Weekend long read

Our weekly round-up of Middle East related background reading.

1) Unsurprisingly to anyone familiar with the BBC’s record, its coverage of the latest events connected to Temple Mount has not included providing audiences with an objective view of past and present use of that site as a central factor in Palestinian incitement. Petra Marquardt-Bigman discusses “The media’s deadly silence on Al-Aqsa incitement“.

“Yet, even if you follow the news on the Middle East diligently, chances are you know very little about the vile incitement that Muslims are used to hearing there [al Aqsa mosque]. The mainstream media are largely ignoring it, even though reporting about it would make it much easier to understand why anything to do with the Al Aqsa mosque inflames Muslim religious passions – and violence – so easily.”

2) Relatedly, at the Tablet, Liel Leibovitz writes about last Friday’s terror attack in Halamish.

“…the murder was entirely foreseeable, the direct result of Palestinian officialdom’s torrent of incitement regarding al-Aqsa. When the Israeli government placed metal detectors at the entrance to the holy compound after three Palestinian terrorists killed two Israeli police officers there earlier this month, the Palestinian leadership mobilized to portray the preventative security measure as an Israeli attempt to take the holy site away from Islam itself. Never mind that, ever since it reunited Jerusalem in June of 1967, the Jewish state has gone out of its way to award the Waqf, the Muslim religious body that administers the site, complete autonomy, going as far as to bar Jews from praying at the site we, too, consider holy lest we offend the sentiments of the irate Imams. Never mind that the response came after a bloody Palestinian terror attack, which, one would think, is the sort of action that desecrates the site’s holiness much more than a thousand metal detectors ever would. Mahmoud Abbas and his cronies have spent all week hysterically yowling that the Jews were marching on al-Aqsa, and al-Abed, 19 and impressionable, listened.” 

3) The Jerusalem Post’s Yaakov Katz records his impressions after a recent visit to Temple Mount.

“…the Mount was empty. There were some tourists – one Chinese group, and another from Europe – but almost no Muslims were there. One who was there, wearing a gray jalabiya and holding an umbrella to shield himself from the sun, whizzed by on an electric wheelchair. Another Arab man, a representative of the Wakf identifiable by the walkie-talkie he held in each hand, eyed Jewish visitors suspiciously, but didn’t follow.

He couldn’t – there were too many police officers. Four walked in front, four in the back and three on each side. Two carried cameras, filming the entire visit in case they would need to arrest and charge one of the visitors for violating the long list of rules posted at the entrance. There, Jews and foreigners alike go through metal detectors and have their bags and identity cards inspected before being allowed to ascend the Mount.

One tourist, for example, had come to the Temple Mount after doing some shopping at the nearby Arab shuk. The guard found a wooden cross and a rosary in her bag. Those had to be left in a locker, since religious paraphernalia – at least those that are not Islamic – are not allowed on the compound.

The identity of the Jewish visitors is also carefully scrutinized. Identity cards are collected, names are punched into a computer, and if something suspicious comes up, the visitor is taken aside for further questioning.”

4) As regular readers know, the BBC does not as a rule cover internal Palestinian affairs and so the absence of any reporting on a new PA law comes as no surprise. Khaled Abu Toameh explains the “new Palestinian law combating information technology (IT) crimes”.

“The controversial Cyber Crime Law, signed by Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas on July 11, permits the imprisonment of Palestinians for “liking” or sharing published material on the internet.

Critics say the law paves the way for the emergence of a “police state” in PA-controlled territories in the West Bank. They also argue that the law aims to silence criticism of Abbas and the PA leadership.

The new law comes on the heels of the PA’s recent decision to block more than 20 Palestinian websites accused of publishing comments and articles critical of the PA leadership.

The law was approved by Abbas himself, without review by the Palestinian parliament, known as the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC). The PLC has been paralyzed for the past decade, as a result of the power struggle between Abbas’s PA and Hamas — the Islamist movement that controls the Gaza Strip.

In the absence of parliamentary life, Abbas and his senior officials and advisors have felt free to pass their own laws to serve their interests and promote their personal and political agendas.”

5) At Mosaic magazine, Liam Hoare and David Hirsh briefly discuss “How the UK’s Labor Party, and Its Intelligentsia, Came to Accept Anti-Semitism“.

“[Y]ou can be sure that Labor would not have allowed somebody to become its leader with a history of anti-black or misogynist politics, for example. . . . The Labor party is not yet institutionally anti-Semitic, but people [in the party] don’t want to hear about [anti-Semitism]. What Corbyn has done is he has allowed the whole thing to be treated as if it’s just a few bad apples in the barrel, and if you find the bad apple, just kick it out, when you should ask what it is about the barrel that makes the apples go bad.” 

 

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