CNN published a furious rage against Israel by Amer Zahr, whom the network describes as “a Palestinian-American comedian and adjunct professor at University of Detroit Mercy School of Law.” But Zahr’s delusional tirade is far from funny.
Zahr was nominally responding to a Jason Greenblatt op-ed in support of Donald Trump’s presidential campaign. But in fact, Zahr barely mentioned Trump at all, instead focusing his vitriol almost entirely on Israel.
Zahr’s “article” is merely a laundry list of lies, conspiracy theories and out-of-context “facts” that are popular among Israel-haters, but have long ago been proven untrue.
Fortunately, HonestReporting and other sources have already addressed many of the items on Zahr’s laundry list of lies.
Zahr begins with the well worn fairy-tale that upon its creation, Israel forcibly evicted large numbers of Palestinians from their homes.
In reality, Palestinians left their homes in 1948 for a number of reasons, but the vast majority left because Arab leaders encouraged them to: with the promise that once they had completely annihilated the new Jewish state, Palestinians would be free to return to their homes, and to a land free of Jews.
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Zahr conveniently covers up that a 1947 UN resolution offered Palestinians an independent Arab state of their own, to be created alongside Israel. Had the Arabs accepted this offer rather than trying to destroy Israel, not a single Palestinian would have become a refugee.
Continuing his delusional romp through history, Zahr moves on to the war of 1967, and a diatribe against Israel for a whole variety of so-called offenses. Yet again Zahr has to distort a great deal of history in order to make his point. For example, he covers up that (just like in 1948) Israel did not start this war. To the contrary, had Arab nations not attacked Israel (with the intent to annihilate the Jewish state), then they would almost certainly have continued to hold all the lands today that they did in 1967, including much of Jerusalem.
HonestReporting has analyzed and debunked many of the tired myths and well-known fabrications regarding the war of 1967 upon which Zahr relies.
Zahr tries to further discredit Israel by listing a variety of anti-Israel resolutions from the United Nations. HonestReporting previously debunked the age-old “UN ploy.” With respect to the specific resolutions to which Zahr refers: he has thoughtfully provided links to each one. If one takes the time to follow those links, it is immediately apparent that none of the UN resolutions actually say what Zahr claims they do.
Zahr ignores all of this context in his rage against Israel.
As the ranting continues, Zahr claims that Israel is trying to “de-Arabize” what he calls “East Jerusalem.” Yet the eastern part of Jerusalem includes much Jewish history that deserves to be recognized, including the Western Wall.
Zahr covers up the fact that Jerusalem was never divided into anything called “East Jerusalem” or “West Jerusalem” until Jordan invaded and divided the city in 1948. In this HonestReporting video we explore the Jordanian invasion and its effect on Jewish refugees, many of whom were left impoverished and homeless.
Palestinian residents of so-called “East Jerusalem” are the subject of Zahr’s next senseless rant. He complains that they are not citizens of Israel, and therefore do not have the right to vote in Israeli elections. What he covers up is that the Palestinian residents of Jerusalem have been offered Israeli citizenship with all its rights, but many have simply chosen to decline. Even today, Palestinian residents of Jerusalem have the option to take Israeli citizenship, if they want it.
Yet even without accepting citizenship, Palestinians in Jerusalem nonetheless have the right to vote in city elections, and have the same rights to healthcare, national insurance and other social benefits as any citizen.
Finally Zahr states that a country cannot be internationally recognized without, “clearly defined boundaries,” which, according to Zahr, Israel does not have. Is Amer Zahr seriously saying that the State of Israel should not exist?
Israel faces a legitimate border dispute, but it is not unique in this regard. There are at least 124 countries involved in border disputes all over the world: from the UK to Spain, from China to the United States. Is Zahr, a law school professor, seriously suggesting that none of those countries exist or have the right to exist? Or has he come up with some special law that applies only to Israel?
As if the content of Zahr’s article isn’t enough, there is also his personal behavior: on Twitter he accuses Israel of everything from apartheid to being the same thing as Islamic State (ISIS). He proclaims that Jews are not indigenous to the land of Israel and that “Zionism is Racism.” This is the sort of person to whom CNN chose to give an international forum.
https://twitter.com/AmerZahr/status/690392180507156482?lang=en
Amer Zahr’s rage against all things Israel is disillusion, disconnected from reality and filled to bursting with a variety of misleading canards and outright lies. But it is nothing new. And that is why it was so very easy to debunk.
The only question is, why did CNN give a public platform to an opinion piece that is so obviously hateful and false?
Featured image: CC BY Andrew Plumb and Carlisle HVAC with modifications by HonestReporting; Map via Wikimedia Commons;
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