Zionists took a stab at "Boycotting, Divesting and Sanctioning" (BDS) artists they charge are doubling as terror supporters and "traitors" in Israel. Liberals and anti-Semites dominating those professions haven't stopped fulminating and blinking in astonishment since the announcements were made last January.
Controversial (a 21st-century word for "conservative") group Im Tirtzu published a blacklist of 117 performers, artists, writers and sundry intelligentsia. The proudly Zionist group notes the accused all openly support terrorists, teach anti-Semitism and/or cheer the Boycott and Divest Sanctions (BDS) that threaten to topple Israel's economy, at the very least. Specifically, Im Tirtzu compiled the list to support Likud Culture Minister Miri Regev's bill that would allow only "loyal" Israelis to receive state funding.
Flustering self-righteous fury erupted across the globe. Liberals went into full "left-beast" mode with hyperbole overdrive. "Im Tirtzu hunts the traitors in the cellar" claimed "Jews for Justice for Palestinians" (who support a number on the list). Tony Greenstein's blog shouts, "Attacks on the Fascist Im Tirtzu – an Exercise in Zionist Hypocrisy." Greenstein also proffers a seal of liberal approval as a "Socialist, anti-Zionist, anti-racist." Self-loathing Jews are required to distance themselves from other Jews to meet progressive standards of purity now.
Im Tirtzu's campaign titled "Moles in Culture" was aggressive, much like the activists they named. Renown Israeli writer Amos Oz is a subject of their scorn and his voice carries a long way. In 2014 Oz characterized the "hilltop youth" of Judea and Samaria as "Jewish neo-Nazis." Oz timed his attacks just a few years after five members of the Fogle family (Jews) were murdered by Palestinian youth in Samaria. Oz refrained from characterizing the murderers as "neo-Nazis." Folk-singer Rona Keinan massively supports BDS and worked against Knesset efforts to defend the nation from it.
Foreign funding for political turmoil is one of the major charges Im Tirtzu leveled at the 117 – big money from the likes of the Ford Foundation, UNICEF, the European Union and other political groups. In a perfect world Oz, Keinan (et al) would end up penniless and shivering in an alley somewhere, thanks to their successful efforts of BDS. Poetic justice.
Leftists in Israel and elsewhere are not accustomed to conservatives making such a fuss, insisting they remain silent so as not to upset the status quo; thus the full frontal assault on Im Tirtzu. Virtually all major media across the world linked arms to denounce Im Tirtzu for "outing" foreign, anti-Israel influence and payments many of the artists/organizations rake in. None of these media geniuses perceive (or will admit) their hypocrisy – hysterically denouncing the idea of a "boycott" against persons and organizations who have been boycotting Israel for years.
After exposing pro-Palestinian NGO "Breaking the Silence" for illegal and pro-terror activates, the group was banned from Israeli schools, where they had been free to indoctrinate for years. Leftists feel public schools are their personal playgrounds and don't take well to being evicted.
Media and spokesmen for most galleries and art groups stormed Im Tirtzu in a fury – under pretense of battling "censorship," of course. Disinformation in headlines like "How Im Tirtzu dominates Israel's Public Discourse" emerged after conservatives actually ventured into media coverage. Leftist hate free speech if it isn't their own. Now even original quotations from Im Tirtzu are disappearing from the internet and replaced by truncated, manipulated sound bites.
Predictably, American rags compared Im Tirtzu with "McCarthyism" – more proof most liberals have never read a history book. McCarthy's blacklisted academics or actors caused some to be unemployed for a period of time or hauled before Congressional hearings. Im Tirtzu isn't looking to prohibit or punish artists, but requests Israel stop paying them to injure the nation.
"We are fighting against the delegitimisation of the state of Israel and organisations and foreign agents funded by foreign governments," they claim. A related Knesset bill sought to force NGOs acting as lobbyists to publicly declare who funds them. Generally, lobbyists can be identified by their name, but using generic "human rights" rhetoric obscures fronts for malicious players. For instance, anti-Israeli NGO "Hamoked" is majorly funded by Norwegian state entities. Why are they lobbying in the Knesset?
Hamoked exists to stoke animosity and resentment against the IDF and Israel. Arguably their accusations of "apartheid," "collective punishment" and "torture" stoke deaths of young soldiers. From their Mission Statement: "Main objective is to assist Palestinians of the Occupied Territories whose rights are violated due to Israel's policies." (Not "may be" violated or "some" Palestinians ... but all of them, all the time.)
Artists with organizations such as "B'Tselem" and "Break the Silence" are sponsored by states opposed to the existence of a Jewish Israel Israel – an incontrovertible fact. While this appears to be legal, leaders of these groups won't accept the right of Im Tirtrzu to publicize it. After years of inciting hatred and violence against Israeli soldiers, Hamoked filed a police report against Im Tirtzu for incitement! (December 2015) So much for freedom of speech in Israel.
Im Tirtzu's claims to combat campaigns of "de-legitimization against Israel" and "Post-Zionist and Anti-Zionist phenomena." Isaac Herzog of the opposing, center-left "Zionist Union" called their accusations a dirty kind of "McCarthyism." Virtually all leftists organizations pulled adjectives "fascist" and "Nazi" out of their hats for daring to confronting them, which proves leftist ideology is thicker than water – and blood and genetics and loyalty and reason and self-preservation.
Sadly, Im Tirtzu leader Matan Peleg couldn't take the hate and folded, apologizing for something his opponents do in their sleep – attacking their ideological enemies. MP Stav Shaffir sounded entirely deranged as she insisted that questioning leftism was incendiary and dangerous. "Im Tirtzu is threatening the foundations of the state of Israel as a democratic and Jewish state!" she railed.
Malcom Dash writing for the Algemeiner offered this cutting commentary on the state of liberalism as it throttles public discourse and truly threatens freedom in Israel and the West: "The left delegitimizes all critical investigation of its activities and shuts down free speech in the name of protecting free speech," avoiding intellectual challenges and debates. Recoil by the left against "public shaming" is a "reaction of the old guard against the empowerment of previously suppressed voices." Leftism batters critics into timid capitulation. "It prevents the free exchange of ideas, encourages self-censorship and leaves people afraid to express their 'non-politically correct' views."
Making love not war? Don't bet on it
Another front on the way to removing all vestiges of Jewishness from Israel comes in the form of a reputed "love story." Hyped as a simple romance between a Jewish woman and Palestinian man with just a whiff of "Romeo and Juliet," the book itself is not the problem.
Compulsion to include "Borderlife" by Dorit Rabinyan as required reading for Hebrew high school classes is a problem. After education officials denied the coveted spot to the romance, spokeswoman Dalia Fenig claimed in the New York Times that the tome "could do more harm than good." She missed her chance to explain the difference between the words "ban" and "choose" for editors at the Times.
Fening mentioned the recent "heightened tensions between Palestinians and Israelis" but there are dozens of other reasons to avoid this particular book. No journalist observes that only Hebrew schools are required to use this. Palestinian schools are busy with their own stuff – Mickey Mouse killing the Jews and bewailing the existence of Israel and so on.
Journalists busy playing sympathetic tunes to multicultural romance missed another important factor. The woman is Jewish and the man is Muslim. This just squeaks past into accordance to Sharia Law, which assumes the woman will convert (or else); "the woman is considered to be Muslim." It also stipulates that all children will belong to the man and the house of Islam. Allowing his child to be raised "kaffir" (Jewish, Christian) he will be considered "Murtid" or one who denies Islam. But it gets worse. The father who loses his children to such a woman misses heaven (and all that eternal flesh!). Straight from the desk of fatwaa issuer Maulana Muhammad Yousef Ludhianvi himself.
Collusion of anti-Israeli media is evident by their lopsided titles on the subject alone. "Jewish-Arab Love Story Excluded From Israeli Classrooms" wept the New York Times. "Jewish-Palestinian Love Story Barred From Israeli School Curriculum" echoed MSN.com, and so they continue the hue and cry.
Google Book Project estimates 129,864,880 books have been published on earth, but for some reason Rabinyan's novel must be required and the other 129,864,879 discarded. Where are the voices of lamentation for them? Ignorance of the liberal press is appalling, but apparently it pays better than reality.
So "Borderlife" is a "love story" but is being used as a political pipe bomb in camouflage. Neither religious Jews nor Muslims believe in marrying outside of their faith and it is offensive to both. Now if the man were Jewish and the woman Muslim, or if they forced this on Muslim teens instead, that would be interesting.
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