Israel's National Ballet Company's show in Vermont interrupted by pro-Palestinian protestors who force their way into theater


Pro-Palestinian groups headed by Adalah – The Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel, staged a protest rally outside an Israeli Ballet performance in the Flynn Theater in Burlington, Vermont, on Friday.  According to an Israel Radio report, four demonstrators eventually forced their way into the theater, waving signs.  Local police, who promptly arrived at the scene and escorted the demonstrators outside. The show resumed after a short intermission.


The Israel Ballet Company is currently touring the US as part of an official state campaign, and is scheduled to perform in [Brooklyn at Brooklyn College on Sunday ]Buffalo, Brookline and Washington.

-Adapted from a Ynetnews.com  report
 

Dallas Islamic Leader Deported

Dallas Islamic Leader, Former CAIR National Board Member,  Deported

Government links him to terror groups

By SCOTT GORDON

Updated 6:04 PM CST, Fri, Feb 19, 2010

An immigration judge in Dallas on Friday ordered an outspoken Islamic leader deported after the U.S. government alleged he had ties to terrorist groups in the Middle East.

Nabil Sadoun, a Dallas resident and former board member of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, or CAIR, was deported to his native Jordan after he failed to appear at his immigration hearing. He entered the U.S. in August 1993.

Sadoun's attorney, Kimberly Kinser, said he was already in Jordan and was unable to return to Texas because the government had taken his permanent resident card, or green card.

She denied he was tied to any terrorist groups.

In the hearing, Judge Anthony Rogers of the Executive Office for Immigration Review, said Sadoun "made a decision to leave the U.S." and forfeited his right to fight his deportation. He said the decision was final and could not be appealed.

In court, the judge made vague references to the government's voluminous motion to deport him, including alleged involvement with Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood. The judge concluded Sadoun lied on government forms when he denied he was a member.

The judge also indicated there was evidence Sadoun contributed to the Richardson-based Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development, which was the largest Islamic charity in the United States. Prosecutors convicted the group of funneling money to terrorist groups and several of its leaders were sent to prison. In the case, CAIR was named an unindicted co-conspirator.

The judge's comments in court provided the only window into the allegations against Sadoun. The documents detailing charges made by the Department of Homeland Security were not publicly available.

Ibrahim Hooper, a CAIR spokesman, said Sadoun left the organization several months ago.

Asked the reason for his departure, Hooper said, "Board members come on, (and) they leave."

Over the years, Sadoun made public comments critical of Israel, but Rogers said he considered the remarks free speech and gave them no weight in the decision to deport him, "no matter how distasteful they are to this court."

CAMERA: "What Often Happens to Israel's Critics" ?

From CAMERA,  2/19/2010

Andrew Sullivan, in a series of recent posts his blog The Daily Dish, purports to describe "What often happens to Israel's critics."

What happens, we're meant to believe, is that these critics are met by little more than "smears and character assassinations."

Of course we've heard this all before from the likes of former president Jimmy Carter, Gaza investigator Richard Goldstone, and Independent columnist Johann Hari. And of course, in each of these cases, the cry of "character assassination" was intended to denigrate and distract from the many serious, substantive critiques of their work. Put another way, the smears were not targeted at Israel's critics, but rather employed by them and directed at the critics' critics (including CAMERA).

But what about the latest charge by Sullivan?

Well, his exhibit one is nothing other than a repeat of a May 2008 column by Johann Hari. Apparently Sullivan hadn't seen the Hari column until now. And apparently he didn't realize, or didn't care to reveal to his readers, that Hari's accusation has long been debunked.

Discussing the reaction to a column he wrote blaming Jewish settlements for poisoning Palestinian land and water with untreated sewage, Hari claimed, and Sullivan echoed nearly a year later,

There was little attempt to dispute the facts I offered. Instead, some of the most high profile "pro-Israel" writers and media monitoring groups – including Honest Reporting and Camera – said I an anti-Jewish bigot akin to Joseph Goebbels and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad ...

Which might be very convincing, were it not yet another distortion by Hari. CAMERA has, in fact, never compared Hari to Goebbels or Ahmadinejad, and very much did dispute the substance of his piece (including inter alia by pointing out the key fact that Hari concealed: that Palestinians are by far the major source of untreated sewage in the West Bank. See rebuttals of Hari's column, e.g., here and here.)

So, understood with all the relevant facts, here is "what often happens to Israel's critics": They sometimes falsify or otherwise distort the facts in relentless attacks on Israel. When that's the case (and also when people disagree with their logic for other reasons) they are often criticized by others, who fact-check, add context and debate ideas. When that happens, Israel's critics often pretend that the criticism amounts to little more than ad hominem smears, and fail to reply to the substance of the challenges.

Plus ca change.

Disclaimer [by CAMERA]: This blog post is in no way charging Andrew Sullivan with being an antisemite. That's left for others to debate.

Iranian President: End of US Supremacy Imminent

TEHRAN (FNA, 2/18/2010) - Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad stressed that the US would soon have to face the end of its supremacy due to the country's wrong approaches towards international issues.

"The US supremacy is melting away just like snow in front of the sun," Ahmadinejad said in a meeting with the Belarusian Foreign Minister Sergei Martynov in Tehran on Wednesday.

This means that in the near future the political trend of the world will change and a great transformation will take place.

"Mr. Obama and its friends or even his rivals cannot change the trend, so we should become ready for the changes in the future," the Iranian president stated.
----
http://english.farsnews.com/newstext.php?nn=8811290671 

Judea Pearl: Roger Cohen's Game with Israel

Roger Cohen’s Game With Israel

By Judea Pearl    February 16, 2010

http://www.jewishjournal.com/ judea_pearl/article/roger_cohens_game_with_israel_20100216/

For the life of me, I wish I could be a professional analyst — someone who makes a living telling people what world leaders think, why they think the way they do,
why what they think is not what they say and how we ought to act knowing what they truly have in mind.

The nice thing about being an analyst is that no one cares if you are right or wrong; it is the sound of your conclusions that count, not the veracity of your premises.

Take Roger Cohen, for example, and his recent New York Times column “Hard Mideast Truths” (Feb. 11), which a friend sent me with a grim comment: “Only Peres is left of the founding leaders of Israel…. Israel needs peace to survive in the long run.”

Cohen is the Times columnist who spent months, perhaps years, on a tireless campaign to convince the West that the Iranian regime does not deserve our suspicion, that it can be reasoned with like any other regime and that it does not suffer from an irrational form of fanaticism. Cohen’s campaign was shattered last June by the reality of the Iranian election, its brutal aftermath and the deceptive progress of Iran’s nuclear capability.

One would think that an analyst who fails so miserably in reading the minds of the ayatollah would acquire some measure of humility or introspection before reclaiming an authoritative posture as a mind reader. A prudent analyst would take a year or two to examine one’s premises, scrutinize one’s inference-making processes or reboot one’s ideology and logical machinery.

Not Cohen. The ink is still wet on his “I erred in underestimating the brutality and cynicism of a regime that understands the uses of ruthlessness” (New York Times, June 14, 2009), and Cohen is back with the same style of logic, same underestimating premises, same conclusion-driven inferences, to offer a brilliant solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

His solution is predictable: “It does not make sense for America to bankroll Israeli policies that undermine U.S. strategic objectives,” therefore, the United States should punish Israel into action on all fronts; settlements, negotiation with Hammas, security compromises and more. But Cohen’s motive has a new twist: It is all for Israel’s own good, otherwise, “what then will become of the Zionist dream?” Israelis are too dumb, so the message reads, to understand that they need peace to survive in a long run, and only New York analysts understand the urgency of this need, and only they can come up with original and innovative solutions to Israel’s future. Israelis, with all their experts, historians, statesmen, peace activists, visionaries, philosophers and, yes, analysts are incapable of thinking out of the box; Cohen can, as he did on Iran.

I lament the day I chose to become a scientist. If any of my theories ever turn out to be wrong, God forbid, no journal would dare print my articles again, and all my theories would forever be suspect of dubious intentions. Not Cohen. He can twist reality at will, and readers continue to swallow his logic, axiom after an axiom, lemma after lemma, as long as the conclusion harmonizes with what they wish to hear: We can fix everything — just push whatever moves.

Take Cohen’s reasons for negotiating with Hammas. “The Hamas charter is vile,” Cohen admits, “but the breakthrough Oslo accords were negotiated in 1993, three years before the Palestine Liberation Organization revoked the annihilationist clauses in its charter. When Arafat and Rabin shook hands on the White House lawn, that destroy-Israel charter was intact. Things change through negotiation, not otherwise. If there are Taliban elements worth engaging, are there really no such elements in the broad movements that are Hamas and Hezbollah?”

If only I were an analyst, I would be exonerated from checking the facts, and I would be spared the embarrassment of finding that the Oslo accords were negotiated only after Arafat proclaimed, three years earlier, before the U.N. General Assembly in Geneva (Dec. 13, 1988) that the Palestinian National Council renounced “all types of terrorism” and had accepted resolutions 242 and 338 as a basis for negotiations (in truth, it did not, but the world heard what it yearned to hear).

As an analyst, I would not need to find out that things did not exactly change through those negotiations in the 1990s — the PLO, to this very day, has not amended the annihilationist clauses in its charter, as openly admitted by Farouq Kadoumi in an interview with a Jordanian newspaper (Al-Arab, April 22, 2004; see Benny Morris’ book “One State, Two States” for a detailed chronology).

On the contrary, an intractable Gordian knot has been created: Every Westerner now believes the charter is amended; every Palestinian says it is amended but believes it is not, and every Israeli knows what Palestinians believe. Not a healthy mindset for peace negotiations.

Most importantly, as a scientist, I would be obliged to acknowledge competing theories. For example, that the blood-soaked Second Intifada erupted precisely because Clinton and Rabin did not insist on seeing an Arabic text of an amended PLO charter on the White House lawn. Their naiveté, so the theory goes, gave Arafat the illusion that as long as the West buys into his double-talk, Palestinians are exempt from doing any homework toward peace. It subsequently made Israelis doubly suspicious of Palestinian proclamations and reinforced Palestinians’ delusion that they can achieve sovereignty without internalizing Israel’s permanency. Cohen now hands them another reinforcement and, once again, all in the name of peace.

Competing theories are cherished by scientists and abhorred by analysts. For a scientist, such theories pinpoint experiments one must conduct and questions one needs to ask; for an analyst, they just spoil the music of the wished-for punch line. Cohen, for example, simply “knows” that “the ‘existential threat’ to Israel is overplayed” — competing theories, elaborating on Israel precarious position do not deserve his attention. The dreadful sight of 40,000 unstoppable Hezbollah rockets aimed at civilian population centers in Israel does not deserve the attention of omniscient analysts. And I purposely do not mention the Iranian nuclear threat, Cohen’s specialty, or whether Israeli society can survive the dead, wounded, maimed and orphaned victims of any massive modern-day assault, because the consequences of competing David-Goliath theories are not on the moral screen of astute analysts like Cohen.

Or take Cohen’s manifesto of morality: “... past persecution of the Jews cannot be a license to subjugate another people, the Palestinians.” The competing theory, according to which Israel relentlessly seeks ways to extricate itself from an unwanted occupation, while Palestinians reject the very notion of end-of-conflict, will forever remain the province of scientists; analysts have a license to ignore the hard evidence that pours out of Palestinian media, schools and public discourse, which spoils the music of a wished-for theory.

Oh, that I might become an analyst someday — mesmerized by wished conclusions, falling for my own conjectures and liberated from the bonds of truth.

Judea Pearl is a professor at UCLA and president of the Daniel Pearl Foundation (danielpearl.org), named after his son. He is a co-editor of “I Am Jewish: Personal Reflections Inspired by the Last Words of Daniel Pearl” (Jewish Lights, 2004), winner of the National Jewish Book Award.

Wiesel: Goldstone Gaza Report "a crime against the Jewish people."

[Elie] Wiesel blasted Judge Richard Goldstone, saying his report on the Israeli offensive in Gaza was "a crime against the Jewish people."

"One thing is clear, that document was unnecessary, and that man [Goldstone] who has a good reputation, who I have known for many years, should have declined the offer to head the committee, because of the anti-Israel mandate which called for it's establishment," Wiesel said. 
-- Ha'aretz  2/9/2010

Disruption of Israeli speakers on campus is denial of free speech

Freedom of speech on college campuses *must* be protected. The public needs to be aware of the orchestrated disruption of Israeli speakers on campuses.   "There is no right to a 'heckler's veto.' "   

If you are concerned about this growing tactic and would like further information, contact JCRC of the Jewish Federation of Greater Des Moines at jcrc@dmjfed.org

Dean: UCI protesters violated free speech   February 10th, 2010

Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of the UC Irvine School of Law and an internationally-renowned expert on the Constitution, says that the students who yelled at Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren during a campus lecture Monday were suppressing free speech. (Coverage of protest.)


Eleven students — eight from UCI, three from UC Riverside — were arrested by campus police and cited for disrupting a public event. The arrests occurred while Oren was trying to discuss U.S.-Israel relations before an audience of 500 people in the UCI Student Center.
“They shouted him down,” Chemerinsky said. “Imagine if they had brought their own speaker and that person had been shouted down. There would be no free speech. There is no right to a ‘heckler’s veto’ “.

University officials announced before the lecture that Oren would answer questions from the audience at the end of his talk, a plan that was canceled after the ambassador was interrupted on 10 separate occasions by protesters. Police escorted each protester from the auditorium, which Chemerinsky says the police were entitled to do.

ADL Dismayed At Confrontational Tactics Aimed At Israeli Speakers On Campus

New York, NY, February 9, 2010 … The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) today expressed concern over the increasing use of undemocratic, bullying, confrontational tactics intended to silence Israeli officials and the expression of pro-Israel views on campus.

"America's college campuses are the cradle of our democracy, where the marketplace of ideas thrives and young people – often for the first time – are exposed to new and different ideas," said Abraham H. Foxman, ADL National Director.   

"Unfortunately, anti-Israel activists on our campuses are increasingly resorting to undemocratic, bullying, confrontational tactics in order to silence Israeli officials and the expression of pro-Israel views.  Such mean-spirited efforts to stifle speech have no place in an academic environment where speakers need to be free to express their ideas – and interested audiences have a right to hear those ideas – without fear or intimidation."

Continuing on a trend that began in earnest last year by anti-Israel activists, Israeli officials have been shouted down, heckled and otherwise intimidated by students and other protesters.  These disruptions have resulted in the arrests of some students and the removal of others, and required security to escort the pro-Israel speakers out of the venues as a protective measure.

"While students and community members certainly have the right to engage in peaceable protest, the tactics employed by anti-Israel activists have significantly disrupted the speakers and prevented the free flow of information and ideas that are so critical in a democracy," said Mr. Foxman.

The most recent incidents, other than at UC-Irvine:

·  University of California, Los Angeles: Anti-Israel activists disrupted a talk at the law school by Daniel Taub, Senior Deputy Legal Adviser to the Israeli Foreign Ministry, on February 8. Audience members wearing t-shirts with anti-Israel messages and duct tape covering their mouths, stood up and blocked views of the stage. They were asked to leave by the faculty members multiple times before being escorted out by campus police.

·   University of Pittsburgh: Anti-Israel activists disrupted a talk by former Israeli Knesset member Effie Eitam on February 3.  Interruptions occurred throughout the speech. Some of the protesters were asked to leave the building by campus Hillel, which organized the event. Approximately 25 individuals participated in a protest outside of the venue, organized by the university's chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine and a local peace and justice center.