Palestinians' Fort of Torture

[Gatestone Institute] [Facebook] [Twitter] [RSS] [Donate] In this mailing: - Khaled Abu Toameh: [Palestinians' Fort of Torture] - Noah Summers: [The Telos Group: The True Identity of the "American Pro-Israeli, Pro-Palestinian, Pro-Peace Movement "] - Burak Bekdil: [Turkey: The Purges Continue] [Palestinians' Fort of Torture] by Khaled Abu Toameh • January 30, 2017 at 5:00 am - Because it is not Israelis who are perpetrating the abuse, the reports are ho-hum to these journalists. - Hamas is an extremist Islamist movement that does not consider itself obliged to abide by international laws and treaties concerning basic human rights. Indeed, the concept of human rights simply does not exist under Hamas in the Gaza Strip, where public freedoms, including freedom of speech and of the press, are non-existent. - In 2013, two Palestinian detainees reportedly died of torture in the Jericho Central Prison. - A London-based human rights organization reported 3,175 cases of human rights violations, including arbitrary detentions, by the Palestinian Authority (PA) security forces in the West Bank during 2016. Hundreds of those detained include university students and lecturers, as well as schoolteachers. During the same year, the PA security forces also detained 27 Palestinian journalists. - Unfortunately for them, they are not going on hunger strikes in an Israeli prison, where such actions garner the immediate interest of the mainstream media. - Many are willing to tell their stories. But who is willing to listen? Not Western governments, human rights organizations and journalists. Most of them seek evil in Israel, and Israel alone. A Palestinian Authority policeman attacks protestors. (Image source: "Palestinians for Dignity" Facebook Page) As Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas and his cronies occupied themselves in the past two weeks issuing warnings to President Trump against moving the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, reports resurfaced concerning the brutal conditions and human rights violations in a Palestinian prison in the West Bank. These reports, however, were buried, along with the abuse, in favor of attention to rhetoric directed against the Trump Administration. Anything uttered by Abbas and senior PA officials regarding the possible transfer of the US embassy to Jerusalem made it to the headlines of major newspapers and TV networks around the world. [Continue Reading Article] [The Telos Group: The True Identity of the "American Pro-Israeli, Pro-Palestinian, Pro-Peace Movement "] by Noah Summers • January 30, 2017 at 4:30 am - In 2014, the Telos Group was outed as an anti-Israel organization not living up to its "pro-Israeli, pro-Palestinian, and pro-peace" self-description. - Instead of building substantive bridges between Palestinians and Israelis, the bridge Telos appears most intent on building is a financial one between America and Ramallah. Telos's actions demonstrate the organization is pro-PLO/Palestinian Authority, not pro-Palestinian. - Telos is focusing its efforts on enabling a corrupt, oppressive PLO/PA government that has opposed peace on multiple occasions, oppressed its citizens by denying them freedom of speech and protection from religious persecution, and jailed journalists who dare to criticize the PA's undemocratic government and its abuses of its citizenry -- certainly not a pro-Israeli/pro-Palestinian/pro-peace agenda. - Peace with Israel is premised on Palestinians no longer supporting their children engaging in terrorist acts against Israel. - While Khalil appeals to UN Resolution 242's "inadmissibility of the acquisition of territory by war" to justify his position on Israeli settlements, he neglects to mention that this "land-for-peace" resolution was premised on the Palestinians halting all violence against Israelis and recognizing the State of Israel. - It is time to call the Telos Group for what it really is: Anti/Anti/Anti: anti-Israeli, anti-Palestinian, and anti-peace. Gregory Khalil addresses students participating in a model UN, in Jackson, Wyoming, on November 16, 2014. (Image source: InterConnections21 video screenshot) At least one person was pleased about the Obama Administration's decision to abstain from the UN Security Council (UNSC) vote on Resolution 2334, effectively establishing the boundaries of a Palestinian state. For Gregory Khalil, the current president and co-founder of the Telos Group, an organization posing as "pro-Israeli, pro-Palestinian, and pro-peace," it was 12 years coming. His 2004 New York Times op-ed encouraged the US to abstain from exercising their UNSC veto in defense of Israel. In December 2016, the Obama Administration finally acted upon the advice of this former Palestinian negotiation-team lawyer by abstaining from -- instead of vetoing -- Resolution 2334. Founded in 2009 with the original name of the "Kairos Project," the Telos Group described itself as: [Continue Reading Article] [Turkey: The Purges Continue] by Burak Bekdil • January 30, 2017 at 4:00 am - What makes Turkey look more like North Korea than a European democracy is the legal authorities' reflex to launch probes into anyone accused, without evidence, of terrorist activity or insulting the president. Erol Onderoglu (left, meeting with European Parliament President Martin Schulz), is the Turkey representative for Reporters Without Borders. He was recently arrested in Turkey, with rights activist Sebnem Fincanci and journalist Ahmet Nesin. They are charged with "making pro-Kurdish terror propaganda and aiding terrorists," because they guest-edited a pro-Kurdish newspaper after its editors were jailed. (Image source: European Parliament) Philipp Schwartz was a Hungarian-born neuropathologist who worked for the Goethe University in Frankfurt for 14 years until he was fired in 1933 for being Jewish. After his -- and other scholars' -- dismissal, he convinced the then decade-old modern Turkish Republic to admit persecuted German professors to positions at Turkish universities. Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, the secular founder of the Turkish state, enthusiastically agreed to Schwartz's proposal. Turkey quickly admitted 150 German Jewish professors. Schwartz was appointed as director of the Department of Pathology at the University of Istanbul. More than seven decades after, a German initiative that bears Schwartz's name is returning the favor. [Continue Reading Article] You are subscribed to this list as {EMAIL}. To unsubscribe, go to [ To edit your subscription options, go to [ To subscribe to the this mailing list, go to [ [Gatestone Institute] 14 East 60 St., Suite 1001, New York, NY 10022