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I embrace what Fund espouses. Pride is important and, in the case of Israel, more than justified. From ghettos.to concentration camps to defeating superior enemies to pre=imminence.
What a prideful society must not do is end with arrogance.
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It’s time for Jews to say, ‘Sorry, not sorry’ The age of the apologetic Jew is over.
By Hillel Fuld JNS
For many years, I have felt something that made no sense to me, but I felt it very strongly.
The feeling was that Jews around the world who blatantly support our enemies are worse than our enemies themselves.
There are many examples of this, but to keep it simple, I’m talking about Jews who are ashamed of their identity, Israelis who are ashamed of their country and the combination of the two: Jews who are ashamed of their country and Israelis who are ashamed of their Jewish identity.
Why do these people bother me so much?
Recently, the answer came to me: These people haven’t gotten the memo that Jews don’t have to be apologetic anymore. Throughout our history, we were always apologizing: “Sorry, I won’t learn Torah if it offends you, Greeks.” “Sorry if we destroyed your economy, Germans.”
It’s not new. It’s even in the Torah. We sent spies to examine the land before entering it, and guess what 10 out of 12 came back saying? “I’m sorry. They are too strong. We can’t do this. We’re too small. We’re too insignificant. Sorry, but no.” Today, we no longer have to apologize.
We don’t have to apologize for waving an Israeli flag, for praying on the Temple Mount, for holding a Torah scroll at the Western Wall or for living in our land—all of it. But these people are constantly apologizing: “We’re so sorry about the ‘occupation.’” “We’re so sorry about those crazy religious people who want my kids to know the foundations of our history, our tradition and our religion.” “We’re so sorry about those freaks who want and are willing to fight for every inch of this land.”
“We are so sorry that the citizens of Israel have spoken and democratically elected a right-wing government that realizes that there never was an Arab Palestinian state and there never will be.”
“We’re sorry, America. Please don’t pull your foreign aid. We depend on you.” Those days are over.
We are home and some of us are proud to be home, while others are still stuck in the olden days when Jews would turn the other cheek. Want to know how this manifests? It’s simple: When you are ashamed of who you are, you blame yourself. There are many Jews out there who blame Israel for antisemitism:
“If only we didn’t ‘occupy’ the ‘Palestinians,’ there would be no antisemitism.” “If only those ultra-Orthodox Jews wouldn’t dress like that and stick to their ‘primitive ways,’ people wouldn’t hate us so much.” But they’ll never accept our apology, so it’s time we stop apologizing.
The new government is too right-wing for you? You must have confused me for someone who cares about your opinion. Foreign aid? Go ahead, Biden, try to pull it. Try to boycott Israel, BDS. Go for it, let’s see how that goes for you. We don’t need you any more than you need us.
Allow me to officially declare that the era of the apologetic Jew is dead. It should rest in peace.
Now let me introduce you to a new creature: the proud Jew.
We have a lot to be proud of. 20% of all Nobel prizes have been awarded to Jews. We have the most moral army in the world. We are able to balance our military power with our unwavering need to behave morally and ethically, sometimes too ethically. We lead the world in life-changing tech: Medicine, food, you name it, we are at the forefront of it all.
We took a desert that Mark Twain famously referred to as “a hopeless, dreary, heartbroken land” and transformed it into one of the most flourishing societies in the Middle East and the world, and it only took us 75 years. So, it’s time we all declared the apologetic Jew dead and introduced the world to a new breed of Jew, the proud Jew. If we don’t respect ourselves, how can we expect the world to?
Our new government, despite its shortcomings, represents the proud Jew. There has never been more Torah learning than there is right now. We have never been stronger physically or economically. That’s something to be proud of. This new government will support Torah. It will support the land of Israel—all of it. It will support our needs, not the needs of our enemies.
We have always talked about and prayed for the people of Israel, with the Torah of Israel, in the land of Israel. And now, we have arrived, not yet to the final destination, but we are well on the way. For that, we, the Jewish people, should be proud, not ashamed and apologetic.
Or, in other words: Sorry, not sorry.
Hillel Fuld, named Israel’s top marketer, is a leading journalist, tech advisor, online influencer and expert on Israeli innovation.
And:
‘Petty, miserly’? Following outrage, Google corrects antisemitic definition of ‘Jew’
A search for the definition of ‘Jew’ on Google showed shockingly antisemitic results on Tuesday.
By World Israel News Staff
Until about 1 p.m. (Eastern Time) on Tuesday, Google defined ‘Jew’ in offensive terms such as ‘petty’ and ‘miserly,’ Fox News reported. Such descriptions are based on centuries-old antisemitic tropes.
The top definition that appeared in search results described the word Jew as to “bargain with someone in a miserly or petty way,” with the origin being “in reference to old stereotypes associating Jewish people with trading and moneylending,” the report said.
It was only farther down where Jew was described as “a member of the people and cultural community whose traditional religion is Judaism and who trace their origins through the Hebrew people of Israel to Abraham.”
Indeed, ‘Jew’ is a noun, according to the second – and correct – definition.
FOX News Digital reached out to Google for a statement on the matter.
“Dictionary boxes show definitions from third-party expert sources and might include related images, pronunciations, translations, and other information,” a page on Google’s support website says, Fox noted.
In a section on the site regarding the source for Google’s definitions, the company says it “doesn’t create, write, or modify definitions” and that “Dictionary results don’t reflect the opinions of Google.”
“We license definitions, which include examples, similar and opposite words, and origins, from third-party experts who compile dictionaries…
“Our partners label these terms as vulgar, derogatory, or otherwise offensive to provide proper context about them. We only display an offensive definition by default when it’s the main meaning of the term.”
The reactions came immediately. Some examples:
“Really @Google? This is your go-to definition for ‘Jew?’ Jew hatred has gone completely mainstream. Disgusting,” tweeted Brooke Goldstein, executive director of The Lawfare Project and a founder of the End Jew Hatred movement.
“When one enters ‘jew’ into the Google search engine, a grotesque antisemitic trope comes up. This is unacceptable @Google,” Americans Against Antisemitism tweeted, demanding an immediate explanation.
Israeli diplomat Elad Strohmayer weighed in, saying,“I couldn’t believe it so I googled it myself… hey @Google, what’s antisemitism? This is shocking.”
Aviva Klompas, associate vice president, Israel and Global Jewish Citizenship at Combined Jewish Philanthropies, demanded a correction and an apology.
“If you @Google “Jew” the dictionary definition that comes up can be seen below. This demands immediate attention @Google – an apology, a correction, and a commitment that it never happens again,” she wrote.
‼️This is shocking. If you @Google “Jew” the dictionary definition that comes up can be seen below.
This demands immediate attention @Google – an apology, a correction, and a commitment that it never happens again. pic.twitter.com/GL81Xl5JMg
— Aviva Klompas (@AvivaKlompas) December 27, 2022
By early afternoon, the leading definition provided by the search engine was the noun.
https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/365051
Google apologizes over offensive definition of 'Jew'
Google apologizes after a search of the word "Jew" on the search engine revealed an offensive definition.
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Our cousin's closest friend . They grew up together in Ft. Lauderdale and then moved to Israel. Ron is BIBI's closest and most trusted adviser.
This appointment was expected.
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Ron Dermer to be strategic affairs minister in Netanyahu gov't
Dermer was rumored to be a candidate for foreign minister. He will also sit in the security cabinet and help Netanyahu run Israel-US relations.
Ron Dermer, Israel’s former ambassador to the United States and a close political confidante of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, will serve as minister of strategic affairs in the new government that was sworn in on Thursday at the Knesset.
Dermer was rumored to be a candidate for foreign minister. In the end, Netanyahu appointed Likud MK Eli Cohen to the position, which he announced alongside the announcement of Dermer's appointment.
He also announced that Israel Katz was appointed as energy minister.
He will also sit in the security cabinet and help Netanyahu run Israel-US relations.
Earlier this year, Dermer, who played a central role in achieving the breakthrough Abraham Accords during his tenure as envoy to the US from 2013 to 2021, joined Jerusalem-based investment firm Exigent Capital Group as a partner.
In his role, Dermer focused on deepening and broadening Exigent’s relationships with strategic partners around the world, building on the success of the Abraham Accords to further develop partnerships in the Gulf region and expanding the firm’s activities to include a multi-family-office and wealth management platform.
And:
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The new, new antisemitism
By Victor Davis Hanson
The old antisemitism was more a right-wing than a left-wing phenomenon — perhaps best personified by the now-withered Ku Klux Klan.
A new antisemitism followed from the campus leftism of the 1960s. It arose from and was masked by a general hatred of Israel, following the Jewish state's incredible victory in the 1967 Six-Day War.
That lopsided triumph globally transformed Israel in the leftist mind from a David fighting the Arab Goliath into a veritable Western imperialist, neocolonialist overdog.
On campuses, Middle-East activism, course instruction, and faculty profiles are now virulently anti-Israel — and indistinguishable from anti-Jewishness.
When columnist Ben Shapiro spoke at Stanford University in 2019, left-wing posters were plastered around campus depicting Shapiro as an insect menace. A "BenBGon" bug spray bottle in Nazi fashion unsubtly suggested that a chemical agent is the best remedy to make sure Jews "be gone" from the premises.
The avowed socialist Representative Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., retweeted the old propaganda boast, "From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free."
Tlaib knew well "to the sea" could mean only the extinction of Israel itself and its 9 million Jews. She deleted her tweet, but only after an outcry of protest.
Anti-Zionists and leftist Palestinian activists Linda Sarsour and Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn. — "it's all about the Benjamins" — often made no effort to hide their antisemitism.
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Yet now a dangerous new, new antisemitism is trending, predominantly among African-Americans — especially prominent politicians, celebrities, and billionaires.
The old trope that blacks inordinately were prejudiced against Jews due to past inner-city stereotypes of exploiting Jewish landlords has been recalibrated. It is now repackaged by black elites claiming that their careers are overly profitable to and orchestrated by "the Jews."
It has been difficult to find any major black leader who has not trafficked in antisemitism, whether Jesse Jackson ("Hymietown"), Al Sharpton ("tell them to pin their yarmulkes back"), Louis Farrakhan ("gutter religion"), or former President Barack Obama's former pastor, Jeremiah Wright ("Them Jews").
Yet what is different about the new, new antisemitism is the open defiance, often even or especially when exposed.
Kayne West was met with pushback after warning, "I'm going death con 3 On JEWISH PEOPLE." Yet he trumped that by soon praising Adolf Hitler.
The Black Hebrew movement absurdly claims blacks are the real Biblical Jews, and Jews the imposters. Black Lives Matter clumsily disguised its antisemitism when claiming Israelis were committing mass genocide in the Middle East.
When novelist Alice Walker was chastised for praising virulent antisemite David Icke (he claimed that Jews formed a cabal of "lizard people"), she too was unremorseful. Walker retorted that Icke was "brave" for publishing his nutty rants.
Rappers from Public Enemy and Ice Cube to Jay-Z and Kanye West all spouted anti-Jewish venom. And billionaires, from the late Michael Jackson to LeBron James, dabbled in antisemitic talk, the first in lines from lyrics, the second in retweets.
In the hate-crime statistics, blacks as perpetrators are overrepresented, and, as victims, Jews and Asians are overrepresented. "Knock out the Jew" occasionally resurfaces as a common sport among New York city black youth.
In our "woke" age, race is seen as an indemnity policy for any self-described victim. Thus even elite blacks, as the still oppressed, cannot be seen as oppressors against "white" Jews.
Wokeism's competitive victimization often embraces Holocaust denial. That way the systematic slaughter of 6 million Jews in industrial fashion does not overshadow the need for a reparatory legacy to atone for slavery and Jim Crow.
When Whoopi Goldberg claimed the Holocaust was not about race and was, for a while, suspended from her morning chat show, she only temporarily apologized. Goldberg this week returned to claiming that the Holocaust was only a crime by white people against white people.
In her ignorance, she was oblivious that Hitler and the Nazis did not believe Jews to be fully human at all.
Among black elites in professional sports and entertainment, the belief that Jews inordinately are represented as agents, executives, or commissioners is considered proof of exploitation — and often ridiculously reduced to master-slave psychodramas.
Marquee professional athletes like Kyrie Irving, DeShawn Jackson, and the retired Stephen Jackson only reluctantly backed off their blatant anti-Jewish messaging.
Apparently, if the athletes of the NFL and NBA are approximately 60 percent or more African American, then they are merely diverse. But if Jews in the entertainment and sport hierarchies appear more frequently than their 2.4% demographic, then as a "cabal" they supposedly pose a threat to black livelihoods.
Black antisemitism is spreading in strange, dangerous ways.
Why? Woke orthodoxy offers cover by insisting that supposed victims can never be victimizers. A leftist-dominated media hides or contextualizes the hatreds promulgated by its own constituents.
Jewish-American groups remain predominantly liberal. And too often, they conveniently overlook black antisemitism, given the demands of left-wing intersectional solidarity.
So, expect the new, new antisemitism to grow more common — and more toxic.
( Hanson's latest book is "The Dying Citizen" from Basic Books. Buy it in hardcover at a 36% discount! by clicking here or order in KINDLE edition at a 40% discount by clicking here. Sales help fund JWR.)
(COMMENT, BELOW)
Victor Davis Hanson is the Martin and Illie Anderson Senior Fellow in Residence in Classics and Military History at the Hoover Institution, a professor of classics emeritus at California State University at Fresno, and a nationally syndicated columnist for Tribune Media Services.
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Where's the mass media's commentary? They attacked Trump's appointments incessantly.
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Pete Buttigieg, Air Traffic Controller
The Editorial Board
Don’t laugh. Mr. Buttigieg’s department said Monday it will investigate Southwest’s “unacceptable rate of cancellations and delays.” It will also “take action” to hold the carrier “accountable,” as if the airline isn’t eager enough to make things right.
Congress is also doing what it does best: Shoot the wounded. Senate Commerce Chair Maria Cantwell announced a probe, while Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren is using the mess to complain as usual about airline consolidation. She wants Mr. Buttigieg to block a merger between JetBlue and Spirit Airlines.
The Christmas week storm caused thousands of flight cancellations, though most airlines are recovering. Southwest’s problems roll on, with the carrier cutting 60% of its schedule Tuesday and Wednesday. One problem seems to be outdated technology that failed to match crews to planes, as Southwest’s “point-to-point” network stranded aircraft across the U.S. CEO Bob Jordan has apologized.
But Democrats care less about stranded passengers than they do about gaining more federal control over the airline industry. Carriers are already required to refund when flights are canceled or “significantly changed.” Mr. Buttigieg proposed a new rule in August that requires airlines to provide refunds if flights are delayed more than three hours, increase the number of connections, land at a different airport, or use a “downgraded” type of aircraft. The rule would also force airlines that received federal pandemic aid to provide credits if a passenger says he can’t fly because of Covid.
In mid-December, a bipartisan group of 34 state attorneys general wrote Mr. Buttigieg demanding that the rule also give state AGs new power to enforce airline consumer-protection laws. The AGs want to force airlines to advertise and sell only flights for which they have “adequate personnel to fly and support,” as well as pay “significant fines” for delays or cancellations that are “not weather-related.” But airlines can’t control the weather, and sometimes crews fail to show or end up stranded.
Airlines have struggled this year, but government has contributed to the problem. Covid lockdowns cost them business for two years. The federal aid that kept them afloat came with a mandate not to lay off or furlough employees. This caused airlines to offer retirement and buyout packages to preserve cash, leading to a pilot and crew shortage.
Mr. Buttigieg’s new rule won’t reduce turbulence. Some airlines already lure customers with the promise of refunds for delays under three hours. Refund policies are built into ticket prices, allowing passengers to choose their level of protection. Stripping airlines of their ability to compete on refunds and other things won’t help customers.
Requiring carriers to add unnecessary employees is inefficient, a sop to unions, and a recipe for higher fares. Imposing fines for non-weather-related delays or cancellations will put new pressure on airlines to cut other corners. The last thing the nation needs is 50 new state airline regulators.
Washington receded from airline management in the 1970s, and the ensuing competition opened air travel to the masses. Politicians love to kick an industry when it’s down, but passengers can take their market revenge on Southwest without political help that will make air travel worse and more expensive.
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In Cuba, Russia Explores a Counter
Thoughts in and around geopolitics.
By: George Friedman
Yesterday, Russia announced that President Vladimir Putin would have an important phone call later in the day, without revealing whom he would talk to. To the surprise of many, it was Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel. The subject of their conversation was energy and industry, and though they may well have talked about both, the suspense Moscow built around the conversation suggests the call was more important than the buying and selling of crude.
I’ve written before about how important Cuba is to U.S. security. It’s the reason Washington has been obsessed with Cuba since Theodore Roosevelt and the Rough Riders, and why the Cuban Missile Crisis was in Cuba and not somewhere else. Back then, the threat was over Russian nukes in Cuba. Today that is not a threat, as both sides have intercontinental ballistic missiles. But there is another threat. This time around, the threat is the blockading of ports along the Gulf of Mexico – places such as Beaumont and New Orleans – that are utterly vital to U.S. trade.
Blockading these ports would deal a serious blow to the U.S. economy. Cuban waters between the United States and Mexico are relatively narrow waterways that could be closed by submarines, aircraft and anti-ship missiles launched from multiple platforms. It is one of the most vulnerable and valuable chokepoints in North America. I suspect that this is what Moscow secretly had in mind in the early 1960s.
Either way, Russia has been fixated on Cuba for decades. For Moscow, Cuba was the key to Latin America and, as important, a perpetual irritant to the United States. Today, the United States is supporting Ukraine, overseeing blockades on dollars and goods, holding a force on standby in the Mediterranean Sea. Russia desperately needs a counter. Using nuclear weapons against the United States would result in the near-immediate death of Russian leadership. Economic pain inflicted in Cuban waters may be just what Moscow is looking for.
None of this means a blockade would succeed, even if it were imposed. Far from it. All the phone call itself means is that the U.S. would have to dust off old contingency plans – of the economic costs of Russian blockades, the risks involved in countering that blockade, and so on. Conversations may go from how to further damage Russia to how much damage Russia might be able to impose. It’s less than Russia needs to inflict, but the psychological impact of a Russian force off the U.S. coast could generate a shift in U.S. psychology. The Russian force would be vulnerable to decimation by U.S. forces, but during that time they could launch conventional weapons at the U.S. But even then, that would not be the goal; the goal would be to redefine the U.S. perception of the risks it’s running by antagonizing Russia.
Cuba, for its part, still reeling economically and feeling embattled by the U.S. as a matter of habit, would welcome Russia. Cuba mattered when the Russians were there, far less with Russia distant. For Havana, a battle pivoting around them is valuable. For Moscow, it would provide home ports. For Washington, it would provide targets.
I doubt that the Russians will go this far, but they urgently need a tool to make the Americans see war with Russia as risky. Putin wanted to put this possibility on the table. Even if Russia and Cuba only talked about energy and industry, it might create a threat, and that was certainly worth a phone call.
A referral is the best compliment.
Feel free to forward this email to friends and colleagues.
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The “big red wave” never did materialize, but this much did happen – Republicans did win the House, prompting alarm among Liberals.
What it means, then, is that they don’t control EVERYTHING. The Senate, the White House, the schools, the Arts, entertainment, the media, all that and more belong to them.
But not the House of Representatives – so no wonder it’s got them frantic. To them, life is so unfair if they don’t get EVERYTHING they WANT. That is their Liberalism 101.
Then along comes GOP Rep, Kevin McCarthy…possibly the Speaker when the House turns red come Jan 3, to say that once he’s in, Ilhan Omar is out.
Omar. Dem/Minnesota represents Somalia in Congress… or so it seems. Her district is rampant with crime because of neglect. She came from there, from Somalia, to introduce their ways, their biases, their intolerance, to conflict with our ways of Judeo/Christian values. She is a mouse that roars.
If you like unbridled diversity, then you must love Omar, the Squad, and the millions drifting in through our Mexico border illegally and unchecked. Presto, and soon they will be voting, just as Omar slipped stealthily into Congress.
She will still be in the House, of course…too late, and too bad she can’t be dumped altogether…but she will be gone from the Foreign Relations Committee,
This has sparked outrage among some Jewish Liberal organizations…well, they say they are Jewish…who find her views perfectly and wonderfully acceptable. Themselves treyf, they declare her kosher.
In fact, they deny…these groups like J-Street…Americans for Peace Now…etc etc…that she is an Israel accuser, and that she is antisemitic towards Jews in America. That’s like saying Mengele meant no harm.
From her tweets that compare Israel to Hamas, and then attack American Jews as disloyal, and greedy, you have to say that if it quacks like a duck, it is a duck.
Indeed, a while back, the House itself thought so. in 2019, she was brought up for censure when even her fellow Democrats thought her anti-Jewish slurs had gone too far. In the end, alas, they let her off the hook and voted to condemn all forms of bigotry, to obscure the message, and to make the point that Islamophobia is just as bad. Islamophobia is where she runs for cover. That is her default position when she is challenged or even questioned.
Like that, the game of tagging everyone else as racist has become the refuge of scoundrels.
Yet hate crimes against Muslims remain steady at about four percent; towards Jews, 60 percent, and climbing.
About these particular leftist Jewish groups, the mask is off. They put on a show about caring for Israel when all they really want is Israel on their terms. They want Israel dispersed, and handed over to the Palestinian Arabs. They say so in dulcet tones, to make an impression of being reasonable, even pro-Israel, but like Omar, their sweetheart, their smell is rancid.
Pay them no mind. Consider them crazy for being heretics. For the real deal…true American supporters for a strong Israel… turn to organizations like ZOA, Zionist Organization of America, and CJV, Coalition for Jewish Values.
Amen, then, for Jewish sovereignty over the Land, as it was, is, and always will be.
Originally published in the Israel National News
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The Republicans’ Mitch McConnell Problem
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Dear Richard,
I hear from people all the time that Thomas Sowell is one of their heroes. For those people—and you may be among them—I’m thrilled to share a digital copy of one of his commentaries with you, absolutely free: “Trickle Down” Theory and “Tax Cuts for the Rich.”
“Tax cuts for the rich” is a favorite argument of those who oppose lower tax rates. But does imposing higher tax rates on wealthy Americans actually increase the amount of revenue coming into the federal government?
Hoover Institution Senior Fellow Thomas Sowell takes an empirical approach in his commentary, “Trickle Down” Theory and “Tax Cuts for the Rich.”
Sowell separates fact from fiction when it comes to tax rates and uses real life data and examples to prove that lower tax rates for all actually lead to greater revenue for the government.
As a friend and supporter of the Hoover Institution, we are proud to offer you this valuable, thought-provoking resource free of charge. Click here to get your free copy of “Trickle Down” Theory and “Tax Cuts for the Rich” now.
Thanks,
Greg Stamps | Online Development
Hoover Institution | Stanford University
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