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58% of Eligible Voters Took Part in Likud Primaries; Results Being Tallied Manually

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At 10:00 a.m. on Tuesday morning in Israel, 113 polling stations were opened throughout the country, and approximately 120,000 members of the Likud were eligible to vote and in order to choose the party’s list for the elections for the 21st Knesset, that is scheduled for April.

142 candidates competed for realistic seats on the Likud list, including 30 current Knesset members and ministers who will fight for a place on the national list. It is estimated that between eight and ten current Knesset members will not be placed in realistic spots on the list for the next Knesset.

The polling stations closed at 10:00 p.m. The ballots were counted in the voting centers and then transferred to the primary war room that was established in Kfar Maccabiah. As the counting was done manually, the official and final results will likely not be published until Wednesday morning.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu published a video in advance of the primaries in the Likud, calling on the members of the party to approve his proposal to reserve three spots on the Knesset list – 21, 28 and 36 – for candidates of his choice.

“The connections on the left endanger us,” Netanyahu said in the video. “The proposal will increase our chances of winning. I am asking you to reserve three candidates in lower spots on the list in order to assure the Likud the ability to deal with the connections between the leftist parties. It is important that the Likud form the next government.”

69,719 Likud members voted in the primaries, making up 58 percent of those eligible to vote.

The results of the primaries are starting to be received by the campaign room set up by the Likud administration in Kfar Maccabiah in Ramat Gan.

Voters were asked to mark 12 candidates on the voting ballot for the national list, as well as to mark five candidates in the various districts of the party.

The primaries took place in the wake of the ongoing conflict between Prime Minister Netanyahu and former minister Gideon Sa’ar, who ran for office on the national list.

At a joint press conference held by Prime Minister Netanyahu with the Austrian president, he was asked about the accusations he recently made about Sa’ar and made it clear that he stands behind them.

“I do not take back even one syllable from what I said about Gideon Sa’ar,” Netanyahu said in response to Sa’ar’s claims that Netanyahu was making up stories about him.

(INN)

Report Shows 1,119 Rockets & Mortar Shells Hit Israel in 2018

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1,119 rockets and mortar shells exploded in Israeli territory, compared with 31 in 2017, the highest annual number in the past ten years, with the exception of Operation Protective Edge in the summer of 2014. Photo by Kobi Richter/TPS on 5 February, 2019

Palestinian terrorism throughout 2018 showed two main trends: the increase of violence from the Gaza Strip after about three and a half years of relative quiet, and the increased number of Arab terror attacks in Judea and Samaria, according to a comprehensive survey on the subject.

The Meir Amit Intelligence and Terror Information Center (ITIC), which published its annual study that analyzed these two main trends, noted that after about three and a half years of relative quiet after Operation Protective Edge the level of violence emanating from the Hamas-controlled Strip has significantly increased, and one of its manifestations was the 1,119 rockets and mortar shells that exploded in Israeli territory, compared with 31 in 2017, the highest annual number in the past ten years, with the exception of Operation Protective Edge in the summer of 2014.

The terrorism and violence coming out from Gaza were led and modulated by Hamas. Hamas decided on a new policy of controlled violence to exert pressure on Israel to promote the organization’s objectives, which are the easing of Gaza’s economic distress, opening of the border crossings, and receiving payments for its officials while avoiding a comprehensive military confrontation.

In Judea and Samaria, popular terrorism continued in its various forms, primarily stabbing, vehicular and shooting attacks. After Arab terrorism peaked in 2015 its scope decreased, but in the last months of 2018, there was an increase in the number of attacks.

Shin Bet (Israel’s Security Agency) head Nadav Argaman, briefing the Knesset’s Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee in November, revealed that 480 significant terrorist attacks were prevented, that is, close to nine significant attacks were prevented for every one carried out. These preventive activities indicate, according to Argaman, the great potential for terrorism simmering under the surface.

The Palestinian Authority (PA) and Fatah in Judea and Samaria continued their support for the so-called “popular resistance,” i.e., terrorism, but prevented Hamas from turning it into military-grade terrorism that would lead to a mass uprising against Israel and destabilize the PA.

The ITIC recorded a total of 22 stabbing attacks in 2018, in comparison to 46 in 2017. The second most common type of terrorism was shooting attacks, with 13 in 2018 and 20 in 2017. On the other hand, the number of vehicular attacks rose in 2018 with 13, as opposed to 10 in 2017.

2018 was less lethal, with 12 Israeli civilians and soldiers killed, as opposed to 18 in 2017. A total of 74 Israelis were killed between the beginning of the wave of popular terrorism in October 2015 and the end of December 2018.

(TPS)

Danon & 40 UN Ambassadors Visit Aish HaTorah: The Embassy of the Jewish People

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Aish HaTorah hosted Israel’s Ambassador to the United Nations, Danny Danon, and 40 UN Ambassadors for a tour and banquet luncheon as part of their 5-day visit to Israel in conjunction with the March of the Living and the American Zionist Movement.

Aish HaTorah hosted Israel’s Ambassador to the United Nations, Danny Danon, and 40 UN Ambassadors for a tour and banquet luncheon as part of their 5-day visit to Israel in conjunction with the March of the Living and the American Zionist Movement.

Rabbi Etiel Goldwicht, Director of Aish Israel, gave a historical overview of Jerusalem from the Aish rooftop, with its panoramic view of the Temple Mount, Western Wall, and surrounding mountains

Rabbi Steven Burg, CEO of Aish, welcomed the UN dignitaries to the Aish World Center, “the embassy of the Jewish people opposite the Western Wall where thousands of guests of all faiths come every year to learn about the Jewish Heritage and Jewish values.”

Rabbi Burg added, “Aish’s core value, which is Judaism’s core value, is love; and taking responsibility for the world. We are open all the time for anyone, from any nation around the world to experience the power of Torah wisdom.” Rabbi Burg thanked the delegation for their support of Israel. “I’m here with a group of heroes, I really look up to all of you and all the work that you do to keep the world at peace.”

Rabbi Etiel Goldwicht, Director of Aish Israel, gave a historical overview of Jerusalem from the Aish rooftop, with its panoramic view of the Temple Mount, Western Wall, and surrounding mountains. The Ambassadors viewed the short film “Reality” produced by longtime Aish partner and supporter, Marc Goldman, which expresses the importance of following the Bible’s wisdom to ensure the spiritual and physical survival of humanity.

“The Aish Dan Family World Center is a magnet that draws dignitaries and individuals from all over the world to come and get connected to Israel. Anyone who comes to Aish leaves more committed and passionate to their heritage then they did when they arrived.” said Ariel Kotler, Executive Director of Aish.

Aish is a global platform that fosters individual and communal Jewish responsibility by building connections to Jews, Jewish learning and the Jewish homeland. Founded by the late Rabbi Noah Weinberg, OBM in 1974, today Aish HaTorah has 35 branches worldwide, engaging over 150,000 people per year and reaching over a million people online.

‘Terrorists in Suits’: Over 100 Links Revealed Between Them & BDS Groups

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The Ministry of Strategic Affairs revealed over 100 links between terror groups and BDS-promoting NGOs, including the employment of 30 current and “retired” terror operatives.

The Ministry of Strategic Affairs and Public Diplomacy (MSA) released its “Terrorists in Suits” report on Sunday, revealing over 100 links shared between the internationally-designated terrorist organizations Hamas and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) with at least 13 anti-Israel BDS promoting NGOs.

Elaborating on a previous report, the ministry reveals how Hamas and the PFLP are utilizing a network of NGOs promoting boycotts against Israel as an additional tactic in their ultimate goal of dismantling the State of Israel. These organizations have successfully placed over 30 of their members, 20 of which have served time, including for murder, in senior positions within BDS-promoting NGOs.

The report documents how boycott organizations and terrorist designated organizations raise finances together, share the same personnel, and showcases that contrary to popular belief, these officials have not abandoned their support for terrorism, but instead, continue to maintain organizational, financial, and active ties with terrorist groups.

 

Funding from Europe, philanthropic foundations

The Israel-boycott organizations in question were also shown to have received millions of euros in funding from European countries and philanthropic foundations, while gaining access to additional funds through financial, crowdfunding and banking systems.

Examples of terrorists working in support of organizations that promote the boycotting of Israel include Leila Khaled and Mustafa Awad.

Khaled became infamous for hijacking two civilian airliners, Flights TWA 840 and El Al 219, and to this day remains active in the internationally-designated terrorist group the PFLP. She has fundraised for, and promoted, anti-Israel boycott NGOs both in Europe and South Africa. In 2011 she was found to have taken coordinated actions for a terrorist cell planning on attacking sites in Jerusalem. Furthermore, in October 2018 Khaled was quoted in an interview saying, “Palestine will be liberated through resistance in all its forms, first and foremost through armed struggle.”

Awad, is currently serving time for his involvement in several terrorist organizations, including serving as a member of the PFLP and received training from Iranian terrorist group Hezbollah. He also represented Samidoun in Brussels, an organization known for promoting boycotts against the State of Israel and advocating for the release of Palestinian security-prisoners in Israeli jails, including those convicted of murdering civilians in terrorist PFLP attacks.

 

Connections to Hamas, Islamic Jihad

Another instance includes the BDS National Committee (BNC), the Ramallah-based leadership of the global Boycott movement toward Israel, consists of 28 Palestinian boycott groups. The lead member of this coalition is the Palestinian National and Islamic Forces (PNIF), which includes five internationally-designated terrorist organizations including Hamas, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and Palestinian Islamic Jihad. The American fundraising platform Donorbox recently suspended the BNC’s account after finding the group did indeed maintain ties to terrorist groups.

Over the past year, and following MSA activities to expose NGO terror ties, several European countries have announced the reexamination and decrease in funding granted to organizations which promote boycotts against the State of Israel.

The report also showed how members of terrorist organizations operate under the guise of “boycott activists” to gain access, and meet with, senior Western government officials and exert pressure to release convicted terrorists held in Israeli prisons.

 

Removing the ‘mask’ of the NGOs

The new report aims to decidedly remove the “mask” of NGOs promoting BDS by exposing in an in-depth study the true nature of this scheme, the ministry said.

“Terrorist groups and the anti-Israel boycott campaign have united in their goal of wiping Israel off the map,” Erdan said. “Terrorist groups view boycotts as a complementary tactic to terror attacks. Following the exposure of over 100 links between terrorist groups and leading BDS organizations, I urge all governments and financial institutions to investigate the activities of these BDS organizations, and immediately end all funding and support which they provide to them.”

             (Ministry of Strategic Affairs)

Miri Regev: Arab Knesset Delegation to Turkey ‘Seeks Evil’ for Israel

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Erdogan praised Arab lawmakers, led by MK Ahmad Tibi, for countering Israel’s “baseless rhetoric” against Turkey.

Israeli Arab MKs met on Saturday in Istanbul with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, who thanked them for “representing the Palestinian demands in the Knesset” and opposing Israel’s “baseless rhetoric against Turkey.” The group was led by MK Ahmad Tibi.

The trip by the MKs received a much cooler reaction back in Israel from a senior member of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s ruling Likud party.

“Time and time again, Tibi and his group insist on proving to everyone they aren’t really worthy of being Knesset Members. They are Trojan horses seeking the evil of the State of Israel,” said Culture and Sports Minister Miri Regev.

Participants said that the meeting dealt with the arrests and detention of three Israeli Arabs who had traveled to Turkey for a kidney transplant. According to Turkish law, it is illegal to receive a kidney from a donor who is not immediate family.

Following the meeting, Erdogan is said to have agreed to release one of the three who was arrested and to drop the charges against the other two who were detained.

Citing the tense relations between Jerusalem and Ankara, Regev charged that the Israeli Arabs were “continuing the terrorist Mavi Marmara cruise that their friend Hanin Zoabi began; their place is in Gaza and not in Jerusalem.”

The minister was referring to the Mavi Marmara ship that set out for Gazan shores in 2010 as part of the “Gaza Freedom Flotilla” despite the warnings by Israeli authorities. A Turkish NGO was behind it, and MK Zoabi was on board. As the flotilla drew close to Gaza, violent confrontations ensued between the activists and Israeli naval commandos.

A flotilla organizer acknowledged that Israeli soldiers did not open fire until an activist seized a gun from one of them. During the struggle, nine activists were killed, including eight Turkish nationals and one Turkish American, and many were wounded. In 2014, a tenth member of the flotilla died in hospital after being in a coma for four years.

Israel said later that deadly weapons, including knives and metal rods, were found on board the ship.

In Saturday’s meeting, Erdoğan also promised that “Turkey will never turn its back on the Palestinian people,” and will “use all means to end the occupation and achieve peace,” according to Tibi.

The MK said that the Turkish president also vowed to “stand by the Palestinians even if he remains the only one standing.”

Leading right-wing politicians. including Regev and former Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman have been outspoken in questioning the loyalty of Arab MKs to the State of Israel.

The Balad party, one of the Israeli Arab factions, picked a new slate on Saturday for the April Knesset election. The new leader, Mtanes Shehadeh, refused in an interview on the Galei Yisrael radio station on Sunday to be pinned down on whether he thought Hamas and Hezbollah are terror organizations.

            (World Israel News)

‘Pain and Frustration:’ An Israeli-Ethiopian Leader Explains Why They Demonstrated

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Thousands of Israeli-Ethiopians on Wednesday demonstrated and blocked main routes in southern Tel Aviv in protest of what they claim are the police’s excessive and violent actions against the community’s members. Photo by Hillel Maeir/TPS on 31 January, 2019

Thousands of Israeli-Ethiopians on Wednesday demonstrated and blocked main routes in southern Tel Aviv in protest of what they claim are the police’s excessive and violent actions against the community’s members.

The protest was sparked by the death of Yehuda Biagada earlier this month. Biagada, an Israeli-Ethiopian, was shot and killed by police.

Young Israelis light candles at the site where 24-year-old Yehuda Biadga was killed by police, earlier this month. Biagada was an Israeli-Ethiopian. He left his home in Bat Yam armed with a knife and after acting violently. His mother alerted the police, and they tracked him down and confronted him. The police say he charged at them with a knife and feeling their lives were in danger, shot him. Photo Credit: VIN

The incident began after Biagada left his home in Bat Yam armed with a knife and after acting violently at home. His mother alerted the police, and they tracked him down and confronted him. The police say he charged at them with a knife and feeling their lives were in danger, shot him.

His family claims he was wrongfully shot. They say that Yehuda was not mentally stable and was experiencing difficulties since his early discharge from the IDF, and that the police did not act according to its procedures and did not fire warning shots before shooting to kill. They also leveled charges of racism against the responding officers, saying that if Yehuda had been white the police would have reacted differently.

The protestors carried signs accusing the police of murder and with slogans against discrimination.

The demonstration, which began in full coordination with police and which was peacefully throughout its duration, turned violent later on in the evening, with protesters throwing rocks, bottles and other objects at police clad in full riot gear and others committed acts of vandalism.

The police stated that while the majority of the demonstrators dispersed, a small number of demonstrators caused damage to shops and property. Police units in the area responded to the disturbances while at the same time speaking to the leaders of the Ethiopian community to calm the situation, the police said.

Police arrested 11 suspects involved in the disturbances, and six police officers were lightly injured.

This latest clash between the Israeli-Ethiopian community and the police comes on the backdrop of already negative relations between the two. The relations have been tense in recent years following several incidents in which the Israeli-Ethiopian community claimed that the police’s actions were motivated by racism.

Maharata Baruch-Ron, Tel Aviv-Yafo’s Deputy Mayor and a member of the Israeli-Ethiopian community, told TPS that the demonstration was an expression of pain and a demand for security and equality.

She said that the Biagada incident sparked the demonstrations, but was not a singular event, while conveying a sense of fear from the police.

“We feel that instead of the police protecting us, we need to protect ourselves from the police,” she said.

Asked if she thought that the Biagada incident would have ended differently if he was white, she said that it is safe to assume so.

She added that the community’s pain also stems from the police’s handling of the incident, which was “insulting and frustrating.” Instead of apologizing and launching an inquiry to the incident, she said the shooting cop was back on the job the next day, conveying the general sense that the police did not care about the Biagada family or the Israeli-Ethiopian community. This, in turn, generates a sense of deep distrust in the police, she explained.

Commenting on the demonstration itself, she said that its message was meant primarily for the policy-makers, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Minister of Internal Security Gilad Erdan. The message was – listen to our cry and fix what is needed to be fixed.

As for the public, she believes that it heard their message and it now understands that the Israeli-Ethiopian community is “contending with phenomena which only it experiences,” as she put it.

She believes the demonstration’s message was well received by the Israeli public, which she described as a decent one which seeks equality for all.

Relating to the acts of violence seen at the demonstration, she accused the police of “adding insult to injury” by preparing for a seemingly violet incident, and by doing so portrayed the community as a violent one.

The police’s “excessive preparations” exacerbated the tensions and only generated more problems, she charged. While claiming that it would enable the demonstrations, the police’s conduct proves otherwise, she said.

She conceded that “only a few” demonstrators acted violently, but the police did not exhibit restraint, as it said it would.

She further alleged that anarchists may have exploited the demonstration to act violently, and it was not proper to taint an entire community with the actions of the few.

In conclusion, she said the Israeli-Ethiopian community proved that it could express its voice publicly in a respectful manner while abiding by the law.

(TPS)

“The Wall” Will Define the Future of the US

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Wall around the Vatican in Rome. Photo Credit–Shutterstock

By this time, you’ve probably had it, “Up to here!” on the Wall issue. We’ve been pounded day in and day with arguments for and against its being built. Years from now, just like “Borking,” the stain on Supreme Court nomination matter in the 1980’s, this era in American history will probably be remembered for… you guessed it, “Walling,” or the refusal by one political party to give in to the other for nothing more than stubbornness laced with much hypocrisy and failure to protect the sanctity of our nation’s borders.

The Far Left, which now includes every single elected Democrat from dog catcher to Senator has nothing more on its mind than destroying the presidency of Donald Trump. Nothing more. Jobs, black employment going through the roof, Gross National Product figures, reduction of taxes, real-time negotiations with North Korea, standing up to Putin, reduction of drug prices, support for Israel and the destruction of ISIS are of no matter to Progressives. So they dump on Trump by jumping on The Wall issue, and like two year-olds, with their wailing, clenched fists and closed minds, demand their way no matter how ludicrous their behavior and arguments are.

The political activist, Laura Loomer, in a simple act of being handcuffed, booked and arrested for merely climbing over the fence that surrounds and guards the mansion of California Governor Gavin Newsom, pointed out the foolishness of those who claim walls are immoral, un-American and serve no purpose other than separating the haves from the have-nots.

She stated to the cameras, while being taken into custody, “It’s interesting how as an American you’re not allowed to hop over Gavin Newsome’s fence or Nancy Pelosi’s fence —you get handcuffed and arrested, but if you’re an illegal alien or you’re a rapist or you kill innocent police officers or you murder and rape women here, an illegal here in California, you get all the free benefits. You have free welfare, free housing, free everything and you don’t get deported, right?” She made her point through her own Martin Luther King Jr. moment while being ‘cuffed and placed in a police cruiser.

And that was that the safety of all who live within our borders, both citizens and those who are here legally, are being put at dire risk for nothing more than political purposes and power. Just a few years ago the likes of Schumer, Feinstein, Hillary and Obama all voted to fund a wall on our southern border. We’ll end with a quote, at that time, from a then sane Senator Schumer, “I support further securing our borders, prohibiting hiring of undocumented immigrants by requiring job applicants to present a secure Social Security card creating jobs by attracting the world’s best and brightest to America.” And to top it all off, Chuckie Boy in 2010, on a League of Women Voters Candidate Questionnaire, voted YES on building a fence on the Mexican border. Let him hop over that one.

Auschwitz-Birkenau & Its Polish Roots

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According to Jan Gross' book, "Neighbors: The Destruction of the Jewish Community in Jedwabne, Poland," about half of the city's Catholic community participated in torturing 1,600 Jews, then corralling them into a barn, which was then set ablaze. (Photo Credit: Amazon)

There is a controversy still brewing regarding the WWII Auschwitz concentration camp which was located in Poland. Over 1 million Jews were killed there. As such, it will remain forever a name to be loathed in Jewish minds for generations to come. Now, nearly 75 years after its liberation by Soviet forces, Polish authorities are attempting to claim the camp was a German one merely located on Polish soil and to prove its point, its Parliament passed legislation that rejects the phrase, “Polish death camps” to describe Auschwitz and would make it illegal to describe Nazi death camps as “Polish.” They went so far as to legalizing fines and a maximum prison sentence of up to three years for anyone who refers to deaths camps built and functioning on Polish soil as being Polish. Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu will have none of that in his statement, “The law is baseless. I strongly oppose it. One cannot change history and the Holocaust cannot be denied.” We agree.

Poland’s current government is trying re-educate the world regarding the German-Polish cooperation in exterminating Jews. Its official stance is that all Poles were heroes during the war. This is a sore point among Poles who also suffered grievously under the Nazi occupation. Their society has seriously avoided discussing the killing of Jews by civilians or of their nationally recognized history of anti-Semitism. What Jewish refugee from that land did not carry with him or her stories of pogroms carried out by Polish civilians against their Jewish neighbors? Or their complicity in outing Jews to the Nazis? In 1941, Polish civilians in the city of Jedwabne, with the permission of their German occupiers, attacked and slaughtered local Jews.

According to Jan Gross’ book, “Neighbors: The Destruction of the Jewish Community in Jedwabne, Poland,” about half of the city’s Catholic community participated in torturing 1,600 Jews, then corralling them into a barn, which was then set ablaze. Even after the war this disease still permeated the land and made it unsafe sadly, for those few Jews who survived the Holocaust. Kielce, a Polish city of over 50,000 was the scene of the murder of 70 Jews by civilians and police in 1946, one year after the end of the war. How can these evil deeds be erased? And why should they be? History is history. We see how vehemently our own nation’s Blacks strive to keep the memory of slavery alive by refusing to compromise with those who wish to deny and forget. Why should we Jews be any different and permit the crimes of the Holocaust to be reduced and shoved aside to cleanse the soul of the Polish nation? Let’s go on living side by side with one another but just as well, let’s face the facts, both good and bad about history.

Letters to the Editor

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Shanghai Jews During WWII

Dear Editor:

As I was researching information about the Jews in Shanghai, I came across an article in The Jewish Voice called “Orthodox Jews in WWII Shanghai” about the exhibit Precious Gift: Rescue in Shanghai from a year ago. I hope that perhaps you could put me in touch with some of people who had lived in Shanghai during World War II.

I am an author working on a book for 5th-8th graders about a German girl whose family escaped to Shanghai. I have spent several years reading and researching the topic. I have already interviewed six people who were in Shanghai during the war- including the daughter of a Sephardic rabbi, and two Russian Jews whose family had migrated in the early 1900s.

Two chapters of the book have been reviewed by my peer writing group and the novel is outlined. I am looking for details to authenticate the experiences of my character. My intent is to tell as many of the stories as possible through the eyes of my 10-year old character and the people she meets.

I noticed in your article names of some people who might be able to provide the tidbits I am looking to record: The Wilken family–”the Sabbaths and other holidays they celebrated and the difficulties they faced (shortages of food, clothing, and medicine” and Judith Cohen-Gilbert’s childhood.

Rabbi Sholom Friedman’s comment resonated with me: “The story of the Jews’ escape to Shanghai is one that students don’t typically encounter in school, and yet it carries with it important lessons: the power of faith, the importance of perseverance, the role of resilience, and the imperative of survival.”

I want this story to be more widely viewed and its lessons must be taught. Those who survived the Holocaust will not survive much longer and a new generation must hear their plight.

I appreciate any information or names you can provide me with.

Sincerely

Adrienne Tropp

Washington, DC


Phyllis Chesler Responds to Detractor

Dear Editor:

The Jewish Voice has been reposting my articles and interviewing me for a long time now. That is about to change. I am referring to your decision to publish a letter which had little to do with the main arguments of my piece about the Women’s March Leadership; a letter which insults me and which uses Holocaust imagery to attack women’s reproductive rights.

My good friend Merle Hoffman, Founder and President of Choices Women’s Medical Center, interviewed the late Elie Wiesel for On The Issues Magazine, about abortion and the frequent misuse of the Holocaust when attacking women’s reproductive rights. Here is a small part of their conversation:

Hoffman: You have said that you are uncomfortable with the violence of the abortion debate, but when John Cardinal O’Connor first came to New York he held a press conference in which he stated that legal abortion was the “Second Holocaust.” How do you feel about abortion being likened to the genocidal slaughter of the Jews?

Wiesel: I am uncomfortable with the language of this debate. I resent the violence of the language the words that they use like Holocaust no it is not a Holocaust. It is blasphemy to reduce a tragedy of such monumental proportions to this human tragedy, and abortion is a human tragedy. What should be done is to give back the human proportion to the abortion issue, and when we see it as such we may be able to have much more understanding for the woman who chooses it.

Hoffman: Women who choose abortion are consistently labeled killers, and I personally have been compared to Hitler and called a great murderer.

Wiesel: A woman who feels she cannot go on, and with pain and despair she decides that she has to give up her child, is this woman a killer? Really really. But look, you cannot let these words hurt you. You have to be strong not to pay any attention because those who do that call you a Hitler and relate it to the Holocaust prove that they do not know what the Holocaust was.

The fact that you chose to publish a letter attacking one of your own writers—me—about an issue that was not crucial to my piece is curious. Birnbaum has defamed me as anti-Halacha on this subject and she is simply wrong, ignorant.

Sincerely Yours,

Dr. Phyllis Chesler


Applauds Expansion of Holocaust Education

Dear Editor,

I was pleased after reading your article “Rep. Carolyn B. Maloney Announces Historic Bipartisan Legislation on Holocaust Education” because there can never be enough Holocaust education. Some of my deepest fears are coming truer as a scary amount of people, especially younger people, don’t know much about the Holocaust. Many people don’t even know what Auschwitz is. I’m glad that this bipartisan legislation could pave the way for making sure our kids get the proper Holocaust education they need so they can be protected by the bad-faith actors out there denying the truth.

The Nazi party and its enablers, under Adolf Hitler, its dictator, systematically targeted and exterminated nearly six million Jews for the explicit purpose of eliminating every Jew on Earth. His killing machine took the lives of about 4 million more oppressed groups. These facts are so basic and fundamental and don’t even begin to dive into the countless horrors and individual stories of tragedy and survival, but we have to remember how foreign these basics sound to a surprisingly high number of people.

No time is too soon to start teaching about the Holocaust, before there’s a chance for lies and doubt to be planted by those who wish to harm us. We should all applaud Rep. Maloney and everyone who supported her efforts. Let’s keep it going and make sure that we never forget.

Sincerely,

Max Kelleher


Thinks News of Cancer Cure Gives False Hope

Dear Editor,

I was disappointed after reading the article “Could Israel’s New Immunotherapy Treatment Become a Possible Cure for Cancer?” because of the false hope it gives. Virtually everyone is affected by cancer and would jump with joy at the thought of a cure being discovered, which is what makes this misleading story even more egregious and devastating.

First of all, there wouldn’t just be a cure for cancer. There are many different types of cancer that develop in different ways in different people. Cancers affect different types of cells. It’s a ludicrous assertion to suggest that there would just be some single cure for all of a cancer. There is no one-size-fits-all solution for treating cancer. It’s great that research continues into finding cures for types of cancer, and there have actually been some promising leads. We need to stay cautiously optimistic though and keep listening to the scientists and not people who are just hyping up a promising study in order to project the false hope that we can now cure all of cancer.

We also don’t want people out there changing their habits or even cancer treatment options because they think a blanket cancer cure is on the horizon. Listen to your doctors and try leading a healthier lifestyle. It’s simple and unsatisfying, and it most certainly cannot prevent cancer, but that’s about all we can do now. It’s hard to face reality and so much easier to buy into the idea of miracle cures. If we face reality though, we know where we stand with current treatment options and experimental cures and can try to keep working forward from there until hopefully there is a day when we can find a way to defeat all types of cancer.

Sincerely,

Ernest Gangi

A Digital Iron Curtain Descends Over the Internet

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Why free speech on the web–as we once knew it–will be over within a decade

A generation of economic pressure failed to regulate the internet. Outraged movie studios and record companies managed to cripple some file sharing pioneers, but broke their teeth on Google’s YouTube. Dot coms like Amazon, Google, Cragislist, eBay and Netflix casually wiped out entire retail industries from the local paper to the video rental place, costing tens of thousands of jobs. And nothing.

No amount of pressure from business interests could close down the internet. Politicians were still too invested in a vision of progress fueled by the growth of something that they did not understand.

“An iron curtain has descended across the Continent,” Winston Churchill once warned. A digital iron curtain is now descending over the internet. Free speech as we once knew it will be over in a decade. The internet will still be a noisy place, but it will be a managed noise of echo chambers, a moderated system in which dissenting views will be treated as trolling and purged as quickly as they are identified.

The political causes of both curtain falls are the same. The Soviet Union and the American Left had both triumphed and inherited a large chaotic region that they had to consolidate under their control. The Soviet Union’s triumph had been a military one over physical territories while the American Left had conquered the messaging territories of the old cultural realm, media, entertainment and advertising.

Having won those, it’s expanding its control over big corporations and big government. And to do that, it has to eliminate the independent voices on the internet that pose a threat to its messaging monopoly.

The consolidation of the internet by a handful of monopolies, the politicization of corporate leadership and the panic over Trump and Brexit created a once in a lifetime opportunity. The official pretext for the power grab was “fake news”: a loosely defined term taken to mean misinformation. The fake news panic relied on familiar panics over the internet’s unregulated ability to influence society. But this time it was attached to the Russians, a classic foreign threat, that made free speech too dangerous to maintain.

The fake news crisis argued that foreign influence over the public square was a national security threat. This was a dangerous argument with roots in everything from the Alien and Sedition Acts to the Cold War. A few years ago, the idea of internet censorship to meet a national security threat would have seemed an implausible movie plotline. But the growing cultural power of the American Left allows it to quickly take a bizarre idea and mainstream it into a policy mandate in a matter of months or years.

“Four legs good. Internet censorship better.”

American elections had to be protected from the Russians by regulating, monitoring and censoring the internet. Direct government censorship was still illegal. But the consolidation of the internet under a handful of monopolies made it easy to apply downward pressure on a handful of platforms. Social media companies that had formerly been open were being redefined as publishers tasked to fight “fake news”.

The lack of accountability for user submitted content had allowed companies like Google, its YouTube subsidiary, Amazon and Facebook to grow huge without facing legal sanctions from the companies whose content and rights were being casually violated by their users. It meant that Google’s search engine could index and link to all sorts of copyright violating material. And that Facebook wasn’t held accountable for the pictures that users uploaded to their profiles, even as it profited from them.

This utopia was made possible by the Communications Decency Act, a mostly forgotten piece of legislation from the Clinton era meant to protect children from pornography. The “decency” part of the CDA was quickly struck down by courts as a violation of the First Amendment. But one particular sentence in the CDA, “No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider” has provided an almost limitless level of immunity for dot coms from government regulation.

In plain language, it meant that if you uploaded a snippet from your favorite Marvel movie to YouTube, Google couldn’t be sued by Disney. The providers weren’t responsible for what their users did.

The CDA had been meant to regulate the internet, instead it all but completely deregulated it.

That was why YouTube thrived while Napster died. The CDA helped make the huge dot com monopolies possible by giving them a pass. But that made internet freedom more vulnerable, not less. Google and Facebook got huge without having to worry about government regulation or corporate lawsuits.

But once a powerful political movement in control of the culture decided that it was time to censor the internet, it could quickly impose its will on a handful of internet monopolies that mostly agreed with it.

This time around there would be no government regulation. Social pressure exercised by the Left through media outlets, already heavily motivated to go after the social and search platforms that controlled their traffic, combined with hearings and action by the Europeans would do the trick.

The platforms would be transformed into publishers, and tasked with the obligation, not of serving their free users or even their paid advertisers, but the social good, as defined by the media echo chamber. Their job would be to promote politically good content, such as that of the media, and penalize politically bad content, such as that produced by conservatives. And then the digital curtain falls.

The two driving forces, the cultural consolidation of the American Left, and the economic consolidation of internet monopolies, are colliding and colluding to form a new environment. In that environment, free speech, and any kind of individualism that is outside the trend, is a dangerous phenomenon.

Internet monopolies that measure their user bases in the hundreds of millions and even the billions can only treat users as collective wholes, tracked, measured and shaped by machine learning algorithms into profitable channels. And the American Left, like its Soviet predecessor, believes that while there might be an infinity of genders, there is only one right way to approach any of its many politicized issues.

Big Data and Big Brother both make money and gain power when they can predict what you will do and nudge you to do it. Big Brother offers Big Data techniques for shaping user behavior through peer pressure while Big Data offers Big Brother new ways to track and manipulate human attitudes.

The soul of the internet was once as anarchic as its infrastructure. As the infrastructure consolidated, the internet became a collectivist environment. And individuality came to be seen as “trolling”.

A centralized environment will be inherently collectivist. It’s impossible for it to be anything else. And when a handful of companies control the internet, they become its political and cultural weak point. Any government or totalitarian movement that can compromise them will control the internet.

If we want an open internet, then we must once again envision it as a chaotic environment of competitive companies, none of whom can get so big that they hold its future and ours in their hands.

Government regulation has a meaningful role to play, but not in controlling monopolies, a misguided policy that would inevitably lead to the end of free speech, but in undermining them and breaking them up. The consolidation of a formerly free market under a small number of monopolies is not purely an internet problem, but is being mirrored across vast sectors of American life from health care to finance.

Internet censorship is the manifestation of that larger problem. As is the growing power of the Left.

The Left never feared huge corporations. They’re easy to take over or intimidate. What it feared was a dynamic open society with many rising and falling power centers and no easy levers for total control. It’s built to take over static power structures. When a society is open, then it can’t win.

Free markets are not an abstract idea that can exist in the absence of the dynamic friction of active competition. When a handful of monopolies control your phone service, your internet and your health care, how you pay at the grocery store and where you shop, your freedoms will also be monopolized.

A society of corporate monopolies will inevitably become a society of political monopolies.

The only way to stop the rise of Big Brother is to break up Big Data.

            (Front Page Mag)

Daniel Greenfield, a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the Freedom Center, is an investigative journalist and writer focusing on the radical Left and Islamic terrorism.

Anti-Semitism & the ‘Visible’ Jews in Crown Heights

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Teen Attacks Jewish Man in Crown Heights with Stick; Charged with Hate Crime

One evening about 30 years ago, my girlfriend, who is now my wife, came home to our small flat in London, her eyes swollen with tears, and the backs of her knees and thighs covered in painful bruises.

An hour earlier, she had been walking through Kings Cross train station when a young Chassidic visitor to the city, lost in the web of the London Underground, approached her asking for directions. She duly took him to the correct platform for Heathrow Airport, picking up one of his suitcases along the way. As she dropped him off and started walking back in the direction of her train, she heard footsteps running up behind her. Before she could turn around to see properly what was happening, she felt a series of brutal kicks to her legs. An oafish voice hissed “you Jewish c***” into her ear as the kicks landed again. Then her assailant, a white male whose face she only glimpsed, ran off, leaving her terrified and dazed, while everyone else around her carried on as if nothing had happened.

I have to admit, I did a lousy job of comforting her after this ghastly episode. I was shocked and worried and angry, but I was also confused when she mentioned, with touching sweetness, her relief that the young Chassid had been safely away from her when the attack occurred.

“Wait, what do you mean?” I blurted, as she sat down on our sofa with a cup of tea. “He attacked you because he thought you were Jewish or because he saw you helping the Chassidic kid?” Exasperation flashed across her face. “What difference does it make?” she snapped.

My stupid question was a salutary lesson in how I’d internalized anti-Semitic stereotypes more than I cared to admit; it dawned on me that I’d asked it because, with her blonde hair and blue eyes, my wife didn’t “look Jewish.” But to the lout who assaulted her, she was as much of a Jew as the young Chassid she’d assisted—and she was therefore unambiguously the victim of an anti-Semitic attack. Like many victims of anti-Semitic violence, she didn’t report the assault to the London transport police, and neither did I, processing the incident instead as an ugly and painful memory.

To this day, it still troubles me that among my first reactions was to wonder why the assailant had identified my wife as a Jew. The internalization of anti-Semitic stereotypes offers part of the answer, but there is, perhaps, an additional explanation that is even more disturbing—that somehow violence against those of us who are visibly Jewish is more easily explained and rationalized than it is against those of us who are not. If the assailant had spotted my wife helping the young Chassid with his suitcase, then there, to my mind, was a rational explanation for why she’d been targeted. But what if the assailant had just decided on the spot that she was Jewish and therefore a legitimate target for his hatred? That was perhaps too unpleasant to contemplate.

We will never know what my wife’s attacker was thinking in that moment. But when it comes to anti-Semitic violence these days, that awkward distinction in my head—between those of us who are publicly visible as Jews and those who are not—is still very much in the air.

On a purely empirical level, it’s a distinction that makes sense, insofar as hate-crime statistics show that “visible” Jews are more likely to face random violence as Jews than are “non-visibles” because, of course, they are identifiable as such by their clothing. But on a moral and political level—and this is the lesson I learned from my wife’s experience—it is a distinction without value.

It reinforces, among both Jews and non-Jews, the notion that violence against visible Jews can be comfortably explained away; lunatics prowl the streets of our cities, and some of them are anti-Semites and racists with no self-control, so a Jew took a beating because he was unfortunate to be wearing a kipah in the wrong place at the wrong time. Next time, wear a baseball cap, you might advise.

These generic platitudes are of little help in the Crown Heights neighborhood of Brooklyn, N.Y., home to the Chabad-Lubavitch movement, where in the last three months about a dozen Chassidic men have been brutally beaten up, leaving many in the community fearful, as one rabbi told me this week, of walking a couple of blocks to go to the store or visit a relative. The most recent incidents took place within a few minutes of each other, in the early hours of Wednesday morning last week. Three African-American youths attacked a 22-year-old yeshivah student who was chatting on his cellphone, leaving him bloodied and disoriented on the sidewalk. Minutes later, the same youths attacked a 51-year-old Chassidic man, dragging him to the ground as they kicked and punched him without mercy. Two of them have since been arrested by the NYPD and charged with hate crimes.

It’s a miracle, frankly, that none of the victims of these or the previous attacks have been killed, but if this trend is allowed to continue, that can easily change. Since the anti-Semitic riots of August 1991 in Crown Heights, there has been real progress in good relations between the Orthodox Jews and African-Americans (and these days many other ethnicities) who live in the neighborhood side by side. And yet, there is clearly a counterprocess at work, expressed in the kind of violent and delinquent anti-Semitism that has become horribly familiar over the last decade to French Jews living in poor neighborhoods of Paris alongside much larger Muslim immigrant communities.

Jewish community leaders in Crown Heights are right, therefore, when they insist on a proper investigation by the city authorities into the circumstances underlying the current spate of anti-Semitic violence. To casually invoke “historical grievances,” the Black Lives Matter movement or any other convenient filter as the sole reason for these attacks doesn’t help anyone. Similarly, the correct observation that the Crown Heights situation is very much an exception, and not the rule, for most American Jews shouldn’t lead us to complacency.

Violence against “visible” Jews is at the same time an expression of hatred towards all Jews and those perceived as Jews. True, the “non-visibles” among us are not on the frontlines—at least, not when we are casually walking the streets of our cities—but that is no reason for us to pretend that what’s happening in Crown Heights is not our problem. Make no mistake: The fundamental impulse behind these assaults is the same impulse behind the Oct. 27 mass shooting of 11 men and women who became visibly Jewish as soon as they entered Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life Synagogue.

(JNS.org)

Ben Cohen writes a weekly column for JNS on Jewish affairs and Middle Eastern politics. His writings have been published in “Commentary,” “the New York Post,” “Haaretz,” “The Wall Street Journal” and many other publications.

Turkey’s Islamist Push into South Asia Aided by American Proxies

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Turkey’s strong backing of the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) has been extensively catalogued, but not much has been written about the country’s support for the Jamaat-e-Islami (JI), the Brotherhood’s ideological cousin in South Asia that also has an active presence in North America.

JI’s role in advancing the Islamist agenda of Turkey’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) was highlighted by a senior aide to President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in a video interview last year. JI and the MB are “soft power proxies” that helped bolster Turkey’s role as leader of a global caliphate “defending oppressed and victimized Muslims,” Yasin Atkay told the pro-government Hilal TV.

Islamist ideologue Maulana Syed Abdul Ala Maududi created the JI in 1941, when Lahore, Pakistan was part of British India. In addition to advancing a rigid interpretation of Islam, the Islamist movement has provided an ideological platform and recruiting base for terrorist groups in South Asia.

Turkey advocates actively on behalf of the JI. Erdogan, for example, denounced the 2016 hanging of JI Bangladesh leader Motiur Rahman Nizami as “neither fair governance nor a democratic mentality.” He also described the Islamist leader as a “mujahid [holy warrior].”

JI’s leadership also openly applauds Turkey’s Islamist leader and regime. After Erdogan was reelected president in June, for instance, JI Pakistan chief Siraj ul Haq called him “a great leader of the Muslim world.” Another JI leader described Turkey as “the hope of the Ummah [world community of Muslims].”

Turkey under the Islamist AKP has become a key sponsor of JI-affiliated organizations in Bangladesh and Pakistan as well as the Islamist movement’s proxy groups in North America.

The Union of NGOs of the Islamic World (UNIW) is a key agency used by the Turkish government to sponsor and coordinate JI activities, an Investigative Project on Terrorism (IPT) investigation finds.

The Istanbul-based organization was established in 2005 with the AKP’s blessing and boasts 340 NGOs from 65 countries, including in the United States. Through a global network of Islamist organizations, UNIW seeks to revive the global Muslim ummah and stand up to the U.S.-led world order. Its stated mission is “to create an ummah consciousness” among its members and seek unity among Muslim nations “against to [sic] the western world which want to weaken the Islamic World by their dirty tricks and try to separate it from each other although they are unions among themselves.”

The network’s membership roster includes leading Islamist and terror-tied organizations such as the Humanitarian Relief Foundation (IHH), World Assembly of Muslim Youth (WAMY), Zamzam Foundation (Somalia), Islamic Relief (UK),International Islamic Relief Organization (IIRO), and others. By sponsoring and coordinating developmental projects, providing humanitarian assistance, and addressing alleged violations of human rights and freedoms in the Muslim world, the umbrella group seeks to defend “Islamic culture and values” and assist in finding “solutions of the problems relating to the Islamic world collectively.”

Helping Hand for Relief and Development (HHRD) and Kashmir American Council (KAC) are U.S.-based UNIW members and work closely with the umbrella group.

Like UNIW, Helping Hand was founded in 2005. It is the charitable arm of the Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA), a JI front group headquartered in Jamaica, N.Y. Helping Hand regional partners have been found to have ties to U.S.-designated terrorist entities, including Falah-i-Insaniyat Foundation (FIF), Hizbul Mujahideen (HM)and its leader Syed Salahuddin.

Under Salahuddin’s leadership, HM launched several terrorist attacks, including an April 2014 explosives attack in the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir that injured 17 people. FIF is closely tied to the Pakistan-based terrorist group Lashkar-e-Tayyiba (LeT) that was responsible for the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks.

ICNA is the most prominent of JI’s proxy groups in North America. ICNA listed “[t]he successful introduction of the concept of Iqamat as-deen [Establishment of the Religion] in North America” in an August 1999 article in its flagship publication, Message International, and succeeded in “planting the seeds of the Islamic movement in this continent.”

The issue features an interview by former JI leader Qazi Hussein Ahmed in which he emphasizes the role of Islamic movements in creating “an Islamic society, an Islamic government and an Islamic state.”

A Bangladeshi war crimes tribunal convicted ICNA’s former vice president and New York chapter leader Ashrafuzzman Khan in 2013. Khan was tried in absentia and sentenced to death. The tribunal found Khan was the “chief executor” of a death squad known as Al-Badr, which was a militant offshoot of JI.

The Kashmiri American Council, meanwhile, was funded and directed by the Pakistani government. KAC’s executive director Syed Ghulam Nabi Fai served 16 months in prison after pleading guilty in December 2011 for conspiring to act as an agent of the Pakistani government without registering under the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA).

Fai received $3.5 million from Pakistan’s intelligence service, the ISI, to influence American policy toward Kashmir. He used KAC as a front for his illegal lobbying activities. Documents seized from Fai’s home show he worked with the ISI “for years before the KAC was even founded.”

Fai has a long association with the JI. He was introduced to the Islamist movement through a local Jamaat leader while attending college, ProPublica reported in 2011.

Later while studying in Saudi Arabia, Fai met with the imam of Ka’aba that houses the most sacred site in Islam, He invited the imam to attend a JI-sponsored conference in Kashmir.

“It really revolutionized the whole thinking of the people of Kashmir: We are not alone,” Fai said in the ProPublica report.

Fai and the imam of Ka’aba were instrumental in the spread of Wahhabi Islam in Kashmir, Pakistan journalist Arif Jamal told ProPublica. Jamal investigated Fai’s role for a book on Kashmir’s “shadow war.” Wahhabi Islam, which is an austere form of Islam that insists on a literal interpretation of the Quran, soon replaced Kashmir’s famed Kashmiriyat—the state’s centuries-old tradition of indigenous secularism.

Fai, who now advocates for the Kashmir issue through the World Kashmir Awareness Forum, also serves as a UNIW board member. He has spoken at UNIW conferences, most recently at the December 2017 international NGO fair in Istanbul. At the event, Fai was seen talking with UNIW’s Ali Kurt and Al Khidmat Foundation President Abdus Shakoor. Al Khidmat is JI Pakistan’s charitable wing.

Shakoor, who serves on UNIW’s board, was previously ICNA’s secretary general.

Turkish government-run organizations and media agencies participate in conventions ICNA co-hosts with the Muslim American Society (MAS). MAS was established in 1993 as the Brotherhood’s arm in the United States. The UNIW website, in fact, claims to have organized the 2018 ICNA-MAS convention last spring in Baltimore.

The conventions also serve as a platform to advance Turkey’s Islamist agenda. Erdogan’s daughter, the vice chair of the Women and Democracy Association (KADEM) Sumeye Erdogan Bayraktar, spoke at the 2016 convention. Bayraktar’s speech, “Overcoming the problems the ummah face: Turkish model,” described the Islamist AKP as a “liberation movement that took its power from the people and the values they upheld.” She accused Turkey’s “minority establishment elite” for modernizing “a mostly religious society through top-down policies.” And she claimed the “Turkish establishment elite had a very hollow understanding of secularism which summed up to a system of discrimination pressure and exclusion of all that had to do with religion while celebrating, promoting and imitating all that was Western.”

(Investigative Project on Terrorism)

Jewish MVP, Jewish Team Owner, Jewish Stadium Owner, Jewish Halftime Performer – All at Superbowl 53!!!

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New England Patriots wide receiver Julian Edelman was named the game's most valuable player after catching 10 passes for 141 yards. Edelman, 32, is one of only a few Jewish players in the league and is certainly the most successful. He is also the most outwardly Jewish NFL player, embracing that side of his identity over time. Photo Credit: NFL

The New England Patriots defeated the Los Angeles Rams 13-3 in Sunday’s Super Bowl in Atlanta, capturing their third National Football League championship in the span of five years.

The Super Bowl is one of the most-watched television events each year, as many Americans host or attend parties to watch the game.

For Patriots quarterback Tom Brady, the victory was his sixth in a Super Bowl, extending a record he already owned.

The 41-year-old star has struck down talk that he might retire after having now played in his 19th NFL season, saying during the postgame trophy ceremony, “How could this not motivate you?”

Both teams struggled to score throughout the game, with the Patriots holding a 3-0 lead at halftime and scoring the game’s only touchdown with seven minutes remaining in the final quarter.

Patriots wide receiver Julian Edelman was named the game’s most valuable player after catching 10 passes for 141 yards.

“He deserves it,” Brady said. “That was one of the best games he ever played.”

Edelman had 10 receptions for 141 yards as he helped the Patriots win the game in Atlanta after he was forced to sit out last year’s game with an injury

Edelman, 32, is one of only a few Jewish players in the league and is certainly the most successful. He is also the most outwardly Jewish NFL player, embracing that side of his identity over time, according to a TOI report. He has a Jewish father but was not raised in the religion, and through the Patriots front office often would defer on questions about his religion.

The Times of Israel report added that, “In a 2014 game, for instance, Edelman wore a pin featuring the Israeli flag. He has tweeted about Jewish holidays. He even went on a Birthright-style trip to Israel, and has written a children’s book that references modern-day Zionism founder Theodor Herzl. After the Pittsburgh synagogue shooting in the fall that killed 11, he wore special cleats with Hebrew on them to honor the victims.”

Robert Kraft, the owner of the New England Patriots is also Jewish and is a visible supporter of Israel.

Israeli Ambassador to the United States Ron Dermer tweeted after the game, “Congratulations to @Patriots and the Jewish people’s Mega-mensch Robert Kraft for winning his 6th Super Bowl trophy and to Julian Edelman, a gridiron Maccabee, for winning the MVP trophy.”

Kraft, 77, bought the Patriots back in 1994.

The Times of Israel has reported that over recent decades the Kraft family has donated more than $100 million to an array of causes, including health care, education, the Jewish community, Christian organizations and local needs.

Kraft is also a prominent supporter of American football in Israel, including his donation of the Kraft Family Stadium in Jerusalem and the Kraft Family Israel Football League.

Yet another Jewish personality in this year’s Super Bowl story is Arthur Blank, who is the owner of the $1.6 billion Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta where the SuperBowl was held.

Blank purchased the Atlanta Falcons in 2001 for $545 million. Since then, Blank has led the Falcons to nine seasons with winning records and one Super Bowl appearance. The Falcons have been to the playoffs eight times during that span.

The team has generally had successful drafts under Blank’s leadership, with franchise players such as QB Matt Ryan and wide receiver Julio Jones being the top names selected.

Even the halftime show had a Jewish presence as well. Adam Levine, a singer with the band Maroon 5 belted out some tunes to a worldwide audience during the spectacular halftime festivities.

The singer took to Instagram, where he wrote a long missive alongside an image of the “One Love” light display featured during their performance.

He added, ” We thank the universe for this historic opportunity to play on the world’s biggest stage. We thank our fans for making our dreams possible. And we thank our critics for always pushing us to do better. One Love.”

Singing the national anthem was 74-year-old R&B legend Gladys Knight who found herself at the center of an unexpected controversy this year, when she signed on to sing the national anthem at Super Bowl LIII in her native Atlanta.

The move was seen by some as showing a lack of support for former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick — who is currently suing the NFL, claiming team owners conspired to keep him out of the league for protesting police brutality against people of color.

Amid the flak, the “Midnight Train to Georgia” diva defended her anthem appearance in a statement, saying, “I understand that Mr. Kaepernick is protesting two things, and they are police violence and injustice. It is unfortunate that our national anthem has been dragged into this debate, when the distinctive senses of the national anthem and fighting for justice should each stand alone.”

For many, the commercials shown during breaks in the action are a bigger draw than the game itself. Many companies roll out new television ads created especially for the big game, and they pay big money to get those ads in front of viewers. This year a 30-second advertising spot cost more than $5 million, according to AdWeek.

The halftime show is also another big draw for many people. This year the NFL had some difficulty finding big-name performers for the show. Several performers, including Jay-Z, Cardi B and Rihanna, spurned the league’s offer to appear at the event as a show of solidarity with Colin Kaepernick. Kaepernick is a black player who accused the NFL of conspiring to keep teams from signing him over his protests of racism and police brutality during the national anthem played before games.

Rappers Travis Scott and Big Boi, as well as the pop group Maroon 5, eventually signed on to perform, but Scott and Maroon 5 agreed to appear only after the league agreed to make contributions to various charities.

The Media Died Last Week – DC’s Newseum Sold

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If the media falls with no one to report it, does it make a sound?

The media sold off its own temple last week and no one noticed.

A decade ago, a 643,000 square foot shrine to the media went up off the Washington Mall. The media funded organization behind it boasted that its Great Hall of News atrium was taller than the Sistine Chapel. The pseudo-religious metaphor continued with 50 tons of Tennessee marble being used to “create the First Amendment tablet on the building’s Pennsylvania Avenue façade”.

The thousands of artifacts included a 3,262 year old cuneiform brick from ancient Sumeria and a 2,756 year old statue of the Egyptian god Thoth, the mythical inventor of writing, worshiped by the media. Photo Credit: Shutterstock

The thousands of artifacts included a 3,262 year old cuneiform brick from ancient Sumeria and a 2,756 year old statue of the Egyptian god Thoth, the mythical inventor of writing, worshiped by the media.

Last week, the $450 million temple constructed by the media to worship itself was sold off for $372 million to Johns Hopkins. There’s no word on whether they threw in the statue of their fallen god.

The fall of the media temple comes just as the media is on the defensive after fallout from a fake news hate campaign targeting a 16-year-old boy based on an out of context video clip. And the only thing that the media can say in defense of its lies about Covington Catholic is that it got them from social media.

That’s also its epitaph. The media doesn’t make the news. It’s just the noisiest part of the echo chamber, amplifying messages from lefty politicians from above and lefty social media trends from below.

The media temple was a project of the Freedom Foundation. The Foundation was backed by media giants like the New York Times, Bloomberg, Comcast, ABC, NBC and Time Warner. And much of the cash came from the Gannett media titan. In 1999, it commanded over $1 billion. By 2001, it was down to $700 million. Blowing through $450 million on a temple, complete with idol, couldn’t have helped.

The original Newseum had cost $50 million and offered free admission. The new Newseum was pure media hubris, stuck between the Capitol and White House as if it were another branch of government.

With a plethora of better museums to choose from, tourists to Washington D.C. weren’t interested in $24.95 tickets to see a news chopper suspended in the New York Times Ochs Sulzberger Great Hall’s atrium (taller than the Sistine Chapel). Photo Credit: Shutterstock

With a plethora of better museums to choose from, tourists to Washington D.C. weren’t interested in $24.95 tickets to see a news chopper suspended in the New York Times Ochs Sulzberger Great Hall’s atrium (taller than the Sistine Chapel). In desperation, the fake news museum even began selling a t-shirt carrying President Trump’s “You Are Very Fake News” taunt. Unlike most of its merchandise, the shirts were popular, but media protests soon put an end to the only popular thing about the Newseum.

And nobody was buying the Newseum’s t-shirts of Thoth; the dead idol of a dying industry.

Around the same time that the Newseum was selling its temple to the pagans of a useful profession, Gannett, which had once funded it, announced the layoff of as many as 400 employees. ). Photo Credit: Shutterstock

Around the same time that the Newseum was selling its temple to the pagans of a useful profession, Gannett, which had once funded it, announced the layoff of as many as 400 employees.

The bloodshed is just beginning at the mammoth publisher responsible for USA Today and a massive portfolio of papers coast to coast, from the Detroit Free Press to the Arizona Republic to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. (If you visit a local paper and its site looks like the USA Today site, it’s a Gannett paper.)

Gannett money had poured into the media temple in happier times. Its finances have been troubled this year. And now it’s in a bloody war with Tribune, another newspaper giant, and the winner of the hostile takeover campaigns will consolidate by cutting jobs and putting more Thoth worshipers out of work.

It’s been a cold winter for the media. The Huffington Post was hit with major layoffs after its corporate parent, Verizon, grew tired of subsidizing Arianna’s vanity lefty project. The casualties decimated HuffPo’s opinion section and filled social media with unintentionally hilarious tweets by ‘journalists’ specializing in gender politics, poverty inequality and culture looking for work.

BuzzFeed, fresh off its recent Trump fake news scandal, announced 15% layoffs. The casualties included the fake news site’s national news team and national security team. Lefty site Mic had already imploded. Bustle’s attempted relaunch of Gawker collapsed with a slew of resignations. The Forward fired its editor and dumped 40% of its staff after $5 million in losses.

And that’s just the very recent bad news for the news. The full list of bad news in just the last year, never mind the last decade, would take more space to tell than even the Newseum could accommodate.

If the media falls with no one to report it, does it make a sound?

The big news here is that the media is dying. And in its desperation, its members are seeking survival strategies. Reporters are unionizing at an unprecedented pace in a futile effort at surviving the rounds of consolidations and layoffs. That strategy didn’t save anyone at Gawker, Al Jazeera America or the Huffington Post. Unions can’t save a bad business model that takes entire companies down with it.

And you can understand why someone who claims to be a “columnist with 10 years of writing about gender politics (and a literal PhD in romantic comedies)” seeking work after the latest layoffs would want the protection of a union.

Or the idol of a dead civilization.

Trump’s big win touched off a media gold rush. But radical partisanship left too many media outlets chasing too few anti-Trump eyeballs after having alienated everyone else. Some like the Washington Post and the New York Times have been more successful at it than others because of their role as brokers between their insider contacts and their insider audiences. Outsiders like BuzzFeed, who don’t have their own people inside the Mueller coup team, were left to make up even more dubious stuff.

The last desperate strategy of the media is blackmailing the big dot coms for operating income. Amazon’s boss is behind the Washington Post. And Google and Facebook are pouring in hundreds of millions of dollars into the media. But while that might have been enough to keep the Newseum afloat, it’s not nearly enough to maintain the media as anything more than a boutique operation.

The media declared a fake news crisis and demanded that Facebook and Google prioritize their traffic. As a piece at Columbia Journalism Review argued, “the one thing journalism actually needs: a guarantee that the conditions on the platform will benefit those producing high-quality reporting.”

Google and Facebook have already privileged media content and censored conservative media, even though that’s not what their users have signed up for. But that makes the media dependent on the business model of a handful of internet monopolies already being targeted by the GOP and the Dems. And the same disruptive trends that wrecked the media’s old business models will wreck its new one.

The media has never addressed the fundamental problem with its business model. It wants a monopoly on the marketplace of ideas even as its own positions drift further leftward. It has tried to outgrow that problem by becoming a bigger monopoly, but the internet limited the extent to which its old infrastructure investments could monopolize the public square, leaving its expensive investments in broadcasting and printing equipment as useless as the massive square footage of the Newseum.

And when that failed, the media swung fully leftward, becoming the messaging arm of the most radical elements in the country, while campaigning vigorously for the censorship of social media “fake news”.

But its new masters rightly view it with contempt.

“They call us to explain to them what’s happening in Moscow and Cairo,” Ben Rhodes once sneered to the New York Times. “Most of the outlets are reporting on world events from Washington. The average reporter we talk to is 27 years old, and their only reporting experience consists of being around political campaigns. That’s a sea change. They literally know nothing.”

The Obama adviser wasn’t wrong.

It doesn’t take much skill to repeat talking points. Or to edit an article that a Fusion GPS hack or one of his many counterparts had already assembled for you behind the scenes.

The dedication of the Newseum in 2008 also marked the death of journalism. That was the year when the media tossed aside any appearance of independence and officially joined a political campaign. A decade later, journalism may be occasionally practiced on the sly, but it doesn’t exist as a profession.

Politicians, never mind PR hacks like Rhodes, once respected and feared journalists. Then they became the unpaid ideological errand boys and girls for Rhodes and his bosses. When lefty politicos and activists whistled, the New York Times, the Washington Post and the rest of the media asked, “How high?”

Readers, listeners and viewers used to be the media’s customer base. The man on the street who paid fifty cents for the paper was the audience all those thousands of reporters were serving. Now the media serves a dizzying assortment of lefty special interests, spinning their stories and doing their PR.

And then the media acts outraged when the public won’t pay it or share its stories on social media.

The Newseum white elephant at 555 Pennsylvania Avenue isn’t just narcissistic idolatry, it celebrates an idea of journalism that doesn’t exist. Journalism now is a bunch of millennial social justice activists playing dress-up. They’re not a profession or an industry. They don’t report. They don’t know anything. And they don’t serve the public. It’s not our fault that the people they really work for, won’t pay them.

Journalism is as extinct as the worshipers of Thoth and the Newseum. The media sold off its temple last week, but long before that its hacks and flacks had sold their soul.

(Front Page Mag)

Daniel Greenfield, a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the Freedom Center, is an investigative journalist and writer focusing on the radical Left and Islamic terrorism.

Rothschild Family Midtown Manhattan Duplex to Sell for $22.5M

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Lady Lynn Forester de Rothschild will make a nice profit when her Manhattan property sells. It’s going for $22.5 million for anyone who wants to live life like the wife of billionaire British financier Sir Evelyn de Rothschild, according to Crain’s.

The famous family owned the duplex for about 20 years and is located within the River House co-op, the Wall Street Journal reports, and it describes it as a “six-bedroom, seven-bathroom apartment, located at 435 East 52nd Street, is listed Christie’s International Real Estate Group.

The apartment has almost 20 rooms and even includes a library on the bottom floor. More of the noise and action happens upstairs where a great hall is located.

Forester de Rothschild brought on Michael S. Smith to help with interior design, according to the Wall Street Post. Smith lent his helping hand to the Obama White House.

The 7,000-square-foot apartment not only affords views of the water but also gives owners exclusive membership to the River Club, which sits in a former mansion worth over $100 million. Even some of the most famous names haven’t been able to get into this club, making it a true elite of the elite when it comes to clubs in the city.

The Jewish Voice has reported about the Rothschild family. The World Jewish Congress President Ronald S. Lauder presented the Rothschild family with the WJC’s annual Theodor Herzl Award last November, which recognizes outstanding individuals who work to promote Herzl’s ideals for a safer, more tolerant world for the Jewish people.

Robert K. Kraft, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of the Kraft Group, was presented with the WJC’s Teddy Kollek Award.

Lord Rothschild had the privilege of accepting the award in the presence of Baron David de Rothschild, Chairman of the World Jewish Congress Governing Board, and Baron Eric de Rothschild, of the Shoah Memorial.

“Each year, the WJC presents the Theodor Herzl Award, the highest honor in the Jewish world today, to a notable statesman or other influential figure in appreciation of his or her dedication to the Jewish people. This year is different. Instead of honoring a single individual, we are honoring one family, the Rothschilds, who have rarely been recognized publicly for all they have done,” Ambassador Lauder said. “The modern State of Israel was created by Jewish heroes who were led by extraordinary leaders such as Herzl, Ben Gurion, Weizmann. But Israel would never have been born without the financial support of Jews everywhere. There is, however, one family that stands above all others — the Rothschild family — who laid the very foundation of the Jewish homeland. Across the world, members of the Rothschild family contributed tremendously to the lives and well-being of Jews, both in Israel and in the Diaspora.”

The World Jewish Congress is the international organization representing Jewish communities in 100 countries to governments, parliaments and international organizations, and it chose the Rothschilds among others to distinguish as helping the community.

NYC Developers Opened 42 Million SF of New Construction in 2018

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In 2018, NYC’s developers opened 42 million square feet of new construction buildings, as reported by PincusCo Media, based on data from the Department of Buildings. That is an increase of 36 percent over the previous year. Approximately a quarter of that total, or an impressive 10.4 million square feet, was accomplished by just three developers—namely Related Companies, Matrix Development Group, and lastly Extell Development. Their developments were spread out through 16 individual buildings in Manhattan, Queens and Staten Island.

Overall, a great majority of the new construction, which got the certificates of occupancy, was residential. The 1,954 projects completed last year across the five boroughs, added a sum of over 30,000 housing units. Most of the units completed were in high rise buildings. Brooklyn was the big winner, gaining 9,482 new residential units in buildings. Manhattan was next leader with 8,488 units. Queens had 6,302 units added. The Bronx gained 4,781 units and Staten Island got only 174 units. These figures exclude one-, two- or three-family homes. Developers worked to construct 925 new one –two or three family homes, spanning 2.6 million square feet of space and adding 1,350 residential units. Over half of those, or 461, were built in Staten Island. Another 297 were completed in Queens, 130 in Brooklyn, 30 in the Bronx and seven in Manhattan. Of course quantity is not all indicative, as two of the biggest single family homes were constructed in Manhattan’s Upper East Side on Park Avenue and 76th Street by the Chetrit Group, one boasting 10,594-square-feet, and the other just under 12,000 SF.

While roughly 28 million square feet of the progress made was for residential units, there was also 14 million square feet of other construction completed. The largest of these projects was under the direction of Stephen Ross’s Related Companies, spanning 3.06 million square feet at 30 Hudson Yards and its attached retail space, as per PincusCo Media. Other notable projects completed in 2018 by Related, the firm which topped the list of projects completed by size, was the 1.3 million SF office building located at 55 Hudson Yards and the 285-unit condo building at 15 Hudson Yards.

The second most successful developer, in opening the most square-footage for the year, was Matrix Development Group. Its major accomplishment was the completion of the three buildings totaling 3.4 million square feet in Bloomfield, Staten Island. The Matrix Global Logistics Park, as the 200-acre development has been named, is leasing 975,000 SF to Ikea for seven years, and another oversized distribution warehouse to Amazon.

Extell Development, led by Gary Barnett, which had the next most square feet completed, finished a total of 1.7 million square feet in five projects. The largest of the firm’s developments was the 1.1 million-square-foot condo tower, One Manhattan Square. It also completed a smaller tower nearby at the Lower East Side, as well as The Kent, the posh 104-unit condo on Third Avenue and 95th Street.