Free Republic

This morning I received an e-mail alert from CAMERA that my alma mater, Harvard's Kennedy School of Government is hosting a two-day conference which essentially begins with the proposition that Israel has no right to exist. This isn't surprising. After all, the Kennedy School is home to my old professor Steve Walt. No one there batted a lash when he co-published his updated version of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion with University of Chicago's John Mearshimer. Not only did Walt suffer no recrimination from his colleagues at Harvard when he first emerged a professional Jew basher. He suffered...

Professor Amy Kaplan at the University of Pennsylvania explains to educators how to shoe-horn hatred for Israel in their courses - even if the course has nothing to do with politics or history.

As part of the "Academic Boycott of Israel," BDS professors speak about how to most effectively demonize Israel in "every classroom." In a breakout session of the “Academic Boycott of Israel” initiative, Amy Kaplan, professor of English at the University of Pennsylvania spoke about how teachers can most effectively demonize Israel in every classroom as well as the "positive aspects" of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement.

Not all George Soros-funded groups are alike. Both Center For American Progress (CAP) and the “media watchdog” it helped to create, Media Matters for America (MMFA), have been roundly criticized for their use of anti-Semitic memes. Most recently the focus has been on the use of the term “Israel-firster” a term meant to portray Jewish Americans as somehow less loyal to the United States than other religious groups. While CAP seems to have taken the charges to heart, and is seeking to change its ways, the Obama/Soros-”firsters” at MMFA are digging in their heels. This dual-loyalty charge, like most anti-Semitic...

Following are excerpts from a statement by Egyptian MP Mustafa Bakri, which aired on Sawt Al-Sha'b TV on February 2, 2012. Mustafa Bakri: Our country is entering a state of anarchy. This anarchy is caused by America, Israel and the former regime. Look at the New Middle East scheme. Don't talk about all the minute details. What happened in Port Said is a continuation of what happened in Muhammad Mahmoud Street, in Al-Qasr Al-Ayni Street, across from the government, across from Maspero, and in the soccer match against Tunisia. They are all connected. It is an attempt to bring this...

The textbooks used to educate Palestinian children who live in refugee camps came under fire at a briefing on Wednesday on Capitol Hill where experts said lessons of intolerance and hatred toward Jews and Israel fill the books’ pages.

As an American flag burns at Occupy Oakland, the man capturing the video recites the following: "I pledge allegiance to a flag of the imperialistic, capitalistic dictatorship. And to the plutocracy for which it stands, privately owned central bank, under the Jews. With inequality and injustice for the 99." For video, click link.

When Ron Paul is photographed smiling with a well-known white supremacists, when Ron Paul is described as having frequent meetings with neo-Nazis, when Ron Paul refuses to return money sent to him by Aryan Nation lawyers, when Ron Paul speaks before the Robert A. Taft club – a group with ties to white supremacists, and when Ron Paul either supervised or wrote consistently racist political newsletters from which he earned financial profits, Ron Paul supporters have an quick explanation: Ron Paul didn’t actually know anything about any of these activities. They claim that, over the course of several decades, Ron...

Salman Rushdie, the author of “The Satanic Verses”, was quietly deleted from India’s Jaipur Literature Festival after the protests of the Darul Uloom Deoband seminary – one of Islam’s most powerful bodies. Rushdie went into hiding after the late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the Iranian Shia leader, issued a fatwa calling for his death. Rushdie’s saga is now, in many parts of the Islamic world, associated with a “Zionist plot” and the “Protocols of the Elders of Zion”, a short book concocted by the czarist police and presented as minutes of a secret meeting where Jews plotted world domination. According to...

What on Earth does the Jewish community in Germany make of the flurry of headlines this week that described substantial anti-Semitism, and how have they reacted to plans to publish extracts from Mein Kampf? Here, they live in the land that produced the Holocaust, and a rigorous academic study indicates that one in five Germans has at least a "latent" antipathy towards Jews. Separately, a British publisher planned to put extracts from Hitler's manifesto on news stands and only held back as a court in Bavaria got involved. You would expect loud and righteous outrage - but you would be...

It was long argued that bringing democratic freedom to the Middle East would greatly lessen or even eliminate regional Muslim hatred for the democratic West, and in particular for Israel and the Jews. That theory was put to the test over the past year as dictatorships were toppled from Libya to Egypt to (almost) Syria. It did not receive a passing grade. Instead of softening their attitude toward Israel and the Jews, democratic freedom has led to the rise of Islamist forces and a seeming explosion of anti-Semitic discourse in the newly free nations. That was the conclusion of a...

CAIRO—Egypt's first free parliament in six decades got to work Monday with Islamists holding by far the most seats and opponents comparing their grip on the chamber to that enjoyed by the now defunct party of deposed President Hosni Mubarak. With almost half the seats in the assembly, the Muslim Brotherhood is promising to cooperate with the military generals, who took power last February when Mubarak was overthrown, in their transition to civilian rule. Thousands of protesters who fear a deal between the Islamists and the army to carve up power cried "down with the military government" behind a police...

Appearing at Harvard University shortly before his death in 1968, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. responded to an apparently hostile question from an audience member about Zionism, saying, "When people criticize Zionists, they mean Jews; you are talking anti-Semitism."

What do the administrators at the University of Pennsylvania know about the 2012 National Conference of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement about to take place at Penn and when did they know it? “BDS,” as this virulent anti-Israeli hatefest is commonly called, is coming to the Penn campus on February 3-5, but university officials have hid from the implications of hosting such an event. They say that the university is on record as not supporting this movement, yet they let the event go forward, providing space and possibly funding, despite the fact that the sponsors may not meet school...

No surprise. (JPost) — There has been an increase in anti-Semitism in the Middle East in the wake of the Arab Spring, according to a report set for release on Sunday. That is the finding of the study Public Diplomacy and Diaspora Affairs Minister Yuli Edelstein is to submit to the government. “[While] the popular uprisings in the Arab world do not represent a general change in attitude towards Israel, Zionism and the Jews it seems the anti-Semitic discourse and incitement have become more extreme and violent,” the report, which was written by scholars at the Kantor Center for the...

Anti-Semitism may not yet be a litmus test for social acceptability in the US, but it has certainly become acceptable. Proof of this dismal state of affairs came this week with the publication of a supportive profile of University of Chicago professor John Mearsheimer in The Atlantic monthly written by the magazine’s in-house foreign policy guru Robert Kaplan. Mearsheimer is the author, together with Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government’s Prof. Stephen Walt, of the infamous 2007 book The Israel Lobby and US Foreign Policy. Since the book’s publication, Mearsheimer has become one of the most high-profile anti-Semites in America.

BRUSSELS—EU countries have again accused Israel of trying to destroy chances for peace with Palestinians by snatching control of East Jerusalem. The December 2011 report by the EU heads of mission in Ramallah—seen by EUobserver—notes that last year saw "a surge in (Israeli) settlement planning" designed to ring-fence the city with Jewish-only neighborhoods. "If current trends continue, the prospect of Jerusalem as the future capital of two states becomes increasingly unlikely and unworkable, undermining a two-state solution ... (Israeli actions) provide fuel to those who want to further radicalize the conflict," it said. It noted that the timing of housing...

Ever heard about the 'Khazar' myth pushed by the Neo-Nazis/KKK? In fact, Jews are both a nation and a religion. the percentage of those with any roots in khazaria is so minimal, that there was only one non-historian "writer" that came up with the idea to say that the percentage is higher. As a penpal who is of Jewish background told me once: 'Before the WW2 Were were told to go BACK to Palestine where we came from... now the same haters don't even grant us that...' Hitler VS Khazar mythOddly enough, Hitler's "aryanism" and anti-Jewish sick obession was AGAINST...

The European Union has decided to pursue a series of steps which may undermine Israel's control of Area C in the West Bank, an official EU document obtained by Ynet on Thursday suggests. The Oslo Accords divided the West Bank into three areas of control: Area A which is under the Palestinian Authority's full control; Area B, which is under Palestinian civil controls and shared Israeli-Palestinian security control; and Area C, which is controlled by Israel. … A Western diplomat familiar with the document told Ynet that the Europeans have decided to simply skip Israeli regulations: "What Europe is essentially...

If you want to understand why anti-Semitism seems to be increasing among young people—especially young people on the hard left—consider a recent invitation extended by a left leaning school in New York to a self-proclaimed Jew hater. The Friends Schools around the country are legendary. Presidents’ children attend them, my own daughter and nephew were students, and they are regarded as among the most elite schools in the world. That is why it is so shocking that the Friends Seminary in New York has lent its imprimatur to a notorious anti-Semite and Holocaust denier. Friends Seminary has a reputation for...

CAIRO—Leading Egyptian political parties will back a senior figure in the Muslim Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice Party (FJP) for the assembly's speaker, with another Islamist group and a liberal party taking the deputy posts, an FJP official said on Monday. The prime task of the new parliament, the first elected since an uprising swept Hosni Mubarak from power last year, will be to pick a 100-strong assembly to write a new constitution. Liberals fear that sweeping gains by Islamists in elections will put faith-based parties in the driving seat and lead to more religious strictures. Islamists insist they want an...

A draft statement for EU foreign ministers next week says Israel's monopolization of land and water in the occupied West Bank is "worrying" and endangers the two-state solution. The text—provisionally agreed by mid-level EU diplomats on Monday (16 January)—says: "Against a backdrop of worrying developments in 2011, particularly with respect to settlements under Area C, the EU reaffirms its commitment to a two-state solution ... The viability of a two-state solution must not be jeopardized." The draft conclusions also say the EU "welcomes" Jordan's recent efforts to restart Israeli-Palestinian talks and urges both sides "to build confidence and create an...

Jewish teenagers in Belgium quit their schools because of anti-Semitism by: EJP Updated: 04/Dec/2011 23:56 BRUSSELS (EJP)---Like every Friday, as part of the day school activities, 13-year-old Oceane Sluijzer goes to the sport training center in Neder-Over-Hembeek, a Brussels suburb, where she plays football. There she meets other girls from the same nearby secondary public school. Many of them are from Moroccan origin and Oceane feels sometimes difficult to be integrated and to be treated well. She was in fact excluded from the group because of her look, she is blond, and because she is not of Arab descent, she...

EU countries are preparing to criticize Israel on "forced transfer" of Palestinians out of the most fertile farmland in the occupied West Bank. … Area C covers 62 percent of the occupied West Bank and was designated by the Oslo Accords in the 1990s as being under full Israeli civilian and military control. The EU heads of mission report—seen by EUobserver—notes that between 200,000 and 320,000 Palestinians used to live in the Jordan Valley, most of which is in Area C, in 1967, but demolition of Palestinian homes and prevention of new buildings has seen the number drop to 56,000....

The jihad in Thailand continues. Not only is Thaland under seige by Muslims from within, but outside Islamic forces as well. You cannot escape Islamic supremacism. Nowhere to run, nowhere to hide. How many have to die, how many countries have to fall victim to jihad before the free world understands they must defeat jihad (not fund it, appease it, placate it, make excuses for it etc.) Jews in Bangkok targetted (hat tip RV in Thalinad) Published: 15/01/2012 at 08:48 PM Online news A suspected Hezbollah member arrested on Friday by police targetted Jews and Americans in Bangkok, Defence Minister...

Ron Paul, one of the candidates vying for the Republican Party's presidential nomination, has met a representative from the extremist anti-Zionist group Neturei Karta. Mr Paul, who has drawn criticism for a catalogue of controversial remarks about Israel and the Holocaust as well as race and homosexuality, shook hands with Rabbi Yisroel Dovid Weiss at an event in New Hampshire. The Monsey rabbi, whose grandparents died in Auschwitz, has previously met Iranian leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad at a conference questioning the Holocaust. The controversial sect, rejected by almost every other part of the Jewish community, was founded in Jerusalem in 1938...

Imagine the outcry if students on a university campus in California set up "checkpoints" to find out whether students with tan complexions are really African-Americans, or whether students heard conversing in Spanish are citizens or illegal immigrants. Screams of protest would rise if students set up similar barriers to check whether olive-complected schoolmates are outfitted with suicide bombs, or if anyone stopped students of any type demanding to know their sexual orientation. Cries of bigotry would be deafening — and accurate. But when Muslim student groups at U.C. Berkeley in 2010 dressed in combat fatigues and carrying fake but genuine-looking...

Keith Hudson, Father of Katy Perry, Apologizes For Anti-Semitic Remarks By Joel Leyden Israel News Agency Jerusalem --- January 10, 2012 .... In a letter addressed to the ADL, Simon Wiesenthal Center and myself, representing the Israel News Agency, Keith Hudson, father of singer Katy Perry, apologized for recently making anti-Semitic remarks. Yesterday, I wrote the following letter to Mr. Hudson: "Dear Preacher Hudson, As a man who believes in Jesus Christ - why do you make racist statements about Jews and money? You stated: 'You know how to make the Jew jealous? Have some money, honey.' 'You go to...

The Center for American Progress is the extraordinarily well-funded hard-Left organization that published a highly deceptive and misleading report on the Muslim Brotherhood neologism "Islamophobia" last year. Now it is unmasked not only as an enabler of jihad and Islamic supremacism, but as -- surprise, surprise -- antisemitic as well.

The ex-Muslim who blogs over at Liberated continues her explorations of Islamic antisemitism: I have an Egyptian colleague who recently went on a trip to Europe with his family. During one of the train journeys, his 7-year-old daughter got friendly with a similar aged American girl on the train, and then both the parents also introduced themselves since they had a few hours more to go. After a few minutes of casual conversation, my colleague found out that they were Jewish Americans. According to his own admission, he said “Shakila, as soon as I found out that they were Jewish,...

According to Ron Paul, in order to stop terrible oppressors like China from killing 100 million more of their own people, we need to play ping pong. According to Ron Paul, if you intend to save the country and be credited with bringing it back to a Constitutional Republic, vote for only a few appropriation bills in 24 years, and earmark every nickel for the 14th District of Texas, that way, you are not spending money on frivolous things like the rest of the country. According to Ron Paul, one must agree with the decision of Roe v. Wade because...

No previous American president has had so strained a relationship with Israel as Barack Obama. As Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren said in 2010, “Israel’s ties with the United States are in their worst crisis since 1975 ... a crisis of historic proportions.” Author and scholar Dennis Prager concurred, “Most observers, right or left, pro-Israel or anti-Israel, would agree that Israeli-American relations are the worst they have been in memory.” In the spring of 2011, David Parsons, spokesman for the International Christian Embassy Jerusalem, said: “There's a traditional, special relationship between America and Israel that Obama is basically throwing out the...

For the first time since the end of World War II, classic anti-Semitic tropes—“the Jews” control the world and are to blame for everything that goes wrong, including the financial crisis; The Jews killed Christian children in order to use the blood to bake Matzo; the Holocaust never happened—are becoming acceptable and legitimate subjects for academic and political discussion. To understand why these absurd and reprehensible views, once reserved for the racist fringes of academia and politics, are now moving closer to the mainstream, consider the attitudes of two men, one an academic, the other a politician, toward those who...

Accusations of antisemitism are building against the Center for American Progress (CAP), the left-wing umbrella organization that serves as a “brain trust” for Democrats on Capitol Hill and in the Obama administration. The latest to weigh in are the American Jewish Committee and the Anti-Defamation League, two leading American Jewish organizations, which have joined the Simon Wiesenthal Center in criticizing CAP and its offshoot, Media Matters for America, for attacks on Israel that go beyond legitimate criticism and may cross the line into antisemitism. Last month, Politico reported that CAP and MMfA have both taken anti-Israel positions that “are challenging...

Why Should Jews, Blacks, Christians, Gays Support Ron Paul? By Joel Leyden Israel News Agency New York, NY --- December 29, 2011 .... Who is Ron Paul? How much do you really know about him? Does he embrace all Americans? Is he fit for the highest office in the US? For the most part, I have ignored Ron Paul. Knowing him mostly as a racist lunatic. That is until this week when his PR people approached me to help secure the Jewish vote for his campaign. It was not so much that I had any real, substantial disdain for Paul...

A secret report prepared by European Union official on the gaps between the Jewish and Arab communities in Israel has reportedly enraged Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman and other top Jerusalem officials, the British Independent said on Tuesday. The confidential 27-page brief outlined a large number of indicators suggesting that Israeli Arabs "suffer from economic disparities, unequal access to land and housing, discriminatory draft legislation and a political climate in which discriminatory rhetoric and practice go unsanctioned," the paper said. While the report criticizes some Israeli Arab leaders over their "disloyalty to Israel," the majority of criticism is leveled at Israel,...

BERKELEY, Calif. — A federal judge has dismissed a lawsuit against the University of California, Berkeley filed by two Jewish students who claimed the school fostered an atmosphere of anti-Semitism by not doing enough to curb harassment during pro-Palestinian protests that included mock checkpoints. Plaintiff Jessica Felber claimed in the lawsuit that a leader of a pro-Palestinian campus group rammed her with a shopping cart as she staged a counterprotest to “Apartheid Week,” an annual event that compares Israel’s policies to the institutionalized racism of South Africa’s former white government. Ms. Felber, who graduated last year, and current undergraduate Brian...

Buried in news stories about the conviction on a former president of Israel on rape charges was a telling insight into the Jewish state: The three-judge panel that convicted Moshe Katsav and the three-judge tribunal that rejected his appeal each had a justice who is an Israeli Arab. Arabs make up 20 percent of the population of Israel, and, as the Katsav story indicates, they are able to play prominent roles in the country’s governmental life, including service in the Knesset. Hundreds of thousands of Jews live in communities in the disputed West Bank territories. To Israelis, the West Bank...

Buried in news stories about the conviction on a former president of Israel on rape charges was a telling insight into the Jewish state: The three-judge panel that convicted Moshe Katsav and the three-judge tribunal that rejected his appeal each had a justice who is an Israeli Arab. Arabs make up 20 percent of the population of Israel, and, as the Katsav story indicates, they are able to play prominent roles in the country’s governmental life, including service in the Knesset. Hundreds of thousands of Jews live in communities in the disputed West Bank territories. To Israelis, the West Bank...

Fmr. Senior Aide, US Cong. Ron Paul, 1997 – 2003 Campaign Coordinator, Ron Paul for Congress, 1995/96 National Organizer, Draft Ron Paul for President, 1991/92 Travel Aide/Personal Asst. Ron Paul, Libertarian for President 1987/88 I have been asked by various media the last few days for my comments, view of the current situation regarding my former boss Ron Paul, as he runs for the presidency on the Republican ticket. I’ve noticed in some media that my words have been twisted and used for an agenda from both sides. And I wish to set the record straight with media that I...

The latest Ron Paul revelation is that, apparently, he would not have sent American troops to Europe in World War II to stop the Holocaust. I mean, we’re getting to the point where this sort of thing isn’t even surprising anymore. To me, the key passage in this particular story is this: Paul then looked at me, and I politely thanked him for his time. He smiled at me again and nodded his head, and many of his young followers were also smiling, and nodding their heads in agreement. Clearly, I was the only one in the room who was...

As the year 2011 comes to a close, media outlets inundate their readers/listeners/viewers with top 10 lists galore. Whether it’s the top ten news stories, songs, movies, books, etc. this is the time of year for fans and critics to give their take on what was hot (and what was not) over the past 12 months. TIME magazine gave their annual “Person of the Year” award to the “Protestor” in recognition of how demonstrations in cities around the world were effective in causing change on a wide variety of issues ranging from social welfare reforms to total government overhaul, which...

After a lifetime of studying the left, I have concluded that leftism is a form of moral poison. It causes otherwise decent and kind people who take it into their systems to say and/or do cruel and sometimes evil things. While not specifically about the left, a major new scholarly book, "Pathological Altruism" (Oxford University Press​), explores this phenomenon of people wanting to do good things yet ending up doing bad. It applies to The New York Times​ foreign affairs columnist Thomas L. Friedman, who has a deep altruistic urge to bring peace to the Middle East. But because he...

What can they say about Paul? What happens to Jewish Republicans, or to Jews who might consider voting Republican if Ron Paul takes Iowa - not an impossible scenario according to current polling. What happens to the Obama-bad-for-Israel Republican theme if Paul becomes the leading voice of their party - even for a week (until the New Hampshire vote). What chances do GOP Jews have to finally break the unending chain of broken Jewish-shift promises. How can Jewish GOPers withstand the ensuing Democratic attack on the “isolationist”, “anti foreign aid”, “anti-Israel” party – how can they defend a party that...

Most members of the U.N. Security Council voiced deep concerns on Tuesday about the impasse in the Israeli-Palestinian peace process and criticized Israel for pressing ahead with the construction of new settlements. Council members were reacting to a briefing by U.N. assistant secretary-general for political affairs, Oscar Fernandez-Taranco, who told them the search for peace "remained elusive in a context of tensions on the ground, deep mistrust between the parties and volatile regional dynamics." Statements criticizing Israel were made on behalf of at least nine of the 15 council members. Representatives of Britain, France, Germany and Portugal said Fernandez-Taranco's briefing...

Prime minister "respectfully declines" to pen an op-ed piece for 'NYT' citing newspapers negative spin on Netanyahu government. Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu is refusing to pen an op-ed piece for The New York Times, signaling the degree to which he is fed up with the influential newspaper’s editorial policy on Israel. In a letter to the Times obtained by The Jerusalem Post on Thursday, Netanyahu’s senior adviser Ron Dermer – in response to the paper’s request that Netanyahu write an op-ed – wrote that the prime minister would “respectfully decline.” Dermer made clear that this had much to do with...

Media Matters for America has had a bad year, with declining traffic and regular knocks from more notable media outlets. This week alone, MMfA was slammed by Politico and the Simon Wiesenthal Center for antisemitism, so they are eager to deflect by trumping up an attack on Big Journalism. From Politico (emphasis added): The Center for American Progress, the party’s key hub of ideas and strategy, and Media Matters, a central messaging organization, have emerged as vocal critics of their party’s staunchly pro-Israel congressional leadership and have been at odds, at times, with Barack Obama’s White House, which has acted...

This anti-Semitic flier was found by residents in Arlington and Takoma Park. Takoma Park resident Hadar Susskind awoke early Sunday morning to find a four-page, anti-Semitic screed laying in his front yard. The flier, which purports to detail "Jew crimes" and labels "Israel the problem," has been found outside homes in areas of Arlington and Takoma Park in recent days. The Anti-Defamation League says that it's currently investigating numerous complaints from Virginia residents who've received the document (others who received it in Takoma Park contacted WJW). The flier heavily resembles a multipage pamphlet that was left in front of homes...

TORONTO (JTA) -- A Canadian teenager was arrested for allegedly setting a Jewish classmate's hair on fire after making anti-Semitic remarks. Winnipeg police have charged the 15-year-old boy with assault with a weapon following an investigation of the Nov. 18 incident in the hallway of a local high school. Police say he confronted a 14-year-old girl and made the slurs before pulling out a cigarette lighter and singing her hair. The girl did not suffer any serious physical injuries. Police weren't notified of the incident until Nov. 25 and arrested the boy on Dec. 4, CBC News reported. Staff at...

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration says it has full confidence in the U.S. ambassador to Belgium, despite comments he made about anti-Semitism that prompted angry responses from Jewish groups and Republicans. Howard Gutman, who is Jewish and whose father survived the Holocaust, told a European Jewish gathering last week that some hatred of Jews reflected hostility toward Israel’s treatment of Palestinians. He said it was different from traditional anti-Semitism. State Department spokesman Mark Toner said Monday that Gutman would remain in his post. Toner said Gutman spoke as ambassador, yet expressed his own views. He declined to say if the...