“Lalela Mswane defied the BDS movement, the new Omicron coronavirus variant, and her own government, and flew to Israel to join Miss Universe”

Posted on December 3, 2021 by ArchitectGuy

BREITBART
Blue State Blues: A Beautiful Black Woman Shatters the BDS Movement
by Joel P. Pollak
December 3, 2021

On one side of the issue stands Miss South Africa Lalela Mswane, stunningly beautiful and beaming, waving from the Ben Gurion Airport in Tel Aviv. On the other side sit the aging, grumpy, bedraggled founders of Ben & Jerry’s ice cream. It’s not even a close contest. And while the Ben & Jerry’s boycott of Israeli customers across the 1949 armistice line, now over six months old, has failed to catch on, Mswane’s courage in standing up to the bullying of anti-Israel activists seems to be catching on. Mswane won the right to represent her country at the 2021 Miss Universe pageant, which is being held in the Red Sea resort town of Eilat, Israel. READ MORE

TIMES OF ISRAEL The beautiful face of regional peace: Miss Universe contestants descend on Israel For the first time ever, Bahrain — which normalized relations with Israel last year — is sending a contestant to the global competition. Morocco, which also relaunched diplomatic ties with Israel last year, is participating in the contest for the first time since 1978. The United Arab Emirates had also been slated to have its debut at the competition, but ultimately did not take part due to time and COVID constraints.

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Yad Vashem defends removal of historic picture of Hitler and Haj Amin al-Husseini

Posted on December 3, 2021 by ArchitectGuy

BREITBART
ZOA Accuses Holocaust Museum of ‘Appalling’ Censorship of Palestinian Mufti Ties to Hitler
by Joshua Klein
December 5, 2021

Following a published letter by the head of “Yad Vashem” — Israel’s premiere Holocaust museum and research center — defending its refusal to display an infamous photograph of leading Palestinian “Mufti” [Islamic legal authority] Haj Amin al-Husseini meeting with Nazi leader Adolf Hitler during the Holocaust, Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) head Morton Klein slammed the museum and its head Dani Dayan for the “appalling” censorship of history. After years of pressure and a recent op-ed by a longtime tour guide at the site attacking the museum’s stance, Dayan addressed the issue on Thursday, claiming the notorious Mufti’s role in the Holocaust was “marginal,” his meeting with Hitler having “a negligible practical effect on Nazi policy,” and thus the famous image depicting him with Hitler “was never displayed” in the museum. READ MORE

JNS Daniel Greenfield: Yad Vashem covers up the Islamic role in the Holocaust It’s Dayan who is politicizing the Holocaust. Telling the truth means displaying historical context, even when it’s politically incorrect. Declaring that Yad Vashem won’t participate “in a debate on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, which is alien to its mission” (a strange claim considering that the goal of the conflict is another Holocaust) is itself an admission that the photo was removed for political reasons.

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“Israel is the model for the nation-state idea on which the current global order was founded. That’s why opponents of the idea see it as a target”

Posted on December 3, 2021 by ArchitectGuy

TABLET MAG
The Most Legitimate State on Earth
by Liel Leibovitz
November 27, 2021

Why are so many of our self-appointed intellectual and moral betters so obsessed with Israel? You could take their protestations at face value, and believe it’s a mere coincidence that these crusaders for social justice single out the world’s only Jewish state for calumny rather than focus on, say, the evils of China or Syria. You could press rewind and argue that this faddish obsession is merely the most modern manifestation of a very ancient hatred. Or you could acknowledge a thornier, more complicated, and often ignored truth that subtly shapes this entire debate: Any way you look at it, Israel is the most legitimate state on Earth, and therefore the pillar on which the legitimacy of the global order of nation-states rests. READ MORE

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Intel deal could value Israeli unit at more than $50 billion

Posted on December 3, 2021 by ArchitectGuy

JNS
Intel to make Israeli self-driving car unit Mobileye public in US
December 8, 2021

Chip-maker giant Intel is set to take Mobileye, its Israeli self-driving car unit, public in the United States next year, Reuters reported on Monday. The deal would reportedly value Mobileye at more than $50 billion. Intel is the largest employer in Israel’s high-tech sector, with 14,000 employees, and it will likely retain Mobileye’s executive team and keep its majority ownership after the initial public offering of Mobileye stock, according to the report. In 2017, Intel purchased Israeli self-driving car-maker Mobileye for $15.3 billion. The move reportedly put it in direct competition with its rivals, Nvidia and Qualcomm, in developing driverless systems for automakers. READ MORE

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Economists attribute Tel Aviv’s emergence at No. 1 to a strong appreciation of the Israeli shekel against the dollar

Posted on December 3, 2021 by ArchitectGuy

LOS ANGELES TIMES
Tel Aviv is the world’s most expensive city, new report says. L.A. ranks 9th
by Ami Bentov
December 2, 2021

Residents of Israel’s seaside metropolis, Tel Aviv, have for years complained of how expensive it is, with living costs taking a big chunk out of their paychecks. A new report backs them up. Tel Aviv is the world’s most expensive city to live in, according to the Economist Intelligence Unit, a research group linked to the Economist magazine. The city, previously ranked fifth on the list, has now surpassed other pricey places such as Paris and Singapore, which were tied for second place. Hong Kong and Zurich, Switzerland, rounded out the top five. New York was ranked sixth and Los Angeles ninth. READ MORE

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When I saw the left give up everything I believe in, I changed politically. You can, too

Posted on December 3, 2021 by ArchitectGuy

TABLET MAG
The Turn
by Liel Leibovitz
December 7, 2021

For many years—most of my politically cognizant life, in fact—I felt secure in my politics. Truth and justice, I believed, leaned leftward. If you were some version of a decent human being, you cared about those less fortunate than you, which meant that you supported a whole host of measures designed to even the playing field a little. Sometimes, these measures had unintended consequences (see under: Stalin, Josef), but that wasn’t reason enough to despair of the long march to equality. Besides, there was hardly an alternative: On the other end of the political transom lurked despicable creeps, right-wing orcs who either cared for nothing but their own petty financial interests or, worse, pined for benighted isms that preached prejudice and hate. We were on the right side of history. We were the people. READ MORE

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“It’s not encouraging the Biden administration recently warned Israel against sabotaging Iranian nuclear facilities and leaked that Israel was the source of a cyberattack in Iran”

Posted on November 26, 2021 by ArchitectGuy

NEW YORK POST
To keep Iran from going nuclear — and prevent war — America must work with Israel
by Michael Makovsky
December 1, 2021

…Israeli defense officials admitted to me they mistakenly believed, following the 2015 deal, that they had more than a decade to prepare for military action. They didn’t anticipate President Donald Trump’s 2018 withdrawal, despite it being then-Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s top priority and a subject of high-level US-Israeli discussions. Israel then had to accelerate planning and preparation, which the lack of a permanent government from 2019 to 2021 undercut. Despite their opposition to the deal, some senior Israeli defense officials acknowledged a new agreement that temporarily slowed or paused Iran’s nuclear program would offer more time to advance operational preparedness. READ MORE

TIMES OF ISRAEL Mossad head vows no Iran nukes ‘ever,’ as credibility of military option scrutinized David Barnea says agency will ‘do everything needed to alleviate threat,’ but air force head won’t say if Israel can destroy Iran’s program and report claims IDF has no strike plan

ALGEMEINER ‘Nuclear Blackmail’: Israel Calls for End of Iran Talks in Vienna After IAEA Revelations Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett urged the United States to “immediately” halt ongoing indirect talks in Vienna between Iran and world powers, following fresh revelations of Tehran’s uranium enrichment violations. “Iran is carrying out ‘nuclear blackmail’ as a negotiation tactic and this must be met with an immediate cessation of negotiations and by concrete steps taken by the major powers,” Bennett told US Secretary of State Antony Blinken during a phone conversation.

JNS In Europe, Lapid seeks to establish coalition of nations to oppose Iran’s nuclear ambitions Against the backdrop of the revived nuclear talks in Vienna, Israeli Foreign Affairs Minister Yair Lapid engaged in a round of high-profile meetings with British officials on Monday, followed by a meeting in Paris on Tuesday with French President Emmanuel Macron.

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Palestinian Authority security forces extricate two Israelis, hand them unharmed to Israel after crowd surrounds them in the city center

Posted on November 26, 2021 by ArchitectGuy

TIMES OF ISRAEL
Two Israelis attacked, car torched by Palestinians after entering downtown Ramallah
by Aaron Boxerman
December 1, 2021

Two Israelis were attacked and their car was set ablaze by a crowd of Palestinians after they entered downtown Ramallah on Wednesday night. It was not immediately clear why the two had found themselves near al-Manara Square in the de facto Palestinian Authority administrative capital, well away from the major checkpoints leading to the site. Police identified one of the Israelis as a resident of the West Bank settlement of Shiloh; the other lives in the mostly Ultra-Orthodox Israeli city of Elad. According to an Israeli security official, the two claimed they sought to reach Hashmonaim, a settlement about a half-hour drive away by car. READ MORE

See the video

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US dismayed to find East Jerusalem housing project back on docket of planning committee’s agenda for next week, after Israeli officials leaked that plan was shelved

Posted on November 26, 2021 by ArchitectGuy

TIMES OF ISRAEL
Blinken initiated call with PM amid doubts Israel actually called off Atarot plan
by Jacob Magid
December 3, 2021

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken initiated a phone call with Prime Minister Naftali Bennett on Wednesday night to express his dismay over Israeli plans to advance a controversial East Jerusalem housing project despite signaling last week that it had shelved the plan, sources familiar with the matter told The Times of Israel. The phone call was “intense,” an official said, with Blinken expressing the Biden administration’s vehement opposition to the 9,000-home plan in Atarot, which supporters of a two-state solution argue would mark a death knell for the proposal by creating a wedge in the middle of Palestinian contiguity between Ramallah and East Jerusalem. READ MORE

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Fines will be imposed on visitors to Israel who do not undergo second PCR test on the third or seventh day after their arrival

Posted on November 26, 2021 by ArchitectGuy

ARUTZ SHEVA
Bennett decides: Fines for persons arriving in Israel who do not undergo a second PCR test
by Ido Ben Porat
December 2, 2021

Prime Minister Naftali Bennett on Thursday evening held a situation assessment on how the Omicron strain is being handled in Israel, with the participation of Health Minister Nitzan Horowitz and professionals from the relevant government ministries. During the discussion, it was decided to impose fines on persons arriving from overseas who will not undergo a second PCR test on the third or seventh day after their arrival (as demanded). The Health Ministry and the Israel Police will synchronize their data systems so that tickets will be issued automatically. The fines will not exceed 2,500 shekels (approximately $790 US). READ MORE

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