Former Labor Secretary Tom Perez on Saturday was elected chairman of the Democratic National Committee, defeating top-rival Minnesota Rep. Keith Ellison, in their respective bids to chart the direction of the national party.
He immediately appointed the Jew-hating Muslim, Keith Ellison as Deputy!
Perez was elected after two rounds of balloting in Atlanta at the party’s annual winter meeting. He received 235 votes, crossing the threshold of 218 ballots.
“We are at a turning point for our party and for all Americans,” Perez said after his victory. “By getting back to basics, we can turn the Democratic Party around, take the fight to (President) Donald Trump, and win elections from school board to the Senate.”
"Congratulations to my friend Tom Perez on his election to lead the Democratic Party, and on his choice of Keith Ellison. ...What unites our party is a belief in opportunity -- the idea that however you started out, whatever you look like, or whomever you love, America is the place where you can make it if you try."
A Palestinian terrorist who murdered two Hebrew University of Jerusalem students has found a new ally, the far-left Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) group. How mainstream Jewish liberal groups respond will be telling.
The killer, Rasmea Odeh, is locked in a battle to deport her for lying about her terrorist past. It all began in February 1969, when the 20-year-old Odeh, together with a fellow member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), set off a bomb in a Jerusalem supermarket, SuperSol.
Two Hebrew University students who were shopping in the store, Eddie (Efraid Dovid) Joffe and Leon (Aryeh) Kanner approached the meat counter, an explosive device, a cookie can filled with 5 Kgm of dynamite, which had been placed by Rasmieh Odeh and Ayesha Oudeh, was detonated and Eddie and Leon were both instantly killed and nine others were wounded.
Eddie Joffe immigrated from South Africa. He joined the Tzanchanim/Paratrooper unit in the IDF. He fought in the Six Day War when during the paratroopers’ first strike at the Egyptian forces in Rafah, and was wounded by shrapnel in the throat, but two weeks later he “escaped” from hospital and rejoined his unit. He also distinguished himself in the Battle of Karameh where he was again wounded by a bullet to the leg.
Aryeh Leon Kanner was born in Uruguay. He was the youngest in his family, brother of Miriam, Irit and Rachel.
His parents immigrated to Uruguay from Europe and settled in Uruguay, they then immigrated to Israel where his sisters Irit and Rachel were already living in Israel.
On his arrival he joined Kibbutz “Hamapil” and began studying Hebrew.
Odeh and her accomplice were soon arrested. It didn’t take long for the authorities to build an airtight case. Bomb-making materials, including explosives, had been found in Odeh’s home. She confessed to the bombing within a day of her arrest, provided details of the operation and even made a videotaped reconstruction of how she planted the bombs. Her co-conspirators also confessed, and they all implicated each other. (Later, in a documentary film, one of her comrades named Odeh as the mastermind of the attack.)
Not surprisingly, Odeh was convicted of the two murders. She was also convicted of membership in a terrorist organization, the PFLP. Odeh was sentenced to life imprisonment, but in 1980 she was released in a prisoner exchange. In 1995, she moved to the U.S., and in 2004 received American citizenship.
In 2013, federal immigration officials became aware of Odeh’s background and took a second look at the forms she filled out when applying for citizenship. The form asked if she had ever been convicted of a crime; she wrote, “No.” and because of that she was indicted her on charges of immigration fraud.
Odeh was convicted and ordered deported to Jordan. But an appeals court ruled last year that her lawyers were wrongly denied permission to argue that Odeh lied on the forms because she suffered “post-traumatic stress disorder” while imprisoned in Israel. A new trial is set to begin May 16.
When Rasmea applied for naturalization (after changing the spelling of her name) to become a U.S. Citizen, she again falsely answered key questions (yellow highlighting added):
Since she has so little chance of prevailing in court on the merits, Odeh has been desperately trying to create political pressure that she hopes will influence the legal process.
Odeh found allies in the Arab-American community in Chicago, where she lives. That’s disheartening, because one would like to think that the Arab-American community is as horrified by Odeh’s terrorism as everyone else.
As it turned out, though, Odeh’s Arab-American allies have proven rather ineffective. The Arab-American Action Network (AAAN), for which Odeh works, has formed its defense of her around two arguments. One is that Odeh “misunderstood” the question on the form; that’s obviously absurd.
Convicted Palestinian terrorist Rasmea Odeh speaks in March 2016. Credit: YouTube screenshot.
The AAAN’s second line of defense is that Odeh confessed to the bombings only after several weeks of “torture” and “sexual abuse” by Israeli interrogators. That, of course, conflicts with the fact that Odeh confessed after just one day in jail. And the AAAN has no way to explain the bombs found in Odeh’s apartment, the statements of her co-conspirators or her undisputed involvement with a terrorist group.
So Odeh has been looking for other allies. And she’s found one—on the edges of the Jewish community. The far-left JVP has announced that Odeh will be one of the featured speakers at its national conference, in Chicago, at the end of March at the Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) 2017 National Member Meeting. Odeh is slated to speak alongside Linda Sarsour, a vocal anti-Israel activist who supports Shariah law.
JVP was founded by three undergraduates at the University of California, Berkeley. It’s ironic that an organization founded by college students should be embracing someone who murdered two college students. I suppose as long as she didn’t murder any members of JVP, they don’t consider her to be the enemy.
JVP is pretty much as far to the left as you can get in the American Jewish world. The Anti-Defamation League has called it “the most influential anti-Zionist group in the United States.” JVP is well-known for supporting BDS, the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign and wholeheartedly endorsing the Black Lives Matter platform, which charges Israel with “genocide” and “apartheid.” In other words, the “Jewish” in JVP’s title is essentially a cover for anti-Israel activitiesThe problem is when left-wing Jewish groups that are not as radical as JVP start to treat JVP as legitimate, instead of as a pariah. Note, for example, that JVP’s director spoke at J Street’s 2011 national conference. After Odeh speaks at the JVP gathering in March, she will surely look for other audiences in the Jewish community. She needs them to soften her image and create pressure against her deportation.
Odeh in an anti-Police protest for Black Lives Matter
Mainstream Jewish liberal groups need to understand that Odeh represents a red line. Anyone who gives a platform to this convicted murderer will be crossing that line. If groups like Americans for Peace Now, Ameinu (Labor Zionists) and others in their camp want to maintain their credibility and be taken seriously in the Jewish community, they need to make it unequivocally clear, right now, that they reject JVP’s hosting of Odeh and will never have anything to do with her.
A special by Stephen M. Flatow
Stephen M. Flatow, a vice president of the Religious Zionists of America, is an attorney in New Jersey and the father of Alisa Flatow, who was murdered in an Iranian-sponsored Palestinian terrorist attack in 1995.
Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN) has a long history of anti-Semitic activities. Ellison hates Israel and has a long history with the Nation of Islam.
A true champion for anti-Semites.
Who is Keith Ellison?… In 1997, when Joanne Jackson, executive director of the Minneapolis Initiative Against Racism (MIAR), allegedly said that, “Jews are among the most racist white people”, Ellison, using his religious name Mohammed, read a statement supporting her on behalf of the The Minneapolis-St. Paul Study Group of the Nations of Islam: “[We] stand by Ms. Jackson. We stand by the truth contained in the remarks attributed to her, and by her right to express her view without sanction. Here is why we support Ms. Jackson: She is correct about Minister Farrakhan. He is not a racist. He is also not an anti-Semite.”
The media and the left are suddenly interested in anti-Semitism again. As usual the “interest” is purely politically convenient. The best evidence of that is the coronation of Keith X. Ellison.
Ellison’s anti-Semitic past continues to be covered up by the media because it’s certainly very revealing that a top progressive had Nation of Islam ties. It’s also very revealing that no one will talk about it.
As a third-year student at the University of Minnesota Law School in 1989-90, he wrote two columns for the Minnesota Daily under the name “Keith Hakim.” In the first, Ellison refers to “Minister Louis Farrakhan,” defends Nation of Islam spokesman Khalid Abdul Muhammad, and speaks in the voice of a Nation of Islam advocate. In the second, “Hakim” demands reparations for slavery and throws in a demand for an optional separate homeland for American blacks. In February 1990, Ellison participated in sponsoring Kwame Ture (Stokely Carmichael) to speak at the law school on the subject “Zionism: Imperialism, White Supremacy or Both?” Jewish law students met personally with Ellison and appealed to him not to sponsor the speech at the law school; he rejected their appeal, and, as anticipated, Ture gave a notoriously anti-Semitic speech.
In a November 6, 1995, column for the Minneapolis periodical Insight News, Ellison wrote under the name “Keith X Ellison.” He condemned a Star Tribune editorial cartoon that was critical of Farrakhan as a role model for blacks because of his anti-Semitism. Ellison argued to the contrary.
Then, in February 1997, Ellison appeared as a local spokesman for the Nation of Islam with the last name “Muhammad.” He spoke at a public hearing in connection with a controversy involving Joanne Jackson of the Minnesota Initiative Against Racism (MIAR). Jackson was alleged to have said, “Jews are among the most racist white people I know.” Jackson denied making the statement or insisted that it had been taken out of context. Ellison appeared before the MIAR on behalf of the Nation of Islam in defense of Jackson’s alleged statement. According to the Star Tribune and the full text of the statement published in the Minneapolis Spokesman-Recorder, Ellison said: “We stand by the truth contained in the remarks attributed to [Ms. Jackson], and by her right to express her views without sanction.”
David Friedman, President Donald Trump’s pick to be U.S. ambassador to Israel, displayed an exhaustive knowledge of Israeli-Palestinian affairs during his Senate confirmation hearing on Thursday, but at times glossed over intricacies of the famously complex region. A look at some of his statements before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee:
FRIEDMAN: Asked about the Trump administration’s position on a two-state solution, he said he would be delighted to see a peace deal giving Palestinians an independent state. But he acknowledged skepticism “solely on the basis of what I’ve perceived as an unwillingness on the part of the Palestinians to renounce terror and accept Israel as a Jewish state.”
He said Palestinians had failed to “end incitement” of violence, and terrorism had increased since the Oslo Accords in the 1990s, intended to be a stepping stone toward Palestinian statehood.
THE FACTS:
Not all Palestinians are the same.
The Palestinian Liberation Organization, the group that formally represents all Palestinians, officially denounced terrorism decades ago, although attacks have continued to be a problem for Israel in the years since. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, in office since 2005 and in charge of autonomous enclaves in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, has spoken out against violence, saying it undermines Palestinian statehood aspirations.
Hamas refuses to renounce violence or recognize Israel. Hamas controls the Gaza Strip after seizing it in 2007 in a violent takeover and setting up a government there to rival Abbas’ West Bank-based Palestinian Authority.
As far as Israel being a Jewish state, Abbas, current head of the PLO, says the Palestinians met their peace requirements by recognizing Israel, and it’s not up to them to determine the religious nature of the state of Israel.
Friedman’s statement was 100% correct. The Palestinians have failed to end incitement; the PLO still praises (and pays) terrorists, despite pretending to renounce terror; the Palestinians still regard terrorists as heroes; and Fatah still views terrorism as a legitimate and justified tactic.
And the reason that the Palestinians refuse to accept a Jewish state is because they want to ensure that they have a “right to return,” and can demographically destroy it.
Friedman is right; the AP is wrong.
The story goes on:
FRIEDMAN: Asked whether under Palestinian law the Palestinians were “rewarding terrorists” and whether there was an “increasing incentive” based on the number of people a terrorist murdered, said, “Exactly true.”
THE FACTS: It’s complicated.
Israel has long scoffed at the Palestinian fund for “martyrs,” set up in 1967 by the PLO, arguing that the payments it makes are an incentive to kill Israelis. The fund makes monthly payments to roughly 35,000 families of Palestinians killed or wounded in the conflict with Israel and had a budget last year of $170 million, Palestinian figures show. Recipients include relatives of Palestinian suicide bombers.
But the fund doesn’t pay people in advance to carry out attacks. The Palestinians argue the fund helps support Palestinian victims of Israel’s occupation, including families of those driven to attack by the dire conditions of occupation or by a desire to avenge others killed by Israelis.
Once again, Friedman is 100% right. The PLO pays the families of terrorists, and terrorists know that their families will be taken care of when they are in prison (and that the terrorists will be handed jobs when they leave prison).
Friedman is right; the AP is wrong.
Here’s a final except:
FRIEDMAN: Asked about his connections to Beit El, a settlement of religious nationalists near Ramallah in the West Bank, Friedman said his affiliation had been as the president of a group called American Friends of Beit El Yeshiva, the U.S. fundraising arm of the settlement’s Jewish seminary and affiliated institutions. He said the money he’d helped raise had gone toward educational facilities like dormitories, gymnasiums and classrooms.
“It primarily derives from my commitment to Jewish education,” Friedman said of his involvement with Beit El. “The quality of those schools is excellent.”
THE FACTS: It’s true that the funds Friedman’s group raises help support the settlement’s educational activities. But Friedman appears to be playing down his family’s long association with Beit El.
In addition to supporting Beit El’s institutions, which include high schools and an Israeli military academy, Friedman has written numerous columns for Arutz Sheva, a right-wing news site affiliated with Beit El. It was in some of those columns that Friedman made controversial comments that have attracted attention since his nomination.
In Beit El, his and his wife’s names are on the facade of the Friedman Faculty House, which the anti-settlement watchdog Kerem Navot says is built on private Palestinian land without permission from its Palestinian landowners.
In the above passage, the AP did not contradict a single thing that Friedman said. Writing for Arutz Sheva is not a violation of any law or US regulation. And blindly trusting an anti-settlement group is irresponsible.
This is a travesty of a “fact check.” The AP has nothing to contradict Friedman, so instead, it throws a bunch of mud at the wall, and hopes that some will stick. Shame on them.
Ami Magazine is on a roll with Fake News, but this time the Chareidie rag published by Yitzchok "The Clown" Frankfurter outdid even itself by causing a huge Chillul Hashem with an article "Analyzing the mind of President Trump" and featuring the heading of this fake story on the cover!
Can you imagine the outcry if "the Clown" would have written a similar article on Obama?
In this issue Ami interviewes Michael D'Antonia, author of "Never Enough" a book that trashed the then candidate Donald Trump. D'Antonia also authored an opinion piece for the Fake CNN News with the byline "Donald Trump, the arsonist-in-Chief,"
where he postulates that "Trump has an arsonist mentality."
When questioned by Ami, if he has any background in psychology, D'Antonia admits that he doesn't..... yet Ami saw fit to interview a Trump hater in a Religious Jewish Magazine.
"The Clown" forgets that we are Jews in galus, and we need to keep a low profile..... he totally ignores the fact that we need to be in the President's good graces.
Just last week, his White House reporter, Jake Turx, dressed as if he just walked out of a Purim Play, sporting a Kippah with his twitter account embroidered, asked a stupid silly question to none other than the President of the United States....
Instead of telling the President that he represents frum Jews that voted and supported him, he asked a long winded question that was confusing and silly...
The President of the United States is the most powerful figure in the entire world, and Turx gets dressed in a purim costume, mocking the entire process of the press core......
Anyone else standing in front of a President would be dressed with "derech eretz" ......
It wouldn't hurt him to dress with a tie ..... yes with a tie ..... and look neat ..... Nobody wraps their peyus around their ears anymore, either curl them or put them under your childish embroidered kippah ...
I guess he represents "the clown" so he dresses as if he was in a circus!
During a press conference today, President Donald Trump was discussing the medias bias towards his administration and deriding a previous reporter from asking a convoluted question.
Trump asked for a straight forward and friendly question and reporter for Ami Magazine, Jake Turx, raised his hand and said he had a very friendly question, however after a misunderstanding of the question, Trump told Turx to sit down and told him that his question was “Insulting”.
Now Jake Turx got a chance to explain himself on ‘Tucker Carlson Tonight’ and you will be surprised what he thinks about Trump slamming him and telling him to sit down.
Trump called on Turx from Ami Magazine in his Thursday's 1:00 PM New conference .....
Turx asked him what he thinks about Trump supporters that are anti-Semites!
Trump said that the question was very "insulting" .... and called him a liar!
Jake Turx, is a Frum reporter covering the White House and was called on by President Trump at Thursday’s press conference.
Turx began asking Trump about the rise of anti-Semitic incidents across the United States, insinuating that it was because of Trump... and that's how Trump understood the question.
“Bomb threats have been made against Jewish Centers all across the country the last couple of weeks….There are people who are committing anti-Semitic acts or threatening…”
At that point, Trump cut Turx off while he was asking the question and said “sit down, I know the rest of your question”.
When Turx tried to finish, Trump told him “Quiet, quiet”, and then called Turx a “liar”.
Trump ended his answer by calling his question “insulting”.
Turx has since tweeted “President Trump clearly misunderstood my question. This is highly regretful and I’m going to seek clarification. #TrumpNewsConference.
This Turx guy had an opportunity to make a Kiddush Hashem, instead he insulted the President of the United States, to his face..... as a reporter in the White House he should have thought how his question would be taken .
I know that “kol Yisroel areivim zeh lozeh”, is 100% true because I turned so red after watching this. Even if the president misunderstood, turx should never have asked any question whatsoever related to anti semitism.
1. Anti semitism is not the pressing issue in the US. I’m not saying it is not a problem, rather nothing has really changed on that front, so don’t make a story out of it.
2. If you would have asked a complimentary question (which the President made clear he was looking for and you reassured him at the onset that you would do so) then you would have created wonderful future goodwill and gotten 50 more questions in the future. Now you will be shunned (rightfully so) , but sadly, others wearing yarmulkas might also be because of your actions.
3. You clearly want this to be about you, rather than using this as an opportunity to better the matzav for frum people.
4. Growing up we were told that when you go to shul, you have to dress as if you would be standing in front of a king or President. Mr Turx, when you visit your Rebbe or daven in shul on shabbos, is that how you present yourself? I’m not saying you needed to wear a hat, but you looked like you were coming out of the mikveh. You are representing all of us.
5. You are on the the world stage, representing us frum people, we are scrutinized extra. Please don’t treat your job as if you’re covering the latest pizza toppings offered at amnon’s pizza for Country Yossi Magazine (for the record, all wonderful establishments). The white house has been generous in giving press passes to the smaller news outlets, and you got one. Don’t squander it.
You had your one chance with the “king”, and you blew it! I hope you can get to Sean Spicer and explain and apologize.
Police boarded an EasyJet flight that originated in Tel Aviv after it made an unscheduled landing in Luton England to “prevent a possible ‘breach of the peace’ by a group of strictly Orthodox Jewish men”.
According to a Jewish Chronicle report on Wednesday 19 Shevat, the flight in question departed on Monday at 14:55.
The problems began when chareidi passengers insisted they be seated next to men and not women. They refused to take their assigned seats. There was a delay as they reportedly blocked the aisle until some females voluntarily agreed to change seats to accommodate them.
The Jewish Chronicle report quoting passengers on the flight states ten men were involved, describing them as “ten men in black hats” who refused to be seated and then blocking the aisle.
Later into the flight, one of the men plugged his cell phone into the control panel area for one of the cabin crew, causing exit lights to turn on. A crew member instructed the man to remove the phone charger, explaining he was compromising the safety of the flight.
The airline said: “easyJet can confirm that flight EZY2084 from Tel Aviv to Luton on 13 February 2017 was met by police on arrival at London Luton due to a small group of passengers behaving disruptively by not complying with the captain and cabin crew’s request to take their seats both prior to departure from Tel Aviv and during the flight.
“For the safety of all passengers easyJet’s crew must ensure that whenever the seat belt signs are illuminated all passengers are in their seats with their seatbelts fastened.
“easyJet’s cabin crew are trained to assess and evaluate all situations and to act quickly and appropriately to ensure that the safety of the flight and other passengers is not compromised at any time.
“Separately during the flight a passenger plugged a mobile device into a USB port on the crew control panel in the forward galley in a foolish attempt to charge it.
“This led to the exit light above the panel being illuminated but did not in any way comprise the safety or security of the aircraft.”
Local police escorted the ten men off the flight. It does not appear that anyone was placed under arrest.
The anti-Semitic, anti-Israel,liberal Jewish group J Street is pushing a campaign against David Friedman, US President Donald Trump’s pick to serve as ambassador to Israel. Ahead of Friedman’s confirmation hearing in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee this Thursday, J Street is scrambling to transmit its plea far and wide: “Stop Friedman.”
The self-hating Jewish group is calling on supporters and non-supporters alike to appeal to senators to oppose Friedman’s confirmation, charging that his appointment should alarm all Americans, including those who tend to disagree with J Street.
“David Friedman is a friend of the settlement movement who backs unlimited settlement expansion, has accused [former] president [Barack] Obama of being an anti-semite and says that liberal Zionists are ‘worse than kapos,’” the advocacy group stated. Anti-Jewish J Street supporters were the targets of the latter insult, while members of the Anti-Defamation League were branded by Friedman as “morons.”
“The contempt Mr. Friedman has shown toward liberal American Jews – labeling them worse than Nazi collaborators – makes him a horrible choice to be our representative in Israel,” reads a letter drafted by the anti-Semitic J Street for Friedman opponents to send to their senators.
The letter also accuses Friedman of posing “a threat to longstanding US policies in the Middle East that have been supported by Democratic and Republican presidents alike.” Friedman – who has a long personal history of supporting the settler enterprise – has referred to the two-state solution as a “scam” and “an illusory solution in search of a nonexistent problem.”
Friedman served as one of Trump’s two advisers on Israel throughout his presidential campaign. A bankruptcy lawyer, he has no prior experience in diplomacy or governance, another point highlighted by J Street.
Following Friedman’s nomination in December, White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus responded to questions about his politics by asserting that Friedman would not dictate the direction of the administration’s policy on Israel. At the time, Priebus told Fox News that US ambassadors “represent the views of President-elect Trump, and not their own views when they get elected and appointed to these positions.”
R' Shmuel Auerbach, son of the late R' Hagoen Shlomo Zalman Auerbach z"l, is the fanatical leader of the "Peleg" movement that opposes registration for the IDF.
R' Sheitnman and R' Chaim Kanievsky Shlitah are for registering for the draft as per State law!
The followers of Auerbach are the ones using violence and are behind closing streets, throwing over and burning garbage bins, causing hundreds of people pain and anguish, by stopping buses and ambulances from reaching their destinations....
Alexander Rapaport, director of Masbia soup kitchen, rallied support for his Yemeni neighbors who were protesting President Donald Trump’s executive order temporarily banning immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries, JTA reports.
Not everyone was happy about the gesture.
Rapaport, who said, according to JTA, that “his experience being the victim of anti-Semitism forces him to call out hatred against others,” is now receiving flack for helping to organize a communal show of support last week for a local Yemeni-owned bodega.
“I received your solicitation letter in the mail along with this phone number,” read a text message he received Wednesday. “After seeing, though, that you protested President Trump’s executive order, and thus shamefully sided with those who are putting American lives in danger, I am no longer able to donate to your organization.”
The message, Rapaport told JTA, was referring to a fundraising letter he sent a few weeks ago to about 1,500 “top donors” — those who had given a one-time three-figure donation to the New York-based Masbia Soup Kitchen Network.
During an episode of 60 Minutes of CBS News on the changing face of Sweden, the camera team and reporters were ambushed and attacked by a group of masked immigrants as soon as the police that escorted them left. They fled the scene, the producer and cameraman got injured. Sweden, like Germany, pursues an "no limit, open border" policy towards illegal immigration of Muslim men from the poorest nations in Africa
This has led to ghettos and the biggest emigration wave of native Swedes fleeing their home country in its history - because it is no longer safe. The only country with more violent rapes than Sweden is a South African nation called Lesotho.
The tiny nation of just over 9 million inhabitants accept a sizable percentage of its population in immigrants while having one of the lowest birth rates in Europe. It is expected that Swedes will be a minority in Sweden within 2 decades. This is just a tiny demonstration of the so-called "demographic shift".
