More criticism of the New York Times article on Israel's ongoing strategy to control Jerusalem from an insightful reader in New York who reminds us of the local angle:
The New York Times failed to tell its New York readers that a central player in the Jerusalem land takeover/parks project, The City of David or Elad, is supported by the Brooklyn-based non-profit Friends of Ir David (donation information here).
Finally, Meron Rapoport ex-ace reporter at Ha'aretz has reported repeatedly on the possibility that, in addition to supporting the Land Redemption Fund, Lev Leviev is a donor to Elad. But Rapoport was unable to prove or disprove this as Elad withheld its donor information, even from the Israeli government. See this from the Adalah-NY website:
Ha’aretz Daily reporter Meron Rapoport has also raised the possibility that Leviev is a donor to the settlement group Elad which is also using dubious means to take over the Palestinian East Jerusalem neighborhood of Silwan for Israeli settlement. Rapoport wrote that, “According to government sources, businessmen originally from Russia are among the main donors to Elad. At an event held by Elad two years ago, in honor of its new visitors center in the City of David, the guests of honor included Russian real estate tycoon Lev Leviev and Roman Abramovich, the owner of the Chelsea soccer club. Representatives of the two would not say whether they made donations to Elad.” Despite an order from Israel’s Registrar of Associations, Elad has refused to turn over a list of its donors. Thus until now it has been impossible to prove or disprove that Leviev has donated to Elad.
A 2005 report by the Congressional Research Service stated: "The United States stipulates that U.S. aid funds cannot be used in the occupied territories." The issue came to a head during a 1992 dispute over the use of U.S. loan guarantees. A Jan. 25, 1992, story in the New York Times said that Secretary of State James A. Baker had cautioned Israel's ambassador "that the administration was not going to underwrite Israeli policies that fundamentally contradict its own principles and long-stated policies." ibid
check this out about another organization doing similiar stuff. http://ibnezra.wordpress.com/2009/05/11/the-ameri...
@ibnezra: Very interesting piece. Thanks for writing that up. It is indeed quite interesting that the organization semi-officially tasked with encouraging and supporting Jewish emigration to Israel from the US gives people more money if they intend to live in illegal settlements rather than Tel Aviv (or, presumably, anywhere else within the '67 borders).
I have not written about it on my blog, but I probably should. A tax break to the Technion helped subsidize development of the Israeli atomic bomb. Columbia Physics Professor I.I. Rabi certified to the US government that the Technion was not involved in the development of atomic weapons. He was on the Technion's board, and I can't believe he had no idea what Technion researchers were doing. I usually write about corrupt Jewish social networking in finance, but it is just as prominent and as problematic in the academia. Rabi is hardly the only example of which I am aware.
The Congress & White House respectively rubber-stamped and caved-in to Israel's pretense to stop, masked under an official stance it would slow-down expanding settlements–that expansion never really stopped and nobody in the US government held Israel's feet to the fire. Shrub's memo OK'd them subsequently. Basically Israel simply ignores the USA's public policy and gets its annual dole every year regardless. No Israel borrowing has ever been repaid. The grants are "loans" technically so that no monitoring or strings can be attached. You should be so lucky to get the deal Uncle Sam gave Israel, and continues to do so. No MSM pundit ever brings up this obvious disconnect in terms of differing state interests. In the 1990's the US taxpayer paid for all the settlements fertilized by USSR transplants.
Has anyone noticed how increasingly various media don't use the term East Jerusalem, but eastern Jerusalem… further eroding the idea/fact that there is an Arab half of Jerusalem. Oh, and how classy are the Israelis? As dozens of Christian, Jewish and Muslim schoolchildren cheered and waved at the helipad on Mount Scopus, loudspeakers played "Jerusalem of Gold," a song commemorating Israel's capture and annexation of East Jerusalem in the 1967 Middle East War.
But there is no arab half of Jerusalem, there is only Jerusalem.