Please read this.
Rabbi Eric Yoffie, who has previously been the keynote speaker at ISNA (the Islamic Society of North America, an unindicted co-conspirator of the Holy Land Trial Foundation), said that Obama is right to call for the building freeze in ‘East Jerusalem.’ This is nothing less than a war on the good from someone who has previously shown his willingness to collaborate with Israel’s (and the U.S.’s) enemies, ala J Street. Actually, Rabbi Yoffie was a featured speaker at J Street’s “Annual Gala.” (quite the coincidence, no?) He spoke alongside the open jihadist, Salam al-Marayati, as well as Iran’s lobbyist, Trita Parsi. And of course, J Street 100% agrees with Rabbi Yoffie that Israel should stop building (for Jews only, of course) in “East Jerusalem,” obviously with the ultimate intent on giving up that land (and thus cleansing 700,000 Jews from their homes) for a future ‘Palestinian state.’
But I digress.
Israel is simply building homes, and in response the jihadists of Fatah and Hamas are building rockets and indoctrinating their people to hate – and yet, according to these progressives, it is Israel that should be capitulating. This point has been rammed home yet again by Hillary Clinton, when she equated building homes in Israel’s holiest city (and capitol!) with hate indoctrination and terrorism in her AIPAC speech yesterday. (big shock here – J Street applauded Hillary’s speech)
Three points on this are often unacknowledged.
1. Ramat Shlomo – the housing units at issue (which caused the diplomatic ‘crisis’) – are in North Jerusalem, not East Jerusalem. Thus, this is saying that Jews have no right to build anywhere in Jerusalem. (and implicitly, anywhere in Israel?)
2. Technically, Hebrew University and Hadassah Hospital are in “East Jerusalem.” Should those institutions be dismantled? Why not, according to progressive reasoning? There is a false myth that all of ‘East Jerusalem’ was Arab in 1949. Totally untrue, as evidenced by the existence of Hebrew University and Hadassah Hospital! Moreover, the 1949 borders of Israel are literally the lines where the fighting stopped. That’s it. I would like ‘Rabbi’ Eric Yoffie and J Street to explain why and how those particular lines are sacrosanct.
3. Arabs are able to build anywhere they want in Jerusalem, and do. The Israeli ‘building inspectors’ have dedicated themselves to tearing down Jewish, not Arab, illegal building. Source.
I reject the implicitly racist/antisemitic notion that Jews are not allowed to build in their holiest city, but Arabs can live anywhere they want.
