בס״ד associated with classic עש״ק פרשת חיי שרה 24 Cheshvan 5779 ISRAEL NEWS antisemitism like the November 2, 2018 blood libel to Issue number 1218 A collection of the week’s news from Israel characterize Israel or Israelis). From the Bet El Twinning / Israel Action Committee of But much of the self-styled human Jerusalem 4:09 rights community has studiously Toronto 5:49 Beth Avraham Yoseph of Toronto Congregation ignored the IHRA framework. Groups such as Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and the World Council of Churches reject the Commentary… definitions described above, and frequently stray into anti-Semitic territory in their incessant and fierce criticism of Israel. They also have studiously Israel’s Role in the Struggle against Antisemitism ignored the vast amounts of anti-Semitic materials emanating from the By David M. Weinberg Arab world. Education and Diaspora Affairs Minister Naftali Bennett rushed to Today, everybody agrees that combating “cyberhate,” including Pittsburgh this week to represent the government of Israel at memorial antisemitism and anti-Zionism, is a top priority. Israel’s Justice Ministry events following the terrorist massacre in the Tree of Life Synagogue. So even has a department dedicated to the fight against online incitement. did Israeli Consul General in New York Dani Dayan. And the Global Forum against Antisemitism, now under the auspices of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his cabinet offered every the Israeli Foreign Affairs and Diaspora ministries, is tackling Christian possible assistance to American Jewry. A semi-secret cabinet-level forum, theological antisemitism, Holocaust revisionism, Palestinian denial of including Mossad representatives, is scheduled to meet to discuss security Jewish history, campus antisemitism, legislative assaults on Jewish for world Jewry. practices like ritual slaughter and circumcision, and even antisemitism in Israeli solidarity with US Jews at this time of suffering is worthy and sports. important, even if some US Jews were quick to reject the Netanyahu Some experts warn that unless the rising tide of hate crimes in the US government’s good wishes. In today’s highly charged political is turned back, American Jewry will have to undergo a process of environment, they see guns laws and the rhetoric of President Trump as part European-style fortress-ization. Synagogues and Jewish community of the problem, and they feel Netanyahu is too close to Trump. centers in the US may need to be protected from neo-Nazis just as I think it is a big mistake on the part of these US Jews to politicize the synagogues and Jewish community centers in Europe are protected from fight against antisemitism, and to willy-nilly drive the liberal-conservative radical Islamists. divide into that fight, when healing and harmony are the much better and This means the adding of multi-layered defenses to Jewish sites, more needed sentiment in world Jewish affairs. including security screening with armed guards, surveillance systems, It’s worth appreciating the fact that Israelis have a come a long way in panic rooms and sterile zones. learning to value the Jewish Diaspora. Not always has the State of Israel If this is the unfortunate fate of American Jewish institutional life – I seen the struggle against antisemitism around the world as its fight. This is hope not! – Israeli security expertise undoubtedly will prove helpful. not something to be taken for granted. In the meantime, Israeli and Diaspora Jews should band together to For the first 25 years of Israel’s existence, the unspoken attitude in draw strength from solidarity, jointly combat hate, and raise the flag of Jerusalem was, “If Jews abroad have a problem with anti-Semites, they can unafraid and vibrant Jewish life everywhere. Keep partisan politics out of always migrate to Israel.” Immersed in the business of building and it. (Jerusalem post Nov 1) defending the Jewish nation-state, Israel’s leaders had no time for “troubles of the Diaspora past.” Attitudes began to change after the Yom Kippur War. The campaign of The Left lectures us about hate speech? By Eitan Orkibi political delegitimization against Israel launched by Arab countries led to Did you oppose the Oslo Accords? Well, then, you are a part of the the infamous “Zionism is Racism” resolution at the UN, and a ton of incitement. Do you support Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu? You propaganda that blended anti-Zionism with antisemitism. The Big Lie play a part in encouraging violence against people on the Left and entered intellectual discourse. minorities. During the 2016 U.S. presidential elections, did you prefer After the Rue Copernic Paris Synagogue bombing in 1980 and other Republican candidate Donald Trump to Democratic candidate Hillary terrorist attacks, prime minister Menachem Begin took the decision to have Clinton? You are buddy-buddy with neo-Nazis. To this day, you continue Israeli officials begin advising Jewish communities abroad on security to obfuscate your role in the incitement that preceded the assassination of measures, and response to antisemitism began to find its place on Israel’s late Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin. agenda. This is the message now being promoted by the Israeli Left in a With the disintegration of the Communist bloc, an enhanced role for patronizing and reproachful tone. And in order to denounce you as Israeli diplomacy regarding antisemitism also became more necessary and encouraging killers, you are being told it is not just your culture of possible. Jerusalem intervened and pressed for government crackdowns on discourse but your entire worldview that makes you "closer in many ways official and street manifestations of antisemitism in the emerging states of to the world of the [Tree of Life Synagogue] murderer than that of the the former USSR. murdered." Yes, that is a real quote. In the late 1980s, then-cabinet secretary (and later Supreme Court While disturbing and sick, this tactic can very easily be applied to the justice) Elyakim Rubinstein established an “Inter-Ministerial Forum for other side. In many ways, for example, the Israeli Left is closer to Nashat Monitoring Antisemitism,” and expanded it to include Diaspora Jewish Milhem, the Arara resident who murdered two Israelis and wounded seven representatives and academic experts. The forum compiled reports on at a bar on Tel Aviv's Dizengoff Street and then murdered the taxi driver antisemitism around the world and eventually won a place on the Israeli who picked him up, than it is to the Right. cabinet’s agenda, reporting once a year. Like many on the Left, Milhem opposed the occupation and believed The 2001 World Conference against Racism, known as Durban I, the settlements were a violation of international law. Like others on the turned into one of the greatest displays of organized anti-Jewish and anti- more radical Left, he also believed that Israeli soldiers perpetrate war Israel hate ever. It was a horrible watershed moment that clarified how crimes and the Israeli Air Force massacres innocent people. Who knows, antisemitism had become a strategic threat. It traumatized even many he could have been inspired by Gideon Levy's column slamming the IAF Israelis. for bombing Hamas targets in the Gaza Strip or former Prime Minister In 2003, then-minister for Jerusalem and Diaspora affairs Natan Ehud Barak's remark that had he been Palestinian, he would have become Sharansky founded the Global Forum against Antisemitism (of which I was a terrorist. the coordinator), involving Jewish leaders and intellectuals. “The State of You know what? It could be that the three members of the Jabarin clan Israel has decided to take the gloves off and implement a coordinated from Umm al-Fahm who murdered two Israeli police officers on the counteroffensive against antisemitism,” Sharansky wrote. “The State of Temple Mount never read the Haaretz newspaper, never listened to the Israel will play, as it always should, a central role in defending the Jewish tales of the human rights organization B'Tselem or watched the obligatory People.” roadblock scene that comes up in so many Israeli movies. But why would In 2016, the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) they need to do that when they have lawmakers from the Joint Arab List? adopted a working definition of antisemitism based on Sharansky’s work, Was it not MK Hanin Zoabi who screamed that they need to "wipe the which includes prohibitions on using double standards to single out Israel floor" with non-Jewish members of Israel's security forces? or denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination. (By this Can anyone seriously deny the demonization industry's presence in the definition, it is anti-Semitic to claim that the existence of a State of Israel is propaganda of organizations against the occupation and the rhetoric of a racist endeavor, to compare Israel to Nazi Germany, or to use symbols "peace activists"? I am not talking about those on the margins, but rather Readers are requested to please mail contributions to: BAYT - re: Israel News, 613 Clark Avenue West, Thornhill, Ontario. L4J 5V3 Annual Rates: Friend - $36, Supporter - $50, Benefactor - $180. Dedications are welcome at $120/week. Call (905) 886-3810 for further info. See Israel News on the internet at www.bayt.ca and www.frumtoronto.com or email [email protected] to request to be added to the weekly email. Opinions expressed do not necessarily represent the views of BAYT. the spokespeople and leaders on the Israeli Left who equate Israel with Nazi worst Nazi verbiage by calling Jews “termites,” directly implying the need Germany, slander IDF soldiers and publicly accuse Israel of intentionally for their extermination. carrying out massacres. What is all this if not an alibi for a murder? We dare not forget Students for Justice in Palestine, who hold tributes Someone out there is reading you guys, learning, and reaching the to terrorist “martyrs,” such as Dalal Mughrabi, who carried out the necessary conclusion.