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Al Jazeera’s undercover Israel Lobby investigation uncovers absolutely nothing
Anshell Pfeffer
Haaretz • October 24, 2018
…Al Jazeera’s undercover reporter spent five months working for The Israel Project – an organization that makes no secret of its attempts to influence media coverage of Israel. During that period, he went out of his way to befriend as many Jewish activists as he could. “Tony” seems to have been a professional and social success, but in all the hundreds of hours of covert footage he obtained, there is absolutely nothing that was not known before. Read more.

Image: Screenshot from the investigation by the Al Jazeera Network. (Source: Al Jazeera)
Palestinian Authority and Hamas developing “parallel police states” in the West Bank and Gaza Strip: Human Rights Watch
Human Rights Watch • October 23, 2018
…“Twenty-five years after Oslo, Palestinian authorities have gained only limited power in the West Bank and Gaza, but yet, where they have autonomy, they have developed parallel police states,” said Tom Porteous, deputy program director at Human Rights Watch. “Calls by Palestinian officials to safeguard Palestinian rights ring hollow as they crush dissent.” Read more.
Palestinians' Refusal to Accept the Jewish National Movement Has Been Disastrous for Them
Alexander Yakobson
Haaretz • October 20, 2018
It’s understandable why in Palestinian parlance it’s common to describe the Palestinian conflict with Zionism and Israel not as a national conflict but as an anti-colonialist struggle. Portraying the Palestinians not as a side in a national conflict but as a people fighting against colonialism holds two advantages: According to the rules of postcolonial discourse, the Palestinians are in the right by definition and are never responsible for anything. But these advantages, and the forgoing of any serious attempt to understand the nature of the other side and its motives, come at a heavy price.
 
If you don’t have a good understanding of whom you’re dealing with, it will be hard to predict the other side’s behaviour and responses (this applies to both sides of the conflict, of course). The Palestinians’ ongoing refusal to accept that they are confronting a people and a rival national movement, and the illusion that this confrontation can be won using methods suited to the colonialist paradigm, have been disastrous for the Palestinian people. 
Read more.
Universalism, Particularism, and Antisemitism
Rafael Castro
BESA Center Perspectives Paper No. 981 • October 21, 2018
For the world to emancipate itself from antisemitism, religions and political movements will have to accept individual freedom of conscience and cultural pluralism, which are essential if universalism and particularism are to coexist. That universalism and particularism can, in fact, coexist and thrive together is demonstrated by 3,000 years of Jewish history. When the world finally understands the merits of embracing universal values without shedding ethnic identity, Jews and Judaism will be genuinely understood and accepted. Read more.
Peace isn't going to be possible as long as Palestinian schools are teaching children to hate
Judith Bergman
Washington Examiner • October 25, 2018
Fatah, the largest faction of the Palestinian Liberation Organization, has announced the publication of four new booklets for children in which notorious terrorists and their actions are glorified, according to a recent news report by the Middle East Media Research Institute.
 
One of the booklets is dedicated to Abu Jihad, Yasser Arafat’s deputy and PLO co-founder, who helped plan and execute the murder of 125 Israelis, and another to Dalal Al-Mughrabi, the female Fatah terrorist who led the deadliest terrorist attack in Israel’s history, in which more than three dozen Israeli civilians, one-third of them children, were killed on a hijacked bus in 1978. 
Read more.
'Bibi' Naitanui's eye-opening pilgrimage to Israel
Ron Lerner
The Age • October 23, 2018
If being two metres tall, weighing 110kg, having dark skin and dreadlocks doesn't make you stand out like a sore thumb in Israel, then having a surname very similar to the country's prime minister will certainly do the trick.
 
That's what West Coast superstar ruckman Nic Naitanui has discovered since arriving in the Holy Land late last week.
 
In fact, the locals are already calling him 'Bibi' – the nickname of the nation's two-time leader Benjamin Netanyahu.
Read more.
European Jews set out ‘red lines’ ahead of conference in Brussels
Yossi Lempkovicz
Jewish News Syndicate • October 23, 2018
“For Jews across Europe, the stakes in the forthcoming European elections have rarely been higher,” said EJA chairman and founder Rabbi Menachem Margolin.
 
Ahead of the European elections in May 2019, the European Jewish Association (EJA), a Brussels-based group representing Jewish communities across the continent, is launching a wide-ranging consultation of European Jewry in order to get agreement around a series of “red lines.”
 
The draft red lines, which include the exclusion from government of parties that espouse antisemitism as set out in the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition, call on all political parties to pass binding resolutions rejecting the anti-Israel BDS movement as fundamentally antisemitic and to support freedom of religion, will be debated and voted on at the EJA’s flagship annual conference from Nov. 6-7 in Brussels.
 
Once approved, an official resolution, encompassing the views of Jewry across the continent, will be forwarded to all political leaders and parties standing in the European elections, and are expected to be signed up to and included in party literature and manifestos. 
Read more.
Iran manufacturing, upgrading missiles in Iraq, sources say
Ariel Kahana
Jewish News Syndicate • October 23, 2018
Iran is building factories to manufacture and upgrade missiles in Iraq, in addition to its efforts in Syria and Lebanon, Israeli intelligence has discovered.
 
According to reports, Iran has already shipped missiles to Shi’ite militias in Iraq and helped Iraq set up missile factories in its territory. 
Read more.
Four Iran environmentalists could face death penalty
Digital Journal • October 24, 2018
Four detained Iranian environmental activists could face the death penalty after the charges levelled against them were changed, the Tehran prosecutor said on Wednesday.
 
"After completion of the investigation, the charges against four of the defendants have been changed to corruption on earth," said Abbas Jafari Dolatabadi, cited by Mizan Online, a news outlet run by the judiciary.
 
"Corruption on earth" is one of the most serious charges in Iran and can be punishable by death. 
Read more.
The deal that disappeared
Eldad Beck
Israel Today • October 24, 2018
Historian Kobby Barda has found a lost chapter of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict: After World War II, the U.S. gave Israel and Arab nations $1.5 billion to solve the Middle East refugee problem. But only Israel lived up to its end of the deal. Read more.

Image: Kobby Barda. (Source: Israel Today)
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