Elie Wiesel: Hamas, stop using children as shields

Elie Wiesel Hamas Child Sacrifice

Elie Wiesel Hamas Child Sacrifice

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Elie Wiesel Condemns Hamas for Using Children as Human Shields, Calls on Gazans to Reject Hamas’s Child Sacrifice

by Joshua Levitt August 1, 2014 https://www.algemeiner.com/2014/08/01/elie-wiesel-condemns-hamas-for-using-children-as-human-shields-calls-on-gazans-to-reject-hamass-child-sacrifice/

Eliezer "Elie" Wiesel KBE (/ˈɛli vɨˈzɛl/; born September 30, 1928) is a Romanian-born Jewish-American[1] professor and political activist. He is the author of 57 books, including Night, a work based on his experiences as a prisoner in the Auschwitz, Buna, and Buchenwald concentration camps. Wiesel is also the Advisory Board chairman of the newspaper Algemeiner Journal. When Wiesel was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1986, the Norwegian Nobel Committee called him a "messenger to mankind", stating that through his struggle to come to terms with "his own personal experience of total humiliation and of the utter contempt for humanity shown in Hitler's death camps", as well as his "practical work in the cause of peace". Wiesel had delivered a powerful message "of peace, atonement and human dignity" to humanity.

Eliezer “Elie” Wiesel KBE (/ˈɛli vɨˈzɛl/; born September 30, 1928) is a Romanian-born Jewish-American[1] professor and political activist. He is the author of 57 books, including Night, a work based on his experiences as a prisoner in the Auschwitz, Buna, and Buchenwald concentration camps. Wiesel is also the Advisory Board chairman of the newspaper Algemeiner Journal. When Wiesel was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1986, the Norwegian Nobel Committee called him a “messenger to mankind”, stating that through his struggle to come to terms with “his own personal experience of total humiliation and of the utter contempt for humanity shown in Hitler’s death camps”, as well as his “practical work in the cause of peace”. Wiesel had delivered a powerful message “of peace, atonement and human dignity” to humanity.

Nobel Peace Laureate Elie Wiesel on Friday published a full-page ad in U.S. newspapers condemning Hamas for using children as human shields. Provocatively, Wiesel’s paid Op-Ed was headlined, “Jews rejected child sacrifice 3,500 years ago. Now it’s Hamas’s turn.”The body of the letter “invokes the story of Abraham and the sacrifice of Isaac to frame the modern conflict between Israel and Hamas,” said Rabbi Shmuley Boteach, whose organization, This World: The Values Network, created the ad campaign.“Wiesel states that though Abraham lifts his knife to sacrifice his own son Isaac, his hand is stayed by God’s own command, thereby rejecting child sacrifice forever,” Boteach said. “Wiesel argues that while the suffering of those in Gaza is immense and a true tragedy, the blame lies solely with Hamas who use children as human shields and stores rockets and ammunition in nurseries, schools, hospitals, and family homes.”Boteach said the rationale of the campaign was “to bring one of the greatest moral voices or our time and one of the most respected human beings alive, who bore witness to the atrocities of genocide and the Holocaust, to respond to the ugly and fraudulent criticisms of Israel and call for an end to the genocidal aspirations of Hamas.”Boteach said, “Hamas’s charter is clear — they seek the annihilation of the State of Israel and the murder of Jews wherever they may be found.”“Not only is it unreasonable to ask Israel not to defend itself against rockets launched and tunnels dug by Hamas with the intent to destroy, it is also deeply immoral,” he said. “If Israel did not resist the terrorists of Hamas, it would be guilty of contempt for the lives of its own citizens.”“We all lament the loss of Palestinian life brought about by the murderous Hamas regime,” Boteach said. “This is especially true of the children. That is why we have produced this advertising campaign with Elie Wiesel, to stop the terrorist cowards of Hamas from hiding behind innocent children and pregnant women.”Boteach said his mission is “to promote universal Jewish values and the light of the Jewish people.”“Israel is the supreme embodiment of these Jewish values, in which we all take such immense pride. Israel is a culture of life which promotes the infinite value of life while Hamas is a gay-murdering, women-honor-killing, deeply-misogynistic, stone-age, barbaric-terrorist death cult dedicated to genocide.”“Hamas is an affront to peace-loving Muslims everywhere who should join us in its condemnation,” he said. “And we Jews will join the fight with our brothers in Israel against Hamas until peace prevails.”

The full page Op-Ed ad will appear in The Washington Post, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Chicago Tribune, The Los Angeles Times, The Miami Herald, as well as in ads on social media, while a television campaign is also planned.

As well as a long career as an author, professor at Boston University, and humanitarian, Wiesel, 85, is also Chairman of The Algemeiner’s Advisory Board, and was even approached earlier this year by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to succeed Shimon Peres as President of the State of Israel. Wiesel said he was flattered, but turned down the job: “Why should I be president? Leave me alone. I write books,” he said. In the end, Reuven “Ruby” Rivlin, 74, former Israeli Minister of Communications and the speaker of Israel’s Knesset, and whose family has lived in Jerusalem since 1809, was sworn in as Israel’s 10th president, on July 24th, in the midst of Operation Protective Edge against Hamas.
The full text of Elie Wiesel’s paid Op-Ed is below:

‘Jews rejected child sacrifice 3,500 years ago’

More than three thousand years ago, Abraham had two children. One son had been sent into the wilderness and was in danger of dying. God saved him with water from a spring.

The other son was bound, his throat about to be cut by his own father. But God stayed the knife. Both sons – Ishmael and Isaac – received promises that they would father great nations.

With these narratives, monotheism and western civilization begin. And the Canaanite practices of child sacrifice to Moloch are forever left behind by the descendants of Abraham.

Except they are not.

In my own lifetime, I have seen Jewish children thrown into the fire. And now I have seen Muslim children used as human shields, in both cases, by worshippers of death cults indistinguishable from that of the Molochites.

What we are suffering through today is not a battle of Jew versus Arab or Israeli versus Palestinian. Rather, it is a battle between those who celebrate life and those who champion death. It is a battle of civilization versus barbarism.

Do the two cultures that brought us the Psalms of David and the rich libraries of the Ottoman Empire not share a love of life, of transmitting wisdom and opportunity to their children? And is any of this discernible in the dark future offered by Hamas to Arab children, to be suicide bombers or human shields for rockets?

Palestinian parents want a hopeful future for their children, just like Israeli parents do. And both should be joining together in peace.

But before sleepless mothers in both Gaza City and Tel Aviv can rest, before diplomats can begin in earnest the crucial business of rebuilding dialogue… the Hamas death cult must be confronted for what it is.

Moderate men and women of faith, whether that faith is in God or man, must shift their criticism from the Israeli soldiers – whose terrible choice is to fire and risk harming human shields, or hold their fire and risk the death of their loved ones – to the terrorists who have taken away all choice from the Palestinian children of Gaza.

I call upon the Palestinian people to find true Muslims to represent them, Muslims who would never voluntarily place a child in danger.

I call upon President Obama and the leaders of the world to condemn Hamas’ use of children as human shields.

And I enjoin the American public to stand firmly with the people of Israel who are in yet another struggle for survival, and with the suffering people of Gaza who reject terror and embrace peace.

Let us return child sacrifice to the darkest corner of history, and work towards a brighter future with those who choose life, Arabs and Jews alike, all of us Abraham’s children.

Arutz Sheva http://www.israelnationalnews.com/

Captured Hamas Manual Encourages Human Shields

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Hamas 'urban warfare' manual urges terrorists to exploit IDF's desire to avoid civilian casualties, says destroying homes bolsters support.

Hamas ‘urban warfare’ manual urges terrorists to exploit IDF’s desire to avoid civilian casualties, says destroying homes bolsters support.

Hamas ‘urban warfare’ manual urges terrorists to exploit IDF’s desire to avoid civilian casualties, says destroying homes bolsters support.

Ari Soffer , 05August2014 https://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/183757

The IDF has published excerpts from a captured Hamas combat manual on “Urban Warfare”, showing how the Islamist terrorist group exploits civilian casualties – and the knowledge that the IDF will seek to avoid them – to its advantage.

The IDF says the manual was captured in Shujaiya suburb of Gaza City, which was the scene of particularly heavy fighting between Israeli forces and Hamas and Islamic Jihad terrorists.

Among other things, the manual urges Hamas fighters to exploit the IDF’s desire to minimize civilian casualties, noting:

The soldiers and commanders (of the IDF) must limit their use of weapons and tactics that lead to the harm and unnecessary loss of people and [destruction of] civilian facilities. It is difficult for them to get the most use out of their firearms, especially of supporting fire [e.g. artillery].”

Echoing official Hamas rhetoric, which glorifies civilians used as human shields as “holy warriors” and “martyrs”, the manual says that the “presence of civilians are pockets of resistance”, in that their presence can contribute to the organization’s war effort in three specific ways:

(1) Problems with opening fire
(2) Problems in controlling the civilian population during operations and afterward
(3) Assurance of supplying medical care to civilians who need it

Apart from the use of human shields, the manual also sheds light on Hamas’s use of the civilian infrastructure of Gaza to rally support.

Much of Hamas’s military infrastructure and hardware is stored in residential homes – usually of its members – complicating the IDF’s efforts to reach them in aerial strikes.

An expose by Indian NDTV highlighted how terrorists deliberately set up rocket launchpads in heavily-populated residential areas, risking severe collateral damage in the event of an IDF retaliation. Thee manual illustrates how even if civilians heed IDF warning to leave – which Hamas encourages them to ignore – the destruction to homes can be used to their advantage as well:

manual-shaiya text

manual-shaiya text

The destruction of civilian homes: This increases the hatred of the citizens towards the attackers [the IDF] and increases their gathering [support] around the city defenders (resistance forces[i.e. Hamas]).

Illustrating the point, a recent AFP report told of how a Palestinian civilian returned to his house following the 72-hour ceasefire currently in effect – only to find evidence it had been taken over and used as a military position by terrorists.

“Is this is really my town?” asked Khayri Hasan al-Masri, a father of three who returned to heavily-damaged Beit Hanun in the north for the first time since fleeing for his life when the ground offensive began on July 17. Gaping holes have pierced the walls of his home. There is a mortar in the living room, a bazooka upstairs.

“What am I going to tell my wife and children? I don’t want them to see this! They will go crazy. How can I explain all this?” he sighed, crunching over debris.

New map confirms: the Shuja’iya neighborhood is a terrorist stronghold where Hamas uses residents as human shields. pic.twitter.com/NVTPEbydq4

New map confirms: the Shuja’iya neighborhood is a terrorist stronghold where Hamas uses residents as human shields. pic.twitter.com/NVTPEbydq4

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Video of UNRWA Camps Showing Children Calling for Jihad Attracts Renewed Attention

by Deborah Danan August 9, 2014

Video of UNRWA Camps Showing Children Calling for Jihad Attracts Renewed Attention

Camp Jihad from המרכז לחקר מדיניות המזה”ת CFNEPR on Vimeo.

A video of summer camps run by UNRWA, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, is making the rounds on pro-Israel social media networks again with footage that shows Palestinian children as young as 6 calling for “Jihad against the Jews.”

“The resistance in Gaza is not enough,” says one camper in UNRWA’s school in Balata. “We need to unite and fight together.”

The Lawfare Project, which promoted the video, that was produced by the Center for Near East Policy Research, headed by David Bedein, makes the claim that US and Europe-sponsored UNWRA is abusing children with brainwashing methods that include games aimed at teaching the values of war and the Arab “right of return” to Israeli cities. It portrays children writing names on kites of the Israeli cities that they will one day recapture as theirs.

Children are taught to chant mantras such as “Palestine is an Arab land from the river to the sea. We want Haifa, we want Natanya.” Camp counselors tell stories of how their grandparents lived in places like Jaffa and Jerusalem and the many cars, palaces, villas and ships they owned before the “wolf” came. “Isn’t it true that Jews are the wolf?” asks one counselor.

“I dream that I will return to Sheikh Munis [Tel Aviv],” says one child, roughly 10-years-old. “I hope Abu Mazen will achieve this goal and will not disappoint, he has built great hopes.”

Another adds, “The right of return is our holy right. If not me than my grandchildren [will return].”

The songs that are sung include inciteful lyrics which range from tamer verses like “I will not forget my promise to take back my land” and “collect stones, throw them at Israelis” to the more radical such as “we are the revolutionaries and we are filled with rage”, “when we die as martyrs we go to heaven” and “with God’s help we will wage war.”

Another child who appears to be about 7-years-old is asked who the Jews are. “They are a gang of infidels and Christians,” she says. “I will defeat them.”

An older teenager is filmed as saying, “Attacking stage by stage is not the answer. We need to attack all at once.” He continues by saying “There will never be peace between us and Israel.”

In one instance, an older child explains one of the differences between UNRWA schools and regular schools within the PA. “UNRWA schools teach us about the Naqba,” she says. “Government schools also but the course load is less than our schools. They teach us a lot about the right of return, how life was before 1948.”

The video explains how funding for UNRWA comes from 20 donor nations, with most of the money coming from the US, Canada, and Britain. UNRWA schools hold summer camps on their premises every year in Gaza, Jerusalem, Nablus and Jenin.

UNRWA services 5 million descendants of Palestinian refugees from 1948 Arab-Israeli war.

Arutz Sheva http://www.israelnationalnews.com/

Lessons from a forgotten war

How a nearly forgotten early 19th century war could provide some guidance in dealing with the Gaza Strip and Mahmoud Abbas.

Joshua Pacht, 22 September 2018  http://www.israelnationalnews.com/Articles/Article.aspx/22773

While most people don’t know it, the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq were not the first time the US was involved in fighting terror in the Middle East. In 1801, the United States launched its first war in the Middle East. Known today as the First Barbary War, it shares many things in common with Israel’s current conundrum concerning the Gaza Strip, and may offer some interesting insights into a possible strategy for dealing with the Palestinian Arabs.

In 1801, the North African Coast or the Barbary Coast, as it was known, was a hub of piracy. Nominally part of the Ottoman Empire, the coast which today covered the modern countries of Tunisia, Libya, Morocco, and Algeria was controlled by de facto independent governors known as Beys and Bashaws, whose economies were based on slave trade in non-Muslim men captured at sea.

Western Christan States continually fought unending wars with the Barbary States, never attaining a decisive victory. The Europeans despaired over what seemed to be an unending conflict and capitulated to the local rulers, agreeing to pay tribute to them to ward off the pirate attacks. This strategy only pushed the Barbary States to raise the price of “peace” almost yearly.

This shares much in common with the Gaza Strip, where every ceasefire after every war comes with a higher price than the previous one. In 2014 the ceasefire agreement called for extending Gaza’s fishing zone to six miles off the coast, today it will cost a seaport and airport, and tomorrow you can bet it will cost even more.

Under Thomas Jefferson, the Americans finally had enough. Believing in the concept of free trade on the high seas and no longer interested in paying ever growing tribute payments to the Barbary rulers, The United States sent a naval taskforce to blockade the city of Tripoli.

Sound familiar? Just like in Gaza, The Americans regularly bombarded the city and prevented the entrance of goods and people, and yet this only seemed to increase the local inhabitants’ resolve to fight.

What did the Americans do to force the Tripoltians to surrender? They threatened to switch the leadership.

In 1804, an American army officer and diplomat to the Barbary States named William Eaton led the United States’ first foreign land invasion in its history. Landing in Egypt, Eaton, with a handful of US marines, built a mercenary army to support the claim of one Hamet Karamanli, the brother of Tripoli’s ruler Yusef Karamanli to the throne of Tripoli. The Americans led the force in a 500-mile march to Libya and captured the city of Derna from Yusef’s forces. Facing a legitimate challenge to his rule, suddenly Yusef was a lot more open to a possible peace treaty. Within a couple of weeks, the Tripoltain ruler agreed to a revolutionary new treaty, in which the United States became the first Christian nation to not have to pay yearly tribute to a Barbary State for peace.

What can we learn from this? How we can replicate this in Gaza? The answer may be a man named Mohamad Dahlan, or as he is popularly known, Abu Fadi.

Abu Fadi is the former head of the Palestinian Preventive Security Force in Gaza. During the mini-Palestinian civil war between the PA and Hamas in 2007, it was he who led the PA’s ultimately failed effort to control the strip. Abu Fadi is no friend of Hamas. He has a very good relationship with the US, Egypt, the UAE, and other supposedly moderate Sunni Arab states. The US and indeed much of the world would much prefer to see him in charge of the strip. He also reportedly has a good working (with an emphasis on working as he is an implacable foe of the  Jewish State) relationship with Israel and it was he who The US under Bush and the Israeli government supported in the 2007 civil war. Another bonus, he is a sworn enemy of Mahmoud Abbas and could possibly be used to “kill two birds with one stone,” presenting a serious rival to succeed the PA chairman, something which might force Abbas to re-evaluate his continued rejection of peace with Israel.

Abu Fadi is no friend of Israel, having been arrested more than 11 times by security forces in his younger years. However, he is defiantly not the proverbial “devil we don’t know” and during his time in Gaza, he actively cooperated with the Israeli government and proved to be a more moderate leader between the choices of Hamas or himself. His close relationships with the US and moderate Sunni states create an interest for him to work with Israel.

Now more than ever is an opportune time to do this: we have possibly the most supportive US administration in history, Hamas is completely isolated and under siege not just from Israel but from the PA and Egypt as well; On top of all this, Hamas is still struggling to recover from the war in 2014 and has never been more vulnerable..

I propose that Israel stop the trend towards tribute with this new temporary ceasefire deal and invade Gaza with the goal to re-instate Mohamad Dahlan as leader in Gaza. Preferably this would happen through a “treaty” in which Egypt re-occupies the strip and places Dahlan in charge. Even if Egypt refuses to take part, and even without an IDF operation, putting Dahlan in power should be Israel’s goal.

In the best-case scenario, this would force both Hamas and Abbas to surrender and accept peace with Israel and at worst we would have a second PA in Gaza which is still immensely better for everyone Israel, Gaza, and Egypt.

Joshua Pacht is a student studying International Relations and Middle Eastern & Islamic Studies at The Hebrew University of Jerusalem

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