www.jpost.com

Martin Oliner #racist jpost.com

There has been an international uproar since US President Donald Trump told reporters on Air Force One on a flight from Las Vegas last weekend that he wants Arab countries to absorb the population of Gaza during its reconstruction[…]
The idea was immediately mocked by Israel’s enemies and the usual naysayers[…]
Even an analysis in The Jerusalem Post disrespectfully mocked the proposal, saying “Trump’s ideas for rebuilding Gaza and turning it into a successful beachfront state, kind of like a large Miami, face many hurdles”

Knowing President Trump, such condemnations will only strengthen his resolve[…]
The president was right in saying that much of Gaza is currently inhabitable, though I would have preferred he add context, blaming Hamas for dooming Gazans by attacking Israel mercilessly on October 7[…]
He has worked in real estate long enough to understand that during lengthy reconstruction projects, out of the box thinking is required. Those who purport to care about Gazans should be gushing with praise for the president for caring enough to find them a positive resolution to their current problems

And those like myself who do not believe Gazans are worthy of any mercy should welcome it as well

LET’S NOT mince words here. The people of Gaza are collectively guilty for invading Israel, murdering, raping and kidnapping Israelis and holding them hostage

It was not just Hamas terrorists who held Israeli civilians captive. Physicians, journalists and United Nations staff from the upper echelons of Gazan society enthusiastically joined that nasty effort[…]
The actions of the Gazan people prove they need detoxifying education before the reconstruction should even be able to begin. They are fundamentally evil, and they must pay a price for their actions

The countries who take in Gazans should properly screen and monitor them to prevent them from causing further harm. If enough countries get involved, the international problem of Gaza could be solved

Mark Fish #fundie jpost.com

[From “Is Lebanon part of Israel’s promised territory?”]

Archived here

The Torah verses convey profound messages that we can insightfully extract for our daily lives. Rabbi Shay Tahan, the Rosh Kollel of Shaarei Ezra in Brooklyn, NY, graciously opens the gates to understand them

The recent conflict in Lebanon raises the age-old question regarding the northern borders of biblical Eretz Yisrael. Where exactly did Hashem define the boundaries, and are we obligated to conquer those areas?[…]
At the blessing at the end of Parshat Ekev, Hashem tells us that we are granted every land we will conquer within the borders mentioned. In the north, the Torah states: "Every place where the sole of your foot will tread shall be yours—from the wilderness and the Lebanon, from the river—the Euphrates River—until the western sea shall be your boundary." This promise from the Creator clearly places the land of Lebanon within the Promised Land of Israel[…]
Expanding Israel’s borders would mean extending the requirement to observe these mitzvot in the newly included territories[…]
Inhabitants and Settlement: According to some opinions, living in the biblical boundaries of Eretz Yisrael may be considered a mitzvah. Expanding Israel’s borders could extend the obligation for Jews to settle and inhabit those areas[…]
War and Conquest: The concept of milchemet mitzvah (a commanded war) includes conquering certain territories that were promised in the Torah. If new land is identified as part of the biblical borders, there may be halachic discussions about the obligation to conquer and settle it[…]
If one looks at a map, they will be astounded by how far north this river extends and how vast the Land of Israel truly is. While we may not be able to reclaim all of it in our time, Hashem will surely return it to us soon

Unnamed Haredim in Jerusalem #fundie jpost.com

One morning in early August, members of the Yaar Ramot Community in Jerusalem woke up to find fliers with the words 'Do not be silent!' hung in the area surrounding their synagogue, Kehilat Yaar Ramot

These posters, addressed directly to Haredi members of the neighborhood, call for protests against the establishment of a conservative synagogue[…]These protesters are banding together to remove a ‘threat’ from the neighborhood, saying that the Haredi community must do everything possible to ‘dissuade them from this path’

“A few years ago, there was some noise that eventually died down.” Gadi Perl, who has been leading the community in this struggle, told[…]Gadi recalled a conflict between the two communities during the COVID-19 pandemic when a group of Haredis attempted to claim that the synagogue was their own because it wasn’t in use

“Because, unlike them, we followed the rules”

According to Gadi, these fliers were put up early in August, along with their daily ‘protest prayers’[…]though he noted that they initially could barely make a minyan most days

“On Sunday, it seems they realized they needed to make some noise, and they invaded the synagogue courtyard.” Gadi went on. “On Monday, they invaded again, and it escalated into a confrontation, leading to the police being called”

On Tuesday, the community set up a lock in an attempt to prevent further escalation, but when Haredis broke it with a cutter, police stood by and allowed them to enter

“On Wednesday, there was already a police presence, and we put on a serious lock. So, they prayed outside. But after the police left, we caught a man on the security cameras pouring contact adhesive on our lock”

By this point[…]the two groups went to court

“They stood in court this morning and told a bunch of lies.” one member said, “We call them Teflon because they've got protection in the area”[…]
“They’re saying we're, you know, treif, and god knows what else,” a member posted in[…]Whatsapp group

Kanye West #ableist #crackpot #racist #conspiracy jpost.com

"I am not bipolar. I'm not in some kind of episode, but I may be slightly autistic. Like Rain Man. And that's part of my superpower. It's the reason why I can produce tracks and design and do so many things."

"There's two things that I can't do: I can't accept hate and I can't hate. Have you ever known an autistic person that hates? That's the reason."

"I love Ari Emmanuel. I love the CCP. We have to bring Christ to the CCP. We need to bring Christ to China. China controls y'all... and controls the people that you're gonna give this video to. The Jewish people are the middleman. They sold America to China. They sold the American media."

"There are people that are the head of the New World Order, that are head of the CCP, that are part of the elite Zionist Jews.” “but that's Satan using them."

Sergei Lavrov #conspiracy #crackpot #dunning-kruger #pratt jpost.com

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov attacked Ukraine and its president Volodymyr Zelensky on Sunday during an interview in Italy, claiming that "the fact that he is a Jew does not negate the Nazi elements in his country. I believe that Adolf Hitler also had Jewish blood."

"Zelensky can promote peace between the states if he stops giving orders to his Nazi forces that border on crime," Lavrov said.

In an interview with an Italian television channel, the foreign minister came out against the media in Western countries, saying that "they are misleading people. The media is talking about Russia's goals in the operation in Ukraine, which do not exist at all."

Lavrov also accused Ukraine of using mercenaries and Western military officers, without presenting any evidence to support his claims, before accusing the West of "stealing" Russian money through the sanctions it imposed on his country, stressing that "we just want to ensure the security of the pro-Russian Ukrainians in the east of the country."

According to Lavrov, Russia has never interrupted the efforts to negotiate an international agreement that would prevent the use of nuclear weapons in future wars. He said that Zelensky frequently changed his position in the negotiations between Ukraine and Russia, and that "he hurts the talks, deliberately sabotages them."

Lavrov also remarked that the upcoming anniversary of Russia's liberation at the end of World War II will have no bearing on Moscow's military operations in Ukraine.

"Our soldiers won't base their actions on a specific date," Lavrov said when asked whether the May 9 anniversary would mark a turning point in the conflict.

"We'll commemorate our victory in a solemn manner but the timing and speed of what is happening in Ukraine will hinge on the need to minimize risks for civilians and Russian soldiers," he added, speaking in Russian through an Italian interpreter.

Lara Logan #conspiracy #fundie #racist jpost.com

"Does anyone know who employed Darwin? Where does Darwinism come from?" Logan asked. "Look it up. The Rothschilds."

"I'm just saying Darwin was hired by someone to come up with a theory based on evidence," she added before saying that evolution is a chicken or egg debate and cannot be answered scientifically.

Father Tadeusz Guz and Catholic University of Lublin internal ethics panel #racist #dunning-kruger jpost.com

A Polish lecturer who said that Jews had practiced “ritual murders” will not be reprimanded because his claims are the subject of “scientific discourse,” the university that employs him said.

An internal ethics panel made the decision not to take disciplinary action against Tadeusz Guz, a priest and faculty member at the Catholic University of Lublin, for a second time after again reviewing complaints over a 2018 speech he gave in Warsaw.

“We know, ladies and gentlemen, that the facts of ritual murder cannot be erased from history. Why? Because we, the Polish state, in our archives, in the surviving documents, have evidence spread across centuries when Jews lived together with our Polish nation,” he said.

Alison Chabloz #racist #conspiracy jpost.com

In a landmark decision, a UK court has sentenced an antisemite to 18 weeks in prison for disseminating grossly offensive material and messages on social media denying the Holocaust.

The sentencing makes Alison Chabloz the first person in the UK to be jailed specifically for Holocaust denial, under the terms of the 2003 Communications Act.
[…]
Chabloz, 57, was convicted for comments she made in an interview with a far-right online radio station in 2019.

“The Jews, they need to stop indoctrinating their children, you know, their grandparents were gassed just because they were Jews,” she said. “No wonder they grow up into psychotic maniacs. They are indoctrinated from birth with this bullshit, and they’ve been doing the same for centuries, even before the Holocaust.”

In a separate interview with a different radio station, Chabloz said that “anything that’s worth controlling will have Jews there controlling it.”

Chabloz accused Jews of inventing the Holocaust in order to profit financially. Hitler’s treatment of European Jews was caused by bad Jewish behavior, she added, and insisted that there was nothing wrong with saying “Hitler was right.” Chabloz claimed that the judge who convicted her had been intimidated by the “Jewish lobby.”

She then publicized the interviews on Gab account, a social networking site associated with neo-Nazis and other extremists.

Vasile Zarnescu #racist #conspiracy jpost.com

A former Romanian intelligence officer has been sentenced to 13 months in prison for Holocaust denial in the first-ever conviction under the country’s 2002 law.

Vasile Zarnescu, 74, a former colonel who worked for the Romanian Intelligence Service (SRI) for 11 years, was convicted on Feb. 4 by a court in Bucharest for writing online articles describing the Holocaust as a “fraud.”

In 2016, Zarnescu also published a book entitled “The Holocaust – the Devil’s Bogeyman – Extortion in the Name of ‘Holocaust Money.’” In it, he claims that the death of six million Jews is “the greatest fraud in the history of the universe.”
[…]
Prosecutors had opened an investigation into Zarnescu after a book launch at a well-known Bucharest bookstore in April 2016 was canceled. The former officer was subsequently charged last year.

Ayatollah Abbas Tabrizian #conspiracy #crackpot #fundie #homophobia #quack jpost.com

An Iranian regime cleric in the holy city of Qom on Tuesday issued a homophobic rant against people vaccinated for COVID-19, claiming that they become gay after receiving the vaccine.

Ayatollah Abbas Tabrizian wrote on his Telegram social-media platform: “Don’t go near those who have had the COVID vaccine. They have become homosexuals.”

The radical Islamist has nearly 210,000 followers on his Telegram account.

Tabrizian has a history of derogatory opinions about Western medicine. Last year, a video showed him burning Harrison’s Manual of Medicine and saying that “Islamic medicine” had made such books “irrelevant,” according to an article on the website of Radio Farda, the Iranian branch of the US-funded Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty broadcast service.

“Like other clerics in the regime, also Tabrizian relates all the shortages [shortcomings] to sexuality,” Sheina Vojoudi, an Iranian dissident who fled the Islamic Republic of Iran due to repression, told The Jerusalem Post on Sunday. “The clerics in Iran are suffering from lack of knowledge and humanity.”

“Actually, his goal of spreading nonsense is to try to scare people [out] of getting vaccinated, while the leader of the regime and other officials got Pfizer, and they don’t provide it for the people with the excuse that they don’t trust the West,” she said.

According to Peter Tatchell, a LGBTQ+ and human-rights campaigner, “Ayatollah Tabrizian combines scientific ignorance with a crude appeal to homophobia.”

“He’s demonizing both the vaccination program and LGBT+ people without a shred of evidence,” he told the Post. “By seeking to scare the public into not getting vaccinated against COVID-19, he is fueling the pandemic and putting lives at risk. Typical of many Iranian religious and political leaders, his bizarre, irrational claims scapegoat LGBTs and put theological prejudice before scientific knowledge.”

Vladimir Matveyev #dunning-kruger jpost.com

A prestigious university in Moscow said it would fire a professor who denied the Holocaust on International Holocaust Remembrance Day.

Vladimir Matveyev, a lecturer on international relations, told teachers from the St. Petersburg region on Thursday that “no gas chambers were found to kill people in concentration camps,” “the gas was used by the Germans for disinfection” and “Six million dead Jews are a fiction.”

In a statement that same day, the state-owned university, known as RANEPA, said it “cannot accept” the lies told by Matveyev.

Matveyev was not representing the university on the video call in which he made the remarks, RANEPA said, and was participating outside his professional duties. RANEPA stands for Russian Academy of National Economy and Public Administration.

Unnamed Twitter posters #racist jpost.com

A flood of antisemitic insults, threats, and violent comments were spread on social media over the weekend targeting Miss Provence, April Benayoum, first runner-up in Miss France 2021 pageant, after it was revealed Saturday night during the final competition that she has an Israeli father.

“I have an array of origins: my mother is Serbo-Croat, my father Israeli-Italian. This gave me a passion for geography and the discerning of other cultures," Benayoum said in response to one of the judge's questions.

The reactions on social media were not long in coming.
“Hitler forgot to exterminate you, Miss Provence.”
"Uncle Hitler forgot to exterminate you."
"#MissFrance2021 do not vote for her. The reason: She is Jewish."
"Miss Provence has a link with Israel. Get rid of her."
"Miss Provence is Israeli. So the one that is voting for her, his mother is a prostitute."

Leading French-Jewish groups, the Israeli Embassy in France, and numerous local politicians strongly condemned on Sunday this storm of antisemitic attack against the Miss France contestant.

Haim Eshed #ufo #conspiracy jpost.com

Has the State of Israel made contact with aliens?

According to retired Israeli general and current professor Haim Eshed, the answer is yes, but this has been kept a secret because "humanity isn't ready."

Speaking in an interview to Yediot Aharonot, Eshed – who served as the head of Israel's space security program for nearly 30 years and is a three-time recipient of the Israel Security Award – explained that Israel and the US have both been dealing with aliens for years.

And this by no means refers to immigrants, with Eshed clarifying the existence of a "Galactic Federation."

The 87-year-old former space security chief gave further descriptions about exactly what sort of agreements have been made between the aliens and the US, which ostensibly have been made because they wish to research and understand "the fabric of the universe." This cooperation includes a secret underground base on Mars, where there are American and alien representatives.

If true, this would coincide with US President Donald Trump's creation of the Space Force as the fifth branch of the US armed forces, though it is unclear how long this sort of relationship, if any, has been going on between the US and its reported extraterrestrial allies.

But Eshed insists that Trump is aware of them, and that he was "on the verge" of disclosing their existence. However, the Galactic Federation reportedly stopped him from doing so, saying they wished to prevent mass hysteria since they felt humanity needed to "evolve and reach a stage where we will... understand what space and spaceships are," Yediot Aharonot reported.

Yair Netanyahu #racist jpost.com

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's son, Yair, called on Sunday for minorities to be banished from Tel Aviv-Jaffa.

Netanyahu made the comment in response to riots that began because of the city's plan to build the Center for the Homeless on a site that was an old Muslim cemetery. He was reacting on Twitter to Blue and White minister Alon Schuster saying there was no chance for coexistence of Arabs and the Jewish minority in Hebron

"The riots prove that there is no chance for coexistence in Tel Aviv-Jaffa, and all the minorities must leave the city," Yair Netanyahu tweeted.

Janusz Korwin-Mikke #wingnut #psycho #conspiracy #racist jpost.com

Far-right Polish MP Janusz Korwin-Mikke was speaking on a news program about the ‘upside’ of the corona virus which he also said was improving the human gene poll through natural selection.

Pogroms against Jews benefited the Jewish people because they winnowed out the weak through natural selection, according to a member of the Polish parliament.

Janusz Korwin-Mikke, a leading member of a coalition of far-right parties called Confederation, Liberty and Independence, made his remarks on a Polish Polsat TV news program last Thursday about the effects of the coronavirus epidemic.

There was an upside to the coronavirus because it is eradicating the weak through natural selection and improving humanity’s gene pool, he said.

Korwin-Mikke tried to prove his point by citing Jewish history.

Murderous pogroms against Jews in Europe had a positive outcome because the weak in the Jewish community died and the strong survived, he said, implying that this improved the stock of the Jewish people.

Rabbis had even been in favor of such pogroms to benefit from the “natural selection” benefits of such massacres, Korwin-Mikke said.

A video of his comments was posted on a Confederation Facebook page.

Korwin-Mikke has a history of making comments distorting the Holocaust and of an antisemitic nature.

In 2013, he said Adolf Hitler probably had not known about the Holocaust. In 2019, he protested the decision to ban Holocaust denier David Irving from entering Poland.

Korwin-Mikke also accused British Jewish activists of “working for the Freemasons,” after international media organizations broadcast footage of an annual antisemitic ritual over Easter in the small town of Pruchnik, Poland, in which residents beat an effigy of a Jewish man representing Judas Iscariot.

Racial Volunteer Force #racist #conspiracy jpost.com

A neo-Nazi group will demonstrate this month outside the Israeli Embassy in the Hague and the municipality says it has no grounds to ban the protest.

Israel’s embassy, the Dutch Jewish community and various politicians have protested the decision not to prevent the Racial Volunteer Force group from holding the protest on Sept. 28, the AD news site reported Thursday. An online petition against the event has received about 2,000 signatures in two days.

But a spokesperson for Mayor Pauline Krikke told AD there is “no judicial ground” to ban the event, though it has been brought to the attention of the prosecution service for monitoring purposes.

The municipality of the Hague, the seat of the Dutch government, parliament, senate and royal residence, is among the Netherlands’ strictest when it comes to limiting freedoms in favor of public order.

[...]

The Racial Volunteer Force, which on Facebook lists Adolf Hitler as its “führer,” wrote about the event that it was protesting the “shadowy dealings of the Zionist lobby,” including the anti-Muslim lawmaker Geert Wilders. They call him a “Zionist pig.”

Nabih Berri #racist #conspiracy jpost.com

The Lebanese Parliament speaker Nabih Berri apparently had no qualms about using an antisemitic slur in a meeting with Jewish American politician Eliot L. Engel.

The Lebanese daily Al-Jumhouriyya quoted Berri as saying during his meeting Engel, "How to Recognize a Jew? If you see a pregnant woman, get close to her and toss a piece of gold near her or at her feet. If the fetus jumps out from his mother's womb and grabs the gold, you know he is a Jew."
The meeting, which took place several days ago, was meant to focus on negotiations between Israel and Lebanon on demarcating the maritime border between the two countries, which would impact oil and gas drilling rights in the Mediterranean.

Al-Jumhouriyya reported in its article on May 29 that Berri made the comment when he as asked what he thinks is motivating Israel to soften its position and agree to demarcate the land and maritime borders simultaneously.

“The Israelis want the oil [in the Mediterranean] and want to produce the oil and gas found in the Palestinian waters,” Berri continued. “If they had companies capable of drilling and producing [the gas and oil themselves], they would have acted immediately, without delay. But they need [the help of] international companies, and the latter are apprehensive.

Steve West #fundie jpost.com

A Missouri Republican who has made anti-Semitic and other bigoted statements handily won a primary for the state’s House of Representatives.

Steve West, who promotes anti-Semitic conspiracy theories on a radio show he hosts, defeated three other candidates Tuesday in the bid for a seat representing Clay County. He won with 49.5 percent of the vote; the second-place finisher had 24.4 percent.

“Looking back in history, unfortunately, Hitler was right about what was taking place in Germany. And who was behind it,” West said on KCXL radio in January 2017, The Kansas City Star reported Thursday.

He has spoken of “Jewish cabals” that are “harvesting baby parts” from Planned Parenthood, abuse children and control the Republican Party. West also has a YouTube channel on which he has made homophobic, anti-Semitic, Islamophobic and racist statements, according to The Star.

West will face Democratic incumbent Jon Carpenter in November.

On Thursday, the Missouri Republican Party denounced West’s “shocking and vile” comments.

“West’s abhorrent rhetoric has absolutely no place in the Missouri Republican Party or anywhere. We wholeheartedly condemn his comments,” the party told The Star.

Reached by The Star, West said his comments were taken out of context, but went on to criticize both Judaism and Islam.

“Jewish people can be beautiful people, but there’s ideologies associated with that that I don’t agree with,” he said. “Jews today are a remnant of the tribe of Judah that rejected Christ.”

Ahmad Salek #fundie jpost.com

(This happened in 2014.)

Ahmad Salek, chairman of Iran’s parliamentary cultural commission, on Tuesday accused his country’s Baha’i community of spying for Israel and the United States.

“I declare very explicitly that Baha’ism is an espionage organization which gathers intelligence for the CIA and Mossad, and there are abundant documents to prove this,” the Fars news agency quoted Salek saying.

Fars, which is affiliated with the Revolutionary Guard, reported in the same article comments Iran’s then-prosecutor-general Qorban-Ali Dorri-Najafabadi made in 2009: “We [as the state] offer a variety of services to the Baha’i sect in Iran and respect them as human beings, but not as insiders, spies, or a political grouplet supported by Britain and Israel to cause disturbance in Iran.” The Baha’i community faces intense persecution from the regime. Last October, Dr. Ahmed Shaheed, the UN special rapporteur on human rights in Iran, issued a report that included a section on the persecution.

He wrote, ”The special rapporteur continues to observe what appears to be an escalating pattern of systematic human rights violations targeting members of the Baha’i community, who face arbitrary detention, torture and ill-treatment, national security charges for active involvement in religious affairs, restrictions on religious practice, denial of higher education, obstacles to state employment and abuses within schools.”

Last August, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei issued an edict – or fatwa – calling on all Iranians to ostracize the Baha’is. After Khamenei issued the fatwa, Ataollah Rezvani, a popular Baha’i leader, was murdered. It is unclear who killed Rezvani.

Salek’s comments triggered reactions in cyber space. The Financial Times Middle East and North Africa correspondent tweeted on Tuesday, “Outrageous: #Iran lawmaker claims entire Baha’i faith is an espionage outfit for the CIA & Mossad.“ Earlier this month, the Baha’i World New Service reported a stabbing attack on a Baha’i family in Birjand in eastern Iran. According to the report, the three victims – husband, wife and daughter – survived the attack. “The attacker – who was masked – entered the home of Ghodratollah Moodi and his wife, Touba Sabzehjou,” the news service wrote.

Diane Ala’i, the Baha’i International Community’s representative to the United Nations in Geneva, said, “There can be no doubt that this crime was religiously motivated. Mr. Moodi was well-known as a leader in the Baha’i community in Birjand. “Our immediate concern is for the recovery of the Moodi family. But we are also concerned that authorities in Iran begin immediately to investigate this crime and bring the perpetrator to justice.

“The sad fact is that there have been more than 50 physical assaults on Iranian Baha’is since 2005 – and none of the attackers has been prosecuted or otherwise brought to justice. And at least nine Baha’is have been murdered under suspicious circumstances in the same period,” Ala’i said.

Anonymous gunman #fundie jpost.com

A Palestinian activist from east Jerusalem’s Shuafat refugee camp, who was shot dead in a hail of bullets on Monday night, feared for his life for working with Israeli officials to improve living conditions in the beleaguered community, the former east Jerusalem portfolio head said on Wednesday.

Baha Nabata, 31, a well-regarded civil rights and youth-group leader, was shot seven times in the camp at approximately 11:30 PM by an assailant who fired 10 bullets at him before fleeing the scene on a motor bike, according to witnesses.

An investigation has been opened to find the killer, police said.

Former Meretz councilman Dr. Meir Margalit, who held the east Jerusalem portfolio and worked closely with Nabata to improve his community’s infrastructure, said that during their last conversation several weeks ago, the married father of two daughters said he feared for his life.

“More than once he told me that people in the refugee camp accused him of being a collaborator with Israel,” said Margalit by phone on Wednesday. “That was because in order to solve the problems in the camp, he had to be in contact with the Jerusalem Municipality, the police, Interior Ministry, and other different Israeli institutions.”

“There was no other way to address the problems in this camp without being in touch with the Israeli government,” continued Margalit, who was shaken by the news of Nabata’s violent death.

Margalit said Nabata told him on numerous occasions that he was repeatedly accused of being a traitor for his efforts.

“He was a very realistic, pragmatic guy,” he said. “He was very much involved in his community, and he really cared about the future of the young generation living in the camp.”

Margalit noted that his murder sends a clear warning to all Palestinians working with Israelis.

“It’s terrible, but I guess that the type of message to all Palestinians who work with Israel is stop doing it, or you will end up like Nabata,” he lamented.

Nabata’s numerous accomplishments included paving the camp’s roads, setting up emergency medical services for residents, and training firefighters with help from the Jerusalem Fire Department.

He also led a youth group in the adjacent Palestinian neighborhood of Ras Shehada.

Since being separated by the capital’s security fence following the second intifada, living conditions in the Shuafat refugee camp have deteriorated exponentially.

Artem Semenikhin #racist jpost.com

Two months after local elections were held across Ukraine, residents of the small northern city of Konotop are expressing shock and dismay over the behavior of newly chosen Mayor Artem Semenikhin of the neo-Nazi Svoboda party.

According to reports, Semenikhin drives around in a car bearing the number 14/88, a numerological reference to the phrases “we must secure the existence of our people and a future for white children” and “Heil Hitler”; replaced the picture of President Petro Poroshenko in his office with a portrait of Ukrainian national leader and Nazi collaborator Stepan Bandera; and refused to fly the city’s official flag at the opening meeting of the city council because he objected to the star of David emblazoned on it. The flag also features a Muslim crescent and a cross.

Svoboda, known as the Social-National Party of Ukraine until 2004, has been accused of being a neo-Nazi party by Ukrainian Jews and while party leaders have a history of making anti-Semitic remarks, their rhetoric has toned down considerably over the past years as they attempted to go mainstream.

[...]

For the Jews of Konotop, however, worries persist, with Ilya Bezruchko, the Ukrainian representative of the US-based National Coalition Supporting Eurasian Jewry, saying he believed residents, who generally get along well with local Jews, voted for Semenikhin because he projected an image of someone who could bring change and reform a corrupt system.

However, Semenikhin himself has a history of fraud, having been arrested for posing as an electricity company worker in order to extract payments from businesses in Kiev in 2012, Bezruchko charged.

Bezruchko, whose late grandfather was the head of the community and whose mother currently works for the city council, said Semenikhin and his assistant have left angry comments on his Facebook page in response to critical articles that the Jewish activist had posted on his blog.

He claimed that someone close to the mayor claimed that he would be hospitalized if he returned to the city from Kiev, where he currently lives, and that the mayor himself posted to say that his mother was corrupt and should be fired from her job.

“The reaction of [the] community is shock. People are shocked it could happen in [a] city and nobody believed it could happen here but it happened somehow,” community activist Igor Nechayev told The Jerusalem Post by phone Monday.

While there have been a couple of instances of anti-Semitic graffiti over the past decade and one occasionally hears references to conspiracy theories identifying Ukrainian political leaders as Jews, for the most part, relations between the Jewish community and their non-Jewish neighbors are cordial, he said.

However, while the mayor attempts to make sure his statements never cross over into outright anti-Semitism, many things he says can be interpreted in such a way, he continued. As an example, he referred to a recent statement by Semenikhin in which the mayor refused to apologize for anti-Jewish actions taken by far-right nationalists in World War II, intimating that it was because those responsible for the Holodomor famine of the 1930s were largely Jewish.

Bishop Seraphim of Piraeus #fundie jpost.com

ATHENS, Greece — A leading Greek bishop has blamed the “Zionist monster” for new legislation that would give same-sex couples in Greece expanded civil rights.

Bishop Seraphim of Piraeus said the cohabitation bill is a result of the “constant war against the true faith” being waged “by the international Zionist monster,” which he said controls the Greek government.

In a statement on the website of the Metropolis of Piraeus, the bishop also threatened to sever relations with any Greek lawmaker who supports the bill when it comes to a vote on Tuesday, saying it subverts human sexuality and is destroying the traditional family unit.

The bishop has a long history of making anti-Semitic comments. In 2010, he told a Greek TV station that Jews had orchestrated the Holocaust and were behind Greece’s financial crisis. He later clarified that these were his personal opinions and did not represent the Church of Greece.

Under the bill, Greek same-sex couples who sign a cohabitation agreement would receive the same favorable tax status as married heterosexual couples as well as increased inheritance rights.

Haredi anti-enlistment extremists #fundie jpost.com

Radical elements in the haredi (ultra-Orthodox) community have, in the past few years, waged a vitriolic campaign of incitement and harassment against haredi IDF officers involved in recruiting haredi conscripts, as well as against enlisted haredi soldiers.

The campaign has taken the form of posters, pamphlets and booklets with cartoons and other images that incite readers against haredi officials involved in promoting IDF service. These publications routinely depict such people as pigs and malign elements attempting to corrupt haredi youth.

In July, extremists published a booklet containing the names, photos and contact details of the most senior haredi figures who promote haredi enlistment, as part of efforts to harass and delegitimize them.

One of the names published was IDF officer Yehuda Glickman. He, along with his wife, were the subject of ceaseless harassment by anonymous people who obtained their phone numbers from the booklet.

The Glickmans received phone calls from people who said they hoped the Glickmans would die quickly, or warned them that they would face harsh justice in the afterlife for their deeds.

[...]

The investigator, David Gabai [...] was able to gain access to the leaders of the campaign. He recorded four of them discussing efforts to stage protests at Glickman's home.

"We need buses and a bunch of other things," said one of the extremists in the recording. "I'm thinking about buying a load of mice and filling up the houses of all these [haredi IDF recruiters] with them," says another.

"Scorpions," jokes one, playing off the similarity in Hebrew between the words mouse and scorpion.

Mus'ab Al-Mosharraf #fundie jpost.com

Mus'ab Al-Mosharraf, who blogs for the left-leaning Elaph website, claims that "it is indisputable that there are monkeys of Jewish origin; none deny this but those who do not believe in the Koran that Allah...," and points out the similarities in behavior between macaques and Jews.

"It should be noted that the Jews were subjected to isolation and degradation throughout all of Europe, and particularly by the Nazis in Germany under Adolf Hitler's leadership. Today, macaques have received some attention and interest, because people fear that they could become extinct," Mosharraf says.

Mosharraf goes on to site a famous passage in the Koran stating that Jewish people are "the offspring of apes and pigs," an oft used trope designed to denigrate Jewish people.

According to MEMRI, the term "offspring of apes and pigs" originates in the Koran in Verse 65 of Surat Al-Baqara, in Verse 60 of Surat Al-Maida, and in Verses 163-169 of Surat Al-A'raf. The parables describe Allah punishing the "Sabbath peoples" for violating his instruction.

The publication of Mosharraf's blog comes as a bit of a surprise, according to MEMRI. The blog has never posted content of this nature before, and it has repeatedly condemned the use of "the offspring of apes and pigs" to describe Jews until now.

Unnamed Jerusalemite driver #fundie jpost.com

[Note: teffin and talit are worn while praing]

An orthodox man pulled over by police for driving while wearing teffin and talit was convicted in absentia at Jerusalem Magistrate’s Court Sunday morning for endangering other motorists and pedestrians.

According to court records, Judge Sharon Larry-Bavli suspended the man’s license for four months, fined him NIS 1,000, and put him on probation for three years. In the ruling, Larry-Bavli noted that the sentence is the minimum “prescribed by the law” for such an unusual driving violation.

Still, the judge expressed some humor, stating “I doubt that prayer would have helped in this case.”

Agudath Israel of America #fundie#homophobia jpost.com

[New Jersey outlaws conversion therapy for LGBT minors.]

Agudath Israel [of America] is “deeply disappointed and saddened that the State of New Jersey now prohibits therapists from treating minors who have made a personal choice to seek help overcoming same-sex attraction,” Agudath Israel said in a statement on Tuesday.

“The new law tramples on the rights of mental health therapists to engage freely in their profession, and it unfairly denies teenagers seeking therapy for issues that are troubling them the ability to obtain professional help.”

Calling it “constitutionally suspect” and a “threat to civil and religious liberties,” the haredi organization compared the New Jersey law to a similar measure in California “that has been challenged in court and whose implementation is currently blocked.”

Dola Indidis #fundie jpost.com

A Kenyan lawyer has filed a petition with the International Court of Justice in The Hague, suggesting that the trial and crucifixion of Jesus Christ was unlawful, and the State of Israel among others should be held responsible, Kenyan news outlet the Nairobian reported on Friday.

Dola Indidis, a lawyer and former spokesman of the Kenyan Judiciary is reportedly attempting to sue Tiberius (emperor of Rome, 42 BCE-37 CE), Pontius Pilate, a selection of Jewish elders, King Herod, the Republic of Italy and the State of Israel.

“Evidence today is on record in the Bible, and you cannot discredit the Bible,” Indidis told the Kenyan Citizen News.

Although those he suggests should have been convicted during the original trial have not been alive for more than 2,000 years, Indidis insists that the government for whom they acted can and should still be held responsible.

“I filed the case because it’s my duty to uphold the dignity of Jesus and I have gone to the ICJ to seek justice for the man from Nazareth,” Indidis told the Nairobian. “His selective and malicious prosecution violated his human rights through judicial misconduct, abuse of office bias and prejudice.”

Indidis apparently named the states of Italy and Israel in the lawsuit because upon the attainment of independence, the two states incorporated the laws of the Roman Empire, those in force at the time of the crucifixion.

He is challenging the mode of questioning used during Jesus’s trial, prosecution, hearing and sentencing; the form of punishment meted out to him while undergoing judicial proceedings and the substance of the information used to convict him.

The case was first filed in the High Court in Nairobi but was rejected. Indidis then applied to have it heard at the ICJ.

Indidis says he wants to establish what crime Jesus was charged with and prays that the court decides “that the proceedings before the Roman courts were a nullity in law, for they did not conform to the rule of law at the material time and any time thereafter.”

“Some of those present spat in his face, struck him with their fists, slapped him, taunted him, and pronounced him worthy of death,” Indidis told the Kenyan news website Standard Media (SDE).

When Jesus died, Indidis insists, he was not given an opportunity to be heard.

“I am suing as a friend,” he said.

Indidis insisted on the validity of his case, saying “I know with a matter of fact and truth we have a good case with a high probability of success and I hope it is done in my lifetime.”

When asked about the case, an official from the ICJ told legal news website Legal Cheek, “The ICJ has no jurisdiction for such a case. The ICJ settles disputes between states. It is not even theoretically possible for us to consider this case.”

Gilad Sharon #fundie jpost.com

There is no justification for the State of Gaza being able to shoot at our towns with impunity. We need to flatten entire neighborhoods in Gaza. Flatten all of Gaza. The Americans didn’t stop with Hiroshima – the Japanese weren’t surrendering fast enough, so they hit Nagasaki, too.

There should be no electricity in Gaza, no gasoline or moving vehicles, nothing. Then they’d really call for a ceasefire.

Were this to happen, the images from Gaza might be unpleasant – but victory would be swift, and the lives of our soldiers and civilians spared.

Anonymous Iranian Prison Guard #fundie jpost.com

"I was given the 'honor' to temporarily marry young girls before they were sentenced to death."

In the Islamic Republic (of Iran) it is illegal to execute a young woman, regardless of her crime, if she is a virgin, he explained. Therefore a "wedding" ceremony is conducted the night before the execution: The young girl is forced to have sexual intercourse with a prison guard - essentially raped by her "husband."

"I regret that, even though the marriages were legal," he said.

Why the regret, if the marriages were "legal?"

"Because," he went on, "I could tell that the girls were more afraid of their 'wedding' night than of the execution that awaited them in the morning. And they would always fight back, so we would have to put sleeping pills in their food. By morning the girls would have an empty expression; it seemed like they were ready or wanted to die.

"I remember hearing them cry and scream after [the rape] was over," he said. "I will never forget how this one girl clawed at her own face and neck with her finger nails afterwards. She had deep scratches all over her."

Returning to the events of the last few weeks, and his decision to set free the two teenage detainees, he said he "honestly" did not know why he had released them, a decision that led to his own arrest, "but I think it was because they were so young. They looked like children and I knew what would happen to them if they weren't released."

He said that while a man is deemed "responsible for his own actions at 13, for a woman it is 9," and that it was freeing the 15-year-old girl that "really got me in trouble.

"I was not mistreated or really interrogated while being detained," he said. "I was put in a tiny room and left alone. It was hard being isolated, so I spent most of my time praying and thinking about my wife and kids."

Daniel #fundie jpost.com

[responding to the story of a congressman being sworn in on the Koran]
This is a prophetic action of national stature. My question is, How much longer until everyone is sworn into office using the Koarn?

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