21 oct 2014
Professor Hillel Vice, a university lecturer at the Israeli Bar-IIan University, sparked a public outrage after he launched calls for wiping out the Palestinian people. Vice wrote on his Facebook page: “The liquidation of the Palestinian people is an unavoidable undertaking”, and “The Arab movements exist to kill and spread insanity.”
The Israeli Jerusalem Online newspaper on Monday quoted Vice, who did not express any regret, as claiming: “The fact that Abu Mazen (PA chairman Mahmoud Abbas) called us murderers on the UN General Assembly stage stirred up my wrath.”
Vice, currently serving as the chairman of the so-called Friends of the Temple, dubbed the Palestinian people as some insignificant minority.
“You are not a nation. You are an insignificant minority, the faster you leave Israel willingly, the better it will be for you,” Vice’s Facebook statement read verbatim.
The Israeli Jerusalem Online newspaper on Monday quoted Vice, who did not express any regret, as claiming: “The fact that Abu Mazen (PA chairman Mahmoud Abbas) called us murderers on the UN General Assembly stage stirred up my wrath.”
Vice, currently serving as the chairman of the so-called Friends of the Temple, dubbed the Palestinian people as some insignificant minority.
“You are not a nation. You are an insignificant minority, the faster you leave Israel willingly, the better it will be for you,” Vice’s Facebook statement read verbatim.
26 sept 2014
Following successive ongoing international campaigns to achieve boycott divestment and sanctions on Israel in different countries around the world, especially in colleges, the Israeli government is now acting on an extensive strategy that includes Israeli reservist soldiers, to recap its losses.
Tel Aviv knows it can count on the ongoing financial, political and military support from the United States, but wants to get US campuses to topple any move that aims at divesting from Israeli and international companies that invest and benefit from the illegitimate Israeli occupation and its settlements.
Many reserve soldiers, especially those who graduated from American Universities, have been asked to “go back to school” in order to operate on preventing any move that calls for boycott, divestment and sanctions, and to try to encourage students’ support to Israel.
The moves came after successful BDS campaigns in different colleges, and aim at restoring “Israel’s image” especially after its latest offensive on Gaza that led to the death of 2137 Palestinians, while at least 11100 have been wounded.
The number includes 578 children, 264 women, and 103 elderly, while more than 11100, including 3374 children, 2088 women and 410 elderly, have been injured.
Tel Aviv is now aiming at regaining support, and encouraging investments, especially in colleges and universities that voted for divestment.
Israeli sources said Israel faced a similar situation during the Second Palestinian Intifada, especially during the era of late Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, adding that back then Israeli soviet-born politician Natan Sharansky toured in many US Universities, and informed Sharon that Israel needs to operate in those colleges, as BDS moves “could have a significant impact on Tel Aviv.”
He said such moves, which he dubbed as “hostile”, managed to achieve some positive outcomes, and could lead to more financial losses to Israel, adding that many liberal Jews told him back then that they preferred to live “without a Jewish State,” Maan said.
Israel now observes US colleges as one of the main “battle fronts” that have been able to achieve divestment from Israel, and are successful in highlighting the Palestinian cause and the ongoing struggle against the illegitimate Israeli occupation and settlements.
In August of 2013, the office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the government would be granting scholarships to certain students who actively participate in activities promoting Israel, and improving its image, especially on social media outlets like Facebook and Twitter, the Associated Press said.
Israel recruited students who were organized in units, while “chief coordinators” of these groups received full scholarships.
Each of those “chief coordinators'” recruits three “desk coordinators” tasked with “language, graphics and research," and receive lesser scholarships while some active pro-Israel students get “minimal scholarships.”
Tel Aviv knows it can count on the ongoing financial, political and military support from the United States, but wants to get US campuses to topple any move that aims at divesting from Israeli and international companies that invest and benefit from the illegitimate Israeli occupation and its settlements.
Many reserve soldiers, especially those who graduated from American Universities, have been asked to “go back to school” in order to operate on preventing any move that calls for boycott, divestment and sanctions, and to try to encourage students’ support to Israel.
The moves came after successful BDS campaigns in different colleges, and aim at restoring “Israel’s image” especially after its latest offensive on Gaza that led to the death of 2137 Palestinians, while at least 11100 have been wounded.
The number includes 578 children, 264 women, and 103 elderly, while more than 11100, including 3374 children, 2088 women and 410 elderly, have been injured.
Tel Aviv is now aiming at regaining support, and encouraging investments, especially in colleges and universities that voted for divestment.
Israeli sources said Israel faced a similar situation during the Second Palestinian Intifada, especially during the era of late Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, adding that back then Israeli soviet-born politician Natan Sharansky toured in many US Universities, and informed Sharon that Israel needs to operate in those colleges, as BDS moves “could have a significant impact on Tel Aviv.”
He said such moves, which he dubbed as “hostile”, managed to achieve some positive outcomes, and could lead to more financial losses to Israel, adding that many liberal Jews told him back then that they preferred to live “without a Jewish State,” Maan said.
Israel now observes US colleges as one of the main “battle fronts” that have been able to achieve divestment from Israel, and are successful in highlighting the Palestinian cause and the ongoing struggle against the illegitimate Israeli occupation and settlements.
In August of 2013, the office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the government would be granting scholarships to certain students who actively participate in activities promoting Israel, and improving its image, especially on social media outlets like Facebook and Twitter, the Associated Press said.
Israel recruited students who were organized in units, while “chief coordinators” of these groups received full scholarships.
Each of those “chief coordinators'” recruits three “desk coordinators” tasked with “language, graphics and research," and receive lesser scholarships while some active pro-Israel students get “minimal scholarships.”
7 sept 2014
Pro-Palestinian hacktivists last night defaced and hacked more than 100 Israeli websites as well as several others belonging to Americans, the Israeli website Rotter claimed. According to Rotter, a group of hackers identifying themselves as AnonGhost breached and sabotaged Israeli and American websites.
The Israeli website published a list of 100 Israeli sites on the internet that had been defaced with anti-Israeli slogans.
The hacking group, which regularly wages spates of cyberattacks on Israeli websites and personal accounts on the internet, threatened to resume its attacks soon.
The group said its attacks are launched in retaliation to Israel's crimes against the Palestinians in Gaza, Jerusalem and the West Bank.
The Israeli website published a list of 100 Israeli sites on the internet that had been defaced with anti-Israeli slogans.
The hacking group, which regularly wages spates of cyberattacks on Israeli websites and personal accounts on the internet, threatened to resume its attacks soon.
The group said its attacks are launched in retaliation to Israel's crimes against the Palestinians in Gaza, Jerusalem and the West Bank.
23 aug 2014
|
Israel on Friday removed from two government Twitter accounts a harrowing image of US journalist James Foley about to be beheaded, after the tweets sparked widespread controversy online.
The still, taken from a video of the killing of the freelance reporter in Iraq by a masked Islamic State fighter, was posted on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's official account on Thursday. Below the image of Foley kneeling in an orange boiler suit was a photo of Hamas militants on a motorcycle dragging the body of a person executed for collaborating with Israel through the streets of Gaza. The combined image was posted a day after Twitter began removing from the micro-blog service the five-minute-long video of Foley's killing entitled |
"A Message to America," which had been uploaded to social media sites by IS fighters, and images from it.
The clip also included a warning that the group intended to kill a second captive journalist unless the United States halts air strikes in Iraq.
Netanyahu was accused of using the tragedy as propaganda by linking IS with Hamas -- the democratically-elected Islamist government of Gaza currently engaged in a struggle against Israel's deadly 47-day assault.
Human Rights Watch director Kenneth Roth tweeted: "Netanyahu's Twitter account is now using image of James Foley's horrible execution to try to score political points against Hamas."
Israel analyst Mitchell Plitnick wrote: "Bibi (Netanyahu) manages 2 hit a new low."
Senior Hamas official Ezzat al-Rishq wrote on Facebook that "Netanyahu's attempt to link Hamas" with IS was "a deception and disinformation campaign" that showed "no respect for the sanctity of the dead."
But a tweet on the foreign ministry's account @IsraelMFA on Friday featured the same two images, with the words: "Islamist terrorist organizations such as #ISIS and #Hamas are enemies of peace and of all civilized nations."
The Netanyahu tweet was deleted early Friday, and the foreign ministry one was removed later in the day.
A foreign ministry official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that after consideration they had decided it was "inappropriate."
An official in Netanyahu's office, also requesting anonymity, said it was removed following criticism but stood by its stance that "Hamas is like IS -- two murderous terror organizations."
At least 2,097 Palestinians, overwhelmingly civilians, and 68 Israelis, all but 64 of whom were soldiers, have been killed since July 8 in the worst Israeli assault since the 2000-05 intifada.
The clip also included a warning that the group intended to kill a second captive journalist unless the United States halts air strikes in Iraq.
Netanyahu was accused of using the tragedy as propaganda by linking IS with Hamas -- the democratically-elected Islamist government of Gaza currently engaged in a struggle against Israel's deadly 47-day assault.
Human Rights Watch director Kenneth Roth tweeted: "Netanyahu's Twitter account is now using image of James Foley's horrible execution to try to score political points against Hamas."
Israel analyst Mitchell Plitnick wrote: "Bibi (Netanyahu) manages 2 hit a new low."
Senior Hamas official Ezzat al-Rishq wrote on Facebook that "Netanyahu's attempt to link Hamas" with IS was "a deception and disinformation campaign" that showed "no respect for the sanctity of the dead."
But a tweet on the foreign ministry's account @IsraelMFA on Friday featured the same two images, with the words: "Islamist terrorist organizations such as #ISIS and #Hamas are enemies of peace and of all civilized nations."
The Netanyahu tweet was deleted early Friday, and the foreign ministry one was removed later in the day.
A foreign ministry official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that after consideration they had decided it was "inappropriate."
An official in Netanyahu's office, also requesting anonymity, said it was removed following criticism but stood by its stance that "Hamas is like IS -- two murderous terror organizations."
At least 2,097 Palestinians, overwhelmingly civilians, and 68 Israelis, all but 64 of whom were soldiers, have been killed since July 8 in the worst Israeli assault since the 2000-05 intifada.
16 july 2014
Using public relations efforts to build public support for military action is not a new idea. But spending money on tweets to shape global perceptions may be the next frontier for such efforts.
Hayes Brown, Editor at ThinkProgress, posted this screenshot of a promoted tweet from the official Twitter account of the Prime Minister of Israel, seeking to build support for an escalation of Israeli military operations in Gaza.
Why I'm on the brink of burning my Israeli passport
Mothers of all Palestinians must be killed: Israeli MP
Hayes Brown, Editor at ThinkProgress, posted this screenshot of a promoted tweet from the official Twitter account of the Prime Minister of Israel, seeking to build support for an escalation of Israeli military operations in Gaza.
Why I'm on the brink of burning my Israeli passport
Mothers of all Palestinians must be killed: Israeli MP
13 july 2014
Right-wing nationalists attack a central Tel Aviv protest against Israel’s bombing of Gaza on Saturday, 12 July
Israel’s latest assault on the besieged Gaza Strip has been accompanied by yet another sharp increase in incitement against Palestinians and solidarity activists on social media outlets, such as Facebook and Twitter.
Facebook groups have been set up to call for the collective punishment of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. Others host incitement against Palestinian students at Israeli universities, including posting pictures of and personal information about individual students.
The radical and violent anti-Palestinian climate in Israel is not divorced from reality.
After more than a week of Israeli government threats to do so, commandos launched the first ground incursion into the northern Gaza Strip early Sunday morning, reported Ma’an News Agency.
At the time of writing, there have been no Israeli deaths as a result of rockets fired by armed Palestinian groups in Gaza, though much of the mainstream media have focused on the impact of rocket fire on Israel rather than the staggering death toll in the Gaza Strip.
As Israel’s latest military offensive enters its sixth day, the Ministry of Health in Gaza reports that 170 Palestinians have been killed and more than 1,000 injured.
Thousands displaced “Four thousand people and rising are fleeing this heavy bombardment in the north; they are in eight different UNRWA schools,” said Chris Gunness, spokesperson for UNRWA, the United Nations agency for Palestine refugees.
“We call on all parties to respect obligations under international humanitarian law, and to respect the sanctity of civilian life and the inviolability of United Nations buildings,” he told The Electronic Intifada by telephone.
Gunness explained that during Israel’s Operation Cast Lead (December 2008-January 2009), more than 50,000 Palestinians took shelter in UNRWA installations across the Gaza Strip as Israel’s bombs destroyed buildings and homes. “They believed in the sanctity and safety of UN properties,” he said of those Palestinians who took shelter in UNRWA’s facilities.
“As a result of military operations, the main office of UNRWA was directly struck and the main warehouse was burned to the ground after [Israeli military forces] fired white phosphorous” during Cast Lead, Gunness said.
Approximately 1,400 Palestinians were killed by Israel’s military during the three-week long military assault.
“Gaza, Gaza a graveyard!”
Israel’s latest assault on the besieged Gaza Strip has been accompanied by yet another sharp increase in incitement against Palestinians and solidarity activists on social media outlets, such as Facebook and Twitter.
Facebook groups have been set up to call for the collective punishment of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. Others host incitement against Palestinian students at Israeli universities, including posting pictures of and personal information about individual students.
The radical and violent anti-Palestinian climate in Israel is not divorced from reality.
After more than a week of Israeli government threats to do so, commandos launched the first ground incursion into the northern Gaza Strip early Sunday morning, reported Ma’an News Agency.
At the time of writing, there have been no Israeli deaths as a result of rockets fired by armed Palestinian groups in Gaza, though much of the mainstream media have focused on the impact of rocket fire on Israel rather than the staggering death toll in the Gaza Strip.
As Israel’s latest military offensive enters its sixth day, the Ministry of Health in Gaza reports that 170 Palestinians have been killed and more than 1,000 injured.
Thousands displaced “Four thousand people and rising are fleeing this heavy bombardment in the north; they are in eight different UNRWA schools,” said Chris Gunness, spokesperson for UNRWA, the United Nations agency for Palestine refugees.
“We call on all parties to respect obligations under international humanitarian law, and to respect the sanctity of civilian life and the inviolability of United Nations buildings,” he told The Electronic Intifada by telephone.
Gunness explained that during Israel’s Operation Cast Lead (December 2008-January 2009), more than 50,000 Palestinians took shelter in UNRWA installations across the Gaza Strip as Israel’s bombs destroyed buildings and homes. “They believed in the sanctity and safety of UN properties,” he said of those Palestinians who took shelter in UNRWA’s facilities.
“As a result of military operations, the main office of UNRWA was directly struck and the main warehouse was burned to the ground after [Israeli military forces] fired white phosphorous” during Cast Lead, Gunness said.
Approximately 1,400 Palestinians were killed by Israel’s military during the three-week long military assault.
“Gaza, Gaza a graveyard!”
Meanwhile, Israelis are taking to social media to call for a yet higher body count in Gaza.
A Facebook page for the group LEAVA — “Preventing Assimilation in the Holy Land” — is dedicated to preventing romantic relationships between Palestinian men and Jewish women and has more than 37,000 followers. The page regularly posts pictures of its “activists” patrolling parts of Jerusalem and other cities.
On 11 June, a picture was posted on LEAVA’s page of a young man standing next to an Israeli flag at a protest and wearing a shirt with the group’s emblem. Written above the photo is the following: “Citizens of Ashdod are also standing with LEAVA. Waiting for Gaza to be turned into a big blaze!” It received more than 2,300 “likes” in just two days:
A post published later that the same day gives what it said were words for a protest chant: “Gaza, Gaza a graveyard! Very soon!” It received more than six hundred “likes.”
With more than 5,300 Facebook followers, a Jerusalem-based house moving company, though ostensibly non-political, posted the following “status” in poorly-written Hebrew on 7 July, the first day of Israel’s latest attack on Gaza:
A Facebook page for the group LEAVA — “Preventing Assimilation in the Holy Land” — is dedicated to preventing romantic relationships between Palestinian men and Jewish women and has more than 37,000 followers. The page regularly posts pictures of its “activists” patrolling parts of Jerusalem and other cities.
On 11 June, a picture was posted on LEAVA’s page of a young man standing next to an Israeli flag at a protest and wearing a shirt with the group’s emblem. Written above the photo is the following: “Citizens of Ashdod are also standing with LEAVA. Waiting for Gaza to be turned into a big blaze!” It received more than 2,300 “likes” in just two days:
A post published later that the same day gives what it said were words for a protest chant: “Gaza, Gaza a graveyard! Very soon!” It received more than six hundred “likes.”
With more than 5,300 Facebook followers, a Jerusalem-based house moving company, though ostensibly non-political, posted the following “status” in poorly-written Hebrew on 7 July, the first day of Israel’s latest attack on Gaza:
One of our advantages: we don’t observe Ramadan!!! We look after our clients and we don’t abandon them […] we keep our word and go to every delivery. If you already closed a deal for a delivery with a company that employs our cousins [commonly used in Hebrew to refer to Arabs], it’s time to cancel and move to us. 0525530344. Why provide for those who kidnap our children? Have a good and peaceful day!
Many Israeli Facebook users have posted violent and disturbing content on their personal accounts. Talya Shilok Edry, who has more than one thousand followers, posted the following “status”: “What an orgasm to see the Israeli Defense Forces bomb buildings in Gaza with children and families at the same time. Boom boom.”
Edry’s Facebook timeline shows a pattern of calls for bloodshed against Palestinians.
Edry’s Facebook timeline shows a pattern of calls for bloodshed against Palestinians.
Writing about the murdered sixteen-year-old Muhammad Abu Khudair, who was kidnapped and burned alive by Israeli youth, she stated: “Sweet settlers, next time you kidnap an Arab boy, call me and let me torture him!! Why do you get to have all the fun?”
Edry deleted the statuses on Sunday after screenshots of them went viral on Twitter and Facebook.
Journalist David Sheen reported for Mondoweiss last week about the “terrifying tweets of pre-army Israeli teens.” After searching on Twitter using the Hebrew word for “Arabs,” Sheen found dozens upon dozens of Israeli youths “proclaiming their desire for all Arabs to die and in some cases be tortured to death.”
“Feels like Kristallnacht”
Edry deleted the statuses on Sunday after screenshots of them went viral on Twitter and Facebook.
Journalist David Sheen reported for Mondoweiss last week about the “terrifying tweets of pre-army Israeli teens.” After searching on Twitter using the Hebrew word for “Arabs,” Sheen found dozens upon dozens of Israeli youths “proclaiming their desire for all Arabs to die and in some cases be tortured to death.”
“Feels like Kristallnacht”
Another Israeli Facebook page, “Dismiss Abu Hussein from Netanya Academic College,” was created for the purpose of incitement against a Palestinian student at Netanya Academic College.
More than five hundred Israeli students have “liked” the page, which was created on 11 July after Palestinian student Tamer Abu Hussein arrived on campus wearing a t-shirt with the word “Palestine” and a kuffiyeh (traditional Palestinian scarf):
After a confrontation with a campus security guard, a post on the page claims that “many students panicked and fled for fear of a hostile act of terrorism.”
It adds that police detained and interrogated Abu Hussein, though there is no proof whatsoever that he did anything wrong. Ostensibly referring to Palestinians under bombardment in Gaza, the post added: “Abu Hussein and every other student who identifies with the enemy should be removed from the college.”
Netanya Academic College students also started a petition demanding Abu Hussein’s expulsion from the school, claiming without proof that he “glorifies terrorism.”
Muhammad Abu Toameh, a friend of Abu Hussein and a student at Tel Aviv University, said he and many others have also been harassed by rightwing Israeli groups on Facebook throughout the past week. A group of students posted photos of him and other friends on a Facebook page for students at Tel Aviv University which he said mocked the safety concerns of Arab students on campus.
“The madness and winds of racism in the air, along with the pogrom-like actions taking place in Jerusalem and other places, feels like Kristallnacht,” Abu Toameh told The Electronic Intifada.
Deep-seated racism This hate speech and incitement is not limited to fringe groups and individuals.
As Electronic Intifada contributor and award-winning author Max Blumenthal demonstrates in his recent book Goliath: Life and Loathing in Greater Israel, deep-seated racism is pervasive throughout Israeli institutions and society.
Writing for the +972 Magazine website, Israeli journalist Haggai Mattar reported that leftwing demonstrators were attacked on Saturday night by a mob of Israelis chanting “Death to Arabs!” in Tel Aviv. Mattar recalls:
By the end of the protest (and a little after it, when they chased us through the streets) one person who had a chair broken over his head was injured and evacuated to hospital, another got punched hard in the head, and one came out with a black eye, someone else had their expensive video camera stolen, and dozens of others hit, pushed, or eggs thrown at them. Some also said that the fascists attacked them with pepper spray.
Leading Israeli politicians and public figures play an integral role in spreading anti-Palestinian incitement.
Ali Abunimah reported on Friday that Moshe Feiglin, the deputy speaker of Israel’s parliament, the Knesset, called for Israel to cut off all electricity to the Gaza Strip. “The blood of a dialysis patient in Gaza is not redder than the blood of our IDF soldiers who will, God forbid, need to enter [Gaza],” he said last Wednesday during a speech in the Knesset.
And just one day before the kidnapping and murder of Muhammad Abu Khudair by Israeli youth, lawmaker Ayelet Shaked, a senior figure in the Habeyit Hayehudi (Jewish Home) political party, posted a Facebook “status” calling for genocide against “the entire Palestinian people.”
In a public letter written in Hebrew, an Israeli military commander declared a “holy war” on Palestinians, who he referred to as “the enemy who defames” God.
The racist calls for violence are not limited to “times of war,” either. As I reported for The Electronic Intifada last month, an Israeli Facebook page called for killing “a terrorist every hour” until three Israeli youths who were then missing were returned (the teens were found dead in the West Bank on 30 June).
Although the content of that page made it clear that the Facebook users consider all Palestinians as legitimate targets, Facebook has refused to remove the page, despite dozens and dozens of requests to do. Nearly 21,000 Facebook users “like” the page.
As the vast majority of the Facebook pages and posts mentioned in this article and others about pervasive Israeli racism on social media have not been removed, it appears Facebook has no problem with anti-Palestinian incitement, even though it poses no idle threat.
To read more about phenomenon of Israeli racism on social media, see The Electronic Intifada’s past coverage:
More than five hundred Israeli students have “liked” the page, which was created on 11 July after Palestinian student Tamer Abu Hussein arrived on campus wearing a t-shirt with the word “Palestine” and a kuffiyeh (traditional Palestinian scarf):
After a confrontation with a campus security guard, a post on the page claims that “many students panicked and fled for fear of a hostile act of terrorism.”
It adds that police detained and interrogated Abu Hussein, though there is no proof whatsoever that he did anything wrong. Ostensibly referring to Palestinians under bombardment in Gaza, the post added: “Abu Hussein and every other student who identifies with the enemy should be removed from the college.”
Netanya Academic College students also started a petition demanding Abu Hussein’s expulsion from the school, claiming without proof that he “glorifies terrorism.”
Muhammad Abu Toameh, a friend of Abu Hussein and a student at Tel Aviv University, said he and many others have also been harassed by rightwing Israeli groups on Facebook throughout the past week. A group of students posted photos of him and other friends on a Facebook page for students at Tel Aviv University which he said mocked the safety concerns of Arab students on campus.
“The madness and winds of racism in the air, along with the pogrom-like actions taking place in Jerusalem and other places, feels like Kristallnacht,” Abu Toameh told The Electronic Intifada.
Deep-seated racism This hate speech and incitement is not limited to fringe groups and individuals.
As Electronic Intifada contributor and award-winning author Max Blumenthal demonstrates in his recent book Goliath: Life and Loathing in Greater Israel, deep-seated racism is pervasive throughout Israeli institutions and society.
Writing for the +972 Magazine website, Israeli journalist Haggai Mattar reported that leftwing demonstrators were attacked on Saturday night by a mob of Israelis chanting “Death to Arabs!” in Tel Aviv. Mattar recalls:
By the end of the protest (and a little after it, when they chased us through the streets) one person who had a chair broken over his head was injured and evacuated to hospital, another got punched hard in the head, and one came out with a black eye, someone else had their expensive video camera stolen, and dozens of others hit, pushed, or eggs thrown at them. Some also said that the fascists attacked them with pepper spray.
Leading Israeli politicians and public figures play an integral role in spreading anti-Palestinian incitement.
Ali Abunimah reported on Friday that Moshe Feiglin, the deputy speaker of Israel’s parliament, the Knesset, called for Israel to cut off all electricity to the Gaza Strip. “The blood of a dialysis patient in Gaza is not redder than the blood of our IDF soldiers who will, God forbid, need to enter [Gaza],” he said last Wednesday during a speech in the Knesset.
And just one day before the kidnapping and murder of Muhammad Abu Khudair by Israeli youth, lawmaker Ayelet Shaked, a senior figure in the Habeyit Hayehudi (Jewish Home) political party, posted a Facebook “status” calling for genocide against “the entire Palestinian people.”
In a public letter written in Hebrew, an Israeli military commander declared a “holy war” on Palestinians, who he referred to as “the enemy who defames” God.
The racist calls for violence are not limited to “times of war,” either. As I reported for The Electronic Intifada last month, an Israeli Facebook page called for killing “a terrorist every hour” until three Israeli youths who were then missing were returned (the teens were found dead in the West Bank on 30 June).
Although the content of that page made it clear that the Facebook users consider all Palestinians as legitimate targets, Facebook has refused to remove the page, despite dozens and dozens of requests to do. Nearly 21,000 Facebook users “like” the page.
As the vast majority of the Facebook pages and posts mentioned in this article and others about pervasive Israeli racism on social media have not been removed, it appears Facebook has no problem with anti-Palestinian incitement, even though it poses no idle threat.
To read more about phenomenon of Israeli racism on social media, see The Electronic Intifada’s past coverage:
- Kill a Palestinian “every hour,” says new Israeli Facebook page
- Israeli soldier becomes overnight hero after pointing loaded gun at Palestinian youths
- Israel soldiers have depraved ‘fun’ making “Rachel Corrie pancakes”
- “Reprimanded” Israeli soldier still posting violent, racist material on Instagram
- Stoned, naked, armed and dangerous: more disturbing images from an Israeli soldier’s Instagram
- “Castrate them!” “Burn them!” “Bullet in the head!”: Facebook Israelis react to photo of Palestinian kids
- “Oops… one less Arab”: even more disturbing Instragram images from the Israeli army
7 july 2014
Ayelet Shaked
A day before Palestinian teenager Muhammad Abu Khudair was kidnapped and burned alive allegedly by six Israeli Jewish youths, Israeli lawmaker Ayelet Shaked published on Facebook a call for genocide of the Palestinians.
It is a call for genocide because it declares that “the entire Palestinian people is the enemy” and justifies its destruction, “including its elderly and its women, its cities and its villages, its property and its infrastructure.”
It is a call for genocide because it calls for the slaughter of Palestinian mothers who give birth to “little snakes.”
If Shaked’s post does not meet the legal definition of a call for genocide then nothing does.
Shaked is a senior figure in the Habeyit Hayehudi (Jewish Home) party that is part of Israel’s ruling coalition.
Her post was shared more than one thousand times and received almost five thousand “Likes.”
Uri Elitzur, to whom she refers, and who died a few months ago, was leader of the settler movement and speechwriter and close advisor to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Here’s a full translation of Shaked’s posting:
This is an article by the late Uri Elitzur, which was written 12 years ago, but remained unpublished. It is as relevant today as it was at the time.
The Palestinian people has declared war on us, and we must respond with war. Not an operation, not a slow-moving one, not low-intensity, not controlled escalation, no destruction of terror infrastructure, no targeted killings. Enough with the oblique references. This is a war. Words have meanings. This is a war. It is not a war against terror, and not a war against extremists, and not even a war against the Palestinian Authority. These too are forms of avoiding reality. This is a war between two people. Who is the enemy? The Palestinian people. Why? Ask them, they started.
I don’t know why it’s so hard for us to define reality with the simple words that language puts at our disposal. Why do we have to make up a new name for the war every other week, just to avoid calling it by its name. What’s so horrifying about understanding that the entire Palestinian people is the enemy? Every war is between two peoples, and in every war the people who started the war, that whole people, is the enemy. A declaration of war is not a war crime. Responding with war certainly is not. Nor is the use of the word “war”, nor a clear definition who the enemy is. Au contraire: the morality of war (yes, there is such a thing) is founded on the assumption that there are wars in this world, and that war is not the normal state of things, and that in wars the enemy is usually an entire people, including its elderly and its women, its cities and its villages, its property and its infrastructure.
And the morality of war knows that it is not possible to refrain from hurting enemy civilians. It does not condemn the British air force, which bombed and totally destroyed the German city of Dresden, or the US planes that destroyed the cities of Poland and wrecked half of Budapest, places whose wretched residents had never done a thing to America, but which had to be destroyed in order to win the war against evil. The morals of war do not require that Russia be brought to trial, though it bombs and destroys towns and neighborhoods in Chechnya. It does not denounce the UN Peacekeeping Forces for killing hundreds of civilians in Angola, nor the NATO forces who bombed Milosevic’s Belgrade, a city with a million civilians, elderly, babies, women, and children. The morals of war accept as correct in principle, not only politically, what America has done in Afghanistan, including the massive bombing of populated places, including the creation of a refugee stream of hundreds of thousands of people who escaped the horrors of war, for thousands of whom there is no home to return to.
And in our war this is sevenfold more correct, because the enemy soldiers hide out among the population, and it is only through its support that they can fight. Behind every terrorist stand dozens of men and women, without whom he could not engage in terrorism. Actors in the war are those who incite in mosques, who write the murderous curricula for schools, who give shelter, who provide vehicles, and all those who honor and give them their moral support. They are all enemy combatants, and their blood shall be on all their heads. Now this also includes the mothers of the martyrs, who send them to hell with flowers and kisses. They should follow their sons, nothing would be more just. They should go, as should the physical homes in which they raised the snakes. Otherwise, more little snakes will be raised there.
Shocking words like this from Israeli leaders have an impact. And they are words backed by actions.
When Israel rampages against the entire Palestinian population, subjecting them to what Human Rights Watch calls “collective punishment,” it sends a clear message to the Israeli public that any Palestinian is fair game for “revenge.”
Shaked evidently has much worse in mind.
Hate trickles down
A day before Palestinian teenager Muhammad Abu Khudair was kidnapped and burned alive allegedly by six Israeli Jewish youths, Israeli lawmaker Ayelet Shaked published on Facebook a call for genocide of the Palestinians.
It is a call for genocide because it declares that “the entire Palestinian people is the enemy” and justifies its destruction, “including its elderly and its women, its cities and its villages, its property and its infrastructure.”
It is a call for genocide because it calls for the slaughter of Palestinian mothers who give birth to “little snakes.”
If Shaked’s post does not meet the legal definition of a call for genocide then nothing does.
Shaked is a senior figure in the Habeyit Hayehudi (Jewish Home) party that is part of Israel’s ruling coalition.
Her post was shared more than one thousand times and received almost five thousand “Likes.”
Uri Elitzur, to whom she refers, and who died a few months ago, was leader of the settler movement and speechwriter and close advisor to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Here’s a full translation of Shaked’s posting:
This is an article by the late Uri Elitzur, which was written 12 years ago, but remained unpublished. It is as relevant today as it was at the time.
The Palestinian people has declared war on us, and we must respond with war. Not an operation, not a slow-moving one, not low-intensity, not controlled escalation, no destruction of terror infrastructure, no targeted killings. Enough with the oblique references. This is a war. Words have meanings. This is a war. It is not a war against terror, and not a war against extremists, and not even a war against the Palestinian Authority. These too are forms of avoiding reality. This is a war between two people. Who is the enemy? The Palestinian people. Why? Ask them, they started.
I don’t know why it’s so hard for us to define reality with the simple words that language puts at our disposal. Why do we have to make up a new name for the war every other week, just to avoid calling it by its name. What’s so horrifying about understanding that the entire Palestinian people is the enemy? Every war is between two peoples, and in every war the people who started the war, that whole people, is the enemy. A declaration of war is not a war crime. Responding with war certainly is not. Nor is the use of the word “war”, nor a clear definition who the enemy is. Au contraire: the morality of war (yes, there is such a thing) is founded on the assumption that there are wars in this world, and that war is not the normal state of things, and that in wars the enemy is usually an entire people, including its elderly and its women, its cities and its villages, its property and its infrastructure.
And the morality of war knows that it is not possible to refrain from hurting enemy civilians. It does not condemn the British air force, which bombed and totally destroyed the German city of Dresden, or the US planes that destroyed the cities of Poland and wrecked half of Budapest, places whose wretched residents had never done a thing to America, but which had to be destroyed in order to win the war against evil. The morals of war do not require that Russia be brought to trial, though it bombs and destroys towns and neighborhoods in Chechnya. It does not denounce the UN Peacekeeping Forces for killing hundreds of civilians in Angola, nor the NATO forces who bombed Milosevic’s Belgrade, a city with a million civilians, elderly, babies, women, and children. The morals of war accept as correct in principle, not only politically, what America has done in Afghanistan, including the massive bombing of populated places, including the creation of a refugee stream of hundreds of thousands of people who escaped the horrors of war, for thousands of whom there is no home to return to.
And in our war this is sevenfold more correct, because the enemy soldiers hide out among the population, and it is only through its support that they can fight. Behind every terrorist stand dozens of men and women, without whom he could not engage in terrorism. Actors in the war are those who incite in mosques, who write the murderous curricula for schools, who give shelter, who provide vehicles, and all those who honor and give them their moral support. They are all enemy combatants, and their blood shall be on all their heads. Now this also includes the mothers of the martyrs, who send them to hell with flowers and kisses. They should follow their sons, nothing would be more just. They should go, as should the physical homes in which they raised the snakes. Otherwise, more little snakes will be raised there.
Shocking words like this from Israeli leaders have an impact. And they are words backed by actions.
When Israel rampages against the entire Palestinian population, subjecting them to what Human Rights Watch calls “collective punishment,” it sends a clear message to the Israeli public that any Palestinian is fair game for “revenge.”
Shaked evidently has much worse in mind.
Hate trickles down
In another sickening example of the country’s endemic racism, Israeli website shtieble.net, which is oriented toward an Orthodox Jewish audience, referred to lynching victim Muhammad Abu Khudair in a headline as a “little terrorist.”
The hate trickles down. These two images were posted on the photo-sharing website Instagram – they are among hundreds posted on various social media sites inciting “revenge” and celebrating violence against Palestinians.
In the first image, posted on 3 July, an Israeli soldier appears with with a weapon on his shoulder and the word “revenge” with two bloody daggers tatooed or drawn on his back.
The hate trickles down. These two images were posted on the photo-sharing website Instagram – they are among hundreds posted on various social media sites inciting “revenge” and celebrating violence against Palestinians.
In the first image, posted on 3 July, an Israeli soldier appears with with a weapon on his shoulder and the word “revenge” with two bloody daggers tatooed or drawn on his back.
In the second image, posted on 6 July, the badly injured face of Palestinian American 15-year-old Tariq Abukhdeir appears next to an image of a pig.
Abukhdeir was savagely beaten by Israeli forces in eastern occupied Jerusalem last Thursday. He is a cousin of Muhammad Abu Khudair. Not “fringe” |
In a New York Times article today, Isabel Kershner presents the rampant racism that apparently led six Israeli youths to lynch Muhammad Abu Khudair as a “fringe” phenomenon.
It is no such thing. Incitement comes from the top,
Shaked is not alone in inciting this kind of genocidal hatred and it was Netanyahu who was the first to incite “revenge” after the bodies of three murdered Israeli teenagers were found in the West Bank one week ago.
And the Times is not alone in helping to whitewash it.
I strongly recommend David Sheen’s latest article for Muftah on the phenomenon of racism in Israel and its widespread denial: “Jewish Groups’ Whitewash of Israeli Racism Ensures It Will Fester.”
With thanks to Ofer Naiman for assistance with research and Dena Shunra for translation.
It is no such thing. Incitement comes from the top,
Shaked is not alone in inciting this kind of genocidal hatred and it was Netanyahu who was the first to incite “revenge” after the bodies of three murdered Israeli teenagers were found in the West Bank one week ago.
And the Times is not alone in helping to whitewash it.
I strongly recommend David Sheen’s latest article for Muftah on the phenomenon of racism in Israel and its widespread denial: “Jewish Groups’ Whitewash of Israeli Racism Ensures It Will Fester.”
With thanks to Ofer Naiman for assistance with research and Dena Shunra for translation.