Mideast War blowback

Post Reply New Topic

A Palestinian-American man was stabbed in the back in Austin, Texas, after attending a protest in support of Gaza in what police are calling a “bias-motivated incident."

Zacharia Doar, 23, was sitting in the passenger seat of his friend’s car on Sunday when a man opened his door and dragged him to the ground, his father, Nizar Doar, told NBC News on Wednesday.

In the scuffle, the victim saw the man charging his friend with a knife. When he went to protect his friend, he was stabbed in the upper left side of his back, a few inches from his heart, his father said, adding that the knife broke his son's rib.

“He is really, really in a lot of agony and a lot of pain at this moment,” the elder Doar said. “It’s sad to be here. Seeing my son suffering is sad to see.”

The attack happened around 7 p.m., police said, hours after the protest had ended and after the victim had gotten food with his friends.

Nizar Doar said he believes his son was targeted because the car had a distinctly patterned Palestinian kaffiyeh, or scarf, tied to a door handle.

The Austin Police Department said Bert James Baker, 36, who is white, was arrested and charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.

The police department said its Hate Crimes Review Committee “determined the facts of the case meet the definition of a Hate Crime.” The agency said the Travis County District Attorney’s Office will make the final decision on enhancing the offense to a hate crime.

Baker’s bond amount is $100,000, according to court records. His attorney, Richard Gentry, declined to comment.

Zacharia Doar, who is now home from the hospital, faces a recovery period of at least six weeks, his father said.

The younger Doar and his wife have a 5-month-old child and recently moved into their first home. “They were looking forward to enjoy the American dream,” Nizar Doar said.

Law enforcement has charged Bechir Lehbeib, 26, with a hate crime after he allegedly took an “In This Home We Stand With Israel” banner from a house in Long Beach, N.Y., and then assaulted the owner who ran after it.

Aleksandr Binyaminov, who is Jewish, saw Lehbeib steal the flag after his security system alerted him that someone was outside. He went after the man, a self-described Palestinian from North Africa.

Binyaminov said he confronted Lehbeib and demanded the return of the flag, resulting in the alleged thief “fighting with me and punching me in my face,” according to the aNew York Post. The assault was captured on video.

Binyaminov said Lehbeib “got me in a choke position, threw me on the floor and head-butted me,” causing bruising to the face.

Before fleeing, Lehbeib reportedly said, “I am Palestinian, and you Jews are killing Palestinians,” wrote the Post. After his arrest, he was said to have told police that he hated Israeli Jews and “if I see the flag of the people that killed my people, we will have a problem.”

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) on Tuesday called for the Biden administration to "reject" the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s (IHRA) definition of antisemitism.

The ACLU sent a letter to the U.S. Department of Education Secretary Miguel Cardona asking that he disregard the IHRA's working definition of antisemitism because "protected speech would be chilled."

"Holding Jews collectively responsible for actions of the state of Israel," is one of a plethora of examples of antisemitism established by the IHRA, an intergovernmental organization dedicated to education, remembrance and research of the Holocaust.

Among the examples of antisemitism cited as a concern by the ACLU is "applying double standards by requiring of [Israel] a behavior not expected or demanded of any other democratic nation" and "drawing comparisons of contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis."

The ACLU claims that if these definitions are applied by the Department of Education when investigating universities for Title VI complaints, it could lead college and university administrators to "silence a range of protected speech, including criticism of the Israeli government’s treatment of Palestinians, analogies likening Israeli policies to those of Nazi Germany, or sharing differing beliefs about the right to a Jewish state."

"People may disagree about whether such speech is antisemitic, but that debate is irrelevant to the First Amendment, which prohibits the government from censoring or penalizing core political speech," the ACLU wrote to Cardona.

"If the Department of Education were to use the IHRA working definition of antisemitism in its investigations of Title VI complaints, protected speech would inevitably be chilled," they added.

The ACLU said further that Kenneth Stern, the lead author of the "original IHRA definition," objected to applying the working definition to campus speech.

Even in the absence of this definition, advocacy groups have filed or threatened to file numerous Title VI complaints and lawsuits, alleging that colleges have violated Title VI merely by condoning Palestinian rights groups, events, and advocacy," the ACLU said.

"We believe this would become even more common if the Department of Education formally adopts the IHRA working definition of antisemitism."

The ACLU's letter came after the U.S. Department of Education Office for Civil Rights in November 2023 released a list of higher education and K-12 institutions that are being investigated for "alleged shared ancestry violations of Title VI

Meta is debating whether to more aggressively remove some social media posts containing the word “Zionist” to counter a surge of antisemitism online, setting up a potential clash over censorship during the Israel-Gaza war, according to people familiar with the private deliberations and internal guidance seen by The Washington Post.

The social media giant has told some civil society groups that it’s considering expanding how it enforces its ban against hate speech to include more uses of the term, especially when it might appear as a hateful substitute for “Jews” or “Israelis,” said the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal matters.

But while Meta’s move may appeal to Jewish groups that have long accused the company of being slow to address antisemitism, it has triggered alarm among digital rights activists and pro-Palestinian groups, who say the approach would stifle legitimate political critiques of the Israeli government, its armed forces and Zionism during a catastrophic war.

“Zionism is an ideology. It’s not a race,” said Nadim Nashif, co-founder of the pro-Palestinian digital rights group 7amleh, who was briefed by Meta on the policy review. “As I told them, in my opinion, this is a slippery slope. From there, you can remove a lot of content that is criticizing Israel and Zionism that is part of legitimate political discussion.”

Meta spokeswoman Erin McPike said in a statement that the company doesn’t allow users to attack people on the basis of religion or nationality but that the company needs to understand how people “use language to reference those characteristics.”

“While the term ‘Zionist’ often refers to a person’s ideology, which is not a protected characteristic, it can also be used to refer to Jewish or Israeli people” themselves, McPike said. “Given the increase in polarized public discourse due to events in the Middle East, we believe it’s important to assess our guidance for reviewing posts that use the term ‘Zionist.’”

Under current rules, Meta bans attacks on people based on race, religion, nationality or sexual orientation. The company also may take down posts that spread “harmful stereotypes,” curse or generally dehumanize groups of people.

Meta has long considered as fair game most content discussing political ideologies, governments or institutions. However, it will remove some posts criticizing Zionism when it finds the term being used as a hateful synonym for Jewish or Israeli people. For instance, according to internal guidance obtained by The Post, Meta currently removes such statements as: “This city is full of Jews. I hate those Zionists.” “Zionists are a bunch of rats.” And “Kill the Zionists.”

Now, Meta is evaluating whether to expand enforcement to include posts where the word is less obviously used as a slur, the people said. In one hypothetical exchange under review by Meta, a user says, “If the media are attacking you, you’re doing something right” and a commenter responds, “Just say it, THE ZIONISTS are manipulating you.”

Historically, Meta has often preferred a hands-off approach to moderating content despite pleas from civil advocacy groups of all types to take down more offensive content. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg defended users’ right to post Holocaust denialism online in 2018 — a year after a deadly neo-Nazi rally in Charlottesville. The company changed its policy in 2020 after years of criticism from Jewish groups.

The Israel-Gaza war has sparked a fresh round of condemnation against tech companies for failing to catch hateful content.


Meanwhile, pro-Palestinian groups have long argued that Meta and other tech companies have failed to protect them from hate speech while suppressing legitimate critiques of Israeli policy. Last fall, throngs of Palestinian supporters complained that Meta was suppressing their view counts and video likes on Facebook and Instagram as they commented on violence in the region. At the time, Meta blamed a bug for preventing some posts, ephemeral videos known as Stories and short-form videos known as Reels from showing up properly, but said the bug had affected accounts equally around the globe, regardless of content.

It wasn’t the first time a glitch affected content in the region. During a two-week war between Israel and Hamas in 2021, Israeli police stormed al-Aqsa Mosque, a sacred Muslim site in Jerusalem, prompting Hamas to fire rockets into Israel. Israel retaliated with a bombing campaign that left more than 200 Palestinians dead. Instagram restricted content containing the hashtag #AlAqsa — a glitch Meta initially blamed on an automated software deployment.

Earlier this month, Palestinian digital rights activists with 7amleh pressed Meta and other companies to try to stop users on Facebook and Instagram from sharing “genocidal” statements and dehumanizing content about Palestinian people. After the International Court of Justice ordered Israel to do more to prevent the killing of civilians in Gaza, “We expected that Meta would come to us … and they would say, ‘Yes, we have to make corrections on our website to protect Palestinians,’” Nashif said.

That didn’t happen, he said, and now Meta’s policy review threatens to further silence Palestinian voices.

Israeli drug dealers are being boycotted by Moroccan hashish suppliers, costing the Israeli illegal drugs industry "tens of millions of shekels".

The true power of BDS revealed. No justice, no weed.

MIT has suspended a pro-Palestinian student group for violating campus protest rules, according to the university prez who emphasized that the punishment is “not related to the content of their speech.”

MIT student chapter of the Coalition Against Apartheid has been suspended as a recognized student organization following its demonstration on Monday.

CAA’s members “once again conducted a demonstration on campus without going through the normal permission processes that apply to every student group at MIT,” President Sally Kornbluth said in a letter to the community on Tuesday.

The student group ahead of the protest was promoting an “Emergency Action” on social media. The title of the protest was “Hands off Rafah.”

“Last night, Israel began a bombing onslaught of Rafah, where almost 2 million displaced Palestinians from across Gaza have been concentrated,” the group posted. “This escalation shows how the genocidal regime will not stop in attempting to exterminate the Palestinian people in Gaza without global pressure.

“At MIT, where we do projects for the Israeli Ministry of Defense at the tune of MILLIONS, it begins with ending these ties to the genocidal Israeli forces and sending a clear signal that business will not continue as usual,” the group added.

The suspension means that CAA is banned from reserving any space on campus for any purpose, and the group is barred from using MIT facilities. Also, CAA will not receive standard funding of student groups, and it will not be allowed to organize any further protests or demonstrations anywhere on campus.

The suspension will remain in force until the Committee on Discipline makes a formal determination — the usual process in such cases.

I want to be clear that suspending the CAA is not related to the content of their speech,” Kornbluth said. “I fully support the right of everyone on our campus to express their views.

“However, we have clear, reasonable ‘time, place and manner’ policies in place — for a good reason!” the MIT president added. “The point of these policies is to make sure that members of the MIT community can work, learn and do their research on campus without disruption. We also need to keep the community safe — and we can’t do that without enough advance notice to organize staff and police resources. That’s why we have the rules.”

The New England chapter of the Anti-Defamation League thanked Kornbluth and MIT for enforcing their student code of conduct.

Kornbluth was one of the university presidents who went in front of Congress last year to discuss rising antisemitism on college campuses.

When I was younger and my family would playfully debate where we’d go if Jews suddenly needed to flee America, Australia was always one of the top answers. We could hide in the Outback maybe, plus Australians were laid back. The comic Shane Gillis does a bit about how nothing sounds sinister when it’s said in the Oz accent.

I seem to have misjudged the land down under. It does, in fact, sound quite sinister when a protest leader shouts into a microphone that, because Israel is a “colonialist” state, it “will only be overcome by greater violence.” Even the accent couldn’t soften that one.

The comment was made in a demonstration in front of the Sydney Opera House just days after Hamas’s October 7 massacre. The demonstration was, of course, in support of the attacks.

That rally has been back in the news recently after police investigated allegations that the crowd could be heard chanting “gas the Jews!” But don’t worry, an “expert review had concluded the phrase uttered was ‘where’s the Jews’, although other antisemitic phrases had been chanted.” Don’t you feel silly now.

Hysterical mass incitement has become quite common at these pro-Hamas rallies, which have proliferated ever since the attacks. But the situation devolved further last week when the feminist activist Clementine Ford made public the personal details of members of a WhatsApp group for Jewish creatives. Mob harassment immediately followed. Jewish members of the group have had to move out of their homes, their businesses have been vandalized, and they are getting flooded with threats. One couple “received a photograph of their 5-year-old child with the note reading, ‘We know where you live.’”

According to ABC News, the list of doxxed Jews numbers about 600. The threats and intimidation have gotten so bad that the state is proposing to criminalize doxxing. “The recent targeting of members of the Australian Jewish community through those practices like doxxing was shocking but, sadly, this is far from being an isolated incident,” Attorney General Mark Dreyfus said. (Interesting last name.)

Indeed, a wildfire of anti-Semitism has spread so quickly and so deliberately and so viciously that lawmakers seem to think beefing up the criminal code is the only way to prevent this from going where anti-Israel activists are steering it—mass violence. “Australian lawmakers have banned the performance of the Nazi salute in public and outlawed the display or sale of Nazi hate symbols such as the swastika in landmark legislation that went into effect in the country Monday,” CBS reported last month. “The new laws also make the act of glorifying or praising acts of terrorism a criminal offense.”

One reason it’s spiraled this far is that respected public figures see fit to specifically target Australian Jews, not just Israel, with their rhetoric. “Why are Australian Jews so intractably bent on justifying what Israel is doing to Palestinians?” asked prominent Australian human-rights attorney Julian Burnside.

In Newsweek, the novelist Megan Goldin gives a rundown of the professional consequences hitting the Jewish members of that WhatsApp group in the wake of the doxxing. Saxophonist Joshua Moshe was fired by his band, which apparently put out a statement proclaiming that they “explicitly condemn any forms of Zionism, racism, bullying, and antisemitism.” Actress Sarah-Jane Feiglin had been harassed so much by colleagues in her improv group that she was booted for being too “emotional” about the October 7 attacks.

Two concerts by Matisyahu, the American Jewish singer famous for his peace anthem “One Day,” have been canceled after pro-Palestinian protesters targeted venues where he was set to perform.

Meow Wolf in Santa Fe, New Mexico, canceled one concert on Wednesday. The Rialto Theatre in Tucson, Arizona, canceled a second on Thursday, after first saying it would not do so.

Both venues cited staffing shortages and safety concerns. Both had been targeted by protesters who said Matisyahu’s record of performing for Israeli soldiers and pro-Israel groups in the United States should disqualify him from appearing.

Matisyahu said in a statement posted to Instagram that he had offered to pay for additional staffing and security at the Rialto show but had been rebuffed.

He will instead play a free show in Tucson for hundreds of people.

Matisyahu, 44, was notable early in his career for balancing his reggae-infused music and an Orthodox Jewish lifestyle; he has since changed his religious practices but remains popular among Jewish and non-Jewish audiences. His 2008 hit “One Day” — which preaches a message of peace and envisions a world without war or bloodshed — is especially well known after appearing in movies, commercials and as a theme song during the 2010 Winter Olympics.

In 2015, Matisyahu was briefly booted from a Spanish music festival after he refused a demand from organizers that he endorse Palestinian statehood. After a brief uproar, he was reinstated, and eight pro-Palestinian activists were prosecuted, though not convicted, on hate crimes charges related to the incident.

Since Oct. 7, Matisyahu has engaged vocally in pro-Israel advocacy, appearing at the March for Israel in Washington, D.C. in November. He recently told the Jewish Journal of Los Angeles that before October, his music had become less Jewish in content, but after the attack, he felt “this strange pull back to being Jewish and feeling Jewish, of wanting to be connected to other Jews and Israel and speaking out about what’s happening and writing songs about it.”

Last week, Matisyahu posted a video of himself draped in an Israeli flag while performing “One Day” for Israeli soldiers during a recent visit in which he toured a kibbutz attacked by Hamas on Oct. 7, met with relatives of the Israeli hostages in Gaza and performed a benefit concert with the Israeli pop star Netta.

The Tucson Coalition for Palestine cited video from Matisyahu’s Israel trip in explaining to supporters earlier this week why they should protest the Rialto show. An email script distributed by the group says the video is evidence of the artist’s longstanding support for the Israeli military. It also notes that Matisyahu has performed for pro-Israel U.S. groups including AIPAC, the pro-Israel lobby; the Friends of the IDF fundraising group; and StandWithUs.

The Tucson chapter of Jewish Voice for Peace amplified the call. On Instagram, some supporters of the Tucson Coalition for Palestine said they doubted the venue would cancel a nearly sold-out show and suggested protesting in person instead.

On Matisyahu’s Instagram post, messages of solidarity poured in from fans and other pro-Israel celebrities, including the influencer Montana Tucker and the singer Regina Spektor, before the account hid comments on Thursday evening.

In his post, Matisyahu lamented widespread tactics deployed by pro-Palestinian activists during the war.

“Tearing down posters of kidnapped children does not bring justice. Chanting genocidal slogans at Jews does not bring peace. Preventing fans of all ethnic and religious backgrounds from singing together in Santa Fe or Tucson does not bring peace,” he wrote. “In fact, it does the opposite.”

The singer also vowed to continue his tour — for his new album titled “Hold the Fire” — and to return to Tucson in the future. His next scheduled performance is Friday night in Las Vegas.

The House Education and the Workforce Committee subpoenaed Harvard University for alleged obstruction of its weekslong antisemitism investigation.

The Republican-led education committee subpoenaed a university for the first time in the committee's more than 150-year history, according to a spokesperson.

The committee sent subpoenas to Harvard Corporation Senior Fellow Penny Pritzker, Interim President Dr. Alan Garber, and Harvard Management Company's Chief Executive Officer N.P. Narvekar for failing to produce "priority documents" related to the probe, which started days after the committee heard "concerning" testimony from the presidents of three prominent universities during a December hearing, according to the committee.

Harvard has been given a new deadline of March 4 at 5:00 p.m. to submit key materials related to all antisemitic acts or incidents since Jan. 1, 2021, according to the subpoena.

The committee said it's requesting documents that date back far enough for it to conduct a thorough investigation of the school's handling of alleged antisemitism.

The committee said it determined subpoenas were warranted after a thorough review of the school's latest submission of documents. However, in Foxx's statement she said she is extremely disappointed with Harvard because nearly half of the documents the school submitted have been publicly available. Among the materials requested in the subpoenas, the committee is asking for all communications relating to the alleged harassment of a Jewish student at a "die-in" protest, pro-Palestinian protests and an "Israel Apartheid Week."

A new survey of nearly 2,000 BBYO participants across North America, taken in recent weeks, found that 64 percent said antisemitism on campus was an important factor in their decision regarding where to attend college. More than 60% said they had experienced antisemitism in person.

There’s evidence that a large number of students are choosing not to apply to Harvard: The university reported a 17% dip in early decision applications this year.

A Palestinian flag sticker was used to cover up a Star of David necklace on a statue of the singer Amy Winehouse.

It happened in Camden Market, north London, where the statue of the Jewish performer was erected in 2014, three years after her death.

A spokesperson for the Met Police said the force recognised that the incident "will have caused upset to many people".
Camden Market said the sticker was removed on Monday.

'Place of diversity'
It said in a statement: "We were made aware on Monday that a member of the public had placed a sticker over the Star of David necklace on the Amy Winehouse statue in the North Yard of Camden Market.

"This was removed immediately, and the incident was reported to the police.

A Met Police spokesperson said the force was making inquiries to establish the circumstances of what happened and to see what evidence, such as CCTV footage, was available.

A spokesperson for the Campaign Against Antisemitism said: "Covering the Star of David, a well-known symbol of Judaism, on the statue of a British-Jewish singer, with a sticker of the Palestinian Authority flag, is antisemitic.

"Right now, 69% of British Jews say that they are less likely to show visible signs of their Judaism. When even a statue of a Jewish person can't get away with it, is that any surprise?"

The Suffolk County hate crimes unit is investigating after a man was caught on camera harassing members of a mosque in Melville on Wednesday.

Video recorded by one of the mosque's members shows 46-year-old Jordan Endler shouting about the Israeli-Palestine conflict and refusing to leave.

"The guy just starts talking about, 'Are you Palestinian? Are you Hamas?,' all that stuff. 'Why don't release the hostages? Do you know what Hamas did? Do you know Hamas raped?'," 16-year-old Omar Amin said. "And we're just saying, 'Sir, we're not Hamas. We don't have these hostages. I don't know why you're coming here."

The Half Hollow Hills High School East student called police.

"He's just getting very loud and too close so what I do is, I go to the bathroom real quick, call the cops because I don't know if he has anything on him. I was scared," Amin said.

Suffolk County Police soon arrived, but after approaching Endler, they let him go.

Islamic Center of Melville President Dr. Talaat Abdelmoneim says he was concerned for his hundreds of members' society.

"That was real shocking at the time," Abdelmoneim said. "Of course all of those people and the children's parents worried at some point that what is going on here, especially with the first impression that this may not have been taken seriously."

Following the incident, the Muslim community on Long Island banded together to bring attention to the video on social media which led to Endler's arrest.

The 46-year-old was charged with criminal trespassing and harassment.

"It makes me feel better and safer that he won't come back," Amin said.

U.S. service member was in critical condition after setting himself on fire outside the Israeli Embassy in Washington, D.C., on Sunday, authorities said.

A video posted online showed a man shouting "Free Palestine" as he burned during the incident, which lasted about a minute before law enforcement officers extinguished the flames about 1pm.

The man appeared to be in military uniform and identified himself as "an active duty member of the U.S. Air Force." Air Force spokesperson Ann Stefanek confirmed via email Sunday evening that "an active duty Airman was involved in today's incident."

The man was transported with "critical life threatening injuries to an area hospital," D.C. Fire and Emergency Medical Services Department said in a post to X.