Opuscula BOYCOTT! OK for me, Not for you?

I’M A LITTLE CONFUSED OVER this “boycott” business.

 

I am both Jewish and a dual-national: U.S. by birth, Israeli by choice.

I place my hand over my heart when the Stars and Stripes go by. I did my U.S. military service back in the 60s. I am a Red, White, and Blue American.

But I also am an Israeli.

I should mention that I am old — “ancient” as my Spouse reminds me — and I am “thin skinned” in more ways than one.

My problem with boycotts

Having written that, I confess to having a problem with boycotts.

I have, from time-to-time boycotted things.

I will not buy anything from China if I can find an alternative source.

That’s a boycott.

I don’t buy from China for a number of reasons, including

• poor and dangerous products,
• alleged government oppression,
• alleged theft of others’ ideas and technologies,
• the gift of the Wuhan/Chinese/Covid pandemic

I don’t buy Ford products having been burned twice with Ford vehicles.

I am not on Facebook or Twitter and I closed my LinkedIn account when I retired. I’m not “boycotting” these platforms; I simply have no interest in them

Being honest, I admit that the above is a “partial” list of products I won’t (knowingly) buy.

These are boycotts, albeit personal boycotts.

Since I boycott products, how can I express umbrage when someone boycotts products from all or parts of Israel?

Is there a real difference between my personal boycotts — that I freely publicize — and the political Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement (BDS)?

My boycotts are personal; while I might welcome people who would divest themselves of countries and companies I boycott, and while I would privately encourage sanctions (in the form of higher tariffs), I don’t mount a soap box, raise a battle flag and yell FORWARD to willing followers.

The “B” in BDS stands for, IMO, “bullying.”

THE DIFFERENCE is that my personal boycotts are not based on lies (Israel is an apartheid state; Israel oppresses Arabs, both of which I know first hand are lies) or senseless hatred of a people. The BDSers are know nothings; 99% have zero first hand experience with Israel, Israelis, or Zionists. (There are many, mostly Jewishly ignorant as well as politically ignorant, Jews who are BDSers. )

Image at https://tinyurl.com/jtpxfnwv

You only hurt the ones you ...

The interesting things about the anti-Israel BDS movement are

• It hurts the people the BDSers claim they support
• It is a political movement that borders on the illegal
• It doesn’t seem to be working

BDSers have cost the so-called “Palestinians” jobs.

The PLO/PFLP is an economic disaster. The citizens line up to work in the horrible, apartheid Israel (think about that) where they hold all manner of employment, both trade and professional.

SodaStream employed Israelis and “Palestinians” in its plant across the “green line.”

The BDSers put an end to that, putting the “Palestinians” out of jobs that paid the same wages regardless of where the worker lived. SodaStream did not have to employ “Palestinians” and the “Palestinians” did not have to work for SodaStream.

SodaStream moved to the south and now hires Israelis.

So, did BDS help or hurt the “Palestinians”? Did its action help of hurt the “Palestinian” government?

A QUICK WORD ON APARTHEID An Israeli Arab may live anyplace in Israel. An Israeli Jew is forbidden by the “Palestinian” government and Islam, to live in “Palestine,” even though there are “progressive” Jews who would rush to live in “Palestine” were they permitted.

Israel’s parliament, the Knesset, includes Muslims who promote the destruction of Israel. That would be like having nazis in Congress during World War 2 or Communists in Congress during the Cold War era. (Soviet Premier Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev was angry and threatened to bury us because President Eisenhower prevented Khrushchev from visiting Disneyland in California. There also was the small matter of Francis Gary Powers and the U-2 downing over what was then the USSR.)

It could have been avoided

Had the Arabs agreed to the 1947 Partition Plan, Israel would be a sliver of a state, with Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, and Egypt as its immediate neighbors. “Palestine” as separate from Jordan did not exist.

Had the Arabs agreed to a peace agreement after 1948, they still would have Jerusalem and Jordan would own the so-called West Bank.

So far, nothing has satisfied the Arabs who insist on attacking Israel.

Jordan lost the “West Bank” to an Egyptian (Arafat).

Jordan lost Jerusalem to Israel.

(Since, both Egypt and Jordan have signed peace treaties with Israel, and while peace between them is nothing like peace between the U.S. and Canada, the treaties have held.)

Oslo divided up the West Bank into three sections. Both Israel and the” Palestinians” agreed to the agreement; the Palestinians quickly abrogated it.

PLAGIARISM is the act of appropriating the literary composition of another, or parts or passages of his writings, or the ideas or language of the same, and passing them off as the product of one’s own mind.

Truth is an absolute defense to defamation. Defamation is a false statement of fact. If the statement was accurate, then by definition it wasn’t defamatory.

Web sites (URLs) beginning https://tinyurl.com/ are generated by the free Tiny URL utility and reduce lengthy URLs to manageable size.

 

Comment on BOYCOTT

Opuscula PLO/PFLP blocks Sick “Palestinians” From Israeli medics

BEFORE ANYONE (FALSELY) CLAIMS THAT ISRAEL prevents sick residents of the PLO/PFLP and Hamas controlled areas from accessing medical care in Israel, LEARN THE FACTS.

It is NOT Israel that prevents “Palestinian” access to Israeli medical care. The PLO/PFLP closed the border (to everyone except politicians and their near kin).

 

 

GRANTED, even before the PLO/PFLP and Hamas closed the border, getting medical care in Israel oft times was difficult.

That might be because too many “Palestinians” brought bombs and other weapons with them into Israel to slaughter any Israeli they could attack.

But “Palestinians” have been coming to Israeli public and private hospitals from the beginning; even before there was a call for another “Palestinian” state. Jordan is the original Palestinian state and it controlled the area where Egyptian Yassar Arafat wanted to create a new state. Egypt controlled Gaza and most Gazans have an “Egyptian connection.”

According to a headline in the English on-line version of Israel HaYom, PA's bid to halt application of sovereignty leaves Gaza patients in limbo¹ “The refusal to process requests for medical permits, aimed at protesting Israel's plan to begin applying sovereignty to parts of Judea and Samaria, has instead hurt many sick Palestinians.”

Jomaa al-Najjar was desperate to send his 2-month-old daughter Joud out of the Gaza Strip to Israel for urgent medical treatment for epilepsy. But with the Palestinian Authority refusing to relay his request, there was no way to coordinate her transfer.

This week, she died in a Gaza hospital.

Who killed the child?

Mahmoud Abbas.

Last month, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas said the authority was no longer bound by previous agreements with Israel going back to the 1990s, which created the PA. He suspended all ties with Israel, even security coordination.

The Palestinians view Israel's proposed sovereignty initiative in the Jordan Valley and some settlements as an existential threat because it would make it virtually impossible to create a viable Palestinian state in Judea and Samaria, Gaza, and east Jerusalem.

Never mind that the so-called Trump Plan — a plan that Abbas refused to even review — did create a “Palestinian” state in Israel that included the PLO/PFLP and Hamas-controlled Gaza.

"We are on the brink of medical chaos," said a spokesperson for Physicians for Human Rights-Israel, a humanitarian group. It said the PA Health Ministry has also stopped covering the cost of treatment in Israeli hospitals, meaning that organ transplant patients are unable to return for post-surgery rehabilitation. The group has appealed to Israeli authorities to ensure the continued movement of Palestinian patients to Israel for treatment.

It is the PLO/PFLP and Hamas that are preventing their citizens from treatment in Israel. Given that Israel is treating patients from area countries, sometimes via an intermediate country such as Cyprus, it is highly unlikely that Israel would refuse to treat any legitimate patient from anywhere. Worst case, Israel could bill the patient’s government, even realizing there is little chance of collecting.

Patients requiring advanced treatment usually travel to east Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria, or even in Israel proper. They need Israeli permission for all three. Egypt has sealed its border with Gaza since March due to the coronavirus.

Hamas has no direct contact with Israel but allows a PA-run liaison office in Gaza to coordinate the entry and exit of medical patients, even during the wars.

According to the Israel HaYom posting, “The Palestinian Center for Human Rights, a Gaza nonprofit, briefly stepped in to help coordinate the permits but stopped after Israeli media reported the arrangement.”

Ibrahim Melhem, a Palestinian Authority spokesman in Judea and Samaria, defended the decision to cut ties.

"Israel is the occupying power on the borders of Gaza and it bears responsibility for the results of delaying or preventing patients from crossing to hospitals in Jerusalem and [Judea and Samaria]," he said.

Gisha, an Israeli nongovernmental organization that advocates for Palestinian freedom of movement, said Israel, the PA, and Hamas must protect that right. It called on Israel to "identify an immediate solution to meet the urgent needs of Gaza's residents for movement, especially patients in need of life-saving treatment."

But if the PLO/PFLP and Hamas refuse to even talk to Israel HOW can Melhem honestly claim that Israel “bears responsibility for the results of delaying or preventing patients from crossing to hospitals”​ As for Gisha, this apparently left-wing NGO also refuses to lay the blame where it belongs: squarely at the feet of the PLO/PFLP and Hamas “leadership.” Rather than demanding that Israel "identify an immediate solution to meet the urgent needs of Gaza's residents for movement, especially patients in need of life-saving treatment" it should be pressing the PLO/PFLP and Hamas to do exactly what it demands of Israel.

The world undoubtedly will hear only the cries of Ibrahim Melhem and Gisha, blaming the lack of access to health care in Israel on Israel.

True, it often is difficult and time consuming to get permission to cross into Israel for medical care. But it was being done.

In January, close to 3,000 Gazans left for treatment via the Erez crossing with Israel, according to UN figures. That number plunged in the following months as authorities heavily restricted travel to prevent the spread of coronavirus, but 188 crossed in April.

It is not Israel that is preventing the residents of the PLO/PFLP and Hamas areas from accessing medical care in Israel. It is the pride of Mahmoud Abbas that has closed the borders.

For want of a nail²

Had Israels neighbors accepted the new state in 1948, Israel would be tiny and Jordan/Palestine would be huge.

Had Israel’s neighbors not continued to attack the small country,

*  Syria still would be in control of the Golan Heights

*  Jordan still wold be in control of Jerusalem (and restricting access to Jewish sites)

*  The PLO/PFLP and Hamas probably would not exist as Jordan and Egypt would put them down early on.

 

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Sources

1. Israel HaYom: https://tinyurl.com/yaxmh834

2. For want of a nail: https://tinyurl.com/n7sb629

PLAGIARISM is the act of appropriating the literary composition of another, or parts or passages of his writings, or the ideas or language of the same, and passing them off as the product of one’s own mind.

Truth is an absolute defense to defamation. Defamation is a false statement of fact. If the statement was accurate, then by definition it wasn’t defamatory.

Web sites (URLs) beginning https://tinyurl.com/ are generated by the free Tiny URL utility and reduce lengthy URLs to manageable size.

 

Comment on Blame PLO/PFLP

Neighbors Isn't it AMAZING

 

Egypt wants gas,
Israel, Jordan building a bridge

FOR YEARS ISRAEL has been telling its neighbors: Have peaceful relations with us and we all gain.

Egypt listened and, although there have been some tensions, the Sadat-Begin peace has held. (I list Anwar Sadat first since he came to Jerusalem to meet with Menachem Begin - two old warriors who knew all too well the price of war.)

Egypt now is first in line for Israeli gas from the Med. It has plans to use some and make a profit on the rest that it buys from its neighbor.

Jordan, which came to the table late, now is planning a new bridge over the river to connect industrial districts in each country.

There already are three crossings between Israel and Jordan:

  Allenby/King Hussein bridge

  Sheikh Hussein crossing /North Border

  Wadi Araba Crossing/South Border,

According to the WorldTribune,
Israel and Jordan plan to boost economic and trade ties with the development of a joint industrial zone on both banks of the Jordan River.

“This is an important milestone between the two countries in promoting a large-scale economic project, which will provide employment and welfare to Israeli and Jordanian citizens and the entire region,” said Deputy Regional Cooperation Minister Ayoub Kara, who heads the project.

Jordan and Israel, in this scrivener's opinion, should be working together to develop a common international airport near the Red Sea.

The bridge is not the only thing Israel and Jordan are working on together.

Also in the works is a joint effort to build a waterway between the Dead Sea and the Red Sea. This little enterprise is expected to cost the neighbors roughly US$800 million according to a Jerusalem Post article.

There is a long history of quiet cooperation between the two countries. Those "quiet" conversations failed to prevent war, but perhaps laid the groundwork for the current peace agreement with the Hashemite kingdom.

With Egypt the issues are security in general and Gaza (Hamas) in particular.

But peace, even a shaky peace, is proving beneficial for all three countries. If only some others in the region would recognize the value of peace with Israel, even if it is "unofficial."

U.S. casualty Price of war

 

ACCORDING TO DAESH (ISIS/ISIL), KAYLA JEAN MUELLE, the 26-year-old U.S. citizen 26-year-old American aid worker died when the building she was being held in by Daesh was struck by Jordanian aircraft, according to the SITE intelligence group.

Assuming the story is true, Ms. Muelle is fortunate that she died in the bombing rather than at the hands of Daesh which has taken to burning its victims alive.

While I offer condolences to those close to her, I would remind everyone, particularly other volunteers, that this is a war zone and protection cannot be guaranteed by any source.

She should not have been in Syria, not matter how concerned she was for the Syrians on any side of the intra-Muslim war.

IF ANY U.S. CITIZEN WANTS TO AID OTHERS, let that citizen start at home - in their own community and when all aid needs are satisfied there, then the citizen's state, then the greater U.S.

Beyond any doubt there are U.S. citizens and both legal and illegal - sorry, "undocumented" - aliens who need succor as much as anyone in a war zone.

IN THEORY there is no U.S. presence on the ground in Syria or it's province, Lebanon, so U.S. aid workers and "reporters" can expect NO assistance from the U.S.

It's been proven, all too many times, that the U.S. is not able to "extract" (rescue) its people from the hands of Muslim terrorists - and in Syria, it's hard to know who is a terrorist: Hezbollah, Daesh, the unaffiliated rebels, or the government.

MEANWHILE, IGNORING LESSONS THAT SHOULD HAVE BEEN LEARNED IN AFGHANISTAN the fools in Washington are sending weapons to combatants in Syria .

Doesn't ANYONE remember how the U.S. supplied the Taliban weapons for their fight with the Russians? Are the denizens within the Beltway totally unaware of the absolute accuracy of Jorge Agustín Nicolás Ruiz de Santayana y Borrás who said "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it" (or words to that effect).

What is going on in Syria, Iran/Iraq, and about to break out elsewhere (Turkey) is anarchy.

During World War II, and in wars and conflicts since, reporters went with the troops; aid workers - notably pacifists - went with, and were more-or-less protected by, the soldiers and sailors surrounding them. Today, so called reporters and aid workers wander around in war zones sans any protection; consequently, these people are becoming victims of combatants.

I can understand a desire by some to want to help, but how can anyone help another when

1. They really don't know who is fighting who
2. They lack protection from the people they want to aid
3. Their country - and its allies - have no presence in the area

The sad part is when a reporter or do-gooder is captured, they beg their government - the U.S., England, Japan, Jordan - to rescue them at all costs.

The exception to the above is the Jordanian pilot who was shot down while on a bombing mission. Jordan offered a prisoner swap; Daesh burned the pilot anyway. Jordan - knowing the Daesh mentality - immediately hanged two terrorists and promised to execute several more.

By the way, if you wonder why Daesh burned the Jordan's Muslim pilot, the answer is that the soul of a burned Muslim cannot enter heaven or receive his 70 virgins.

Ms. Muelle was "collateral damage." She was in the wrong place - by her own choice - at the wrong time.

While I feel for the woman's kin, I cannot generate any sympathy for the woman. She went to the area against the advice of her country; she knew it was a war zone (ergo her raison d'etre) and she was doing what she wanted to do when she was captured by Daesh and held in the building that a bomb turned into rubble.

 

While Israel and Arab states use Arab acronym Daesh, most world knows radical Islamist force as either ISIS or ISIL.