Free Republic

Five months into the Gaza crisis, the results of the updated Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) assessment released today indicate the unfolding of the worst possible forecast for Gaza. Gaza is already facing famine, with 100% of people estimated to be acutely food insecure, according to the IPC. In Gaza's Northern Governorates, 70% of the population are facing imminent famine. In the centre and southern governorates, 50% of people face catastrophic food insecurity conditions. The situation is projected to deteriorate fast in the next weeks and months and famine is likely to also affect the South. This is unprecedented....

Western powers will not censure Iran over its lack of cooperation with the UN nuclear watchdog at its Board of Governors meeting from Monday for fear of aggravating geopolitical tensions, diplomats said. Last week, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said in confidential quarterly reports seen by AFP that Tehran’s cooperation with the agency remained poor on several outstanding nuclear issues. These include expanding its nuclear work, deactivating agency surveillance devices for monitoring Iran’s nuclear programme, and barring senior inspectors. The so-called E3 group — France, Germany and the United Kingdom — initially planned to censure Iran for its lack...

The Jerusalem Post reported on Monday that the nation of Hungary, on two occasions, blocked attempts by the European Union to make a consensus statement against the anticipated Israeli military operation against Hamas in the southern Gaza town of Rafah, where the bulk of Hamas terrorists are thought to be concentrated.EU’s Foreign Policy Chief Josep Borrell reportedly tried to unite all 27 member states behind a statement calling for an “immediate humanitarian pause” in the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza, a move that Israel argues would allow Hamas to regroup and rearm its terrorist elements.According to the report, Borell eventually succeeded...

Had they not died as part of the Charlie Hebdo killers' final act, I wonder how much publicity the murders of Philippe Braham, Yohan Cohen, Yoav Hattab, and François-Michel Saada at a kosher grocery store would have attracted. An Islamic fanatic killed another quartet of Jews at the Jewish Museum in Brussels last spring, and it was a big story for a couple of days, and then faded away. Over the last decade, the Continent seems to have developed a certain psychological ease with the routine murder of Jews. What remains of Jewish communal life in Europe now takes place...

Plans for new settlements in East Jerusalem pose a threat to peace and Israel’s relations with the European Union, the 28-member bloc said on Friday, joining the United States in its criticism of the decision. The strong language from the European Union, the biggest aid donor to the Palestinians, who seek statehood in territories captured by Israel in the 1967 war, echoes criticism from Germany, France and Washington. French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said the decision to build 2,610 homes in Givat Hamatos would be the first new settlement in the East Jerusalem area for 15 years. “This represents a...

Never again! This is the rallying cry Jewish communities worldwide have lived by since the Nazi Holocaust of World War Two. But the recent explosion of violent Jew-hatred among radical Muslims and their leftist supporters in Europe has caused European Jewry to adopt measures to ensure that ‘never again’ really means ‘never again’. Perhaps the most important of these actions has seen Jewish groups hire former, elite, Israeli soldiers from private security firms to protect synagogues and other Jewish establishments. “…in Germany alone, several hundred former, Israeli soldiers are charged with the protection of Jewish institutions,” Beni Tal, an Israeli...

When and how will this pandemic of anti-Semitism end? The last time it was this bad in Europe, it ended in mass murder. Today the “Palestinians,” the darlings of the international media and “human rights community,” call openly for a new genocide of the Jews, and nonetheless never lose favor with the intelligentsia and elites. The moral myopia is as pandemic as the Jew-hatred, and growing. Whether this doctor is a Leftist or a Muslim (or both), he should be stripped of his license to practice medicine. But probably he will get away with a perfunctory reprimand. “Doctor refuses to...

Since January of last year the European Union has been threatening to boycott any company or entity that does business with the West Bank of Israel. The sanctions, perversely designed by Secretary of State John Kerry, were meant to punish Israel for its settlements in the West Bank and encourage the Jewish nation to adopt Kerry’s peace process framework. The economic boycott threat was entirely one-sided against Israel. Because there were no consequences for the Palestinian Authority should they abandon the peace process, it gave the PA every reason to harden their position and wait for the EU to act...

There was a humane demonstration in Paris in support of the three Jewish boys who were kidnapped last week by jihad savages. Muslims, of course, attacked the Jews. It’s indicative of just how horrible it really is in Europe — that it is an act of real courage to attend a rally in support of kidnapped Jewish children. Islamic Jew-hatred – it’s in the quran. Political and media elites attack and smear me for our bus and subway ads. But did they cover this barbarity? Of course not. The enemedia is hellbent on destroying my colleagues and me. They voluntarily...

Fresh on the axe attack on young Jewish teens comes this story. What drives this vicious Jew-hatred in the Muslim world? The quran — which apparently is fine. But speak of it and you will be smeared, targeted and marginalized as a racist-islamophobic-anti-Muslim-bigot. Apparently French authorities have not yet labeled this hate attack as “anti-semitic.” They refused to to designate the torture and savage murder of Ilan Halimi as hate, too, if you remember, despite the fact that that was all about and only about targeting and slowly torturing a young Jewish man. Two young Jews attacked in Sarcelles Laurence...

Two Jewish men were attacked outside Paris Saturday night, French Interior Minister Bernard Caseneuve announced Sunday, as they were leaving a Creteil synagogue. Caseneuve ordered police around France to increase security at Jewish houses of worship and other Jewish establishments, the Ministry stated. He condemned the attacked with "utmost severity." Very few details are available on the attack. Sources told Israeli small-time news site 0404 Sunday morning that three French Jews were attacked - not two - and identified them as the synagogue's treasurer and his two sons. All three have been hospitalized, according to the report. The men were...

Last Friday the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) issued a condemnation of remarks made by a spokesman for the Italian populist “Pitchfork Movement,” remarks which the organization says show a “deep-seated anti-Semitic hatred.” […] In his interview, (Andrea) Zunino espoused classic tropes of Jewish global domination. He remarked “we want the government to resign. We want the sovereignty of Italy, which is the slave of bankers like the Rothschilds. It’s curious that five or six of the richest people in the world are Jewish.” Zunino also justified Nazi leader Adolf Hitler’s genocidal Jew hatred, saying that Hitler, “who probably was crazy, used...

Another day, another newspaper story about anti-Semitism in Europe. The good news, I suppose, is that there are at least some newspapers in Europe that are willing to acknowledge the phenomenon. The bad news is that there’s more than enough material to keep the stories coming. The latest report, in the Danish daily Jyllands-Posten, is about seventeen-year-old Moran Jacob, a Jewish boy who until recently lived in Nørrebro, a heavily Muslim neighborhood of Copenhagen. Back in January, Jacob agreed to testify at a hearing about anti-Semitism at Copenhagen’s City Hall, where he told about the harassment he’s been subjected to...

The European Union has published new guidelines explicitly banning any EU funding of Israeli institutions operating in territories occupied since the 1967 Mideast war, despite vigorous Israeli objections. The EU holds that Jewish settlements in territories such as the West Bank and east Jerusalem are illegal. The Palestinians want some of those territories for their hoped-for state. After EU officials announced plans this week for the new guidelines, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke with several European leaders to express his opposition. …

Israeli settlers living in the Palestinian territories often deceptively give their products a “Made in Israel” label. The European Union wants to move soon to end the practice and appears to be set on a collision course with the country. … The international community has never recognized Israeli sovereignty over these areas, and the Geneva Convention outlaws the establishment of settlements within occupied territories. Nevertheless, successive Israeli governments have allowed colonies to be built up within them and, today, some 650,000 Israeli settlers live in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. …

The European Union’s 27 foreign ministers today criticized Israel’s response to Palestine’s successful bid to upgrade its status at the United States, saying that they were “deeply dismayed” by Israel’s decision to expand settlements in the occupied territories. Israel has said that it intends to build 3,000 more Jewish settler homes in East Jerusalem and the West Bank. Ministers said that plans to develop the “E1 area”—which would effectively separate East Jerusalem from the West Bank of Palestine—is a particular concern. “The E1 plan, if implemented, would seriously undermine the prospects of a negotiated resolution of the conflict by jeopardizing...

MEPs have rubber-stamped a trade deal with Israel despite a warning by their own legal services that it might clash with EU law. The European Parliament in Strasbourg on Tuesday (23 October) passed the so-called ACAA (Agreement on Conformity Assessment and Acceptance of Industrial Products) pact by 379 votes against 230 with 40 abstentions. … The legal description of the Israeli body that certifies drugs for ACAA purposes could be a stumbling block, however. EU parliament lawyers spelled out their views in a 10-page analysis dated 16 March this year. They said that if Israel’s ACAA regulator—most likely its health...

A rabbi was attacked over the weekend in Vienna, Austria, by local soccer fans. According to local media reports, the fans, who were on their way to a game, met Rabbi Schlomo Hoffmeister and screamed at him, “Move, Jew - Jews out, Heil Hitler.” According to the rabbi, they also saluted with the Nazi salute. Rabbi Hoffmeister claimed that police officers standing nearby refused to intervene. When he asked for their help, they reportedly replied, “It’s just soccer.” Local police later said they will investigate the claims and will work to catch both the police officers and the fans who...

A statement issued by the European Union on Tuesday seemed to suggest it supports Palestinian Authority Arabs’ rights to throw stones during non-violent protests. The statement, released on Tuesday by the spokesperson of Catherine Ashton, High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, criticized Israel for convicting PA Arab Bassem Tamimi of dispatching stone-throwers and protesting illegally. An Israeli court convicted Tamimi on Sunday, according to an AFP report. The 45-year-old was charged with soliciting stone-throwing based on evidence that he directed such incidents from the roof-tops. He was arrested on March 24, 2011, AFP reported,...

The new Nazis kill them right in the cities. And the killing will not stop until the Muslim occupation of Europe comes to an end. There was a time when Jewish children were hunted down and killed in France. Their killers believed themselves to be members of a superior group that was destined to rule the world and enslave or exterminate members of inferior groups. The cowardice and appeasement of the French authorities allowed them to operate freely, to kill Jews and launch attacks on other countries. What was then is now again. The occupying army doesn't wear uniforms, it...