Shabbat Shalom with A Party 424 Meters Under the Sea

Shabbat Shalom to all my readers.

David Guetta at Masada:

Norway: Museum displays artwork demonizing Israel

Via pro-Israel blog MIFF:

Sørlandet's Museum of Art (SKMU) in Kristiansand recently opened a new exhibition called "Collecting Then and Now for Later".

One of the artworks in this exhibition is "Glem ikke" ("Don't Forget") by Guttorm Guttormsgaard, which displays the 'crimes' of Israel throughout the years, mass-murdering and terrorizing Palestinian refugees.

For example, the 2003 panel says:

2003
Sharon-ISRAEL
mass-murders
REFUGEES
women men
PALESTINIANS
children elderly
LONG LIVE PALESTINE

The museum sees nothing wrong with the piece and think it encourages expressing different opinions.  They certainly don't think it's their job to censure it.  In fact, they bought it.

Norway: Memorial for Jewish Holocaust victim vandalized

Via Norway, Israel and the Jews, as reported in document.no:

A 'stumbling stone' memorial in Oslo was recently vandalized.  This stone was set in memory of Karl Leopold Kirschner, a Norwegian Jew who was deported to Auschwitz, where he was murdered.

Russia: Head of gov't news agency 'outs' Jews

The Russian Jewish Congress is critical of Dmitry Kiselyov, head of the official Russian international news agency, for 'outing' Jews.

After Kremlin critic Viktor Shenderovich compared the a Sochi Olympics win to the Nazi Olympics in 1936, Kiselyov responded by saying that Jewish Shenderovich wouldn't have remained alive in Nazi Germany.  The same goes for the Jewish poet Igor Irtenyev, who supported Shenderovich.

Kiselyov then pointed out that Irtenyev's real name is Igor Mussayevitch Rabinovitch.

The Russian Jewish Congress points out that though this sounds 'innocent', it has antisemitic connotations in Russia.  Stalin's antisemitic campaign against Jews started by revealing the 'real' names of Jews who had changed their names.

More: Walla

UK: Local politician receives antisemitic mail

"Do Jews Play Golf?"

VILE hatemail was delivered to the family home of Tamworth Borough Council's leader – comparing him to Adolf Hitler.  

 Cllr Danny Cook this week told the Herald of his anger at receiving the "anti-Semitic" note, as the decision to close Tamworth Golf Course – and potentially develop the site for housing – continues to provoke a strong reaction.  

More: Tamworth Hearld

France: Election poster vandalized with antisemitic graffiti

A poster of Annie Lévy Mozziconacci, a candidate of the Socialist Party (PS) in Marseille was vandalized, adding a beard and the Jewish traditional sidelocks.

More: France3, via LDJ

Netherlands: Ex-Poet Laureate says Israel colonized West Bank for resources

Ramsey Nasr is a former poet laureate of the Netherlands and the city of Antwerp.  His mother is Dutch, his father Palestinian.

In an interview in Dutch women's magazine Libelle two years ago, back when he was still the Dutch Poet Laureate", Nasr told of the first time he visited his father's side of the family, in the West Bank.

Q: How was it for you to be there? 

A: It's the most beautiful land that you can imagine.  The West Bank is very fruitful, truly a biblical land.  That is also the reason that Israel wants to steal it with settlements, and doesn't want to relinquish it.

That statement has no connection to reality.  But the journalist didn't feel it needed a follow-up question.

France: "Please don't tell my students they were Jewish"

A bit of history first: In 1943 the French arrested a a French Resistance group called the "Manouchian Group".  Half its members were Jewish.  They were executed on Feb. 21, 1944.  Seventy years ago.

As part of a campaign to discredit the group and the French Resistance, the German authorities published a poster, the "Affiche Rouge" (Red Poster).  The poster featured ten of the men, seven of which were Jewish.  They also handed out flyers alleging the Resistance was being led by foreigners and Jews.

L'histoire par l'image 

Back to our time.  Benoît Rayski, a French historian, tells the following story:

He came to speak to students at a vocational high school in Mantes-la-Jolie (north-central France), about the "Affiche Rouge"

Before Rayski entered the class, the teacher asked him to refrain from mentioning that the men on the poster were Jewish. It would be preferable if they were described as immigrants and foreigners and that the "Manouchian Group" were, like his students, 'diverse'.  Because Palestine and everything.

Because we wouldn't want Muslim students in France to know that Jews died fighting the Nazis.  We prefer they think those Resistance fighters were immigrants, just like them.

The Vichy Regime sent them to their deaths for being "Judeo-Communists".   According to Rayski, when teachers strip those Jews of their identity, for fear the truth might displease their students, they are killing them for the second time.

More: Atlantico, via LDJ

Netherlands: Complaint against antisemitic site

Image from Andere Kijk

Jewish organization CIDI had lodged a complain against the antisemitic site Andere Kijk (a different look).

More: CIDI

Luxembourg: Pension fund boycotting Israeli companies for settlement activities

The Luxembourg government pension fun, Fonds de compensation (FDC) is boycotting eight Israeli companies and one American company for being involved with settlements/security fence/human rights violations in the State of Palestine.

Altogether, 15% of companies on their exclusion list are committing crimes in Palestine.

The Israeli companies are real estate companies AFI Group and Jerusalem Economy Ltd for "Association to supporting construction of illegal settlements in occupied territories (State of Palestine)" .

Bank Hapoalim, Bank Leumi, First International Bank of Israel, Israel Discount Bank, and Mizrahi Tefahot Bank are being boycotted for "association to financing illegal settlements in occupied territories (State of Palestine)" .

Elbit Systems is boycotted for "Association to providing security systems for illegal separation barrier on occupied territories (State of Palestine)".

FDC is also boycotting Motorola Systems for "Association to assisting in human rights violations in occupied territories (State of Palestine)".

More: FDC (PDF document)

UK: Jewish student threatened with death, rape, after complaining about Israel Apartheid Week

During previous “Israel Apartheid Weeks”, Birmingham’s “PalSoc” (Palestine Society) – one of the largest of its kind in the UK – had erected fake “checkpoints” to portray Israeli security measures as a sinister manifestation of racial segregation. Many Jewish students had felt directly targeted by the protestors at the time.

(...)

But even in cyberspace, far from catching on, the university’s “Israel Apartheid Week” page was quickly inundated with Jewish students firing back at the hypocrisy and anti-Semitism which they say lies just beneath the surface.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the debate soon degenerated – one Jewish student who protested that the campaign made her feel uncomfortable received death threats, and other posts threatening her with rape.

More: Arutz 7

All-Ukrainian Jewish Congress: Antisemitism Not on the Rise

Vadim Rabinovich, president of the All-Ukrainian Jewish Congress (VEK), co-founder of the European Jewish Parliament (EJP) :

I personally have communicated with the heads of a whole number of groups that consider themselves radical, who have assured me that no manifestations of anti-Semitism have been or will be planned. Moreover, they emphasized in particular that they will ruthlessly combat such manifestations in their own midst. I want to reiterate: even in this difficult period of civic resistance, there have been no grounds to claim any serious incidents of anti-Semitism in Ukraine!

More: The Interpreter

France: Jewish comedian harassed after saying Quenelle is antisemitic

Michaël Youn, a Jewish actor, singer and comedian has taken on the services of a company to moderate discussions on his social media accounts.  Youn has suffered from racist and antisemitic comments on his Facebook and Twitter accounts, after he tweeted that Dieudonné's Quenelle gesture is antisemitic.

More: DJN via LDJ

France: 'Jewish mafia' behind Ukrainian protests

Via Elder of Ziyon:

Then a little known French antisemitic website named "PlanetNonViolence" claimed that "the Jewish mafia" is behind the Ukrainian protests, that Israel is sending "surveillance equipment and other high tech gadgets ostensibly to protect Jews" to the region, and that Israel is fomenting violence in order to get Jews to leave the Ukraine and move to Israel.

Now mainstream Arab media is reporting all of this as fact, adding that a Jewish Ukranian businessman, Viktor Pinchuk, is also acting behind the scenes to foment revolution so he can get the Ukraine to get  into the orbit of the EU to help his fortune. 

Ukraine: Israel urged to send forces to guard Jews

In a letter to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon, the head of the European Jewish Association, Rabbi Menahem Margolin, urgently requested that Israel “send trained security guards to protect Jewish communities in Ukrainian cities and towns.”

Ukrainian Jewish communities throughout the country are seriously concerned and feel helpless in the face of a “growing wave of anti-Semitic attacks,” the letter stated, citing the recent examples of a Molotov cocktail thrown at a Chabad center in the eastern city of Zaporozhye, a threatening phone message left for a rabbi in Kryvyi Rih calling for him to leave the city, and anti-Semitic graffiti found in Kiev and other locations.

The reports indicate a “Jewish emergency,” according to the letter sent by the Brussels-based EJA head.

More: Times of Israel

Spain: "They are pro-Arab; it pains me to see the way they treat the State of Israel"

An Israeli Jew of Spanish descent explains to El Pais why he's not going to bother about Spanish citizenship:

"I am too proud to stop being exclusively Israeli," he says. "I love Sefarad , my roots are there. But I will never abandon Israel. The Spanish government made a nice gesture, but we are not well understood in Spain. They are pro-Arab; it pains me to see the way they treat the State of Israel."

Germany: Cartoon of Facebook’s Zuckerberg Compared to Nazi Imagery

A caricature of Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg published on Friday by a German newspaper was sharply criticized by Jewish human rights group the Simon Wiesenthal Center (SWC) as reminiscent of Nazi imagery.

SWC Associate Dean Rabbi Abraham Cooper on Monday called the cartoon “an outrage” and said that the artist was guilty of anti-Semitism.

The cartoon, published by Suddeutsche Zeitung (SZ) and entitled “Krake Facebook,” German for “Facebook Octopus,” shows Zuckerberg as a half-human sea giant grasping with tentacles at computers around him. Depicted with a hooked nose, the 29-year-old entrepreneur is shown smiling while his curly hair creeps out from under an oversized hat that has the Facebook logo on its brim.

More: Algemeiner

Netherlands: "Oh! We thought you were Jewish!"

Jews in an ethnic nation-state find themselves in a problematic situation.  They might live there for generations, but they're still not 'ethnic'.

I recently ran across this story, which illustrates the point.

The synagogue in Enschede is celebrating 85 years.  Rabbi Binyomin Jacobs, Chief Rabbi of the Dutch provinces recalls:

When years ago I gave a lecture in this synagogue to a non-Jewish public, I was complimented for my good Dutch.  My somewhat perplexed response was: "But I am Dutch!"  To which came a comment from the audience: "Oh! We thought you were Jewish!"

Ireland: Journalist compares Israelis to Nazis

Via CiF Watch, Irish Times journalist Frank McDonald compares Israelis to Nazis.

@JohnAHale @paversarogers @adamlevick It's very unfortunate that the Israelis have behaved like Nazis, killing innocent women & children.
— Frank McDonald (@frankmcdonald60) February 19, 2014

Attacked for his views, he pulls out the "Anti-Zionism is not antisemitism" card.  Just because I call the Jewish state "Nazis", does not mean that I'm talking about Jews.

@adamlevick @YummySabich Don't get me wrong. I am not equating Jews with Nazis. Not all Jews are Zionists, as you must know.
— Frank McDonald (@frankmcdonald60) February 19, 2014

Spain: The 'Imperialist-Zionist' plot in the Ukraine.

MSR is the Spanish "Republican Social Movement", which is part of the Alliance of European National Movements.  More well know members of this alliance are Jobbik and the BNP.  An observer party is the Ukrainian Svoboda (AKA the "Jews don't need to worry" party)

MSR tweeted the image above with the following text:

Enough shedding of European blood in #Ukraine Stop Capitalism Stop Zionism Don't play with Europe & the Europeans pic.twitter.com/ThYwtwHpUM— MSR international (@MSR_int) February 21, 2014

Note that they don't differentiate between imperialism (in the image) and capitalism (in the translation). It all goes with Zionism.

Ukraine: Synagogue attacked with firebombs

A synagogue in eastern Ukraine sustained minor damage from firebombs hurled at it by unidentified individuals.

The firebombs hit the Giymat Rosa Synagogue in Zaporizhia, located 250 miles southeast of Kiev, on the night of February 23, according to a report Monday on the news site timenews.in.ua.

More: Times of Israel

European far-right parties flock to Syria in order to 'defeat American-Zionist war machine'

Anti-Assad blog Tahrir-ICN reports about the European far-right support for Assad:

The Assad regime has won the support of fascists and far-right nationalist parties and organizations across Europe. These include the National Front (France), Forza Nuova and CasaPound (Italy), Golden Dawn and Black Lilly (Greece), the British National Party (UK) and the National Rebirth of Poland, Falanga and All Polish Youth (Poland).

This support can be attributed to: anti-imperialist/anti-globalism sentiment with a strong focus on national states (they believe the Assad regime protects the Syrian state against US imperialism), Islamophobia (they believe the Assad regime fights Islamic extremists), anti-semitism (they believe Assad’s regime acts as resistance to Israel). All of these beliefs rest on fallacy and an uncritical perpetuation of regime narratives.[1] They are also positions shared (although without the racist element) by sections of the left. Another reason is likely to be concern about increased Arab migration to Europe where fascists in a number of countries have protested against and harassed Syrian refugees.[2]

Greek blog glykosymoritis reports about the far-right Black Lily:

"Democratia" newspaper journalist Panagiotis Liakos contacted Stavros Libovisis member of the editorial group of "Black Lily" and in an interview asked him about the involvement and role of the organisation in the Syrian conflict and received some very interesting answers.

(...) 

[Q:] What's the reason for the conflict in Syria to your opinion? What you think is going to be the outcome?

[A:] This is just another episode in the expanding global dictatorship of the American-Zionist war machine after the collapse of the USSR and there is a good chance Syria to be it's first geopolitical defeat since the Vietnam war. Some of the reasons for conflict is the protection of the murderous Israeli state interests, the race for the exploitation of the rich natural resources of the area and the hate of the Emirs of the gulf for Syria among other things. The Syrian people at the end will prevail because they are on the defence of nation and truth! 

France: Woman suffers from antisemitic hate campaign after putting up mezuzah

One French Jewish woman from Goussainville, next to Paris, tells of the antisemitic hate campaign against her family.  

Ruth Smadja's story started in September 2009, when her rabbi suggested she put a mezuzah on her front door.  A few days later, her door was covered with insults.  After the door was cleaned it was again covered with insults, and a clear message: "Jews out".

The hate campaign continued with thefts and vandalism.  One day, Smadja started receiving death threats.  The family stopped going out, and the kids dropped their extra-curricular activities, for fear of being attacked.

Ruth is running an internet campaign on Twitter and Facebook, seeking help to move someplace safer in Paris.  See more on her story at Europe-Israel.

Netherlands: Op-ed rejects Israel as Jewish state

In January, a similar article in a German newspaper caused an uproar in the local Jewish community.

Willem Aldershoff, adviser on EU-policy Israel/Palestine and Michel Waelbroeck, scholar of European law write in Dutch newspaper Trouw about the Israeli demand to be recognized as a Jewish state.  The article is headlined: "Israel should be more than the land of the Jews".

The short-short summary: Recognizing Israel as a Jewish state is a ridiculous demand in international law, even some Israeli politicians think it's unnecessary, it wouldn't add anything to a final peace agreement, it will be the first step in making the Palestinian citizens of Israel second-class citizens (e.g. the Jews will rename the Palestinian villages in Hebrew), the PA already recognized Israel, Israel does not intend to recognize Palestine.

There might be more.

And then we come to the final paragraphs (my translation):

UN Resolutions 194 (1948) and 237 (1967) leave no doubt as to the right of return of the Palestinians.  It also shouldn't be forgotten that the Palestinians have an ancient and direct connection with the  area of former Palestine.  They've lived there from time immemorial and formed the vast majority of the population.  Jews have lived there too, but the mass Jewish immigration to Palestine is relatively recent, in 1893, 6% of the population were Jewish, in 1946, 33%. 

For the Palestinians, recognizing Israel as a 'nation-state of the Jewish people' would be tantamount to being forced to deny their national history.  What people in the world could swallow such a condition, one that so strongly agitates the national soul?

There is a difference between discussing whether the demand is necessary, and denying Jews the right to their own homeland.

Aldershoff and Waelbroeck have no problems demanding the same from Jews.  Jews were just a minority.  No discussion of why.   By 1893, Jews were a majority in what the media love to call "Arab East Jerusalem".  But that, of course, does not give them the right to deny the Palestinians their connection to their most holy of cities.  Nobody denies the connection of Jews to Europe, even though they were expelled over and over again.  But when it comes to Israel, the Jews have lost their right to the land, despite their attempts over and over and over again, throughout the centuries, to return to their homeland.

Ireland: Irish academics pledge to boycott Israel

The Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign (IPSC) today welcomed the announcement that almost 140 Irish academics have signed up to pledge in support of an academic boycott of Israel until it complies fully with its obligations under international law.

More: IPSC

Romania: Priest denies Holocaust

With thanks to RCA Romania (the Center for Monitoring and Combating Antisemitism In Romania).

A clip recently uploaded to YouTube shows Father Andrei Lehaci, a priest in Timisoara (western Romania), talking in class against gypsies and Jews.

Regarding Jews, Lehaci told his students that they shouldn't listen to those saying that Ion Antonescu killed Jews.  According to Wikipedia: "A common assessment ranks Antonescu's Romania as second only to Nazi Germany in its antisemitic extermination policies".

Church officials say that the video is from 7-8 years ago, when Lehaci temporarily served as a teacher.  Following the appearance of the clip, Lehaci was removed from his position as parish priest, but will continue to serve in the Church.

More: monitorulcj.ro, Agentia de Investigatii Media

France: Book on Jewish-Muslim relations denies Jewish right to self-determination

The Encyclopaedia of Jewish-Muslim relations was edited by two French professors.  The book appeared in French and in English (published by Princeton).  Like most academic books.. it also has its own English-language trailer, created by ARTE France.

The "Point of No Return" blog points out that the book has an antisemitic agenda, and that many of its authors are known anti-Zionists.

Point of No Return reports:

The joint editors are a Tunisian professor at the university of Nanterre (Paris), Abdelwahab Meddeb, and Benjamin Stora, a Jewish professor of North African history and author of a history of the Jews of Algeria. The two men have been touring France, North Africa, Israel and Belgium promoting the Encyclopaedia.

(...) 

The underlying premise is that Jews are not a people in their own right. They are Arabs of the Jewish faith. Antisemitism is unknown under Islam. Through the centuries Jews have been tolerated, until the harmonious relations between them and their Muslim brethren were torn asunder by the European colonial powers and 'European' Zionism. Pogroms at the time of Mohammed were inter-ethnic or inter-tribal conflicts; the 1929 massacre in Palestine incited by the Mufti of Jerusalem was nothing more than an anti-colonial rebellion. The Jews are 'imprisoned in a 'European Zionist identity' which is alien to them. 

The Encyclopaedia cloaks superficial criticism of Islam in apologetics. Antisemitic outbreaks are always the fault of fanatics. Jews are to blame for their own suffering; modern antisemitism is a backlash to colonialism and the 'theft' by European Zionists of Arab Palestine. Many of the contributing experts are anti-Zionists. 

France: March against antisemitism turns antisemitic

"against homophobia, racism and the extreme right"
Anything missing?

Following the antisemitic and homophobic graffiti in Toulouse, 2000 people marched in the city this past Saturday.

But some of the participants turned on Nicole Yardeni, head of the regional CRIF (French Jewish umbrella organization).  They shouted "Yardeni get lost. CRIF, fascists, Zionists, get lost."

Yardeni was surprised that the protesters did not want Jews in a protest march against antisemitism, and noted that some protesters identified with anti-Zionism (*).

More: RTL

(*) Remember: Anti-Zionism has nothing to do with antisemitism.

Update, via LDJ: The antisemitic protesters were members of a Communist group.

Germany: Memorial for Jewish Holocaust victims desecrated (again)

A memorial statue for the Jews of Freiburg on Wiwili Bridge was desecrated again.  It was previously desecrated last November.

More: AIF, via JFDA

Norway: YWCA-YMCA boycotting Israel

YWCA-YMCA of Norway is calling for an economic boycott of Israel.  (h/t MIFF)

Not much to add to that.  The Christian organization explains it's because they want peace.

Ukraine: Police making threats against Jewish community

Ever since the beginning of the unrest in the Ukraine, both sides have used accusations of antisemitism in the other side to bolster their position.  Bottom line: the Jews are in a very precarious position.  

Arutz Sheva's Russian-language sources reported disturbing facts on the ground Saturday, claiming that the Ukrainian police forces - who are loyal to Yanukovych - have been making open threats against the Jewish community there.

They have also been promoting anti-Semitic propaganda, according to the report.

"The police know that the damage to the Jewish community could ignite harsh reactions from European countries," a source stated to Arutz Sheva Saturday night. "Because of this, senior police forces there are attempting to bring the Jewish community into the turmoil." 

More: Arutz 7

Note also this article, from the New York Review of Books:

The protests in the Maidan, we are told again and again by Russian propaganda and by the Kremlin’s friends in Ukraine, mean the return of National Socialism to Europe. The Russian foreign minister, in Munich, lectured the Germans about their support of people who salute Hitler. The Russian media continually make the claim that the Ukrainians who protest are Nazis. Naturally, it is important to be attentive to the far right in Ukrainian politics and history. It is still a serious presence today, although less important than the far right in France, Austria, or the Netherlands. Yet it is the Ukrainian regime rather than its opponents that resorts to anti-Semitism, instructing its riot police that the opposition is led by Jews. In other words, the Ukrainian government is telling itself that its opponents are Jews and us that its opponents are Nazis.

Shabbat Shalom

Celebrating the Israeli Jordan Valley.  To all my readers, Shabbat Shalom.

France: Mayor condemns 'cold-blooded murder' of Palestinian terrorist

 On January 29th, Mohammad Mahmoud Mubarak, a resident of the Jalazoun refugee camp, opened fire on civilian cars and then turned on IDF soldiers. He was killed after a seven minute firefight.

The Palestinians claimed he was an innocent road worker.

 Hard to decide who's telling the truth here, right?

This must be the reason why Pierre Gosnat, the Communist mayor of the Paris suburb of Ivry-sur-Seine, published an official condemnation of the 'cold-blooded murder' of young Mohammad Mahmoud Mubarak.

Pictures and more at Le Monde Juif:

Gosnat wrote that the city supports the Palestinians in their wish to live in peace.  In the picture attached to that same letter, we see Mubarak in a PFLP shirt.  The PLFP being a terrorist organization.  His Facebook page glorifies terrorism.

As it turns out, peaceful Mubarak is the son of a prominent Fatah leader, and the nephew of Hamas MP Ahmed Mubarak.

Sultan Abu Al-Einein, advisor to PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas on NGOs and member of the Fatah Central Committee, praised "our heroic Martyr (Shahid) Muhammad Mahmoud Mubarak from the resolute Jalazone refugee camp, who ascended to Heaven as a Martyr in the battlefield while challenging the Zionist enemy".

Equipment of innocent Palestinian road worker
murdered by blood-thirsty Israeli soldiers

It's hard to fault Gosnat, though.  Take a look at how various respectable news organizations reported this terrorist attack.  

The BBC (more at BBC Watch):

The Los Angeles Times:

The New York Times:

EU: Funds to demonize, boycott Israel

A few days ago NGO Monitor published its report "Evaluating Funding for Political Advocacy NGOs in the Arab-Israeli Conflict: The European Instrument for Democracy and Human Rights (EIDHR)"

The EU claims it does not boycott Israel.  But it funds organizations whose main goal is to do so.

Breitbart reports:

In particular, Steinberg pointed to the EU's highly disproportionate funding for NGOs through the European Instrument for Democracy and Human Rights (EIDHR) which, "allocated over 11 million euros to NGOs in Israel and the Palestinian Authority, which represents 57% of EIDHR funding directed at the Middle East, while projects in Syria, Iraq, Iran, Oman, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE are largely ignored by such EU frameworks."

As just one the example, the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions (ICAHD), which in 2010 was awarded an EIDHR grant of 169,661 Euros, presented a completely one-sided, context-free perspective on the conflict, including accusations against Israel of "ethnic cleansing," "genocide," "collective punishment," and "apartheid."

Numerous EU funded organisations routinely employ demonising anti-Israel rhetoric, campaign for anti-Israel boycott efforts (BDS), actively lobby international frameworks, and engage in anti-Israel “lawfare” activities, says the NGO Monitor report.

Belgium: Politician says Israel founded to establish global domination

Agnes Jonckheere, head of the Free Christian Democrats party (VCD) had to temporarily resign close to a year ago ago after she wrote that “a few Jewish families that monopolize the banking world” caused the financial crisis in Europe.  She explained that the protests against the Jewish banking elite in Hungary and Greece were nothing like the Nazis.  "That anger is directed at 'Judaism, which controls the banks, the government, and world economy'".

Her 'resignation' barely lasted a couple of weeks.

Now she's back.

Belgian Jewish site Joods Actueel reports that in a news update sent to party supporters and posted on the party's website, Jonkheere wrote as follows (my translation):

"The real reason for the founding of the State of Israel was not to give the Jews a homeland, but mainly to enable to install from this place, where the three world-religions are established, global domination too, with the necessary military control.  The nation is zealously defended, but not the religion of the Jews.  On the contrary: they pass laws to support and strengthen liberal Judaism, represented  by the modern Orthodox Jews with their kippahs."

The update has since been removed from the party's site.

Netherlands: Labor Party candidate posts antisemitic, anti-Israel material

Natasha Elfrink is the Dutch Labor Party's candidate in Arnhem.

On the Muslim site "Wij Blijven Hier" (We're Staying Here), she explains why she's not an antisemite (h/t joods.nl).

To summarize:

She was eight when Mohammed el Durah was killed, and she sympathized with him.  As time passed, her empathy for the Palestinians grew.  She writes that she wasn't blind, she also saw the suicide attacks against innocent Israelis.  But those were desperate cries for help.  "Where you sow hate, you'll also reap hate".

She felt very insulted when she was first accused of being an antisemite.  She does not think that the Holocaust is justification for the suffering of the Palestinians.  Calling her an antisemite for saying so is just a way for the Israeli regime to shut people up.

Anyway.

Natasha Elfrink is also a Facebook member of many Palestinian groups.  She's also signed up to various Jihadi, Islmist, and Sharia groups.  A Facebook group called "Who is Natasha Elfrink" is currently following up on the friends of this Labor candidate.

When confronted about it, she said that she signed up for groups she did not agree with for her studies (Islam and Arabic at Radboud University).

In any case, she participated in World Hijab Day.  She retweets 'Free Koran' giveaways.

On her twitter feed she jubilates over freed Palestinian terrorists.

In mid-December, Israel was hit by a major storm.  For several days thousands were left without electricity and in some cases, water.

Elfrink focused on the 'real' news, and wrote: "Look.  I think this is outrageous.  And you know why?  On December 14, Israel flooded Gaza.  Not a word about it in the media."

You know why the media did not report it?  Because no such thing happened.  It was yet another Palestinian blood libel against the Jews.

Elfrnk is not antisemitic because she thinks the Palestinians got a raw deal.  She's antisemitic because she believes conspiracy theories against Israel.  Because she's happy when a Jew-murderer goes free.  And because she justifies terrorism against Jews.

When the victims are Arabs, she sympathizes.  Nothing justifies their suffering.  When the victims are Jews, she sympathizes with their persecutors.  Because it's understandable.

Note to Elfrink: If you 'understand' and 'sympathize' when people kill Jews, you're an antisemite.

Russia: Mistaken for Jewish

Australian  Howard Willis describes the hostility with which he was met in Russia (and Poland).  People just assumed he was Jewish.

My naiveté was bumped but not quite overturned the week before I went to Moscow. On a rainy day in south-eastern Poland, an elderly man made a show of walking out of a bakery as I entered. A complete stranger, whose sudden fury was open and unmistakable. I had never before experienced such impersonal hatred, such open contempt. It shocked me. But then, what to make of it? That old bastard in Debica could have been just a nutter, right?

In Moscow there were those who looked at me, to use Anya von Bremzen's phrase, with a scowl like frostbite. But you can misread it. One old girl approached me, her eyes glittering with apparent malice ... and politely, timidly asked directions. Muscovites have a legendary rep for brusqueness (talk to them, they melt), but over and above the background surliness, there were a few distinctly hostile stares.


Settling the matter of my origins usually led to 'the Jewish Question'. The version put to me by one of my more forthcoming interlocutors concerned those Jews who got out of the stagnating and collapsing USSR in the 1970s and '80s. These people, I was told, acquired assets in the West and then returned to fall like wolves upon poor, vulnerable Russia during the disgraceful and terrible times of Yeltsin. 

More: Eureka Street

Norway: Article on "Jew Clause" sketch attracts antisemites

Norwegian broadcaster NRK was criticized for a recent sketch on Norway's "Jew clause".   This clause in the Norwegian constitution banned Jews from the country.  It was removed in 1851.

The Local's report on this story attracted several antisemitic comments, from people who don't understand why Norway let the Jews in.  The comments are still online.

Lithuania: Neo-Nazis marchers demand “Lithuania for Lithuanians"

This past Sunday, Lithuanian neo-Nazis marched in honor of Juozas Ambrazevicius-Brazaitis, the WWII Prime Minister who actively encouraged Lithuanian participation in the mass murder of Jews.

A day earlier a similar march was held in Bulgaria, this time honoring Gen. Hristo Lukov, a Nazi supporter.

Honoring Juozas Ambrazevicius-Brazaitis
Photo: DefendingHistory.com.

Although the demonstrators in this event, purposely held for the past six years on Lithuania’s Independence Day, have in the wake of our criticism of past marches desisted from expressing overt anti-Semitism, their deep animus against Jews is obvious to the discerning observer. Thus once again, among the leading and largest banners was one glorifying Juozas Ambrazevicius, the prime minister of a provisional government established by the Lithuanian Activist Front in Kaunas shortly after the Nazi invasion, which strongly supported the Third Reich and actively encouraged Lithuanian participation in the mass murder of Jews.

The adulation expressed for Ambrazevicius is hardly surprising, given the reburial of his remains in Kaunas with full national honors by the govenment in 2012, as if he were a heroic Righteous Among the Nations, rather than a war criminal. In that context, the most popular slogan of the marchers, “Lithuania for Lithuanians,” rings particularly ominous, as its implications are clearly exclusionary.

More: Jerusalem Post

Czech Republic: Swastika sprayed near Prague synagogue

A swastika was sprayed on a bench next to the Old-New Synagogue in Prague.

More: CFCA

Sweden: Rocks thrown at Malmö synagogue

Rocks were thrown at a synagogue window in Malmö.

More: CFCA

Germany: Neo-Nazis play Jew-killing monopoly

"Pogromly" board

A Neo-Nazi group created a perverted board game based on Monopoly where Jewish people get sent to death camps so they could pass the time between murders. 

The game, where the winner is the person who deports the most to the gas chambers, has featured at the trial of 'Nazi bride' Beate Zschape in Munich.

More: The Daily Mail

France: Antisemitic graffiti on school

A school in Tarare (eastern France) was vandalized with antisemitic graffiti.

More: LyonMag, h/t LDJ

Norway: Holocaust survivors suffer because Jews prefer their name on new hospitals, or something

In honor of Holocaust Remembrance Day, journalist Sidsel Wold wrote an article on the problems of Holocaust survivors in Israel (h/t Norway, Israel and the Jews).  The article is based in part on a similar article which appeared in the Guardian, written by Harriet Sherwood.

There is no doubt Israel should do more for its Holocaust survivors, though I personally feel uncomfortable when foreign journalists use Holocaust Day as a platform to talk about how bad Israel is.

Wold's article is titled: "Here [Poland] The Knesset Members Honor the Dead, at Home The Survivors Live in Poverty".

So we start off by accusing the Knesset of daring to go to Poland and pretending to care about the Holocaust, when they really should do more for the survivors.  But Wold doesn't stop there.  She thinks all Jews are responsible for the sad state of Holocaust survivors.  

She cites Avi Dichter, who heads an Israeli state-funded organization to help Holocaust survivors.  Dichter spoke to the Jerusalem Post (which Wold wrongly identifies as Ynet) and said as follows:

Dichter said that he makes sure to fit in meetings with potential international donors when he takes personal trips each month. 

“Donating to a museum, a university or a hospital is much more widely accepted because they put a sign with your name on things, but you can’t put a sign on a Holocaust survivor,” Dichter said. “It demands a different approach.” 

“We need to tell them the individual stories of these struggling survivors,” he said. 

“Donors want to connect to the cause not just rationally but also emotionally.”

In Wold's world, this was translated to the following (my translation to English):

The Foundation for the Benefit of the Holocaust Victims in Israel is dependent on both state and private donations. But for many Jewish donors, it's more accepted, or even more attractive, to give money to a new museum or a hospital wing, where the donor's name is put on the wall in large letters. 

"You can't put your name on a Holocaust survivor," said Dichter.

Dichter did not mention Jews specifically, and he was talking about the different approach needed to get money for an emotional issue.   But for Wold, this becomes an accusation against all Jewish donors: Jews prefer to give money to places where they'll be noticed.  In large letters, no less.

Notice that in the one line which is an actual quote, Wold manages to misquote Dichter.

Wold also accuses PM Netanyahu and other Israeli politicians of using the Holocaust to claim special privileges (again, my translation):

PM Benjamin Netanyahu is one of Israel's many politicians who constantly refer to the fate of the Jews under the Nazi regime, and to the six million Holocaust victims, in order to explain to the wold why the State of Israel must be so strong and why Israel has special needs.

Of course, this is in an article where she actually talks about those special needs (!).

British Middle East expert: “The possibility of a conventional attack against Israel is next to nil"

Fanar Haddad is considered an expert on the Middle East.   So he must be aware that the residents of every major city in Israel have been under conventional attack in the past ten years.  I myself spent time in a bomb shelter, and I do not appreciate being called 'paranoid', when I wish that next time a rocket is aimed at me, it will be blown out of the sky before it lands.  Because it's obvious to all Israelis that there will be a next time.

But some feel Israel, which gets significant funding from key ally the U.S. for missile defense capabilities, is going overboard.

Fanar Haddad, a research fellow from the Middle East Institute in Singapore, said Israeli military superiority in the region was so firmly established that Iron Beam was unlikely to change anything in the short or medium term. 

“The development of another layer says more about Israeli paranoia,” he said. “The possibility of a conventional attack against Israel is next to nil and there is hardly a need for five layers of missile defense systems.”

More: Times of Israel

Hungary: “fellow Hungarian countrymen” vs “our Jewish citizens”.

There is a problem with the comparison, as Hungary is an ethnic nation-state, while America is a non-ethnic country.  Still, this is an issue in most European countries.

Imagine the White House chief of staff stating the following at a press conference after a significant meeting about a highly controversial issue with the leading representatives of American Jewry: “The President will address all of our fellow Americans as well as our Jewish citizens next week.” It does not take a lot of imagination to envision the firestorm of criticism that would follow such a division of the American people into real Americans versus Jewish citizens of America.

Yet, this is precisely what János Lázár, the Minister of State for the Prime Minister’s office, said after the unsuccessful round-table meeting with leading Hungarian Jewish organisations. Of course, he was not talking about fellow Americans but rather “fellow Hungarian countrymen” and “our Jewish citizens”.

More: Budapest Times

Malta: ‘No anti-Semitism case ever reported’

The Malta Independent reports:

Speaker of the House Anglu Farrugia today had a courtesy visit from John Mann MP, Chair of the UK’s All Party Parliamentary Group against Anti-Semitism and of the Steering Committee of the Inter-Parliamentary Coalition for Combating Anti-Semitism. 

The two sides discussed how anti-Semitism should be combated. 

Dr Farrugia highlighted that no case was ever reported to have occurred in Malta related to anti-Semitism.

I was intrigued by the idea of a country with no antisemitism.  So I Googled around.  Malta does not have a lot of antisemitism, but it's not antisemitism-free.   A few years ago a teenager set up an antisemitic Facebook page.  Additionally, Malta is a Catholic country, and Catholic antisemitism, blaming Jews for the death of Christ, is alive and well on the island.

Sweden: Neo-Nazis charged with rioting (and antisemitic hate speech)

The riots had nothing to do with Jews.

The Local reports:

Charges were filed on Monday against people who took part in a violent riot in Stockholm's Kärrtorp suburb in December last year. Four of the suspects were charged with violent rioting (våldsamt upplopp) and hate speech (hets mot folkgrupp) and another three were charged with instigating violent rioting. According to the indictment, several of those charged threw bottles, rocks, and firecrackers.

What type of hate speech?

Radio Sweden adds a few more details: One person made disparaging remarks against Jews, raised his hand in a Nazi salute and yelled "Adolph Hitler".

Hungary: Jobbik, Socialists use Jews to get votes

Jobbik, a far-right party, recently held a pre-election rally in a former synagogue in Esztergom.  The building is today a community center.

Both Jobbik and the Socialist mayor of the city, had an interest in causing a provocation.

Euronews reports that Jobbik chose this location in order to cause a provocation:

However, Attila Magyar, euronews’ correspondent in Esztergom said the choice of location was intended to provoke:

“Last year the Jobbik party interrupted several parliamentary sessions. Now something similar has happened to its members. By choosing this location, the party has achieved its goal and received the attention it was seeking.”

The local rabbi, Rabbi Baruch Oberlander, says it was a socialist provocation:

The Rabbi explained that Jewish community leaders tried adamantly to stop the rally, to no avail. 

"We, on behalf of the hareidi communities of Budapest, turned to the mayor via a letter, asking that the rally be stopped from being held in the synagogue, and would even provide a replacement if need be - but she intentionally ignored it," he accused.

"Regrettably, it is obvious that the Socialist Left party has decided that it's worth it for them to cynically use Jews and the topic of anti-Semitism in the hopes that it will bring them victory in the upcoming elections. Unfortunately, many Jews and Jewish leaders participate in the elections, and the Socialists take advantage." 

Serbia: Cemetery vandalized

Several headstones were vandalized at the Jewish cemetery in Subotica on the night of February 10-11. 

According to Jewish Community Subotica, nine headstones have been damaged, including two of greater value belonging to prominent citizens.

More: InSerbia

France: Antisemitic graffiti throughout Toulouse

Graffiti at Toulouse University (UT1): swastika, "Death to CRIF" (Jewish umbrella organization).

PD (gays) = Jewish star

Swastikas and other hate graffiti were painted on buildings throughout the French city of Toulouse. 

Sunday night’s vandalism, which also included far-right symbols, struck an LBGT center, a university and cemetery, and the offices of left-wing candidates in elections next month, according to Radio France International. Police have not identified any suspects. 

The graffiti attacked Jewish groups and compared Jews to homosexuals, RFI reported.

More: JTA

Germany: Berlin Film Festival Award for Anti-Zionist British Director Ken Loach Angers Jewish Group

Deidre Berger, director of the American Jewish Committee’s Berlin office, said, “It is a disgrace that a prominent German film festival glorifies a director who has distinguished himself through bigotry and the denial of Israel’s right to exist.”

She also said that awarding Loach the “The Honorary Golden Bear for Lifetime Achievement Award” was especially deserving of “shame,” as it was taking place in Berlin.

“Shame on the Berlinale for honoring an artist who calls for a cultural and economic boycott of Israel, and to do so in a city that once boycotted Jewish shops and property due to anti-Semitic policies of the German government,” Berger said.

More: Algemeiner

Netherlands: Cemetery vandalized

A Jewish cemetery in Doetinchem (eastern Netherlands), was desecrated.   Two gravestones were broken, the Jewish star on one of them was covered over.  In January one of the graves was smeared with shaving cream (this incident did not make the news).

More: CFCA, CIDI

France: What North African anti-Semites learned from the French

You might think that, given the gruesome racism of French Algeria, the Arab gangs of the banlieues (squalid housing estates encircling Paris and other cities) would despise no one more than the nominally Christian descendents of their colonial oppressors.

Wrong. It’s French Jews they really hate. Worse, Jew-hatred isn’t confined to gangs. Hussey spells this out in uncompromising language that you don’t expect from a contributor to the BBC and Guardian, which shy away from exposing non-white racism.

Anti-Semitism thrives in the banlieues, says Hussey: young people’s chatter is full of references to sale juif, sale yid, sale feuj (backslang), even youtre, an old slang word derived from the German Jude that carries overtones of the deportations of Vichy.

(...)

I can derive only one comforting thought from Hussey’s brilliant book: Muslim Jew-hatred in France is so deeply rooted in that country’s native anti-Semitism that it’s unlikely to be replicated in Britain. Half a million French Jews, on the other hand, face an unnerving future.

More: The Telegraph, via Philosémitisme Blog

Soviet Intel Officer: "The Jews ... proved a convenient enemy for both leftist and rightist totalitarians"

You talk at length about the anti-Semitism that underpinned and animated much of the Leftist attack on the West, including in the media through plays such as “The Deputy.” Why is it that Leftism and Jew-hatred have gone hand in hand? 

Pacepa: Most leftists are totalitarians, and totalitarianism (what we now innocuously call the “nanny state”) always requires a tangible enemy. The Jews, who were not protected by the power of a state, proved a convenient enemy for both leftist and rightist totalitarians…

More: The Blaze

Norway: Labour Party youth support Palestinian terrorist

Members of AUF, the Labour Party's youth group, pose with a picture of Palestinian terrorist Marwan Barghouti.

Barghouti is in jail for murdering Jews.  The AUF were targeted by Norwegian terrorist Anders Behring Breivik.  But the AUF don't think there's a connection.  Killing Norwegians is bad, killing Jews is... freedom fighting.

Now, imagine the international outrage if youth from an Israeli political party would take a similar photo with Breivik.

More: MIFF

Germany: 788 antisemitic crimes in 2013, 96% by right-wingers

Police recorded 788 antisemitic crimes in 2013, including 32 cases of physical assault and violence.

The breakdown:
Right wing: 753 crimes, of which 29 violent crimes
Immigrants: 16 crimes, of which 3 violent crimes
Left wing: 1 crime
Unregistered: 18 crimes

The figures come from monthly inquiries by the Bundestag's Vice President Petra Pau (Left Party), and her faction.

The numbers are expected to rise, as many crimes are not reported immediately.

More: Tagesspiegel, Deutsche Welle

Norway: Blaming Israel for Oslo’s bomb

John Færseth, Norway's top-most expert on conspiracy theories, looks into the theories surrounding Anders Behring Breivik's terrorism.  Israel and the Jews were of course responsible for it all.  Read the whole thing.  Almost every Jew-hater out there has joined the party.

The killer himself strained credulity by claiming to be part of a neo-Knights Templar group of Christian crusaders. Yet within days of the attack some theorists claimed to detect a still larger conspiracy. It was lurking, they said, behind the terrorist’s support for the state of Israel in his manifesto “2083 – A European Declaration of Independence”. Their conspiracy claims, now publicized on a number of websites, come in what may be described as “soft” and “hard” versions. But the culprit is the same in both: Israel.

More: Hate Speech International

Russia: Pro-Kremlin lawmaker says Jews destroyed Russia

A local politician from the party of Russian President Vladimir Putin has accused Jews of destroying Russia.

The accusation by Oleg Bolychev, a legislator from the ruling United Russia party at the regional parliament in Kaliningrad, was made in the parliament on Feb. 6, according to the Regnum news agency, which reported on it on Thursday.

During a debate, Bolychev called his detractors “Jews, mired in opposition,” adding: “You destroyed our country in 1917 and you destroyed our country in 1991.” 

More: JTA

Bulgaria: "What's wrong with that? Hitler is good"

Hitler and Nazi items are being sold in various tourist shops across Europe.

Nazi mugs on sale in Bulgarian store (Photo: Janna Kushnir)

On the final day of their five-day trip, the mother and son entered a gift shop in the town's main street and were surprised to find the mugs with swastikas and Hitler's picture offered for sale, stacked near cosmetic items and various trinkets.

Kushnir, the daughter of a Holocaust survivor, asked the cashier if selling such items was not forbidden, to which she said the clerk had replied: "What's wrong with that? Hitler is good.

More: Ynet

Israeli journalist found the following Hitler poster hanging in a market in Budapest, Hungary.  The stand also had various Nazi emblems and insignia for sale. (news1)

Hitler poster in Budapest market, Yoav Limor

Tourists found the following in Tallinn, Estonia (Europe-Israel)

Nazi paraphernalia sold in tourist shop in Tallinn, Estonia

Hungary: Research institute director says genocide of Jews was 'action against aliens'

Sandor Szakaly, head of the Veritas institute, told MTI in an interview last week that the deportation of the first group – some 10,000 people – from Hungary during WWII qualified as an “alien citizens’ procedure” because the deportees were not Hungarian citizens.

Szakaly’s remarks created a stir in Hungary, with both DK and the Federation of Hungarian Jewish Communities (Mazsihisz) demanding that the director should resign or his appointment should be withdrawn.

“As the deported Jews were massacred by SS members, it was clearly a genocide committed by the national socialist regime,” DK said on Monday.

More: Politics.hu

UK: Celebrity photographer slams ‘extremist’ Jewish lobby

Leading UK photographer Rankin had harsh words Thursday for both Scarlett Johansson and the “zealots” in the “US Jewish lobby,” who he said control the entertainment business.

In a lengthy, wide-ranging interview with London’s The Independent, John Rankin Waddell heavily criticized Johansson’s role as spokeswoman for Israeli company SodaStream, and implied she couldn’t leave the deal because of the powerful influence of extremist Jews in Hollywood.

(...)

The “main thing in all this for me,” he said, is “that kind of extreme Judaism.” The “extreme belief” that Palestine is the Jewish homeland and “those people are worthless to them” is “very powerful in America,” he added.

“They will blacklist you… it’s worse than McCarthyism. You are pro-Palestinian? F**king forget it,” Rankin said.

More: Times of Israel

Shabbat Shalom