Astonishing Decision by EU Court of Justice Enabling Anti-Semitism

Court of Justice: EU nations must label Israeli products

By Clyde Hughes

A sign is seen advertising tourism, in Hebrew, in Jewish settlements in the West Bank Ofer Settlement

File Photo by Debbie Hill/UPI | License Photo

(UPI) -- The European Union's Court of Justice ruled Tuesday that all 28 nations in the bloc must now label products that come from Israeli settlements, for "ethical" and other reasons.

The court ruling says the labels are needed and could "influence consumers' purchasing decisions."

"The provision of information to consumers must enable them to make informed choices," the ruling states, "with regard not only to health, economic, environmental and social considerations but also to ethical considerations and considerations relating to the observance of international law.

'The court underlined in that respect that such considerations could influence consumers' purchasing decisions."

I wonder how many Palestinians they will put out of work with this madness?

The settlement land captured by Israel during the Six-Day War against Arab forces in 1967 remains controversial. The United Nations claims much of the land occupied by Israel. The European Union has expressed concerns about expansions of Israeli settlements in those territories, saying it's complicated the peace process.

Israel has said it's being treated differently from other nations that have annexed lands through war.

"This blatant discrimination makes it more urgent than ever for the Trump administration to defy Brussels by making official what has long been U.S. practice, to allow these products to be labeled 'Made in Israel,'" said Eugene Kontorovich, director of international law at the Jerusalem-based Kohelet Policy Forum.

Lotte Leicht, EU director at Human Rights Watch, said European customers have the right to know if products come from the territories since they are so disputed.

So, is there a similar law concerning Crimea? 

Corbyn's Antisemitism Documented in Arsenal FC Attempted Boycott

Corbyn called for boycott of Arsenal FC

in 2006 in protest of club’s deal with Israeli tourist board

Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn offers an Arsenal shirt to the EU chief Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier. Brussels, Belgium, July 13, 2017 © Pool / Reuters

Jeremy Corbyn urged fans to boycott his favorite football club, Arsenal FC, in 2006, after they struck a sponsorship deal with the Israeli tourist board, saying it’s wrong to treat both 'Israel and Palestinians as equals'.

The Labour leader, who is a lifelong Arsenal FC fan and supporter of the Palestinian people, called on fans to boycott the club, after Israeli holiday destinations were advertised at the stadium. The £350,000 deal was signed off by Dubai-based Emirates airline, Arsenal's prime sponsor, before going ahead, the Mail Online reported.

Speaking at the Palestine Solidarity Campaign Trade Union Conference in 2006, Corbyn said: “We must campaign against and boycott Arsenal football club for their arrangement with the Israeli tourist board.”

“It is wrong to treat both parties [Israel and the Palestinians] as equals,” he said, adding:

“The situation is the running sore of US foreign policy.”

The revelation has been met with anger from his opponents, with one social media user urging Corbyn to “stop digging” in reference to the anti-Semitism ‘crisis’ within Labour. Another hopes that he is “roundly booed” the next time he attends an Arsenal football match. The Labour supporters, meanwhile, are asking why the Mail has trawled through 12 years of history to find a “non-story.”

Neil Clark, a journalist and broadcaster said that this latest story on Corbyn is part of an ongoing campaign to push him to the point of resignation – and that it will continue so long as he is Labour leader.

"There is quite clearly a campaign to get Jeremy Corbyn to stand down or failing that to really smear him, try to keep this [story] so often, that he is an anti-Semite or that he is someone that has a problem with Jewish people,” Clark told RT.

He also insisted that people should not be surprised by this latest revelation, as Corbyn has long been “a strong critic of Israel” and that everyone should be free to criticize Israel just like any other country.

"Jeremy Corbyn has been throughout his career an opponent of imperialism and a strong critic of Israel and that's his position,” Clark said.

"His criticism of Israel is legitimate. Israel is a country that should be criticized, that can be criticized. We criticize America, we criticize France, people criticize Russia, and they criticize Germany."

But 'we' don't ever criticize Palestinians in spite of their murdering of innocent Israeli women and children, their firing thousands of missiles into Israel, their teaching their children to hate and kill Jews, their fire-bombing thousands of acres of crops, their refusal to even discuss peace, their single-minded goal of eliminating all Jews from the Middle East. No, we criticize the Jews because they do what they have to do to survive.

A Labour spokesman said: “Jeremy has never boycotted an Arsenal game. He does support targeted action aimed at illegal settlements and the occupation of Palestinian territories, and has backed campaigns to bring it to an end.”

Corbyn is on record as saying that he opposes a boycott of Israel as a whole, but supports a a “targeted” boycott of produce from illegal settlements on the West Bank.

Even though many of them employ Palestinians. Thousands of Palestinians work in the West Bank for Israeli companies and about 100,000 work in Israel. 

Shocking Video of Palestinian Addressing EU Parliament

Truth will prevail, eventually

video 4:17

Israeli Minister Calls EU ‘Blind to Hatred’ Following Rejected Report on ‘EU Funding of Terror’

A man wearng a T-shirt with the message, "Boycott Israel Apartheid" holds a Palestinian flag during a protest in Paris, France. © Pascal Rossignol / Reuters

The EU and Israel have clashed over an Israeli report which claimed the bloc’s money funds terrorism and attempts to boycott Israel. Brussels says the claims are unfounded, according to Haaretz.

The May report titled “The millions given by EU institutions to NGOs with ties to terror and boycotts against Israel” was produced by Israel’s Strategic Affairs Ministry and claims that in 2016, the EU paid over 5 million euros ($5.9 million) to European and Palestinian organizations that promote the boycott of Israel. 

Following the release of the document, Gilad Erdan, the head of the ministry behind the report, tweeted: “The EU continues to finance BDS organizations, some of which are linked to terror organizations, with tens of millions of shekels a year.”

BDS stands for ‘Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions’ and is a broad coalition of NGOs which seek to pressure Israel politically and economically to force it change its policies toward Palestinians. Supporters of BDS perceive their effort as similar to what was used to pressure South Africa to end its apartheid regime. Israel considers the movement an attempt to delegitimize its existence and a threat to national security.

The difference between the Palestinians and black South Africans is that black South Africans were not generally determined to murder every Africaaner in the country. Israel could ease restrictions on Palestinians, but they would risk their very existence to do so.

EU Foreign Policy Chief Federica Mogherini responded to the report in a letter to Erdan, which was obtained by Haaretz, the newspaper reported on Tuesday. The European official rejected the report’s assertions that the EU money went to fund the BDS movement and terrorism, saying the allegations were “unfounded and unacceptable.”

“The title of the report itself is also inopportune and misleading; it mixes terrorism with the boycott issue and it creates unacceptable confusion in the public eye regarding these two distinct phenomena,” the letter sent two weeks ago reportedly said. She suggested that if Erdan had evidence to the contrary, he could come to Brussels and present it.

Those two 'distinct phenomena' are not so distinct. Both are born out of a hatred of Israel, or, at the very least, a willful belief of the outrageous propaganda coming from Palestinians.

Mogherini said the EU allocates funding to particular projects and takes care that its money does not support BDS activities, which the union does not back. She added, however, that the bloc does support freedom of expression and that “any action that has the effect of closing the space in which civil society organizations operate by unduly restricting freedom of association should be avoided.”

In other words, they have no trouble supporting organizations that support BDS; but they are sure all EU money goes toward non-BDS activity. That such support could free up resources for BDS activities, doesn't seem to have occurred to them. Or, that by supporting such organizations they are giving them legitimacy, doesn't seem to bother them either.

Asked for comments on the letter, Erdan lashed out at the EU and its top foreign policy official, saying: “Mogherini admits that most of the funded orgaynizations which appear in my ministry’s report indeed promote boycotts of Israel, yet she employs the ridiculous excuse that the money is given to the boycott organizations but used for other purposes, and not for their activities aimed at boycotting Israel.

“Regrettably, excuses like these also represent the European Union’s policy on other issues, such as its attitude toward Iran and Palestinian terror,” he added. “On these issues, too, the EU has chosen to act like an ostrich and behave as if it were blind to the hatred, incitement and boycotts.”

Firing back, the EU said its “fight against terrorism has never been stronger,” and that it was “confident that our funds have not been used to support boycott of Israel, in particular not BDS activities.”

The EU's support of Israel has, I believe, been weakening over the past couple decades and, almost certainly has to do with the dramatic rise in Islamic populations in EU countries. This will only get much worse before it gets better. The New Normal will be a highly anti-Semitic Europe, and they seem to be halfway there.

Israel Appoints Its 1st-ever Female Muslim Diplomatic Envoy

© Rasha Atamny / Facebook

Rasha Atamny, a 31-year-old Palestinian born in a small Arab town, has been appointed Israel’s first secretary at its Turkish embassy in Ankara, the first time the country has sent a Muslim woman to represent it abroad.

Atamny will occupy a senior post at a mission responsible for nurturing one of the country’s most fragile relationships. Last year, Israel and Turkey signed a reconciliation agreement that tentatively ended a six-year diplomatic breakdown caused by the IDF’s military operation against a Turkish-sponsored humanitarian flotilla destined for Gaza.

Born in Baqa al-Gharbiya, a town of fewer than 30,000 on Israeli side of the West Bank border, Atamny studied psychology at Hebrew University, before being accepted on the hyper-competitive three-year Foreign Ministry cadet course alongside 21 of her contemporaries.

In a blog written while she was still completing her course, Atamny said that her decision to become a diplomat came from a three-month internship at the Israeli mission at the UN.

“One turning point will always stay with me: one day, I sat down in my usual seat in the human rights committee, and listened with great interest to a discussion taking place on women's rights violations,” Atamny wrote in Hebrew.

"At this point, I had gotten used to the continuous barrage of accusations leveled against Israel by many countries on the council... The discrimination against Israel in the UN is very obvious and disappointing. But this time it was different. This time I listened to speeches by Syria, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq and Egypt, all decrying the 'systematic women's rights violations' by Israel, while I, an Arab, Muslim Palestinian origin, represent Israel at the UN Human Rights Council."

“That day at the UN made me desperately disappointed and pushed me to take matters into my own hands, to try and at least object in thought to the systemic conduct carried out in the international arena against Israel.”

Atamny’s Twitter account, which has recently been closed but remains cached, strikes a similar pro-government tone, attacking supporters of the BDS campaign, which she says is about “eliminating Israel” and defending the controversial lemonade-making machine manufacturer Sodastream.

Israel has previously appointed Christians and male Muslims to foreign roles, as well as female Muslims to Foreign Ministry jobs inside the country, but never abroad.

Well this must be a dreadful embarrassment to Israel's many critics. There is little doubt that Syria, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq, and Egypt do not have Jewish envoys. And the number of female envoys representing those countries is probably minuscule. Of course, Muslim countries would have to appoint 2 women to do one man's job because otherwise you can't believe anything they say.

Israeli Justice Minister Claims BDS Wants to ‘Wipe the Jewish Nation off the Face of the Earth’

Amazing articles (2) not because of what the minister said,

but because of the remarkable naivety of the antisemitic media,

specifically RT and the Washington Post 

Ayelet Shaked, Israel's Justice Minister © Gali Tibbon / Reuters

30 Oct 2016 RT

Israeli Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked has accused the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement of wanting to “wipe the Jewish nation off the face of the Earth” and of being “deeply rooted in anti-Semitism.”

Shaked made the remarks Sunday at the opening plenary of the Jewish Agency for Israel’s latest board of governors meeting.

The board, which meets at least three times a year, is the central policy-making body of the Jewish Agency, a large nonprofit organization which says it aims to “connect the global Jewish family.”

Addressing the board in Jerusalem, Shaked warned “all those agents of ignorance and hatred” against testing Israel's strength and determination to defend the Jewish state, according to the Jerusalem Post.

The BDS movement is a global campaign, first launched in Palestine in 2005, to apply political and economic pressure to end Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories.

Shaked, however, insisted that the campaign has “no interest in promoting human rights, but in wiping the Jewish nation off the face of the Earth.”

She also referred to the movement as anti-Semitism dressed up as a platform for freedom and justice.

“It's deeply rooted in classical anti-Semitism that has spread all over Europe throughout the past few hundred years,” she said.

The justice minister also claimed the movement was “defeated” and referenced a Bloomberg report from June on foreign investment in Israeli assets.

Foreign capital flow in the country has nearly tripled since the launch of the BDS movement 11 years ago, with investments reaching a record high of $285.12 billion, according to the Bloomberg article.

Shaked is renowned for her anti-Palestinian rhetoric and sparked controversy in July 2014 before she became justice minister for a Facebook post, later deleted, referring to Palestinian children as “little snakes” and apparent warmongering.

She had quoted a former Israeli writer who was referring specifically to children who attack and murder Jews just out of hatred bred into them by their families and friends. RT makes it sound like she refers to all Palestinian children as such, which is not correct and reveals RT's bias.

“This is a war. It is not a war against terror, and not a war against extremists, and not even a war against the Palestinian Authority. These too are forms of avoiding reality. This is a war between two people. Who is the enemy? The Palestinian people. Why? Ask them, they started...,” she wrote.

Again, this is a quote. See below.


Washington Post WorldViews

Israel’s new justice minister considers all Palestinians to be ‘the enemy’

By Ishaan Tharoor May 7, 2015 

Ayelet Shaked of the Jewish Home party is known for her strident views on Palestinians and the Israeli left. (Tsafrir Abayov/AP)

An 11th-hour deal on Wednesday led to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu forming the most right-wing government in his country's history. Netanyahu's slim majority in the Knesset, the Israeli parliament, was secured after a pact with the Jewish Home party, led by Naftali Bennett, an ultra-nationalist who draws much of his support from Israel's settler population and rejects a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

And he does that because Palestinians don't want a 2 state solution, they want Jews gone.

One of the terms of the alliance was that Netanyahu would tap Bennett's de facto lieutenant, Ayelet Shaked, to be the next justice minister. This is a move not without controversy.

Shaked is known for her strident (some would say extremist) (those 'some' would be RT and The Washington Post, just to name a couple) views regarding Palestinians and the enfeebled Israeli left. In July, in a controversial post on Facebook, the then-member of the Knesset posted the text of an article by the late Israeli writer Uri Elitzur that referred to Palestinian children as "little snakes" and appeared to justify the mass punishment of Palestinians living under Israeli occupation. The post has since been deleted, but an archived version remains.

It was put up shortly after the discovery of the bodies of three Israeli teens kidnapped last year while hiking in the West Bank. Their killing eventually escalated into a 50-day war in which Israel pummeled the Gaza Strip, a Palestinian enclave dominated by the militant Islamist group Hamas, which launched barrages of rocket fire at Israel. The Gaza war killed more than 1,400 Palestinian civilians and reduced whole swaths of the impoverished territory to rubble.

The leftist site Mondoweiss offers a full translation of Shaked's controversial posting, which quotes Elitzur, a former Netanyahu adviser, here. Some excerpts:

The Palestinian people has declared war on us, and we must respond with war. Not an operation, not a slow-moving one, not low-intensity, not controlled escalation, no destruction of terror infrastructure, no targeted killings. Enough with the oblique references. This is a war. Words have meanings. This is a war. It is not a war against terror, and not a war against extremists, and not even a war against the Palestinian Authority. These too are forms of avoiding reality. This is a war between two people. Who is the enemy? The Palestinian people. Why? Ask them, they started...

Behind every terrorist stand dozens of men and women, without whom he could not engage in terrorism. Actors in the war are those who incite in mosques, who write the murderous curricula for schools, who give shelter, who provide vehicles, and all those who honor and give them their moral support. They are all enemy combatants, and their blood shall be on all their heads. Now this also includes the mothers of the martyrs, who send them to hell with flowers and kisses. They should follow their sons, nothing would be more just. They should go, as should the physical homes in which they raised the snakes. Otherwise, more little snakes will be raised there.

So it is obvious Elitzur was talking about terrorists here not every Palestinian child. The mention of destroying the homes of such terrorists as opposed to destroying the homes of all Palestinians makes that very clear. 

Even if these aren't Shaked's own words, the sentiment is noteworthy, and it reflects what critics say is the Israeli nationalist right's widespread intolerance of the Arabs in their midst, who make up one-fifth of the Israeli population.

So, why does The Washington Post insist on bending that quote to refer to all Palestinian children? Did the Editor simply overlook this piece of antisemitic trash or was he/she in agreement with it? Either way, it reflects very poorly on journalistic ethics and honesty.

Bennett and Shaked's Jewish Home party are avowed opponents of Palestinian statehood. Bennett's proposal for settling the "Palestinian question" involves the creation of semiautonomous territories that some have likened to the bantustans of apartheid-era South Africa.

Again, who are the 'somes' referred to here?

Shaked's appointment as justice minister also has raised fears that Netanyahu's new government will attempt to rein in the Israeli judiciary, as my colleague William Booth reports. Some are rather worried about what may follow.

"The demand to give Ayelet Shaked the Justice portfolio is like giving the Fire and Rescue Services to a pyromaniac," opposition lawmaker Nachman Shai told the Arutz Sheva news site.

OK, it's been nearly a year and a half and I'm still looking for signs of smoke!

Shaked, a photogenic former tech executive, doesn't seem too bothered about the opinions of her opponents. She once dismissed Haaretz, arguably Israel's most internationally respected newspaper, as a publication "read by a mere 30,000 Israelis."

Oh, no! She didn't say that, did she? She ought to be tried for treason, obviously! Good grief!

After all, Shaked is about to gain a cabinet post in a climate in which an Israeli former foreign minister can call for the "beheading" of disloyal Arabs with no political cost and in which warning of Arabs "voting in droves" helped Netanyahu's Likud party win Israel's general election earlier this year.

That's the difference between Israel and many of the Arab countries around them, 1) free speech, 2) free criticism, 3) an Israeli can call for beheading though it would never be taken seriously, but in Iran, Saudi Arabia and who knows how many Muslim countries, it's a frequent occurrence sanctioned by the government.

Yet, here, the Washington Post writer criticizes Israel for not condemning the man for mentioning it; rather than praising Israel for not adopting tactics that are more fit for Islam.

"Shaked is going and taking her place in the pantheon of the extreme right," says leftist Israeli legislator Michal Rozin, "and represents an ideology where her own racism doesn't embarrass her."

Rozin must be one of these 'somes'! So, the question here for Mr. Rozin is, would you be racist if you hated Nazis? Is it 'extremist' to hate people who want to kill you and everyone who is a Jew. Are you too dense to see that if the Palestinians had the capability of the 1930s-1940s Nazis, that they would surely try to accomplish the very same thing, the annihilation of the Jewish race?

Antisemitism in Administration and Student Body Forces Neutral Student President Out of UCLA

The Palestinian propaganda machine is running full-speed

in American Universities, and both students and staff are

more than willing to believe the lies they produce

UCLA Student President Leaves

Due to Anti-Israel Harassment

BY: PARDES SELEH

After a long, tedious struggle with anti-Israel harassment from administrators and student members of the Boycott, Divest, and Sanctions (BDS) movement at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), a former graduate student body president has decided to leave his UCLA education behind, in his quest for a less hostile learning environment.

Former UCLA law student and Graduate Student Association (GSA) president Milan Chatterjee has been the object of bullying and framing ever since he refused to allocate campus funding to an event that either promoted or rejected support for the State of Israel. Chatterjee’s “viewpoint neutrality” policy stated that topics surrounding Israel were irrelevant to the nature of campus politics and thus, campus funding should not be directed to taking sides on such measures.

The Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), an anti-Israel hate group responsible for leading the smear campaign against Chatterjee, responded with a plethora of threatening legal documents, administrative pushes, and media allegations painting Chatterjee as a biased student body president and calling for his apology and resignation. SJP leaders Rahim Kurwah and Yacoub Kureh, two UCLA grad students, enlisted the help of Palestine Legal (PL) and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) to send lawyers after Chatterjee to intimidate him, as well as push UCLA’s figurehead administration to launch a detailed investigation into his actions.

I would love for someone to ask the Students for Justice in Palestine if they would be happy with a two-state solution in Palestine? I would be willing to bet that few, if any, would want anything less than the annihilation of Israel. That's what they call 'Justice'. Hitler had a different name for it.

These allegations were easily debunked time after time, but that did not stop hateful anti-Israel activists from attempting to publish falsehoods and make them a supposed reality. Worse, the UCLA administration did nothing to stand by the GSA neutral policy and defend Chatterjee for doing his job. Instead, Vice Chancellor for Equity, Diversity and Inclusion Jerry Kang aided the SJP by taking part in the investigations and harassment directed at the student president.

"Your administrators chose to not take any action

or even investigate this matter."

FORMER UCLA LAW STUDENT AND GRADUATE STUDENT

ASSOCIATION (GSA) PRESIDENT MILAN CHATTERJEE

Finally, Chatterjee has had enough. Not only was his reputation being constantly tarnished with cruddy lies and hateful spews; he was fighting to not fall behind in his schoolwork, his health, and his sanity. In a letter to UCLA Chancellor Gene Block, Chatterjee revealed his decision to complete his final year of law school at New York University (NYU) in Manhattan. He wrote:


Dear Chancellor Block,  

I write to inform you that I have decided to complete the final year of my UCLA School of Law program at a different institution. The hostile and unsafe campus environment I am facing at UCLA has left me with no choice but to move away from this university at great additional expense to me and my family.

Since November 2015, I have been relentlessly attacked, bullied and harassed by BDS-affiliated organizations and students. The smear and harassment campaign started with the false accusation that I (an Indian-American Hindu) was not “viewpoint neutral” when allocating funds, in my capacity as Graduate Student Body President, to a diversity event. What really occurred is that my administration and I abstained from supporting either a pro- or anti- BDS agenda. This condition was explicitly approved by a UCLA administrator. The event took place on November 5, 2015 and a variety of campus viewpoints were actively represented, including both sides of the issues raised by the BDS movement. Dean Erwin Chemerinsky-- one of America’s leading constitutional law scholars-- and four legal organizations concluded that my administration and I acted in a viewpoint neutral manner.

Subsequently, BDS activists wrote defamatory articles about me and led a grassroots campaign against me on the UCLA campus. They even tried, on multiple occasions, to remove me as Graduate Student Body President. I reached out to senior members of your administration-- many times-- for guidance and support to defuse this situation. Furthermore, I believed that these administrators would be especially sensitive given the public outcry caused by similar BDS-led efforts against UCLA students Rachel Beyda, Avi Oved, Lauren Rogers, and Sunny Singh. I could not have been more mistaken. Your administrators were non-responsive and unhelpful.

In fact, when Palestine Legal and the ACLU circulated a legal letter defaming me on the Internet, had their attorneys write a libelous article about me in the Daily Bruin, and sent lawyers to Graduate Student Association meetings to attack me personally, I contacted the Interim Vice Chancellor of Legal Affairs many times for help. Not only did she decline to provide me with the necessary legal support, but she told me that I needed to get my own attorney. Finally, I was connected to the American Jewish Committee, who found the situation serious enough to refer me to a pro-bono counsel.

In late February 2016, my new attorney, Peter M. Weil, of Glaser Weil LLP, sent you and several senior members of your administration, a lengthy letter detailing the constant bullying harassment and attacks to which I was being subjected. Your administrators chose to not take any action or even investigate this matter.

To make matters worse, at the behest of pro-BDS organizations, the Vice Chancellor of Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) launched a three-month-long investigation of me. His office wrote a defamatory, 27-page report which has been heavily condemned by seven major organizations.

In reality, this report was an attempt by your administration to publicly scapegoat me for their systematic failure to adopt and implement University of California policies, and provide the necessary guidance to me and other student organizations when we approached them for help. Your administrators fell asleep on the job and decided to blame me-- a student-- for it.

But the desire to vilify me did not stop there. Although the Report was designated as “Confidential,” no reasonable safeguards were adopted to preserve the report’s confidentiality. It was readily forseeable that pro-BDS organizations-- whom your administration freely made this “Confidential Report” available to-- could and would leak it. No efforts were made to prevent this and, of course, this is precisely what occurred.

In violation of confidentiality and retaliation policies, Students for Justice in Palestine openly and unlawfully leaked the EDI report onto the Internet. When I filed a complaint about this violation, your administration declined to investigate it. Worse yet, the Vice Chancellor of EDI, on his blog, urged the public to read this leaked confidential report, and gave them access to it. As recent as August 22, 2016, there was a scurrilous op-ed piece in the Daily Bruin attacking me and relying extensively on the so-called Confidential Report.

UCLA is one of the finest universities in the world. It is unfortunate, indeed that your administration has not only allowed BDS organizations and student activists to freely engage in discriminatory practices of its own against those same students. Whether you choose to acknowledge it or not, the fact is that the UCLA campus has become a hostile and unsafe environment for students, Jewish and non-Jewish, who choose not to support the BDS movement, let alone support the State of Israel.

I implore you to acknowledge the reality of this regrettable situation and take corrective action that not only remedies my grievances but addresses the current hostile and unsafe campus climate generally so that other students are not forced to leave UCLA. It is too late for me, but I sincerely hope that it will not be too late for those students who follow me.

I will be returning to Los Angeles as often as necessary in order to pursue the discrimination grievance that I filed pursuant to UCLA Procedure 230.1

Sincerely,

Milan Chatterjee

Leader of Green Party in Canada May Step Down Over BDS Decision

Elizabeth May could quit as Green Party leader

'Broken-hearted' May says boycott Israel policy has her

on verge of stepping down as leader

Is Green Party Leader Elizabeth May about to step down as her party's leader? She's heading off on vacation to decide, following her party's decision to embrace the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement, which she doesn't support. (Chad Hipolito/Canadian Press)

David Cochrane, CBC News

Elizabeth May says she could step down as Green Party leader later this month if her party doesn't reconsider its decision to endorse a movement that calls for the boycott of Israel.

At its policy convention last weekend, Green Party members voted in favour of a resolution which, in part, said the party "supports the use of divestment, boycott and sanctions (BDS) that are targeted to those sectors of Israel's economy and society which profit from the ongoing occupation of the OPT [occupied Palestinian Territories.]"

"I would say as of this minute I think I'd have real difficulties going not just to an election but through the next month," May said in an interview with CBC Radio's The House, set to air this Saturday morning on CBC Radio One.

"There are a lot of issues I want to be talking about with Canadians, and this isn't one of them."

I'm not a Green Party supporter but I am very impressed with Elizabeth May's stand on BDS. Stand your ground Elizabeth; call a leadership convention and be prepared to pull out of it if support for BDS is not dropped. The Green Party was not formed to encourage antisemitism.

May is headed to Nova Scotia for a family vacation, where she will seek their advice on her future as leader.

"I need to talk to my family and ask them what they think I should do," May said. "You're talking to a broken-hearted person who is trying to figure out the best way forward."

'Wrong-headed for the party'

After Green Party members endorsed the BDS movement, several prominent Jewish organizations denounced the move, with one leader saying he was "irate" with the party.

But another Jewish group was enthusiastic about the resolution brought forward by the Green Party's justice critic, Dimitri Lascaris.

Even some Jews are antisemitic.

"This is the first time a Canadian political party with representation in the House of Commons has taken a strong and positive position in solidarity with the grassroots Palestinian movement for freedom, justice and equality," said Tyler Levitan, a spokesman for Independent Jewish Voices Canada in a release.

A hotly debated House of Commons motion introduced by Conservative MPs to condemn the BDS movement passed 229-51 last February, with some MPs preferring to abstain.

May — who opposes BDS — said she has been criticized as both a Zionist and an anti-Semite since it was adopted as official party policy.

"It's horrible. You are caught between two very strong loud voices," she said.

"I think it is wrong-headed for the party. It's a very polarizing and divisive campaign."

Plans to run again as MP

As she considers her future, May is also seeking ways to get the party to reconsider its support of the BDS movement.

May told The Canadian Press there could be "a trigger to hold a special meeting of all members" for another look at a resolution she believes does not reflect the party's genuine will.

If May can't trigger a special review of the policy, the only other opportunities to revisit the resolution would be at the party's next meeting in 2018 or at a leadership convention, should she opt to step down later this month.

Whatever her decision, there will be an emergency meeting of the party council to discuss next steps, likely Aug. 21 or 22, she added.

A survey was sent to Green Party members on Wednesday night asking them how they feel about the BDS motion.

Regardless of her future as leader, May plans to seek re-election as a Green candidate in the next general election.

"My constituency is my top priority," she said. "I am going to run again in 2019."

Cuomo Issues Executive Order to Fight BDS

Photo by Kevin P. Coughlin/Office of Governor Andrew M. Cuomo

By Jacob Kornbluh 

NEW YORK – New York Governor Andrew Cuomo on Sunday signed an executive order that orders state agencies to divest themselves of companies and organizations who support the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement against the state of Israel.

“In New York, we lead by example. We are also a place of action. We want to take immediate action because we want Israel to know that we are on their side,” Cuomo said during a speech, attended by Jewish leaders, at The Harvard Club. “If you boycott against Israel, New York will boycott you.”
The executive order – the first such signed by a governor – will command the commissioner of the Office of General Services to compile a list over the next six months of businesses and groups engaged in “boycott, divestment or sanctions activity targeting Israel, either directly or through a parent or subsidiary.”

Once the process is completed, all executive-branch agencies and departments will be required to divest themselves of any company on the list to be made public, according to the draft first published by The New York Times. “The State of New York will not permit its own investment activity to further the BDS campaign in any way, shape or form, whether directly or indirectly,” the order states.

“New York stands in solidarity with Israel today and always. This state will not stand for the politics of discrimination in any form, and we will continue to demonstrate our unwavering support for the people of Israel in the fight for freedom, liberty and democracy,” said Cuomo. “I’m proud to sign this nation’s leading executive order, which will help protect Israel from the threat of divestment.”

Cuomo called on governors from all states to follow his lead and take immediate action to fight the BDS movement. According to the governor’s office, Cuomo has been named as the Co-Chair of the American Jewish Committee’s Governors against BDS initiative. “This order sends the message that this state will do everything in its power to end this hateful, intolerant campaign. New York and Israel share an unbreakable bond and I pray that the Israeli and Palestinian people will find a way to live side by side and find peace, prosperity and security,” he said.

Following his speech, Cuomo marched in the Celebrate Israel parade on fifth avenue, alongside a truck blaring Israeli music. “I am the first governor in the country to sign an executive order saying we oppose the boycott of Israel. I am proud of it  and I hope other states follow our lead,” Cuomo told reporters before marching. “It is very important that Israel is strong, not just for the sake of Israel but for the sake of all democracies. Israel is an important strategic ally of the U.S. And we have to keep that relationship strong. And even in this difficult time of turmoil, I want Israel to know New York stands with them.”

Asked if he has responded to President Obama’s April letter requesting to lift state sanctions against Iran as part of the Iran nuclear deal, Cuomo said: “I would have to check. I don’t know if we have.”

Last month, Texas Governor Greg Abbott informed the Obama administration that the state of Texas would reject the administration’s request, sent to all states on April 8, 2016, to “review” its economic sanctions against Iran in order to abide by the terms of the international accord. He also urged other states to follow his lead and reject the administration’s request to lift state sanctions on Iran in a letter sent to 49 governors on May 31.

Senator Chuck Schumer on Sunday said he would seek to introduce the same idea to fight BDS on a federal level. “I think what the governor has done is an excellent idea,” Schumer told reporters. “I think that the state (of New York) should not do any business with any company that participates in BDS, and I am looking at introducing a federal law to do the same thing. BDS is a movement that is just totally unfair to Israel. They hold Israel to one standard and hold the other countries, including those who are sworn enemies to Israel, to another standard.”

United Church of Canada Passes Israel Divestment Resolution

This policy by the UCC is just wrong on so many levels. It reveals a remarkable lack of knowledge of what is going on in the middle east. It also reveals an inherent antisemitism that is extremely unbecoming of a Christian church.

Protesters shout slogans during a rally in Paris, France, Thursday, June 3, 2010, as they demonstrate against Israel's raid on a Gaza-bound aid ship, and man in foreground wears a t-shirt calling for a boycott on Israel. (Jacques Brinon/AP)Protesters shout slogans during a rally in Paris, France, Thursday, June 3, 2010, as they demonstrate against Israel's raid on a Gaza-bound aid ship, and man in foreground wears a t-shirt calling for a boycott on Israel. (Jacques Brinon/ AP)

Josefin Dolsten
RSSNEWSROOM

Nonbinding decision by country’s largest Protestant denomination 

further expands a three-year boycott policy

The United Church of Canada passed a resolution Tuesday during its 42nd General Council encouraging divestment from Israel in order “to address the illegal occupation of Palestinian territories by the State of Israel.”

The new resolution called for “initiating and developing a program of education and advocacy in cooperation with our partners, related to divestment from and economic sanctions against all corporations and institutions complicit in and benefiting from the illegal occupation,” according to the UCC 42nd General Council website.

The UCC is Canada’s largest Protestant denomination, with more than two million members. In 2012, the organization passed a resolution boycotting settlement-produced goods.

The statement also urged members to discourage “tourism which bolsters the oppression of Palestinians.”

The new decision was meant to be understood as focusing on “advocacy and encouragement, rather than a mandatory or binding direction to the church.”

United Church of
Canada logo

Not all UCC members, however, were in favor of the resolution.

Rev. Andrew Love, the founder of Bridges Not Boycotts, a group that opposes anti-Israel boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) policies in liberal Protestant churches, said, “The ugly face of anti-Semitism has found a warm embrace in the BDS campaign against Israel.”

“Now the United Church has added a divestment strategy to its boycott campaign. It is targeting Israel for attack; yet, it still thinks it can be in genuine dialogue with the Jewish community in Canada,” added Love.

The anti-BDS organization noted in a press release that UCC had also approved a policy to strengthen the relationship with Canada’s Jewish community, which the organization saw as being in “obvious contradiction” with the divestment policy.

Rev. Love, you are right-on. You are my hero for today for trying to speak truth and sense to a pathetic, uninformed policy.

Conservative Talk-show Host Believes Jeb Bush is Antisemitic

Jeb Bush has revealed that he is anti-Israel, says leading conservative talk show host Mark Levin. The radio talker says that two things show that Bush seems to be setting himself up as the anti-Israel candidate. Bush is anti-Israel not only for picking well-known Jew hater James Baker as a top advisor but for letting Baker give a headline speech at an anti-Israel conference last weekend.

I don't know how good a source this site is
but for a right wing site to come out and
criticize their star candidate for President
it's pretty astonishing.

Baker, Levin says, is a well-known hater of Israel. But that Bush allowed him to give this speech is pretty blatant.

The annual conference of the activist group J Street features an array of anti-Israel speakers, including proponents of the Boycott, Sanctions, and Divest (BDS) movement, which seeks Israel’s destruction, and advocates for the terrorist group Hamas.

Jeb Bush’s selection of Baker as a foreign policy adviser has sparked concern among conservatives and in the Jewish and pro-Israel communities. Baker is infamous for his hostility to Israel, having said during his tenure as secretary of state in the George H.W. Bush administration, “F—- the Jews, they don’t vote for us anyway.” Baker is also a supporter of President Obama’s Iran negotiations.

“Jim Baker, much like Barack Obama, has always had a hate on for Israel,” Levin said. “This antipathy toward Israel is well documented. Baker wanted the U.S. to punish Israel for destroying Iraq’s Osirak nuclear reactor [in a 1981 airstrike]. He hated Netanyahu as early as 1990, barring him from entering the State Department’s building. And last but not least, Baker co-wrote the Iraq Study Group’s 2006 paper that recommended among other things that the United States tilt its foreign policy away from Israel and toward Syria and Iran—advice that Obama seems to have taken to heart.”

“This is the guy, the leading advisor to Jeb Bush on foreign policy, who Jeb Bush asked to be his leading adviser, and now he’s the keynote speaker to this left-wing hate group J Street,” Levin said.

Do we want an anti-Israel president like the one we already have?

Well this is certainly surprising! A republican in a presidential campaign coming out against Israel! How do you think that will play to the Christian Republican base? Most Christians know that turning your back on Israel will not win any favours from God, indeed, it may result in catastrophe for the US. And not just for the US.

Bushs have a habit of starting wars in the middle east - it keeps the war machine inventory moving. But since Iraq is already at war and Americans are already there, Jeb will have to start one somewhere else. What do antisemites do - they try to find a way to destroy Israel and the Jewish people. 

I have been saying for some years now that the US would abandon Israel in its greatest hour of need. It is easy enough to believe that Obama would stab Israel in the back, but for a Republican government to do so is barely thinkable. Nevertheless, it is becoming more possible every day. God have mercy on America should that day ever come.