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‘West Bank is part of Israel, like Tel Aviv’ — ‘Birthright’ tourguide informs American Jews

Media Analysis
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Elon Glickman challenging map given out on Birthright trip to Israel that fails to show the West Bank.

A news site has published video of Elon Glickman’s challenge to his Birthright tour before he and five others ultimately walked off that tour ten days ago, in which the Los Angeles youth holds up a map that young American Jewish tourists receive from the program that does not show the West Bank as a distinct political entity.

Here is the dialogue between him and the group’s tourguide.

Glickman: It feels like the equivalent of going to the Jim Crow south during segregation and not talking about segregation. These maps–…. Literally if I hadn’t asked anything, like, how would anyone know where the West Bank was because this map doesn’t say anything?

Tour guide: So Israel sees the West Bank as part of Israel. And Israel does not put anything on our maps around the West Bank because the West Bank is just like Tel Aviv or Jerusalem.

Glickman: Like I said, literally erasing the fact that Palestine even exists, though.

Tour guide: Palestine, if you’ll ask anybody in Israel–

Glickman: It’s not fair. I think the real issue is that it’s inappropriate for all of us to be told that, to be shown this map as if this is the truth. When only Israel and the Israeli government seems to think that the West Bank is part of Israel. When the entire international community and Palestinians themselves would never say that. And the reason is because the people who live there can’t vote, they’re under military occupation, their water is being controlled by someone else and they can’t get access to it. And their lives are like a living hell because they can’t even see their families in Jerusalem… the roads are constantly controlled, they have to go through all these checkpoints.

Tour guide: We’re not saying this is the truth, this is what you should believe in.

Glickman: I’m upset at Birthright for only showing me this truth when I know there are so many other young American Jews like me, when this is the only chance they get to see this place–

Tour guide: Israel is showing you what they believe. And also in Israel it’s very divided. And people believe different stuff. But the West bank is part of the state of Israel it’s part of Israel and that’s what the government is showing you, the country of Israel.

Glickman: What is the Israeli government’s agenda and what are the other donors to Birthright’s agenda in showing us these maps and not talking about the West Bank and occupation. The agenda is for all of us to go home and believe that Israel is this great country that’s not enforcing a military occupation. Because that’s the agenda I’m seeing.

Birthright participant [bridling]: It’s free! You didn’t have to pay. There’s no such thing as a free lunch. We are receiving one side of the argument, because only one side is paying for us to be here.

Here’s that map. The West Bank is labeled Judea and Samaria.

Birthright map of Israel that includes West Bank, from Hallie Berkson-Gold’s twitter feed.

Birthright issued a statement saying that it is providing a “non-political educational experience.”

we will not tolerate any attempts to use this experience to promote ideological agendas. Our program provides educational enrichment and embraces thoughtful discussions on many subjects. We will not allow this effort to be taken over by those motivated to engage in a political campaign given our commitment to providing a non-political educational experience.

Glickman and six other former participants were soon demonstrating outside the Jewish National Fund over its efforts to evict a Palestinian family from East Jerusalem.

Here’s the crowdfunding site for eight Birthright walkers, who say they are being threatened with a lawsuit by Birthright. “As a result of our actions Birthright has taken our trip deposits, canceled our flights home, told us that we will need to be responsible for booking our own flight, and — worst of all — threatened a lawsuit against us.”

One comment on the Birthright walkouts from Phoebe Maltz Bovy:

I realize this is useless to anyone’s narrative, but it really was my feeling while on Birthright that they didn’t much care how we felt about Israel, as long as we returned home shamed out of the possibility of intermarriage.

Thanks to Allison Deger, Annie Robbins, and Jonathan Ofir.

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About Philip Weiss

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45 Responses

  1. Liz
    Liz on July 23, 2018, 3:00 pm

    It’s clear with how Birthright is responding (defensive, threatening lawsuit, etc…) that this tactic by these young American Jews is working to really rattle the seemingly solid foundation of Birthright and its Zionism!

    • annie
      annie on July 23, 2018, 4:08 pm

      i think elon glickman really scares them because he’s an alfa male, smart, handsome, not afraid to speak his mind. they’d rather cast him as captain israel.

  2. JLewisDickerson
    JLewisDickerson on July 23, 2018, 3:21 pm

    RE: Birthright issued a statement saying that it is providing a “non-political educational experience.” ~ Weiss

    MY COMMENT: It is absurd for Birthright to claim they provide a “non-political educational experience” when Sheldon Adelson is one of their biggest donors!

    SEE: “Israel’s sugar daddy, Sheldon Adelson” | by Brad A. Greenberg | JewishJournal.com | June 27, 2008

    [EXCERPT] . . . Adelson’s reach hasn’t been limited to charity. In fact, some say he uses money to meddle in Israeli politics, pushing a right-wing vision void of a peace process through his connections with American politicians—Bush called the Republican donor “some crazy Jewish billionaire”—and his free daily newspaper, Israel Hayom, which observers criticize as being stuffed with propaganda for Likud leader Benjamin Netanyahu.

    At a formal dinner attended by more than a hundred senior officials of various Israeli and Jewish organizations, guests were offered the opportunity to tell Peres what they considered the biggest challenge facing the Jewish people. Adelson, according to Ha’aretz, declared, “I think Jews should have lots of sex. That is the solution to our demographic problem.”

    After Adelson addressed the conference, Nahum Barnea wrote in his column in Yedioth Ahronoth, “I saw a gambling tycoon from Las Vegas who bought my country’s birthday with three million dollars. I thought with sorrow: Is the country worth so very little? Were the champagne, wine and sushi that were given out for free in the lobby—breaking convention for such events—worth the humiliation?” Barnea went on:

    Adelson is a Jew who loves Israel. Like some other Jews who live at a safe distance from here, his love is great, passionate, smothering. It is important to him that he influences the policies, decisions, and compositions of the Israeli governments. He is not alone in this, either; even back in the days of Baron Rothschild, wealthy Jews from the Diaspora felt that this country lay in their pocket, alongside their wallet.

    Regrettably, in the latest generation, we are being led by politicians who look at these millionaires with calf’s eyes.

    In Israel, where political, academic, and business leaders tend to be outspoken, there is a striking reticence at the mention of Sheldon Adelson. Even people who are diametrically opposed to his politics refuse to be interviewed. “There is a discernible amount of self-censorship going on,” the liberal Israeli-American writer Bernard Avishai said. “There is no ideological justification for what Sheldon is doing among the Israeli intelligentsia—and a revulsion at an American weighing in so heavily on Israeli politics, in such a crude, reactionary way. But they won’t speak.”

    These details come from Connie Bruck’s masterful and revealing profile of Adelson for this week’s New Yorker. It’s been getting a lot of buzz for its insight into the mindset of a right-wing American Jew whose love for Israel spans from his Lithuanian father too poor to set foot there to his sabra wife. But what really shocked me was a portion a little closer to home for Adelson, whose non-union Venetian was in 1999 being picketed by the Culinary Union:

    Las Vegas’s Temple Beth Sholom was holding a dinner to fête the new mayor of Las Vegas, Oscar Goodman. Adelson, a member of Beth Sholom, had recently pledged two hundred and fifty thousand dollars to the temple’s new-building fund.

    The dinner was to be held at the Venetian, but Mayor Goodman said that he would not cross the picket line, and synagogue officials decided to go elsewhere. Adelson excoriated Beth Sholom’s rabbi, Felipe Goodman. Rabbi Goodman told the Review-Journal* that Adelson had been “so verbally abusive. I was very upset because no one had ever talked to me like he talked to me.” After the dinner took place at the Four Seasons, Adelson withdrew his pledge to Beth Sholom. He gave large sums to the local Chabad, a branch of the Hasidic Chabad-Lubavitchers, for the construction of a new center. . .

    ORIGINAL LINK – http://www.jewishjournal.com/thegodblog/item/israels_sugar_daddy_sheldon_adelson_20080627
    CURRENT LINK – http://jewishjournal.com/uncategorized/64532/
    INTERNET ARCHIVE (June 27, 2008) – https://web.archive.org/web/20080704091251/http://www.jewishjournal.com/thegodblog/item/israels_sugar_daddy_sheldon_adelson_20080627

    * NOTE: Later, the Las Vegas Review-Journal was surreptitiously purchased by Adelson.
    SEE – https://www.newyorker.com/business/currency/how-the-las-vegas-review-journal-unmasked-its-owners

  3. John Douglas
    John Douglas on July 23, 2018, 4:07 pm

    These young American Jews deserve great credit for brave and committed actions breaking with the Zionist line, questioning it in the middle of Israel and speaking out in such a public manner. The effect will be tremendous, including undermining the slander that questioning Israel’s actions is de facto anti-Semitic. Bravo!!

  4. CigarGod
    CigarGod on July 23, 2018, 4:11 pm

    Right on, Glickman.
    Most people won’t challenge bs.
    Enablers are the most insidious…no matter their nationality.

  5. HarryLaw
    HarryLaw on July 23, 2018, 4:48 pm

    Most Israeli politicians regard the whole of the West Bank as sovereign Israeli territory, as do many US politicians and US media who balk at the expression ‘occupied territories’, here is part of the Likud charter “The Jewish communities in Judea, Samaria and Gaza are the realization of Zionist values. Settlement of the land is a clear expression of the unassailable right of the Jewish people to the Land of Israel and constitutes an important asset in the defense of the vital interests of the State of Israel. The Likud will continue to strengthen and develop these communities and will prevent their uprooting.” Presumably when the ‘West’ is suitably softened up the Israelis will annex area C, 60% of the West Bank [there are very few Palestinians in area C] this will leave the Palestinians with just 8.8% of the West Bank of the 22% they were ready to accept as part of a comprehensive settlement. Of course the 8.8% will be whittled down and be surrounded by settlements. Sounds like the ‘trail of tears’ 180 years ago in the US.

  6. Kay24
    Kay24 on July 23, 2018, 5:00 pm

    And some break the silence in the political arena. Mossi Raz speaks about being not allowed to speak out.

    https://www.facebook.com/BreakingTheSilenceIsrael/?hc_ref=ARRZ7Xe2FLmjuFGsS-6ubcnX9ycjcxahN1NYan-VradxJfE_LFfLmifpn7j4nClMenE&fref=nf

  7. guyn
    guyn on July 23, 2018, 5:31 pm

    Ha ha. Poor Israelis. Each time they are asked good quesitons, they look totally delusional. I can’t wait to see this kind of conversation to be featured in the MSM.

  8. Spring Renouncer
    Spring Renouncer on July 23, 2018, 5:34 pm

    This is great. What Elon should also have mentioned is the mythical “two state solution”. If the West Bank is Israeli “like Tel Aviv”, then there is no two state solution and no democracy.

    The truth: there is no viable two state solution and no democracy in Israel right now.

    • HarryLaw
      HarryLaw on July 24, 2018, 3:48 am

      Spring Renouncer, the Israelis may well be delusional, but that is no excuse for ‘the West’ who still think the two nation scenario is the only option, no matter how much territory the Israelis claim sovereignty over, both dejure and defacto. In 1923 Jabotinsky wrote the ‘Iron Wall’ he said…
      “There will always be two nations in Palestine – which is good enough for me, provided the Jews become the majority. And secondly, I belong to the group that once drew up the
      Helsingfors Programme, the programme of national rights for all nationalities living in the same State. In drawing up that programme, we had in mind not only the Jews , but all nations everywhere, and its basis is equality of rights. I am prepared to take an oath binding ourselves and our descendants that we shall never do anything contrary to the principle of equal rights, and that we shall never try to eject anyone. This seems to me a fairly peaceful credo”. http://en.jabotinsky.org/media/9747/the-iron-wall.pdf
      I do not think he anticipated a Palestinian majority or that the Jewish population could abrogate the rights of the Palestinians in such egregious ways.

  9. Rusty Pipes
    Rusty Pipes on July 23, 2018, 10:03 pm

    So, is there some fine print in the Birthright contract that these dissidents missed? And even if they did, how appealing will these trips be to future young Jews if they get the message that if they don’t all have the same glowing response to these trips, they could be sued for expressing their opinions? Whatever happened to two Jews, three opinions?

    • echinococcus
      echinococcus on July 24, 2018, 1:28 am

      Logically there should be some fine print somewhere, because bringing these young Americans to the other end of the world after having promised a free trip, then cancelling their return tickets may well be considered kidnapping –at least in the US and with a good lawyer.

      Then, re “Birthright has taken our trip deposits”, what kind of free trip is that, anyway?

  10. Marnie
    Marnie on July 24, 2018, 12:20 am

    Alright Elon Glickman!

    And the only thing birthright can do is threaten a lawsuit and tell them to pay their own way home. I hope this happens so much that birthright collapses out of fear but I imagine what will happen first is the ‘state of israel’ will sue birthright for defamation(truth) but what Elon Glickman and like-minded young jews should do is sue birthright for misleading them, for their false narratives. Speaking of desperation:

    Israel to fund Jews-only booze cruises to wreck inter-racial love
    https://www.alaraby.co.uk/english/comment/…/israel-to-fund-jews-only-booze-cruises

    “Israel is an odd country.

    It’s a country where the leader of the LGBT caucus in parliament votes down pro-LGBT legislation during LGBT Pride Week.

    It’s a country where the government’s most vocal advocate of freedom of religion makes a public show of support for the fanatical religious movement trying to turn Israel into a theocracy.

    It’s a country where the woman ranked most liberal of all Israeli legislators for four years running wants to insert the Israeli government into the bedrooms of its citizens, and into the boudoirs of foreign Jews.

    Israel is a strange country in which all of these are all the same person; ruling Likud party MP Sharren Haskel, the youngest member of the Israeli parliament. And now Haskel’s latest pet cause is encouraging young Jews to procreate with other Jews – local, foreign, whatever – just not with non-Jews.

    It is fitting that Haskel first entered the Knesset in 2015 to take the seat of fellow Likud legislator Danny Danon, upon Danon’s promotion to Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations. In 2011, Danon commandeered a Knesset committee to incite against mixed-race relationships, claiming that they were not consensual, and that Palestinians were whisking away hundreds of Jewish-Israeli women against their will.

    Police officials in attendance corrected Danon, noting that they did not have evidence of even a single instance of this kind of inter-racial “kidnapping”.

    But Danon was never alone in the crusade against mixed couples. The Israeli government has long attempted to prevent romantic relationships between Jews and non-Jews. Religious groups receive state funding to patrol the so-called “mixed cities” – the few remaining areas of the country where Jews and Palestinians still live next to one another – in an effort to discourage mixed-race relationships.

    The Israeli government has long attempted to prevent romantic relationships between Jews and non-Jews

    When mixed Jewish-Palestinian couples decide to spend their lives together against all odds, Lehava, an anti-miscegenation street gang, brings hundreds of protesters out in full force to chant “Death to the Arabs!” outside the wedding hall.

    When a small number of Jewish and Palestinian families send their children to study together at one of the rare schools that instruct in both Hebrew and Arabic, Lehava goons torch it and leave graffiti at the scene reading “No miscegenation”.

    The head of the Lehava gang used to receive financial support directly from the Netanyahu government. Since that funding channel was exposed, Lehava’s leader now turns for money to the Falic family – the largest funders of Netanyahu’s own election campaigns.

    Read more: Vigilante violence reminds us how little #BlackLivesMatter in Israel

    Earlier this year, two young Israelis were convicted of lynching an African refugee in public, pulverizing his face to the point he was unrecognisable, even to his own brother. The killers allegedly attacked because the non-Jewish black man had dared to briefly stop to speak to a group of Jewish-Israeli female teenagers.

    In the United States and elsewhere in the West, where opposition to so-called “mixed marriage” is rightly considered to be bigoted, proponents of racial purity must be more careful, and couch their anachronistic ideas in more neutral language.

    They fear that without romantic partners from a similar background, Jews will be less likely to express blind support for the Israeli state

    The free Birthright trips to Israel that the Netanyahu government funds for foreign Jews don’t explicitly state that their objective is to encourage breeding. But the unsubtle efforts to spur on sex between programme participants has been repeatedly noted, scoffed at and slammed.

    Now Haskel is upping the ante, arranging tours to Israel for young Jews from abroad which would dispense with Birthright’s educational function and focus only on fraternising. Her plan: Fly in foreign Jews on Tu B’Av – the Hebrew calendar’s equivalent of Valentine’s Day – for the sole purpose of partying, and hopefully, hooking up.

    “Over the course of the events, young Jewish-Israelis and Jews that live in the diaspora will get to know one another, and that is likely to lead to couples forming,” reported top circulation news outlet Israel Hayom.

    “We’ll return to the glory days,” Haskel told the pro-Netanyahu paper. “Young [Jewish] men and women from all over the world will arrive and form relationships with local young men and women, in order to prevent miscegenation and strengthen the connection to Judaism.”

    Outside of Israel, public figures like Haskel who champion individual liberty in the economic domain often also profess a laissez-faire policy in the sexual realm. Objectivists may take issue with government regulations in the financial sphere, but they also oppose any state role in the affairs of the heart. This is not the case in Israel, however – and certainly not with Haskel.

    “My views are extreme right-wing in anything to do with our economy,” Haskel told the far-right Jewish Press earlier this year. “I’m libertarian in that I don’t want the government telling me how to live my life and run my business. But I’m not an extreme libertarian. I also have some conservative views. I am an economic libertarian, but on civic issues I would want the government to bring Zionistic and patriotic values to my country.”

    Apparently, these patriotic values include spending state money to try to determine the dating habits of young Jews, near and far, to decide what they do with their genitals.

    Admittedly, Haskel’s free market principles might alienate many Israelis who want a nanny state to serve them in return, after years of mandatory military service in which they first served the state. If Haskel’s economic concepts ever catch on in Israel, it will be because of American far-right funders of the Jewish Statesmanship Center, who groomed her for political power.

    But Haskel’s decision to attend Donald Trump’s inauguration only increased her standing in the country. And her distaste for miscegenation puts her squarely in the Israeli mainstream. Just last month, we were reminded that adamant opposition to mixed marriage is not relegated to the right-wing; rather, it spans much of the Israeli political spectrum.

    On the day he was appointed chair of the Jewish Agency – a powerful role sometimes referred to as “prime minister of the Jewish people” – the Knesset’s Leader of the Opposition, Isaac Herzog, told Israeli TV that mixed-race families were “an actual plague” for which he hoped to find “a solution”.

    Haskel’s plan is to fly in foreign Jews on Tu B’Av – the Hebrew calendar’s equivalent of Valentine’s Day – for the sole purpose of partying, and hopefully, hooking up

    So-called liberal Jews like Haskel and Herzog ostensibly oppose miscegenation because they fear that without romantic partners from a similar background, Jews will be less likely to express blind support for the Israeli state and its territorial claims. The anti-miscegenation camp fears that if Jewish families include non-Jews, they may prize the human race over any particular subspecies of it, even their own.

    Award-winning American Jewish author Michael Chabon slayed that dragon two months ago in his speech to the graduating class of Jerusalem’s Hebrew Union:

    “Were you to ask me if I hope my children marry in [to other Jews], I would say: Yes. I want them to marry into the tribe that prizes learning, inquiry, scepticism, openness to new ideas. I want my children to marry into the tribe that enshrines equality before the law, and freedom of conscience, and human rights. I want them to marry into the tribe that sees nations and borders as antiquated canards, and ethnicity as a construct, prone – as all constructs – to endless reconfiguration,” said Chabon.

    “I still believe, even today, that this is the world’s most populous tribe. There will be plenty of potential partners for my children to choose among. A fair number of those potential partners are even likely to be Jews,” he remarked.

    Thankfully, Chabon’s words are still true: American Jews – a small minority in the US – are mostly liberal. And unlike the hypocrites who claim that name in Israel, they are just as likely to marry non-Jews as Jews.

    Perhaps it’s not American Jews who need a Birthright trip, but rather Israeli Jews like Haskel and Herzog who need an “Earthright” trip: one that teaches them how humans can be at home anywhere on earth, not only in Israel-Palestine; and how their lives are enriched, not impoverished, when they forge close connections with their non-Jewish neighbours, as equals.

    But if they still can’t keep away from the futile fight against inter-racial love, then let them at least have the decency to do it on their own dimes – not with my taxes.”
    David Sheen is an independent journalist originally from Toronto, Canada and now based in Dimona, Israel.

    An orgy for nice little jewish boys and girls and it’s glatt kosher too!

    If anyone else tried this, what would the fallout be? Would they be called racists? Does the eugenics experiment come to mind? Something comes to mind.

    Lebensborn – Wikipedia
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lebensborn

    “Lebensborn e.V. (literally: “Fount of Life”) was an SS-initiated, state-supported, registered association in Nazi Germany with the goal of raising the birth rate of “Aryan” children of persons classified as “racially pure and healthy” based on Nazi racial hygiene and health ideology. Lebensborn provided welfare to its mostly unmarried mothers, encouraged anonymous births by unmarried women at their maternity homes, and mediated adoption of these children by likewise “racially pure and healthy” parents, particularly SS members and their families. The Cross of Honour of the German Mother was given to the women who bore the most Aryan children. Abortion was legalised by the Nazis for disabled children.

    Initially set up in Germany in 1935, Lebensborn expanded into several occupied European countries with Germanic populations during the Second World War. It included the selection of “racially worthy” orphans for adoption and care for children born from Aryan women who had been in relationships with SS members. It originally excluded children born from unions between common soldiers and foreign women, because there was no proof of racial purity on both sides. During the war, many children were kidnapped from their parents and judged by “aryan” criteria for their suitability to be raised in Lebensborn homes, and fostering by German families.

    At the Nuremberg Trials, much direct evidence was found of the kidnapping of children by Nazi Germany, across Greater Germany during the period 1939-45. “

    • Mooser
      Mooser on July 24, 2018, 11:58 am

      “They fear that without romantic partners from a similar background, Jews will be less likely to express…”

      “Express”? Isn’t that what it’s called when two recessive genes get together?

      • Marnie
        Marnie on July 25, 2018, 12:39 am

        “Express”? Odd word for splooge.

      • Mooser
        Mooser on July 25, 2018, 11:42 am

        “Express”? Odd word for splooge”

        Just once, I’d like to see the proponents of Jewish in-marriage confront the genetic realities of it.

    • RoHa
      RoHa on July 24, 2018, 7:28 pm

      Pssst, Marnie!

      “Michael Chabon slew that dragon.”

      Slay, slew, has slain.

      It’s an irregular verb. We’ve got a whole slew of them.

      • Marnie
        Marnie on July 25, 2018, 12:32 am

        Greetings –

        I appreciate any feedback from you RoHa! I know I’m grammatically challenged (it’s a gift) and how you’ve managed to hold back on correcting me must be nothing short of a miracle or at least a testament to your patience. Anywho, I’ll pass your correction on to David Sheen, the author of the offensive slayed, instead of slew. ;^)

      • echinococcus
        echinococcus on July 25, 2018, 6:00 am

        RoHa,

        Not Marnie’s doing. See Mr. David Sheen.
        https://www.alaraby.co.uk/english/comment/2018/7/17/israel-to-fund-jews-only-booze-cruises

      • Marnie
        Marnie on July 25, 2018, 8:47 am

        FFS echi. And the entire Sheen article from Al Araby is above in my post. WTH.

      • echinococcus
        echinococcus on July 25, 2018, 11:14 am

        Sure, Marnie
        1. Your reply hadn’t appeared yet
        2. I replicated the link because it was broken on your post, and to point out to RoHa that that pas tense was authored by someone else than Marnie
        3. Why so touchy?

      • Marnie
        Marnie on July 25, 2018, 12:31 pm

        “Why so touchy?”

        Who’s touchy?

      • RoHa
        RoHa on July 26, 2018, 1:54 am

        Sorry, Marnie. I didn’t catch that you were quoting an article. I should have checked your link.

        And thank you for responding so gracefully.

        Not everyone appreciates my concern for their well-being, even though, well, I will tell you what I am: I’m a genuine philanthropist — all other kinds are sham. Each tiny grammar error and each logical defect in my erring fellow-creatures I endeavour to correct. To all their punctuation slips I open people’s eyes; and little plans to make them reason clearly I devise; I love my fellow creatures — I do all the good I can — yet several people say I’m such a disagreeable man!

        And I can’t think why!

        So it is nice to get a gentle reception.

      • Marnie
        Marnie on July 26, 2018, 9:21 am

        RoHa –
        I’m touched (not to be confused with tetched, at least not yet, or touchy). Thank you.

      • Mooser
        Mooser on July 26, 2018, 3:20 pm

        “It’s an irregular verb. We’ve got a whole slew of them.”

        That’s what makes me wish we could kick the habit, and give up smoting for good.

      • RoHa
        RoHa on July 26, 2018, 10:07 pm

        “That’s what makes me wish we could kick the habit,”

        Try your luck with Chinese. Since it doesn’t conjugate verbs by morphology, it can be said to have no irregular verbs. Esperanto and Papiamento are also very regular. Finnish apparently has only one or two slightly irregular verbs. Welsh has at least eleven, but the plurals of nouns are nearly as bad as Arabic plurals.

      • Mooser
        Mooser on July 27, 2018, 11:46 am

        “the plurals of nouns are nearly as bad as Arabic plurals.”

        True, no doubt, still, Arabians learn Arabian with the speed of summer lightning. And Hebrews learn it backwards, which is absolutely frightening.
        But use proper English; you’re regarded as a freak.

  12. Maghlawatan
    Maghlawatan on July 24, 2018, 2:47 am

    Glickman is a wild motherfucker. And you can tell from the conversation that he is operating at a far higher level than the Birthright schmuck. Israeli Judaism has beaten this strand of personal expression out of people. American Judaism obviously has not. I would like to see more of this .

    It is no coincidence that US Judaism produces all the best art.

    • Marnie
      Marnie on July 24, 2018, 8:21 am

      Israeli judaism is in name only. They’ve removed the holiness, the compassion and the mitzvot and replaced it with avarice, gluttony, jealousy, covetousness, murder, greed and the love of the shekel/dollar/whatever denomination is preferred. Glickman and his fellow travelers who jumped off the ziobus are damn good people – mensch’s all.

  13. Ossinev
    Ossinev on July 24, 2018, 7:11 am

    The young people of course have to be applauded for their decision to hear and see the “Palestinian Narrative” and to ask questions about the occupation.But I can`t help but feel that the first question they should seek an answer to is one that should be asked before they agree to take part in the trip and before they step on the plane viz “what gives me the so called Birthright to move to claim rights to and settle in another people`s land ?

    • catalan
      catalan on July 24, 2018, 8:25 am

      “to move to claim rights to and settle in another people`s land ?”
      I settled in the United States from Bulgaria and live in the middle of several Indian reservations. Is that wrong? Is New Mexico the land of “another people”? I never asked the Indians if they want me here. Does land belong to “peoples” in your opinion? We have millions of illegal Mexicans here. Are they settling in “another people’s land”?

      • CigarGod
        CigarGod on July 24, 2018, 9:42 am

        Discipline and focus, catalan.
        You can do it if you try.
        Now…back to I/P topic for a serious effort…

      • Misterioso
        Misterioso on July 24, 2018, 10:32 am

        @catalan

        You can’t be serious. It’s utterly moronic to attempt to draw an analogy between your experiences in New Mexico and Jewish Zionists of foreign origin brutally and illegally by force of arms, several massacres, mass rape and intimidation dispossessing and expelling one million two hundred and fifty thousand indigenous Palestinians between late 1947 and 1967. And of course, the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians continues to this day while they increasingly suffer under the fascistic boot of the Zionist occupiers.

      • Talkback
        Talkback on July 24, 2018, 11:53 am

        catalan: “I settled in the United States from Bulgaria and live in the middle of several Indian reservations. Is that wrong?”

        No, because they United States are not occupied by Bulgaria.

      • catalan
        catalan on July 24, 2018, 3:17 pm

        “It’s utterly moronic to attempt to draw an….” misterioso
        Your use of insults betrays your anger. Anger stems from helplessness. I can see why you are helpless. Israel is a nuclear armed state and therefore is capable of completely annihilating the enemy. Therefore, you are left with helpless anger, while the Israeli economy grows and American Jews thrive. I wish you many more successes in BDS and the March of return. Keep doing what you are doing as it seems to be working.

      • Mooser
        Mooser on July 24, 2018, 4:07 pm

        “Anger stems from helplessness…”

        So does malicious fantasizing, or haven’t you noticed? Here, try this:

        ” Israel is a nuclear armed state and therefore is capable of completely annihilating the enemy. “ ‘IDF Major catalan”

        Sure, “catalan”, “completely annihilating the enemy” with nuclear bombs is well within the range of practical solutions Israel has to fight BDS. (Or anybody else, for that matter. Also, not being in the NNPT…well, it wouldn’t go well)

        And just think, if the 6 million Jews of Israel start chucking nuclear bombs around, that still leaves 8-9 million Jews in the rest of the world (that’s you and me, pal)to explain to everybody why they can’t get mad about it.

        And if you’re not up to that explaining, just say “My choice is to be a Unitarian Christian.. It’s a much easier life now where I am not responsible for Israel .”

      • Maghlawatan
        Maghlawatan on July 24, 2018, 4:29 pm

        “Israel is a nuclear armed state and therefore is capable of completely annihilating the enemy. ”

        Not a dispersed enemy that wants to take down Israel bonds, armed only with the idea of fiduciary duty.

        Israel cannot defeat :

        1 Reason
        2 Justice
        3 The goys

    • echinococcus
      echinococcus on July 24, 2018, 1:28 pm

      Ossinev,

      Sure, let’s applaud but also note, every time, that their going to Palestine on this program shows that they buy in to Zionism, ie invasion, theft and genocide. They seem to only oppose Zionist “excesses” that make it, ehm, beyond the pale in the nice Western drawing rooms. A well-behaved Zionism that settles in one of the “two” states, now that the first two big waves of Palestinian dispossession is done, they’d have no problem with.

  14. EUHUGUENIN
    EUHUGUENIN on July 24, 2018, 4:37 pm

    I love the smell of hypocrisy in the morning!!

    And a short memo the US government; the American people have gotten sick and tired of US aid, both financial and military, “never being enough” for this wretchedly apartheid, self-declared theocracy with nuclear weapons which is what Israel has become in the 21st century.

    As you are aware (or should be aware) all aid to Israel is completely illegal under the Symington Amendment, which prohibits any aid from going to a nuclear armed country which refuses to become signatory to the NNPT, and refuses to have its nuclear facilities inspected.

    Israel comes in at a big fat zero-compliance on both issues, so what is the deal here, please?!?

    The victim card has been played once too often by an Israeli government which spits in the face of US officials, and tells them it’s raining.

    And did I mention serial genocide against the Palestinians, coupled with brisk annexations of property in the West Bank and East Jerusalem? The Israeli government will not listen to anything approaching a two state solution; it wants territory, and to get rid of as many Palestinians as it thinks it can, and by any means necessary.

    It is high time for all US aid, both military and financial, to stop now, because this is the only language the Israeli government understands.

    No more wars for the crap hole state of Israel. And, that is PRECISELY what this greasy neocon obsession to drag the US military into Syria is all about.

    No more wars FOR ISRAEL.

    Top US General Says American Troops Should Be Ready To Die For Israel

    https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-03-19/top-us-general-says-american-troops-should-be-ready-die-israel

  15. catalan
    catalan on July 24, 2018, 6:05 pm

    “Not a dispersed enemy that wants to take down Israel bonds,” maghla
    As of today, the interest on the 15 year Israeli bond is 4.60%. This is a very low rate for an economy growing at Israel’s pace. It means that investors currently do not foresee any big risk in Israel and in fact they see less risk there than in many other comparable economies. Perhaps you are wiser than the combined wisdom of global investors; then again, maybe you are just wrong. BDS and whole anti-Israel and anti-Jewish sentiment is well known to investors and discounted.

    • amigo
      amigo on July 24, 2018, 7:15 pm

      “As of today, the interest on the 15 year Israeli bond is 4.60%. This is a very low rate for an economy growing at Israel’s pace. It means that investors currently do not foresee any big risk in Israel”catalan

      Seems to me those 2 statements are contradictory.

    • Maghlawatan
      Maghlawatan on July 25, 2018, 6:00 am

      The yield on US Treasury bonds does not include the cost of the next crash, Catalan. Neither does the price of any stock in the S&P 500.
      Investors operate in herds and herds cannot price tail risk.
      Peasants call this ignorance

  16. James Canning
    James Canning on July 25, 2018, 2:35 pm

    The occupied West Bank is not part of Israel. Full stop.

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