspect in last year’s botched attack on a synagogue in the eastern city of Halle with murder and attempted murder, among other offenses.

The German man in his late 20s attempted to attack a synagogue on October 9, which was Yom Kippur, Judaism’s holiest day. He later killed two people. The attack stoked concern about anti-Semitism and far-right violence in Germany. 

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Ukraine: Firebombing damages Jewish center

Via JTA:

A firebombing slightly damaged a Jewish community center in southern Ukraine.

Kherson police are investigating the early Monday morning attack, in which someone set fire to a bottle of flammable liquid and dropped it on the threshold of the building, Interfax reported. The liquid did not completely catch fire, however, according to Interfax.

The Chabad emissary in Kherson, Rabbi Yossi Wolff, told Anash.org, a news website geared for the worldwide English-speaking emissary community, that the front door of the building caught fire.

Security cameras filmed the attack, according to the report.

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Europe: The EU continues to support organizations with strong ties to terror

Via Arutz Sheva:

The EU can hardly claim it is not aware of terrorist ties in organizations it supports, such as War on Want, if even PayPal stopped the cash-flow to this dangerous group by refusing to serve it.

[…] One of the organizations supported by the European Union is War on Want. This entity, which describes itself as an anti-poverty charity based in London, is in fact part of a web of organizations that maintain steep anti-Israel sentiments as well as ties to terrorist organizations.

NGO Monitor, a research institute that conducts independent analysis on NGOs, described War on Want as the “leader and mobilizer of anti-Israel BDS (boycott, divestment, and sanctions,) movement.”

BDS has long been known for its radical anti-Israel views. A report aptly names “Terrorists in Suits” found over 100 links between Hamas and BDS. The leading BDS committee includes a coalition of 28 Palestinian entities such as Hamas, The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, and the Islamic Jihad.

BDS is not the only dangerous organization connected to War on Want. They are also tied to the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), a terrorist organization labeled as such by the US, EU, Canada, and Israel.

In addition, one of War on Want’s main funders is Interpal, a group that is not only designated a terrorist organisation by countries such as the United states, Canada and Australia , but was described by the US Department of the Treasury as “a principal charity utilized to hide the flow of money to HAMAS.”

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UK: Politician promotes revolting antisemitic lie

Via On The Dark Side:

Jenny Tonge [British House of Lords lawmaker] has promoted an article by Ramzy Baroud alleging that IDF soldiers and settlers ‘are working extra hard to spit at as many Palestinians, their cars, doorknobs, and so on, as possible’ in order to spread Covid-19. 

There is no evidence for this. 

Tonge calls Baroud ‘a well respected writer’. 

Well respected by whom, Jenny? 

You only have to look at Baroud’s website to see that he buys into and propagates all the antisemitic lies about Israel. See the video of his talk at the University of Turin in Italy marking this year’s ‘Apartheid Week’ (it was delivered by Skype due to the Corona outbreak). 

He appears to support terrorism, he compares Zionism to Nazism, he says that Zionism equals racism and he says that it’s a prelude to genocide.

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Related:

UK lawmakers: Baroness must apologize for saying Israel lobby behind Corbyn loss

UK: Financial Times more anti-Israel than Arab media

Via Elder of Ziyon:

Here was an absurd headline from the Financial Times last week (The Arab medics battling coronavirus in Israel’s segregated society):

The article's bias is truly insane:

Arabs make up only a fifth of Israel’s population, but represent half the country’s pharmacists, a quarter of its nurses and just under a fifth of its doctors, according to the Central Bureau of Statistics. Some of the nation’s largest hospitals have Arab doctors heading major departments, and the country’s leading virologist is Arab. […]

In Kafra Qara, an Arab town south of Haifa with so many medical professionals that residents call it the city of doctors, Jameel Mohsen was more critical.

“As an Arab, other jobs are closed off to us, so we became doctors,” he said, peeling off layers of protective equipment after setting up a Covid-19 ward at the Hillel Yeffe Medical Center, where he is head of infectious diseases.

If anyone can find any minority group complaining that they are over-represented in the medical professions as evidence of discrimination, I'd love to see it.

Of course, there are no professions in Israel where Arabs are not allowed. There are lots of Arab police officers. There are many Arab engineers and programmers and research scientists. Once, the acting president of Israel was a Druze Arab.

While FT claims that the over-representation of Arabs in the health sector somehow shows how Israel is discriminatory, Gulf365 has a very good article for its Arabic-speaking audience about how Arab doctors are essential in battling the coronavirus in Israel. The article bullet points are:

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