ISRAEL GIVES BACK TO THE UNITED STATES FAR MORE THAN IT RECEIVES.

THE US GAINS FAR MORE FROM ITS MILITARY AID TO ISRAEL THAN THEY GET FROM ANY OTHER COUNTRY.

Detractors of Israel like to jump on the figure of $3.8 Billion (2019) that the United States gives to Israel for its military defense.

What they do not take into consideration are three important factors that make the US-Israel defense relationship truly unique.

1.      The $3.8 Billion defense budget that the United States is giving Israel in 2019 is split between $3.3 Billion which is conditional on Israel spending 100% of that figure on US-manufactured military hardware. In other words, this is budget that goes entirely on the US-based military industry. The remaining $5 Billion is allocated for missile defense systems such as the American built (with Israeli technology) Iron Dome and Patriot missile defense systems. In other words, a joint venture of sorts between the United States and Israel.

2.      It is important to look beyond the simple figure of $3.8 Billion and not treat it as if it is a one-way transaction to Israel’s exclusive benefit. Nothing can be further from the truth. The United States gains massively by a few hundred percent rate of return for the initial investment by having Israel as a battle-tested laboratory for the US defense industry and the Armed Forces products.

      This is achieved through a list of modifications and upgrades to some of the most sophisticated US military equipment and systems that the US would never get from any other source save for their own military which does not have the same geographic intimacy of an enemy so close that it calls for split second responses against all forms of military attacks experienced exclusively by Israel on a weekly, even daily, basis. 

     

The feedback from Israel’s use of US-supplied hardware saves many years and huge costs in American R&D. Through tried and trusted Israeli military usage, the end product improves and enhances the US defense industries competitiveness in the global market, making US military hardware even more attractive to global buyers. It increases US exports and expands the American domestic employment base.

      Israel provides the US with unique and vital military intelligence, saving US lives, both military and civilian. 

      Israeli intelligence improves the US war on terror and undermines the position of US enemies and adversaries.

3.      Perhaps the greatest cost saving to the US, both in terms of blood and treasure, gained by its relationship with Israel, is the fact that Israel is an extension of America without the United States requiring to place “boots on the ground” and the vast savings that come from not having US troops deployed in Israel.

      Unlike other Middle East and European allies of the United States, Israel does not require American troops to physically defend our country or to be stationed here. This alone saves the United States many billions of dollars as can be seen in the following examples.

As opposed to Israel’s annual military aid grant of $3.8 Billion, the United States spends $4.89 Billion in Afghanistan. 74% of that figure is on military aid in keeping their solders there.

The United States has 28,500 troops stationed in South Korea. The annual boots on the ground cost is an estimated $7 Billion with a further $1.1 Billion spent on what is called non-military personnel.

In peaceful Japan the figure is even higher with 50,000 American troops stationed there. The annual cost is given at $12 Billion with a further $2 Billion spent on non-military personnel.

These figures only cover the cost of maintaining troops and supporting personnel in foreign countries. They do not include the additional costs of the military hardware, equipment, construction, and operating systems used in these countries.

These figures dwarf the annual figure that America gives its greatest ally, Israel. The US investment and return on investment in new product development andr vital intelligence is minimal compared to the benefits that Israel provides the United States.

If we add Europe to the equation, there are 55,000 American troops stationed in three European countries alone – Germany 35,000, Italy 12,000, Britain 8000. There are US troops in many other European countries.

It is estimated that the average cost per annum of stationing military personnel abroad is between $10,000 - $40,000 per person.  That does not include infrastructure costs, etc.

In Europe, NATO pays 33% of the cost, an estimated $2.5 Billion. This puts the US contribution to its military personnel in Europe at a minimum of $5 Billion annually. This alone is 30% more than Israel receives annually.

President Trump is trying to get NATO cover even more of this cost, thereby reducing the cost to the American taxpayer.

The Pentagon pegged the cost of the US presence in Germany, Japan and South Korea in 2019 to be $21 Billion. This figure includes military pay, operational spending, military construction.

Compare that $21 Billion, which is spent in the three named countries, to Israel’s $3.8 Billion, which is returned to the United States in full to an expanded US military industry, and one easily see the massive benefit that America gains by having battle-tested Israel as their main and trusted partner.

As a     As a final shot at budget comparisons, The United States spent an estimated $81 Billion in 2018,

to protect foreign countries oil supplies. Now compare that to the $3.8 Billion that the US gives Israel to use and test its military hardware. It’s chickenfeed.

The      The United States gains far more from US aid to Israel than any other country on earth.

Barry Shaw is the International Public Diplomacy Director at the Israel Institute for Strategic Studies.              

The Israeli Election and Liberman's Pivotal Conditions.

The Israeli Election and Liberman’s Pivotal Conditions.

The Israeli elections on September 2019 proved one thing. Not only is Israel the only democracy in the Middle East, it is also a global democracy on steroids.

The elections results showed the benefits but mainly the faults of a multi-party electoral system.

The race started with 31 hopeful parties. At the end of the voting process Israel was left with nine political parties winning seats in the 22^nd Knesset.

Israel has to change the law by lifting the electoral threshold for allocated seats in a future Knesset from the current low bar of 3.25% to 5%.

The outcome of a very tight race left the Israeli version of the Siamese twins able to form a narrow majority government but shackled from doing so by pre-conditions set by Benny Ganz, the leader of the Blue & White party, who said he would never sit in a joint government with a leader facing criminal charges, referring to the corruption charges faced by Likud leader and perennial Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu.

Unless Ganz climbs down from his moral tree Israel is frozen in a stand-off and could, potentially be facing its third election in under a year.

President Reuven Rivlin said he would not allow this to happen, but he has no constitutional role in deciding the outcome.

The spoiler in the game is the blunt Russian, Avigdor Liberman. He’s the tough guy who is calling the shots having positioned himself as a centrist party winning nine decisive seats. This has enabled him to be the pivotal figure in the race to power.

Liberman picked up lots of votes from disaffected Bibi voters who sought refuse in Liberman’s party, unable to bring themselves to vote for Ganz’s party with the left-wing Yair Lapid toted to become a rotational prime minister in a Blue & White government.

Without Liberman, Likud is unable to form a right-wing government. Insufficient mandates of the small right-wing and religious parties prevent the option of a coalition without Liberman, and Liberman has issues with the religious bloc. No right wing-religious deal is possible without the heavy Liberman climbing down from his political tree.

Ganz is unable to form a center-left coalition even with the Arab party without Liberman because Liberman has said he will not sit in any government with the current Arab politicians, most of whom he sees as anti-Israel antagonists and not part of the Israeli consensus.

With the final votes not yet in Liberman faced the press the morning after election night to itemize his conditions for joining a 73-seat unity government with the Likud and Blue & White.

Liberman is pushing for a more secular society in Israel. He insisted that the recruitment law, which requires every citizen to serve in the IDF, must apply to the orthodox religious community in which most of the young men spend their years studying in yeshivot (religious education institutes) instead of serving in the army.

He also insisted that all Israelis, including the ultra-orthodox who have their own strictly religious education, must go through the general state education system. The religious students can, insisted Liberman, continue their religious studies after a day of regular education where they will learn worldly subjects like mathematics, geography, languages, etc.

Liberman’s final condition hit at the strictures placed on regular Israelis by religious political parties of the past. He insisted that public transport be allowed to operate on the Sabbath. The religious parties look on this as a desecration of the Jewish holy day of the week. Regular Israelis look on the absence of public transportation on Saturdays as a forced imposition. Saturday is the only free day of the week for working Israelis. Lack of public transport on a Saturday severely restricts many Israelis from visiting family, or simply enjoy traveling to wherever they want on their one day of leisure.

The problem with Liberman for the two main parties is that they never know what new imposition the heavy Russian will lay on them next. Liberman destroyed a previous Netanyahu-coalition because he was unhappy by the way the Prime Minister handled Hamas in Gaza. He thought Netanyahu was too kid-gloved in not responding hard enough against Hamas after one of their rocket bombardments on Israeli civilians. 

The Likud and Blue & White have the ability of forming a narrow two-party coalition of 64 seats, if only Ganz can climb down from his tree. He insisted that he would never share a government with Netanyahu facing impending charges.

Then we come to the tricky ego-charged question of who will be Israel’s next Prime Minister. Ganz or Netanyahu.

The process demands that the leaders of every party elected to the next Knesset will recommend to the president which leader they prefer to be prime minister. Of the nine parties, four will choose Netanyahu, four will choose Ganz, and no one knows what Liberman will whisper in Rivlin's ear. This is where President Reuven Rivlin has to transform himself into King Solomon. He has to knock heads together and impose a solution dividing up the electoral baby.

It may hurt some egos and upset part of the Israeli electorate, but it’s better than Israel facing a third election in less than a year.

Barry Shaw is the International Public Diplomacy Director at the Israel Institute for Strategic Studies.

Israelis can reclaim their land at the ballot box.

On September 10, Benjamin Netanyahu pulled off one of his famous political masterstrokes when he made a dramatic announcement one week before a contentious national election in which it looked far from certain that he would hold onto his record-breaking office as Israel’s Prime Minister.

The polls were showing a tight race between his Likud Party and the Blue & White Party with neither showing the electoral ability for form a coalition government.

The master tactician had to find a way to break the Gordian knot by applying his version of Dale Carnegie’s famous book. How to win voters and influence people.

With the aid of maps to highlight his statement, Netanyahu told the Israeli public if you want Israeli sovereignty over the Jordan Valley and the Dead Sea you have to vote for me and give me a mandate big enough to form a coalition government to immediately carry out this commission.

In one fell swoop he looked into the television camera and tested every voter, “It’s up to you!”

The second election in 2019, and possibly not the last in a long chain of elections, became one in which the elector, every Israeli citizen, was given the choice of having a sovereign Israel paced in their hand.

And how did Israelis react?

From the response I have been received, very cynically.

There are those who have told me that they don’t trust him, that he could have made this commitment and taken steps to enact sovereignty during his many years in office, but he didn’t. That is was just an election ploy to get people to vote for him but then he would make excuses to delay his plan to annex important parts of Israel into full sovereignty. That was the level if disenchantment being felt in Israel heading to the polling stations.

A number of people reminded me that Benny Ganz, head of Blue & White, had also pledged to include the Jordan Valley in any peace deal, so what was different with Bibi’s promise, they insisted, rather than asked.

Some on the left said it was a typical Bibi move to win over voters from the far right party, but was it a right wing tactic?

Benjamin Netanyahu was simply echoing a left wing Prime Minister, Yitzchak Rabin, who declared, in his final speech in the Knesset on 5 October 1995, that “The borders of the State of Israel…will be beyond the lines which existed before the Six Day War. We will not return to the 4 June 1967 lines.” Rabin was not called a “right wing hawk.” At this moment in history he was being hailed as Israel’s greatest peacemaker. He went on the make this declaration, “The security border of the State of Israel will be located in the Jordan Valley in the broadest sense of that term.”

In essence, Netanyahu was saying nothing new. It was already out there stated, noted, and agree by everyone in the international community, except the Palestinian leadership.

A lot of people abroad were perplexed when Bibi spoke about the Dead Sea area. They included many who have stayed at the Dead Sea during their visits to Israel. Almost all of them have driven from Jerusalem down to the Dead Sea resorts. They had all assumed that the Dead Sea was an integral part of Israel. They were shocked to discover that it is still considered as “disputed territory,” or as Israel’s opponents would say, “occupied Palestinian land.”

The Israel deniers are ignorant or ignore the history of Qumran where the Jewish Essenes from the Second Temple period lived and wrote the famous Dead Sea Scrolls about the battle between the Sons of Light over the Sons of Darkness, an enigma for today’s battles.

Such a battle was brutally, tragically, heroically, symbolically, played out on the heights of Masada, a once magnificent desert palace and fortress built by the Jewish King Herod, at which the last Jewish resistance to Roman conquest and destruction was played out until its dramatic conclusion.

In the year 73 CE, when all hope was lost, the last surviving Jews, just under a thousands in number, pledged and carried out a communal mass suicide rather than be slaughtered or carried into slavery by the foreign invaders.

The historical shock of this epic event left its impact in the soul of the Jewish people. “Masada Shall Not Fall Again!” has become the battle cry for the Sons of Light.

Thus has been the fate of the Jewish Sons of Light at the hands of the Sons of Darkness for the two millennium of Jewish history since the destruction of the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem and the fall of Masada in Israel’s Dead Sea region.

This is the way that Israeli Jews, and the majority of Jews globally, see the world today. Too many Sons of Darkness desire nothing more than extinguish the Jewish Sons of Light.

It cannot be denied that it is Israel, and only Israel, in a very dark Middle East that shines the light of freedom, democracy, progress, human rights, and Tikun Olam - Heal the World- and none does that better than Israel.

Yet sadly, tragically, as predicted in the Dead Sea Scrolls, we too often have to fight to prevent that light from being extinguished, surrounded as we are by Sons of Darkness.

Hence the importance of the Jordan Valley and the Dead Sea to the people of Israel.

In a few days, Israelis have the opportunity to declare “Masada Will Not Fall Again!” as they head out to vote.

It remains to be seen if Israelis are ready to take up that challenge by taking the fate of our country into our own hands at the ballet box.

Barry Shaw, International Public Diplomacy Director, Israel Institute for Strategic Studies. Author of ‘Israel reclaiming the Narrative.’

Israel. The Dreyfus of our time.

In September, the Venice Film Festival awarded their Grand Jury Prize for best movie to Roman Polanski’s ‘An Officer and a Spy.’
The film is about the trial and wrongful conviction of a Jewish officer in the French military in 1894.
The Dreyfus case symbolized the rise of French anti-Semitism.

The Jewish officer, Alfred Dreyfus, was wrongly accused and sentenced to life imprisonment on distant Devil's Island on charges of being a traitor spying for Germany. 

The Jew, Dreyfus, was innocent. The real traitor was Major Walson-Esterhazy.

But, when Emile Zola wrote the famous "J'Accuse!" denouncing the anti-Semitism of the French military court that made a Jew the scapegoat, the French officer class rallied round each other, put Esterhazy on trial, acquitting him of all charges having deported their Jew.
To add sin upon sin, they brought Dreyfus back for a second trial and again found him guilty.
Convinced of his innocence, Alfred's older brother, Mattieu, spent his time and money organizing a campaign to prove his brother's innocence. 

Polanski’s movie centers on the figure of Colonel Picquart who found a discrepancy on the handwriting on key documents between that of Dreyfus and the hand of Esterhazy. Despite obstructions put in their path by the French military they discovered evidence that implicated other people,including Esterhazy.
It took until 1906 before Dreyfus received a presidential pardon. By that time Theodor Herzl, inspired by the trial that he had attended as a journalist, had embarked on the Zionist cause, convinced that Jews would never be entirely safe until they had their own homeland. 

But still, until today, the Dreyfus stigma hovers over France as we have seen with regular outbreaks of violent and deadly anti-Semitism against French Jews. Many have found refuge in the Jewish State of Israel.
However, the French Defense Secretary, Lawrence Farley, recently announced his intention to posthumously promote Alfred Dreyfus to the rank of general.
Farley said that this belated honor was also made in memory of the French Jews who were deported to Nazi concentration camps by the French police during World War Two.
There are still echoes of the past in France with the French military objecting to the proposal of having a statue of Dreyfus placed in the forecourt of the French General Court. It was placed instead inside the Jewish Museum.
Despite lip service offered by senior French officials, Jew hatred still runs rampant in France and the main threat is solidly contained in the Muslim migrant community.This the French have not addressed with any conviction. Until they do, French Jews will continue to enjoy the protection of Israel.

It should be beholden on the French to have Polanski’s movie screened on their own soil at the Cannes Film Festival.
In a sense, Israel is the Dreyfus of today. The Jewish state is constantly accused of criminal charges that Israel did not commit.
he accusers cover up for the crimes of others, those they support and welcome into their societies. They shower these criminals with money, honors, invitations to join their austere organizations. They do not question their evil intent. Their Esterhazy must be protected lest their finger pointing at the collective Jew be considered as something that dare not speak its name.
And so it is the Middle East Jew, that imposter, that must continue to be condemned while the Palestinian Esterhazy is allowed to literally get away with murder and treachery against the whole notion of justice and peace.
Dreyfus, the exemplary and courageous officer surrounded by a sea of Jew haters sent the Jewish officer to Devil’s Island for crimes they themselves committed.
Israel, the exemplary and courageous state surrounded by a sea of Jew haters determined to send the Jewish state to purgatory for crimes they themselves commit.
Israel. The Dreyfus of our time.
Barry Shaw is the International Public Diplomacy Director at the Israel Institute for Strategic Studies. He is a writer, author and speaker on important issues relating to Israel and the Jewish people.

Israel. The Dreyfus of our time.

In September, the Venice Film Festival awarded their Grand Jury Prize for best movie to Roman Polanski’s ‘An Officer and a Spy.’
The film is about the trial and wrongful conviction of a Jewish officer in the French military in 1894.
The Dreyfus case symbolized the rise of French anti-Semitism.

The Jewish officer, Alfred Dreyfus, was wrongly accused and sentenced to life imprisonment on distant Devil's Island on charges of being a traitor spying for Germany. 

The Jew, Dreyfus, was innocent. The real traitor was Major Walson-Esterhazy.

But, when Emile Zola wrote the famous "J'Accuse!" denouncing the anti-Semitism of the French military court that made a Jew the scapegoat, the French officer class rallied round each other, put Esterhazy on trial, acquitting him of all charges having deported their Jew.
To add sin upon sin, they brought Dreyfus back for a second trial and again found him guilty.
Convinced of his innocence, Alfred's older brother, Mattieu, spent his time and money organizing a campaign to prove his brother's innocence. 

Polanski’s movie centers on the figure of Colonel Picquart who found a discrepancy on the handwriting on key documents between that of Dreyfus and the hand of Esterhazy. Despite obstructions put in their path by the French military they discovered evidence that implicated other people,including Esterhazy.
It took until 1906 before Dreyfus received a presidential pardon. By that time Theodor Herzl, inspired by the trial that he had attended as a journalist, had embarked on the Zionist cause, convinced that Jews would never be entirely safe until they had their own homeland. 

But still, until today, the Dreyfus stigma hovers over France as we have seen with regular outbreaks of violent and deadly anti-Semitism against French Jews. Many have found refuge in the Jewish State of Israel.
However, the French Defense Secretary, Lawrence Farley, recently announced his intention to posthumously promote Alfred Dreyfus to the rank of general.
Farley said that this belated honor was also made in memory of the French Jews who were deported to Nazi concentration camps by the French police during World War Two.
There are still echoes of the past in France with the French military objecting to the proposal of having a statue of Dreyfus placed in the forecourt of the French General Court. It was placed instead inside the Jewish Museum.
Despite lip service offered by senior French officials, Jew hatred still runs rampant in France and the main threat is solidly contained in the Muslim migrant community.This the French have not addressed with any conviction. Until they do, French Jews will continue to enjoy the protection of Israel.

It should be beholden on the French to have Polanski’s movie screened on their own soil at the Cannes Film Festival.
In a sense, Israel is the Dreyfus of today. The Jewish state is constantly accused of criminal charges that Israel did not commit.
The accusers cover up for the crimes of others, those they support and welcome into their societies. They shower these criminals with money, honors, invitations to join their austere organizations. They do not question their evil intent. Their Esterhazy must be protected lest their finger pointing at the collective Jew be considered as something that dare not speak its name.
And so it is the Middle East Jew, that imposter, that must continue to be condemned while the Palestinian Esterhazy is allowed to literally get away with murder and treachery against the whole notion of justice and peace.
Dreyfus, the exemplary and courageous officer surrounded by a sea of Jew haters sent the Jewish officer to Devil’s Island for crimes they themselves committed.
Israel, the exemplary and courageous state surrounded by a sea of Jew haters determined to send the Jewish state to purgatory for crimes they themselves commit.
Israel. The Dreyfus of our time.
Barry Shaw is the International Public Diplomacy Director at the Israel Institute for Strategic Studies. He is a writer, author and speaker on important issues relating to Israel and the Jewish people.

Tlaib and Omar are preying on your ignorance.

Tlaib and Omar are preying on your ignorance. In other words, they are lying.

Rashida Tlaib screams about her Palestinian family being victims of Israeli oppression. But is that true?

The World Bank, in 2014, described her village as "one of the richest in the region."

Now comes the revelation that Achiam Tlaib drives a new BMW and lives in a three-storey building. How many of you enjoy this lifestyle?

Another relative, Raja Tlaib, poses on his FB page next to his new Mercedes (do you have a Merc?), wearing an expensive suit. He also has pictures working out at the gym.

Anas Tlaib also has a nice Mercedes. Mawaid Tlaib vacations in Italian coastal resorts.

Samach Tlaib drives a BMW, and Naif has a fancy Corvette convertible (rarely seen in Israel).

Good luck to them. We do not resent their prosperity.

What we do resent are the lies and disinformation of Rashida Tlaib and others designed to deliberately harm Israel as part of a campaign to demonize and delegitimize Israel and create a Palestinian state "from the river to the sea" in place of the Jewish State.

As I write in my book, 'Fighting Hamas, BDS and Anti-Semitism,' it is, at its core, an intense anti-Semitism to remove the Jewish presence from the Middle East.

It is illogical, impossible to achieve, but it drives the Red-Green alliance, made up of the radical Left and political Islamists, aided and abetted by Western useful idiots.

Barry Shaw,

International Public Diplomacy Director,

Israel Institute for Strategic Studies.

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=2383858821659697&set=pcb.2383860828326163&type=3&theater

https://www.amazon.com/Fighting-Hamas-BDS-Anti-Semitism-violence/dp/1508595534/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=fighting+hamas+bds+and+anti-semitism&qid=1566715575&s=gateway&sr=8-1

https://worldisraelnews.com/palestinian-village-where-tlaibs-grandmother-lives-is-rolling-in-dough/?utm_source=MadMimi&utm_medium=email&utm_content=US+Confirms+Israel+Bombed+Iraq%2C+First+in+4+Decades%3B+New+Video+Emerges+of+US+High-Schoolers++Performing+Hitler+Greeting%3B+Israeli+Teen+Killed+by+Explosive+Device&utm_campaign=20190823_m153407869_US+Confirms+Israel+Bombed+Iraq%2C+First+in+4+Decades%3B+New+Video+Emerges+of+US+High-Schoolers++Performing+Hitler+Greeting%3B+Israeli+Teen+Killed+by+Explosive+Device&utm_term=_0D_0A_09_09_09_09_09_09_09_09_09_09Read+Now_0D_0A_09_09_09_09_09_09_09_09_09&fbclid=IwAR2rM8otuIL3HOLXh-PcmDHKvpZfZcaZbFeasXWSdNxjoUhpKaLVhNEUcsk

My Palestine itinerary for Tlaib and Omar.

Ilhan Omar tweeted, “Yesterday at Social Justice Day a student asked me, ‘How do I stay hopeful that change is going to come?’ This is tough to unpack,” she responded before going on to give a blab la meaningless ramble.

More perceptively, @rdunnflorida tweeted, “Only weak people blame others. Strength is taking responsibility for everything that you do.”

This set me thinking. How about a different Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib itinerary for their Tour of Palestine? One based on them educating Palestinians to take responsibility for themselves based on their social justice and civil rights principles.

So welcome to my Omar-Tlaib Palestinian Social Justice Tour. 

It will not be the hostile agenda devised by Hanan Ashrawi and her anti-Israel Miftah group that will never lead to normalization and peace. Instead, it is one that appeals to anyone genuinely concerned about social justice, civil and human rights for Palestinian Arabs.  Hopefully it will solve all the unsolvable problems and lead to a better future for those that Omar and Tlaib claim to care for.

This tour demands a high level of truth and honesty. A difficult but necessary commodity for these two new Congresswomen.

It begins when their plane lands at Ben-Gurion Airport. This is their first test of honesty. The two Democratic delegates have to admit they have arrived in Israel. Don’t let them off the plane until they do. Honesty has to start with them. Without that, they have no chance of making the world a better place.

In fairness to them, my itinerary does not force them to meet Israel’s Prime Minister or President. Nor does it impose on them a visit to the Knesset, or to attend a wreath-laying ceremony in memory of Holocaust victims at Yad Vashem. They will have to struggle with their Jew-hatred on another occasion. Maybe it will come as they strive to establish lasting peace which will sprout out of my itinerary.

They will head straight to Ramallah and, after a good night’s sleep in one of the five star hotels there, their schedule will begin.

After breakfast they will be driven to a meeting with President Mahmoud Abbas. After handshakes, hugs and kisses, they will be ushered in to a special assembly of the Palestinian National Council. After initial formalities. The ladies will stress the importance of civil rights and request to know how many Hamas members are represented in the assembly, based on the fact that in the last 4-year national legislative elections, which took place 13 years ago in 2006, Hamas won a majority, 74 of the 132 seats.

The ladies will note than no Hamas representative has ever attended a council meeting since the Hamas-Fatah split in 2007 and the resultant Palestinian Civil War in which 600 Palestinians were killed and dozens more murdered or executed in the following years.

If Omar and Tlaib are insistent on pursuing a policy of civil justice, they will place a motion for both sides of the Palestinian political divide to come together and set a deadline to meet again in one years’ time. Good luck with that.

After lunch with the President, they will be driven to BirZeit University to meet the student body. Here democracy reigns with Hamas and Fatah each gaining 23 seats in April 2019 student elections. They will be disappointed to learn that a progressive movement in Palestinian student society does not exist. The Progressive Student Union received zero seats, while the student wing of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine won 5 seats. Which shows the way that future political winds are blowing around Ramallah.

On the second day, Omar and Tlaib will be taken to a UNRWA refugee camp to learn that  the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians does not exist. UNRWA officials will be pleased to show the two congresswomen the success of decades of dedicated service to Palestinian refugees that has bloated the numbers from a few hundred thousand to the amazing figure of over five million registered Palestinian refugees. Enough to keep thousands of officials in gainful employment for decades to come.

Apart from the propaganda benefits, little has been done to lift Palestinian Arabs out of poverty. During their visit they will examine schoolbooks to see that Israel does not exist.

From there, they will be taken to one of the summer camps where kids and youths are taught the importance of killing Jews, and then taken out into the open space to learn how to shoot guns and how to stab Jews to death.

To relieve the tension, they will be given an afternoon guided tour of Rawabi, the new Palestinian new city with its elegant shops and luxury homes built for families close to the corrupt plutocracy of the Palestinian leadership.

Hailed as “the flagship Palestinian enterprise” and built by Palestinian billionaire, Bashar al-Masri, Rawabi is only 24 kilometers (12 miles) from the Balata refugee camp they had just visited.

The juxtaposition of such wealth with the dire poverty of Balata will give them pause. Rawabi cost 1.5 billion dollars to build. Balata, which houses 27,000 Palestinians, was described by Ha’Aretz, Israel’s left wing newspaper, as “a rat-infested Mumbai-like slum.”

To compound the corruption and criminality of Palestinian wealth and poverty, Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib will be invited to dine with President Mahmoud Abbas.  That was supposed to have been at his $8 million, 50,000 square feet, mansion complete with helipad, until uproar and embarrassment at the gross waste of foreign money turned it into a “national library.”  Instead, Abbas will host them at his more modest several million-dollar address.

In 2018, Mahmoud Abbas ordered a $50 million private jet from Boeing. It will be a specially-converted 737, though where he is going to park it is another matter. The only airport under Palestinian control is in Gaza occupied by Hamas, his deadly political enemy, and that runway was bombed by Israel to prevent weapons being flown in and used against the Jewish State.

This economic waste would make interesting conversation for the Palestinian-supporting American social justice socialists and the PA leader over dinner.

Day three will be a compulsory visit to Jericho for the justice warriors. Their visit will include a tour of the detention camp mentioned in a 2019 Human Rights Watch report.

According to HRW, “Both the Fatah-led Palestinian Authority and Hamas authorities in Gaza are arbitrarily arresting peaceful critics and opponents. From January 2018 through March 2019, the Palestinian Authority admitted detaining more than 1,600 people based on their peaceful expression, while Hamas authorities arrested more than 1,000 during the March 2019 protests against their rule.

‘The Palestinian Authority and Hamas remain bitterly divided, but unified in a common approach to crushing dissent,’ said Eric Goldstein, deputy Middle East and North Africa director at Human Rights Watch. ‘Leaders who have been in power for more than a decade without elections should, at the very least, listen to criticism, not punish it.’”

In the HRW report, the Palestinian Authority admitted detaining 65,415 Palestinian in the West Bank in 2018 and the first three months of 2019. I bet you didn’t read that in your mainstream media.

Is must be an issue for the concerned Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar to investigate and report on to Congress?

It gets worse.

Tlaib and Omar insist they are champions for Palestinian human rights. Let them examine this.

Under the Palestinian Authority and Hamas, people are being detailed, imprisoned and tortured because of their political affiliations.

The Independent Commission for Human Rights has received 455 complaints from Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza of “torture and mistreatment” in 2018 and the first quarter of 2019. 242 by Palestinian security forces in the West Bank and 213 by Hamas in Gaza.

Human Rights Watch recommended that, “other countries should suspend assistance to Palestinian security agencies that routinely torture dissidents including, for the Palestinian Authority, the Intelligence Services, Preventive Security, and Joint Security committee, and, for Hamas, Internal Security, as long as systematic torture and other serious abuses continue.”

Issam Akel, a Palestinian-American, was sentenced on December 31, 2018, by a Palestinian court to life imprisonment with hard labor for the crime of selling his Jerusalem property to a Jewish buyer.

He was part of a roundup of 44 Arabs arrested by the Palestinian Preventive Security forces for selling property to Jews.

This is an opportunity for Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib to act against this human rights and civil rights abuse of Palestinians by Palestinian authorities.

It took the protests of the Israeli and American governments, including the personal intervention of David Friedman, the US Ambassador to Israel, to force the Palestinian Authority to release Akel into the hands of US authorities in late January.

Akel is one case. He was lucky. There are at least another 43 other Palestinians who are suffering incarceration for the anti-Semitic and racist policies of the Palestinian Authority that Omar and Tlaib must examine.

Day four will take them to a place that was on their original program. They will visit Khan al-Ahmar, the makeshift Bedouin village, but this time they will visit it with Regavim, the Israeli NGO that will not give them propaganda. Regavim will give them the facts and show them the maps and the aerial photos to back up their truth.

Khan al-Ahmar is a real example of “illegal occupation.” This one is being carried out by the Palestinian Authority with the connivance of several European nations and the EU in clear breach of the signed Oslo Accords. The land is in Area C which, according to all parties to the agreement, remains in Israeli administrative and security control until a future permanent peace agreement.

The Palestinian Authority have deliberately transferred in from other areas tribes of Bedouin families, dumped them down in a barren spot and given them free makeshift housing. The Europeans have brought in prefab structures, provided solar panels, and constructed a school. All in blatant illegal breach of international agreements.

Regavim will then take Omar and Tlaib to visit the empty lot in the Mishor Adumim industrial area which once housed SodaStream, the soft drink company that employed over 600 Palestinian workers enjoying Israeli wages and social benefits. They worked alongside and often above Jewish workers as supervisors. That was before the BDS Movement and the Palestinian Authority began to exert pressure and threats against this normalization designed to lead to cooperation and a better future for both Israelis and Palestinians. SodaStream moved out of the area and opened a new factory in the Negev, north of the Israeli city of Beer Sheba, where Palestinian workers have been replaced by local Bedouin who now enjoy the Israeli good life.

Omar and Tlaib should visit the 600+ unemployed Palestinians, thrown on the scrapheap thanks to BDS and anti-normalization Palestinian officials, many living the luxury life in Rawabi.

Miftah was determined to take them to Bethlehem. They should go there to visit the miracle checkpoint that “imprisons” the Muslim Palestinians of Bethlehem, but not the Christians.

When Israel governed the holy Christian town of Bethlehem, the population was 80% middle class Christians. Tourism was good and Bethlehem folk lived free and productive lives. Then came the peace agreement and Arafat’s men moved in. What followed were threats and violence against the Christian community and terrorism from Bethlehem against Israeli civilians in Jerusalem, Hebron, and other places.

A security barrier was built in the north of the town and a check point was needed to stop armed terrorists infiltrating into Israel. Meanwhile, in Bethlehem, Christians were harassed and threatened by their new Muslim neighbors and fled.

Today, the Christian population of Bethlehem is below 20% and falling. Omar and Tlaib would learn a lot by listening to those who barely escaped with their lives.

Bethlehem is a once-Christian town with an overwhelmingly Muslim majority. Those who have been “ethnically cleansed” have been the Christians by the Palestinian Muslims. Fact!

In other words, the “oppressive” Bethlehem checkpoint is a place that lets Christians out and lets Muslims in.  It’s a new form of replacement theology.

Simply put, since Israel moved out and the Palestinians moved in, Bethlehem has gone from being a thriving Christian town to a poverty-ridden Muslim town. This is due to corrupt and lawless Palestinian occupation, not a non-existent Israeli occupation.

Next stop Hebron

Omar tweeted, before she had visited the place, that Hebron was, “Once a bustling economic hub, settlement expansion has resulted in a two-tier city, with Palestinian living under military occupation forced to walk on the other side of the street from Israelis.”

Who is giving her this propaganda crap? How dare she write such nonsense, as if she is an expert and before she has even visited the place?

Hebron is the place where the Jewish Abraham bought a plot of land and where the Jewish Patriarch and Matriarchs are buried. A truly significant Jewish town.

 Jewish did I say? Jewish “settlement expansion” in Hebron?

Only 3% of Hebron is Jewish today. That may be because Hebron is the place where Arabs massacred the Jews in 1929, and continue trying to kill them.

Settlement expansion? Today, there are 220,00 Palestinian Arabs living in Hebron and barely 700 Jews. Who is expanding? Palestinians or Jews? You decide.

The few Jews are protected by IDF soldiers because Hebron Arabs, affiliated to Hamas, want to kill them. Jews dare not set foot in 97% of Hebron. You wouldn’t know that from the anti-Israel propaganda.

But how about Omar’s “once a bustling economic hub”?  Today, Hebron accounts to 30% of the West Banks GDP.

Omar tweeted on August 16, “77% of shops have closed bc of military occupation.”  In my tour Ilhan Omar will visit the thriving shopping malls and markets of Hebron. In fact, Hebron has more shops than any other Palestinian town. So much for 77% shops closed.

I told you I would bring you facts and truth in my Omar-Tlaib tour of Palestine.

Throughout their Palestinian tour to Ramallah, Jericho, BirZeit, Rawabi, Hebron, Bethlehem, they will not meet a single Jew. Jews are banned there. This is genuine racist apartheid. It is also the official policy of the Palestinian Authority.

But, when my tour demand that they walk through the Jaffa Gate to the most holy site for all three of the world’s great religions, they will be blown away, peacefully, as are all tourists who visit Jerusalem, at the intermingling of Jews, Muslims, Christians and others, walking freely among each other in the bustling alleyways of the Old City.

When they approach the Western Wall of the Temple Mount they will see hundreds of Jews praying with Muslims passing by undisturbed. But when they reach the plaza of the Al-Aqsa mosque they will witness Muslim women abusing any Jew that may have ventured there due to a personal sense of holiness in being on the spot of the ancient biblical Jewish Temple. The harmony they may have enjoyed in arriving at this location is ended by Muslim hostility to Judaism.

And this is the core of the whole problem.

Solve that, and you solve everything. 

Barry Shaw is the International Public Diplomacy Director at the Israel Institute for Strategic Studies. He is the author of ‘Fighting Hamas, BDS, and Anti-Semitism.’