Today’s Top Stories
1. Iranian cities were rocked by anti-government protests, the most significant public unrest since 2009. The Wall St. Journal (click via Twitter) reports:
Working class and labor unions joined the middle class and student activists in dozens of cities and small towns from Tehran to Ahvaz and Qom, a key regime’s religious stronghold. In the videos shared with the Journal, protesters were seen chanting “Death to Khamenei,” and “We don’t want the Islamic Republic, we don’t want it” and “Reformist and hard-liners, you are both done.”
The protests present a challenge for Iran’s leadership. The presence of working-class protesters that traditionally comprise the Islamic Republic’s power base makes it harder for Mr. Rouhani’s government to dismiss the uprising as opposition instigated by foreign powers.
Further raising eyebrows, protesters denounced Tehran’s support for Palestinians and also chanted “Death to Hezbollah.”
The slogan “Not Gaza, Not Lebanon, I Give My Life for Iran” has been repeated in protests across the country, which stretched into a third day Saturday.
Crowds chanting “Death to Hizballah” and “Death to the dictator” — on the streets of Iran—-powerful images that would sure impact the monolithic view of Muslims as Islamists in the West?? Where is the coverage??? @CBSNews @ABC @NBCNews @PBS @CNN @MSNBC
— M. Zuhdi Jasser زهدي جاسر (@DrZuhdiJasser) December 30, 2017
The Revolutionary Guards has threatened to respond with an “iron fist.” and cut off Last I saw, three Iranians were reported shot dead by the Revolutionary Guards.
I found these roundups of what’s known by the Jerusalem Post, Wall St. Journal (click via Twitter) and CNN helpful.
2. Times of India: The PA recalled its envoy to Pakistan after he shared a stage with Walid Abu Ali, who masterminded the 2008 Mumbai terror attack. India protested and the Palestinians got the hint. In a series of shooting and bombings over a four-day period, terrorists from the Lashkar-e-Taiba, an Islamic terror group based in Pakistan, killed 164 people and injured at least 308.
See Indian columnist by Rezaul Laskar‘s take.
Palestinian Authority recalls its ambassador to Pakistan, Walid Abu Ali, after he appeared together with India's No 1 enemy Hafiz Saeed during a rally in solidarity with Jerusalem. "Palestinian Authority supports India's war on terrorism." pic.twitter.com/9UbeeQfWNm
— Khaled Abu Toameh (@KhaledAbuToameh) December 30, 2017
3. Israel approved a cooperation deal with the European Union featuring a provision excluding settlements. Haaretz reports that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu approved the deal despite objections from other ministers:
With the approval of the agreement, Israel now de facto agrees to a boycott of the settlements…
The program is aimed at promoting socioeconomic development, innovation and competitiveness in a number of fields, including education, research, technology, employment, environmental sustainability – by providing large grants for suitable projects.
Join the fight for Israel’s fair coverage in the news
4. Fairfax Media’s Extremist Line on Lorde Controversy: By backing BDS, Fairfax’s NZ journalists have placed themselves outside the mainstream of political opinion and joined hands with extremists.
5. Video: A Look-Back on the Year’s Achievements: 2017 was been a record year for HonestReporting setting the media straight. As a grass roots community, our success is your success and we wanted to express our thanks with a short video summing up what YOU helped us accomplish for Israel.
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Israel and the Palestinians
• Bashar Assad regained control of Syrian Golan as rebels abandoned the Israeli border area. Avi Issacharoff weighs in.
Meanwhile, I wonder if UNIFIL have anything to say about a second Shiíte militia commander visiting the Israeli-Lebanese border. “Al-Hajj Hamza, the operations commander of Liwa al-Baqir, a Hezbollah-allied Syrian militia trained by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, was seen in pictures published on Twitter on the border with Israel.”
• The Israeli Air Force struck a number of Hamas targets in Gaza in response to weekend rocket fire. Did the Palestinians deliberately time their barrage? Ynet notes, “The Code Red alarms were sounded during a ceremony held in Kfar Aza marking the would-be 24th birthday of soldier Oron Shaul, whose body has been held by Hamas in Gaza since Operation Protective Edge.”
• Mahmoud Abbas has A) alienated Washington while B) presiding over a divided people at a time when C) Sunni states are coming to see Israel as a bulwark against Iran. The Media Line examines Abbas’ possible next steps as the Palestinian leader considers his legacy.
• Lebanese Foreign Minister Gebran Bassil is taking flak for saying he has no ideological problems with Israel’s existence or against the Jewish state having security.
• US Ambassador to Israel David Friedman discussed the Palestinian and international reactions to Trump’s Jerusalem declaration with the Jerusalem Post:
[Friedman], one of the driving forces inside the administration behind Trump’s historic Jerusalem move, told The Jerusalem Post this week that these types of reactions remain “largely emotional,” and that the Palestinians “overreacted.”
“We expected the reaction, although we were disappointed with some of the rhetoric which was ugly, needlessly provocative and antisemitic,” Friedman said. “As we go forward, this has to change.” . . .
Friedman dismissed Palestinian threats to bring in a new peace mediator, saying, “There is no path around the United States. Israel has made it clear that they will not engage under the sponsorship of any other nation. You cannot clap with one hand. Moreover, only the United States has the regional credibility to bring forward a historic peace agreement.”
Around the World
• A key Labour official admitted to the Daily Telegraph that there are three kinds of anti-Semitism in Labour ranks. The confession comes from Jon Lansman, who is Jewish, and is one of the co-founders of the pro-Jeremy Corbyn grassroots group. More on the story at the Jewish Chronicle and Daily Telegraph.
• Half of Canadian Jewry “disappeared” due to question 17 on the national census form!?
Irving Abella, an eminent historian of Jewish Canada, remembers a moment of puzzlement when he reached that question on his census form. He knew immediately that the change to the form would have a big impact, he said, but he didn’t anticipate the “disaster,” as he put it, that it turned out to be.
• Are pro-Palestinian Wikipedia scrubbing Wikipedia to protect Linda Sarsour? Haaretz takes us behind the scenes of a “full edit war.” This is why I tell people that a Wikipedia page is only as good as the last person who edited it.
The deft usage of Wikipedia guidelines and procedures are part and parcel of Wikipedia’s collective-editing process. However, in Sarsour’s case, there are a number of instances where seemingly pro-Sarsour editors are making use of Wikipedia’s rules to defend her personally rather than the actual content being debated. Moreover, one contributor tells Haaretz, it seems that at least two of these editors are using their Wikipedia status to defend the Sarsour article for non-encyclopedic purposes.
• Spanish court rules city council’s boycott of Israel is illegal.
The sentence declared that the council of Gran Canaria is “not competent to adopt such a resolution.”
Taking into account that a local council cannot make claims that would affect the foreign policy of Spain, the court further stressed that it could not understand how the resolution would improve or impact on the local community . . .
This legal win is one of a string of recent successes by ACOM in combating the BDS movement in Spain, and includes among others, the annulment of 14 boycott agreements by the courts as well as seven institutions voluntarily withdrawing their declarations.
This extraordinary department is one of a kind. Tax authorities do not usually establish departments targeting a specific nationality or religion. The action is astonishing, especially when the country involved is France, which is constitutionally defined as a secular republic that refrains from “marking” people according to their religion. Tax authorities around the world do establish teams to deal with sectors whose tax reporting is questionable. They target a specific market when there is concern that it contains a large amount of unreported capital, such as the real estate market or the diamond market. Setting up a specific department dealing with a designated nationality or religion, however, is not an accepted practice . . .
The aim of the department is to catch French tax evaders using Israel as a tax shelter.
• A fugitive who ran internet scams in South Florida may have been funneling millions of dollars to Hezbollah, the Miami Herald reports. Why is Roda Taher on the run?
He’s wanted for directing more than a dozen “money mules” in a $94 million internet scheme in South Florida that law enforcement sources say he used to finance Hezbollah, the radical Muslim group based in Lebanon. It is a U.S.-designated terrorist organization and has been linked to bombings and killings of Israelis and other Western targets in the Middle East.
The 38-year-old Taher paid the mules a fee to set up numerous shell companies with bank accounts in South Florida to receive proceeds from lottery, inheritance and other email-hacking scams and then to transfer the millions all over the map — including to companies in Germany, China and the United Arab Emirates.
• The National Basketball Association apologized for giving web site users the option to select “Palestine – occupied territory” as their country of origin. The web site was amended to say “Palestinian Territories.” NBA official Kathy Behren told Israel National News that the listing had been provided by a third party.
Commentary
• Iran’s anti-government protests are on my mind:
– Sohrab Ahmari: Iranians shatter a New York Times myth
– Elliott Abrams: The Iran protests — and the New York Times
– Zvi Bar’el: The Iranian regime has learned to fear protesters
– Abdulrahman Al-Rashed: Iran: The view from Mashhad
– Menashe Amir: This time it’s serious
– Wall St. Journal (staff-ed): New protests in Iran (click via Twitter)
– Heshmat Alavi: Iran: How the people suffer as billions go to waste
• Tweet of the day goes to Emmanuel Navon
"Experts" were telling us that recognizing Jerusalem as Israel's capital would spread unrest in the Middle-East.
In fact, the unrest is caused by people's rebellion against an oppressive regime that spends their money on funding war throughout the Middle-East. https://t.co/d4FfXvBYb8— Emmanuel Navon עמנואל נבון (@emmanuelnavon) December 31, 2017
• Here’s what else I’m reading today . . .
– Daniel Gordis: Israelis don’t care how the UN votes. Here’s why.
– Itamar Eichner: Despite PM’s foreign trips, Israel remains nearly isolated in UN
– Martin Kramer: The fantasy of an international Jerusalem
– Ed Rogers: Future presidents may thank Trump for acknowledging Jerusalem as Israel’s capital
– Greg Rose: Tolerant Israel best placed to protect sacred Jerusalem
– David Parsons: Jerusalem, the UN, and evangelical diplomacy
– Roie Yellinek: Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem: The view from Beijing
– Richard Goldberg: Trump should crack down on UNRWA
– Michael Krape: Airline captain keen on Palestinian martyrdom
– Judah Ari Gross: Saudi ban on Israeli chess players underscores limits of Gulf relations
– Washington Post: Letting Saudi Arabia host a chess tournament was a big mistake
– Khaled Abu Toameh: Arab apartheid targets Palestinians
– Naseem Khan: Why do I write in a Jewish newspaper?
– William Jacobson: Ahed Tamimi case is about child exploitation by anti-Israel activists
– Petra Marquardt-Bigman: The deceptive campaign for Ahed Tamimi
– Yair Rosenberg: Confessions of a digital Nazi troll hunter
– Uzay Bulut: Twitter explodes with genocidal Jew-hatred
– Manfred Gerstenfeld: International media coverage of anti-Semitism causes government action
– Leila Beckwith, Tammi Rossman-Benjamin: Anti-Israel bias reigns at Columbia U.
• For a sense of what the critics are saying, see Maha Nassar and Roger Cohen.
Featured image: via YouTube/Iran Protests LIVE; Friedman CC BY US Embassy Tel Aviv; Canada CC0 Pixabay; Paris CC BY-NC-ND Luc Mercelis; James CC BY-NC-SA Keith Allison; chess CC BY Vladimir Agafonkin;
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