Today’s Top Stories
1. A Hamas drone and rocket engineer was killed in Malaysia, shot and killed by gunmen on a motorcycle. Officials in Jerusalem dismissed suggestions that Israel was responsible for Albatsh’s death.
The family of Fadi Albatsh is trying to bring his body back to Gaza for burial, but Israeli officials say they won’t allow this as long as Hamas holds the bodies of IDF soldiers Lt. Hadar Goldin and Staff Sgt. Oron Shaul, who were killed during the 2014 Gaza war. The New Straits Times reports that the family may try to bring Albatsh to Gaza via Egypt; Israel has asked Cairo not to allow the transfer.
2. The Hamas “Press Office” handed down directives to journalists covering the Gaza fence clashes. Palestinian journalists will have to toe the Hamas line or face the consequences. I haven’t seen any Western papers disclose the intimidation their Palestinian stringers face or how it effects the final product. Bassam Tawil noted the Hamas directives posted online.
In a nutshell, Hamas does not want journalists to use the words “clashes” and “confrontations” when reporting about the demonstrations, or that any demonstrators killed were its own operatives. Photographers are not to take photos of Palestinians throwing rocks or firebombs, and to solely focus on the Israeli response. Journalists are not to quote or rely on Israeli media or inform Palestinians what Israelis are saying about clashes. Journalists are to instead expected to “humanize” the dead and injured Palestinians.
Since the Palestinian journalists covering the “March of Return” are unlikely to ignore Hamas’s new instructions, this will affect the reporting of the international media. Most international media outlets and correspondents employ Palestinian producers and translators and “fixers” to assist in covering Palestinian issues.
A Palestinian journalist who is afraid to defy the Hamas instructions will not tell his employers everything he sees and hears. Some of the Palestinian journalists will also be doing that of their own volition and not necessarily out of fear of Hamas or any other Palestinian group. These journalists see themselves as foot soldiers of the “revolution” and are convinced that their loyalty should be, first and foremost, to their people and cause. And the truth? Well, the truth finishes last.
3. The Friday Palestinian clashes along the Gaza border continued. Reports put the number of Palestinians who came out this weekend at 3,000 — a significant drop-off from the 30,000 who showed up for the first “March of Return” three weeks ago. The Wall St. Journal (click via Twitter) notes that “Several Palestinians this week flew kites with oil-drenched, burning rags on their tails in an attempt to set alight Israeli fields on the other side of the fence.” Indeed, one flaming kite set an Israeli warehouse ablaze.
Four Palestinians were killed; one was a 14-year-old boy who ignored warnings from his mother and IDF leaflets. Hamas and Fatah figures got into a big fight at Ayoub’s mourning tent as both sides apparently accused each other of trying to exploit the boy’s death for political purposes.
According to Israeli media reports, an initial IDF probe concluded that Mohammed Ibrahim Ayoub was trying to damage the border fence.
Israel and the Palestinians
• Plenty of news on the issue of embassies relocating to Jerusalem. There’s a political tussle going on in Romania over the issue. Prime Minister Viorica Dancila and the ruling Social-Democrat Party approved a memorandum to begin the process, but President Klaus Iohannis says that A) the move would violate international law and that B) constitutionally, the final decision is his. The Czechs announced plans to open an honorary consulate in the Israeli capital (What’s an honorary consulate?, you ask.)
Meanwhile, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that at least six countries are in talks to move their embassies, and that Israel would offer “preferential treatment” to the first 10.
• Nicola Khamis, the mayor of the West Bank Christian town of Beit Jala, sparked a BDS storm by disclosing that he’s also a sales representative for the Israeli dairy cooperative, Tnuva:
Khamis said that if the Palestinian Authority government makes a decision not to work in Israel and with Israelis and not to purchase Israeli products, he will be the first to abide by it.
He pointed out that when the PA took a decision last year banning Israeli products from entering the territories under its control, he obeyed the order for the full 19 days and did not market any Israeli goods.
“I work in accordance with the Palestinian law and regulations,” the Beit Jala mayor added. “Palestinian law does not ban Palestinians from working with Israel, including purchasing and selling.”
• Israeli police found a bomb in a Palestinian truck on Independence Day.
• Ynet: “The European parliament in Brussels adopted on Wednesday legislation preventing the transfer of funds from the European Union’s PEGASE to the Palestinian Authority, if those funds are to be used for education to hatred.”
• The US State Department is raising eyebrows for its annual report on human rights around the world, its first issued under the Trump administration. The 2017 report didn’t refer to the West Bank as “occupied.” More on the story at the Jerusalem Post. (The Washington Post notes other conspicuous changes.)
• To international skepticism, Syria and Russia claim their defense systems intercepted a lot of US missiles in last week’s US-led strike. Writing in the National Post, Professor Michael Armstrong uses the controversy to examine disputed claims about Israeli Iron Dome’s success rate.
• Israeli cyber firm says it has evidence Hamas planted spyware in Fatah phones.
• Actress Natalie Portman, who was to be honored with a prestigious Genesis Award, said she would skip the award ceremony because she doesn’t want to appear to endorse Netanyahu, who is scheduled to speak at the affair. Portman initially didn’t specify why she wasn’t attending and early reports and reactions assumed it was because of BDS. Genesis Prize organizers subsequently cancelled the ceremony. See Ynet and JTA coverage plus Portman’s Instagram post and draw your own conclusions.
The Genesis Prize Foundation canceled the prize ceremony, saying in a statement that its organizers “fear that Ms. Portman’s decision will cause our philanthropic initiative to be politicized, something we have worked hard for the past five years to avoid.”
Around the World
• German controversy, part 1: A German theater offered free tickets to the premiere of George Tabori’s production of “Mein Kampf” to anyone wearing a swastika armband, while offering Jewish stars to purchasing patrons. The play premiered on April 20, which is also Adolf Hitler’s birthday. Germany outlaws the display of swastikas. How did the evening play out?
• German controversy, part 2 (per Jerusalem Post): A German LGBT group “terminated its account with the Bank for Social Economy over the financial institution’s enabling of organizations that advocate a boycott of the Jewish state.”
In this case, they picked Kollegah and Farid Bang’s Jung Brutal Gutaussehend 3 [Young, brutal, and good-looking]. The lyric that caused the most controversy — “My body is more defined than those of Auschwitz inmates” — is only on a deluxe edition of the duo’s album and the song was not performed at the ECHO ceremony.
• German controversy, part 4: Adam Armoush, a 21-year Israeli Arab in Berlin who didn’t believe Germany was antisemitic, donned a kippa (skullcap) to find out for himself. Armoush was attacked by a man whipping his belt while shouting “Yehudi.” A video of the assault went viral, drawing condemnation and concern. The attacker — a 19-year-old Syrian asylum seeker turned himself in to the police. See Deutsche Welle
Antisemitischer Angriff in #Berlin – ein Mann schlägt mit einem Gürtel auf einen Mann ein und bezeichnet ihn wiederholt als "Yahudi" (arabisch für "Jude"). #Antisemitismus pic.twitter.com/YCHVgCF1ox
— Jüdisches Forum (@JFDA_eV) April 17, 2018
• A recent UK Labour TV advertisement is drawing more attention to the party’s antisemitism problem. It features the general manager of a Leeds mosque who the Daily Mail reports has a history of antisemitic social media posts. And Guido Fawkes points out that ad’s producer, Jake Bowers, also has a history of antisemitic social media posts.
• The Sunday Times of London examined the nearly 2,500 people and organization that UK Labour Jeremy Corbyn follows on Twitter. According to the Times, he follows :more than 40 accounts that are pro-Palestine and in many cases fiercely anti-Israel. A small number of tweets on those accounts are abusive and some are anti-semitic” and violate both Labour and Twitter policies on antisemitism.
Other accounts Corbyn follows “are used to spread some of the conspiracy theories that seek to exonerate the Syrian regime for the suspected chemical attack in Douma and the Russians for any involvement in the chemical attack in Salisbury against Sergei Skripal.”
Last night Labour sources said that while Corbyn often sends his own tweets, they denied he had seen the anti-semitic ones, claiming he does not have time to read his Twitter timeline.
• A University of Winchester academic who defended Jeremy Corbyn is now being investigated for antisemitism.
• Syracuse University suspends fraternity after video of ‘extremely racist’ behavior surfaces.
• 250 French intellectuals can’t be wrong, can they?
• Teens apologize for threatening to bomb Swedish Jews at Malmo synagogue.
Commentary/Analysis
• Quote of the day goes to Bret Stephens, addressing international critics of Israel’s response to the Gaza border clashes:
It would also be helpful if they could explain how they can insist on Israel’s retreat to the 1967 borders and then scold Israel when it defends those borders. They can’t. If the armchair corporals want to persist in demands for withdrawals that for 25 years have led to more Palestinian violence, not less, the least they can do is be ferocious in defense of Israel’s inarguable sovereignty. Somehow they almost never are.
• Heather Mann is making waves describing in a Sunday Times of London op-ed the threats and abuse she and her family have received because her father, Labour MP John Mann, fights antisemitism. We’re talking about threats of rape, a vial of suspicious liquid found in the mailbox, visits from the bomb squad, and more.
The abuse received by my dad and other MPs, including Ruth Smeeth, continues to be ignored or denied. Some Labour Party members are even questioning whether these latest threats against my family are real. It’s my, my mum’s and my sister’s safety we are talking about.
We are a strong family. But I understand what so many Jewish Labour supporters are now feeling. I demand leadership from my party.
Last week, her father gave a rousing must-watch speech against antisemitism in the House of Commons.
• Plenty of spilled ink and burnt pixels dealing with Israel, Syria and Iran.
– Ron Prosor: Time to target Hezbollah in Europe
– Alex Fishman: Israel playing on Iranian nerves
– Avi Issacharoff: Israel and Iran are headed for a collision in Syria
– Yaroslav Trofimov: Iran’s moves in Syria raise risk of conflict With Israel (click via Twitter)
– Jennifer Rubin: Another administration causes headaches for Israel in Syria
– Lawrence Freedman: Israel and Iran will joust but know all-out conflict is too risky
• Here’s what else I’m reading today . . .
– Avi Issacharoff: Israel-Hamas shadow war follows Palestinian expats to Malaysia
– Yoav Limor: Hallmarks of an Israeli hit
– Liron Libman: The blurred distinction between armed conflict and civil unrest: Recent events in Gaza
– Hadley Freeman: If people don’t know about the Holocaust, it’s because they don’t really care
– David Collier: Attacking Jews, the whole antisemitism crisis, will ‘be positive for Labour’
– Melanie Phillips: In Britain and Poland, antisemitism’s ugly history repeats itself
– Yonah Jeremy Bob: Did Mark Zuckerberg make Facebook vulnerable to anti-terror lawsuits?
• For a sense of what the critics are saying, see Roger Cohen.
Featured image: CC BY abstrkt.ch; euros CC BY-NC-ND b.e.n.; Portman via YouTube/Jimmy Kimmel Live; Kollegah und Farid Bang via Wikimedia Commons; Twitter CC BY Jurgen Appelo;
For more, see yesterday’s Israel Daily News Stream and join the IDNS on Facebook.
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